Hello, blogging apathy...

Well, the daily blogging thing seems to show signs of deterioration...grr! and blogger is eating my posts/corrections!

Yawn. Stayed up all night watching Sopranos two nights ago, (I'm now on S2E11) which was kind of a stupid thing to do, considering I had a 3:30 appointment at the Apple store. As is usually the case when I don't get enough sleep, the daytime regular-business-hours part of the day is the worst of it. Trying to stay awake while watching TV or otherwise just sitting/reclining exacerbates the sleepiness too. Phone calls will help a little, thanks to those who unknowingly participated in that manner. Around 2:30 pm, I begin preparations (after having nodded off for about 20 minutes and being awoken to a phone call) to make my way to SouthPark, groggily brush my teeth, get dressed, load the car, and head over. Once there, I'm immediately perked up by the sights and smells of the mall (and partly by a large quad-espresso full-fat (whole milk is the only way to go) raspberry mocha.)

Once at the Apple store, despite having an appointment with Tracey (found out later that it was "Casey"), got stuck with IJ (short for Ijemoa, a dreadlocked black guy who's nice enough, but I've been warned is intermittently incompetent). Chatted with the guy about this and that, decided that I'd somehow lost the "hot-chicks-with-iPods" lottery at the Apple store (not a one walked in in the 2 hours I was there). End result of the visit is that my Powerbook is in for free screen replacement, to be returned to me in a week and a half or so, also got the guy to include the battery I burned out to try and get it replaced, but I think that's probably unlikely. The iBook probably doesn't need service (doesn't show any symptoms), but found out that Mikey will have until the middle of May to take it in under the logic board recall/service bulletin if he wants to. Now I just need to find him an AC adapter...this will be a pain in the ass, no doubt.

Upon arrival at mi casa, lounged on the veranda for a bit, (it was almost too hot) enjoyed the day's gorgeous weather that way...got an IM from Asian hottie Em back home, good to talk to her again...I miss some of the old crown gang, wonder how they're all doing...ahh, all those underage hotties back then...

Finally couldn't stay awake any longer at a little after 9pm, zonked out, slept until a little past 11am, and actually got up before noon, no small accomplishment there! Whipped up some breakfast/lunch, took a few phone calls, IMed with Mikey about iBook issues/shipping, going to shower and head out to run a few errands. Kel stopped by for exactly 23 seconds, looking very tired...there were a couple things I wanted to ask her, but she was here and gone so quickly that I can't think of what they were in time...hrm...guess I'll have to try calling her later; need to give her enough time to nap. Thought I should write a little something for today, so as to have a slightly shorter entry later/tomorrow. May try and make the later Perch show with the gang tonight, gotta make a couple calls to see who's in.

Back to the stone age...

So here I am minding my own business last night, when the power goes out. As it turns out, (as told to me by the flatmate) a garbage truck hit a pole and took no fewer than six accompanying lines with it. Power was out in excess of twelve hours. [Senseless griping about having to make do wihtout the modern amenities of civilized life edited for brevity.] Not that that had any impact on my sleeping habits. Up today at something like 4pm,

Weekend was great, as usual; partied Friday and Saturday nights, but knocked off relatively early both nights, and got some much-needed rest. Way overslept Sunday, but then spent the rest of the afternoon/evening at the resort, where we had some quality time with the gang, despite the absolutely crappy weather (incessant rain all night Sunday) rendering the hot tub all but unuseable. Forgot to bring my extra carton of ice cream home, and as a result, am espresso chip-free for the week. [Snif.]

It appears that there's an alarming lack of blogging action going on of late, on many fronts; dunno if there's some sort of universal cosmic blogging vaccuum or something like that going on. Maybe people are just out enjoying the weather.

I need to have a moment of silence here, as I've just discovered that I've inadvertently deleted some really good photos I'd taken with this blonde I was seeing for a while last year...there were only about 10-12 shots, but rare int hat I was happy with the vast majority of them. Normally I need to take about 300 to get a handful that I like, but it was a good day. Alas...going to mess with a couple data recovery programs, but I think they're gone.

So I've probably been watching way too much TV lately, enjoying on the relative luxury of my newish 15.2" widescreen baby. Took in The Incredibles last night prior to the power outage...man, what a fabulously written film...those Pixar boys continue to outdo themselves.

Finished up Sopranos season one, and I have to say that I respect them for not going to a cheeseball cliffhanger ending, although with the next episode cued up and ready to go, I'd have been in better shape to weather it than the normal 9-month wait. Starting into season two, I appreciate whoever's responsible for putting it in widescreen format. Aaaaah...widescreen goodness.

Going to try and make it in to the Apple store tomorrow (finally) to see the geniuses about the screen and logic board replacements, heard it's going to be quite nice...ought to head on down to Rock Hill and pick up the bike...Really need to get it moved over to Kel's for convenience's sake...aslo need to get my crazy-ass hair cut while I'm down on the Hill (never have heard why they call it that, there's nary a trace of hill to be seen there...) Probably wouldn't hurt to pick up some fruits and vegetables at the produce stand I like down there.

REALLY need to do taxes, give blood (damn, it's already wednesday, gonna have to wait until next week, again...sheesh), get the stuff moved over to Kel's, Send Laura's care package, and a host of other stuff. Won't bore y'all with the details, but suffice it to say that the list is lengthening. Ugh.

More soon, ciao...

Et tu, Jennifer? Et tu...

Twenty-three (minus six) reasons why Elektra is the worst movie ever:

Pros:

-Jennifer Garner running around in a skimpy bustier/corset thinger. This is an obvious pandering to the T&A-loving prepubescent boy demographic, but hey, what can I say, it's classic, and it works. Some of us never grow out of that stage.
-Not altogether crappy choreography in the first "training" fight/sparring sequence.
-Goran Visnjic...eye candy for the ladies, but goddamn, I keep thinking he's going to ask for a 100cc bolus, stat. (OK, I guess they don't really say "stat" much on er, and what I just said probably made no medical sense, but still.)
-Seems to pay homage to one of the finest films ever made, Leon: the Professional. Wait, when it's a blatant rip-off, is that homage? "No women, no kids...that's the rules."
-The fancy compound bow assembly scene is kind of cool and mechanical. But the actual thing looks stupid and geeky.

Cons:

-Crappy dialogue: "But I have nowhere to go!" Nigga, please.
-Crappy comic booky storyline
-Crappy character development
-Way too friggen "hollywood"
-Oh, but the hero has a tragic flaw! OCD? It's so Shakespearean!
-Jennifer Garner, while very hot, is in certain scenes here, the manliest hottie I've ever seen...except for maybe Linda Hamilton in the Terminator
-Terence Stamp as the old wizened martial arts master? WTF?
-Crappy dialogue "Whoa, how did you do that?" Bitch, I'm a superhero.
-Crappy dream/flashback sequences
-Can anyone really do one-handed pullups? is that humanly possible? Oh wait, superhero...forgot...
-Crappy dialogue "If you don't, I'll just keep breaking into your house." Oh, the shit be ON now.
-OMG, Goran Visnjic is the love interest! I didn't see THAT coming! Oh, the writing!
-Isn't there some superhero code that you're not supposed to just bust out your super powers all willy-nilly and in front of regular mundane non-superhero people?
-Crappy script/screenplay: OMG, she has to kill the love interest! but it's for a "lot of coin"(see next item)! Didn't see this plot element coming either!
-Crappy dialogue "But it's for a lot of coin!" Bitch betta ha-ah mah mon-NAY!
-Crappy over-the-top background music
-Crappy dialogue "this was back in...Baltimore"
-OK, can the Matrix "Bullet time" thing be any more played out? Come on guys, that's SO 1999.
-I really don't want to beat a dead horse here, but the dialogue is really really bad.
-I would LOVE to see this movie at Brew 'n View at the Vic in Chicago. (It's one of those places that serves beer and they play bad movies, and people yell smart-ass drunk remarks at the movie. Fun.)

-That guy balancing the coin on edge on his finger while he walks? If there's a bad-guy minion dork losers club, this guy is the president.
-Wow, bad guy hirearchal power struggle...the evil asian supernatural forces of evil (wait, asians are at the root of the evil forces in the universe? Ah, it all makes sense now...and the trainer of the forces of good are a blind white marital arts master...it's all beginning to gel...) have a fancy conference room with a mahogany conference table, this is too funny! And what about the name? "The Hand"?! The greatest evil geniuses in the universe, and the best they can do is "The Hand"?! Come on, there's got to be at least ONE evil copywriter/marketing guy in the world! Really, makes me think of the Jay/Silent Bob masturbation reference "the band of the hand". Teehee. I will say that the "kiss of death" chick ("Typhoid", (see? I couldn't make this shit up...this is weak, even by lower-than-life cheesy comic-book standards) Natassia Malthe) does have a mighty and fearful cleavage.I always knew I had a thing for Norwegian women...
-OK, it's starting to bug me that the only people in this who are adept at the martial arts are the white people...You don't see me making a movie about white basketball/football players, do you? Hrm? It's okay, really...it's not like we invented the goddamn martial arts or anything, sheesh. And yet there was no uproar from the NAACP...colored people, my ass. They should be the NAADCP, with the "D" standing for "darkly".
-Where's the justice in letting her agent guy stick around to fend off the uber baddies with a little tiny over/under shotgun?! For chrissakes, it's not even a pump-action or repeater! And movie people LOVE pump actions! Just cause she doesn't want to make out with him, it's OK to leave him to die? Women are so self-serving...

Holy crap. the bi hottie kissing action almost makes up for all the crappiness. Seriously, I was laughing just about the whole movie, then they lay this on me. I have to excuse myself for 38 seconds...be right back...and for heaven's sake ladies, let's have more tongue!

And no, no one urinated in my corn flakes...I woke up in a fabulous mood, this is really just that bad a film. However, I was definitely less inclined toward criticism after the girls kissing...maybe they should have started the film with it. And Ms. Garner really does have an incredible physique; abs, legs, back...noticed that repeatedly throughout the film...as well as a tangibly (almost caricatureish) swivel-hipped gait...yum.

