I'm forcing myself to write this. Every time I open my test journal these days, I close it again unedited. I just don't seem to have the desire, or will, to put my thoughts down here. Part of that, I'm sure, is the fact that I'm busy. The Kwik-E-Mart demands my time from early morning to early evening. Then I come home and make dinner. By the time we've cooked, eaten, cleaned up, and done any daily chores that need doing, I'm too tired to spare any intensity of thought or emotion for the blog.
Add to that the time I am spending on curling club business (I'm on the board of directors), at the gym (my wife convinced me to join again), walking the dog (he won't walk himself - well, he will, but we want to make sure he comes home again), and doing other daily, mundane things, and I barely have enough energy just to read other people's blogs. Creating my own content seems beyond me right now.
I have no plans to shut this blog down, but I expect postings to remain infrequent for the foreseeable future. I still have a bunch of stuff percolating in the test journal that I intend to finish. Realistically, though, I can't put a timetable on that. So, for those of you who do visit regularly, I'm sorry for being a boring blogger. If you're looking for something interesting (a little bit goofy, but interesting none-the-less) to read, try doing a search for "crackergate." Let me know what you think about what you find.
Here are the last two friday random ten lists from my iPod updates.
July 25
1) Amigos Para Siempre (Friends For Life) - Sarah Brightman (with Jose Carreras)
2) It Would Be So Nice - Pink Floyd
3) Road Buddy - Dar Williams
4) A Saucerful Of Secrets - Pink Floyd
5) Didn't Leave Nobody But The Baby - Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss & Gillian Welch
6) Into Everything - Moist
7) Bus Stop - The Hollies
8) Life Has Just Begun - Spirit
9) Mull Of Kintyre - Ashley MacIsaac
10) You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet - Bachman-Turner Overdrive
July 11
1) Pump Up The Volume (12" US Version) - Marrs
2) That's How... - D12
3) Who Wears These Shoes - Elton John
4) Nebakanezer - The Black Crowes
5) Dialing For Dharma - FM
6) Not Too Late - Norah Jones
7) Better Place To Be - Harry Chapin
8) Superman's Song - Crash Test Dummies
9) Any Way You Want It - Journey
10) Tell Me On A Sunday - Sarah Brightman
Tags: boring blogging, busy busy busy, Kwik-E-Mart, friday random ten
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Hammer
Monday, June 30, 2008
Friday random thirty...'n' stuff
Here's Matt looking decidedly dapper at his Grade 8 graduation Wednesday night. That's right, next September he'll be in High School. It is to shudder.Although I outwardly scoff at sentimentality, I have to admit there were times during the evening when I had to blink a bit, because I had "something in my eye." This group of kids impresses the hell out of me. During the graduation ceremony every single award winner was heartily cheered by the entire group. In fact, during the closing presentation, a slide show of student photographs past and present, every single student's picture was met with delighted squeals and cheers. Not one child could claim they were left out, held in less regard than any other. I predict great things for these students over the next four years, and beyond.
For more pictures, visit my Flickr photo set for the event.
**this is a dividing line of text**
Wish me a Happy Blogaversary. As of yesterday, AWV is four years old. It's still not too late to take advantage of our two-for-one offer.
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Also, Happy Canada Day tomorrow. This July first, Canada will be one hundred and forty-one years old. Sure, that's nothing compared to y'all's two hundred and thirty-two years, but that just makes us younger and hipper.
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Also, also, having been horribly remiss, here are three whole weeks worth of Friday random ten lists for your perusal. Have a great holiday, be it tomorrow, or Friday.
June 13th
1) I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For - U2
2) I Guess That's Why They Call It The Blues - Elton John
3) Silent Warrior - Enigma
4) Now - Days Of The New
5) Just One Of Those Things - Branford Marsalis
6) Eagle Will Rise Again - The Alan Parsons Project
7) Arnold Layne - Pink Floyd
8) Children And All That Jazz - Joan Baez
9) A Million Vacations - Max Webster
10) Navy Bean - Tracy Bohnam
June 20th
1) Twelve-Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming To The Canyon) - The Mamas & The Papas
2) Spoon For A Knife - The Jive Kings
3) Thirty-Three - Smashing Pumpkins
4) Good Company - Queen
5) Wild World - Cat Stevens
6) Your Song - Elton John
7) Hello Goodbye - Live On Arrival
8) Dance With The Devil - Breaking Benjamin
9) A Million Vacations - Max Webster
10) Goodbye Cruel World - Pink Floyd
June 27th
1) Why'd You Lie - Colin James
2) Fight - The Tragically Hip
3) Lagavulin - Wide Mouth Mason
4) Lithium - Nirvana
5) Next Contestant - Nickelback
6) Dolly Dagger - Jimi Hendrix
7) Starseed - Our Lady Peace
8) Touch Me - Ian Thomas
9) Supernova - Mike Oldfield
10) Black Sabbath - Ozzy Osbourne
Thursday, June 19, 2008
This morning
Me: "Hurry up, Matthew. If you don't leave the house right now, you're going to be late for school."
