kapgar

I can't see that thief that lives inside your head...

Katie and I were wrapping up the season one DVDs of Monk when B-roll video of the Golden Gate Bridge showed up on screen. I paused the DVD player and looked at our TV... underneath the photos on the wall... we were both officially creeped out.

Why?

Check this out...

Here's a better view of my original photograph taken back in 1999 or 2000...

Now, I realize that this shot has been taken many times in the past. Hawk Hill is a great place to take photos of the bridge. But damn. Creepy to see them stacked like that.

While I've loved taking part in this Photo365 challenge, I think it's starting to play with my head a bit. To the point where I'm having dreams about photography. Actually, two nights ago, I had two dreams involving photography.

In the first, I was running through the woods taking pictures of a bunch of weather phenomena. Around me were a bunch of teenage kids also running. A few of them stopped me and asked me to take pictures of them. I said yes. As I'm snapping the pictures, another kid stops and asks what I'm taking pictures of. I point to the three kids and say, "them." He counters with, "who?" I point again. I can see them, he can't. I look at the review screen on my camera and see that my pictures are filled with nothing but fallen trees and rocks and other scenery items, no kids.

The second found me in some coastal village in southeastern Asia. There's a big festival going on and I'm taking some pictures. A monk (I think) walks up to me and lets me know that it's a private festival and they'd appreciate me not taking pictures. I apologize and go to delete the pictures off my memory card. When I hit the button on my camera, parts of start falling off and, no matter what I do, I'm unable to put it back together. I pretty much start freaking out.

I'm getting too involved in this, aren't I?

BTW, if you're interested in seeing my work on Photo365 to date, check out the slideshow below...

Call it education, it was somewhere in between...

Today was supposed to be another in our relatively new series of Friday Firsts for Katie and me.

To clarify, Katie and I started to implement a series of new stuff to do on Fridays since she already has the day off and I have many vacation days banked up. It started several weeks ago with the trip to Shedd Aquarium and the Sears/Big Willie Tower in Chicago. The week after, it was the Chicago Auto Show. We had a couple weeks off after that, but I took today off so we could figure out something new to continue this tradition.

Well, we did make it a First, but not in the way we were hoping. It marked our first trip to the radiology lab at the local hospital for chest X-rays on Katie. She has bronchitis, which could potentially lead to pneumonia.

Yay!

So much for today, eh? 

Any predictions on the Oscars this Sunday?

Listening to XRT 93.1 FM, The Regular Guy (their movie reviewer) picked his longshot win as being Inglourious Basterds for Best Picture. He thinks that all this battling between Avatar and The Hurt Locker might allow Tarantino's masterpiece (that I like more and more with each viewing) to creep in and take the win. How cool would that be? 

Katie's longshot is Jeremy Renner in The Hurt Locker over the likely winner, Jeff Bridges in Crazy Heart.

Me? My longshot pick was going to be Anna Kendrick from Up in the Air over the heavily favored Mo'nique in Precious (I refuse to type up that ridiculously long BS name that the film officially goes by even if I did just type a much greater amount of characters in my parenthetical inclusion than the title would have, but oh well), but I think I'm going to shoot for Carey Mulligan in An Education over, oh hell, I don't even know who's really favored... Streep?

Should I pick both. Oh why not?

Shake, rattle n' roll...

Sorry this is coming so late in the day. Heck, some of you may not even receive notice until tomorrow considering how slow both my RSS feeds and subscription service are to update. Oh well. You'll just have to take my word for it that it was posted on Wednesday.

Steak
As much as I like trying new restaurants and going to small, non-chain places, there's something about Steak 'n Shake that does it for Katie and me. And we had to cave into temptation tonight. God that's some good stuff. The only kinda strange thing is that they've recently introduced Kool-Aid flavored milkshakes. Even our waitress wasn't too keen on them. Oh well.

Blanket
After Steak 'n Shake, Katie and I went to Aldi for some groceries. While loading the purchases into the bed of my truck, Katie noticed that I had a blanket spread out in the bed. She noted that it looked like I was hiding something.

Me: "It's a body. It's perfect because it's so cold that decomposition is delayed a bit."

