smacky and bucky

Can someone please explain the concept of Daylight Saving Time to my cats? They want me to get up at 5am now! The Maimi Herald explains it here, but with no pictures, my cats can't understand it.

Two teen girls in matching French maid costumes. One of them drunk and belligerent. The other stated the day before that she hates that blonde bitch. Fry guy is about to have about 12 fantasies come true at once as the girls catfight over him.

Funky Winkerbean is usually a very depressing comic. They just finished a storyline about a woman with recurring cancer taking a trip to the Grand Canyon with her husband, who hates his job as a teacher so much that ANY comment that reminds him of teaching sends him into a rage. So it wasn't exactly the poignant vacation they were hoping for. And I'm sure this story will turn into a portrayal of teen alcoholism, and blondie will either get her stomach pumped or die in a car crash. But if you weren't familiar with the strip, you'd think that maybe some wrestling about to happen.

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Considering we only gained one hour over the weekend, I got quite a bit done. Saturday we went to a funeral, an after-funeral reception, and dinner with Laura's dad and stepmom. Sunday I got up at 7 (which was now 6), had coffee, emptied the dishwasher, cleaned the basement, had another cup of coffee, went to the other house and got up eight bags of leaves from the yard, stopped by the grocery store, stopped by the drug store, had lunch, installed and activated the satellite radio in my car, ran a load of laundry, cleaned the guestroom, took a shower, put the clean laundry away, took a nap, read some, had dinner, watched Family Guy, read more, and went to sleep around 11:30.

Now we can look forward to it getting dark by 5. I don't care for that. Now the sun is up as a drive to work, but so what? I'd rather have it sunny when I can enjoy it, not when I'm in my windowless office.

It's been a while since I mentioned any new music on the blog, mostly because nothing that's come out recently has excited me much. But today I have something: Lily Allen.

Her songs are a mix of reggae and ska, and her lyrics are really good. You can hear full length versions of songs on her website lilyallenmusic.com. Track 3, Smile, is an early favorite. The song starts with the lines, When you first left me, I was wanting more, but you were fucking that girl next door. Whatja do that for?

How could you not love that?

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The dryer at our other house is now fixed. It took three hours of the workday on Wednesday, and two guys. The appliance repairman said the dryer was fine and the outlet was bad. So we called the main office and they sent the electrician from Monday out to check it. The electrician swore the dryer was bad and the outlet was fine. They didn't really come to an agreement over it. The appliance guy dismantled and reassembled the dryer, not finding anything, and the electrician changed the outlet, saying "I'll bet my paycheck it's the dryer and not the outlet."

He plugged the dryer into the new outlet and it worked. Huh. Someone owes someone a paycheck! I wish I'd made that bet with him. I'll bet electricians make a lot of money (definitely more per hour than an editor!).

Rain this weekend, 40 MPH winds, and a funeral to attend. So my weekend isn't looking like a barrel of fun yet.

Here's a comic that's also a valuable lesson:

In the middle of filming of the final episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000, they flashed up some of the best lines from past movies they've mocked. The sequence didn't make the final cut, obviously, because it wasn't supposed to, but thanks to the magic of YouTube, here it is:

Our county had some sort of strange power surge in their electrical grid back in September, with hundreds of houses across the county getting fried in some way. I was at our other place, mowing the lawn and checking out the inside, when I noticed scorch marks around the dryer outlet. I checked the circuits and saw that the circuit for the dryer had been tripped. I turned it back on and heard a loud pop, as it tripped off again.

Yes, our other house (the empty one for sale) was one of the houses affected by the "event." After a series of calls, it worked out that an elctrician was scheduled to stop by yesterday and check things out. I met him at the house around 5:30, and he confirmed that the outlet is fine, but the dryer has a short in it somewhere.

He told me to call his company again and explain the findings, and to make an appointment with their appliance repair folks. Did that this morning, and they'll be coming by tomorrow sometime (calling me before they arrive). The good thing has been that the bills are going to the county, so it's no out-of-pocket expense for us.
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In TV news, Heroes is getting good, with the different plots coming together. Like most people, Hiro (the Japanese guy) is my favorite character, as he's having such a good time with his powers and is just having a great time crossing America. Funniest part: He sits down in the diner, opens the menu, and says "Waffles! Woo hoo!" He keeps the show from taking itself too seriously. Like many geeks, his philosophy is a mix of Star Wars, Star Trek, and comic books.

Sometimes they just stop trying. The folks behind Mary Worth failed to foresee that some people would become obsessive about the Aldo plot. Well, that plot is over, and now they've gotten lazy. Behold:


<-- Mary's reaction to Aldo, back when the story was ripe with the promise of stalking, possible violence, and love.