Matthew: "Well, I'm going to be late, then, because I'm not going anywhere without straightening my hair."
Oh, the many joys of raising a fashion conscious teen!
Tags: family, humour, fall out boy hair
Monday, June 9, 2008
Special characters
"how do you make that little degree symbol, anyway? I can't find it on my keyboard."Well, Bea, don't beat yourself up over it. You can't find it because it isn't on your keyboard. The degree symbol (º), and many other similar symbols, like the Yen (¥), Pound (£), and Euro (€) symbols, or the copyright (©), and trademark (™), symbols are special HTML entities. They are available using the html editor built into your journals software. For example, in order to create the degree symbol, switch your edit text box to the html setting, and type "°" (without the quotes). When you switch back to the text view, you will see the degree symbol.
One of the most useful html entities I have discovered is the 'non-breaking space.' You may or may not have noticed, but the AOL Journals software has a tendency to eat spaces. You'll type something in, click 'save,' and check the result, only to find that the space between two words has disappeared - likethis. You click 'edit,' and insert a space, then click 'save' again. Sometimes that even works, but often, no matter what you do, those two words remain gluedtogether.
The solution is simple. Switch to html view. Find those two words, and right between them, type " " (without the quotes). This will insert a space between those two words which is, in typeface lingo, non-collapsable. It forces the text editor to leave a space in there no matter what. The only odd thing that sometimes comes up is the fact that the 'non-breaking' part of that space means the text editor will never insert a line break between those two words. So if they occur near the end of a line, using a non-breaking space can result in a non-uniform line length.
Sound too complicated? Never mess with the html functions of your journals software? Never fear. The most commonly used of the html entities all have keyboard shortcuts which work in most word processing programs and Internet browsers. If you are using Windows™, these shortcuts use the 'ALT' key and the numeric keypad buttons. For example, the degree symbol can be easily inserted as you type by holding down the 'ALT' key, and typing the numbers 167 on the numeric keypad. When you release the 'ALT' key, the degree symbolº will appear.
Here is a list of available special ALT characters. Your browser may not support all of them. Have fun experimenting.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Suddenly, Summer
Still it wouldn't seem quite so bad if it weren't for the fact that Thursday's high was 19.5, or a lowly 67 degrees. I think we need to relabel our months up here. So far this year, we've had January, January, March, March, March, and August.
Last night the wife and I went down into the city to a little bar - right near our first apartment - to see a band called Headbone Station. One of the band members is an old high school buddy of mine, so we thought we'd check 'em out.
Except when we got there we found out they weren't playing that night, regardless of what their MySpace page said. So we sat and had a beer and listened to the Pete Martin reggae karaoke experience instead. Man, I'll tell you; there's a real feeling of responsibility in being the only members of an audience. It was like we were in some little cabana at an unpopular resort somewhere in the Caribbean. Pete was playing just for us. We felt guilty leaving after only one beer.
Well, not that guilty. He wasn't really all that good.
Now, here are two Friday random ten lists for your perusal...
Friday, June 6th
1) Abacab- Genesis
2) Indian War Whoop - John Hartford
3) Please Love Me Forever - Tommy Edwards
4) The Times They Are A-Changin' - The Byrds
5) Wondering Where The Lions Are - Bruce Cockburn
6) Fast Car - David Usher
7) Every Breath You Take - The Police
8) Obsession (Reprise) - Robert Michaels
9) Betrayed - Avenged Sevenfold
10) The Navy Song - Billy Talent
Friday, May 30th
1) Cocaine - Eric Clapton
2) Kind-Hearted Woman - Colin James
3) Uncle Salty - Aerosmith
4) Spawn Again - Silverchair
5) My Friends - Dar Williams
6) Miracle - Matt Dusk
7) Breakdown - Guns 'N' Roses
8) Nautical Disaster - The Tragically Hip
9) The Fire - Reel Big Fish
10) I Ain't Gonna Be Your Monkey Man - Willie Dixon
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Lesbians shack up, depend on cheating males for reproduction...
Says the report:What happens when there is a shortage of males and a female wants to have a family?But wait! Where do these offspring come from? Well:
In the case of the Laysan albatross, females shack up with each other for years and take turns raising offspring, research now reveals.
10 of the 16 chicks that belonged to female-female partners were fathered by males that cheated on their female mates.Evil lesbian chicks luring men away from their wives. Can you imagine?
