Random Access

Sunday – 29 March 2009
Today has been a quiet and slow day… and that’s good.

<< Rewind <<
Yesterday morning, SaraRules and I got up, picked up her mother and headed to South Towne Expo Center for a bridal show. We stood in a short line to get in and, then, it was “Game On.” The show was smaller than I had expected – far smaller, in fact. There were, maybe… 40 exhibitors in all. I think that we were in and out of the show inside of 30 minutes.  However, in that time, I put a deposit on my tuxedo rentals with Men’s Warehouse; they were running a special that I couldn’t pass up: $30 off each rental. Win.

There was a car show at the other end of the Expo Center, so we checked out the cars they had outside the main hall. That was when I also noted the differences in admission to the events:

• Bridal Show:
  • Brides: Free
  • Other guests: $5.00
• Auto Show: $14.50

I began to wonder which show would actually make the most money. I’d like to see the final numbers.

After dropping off SaraRules’ mom, we headed to Oh Sushi for lunch. Tasty, tasty sushi… Next: Dr. Volt’s.  From there, we headed to Wheeler Farm for an afternoon walk. The weather was perfect for it – sunny, a light breeze and high clouds. Next, we headed to Best Buy to pick up a copy of Quantum of Solace. Then, back home for a bit…

…and then off to OnlyAly and ‘s for poker. It was a good crowd and I played in some good games. Despite some decent hands, I got outplayed in both of the tourneys. At least it was fun and a good way to spend the evening.

> Play >
As I mentioned, today has been quiet and relaxing.  I got a good night’s sleep last night, following Friday night’s rather poor-quality sleep. We watched an episode of Whose Wedding Is It Anyway?, featuring Baltimore Ravens’ TE Daniel Wilcox. We also caught an episode Top Gear that featured a Ford Fiesta storming a beach along with the Royal Marines AND being chased – through a mall (video) – by a Chevrolet Corvette . (I swear, they get away with more cool stuff on that show…)

Next up: Errand-running.
(Misson: Accomplished)

This evening, I’m not sure what’s on tap. I believe that we’re doing Date Night tonight, as we aren’t having dinner with SaraRules’ family until tomorrow night.

Stray Toasters

• There are not many satisfying WordPress themes for “wedding” or “marriage.”
• SaraRules picked up the new Prince 3-CD set today.  So far, it’s pretty good.
• Did Builder’s Clout Trap Couple in Dream Home?
• Steampunk Chronulator
• Courtesy of : Welcome to the Bizarro World
• Obama: Auto Industry Needs To Do More To Get Help
• Shock #1: Comic book author Greg Rucka has a LiveJournal account.
  Shock #2: He spilled the beans about a new Question feature that he and Cully Hamner are working on in said LJ.
• The Voice of CN’s Batman Talks Season 2



• Is the Bat out of the bag?
  This “Battle for the Cowl” article contains spoilers. You have been warned.
• Darth Vader + hula girl = ??? (video)
• Amazing art made with old cassette tapes

Namaste.

Friday – 27 March 2009
Another 9/80 “on” Friday kicked off…

…with me coming into the office to find out that the alarm had been tripped. *grblsnrkx* Turns out that the electricians were the first ones in the office and they don’t have our alarm code. I fired off a quick email to TPTB and let them know what happened.

Next, I discovered that one of the logon scripts on my main PC decided to go on holiday. I had to bug Jim, one of our Windows admins, to help me walk through some steps to try and recover. It looks like Windows has horked itself. Fortunately, I have another Win box that I can just port things over to. It’s just a matter of taking the time to do so. Good thing it’s the slow Friday around here.

Stray Toasters

• I gave Paul (my boss, two steps up the ladder) a copy of Coupling (BBC version, Season 1). He returned it this morning… and asked where Seasons 2 and 3 were.
• iPhone 3G Finally Available in US Contract-Free
• International Torch Relays Banned
• 
• 26 Great TV Shows That Got a Quick Hook and The Ten Best Television Finales
• Cartoons to become far scarcer on Cartoon Network
• Apple has the trailer for Where the Wild Things Are. Check it out.
• 10 ways to get a really good sleep
• By way of :

  

• New Gorillaz doc will premiere online
• Marvel launches writer’s program
• Wil Wheaton teaches his son to slay dragons
• From the “Don’t call it a comeback, I been here for years…” file: Old-school Keyboard Makes a Comeback of Sorts

Namaste.

