What an Ass Hole

My Foot And Your Ass Are Going On A Date

So my new job. Amazzor. I get a desk by the window in the warmest corner of the building. I also have four screens at my disposal, one of which is a laptop. I get a nice $2500/month salary, which is also nice considering I get insane health/dental/eye benefits. I get a nice sized cubicle that apparently is highly disputed. What do you do at your job? So far, I've made graphs and charts for math problems.

Now the usual bitchy-Dave part.

I have to walk to work. 2.3 miles seems like a short distance on Google maps, but they failed to show me the 42-grade hill I have to scale every morning. Don't forget that it's "northern" Iowa winter winds and below freezing temperatures. As well, people don't understand that shovelling snow off sidewalks prevents ice, especially deceivingly thin layers of ice that are hidden under wet powderings. Oh, and then there was the matter of $0.10 and the bus driver, Dickhead McDoucheBag.

I got that sumbitch back this morning, though: I paid the $.75 fair with seven dimes.

Otherwise, though, can't complain. I move into the Raven's Loft (that's what I decided to call my 2 bedroom apartment because it's on the 3rd floor and farthest away from the stairs) on Sunday. Hopefully with the help of Ol' Windypants.

The body was exhumed in near-perfect condition

INTRODUCTION: I'm writing this in as response to Dave's recent plea for posts.

SCIENCE FICTION: Since I'm gearing up to write my science fiction
epic, BREEDING TO DEATH II: BACK IN THE SADDLE, I decided to read some
SF over the next few weeks. I bought the 2007 Year's Best and, like
usual, it has a few really strong pieces buried in several
good-but-not-amazing stories. Here's a description of the best so far:
the Nazis have won the war, which is a bit played out, yes, but they
win because the Pacific Ocean is impassible, the Japanese thus weren't
able to bomb Pearl, and the US never got involved. So anyway, in the
present, the victorious Germans launch an expedition across the
Pacific in a monstrous airship, and find progressively weirder islands
as they cross impossible lengths of water.

Pretty great!

There are a few other strong pieces, one including a deranged
artificial intelligence running surgical equipment on a hospital ship.

Also in SF news I started playing Mass Effect. Has anyone else messed
with this game?

DINNER: I'm making orange-marinated tilapia and coconut rice.

AT WORK TODAY: I got a white board. It was covered in a grid of
electrical tape. After, the best thing I could get to remove the
residue was cooking spray. The office smelled like making pan pizza at
the Hut.

Just another manic Tuesday

Have you ever had the urge to bite a reporter

Finally watched this movies thanks to Netflix and I have to say that the American version of this movie is almost dead on, a plot to plot copy of this suspenseful foreign film. The only difference was the ending and the American version ramped up the gotcha moments all the more but over all a damn good movie that uses the first person perspective to it's full advantage to tell a story without some whiny bitch staring into the lens and getting snot on everything. Don't get me wrong, I fucking love "Quarantine" and eagerly hope for a sequel that will never happen but didn't like how the ending went where every thing slows way down to get that last dramatic shot of the movie. In "[REC]", the last moments only slow for a couple of beats before getting to the last shot and that made the pacing better and wished that "Quarantine", had followed suit but alas it did not. All and all I say if you like suspension and possible zombie type outbreaks, more so in the American movie and the foreign movie is more biological and the end has religious undertones to it, and the American version is more crazy guy, as I don't think that they like pissing off the Catholics but I don't see how it would if kept to the originals ending. I say watch them both sometime, not back to back though, as you watch one you all ready know what's going to happen in the other, around October and in the dark works best. Oh and "[REC]" has got a sequel and number 3 in the works. I hate Hollywood.

I Should Try This.

Male Villain Seeks Female Arch-Enemy. On Craigslist.

Jerko bananas, that's what they are

I have to wait for an apartment. Despite how adamant I made it known that I had to be moved in before Monday.

I don't know how this relates to the cat.

"Gamer" rent it now. You know what it's about, but it's still a good movie. Great casting. And the undertow will suck you under to a watery grave. No really watch it. It caught me by surprise even with the obvious ending, yet still I watched because it related to me and where things might go someday.

Tuesday again

Posting just to post.

Recommended Viewing

Was a very enjoyable movie and if you like a little bit of the surreal, then rent it. And you can't go wrong with a little Kevin Spacey action. So this guy is on the moon harvesting solar radiated moon rock that's used as a clean energy source on earth, and then there's a accident and things start to go wrong and get weird, not alien landscape weird, just weird in the sense of what is he doing with his life. Get past the false science for you brainy types and it's a good character driven story.

Here's a story I wrote for you.

Sarah helped with the ending.

One day a bunch of dinosaurs decided to collaborate on dinner. They
visited the local grocery together with a thirty-dollar budget. "That
won't buy us much," said the red dinosaur. "It's okay," said the
triceratops. "I brought some coupons. Here." He brandished a sheaf of
half-off tabs. "We just have to be careful about what we get."