Ah well, onward ho.

All over the place...

Earlier today, when I thought about it, I seemed to be under the impression that I had a bunch to write. Now, very nearly 12 hours later, I find that that's not necessarily the case any longer.

Awoke today to an IM from Kate (yes, THE Kate) asking me to call her. Turns out evrything's cool, just had a small favour to ask. It was good to talk to her, however briefly; we don't really keep in touch anywhere enough these days.

Threw together some pork chops for lunch, I really don't care for overdone meat, but the ubiquitous "they" say you should always fully cook pork. I like my steaks (beef) increasingly rare these days, and that's begun to bleed (no pun) into pork a little. I try to balance proper foodservice skills, lest I drop dead of some kind of foodborne illness. Anyway, hope I don't get trichinosis. They were tasty, but that's probably too dear a price to pay for juicy pork chops. Is it fairly obvious that I came home hungry? I don't normally obsess over food this much. Talking to the ex-girlfriend gets three lines, possible trichinosis (I love saying that) gets 7. Do I have my priorities straight or what?!

Have begun recruiting fellow Charlottans/charlatans (I'm so proud of that homophone, can you tell?) for the mass desencion on the Perch next Thursday, so if you live in or near Charlotte, beware, I will be bugging you about this. I must do the bidding of the talking baby.

Goddamn, I so need to cancel my AOL. These guys are such shysters; They're telling me that though I've had my AOL account and Screen Name, "GTChang" for well over 12 years now (never mind that I've only paid for the last half or so of that time), if I were to close my AOL account, I lose my screen names, and hence, my whole AOL/AIM buddy list. I haven't appreciably used my AOL acocunt or proprietary AOL services for anything but e-mail/IM for the last 13 or so months, and I think it's silly to pay $14.95/month for crappy e-mail that I never check! But I'm loathe to give up the screen name, because if anyone in the last 13 or so years from my past should get the sudden urge to call/find me, they'll be able to, as my e-mail address hasn't changed in forever.

Ah well, getting sleepy. more on this later. Ciao!

Keepin' the pimp hand strong...

The link in the topic comes from a time where Ames (Esq.) and I, while she was in law school in the StL and I had just started at the theater, (My god, way back in 2000? Crikey.) would stay up all night several times a week playing this online game, Pimp War, where the object was to amass as much cash as possible, have as many hoes as possible, back them up with thugs, and obliterate your fellow competing pimps. It sounds geeky, but it really is a highly dynamic game, and quite addicting. Ahh, good times. It'd be nice to get a few people together for a game, but it is a HUGE time sinkhole. And like the weekly poker games of my reckless youth, a moment in time never again to be recaptured. Oh, how fleeting, momentary, and underappreciated these gossamer moments in our lives are!


Today, my friends, was a good day. Perhaps like so many others in this boy's charmed and wonderous life, but a good day nonetheless, entitled to it's due recognition as such, and really, who are we to say otherwise? The sun was shining (a bit too brightly for my taste at noon, thankyouverymuch), it was absolutely balmy, and all is right with the world. Lounged about the abode, got out for a spot of lunch (after wishing wing-ed Ames the happiest of birthdays, tried to enjoy the weather, loaded up Laura's Mini 'pod and put it though its paces. 150 or so songs later, looks like barely 20% of the space is taken up. Nice. I thought I'd dislike the mini, but it's got a good feel to it, doesn't seem as susceptible to scratches, and there's soemthing to be said for the feel of cold brushed aluminum. Also took the opportunity to renew my memberships to Wired, Automobile, and Maxim, which had run out, figured I'd check out Razor, and finally, AutoWeek for Bah.

Funny link of the day: this video focuses on the advertising industry, but the truths contained therein are universal. Kinda like Office Space. I especially like the "Looking forward to sleeping with you" line. I guess I would.

Made/finalized plans to see the Perch gang again with D and Mo, and do our usual grab-a-bite-while-I-marvel-at-their-relationship thang, probably in that order.

First, we met at SouthPark mall, for the simple reason that it's the only landmark anywhere near central Charlotte that I can remember how to get to. Wandered around a bit after closing time in search of a civilized alternative to the bushes in the construction area unlit parking lot, chatted about Appa and the wauwatosans(? something like that...guess I'll find out soon enough...), monkeys, and the elusive "cabbie hat" worn by Gwen in the ND "Bathwater" video. Naturally, I had no idea what the hell the girls were talking about (story of my life), so as soon as I got home, I downloaded said video, and imagine my surprise when I find I was thinking of the entirely wrong video! (I had "Simple Kind of Life" in my mind's eye) I'd forgotten that Gwen is so hot in this one! (You were right D, it may well be one of their best videos...)

On the way over to the chortlefest, the ass warmers in the ghetto fabulous lex seemed to be appreciated by the dual hotties, who had apparently never been in the car with my unlicensed ass prior to (and perhaps subesequently, for that matter) today. Completely missed the originally planned 9pm show, between my chronic lateness, and D's...well, I was going to say workaholism, but it occurrs to me that I actually have no idea what held them up...suffice it to say that we way overshot the 9pm show, (didn't even meet at SouthPark til several minutes after 9) and it's just as well, because for the 10:30 show we eventually made, the Perch players completely ripped the 9pm crowd for being dead. That and there was a shocking preponderance of hotties at the 10:30 show. And more alcohol. I had no idea it was a BYO type of enviroment. Next time I'll know. Regardless of the late start, I'm utterly amazed by how much I enjoy completely mundane social/public situations with D (and D and Mo to a lesser, but equally shocking) degree.

Some points of discussion on tonight's performance:

-"Talking Baby/The Critics" has got to be the funniest shit ever conceived. Wish I'd seen them when they were on MTV2.

-I'm almost sad to report that there were no Asian jokes :( this time. We enjoyed a brief renaissance as the butt of the brunt of last visit's comedic episode, but were all but discarded (in favour of the Mexicans, no less) this time around.

-Of the usual two songs they do, last week had one exceptionally funny ("Asian Brad") and one not so funny. This week, one shone a little brighter, the Sharon Road/Ballantyne (to the tune of "Country Road", I think) song, as compared to "Viva My Fat Ass" (To "Viva Las Vegas").

-The fake product commercials are amusing and fairly clever.

-A couple sketches were just like "huh?" and some were groaners, but all in all, a very very funny show.

Much hipper crowd this time out, might just have been due to it being the later, more relaxed smoking/drinking show. On the way out, I was pressured into spanking Quay, the big black guy in the troupe, for a group photo...I feel so used!

So to my Charlottan (charlatan?) friends, we're doing the Perch next Thursday. Or perhaps the week after that. Be there or...or...be lame and/or ridiculed in your absence.

Had the sustenance diversion at what is becoming our "regular" post-Perch hangout, San Remo's, (on...Sharon Amity?) wherein all manner of critical topics were discussed, such as: playing "bullshit" with drunk/altered friends, (Gotta teach/introduce Mo to Beirut (and don't ask me why they call it that, I have no idea)), an invitation to journey to scenic and hippie-infested Boone, NC, the realization (of others, not me) that I need to begin a career as a male escort (WHY does this keep coming up lately?! But the interesting new twist du jour is that D's of the impression that male escorts actually charge MORE? How can that be right? wouldn't there be a huge glut of slutty men posing as "professionals"? More research is called for...), D's upcoming prom date (tee hee) and various sundry appurtenances required herewith.

Overall, I had a fabulous time, we need to do this more often...

Definitely need to get over to the Apple store tomorrow or Monday...Tuesday at the latest! Gotta see a man about a horse, or somesuch. Also need to head down to Rock Hill and get the 'fro trimmed/hacked off. Never heard from Kel, so I guess the furniture/bike moving isn't going on tomorrow. Just as well, I prefer to sleep anyway. The to-do list is rapidly getting out of control here...haven't even given blood yet, and already took the credit in the form of Ro's "ooh" comment a day or two ago, and I haven't corrected her yet... Maybe this next week...

Been at this for far too long...off to bed...

Lazy Sunda...er...Wednesdays...

No news today other than that it was absolutely gorgeous out and I lounged out on the veranda all afternoon. Joy.

Aside from that, spent some time on the phone, worked on the TiBooks, watched some Huff, ate, watched Ray, showered, wrote this, and now it's off to bed.

Spoke briefly to Kel today, looks like I finally have somewhere nearby to keep the VMax...so I'll possibly be making a trip down to Rock Hill on Friday afternoon(?) to retrieve it. If not Friday, then soon thereafter, as I'm itching to get out and ride...it's been a long winter.

As an aside, I just love it when D gets all gushy! :) I'm sure we're all just glad it's spring. I know I am.

Looks like another fine day tomorrow, perhaps I'll write more from the sunny veranda. But then again, I wouldn't count on it either.

Relative productivity...

Now Playing: Mystikal - Ghetto Fabulous

Clearly, I've got WinAMP on "Random", with the full entirety of the playlist from which to choose. Mystikal is pretty funny as rap guys go, and the musix generally isn't bad either, especially as compared to the rest of the R&B/rap world.

Got up a little late today, but to a couple select morsels of good news:

-D was free and cashing in a BC (to borrow a page from Rosie's book of cute asian colloquialisms) visit for tonight.
-My PowerBook had arrived while I slept, along with Laura's Mini 'pod.

The [potentially] bad news is that while my notebook's date of manufacture falls within the screen replacement recall period, the serial number, for some reason, does not. So I need to go into the Apple store and see if I can wrangle myself a new screen. Wish me luck. Perhaps I should enlist the help of one of my hotter bustier female friends to come along as visual persuasion? Mike pointed out that the iBook I've got (that he's thinking about buying) is also subject to/eligible for recall service. It falls within the manufacture date AND serial ranges, but doesn't exhibit any of the symptoms listed in the recall. This will either be a very fruitful or very aggravating trip to Apple.