I had to skip the lunchtime workout today; I had a lunch meeting to attend. We went to Pawit’s Royal Thai. (, Pawit said to tell you “Hello.”) Pad Pra Grow and iced coffee. Very tasty. And the meeting was productive, too.

Stray Toasters

• I caught Bret online a little while ago. I haven’t had a chance to catch up with him in a while, so it was nice to have a few minutes’ long chat with him.
• Girl, 14, Faces Porn Charges for Nude Photos
• Damn you, Mafia Wars!  *shakes fist*
• Photographer Captures L.A.’s Vintage Homes
• It’s amazing that I’ve been looking for new ‘Clix to make… and it didn’t occur to me – until this afternoon – to make a John Stewart GL one.
• Speaking of GLs, Stephanie did a mock-up of my GL Pony as a mini-pony. She said that it looks good. I can’t wait to see the finished product.
• Cassandra Wilson: Standards Transformed
• Wing Commander (the game, not the movie)
• was screening resumes and came across one that made his brain go all ‘splodey. I had to see what caused it, so I went around to his desk to check it out. *OW* The entire thing was written in an Olde English font…¹
• 10 OSes We Left Behind

Namaste.

¹ – It turned out that the resume was fine; it was ‘s word processor that read it oddly.

Thursday – 26 March 2009
There are light flurries again this morning. *shrug* I think that it’s supposed to creep back into (or at least near) the 60s this weekend.

Last night, after stopping to say “Hi” to , SaraRules and I went walking. (Hey, it’s exercise…)  As it was cold and wet outside, we opted to go walking at South Towne Center. I hadn’t been there in… longer than I can remember. Mall-walking has the added benefit of allowing you to pick and pan the latest fashions in the window displays. We did. There were a number of dresses in one store’s windows that we found… “aesthetically unpleasing.” But, we were also pretty sure that somewhere a high school-aged young lady would think that they were the greatest things ever. Also while walking through the mall, I found $20 USD. Just lying there on the ground. WIN! We also discovered that there are TWO Bank of America ATMs in the mall. O,o ?!? (For those of you who don’t understand why this is noteworthy: BoA doesn’t have branches in this state… AND they happen to be my bank. Thus, finding a veritable last bastion of banking goodness makes me quite happy.) Seeing the ATMs also raised a question: Who services these machines? We guess that someone from either Idaho, Nevada or Wyoming must have to cover them on their routes.

After getting back home, we watched NCIS, The Late Show and The Late Late Show. Just before heading off to bed, I decided to give “The Fickle Finger of Fate” method to channel surfing and see what was on. One of the things I found was Blacula. I haven’t seen that in ages. It made me laugh, but I still turned off the TV and called it a night.

Stray Toasters

• How to Change the World
• Bankrupting the Arts: State budget cuts could change Baltimore’s cultural landscape forever
• Thanks to for pointing this out: LEGO Batman is being ported to the Mac
• Also from : Project Runway finalist denies cat used as weapon
• From baby to blog to memoir for Heather Armstrong – I couldn’t remember why the name “Heather Armstrong” sounded familiar until reading this article. She’s a blogger from SLC, whose site I’ve read from time to time.
• Mythbusters Accidentally Bust Windows in Nearby Town
• Internet Explorer 8 “critical” flaw in final version – Is this a surprise? Really…?
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” file: British local governments deploy anti-teenager pink lights designed to make kids ashamed of their appearance
• 
• id Releases Open Source Wolfenstein 3D for iPhone
• The whole wide world
  An endless universe
  Yet we keep looking through
  The eyeglass in reverse
  Don’t feed the people
  But we feed the machines
  Can’t really feel
  What international meansIn different circles
  We keep holding our ground
  Indifferent circles
  We keep spinning round and round
• Remixes of the paranoid London police “anti-terror”/suspect your neighbours posters
• TV, films go boldly down scientific path
• Does this mean that Banjo Hero is around the corner?
• Anatomical models for artist’s reference – Now available in Dr. Manhattan model, too!

