"To know, and not to act, is not to know." -- Wang Yang Ming, Chinese General, 880 A.D.
2003 Archive
2004 Archive
"To know, and not to act, is not to know." -- Wang Yang Ming, Chinese General, 880 A.D.
Email
2003 Archive
2004 Archive
| Jan 20 | It's About That Time Time for me to archive the year that was and do up another design concept for coreytamas.com. Should be available in the next few days, so be sure to check back. |
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| Jan 20 | The Hulk Doesn't Make Sense To Me I was just waching The Hulk tonight (a movie I actually liked) and there's a scene in it where the big green protagonist tosses a guy through a window. Actually, he tosses the couch the guy is on through the window, and the guy goes with it. Shortly thereafter, he pushes the guy through the porch railing with his foot. Moments later, he uses the guy's unconscious body as a cricket bat to smack two other guys down later. Oddly enough, the guy doesn't die. In fact, later on he's feeling pretty good. Kind of like his old self. Ok. He has some bandages and a cast, but still. This is the part I don't understand, because I'm trying to picture how I'd feel after being thrown through a window or pushed through a railing or used as a cricket bat. I'm thinking death and, if not death, traction. If not traction, I'm picturing a whole lot of chiropractic care. See what I'm saying here? Like, for instance, one time I was going down a flight of stairs and I misjudged how many steps there were and I tried to step down one more step when there wasn't one. My foot sort of slammed into the floor and my entire back got screwed up by that to the point where I needed to take some pain medication and spend a few visits at the chirpractor's to get myself back in shape. This bad guy in the movie was picked up by the leg and used as a bat with which to hit other bad guys. Yet I was out of commission because I thought there was just one more step. I'd make a terrible bad guy, given my pantywaist's constitution. One reason I like The Hulk, though, is because I got a laugh out of watching a giant hulk poodle bite The Hulk on the peñor. That was funny. He hollers like... well... like me when I missed that last step. |
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| Jan 19 | Colin Comes Through Again Paris Hilton Is Even Dumber Than You Thought. Quote: When asked if she knew the last name of a companion on the night in question: "It's like a weird Greek name. Like Douglas." Hoo boy. Thanks, Colin! |
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| Jan 19 |  DoraThis is my daughter, Dora, wearing her "serious face". No, really. That was the face she made when I told her to make a nice, serious face. You should have seen what she was doing before I insisted on the serious face. |
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| Jan 18 | A Little Blurb About My Other Favorite Show Arrested Development is actually canceled. It's not just a bad dream. |
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| Jan 18 | A Little Blurb About My Favorite TV Show From Penny Arcade: Battlestar Galactica equals f**k yes. When I heard that not only did Cylons look like people now, but that they had done away with Muffit - the most enduring robear symbol of our age - I directed all further inquiries to the hand. I was wrong, wrong, a thousand times wrong. People have been wrong about things in the past, but their folly never endured so, tainting the line of man. |
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| Jan 18 | ClickBoink Just say it out loud, as one word: "ClickBoink". If you have to wait until there's no-one else around because you're embarrassed, that's fine. Just make sure you say it. Indulge me. Then, try saying this: "ClickBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBoink". That's eleven "Buhs". Count it on your fingers. Say it right out loud. Now that I've had you do this, you understand what it is I love about the new Intel Macs. When I saw iTunes being launched on an Intel iMac (1.67 GHz) when I was in San Francisco, it was nearly instantaneous. By the time your finger leaves the button, it's launched. If it were a sound, it'd be "ClickBoink". Click being the depressing of the mouse button, and Boink being the appearance of iTunes, fully launched, right in front of your eyes. On my Mac, which is a 1.67 GHz laptop, I don't get that. I click, the icon bounces in the dock, THEN it launches. You don't get "ClickBoink". You get "ClickBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBuhBoink". I don't realize that you could just get "ClickBoink", but apparently the Intel chip makes that possible. I can show you benchmarks, system specs and timedemos of the new Intel Mac's performance, but that's one layer removed from really understanding how it feels to see the thing in action. Just say "ClickBoink". Then you'll get it. |
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| Jan 18 | iGameTastic I was interviewed on iGame Radio yesterday. Now don't get me wrong; it's not exactly CNN, but it was an interesting show. It was all about Macworld San Francisco and the advent of the new Intel Macintoshes and (for some reason) my view on the whole thing. iGame Radio host Omaha Sternberg interviewed me at 9 AM before I had to catch a plane, and it really makes me seem... how can I say it? Dull. Dull and listless. When I'm sleepy I: a) Have a very monotone voice, b) Repeat myself a lot, c) Am not very smart. Be prepared. Assuming you actually would like to listen, go to iGame Radio. There are two ways to listen to this (and both of them suck). Sucky way #1: The interview will actually play on the front page when you arrive there. The good thing about this is that it's easy, but the bad thing is that you have to wait for about 48 minutes before my interview begins. Worse still, there's no time counter, so you can't tell where you're at in terms of when things start. If you want, you can move the little slider to about here. Another tip (I know this works on Macs... not sure about Windows) is that you can hold down shift and click the volume control and get this, which allows you to increase the volume more than you're "supposed" to. This will help with the sucky audio quality mentioned below. Sucky way #2: You can subscribe to the podcast using the instructions on the page, and you'll download the MP3s to iTunes (you can select which ones you want to download an which ones you don't). This makes things a little more hassle than it has to be, but when you're done listening you can just unsubscribe and erase whatever files you don't want. If you do this, you'll be able to advance the show to 48:30, where the interview actually starts. Regarding sound quality: Sound "really" sucks until about 51:30, and then it just "merely" sucks. Sound goes from "merely'' sucks to "not-too-bad" sucks at 58:12. Sound goes back from "not-too-bad" sucks to "really" sucks at 1:12:30. Then, just for larfs, it goes back to "not-too-bad" sucks at 1:13:17. It all goes well until 1:27:55, when the interview ends. P.S. Omaha makes one small mistake in that she says I'm going home. I only wish that had been the case. Sigh. My soul needed to be in my own bed about 48 hours before I actually was. Bleh. |
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| Jan 17 |  Happy Birthday, Terry!34 years old today. My brother Terry is just a few years younger than I am. Like me, he's getting used to that no-man's-land between youth and middle-age, which brings along a little baldness, a little greyness, a little extra padding in the middle and a few wrinkles around the edges. Also like me, he's getting used to some of the gifts this age brings... expecially parenthood. At first I started a long description of what kind of man Terry is; how he's so remarkably intelligent, wise, mature, easy-going and dignified. I did scribble out a couple of paragraphs about that sort of thing, but it didn't ring through with the spirit of what he's really like. I want those of you who don't have the pleasure of knowing him to be able to feel a little of what I feel about this amazing person. Instead, I will paint you a picture in a different way. Terry is like still water... such as a lake. Deep, constant, tranquil. You go to it, you leave it, you return. Sometimes you forget about it. Sometimes you're immersed in it. Always it is there, always it is strong and real, and when you need something simple and reliable to remind you that the world really is a place of beauty as much as it is a place of confusion and frustration, you sit by its edge and are lost in its even, smooth surface. I feel sorry for the people in the world who don't get to meet Terry. I'm lucky to have spent the last 34 years being a brother to the kind of man the world needs more of. Happy Birthday, bro. |
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| Jan 17 |  Sprint Can Go DieIt's not that I'm against productivity or working some extra hours, but this giant ad in the airport astonished me by proposing the worst idea of all time. |
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| Jan 17 | Who Needs TV... When you have Sarah Brown? Not sure how to target specific posts, so click here and check out "Bryan Byrne Is Funny". This post isn't actually by Sarah Brown, but... just click it. You'll see. Text is sorta not-safe-for-work, if you care about that kind of thing. |
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| Jan 15 | Starstruck I saw James Gandolfini in the San Francisco airport today. |
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| Jan 15 | Just Kill Me San Francisco is a little cool... a tiny bit breezy. Nothing seriously cool. I can go outside in a light jacket. Or even less. It rained a bit yesterday, but all is good now. I was feeling pretty good, when I realized I am on my way home to Ottawa soon, so I thought I'd check the Ottawa weather online. Then I saw this. Apparently it feels like -30 with the wind chill... and once again, I hate my life. |
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| Jan 15 |  Hello What?Here's me at the San Rio store in San Francisco, and they had these Hello Kitty Fender Squire guitars. I had to try one out and, in doing so, gave Peter Cohen the opportunity to take a photo that made me look like a big sissyboy. What's worse is, it must not bother me too much because I don't seem to have a problem with showing everyone on my blog. |
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| Jan 14 | Huh?
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| Jan 13 |  The Macworld That WasThe show isn't quite over yet, but we're coming around the bend. MVP? Peter Cohen. Reliably being both my go-to guy when I needed a few minutes of tranquility and sanity, and also the man-with-the-plan when it was time to party. Peter, you were the wind beneath my wings this week. |
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| Jan 9 | Woof This is probably the funniest thing I've seen in months. |
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| Jan 8 | Open Letter To The Pussycat Dolls You wouldn't say that if you actually met my girlfriend. |
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| Jan 7 | They Got Me With The Easiest Trick In The Book According to the book they have full of room service dishes, the Ramada Inn describes this particular appetizer as "Grilled Asparagus, Goat Cheese Vinaigrette, Chive Oil". Sounds pretty good, doesn't it? I normally don't use room service, but here I am in San Francisco waiting for Macworld to start... hungry, bored, etc. I decided that I would splurge this one time, as the appetizer is $12. Expensive, yes, but I've been watching my money pretty carefully since I got here. I feel like it's a justifiable treat to myself. Well, the thing gets here and it's $19. They add tax of $1.50, which sucks but is understandable. Then there's the $3.00 "We're Delivering It To Your Room Fee, And We Charge $1.50 For Every Minute Spent Traveling To The Second Floor". Finally, there's the $2.50 gratuity, which is added onto the bill because they're just so darned certain that you'll feel like paying them an additional ~20% tip for the absolutely astonishing feat of rolling a cart to your hotel door. What amazes me is that the guy who brought it to me stood there as if I were going to slip him another couple bucks for a job well done. When all was said and done and I'd been slapped with a $19 price tag, I lifted the cover off the plate and looked down at a plate containing nine lukewarm stalks of asparagus swimming in what looks like melted cream cheese and some green dye. For the record, no; it wasn't all that tasty. They got me. Fair and square. |
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| Jan 7 | If I Could Marry A Song... It'd be "Trigger Hippie" by Morcheeba. |
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| Jan 6 | Problem It's very hard for me to stick to any kind of diet when I'm in San Francisco, and I leave to go there tomorrow. I will likely be resetting the Pepsimeter a couple times. |
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| Jan 1 | History There's a quote I heard once on the radio: "Young people tend to only learn enough about history to disdain it". For the past few years, I've been searching for the source. It's one I want to know (so if you have it, please email me). You see, I find it particularly relevant when pop culture gives a glance to religion and its history. People are quick to point out that wars get started because of religion; persecution, prejudice and strife profliferate in the name of religion. It's true; a cursory glance at history makes that pretty clear. The part that people sometimes forget is that great things also happen in the name of religion. It is because of Islam that we have hospitals and universities, for it was Muslims who came up with the idea to better seek knowledge and care for the sick... as Muhammed told them to. It was Muslims who, in the year 1000, made it possible to write a cheque in Spain and cash it in India. It was because of them that we have long divisions and stopped using Roman numerals. Thanks to Islam, there were streetlights in Baghdad in the same era, and while most of Christendom was illiterate, there was a street in that city where over 100 bookstores were open. It is because of religion that we had the rennaisance. People argue that these things would have happened anyhow in the fullness of time, and that religious inspiration bore no responsibility for motivating people to accomplish great things. On the other hand, they give no weight to the idea that wars would happen as well, or that cruelty abounds regardless of religious affiliation (or lack thereof). In their cursory survey of history, they see that religion causes problems, and all solutions pop out of thin air without source or inspiration. I find this extremely naive and a difficult subject to discuss because, as it's been said, a lot of people only learn enough about history to disdain it. |
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| Jan 1 | Best Quote Today Got this from nj.com on the subject of movies coming in 2006: We hasten to say we've seen very few of these new movies already, and hesitate to offer any sort of early thumbs-up or thumbs-down now, based on a couple of trailers and a sentence or two of synopsis. After all, you can't judge a book by its cover, or a movie by its title. Although, faced with something like "Untitled Will Ferrell NASCAR Project," penciled in for August, we sort of think we can. |
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| Jan 1 | Well. Now I Know. I have this sweater that I really like. I took it out of the pile of clothing on the bed and threw it on today, and it felt all nice and comfy as usual, which was nice. Thing is, I looked down and there was this weird, dull reddish kinda of spot on on it. Well, the day went by and I didn't give it a lot of thought (as I was just hanging out in the house I didn' feel the need to tend to it immediately). Then, later, I made myself a big bowl of pasta and sauce and sat down at my computer to watch a downloaded episode of Supernatural (good TV show). A few minues go by and I look down. There's a spot on my sweater next to the other spot. It's a wet spot next to the dry one and just a slightly brighter color, glistening in the light of the table lamp. |
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| The Final Hours Of Dec 31 | Dear2005: You Had Your Chance To Impress Me, And This Is What You Did With It? Oh, 2005. You had so much potential. You came out of the gate looking like you were really going to wow me... but you didn't. You just sat there and let everyone walk all over you. You didn't even try to fight back. Now with half an hour left to go before you are out of my life permanently, I want to say thank you for what you did for me... as little as it was. Even so, my hopes for 2006, your successor, are that it will accomplish much more than you. In the mean time, as you go off to wherever it is that old years go, please accept my best wishes for your retirement. Do not, however, think of yourself as having earned the right to brag to the other retired years about what an improvement you made in my life... because I ended up with a lot on my plate that you, 2005, didn't offer a lot of help with. No hard feelings, but... there's the door. |
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| Dec 31 | Coke Machines: Apropos Of Nothing This was something I read on Fark.com in the comments section from a guy who calls himself "vending machine guy". Vending machine guy here. I can tell you that Coca-Cola is a frustrating company to deal with. Many of their bottles don't fit in their own machines. This results in jammed columns (or the bottles slip forward away from the switch that tells the computer there are bottles present). When this happens, the readout says "Sold Out" even though there's product in there. Customers think you're slacking. There are probably 250 Coke product column jams for every 1 Pepsi. That's because the Pepsi bottles are designed intelligently. Coke bill acceptors are the worst, "eating" bills more often than any others I've dealt with. It takes a long time to get replacement parts from Coke. I still have a machine on my route with a dead bulb even though I ordered its replacement in late October. It's in the best account of our entire operation! I've never had to wait for a Pepsi bulb. |
