kapgar

Time to play with picture pages...

I'm actually a few weeks late with this, but I hit the 200 picture mark with the Insty365 Challenge. I can't believe I would overlook such an obvious gimme post, but here it is anyway. Better late, than never, right?

Checking it off my list, unable to rewrite...

Yes, I do still have two Top lists to post and, including today, only two days before the New Year to post them. However, I really wanted to do another Snippet Wednesday. Plus, Katie and I are talking about seeing a movie (or two) on New Year's Eve and I'd like to give those movies a fair shake on the Top Films list. So that one will be on New Year's Day while the Top Shows will be tomorrow. Promise.

Banking
This bugs me. We are receiving bills for an urgent care visit for Katie from February and March of 2008. They’re claiming we never paid. Never mind the fact that it took them nearly two years to discover this supposed discrepancy, we did pay it. They say they’ll waive it if I can provide them with copies of the canceled checks. Due to that stupid federal law that passed some odd years ago, banks no longer have to send back canceled checks to us. So I checked our online account to find the digital images of the checks. I can only access back through August 2008. So I call my bank branch and they tell me they can look for it but it will take “research” as the information is “archived” and they may have to charge me for the research time. Isn’t that supposed to be the great thing about online banking is that your history is entirely digital and should be available at your fingertips 24 hours a day, seven days a week? Why would you archive digital information and make in inaccessible to the user? This makes no sense. Stupid banks.

Bear
I was reading Marty’s top albums of 2009 list and I really like this one thing he did which I might try next year… he included lists of albums that he considered a letdown or that he just didn’t get. It’s a pretty cool concept considering how much hype some albums receive. And I completely agree with him on his assessment of Grizzly Bear’s Veckatimest in this regard. I’ve listened to that album a ton of times and I just don’t get it. Why is it so highly regarded? What makes it so great? Why was it one of the top selling independent albums of the year? And the real kicker for me is that usually when I see a band live, I wind up gaining an appreciation of the album by hearing the songs up close and in person. I saw Grizzly Bear at Pitchfork and the live experience helped not at all.

Bears
Can someone tell me where the hell the Jay Cutler that we saw on Monday night against the Vikings has been all season long? Damn. Even though the Bears defense really started to stink things up a bit in the fourth quarter giving up 17 unanswered points and letting the Vikes tie it up, it was a very exciting game! This is something we haven’t really seen all season… save for the stinking things up bit. That was pretty much par for the course for the Bears this year.

Book
I cannot, for the life of me, find my Moleskin notebook. I’m pretty sure I’ve exhausted the places where it could possibly be located. Dammitalltohell. Why is it that when you don't need something, it's always there, but when you do need it, it's nowhere to be found? I wanted to do some writing and, of course, it’s nowhere to be seen. 

Books
The reason I’d like to find my Moleskin is because I have an idea for a book I’d like to write and I want it along for the ride. Maybe I should just buy a new one that would be dedicated to this endeavor. Actually, that probably would be a better idea since I have some ideas for illustrations that would accompany the text and an oversize Moleskin would be better for this project. Yes, it’s a children’s book. Anyone have contacts in the children’s book publishing industry?

Bark
Dog collar beer bottle opener? Greatest. Invention. Ever. Me wanty. Hey, do you guys need a blog reviewer? Drop me a line. E-mail addy's in the top menu bar.

Time to head to work. Adios, peeps.

The gift you gave is gonna last forever...

I know that there are some of you who actually look forward to Snippet Wednesday. And I've kinda left you hangin' the last coupla weeks. Last week it was an unfinished Snippet Wednesday due to Katie's crash. Yesterday, I just plain ran out of time.

So I'm gonna make it up to you with a special edition Snippet Thursday: The Reckoning!

Still love me?

Katie
Tomorrow marks Katie's official final day of student teaching. However, she got her grade for student teaching as well as her portfolio yesterday. As on both! That means she is graduating with a 4.0! I'm ridiculously proud of her! Mah baybee gotz intelluhjints!

Taste
My IT Director at work was in my office for a meeting yesterday when he looked on my cubicle cabinet and saw a promo card for the release of The Flaming Lips new album. This led to a discussion about music. Turns out:

• My IT Director loves The Flaming Lips.
• My IT Director loves Pete Yorn.
• My IT Director loves Bob Mould and Hüsker Dü.
• My IT Director loves The Replacements.
• My IT Director loves Tom Petty.

Clearly, my IT Director rawks.

Digital
I went to Best Buy yesterday to look into how much copies of The Hangover and Inglourious Basterds were on DVD. I also was curious if they came with digital copies. Both do. But, thanks to Ren's recent warning, I began to read the small print. Expirys were not a concern, thankfully. But compatibility was. Basterds is fine, but Hangover is neither Macintosh nor iPod/iTunes/iPhone compatible. Why in the name of Christ would a distribution company not want their product to work on the top-selling digital player of all time? Sure, I can probably rip and convert it without a problem (I do have Handbrake and iSquint and all those other cool little apps), but just loading the digital copy is so much easier. 

Inglourious Basterds digital copy? WIN!

The Hangover digital copy? EPIC FAIL!

Oh, and I alerted some customers and employees to this fact as well. They were dumbfounded by the stupidity of it all.

Blu-Ray
I actually have a Blu-Ray disc. My very first Blu-Ray disc. I don't own a Blu-Ray player, but I have a disc for when that day does come. I don't know how many of you subscribe to e-newsletters from restaurants and whatnot. Well, I do. And I get all kinds of free birthday shit as a result. Usually they amount to free desserts or, if I'm lucky, free entrees.

I got über lucky this year thanks to Disney who offered me a free Blu-Ray disc for my birthday. Say whaaaa? Of course I could only choose from a list of five movies. But it's free. So who cares? I chose Enchanted. Hey, Katie and I enjoyed that movie. And it's got Amy Adams. Can't go wrong with Amy Adams. Both my wife and Sizzle know of my obsession with her very well.

Gift
I think I've finally figured out what I'm going to get for Katie for Christmas. I usually have her gift done by now. This, I believe, is the latest I've waited to buy something. I just want to do a little research first before I actually buy it. There's no way in the name of all that's holy that she'll be expecting this. Not one iota of a chance.

Fox
I had a plan last week to write up a big glowing review of a movie Katie and I went to see, Fantastic Mr. Fox. I had it all pre-written in my head and was sitting down to type when I decided, instead, to read through my subscriptions in Google Reader. This was when I noticed Avitable had done the same thing and pretty much had the exact same opinion of the movie as Katie and I. So, if you'd like to read about a fantastic film, sure to be one of my tops of the year, head over to Av's digs and read up. 

Medley
This is simply too cool.

Well, adios for now.

Tonight there's gonna be a jailbreak...

...somewhere in this town. Tonight there's gonna be trouble, so don't you be around.

And that trouble is Snippet Wednesday!

Dodging
Tonight is the playoffs for this season of dodgeball and I think, afterwards, I'm officially quitting the sport. It's just not as much fun as it once was and the novelty certainly wore off quickly. Plus, having a bunch of adults slinging barbs and calling each other a bunch of effin' liars in a league that runs on the honor system just sucks. I'm done. God I hope my buddy starts a sand volleyball league again this summer. Been too long.

Funkalicious
Katie got me an early birthday present this year and I'm just as happy as can be about it. The funny thing is it's only a sweatshirt. But it's singularly the coolest sweatshirt in the known universe. It's called Funkalicious from Threadless. I saw this design for the first time at the Threadless booth at Pitchfork and fell in love. I was planning to go back later and get it but I got so stuck in the masses of people awaiting the Lips show that, if I left, I never would've gotten my place back. And Threadless only recently started reprinting this design on hoodies (I didn't want it on a t-shirt). But now my boom-boxin' astronaut is rockin' it on my chest!

Stats
For some reason, this morning I decided to look at my all-time stats just to see how things have changed. Right now, I'm lucky to break 100 hits a day. But there was actually a time when I had 943 views in a single day. So I drilled down to find the date... June 4, 2007... yeah, the day when Dave guest posted for me while I was in Las Vegas. And, in the comments is Kim stating how this is probably going to be my best statistical post ever. How right she was. I find stuff like that funny. But it was a brilliant post by Dave. No question. Slappin' the salami!

Flair
Remember the 80s when we owned jean jackets with buttons and patches all over them? Do you still do that at all? Decorate something with flair, that is? I think my camera bag is slowly becoming that flair canvas for me. I've got a few buttons and pins and a Rwandan beehive keychain (craft thing I got from Starbucks) and I want to sew on some patches that I dug up at home from a friend who was in the military (Airborne patch and unit insignia). It's not ridiculous looking and I'm sure I'll stop before it gets bad. But it's kinda fun. Takes me back. But in a controlled manner.

Mars
I've been watching the BBC version of Life on Mars, season 1, since they finally made it available and, like many of you told me, it is good. In some aspects better than the U.S. version I so dearly love. But, in other aspects, not as good. I'm not sure if it's simply because it's a DVD version, but the BBC version is far more risque. The stories are really cool and they don't delve as far into Sam's "visions" as the U.S. version (no lunar rovers yet; but that little girl and her clown doll are weirding me out). While I still really like Jason O'Mara in the U.S. version, Jon Simm is starting to grow on me. I'm kinda torn between the U.S. and U.K. when it comes to Annie, Gene, and Chris, in all honesty. But, the biggest difference to me is the character of Ray carling. The BBC Ray is just lacking a lot of the gusto and bravado brought to the role in the U.S. by Michael Imperioli. I think Imperioli and his 'stache rock that role like no other. I'm also hoping the story with Sam's mom and his younger self builds up a lot more like it did in the U.S. version. There's still time. Any other opinions? Bear in mind, I'm only six episodes into season one. There are two eps left and then I've got season two to watch.

