So it's been a while... deal with it. I was on vacation and didn't feel like even looking at a computer. Let me tell you, it was great. If you have the opportunity, do it. Break away from the computers that tie you down. You'll love it. Well, anyway...

Katie and I saw Pearl Harbor this weekend. This is a movie I both wanted to see and dreaded the very thought of at the same time. Well, my fears were well-founded, apparently. It wasn't exactly the strongest movie I've ever seen in my life. The love triangle between Ben Affleck, Kate Beckinsale and Josh Hartnett was pretty weak and definitely unnecessary. It also made the first half of the movie drag quite a bit. At least the love story build-up in Armageddon had moments of excitement and levity built in thanks to the training sequences. None of that in this film except in one instance with Affleck flying over in Britain. Another thing that irked me was the lack of suspense during the attack. Yeah, we all know how it turned out. Pearl Harbor was bombed to hell and back. Hey, we also knew that the Apollo 13 astronauts made it back alive, yet Ron Howard still turned this most-obvious of stories into one helluva nailbiter. Why couldn't it be a little more suspenseful? Because it's Michael Bay in the director's chair and Jerry Bruckheimer forking over the cash to make it. Neither of these two are well-known for intricate plots... just special effects, baby. And that is what this film had a lot of. If you want historical accuracy, see Tora, Tora, Tora. Now that's a great film. The visual effects are spectacular and they didn't need a computer to achieve them. Now, that's impressive. Oh, well. Enough rambling. See Pearl Harbor for only the effects. Don't expect much else. Well, that's my $0.02.

The NFL decided today to realign the league effective for the 2002 season. What this means is that the NFL will now consist of eight 4-team divisions. Now, in the NFC, we will have the North (Chicago, Green Bay, Detroit and Minnesota), the South (Atlanta, Carolina, New Orleans and Tampa Bay), the West (Arizona, St. Louis, San Francisco and Seattle), and the East (Dallas, NY Giants, Philadelphia and Washington). The AFC will be made up of the North (Baltimore, Cincinnati, Cleveland and Pittsburgh), the South (Houston, Indianapolis, Jacksonville and Tennessee), the West (Denver, Kansas City, Oakland and San Diego) and the East (Buffalo, Miami, New England and the NY Jets).

The major changes, in case you can't figure it out, are that there is no longer a Central division in each league (replaced by the North and South divisions - rather Civil War-ish, isn't it?), Arizona switches from NFC East to NFC West (this should've been done a long time ago - never did understand why this one happened in the first place), Seattle moves from the AFC to the NFC, and an expansion team has been added in Houston. Kinda different.

I can think of one major change I would make to this plan, though. In the AFC, Indianapolis should be in the North not the South. To balance it out, move Pittsburgh to the East (not North) and Miami to the South (not East). Did you get all that? I know that Pittsburgh is at the westernmost tip of Pennsylvania, but it makes more sense to have Miami in the South and I think this idea could work pretty well. However, I must say that I cannot wait to start watching NFC North action. Yeah, baby.

I'm kinda hurtin' right now. This weekend, I'm going to be helping my friend Brian move into his new house (both Friday and Saturday) and one of my Dad's oldest friends is coming in town Saturday night and my Dad wants us all to get together. You see, this friend won't be able to make it to our wedding, so my Dad wants him to be able to see and talk to me while he is here. That means I won't get to see Katie this weekend. Call me a whiner. Like I give a damn. I miss her... okay?

Damn, I wish I was a kid again. Well, not a kid... more like an early teen. When I started my teenage years, it was still the late 80s. Back then, I had the biggest schoolboy crush on people like Kristi Yamaguchi, Elisabeth Shue, and Belinda Carlisle. Yeah, they were my girls. Every kid has his fool-fantasy crushes, doesn't he (even she)? Well, I think if I were that young again, I might be able to appreciate the fact that Belinda Carlisle has announced she will be posing in the August issue of Playboy. Damn, where was this spread back then? So unfair.

Today is a day for both mourning and celebrating. Why, you ask? Well, today is the 11th anniversary of the death of Muppets creator Jim Henson. I can't believe it was 11 years ago that he died. I'm mourning because he has created not only a pop culture phenomenon in The Muppet Show and Sesame Street, but he created something that made my childhood a heckuva lot of fun and still gives me chuckles. I'm also celebrating the fact that he did all that he did and that his creations continue to live on despite his untimely death. God bless you, Jim. You da man.

Yet again, from the "Darwinism Missed Me" file comes this little number... police in Bogota, Colombia, arrested a man they believe is responsible for placing threatening phone calls to a local businessman on repeated occasions. Police were given the name Juan Guillermo Torres from one of his fellow thugs, and they were also told he has blonde hair and blue eyes and lives in the Medellin suburb of Bello. Well, the Torres who is now in custody not only has brown hair and brown eyes and is from the Medellin suburb of Pedregal, but he is also deaf and mute. What in the hell were they thinking? Even worse than this arrest is that, despite these obvious differences, the courts are still going to prosecute him. So much for natural selection.