…right on to the friction of the day.

Namaste.

Monday – 23 March 2009
After a weekend in the upper 60s – and I think I even saw the thermometer hit 71°F on Saturday – it’s snowing. Or, at least it was snowing this morning. Right now, it would be better to say “flurries,” but you get the idea.

Yesterday, I got up and met and Bird at the Garden of Sweden. Yes, that was two trips in two days – they had a sale with “one day only” items. Yesterday’s item was an 11-quart stockpot. I didn’t think that it would be as popular an item as it was. I stood in line to get mine and then wandered back through the store to find Nyx and Bird. By the time we got back to the kitchenware section, ten to fifteen minutes later, all of the pots had sold out. Unglaublich! I left Nyx and Bird to finish their shopping and headed to the checkout, where I got in line between two ladies – either sisters or long-time friends – who had also come in search of the stockpot. Listening to them banter back and forth was amusing. As I was leaving, one of them stopped me:

Lady: I saw that you got one of those pots and just have to know what you’re going to use it for. I’m using mine to make gumbo.
Me: I’m mainly going to use it for cooking Cornish hens.
Lady: How’re you going to do that?
Me: I parboil them before baking them.
Lady: I see. Well, you should try putting a little bit of orange marmalade on them before you put them in the oven.
Me: I’ll have to try that. Thanks!

It was cute and unexpected.

I made another stop and then popped in to say “Hi,” to and to drop off a couple of things.  I couldn’t stay long because Chris was heading over… and had, in fact, already been to my place.

I got home, met Chris and we headed to Five Guys to pick up some lunch. Then, it was back to my place for a game of HeroClix. We chose a “Monsters vs. Monsters” theme. 600 points limit. I went with:

• Cassandra Nova
• Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy
• Giant Man (zombie)
• Johnny Sorrow and
• Joker (Arkham Asylum)

Chris brought:

• Giant-Man (zombie)
• Iron Man (zombie)
• Maestro
• Spider-Man (zombie) and
• Wolverine (zombie)

Then it was game on. After a couple of opening feints, we started in on the battle royale. We wound up wearing each other’s teams down, but Chris finally got me to a point where my last two figures (Cassandra Nova and Giant Man) couldn’t do anything to damage his remaining figures (Iron Man and Maestro), so I conceded the game. A little while later, while we were hanging out, SaraRules got home; she’d been in AZ visiting her grandparents. After Chris left, she recounted her vacation and I told her about my week. It’s good to have her back home.

Stray Toasters

• Derek, my acolyte from AF, and a friend have just written an iPhone/iPod Touch app: Microkart. If you’re a iPhone/iPod Touch user, check it out and leave ’em some feedback.
• Best Buy Staff Paid Bonuses to Deny Legit Guaranteed Price Matches, by way of Nyx
• From BBC News: Quest to legalize polygamy in Utah
• Wine casks turned into hotel rooms
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” file: Company puts bounty on porta-potty arsonist
• 
• Flammable Water
• Why are Kit Kat bars so good?!
• The Science Behind Tesla Coil Music
• NFL Shop.com is offering 30% off on apparel again.

  

• Gamehouse – download a new free game, every day.

And that’s that.

Namaste.

Monday – 16 March 2009
Yesterday afternoon, SaraRules and I decided to get in a little shopping. We didn’t find much that made us go “wow.” We stopped by a craft store so that SaraRules could pick up some material for a quilt. While there, I decided to look for some glitter – I had an idea for my Sodam Yat ‘Clix mod.

After that, we headed up to her parents’ place for dinner. During dinner and dessert, we watched Miami Vice. It wasn’t a great movie, but it was entertaining. (There’s another part of my youth that just went *poof*.) No one in the room had seen the TV series other than me, so I had to do a little ‘splaining after the movie was over.

We headed home. As it was still fairly early, we looked for something to watch On Demand. SaraRules picked Ghosts of Mars, which she’d seen before. It was, as she warned me, another “not great, but entertaining” movie.

Human of the Day
W. Neil Berrett earns the honor today for coming up with what has to be the hands-down best resignation letter that I have ever seen.