Any way the wind blows...

Happy Snippet Wednesday Before Turkey Thursday!

Bohemuppets
This video goes a long way to proving why I love the Muppets and how, despite being nearly 35 years old, I find them hilarious and oh-so brilliant.

Okay, it's not as new as it was this morning when I first began writing this up. Now it's everywhere. But I'm still posting it. I don't care.

Graduates
Yep, we graduated this past Sunday from the Citizen's Fire Academy. I don't know what I'm going to do with myself on Monday nights now. Anyway, here are photos from the final two days including auto extrication and the graduation itself. Enjoy! (Facebookers, click through)

Amazon
I'm thinking the greatest single thing to happen to my music loving has been the Amazon MP3 Store. Now they, like so many others, are getting in on the Black Friday specials. A little early, sure. But still. The sad thing is, I either already have much of what I want from this list of specials or it's been ordered by my local library by my request. I really have too much music. And too much influence over my library.

Moon
I know I've been having fun on Twitter at the expense of many New Moon and Twilight fans. I can't help myself. This is my revenge against all who heckled me when I got so geeked (and ultimately disappointed) about the release of the new Star Wars film back in 1999. Yes, Twilighters, I'm equating you to geeks. And you are. Admit it. But anyway, I do want to see the film New Moon despite this heckling. And I think Katie and I are going to see it pretty soon. We kinda have to. About half of Katie's class saw it opening night at midnight and they were in shock she hadn't seen it yet. Due to parent-teacher conferences this week, she's had a reprieve, but we need to see it before next Monday or she may pay with their scorn. Here's hoping tickets are available.

Eternal
I only wish I had video of the show that Katie and I gave the drivers next to us as we drove to the grocery store tonight. She was singing harmony as I took the role of Susanna Hoffs singing The Bangles' "Eternal Flame." I thought we sounded pretty damn good.

Danger on the tracks...

Happy Snippet Wednesday to you.
Happy Snippet Wednesday to you.
Happy Snippet Wednesday, dear reader.
Happy Snippet Wednesday to you.

How sad is it that when typing that, I accidentally keyed "dead reader" at first? That's truly not how I think of you all. Honestly!

Sales
Already I'm loving the holiday sales season even if I truly believe it's blasphemy to be thinking about the holiday season this early. I almost violated my own Christmas list by purchasing the complete series of Life on Mars (US) yesterday when I saw it for $17.49 at Best Buy. It's a $40 set. Same original price for season four of The Closer, which I actually did buy for Katie yesterday at Target for $12.99. How do you pass that shit up?

Santa
Speaking of holidays, I had flipped on some news broadcast last night and they were reporting that the Amalgamated Order of Real Bearded Santas is pushing that their employees be given higher priority on H1N1 vaccine shots. While I laughed at first, it does make perfect sense. They are exposed to a ridiculously high number of children on a daily basis, many of whom are probably sicker than dogs and still go to see Santa anyway because their parents won't deny them this childhood privilege even if they are hacking their lungs out all over the floor. And a lot of the guys playing Santa (the real-bearded ones, anyway) are older and some quite overweight. Yeah, give them the vaccine. Last thing we need is a class-action lawsuit against a Santa who infected a few hundred kids. But I do still laugh at the idea that Santas are unionized.

Trains
The reason I have no idea what channel this newscast was on is because it was whatever channel was left on the TV before switching over to my DVD player last night and watching one of the better thriller movies I've seen in a while, Transsiberian. In a nutshell, it's about a couple (Woody Harrelson and Emily Mortimer) who take a train trip across Siberia to Moscow after completing volunteer work in China. While on board, they meet up with another couple (Kate Mara and Eduardo Noriega) who may or may not be drug mules. Murder, intrigue, and police investigating ensue. It also stars Ben Kingsley as a Russian narcotics detective. Is there any nationality that dude doesn't play? Offhand, I've got German, Jewish, American, British, Indian, Russian... Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised considering its low-budget and low-distribution nature. Very enjoyable. Oh, and it was directed by Brad Anderson, the guy behind the disturbing The Machinist starring Christian Bale in what I consider one of his finest performances.

Mojo
Just when I think I can have all my snippets related, I throw in one that's not. Well, pretend it is. Let's just say I was reading this before watching Transsiberian, okay? I had forgotten how much I enjoyed Mojo magazine. It's basically another music mag with reviews and interviews and the like, much akin to Rolling Stone but without the political leanings. And, as a bonus, it comes packaged with a CD of music related to the theme of that month's issue. Sure this makes the mag cost $9.99 per issue, but I don't buy it often. This is actually the first issue in a few years and I had to do it because the CD is all electronic music including M83, LCD Soundsystem, Tangerine Dream, OMD, and an exclusive track from Kraftwerk, along with 10 more. Yes! I like electronic music, okay?

Ken
Must. Break. Addiction. To. KenKen. Puzzles. But. It's. Too. Much. Fun. Help.

Black cat, nine lives, short days, long nights...

Welcome to a vacation-borne Snippet Wednesday. Of course, it's only a vacation day for me, not Katie. How's that work? In Illinois, kids get freakin' Casimir Pulaski Day off, but not Veteran's Day? And I actually do get a real holiday like Veteran's Day off but not some weird, never-heard-of-outside-Illinois-borders holiday? WTF?

I guess I should just shut up and not complain, eh?

McAdams
Rumors are swirling that Rachel McAdams may be cast in the next Spider-Man film as Felicia Hardy/Black Cat. Rock on! This might actually help make up for that travesty of a third film that has officially ruined the series for me. But I think they'll have to recast Peter Parker/Spider-Man as well now. Rachel is too much woman for Tobey Maguire. Sorry, dude, but it's the truth.

CaptureMyChicago
Well, I finally got semi-firm (heh heh) word on when the CaptureMyChicago book will be out and winners announced... December 9! When I first placed the order for the book, it said it would likely ship in mid-November. Aye aye aye! I gotta wait another month? And they won't announce who is in the book until the launch party on the 9th. This is brutal! I wanna know! Stupid launch party.

Titans
Okay, sure the teaser trailer for Clash of the Titans looks a little overwrought with CG and more than just a bit fakey. But, damn I think this is gonna be one good ol', popcorn-munching fun fest of a film. BRING ON THE TITANS!!

Sorry it got recentered a little funny. I had to resize to fit the width of my central content column. Well, it was supposed to resize, instead it was cropped. Never had that happen before. If you wanna see it in all its glory, go check out either Geeks of Doom or Cinematical.

Veterans
On a more serious note, do take a moment to remember those who have served in the Armed Forces. A really great tribute came last year from my buddy LeSombre. Quite moving.

Never forget.

I'm gonna set you free...

Um, yeah, so it's Snippet Wednesday. Sorry, I got nothing more original. I need to make a couple lunches before I head out for work.

Fall
While I'm upset that we here in Chicago still never seem to have much of a fall in terms of nice autumn weather, we did get some beautiful leaves for the first time in about two or three years. Lately, the odd times during which we've had rain have made the leaves go from green to brown with no color variations in between. Something worked this year and we got some magnificent colors. Thank God.

I'll upload some more pictures soon.

Victims
Talk about death and decay, police in Cleveland have discovered the bodies of 10 victims in or near the house and yard of a suspected serial murderer. The kicker is that people have been complaining about strange odors emanating from his house for years. One person went so far as to describe it as the smell of a dead body. And it took Cleveland cops how long to investigate? There's something severely wrong with this story.

Superman
Funny thing about this particular Dilbert strip is that I could see this sort of thing as an outtake in the original Superman. How funny would that have been?

 

Swell
I was totally stoked the other day when I discovered that The Swell Season (featuring Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova of the movie Once) had a new album out. Cooler yet was that there was an iTunes code in it for an additional free song. But they had two codes, one for the US store and one for the Canadian store. So, if there are any Canadian fans of The Swell Season, drop me a note in the comments and the code for this song is yours. I'm not sure if it cancels out after I redeem the US code, but it's worth a shot. First come/first served.

Married?
Archie is marrying Veronica? Not Betty? Six-part comic arc? WTF? This is so not cool.

Time for lunch making. With a tear in my eye on Betty's behalf.

Just open up your mouth and feed it...

The last Snippet Wednesday of October 2009. Where the hell has this year gone?

Teeth
Okay, this has been driving me nuts and considering the current popularity of the genre, I feel we need a decision and that right now! Where should vampires fangs be? Some TV shows and movies have them on the back two incisors like The Lost Boys and True Blood. I find this goofy looking because they just clash with the already pointy incisors, but it's very efficient for grab-and-go dining.

 

Then there are those shows/movies that have them where I feel they look best, on the canine teeth. These teeth are already pointy and it looks natural when the canines just grow out a bit to become fangs. But it's gotta be a bitch to have to bite back that far on a person so the canines can make contact. Fast food would be an impossibility. Seriously, try it. Stick your forearm in your mouth and see how far you have to shove it in (that's what she said) before you can get a good grip with your canines. Some examples of this can be found in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Bram Stoker's Dracula. 

 

Oh, and don't get me started on goofy little Nosferatu boy. I'm not even including his front incisor appearance as an option. Although he is certainly getting a handful in this shot, isn't he?

 

So what say you? Rear incisors or canine fangs?

Joy
The library got me Phish's new album, Joy! I'm not a huge Phish phan, but I've heard bits and pieces of this album and have liked what I've heard. Maybe I'll go back and pick up some older stuff later on.