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| Dec 31 | Thank You, VH1, For Taking A Dump On My Idea Of An Artistic Icon Public Enemy. You've heard me talk about them. You know I love them. In fact, to me, they've always represented what's good and right about rap music; from the message to the musicianship, Public Enemy has always been the standard for me. Well, this brings me to the subject of Flavor Flav; the side-man and "court jester" of sorts to Public Enemy's massive personality on the mic, Chuck D. In my mind, Flav's goofball antics (some of which really defined rap style; if "Yeah boyeeeee" could be copywritten, Flav would have cashed a lot more checks) always had an air of irony to them... he was less like a clown and more like Batman's Joker; you wanna laugh, but you don't. Or you do laugh, but you don't want to. Either way, he was part of what made Public Enemy great. He was part of the sound, part of the message of social rebuilding and big part of the energy, diffusing Chuck D's too-serious-to-swallow-without-a-chaser aura. Ok, this morning I dialed up Yahoo and saw this. Oh, sweet merciful God, no. Flavor Flav has been made into the axis of a reality TV show geared to find him a mate. Could anything possibly be more odious? "Yeah boyeeeee" has now been reduced to a modern-day "Whatchyoo talkin' about, Willis?" as this aging rap icon works overtime to line the pockets of VH1's corporate moguls, essentially pouring a bucket of white-out on PE's anti-corporation cornerstones like "Shut It Down". Between commercials for Diet Coke and Lexus, Flav will shed his counter-culture, rap-without-fear-or-compromise legacy and dance around his mansion and pool with half-naked hootchies under the guise of finding "True Love". He's now a walking, talking version of Fear Factor except, in this case, Flav himself is the object of horror, and won't it be wacky to see how the ladies react to it? There's a darker side to the joke; Flav is a convicted spouse-abuser. Though I love Public Enemy, I will never condone that... and I find the effort to make a big, carefrree party out of finding Flav a girlfriend tasteless given this ugly stain on his history. So thanks, VH1, for playing a part in my gradual but oh-so-steady dissolving of faith that there's something in rap music which counters the product-placement deluge of nobodies like Fifty Cent (who's keepin' it so real he has 17 product mentions in seven songs). Thank you for boiling rap down to being nothing more than just another commodity. More than anything else... thank you, Flavor Flav, for showing the world that (as many suspected) Chuck was the one with the backbone to stand up to corporate America. Also, I'd like to say that I don't think "macadocious" is a word. I intend to write to Yahoo about it. |
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| Dec 28 | Canada There are two things which, to me, speak a subtle but very penetrating volume of meaning about what it is to be Canadian; not the "rah rah rah" Canadian, where your self-conscious obsession with lack of culture makes you grab onto anything you can to hold it up and say "LOOK! THIS IS MINE!". I'm talking about the real feeling of being Canadian... the thing you can't put words to but, to those of us who grew up here, can transport us to a place and time and wordless emotion which communicates how it feels to be from this country. This. And this. |
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| Dec 28 | The Worst Idea In The History Of Bad Ideas Eating chocolate icing straight out of the can seems like a really good idea. It's a small, condensed repository of flavor with nowhere to go but your mouth. Sit down, grab a butter knife, watch Home Movies, and shovel it into your face. The first few knife-fulls are like heaven, but if you keep eating you're basically signing your own death warrant. It's been about an hour and, God, do I feel bad. Yechhhhh. |
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| Dec 26 | Death Of A Charater Actor Vincent Schiavelli died today in Sicily. He was no superstar, but I've been watching him since I was a kid (first time I think I saw him in a role was W.K.R.P. in Cincinatti). Take a look at his photo, read the article, and think about him for a moment before he starts to fade from your memory. BTW, I had to restart my Pepsi counter. Yes, I fell off the wagon. |
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| Dec 15 | Television Theory My theory is: If you have cable service, there is no time of the day or night when you are not be able to either watch Star Trek, CSI, or one of their spinoffs (Star Trek: TNG, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, Enterprise, CSI Miami, CSI New York). If I ever find myself looking for a good Masters' thesis, I may put this to the test. |
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| Dec 13 | Seeing This Was The One Thing Which Kept My Day From Being Total And Utter Cack Color photo of kids falling asleep on a bed during a square dance, circa 1940's |
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| Dec 9 | Pepsi It's a drink that includes a massive amount of caffeine. Caffeine, incidentally, totally screws up your sleep. Most people know that it can keep you awake, but they don't realize how much it affects you while you're sleeping; it prevents you from really sleeping properly and, therefore, you feel extremely tired pretty much all the time (and, as such, your urge for caffeine intake increases). It's loaded with sugar. Sugar has an amazing depressive power on your system. A lot of people believe sugar makes you high and keeps you high. That's partly true; it gets you high for a short time and then drops you quickly. I, personally, have noticed a link between sugar and my allergies as well (the more I consume, the worse they get). I have heard that there is so much sugar in Pepsi that it requires an additional chemical in its composition just to keep the sugar dissolved, otherwise it'd be like sludge. I don't know if that's actually true, but it wouldn't surprise me. It's also carbonated. I recently learned that carbonated drinks turn into acid once they're in your body. Addiction. Pepsi, like all sugary, caffeinated drinks, is addictive. In other words, you have to keep drinking it or you feel like crap. I think Pepsi is tasty. I'll give you that. Even so, it makes my breath smell bad. I'm not sure why this is, but after I drink enough Pepsi it's like my gums go all nasty or something and I have to brush my teeth, like, twenty times. I don't drink alcohol. I don't use any drugs unless prescribed by a doctor. I'm not a junkie in the sense that I'm going to end up in jail for possession or for driving while under the influence. What I do know is that I keep trying to stop drinking Pepsi and failing. I have sleep problems, and I don't know if the caffeine and sugar are the source, but they can't be helping. I don't believe my teeth like being washed with Pepsi. I certainly don't like gaining weight from it. I also have a mild skin problem that seems to have something to do with the Pepsi as well. I keep quitting and I keep getting back on it again and it's mainly because I don't really take quitting Pepsi all that seriously. I mean, when you have to stop smoking crack, you gotta stop. There's no grey area there. With Pepsi it's just a little different; no one is going to look at you and say "Man, put that sh*t down. You got your whole life ahead of you". Yet knowing that my Dad (an avid Pepsi drinker) had two heart attacks and now has diabetes makes me feel somewhat sober. Seeing movies like Super Size Me gives me pause to rethink what I'm putting in my body; I keep remembering the scene where this whale of a man was talking about how he basically drank what most people would consider to be two pailfulls of Pepsi a day... only to end up in the hospital, having gone blind from a diabetic somethingorother, and needing his stomach stapled and... yeeeesh. With relatively little fanfare and relatively little hoorah, I've started a counter near the top of this page which keeps track of how many days I've gone without Pepsi. We're now at 1. let's see how it goes... |
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| Dec 8 | AIM IM with Andy Osier. 4:25 PM Andy Osier: hey Corey Tamas: Howdy Andy Osier: what exactly is on your girlfriend's finger? Andy Osier: on your blog Corey Tamas: A hair elastic Andy Osier: ahh, my mind is a scary place Corey Tamas: What did you think it was? Andy Osier: (answer censored -C.) Corey Tamas: It's a big one. You're very kind. |
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| Dec 6 | ... If you try to chase two rabbits, you end up losing them both. |
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| Dec 5 | When The Girls Leave When my two daughters leave to go back to their mom's home after spending several days at mine, the entire apartment becomes a different place. I work my way slowly and laboriously through the towering junkpile of dirty dishes that accumulates from neverending banquets of yogurt, salad, cake, jello, cereal, pancakes, porridge, chicken, milk, juice, and hot chocolate. Blankets get dutifully folded and left waiting for the return of their mistresses, like pets waiting motionlessly at the door for an owner to get home. The detritus of water-logged toys from around the edge of the bathtub get gingerly wiped and returned to the basket they're kept in. Papers with half-finished line drawings in colored marker and pencil crayon are neatly stacked in a drawer where I keep those things. Surfaces which are sticky beg for a good wipe, and I give it to them. I get to drink coffee leisurely and in silence as I calmly surf the web or assemble a neat list of what I need to do with my day. A roaring quiet fills every corner and it seems that no matter how focusedly I stride from room to room doing important things, I can't seem to fill the apartment with life all on my own. I'm now able to do my laundry, pay my bills, finish my assignments and set my own pace as I wish... but it comes at the cost of having sweet, wonderful, joyous, uncomplicated life tucked right in the folds of my most private existence. The best I can do is just try to fill the hours until I can have it back because when my life is about nothing but me it is no longer worth living. |
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| Dec 5 | The Flick Filosopher On "The Polar Express" "...It is also generally not recommended that a happy holiday flick feature an all-hands-on-deck North Pole sendoff for Santa on Christmas Eve that more resembles a Nuremberg rally than a Macy's parade." A fantastic review that nailed exactly what it was that I didn't like about this movie, even though I couldn't articulate it beforehand. |
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| Nov 30 | The Best Email I Ever Got (Name and bad words edited) Subject Line: Happy To KnowI got it over six months ago from someone I've never met nor heard of, but I keep it to read whenever I need a little pick-me-up. |
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| Nov 26 | A Little Favor For Your Old Pal Corey I have a cousin named Pieter who is a huge hockey fan. He's trying to score season tickets for the Hamilton Ontario Bulldogs, and the contest he's entered in order to do so is a sort of "Survivor" themed competition. He needs votes in order to make this happen and he's actually a really nice guy... so he deserves to win. If you would help me by heading over there and putting a vote in for him, I'd sure be happy. Here's how you do it: 1. Go to The Hamilton Bulldogs website. 2. Click the "Survivor" link (looks like this). 3. My cousin is Pieter K (misspelled as "Peter"). Lower left corner. Click his pic, listen to his 30 second blurb about why he should win (or skip it if you prefer) and vote for him. Hey, I know it's ballot-stuffing, but it's just some hockey tickets. Consider it a favor. And I owe you one. Or Pieter does. Either way. |
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| Nov 26 | Have You Ever? Have you ever hurt someone's feelings without trying to? If yes, please proceed to the next question. Has that person been someone you really care about? If yes, please proceed to the next question. Do you want to make your relationship with them better, but you ended up making things way worse? If yes, please proceed to the next question. Have you ever felt terrible about it? If yes, welcome to my experience of Saturday, November 26, 2005. |
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| Nov 25 | We're Back I had to do without my computer and my car for a while over the last few weeks. I may decide to write an overwrought description of the withdrawals. Depends how much I want to subject you to the stories of crack-addict-like behavior that occurred when I couldn't check my email or drive to Starbuck's. In other news, I was just reading about how Paris Hilton believed Santa Claus was real until she was 17. |
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| Nov 8 | Home Movies To explain your questions about what's in my "current obsession" panel (above): Here's the answer. In case you're wondering what it is, it's a cartoon series about an 8 year old kid with a video camera named Brendon Small. Picture David Spade without the confidence or smooth manner, and that's Brendon. The dialogue is just too damn good to be true. I can't stop laughing. |
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| Nov 8 | Hallowe'en Story Here's a story I forgot to mention last week: I was out with the kids on Hallo'ween taking them from house to house (like you do) and staying back by the sidewalk, resplendant in my clown makeup, as the kids went around and collected candy. Dora, dressed as a brilliant white little kitty cat (with Ruth as a cute little witch) found herself face to face with an old woman handing out candies. She was probably in her late eighties. In fact, I know she was. She was 87. How do I know this? Because as soon as Dora saw her, she said (at the top of her voice) "Boy! You sure are one old lady! How old are you??" She persisted over and over until the old woman finally confessed that she was 87. Dora was suitably astonished and made a huge "HOLY CRAP" sound. I wanted to explain to her that some people might not want to be asked so directly about their age, but aborted that plan because I was too busy clamping my hand over my mouth to keep myself from being heard as I laughed uncontrollably. Just to punctuate this amusing tale, here are pics of the kids in their costumes.    |
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| Nov 1 | Guess what? I'm A Hallowe'enie I kept writing and re-writing an explanation for what you're going to see in these photos, but everything just sort of takes the wind out of the sails. Here's the brief story: - Went back to Almonte last night to go trick-or-treating with my kids - Had a little extra time, so I stopped at Wal-Mart to see if I could find them interesting gifts - There weren't any good gifts, but there were some cheap costumes and props. - I stopped at Starbuck's rest room for ten minutes and engaged in the transformation, documented below. - Shut up       |
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| Oct 30 | The Latest I'm feeling better, in general, but I've been rather sick for a while. Thanks everyone for My home finally looks like a home. My work has been heavy lately, but it's definitely moving forward. My kids are adorable and sweet. My girlfriend Lori is just as wonderful as she's always been. Not much to report... I just don't like letting the blog get too stale. |
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| Oct 24 | Super Soldiers From Fark: US military attempting to create an army of super-human soldiers who will be more intelligent and deadly thanks to a microchip implanted in their brains Can I just ask: Has there ever been a science fiction movie made in which an attempt to create an army of super-human soldiers didn't end in countless normal people getting blown to kingdom come? |
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| Oct 24 | Punk Rock I'm not a guy who likes to be crabby... especially about music. If you like a certain kind of music then there isn't a single person in the entire world who should attempt to tell you that you're not supposed to. Simple as that. I just want to say something, however, about today's idea of "Punk Rock". Again, I'm not trying to dish on people or make them feel like somehow they don't measure up. I just want to take a moment and comment on how today's definition of "Punk Rock" is so much different than the punk rock of, say, 1976. Punk Rock came at a time when disco had overtaken the airwaves and cocaine-based, empty, party music became the de-facto norm of pop culture. Punk came along plying something of the same role that twelve-tone-row did in the early twentieth century: To shake things up, to break patterns and, ultimately, to burn out like a Roman Candle after having woken everyone out of their slumber. It was not life-affirming, it was not meant to sell, it was no party music. Its intent was to create a sort of musical score for the doom of a generation without hope. It's arguable what the greatest Punk quote of the short-lived era might have been, but to me it's Johnny Rotten's "Get pissed/Destroy", not as much sung as it was barfed up in The Sex Pistols' "God Save The Queen". The record industry wanted nothing to do with Punk Rock and, if it weren't for the flooding of cash which came from the pockets of a bitter generation who identified with punk's nihilistic message, it would have never seen any sort of commercial presence. It wasn't meant to. Early Punk was meant to eat itself in its own ugliness. Take Punk icons such as Sid Vicious, who was brought into the Sex Pistols despite being unable to actually play an instrument; he was given the job because the rest of the band liked the style with which he gave a chain-whipping to a reporter. During his two-year stint as a Sex Pistol, he was known for hitting fans in the audience over the head with a Fender Precision bass (which, if you know the instrument, could easily bust your head open). In ending his heroine-soaked tenure, he killed his junkie girlfriend and then himself. According to Rolling Stone, "it was a pathetic, punky footnote". I don't advocate this sort of Punk lifestyle as a philosophy, but I'm trying to make the point that Punk wasn't cute, fun or sellable. It was meant to break with the past, bury the sixties, destroy the reign of disco and then eat itself. It was ugly, it was angry, it was without hope and joy. Parents were terrified their children might take to Punk Rock. Schools wanted to see it gone for good. That's what Punk is. It's meant to be the bitterest, ugliest pill and - in its purest form - it cannot sustain itself. Does that sound like MTV sweethearts Avril Lavigne, Sum 41, Blink 182, Lit? Each good-looking, fun-time rock act piping up "I kissed a girl" lyrics with instruments in tune and verse-chorus-verse posturing steps forth with a smile, selling T shirts, posters and enjoying slicker-than-thou websites. Never shall they utter the F-bomb on television, never will they tell the youth of 2005 to fall on their own knives because there's no point. Hell, Avril Lavigne, in a cheeky display of "nyah nyah"-ism, dropped her pants enough to show an inch of buttcrack with "MMVA" (Much Music Video Awards) written across the upper half of her bum. If there's any symbol of "new Punk" to me, this would be it; where she chastely revealed a finger's-width of crack in the interests of shilling Canada's biggest music TV corporation, the punks of years past would have never made such a censorship-delimited display of corporate-kowtowing. Even today Johnny Rotten is probably the most un-interviewable man on the face of the Earth; he belligerently shows such contempt for MTV while being interviewed by MTV that they can rarely get ten consecutive seconds of his time before he storms out in a spiky rage. I don't expect to see him using the top 1/10th of his butt as a corporate billboard in the near future. I have nothing against Avril. I have nothing against most of the modern Punk acts. I love the music and I welcome the positive, if lightweight message of the genre. I just have trouble with hearing that this is "Punk" because, if it were, it would have eaten itself long before now. |
