Month: May 2005

I never got around to the latest results because, unfortunately, the end was inevitable. Also, I was hoping to get some of captures done by now to share with those interested. For one last time, though, if ya ain’t innerrested jump to the next post.

Continue reading “American Idol – Top Three… Two… One”

With Make Love the Bruce Campbell Way due to hit shelves next week, the Chinned One himself is heading out on the road. I’ll be looking at these dates in the area, most likely hitting the Bookends signing in Ridgewood. Although I have to admit that catching a screening of Man with the Screaming Brain along with the signing would be awesome. Which reminds me, time to order those comics.

Next up, I’ll be keeping all eyes on Neil Gaiman’s journal for word on when he’ll be hitting New York City for the Anansi Boys signing.

My fight with allergies has deteriorated from me pretending to fight allergies while actually fighting an infection to me me clearly fighting an infection. In the beginning, the watery eyes and sneezing clearly meant my non-existent pollen allergy was going haywire. But as of this weekend, there’s no more pretending. Last night I could feel my breathing was a bit more labored, even though most of my other symptoms seemed to be clearing up. And with my history of asthma, breathing problems really get to me.

So by the time I woke up at around 5 AM, I had a slight panic attack. I’m good at calming myself through them, but it was definitely stressful. The physical side of the attack made it difficult for me to discern what part was being caused by my ailment, and what part was being caused by me worrying about what part was being caused by my ailment. But I managed not to lose it and alarm Lisa. When she did wake up, I calmly stated that I was thinking I should see a doctor today. That’s still up for debate, as I don’t feel that bad now, but Bhavna (who went to the ER last week) is trying to convince me its for my own good. We’ll see…

Continue reading “Life and its lemons”

“…and then throw it in the face of the person who gave you the lemons until they give you the oranges you originally asked for.”

Ah, the wit and wisdom of the great Bill McNeal. Happy, happy day. After more than 2 years of waiting, the first two seasons of NewsRadio have finally hit the shelves. One of the greatest TV shows of all time (it’s one of my all time favorites, so no exaggeration here) and I can finally stop watching the crappy vidcaps that took me months to download. If you dare doubt the sheer comedic genius of this show, just check out the quote page. Or even better yet, a thread of fans sharing their favorite quotes. Then, once you are done doubting, just go out to the store and blow another thirty bucks.

And the hits just keep on coming. Last week saw the first season of Scrubs finally come out, and next week we’ve got Moonlighting coming our way. Now if only The Adventures of Brisco County Jr. would get done, my life would be complete.

PS – I forgot to mention that Best Buy has all season box sets of The X-Files on sale for $50! I might just fill out my collection this week.

…that make you laugh:

A college class was told to write a short story in as few words as possible. The instructions were that the story must contain the following three subject areas:

1. Religion
2. Sexuality
3. Mystery

There was only one A+ paper in the entire class.

Good God, I’m pregnant! I wonder who the father is.

(thanks to ***Dave)

You know how people always talk about the funny coincidences in life, that it rains on weekends and is beautiful during the week and such? Man, I am a walking billboard for that these days. My allergies have been on the fritz for the last two weeks. But wait a second, I don’t really have any allergies, not outdoor ones at least. I’m the cat and dust kinda guy, not the pollen type. Yet this year Mother Nature is pulling no punches and subjecting me to whatever form of mucous-filled Hell she can concoct.

Winter was rather lovely for me. No major illness. No serious colds or flus. I even managed to avoid skidding my death trap of a car off the road. But once the weather broke, and offered us the wonderful embrace of sunshine and reasonably warm climes, I quickly became terrified of the particles filling the air. Over the last week I’ve become an expert in various techniques of blowing my nose… don’t worry, I’ll spare you the details.

It all culminated this weekend in enough sinus pressure to nearly explode my head. A wonderful afternoon of Slow Food and good company over at Sandy’s concluded in a haze of clogged passageways and the uncertainty of an infection. Yesterday’s attempt to catch up with Joseph had to be abandoned as I couldn’t even imagine trying to go anywhere but my couch. My head was pounding, my neck was stiff, and my sinuses were stuffed. It’s a miracle that I made it through the day.

And now that Monday has come and I am back at work… well, I’m still blowing my nose a lot, but it’s nothing compared to this weekend. So now that I can tolerate the outdoors again, I am once again shoehorned into my little closet of an office. The joys of irony… or perhaps it’s the joys of Murphy’s Law…

An old friend e-mailed me a while back. I, being the dunderhead that I am, took over a month and a half to finally get back to him. But here’s the good part. Rather than coming here and posting about how I’m going to write back to a long lost friend and brag about re-connecting as I so often do, I just wrote the e-mail and sent it. Then I wrote another one, to one of my sisters, and sent it. And then I wrote one to another friend, and then another, and then another sister just for good measure. Wow, it’s like after using e-mail for a decade, I finally get it.