Mary's reaction yesterday, as she whined that her doctor boyfriend, working in a third-world country, hasn't bothered to phone -->


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Lazy Sunday for us. Laura had to do actual work (ick), so I had the afternoon to myself. I found her old notebook of CDs and decided to add some songs to my iPod. I ended up adding 407 songs! She basically had everything I never bother to buy: Sarah McLaughlin, Tori Amos, Eurythmics, etc. My iPod got a super-dose of estrogen.

I also watched Capricorn One, a movie from 1978.

Plot Synopsis: Classic conspiracy tale about the first manned mission to Mars. All appears to be going well until the astronauts are pulled off the ship just before launch by shadowy government types and whisked off to a film studio in the desert. It transpires that the space vehicle has a major defect that NASA just daren't admit. At the studio, over a course of months, the astronauts are forced to act out the journey and the landing to trick the world into believing they have made the trip. Meanwhile, a journalist (played by Elliot Gould) is getting suspicious and every clue he uncovers seems to result in an attempt on his life! The astronauts are just about to splashdown when a further twist to the tale occurs, leaving them with no choice but to try and escape....

By the way, the astronauts are played by James Brolin (Mr. Barbra Streisand), Sam Waterston (Law & Order), and O.J. Simpson (Well, you know his story...). It's a good movie, filled with distrust of the government in a post-Nixon era, lots familiar faces (Telly Savalas, baby!), and long extended chases with cars and helicopters, typical of the 1970s. The 1970s were the age of the chase (French Connection, Bullit). The 1980s were the age of blowing stuff up (Die Hard, Lethal Weapon) . The 1990s were the age of CGI (Star Wars, Jurrasic Park). I've pretty much stopped going to movies now, because the 2000s are the age of unnecessary remakes of old movies (Fog, Texas Chainsaw Massacre) or movies made of TV shows (Dukes of Hazzard, Starsky and Hutch, Brady Bunch).

I received a promo copy of the new CD by Puffy AmiYumi, and it got me thinking about names and copyright law. The band, best known in America for the theme song to Teen Titans, is huge in Japan. They had their own TV show, sold millions of CDs, and played to packed stadiums. In Japan, they're called Puffy. In the United States, there's a guy named Sean Combs (likes to sample top-40 hits and talk over them) who had the nickname Puffy. He apparently trademarked the name in America, so when the band started releasing music here, they had to alter their name. So they added their first names to the band name (Ami and Yumi). They remain known by that name here, even though Sean has since changed his nickname a few times since then. He now goes by Diddy. But in a glowing example of the wheel of karma, there's a DJ in England who has apparently trademarked the name Diddy, so in England, Sean can't release his CDs under that name.

We went to a great Chinese restaurant for Laura's birthday dinner. Yum. On the way home, we were the fourth car to make a left turn at a stoplight, and a fat female cop was standing in the middle of the road and made all of us pull over. (The fact that she's female means nothing to the story. Pointing out that she's fat is just me being mean.) She went to each car and said there is a sign at the light that says no left turn between the hours of something and something. We then waited about 20 minutes while she climbed into her cop car (which she had left running with the air conditioner on... your tax dollars paying for that waste of gas. The car was also parked on the sidewalk.) and wrote each of us a ticket.

Cost: $30 for "failure to obey a sign" + $50 "processing fee" + $5 "local charge"

What the fuck is a "local charge"? I don't mind the ticket, whatever, sometimes it happens. But while the woman was writing the tickets, I watched FIVE cars turn without using their turn signals right in front of her, which according to the ticket price sheet she gave me, is just as serious an offense! It's the same $30 fine! It's just hypocritical, and that's what irks me. That and the fact that there wasn't a car for 3 miles coming in the other direction so there's no reason you can't make a left turn there. Plus you know that woman gets posted there every weekday between those two hours. It's a guaranteed money maker. They're not making the world safer in any way. It's a trap set up to make money for the county (and whoever gets that $5 "local" cut).

I'll spare you the self-righteous "I wonder what liquor store is being robbed, what woman is being mugged, and what child is being molested while this cop is writing tickets for illegal left turns" speech, but I do think that's valid as well. They pick and choose which laws to enforce (ignoring all the "failure to signal a turn" because, even though it's a fine of the same amount, is a one-on-one offense and doesn't make the same cash in the same amount of time).

I completely side with the people that pay the fines in person with pennies now, but I think I'll satisfy myself by writing "Traffic Scam" in the memo line of the check I send them. That or "County Blood Money."

I also would like to point out that there's a construction zone I drive through coming to and from work, in which the speed limit is 35. Every day I'm passed repeatedly in that zone by people doing 55 mph or more. I've never seen anyone pulled over, or even a cop sitting there as a speed deterrent. But again, that would be a one-on-one offense without the same "cash to time" ratio.