And so they were. Fish was entirely out. So was that fancy cheese that
the pterodactyl loved to grate over everything. Instead they bought
pasta, tomatoes, some garlic. A jar of olives and a package of
chicken. They shopped so well that they had enough left to splurge on
a loaf of fancy bread and a 7-dollar bottle of red wine.

But at home the oven was broken. "Jesus Christ," said the
velociraptor. "I hope somebody brought a charcoal grill."

"I keep one in the trunk of my car at all times," said the brontosaurus.

"I hate it when things taste like smoke. And how will we boil the
angel hair noodles?"

"In a pot," said the brontosaurus. "You just need any old pot, it
doesn't have to be something special—"

"We're going next door," said the velociraptor, whose kitchen they
were in. "I'm sleeping with the neighbor. She'll let us use her oven."

And she did.

It's a Piece of Junk!

I got that job in Coralville. So in about 10 days time, I got to move up there.

Nice pay, nice benefits. Not GD Albia.

Excessively Long Shot

And one helluva fight.

Bacon Bourbon Carmel Corn. For the man's treat at the movies when stuck in a chick flick. Or Amish when he cries at chick flicks on a date with his Grandma. Oh burn. Not to worry. He can't read.

OMGCD

The Low Anthem

And who could heed the words of Charlie Darwin
The lords of war just profit from decay
And trade their children's promise for the jingle
The way we trade our hard earned time for pay

These guys are going to be on Letterman tonight. A lot of their songs are really slow and kind of sad, but they have some really good upbeat songs like Champion Angel and The Horizon is a Beltway. You might want to check them out.

Earthbound Progress: Awesomely

OH MAN I'M STARVED

I found an old Tootsie Pop my niece brought me from a parade when I
was in Iowa, so that's helping a little. And I'm trying to decide what
to have for dinner (Sarah, if you're reading this, the decision is on
you, since I brought home pizza last night). Really what I'm craving
is hot wings and chips. Which yes, I'm aware, sounds awful.

Awfully delicious!

It would terrify 8-year-old me, but my tastes are noticeably different
than they used to be. Some things I like now that would have
particularly disgusted me just a few years ago:

bacon
fried plantains
white sauce on pizzas
sashimi

I can still say that I'm holding out against mayo, at least.

We had a nice run of cooking great stuff a while back, chicken tacos
with homemade salsa, baked squash stuffed with apples and turkey
bacon, cauliflowre gratin, etc., but now with the cold streak here the
kitchen has been a bitter waste, a place as frozen and timeless and
disturbing as a haunted forest. Sometimes the cat would disappear and
I would creep out there to look for her, thinking what is she doing?
She's going to get herself KILLED.

Tis Tuesday

Nostalgia Shot

Watching this level being played even brought back anxiety on just how goddamn hard it really was.

The IRS

This morning as I drove through blisteringly cold 40-degree roads to
get to work I listened to an NPR call-in show featuring the
Commissioner of the IRS. I only got about 20 minutes but it was pretty
good! My dominant impression was that the IRS is evil but that the
some of the people they deal with are largely insane (this latter
opinion developed after listening to some of the callers). Of course
you are not able to specify that your particular bundle of tax money
be used only for humanitarian purposes. If you could, who would
specify that they wanted theirs to be used solely for bullet casings?
And anyway, what the fuck would it matter, since those bullet casings
would still be bought? It's not like the government is etching your
name on your contribution, so that some soldier in the wasted nowhere
is cracking open the wrap on a new field knife and saying Thank you,
Tim Dicks. I am glad that your specific tax dollars bought this knife,
which I will now sink into some heads. If you could divert your money
to some sort of donuts-only fund, it would just mean that someone
else's money was sluiced into the blood gutter. The IRS guy astutely
pointed out that the only way to direct where your tax dollars go is
to put effort into electing officials whose policy decisions align
with your own ideals.

Of course you're fucked if the opposing politician wins but really, come on now.

To address my first point though, the IRS sounds totally crazily
machine-like. You could almost hear the glee in the guy's voice when
he spoke about ferreting out tax evaders. A listener called in and
then emailed in to address the issue of some charity misusing its tax
breaks to fund middle east violence and the response was basically
that the IRS is very careful about monitoring the behavior of anyone
claiming to be a charity. There was almost a robocackle in his voice.
It really made me want to work for those people, roll around in a dark
car threatening small businesses, knocking out windows, throwing
flaming briefcases full of tax forms into small clinics.

Anyway, all that is to say that it was a fairly interesting twenty
minutes that I had no idea I would be interested in and you can read
about it here: http://wamu.org/programs/dr/

Fuzzy Pickles

I'm playing Earthbound in preparation to play a hack of Mother 3. I'm realizing slowly that my early teenage years seem to flood back with the sights of Earthbound. Somehow, I've connected Ness's house with Tim's house and how it sat at the edge of civilization. As well as all the retarded things that were done in the woods. It also reminds me of the magic and stupidity that was teenage wonder of small town life. Nostalgia and simplicity also seem to permeate from every conversation in this game.

