A friend of mine has taken to the airwaves for a weekly radio shown in NY. As part of his weekly (or almost so) regiment he has started producing segments called Jaguar Skills. This is seriously funny stuff, well at least to me it is. Its a UK DJ that has “superfly ninja DJ skills” and who battles evil about as well as he combats telemarketers or STDs.
You can find out more at the Jaguar Skills website, or check out the audio episodes below.
Jaguar Skills, ho!
What’s better than existing furniture? Why… new furniture! As I’ve been upgrading to new furniture around the downstairs of the house I’m weeding out the older, less desirable furniture. To my surprise I found this bookcase that looks like it now belongs. Here it is:
It fits so precisely that I’ve lost access to the power plug adjacent to the space. That’s why there are so many power cables running off to the side of the photo. When I get a chance to set my camera up correctly for low light I’ll be able to show you what all of those cables are for.
It’s official: I’m a complete klutz. I was walking around today, doing some errands, and while stepping off a curb my ankle twisted and became my heel. The twist was so bad that a woman standing nearby actually cried out “oh my!” when it happened. It was a serious challenge just limping back to the truck and driving home.
Looks like there will be very little exercise for me in the near future and a whole lot more limping around and cold packs. Joy for me.
So the “new” house I live in is starting to show signs of its not-so-newness. On Friday the water heater died and I’ve been dealing with the impact of that ever since. What impact, you say? Well for starters…
- No showers because the water here is about 45F coming out of the tap
- Dishes piling up because there is no way to wash them
- Running out of clothes because there is no way to clean them
I never realized how much I was dependent on hot water. I also didn’t understand that the life cycle for water heaters was so predictable. In my complex 4 other water heaters failed this month. The complex is only 14 years old, so it seems like that is the max lifetime for water heaters, or at least A. O. Smith 50 gallon versions like I had.
I’ve been told to expect the HVAC and garage door opener to go next. Just when I was happily expecting to save some money here comes the home issues to eat up that savings.
I recently added a new set of furniture to the homestead, this time in the form of a dining room table and chairs. They match my living room gear, more or less, and the table expands out to nearly double the size. It was good Scandinavian design and I’m glad to have it. Photos are below.
I took a part of this afternoon to go see Batman Begins and I walked away from it pretty impressed. It could have fallen apart just like the many other iterations of Batman have, but it held it all together through the whole picture. It felt, dare I say it, believable, which you could never have said about the first set of movies.
The soundtrack is great also, with Hans Zimmer doing his best to convey the dark tone of the new picture. So great, in fact, that I went straight over to Amazon.com and ordered the soundtrack. But, I am a soundtrack nut, so that’s what I get.
If you are looking for a good film to watch on a weekend (or weekday, for that matter) you can’t go wrong with this one. Recommended.
For those of you who have seen the VH1 show Best Week Ever this will be familiar to you. For those who haven’t, there is a segment in the show about good things happening to someone meaning “upgrade” and bad things happening meaning “downgrade.” I now present my own version: the Tokyo trip edition.
For those keeping score at home, that is 5 upgrades vs. 8 downgrades. I’m only half way through this trip (which continues for another 6 days) and the downs are already winning. It isn’t looking good for upgrades, but then it wouldn’t be me if it did.
Yes, I knew this 3rd (or 6th) installment of Star Wars would be rough. I’m a fan of the previous SW movies, so I knew what I was in for. The effects were fantastic, and the battles were epic. Its good to finally know how everything fell into place and how the empire began.
But good lord, could the dialog the actors had to read be any worse? Hayden should have changed his name to wooden, Natalie turned up the sap and turned down the drama, and Ewan & Sam just phoned it in. I was thankful for the long silences later in the movie because the rhetoric was just weak.
In the final analysis, I decided that this was a pain that I had to make it through, if for no other reason than to see Yoda put out the smackdown one last time. I’m sad that it cost me $10, though.
Maybe I set myself up to fall on this one, but I was expecting much more from the LOST season finale than I received. Yes, the crazy French woman is back. And the baby is stolen and returned. Rocker dude finds the heroin from the drug plane. And of course the rescue raft sinks.
But the biggest bummers are the hatch is now open but all we see is a ladder, and the creature on the island is a puff of black smoke and clanking sounds. What gives with that? We have to wait all season long for these bits of knowledge? And could ABC please pack a few more commercials into the episode? Most of that 2 hours was spent skipping through the latest car ads, insurance pitches, and movie promos. Sad indeed.
At least I was entertained by the “teacher bits”. Too bad that happened so early in the episode that no laughs came after that. A big thanks goes out to Mark and his super HDTV theater room for the finale’s screening goodness. At least I got to see 720p widescreen in all its splendor.
I’ve learned two important things this weekend, both quite different from one another:
So for those keeping score at home: head vs. 2×6, 2×6 wins. Thinking vs. toilet install, well I’m still waiting to see who wins this one.