Katie: "I knew it!"

Me: "Yeah, there are some things about my family I haven't told you."

Katie: "..."

Brooke
I don't know if you've all seen tonight's Criminal Minds yet, but Brooke Smith of Silence of the Lambs and Grey's Anatomy guested as the mother of a kidnapped child. At one point, she's talking to one of the agents who is reassuring her that she's working with the best. She says, "I know." Well, duh, of course you know. You've been helped by the FBI before. Hell, you were even working with the Behavioral Analysis Unit. Back when you were kidnapped by Buffalo Bill and kept in a well and threatened with hoses when you didn't properly lotion your skin. Silly girl.

Lincoln
Who ever heard of a trailer for... a book? Well, somebody thought to do it for the new Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith. I was already stoked about this book to the point of pre-ordering it, but if I wasn't, this trailer sure would've sold me on it.

Things
We bought our first Blu-Ray DVD today. No, we don't have a Blu-Ray player yet, but for a mere $3 more than the standard DVD edition, we got a combo edition with the standard DVD, Blu-Ray, and digital copy of Where the Wild Things Are. I really like this combo pack idea that some studios are doing (they're also offering a combo pack edition of the Bourne trilogy). Oh, and if this film sucks, @LarsenonFilm will pay dearly. We almost never buy a DVD sight unseen, but I'd read so many good reviews from some of you as well as Josh Larsen's testament that we figured why not. Don't judge us. We really don't buy many DVDs at all anymore.

Time for bed. I hope.

You got nothin' to hide...

Last night, Katie and I got home from work and, since this was the first time we had seen each other (she's still asleep when I leave in the morning), we were checking out what each other was wearing.

She had on a turtleneck.

I love turtlenecks.

I find them completely and utterly sexy if well chosen and well worn.

Katie's was both well chosen and well worn.

Some guys dig on swimsuits or lingerie or underwear on women or any number of other articles of clothing that show of skin. I'm not saying I don't find that stuff sexy, but few things compare to a good turtleneck sweater. And there are few things that cover up more of a woman's body.

Am I weird for thinking this way? Is it strange that I find something like that sexy?

I wish I could explain why I think this way, but I cannot.

Well, one good thing about the Olympics being done is that we now have most of our standard network shows back.

In addition to the usual suspects, though, last night marked the return of Rules of Engagement on CBS. This is far from one of the greatest comedies on TV, but Katie and I find it enjoyable. We love the cast, even David Spade (Russell) who I otherwise find annoying.

But the coolest thing about last night's episode was finding out that Adhir Kalyan has become a full-blown cast member! For those of you who watch, he plays Russell's personal assistant, Timmy.

I do, however, think they may need to redo the opening credits. The final still image showing all of them in bed now features Timmy and it's clearly a bad Photoshop job. Seriously, just retake it. He's crushing their legs.

If you're interested, you can download an episode (or maybe it's just a teaser, not sure) free from iTunes.

Oh, an unlike yesterday's post, this was not solicited. Just something I decided to write of my own free will. Yeah, I still have some of that left.

Here we are now going to the southside...

The late night wars are over. Jay won, Conan lost. Well, actually that remains to be seen. Sticking at NBC could still prove the losing end of the deal while Conan will likely wind up on his feet elsewhere.

But what people forget about in all this are the shows that got dicked by NBC in the 9 p.m. (Central) time slot. They were cut to make room for Jay's crapfest and, even though he's gone, none of them are coming back to NBC. We almost lost Chuck, which has proven to be one of Katie's and my favorite shows. But we did lose the then-relatively new Southland, a drama about cops on the job in Los Angeles.

Katie and I were interested in this show almost immediately because of the cast. We were fans of Ben Mackenzie from The O.C. (don't judge us), Regina King from the multitude of roles she's been in including Jerry Maguire and 24, Michael Cudlitz from Band of Brothers and Life, and Tom Everett Scott from Philadelphia (I think we were two of the only people who watched that show).

Aside from being a procedural cop drama, what made this interesting was that it focused on two different arms of the police department... homicide detectives and beat cops... and the strained dynamic between them.