BSG
I just finished watching Battlestar Galactica, season 2.5. Damn! Talk about a cliffhanger season ending! All I can say is that if I were watching this series live, I'd be pissed I'd have to wait however long to find out what happens in season three. Thank the Gods for DVD. And thank my library for having all these seasons available so I no longer have to wait for Netflix to do it for me. I had a friend offer to loan me the whole series, but I was afraid of how long it would take me to watch it. May not be a problem anymore.

Camera
Don't you hate how on the day you forget your camera, everything in the world happens for which you could possibly need it? On Monday, I was driving into work and saw a truck fire. Sure, I got a couple pictures, but not the quality I would have with my trusty Sony. These were Blackberry shots. And then, that night at Fire Academy, we were up in the bucket truck a good 85 feet above the city. You could see so damn far and the shots would've been spectacular. Oh well. Shit happens, eh?

Memes
Has anybody done any memes out there lately? I can't even remember the last time. Feels like years.

Oh well, time for work.

It all started with a big bang...

This is Snippet Wednesday! This is Snippet Wednesday! Pumpkins scream in the dead of the night.

Smoked
I was warned about this when starting the Citizen's Fire Academy and clearly they were not full of it. We spent Monday night in the training tower watching how quickly a fire can fill the room with smoke and seeing how dark it gets and the stratification of heat... all that cool stuff. But they told us that one thing we'll notice is that our bodies will pick up on the scent of soot and smoke and that it will effectively ooze out of our pores for days afterward. Last night I came home and showered. I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed trying to get the smell out of me and it wouldn't get out. Turns out it did, according to Katie. But my nose couldn't tell. I still smell the smoke. It's ingrained in my sinuses. Yummy.

Wil
Did you all happen to catch Wil Wheaton as, well, Wil Wheaton the other night on Big Bang Theory? I knew it was just a matter of time before he finally showed up there. Wil raves about the show to no end. And his turn as the target of Sheldon's ire was pitch perfect. And Wil had some cool stuff to say about the experience on his own blog. It's kinda fun reading Wil's blog when he talks about his work on different shows. His Criminal Minds diary last year was a lot of fun to read.

Boo
You know it's true love when your wife helps you celebrate your favorite season by going out and buying you a box of Boo Berry cereal as a surprise. I love you, hon!

Discworld
Are any of you fans of Terry Pratchett's Discworld books? I'm interested but a little timid. There's just so damn many of them. Is it an actual series that needs to be read in order or can you pick and choose individual novels as you go? What are your recommendations? I'm asking because I picked up a book some time ago called The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents and am now getting around to reading it. I had no idea when I bought it that it was technically part of the Discworld saga, but it does seem to stand alone pretty well so far. But I thought this might have more to do with the fact that it's classified a young adult book as opposed to the scifi/fantasy that the remainder of them are. So, being a YA book and not an adult novel, I thought maybe he wrote this one intentionally to stand alone and not tie in to the rest so much. So what say you?

Capture
The Capture My Chicago photography contest is over both in terms of submissions and voting and there is no word so far on what is going on. There wasn't even an official announcement about it closing. I would seriously like to know what's going on. C'mon CBS! Give us some idea here! This is killing me. Not that I actually think any of my photos were chosen, but I'd at least like a little clue into what's happening. Updates?

One day I say today we live as a lion...

Need a great gift for a loved one? Try a Snippet Wednesday! They are great for any occasion and are truly one size fits all.

Psych
I did have a few requests regarding where I found those variations of the theme song from Psych and I figured it might be easier to just post them here. Might even steal some traffic when people Google both those audio files, we shall see. But I'm posting them here in MP3 format. There are plenty of tips and tricks provided by myself and others as to how to convert them into ringtones in this post and its comments, so knock yourselves out. Let me know if you are able to make them work.

• Psych Theme Song (Hindi variation)
• Psych Theme Song (Boyz2Men variation)

Zombie
Must. Have. [Brains.] Now.

Zombie Mez-Itz???

God I love ThinkGeek.

Zoo
I'm going on yet another field trip with Katie's class. Today it's to Brookfield Zoo. I haven't been to the zoo in years and miss it immensely. Of course, my number one goal is to collect all the wax animals just like when I was a kid. 

Bonus points if they have a red wax lion.

More bonus points if it has a slightly smashed head.

Even more still if it talks and only I hear it.

"Find a penny..."

Speech
Katie saw this flyer posted at her school. We both found it quite hilarious.

Hair
Less than 12 hours and counting...

Yes, Katie will be there to chronicle (photograph) the shaving of my head and I'm sure to hold my hand as well.

Whichever way the wind blows...

For this Snippet Wednesday I shall regale you all with snippets about what I've been doing with my week off work. No, I swear I'm not trying to rub in the fact that I'm off and you're not. Really.

Reading
Sadly, it hasn't been the reading of books, thus far. I think I'm going to try some more of that later on today. I did, however, finish the book I was "halfway through" last week. But I have been catching up on a huge backlog of magazines that have been piling up around here. I had four Sports Illustrateds and three Rolling Stones that I had either not started or only gotten partially through. Right now I have two SIs and one RS left! Yay me! And, thankfully, I no longer have to look at that freakish picture of Megan Fox on RS from a couple weeks back. That picture disturbs me. And, sorry if it makes me less of a man, but she does nothing for me. Not anymore anyway.

Cleaning
I've been cleaning our bathrooms and doing some straightening, dusting, and vacuuming (hey, I spelt that rite on my fürst tri!). Exotic, eh?

Moulding
As much as I wish I could say this referred to me listening obsessively to the music of Bob Mould or Sugar or Hüsker Dü, I can't. I'm talking about getting the crown moulding installed above the cabinet in our master bathroom. It's been partially installed for a couple years now and desperately needed to be finished or I think Katie might do something to me that I'd rather not think about while I sleep. It's now installed and the filler is drying so I can get around to painting it.

Containerizing
We discovered this morning, via an abundance of little black turds on the counter top, that we have another mouse. He must be new as of last night or early this morning because that was the only place I could find his crap, literally. So I cleaned and containerized all our food. The little bastard did manage to eat through the bag that contained a brand new batch of naan bread that I bought at Trader Joe's only yesterday. I never even got to enjoy any of it. Yes, traps are set to kill. (In deference to Marie) Eff you, you effin' effer!

Watching
I will admit to watching an exorbitant amount of TV on DVD. I finished season three (and, thus, the entire run) of Deadwood. I finished the first disc of Battlestar Galactica season 2.5 and disc two should be here from Netflix tomorrow. I rewatched disc two of Firefly (I love "Our Mrs. Reynolds," great episode). 

 

I also wiped our TiVo clean of Mad Men and The Amazing Race. Okay, not every hour can be productive.

Exercising
I did go jogging on Monday, but I skipped yesterday due to some crappy weather. It rained most of the day and then we had a pretty nasty wind storm into the evening despite the clouds completely clearing up. Strange, strange weather yesterday. Today, though, I am going in for yoga. I know that means driving in to where I work, but my yoga instructor has been out of town for the last couple weeks and my body can feel it. So I decided not to miss this week even if it means wasting some gas. But I have to be there for dodgeball tonight anyway, so why not? And I might try to work out between the two. Not sure what yet, but something.

Tweeting and Booking
I've also been doing my fair share of Tweeting and Facebooking. Not really a whole helluva lot, but enough to keep relatively up to date.

And how has your week been so far?

Mother, tell your children not to walk my way...

I knew I wanted to use that lyric for this post but I wanted to get it right so I Googled it. I was so damn convinced it was The Cult. But it's Danzig. How the hell did I mix that one up? Oh well, on with Snippet Wednesday, anywho.

Foo
Ack! New Foo Fighters!! NEW FOO FIGHTERS!!! NEW FOO FIGHTERS!!!!

(iTunes | Amazon)

Did I get the idea across that I'm excited? Really? You didn't feel it? Lemme try again...

NEW FOO FIGHTERS!!!

No, I won't go so far as blinking text. Not even for the Foo Fighters. Sorry.

Malfunkshun
The other day, while shopping for decade-related costumes for Katie to wear to school in their weeklong celebration of the school's 50th anniversary, we came across a Mother Love Bone T-shirt. Of course we bought it and she wore it on Monday. But it got me a bit wistful for the band and I've subsequently been going a bit nuts listening to their music as well as reading about them and their late lead singer, Andrew Wood. I discovered that there was a documentary made about his life called Malfunkshun, after the name of the band he fronted prior to MLB, and I tried to find it on Netflix. They clearly didn't have it as this mixed bag of search results would indicate.

But seriously, a cult horror film followed by an NC17-rated steamy, dark, cerebral romance about a kid's forbidden desire for his mom, and then... Mulan? A Disney flick. Family animation. I can just see some kid putting Ma Mere in their queue as a mother's day tribute.

Music
I'm sure all of you already think I'm a music addict ("whore" might be more appropriate). But just to confirm the theory, my iTunes account is now showing that I have...

Yes, 10,794 songs that clock in at 29 days, 12 hours, 51 minutes, and 13 seconds (including the copy of Danzig's "Mother" that I just picked up because I felt so guilty). I can listen for nearly a month without hearing the same song twice (unless you're talking February; I so rock that month, even on leap years). Yeah, my name is kapgar and I'm a music junkie.

60
Katie and I are actually going to try watching The Amazing Race again after giving it up for about two or three years. We kinda miss it. But the problem is that CBS, the network that airs TAR, always seems to have something programmed during the day on Sundays that bumps the start time of everything else after it, including TAR. So I get severely annoyed having to open my TiVo viewing of something we want to watch by seeing snippets of crap we don't want to watch in the form of 60 Minutes, a show that I feel has absolutely no newsworthiness or cultural significance at all. Why is that show still on the air? Somebody please pull the plug already.

Rogue
Why is part of me morbidly fascinated about the pending release of Sarah Palin's memoirs, Going Rogue: An American Life? Am I doomed to damnation if I read it? Could my damnation be any worse than it already is having forced myself to read an Ann Coulter book as I did a few years back?