If you never played Earthbound, you missed out dearly. And we can never be friends again.

Awesome Cupcake Prowess

Found these awesome cupcakes through geekologie.com and since cake is something I do on occasions, at night in my underwear, I wanted to share with you. Go here for the reference chart.

Music Appreciation 2010

It's 2010 muzzer beeches!

And we're all wondering the same thing: Where are the flying cars?

As it turns out, flying cars are really hard to design. How about a flying motorcycle instead?

BEHOLD, THE FUTURE!!!





The Switchblade, by Samson Motorworks










Or how about a flying . . . hovercrafty . . . thing.





The X-Hawk, by Urban Aeronautics












Maybe 2020? If we start saving now, we might be able to afford one.

Instead of griping about what we don't have, we could be thankful for what we do have. Like the iPod. My goodness how awesome is that little gadget? Do you remember music before the iPod? Back when we had to buy a whole CD and then insert that clunky ol' disk into a CD player? How did we ever survive? Seriously though, I love the iPod. It gets my vote for best new product of the past ten years. And how about the social networking websites? Pretty awesome, huh? Probably #2. Except Twitter. Twitter can suck it. My favorite . . . well, I hate to mention it by name, but it rhymes with Occult Trend Binder.

Rolling Stone did a special issue recapping the '00 years in music and reminded readers just how good music has been these past ten years. They make a good argument by comparing what we heard on the radio in the '00s with what we heard on the radio in the late '90s. Remember Fred Durst? How about N'Sync? Backstreet Boys? Britney Spears? Mudvayne? For most of us, that's all they are. A memory. We don't hear any of that crap anymore. Sure, there is still plenty of crap, but it just seems so much less crappy. The crap is diluted.

I'm always on the lookout for good new music and this issue of RS was an excellent place to find it. Not all of it is really 'New' anymore, but I've never really listened to bands like Wilco or the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs or even Jay-Z and this made me take a second look at some of these bands I've overlooked these past ten years. Rolling Stone isn't always the most reliable source of musical taste, but they had 100 artists, critics, and other music biz people vote so the final list was the result of the sacred democratic process the supreme court took for granted at the beginning of the decade.

Here's a link to the Top 100 Albums of the '00s.

I could go on and on with my reactions to some of their choices. One that caught my eye was #29, Sigur Ros. I thought this band was just some way-out goof troop only an eccentric English grad student would listen to (do you know Joe?), but as it turns out, other people have heard of them and really like them.

I was really glad to see Green Day's American Idiot appear at #22. That was one of my favorite albums of the decade. There were a couple of occasions back in '04 when I defended it against criticism, so I felt kind of vindicated to see it there.

The issue also features the top fifty songs and the ten best movies of the decade. Gnarls Barkley's Crazy got #1 song--I couldn't agree more. The #1 movie was There Will Be Blood.

Aside from that, if you haven't already been listening to Kings of Leon, Muse, and Man Man--get on that! I know Man Man and Muse don't appear in the top fifty, but they are still rock hard on stilts. Kings of Leon are also some hardrockin sumbeeches. If you haven't heard the song Four Kicks, I assure you, it will be the hard-rockinest two minutes and eleven seconds of your life!

Education Time!

I interviewed for a job at the beginning of December.

...and the entire office is out until next week. This includes everyone who can give me an answer on anything besides when said people will return.


God damn holidays.

There is a ten-foot python on the loose in this city

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/breakingnews/os-brevard-python-is-loose-20100105,0,6723791.story

It's cold as hell here. COLD AS HELL. The heat in this state is about
the only thing it has going for it and now even that has fled, has
sunk down into the earth or buzzed out over the winds and now I'm
wearing three shirts and a jacket IN MY JOB, as well as fingerless
gloves. At home we bought a space heater but at least 4/10 of the time
we've had it on the circuit has blown and I've had to go three flights
down a fire escape and crawl through a hole into a subterranean
dungeon to flip the breaker.

LAME.

The solution was not to run the thing at the same time as the
television, two lamps, Xbox, and computer. Still:

LAME.

Here are some rbook eviews:

1) Icelander (novel): I picked this up after growing bored with the
next book, and it's great! Very quick read, stylistically sparse
(primarily dialogue), generally light-hearted (there's death and
eyeball stabbings but none of it is really tragic) and some
nationalist conspiracy.

2) The Wrestler's Cruel Study (novel): This one I grabbed from the
downtown library. It's a big old plot that is kicked off when a pro
wrestler's girlfriend is kidnapped. It's dark comedy and the writing
is good but something about the style made me feel unpleasant so I
buried it in the cat's litter box and let her have at. Maybe you would
love it.

It's Tuesday.

Bump

Bitch act like he never seen a $1 bill before.

A Message for Everyone Who Weren't at Kevin's This Weekend

You missed the gorging of lasagna. So much awesome Italian goodness. Sure, some of you got nice temperatures and weren't freezing by the cold, emotionless hand of Old Man Winter...

But we had lasagna.