Stray Toasters

• I finished my Sodam Yat HeroClix figure.

  
  (click image for more pictures)

  I also took care of his dial and his character card. For both of them, I used the stats and quotes devised by flashshello, a member of the HCRealms community:

  

• It’s March Madness time, once again.  Got your brackets ready…?
• Superman/Batman confirmed as next DC animated movie… after this summer’s Green Lantern: First Flight movie.
• Cleopatra’s mother ‘was African’
  Really?  I never really thought that there was much question about this, the movie with Elizabeth Taylor aside.
• 10 Republicans vote against Pi… including a senator from Utah.
• AIG Ripoff Gets More Maddening
• “No, ma’am. I’m just The Middleman.”
• STS-119 finally launches into space

Back to the grindstone.

Namaste.

Sunday – 15 March 2009
“Beware the Ides of March.”

Yesterday was an all-around good day. Race to Witch Mountain turned out to be pretty fun. It was a little predictable in spots, but still fun. There were about twenty minutes of previews before the movie – we guess they figured that if they had a captive audience kids in the seats, they might as well throw a bunch of “Hey! Go see these!” trailers at ’em. Among the more interesting ones were:

• Battle for Terra (Think Titan A.E., but this time with Earth on the offensive)
• Monsters vs. Aliens (This just looks like silly fun)
• Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and
• Up

Disney, through their new Disneynature division, has an upcoming nature documentary called Earth. It apparently follows three families: Elephant, polar bear and whale – over the course of a year, but it also shows their environments and how they interact with the world around them. It looked similar to the Planet Earth series that The BBC and Discovery Channel did last year.

After the movie, SaraRules and I did a little bit of shopping. Then, back home to change and it was off for a night at the opera. (Not to be confused with A Night at the Opera or A Night at the Opera.) We started with dinner at Macaroni Grill; she had the Pollo Limon Rustica, I had the Chicken Marsala. From there, we strolled up to Capitol Theatre for the performance of Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro. It was a good production – the casting, the music and the set and costume design. I enjoyed it.

Today, I’m joining Mrs. in a fast until dinner, on behalf of .  Actually, it’s been going since midnight. Aside from that, I think it’s going to be a rather lazy day until we head over to SaraRules’ parents’ place this evening.

Stray Toasters

• Former Ravens DE Douglast Follows Ryan to New York
• Silhouette Masterpiece Theatre
• Designer armor arrives in India
• SXSW: G-strings, Frosting Make Perfect Pair at Burlesque Cupcake Cookoff
• The Gentleman’s Handbook
• , the next two items are for you:
  • Metroid: New Samus Cosplay International Champion Crowned
  • Pixelninja cosplay photos (scroll down)
• British Boy Goes on Electric Shock Free-For-All with Bulgarian Stun Gun
• From Gizmodo: iPhone App: Have2P Will Save Your Underpants

Namaste.

Friday – 13 March 2009
Another 9/80 Friday begins. This morning, I had Jonathan Coulton’s Skullcrusher Mountain playing in my head as I got ready for work. (I’m currently listening to 2112, so it’s been a win-win kind of morning, musically.)

I arrived at the office and discovered that I was the first person here. It wasn’t the lack of  lighting that gave it away – lights can be on in one area, but not another. No, I was informed of this by the way the alarm beeped at me when I opened the door. It was at that moment that I remembered something that had been nagging me for a couple of weeks:

I didn’t remember the disarm code.

I entered what I thought was the code. Strike one.
I tried another code. Strike two.

*grblsnrkx*

One more chance to get it right before security and/or the police showed up. I am going to assume that the two synapses that rubbed together to form “a clue” were just on a coffee break, because I got the right code on the third try. I just hope that the rest of the day is relatively less eventful that that.

Stray Toasters

• I worked on my Sodam Yat ‘Clix again last night. I finished the top of his dial and mounted (most of) the figure on the dial. I still need to figure out what to do for his head. And then, there’s also the matter of doing a character card for him…
• NEA Releases Strict Rules for Arts Stimulus Grants
• Medals for videogame veterans
• 
• Bored? Try Doodling to Keep the Brain on Task
• A dime for a dozen
  If that’s what you’re after
  A moment of silence
  Or a lifetime of laughter
• MacBook modded with second monitor inside logo
• 
• Modern day Noah’s Ark replica
• Last week, I mentioned that Craig Ferguson did a great, though brief and comical, mini-history of South Africa on The Late Late Show. It seems as though CBS has finally posted the video of it:

Time to see what (other) kinds of trouble I can get into…

Namaste.