How's this for a big weekend? Katie and I not only signed for an apartment today (nice two bedroom jobber with about 875 square feet), but we also bought a bed and found a couch/chair/ottoman combination that we like a lot and will probably buy in the next few months. I'm liking this and so is Katie. We've only got a few more things to buy here and there and we're set. Woo hoo!

Is it possible for Orlando Jones to be any funnier? For those who don't know who I'm talking about, Orlando Jones is the actor who is the new spokesman for 7-UP as well as having appeared in the movie Office Space (as the recovering crack addict / magazine salesman) and starring in the movie Double Take. I was just watching a trailer for his upcoming movie Evolution -- costarring David Duchovney, Julianne Moore, and Seann William Scott -- and it looks damn funny. This is the second trailer I've seen so far and there is one scene in particular that I am really looking forward to. If you check out the trailer in the above link, you'll see a scene where Jones shouts "There's always time for lubricant!" Well the other trailer I saw was obviously from that same scene in the movie, but it has to do with amputation of the leg in questions. The doctor says they have to cut it off. Jones yells "No, don't cut it off!" The doctor says that this creature under his skin is moving up into his genitals. Jones screams "Cut it off! Cut it off!" I'm sorry, but this guy cracks me the hell up. If he keeps up the way he's going, he could easily be one of the most in-demand comic actors out there.

Hey, hey, hey... Katie and I passed our pre-Canaan (did I spel that rite?). Now we can officially get married in the Catholic Church. This was so completely and utterly nerve wracking that I'm glad we didn't fail and then have to go through it again. Yet, after it was all over, the thing that freaked me out the most was when the people working with us said that we need to submit our final results to "our file." I asked what they meant and they said that the church now has a file on the two of us. How weird is that? I mean, this isn't the CIA or the FBI or even the local Post Office. It's a church. And they keep "files" on people. I'm afraid.

As many Bears fans know, our local gridiron heroes will be moving to a new home for the summer camps. Yep, as of July 20th, the Bears will move from their summer camp home in Platteville, Wisconsin to some heretofore undecided university (or Rantoul AFB) within the state of Illinois. Only makes sense, in my mind, that the Chicago Bears train in Illinois and not the homestate of their biggest rival, the Green Bay Packers of Wisconsin. Am I the only one who thinks this makes sense? Well, anyway, the list of potential host universities has been cut down dramatically. Originally, the list consisted of 11 universities. However, recently eliminated from the running are UIUC, ISU, SIU Edwardsville and Carbondale, Monmouth, Rockford, Knox and the Rantoul AFB. This leaves Olivet Nazarene, Millikin, EIU and my alma! Woo hoo! NIU may be the new host to the Bears summer camp. That would be so cool to go out there and watch the Bears train. Nice and close, too. I'm liking this. Continue to woo, N-I-U!

Happy Cinco de Mayo. Okay. That's all I wanted to say. Nothing else.

As much as I typically love this time of year, there is one thing that I really hate... the fluctuation of the weather. For the last couple of days, it has been absolutely spectacular out. Bright... sunny... warm... cloudless... etc. You get my drift. So I took advantage of yesterday's nice weather to do one heckuva bang-up job cleaning my truck. Washed it, whipped out the bug & tar remover, polished all the chrome, armor-all'd the interior, cleaned the windows. Why do I tell you all this? Because, today, it looks like it wants to rain. It's actually somewhat cold and windy out. Dreary as hell. And it seriously looks like the sky just wants to open up and puke all over my nice clean truck. Why does timing always pan out that way? You clean your car and, all of a sudden, it either rains or a flock of sphinctorally-challenged birds happens overhead. Are cars just not meant to be clean? Or is this a carwash conspiracy? Dunno. But, it pisses me off.

I'm sure there are many people out there crying right now. Why? Survivor's over. Who won? Who gives a damn. All I know is that it's over. Thank God. Now if only we could be so lucky as to see all other reality TV shows end for good. I think what really scares me is the thought that if writers and actors do go on strike (the former of which should have been on strike already, but just haven't had the cojones to actually do it), then we're going to be forcibly stuck with even more reality shows because they need no scripts or professional actors. Great. Can't wait.

Okay, I must admit, I love when people say funny things. Weird way to start out a column, eh? But, I was visiting one of my fave sites NewsAskew, and they featured a snippet from an interview that producer Scott Mosier (Clerks, Chasing Amy, etc.) said and it made me laugh... damned hard. When asked about what his new collaboration with Kevin Smith - entitled Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back - was about, he replied, "It's sort of like The Muppet Movie. Only without the Muppets. And rated R." How can you not laugh at a quote like that. There are so many possibilities. Damn, that's funny.