Ran over to Sears for a couple/three Torx wrenches with which to perform surgery on the TiBooks (T6, T8 and T9, in case you were interested). Took the opportunity to wander Carolina Place mall, and while the mall itself doesn't do much for me (layout is uninspired and barely has any stores I'd frequent), there does seem to be a preponderance of skanky women, which always makes for a more pleasurable shopping experience.

Been trying to run down the half charge in the mini 'pod, so that I can properly perform a couple/few initial conditioning charges, but without any songs loaded, it keeps going to sleep every couple minutes, and I'm finding that this is a VERY tedious way to drain the battery, even at half charge.

Visit with D was fabulous, it's been far too long since we've had any quality time. We got to catch up a bit on one another's goings-on, as well as M's recent news. Made plans to try and see the Perch again on Thursday night, possibly with "M's Gene" (Isn't that cute?!) She also offered to put me in touch with a friend who's a contractor in Myrtle Beach...not sure how feasible that'll be, but a friend of a friend is a good place to start, especially since it looks like the GC is something that has to be farmed out, would obviously rather have someone I can trust...

Took the better part of the evening (say 12am-4:30am) to finally figure out how to burn the OS X install disc images to get the damn things to mount properly and do the installation. So now while I'm waiting for CDs to burn, and OSes to install, I'm afforded a few minutes with which to blog.

Guess today wasn't the day for the elusive better post either. Keep reading, I've got to be due pretty soon!

The ides of March...

...on or around the twenty-second, or how everything I do tends to be late...

Four-thirty am, and I just remembered that I had yet to write a blog post!

Fabulous weekend, as usual, entailed party Saturday night, quite crowded/happening at the club. Had some more of the wrong kind of attention, it seems I'm no better at saying "no" than I was a couple few weeks ago; still ends up sounding like a lame excuse...gotta watch more closely as the girls defer unwanted advances with grace and learn from their example.

Sunday recovery at the resort was spectacular, with the first day of spring giving a tantalizing taste of the impending summer season...good times lie ahead! Got a surprise (and very welcome) call from D extolling the beauty of the weather Sunday afternoon, had a fabulous dinner of Old Bay steamed shrimp, deliciously prepared and masterfully grilled skirt steaks (never had that cut before, it was quite good), tasty spinach salad, basmati rice, Edy's Espresso Chip ice cream, and turtle pie. Yum.

Whittled the night away chatting with a couple new friends, and the usual gang of older dear friends, some back from being absent for far too long (two weeks?) Enjoyed the hot tub, a roaring bonfire, gorgeous evening, hilarious anecdotes, and even more bonding with people who are becoming more and more dear every passing day. Life is indeed good.

Monday: chatted with Mike a bit on the feasibility of building a house, having him design, and potentially trying to do as much work on it myself as possible. Need to look into finding some architectural magazines/books to get some ideas. Not having owned enough (any) houses from which to base what I like and don't like being the main problem with this plan. Initally, however, things don't look too promising; based on my first(and very rough) here-are-just-some-random-numbers-to-get-us-started estimates of 2500-3000 heated square feet, probably two-story dwelling with 1.5-2 car attached garage, and perhaps another 2-2.5 car detached garage with basic 2-bedroom apartment, the number off the top of his head, "doing it on the chap" was $200K, probably closer to $250 to do it more properly. Then figure in that architects/planners always underestimate, so it's probably safe to add another 20-30% for estimation's sake, and that's in addition to land costs. Yikes. On the plus side, similarly sized homes (without the two-car detached gar/apt thing) are on the market for $300-400K. Sure, living on the lake would be beyond idyllic, but is it worth spending big-city resifential bucks in Charlotte? More research is required, as is more conversation with Mike. Come to find out architectural firms get around $2/htd. sq ft. just to design the place, it's no wonder they end up costing so much. Then we kicked around the idea of putting off the detached garage til later, then realized that getting the detached garage up first would be the most cost effective way to get the place liveable, while construction of the main building could then theoretically be done semi leisurely, thus taking the pressure of needing to finish it quickly in order to live in it completely and indefinitely off. Much, much more research and planning is called for here. More on this later...

Got a call from FedEx at 8pm, Laura's PowerBook had arraived at the Depot, and I had 30 minutes to get dressed and head down there. Turns out our boy Dan the seller find yet another way to screw this up, by shipping via the wrong service class. Lovely, cost me an additional $40 or so over and above the original shipping allotment to pick the thing up. Debating how much of an ass to be to the seller over this oversoght. I reviewed my last email to him and I specifically listed all the shipping specifications. Grr! Spent the rest of the night trying to figure out how to install Mac OS X updates, and possibly burning out/frying one of the spare batteries. Grr, this shouldn't be so difficult! Maybe it'll go easier once I get some sleep and attack it with a clear head/fresh perspective. The silver lining is that the unit is in excellent shape, and seems to run pretty well, so Laura should be very happy with it, if I can ever get it over to her...Now when the hell's mine going to get here? It's been a week for Chrissakes! I haven't even heard fromt he guy...might be time to pen the threatening letter. People don't like to have to pay charegebacks. Bastard!

Need to give blood this week, and start doing taxes...I think that if I don't get them in on time, I lose another year's refund. Damnation! Get motivated!

Off to bed, better post tomorrow hopefully.

March madness...

Now playing: Mike Ness/Social Distortion - Don't Think Twice, transitioning into Social D - Ball and Chain.

Awoke to an early-morning (early for me...11am) phone call today, and it literally took the combination of the first appearance of the sun in a week and the urgently sultry whisperings of a lusted after/dearly loved one to get me motivated to go outside and visit with civilization. So I fought the urge to go back to bed for a little while, until the wakefulness of the day took hold. Needless to say, it took a smidge longer than I thought, and I didn't actually get out and about until well after 13:00. Fortunately, however, rather than being subject to my rather haphazard and disjointed plans of swinging by Best Buy, CompUSA, and the Apple Store, then maybe getting some pizza for breakfast/lunch, and maybe finally washing the car, I get an e-mail from a buddy with very nearly the exact same destinations and plan. Serendipity, baby!

To make a long story only very slightly less long, weirdness of weirdnesses, I spent the better part of the day doing geek shopping ("playing computer", as someone called it), drinking, and ogling women with my girlfriend's husband. How strange is that? Someday, maybe today, someone I know will read this and be completely shocked, perhaps with adverse consequences. However, I'm pretty sure that I've limited distribution of this URL to those who mightn't flip out at any random thing. Therefore, I make the assumption that those who choose to read this tripe have some inkling of the sordid state of my affairs (no pun), and the slutty events which pepper and, of late, define, my life, so eh. Unless its you, Bah...in that case, I'm only kidding, please don't disown and/or write me out of the will, I'm still the more pious son by a landslide. Then to make matters worse, or at least the story more interesting, prior to meeting up with him at CompUSA, through a combination of coincidental timing, my crappy-ass phone, some subliminal/unconscious evil undertones, and just a dash of chemical X, the three of us ended up on a bizarre (yet kinda hot in a twisted way) conference call. We are SO going on Springer next week. Somewhere in (an)other parallel universe(s), the alternate Gene is totally busted after the day's events, and all the other us(es? what's the plural form of "us"?) are going to need some combination of: therapy, police intervention, distracting alternative vice (like say gambling), alcohol/hard liquor, LOTS more bullets/shells/ammunition, possibly a bunch of reassuring hugs, and/or a ton of lube. Here's to hoping all goes well, this one's definitely the best scenario. Sorry alternate Genes, sucks to be you.

So headed to CompUSA, shopped a little there, got "help" from some retail automatons who were labelled "knowledgeable" and "expert" but were of absolutely no help whatsoever, leaving us to find our own solutions to problems Apple didn't know we had, or something like that. Joy. Next up, SouthPark Mall, Late (16:00) lunch at the Cheesecake Factory, where one of us was strongarmed by the cute waitress Megan, into a lunch of fish tacos (I am NOT making this up, nor unfortunately, is that a euphemism for anything else). I had a burger. Much fat was chewed, and I've made the determination (or had prior determinations reinforced) that I need to introduce D to these guys, as her hot brainiac side will mesh perfectly with this bunch, and Laura/Melik to these guys as well, as their idealistic ideological socioeconomic views seem to be perfectly in-sync. Laura, when you read this in fifteen weeks or however long it is until you'll be home, I need a copy of that book we talked about to pass around here.

At the risk of repeating msyelf from a couple days ago, there are some GORGEOUS women at this mall, yum. More research! After getting our fill of Cheesecake Factory eye candy, some perhaps not quite ready for primetime, if you catch my gist, we wander over to the Apple store, by way of Belk, where it's noted that this, at least from outward appearances, might seem to totally be a bad gay date gone horribly wrong. I attest that I'm definitely not going to be mistaken for gay, having come out (poorer wording I could not imagine)in total slovenly bum mode, and that if he didn't want to be mistaken, he shouldn't dress so stylishly. Again, through no fault of mine. Couple of attractive blondes at the Apple Store, although one was looking somewhat forlorn at the Genius Bar (apparently, one of the lesser Geniuses had, or was in the process of botching (or had botched) her repair and/or computer.) The other one looked far more promising, sporting an enormous rock, a cute English or possibly Aussie accent, and suitable shopping bags from Louis Vuitton and Burberry. It was everything I could do to not call her "mommy" and follow her home.