Wes informed me yesterday that he wouldn’t be available to go to the gym today. That’s fine, things like that happen. About twenty minutes later, Eric sent an email saying that he’d be in the SLC office today and wanted to go workout. Win-win. And that’s exactly what we did:

• Bench Press: 3 sets/10 reps, 205 lbs
• Fly: 3 sets/10 reps, 100 lbs
• Lower Back Extensions: 3 sets/15 reps – 1 set @ 140 lbs, 2 sets @ 160 lbs
• Curl/Shoulder Press (dumbbell): 3 sets/10 reps – 1 set @ 30 lbs, 2 sets @ 25 lbs
• Bench Dips: 3 sets/15 reps
• Incline Push-ups: 3 sets/15 reps
• Decline Sit-ups: 2 sets/15 reps

Post-workout weight: 186.8 lbs.

Stray Toasters

• Jake Theis, former Brand Manager for WizKids, has started a new blog: Second Rodeo
• pointed out this portions calculator
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” file: Pet store expects fish shipment, but gets corpse
• IT versus users
• pointed out: Back to the Future (alternate ending)
• Resident Evil fans will understand:



• …speaking of which: Resident Evil 5 comes up with new survival strategies

And that’s it for now.

Thursday – 12 March 2009
Another NBN Thursday begins… and today’s song-stuck-in-my-head was REO Speedwagon’s Roll With The Changes. That’s not so horrible a song to have on loop in your head.

Last night, SaraRules and I modified the cardio workout: We went walking. More specifically, we went mall-walking – we started at one end of Fashion Place and did a complete circuit of the mall. This included a tour of the new Nordstrom’s. Shockpuppet made some comments about how entering that store was like not being in Utah anymore; she was right – the new store is quite impressive.

Back at home, we watched Double Indemnity. We’d both heard about the movie, but neither of us had seen it. It was good and, despite being a little dated (style and some dialogue), held up rather well for being over 60 years old. There was an interesting commentary before the movie started about how Billy Wilder, the film’s director, chose the lead actors for the film and some of the difficulties he encountered in bringing the movie to the screen.

Stray Toasters

• I spent a little time working on my Sodam Yat figure last night. I matched a torso to the lower body. I still need to find a right arm that “works” and figure out what to do for a head.
• Yesterday afternoon, and I tossed around a few ideas for adding a new “random element” to ‘Clix games: Civilians.
• Finding the black in noir
• How the Crash will Reshape America
• I usually use the “Monkeys!” tag to denote when someone – either in the office or somewhere that I’ve been – does something completely asinine. However, this story merits the tag because, well, it’s about a monkey (actually, in this case, a chimpanzee) and is chock full of amusement awesomeness: Chimp Found Plotting Against Zoo Guests
• Cop’s Risky Gambit Nails Alleged Craigslist Child-Sex Predator
• Pattie Maes demos the “Sixth Sense”

• Man survives Niagara Falls plunge
• Disney’s new racing game at core of big bet
• Iraqi jailed for Bush shoe attack
• HOW TO: Rob the world’s most secure diamond vault
• Playing Fair: A look at competition in gaming

Namaste.

Wednesday – 11 March 2009
Last night, after a quick dinner, SaraRules headed off to a quilting class and I headed up to visit . She’s doing a bit better, which was good to see and hear.

From there, I headed over to Chris and Mary’s to play ‘Clix. As we were expecting to play with a couple other people, we hadn’t set up any teams or themes. No one else showed up, so Chris and I put together teams around the theme of “Villains.” We played for a little over an hour, at which point I needed to leave, and Chris called the game a draw… even though he was a bit ahead on points. But, I gladly took the tie.

For some reason, I woke up many times during the night. I woke up a little after 2:00 AM and would have sworn that I had nearly overslept. Nope. *sigh* When the alarm finally went off – four-and-a-half hours later – I got up… with Sammy Davis, Jr’s The Candy Man running through my head. O,o.