Funny thing... I couldn't remember Coulter's name for whatever reason. So I Googled "conservative freakshow blonde pundit" and, lo and behold, a link to a CBS news page about her shows up first in the results. 

I'm off too work. Enjoy!

We hear he is a wonderful wiz...

Hollow it out, pack it in tight, light 'em up, and take a long drag on Snippet Wednesday.

iDependence
I was reading a post on Kevin Spencer's blog about his iPod crapping out and how he suddenly became very aware of how dependent he is on his iPod on a daily basis. I completely agree with him except I never needed my iPod crapping out to tell me that. I'm fully aware of my overdependence on this little electronic gem. I listen to it on my commute to work and nearly all day during work. I use it when I work out and anywhere else I drive and sometimes just when I have a free moment and need a music fix. I would be so lost without my iPod. Is that sad?

Jam
I wasn't going to talk about the new Pearl Jam album, Backspacer, and how much I'm enjoying it so far (probably my favorite album of theirs since Vitalogy), but then I read this review on Chicagoist and realized how nicely it summed up my feelings and decided to share it with you. So here you go.

NCIS
After all that to-do yesterday with regard to NCIS: Los Angeles, what do I do? I forget to set the TiVo for last night's premiere episode. Oh well. Guess we'll be starting with episode two as I see no replay of the first episode in the immediate future. Stupid me.

Lips
I totally want to preorder the new Flaming Lips album, Embryonic, from their Web site. Not that I actually expect to get either the autographed litho or win the tickets for the New Year's Eve show (although either would be damn cool), I'm in it for the dead Muppet CD case! Tell me that's not cool. Okay, there are a lot of reasons I really want this set, like the DVD/CD and the litho, but that is some damn unique packaging. Oh and if one of you, as a result of seeing this snippet, orders the set and wins something, I'd better get a cut of it. If it's the litho, be creative. 

Wizard
Tonight, Katie and I are off to see the wizard. Yep, the wonderful Wizard of Oz. It turns out that a local theater is showing it and hopefully there are still tickets left. With my luck, there won't be. But we shall see. That would be a cool flick to see on the big screen.

Yep, it's all sold out. Go fig.

He's the world's biggest...

Fasten your seat belt, if you can (more on that later), 'tis Snippet Wednesday!

Disclaimer
For any of you reading this or any of my posts in the Notes section of Facebook, you might have noticed how I talk about photo albums or videos that don't seem to be there. This is a quirk of the Notes application. It imports text with some degree of efficacy (minus some formatting) and the occasional embedded image. But photo galleries or videos? Nuh uh. I recommend you all just click on over here to www.kapgar.com to view these posts in all their gory glory.

Photos
Here are some pictures I took recently in and around Union Station in Chicago for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!

Signature
The reason I was downtown and able to take those pictures last week was because I was going to that showing of Million Dollar Quartet where I was going to get my copy of The Last Starfighter signed by Johnny Cash/Lance Guest. Well, here's what my cover looked like prior to the signing...

Wanna know what it looks like now? Exactly the same. Turns out after going all gaga for the showing, Lance Guest wasn't in the cast that night. Actually, he's out of town for a few weeks and they expect him to rejoin, they just don't know when. 

Damn you, Alex Rogan! You owe me a signature!

Toner
I can honestly say, there are few things in life I hate buying more than replacement cartridges for our printer. I dread this deed simply because they cost so damn much and rarely last long at all. I'd go to those refill places, but the one or two times I've tried refilled cartridges, they didn't work well at all and did a number on my printer. This may have changed in recent years, though. Any experiences positive or negative?

Belted
As I was driving out to pick up the printer cartridges last night at OfficeMax, I discovered that the button on my seat belt buckle was coming loose. The seat belt still works, but it sometimes takes a little fiddling. Thank you to the guy at Advance Auto Parts, though, who told me about a local junkyard that has what effectively amounts to a freeform Saturday. I just drive in, find what I need, grab it, and pay about half price off the normal junkyard costs. He told me he redid the entire interior of an SUV for about $50. Guess where I'll be on Saturday?

Jackass
Am I the only person who applauds President Obama for calling Kanye West a jackass? Regardless of whether it was off record or not and whether it was appropriate or not, it needed to be said and by someone from whom the message would actually bear some weight. Hey, if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, and steals the spotlight from a VMA winner like a duck...

Well, time for work. Adieu.

Walk away and taste the pain...

But don't come again some other day or you'll miss Snippet Wednesday!

Office
The big ol' honkin' special edition "Beet Box" set of season five of The Office came out yesterday at Best Buy and I gotta say there's one thing that pisses me off... the whole reason I got it was the T-shirt that was included that says Schrute Farms Beets. Great shirt but it only came in large. That's too big for Katie and too small for me. Why oh why didn't NBC Universal just include a certificate with the set so you could go online and order one in the size you want? That would make so much more sense. Sure you'd have to pay shipping (if they want to be dicks like that) but you get what you want. At least my beet-shaped stress ball is in the right size.

Quartet
Tomorrow I'm heading into the city with my brother and SiL (Katie can't make it due to work) to see Million Dollar Quartet again. It will be cool to see it and hopefully we'll have most of the same cast members as the last time. The reason why is because there is a Q&A afterward with the cast. I'm hoping this means we can get some signatures because I just bought my 25th anniversary remastered The Last Starfighter and I would really like it signed by Alex Rogan/Johnny Cash/Lance Guest. Cross your fingers for me.

Habañeros
If any of you have been following my Tweets then you know that I've been daring myself to eat several of the peppers I've been growing. Whole. Untainted by being mixed with anything else. And yesterday a coworker and I both ate habañeros and I video'd it. I'm still playing with the video trying to figure out edits and captions and transitions and the like but it will be posted soon. I will beat this bitch known as video editing and hopefully get back to making video posts on a semi-regular basis. They are fun when they don't piss me off.

Music
Yesterday I looked and saw that nearly 20% of the music in my iTunes was loaded on my computer this year. Holy crap! That's nearly 20 GB of music just this year and it isn't even over! Oh I knew this Time Capsule was going to be both a blessing and a curse. Mostly a blessing though!

TV
The fall TV season is upon us. Are there any new shows that have piqued your interest? Sadly there are very few for us. We're going to give Accidentally on Purpose a shot since we're both fans of Jenna Elfman from her Dharma & Greg days. But we're not holding out much hope for it. And then there's Community. Hard to go wrong with Joel McHale and Chevy Chase. Or I hope it's hard to go wrong anyway. Finally there's NCIS: Los Angeles. We've watched NCIS on occasion in reruns and like it but have never committed to it. Just too much to catch up on. Hopefully starting this from the beginning will make up for it somewhat.

Commas
I can't believe I went a whole post without typing any commas. Not that I didn't need them. I just opted not to. Meh. Screw commas. Overrated little pieces of punctuation. Maybe next time I'll shoot for no periods or paragraph breaks and just turn my whole blog into a James Frey novel.

Time for workity work workin' workers.

Here come the story of the hurricane...

I feel like the floor of a taxicab. Hmm, must be Snippet Wednesday!

Bose
I finaly got my new earbuds and I did wind up getting the Bose in-ear buds again. Turns out those of you, including Katie, who said to talk to Bose were absolutely right. They actually do have a replacement program. Turn in your old ones and get a new pair for half price. Sure, this half price is still more than I was looking to spend, but Katie even said I use them religiously and we know we like them, so I might as well. Can I tell you how nice it is to have bass again in my music?

Crowes
And what better to listen to with my new earbuds than the new double album, Before the Frost... Until the Freeze, by one of my longtime faves, The Black Crowes. Glad to see they came back from their hiatus. I only hope the Foo Fighters do the same.

Parents
Not only can I see parents doing this, it's really not a half-bad idea. Funny though it may be. And when The Onion, in an attempt at lampooning morning "news" shows, does a better job than the shows themselves, you know something is wrong. Or maybe it's right. Hmmm...

Facebook, Twitter Revolutionizing How Parents Stalk Their College-Aged Kids

Poll
The idea that somebody would pick Spider-Man 2 over Superman in a head-to-head superhero poll just floors me. Please avert this travesty of superheroic injustice by visiting Cinematical and changing things before it's too late! (I agree with all the other results so far, though).

Kevin
Yeah bitches! I'm a hurricane this year and I'm bearing down on Mexico! Rock on!

Check that. I've been downgraded to a tropical depression. I guess I pussed out. Talk about depression. I was so excited when I saw the name "Hurricane Kevin" on the Google Earth hurricane tracker. This blows, but apparently not enough.

Fetch
Somehow I don't see that a subject line of "Jerry plays fetch with himself" on a spam e-mail message is really going to make me want to open it. Just so many things about that I'm much better off not knowing.

And it's time to head on out into the void.

I got a devil's haircut in my mind...

Welcome to Snippet Wednesday, where we take three parts debonair, four parts sexy, five parts awesome, and... completely disregard it all in the name of blog tripe! Wooo hooo!!!

Fiber
If you read this on a product, would you ever eat it? "NEW USERS: Increase your fiber intake gradually. Gastrointestinal discomfort may occur until your body adjusts." This warning is on the wrapper of the new Kellogg's Fiber Plus bars. I'm thinking the original warning "You will have gas the likes of which have not been seen since Vesuvius" was nixed at the last second. C'mon, be honest with us here, okay? TRUTH IN ADVERTISING, DAMMIT!!

Porn!
If you're under 18 and having, er, urges, you might want to take a hop across the pond to get your fix...

Rampage
Fatal cow attacks in Britain? Well, duh, they obviously want their porn, too, before the three-week grace period is up!