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Saturday random thought
Friday, May 23, 2008
Friday random ten(s)
iTunes keeps doing weird shit. I used to have over 5900 songs in the library, but now it's telling me there are only 5875. Somewhere, iTunes has lost some songs, and I don't understand how. One of the ones I was able to pin down as being missing was track 16 of the soundtrack album from the movie The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Tracks one through fifteen are there, as are seventeen through nineteen. Sixteen has disappeared. I know it was there when I originally copied the CD to iTunes. Now it's gone.
And I mean gone totally. When I manually go looking in the iTunes music folder, the rest of the files are all there, and track 16 is not. Where did it go? Matthew tells me there are entire albums missing. We're going to have to recopy the discs, which is a total time waster. I hope none of the songs Matthew downloaded from the iTunes store are missing, because we haven't backed them up yet.
Stupid iTunes!
And now, because I was negligent last week, here are two (2) Friday Random Tens.
May 16/2008
1) Lucky (Boomtang Boys Mix) - Bif Naked
2) Whoa - Midnight Oil
3) Legend - Nelly Furtado
4) Guys and Dolls (Reprise) - Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin
5) The Unforgettable Fire - U2
6) More Today Than Yesterday - The Spiral Staircase
7) Jennifer's Body - Hole
8) Peace Train - Cat Stevens
9) Tourniquet (Live) - Evanescence
10) Growing Up - Bruce Springsteen
May 23/2008
1) Coloured Rain - Traffic
2) Crocodile Rock - Elton John
3) Patio Lanterns - Kim Mitchell
4) Hanger 18 - Megadeath
5) Medley: The Munster Cloak/An Poc Ar Buille/Ferney Hill/Little Molly - The Chieftains
6) What's It Take - Robert Palmer
7) Wasted Time (Live) - The Eagles
8) On The Boulevard - Murray McLauchlan
9) Wake Me Up - Norah Jones
10) Love Reign O'er Me - The Who
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
100 movies - the last 10 (plus 1)
I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "I don't believe it." But yes, it's true. I have finally reached the final edition of the list of "100 movies I really like." I started this thing over eight freaking months ago (if this had been a list of 100 TV shows I really like, I could have said, "eight frakking months ago" there).
Now, remember that these movies have been listed in completely random order (actually determined by an online random number generator - no, I don't remember which one), so these are not necessarily my ten favourite movies. They are just the last ten left after I named ninety others.
(Actually, I have only named eighty-nine others, haven't I? I accidentally listed The Fugitive in both this list, and this one.) So, here are the movies. Comment on my choices as you will.
Alien - Earlier on this list I named the sequel to this film, Aliens. This is an entirely different creature (heh). In fact, this is much more of a Horror/Suspense/Thriller than a science fiction film. Heck, the audience doesn't even get to see the monster until almost the end of the movie. Also, the alien's method of reproduction falls under the category of most creepy sci-fi concept ever.
Big - Tom Hanks wasn't an unknown, by any stretch of the imagination, but Big was the film that lit the fuse on the rocket his career was to become.
Terminator 2: Judgement Day - What better way to deal with a man who can't act than to cast him as a robot? Heck, it worked for Peter Weller. I originally had the first Terminator movie here, but decided I liked the second one better. Hasta La Vista, Baby!
The Pink Panther - No, not the recent one starring Steve Martin. Are you kidding me? I'm sure Martin wakes up every morning, looks in the mirror, and askshimself, "what the hell was I thinking?" Who decided it was a good idea to remake a movie starring one of the funniest human beings who ever lived? And has that person learned their lesson?
Seriously, there is no one who could ever match the comic genius of Peter Sellers in the role of Inspector Clouseau.
Shrek - This movie was in the can when when Mike Myers decided Shrek should have a Scottish accent. So he went back into the studio and revoiced Shrek's dialogue for the entire film. At some point after that he walked away from the Sprockets project because he didn't want to release a steaming heap of crap that would make money anyway just because he was in it. That's just the way Mike rolls.
Lethal Weapon - In the best tradition of The Odd Couple. Detectives Murtaugh and Riggs are among the best cop partnerships ever filmed. Also, Gary Busey puts his natural born creepiness to good use as Mr. Joshua, the former special forces nut job/bad guy.
A Beautiful Mind - There had to be at least one Oscar winner on this list. Didn't there?
La Femme Nikita - The American Remake of this film, Point Of No Return, was actually pretty good. Credit where due, director John Badham didn't stray too far from the original. The original, a French film directed by Luc Besson, is described by one IMBD user as, "cooler than a fortnight in Antartica wearing a bikini, drinking chilled vodka with ice-packs strapped to your body."