We all implicitly understand that citizens far outnumber cops. It's only our agreement to uphold the laws willingly that maintains any order in society, because if we all decided "screw the laws," there's nothing the cops could really do. You saw that in New Orleans for the most part, and that wasn't even a majority of the citizens looting. So the only thing cops can do is uphold some of the minor laws some of the time. This sort of random enforcement is designed to keep citizens on their toes. It's also terribly hypocritical.

In conclusion, I'm looking forward to the day when we sell our final house in this county and move away, taking all our real estate tax money, all our personal property tax money, and all our "stimulate the economy by buying crap" money out of the county. Let some other sucker pay for the gas in the "still-idling with the air conditioner running" cop car.

Today is my wife's birthday! I don't have any digital pics of her (or us) stored anywhere, so here's a fictional character that reminds me of her:

I had this issue signed by the artist/writer Frank Cho at the Baltimore Comicon about a month after our wedding and framed it for Laura for Christmas that year.


Happy birthday, sweetie!

(No, she doesn't read this blog, so I'm just sort of sending out well wishes into cyberspace...)

My parents are coming to visit this weekend to celebrate some birthdays (mine and my wife's are nine days [and a few years] apart. I'm the older one).

I took the afternoon off yesterday with a bad headache and went home and slept until dinner. Feel much better today.

What I've learned this week at work: Ms. Streisand spells her first name BARBRA, not Barbara. Huh. Her name came up in a book I'm working on. A science book. And no, it's not using physics to configure the trajectory of a satellite around the orbit of her ass, so don't even guess that.

Oh, my father-in-law's brother is famous! Billy Doleman (bio) is an acheologist/anthropologist, and he's on the SciFi Investigates team, along with a "paranormal" expert (eye roll), a crime scene investigator, and "Boston" Rob (some guy who has apparently made a career out of reality television?). The show comes on Wednesdays at 10pm on the SciFi channel(and since it's cable, it's repeated 50 other times if you miss it). This season, the team will investigate voodoo, bigfoot, UFOs at Roswell, mothman, etc. Billy came to visit about a month ago and we saw a lot of behind-the-scenes slides of upcoming shows.

He even keeps a show blog on the SciFi channel website HERE.

Here's a pic of the entire team looking like extras on CSI: Miami.

Last night NBC had two premiers: One good and one unfortunately awful.

The first was 30 Rock, with Tina Fey, Alec Baldwin, and Tracy Morgan. This show had a lot of great lines and Tina dancing on a stripper's stage. I'll stick with this show.

The second was Twenty Good Years, with Jeffrey Tambor and John Lithgow. These two guys are comedic geniuses, so it hurts to say that NBC is probably going to kill this show. The problem isn't the writing, which was very witty, or the acting, which was great, but the stupid laugh track. For some bizarre reason, NBC decided the show would be enhanced by an obviously fake laugh track, and they went completely overboard with it. They use it after every line in the show! Example: Jeffrey's character is talking to a woman and says, "A relationship is like building a house.." and this is followed by a laugh track. It's not even the punchline! Who the hell laughs at every sentence you way while you're telling a joke? Maybe someone high out of his or her mind, but not normal people. The laugh track was so noticeable that it ruined the show. I couldn't watch the last half, and that's a shame, because those two actors are so good that they don't need a laugh track. Screw you NBC. Bad move.

DROP THE LAUGH TRACK AND I'LL COME BACK.

Not as lot to say. Work this week has been busy but productive, as opposed to frustrating, so that's all good. We went to a nice dinner last night and generally had a date.

Oh, for my birthday I've received some good books and CDs, but I think my early favorite is this:

The first season of Riptide. Three buddies (Vietnam vets) set up a detective agency and live together on a boat. No, it's not gay. The writers make sure you know that by having the guys hook up with pretty girls in just about every episode. But the show has a lot of fights, and boat chases, and helicopter chases (the show must have had a pretty big budget because cars flip over and things explode a lot in the show. I loved this show when it was on in 1984-1986. It's still a lot of fun to watch. The only thing dated is some of the computer talk of the resident genius. And if you're a female and easily offended, there are a lot of women in bikinis on the show. They live on a boat, so it's not out of place. It also explains one of the reasons I loved the show as a kid!

When I wrote my previous post, it looked like a long rainy weekend at home with a dog, two cats, and a TV. But I got a call at two in the afternoon Friday that changed all that. My wife called from Atlanta and said her aunt's funeral was Saturday morning, she and her mom were driving to the river Saturday afternoon, arriving late that night, and I should go to the river. I thought about heading down there Saturday morning, as holiday, friday afternoon, rainy, rush hour traffic sounded like hell, but I asked our dog if we should go, and she ran to the front door and demanded to leave. The traffic did indeed suck, but we got there Friday night around 10:30.
Spent Saturday doing nothing as the rain continued to pour down.