Aftre all that exhausting people (girl) watching, refreshments were needed, and we headed over to Selwyn Pub on (duh) Selwyn Blvd. There, we sat next to a table of nubile, corn-fed midwestern girls, no doubt chock-full of the "Iowa Goodness(tm)" that I hear so much about. And they were from Iowa State, the alma mater of a couple dear dear friends of mine. In trying to remember ANY shred of information about my one trip to beautiful Ames, Iowa, all I could come up with was that the Cardinal mascot's name was Cy. The Cyclone. Of the Cyclones. Don't ask me what anything has to do with anything else, I have no idea how collegiate sports work. The only other thing I could remember was that one of the residence halls was called Buchanan Hall, and that the large contingent of Asian students there had, for some unknown reason, an absolute inability to pronounce "bue-CAN-an", but instead called it "BOOOK-a-non", and this apparently entertained mindless/drunk midwestern farm boys (and girls) to no end. Determining that those two snippets of info wouldn't be enough to grant us entry into the sanctuary of the hot brunette's and the semi-hot far blonde with glasses' company. Pity. Instead, we were left to debate exactly how much they obviously wanted us. Commence with badgering Ham and Jen to come out and join us, (we haven't seen them in far too long!) have a few drinks, and decide to take our pub crawl/creep/drive to Champs on Park Road. Holy crap, was it crowded! Tons of loud Syracuse fans, enough Dale Earnhardt memorabilia to stock the eventual Mars NASCAR hall of fame museum, and the worst service in recent memory couldn't dampen our enjoyment of the evening. Some time thereafter, we're joined by the GF/wife, and continue to have an even grander (and less latently homosexual) time.

Picked up my iPod today, and while I don't have my powerbook yet, so I can't tweak or really play with it at all, I have the benefit of there being 36GB of music on it already, not all of it bad! There are so far a number of albums in particular that are totally taking me back! I'm gonna love having this thing, thanks again to the very gracious seller for cutting me such a sweet-ass deal. Can't wait to get the PowerBook and really be able to tweak this thing. Life is going to be very grand very soon.

Here are a couple links for the day, than it's off to bed with me:

My baby Gwen in the Russian GQ, isn't she dreamy?: clicky
Marginally clever Heineken ad: clicky
Aesthetically pleasing (aren't they all?) Vic's ad: clicky

For chrissakes, enjoy yourselves! It's going to be nice here, here's to hoping it's that way wherever y'all are too. Never did get to wash the car...hrm...perhaps tomorrow...

Crazy-ass shenanigans...

Nice festive word for the day, eh? "shenanigans", heh...

Another slow news day, as it were...

Laura ordered her iPod mini today, should be here early next week, I've agreed to purchase mine, should have it in my grubby hands this weekend. It's kind of creepy how helping people buy stuff lately has resulted in me buying the items as well...what's going on here? She's got a green 4GB 2G mini on the way, and mine's the 40GB 4G clicker iPod classic. You know people are going to start calling the original one the "classic", I'm just ahead of the curve, for once, since I'm the last person on the face of the planet to get an iPod. (Damn those bastard Joneses! Always ahead of me!) Next week should be a good week for getting toys in the mail, it'll be like Christmas, yay!

Learned a lot about iPods and PowerBooks on the internet today, with the notable exception, of course, of what it was that I actually needed to know/was truly looking for. Grr.

Turns out the newer PowerBooks (not sure which ones just yet) actually have accelerometers built into them, how cool is that? From what I can find, it appears that they're designed to sense sudden speed increases (as in a drop situation), where they then issue "park" commands to the drive heads. This is bad-ass! Someone's found a way to tap into the output of the chip, and integrated it into an iTunes playback control called Bumptunes. Now if only we could take that information, and find a way to output it into a graphing/datalogging hybrid software package, we could take our powerbooks out to our cars on race day, strap them in for the ride, and we'd have the effectual duplication of the R34 Skyline GT-R's accelerometer display! (I should find a video of this in action and link it so y'all could know what the hell I'm talking about.) Suffice it to say that it's a feature that if I had in my car, I'd be wrecking it as fast as they could put it back together. Anyway, here's another more interesting and in-depth article about it, complete with illustrative applets. Skip, we need to chat about possible practical applications of this find.

Along those lines, I've discovered a bit of a geek tech blog in interconnected.org Haven't read much of it, but what I did read was very interesting. Brainiac geek stuff that's hella cool, but way over my head, fun.

Some other sites I've found in the course of my research are:

-ipodlounge.com, a site for all things iPod. Reviews, articles, forums, hacks, you name it. way more information than I could absorb in a reasonable amount of time.

-replica G5 PowerMac THIS guy has WAY too much time on his hands. This and the second accelerometer link were found on applefritter.com, a site seeming devoted to geekier apple stuff like hacks and tech and such. Haven't looked around much other than those two articles.

-ipodhacks.com - More hacks I haven't had a chance to look at.

-ipodbattery.com - iPod replacement batteries, along with rudimentary instructions (and too-small photos) for iPod disassembly. 4G, 3G, 2G/1G, and Mini. Be warned, however...if you're like me and feel the urge to take stuff apart simply because you can, and want to see if you can get it operationally reassembled, it's not my fault if you break your shit. I can barely keep my own things working after compulsory disassembly. As an aside, it amazes me how much juice they're able to pack into little tiny batteries these days several hundred to over a thousand mAh in a couple ccs worth of space? Amazing!

-everymac.com has a comprehensive specification listing of every mac ever made, along with estimated current market pricing. They're a little on the optimistic side on that market value range, but it's a good tool and reference if you're shopping/researching.

Oh yeah, good post on rollertrain today. Check it out.

Had every intention of getting out of the house and actually being out and productive today, but got bogged down with IMs and research, bleh. Tomorrow I'm getting out early for sure! Won't be answeringing IMs, either, dammit. Call me if you need something, I mean it! Not responding to IMs!

VERY glad I'm composing in Word tonight, friggen crap-ass pages on myspace.com keep crashing my browser, causing me to lose various e-mails and things I'm working on piecemeal. HTML isn't something kids should be playing with!

I think that'll do it for tonight...caouple more things I wanted to talk about, but 5am is rapidly approaching, and I'm getting sleepy. Happy after-the-fact paddy's day. Hope the green beer doesn't mess with your poop. ZzzZzzzzZZz.

Ahh, the smell of commerce...

Another drab, rainy day here in the Carolinas...this is starting to feel like life in the north...

Didn't manage to get a whole lot accomplished, on account of the normally pathetic lack of motivation being further dampened (no pun) by the dreariness of the day.

Finally got down to SouthPark and the Apple store there, but I think I was too late to catch most of the uber hotties I seem to hear so much about, alas. Stopped by CompUSA (which turned out as just a couple miles from me) just prior and perused the newest techie offerings that our consumer-oriented marketplace has to offer. It also got me shaking my proverbial fist at this poor man's unemployed lifestyle. Since I'm a sucker for marketing, and materialistic to the nth degree, and thus unable to keep up with my insatiable need for toys and gadgets. That new 30" Studio Display LCD monitor almost gives me an erection, it's so pretty! The only thing better than having one would be to have two parked side-by-side on my crappy milk carton pseudo-desk. Yum! I suppose I could always sell a kidney...

All this Apple fixation has prompted me to go on a search for cool mac programs to pirat...er, I mean download, try, then purchase...yeah, that's it. I don't even know what some of these are for, nor if I even have any remote use for them, but they looked cool at the Apple store and/or on the demo machines there. So far on the list are OS X 10.4, Adobe Creative Suite and Microsoft Office '04, and iLife '04 to start, of course. Logic Express 7, Final Cut Pro HD 4.5, Apple Motion, DVD Studio Pro 3, Toast 6, Limewire PRO 4, Virtual PC 7, and Finale '04. Let me know if I'm missing any killer apps out there that a budding mac guy needs to have.

Arrived at the mall at around 20:30, and it was surprisingly dead...by 21:05, it was almost completely empty...never saw a mall clear out on time like that, stragglers are generally in there for a good 30-40 minutes past closing time, the bastards! Of the relatively small crowd, and even of the employees, I must say that the percentage of attractive people seems disproportionately high. I do have to say that I really like the feel of this place, it's upscale, and the environs are quite nice. Of the malls I've visited here so far, this one is really more my speed. Last one I was at had an ice-skating rink in the center...very novel idea, but the mall itself seemed to be in a bit of an identity crisis, and the clientele was a little shady. Plus, SouthPark seems to have all my favorite stores upon cursory inspection...Apple, Nordstrom, BR, Maggiano's, Morton's (Which I think is one of the original Chicago steakhouses) and Tiffany(!) with Neiman Marcus on the way. It's also run by Simon, which is probably one of the better mall management companies out there...heck, I don't even remember some of the other crappier ones I used to deal with. The first and most recent time I was here, it was still under construction (renovation?) in some parts, and I was just meeting a friend for dinner at the Cheesecake Factory, and I was as usual, running late, so I didn't get much of a chance to walk around. Perhaps if I'm up at a normal hour, I'll wander on down there and hang out for a bit, peruse the bored suburban upscale wife offerings over a full-fat, whole milk mocha. I wish my stupid PowerBook would get here already, so I'd ostensibly have a reason to be there, grr!

Being in a mall again though, especially one as upscale and generally nice as SouthPark, has reawakened a bit of the money-grubbing capitalist in me though, along with the occasional desire to be obscenely wealthy. Unfortunately, I'm a bit like the underwear gnomes from South Park (television program here, not the mall) where their business plan invloved three steps:

1) Obtain underwear
2) ?
3) Profit

My plan similarly lacks that critical middle step. Need to get cracking on it though, if I'm going to retire by 35, that doesn't leave me much time.

Talked to Laura for a pretty good spell, I miss having her within phone's reach (especially where international rates are not in play!) Talked for quite a bit, while I was leaving the Apple store and going to Wal*Mart to see if they sold iPods, wandered around "wallyworld" for like an hour chatting about all kinds of things, catching up in general, reminiscing, etc. *sigh* I need to get back to London! Finally either a wandering signal or my crappy phone resulted in my getting discoed like 8 times in 10-15 minutes, so I finally walked out with nothing and she talked me home, where we shopped and researched some more online. Ahhh, screw brick-and-mortar!

Laura, darling, if you should see this before you get on the plane to the MX, have a safe journey, godspeed, don't drink the water, and say "hi" to Michelle for me...bon voyage!

Get to see D and M tomorrow night, going to try and coordinate another Perch outing...here's to hoping they do the Asian Brad song again and I can surrepeticiously record it for posterity. Find another greasy spoon perhaps afterwards, and drool over that which I cannot have (at that juncture). It's deliciously torturous, but makes the next time all that much better. *sigh* Let's all pray that when the next time rolls around, that I won't be too late to enjoy the fruits of the build-up.