At times, the show became a bit overlong, but when it was on fire, it was on fire. However, you could tell it did not belong on a regular television network. It had much more to offer if it could afford to be edgier.

Thankfully, somebody else realized this as well... TNT... the home of two other shows we love, The Closer and Men of a Certain Age (while we've heard good things about it, we have yet to watch Leverage). And new episodes of Southland are scheduled to start tomorrow night.

Southland is a good show and if you are even half interested, I suggest checking it out. And if you started watching it on NBC and thought something was missing, that's because it was airing on NBC and that should be all the answer and justification you could possibly need to give it a second chance.

So tune in at 10/9 Central on TNT for new episodes of Southland starting tomorrow.

In accordance with FCC regulations, yes, this was a solicited review. But, also in the pursuit of honesty, Katie and I truly were fans of the show back when it first aired and we were already going to be watching it again so it didn't take much to convince me to write this. All I got in exchange for this review was a cool talking greeting card with audio from Southland as well as a branded thumbdrive and a hand-written thank you note. Money might've been nice, but c'est la vie. Reviewers have to start somewhere, right?

Congratulations to Canada on their big win in men's hockey yesterday to close out the 2010 Winter Olympics. Katie and I were watching intently and hoping against hope that the USA would win out. Although our team wasn't playing all that well throughout most of the game, around the end, for a second, we really thought we would.

It was a hard-fought battle, but Canada came up with gold in the end. To the victors go the spoils. At least with men's hockey, the spoils didn't include underage beer consumption.

To Ryan Miller, goalie for the US squad, you are a god. Would you like to come play for the Blackhawks? Please?

Just acting like we're animals...

I think the world as we know it is coming to an end.

You think I'm joking? Check this shit out...

Earlier this week, Tillikum, an Orca at Sea World Orlando, rose up, snatched its trainer, and drowned her.

Komodo Dragons in Indonesia attack a park ranger.

A shark-filled tank at a shopping mall in Dubai springs a leak.

A glacier measuring two times the size of Los Angeles has broken off Antarctica and is floating around the ocean threatening to wreak havoc with ocean currents and other weather phenomena.

Earthquakes are running rampant lately, some in areas you wouldn't normally associate with earthquake-like tendencies, and are causing all kinds of damage from both the initial shockwaves, the aftershocks, and tsunamis if they're ocean-based. Another tsunami is now threatening Hawaii.

You wanna know who's to blame? The animals of the world. They're rising up against humans. They're taking back their planet. They're delivering a collective "FUCK YOU" to humans the world over.

The Tillikum and Komodo Dragon stories needs no further explanation. They're just pissed.

The tank leak is because them sharks be hungry and are ramming seams in the glass. They just didn't quite time it right. The leak was discovered before they could break free and make a smorgasbord of the shopping public.

I believe that the glacier broke off because the penguins are sick of being stuck either in zoos or aquariums pretending to be cute on an ice floe that we're responsible for melting.

You can't tell me he isn't one angry flightless bird

The earthquakes are clearly the animals who are capable striking fault lines to prove how pissed off they are.

The reign of humans on Earth is over! Give it up!

I hereby declare my allegiance to the non-human animal kingdom. ALL HAIL MY NEW OVERLORDS!!

Are any of you watching Caprica? I've been giving it a shot after finishing the entire Battlestar Galactica series recently, but have been on the fence.

**SPOILER FOR LAST NIGHT'S EPISODE**

It's not a bad series, I suppose, but it has been really slow and I can't say I've been entirely impressed with some of the casting. I was about to give it up until last night's episode with Daniel's introduction of the Cylon to his company's Board of Directors as well as Tamara and her new, shall we say, antics. These two bits at least added some excitement.

What's your take on the show?

Desi-i-i-i-ire...

My favorite U2 song ever.

Well, last week was "under." This week is "over." Kinda weird that I take a themed blogging day and break it into subthemes, isn't it?

Over-

-expectant
A friend e-mailed me with the information on the new HTC Android phone that AT&T will be carrying is the HTC Desire. It's supposed to be a slightly upgraded version of the Google Nexus One and without the Google branding. It's such a pretty phone. It seemingly does everything I hope it would do. I just am unsure if it has a physical keyboard or if a touch screen is the only option. We will have to see. But, for now at least, I'm drooling.