Stray Toasters

• Code Monkey get up, get coffee
  Code Monkey go to job…
• Sean, one of my henchmen, just told me a story about an encounter he had with one of the AF monkeys yesterday. He now wants to put up a list of “Stupid IT Requests of the Week” for each time someone puts in a dumb request. I endorse this idea.
• Thanks to for pointing out Stuff Mormons Like.  It was a funny way to kick off the morning.
• …then she pointed out Celebrities Wear Costumes for Purim, which was a bit odd and unexpected, to say the least.
• Deadly shooting at German school
• Conjunction Junction, what’s your function?
• 
• NBC Stars Whimper About Jon Stewart’s Skewering of CNBC
• From NPR Music:
  • Act Like You Know: Ornette Coleman
  • Free SXSW Sampler
• 10 Best Uses for RFID

Attack the day…

Namaste.

Tuesday – 10 March 2009
Last night, after NCIS and 24, I did something that I haven’t done… well, pretty much in a few years: I did a cardio workout. Thirty minutes on a recumbent bike. I’m trying to get back into the habit of doing some cardio. Yay. It wasn’t hellish… until about 20 minutes in, when I hit the control panel and somehow wiped out the data for my session. *grblsnrkx* Fortunately, my watch has a stopwatch feature, so I used it to count down the final 10 minutes. With roughly 40 seconds left in the ride, I did something equally brilliant: Pointed the toes on my right foot. That brought me the exquisite ecstacy agony of a cramp in my right calf. Go me! I limped along for the last few seconds and was quite glad to have the whole ordeal come to an end.

Stray Toasters

• I think that I’m going to start referring to Tuesday and Thursday as “Meeting Day 1” and “Meeting Day 2,” respectively.
• Pending confirmation from our venue, it looks like we have a date.
• I chatted with for a bit last night. Among the other news he shared was the note that Bit is not quite walking by herself, but is “…pulling herself up on things and shimmying.” Or, as he added: “…she’s no longer crawling like G.I. Jane.”
• Obama to address U.S. education woes in speech
• I’ve started work on my Sodam Yat/Ion ‘Clix figure. I feel like Dr. Frankenstein.
• In related news, Jake Theis posted an update about the future of HeroClix.
• 
• CGSociety’s steampunk art contest winners and Steampunk Fairy Tales CGI
• Jack Hanna was on The Late Show last night. It was just as amusing as most/all of his other visits to the show. He also had a pair of cheetah… kittens (?)… that were very cute with him. (Of course, they’re only “cute” until they start eyeing you as a potential snack or meal.)
• Dremel, Dremel, Dremel
  I made it out of clay…
• A handful of people will get that reference.
  Two, possibly three, of those people know why I find it so amusing.
• 

Namaste.

Monday – 09 March 2009
I woke up this morning expecting to find a new blanket of snow outside. That’s what the weather forecasters warned us was coming. It hasn’t showed up yet. But, it seems as though we are, in fact, due for snow in fairly short order.

Last night, after dinner with her family, SaraRules and I went home and watched Spenser: A Savage Place, the last of the Spenser movies with Robert Urich. Aside from the dated fashion, it wasn’t bad. I need to reread the book to see how much it deviated from the original story.

Stray Toasters

• While having dinner with SaraRules’ family yesterday, we watched Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. There was… something… about Commodore Norrington that struck me as familiar, but I couldn’t place what it was. A quick trip to IMDb solved it: Jack Davenport played Steve on the BBC version of Coupling.
• From NPR Music: India.Arie: Love and Politics
• Fifty years of Barbie
  • Barbie at 50: Is Mattel’s star still in fashion?
  • I was surprised to find out that Barbie actually has a full name: Barbara Millicent Roberts. I shouldn’t really be shocked, though; for example: Hasbro came up with rather elaborate backgrounds (names and histories) for all of their G.I. Joe characters/figures.
  • I was also surprised at how large Ms. Roberts’ circle of family and friends is. It’s huge. Verizon network huge.
• It looks as if the Legion might/will be in the Smallville season finale.
• Life Before the Console Age: Forgotten Electronic Games
  I had a Big Trak, Merlin, an Intellivision and Blip.
• Offbeat name? Then Facebook’s no friend
• I was surprised to see: Terrell Owens to join Buffalo Bills
• Holy caped crusader! You could be a superhero, too
• I think that I’ve settled on my next attempt at a ‘Clix mod: Sodam Yat as Ion.