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| Oct 23 | This Weekend My two girls were here this weekend. It was their first time in the new apartment, and they love it here. They didn't even want to go out, they liked it so much. They loved their bedroom. They loved the living room. They loved the yard. Everything just delighted them. Ruth came to me several times and would give me spontaneous hugs and tell her how happy she was to be here. If I had one fear about moving here, it was that my girls wouldn't be happy... but my fears were laid to rest when they came in the door. Throughout the weekend, both Ruth and Dora spontaneously told me they love Gatineau. If my own custom-designed heaven were to become a reality, it most certainly would include this small thing: That my girls are happy in my home. |
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| Oct 19 | Still Sick Different kind of sick, but still sick. What kind of sick? You don't wanna know. |
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| Oct 19 | Nine Seconds When I listen to Weak And Powerless by A Perfect Circle, there are nine seconds of the song that I take particular notice of. They occur from 0:54 to 1:03. Whenever I hear that little section (especially when it's through a nice big speaker system) I always stop and say to myself "That's the way I want my own music to sound". |
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| Oct 19 | Separation Anxiety Sometimes I like to weigh myself. I think we all do, right? Anyhow, I went into the bathroom today and stood on the scale and, somehow, I'd managed to gain about 7 pounds. This kind of troubled me. I realize that I could gain or lose over time, but a 7 pounds leap is... downright strange. Had I porked out on something that put all that fat on me and I hadn't realized? It was pretty disturbing, actually, because while I wasn't exactly expecting to see my ideal weight for my height, 7 pounds is a lot to gain in a short time. I checked the scale. Seems to be working right. This was really bothering me. Then something dawned on me; I was still holding my laptop computer without realizing it. If I put it down, maybe I would like the results the scale showed me a little better. |
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| Oct 18 | Ever Just "Had It"? Who am I kiddiing? I know you have. Who hasn't? Today is my day for "had it"... and "had it", I have. It all piles up. I keep taking the high road to the best of my ability, but... I'm going to put this post on hold. I'm about to say some stuff I know I'll look at tomorrow and say "That wasn't very clear thinkin', mister"... and I embarrass myself enough as it is. Don't you think? |
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| Oct 18 | Oh, And Another Thing I'm sick. I can't deny it anymore. I want to deny it. I like to pretend it's not real, but it's real. I've actually been nursing this one for about two weeks, and it finally won last night. I have now switched my psychological approach from "No, this isn't happening" to "This will be over by tomorrow morning". Here's hoping. |
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| Oct 18 | Non Sequitur I think I just broke my finger. |
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| Oct 15 |  Bald Is BeautifulI've never really been extremely comfortable about my rapidly thinning hair. When I was a younger man, I had quite a long mane of locks to boast... but, as age and testosterone set in, a lot more forehead started to appear and it was something of an identity shift for me. Lori recently explained to me that she loves the size that I am (dispelling my worries about being too fat), the grey in my hair (dispelling my worries about looking too old) and – miracle of miracles – that she loves my receding hairline. Now, when I look in the mirror, I like it as well. Sometimes you just have to hear that you're ok as you are. Next job: To get Lori to tell me she likes acne. |
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| Oct 13 | Review Of The New Place Needs to be cleaned more often. No-one really comes to visit. Can't get any TV reception. I rarely go outside. Not enough room for all my stuff. In short: Just like my old place!! |
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| Oct 13 |  JonathonThough I've mentioned Jonny before in this blog, I've never really given him his full due (as he frequently reminds me). Jon has been my friend and a shoulder to lean on for about 12 years now. We don't see each other very often but, instead, our connections tend to work the same way that Batman responds to the Bat Signal; once in a while I throw up the notice to let him know I want to see him and I wait until he shows up. The only thing is that, instead of flashing a giant black bat on the clouds, I usually just open up MSN and simply message him one word: "Girl?" See, Jon is pretty darn gay... which has relatively little impact on our friendship but, for what it's worth, it's important back-story if you want to read his blog (incidentally; Jon has no concern with making his blog family-friendly in the way that I do, so click at your own risk). Anyhow, this is a little toast to Jon, wo has passively-aggressively made it known that he wants a nice chunk of real-estate on my blog and, therefore, can onl be appeased by letting it be knowing what a great friend he's been to me. When I'm feeling bad, he's one of the first people I get on the phone to have dinner with so I can spill my guts. When I'm feeling like having some fun he's the first person I call to get me out of the house to have good times. When I feel like wasting a couple hours having a chat, he's the first guy I dial up to while away an hour or two. Jon's main weak point is that he wasn't impressed with the Vietnamese lunch we shared a few weeks ago. That's a serious strike against him. Otherwise? He's been true blue and my life is better to have him in it. Who knows when I'll see him next. Could be days, could be months, you never know with Jon. What I do know is that I just feel better looking at that photo of him because... come on. It's cute. It should be on a tshirt. |
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| Oct 11 | Japanese Screens Because Lori's desk is next to the living room area, I'm going to build a Japanese screen to separate the space, thus giving her a little sense of being isolated from the rest of the room (at least to some degree). Now, it's time for me to talk with the man who knows all about wood, joints, saws and braces. My brother. I'll keep you up to date. |
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| Oct 10 | One Very Long, Very Enjoyable, Very Much Overdue Phone Conversation With Lori Sometimes a guy just plain needs to talk to his love for a couple hours in a row. |
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| Oct 9 | Just Another Meme 1. Name someone with the same birthday as you? Kylie Minogue. 2. Where was your first kiss? Grade 8. Michelle Fletcher. Worst. Kiss. Ever. 3. Have you ever seriously vandalized someone else's property? Never. I don't even remember lightly vandalizing someone's property. 4. Have you ever hit anyone of the opposite sex? Nope. 5. Have you ever sung in front of a large amount of people? Yeah. Once upon a time I even thought it might be a career. 6. What's the first thing you notice about the preferred sex? The first thing I notice is that they're not as pretty as Lori is. 7. What really turns you on? In another person? None of your business. I would like to note that I find it interesting that this question takes pains to specify "in another person", as if to make sure that we don't muddy the waters with how much I turn myself on. 8. What do you order from Starbucks? Depends on the day. Right now I'm loving the venti vanilla bean frappuccino with the afagado shot with caramel sauce thingie. 9. What is your biggest mistake? Something so heinous that I don't feel like saying it here. 10. Have you ever hurt yourself on purpose? Don't we all? 11. Say something random about yourself. Sometimes when I scratch my collarbone in the right place, it makes my tongue itch. I have no idea why. 12. Has anyone ever said you looked like a celebrity? I've been told that I look like Bruce Willis, Michael Hutchins and Kurt Browning... all depending on the period of my life I've been in. 13. Do you still watch kiddy movies or tv shows? I got two kiddies, so I indulge frequently. Having said that, I will see every Pixar movie in the theater whether I have kids with me or not. 14. Did you have braces? Nope. I've always had pretty darn good teeth. 15. Are you comfortable with your height? Yeah, I think it's about perfect. 16. What is the most romantic thing someone of the preferred sex has done for you? That's also none of your business. 17. When do you know it's love? When the other person gives you the inspiration to be the person you always hoped you were. 18. Do you speak any other languages? Yes. American Sign Language. 19. Have you ever been to a tanning salon? Yep. 20. What magazines do you read? Nothing regular. I like GQ and Men's Health. 21. Have you ever ridden in a limo? Several times, but... not a single one of those times was ever special in any way. 22. Has anyone you were really close to passed away? Yes. Good friend killed himself a few years ago. 23. Do you watch mtv? Only when I can't find a cheese grater to rub my head with. 24. What's something that really annoys you? Usually nothing annoys me more than myself. 25. What's something you really like? I love eating pho tai across the table from Lori or... even better... sitting next to her. 26. Do you like Michael Jackson? No. Never have. 27. Can you dance? I've been told that I can. I wonder. 28. What's the latest you have ever stayed up? Oh, please. That's measured in days... not hours. 29. Have you ever been rushed by a ambulance into the emergency room? According to my mom, they rushed me to a hospital once when I was very small. Apparently I drank some bleach, thinking it was Pepsi. Yes, I'm aware of how that throws open the doors for lots of jokes. Keep them to yourself. 30. Do you actually read these when other people fill them out? Depends on the person. You just know some of them are going to be awesome. |
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| Oct 8 |  Okay, You Can Stop NowWith regard to that haircut I mentioned... everyone is sending me links to the Flowbee. Alright, alright... uncle, already. |
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| Oct 6 | Desperate Cry For Help I need a haircut. Bad. Can anyone help me out? Let me know. |
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| Oct 4 | Me At 6 mos., Dad At 20 yrs., and Our Seizure-Inducing Drapery/Wallaper in 1969 |
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| Oct 4 | Phone To those of you who might be trying to phone me... I am obviously not answering my phone. This is because the fellows who helped me move and pack up some of my things at the old home put the phones somewhere, and I can't find them. I'm looking. Honest. Well, not looking that hard... |
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| Oct 4 | I Could Totally Write Sex In The City HBO's long-running series, Sex In The City. Ever heard of it? Well. I could write it. I could. Don't believe me? Well, basically it works like this: Three over-30 women from New York. Every week each one meets a guy. At first the guy seems cool. Later, one incident happens which closes the book on that guy forever. The fourth woman, Carrie, stays in a pointless relationship with a man who has no actual name. Every week she must "realize" something before the end of the episode which will have no lasting impact whatsoever on the relationship itself. Every four shows, Kim Cattrell shows a nipple. Please contact me directly via email so I can tell you where to send the check. |
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| Oct 3 | A Letter To The Town Of Almonte, Ontario... Where I Lived For Roughly 8 Years Or So Dear Almonte, I'll always remember the first time I laid eyes on you. It wasn't exactly love at first sight, but after we spent long enough in each others' arms we grew on one other. We had some good times, a few laughs and - sure - it came to mean something. Once upon a time I even thought I'd never leave you. Yeah, it got serious for me, baby... but that was then. This is now. The romance has been gone for a while, though; you grew one way, I grew another. That's how it is sometimes in this crazy world, baby... and now I know you're no good for me. You may still be easy on the eyes and you may still remind me of the good times, but we're just two ships that passed in the night. That's all. So yeah, you broke my heart, but I'm moving on. We had some grins. We had some laughs. Now it's time to say Sayonara. Try to forget me, baby, the way I'm trying to forget you. Ciao, Corey |
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| Oct 1 | A Question About Battlestar Galactica Colonel Tye: Is he ever right about anything? |
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| Sept 30 | Things We Believe When We're Children When I was about 6 or 7 I believed that the world existed entirely, at one time, in black and white. I believed this because some movies were in black and white. I began to piece the bits together a little at a time... I realized that the change to color in the world happened sometime in the 30's or 40's, but I couldn't come up with a decent theory on what happened. When I finally asked my mom one day "What happened to make the world change from black and white to color?" she explained that it wasn't the world that was black and white, but the film movies were made on. I have never since felt like a bigger dumbass than I did at that moment. |
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| Sept 28 | T-Minus 3 Days I move to Gatineau on Saturday. I just have to say that I really like my new place. The kids have a nice bedroom and a back yard and a sledding hill nearby and a beach about 5 minutes away. There's a huge bedroom and the kind of kitchen I really like. I also really like hardwood floors, and it has those. There's even a great little spot for Lori's desk if she decides she wants it there. |
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| Sept 26 | Ironic, Considering The Last Post I Made It's a bad night. I feel awful. Everything has been going wrong. I feel terrible. Does anyone ever just get what they want? |
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| Sept 26 | Oscar Wilde "Seriousness is the only refuge of the shallow." ~Oscar Wilde |
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| Sept 26 |  Not That I'm Overly SurprisedThe only time... and I mean the only time my Mac ever crashes, hangs or does anything really weird is when certain applications or programs, and only those applications and programs are used. No others. Just a small collection of very specific software causes problems. What do all those programs have in common? They're made by Microsoft. |
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| Sept 25 | I think... am I?... I think I'm... yeah... yeah, I think I am... no, wait... yeah, no doubt about it... it's for sure.... I'm getting a cold. |
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| Sept 22 |  RuthMom got the kids some bhindis and after taking a bunch of photos I managed to score this really nice one of Ruth. Isn't she beautiful? I don't think bhindis are supposed to go on your nose, though. |
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| Sept 22 | Lori Not everyone who reads this blog knows her, or knows her well. All they know is that she's occupied the "I'm Way Into" slot on my "Obsessions Bar" at the top of the page for many, many months now. Lori, surprisingly, doesn't read my blog that much. I suppose she has so much access to me in real-time that she doesn't really feel the need. Can't say I blame her. The first thing that most people notice about Lori is that she's pretty. Very pretty. She also has a sweet, positive personality which makes her even more of a dish. People everywhere we go notice her and many comment. Sometimes people want to shake my hand and tell me how lucky I am to have such a lovely woman on my arm. Sometimes people just tell her she's pretty (there's one restaurant we go to where the waitresses tell her how beautiful she is... every single time). Some are a little less polite and/or dignified about it and need a punch in the head. Anyhow, everyone knows how gorgeous Lori is. Even my grandmother said "She has quite a nice figure, doesn't she?" My grandmother, for crying out loud. Anyhow, I can't help but consider the fact that those who notice her beauty don't usually get the chance (or won't take the time) to get to know her better. It's a shame, too, because the best parts of what Lori has to offer aren't things you can just see at a glance. For instance, what isn't easily apparent is that she is a very fine writer; witty and deft and uses her expansive vocabulary to create engaging and interesting prose and poetry. Though I noticed her (amazing) looks early on, I really was caught by her ability to communicate and be funny. God, is she funny.