Jet
Holy crap! I had no idea Jet was even still around and now they've got a new CD. I was way more addicted to Get Born than I should ever admit. But I will say it anyway. And their new album, Shaka Rock, is only $3.99 on Amazon for a limited time. Or pay full price on iTunes once the promo period runs out. Gotta say I'm loving the Amazon store more and more every day.

Faces
One of the things I always loved about Sports Illustrated was the "Faces in the Crowd" section where they give little sentence blurbs plus a photo highlight to regular people who have made some major athletic accomplishment. I always hoped I would see someone I knew in there. To the best of my knowledge, this has not yet happened. Have you ever known anyone in the "Faces in the Crowd"? Oh too funny, while searching for "Faces" on their Web site, I found that the swimsuit edition is on Twitter. I'm shocked there aren't more followers. 

Targettunes
I'm curious... for at least the last several years, Target has had an online affiliation with Amazon. Amazon is in direct competition with iTunes in digital music sales. So how come Target is now aligning itself with iTunes for exclusive online music sales starting with Pearl Jam's new album Backspacer? What am I missing? It's an online menage-a-trois of pain ("I hear you have to pay extra for that kind of action, Cotton"). Clearly I need to be hired as their proofreader, though. Found two errors in that tiny little paragraph below.

Time for work!

You were a vampire...

Today we will talk to a 12-year-old girl who was impregnated by her seven-year-old half cousin who summarily left her for his 52-year-old social studies teacher. Now she's working as a greeter at a local Wal-Mart while living in a mobile home that she shares with a family of dogs that sought refuge after escaping from Michael Vick's, er, kennel and traveled halfway across the country with a bunch of crack-addicted carnies. All this and more, today on Snippet Wednesday!

Talkies
Something like that might actually get me to tune into Maury or Tyra or Oprah or whomever. Alas...

Coraline
Instead, I watch movies like Coraline, which, in all honesty, completely underwhelmed me. And I was a fan of The Nightmare Before Christmas. A big fan. But Coraline? Meh. The animation was pretty cool, but the story just didn't flow well for me. It felt too forced and no fun.

True
The good thing is now that I'm sending back Coraline to Netflix, I will finally be starting up on HBO's True Blood, season one. My only complaint about this is that each disc of the set only has two or three episodes on it. I've become so accustomed to four or five episodes per disc (House does five per disc from season three on) that this is just not gonna be enough to whet my appetite. I know it's all about the timing. Network shows are shorter because of commercials. But HBO shows aren't that much longer. They still have commercials, just at the ends of the episodes. Most episodes of Deadwood still clocked in at only about 45 minutes each and that was HBO as well. Stinks of a plot to upcharge for the DVD set, if you ask me.

NFL10
It was time to renew my subscription to Sports Illustrated and I saw that they had a new offer... subscribe for a half year and get a free copy of EA Sports Madden NFL 10 on whatever gaming platform you want. So I checked, and they do have it for the Wii. I'm not a huge fan of the Madden games. They just get too damn complex for me. But on a Wii? This could be fun. And Katie wants to play it with me. We can be terrible together (I was going to say "we can suck together" but I know how you perverts think). 

Lebanon
Is it wrong that I saw the headline to this article -- "Arlen Specter Faces Angry Lebanon Crowd on Health Care" -- and all I could think was "what the hell is Marie doing now?" Of course this time, they actually are talking about Lebanon, Pennsylvania, not the country that Marie is currently visiting. My bad.

Lego
I'm a fan of nearly all things Lego (except maybe for Bionicle). I love these little bricks and have since I was about five years old. I still get excited when new sets get released and I love going in Lego stores. It's just too much fun. But this announcement of a combination live action/animation film featuring Legos? I dunno. I can't say I'm looking forward to it at all. Please, just nix it before it goes too far.

I know a bear that you all know...

And welcome back to my neglected stepchild of a blog. Just in time for Snippet Wednesday!

CDs
I love getting CDs from the library, as many of you already know. What I hate, though, is that it seems there are few to no libraries that believe in CLEANING their CDs. Of the tonnage of albums I've picked up in the last few days, both Morrissey's "Maladjusted" and Ray Lamontagne's "Gossip in the Grain" are scratched beyond listenability (is that a word?). To librarians everywhere, do not just check that discs are in the cases when they're returned; you also need to make sure they're in good condition. There's nothing more frustrating than waiting a while for a disc (be it CD or DVD) to become available only to have it rendered unusable. Not good.

Scoots
I told you, Scott. Once I met your new dog, Scooter, I'd talk about him here. And he is an awesome dog. He's half Doberman and half Schnauzer, so he's a slightly larger-than-medium dog who thinks he's either a purse dog or a cat. This claim was evidence by his utter need to lie on people's laps or on the top edge of the couch. The latter proved somewhat disastrous as he fell between the back of the couch and the cushions and couldn't figure out how to get out. Here are some photos. If you can't view the gallery in Reader, click on through either here or to the Flickr album.

Secondhand
Now that you all have read my two guestposts from Monday and Tuesday and know the sort of thing I like to do while guestposting, I need your help. A week from this Saturday, I'm guesting over at Secondhand Tryptophan as part of Karl's Summer of Love. I want to know what you'd like to see me write about. Within reason, of course. I'm not going overboard as I'm neither unemployed nor self employed. I do have gainful employment that I'd like to retain and my employers are aware of my blog so don't expect anything too wild. But still have a little fun. Let me know.

Tweet
I've been cleaning up my Twitter follower list a bit lately. Yeah, yeah, I know I was recently considering dumping it, but I didn't. Instead I took it private and have been trying to reduce my following/follower lists to just those I know or really give a damn about. But it is possible that I accidentally deleted one or two of you. So please, if you were removed from my Twitter list and feel it was an error, let me know. I have a ten-page application I can send you for reinstatement that needs to be filled out in triplicate. And I need a note from your third-grade teacher. Can't be too safe these days.

Ultrapsychotic
I know I railed against marathons some time ago, but I must apologize. Compared to this dude, not only are marathoners completely sane, but they're measurably pussified, too. Nothing personal, marathoners, but you got nothin' on this dude. How many times was he dropped on his head as a child?

Bearly
And in pure LeSombre tradition, I will save the last snippet for the Park Ranger should Wil Wheaton's tweet come true... "I know I'm not first to think this, but just once, I would have liked Yogi to tell the ranger, 'I'm a fucking BEAR, man. Just walk away.'"

Oh lolli, lolli, lolli...

Eventually, if my eyes ever peel themselves open (ha! not freakin' likely), it will truly be Snippet Wednesday. Yet I fear it's gonna be a drag-ass one at that.

Birthday
First a Happy Birthday wish to my Dad who turns God-only-knows how old today. Actually, I might really know if I wasn't too tired to do the math in my head. But he might not want me posting the truth so perhaps this works out for the better. Happy birthday, Dad!

Lollipop
The picture of me with Tori, Kim, Sizzle, and Nilsa the other day? It was pointed out to me by a couple of them that coming up with a name might have been easier if I had posted an alternate photo. One of the others that was taken by Sweets who snapped quite a few with my camera while Steven was taking pictures with everyone else's camera. So, below, find the picture they suggested and you all get to choose which name is better... "Kevin and the Hot Licks" (Nilsa's suggestion) or "Lollipop" (my suggestion). If you pick the last one, I'll get to strut into work like Jerry O'Connell and Corey Feldman as they sang "Lollipop" along the railroad tracks in Stand By Me. Oh, who am I kidding? I'll do that anyway.

Jinx
I swear I gotta stay away from big-deal sports events. Last night, while typing up my weird post, I received an e-mail alert from the Chicago Tribune that White Sox pitcher Mark Buehrle had another perfect game going into the fifth inning. If you recall, last week, he pitched what is only, by official definition, the 18th perfect game in baseball history. And now, on his first game back after that accomplishment, he had another one going. There have never been back-to-back perfect games ever. So I turned on the TV and saw him get two guys out in the sixth against the Twins, only to give up a walk, a couple hits, and a run immediately afterward, thus negating not just a follow-up perfect game, but any shot at even a no hitter. So to White Sox fans, I apologize. I'll stay away and never watch anything of this sort again. Promise. But to Buehrle, 45 consecutive retired batters? Nicely done. At least you're doing your part to make Chicago baseball exciting.

Renewed
Yay! Both Burn Notice and Royal Pains have been picked up for additional seasons by USA. And I do believe Wil Wheaton Tweeted from ComicCon that The Big Bang Theory was renewed for two more seasons. Happy days!

Mal
Oh, dude, Nathan Fillion is on Twitter? Sweet!

Ripped
And in pure LeSombre tradition, I will save the last snippet for myself for when someone truly pisses me off and I must go all Whitechapel on their ass.

I want to ride it where I like...

Wilkommen aus Snippet Wednesday nummer googolplex! Yep, despite how the company spells it, the real way is "googol." Looks so funny, though, doesn't it?

BMX
The BMX photo shoot that I was supposed to do last Thursday had to be rescheduled due to weather and other mitigating circumstances. Blake and I moved it to yesterday, instead. And then I almost missed it not realizing that Naperville, IL, has two skate parks and I was sitting and waiting in the parking lot of the wrong one. Go fig. But I finally got there and snapped away to the tune of 147 photos worth. I trashed 31 off the bat because they were bad and wound up uploading 98 to Flickr. I'm hoping this embeddable Flickr slideshow works better than Pictobrowser isn't, but, if not, you can check them out in the Flickr album.