Finally, today's (ever growing, it's a work in progress) T&A link is here. Yum. Hasta manana, gringos!

Questionable newsworthiness...

Not a whole lot going on today, getting just a tad bit antsy, paid and dutifully e-mailed both PowerBook sellers yesterday, haven't heard a peep from either in well over 24h. Deep, steadying breaths, calm blue oceans...

Got an IM this morning on a March Wired magazine article on the originas and controversy over Wikipedia, one of my more precious recent research-type time sinkhole site discoveries. Anyway, in this article, I found an amusing and apropos quote:

"Recovery may take 12 steps, but becoming a junkie requires only four. First comes chance - an unexpected encounter. Chance stirs curiosity. Curiosity leads to experimentation. And experimentation cascades into addiction."

Cute, huh? (And no Amy, this does NOT constitute an admission of any kind! Just a little humour.)

Grand plans for the day included going to give blood, I'm a couple months overdue on this, (I seem to be a couple months behind on everything, wonder if there's a theme...) I'd really hoped to get back on the cycle of giving every X number of weeks (7? 9?), as soon as one is allowed to do so. I think it's good karma to do this, plus it can't be a bad thing to train one's body to stay on the higher the blood cell production schedule, right? There's some kind of flawed logic there, perhaps.

Instead of the above possibilities, however, spent the afternoon attempting to bail Larry (high school buddy) out of an adware/spyware induced computer fog. Like doing computer stuff over the phone with my father, Larry also seems to be gifted with the unique ability to make electronic devices and computer software perform completely outside of their specified parameters and give completely random and unexpected results.

Speaking of Larry, in honour of an excel spreadsheet he forwarded me several years ago that basically did the same thing, but not web-enabled, here's a link to the Mueller Tourney. I can't believe I was bored enough to finish it. Angelina Jolie won in mine. Funny though, makes you think about how inherently flawed this sytem is for certain kinds of determinations.

In related news, perhaps of only marginal interest are these recent articles on how Angelina Jolie and Jessica Alba both seem to be, at least from these interviews, into very casual and/or random types of sex. Definitely a step in the right direction, but no word on their respective views on unemployed Asian guys. Developments as they become available. Wonder if there's any correlation to their being my two final choices left in that tourney thinger? The mind boggles. Angelina really only barely edged out Jessica because she'd probably be kinkier. Jessica is a smidge hotter, but that on its own might get old. So the moral of the story is that it's still better to be some combination of slutty, kinky and hot (even if it's bordering on freakish) than hot and slutty, but unadventurous.

Further proof that you can take the girl out of the trailer, but not the other way 'round:

Can anyone explain to me why anyone would buy a car with a base price well in excess of $100K, only to stick a goddamned pine-tree air freshener in it?! What, does the smell of Connolly leather and hand-finished burlwood make you sick? No class, these people, I swear. Both of them need to be taken out back and beaten to within an inch of their lives, I don't care if she is Britney. White guys with cornrows and rap clothing need to be systematically dealt with on a genocidal scale.

Interesting post on Rollertrain today on ageism in the porn industry, featuring perhaps my favorite blog quote of the day, "DAYUMN! Who dat old bitch is?" (I can practically hear Brian (ex husband of a marginal friend here, was at a party with him once) exclaiming that, he's the most flamboyant, allegedly straight southern man I've met since moving to the Carolinas; "is" is pronounced more bi (no pun) syllabically, like "EE-yez".) I don't talk enough like this in my everyday life. It's almost like hip hop confederate Yoda.

T&A link of the day is here. Good god, I miss Vegas. I guess these are from the '04 ('03?) AVN Awards...I need to get out to the '06 WinterCES (Consumer Electronics Show), so I can hit the AVN Awards too while I'm there. Sigh. Perhaps one day soon I'll get over the stigma of looking like an ass in them, and finally find the courage to re-release my mid-nineties photos with porn star chicks...perhaps some of you have seen them already, they're out there on the internet, just not widely publicized.

Downloaded Limewire PRO for PC and Mac today, and I have to say, it seems to be MUCH less of a resource hog (at least in PC testing) than the non-paid version. Of course now that I have the "turbocharged" abilities enabled by the PRO pack, I can't think of a blasted thing to download. Hrm.

Very disjointed entry today, compeltely devoid of cohesiveness. Where's my Ritalin?

I _know_ I'm forgetting something...

Bleh, waited far too long to start writing tonight, this won't be long...let's see what I can get down prior to zonking out:

Saturday night finds us at the club with a slightly abbreviated group, as was the case last week, but still managed to have an incredible time. Club was surprisingly crowded though, didn't really expect that. Finally met the elusive D/N pair, who turned out to be every bit as much fun as represented. Looking forward to lots of fun times with these guys.

Out-of-context I-wish-I-hadn't-accidentally-overheard-it" snippet of conversation of the weekend:

"It's something I got when I got my divorce."
"Ah, so it was a celebratory thing then?"
"No, [I was still having sex, but] I got it to celebrate the event."

Add to the fact that it was ill-timed with what I was doing at the time, damn near made me laugh out loud at a most inopportune time. That would have been bad.

Spent a goodly part of Sunday enjoying the unseasonably warm weather on the shores of Lake Norman, Lunch at the Rusty Rudder, where one can motor one's boat right up to their dock and fuel-while-you-chow-down...how's that for convenience? My future 29' (I'm not greedy) Sea-Ray cabin cruiser would look mighty fine parked there with disembarking bikini-clad women bounding up the pier ramp to collect our calamari and "hot hole wings", (I didn't make up the name, damnit) yum. Good food, glorious day, idyllic locale, with some lovely scenery to accompany lunch. I'm almost completely convinced to take up lake life...

Post lunch, head back to the resort, walk down to the lake for an early spring blazingly red sunset/glassily tranquil waters photo op featuring Marley the rock-retrieving happy black lab and all his happy friends. Lake life is indeed good, and every bit as enticing as one could imagine.

The rest of the evening is comprised largely of ebullient conversation, effervescent hot tubbing, energetic but effete questing for midnight dining fare, erudite musings on the nature of people, and energetic consumption of decadent Brewster's turtle ice cream, and enervated television viewing.

Monday: Squandered the day researching iPod deals, cell phone calling plans, being generally lazy, attempting to pay for TiBook purchases, looking for my David Sedaris books, coming up with a list of stuff I need to do tomorrow/the rest of the week, etc. Stopped off at Sam's club and impulse purchased a giant bag (5 lb) of honey BBQ wings and they suckered me into a giant (4 lb) bag of crappy fish sticks (never shop on an empty stomach, remember?) by having a kindly old lady handing out yummy crispy breaded and fried hunks of pure artery-clogging goodness. Damn those kindly old ladies! My freezer is packed to the gills! Chatted with D about another possible Perch outing and some well-deserved (for both of us for being so patient/good!) playtime...can't wait for either!

Don't remember exactly when it came up, but I did research the last time we saw K and C, and it appears that y'all were correct, it probably was Valentine's weekend, and not "a week or two ago", as I claimed...no clue WTH I was thinking. What can I say, the weekends all go by so fast that I can't tell them apart! Lucky I didn't bet my fortunes on it, eh? ;) Sorry if I implied that y'all had faulty memories...we all know that that's MY affliction.

This weekend has been a case study in dichotomous learning: meeting new friends has helped me to remember the best parts of meeting new people, and feeling the rush of shared chemistry and liking what one learns about a person in the getting-to-know-you phase. Conversely, time spent with established friends serves only to strengthen said bonds, in deeper and more profound ways than previously thought possible. Do I seem to say this every other or third weekend? Damn, reading this blog must be getting old, I need new material...

Once again, sorry for the preponderance of typos, grammatical atrocities, I still haven't looked over the last entry, either...one of these days, I'm going to get motivated to go through and proofread...one of these days...

If ever there's been a time...

...that I don't feel quite up to blogging, but yet still have that pressing need to do so, this would be it.

First off, by way of Laura's notebook nightmare update, we've missed the boat entirely...It's now officially too late to get it in time for her visit, will need to make other arrangements to get it to her upon her return to the UK. Oh well, more time to do a proper job of preparation, perhaps we can now get her hooked up with the iPod and send everything over as a functional and cohesive unit. On the plus side, I did manage to win the auction for _MY_ new (sorta) Powerbook Titanium as well, so we're both proud new simultaneous owners of TiBooks, woohoo!

Skip posted a comment to my Chicago Reader mention yesterday, but since the comments are kind of hit and miss for follow-up, and a complete question mark as to readership, I'll post my response here: Damn you for mentioning all those other things I miss about Chi! Now I'm homesick! I definitely pick Edwardo's for stuffed (as opposed to deep dish, worlds apart, lecture for another day) pizza over Gino's East (never could get used to their "sheet" approach to sausage...patties shouldn't be 14" in diamater...),Uno, Due, Lou Malnati's, and uh...what's that other place...crap...now it's going to bug me. Clubs...never been to Exit, but drove/rode past it about a billion times, always wanted to check it out, heard good things about it. Metro was the one where I'd go see concerts and such with the teenybopper crowd. Missed going to places like Medusa (High school hangout when I was in high school) and the Double Door (legendary Chicago venue), kick myself for the latter...a bygone era, indeed... *sigh* overly homesick...more on Chicago greatness later.

Did my first night volunteering at the club, ended up being there for over ten hours...worked for about four, giving tours and such, was a hoot, got to meet a bunch of people, etc., was reintroduced to Monica and company, then partied for the next six or so. What a night! if you see me or run into me via IM, ask me what happened. Managed to get some reluctant partygoers out of their home to join in on the fun. Thanks for coming out guys, much fun was had by all, I hope! Moni was asking if y'all had a good time long after your departure. It was insane, and I have no idea where I'm getting the higher brain function to type this. (I'm sure we'd see if we had a tape of this asylum escapee trying to blog with inadequate sleep...) I'm sure I'll be poring over this entry looking for typos tomorrow, this will just be one big huge mess.