-exposed
I'm still freaked out about this. In Pennsylvania, a school district that gives all their students a MacBook, activated the built-in iSight cameras and observed a 15-year-old student doing something deemed "improper." He got in trouble as a result. But, when confronted by school officials, they showed him the photo of him doing whatever he did and he recognized it as being taken while he was at home. Now a class-action lawsuit is being started up because what the school did may violate federal and state wiretap and computer intrusion laws. This is nuts. I'm sorry, but this is just wrong. God only knows what I might have been caught doing in high school. Yikes!

-reaching
And then there's the kid that got a five-day suspension for his "I hate my teacher" page on Facebook. Some people are claiming that the kid was at home and was entitled to do whatever he wanted on his own time. I'm on the fence about this one. The ACLU or some other group claims that this is no different than talking to friends outside school or on a phone or whatnot. But, in my estimation, it's exactly the same as if the kid wrote a note on his own time and sent it to his teacher. If s/he felt threatened by the note, even written on the student's personal time, the school has every right to act and remove the student for the teacher's safety. Add to that the fact that a couple dozen fellow students became fans of the page and that would potentially add to the perceived threat level. At least that's what I think. You?

-stretched
Last week, I was introduced to a killer yoga pose called the Pigeon Pose. I was actually able to go full stretch on that one and hold it for a few minutes. It was a great stretch. But, of course, my legs were killing me for the next couple days until I did the stretch again and all returned to normal. But this is the closest my body has ever come to doing the splits. Bear in mind, although I did do the forward fold, I didn't go full One-Legged King Pigeon or anything. I'd like my body to not hate me entirely, thank you very much.

-dunn
This whole "under/over" subtheming reminds me of the crew introduction sequence in Airplane!

"Unger, Ober... Ober, Dunn."

Tell me the tales of war...

For a little while now, I had been tentatively looking forward to Neil Gaiman coming to my old hometown of Naperville as part of the Naperville READS program that they host annually. I say "tentatively" because, while I've read a couple of his books and enjoyed them as well as his Sandman graphic novels, I've had the worst time getting through Good Omens (tried to read it twice now) and I wasn't a fan of the movie adaptation of his fairy tale Coraline.

But, with the signing and reading happening next Tuesday, I was getting a little hyped up.

I went out today and spent a while anguishing over which of his many graphic novels I wanted to buy to have signed (I only own his novels, but had always borrowed his graphic novels from friends or the library). With helpful advice from some of my cool Tweeps including @lesombre, @lynneNaranek, and @MightyHunter, I chose a hardcover copy of Sandman: The Dream Hunters.

Then I went to pick up the ticket for entry to the event.

As the woman handed it to me, she informed me that things had changed and that Gaiman was only going to do a reading and discussion... no signing.

WTF? Seriously? I know this program is all about promoting reading and whatnot, but the cool thing was that they always got great authors to come in and SIGN BOOKS in addition to the reading and discussion.

C'mon Neil! Be my friend! Stick around and sign! Don't just sell pre-signed books!

Besides, Norm wants to take a picture with you. Don't make me Photoshop it.

Katie LOVES her iPod.

I got her the project RED iPod Nano, in case you wanted to know.

When I gave it to her, I already had it charged up and loaded with music and videos, including South Park, The Simpsons Movie, and Star Trek. Oh, and the UNO game I bought last year.

I gotta admit, it's one cool little device.

The fact that it has that Nike/iPod exercise tracker available plus the built-in radio with song tagging and live pause as well as the pedometer, video camera, built-in speaker, and shake shuffle makes it pretty damn rockin'. I almost want one, but still love the uber-capacity of my 160GB Classic iPod, which is actually about half full.

I haven't legitimately drooled over an iPod in a while.

This is totally drool-worthy!

Under pressure...

I'm feeling in kind of an "under" mood for this Snippet Wednesday.