Boxing
I've always harbored a love of boxing, a revelation that is likely to turn my mom's stomach. And I've always wanted to take up boxing personally. Not for the purpose of fighting, but for exercise. I'm not sure you can get much more "total body workout" than that. I haven't joined a boxing gym yet, but I was pricing one near where I worked only to find out last night that it has gone out of business. Back to the point, though. Imagine my surprise when, a day or so ago, Katie tells me that she would like to try boxing as well, for fitness and stress relief. Not that I'm into the overly ripped female physique, I'm not. But something about Katie boxing is just, well... hawt.

Does that make me weird?

Sizzle
Just a few more days! Just a few more days! Until what? Until I meet my long-lost blog sis, SIZZLE! Ohmigod, we've been talking about meeting each other in person for years. Yeah, blows my mind to think about how long we've known each other too. But, yeah, it's been years. And I also get to meet NILSA! After oh-so-many Chicago-area meetups that she has backed out of, she's trapped! She's hosting this little shindig at her place and CANNOT ESCAPE! And there is also a chance that CITIZEN NEIL will be in attendance. There is no guarantee at this point depending on his schedule, but it could happen! As Sizzle pointed out to me, this meet-up will most certainly be worthy of its own post. Damn right!

Dawg
Apparently, the brother-in-law who regularly reads this blog has inquired as to why I have not written a post about his and his lady fair's new dog. They adopted recently and, by all accounts (Katie's included), he's one adorable little booger. The problem is that I'm the admin of this blog and I have not met him yet. So, Scott, when you want a post and pictures up about the li'l guy, you let me know when your schedule opens up and you're not busy littering the earth with little white pock-marked balls.

Ball... court... yours. ;-)

Wired
And in pure LeSombre tradition, I will save the last snippet for myself for when I must make the ultimate decision between the red wire and the blue one. Or is it green? Or yellow? Shit!

 

Thank you, kitteh.

Never coming back until I touch the midnight sun...

Welcome to Snippet Wednesday number one billy-yunnnnnn. Okay, so that's not entirely accurate.

Props
So do you think I can lie and pretend I live in Scranton just so I can unload a bunch of my crap to the producers of The Office and hopefully see that shit appear as props on a future episode? That would be soooo cool!

Ride
I'm hoping to have some pretty good photos later this week. A local park district decided to reserve a couple days of the week for BMX riders and I am friends with the guy who was behind the request. So he's gonna make sure that a bunch of guys are out there tomorrow, weather dependent, so I can snap some shots of them in action. That could be serious fun!

Plimp'd
I didn't even know Martha Plimpton was still alive let alone still acting and now she's going to be a regular on Grey's Anatomy? The last thing I saw her in was Pecker with Edward Furlong (don't ask).

Guest
It's weird. I don't guest post for the longest time. Then I receive an invitation from one person... and then another... and another... until I have three gigs all within a couple weeks of each other. Guess whose blog is gonna be rather neglected during that time? Anyone want to fill in here for me? But I will have fun during these posts. I actually already have one written for It's Me Penelope. It's one that will guarantee she never asks me to guest post again! Muahahahahahahahahahahahahaha! ha.

Tupac
Holy crap! Not only is Tupac alive, but he's... purse snatching?

Simpson
And in pure LeSombre tradition, I will save the last snippet for myself for when all the rest of my hair falls out save for two strands. Then I can groom it and be stylin' like Homer Simpson!

Easy as 1-2-3...

Hey everyone. Hope you're having a very happy 7/8/9 Snippet Wednesday. Don't forget to make it an über-celebration by going hog wild for a whole second at 12:34:56 p.m., too!

Obsessed?
I was driving behind a little PoS car this morning when I noticed an odd license plate. It said "TWI HARD." I wasn't quite sure how to take it until I read the license plate frame that declared "My heart belongs to Edward" and was accompanied with a litany of bumper stickers in the rear window including "I like my men cold, dead and sparkly" and "My other car is a shiny, silver Volvo" (Edward's car), among others. Yeah... obsessed much? I've got one thing to say to that and I'm going to let the Count from Sesame Street do it for me...

Rollin'
Also on the way to work, I was driving up a hill when I saw a can in the road up ahead of me rolling uphill. Yes, uphill. That had to be some strong wind. Not that Illinois is full of mighty hills by any stretch of the imagination. Heck, I live in an area where "mountainous" is used to describe any natural formation that is greater than 100 feet above sea level. Ah, scenic northeastern Illinois!

Redesignland
Did I mention that Tales From Redesignland has returned? Oh happy day!

1901
A couple weeks back, my Pitchfork buddy Eric introduced me to a French alt/electronic band called Phoenix by way of the video for their song "1901." I was hooked. So I purchased the "1901" single... only to receive a copy of it free the next day as part of a Facebook indie rock sampler. Go fig, eh? There's something to be said for patience.

Deck'd
Tweetdeck supports multiple accounts simultaneously now??? Oh, this is dangerous. Seriously dangerous.

Rochambeau
And in pure LeSombre tradition, I will save the final Snippet for myself in anticipation of the day when the apocalypse will be determined by a game of Rock-Scissors-Paper (and I hope the other guy picks "paper").

But I won't heed the battle call...

Yeah, it's been nearly a week. I go on tears anymore... several days on and several days off. Oh well. At least I'm back in time to celebrate Snippet Wednesday. Wouldn't want to miss that.

Grease
In the class Katie is taking right now, they have a project where they are supposed to analyze a movie that is appropriate for teenagers. I'm not sure entirely what the analysis entails, but it's a project I'm more than willing to help with simply because it involves, well, movies. Last night, one of her fellow students presented on the movie she had watched. It was Grease. During the presentation, you are supposed to show a scene or two from the film that supports your analysis. Katie has never seen Grease and never wanted to. Last night, she walked away from having watched one of the musical numbers and said stuff to me like, "this is one of women's favorite movies? Why?" and "are we all sure John Travolta's not gay?"

I love my wife. And her disdain for this movie is the primary reason why I'm willing to forgive her for not having seen Star Wars. If she was one of those women that watched Grease repeatedly and dragged me into it, I guarantee she'd have every line from the holy trilogy memorized by now.

Running
I've decided something... running outside sucks. I don't know why, but I just can't breathe outside. Maybe it's the allergen factor or something, but everything just closes up and I can barely run about 20% the distance that I do on a treadmill at the gym. I am actually able to run five miles on a treadmill and, yet, I think my max-out distance before I feel like keeling over and dying outside is a mere 1.1 miles. I can understand the uneven terrain and inability to control your speed will have an effect, but that freakin' much??? Yeah I see no races in my future unless they start the world's first treadmill-based virtual race. Now that would be cool.

Laces
However, despite my disdain for outdoor running, I must say that I do absolutely love my new running shoes. I went to an actual running store, Naperville Running Company, and got a pair of New Balance 769s. I never realized how lightweight shoes could be. And the heels are like running on pillows. But even cooler than the weight and the cushioning are the laces. Yes, laces. I love these damn things (see right; I have the silver and blue version of those shoes). Instead of being the regular or even the barrel laces that are so common on athletic shoes, these ones kinda pill out so they look like a fabric version of a dogtag chain. The purpose is to keep the laces secure without double knotting them. And they work! New Balance apparently holds the patent on this style of lace and don't sell them in stores separate of the shoes, but I have a pair and I love them. Simply because I hate double knotting shoes and sitting there forever trying to unlace them.

Book
Holy crap! I actually finished a book that wasn't either a Twilight novel or a graphic novel! Last night, I finished Dennis Lehane's fantastic historical novel The Given Day and this is probably one of my first completed books in nearly a year if not longer. My reading has been pathetic as of late. I just can't motivate myself to do it so finally tearing through this 700-page beast felt good. Sure, I was struggling at first even with this book, and, all told, it took me a couple months to finish. But the final 450-500 pages were just in the last couple weeks. So that's a marked improvement. Now I just have to write the review over on Goodreads. Next is Jhumpa Lahiri's Unaccustomed Earth. Bought this one a little more than a month ago and I'm finally going to read it. I love Jhumpa Lahiri.

Photos
I did take some photos from this past weekend's Swedish Days festival in Geneva. And, despite being such a beautiful day, it got a little wicked that night, so I also have some photos from the looming storm. Enjoy.

As always, you can hit up the photo albums over on Flickr as well - Swedish Days 2009 and Under a Blood Red Sky.

You gotta shock the monkey...

Zip your lips, slouch your butts to the seat, and listen hard! It's Snippet Wednesday.

Quote
I'm hoping one of you can catch the reference in my intro sentence. C'mon... anybody?

Air
Yes, the air conditioner is on the way to being fixed. Get this, the guy comes out yesterday and I explain what I think is happening so he flips on the power from the thermostat and... it works. Seriously? You're gonna play that game, A/C? The guy told me, though, that the bearings on the fan motor are shot and it will die. He was guessing that after this initial use of the A/C to bring the temperature down (which it did quite nicely), that it would shut off and likely not turn back on. So he's coming back out later this morning to replace the motor. All told, we are going to be spending about $300. Much less than what Katie was thinking we'd be charged, so that's good.

Film
In an attempt to cool off on Monday night, Katie and I went to the theater to see The Proposal. Pretty predictable, but still funny and enjoyable. And, as would be expected, Betty White was brilliant. But this is not the point of this snippet. As we were leaving, there were several hexagonal shaped cases by the door of the theater, which I immediately identified as film reel shipping cases. And the label read Transformers 2. I wanted so desperately to snag them and throw them up on e-Bay. I wonder what they would have fetched.

Shocking
Typically when I read a headline such as "Girl dies Tweeting in the tub," my initial thought has something to do with my dumbassed fellow USian. It's quite reassuring when I find out we are not the only idiots in the world. This girl, who actually took her laptop in the tub with her to update Twitter, was Romanian and, if she was dumb enough to do this, deserved it.

Okay, time to go to work. Adios!