Desperado - Antonio Badaras is almost as pretty as Salma Hayek in this one. This may be the most cinematographically attractive shoot-em-up movie ever made. Your mileage may vary.
First Blood - I can still see Sly pulling a needle and thread through his own skin (shudder). I think Richard Crenna's costume had an actual board sewn into it in this film. Brian Dennehy elevates everything he appears in. OK, maybe not Tommy Boy.
That's ten. I have now listed every film that appeared on my original list of 100. The only problem is, that original list only named ninety-nine different movies. So I owe you one. That fact is what has held up this last entry of the series for so long. I just didn't want to try and come up with one more movie to add.
Circumstance to the rescue. We went out to the theater to see Iron Man last night. Let me tell you, it rocked. The decision to cast Robert Downey Jr. was an inspired one, and he pulled off the role with ease. We totally believed his transformation.
The special effects were top notch, with special mention due the suit effects. It looks totally real. I thought Jeff Bridges overplayed his part a little bit, and I never quite bought Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts, but Downey carried every scene he was in, and was able to lift the film past those deficiencies, and the few slow spots in the story. I highly reccomend you see this in the theater, with the Big Screen, and the Big Sound. It's worth the over-inflated tickets and popcorn prices.
Also worth mention were the previews preceeding the movie. The new Indy was the most notable, and I suspect we'll be back in the theater before the month is out to see it. The Dark Knight looks excellent, although I'm not a huge Batman fan, so this one will wait until it hits DVD. Also pretty funny looking were Kung Fu Panda, and You Don't Mess With The Zohan, Adam Sandler's latest. Although I suspect we saw most of the funny bits of the latter in the trailer.
Well, there you have it: one hundred movies I really like. Not an entirely comprehensive list, and were I to compile it again, I would not be surprised to see huge differences in the movies selected. At several points during this process, I have smacked myself on the forehead and said, "I could have had a V8!" Or at least remembered another film that should have been here.
But then again, I have carefully disclaimed any intention to make this list actually representative of anything other than a bunch of movies I really like throughout the whole process. Just in case you're interested, here is the full list, in the order I originally wrote them down, all those months ago:
1:Bull Durham
2:Star Wars
3:Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.
4:The Maltese Falcon
5:The African Queen
6:Casablanca
7:Raiders of the Lost Ark
8:Blade Runner
9:The Rock
10:Big
11:Serenity
12:Back to the Future
13:Moulin Rouge
14:A Knight's Tale
15:Braveheart
16:The Fugitive
17:Frailty
18:Ghostbusters
19:Gladiator
20:Highlander
21:The Hunt for Red October
22:The Incredibles
23:The Iron Giant
24:Jurassic Park
25:Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
26:Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
27:The Matrix
28:Monsters Inc.
29:Pink Floyd: The Wall
30:Shrek
31:Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
32:Spiderman
33:Stargate
34:The Legend of Bagger Vance
35:This is Spinal Tap
36:Hard Core Logo
37:A Beautiful Mind
38:The Bourne Identity
39:Underworld
40:The Transporter
41:The Terminator
42:School of Rock
43:Men in Black
44:The Last Temptation of Christ
45:Ice Age
46:Armageddon
47:Ocean's Eleven
48:The Green Mile
49:Agent Cody Banks
50:Titan: AE
51:Die Hard
52:Beverly Hills Cop
53:Cast Away
54:Aladdin
55:The Lion King
56:The Nightmare Before Christmas
57:They Live
58:The Wizard of Oz
59:Scrooged
60:Stripes
61:Memento
62:Alien
63:Aliens
64:Ferris Bueller's Day Off
65:Saving Private Ryan
66:Hang 'em High
67:High Plains Drifter
68:The Sixth Sense
69:Little Miss Sunshine
70:Toy Story
71:Twelve Monkeys
72:Casino Royale
73:Blood Diamond
74:The Road Warrior
75:True Lies
76:Apollo Thirteen
77:Chicken Run
78:Close Encounters of the Third Kind
79:E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial
80:La Femme Nikita
81:Shanghai Noon
82:The Fugitive
83:Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
84:Payback
85:The Pink Panther
86:Rain Man
87:Ruthless People
88:Shakespeare in Love
89:Mrs. Doubtfire
90:True Grit
91:Victor/Victoria
92:Benny and Joon
93:The Untouchables
94:Soylent Green
95:Gattaca
96:The Fifth Element
97:First Blood
98:Predator
99:Desperado
100:Lethal Weapon
really 100:Iron Man
<< previous ten
Tags: memes, 100 movies, blogplugs
Sunday, May 11, 2008
As if millions of elbows cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced
"Oh, so what," I asked. "You've got The Force, now?"
"No," she answered. "I've got The Arthritis."