Nothing like people you've either just met or are just getting re-acquainted with tell you what a lucky bastard you are to really drive the point home.

Haha, goddamn...no sooner do I mention her here and link to her blog than what should she do, but selectively copy-and-paste my ass into an ADHD stalkerly looking type...I wonder who "GC" in the dialogue on March 12th's entry is? Haha, I'm always happy to give my friends the benefit of an IM ego stroking. Seriously though, I love Ro to death, and wish she would get the motivation to tell her employer to "fuck off for a weekend, I'm going to Charlotte to get crazy with Gene and crew!" And I can't believe she said I was her BC...damnit, SHE was MY BC! Oh well, I guess it was what it was, heh...we probably used one another to an extent. Definitely my favorite from a short list of Asian playmates...Miss you Ro! Get your ass down here already!

I think I've somehow managed to sprain my wrist...go easy on me for a while, ladies!

That'll be it for no, my pillow/bed's siren song calls to me. Can't...keep...eyes...open...Bon weekend, friends.

Intense spellcheck and grammar review (of this entry) tomorrow, don't be alarmed in the meantime!

Party in my bansoo...

OK, powerbook seller guy is seriously pissing me off. After skimming over yesterday's rant, I'm loathe to give this subject any more airtime, but this guy is serioulsy imbecilic. I send him the full amount plus my half of his whiny little $13 service charge, via a PayPal credit card payment, and the moron DECLINES THE PAYMENT. He then writes me this completely maddening e-mail basically explaining that he thought he could accept the one payment with the service charge, and not convert to a business account and basically he's an idiot (not in so many words,) and that he's terribly sorry, blah blah blah. Great. So I write him back explaining that ideally, he should keep his personal account and open a business account, since once you convert to a business account, PayPal takes a percentage of everything you bill (don't get me started on that shyster practice), and going forward, only use the business account for items that will surpass the $500/mo limitation of the personal account. That way, he can keep selling higher-dollar items, without having to give up a slice of every pie that goes through. Here's to hoping that the little light comes on in his head before the burning insulation smell hits...

This is all further proof of that universal maxim that no good deed goes unpunished. We'll see how this turns out...either way, it'll all be over in a matter of days. On the plus side though, while shopping for potential backup Laura/Hazel units, I might have come across a sweet little deal for myself: an 867MHz Ti PowerBook with a dodgy LCD screen. Exactly the problem outlined in this technical service bulletin/recall notice. The upshot? Potential for last-generation Ti PowerBook on the cheap, with Apple footing the bill for a brand-new LCD screen...generally, if you schmooze the tech guy, they'll take the opportunity to tune-up the unit at the same time; go through it and shore up/replace questionable components, etc. while they're under the hood on the company dime. Downside is that unlike cars, the mechanic can't just look at any random solid-state electrical component and say "yep, that bad boy's about to give up the ghost" like they would with a timing belt or something like that. It would also give me the opportunity to scope all the hotties I've been hearing that frequent the Genuis Bar at the Apple Store in SouthPark Mall. Hell, maybe I could even time it with one of Skip's thrice-weekly problem du jour visits, heh. Latest tech at bargain-basement prices, with new OEM hardware to boot...just the kind of deal I like. (Which will come in handy, as I just hopelessly broke the AC adapter for my girly iBook today.) Wish me luck...gotta set the alarm to work the eleventh-hour bidding magic...I've got it down to a science, but it only works if I'm awake...go figure.

Gah. Nearly 5am, and I have to say that I very much don't feel like writing.

Had a lovely chat with my beloved Rosie tonight, haven't talked to her in far too long. She's living out in LA now, doing the nursing thing. It's probably been over a year since I've seen her, maybe as many as three since we've really hung out and partied...she's a riot to go to strip clubs with, I regret not having done more of it back in the day! Ahh, the days of getting lap dances from Ivanka at All-Stars, eh? *sigh* Fond memories. Well, in honour of the occasion, I'll be linking to her blog, rosieyatch.com (Hey, I didn't pick the name!) but consider this fair warning, her blog is peppered with Korean, and is not for the faint-of-heart; sometimes it even makes me cringe, but she's cute, and it's funny, so what the heck? I've been working on getting her to head on down here for a weekend to meet the gang, I think she'd fit right in with these partygoers. She says she's shy though...one more reason to get those flight benefits back!

OK, just made myself a sandwich...I so should not be snacking at 5:30am...esp if I'm going to get to bed before sunrise...ah well.

While on the subject of blogs and co-linking, y'all may have noticed that I've added a "links" section to the right. My hope is to keep a running list of sites that offer changing/updated content, and thus enticement for re-visitation, as a value-added feature for my reader(s). If you've any suggestions, let me know...my thought is that I'll add them gradually, as I talk about them here.

Growing up in Chicago, one of my favorite things about the city was our superior alternative paper, The Chicago Reader. This is not a conglomo chain like the 'loaf, which is another good alternative paper, but I haven't read it enough to comment on it. Whenever I'm not living in Chicago, I miss being able to get the Reader every Thursday. Here are just some of the things that we as readers (of the Reader) had to look forward to:

-The Straight Dope - A Chicago original, this is a weekly column penned by the self-proclaimed "smartest person in the world", Cecil Adams. Readers write in with all manner of questions, ranging from the asinine to the unfathomable, and they then have their questions answered in a suitably irreverent and occasionaly abusive manner. Funny stuff. It's even enlightening most of the time. They've been around since 1973, so there's a lot of information there. The page I'll be linking to is the columns page, where the weekly column will be listed, but beware...the most current column is counterintuitively placed in the middle of the page, go figure.


-Life in Hell - Prior to stardom as the creator of The Simpsons, Matt "rhymes-with-staining-not-stoning" Groening penned a little comic called "Life is Hell". Clever in a Simpsons kind of way, back when Homer, Marge, Maggie and Lisa were Groenings, and not Simpsons (yet).

-Savage Love - Dan Savage is my hero. Not becasue he's gay, but for making a living insulting his fan base. Possibly the funniest weekly columnist writing today, I someday hope to abuse my readers as thoroughly.

-News of the Weird - Chuck Shepherd's culling of all manner of weirdness in the world was making regular peoples' screwy lives seem normal by comparison long before that poser Jerry Springer came along. (Maybe not, but it sounded good.) There's also a list on that page of the long-standing (and proven beyond a doubt, in my opinion, as well as very very creepy) theory that bearing the middle name "Wayne" is a very good indicator that someone is a murderer.

-Reader Matches - Easily the weirdest people in Chicago (possibly even the country) looking for love in all the wrong places. I may or may not have placed an ad or two in my day, but I assure you, it was strictly for research and/or amusement purposes. Although I DID meet this one girl who was a dead ringer for Claire Forlani. Rowr. Too bad she stopped returning my calls (Suzanne, not Claire). Hrm. In the course of looking at the site to see if it had changed any, it appears they've split off into two sides, "normal", and "deviant" (my labels). I'm far too tired today to try and look through both, but I am curious to see if they've ditched the whole very pathetic air of desperation and freakishness that once surrounded the site which gave the whole experience it's endearing uniqueness. Updates to follow.

Another thing I miss about Chicago is Wild Chicago, a weekly local program airing on our PBS affiliate, WTTW channel 11. I could do pages and pages on this program, but that might be a story for another day. For now, suffice it to say that it was a half-hour local people/points-of-interest show with an offbeat, Safari Joe type host and "wild correspondents" covering various "stories" around and about town. My favorite was the absolute goddess Tava Smiley. I think she later moved to LA to pursue an acting career, going on to appear on programs such as ABC's General Hospital and TLC's Clean Sweep

Hrm, maybe I could pitch an idea for a show like that to be done in and around the greater Charlotte area...wonder if any of the local stations would bite...is there even a PBS affiliate here? I should research that some more. A show like that would be fairly cheap and easy to produce, and I think I've seen enough episodes to be able to throw it together...hrm...

Never, ever understimate...

...the potential of people to be completely brainless and asinine, nor how much it can cost you financially and in terms of completely wasted time that you'll never, ever get back.

So I'm buying a notebook for Laura (Well, I'm not paying for it, per se, but I'm facilitating the purchase, inspection, preparation, and transfer of said equipment) and I've got a deal lined up on ebay...not the greatest deal on the face of the planet, but well beyind fair for what we're getting, considering it's exceptional condition and superior care. Well, I've gone back and forth e-mailing this guy out in Cal-i-for-nigh-ay for a week now, and I swear to god, this is the biggest moron on the face of the planet. I mean on the surface, he appears to be a normal run-of-the-mill guy, a little dorky, perhaps, but hey, it's not like I'm going to be marrying him, right? So the whole time, I'm like "dude, I cannont emphasize enough the fact that this whole project is under tremendous time constraints, and things will need to adhere to a certain timeline. Only after auction's end, do I notice that the guy won't take credit cards via PayPal. OK, no problem...my fault for not paying close enough attention. I e-mail him Thursday informing him of this, and that I'll need to shuffle some money around in accounts and such, and will be in a position to transfer funds to his PayPal account as per his auction instructions either Monday or Tuesday, and I'll have specific shipping instructions for him then. Great. Plan was to ship Wednesday, via FedEx two day service, for me to receive the unit on Friday, Laura gets to AR on Saturday, inspect/test/prep it over the weekend, box it back up, and ship it to her at her folks on Monday, again via FedEx 2-day for her to play with it Wednesday, and leave for MX on Thursday. Voila, another logistical masterpiece designed, implemented, and wrapped up nice and neat by yours truly.

Tuesday night comes, I make the arrangements and transfer the funds to Mr. Seller, and drop him an e-mail with the instructions, obtained from my very helpful CSR, Kat, at FedEx: He is to box the items with a final linear measure of no more than 72 inches, not surpass his high-side estimate of twenty pounds, insure for $1200.00 declared value, inform his FedEx station to ship via 2Day "Hold at FedEx Location, Bill to Recipient" service. Should he not be able to make the Wednesday deadline, he may even ship Thursday, 2Day "Hold Saturday at FedEx Location, Bill to Recipient". This way, I can hopefully utilize my interline discount (since I'm still in posession of my airline badge, otherwise we're looking at in excess of $300 for two-way shipping) when picking up the parcel.