Lori is also a very private woman. Though she makes everyone feel as if they are her best friend, few people actually get to know her... the real her. She is extremely thoughtful and, therefore, is often very quiet. She observes. She processes and remembers. Being around her is like a walk through the forest; unless you are gentle and you watch carefully, you might miss everything that's worth seeing and hearing. |
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| Sept 21 | One For The Books Last night I had this dream which was like the all-star dream for me; I remembered all of it, which is also weird... but weirdest of all was the way it included a positively packed all-star cast of people and icons from my personal life. Present in a single dream were: - My sweet girlfriend, Lori - My good friend Duncan - Duncan's living room - Duncan's kids - My dad - My friend Brett's dad, David Smith - My mom - A Baha'i youth conference - A kitten - My high school - A mall which exists in Toronto but I forget the name of - Starbuck's - A venti triple decaf no-fat extra hot latte which I also asked for to be "grainy". I have no idea what "grainy" means, but I think it was my brain trying to come up with a longer drink name. |
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| Sept 18 | It's Finally Happened I was just reading Pitch Fork Media's list of top ten albums for the 2000-2004, and I don't believe I've heard a single track from a single one of the entries. |
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| Sept 18 | Battlestar Galactica Ok, I really feel like I owe it to you all to discuss this here. I'll get right to the punchline: Watch this show. Go rent the Miniseries, then rent Season One, then use Bit Torrent to download Season Two. I'm talking to all you people who enjoy good stories, good characters and good concepts. Let me get a little more into the details of this show. Just as a precursor, yeah... I did used to watch the old show in the late 70's. And I loved it. I adored it. I lived for it. Then, maybe a year ago, I downloaded a few episodes from that old show to watch again and maybe catch a bit of the magic for old time's sake. Well, I nearly hurled, it was so bad. I realized that, yes, there are some shows which an 8 year old mind can forgive that a 36 year old mind simply can't. What a piece of derivative, cheapass, rip-off, shoddy, puddle-deep trash. Horrible. Just horrible. There I sat, watching in disgust as another sacred memory from my childhood caved completely in, caught fire and blew away in the wind. The new BSG isn't like that. I promise. The story is that a parallel "humanity" living in a far-away system is attacked by Cylons - an artificial race which humanity itself created - and nearly wiped out. Taking the last of their heavy battleships and whatever remaining human transports that could be gathered up, they set out to find a mythical place called "Earth". As you can tell, the plot of the original and the new series are virtually identical, but they both play out so very differently. Top-flight actors like Edward James Olmos and Mary MacDonnell make the scripts believable and, my favorite part, the CG really brings the whole thing to life. I just love it. One important note is that you really must watch it sequentially; the developments (particularly between Seasons 1 and 2) are huge and jumping ahead is a big no-no. Start with the mini-series (which is really just a two-hour-or-so movie that you can rent from most video stores). Oddly enough, the mini-series is actually the weakest part of the whole affair; while not exactly bad (especially by the standards of the original show), it's uneven. It sets the stage for the rest of the series, however, and one watch-through is painless, I promise. The first season is now on DVD and you can rent it. If you are intrepid enough, you can also download it from the usual places where people download stuff. Don't know where that would be? Here... first grab Bit Torrent (and read up on how it works. It's simple), and then do some searching on Isohunt, Torrent Reactor, Torrent Spy, and The Pirate Bay. You'll find all the torrents you want there. As for Season one, it's a masterpiece. Great stories, great pacing, great development, great characters... believable and yet also fantastic. There's not a bad episode in the bunch. Using your newfound Bit Torrent skills, grab the first 9 episodes of season two (at present there are only 9, as the season's not done yet). Season one was amazing, but season two tears the doors off of season one. So, look... if you like Sci Fi and want to see something gritty and fresh and expertly created, this is my recommendation. |
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| Sept 16 |  Here's Where I Am Moving ToI don't feel like giving the exact address away but, thanks to Google Maps, you can get a good look at my new home! |
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| Sept 16 | "I Get Knocked Down, But I Get Up Again..." There is nothing I can think of, from the Von Trapp Family Singers all the way to Britney "Can I Get That In Large Bills?" Spears that irritates me more than having Chumbawamba's "Tub Thumpin'" stuck in my head. I am about ten minutes away from drilling through my own skull just to let the song out. Please, God, make it stop. |
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| Sept 14 | Another Mushy Email This is another email from Lori that I didn't publish earlier for you. If you're not up for mushiness, you may want to look the other way. You may wonder why I'm posting this here; mainly it's to give Kirsten fodder to use when she's making fun of me. Anyhow, I just told Lori she'd given me my first smile in a long time: You just gave me my first smile in a very long time, too. Thank you for that -- all it took was knowing you were smiling. I love you so much! I have to sign off but will try to get back on later. You are my love. |
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| Sept 14 | F***ing Windows Here comes a very long rant about Windows and some responses to it. This first bit is written by my buddy Steve, who is far from a neophyte in the world of computing Also, I'm trying to edit out bad language, so that should explain the appearance of stars in the middle of words. :) Honest to f***, I can't see how anybody can use this crap and get anything done. I didn't expect to like Windows when I built this PC, but the number of things it does that leave me absolutely dumbstruck steadily grows. Currently I'm grappling with a crasher that just defies all logic. About two times out of three when I boot the machine, it makes it to the login screen, or possibly to the desktop. Then, sitting there untouched, thirty seconds or so will go by and then it will quietly blue-screen and reboot. Wow. I get a flash of white text on the blue screen, maybe 1/60 of a second (nowhere near enough to read what it says), and then it reboots. IF it comes back up, I get a dialog box informing me "Windows has recovered from a serious error." Wow, you think? It asks me to click "report" and I usually do, whereafter it opens a browser window and says it has no idea what's wrong, but invites me to fill out some customer satisfaction surveys for Microsoft. So I did something wrong building my PC, you think? Loose RAM? Bad cable somewhere? Motherboard flaw? Well, all I can say is this: I have Red Hat Fedora Core 4 running on another partition, which is doing just fine on the same hardware, no problems at all, and I'm working on a Linux From Scratch build on another drive which is also chugging along flawlessly. No problems USEEING TEH LOONIX. Same hardware. OK, so whatever, windows is h0rked, right? So reinstall. I expected to be doing a lot of that anyway and I'm sure as hell not keeping anything important on this machine. Yesterday I went to do that, booted my XP machine ready to wipe the Windows partition and start over... only to find that XP won't install unless it also gets to wipe out my Linux From Scratch hard drive too and put an XP partition on it. Becuase f***ing Windows thinks it owns the entire universe, I suppose, and it can't imagine not having the right to shit itself all over any device it sees. Why, after all, would you ever run anything other than Windows? So in order to fix my busted install I'm going to have to yank that drive out (or disconnect the cables at least), reinstall windows, and then reconnect the drive. And for all I know, that's the thing that's making XP shit the bed in the first place. I am a Mac and Linux user. Windows will always be alien to me, even if I have to work with and support it. I can't imagine why anyone who needed to do any kind of computing and have it be remotely reliable would use it. This was my response. I respect what Steve has to say, so I'm not challenging him... just adding to an already sound argument: What helped me to understand Windows as an operating system was a very simple shift in my thinking which addressed pretty much every single concern I've ever had with it: Windows purpose has nothing to do with being a useful operating system. People constantly talk about Windows as if it's flawed, but it's really not. The reason it's perceived as flawed is because it's evaluated as an operating system; stability, speed, functionality, security, ease-of-use, all of these things in which Windows falls short are often held against it as if those who created Windows somehow failed in implementing key checkbox features. Nothing could be further from the truth, but to see that one must be absolutely clear on why Windows exists and what purpose it is intended to serve: Windows is created to make money for Microsoft. That's it, that's all. All of those operating system checkbox features are only important to the extent that they make more money for Microsoft. If that over-arching goal is not going to be abundantly met, then the lesser goal is irrelevant. Apple (who I have a love/hate relationship with, so don't call me a "fanboy", thanks) has a different approach: Their belief is that if they make the best damned operating system in the world that it will bring money into their coffers. I, personally, find this somewhat naive; the world in general doesn't care about X11 or AFP or open-source Darwin, etc. etc. Only certain kinds of consumers to. I don't know if Apple has ever sat down and said "We spend more money on implementing X11 than we make from people who buy OSX because they need it". Apple may not even care. Mark my words, however; Microsoft has done this and continues to do it. So the end result is this: Microsoft strikes the balance between making a profit and creating an operating system which does what you need. Windows, for all its security problems and shortcomings (which are countless), hits the sweet spot thanks to marketing and advertising and general "bullsh**" propaganda which makes Windows users think they're getting a top-flight operating system experience. It's true that if Windows was any worse that profits would taper off, but what most people don't realize is that if Windows was any better that profits would also taper off, as the diminishing returns for investment start kicking in when they *really* dedicate themselves to making it secure, stable, or whatever else they're currently lacking. Instead, the cycle of upgrades, tech support, patches and new releases is predicated on the assumption that Windows bugs you enough that there will be a reason to leave the familiar behind and move on to the next product Microsoft wants you to buy... but in the mean time it's good enough that you won't go through the inconvenience of "Switching" to a Mac or taking the intellectual plunge into *nix. The Microsoft empire is completely founded on this principle. Many of the brightest minds in the world are brought into the Microsoft fold. Obviously, they know how to make an operating system which works. The question isn't "Why don't they fix Windows?"... the question is "Why should they?". See, they've already got your money and will continue to get it; how will fixing Windows serve that end any better than it already does? |
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| Sept 13 | That Mysterious Third Thing You might remember that on August 31st I told you about a third thing which means a lot to me but probably little or nothing to you. Well... here it is: I'm moving. New digs. I take occupancy on October 1. Gory details to follow, and that's a promise. |
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| Sept 12 | Me == Honey, Darling, Sweetheart I haven't said much about Lori in a while, have I? She's still lovely, still Oregonian, still my adorable girlfriend. I just got some very lovely and tender "romance" email from her last night. Another quick note to say... I love you, I love you, I love you. You are always in my heart and on my mind.How adorable is that? Right now she needs your prayers, by the way. Life treats her as it does the rest of us: Ironically and without warning. Keep a warm, kind thought for her, please. |
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| Sept 10 | The Challenge Of Dora My youngest daughter's name is Dora. If you follow this blog then you already know a fair amount about her. She is a very interesting kid in so many ways, but there's one thing I know about her that makes her extremely unusual. The only way I can think of to describe it is to say that she just doesn't care about material things. She has an interest in something else entirely, which I'll get to in a minute. I started noticing over the last few years about how Dora behaves when she's getting gifts on birthdays and other occasions; she's always grateful, always excited, but she tends to forget her gifts very quickly and move on. Where her sister will receive, for instance, a stuffed animal and will pet and cuddle it for hours or days to follow. Dora doesn't do this; she loves it for about three minutes, and then it's on to something else. I sometimes wonder about the people who give her gifts and if they feel insulted by the way she just walks away from those sweetly wrapped toys and stuffies. Not that I care that much, mind you. No, Dora is one of (if not the only) person I know who truly has no interest in material things. I never thought that I would ever meet someone who really has that quality. I keep thinking it must be my imagination, but when I ask her what kind of thing she'd like to own, she can only dream up fantastical things like a pony that can sing Happy Birthday and has wheels for hooves (true story). Dora is not a person who has no wants, however; Dora wants you...your time, your attention, your ear, your affection, your company. She wants you. She wants to talk with you, she wants to show you what she's interested in, she wants to sit next to you while you're doing what you're doing and ask you about it, she wants to snuggle and hug, she wants to be close. She reminds me a bit of a puppy if you've ever had one then you'll know how they follow you from room to room without fail, just because they can't stand being separated from you for any time whatsoever. It makes Dora more work. You can't just give her a stack of toys and tell her to play while you go flip through an Ikea catalogue or chat on the phone. You can't ply her with Disney movies while you surf the web or read a magazine. No, Dora won't fall for that. Ruth is somewhat more self-sustaining and likes her alone time, during which she will engage things that interest her; books, toys, whatever. Dora isn't like that. The worst torment for her is to be alone with no one to chatter with, no one to play with, no one to talk with. Sometimes that's Ruth's idea of heaven, but for Dora there's really nothing she wants less. It's a lot more work to be Dora's caregiver for this reason, but it lends a special sweetness to the experience of being her parent. |
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| Sept 10 | Just Kinda Makes You Wanna Cry On the subject of Hurricane Katrina and the ensuing damage to New Orleans: Click here for more. "What didn't go right?'" –President Bush, as quoted by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), after she urged him to fire FEMA Director Michael Brown "because of all that went wrong, of all that didn't go right" in the Hurricane Katrina relief effort "What I'm hearing which is sort of scary is that they all want to stay in Texas. Everybody is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway so this (chuckle) – this is working very well for them." –Former First Lady Barbara Bush, on the Hurricane flood evacuees in the Houston Astrodome, Sept. 5, 2005 "We've got a lot of rebuilding to do ... The good news is — and it's hard for some to see it now — that out of this chaos is going to come a fantastic Gulf Coast, like it was before. Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott's house — he's lost his entire house — there's going to be a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch." (Laughter) —President Bush, touring hurricane damage, Mobile, Ala., Sept. 2, 2005 |
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| Sept 10 | I Hate September I've come to realize – and accept – that I really dislike this entire month. Always have. |