Namaste.

Saturday – 07 March 2009
Yesterday, SaraRules and I settled on a venue for the wedding.  Next step is to pick a date.

After that, we picked up Perry (which he knew about) and kidnapped him to go to see Watchmen (which he didn’t know about). We met ,  and shockpuppet, Jana and Jason. I went in expecting to see the new Star Trek trailer… and was disappointed to find that it wasn’t in front of our feature. We did see the latest trailer for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which was good. Watchmen was an excellent adaptation of the graphic novel, in my opinion.  Zach Snyder did a good job of bringing the comic to film… but, I can understand the complaint that it might be a lot for people to take in if they haven’t read the book.

After the movie, SaraRules and I stopped at a hobby shop, where I finally found a few sheets of dry-transfer letters that I used on my Winter Soldier/Captain America ‘Clix.  Speaking of which, I finally got around to taking pictures of both Shado (my first mod) and the new Cap:

and

More them can be seen here.

Stray Toasters

• What would a real life Barbie look like?
• Button gaffe embarrasses Clinton

Quote of the Day
Today’s quote comes from Rachel and bash.org:

SergioThree: there’s other fish in the sea, man, she’s just a girl
Beatsfromkorea: no dude, that’s bullshit.
Beatsfromkorea: Think of it this way. if your precious copy of street fighter third strike broke and i told you “it’s ok man, there’s other games in the sea. here, play mortal kombat instead” what would you say? you’d be like, “fuck that, gimme third strike.”
SergioThree: …
SergioThree: you just reached me on a level that i never thought possible

And that’s a wrap. We’re off to visit and her family.

Namaste.

Friday – 06 March 2009
It’s a little after 8:00. (Or, rather, it was when I wrote that…)
On my Friday off.
Why am I already awake?

Could it have something to do with the fact that I slept poorly?
Or the weird dreams I was having?

I wish I knew.  But, there it is. The coffee pot is going, so I should have some liquid motivation in a few minutes. Or, as Dolly Parton put it:

Tumble outta bed and I stumble to the kitchen
Pour myself a cup of ambition
And yawn and stretch and try to come to life

This morning agenda has a couple of items on it:

1. SaraRules and I are heading back to Heritage Gardens. As it’s on “The Even-Shorter List,” we want to confirm a few things about the venue.
2. We’re off to see the Wizard Watchmen in a few hours.

This afternoon… who knows? And there’s Clitorati this evening.

Chew on This: Food for Thought
This I Believe: Finding Freedom in Forgiveness

Stray Toasters

• While I’m avoiding most reviews of Watchmen, I did read ‘s – she saw it last night. She reviewed it favorably, but she did say that someone in her group had not read the graphic novel and was a bit disappointed. She also noted that she didn’t mind the changes that had been made. I’ll take those as good things.
  
• By way of MarknTyme: Saturday Morning Watchmen

• Last night, I read JLA: Earth-2. Again. (I owned a copy years ago…) It was a good read. Again. The book tells the tale of a parallel Earth whose version of the Justice League is the Crime Syndicate of Amerika and whose Alexander Luthor is the world’s only hero. It’s an refreshing take on the classic “good vs. evil” story.
• In a related note, I ordered the last three (3) ‘Clix I needed to complete my plastic CSA.
• The Gospel Truth: Sometimes a Little Hazy
• For :
  
• Despair, Inc. is having their annual Retirement Sale.
• Unemployment Rate Jumps to 8.1 Percent
• Have any other long-time NPR listeners noticed that Joe Palca and Ira Flatow’s voices sound eerily similar?  Ira’s voice is “just a tad” higher-pitched than Joe’s.
• Zombie brains hoodie
• If the weather makes up its mind whether it wants to be hot or cold, it soon might be time to start thinking about getting over to the driving range…

Time to get this day moving along.

Namaste.