Wednesday evening, I get an e-mail from PayPal indicating that my payment has been declined by the seller, and that oh, by the way, we're putting a four business day hold on your funds. WTF?! Turns out the clown hasn't read PayPal fine print entitling his personal account holding ass to a maximum of $500/month in free funds receivership, and balked at paying the $26 it would have cost him to recive full funding. He then e-mails me saying "Whoops, sorry, I thought you paid by credit card, so I declined the payment." then another one saying, "Whoops, looks like you paid me via direct confirmed transfer as I requested, but PayPal wants to charge me and I don't want to pay, so what can we do?"

Well, Mr. Seller, it appears that not only have you not accepted my confirmed funds, but your declination of said payment has caused PayPal to place an effective six day hold on my funds, thus disabling me from paying your moronic ass until the day before the recipient of this item has left the goddamned country.

It should also be mentioned that I've instructed this rocket scientist in every single e-mail correspondence thus far, to hey, "Call me if you run into any problems of any kind whatsoever, or e-mail me your number, and I'll call you! whatever is most convenient!" Instead, we've exchanged something like 18 e-mails where he keeps asking me what I want to do. My next one is going to indicate that I'll be flying to Redondo Beach and picking up the unit myself, and while I'm there, throttling his moronic ass for the betterment of all humanity. His last offer was for us to split the fees, $26, or $13 each. While normally, I'm all for splitting the difference (this is why your first offer as a buyer in a negotiation-type situation should never be more than half a seller's asking price. Asian haggling classes forming now, get your registration in early!), but in this case, I'm loathe to do it, on principle alone. I mean really what the hell is $13 in the grand scheme of things, but this guy has been a complete (although very well-mannered and accomodating) dolt through this whole process, and is a poster child for why not to do business on ebay, via PayPal, or the internet as a whole.

So the upshot of all this is that I've got to miraculously pull another grand out of my ass and in all likelihood, pony up another $13 for this guy's total ignorance, and lose at least a day of prep time, in addition to possibly not getting Laura the notebook until the morning of her departure. This is so not cool.

Here's my last e-mail to him...think it's over-the-top? (and here I go quoting myself again...)

Dan;

Normally, I'm all for, and usually the first to suggest splitting the difference. I'm not at all interested in haggling with you over $13, so I don't want to give you the impression that I'm about to, but I think that in this case, in principle, I have a certain objection to paying for half of something that's arisen through no fault of my own. I had originally planned on paying for this auction via credit card, and I fully admit that it was my oversight that led to my last-minute discovery that you had requested PayPal payment via verified bank transfer, and as such, I went to the added expense and effort to ensure that payment was made as per your specifications. While I recognize that you had no way of knowing that your declination of payment was going to effect a six-day hold of payment funds, I'm now in effect having to come up with $2,000.00 to pay for a $1000.00 auction, (as well as incur shipping approaching $300; this is in no way your fault, but I mention it to give a better and more complete situational overview) in order to live up to my obligation to purchase these goods.

I do fully appreciate your accomodation of my time constraints, and associated inconvenience in the shipment requests I've made, and I'm grateful for these efforts.

I hope that I've not offended you in any way, as this is not my intent; merely to present the situation as I see it, and I welcome your thoughts and/or remarks.

I will need to make a call or two in the morning to see about re-remittance via cash or credit card payment. Either way, I'm still going to need to complete this transaction in a timely fashion. Non-delivery is not an option for me, as I've made a committment, and this is the only opportunity we have in the foreseeable future to accomplish this task.

Thanks for your continued cooperation,

-Gene


(end psychotic rant)

Back to our normally scheduled programming tomorrow. Developments as they occur

Warm...warmer...disco...

Wow, apologies for the longish break, I believe that this has been the longest pause in entries this blog has seen to date. By way of excuses, I offer the following: I didn't get much sleep, and when the time came yesterday for blog posting, I was REALLY tired and dozed off instead of writing.

Now Playing: The Chambers Brothers - Time (Has Come Today)

Anyway, lame excuses aside, here's the recap:

Clubbing Saturday night, packed house, but definitely a weird kinda vibe. Had a good time, as usual, but I'm almost ashamed to say that for the first time in my life, I turned down a three-way with two women. I know, it sounds bad...but really, there were mitigating factors and extenuating circumstances! I guess it's bound to happen, and perhaps the women out there can better and more easily identify with this, but when one goes out and gets attention from the opposite sex, there are two kinds of attention one can draw, good and bad, desirable and undesirable. This was definitely the latter of each descriptive pair. [shudder] Let's move on, shall we? And never speak of this incident again.

Sunday afternoon finds me ready to head to the local home-improvement conglomo-mart for a fluorescent ballast to complete a long-overdue home repair. Do the necessary old-part research, gather tools, make preparations, pull defective item, head out to the car to make the short drive, only to notice that hrm, the driver's door seems to be ajar. I get in, key the ignition, notice that the power tilt/telescope steering isn't doing its normal motor-out-and-down-to-greet-me dance, and I hear the telltale "click click click" of a dead battery. Gnash teeth, realize that the automatic headlights don't turn off unless I close the doors properly, bang head on immobile steering wheel. Grr. Locate battery charger and extension cord (thanks for the assist, S/L), plug the car in, put off trip until tomorrow. Lovely.

Sunday recovery at the resort was highly welcome after last week's notable absence, at least from my perspective, but then again, I don't have to clean up after...I'm sure that factors in when doing the is-it-all-worthwhile calculations. As noted by others, many were in rare form, which, in sum made for a very trippy time, disco lights notwithstanding. Did get to spend some quality time getting to know/bonding with a couple dear friends, and that's always a good (and welcome) thing.

Monday actually sees me at Lowe's to obtain proper parts for fluorescent repair, also had the most stupid/silly/dreamy high-school-y ice cream "date" with a dear, dear friend...*sigh*. Did I mention that it was dreamy? 70+ degrees, sunny, ever so slight breeze (depending on whom you ask), highly fatty ice cream products with flake chocolate bits (similar to those found in my favourite ice cream, Edy's Espresso Chip) and not shavings as I like, (but still preferable over chunks/chips), idle and mildly inappropriate banter in the presence (but not earshot) of children, weird conversations with random grandparents and ice cream shack employees, and general teenage hijinks. *sigh* I haven't had this kind of carefree fun since I was a kid.

Cool mac thing I learned over the weekend: To quickly connect two macs via firewire (apparently, OSX doesn't have IP over 1394 built into the OS), all you do is connect the two computers via firewire, and boot both. While they're booting, you want to hold down the "T" key on one of them, until you see the firewire logo on-screen, release the "T" key, and voila! When the other computer comes up, the computer displaying the firewire icon is now a slave firewire drive. Cool, eh? I thought so. Two files totalling just over a gig I needed to transfer that estimated at 3 hours over the less-than-ideal 802.11b connection I had at the time, took less than TWO MINUTES, woohoo! Hello 400Mbps firewire! And that's the slower, crappier standard, nice. Dunno if this trick works in a mac-to-PC connection, I'll have to try that out.

Overall, had an incredibly fulfilling weekend, despite some weird/off vibes Saturday and Sunday nights, thanks primarily to developing interpersonal relations.

Watched Dodgeball, this was I thought an incredibly funny movie, but Vince Vaughn doing his schtick is pretty much all it takes for me to like a film. Writing wasn't great, but the strategic and clever use of cameos wasn't completely cheap and blatant. Plus, hot chicks making out under the guise of bisexuality is always good for a cheap thrill. Here are a few choice quotes:


-"There's someone out there for everybody.""You think?""Absolutely. In some cases, there's two somebodies for one person. I like to call that 'the jackpot'."
-"This is Seth from Videorama. The following DVDs are now overdue: "Drunken Hussies 3", "Backdoor Patrol 5" and "Mona Lisa Smile". Thank you."
-"You were adopted, your parents don't love you!"
-"This doesn't concern you, La Fleur.""Not nearly as much as your hair does."
-"I'm not a banker, I'm a lawyer.""Really? What kind of law are you involved in, pretty eyes?""Sexual harassment, mostly."
-"Donde esta la biblioteca, Pedro?"
-"Quit? You know, once I was thinking of quitting when I was diagnosed with brain, lung and testicular cancer all at the same time. But with the love and support of my friends and family, I got back on the bike and won the Tour de France five times in a row. But I'm sure you have a good reason to quit. So what are you dying of that's keeping you from the finals?""Right now it feels a little bit like... shame.""Well, I guess if a person never quit when the going got tough, they wouldn't anything to regret for the rest of their life. Well good luck to you Peter. I'm sure this decision won't haunt you forever."

Chatted with Ames, Esq., and she's sold me on the idea of writing screenplays vs. novels as the more viable medium, as far as our particular situations are concerned. However, it seems that screenplay writing has it's full set (and then some) of idiosyncrasies, and it's going to take a little bit of time to discover, scrutinize, and then internalize these minutiae. Fun. Now I just need an idea. I thought about writing the story of our relationship, but it's missing the a) happy ending, b) plot twist (where, say, I was dead all along, but didn't know that's what she was trying to tell me the whole time, until five minutes shy of film's end, then we run the montage of cheesy foreshadowing aren't-you-a-moron-for-missing-these-cues cutscenes), or c) after-school special message, such as "drugs are bad, mmmkay?"

Tuesday morning (OK, 3pm) arose to unusual silence...turns out the power had gone out (and been out for some time), roommate had left patio door open, and the place was freezing. Fortunately, it wasn't long before it came back on, anyone who knows me knows how lost I am without my internet access. couldn't cook, watch TV, IM, or do anything but (shudder) read!