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| Sept 10 | All That You Are This song resonates with me a lot, which is kind of funny because it's really just a garden-variety pop song. Maybe sometime I'll jot down some reasons why this close to perfectly describes so much that goes on in my little strange world. If I said it, I meant it I'm not really demented I'm just saying it's been said again and again Not that I'm all that grounded I'm already dumbfounded I'm a liar believe me, baby Well it's all that you are You're just one shining star Well that's all that you are Maybe everything's changed And maybe I stayed the same What does it matter to me now, anyway If I ever regret it If I'm ever repentant Karma sings and we'll dance the dance, baby |
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| Sept 10 | Holy Fuck. Yeah, that's right. I said it. I dropped an F Bomb on you. Despite my ongoing attempts to not say it, I just said it. Why? Well, let's start with this: If you haven't read my August 21 entry yet, entitled "The Day I Became A Man", and it's companion entry, "Before You Ask". Go ahead. Go read it. You'll need to if you want to understand the rest of what I'm writing below. Now that you've read it, look what I got in my email in-box just a few minutes ago (and it's edited in such a way so the stuff that's none of your business is missing): From: "KIRSTEN GUNDLACK" <****@hotmail.com> To: jwcorey@gmail.com Date: Sat, 10 Sep 2005 00:44:17 -0400 Subject: I came over and made you show me your Millennium Falcon... ...because that day in the mall, I really wanted to ask you to take it out of the box and show it to me. But I couldn't, because it would have been a big hassle for you and my friends wouldn't have been interested. Later on, though, I rode my bike to your house and we got it out and I opened all the hatches and tried out the sounds and was grateful that somebody as smart as you liked Star Wars as much as I did. So I was Googling my brother's name (note: Christian), because he is an ultramarathoner of modest disposition who lives in London, and sometimes it's the only way to find out that he's been winning races. Imagine my surprise when I saw my name, and found your blog, and read the sweetest story about that day in the mall, and then I read it all. The whole kaboodle, the last two years and change, and it was a hell of a read, a terrific read. I write, but I don't have that level of honesty in my writing. Yet. By honesty I don't merely mean being candid about what's going on outside and in; there's a level where the writer sees things, really looks, clear-eyed and cold at them, and so can draw them vividly for the reader, even if they're painful or bitter-tasting or trivial. You have that thing that I aspire to, and I'm so glad that you write. And it's times like this that I am more deeply in love with the Internet than ever. You look wonderful in the pictures (although I skipped the pimple and your earlobe - I'll take your word for it). Your mum looks great too - just the way I remember her. She was infinitely cooler than the other fourth-line moms (note: "4th line" is the rural route we lived on).(I don't know if you noticed the sad state of our farmhouse on your last drive-by, but all the barns, paths and gardens are long gone.) My mum and stepfather now live in Kingston, but my dad is still in Milton, as are Laelar and Erin (note: her sisters). Christian, as I said, is in London, by his reckoning a good city for runners. Your daughters sound delightful! I'm sorry that they have to go to school. Every year at this time I phone my eldest niece (Erin's daughter Emily, aged 10) to give her my sympathies. The knot in my stomach has mostly gone away now that the first week is over, and I'm happy to report that I did not reflexively buy a new pencil case. So here's the where and what of it: I am living in ***** (note: none of your business). I got married a little over a year ago, and my husband Daniel has a stage combat school here (www.rapierwit.com). I do most of the computer-related and joe jobs around the place, and Daniel does all the sexy fight-related stuff. (I'd be the pen. He'd be the sword. And yes, the site needs updating.) Right now I'm also trying to finish a novelizaton of a screenplay for a filmmaker friend of ours. ***** (note: more stuff that's none of your business). So I was writing, trying to plug script holes the size of Paris Hilton's hoo-ha, and I got stuck and frustrated, and began googling compulsively. This would be where you came in. Of course, there's been quite a bit that's happened up to this point. Gripping family drama. International travel. Pet deaths. A parade's worth of loves, losses, cars, furniture, apartments, houseplants, hairstyles, computers...I suppose that eras can be measured in thousands of different types of increments. I was living in Tokyo from '94 to '99, so I tend to divide things into B.J. and A.J. I am still getting used to this whole marriage thing. I suppose that I didn't really picture myself married, and I keep thinking that next year will be the year that I do the big Thailand backpacking trip, and have to remind myself that things are different now. We are going to Mexico with Daniel's family over Christmas, and judging from the pix of the resort it will be a far cry from the trips I'm accustomed to. Daniel's family is not so much into backpacking. They have trouble coming to grips with pet hair on furniture, fer Chrissake. But I digress. Actually, digression is what I do best. Guess what I'm being tested for! And guess what drug I'm on! Jeez, maybe it was, like, a whole thing with the kids in our enrichment class. Nah, not Peter Stabins. No way. Jody Klymak, though...now, he had the right kind of manic energy...(note: yeah, those were some of my childhood buddies) So I'll stop here, because I (being the presumptuous type) am assuming that we shall engage in some form of real interaction again in the future, and we wouldn't want to have nothing to talk about. (Not bloody likely, but just in case...) Like many folks, I can be phoned ***** (note: like I'm going to publish her phone number). Or I can be e'd back at this address, which I reckon is an easy one for you. Oh - where does Tamas come from? Last coincidence of the day: I finished Diane Ackerman's A Natural History of the Senses last night, and that was the first time I'd encountered the term synesthesia; tonight I followed one of your links to Sarah Brown's blog, and, lo and behold, she mentions it on her site. (She was jazzed because her new cell phone numbers were really great colours.) Wacky. So let's communicate! The time has come again! Kirsten P.S. Samurai Jack is on. How much do you love it? P.P.S. Just heard one of my favourite South Park quotes: "Wow, dude! I feel so much better about being Jewish now that I know Mel Gibson is just a whacko douchebag!" A bientot! |
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| Sept 7 | Gibran "My soul preached to me and instructed me to drink the wine that cannot be pressed and cannot be poured from cups that hands can lift or lips can touch. Ere my soul preached to me, my thirst was like a dim spark hidden under the ashes that can be extinguished by a swallow of water. But now my longing has become my cup, my affections my wine, and my loneliness my intoxication; yet, in this unquenchable thirst there is eternal joy." -Kahlil Gibran |
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| Sept 7 |  Dora & Ruth Go To SchoolI didn't exactly love school when I was a kid, so every year when the end of August and the beginning of September roll around, I get a bit melancholy. Even though my September generally looks a lot like my August (which looks a lot like my July, which looks a lot like my June, etc), I get that sense of loss that I used to get when summer was nearly over. It's just "phantom pain" now, but I still have this powerful urge to shut my eyes and ears and pretend that if I act like I don't notice it's back-to-school time then it won't be. Dora and Ruth are really quite ready to go back to school. Their skin is ruddy with sun-browning and lake water and all of the things that summer marks a kid with. They've played and swam and romped and done their summer routine. They're both ready to move on and get their heads back into the game. I haven't the heart to tell them that getting back to school might be harder for them as they get older. Why ruin it by saying something like that now? Ruth started Grade 3 yesterday and Dora is starting Senior Kindergarten today (French Immersion, no less). Dora has a new teacher, though Ruth has the same one from last year. Same school. Same basic routines. Same dreary details to sort out about whether the kids go to my house on certain days or their mothers on other days. That part is rather tiresome, to be honest. Still, we work things out and figure our plans and everything seems to go on as it's supposed to.  I told Ruth today that I still think of her as the little brown baby that laid across my lap while I typed on the computer at night, bouncing her gently up and down so she would stay asleep. Hearing that meant as much to her today as hearing that sort of thing meant to me back when I was eight years old. I should have known that's how it was going to work out. In fact, while I was trying to bare my heart to her at that moment, she actually tried to bite my nose. Like, with her teeth. Yeah, so I think I'm on my own with that one... just as my poor mother was back in 1977.Now I give a little thought to those feelings my mom was going through as I brushed her off and burst out the screen door in my running shoes and little jean jacket. Right now I'm going through the same thing. |
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| Sept 7 | "Which Tarot Card Are You?" Meme
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| Sept 6 | From Fark.com "Major oil pipeline on East Coast is now operating at 100 percent capacity, meaning oil companies will have to think of some creative new thing to blame for increasing prices." Here's the link. Gas prices have been a sore spot for me over the last few days (since the spike). My sympathy and feeling for the victims of Katrina is not lessened by it, but I am very unimpressed... not only with the effect of this matter on me, personally, but I fear for the economy. Also, I don't want to pay $20 for a quarter tank of gas. Does that make me a bad person? |
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| Sept 6 | Haiku For A Piece Of Black Fluff On My Living Room Floor Stumbled upon you Mistook you for a spider Time to change my pants |
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| Sept 6 | Wild Things "I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself." D.H.Lawrence (1885 - 1930) |
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| Sept 5 | It Appears I Am Out Of Allergy Medicine This is going to be one very long night. |
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| Sept 5 | A Little Trick There's this thing I do sometimes, and I'm going to do it now. It's a trick where I decide to stop being sad. It sounds pretty silly, just saying it like that, but at times it can be quite helpful. Like right now. Here I go. One, two three... And done. |
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| Sept 3 | Coming Down From The High I had a very successful trip, and now I think I have the blues. I'm really feeling that "why bother?" feeling right now. Don't trust anything I say until it wears off. |
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| Aug 31 | Two Things Which Mean Little To You But A Lot To Me First, I am experiencing something I don't believe I've had in years: A regular sleep schedule. I go to bed relatively early and I wake up relatively early feeling refreshed and awake. That's new for me. It's new enough that I had to post it here, despite the fact that most of you are probably just reading in hopes that I'll post more about snot rolling out of my face. The other thing is that I'm going on a road trip to visit some people and do some soul-searching while I'm at it. I haven't been on a road trip in a long, long time and it's going to be amazingly good for me. I leave tomorrow. There's one more thing which counts as "Means Little To You But A Lot To Me", and it's big. Really big. I have to tell a few specific people before I can announce it here, but it's big enough that it's probably going to change some of the pictures which appear in the "Obsession Bar" above. Wish me luck. |
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| Aug 29 | For Colin (Transcribed from AIM) Corey: Have you written anything in your blog in the last 24 months? Colin: no. I have no real appeal for me either. I prefer to read yours. Corey: Any requests for upcoming entries? Colin: you haven't had a disgusting ailment in a while. Corey: Oh, I have one now. Corey: The allergies. Corey: I woke myself up last night with the sensation of snot rolling out of my face and onto the pillow. Colin: there's the type of visceral detail you don't get in most blogs. I missed it. Corey: I'll post that. Colin: thx |
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| Aug 29 | Stoned I was at the bank this morning. While there, I took notice of the usual assortment of customers and staff milling about. Most of the teller staff were older women; the type that wear neat polyester suits with modest brooches on the lapel and sensible flat soes. Their hair is cut short-ish and their makeup is not intended to entice so much as it is to conceal. I have nothing against women of that generation; I'm just making an observation. I was waiting at the counter for someone to pay attention to me when a couple women came in who were obviously "regulars", and the older, polyester-wearing women on staff greeted by name the older, polyester-wearing women who just walked through the door. There was a quick exchange of "Hi" and "How are you this fine day?" and "How goes the battle?" and I'm sure you can guess the rest. What made me stop and take notice was when a woman behind the counter asked one of the women who had just come in about her husband, and the customer explained that he was well and had gone to the Rolling Stones concert in Ottawa last night (they played here to one of the biggest crowds any show in Ottawa has ever enjoyed). From behind the counter a few women gathered at the wicket for a gab, and they asked how Mick Jagger was. It turns out that he was very spry and he put on "quite a little show", and great it was that it didn't go too late... and everyone nodded in agreement. See, for me it was something of a mind-bender because I'm used to fans of rock music looking a certain way... like this, this, this or even this. I don't usually expect this. I realized that The Rolling Stones will be, to my children, what Lawrence Welk was to me. And I'm ok with that because, you know what? That's kinda what they are to me as well. |
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| Aug 29 | Blogs Did you know that I actively maintain five blogs, each on a different aspect of my life that I want to write about (this is one of them)? I'm not surprised if you didn't know that. At the moment only Lori has access to all five. If you can find all of them then you're an exceptionally resourceful person, because I haven't made them easy to find. I don't know why it is that people get off on saying "I know something you don't know and I'm not going to tell you", but I sure know that I find it a real knee-slapper. |
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| Aug 29 | Abject Misery If you look here and scroll to Sept 2 and then you look here and scroll to August 23, you will be able to predict what I'm about to say. It's allergy season. I try to deny it, but I keep waking myself up by sneezing my head off. It's really unpleasant. |
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| Aug 28 | Pepsi The Evil Dark Elixir has made a return in my life. Proud of that? No, I'm not... but I have a plan. I'll let you know if it works. If it doesn't, we'll pretend I never said anything about a plan. Got it? |
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| Aug 28 | That's My Mom On The Right She so crazy! |
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| Aug 27 | Sad Lisa She hangs her head and cries in my shirt She must be hurt very badly Tell me what's making you sadly Open your door, don't hide in the dark You're lost in the dark, you can trust me 'Cause you know that's how it must be Lisa, Lisa Sad Lisa, Lisa Her eyes like windows trickling rain Upon her pain getting deeper Though my love wants to relieve her She walks alone from wall to wall Lost in a hall, she can't hear me Though I know she likes to be near me Lisa, Lisa Sad Lisa, Lisa She sits in a corner by the door There must be more I can tell her If she really wants me to help her I'll do what I can to show her the way And maybe someday I will free her Though I know no one can see her Lisa, Lisa Sad Lisa, Lisa |