Under-

-exposed
I couldn't believe it when Marty sent me this link to a story about one of the members of The Crystal Method who has been chronicling his tour with pictures of his son's Lego Stormtrooper in the different locales he visits. The trooper is even named Norm. In his case, though, it's for "NormTrooper" whereas mine was "Stormin' Norman," but still. Too creepy. I think my Norm needs to get out a little more.

-shirt
I bought a pack of Jockey undershirts a month or so ago without realizing that I normally buy them in tall sizes. Now, after a couple washings each, these things could barely be worn by a toddler and provide full coverage. So, until I have a chance to get back out to a store to buy new ones in the right size (and exchange the one pack I didn't open), I've been wearing T-shirts as undershirts. Last week I used a Blackhawks shirt one day. Yesterday was my Flaming Lips skull shirt from last December's concert. Today is my Ami James skull tattoo shirt. I'm stylin'!

-played
The mysterious gift I bought for Katie for her birthday was a new iPod. As you know, her old iPod died and was outside the warranty period. So I got her an iPod Nano and loaded it with music and video for her trips to the gym. Yes, she has an iPhone, which she has used at the gym, but she's always afraid of dropping it in mid-run (this has happened) and that's a bad thing to do to something that expensive. So she's been languishing for some time with the radio at the gym set to some crappy Top 40 station. Ick. That must change. Humanity dictates it!

Oh, and since I ordered it from Apple, I did get it engraved. But that stays between us. ;-)

-mined
In an attempt to circumvent Netflix, which has had me on hold for the show Glee for a month now, I asked if my library would order it. I received an e-mail yesterday saying, "Unfortunately, because Glee is a network television show, I will not be purchasing it." Huh? What the hell does it being a network show have anything to do with it? And what sense does that argument make when you already stock 24, also a supposed network show?

-estimated
Lindsey Vonn takes the gold in the Women's Downhill while teammate Julia Mancuso takes silver? NIIIICEEEEE! Way to go, ladies! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!

When they finally get the word...

I must apologize. I got so caught up in the fact that I went through an earthquake yesterday and the subsequent blogging of it, that I completely forgot it should've been a Snippet Wednesday. Guess I'll be having another Snippet Thursday: The Reckoning (yanno, like the last time I effed it all up?).

Fizzy
I'm going out to lunch with some coworkers today and one of them decided we're going for sushi. I'm not sure if I've mentioned it here before or not, but I used to love sushi. Until, that is, December 2008 when I had some sushi and caught the flu immediately afterward. It wasn't pretty. I don't blame the sushi; I know it had nothing to do with it. But the two events happened so close together that my stomach churns at the thought of sushi. Well, I think I may give it another shot today. I hope it all works out for the better. Pray for my intestinal fortitude, will ya?

Fuzzy
I know I rave about The Onion and their videos a lot around here. About the only thing I can think of that compares to The Onion in terms of humor and relevance is The Muppets. And this latest video, all about my Katie's fave Beaker, just furthers that belief...

Big
I dare say that working out is starting to work a bit for us both. Our chiropractor's office is running a Biggest Loser contest to see who can lose the most weight, based on percent, each month for the first few months of the year. Katie rocked January, even beating the guys, and won a one-hour massage. I didn't do so well in January, but, so far as I can tell in February, I've been losing. The scale at the gym says I'm down ten pounds from what I was a couple weeks ago. This is, of course, relative to the scale's original reading as it's notoriously off in terms of actual weight. From what I've been able to figure, it is about six pounds heavy. Hmmm, I like that. I hope it's true.

Buzzy
So far, I'm liking the new Google Buzz, the social media functionality that's now built into Gmail accounts. I read somewhere how it's being likened to a gateway drug between webmail and full collaborative applications like Google Wave, which I considered to be a complete and epic failure, and I would agree on that comparison. But I doubt it will bring me back to Google Wave. The nice thing about Buzz is that it's incorporated into my Gmail screen so it's all right there. Not another Web site for me to log into. Now, if only they would incorporate Six Apart blogware and Facebook, I would truly be happy.

I'm not entirely sure how it worked out like this, but this post has lead to a hankering to listen to an old album by The Refreshments. Can't figure out why.

 

I miss those guys. They put on a good live show.