I want to communicate with people more regularly, so dammit stop thinking and writing about it and just plain do it. This post is so post-modern it almost sickens me. But I’ve got another point that this is supposed to lead to, so let me see if I can find it… nah, screw the segway, let’s just get moving…

Continue reading “And now for something completely different”

…or “How I Learned to Stop Nitpicking and Love Lucas”

To be honest, I enjoyed Episodes 1 and 2. No, they certainly weren’t as compelling as the original trilogy, but it was foolish to think they could be. There was too much at stake, too much time had passed, and too many high expectations for them to even come close. But in the end, Lucas learned his lessons. Attack of the Clones dropped a lot of the childishness and plotless wow factors from The Phantom Menace. And now Revenge of the Sith (possibly the best named episode) loses almost all of the failures of the previous two and delivers the movie I dared not dream to be made.

In case you couldn’t figure it out, I caved in and ordered two tickets for Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith for Lisa and I just after work. And now I’m just soaking in the beautiful realization of a movie done right.

At this point, you should probably stop reading if you haven’t seen it yet. Not that I plan on spoiling anything, but I wouldn’t want to influence your opinion (because I know how much sway my words hold)…

Continue reading “OMFG! Wookies rox0r!”

It’s May 18th. You know what that means, right? I have to admit, I’m really looking forward to this third installment, yet I have no tickets. Planmaking is certainly not my forte, and these days seeing a movie in the theater (especially opening night) just isn’t a big enough motivator. Of course, now I’m regretting that decision, as I saw the last two releases and the original trilogy re-releases on their respective opening days. Oh well, what’s a geek to do?

My real concern is having to avoid spoilers and discussions from those who took the punishment of entering a theater at midnight. I don’t want to be left out! And while my job is flexible, it’s not like previous years where I could just skip half the day in order to see a movie. So now I’m not even sure when I’ll get around to it.

I am such a terrible geek! So, what plans do you guys have, if any?

The Comcast tech came Friday morning. I was already at work, which left my somewhat less technically savvy partner to make sure matters were taken care of. Not that I thought Lisa would screw anything up, mind you, but cable techs don’t always know what they’re doing and sometimes you need to know more to keep them on track. My fear was that another day would come and go and I would be left in the Internet-less void my apartment had come to occupy. Lisa did call me while I was at work, and left me with a sunken feeling that our connection would never be restored.

Well, at least at first she did. The tech was all sorts of confused with my rig (I’m not exactly sure where that term came from) and left in a bewildered state, muttering foreign curse words as he stumbled down the street. He thought it was the modem, the poor fool. If only someone had bothered to let him know that we already tried THREE OTHER MODEMS. And while his half-assed job did not conclude with some good ol’ fashion web browsin’, Lisa assured me that the “Connected” light was, in fact, on. Which meant that the rest of the troubleshooting would be left as an exercise for the paying customer. Namely, me.

But a funny thing happened on my way home to get my download on – I didn’t go home. That’s right, faced with an unknown evening lacking any concrete plans, I still decided that heading over to Hoboken for whatever adventures may await was a better scenario for a Friday night than catching up with e-mail and blogs. No offense to all of my regular reads, but it’s time that I get my life back.

Lisa and I have somewhat isolated ourselves out here in Montclair. It’s not like we’re avoiding people, but there aren’t nearly the opportunities for random socializing as we had in bustlin’ ‘Boken. Even the Arts and Music Fest was a bit of a downer with no central hub to congregate and a lack of apartments for crashing, leading us to an early departure. But we’re slowly getting into the swing of the more suburban lifestyle, and that often means going out of our way to see people. In this instance I took the free time (while Lisa was visiting another friend) to enjoy some quality time with a mutz and sopresseta sandwich from Luca Brasi’s (it’s been way too long), some intense browsing at Tunes (more music to come later), and finally a stop at Busker’s (the unfortunately named new hangout in Hoboken).

And that’s exactly the kind of night I needed. Chillin’ out on the sidewalk, knockin’ back a few Smithwick’s, and catchin’ up with some friends. Don’t get me wrong, I still need to catch up with all my online reading, but I’d like to start putting more effort into re-connecting with my “real world” friends.

Man, sometimes these “sorry I haven’t been writing” posts can become a big mess. Next up, my Internet identity crisis!