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| Aug 25 | Thought I had a thought today while driving. I realized that life, and the quality thereof, largely comes down to this one thing. It can be described in many ways, but at the moment it came into my head I thought of it thusly: Unless you have something you would die for, you haven't really understood what it is to live. Sounds like a cliché, doesn't it? Nonetheless, I realized that it's true; unless there's something that means more to you than your own life your entire existence will be a non-stop circuit of self-interest and grounded motions which utterly fail to transcend in any meaningful way. And who wants that? |
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| Aug 23 | Sorry, But No. Here's the setup: Today I was listening to CBC radio. There was a show about creative sentencing the American judicial system. To be more specific, it was about judges who would substitute the usual diet of prison time, fines and community service with punishments that more closely fit the crime. For instance, a thief might have to stand in a public place wearing a sandwich board saying "I AM A THIEF AND THIS IS MY PUNISHMENT" on it or a belligerent kid who disturbs the peace by booming hip-hop from his truck being made to listen to Wayne Newton for hours on end. I have to admit that there's a certain poetry to it, but I'll side-step my own pontification about that so I can get down to the point I have in mind. One judge sentenced a fellow with repeated DUI offenses to a week in jail and then ordered him to put a bumper sticker on his car. That sticker says "DRUNK DRIVING: YOU CAN'T AFFORD IT" and then, in small letters, something like "This sticker is posted in compliance with a ruling from the judicial system" or something stuffy like that. Apparently the small print isn't visible unless you're quite close. The judge in question said that he was trying to raise awareness and that he felt if people knew how much cash they could lose for getting stung on DUI that they might think again. Then, interestingly enough, a quick interview was conducted with the guy who had to post the sticker on his car. The interviewer asked him how it felt to have to do do it and whether he considered displaying the sticker to be worse than prison. He said that prison was bad enough, but that the sticker was far worse and that he didn't agree with the idea behind it, saying that it's a shame-based punishment and that it violated his first amendment rights. In other words, he was saying that if he had bumper stickers all over his car and the judge ordered him, as a punishment, to cover one of them up that his right to say what he wanted would be violated and that having to post the sticker on his car was exactly the same thing and, therefore, unconstitutional - as he was being forced to say something that he wouldn't say otherwise. He was quite strident about it, as if he was reporting on the bad conditions of a POW camp or some sort of secret oppression squirrelled away from the eyes of the world by an evil corporation. He was quite clear about the fact that the punishment was far, far out of bounds. Ok. That was the setup. Here's my reaction: Somebody needs to shut up. Dear guy-who-drinks-and-drives: You could have spent many months (or more) in prison for a repeat DUI offense but, instead, you spent a week in prison and had to slap a sticker in your car. Boo hoo. Let me get my violin. As for the matter of constitutional rights, I barely know where to start on that argument. I believe that your research about constitutional rights should have been expanded to cover the part where it's a violation of a person's constitutional rights to drive your radial tires over their head because you're a stupid alcoholic who doesn't know enough not to get stinking drunk like a 17 year old, let alone put your keys in your pocket and take a taxi. I think your love of Jägermeister isn't just reason to take away someone else's ability to speak freely by, well... killing them. Now, backing up a step or two, I'd like to also add that the first amendment was created in order to protect peoples' right to speak freely about the government without facing incarceration. It was not created in order to protect you from using eight inches of bumper for advocating that people not drink themselves stupid and then drive a car. I get really offended when I hear people spout off about how the first amendement apparently is supposed to protect their right to wear a T-Shirt that says "Moustache Rides: Free". As a Canadian, the whole "free speech" issue doesn't resonate with me in the same way it might for an American citizen, but I still have to say: Shame on those of you who cry "free speech" so you can do something you know you shouldn't be doing. Getting back to the topic on hand... I do believe to a certain extent in the machinations of karma, and I think that a person who trades a whole lot of jail time for a bumper sticker after having repeatedly committed a crime which could kill innocent people has not yet learned his lesson... and I hope when he finally learns it he doesn't have to ruin someone else's life to do so. |
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| Aug 23 | Box Of Puke I bought some large mailing boxes from the local post office for me to pack things in and, as you can probably guess for yourself, send somewhere by mail. They all smell like vomit. It's disgusting. |
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| Aug 21 | Before You Ask I haven't seen Kirsten in roughly 17 years and I have no idea where she is, what she's doing or what her phone number might be. Don't ask. |
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| Aug 21 | The Day I Became A Man I played with toys for a lot longer than most kids did. For whatever reason, I just didn't see the point in giving up my attachment to them, even though other kids were starting to put more attention into things like hair care, Van Halen and hickeys. I just wasn't ready to go there and, so, I continued on in my own little world for a while despite the movement of my peers towards adolescence. I was about 12 when The Empire Strikes Back came out in theaters. Along with it, as you can imagine, a slew of movie-tie-in toys were releasedd and, among them, the Millenium Falcon. It was a marvel of toy-related engineering; some battery-powered noises (if memory serves) and covers that lifted off to reveal the cockpit and "hang-out area" where Luke put on a blindfold and swung at a floating ball in the air. I really wanted this thing which, at the time, retailed for about $35. I'm not sure how much that'd be in today's terms, but it sure would be a lot more than $35 - I know that much. I squirreled away cash and sought out odd jobs to do in order to scrape the funds together to acquire one. This took me about a month, and to this day it represents one of the most committed endeavors to "save up for something" that I've ever embarked upon. The day finally came when I had the cash in hand and my mother, blessed that she is, took me to the Milton Mall where I could go to Zeller's (Dear American Friends: Think "Wal-Mart") and pick the giant plastic beast up in the gigantic box and slap my money on the barrelhead for the crimped-haired teenage checkout clerk. Oh, the pride of it; to have set a goal, saved up for it and finally brought it to a happy, victorious conclusion. My memory of the day is a little hazy, but I remember mom left me to get the toy on my own while she did a couple other things in the mall and, when I was ready, I could meet her at some other store. It had to be something like that because I know I marched from Zellers into the mall area with a huge frikkin' box covered in a nearly-transparent bag. I used both arms. I had to. It was that big. As I was walking down the tiled passway with my gigantic Millenium Falcon box (clear to all onlookers through the not-quite-opaque plastic bag it was covered in), I ran into Kirsten Gundlack, the then-love-of-my-life (she knew me back then as Corey Dingwall). I had a crush on Kirsten so big that I was stupefied by it. She had curly brown hair and a pixie-face and something of a small overbite (if you're reading this, Kirsty, you can rest assured that your overbite was gone by the last time I saw you). She would wear adorable polyester tartans and giant, white running shoes and dark tights and I think the day I first saw her wear lip gloss was the first time I ever made that cartoony motion where little valentine hearts exploded around my head as I made a lazy-eyed expression of love. She wasn't "precious" in the way the roller-skating, roach-clip-with-feathers-wearing girls were. She was just brainy and cute and I never stood a chance (she looked a lot like the child actor who plays "Lava Girl" in The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl In 3D). Ok, so anyhow. Kirsten Gundlack. She (herself a Star Wars fan, actually) and she walked towards me with a couple of friends, all of whom I knew from school. She stopped to chat and revealed that she had been clothes shopping and picked up a new jacket or whatever and that her friends had just gotten some makeup. They were now on their way to look at the newest craze from Sony, the "Walkman" (a personal device for playing cassettes with headphones attached that looked like something from NASA) and that they might pick one up. I don't know why she asked me what I had in my arms, as it was painfully clear to anyone with two eyes, but she did. As I stood there in my sorta-too-short corduroys and my Garfield "I Hate Mondays" button on my lapel, I weakly confessed that it was a Millenium Falcon toy. Not a model that mature hobbyists would assemble and paint and mount on their shelves. This was a 20" replica made of durable plastic so that kids like me couldn't break it when running around the house making HyperSpace noises with our mouths. Not only did this thing reveal that I had just blown $35 plus tax of my own money on a Star Wars toy, but it also revealed that I must, of course, have lots of other toys in my possession, as the Millenium Falcon requires the Star Wars action figures to really get the most out of it. Kirsten didn't tease me and she didn't sneer. She just said "Oh" and then her small cabal of feathered-haired girls marched on to look at Walkmans. I stood there, motionless, this enormous box in my arms, feeling something akin to the emotion one gets when they dream they've gone to school and forgotten to put their clothes on before leaving the house. The Millenium Falcon never saw a lot of use. Seeing myself through Kirsten's eyes 25 years ago neutered my passion for battery-powered space ship noises and little plastic gangway ramps that fold down. Soon after I acquired some hair spray, a denim jacket, a copy of Bat Out Of Hell by Meatloaf and, of course, a Walkman. |
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| Aug 2 | Things You Shouldn't Say With A Straight Face Apple released a new mouse today. This comes as a response to years and years of public pressure for a multi-button mouse with Apple sticking its fingers in its ears and going "LALALALALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU". Now there's this thing, called the "Mighty Mouse". Alright, name notwithstanding, it doesn't look so bad. It has a scroll ball on the top which allows you to scroll horizontally, vertically and (get this) diagonally. Finally, the long-standing challenge of scrolling through a diagonal document has been solved. Everybody with me now: WHEW! It has a touch-sensitive surface on the top instead of buttons to track clicking. Yeah, nothing could possibly go wrong there. Finally, there's a "squeeze" feature where if you give your mouse a little squish that something interesting will happen. This is the first time I've ever heard of such a thing and my first reaction is to wonder how many times I'm going to accidentally click that sensor-surface on the top while squeezing, but whatever. I actually think it looks like an alright mouse. Probably not the most amazing thing to ever enter the market, but still a worthy contribution and a nice alternative to the average, every day fare. The part that makes me laugh, however, is a comment from Apple's David Moody, Apple’s vice president of Worldwide Mac Product Marketing: “If you look at the multi-button mouse market today, they are all a little complex.” Yeah. Having two buttons, left and right, to click is sort of a head-scratcher. Give me diagonal scrolling and mouse-squeezing to keep things nice and simple. |
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| July 28 | Cold I can't believe I'm saying this after the absolutely maddening heat wave we had for weeks on end here in the nation's capital, but... I'm freezing today. 23 degrees celcius (or 74 farenheit) with very low humidity is making me all chilly. Please... don't remind me in coming January that I said this. |
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| July 26 | This Is What Insomnia Does To A Guy |
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| July 25 | Tiger. Raawwwr. I just upgraded my Mac to OS X 10.4, aka Tiger. You can now see why it is that I don't habitually write a "tech blog" like some people, because I'm just plain not qualified to make intelligent comments about hardware and software. Sure, I can review a video game from time to time, but rather than comment on frame rates and system requirements, I tend to say things like "This game rocks so hard it made me fall over and die. Four times". Nevertheless, here's my quick overview of Tiger and what I think of it. Overall improvement of speed: I haven't noticed much so far. It seems that Apple looks at system resources and has to make a decision: Make the computer faster, or keep it at a "nominal" performance and add more gee-gaws to make it seem cooler. I think they go for the latter. Me? I'd like to have a computer that boots in 20 seconds and can open any application in 3. Instantaneous application switching and never the spinning collor wheel. That's my idea of an "update". But yeah, I guess that fancypants visual effects like zooming and poofing are important, too. Overall improvement of cuteness: Oh, this is just off the meter. New desktop images, new visual effects like a "splash" in the Dashboard app, new groovy acid-jazz music playing with the setup assistant... it's all sweet. Speaking of Dashboard: It's like a container for mini-apps that do things like tell you the weather or convert pounds to kilograms. In other words, it's a free collection of the kind of programs you used to have to pay $29.95 for back in 1989. It's not amazingly useful, but the interface is niiiiiiice (thus leading to a phenomenon where you end up using it just to be able to look at it). I like seeing the weather at a glance. I like being able to convert stuff. The rest? Not much I can do with it, really. Spotlight: Basically an instantly available search engine that tears the paint off of anything that's been offered before (on any OS). I click once, I type "Lori", and by the count of three it shows me every email, every photo, every text file, everything on my computer with her name in it. And I can click again to sort it any way I wish. There's no lookin' around. It's all right there. I have absolutely no idea what the hell I'm going to use this for, but ok. New desktop pictures: They're great! Other stuff: I don't really care. Automator might be fun. The rest? I either don't need it or I already have a way of doing it. So why did I install Tiger? I wanted to have access to the latest Apple updates (for Safari, for instance), I wanted to increase stability on my machine (as my former OS install was getting a little weird) and I sort of need to be able to say I'm using Tiger when I review games. I say it's Thumbs Up for Tiger, but... I probably would trade Tiger for a sushi dinner. |
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| July 21 | This is my mom. There are many moms out there, but this one is mine. Me and mom. She visited this week from Haifa, Israel and just got on a plane this morning to head back home. If we both look sweaty, it's because it's been 100000 degrees here lately.  |
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| July 21 | New Email Address That's right, folks: jwcorey@gmail.com. It's the first time I've changed my email address in probably 8 years. The old address, corey@tamas.com, still works fine and will be active for as long as I can keep it that way... but I thought it might be time to start migrating to a new one. So stop mailing me there if you don't mind. Thanks! |
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| July 21 | Life Imitates Art The Smoking Gun. Penny Arcade. |
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| June 11 | Grandpa What I didn't say in my last entry but decided to add today is this: My grandfather is quite sick and is in a hospital in Western Canada. I'm not sure which details to share, except maybe to say that he is a very special man and I am genuinely very worried, as all my family is. Therefore, despite the positive ring of my June 10 entry, I'm actually quite concerned and could use some good thoughts and prayers for him if you can spare them. |