Laura arrived Saturday night around 1am. Our six days apart were the longest we'd been apart since we first met in 2000.

Sunday night she made a fantastic birthday dinner.

Monday she made a great birthday breakfast.

It turned out to be a great birthday.

Laura's still out of town, been gone since Monday. Now with wake and funeral preparations, she's not sure when she's coming home.

(Did I mention it's a three-day weekend and Monday, Columbus Day, is my birthday?)

I'm likely going to be spending my holiday/birthday long weekend alone. But as pathetic as a long weekend alone in front of the TV as it rains outside sounds, it has to beat a funeral.

Laura's Aunt Margaret died about an hour and a half ago (at 6:30 am). Her entire family stayed up with her all night, she wasn't in pain, and her breathing just got slower and slower. Laura's not sure when she'll be home now (it was tentatively supposed to be tomorrow), as she'll be helping with the arrangements for the wake and funeral.

From Margaret's initial pain to diagnosis was a period of two weeks. From diagnosis to her death was five days. I can't believe how quickly it took her.

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I'll save all my goofy talk for tomorrow.

Last night I played lonely single guy and went to Borders, bought a book, then went across the street to a restaurant and got a "table for one." Burger, beer, and a book. Wild Tuesday, huh?

Tonight kicks off the third season of Lost. I've been avoiding spoilers of this one. Hopefully it will be good.

Today is supposed to be the last freakish summer-feeling day: 85 degrees. By Friday, the forecast calls for highs in the low 60s. Quite a drop in two days.

Finally, what's worse: A child predator or a child predator/politician? Foley's lawyer has said Foley is an alcoholic, gay, and was molested as a teen by a clergyman. But he's not a pedophile! Speaker of the House Hastert says he didn't know anything until ABC put it on the news last Friday, even though two REPUBLICANS say they warned him about it months ago. He also says he won't resign, and that this was leaked to the press by the Democrats! Augh! Typical! "The worst part isn't that this happened, it's that it became public!" He had cybersex on the House floor! He finished and said "Gotta go vote!" Holy crap!

Ugh, I miss Laura. She's the one that cares about politics. I'm the one that cares about dumb(er) stuff. Though the Foley scandal is pretty freaking dumb. The worst part is probably the message this sends to close-minded people: That all gays were "made" after some sexual trauma happened to them as kids, and all gays secretly want to then do the same thing to young boys and turn them gay too.

I'm having some numbness in the two smallest fingers on my left hand. What could that be?

Today's picture has nothing to do with anything. It's just very amusing. Mark Trail thought the bear was a missing tame pet bear, so he called out to it and said "Come here, girl." Well, it did, and now he realizes it ain't no pet!

The wife is out of town until Thursday night, visiting her aunt. Wife and her sister got a call yesterday that they needed to come very soon, while her aunt was still "lucid." Apparently liver failure causes contaminants normally filtered by the liver to enter the bloodstream. They travel to the brain and can cause dementia comparable to Alzheimer's disease. So the news just gets more and more grim. I feel so bad for her aunt, who doesn't deserve this, and wife and her family, who have to cope with this.

The pets and I hung out on the bed last night reading and watching TV (the animals aren't big readers, so they mostly slept). I caught the second episode of Heroes, and it was better than the first. There's some shady elements that are a bit to X-Files, but the superpowers part is getting more interesting.

I'm currently reading this:

The Road to the Dark Tower: Exploring Stephen King's Magnum Opus by Bev Vincent. Yes, I haven't gotten enough of that world, even after 5,000+ pages in the seven books in the series. This book gives a lot of background about when King was working on each book, and the connections that you may not have noticed, for example, something mentioned in passing in book II that isn't seen again until book VII. This book also examines other titles of King's that tie in to the Dark Tower world.

Found these guys on Saturday: First Appearance Iron Man, Power Man, and Batman (with "leg up on a stump" power!). Yay!











Now the serious news... Wife got a call yesterday. Her aunt was in the hopital since last week with abdominal pain. Yesterday they finished all the tests and announced she has advanced liver cancer. They don't thing treatment will help. It's a huge blow and a terrible sursprise. This woman is a real pure soul, one of those rare people that never said anything bad about anyone, never hurt anyone, and is always happy. So of course she gets this while other random assholes still wander the Earth causing pain and misery. It goes without saying that it's not fair, and the wife is very upset about this.

Last night we went to visit wife's sister-in-law and her husband. They're finishing work on the new home they bought and they invited us to come check it out. We were also returning my brother-in-law's car, since mine is finally fixed. Also, wife wanted to tell her sister about their aunt in person.

Their place is really nice, just a few blocks from water. We went out to dinner for Mexican food, then came back and watched Goodfellas, which was a random pick, but great fun to watch again.