Come on let's take the long cut...

Welcome to a sopping wet edition of Snippet Wednesday.

Rain
It began pouring here yesterday and didn't let up much. Of course, at work we had an outdoor event and I wound up drenched. I'm thankful that I had some workout clothes and a pair of shorts that I was otherwise going to take back to Kohl's to exchange for a smaller size. Sure I didn't match all that well, but it beats walking around in sopping wet dress clothes. Yay. Even after wet clothes dry up, they still feel wet, you know what I mean? Softball tonight should be fun with how flooded the fields are likely to be. Thank God I'm not playing because...

Dentist
Yeah, my six-month cleaning with the dentist is tonight. My only question is whether I'm going to wind up with the nice, cute hygienist or Hygienist Ratchet. Any bets?

Serrated
Here's a hint for any one of you... when cutting a loaf of bread with a serrated knife, make sure the serrated edge is toward the bread and not toward your guide finger. Just sayin'. Some fuckin' Eagle Scout I turned out to be.

Faced
I got a little freaked out the other day when I received an Facebook friend request... from my mom. My mom is on Facebook. This scares me. I love you, mom, and I know you're reading this, but it still freaked me out.

Year
I didn't realize that a couple weeks ago I hit the one year anniversary of Snippet Wednesdays. Holy cow! That's the longest I've stuck with any theme on this blog. Way to go, me!

Forgotten
I had another thing I wanted to mention as a snippet. Thought about it this morning on the drive to work. Of course, I didn't write it down and now it's forgotten. And I'm sure I'll think of it again precisely one hour after this post goes live. Because that's just how my brain works.

Okay, time to get ready for yoga and then figure out what to do for lunch. I forgot (seems to be going around) to bring anything to eat today. Go fig, eh?

Take another little piece of...

It's Snippet Wednesday! And about the only thing snippety about it is that I wish I could take a pair of scissors and just cut this day out of the calendar of existence thus negating it all. Once you read my one and only snippet for this week (I guess that would make it just a regular old everyday post, eh?), you'll understand why I've had absolutely no time to think about this at all. Sorry.

Consistency
Why can't life, be it personal or professional, show some consistency? I was having a relatively steady week. Things happen, I take care of them. So, to make things a little more interesting, I decide to add a really big project to the mix... and EVERYTHING COMES OUT OF THE WOODWORK. I swear to God. Never mind that I had all the time in the world the first couple days this week or even last week to do these things, if they'd been given to me. It just all decides to rain down on me at once. My mind is everywhere. And nowhere. Hell, I don't even know where.

Is the world working on some sort of Kapgar Alert System that lets them know I'm working on a ton of shit all at once and that they should pile on even more?

I need hard liquor. Stat.

Seas would rise when I gave the word...

I'll warn you now, this Snippet Wednesay is chock full of geeky goodness. Hope you can handle the overload.

Privacy
Obviously, being a public blog, there are things that I don't talk about. That's just how it goes. However, some of the topics I've avoided are ones that I would truly love input from some of you on. To that end, I've played with the idea of setting up a password-protected post (actually, using Typepad, I need to set up an entire alternate blog with password protection; they don't offer it on a post-by-post basis). But I'm curious, for those of you who have opted to privatize either a single post or an entire blog, have you had any negative whiplash from people to whom you didn't give passwords? Either people you know simply from the blogiverse or people you know in real life who read your blog? I'm worried about having someone ask me for the password that I don't want to give it to.

Chickenfoot
How did I miss this? I know I've railed against the concept of supergroups (okay it's more a "pffttt" than a "railing") in the past, but this one could make me change my mind. This Friday will see the release of an album by a group named Chickenfoot (stop laughing). The band consists of Sammy Hagar and Michael Anthony of Van Halen on vocals and bass, respectively, Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers on drums, and Joe Satriani on guitars. Holy crap on a cracker this is rock ecstasy. Me likey the sound o' this!

Clash
If there was any one other movie I geeked out about as a kid aside from the Star Wars films, oh, and The Last Starfighter and, yeah, Ghostbusters and Real Genius (okay, I was a geek, I admit it), it was The Clash of the Titans starring Harry Hamlin, Lord Laurence Olivier, Burgess Meredith, and Judi Bowker. I even dressed as Perseus for a couple Halloweens, that's how much of a geek I was for it. I still love the movie and own it on DVD. Hey, it's a Ray Harryhausen classic. And now they're remaking it. Normally, I'd cringe at the idea of a remake of a movie I love so much, but it stars freakin' Liam Neeson and Ralph Fiennes. How can I cringe? Those are powerhousers, baby. And here's a teaser image of Sam Worthington as Perseus. It's very 300 and I can't wait. Thanks to Cinematical for the image. 

Buckley
Trolling through the Sunday sale ads, I saw that Jeff Buckley, a musician I really enjoy (I guess that should be past tense since he died some time ago; but I still enjoy his music) has a new 1 CD/2 DVD tribute set. It's going for $19.99 at Best Lie and contains a bunch of live performances as well as a documentary about his life. Have any of you picked it up or seen some of this footage prior to the release of this set? Is it worth the money? I don't usually buy into bonus feature stuff like this, but I'm tempted here.

Kelloggs
Once in a while I start to collect those Kellogg's movie points because they have some interesting DVD titles available. I figure, I'm already going to buy the cereal, why not get a free DVD? It's been a while, though, since I've done this. But, last night, I picked up a box of Corn Flakes and the DVD offer had Danny Boyles' Millions available. I gotta do this. That was a great flick! So, um, anybody have any of these movie tokens they'd be willing to send my way? I don't buy cereal nearly as much as I used to and this offer might expire by the time I get the five requisite tokens. Help.

Coldplayed
All I can say is "holy cow."

It can't rain all the time...

If I didn't wait so long to post, maybe I could have come up with something snappier as an introduction. As it stands, just accept that this is Snippet Wednesday, albeit for only a few more hours.

8
I know it's already been said better by both Dave and Neil, but I just wanted to chime in on the news that the courts in California upheld the vote in favor of Proposition 8 banning gay marriage. I seriously am disappointed. That's all I can really say. While I do agree with Neil that it wasn't the California court's place to overturn the vote of their own people, the fact that it passed back in November in the first place is just sad.

Huckleberry
Reading this entry on Not Always Right reminded me of a time (don't ask me why as they're not really related other than being stupid stuff about classic books) when I went to a Waldenbooks back in high school to buy a copy of Huckleberry Finn for English class. I walked up to the counter and asked the salesperson, "where can I find a copy of Fuck Hinn... I mean Huck Finn. Dammit." They couldn't stop laughing. Several of them. I bought my book and walked out.

Porno
Speaking of titles and controversy, can someone tell me if the official name of the most recent Kevin Smith film is Zack and Miri Make a Porno or simply Zack and Miri? I ask because I see it both ways. I think I've seen it in stores as Zack and Miri Make a Porno, but I just got a copy from the library that was titled Zack and Miri. What gives? Censorship? IMDb says the shortened version is just a promotional title. But I'm thinking if copies are being sold in that name, it's more than just "promotional."

TwitTV
Am I the only one who thinks Twitter is starting to "jump the shark," as it were? First there was the inability to keep the servers up to snuff for just the early adopters. Then they fail to improve their server farms resulting in huge crashes after being hyped by The View and Oprah. Then Ashton started his race to a million with CNN. Now there is Twitter on the big and small screens. This just sounds terrible. Part of me just wants to quit before it gets any worse. And, honestly, I barely use it as it is. 90% of my Tweets recently are just RSS-fed updates from my other sites. Have any of you quit the Twit?

Softball
Dammit, I was so hoping it would rain today so I wouldn't have to play softball tonight. I want to go to the gym and then go home and watch the Blackhawks. Stupid rain doesn't come down when I want it to.

Or else it gets the hose again...

It puts the lotion on the skin or else it gets Snippet Wednesday again.

Liege
Google is starting to scare me, folks. I think it can read our minds. Yes, I'm anthropomorphising it to some degree, but, to me, it is no longer a corporation... it has become an entity all its own... a sentient being. Right now, I'm just waiting for it to start breathing and eating. I got an e-mail from my buddy Eric and, at the end, he says "Or...we could meet for lunch Thurs or Friday." Off to the right of the e-mail (in Gmail, for the record), at the top of the yellow Sponsored Links box, I see...

Okay, it's not perfect, but the simple idea that it scanned the message and picked up on this without Eric having created some sort of formal calendar request or .ics file or even listing specific dates, well, it just scares me.

I think we should all just give up now and declare Google our Overlord.

Twit-Tees
As much as I love that Twitter has launched a T-shirt shop with Threadless and as cool as this "In Space, No One Can Hear You Tweet" T-shirt, I gotta admit a little disappointment that they didn't create their own official Fail Whale or Foul Owl shirts. Yeah, the purpose of this is more of a contest to get the coolest Tweets on a shirt, but you need a Fail Whale T-shirt, regardless. It's a moral imperative.

Site
You remember that Web site I was working on when my thumbdrive corrupted and I lost it all? Well, with Katie's input, I redesigned the site a month or so ago from scratch and it's done and the customer loves it, and so do I. Much more than the first site I created, which I kinda hated. So big thanks to Katie for the help and big thanks to technology for crapping out on me.

Wolf
I seriously want to know what the reviewers of this T-shirt on Amazon were smoking and if they're willing to share. My God. Dems some creative folk.

Vandapples
One of the windows of the flagship Apple Store on the Mag Mile in Chicago was shattered by a drunk guy with a brick. Best part of the article is the comment from MB, "Windows doesn't need help getting broken - Microsoft has done a great job making it break down for you" or the one from Bill, "Maybe he was a PC."