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| June 10 | Strange, Beautiful Trip I took a quick and unexpected journey this week. Didn't plan to, but things happen. The main side-benefit of this little trip is that I have gotten to spend some time with my beautiful Lori, who has been having a pretty tough time lately, but doing such great things about it. Sometimes life gives people these little gifts which serve to make everything clear, which soothe your pain and untangle the tangled knots that your own hand alone can't undo. She really impresses me. There were other benefits, too. Overall I'd say my week has been a net gain. Gotta get back to work, though... still lots to do. |
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| June 5 | Did you know? Sometimes when I'm thinking about you all on my own, I will look up facts about where you live. For instance, traffic, weather, pollen content in the air for the day, forest fire risk, that sort of stuff. Makes me feel like I know more about where you are and what you're doing than I actually do. |
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| June 5 | Grocery Store You know, every parent thinks their own kids are the best around. I mean, even those that get driven crazy by their children still hold onto that idea that their kids are exceptionally awesome. I think that's a good sign, don't you? I mean... if a parent says something like "Oh, my kids are alright. I guess. I dunno. I scarcely pay attention", wouldn't you want to call the authorities and have them step in? Point is: You can't always trust a parent when they start prattling on about how awesome their kids are; be they right or wrong, there's no way a parent can be unbiased. Yesterday I was in the grocery store and I had the two girls with me. Now, truth be told, I thought their behavior was incorrigable. I'm the type of dad that holds back as much as possible from being one of those ogres you see in the store who grabs their kid by the arm while in the checkout aisle, lifts them off their feet and hisses "As soon as we get home you are going STRAIGHT to bed and you can forget about ice cream, mister!" or whatever. Thing is, Ruth and Dora were both wandering off, not noticing themselves getting in the way of other people pushing carts and, well, I was starting to get a bit hot under the collar... though I wasn't letting it out yet. An older Swedish lady I've never met came up to me (yes, I said Swedish) and beamed, telling me "I just have to say that your daughters are so beautiful, and so polite". I couldn't disagree with that (how rotten are parents who get compliments about their kids and then come back with something snide like "You wouldn't think that if you had them"? Yuck). I gazed at them both and said "Yes, I'm really lucky. These two girls are just lovely and they are incredibly well-behaved". See, even though their behavior wasn't top-notch by their standards, they were still doing really well. She then went on to tell me that Dora (who is five years old) was wanting to get past and said "Excuse me, but would you mind if I pass by you?" Yeah. That's Dora. I can't argue that. I listened to a few more minutes of this lady telling me how awesome my kids are and I started to feel a bit chagrined that I had even considered chewing them out for their behavior that day. Later, in the checkout line, a friend of mine who was ahead of me was chatting me up and said "How do you do it? Alone with the two girls in the store with them asking for everything in sight?" It took me a minute to figure out what she was saying, then I replied "Oh, no. It's not that bad. They rarely beg or whine for anything that they want. When I say 'no', they almost always accept it the first time I say it". She was laughing, and I couldn't figure out if she thought I was fibbing or if she was incredulous. I cast a glance back at the two of them standing there, each doe-eyed and daydreaming about who-knows-what. I started to realize that they really are quite exceptional, and that I'm lucky. Extremely lucky. I never chewed them out for not noticing oncoming grocery cart traffic. I don't want to activate some kind of karma that is intended to teach me how good I actually have it. |
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| June 5 | Horoscope I read horoscopes. I sorta pay attention to what they say, but I also sorta don't. Today I saw something in my own horoscope which made me pause.. "If you can understand, you can forgive." All I can say about that is: Yes, exactly. In other news, it's stinking hot out. |
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| June 4 | Why Things Happen Things happen either to make you stronger or to take you out of the game completely. Sometimes people misinterpret the former for the latter. Sometimes the other way around. When things happen, I always believe there's a "why". It's just not always readily apparent to me. Some days I'm patient about waiting for the "why". Some days I'm not. Right now I'm just waiting to figure out if I'm getting stronger or if I'm being removed from the game. Either way, it's against my will. |
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| June 2 | Yay. I'm a genius. I just put an exacto-blade through my thumb. |
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| May 31 | Damn These are some stale corn chips I'm eating. |
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| May 31 | My New Favorite Photo Of Myself |
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| May 31 | Birthday Wishes Best birthday wish I received for 2005 came from Kris Boyer: "Congrats on not getting yourself killed for another year." |
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| May 28 | My Birthday I'm 36 today. |
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| May 18 | Schadenfreude Does the fact I find this funny make me a bad person? Actually, don't answer that. |
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| May 18 | People Today I came to a realization. I don't hate people. Right now I'm in a swirl of complicated interpersonal relationship where I have to navigate the whims of both strangers and people who are close to me and, in all cases, deal with conflicting desires and hopes and demands and etc. etc. This has caused me all sorts of stress and grief of various kinds and for a while I was questioning to what extent I actually dislike people in general. I realized that I don't. Not at all. I find that, in general, people want to do the right thing. They really do. We all know they rarely manage to do it, of course, but the intention is almost always honorable. What gets in the way is peoples' fear, their lack of understanding, lack of hope, the unconscious mimicking of ingrained patterns and habits and lack of a moral compass they can really rely on. It's very, very rare that you meet someone who is genuinely mean. It's just not something you see every day. When someone pisses you off it's usually not the result they're looking for; for the most part people want to be friends, they want to help each other, they want to get along and they want to do the right thing. Not all, of course... but most. If you really believe someone you know is a genuinely bad person then the way you'll treat them and behave with them will mirror that, and then an already negative situation gets worse. Maybe the transformative agent which transports people from a place of negativity and confrontation is the understanding that (as the saying goes) "everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle". In an attempt to make some sense out of my life this has proven to be one of the most valuable perspectives I've come up with so far. |
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| May 18 |
Yeah, well...
Does your weblog own you? |
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| May 17 | The Wrong Kind Of Mother's Day Present Today's entry deals with a sign I saw today. I was driving to Ottawa's 416 highway when I passed a sign at a furniture store. I think it was meant to be a Mother's Day advertisement of some kind, and here's what it said: Soft Stools It's hard to imagine a world where nobody on the staff of that store would have stopped and said "Maybe we should rephrase this, guys". |
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| May 16 | Ruth's Desktops One day last summer I sat with my two cute kids out on my front step and we soaked up the sun while playing and messing around. The digital camera got hauled out and I took some pics of the two of them. Well, naturally the girls wanted a turn shooting pics as well, and it was hard to say no (with a digital camera not having film, it's not much of a tragedy of they blast away 100000 useless photos). My youngest, Dora, peeled off about three dozen blurry photos of basically nothing inside of thirty seconds, got bored, and went off to eat yogurt. Ruth, however, was more interested in taking actual photos. She carefully wandered around the yard and driveway and sidewalk and took photos with intent and focus. It's interesting to see into the mind of a seven-year-old, as her idea of "good photo" is unencumbered by what a good photo is "supposed to be". Instead of smiling photos of me and her sister and then me again and her sister again, Ruth noticed the beauty of repetition in things such as grass or gravel and started snapping pics of those things. In the end I was actually very impressed; she came up with a batch of pics that actually make pretty darn good desktop pictures. I've decided, therefore, to offer them to you here if you want to use them. Personally, I use the one with the bottlecap. Ladies and gentlemen: My daughter Ruth, the photographer (be warned: These are very high-res):          |
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| May 15 | Kids I love that my kids are great kids. Every parent thinks that about their own kids, so maybe I'm just biased. What I do know, though, is that people are always telling me that they're the most polite, intelligent, sweet children they've ever met. I know that when I look at them I see the embodiment of attributes and personality traits that I admire and love. They remind me of what it means to truly be human, and that's worth much more than the words make it sound. |
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| May 14 | Change in wardrobe As my laundry pile gets higher and I start scraping the bottom of the barrel for things to wear, I broke out some of my old Stanford fitted boxer short underwear (you know; the type that are intended to make you look like Marky Mark). Problem is that I've lost some weight since I last wore these and so they're extremely loose. They make me feel like I'm wearing a skort. |
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| May 11 | Tonight Tonight I'm doing a few things that I never do... all at once. I'm drinking soda, eating nacho chips and watching a VHS tape. What's on it? An old recording of myself and my old band performing, circa 1989... back when my hair was down past my shoulderblades and I weighed about 120 points. As I'm watching this performance we were doing on a local TV show (in Sudbury, Ontario... go, us!) I saw my hands all over the frets and remember back when I used to dream in chords and scales. This was before health problems, before divorce, before car payments, before a career path... For some reason, I'm sad now. I'm swilling a Pepsi like it's scotch... with the lights off. |
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| May 11 | Minor Change I decided to split off the front page of this blog so it loads faster and puts less strain on the server. Wanna read 2004 and a bit of 2005? Go here. |
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| May 9 | Firestarter I was just reading up on a movie at IMDB called Firestarter. I noticed something sort of weird in one of the user reviews. Here's an excerpt... A young Drew Barrymore stars as a girl who has the ability to light fires with her mind. Her and her father are on the run from government agents who want to take her in for testing... All the performances are great especially Martin Sheen as the man who wants to do the testes on Barrymore...Does that... uh... read properly to you guys? See, I thought Martin Sheen was happily married. |
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| May 9 | Star Wars Episode Something: Revenge Of The Whatever When I was seven years old, back when my family used to celebrate Christmas, I got a little something from my Aunt Beth and Uncle Pieter under the tree. It was a card and, in it, was a little note promising to take me to the movies a few weeks later to see the the new flick everyone was talking about: Star Wars. You've gotta understand: Back in 1977, this movie was fresh. Darth Vader wasn't an entrenched part of pop culture. Lightsabers weren't, either. Same for Wookies and Yoda and The Death Star and catch-phrases like "These aren't the droids you're looking for", etc. etc. It was a very, very new phenomenon which brought something that went far beyond just a movie and, in my opinion, formed the boilerplate for movie marketing, merchadising and budgeting for the last quarter of the 20th century and beyond. I didn't care about any of that, however. I was seven years old. My world was hugely rocked by what I saw on the screen and, like so many other boys my age (girls, too), a level of excitement for a good-versus-evil mythology was ignited. In short, when people of my generation say that Star Wars was more than just a movie, they're not kidding. Beyond the wooden acting, ham-handed directing and implausible physics of the thing, the basic concept was rock solid from the outset. It really swallowed us right up. Thing is, it's been about 30 years since then. In those three decades I've been pounded and pounded and pounded by Star Wars hype that, frankly, no movie could live up to. I'm tired of Star Wars. Like all good things, Star Wars has been hammered at me from every direction for 30 years, and in the last 8 or so (since the re-release of the originals that occurred in the mid-late 90's) I've just plain had my fill. No movie can be as good as this much hype. It detracts strongly from the Star Wars legacy to erode enthusiasm with over-exposure like this, but there you have it; I am out of gas for Episode III. Despite it being the very zenith of 30 years of story-telling and the focal point of a deeply embedded cultural mythology, I just don't care. I'm more excited by other things now, like Battlestar Galactica or Firefly (and the upcoming movie, Serenity). In fact, I think I'm largely interested in things which don't appeal to seven-year-olds. If the experience of Episode I and II was a better one, more satisfying, better crafted then I might feel different... but as it is the fire was not re-ignited. So I will see Episode III, for sure... but I won't be first in line, and I won't be there on openning day. I'll likely go with Lori at some point, but there's not much more on my docket as far as celebrating the expreience. It's just a movie to me now, and not even one I'm really all chuffed up over. Also, Hayden Christiansen is a terrible actor. That doesn't help. |
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| May 9 | Is it me..? ...or are some things just plain, old-fashioned stupid? That link points to an article about a chili sauce that ranks about 32 times hotter than the hottest pepper known to man. It's so hot it could literally kill you. Diners must sign a disclaimer recommending “protective gloves and eye wear” — but even sweating testers in safety gear were blinded by tears for 30 minutes.First of all, who would voluntarily ingest such a thing? I guess there is no "second of all". Simply put... when I have a plate full of medium wings, I find myself in the bathroom 12 hours later praying for death and biting down on a leather belt. I'm going to lie awake at night having anxiety attacks just from knowing this new product exists and is in circulation. |
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| May 9 | What do you people want from me, anyhow?? Here's a little chart that shows which search engine queries lead people to coreytamas.com.  "What do Canadian people wear in clothing mostly all the time?????????" I haven't even got a joke for that, it's so weird. And as for you people entering "Corey is the dumbest thing" into Google: Knock it off. |
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| May 8 | Progress Coming along nicely. Tomorrow I'm going to shave it to look like a goatee. |
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| May 8 | I miss Lori I can't stop thinking about her. |
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| May 8 | Kill me I have the "Goofy Goober" song from Spongebob Squarepants stuck in my head. |