Watched a few more episodes of CSI:NY, and while the show isn't getting any better, the music selections have been pretty good, especially episode 01.04...need to try and find a tracklist/playlist of some kind...the only song I've been able to identify thus far is Beastie Boys - An Open Letter to NYC. Caused me to download the Beastie Boys discography, it did. Somewhat reminiscent of 2 Skinnee J's, who I think also hail from that general area. "718" is still one of the rap classics, if you ask me. (not that I know the first thing about rap, obviously.)



I love that line in the second frame, I've always thought that it was pretty clever. But learning more from staying home is pretty much the mantra of my life, right?

Looks like D is (at least temporarily) making her blog public...not sure what the ramifications are yet, if any, so I'll go ahead and recommend a third-party blog I've become aware of through her observations:

Rollertrain, funny stuff. This girl works in the porn industry as a copywriter. Although in reading a couple sample entries, she does use "peak" where she means "pique" (that one totally drives me up a wall). Like Superficial, both amusing AND informative. Also highly relevant, if like me, you're a fan of the porn industry. Wait, have I said too much? Probably not work-safe, depending, of course, upon where you work, sucker!

Finally, while I was writing this, I noticed that practicinghedonists posted about a fire story. I left a comment, but it evolved into a pseudo-post, so I thought I'd add it here for posterity:

Damn...all my fire stories pretty much have the theme of me accidentally burning something down as an unfortunate outcome of my budding pyromania. My electrocution stories are probably better. Although, this one time, for a H.S. journalism class project, we were to invent a product/service and produce a mock commercial or print ad for it. Ours was "Four Guys' Revenge", and for the commercial, if memory serves, we offered a range of services to exact payback on those who have wronged you, from beatings to body disposal, to destruction of property, and things of that nature. To illustrate said scenarios, we naturally had to stage some dramatic re-creations. Being poor high-school students, we lacked the budget to bring on the lucasfilm and/or ILM boys, so in order to achieve the desired effect, we may or may not have set fire to an abandoned car in a shopping mall parking lot. I'm not exactly sure how we determined that it was abandoned, but it made sense at the time, and was deemed "foolproof". I mean who can go a day without seeing an abandoned Mercedes-Benz? Just kidding, it was definitely a domestic car...they give those away in cereal boxes, right? (I think the statute of limitations for arson has long since lapsed) When questioned by a concerned Journalism teacher, we naturally replied that we'd taped the segment off some cable program, and that really wasn't our mall in the background, nor were those guys that vaguely looked like us really us. (Thank you grainy 80's video technology!)

Come to think of it, South Park ripped off our idea when Cartman had that shit-smearing venture! I'm gonna sue!

I suppose I really should have saved this story for MY blog, but the chances if it getting read by someone it might upset are much much greater there. Ah well, my loss is your gain, enjoy!

Hrm, on second thought, maybe I will paste it to my entry anyway. So that my readers might be regaled by my tales of harmless high school tomfoolery...


I love quoting myself as a third party, it's so paradoxical and self-aggrandizing.

Ciao for now, kids...

Coq au vin, c'est bon pour la femme...

Laura was suitably impressed that I came up with that one (less the "la", she had to give the grammatical assist) on my own. :) Saw an Alton Brown/Good Eats show (love that program!) on Coq au Vin, (literally, "Cock with wine") a classic French fricassee, traditionally made with aged/mature roosters...thought it a wickedly apropos subject heading and toast for the pre-weekend post, I'm sure y'all can piece together the rest of it... ;)

On a related note, last week's Foamy 'toon (Foamy's Rant V) talks about lame/annoying word play, much like I'm doing above, but I fully agree with the lameness of said behaviour as a comedic medium, and eschew it unless it's me doing it and its genuinely funny/clever, as here. (Or not.)

While watching a Modern Marvels episode on engineering disasters, I saw my first TV commercial for the upcoming new third generation Lexus GS. I initially disliked the car when I first saw it at last year's auto show in Chicago when I was there in February, but it has since grown on me. Both the auto show prototype and the photos I saw recently were of a silver car, and the one in the commercial was black. Oooh, the black makes all the difference! With some nice dark tint and some graphite eighteen or so inch wheels, this car would look nice. What's not to love about this car? It's totally me in vehicular form: Asian, gorgeous, muscular, understated, sexy, capable, confident, and exudes class. OK, how about just Asian? One out of eight isn't THAT bad. Here's a pretty thorough review. Unfortunately, they're not due out with a new engine or a high-performance hybrid version anytime soon, so until then, we're "stuck" with the same 300-horsepower, 325 lb-ft torque 4.3-litre engine that's in my car. Don't get me wrong, it's a damn fine engine, and I'm thrilled to death with it, but with the Daimler boys and the Bavarian brutes are all packing close-to-or over 500 horsepower in the top performance models, the M5 and E55 AMG, some added grunt would be nice. What IS exceptionally interesting is the addition of all-wheel drive. Toyota's been lacking an AWD performance car in its US portfolio for too long. That it's a 4-door luxury-branded sedan and not a 2-door sports car will sit well with both my attorney (driving record: extensive and not exactly glowing) and insurance agent alike. The Toyoda (not a typo, story for another day) family makes a world-class automobile in the Lexus marque, it's time they stepped up to the plate and gave us something to run against all those mid-life crisis-addled doctors and lawyers who are above owning a Corvette. I'd gladly pay $70-$80K (well, $30-$40K on ebay the year after, anyway) for a rock-solid-reliable-despite-how-poorly-I-maintain-it, 500hp (that I could then modify to 550/600HP), V10 or V8 high-performance hybrid, AWD, 7-speed, Lexus GS550/GS500h in a heartbeat. Crap, now that I read the website, the only version available as AWD is the 2JZ GS300, which is a typically Toyota bitch-ass play-it-safe move. On the plus side, the 2JZ is an infinitely flexible platform, proven to have the potential to make over 1000HP in gasoline applications. But who wants to crack open the engine of a brand-new $50K+ car and void the beloved warranty? Ugh...never mind again, one site says they've deleted the inline six in favour of a V6. Damn them!


(photos by yours truly)


Hrm...just spec'ed a couple out on the Lexus website, $62,829. Yikes. And that's for the 430 WITHOUT AWD. $54,599 for the AWD GS300, and that's with the anemic 245HP. Suck. That's a house in this part of the country...granted, not a nice one on the lake or anything, but a house nonetheless. I guess the ideal E55/M5 competitor I describe above would ultimately go for more like $90-100K. Frightening.

Guess I'll stick to buying a MotoRex-imported R34 Skyline GT-R if I absolutely have to have an AWD sleeper. Damn, it appears that a V-Spec II R34 has gone up from $60K a few years ago to around $90K too...guess that won't be happening anytime soon, either. In the meantime, the stability-controlled RWD in the current GS has saved my ass so many times that I should be grateful and not complain anyway.

Well, thanks for indulging, dorky diatribe over...I really try to not let the rabid car geek out that often, it seems to repel women, go figure.

Along that vein, I REALLY need to wash my car...damn, it's supposed to rain all day tomorrow...figures...hood is still all smudged too...[sigh]

What is it with magazine subscription management services that take goddamn 12 weeks to get a change-of-address in?! Of six magazines I called today (yeah, I know I moved well over three months ago, but hey I just got around to it, OK? Sheesh.) only PC Magazine said they'd have the April issue out to my new address. Everyone else said "maybe June/July". WTF? In this day and age?! Completely unacceptable. One even used an obnoxious marketing company that a) kept me on hold for like 10 minutes, THEN b) tried to sell me an extension at an exorbitant rate! (something like $0.99/week, I wasn't paying attention...WTF? That's higher than the newsstand price! Who the hell sells monthly magazines at weekly rates? What morons are saying "yes" to this? Never mind that my subscription to this particular piece of crap was paid through like 2009 or something. Bastards.) Hell, there were three more to which my subscriptions expire in the next three or so months, and now I'm thinking it's not even worth calling those guys, because they won't get it switched over soon enough to make a difference! Nor can I just go re-subscribe, as the new subs would probably start by the second month at the latest, and I'd no doubt overlap those issues. Not that I even read any of them regularly...Wired is the only one I read cover to cover the moment it arrives, and Automobile has some decent writing/format points, but all the other ones are basically just fluff. Ugh.

All you need to know about magazine subscriptions is relayed at the end of my January 7th post, "Schoolboy giddiness..." I'll definitely be going through them for my requisite renewals...quite a few of them expire this year.

Started watching CSI:NY tonight, and I have to say that I had high hopes for this, what with Gary Sinise starring and all. I was only able to get through a few episodes due to a some distractions here and there, and the rest of the first season could definitely get better, but so far, what a waste of talent. The writing's terrible and the plots are hackneyed and poorly-paced. I've never liked the CSI franchise as much as the Law & Order programs, but I thought I would because of the whole science geek appeal of CSI. I've seen a few episodes of each CSI serial, and except for an inexplicable attraction to Marg Helgenberger and the aforementioned respect for Sinise's talent, I don't care for any of the cast, where all the Law & Orders have at one time or another featured prominent hotties. So far, in the first two episodes of CSI:NY, I find the "Scientific" plot devices very thin and unbelievable. Unable to pinpoint where a crime takes place, they use "city maintenance databases" to determine where in the 800+ acre park the planted geranium, peony, and wisteria plants? come on, this is a public park, not a botanical conservatory! common plants like that would be EVERYWHERE, not just "five key locations", give me a break. and that's just one glaring example. Continuity isn't great, with blood-smeared handprints on cars changing location and orientation. Maybe they're just setting the stage for a "most-improved show" award next year...Gary, Gary, Gary...what are you doing? Never, ever follow David Caruso's career path! Duh!

I also really need to reiterate that I'm really liking this Superficial site...Keira Knightley is looking hot, Katie Holmes is looking hot, Krista Allen is hot, and in these photos sorta reminds me of Kel, and while the guy has in the last couple days gone on about Britney a little too much (suspiciously, if you ask me), his sense of humour is otherwise spot-on and occasionally tear-inducing.

Wow, this could well be the longest (and yet most boring to most) post yet...perhaps I should ponder the quality/quantity conundrum this weekend?

Have fun doing whatever you choose to be doing, see y'all Monday...