Dream
Okay, Chris Milk is one talented guy. He created a 43 second video meant to encompass a lifetime's worth of memories into a single "life passing before your eyes" sort of video and it's hauntingly beautiful. Some segments are borderline NSFW, but not too bad. No nudity. Although I can't say the still frame below is necessarily one you want your boss to see over your shoulder.

I still can't believe it had as big a crew as it did, though.

If only the final Lord of the Rings movie could've been this concise... I may have actually enjoyed it more.

Last Day Dream [HD] from Chris Milk on Vimeo.

Belongings
I wanted to go out on a positive note and that honor goes to US Airways who have spent the last several months restoring, to the best of their ability, the belongings of the passengers from Flight 1549 that went down in the Hudson River early this year. This week, those belongings began making their way back to their owners. Considering US Airways had no legal responsibility to do this and had already given money to the passengers, it's pretty cool that they did this anyway.

Can't you smell that smell...

I am making a concerted effort to ensure that this blog is more environmentally friendly. To that end, this Snippet Wednesday is 100% compostable and can be used as a very potent fertilizer (read: kapgar.com is more full of shit than ever).

Mac
I can't wait... less than a week... however, after buying my new camera lens, I may have to hold off a bit. Money, yanno. But enjoy this fake video promo for the new Punch-Out!! on the Nintendo Wii, all the same. Funny stuff.

Bite
Well, my bite hasn't completely healed yet, but no rabies indications either, so that's a good thing. However, I don't think I ever mentioned how Katie asked if Noelle, whom I sometimes refer to as "Devil Dog," might actually be a vampire and this bite would thus turn me into her very own Edward Cullen, complete with great hair. Then she proceeded to stare at me wide-eyed in anticipation of the transformation. Yeah, she was a bit disappointed.

Trek
Katie and I saw the new Star Trek last night after running at the gym. Yep, we're still with the whole running thing, but on to Trek. We both enjoyed the heck out of it. Great movie? No. But damn fun. And, as I always say, if Katie can enjoy a scifi film, all the better. I will say that one of her reasons for seeing it (Eric Bana) was a bit of a letdown as he was so caked in makeup you couldn't tell it was him. But the overall movie was definitely cool and Katie has said she'd watch both the sequel (in which I really hope they do more with Zoe Saldana as Uhura) and maybe even some of the original films with me. Oh, and Simon Pegg rocked that film.

Religion
Sorry if yesterday's post turned some of you off. I know religion is not a favorite topic to talk about. But I know it's bad when the first two comments are from 1) a person who is completely unidentified (Google ID that didn't populate the form fields correctly; perhaps Whall? I think this has happened to him before on here) and 2) another person I've never seen here before. But I thank you all for the comments you did leave. They did confirm my own views on the subject at hand.

Heart
Sadly, no, I didn't see this myself, if it's even real. It was sent to me by my mom. Still funny, though. C'mon people, think about the roaches!

Doctor, doctor, gimme the news...

Just drop your pants, put your hands on the table, spread your legs, turn your head to the side, and cough. It's Snippet Wednesday.

eTextbooks
Oh thanks Amazon. Where the hell were you when we were still buying textbooks for Katie in grad school? You come up with this killer idea for creating a larger screened version of your Kindle e-book reader for use with textbooks, newspapers, and magazines. Only you wait until after Katie is done with all her textbook-based learning to introduce it. Damn you!

OTweet-GYN
I was looking at a random stream of Tweets the other day, and these two showed up one after the other. I wonder if the events they are referring to are related.

Tinted
Everything about my musical upbringing is telling me I should hate the new power pop supergroup Tinted Windows. Why? 1) "Power pop"; 2) "supergroup"; and 3) the lead singer is Taylor Hanson of, well, Hanson.

But I don't hate it. I actually kinda dig it. But let me justify this decision before you all scream foul. 1) The other vocalist is Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne; 2) the drummer is Bun E. Carlos of Cheap Trick; and 3) the guitarist is James Iha of the Smashing Pumpkins. How in the name of all that's holy do these four guys come together and record an album? I dunno. It's not great, in all honesty, and many of you may not like it. But I do. Guiltily.

Pooh'd
This came in an e-mail from one of my dodgeball teammates. It cracked me up to no end. It looks pretty clear to me as I'm typing this, but if you are having trouble reading it, just click to enlarge (that's what she said).

Ah, I just can't enough of Swine Flu jokes.

Customers
A site all about the conversations employees in various industries have with severely stupid customers? Yeah, Not Always Right is quickly becoming one of my favorite Web sites of all time.

Oh-oh-oh-oh-operator...

"Mom, do you ever get that, er, not-so-fresh feeling?"

"Yes dear. Every Snippet Wednesday."

Swing
I'm up at bat. The guy in front of me in the lineup just belted an in-the-park homerun. I have to keep up the momentum. If I strike out, the side is retired. I hate being the one to end an inning. It sucks. I've done it before, but I don't want to do it again. The first pitch drops way short of the plate. Ball 1. The second pitch is sailing right where I like it. I can feel this one. I know it's going to fly the second I make contact. I pick up my shoulders a little bit and start to lift my lead foot. The bat begins its movement through the air. I can visualize exactly where in the air the bat and ball will make contact. A split second from now and... my alarm goes off. Dammit.

Miles
Well, that's one athletic fantasy that went bust, but my running has improved. After getting severely worse. A few weeks ago, I reported to a few people that my lazy ass had hit the mile and a quarter mark running on a treadmill. I did that a few times in a row and I had set a goal of keeping a certain distance for three runs before increasing it. I went in to begin the fourth run after that distance milestone, but all I could do was a mile. Three times I did only a mile, and then I had one really bad day where I could only get a mile done by running it in two half-mile spurts. I was starting to get bummed out. As I'm wont to do when exercising, I started feeling the desire to give up and began to use the elliptical machine instead. Then it hit me, I was trying to go too fast. Slow it down. Live the old "slow and steady wins the race" maxim, after all, I'm not actually in a race. So I dropped my speed a bit last Thursday. Not too much, but apparently enough for my body to feel the difference. I was back up to a mile and a quarter last Thursday, mile and a half on Friday, mile and three quarters on Monday, and I hit two miles yesterday! This is the first time I've run two nonstop miles in five-odd years. Dude, this is nice! Eventually I'll pick the speed back up, but I need to condition my body to get used to the physicality of running first. Then I think it will all fall into place.

Chuck
[Only very minor spoilers for people who haven't seen the finale of Chuck yet]
"Guys... I know Kung-Fu." Okay, I loved the finale of Chuck on Monday night. Whether this is just the season finale or the series finale remains to be seen. It is a bubble show right now. But Katie and I enjoy the hell out of it and would love to see it return. C'mon NBC, make it happen.

Vienna
Sorry if the title of this post gave you an earworm of Falconian proportions, but that song came up on shuffle on my iPod while at work yesterday and made me very happy. It has been stuck in my head ever since. Even this morning, after waking up, it was the first thing signaling that my brain was indeed awake. Hey, there are far worse songs to have stuck in your head than Falco's "Vienna Calling."

Filthy
I've been tracking some of the responses to this outbreak of Swine Flu (which has now supposedly made its way to the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago) on the Web and I came across a site from a health department in Wisconsin that had a picture of a big ol' sow right on the page. I began to feel sorry for the poor guy and, for some reason, Vincent and Jule's debate about swine from Pulp Fiction popped in my head. I don't know if anybody else out there has already done it or not, but I became inspired and created the following. Miramax, please don't sue me. It's all in fun. Really.

Hey, I'm not the only one having a little fun with Swine Flu.

Okay, time for work.

Bee girl, be a girl...

Ahhhh, zee spring allergy seezohn is upohn us. Zee flowerz and treez are blooming and zee pollen is free flowing. As an allergy sufferohr, make sure to dose up on your medicashuns to protect yourself from... SNIPPET WEDNESDAY.

(Pretty soon I'm going to run dry on creative ways to intro these posts.)

Mode
I am so happy I didn't buy into the iTunes Pass that was offered for $18.99 a couple months back that gave customers a progressive download of content from Depeche Mode leading up to the release of their new album, Sounds of the Universe, yesterday. From what I've heard from Kevin Spencer, it doesn't seem to have proven worth it. Combine that with the current offer from the Amazon MP3 store to buy the nuts & bolts album for $3.99 (not sure how long this link or offer is good) and I'm really glad I didn't get the Pass.

Kama
At least my spammers are considerate of my time and keep their marketing thematic.

Meme
Oh, Marie's going to get it. She tagged me in a meme. And one that makes me work, at that. Damn her!

Here are the rules:

• Take a picture of yourself right now.
• No primping or preparing.
• Just snap a picture.
• Post the picture onto your blog.
• Tag some people to play along.

Okay, here's my contribution to the meme. You must keep in mind that primping and preening don't happen for me, so what you see is what you get, regardless. I also don't tag. So play along if you'd like.

And, Marie? I will get you, my pretty.

Gym
Funny how "cool" kids try to be. At the gym yesterday was this woman I'll call "O" (it's her initial and not a reference to the, er, novel, okay?) and she's there nearly every day. She's probably in her late 30s or early 40s and in really good shape and a lot of the divorced guys at our gym fumble over themselves to be her "friend." What was funny about yesterday was seeing a high school kid trying to impress her. He couldn't have been any older than about 17 and had the build of a cross country runner. But I watched from one of the weight machines as he headed back to the free weight alcove where she was working out, stopped in front of it, puffed out his chest, and then sauntered in. Considering the only two people back there were O and a guy in his mid 50s, I think it was pretty obvious who he was trying to impress. Kid, she's more than double your age and could kick your ass from here to Chicago and back before you even realized what was happening to you. Give it up.

Okay, I'm off to work.