Friday, September 25, 2009

Solar Surf



The Fuck Buttons are one of my favorite new artists. Not for the faint of heart, but they do have penguins in the video! Think I may try to check them out in Chapel Hill on Nov. 5, although this will require a night off work. Maybe I'll just take a week's vacation for my birthday or something. Open invite to one and all, but I'm not sure anyone else I know will enjoy it. Philistines.

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

The emerging science of teledildonics

Been a good weekend. Saw a jazz legend. Sonny Rollins was amazing. That man is 79 years old! He blows it out. His band was amazing too. Such a good time. To set the mood, we went to Mama Dip's and had soul food for the ages. So tasty. The only downside was the drive. It's just a pain in the ass to go to Chapel Hill and back. Didn't help it was rainy and foggy on the drive back. Still was good to get out of my usual routine and we had a good time. Hopefully we can do something like that again.

I have to admit I was out of my depth as far as jazz knowledge went. I basically know the old school A-list names and not much more, whereas Kevin, Jason and Jimmy know that shit back and forth. It was interesting to listen to them talk about it, but I didn't have much to add.

I picked up the new Halo game and it's ok. I miss being the Master Chief, but this game has some cool stuff. Still, having only played it a little it seems like kind of game Bungie made to satisfy a contract requirement, rather than one they were excited about. I'll give it a little more time.

I've also been watching a lot of Lost, which continues to captivate. I'm fighting the urge to go watch it now, but I think I'll catch The Ultimate Fighter and Top Chef first. I also need to watch Gran Torino, which I've had from Netflix for over a week.

Oh I've been trying to maintain a pace of reading one book a week and may have fallen a bit behind on that recently, just because of a lot of distractions. That, of course, is not counting graphic novels and it's just not the same thing. I did finish Johannes Cabal the Necromancer and it was ok, not great. Evil carnival tales are always fun.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Something that made me smile



Remember when Pittsburgh had a running game?

Bitch fest

I can not describe how much working on Sundays make my life suck. I used to have this bright beacon of hope, as Sunday started my weekend and I could spend the whole day relaxing and watching football. Now, I try to "fit in" the early game with lack of sleep and then drive to work as the second game opens and half the time I will be forced to run the late game. Then during the night game I get to watch on a 10 inch screen and try to divide my attention between it and what I'm actually supposed to be doing.

Look, I know I'm not working in a salt mine or anything, but these days it seems I have fewer and fewer things to genuinely look forward to and this takes away another of them. So now I just get to work (watch television), kill my days off (watching television) and then go back to work. Pathetic.

This feeling is exacerbated by the fact that this week I get to drive in to work on Wednesday for a meeting. Hooray. Oh and today was fucking terrible. Got my oil changed and inspection and found out I need new brake pads (and possibly rotors). Waited 45 minutes at Comcast to get a digital cable box and they don't give me the cable I need to get HD channels and got a haircut and had to listen to my stylist's baby daddy issues.

Oh and my fantasy receivers crapped out on me and Jake Delhomme helped screw me over two different ways (I started Steve Smith and Nick started the Philly D.) so the Evil Penguin starts off slow. Well assuming Nate Kaeding doesn't get nine more points tonight, which seems unlikely.

Oh and Week 2 beard update: I have trimmed it a little to make me look less homeless. It's not filling in fast enough and I still look white trashy. Also still itchy. But I will not be give in and will continue my quest to grow a decent looking beard and earn the name Beardo.

Monday, September 07, 2009

Accelerating constantly toward some null point

Today was the last Sunday of the year without NFL football. Mike described it as the worst week of the year and I'd have trouble arguing with him about it. Work tonight was mind-numbing. I know I say that a lot, but it just seemed to be moving in slow motion all night. I had a hard time focusing and was disinterested in pretty much everything on television. Brutal.

Next week I won't have enough time to keep up with everything. I never seem to tire of highlights and analysis of football. In fact, I seem to be growing ever more caught up in sports. I think this is because it's the one interest of mine that I find people to talk to about. Other stuff I enjoy I find the people I interact with to have not only no interest in them, but, often, downright dislike for them. You can't discuss a song with someone when they won't even concede it's music. But whatever, it's just a issue with my feelings of isolation. No surprises considering my job and overall lifestyle.

So I finally endured my way through work and have made it home and stuffed myself with Canadian beer and chili. Others will probably be thankful if I stay isolated tomorrow. Not gonna be pretty. Not sure what I'm gonna occupy myself with otherwise the next coupla days.

I'm currently watching this documentary "No Maps for these Territories" as I write this. Which is about the author William Gibson, his life and thoughts. He's amazing and I urge everyone to read all his books. He's got a futurist mind and some really interesting things going on in his head. He coined the term cyberspace in the 80s. That's just the start of his genius. But I think I've covered this before.

Wednesday, September 02, 2009

Fall approaches

A very low key weekend. Monday I bummed around then watched True Blood with Trip. That episode was a little blah, I'm over the crazed town thing, but the show overall is pretty awesome. Only one more new episode this season, tho.

After that I came home and watched Sword of Doom. A samurai movie starring the inimitable Toshiro Mifune. That guy is awesome. The movie was a little confusing, which may have been partly due to translation problems, but had some quality sword battles. Worth checking out if you're into such things.

I got to spend the next night at Trip's with an old friend, who has assumed the role of functional alcoholic. It's not pretty and hanging wasn't that fun. It sounds cruel, but I've spent too much time dealing with drunks to volunteer for more. Not really sure what to do about this...

Today my big project was going to Gamestop to preorder Halo:ODST and then hitting the library. Picked out a couple of interesting books. I decided to plunge into Norman Mailer's "The Executioner's Song" which is a little intimidating as it's a modern classic and like 1,000 pages long. I'm 50 pages in and so far it's good, but it's very early on.

I also finished George Mann's "The Affinity Bridge" and I loved it. Nice steampunk vibe, set in the 1800's but doesn't try to emulate the 19th century style, which I tend to find quite dry. Ohh and it has zombies, which is almost never a bad thing. I think it may be the start of a series and that seems like a good thing to me.

Now I'm watching Top Chef and sipping a nice glass of Jameson's on ice. A nice stress reliever before I head back to work tomorrow. At least I get to watch the Steelers final preseason game. Not too exciting, but preseason football is better than no football. Plus the final preseason game means we are just a breath away from the kickoff of regular season. I'm ready to make a run at a second TLB title and hopefully the Steelers can repeat as well. Not sure which one I'd like more at this point. Probably the Steelers, but I'd be fine either way. Super fine with both.