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| May 8 | Insomnia I slipped into bed and waited. Nothing happened. I laid there and did not sleep. I tried re-positioning the pillows, moving the duvet, adjusting the sheets. Nothing. The spark didn't catch. I lay there, fully awake. Later I do what I think the right kind of position is: On my right side with my head propped up on pillows and another pillow between my slightly bent knees. I add pillows under my head to elevate it more. Then I remove a few to lower it more. Up. Then down. Then on the left side. Repeat. Then, later on, I put pillows in a horseshoe shape around my head with my face down in the middle, arms raised up on them. I feel as if I am shoving my head into a big, feather-filled toilet seat. I then imagine that I look as though I've been shot in cold blood and fell into a pool and that this is the position the police find me floating in. On my back. Side again. Back again. Front again. Side again just for luck. No use. My head continues to rev like a 16 year old boy driving his dad's Honda by himself for the first time. Despite the flurry of cranial activity, I'm not actually thinking anything interesting. Perhaps that's what makes insomnia all the worse; if these were interesting, compelling thoughts maybe I'd get more out of it. I may even cultivate it. No, instead I'm passing the same thoughts around over and over... thoughts which elicite as much enthusiasm and excitement as gum with all the flavor chewed out of it. While I'm at it, my mouth tastes disgustingly similar. Trying the pillows-on-the-side thing again. Still nothing. When I come up with the "face-down in the pool after being shot" idea, I decide to write it up in this blog. Still no sleeping yet. I don't even want to tell you what time it is. I think I may lose my mind this way. |
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| May 8 | My Mom My mom's name is Linda Bishop. She's currently serving at the Bahá'í World Center in Haifa, Israel . The best description I've ever heard of my mom is that she's like popcorn wrapped around a brick. See, she has this really sweet, lovable and very pleasant exterior. She's very huggy and seems almost as if she's too nice to have the mettle for anything really serious in life. Looks can be deceptive, however, as mom has tackled and defeated some of the most outstanding and difficult challenges a woman could ever expect to face. This is probably the thing I will remember most about my mother for the rest of my life; when the chips are down, she is a powerful, clear-minded, brave and deft warrior. She has always shown great ability when under stress. I hope I absorbed some of that as I was growing up. To tell the truth, I might also remember that she has two crowns on her head (where most people only have one). As a result, her hair parts kind of funny and she has to wrestle with it to make it behave. Everywhere I go, people love my mother. There's no-one I've met (with the possible exception of one jackass who shall remain nameless) who didn't both love and respect her. When I meet people who already know my mom, all they want to do is talk about how special and sweet she is. How can I argue? I suppose I could say "You should see the side of her that *I* know", but that'd be misleading because the side of her that I know is every bit as special and lovable as what everyone else perceives. My mom taught me everything I know about unconditional love and what it means to stick with the people you love, no matter what. She's probably the only person who ever completely stood behind me through thick and thin, good and bad, up and down. I believe she is the most forgiving, non-judgmental person I personally know; and those qualities, to me, are a mark of true strength. Like all mothers, she made a few mistakes while I was growing up. That's just par for the course. When I look back, though, I can scarcely remember anything serious; all I can remember is that she tried her damnedest and always loved my brother and me, no matter what. I think that's one thing I really value about what she's taught me: The importance of the phrase "no matter what" when used in the context of loving and supporting people. It's made me a much better person and friend to others. Today is Mother's Day and I did take time to put a little something in the mail for her. Really, though, how does one thank one's mother for all they do for you? I know in my case the only way I can repay the debt I owe to my mother is to be to others what she has been to me. She has taught me the most valuable lessons I've ever learned and I will love her forever. |
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| May 7 | Weirdest thing. My cell phone doesn't seem to be receiving SMS text messages properly (a message sent by Lori from two nights ago arrived this morning at 10 AM), my email seems to be continually delayed (both in and outgoing sometimes by 12 hours). I'm getting a weird feeling about this. Am I in a Stephen King movie or something? Anyhow, if you're trying to get ahold of me and having some bad luck, try the phone. |
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| May 7 | Things you do when you're alone Sometimes I drink hot pepper sauce - the kind you use on hot chicken wings and stuff - right out of the bottle. With the fridge still open. |
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| May 7 | Why I'm done with The Sopranos The Sopranos is probably the best show on TV. Actually, I don't even know if it's on TV anymore because I don't watch TV. I just rent DVDs or download episodes of shows I want to see. Still, this is one of the best shows ever. It's a TV show about a mob boss who spends a fair amount of time balancing the insane demands of maintaining illegal business with his own family life and the healing of pain that a middle-aged guy with issues has to work out. The characters are fantastic; multi-dimensional and extremely well-acted. The stories are fresh and creative and well-crafted. It's funny without using humor as a cheap instrument to bouy a sagging plotline. Best of all, they manage to avoid feel-good clichés that go along with most TV shows; they don't provide easy outs for the moral situations and drama, and that provides a very satisfying experience for an intelligent viewer who wants to give a damn about what they're watching. Thing is, I'm done with this show. I don't really feel like watching it anymore. The thing is that the show centers around Tony Soprano, the mob boss I mentioned earlier. Tony does care about his kids and he cares about his wife and he cares about his aged mother and, like anyone who cares about something, he wrestles with caring for himself. After watching three seasons and what was probably about 30 episodes I've realized that Tony Soprano is a bad person. In other words, the caring he has for the various important people and things in his life doesn't actually have any impacct on his decision making. He still has sex with whatever woman he fancies that'd let him, he puts brutal beatings upon people he doesn't like (if he doesn't actually kill them) and he lies without restraint. It'd be one thing if he was conflicted by the good in his life as he was carrying out the bad... but the connection he has with the "important" things in his life provide no speed bump whatsoever for his cruelty, selfishness and self-indulgence. After watching so many episodes of this show, I assumed that Tony was changing in some way... growing and devleoping... but then he dives back into his old ways without remorse, without thought and without hesitation. And so, I've lost interest. I don't need to watch a bad person with good things in his life turning his back on them when the doors to a better way of thinking and being keep opening. Not for another 30 episodes. Bad guy with a heart of gold? Sure. Bad guy with a heart of compost? Meh. I no longer wanna watch this show. Kind of a shame because it's such a good show. We're going to watch Scrubs from here on in and hope that I don't have to make another post like this in a few weeks. |
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| May 7 | I must be EXTRA hot My old friend Janet popped by unannounced, knocked on the door, stuck her head into my apartment and started "YOOHOO"ing for me. I was napping and had been for a while, so I wasn't really at my peak... especially considering that I was wearing my slob clothes from the night before. I got out of bed with a howling, fierce bedhead, a few days' worth of stubble (remember: I'm growing my goatee. Here's the latest progress) and - Oh God - the breath. Janet said I looked awesome... twice. This astonished me because I did not have my game face on (which is putting it mildly), but what it really said to me was that I have lost so much weight since the last time she's seen me that even my currently Creature-From-The-Black-Lagoon state of appearance is an improvement over the last time she saw me. I'm simultaneously flattered and a bit gobsmacked. I've got this problem with sugar. I can completely quit sugar and not crave it. I can go for days or even weeks without so much as an iota of interest. But as soon as I have one single grain of refined sugar I suddenly become like Cookie Monster. I've been off sugar for a few days now (decided it was time to get a bit stricter with the eating), but today Janet's husband Kevin was kind enough to offer me a butterscotch Lifesaver. And I ate it. And now I want to spoon sugar out of the paper bag I keep sugar in. And it was going so well, too. So now I'm busy chewing cardboard. As it gets wetter, it gets sweeter, so this might actually work. |
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| May 6 | Spring Cleaning Last night I took out the trash. Thing is, I took a huge amount of time to clean my home and throw out the crap that's been lying around which needed dealing with. So I took the garbage bags out, one after the other, all freshly filled with the avalanche of refuse that used to be scattered throughout my home. I ended up with not one, not two, not five, not ten, but twelve garbage bags full on the curb. Even though it was night, I had to take a photo. I just had to. |
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| May 6 | Track The Goatee I'm growing my goatee back. I'll chronicle it here. Let's start with this photo. |
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| May 6 | Lucky Kinda Day Ever have one of those days where everything just goes right? When you put a little effort into something and get a generous return? When the stars are aligned in such a way that luck is on your side? Sometimes it's good just to watch the universe unfold in a friendly way, where a helping hand just reaches invisibly into your affairs and gives you a little extra boost. Nice, huh? Thing is, that's the exact opposite of the sort of day I'm actually having... but that kind of day sure sounds good right now. |
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| April 30 | Movies I've seen a few movies lately that I am going to want to comment on. One of these is The Amityville Horror. I didn't actually intend to see it, but somebody I know thought it would be worth seeing, so I took her word for it and gave it a chance. I can't say I'm pleased with how it worked out as a movie-going experience, but it did give me something to write about. The Amityville Horror is supposedly a "true story" about a family that moves into a haunted house and the father goes wacko. Personally, I liked this story better back when it was called The Shining, but whatever. Cast in the role of the dad-going-nuts is Jack Nichols- er... I mean Ryan Reynolds, who is best known for his role as Van Wilder, a charismatic, likeable slacker who stays in college far, far too long simply because he's having a good time. I personally liked that story better when it was called PCU, but whatever. Anyhow, Ryan has all the dark, brooding complexity of a Blue Mountain E-Card, so they had to punch the movie up considerably by adding orchestral stabs that burst your eardrums every time something scary happens on the screen. This is done so that, in case you don't happen to adequately defecate in your pants because of the cheap, clichéd scare on the screen, you will be forced to do so because of the sudden 120dB blast that's part of the movie soundtrack. I believe the producers feel this is important because, seriously, what's a horror movie unless you defecate in your pants (regardless of why)? Anyhow, I'm getting away from the meat of this "true story". There's a family that moves into a house and gets creeped out. This is achieved by the appearance of a spectral girl child who has stringy hair and pallid skin (she's dead, after all), and she speaks to a living child in order to make the parent wonder why the kid has such an active imagination. I liked this story better when it was called every other horror movie ever made, but whatever. As the story progresses the mother does a lot of screaming and crying (like you do when your kid has dead friends) and other clichés such as the following make an appearance: - Magnetic letters re-arranged on the fridge to make a scary message (not as scary as "Redrum") - Family pet is killed early on in order to create that foreshadowing thing - At one point after the father goes bonkers you think he's dead but he's not. In case it doesn't scare you when he gets back up again after being clocked in the melon, the sound designers help you to evacuate your bowels by throwing in one of those aforementioned orchestral stabs - Turns out the house is built on top of a burial ground where people were tortured and murdered, a story I liked better back when it was called... aw, you get the idea. I read a bit about some of the possible "truths" from this movie as they reportedly happened. It seems that nothing quite as shocking or scary as the movie portrays quite took place, and even the things which were reported to have taken place are in question. Seeing as the movie apparently didn't need to stay too close to the true story (or whatever), it is my personal opinion that the writers should have added a team of deadly ninjas who fought a giant battle against the evil spirits, and this battle should have taken place in Hell in the form of a mega-battle-of-the-bands. Or perhaps a deadly hockey game against zombies. It certainly wouldn't have detracted from the story as it currently is being told in the theatres. Some orchestral stabs may also have helped make it work. Who knows? |
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| April 25 | Updates, Baby. It's been a while since I've given you a window onto my soul and stuff. Why not get you nice people up to speed? First of all, if you don't already know why I put the blog on hold for a few months, you never will. Neener. I have someone very special in my life now, and her name is Lori. We are so very into each other and are definitely making sure the people we know and care about are aware of what's going on. I'm going to talk a lot more about Lori in future entries. I have managed to get a serious hold on this thing called ADD. Welbutrin did not work. Not even a bit. It was like Dexadrine... but it took longer to get out of my system. In other words: It was like hell, only not as pleasant and relaxing. I decided to get away from pharmaceuticals and started working on nutrition instead. Now that... that worked. As God is my witness, it's the only thing that worked. By taking vitamin supplements, seriously curtailing my sugar and caffeine intake and making sure I drink a lot of water, things have really changed for me. With the help of a nutritional healer that I know, I've managed to make wholesale changes. My skin has cleared up. I sleep better. My allergies have disappeared. I'm down to 208 pounds. Best of all... my problems with ADD are clearing up exponentially and, thankfully, all the side-issues that arose because of it. That feels wonderful. It's so awesome, in fact, that I want to tell every single person I know and care about to try doing what I did... the change is that wonderful. Thing is, I remember how I saw stuff like this before I was actually into it and what a big steaming crock I thought it was... so I'm keeping my mouth mostly shut. I still play Warhammer. I got out of it, got back into it. Out of it, into it, out of it, into it... I've decided to stop fighting it and stop feeling ashamed of it. Warhammer has provided me with an absolutely indispensible and highly enjoyable social circle of men who a) don't drink to have fun, b) don't need to get laid to have fun (though for some that's not an option anyhow), c) don't take drugs to have fun, d) are reasonably smart, well-mannered and non-violent individuals. Warhammer is a great way for someone to spend their time and creative energies. In fact, if you can manage to keep your spending in line, I'd say it's one of the best pastimes a person could indulge in. I'm playing a lot more guitar now. Like, a lot. Lori has inspired me a lot to get back into what I love and throw myself into it. So... a lot more guitar. My fingertips burn and ache at times... and it's a feeling I really love. I'm blogging again. Stay tuned... more stories about me falling on my face in the snow or the cat puking in my sandals are on the way. |
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| April 21 | Spring Has sprung. And I'm going to bring this blog back again. |
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| Feb 3 | Owie I plucked the grey hairs out. People, don't ever pluck hairs from your lip. It's not like eyebrows or hair on your scalp. You'll feel it for an hour after you pluck and... it's so not worth it. |
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| Feb 2 | Upon Closer Inspection... Make that three grey hairs. |
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| Feb 1 | Oh Boy. I have a grey hair in my moustach. Just one. Right in the middle. That's so wrong. |
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| Feb 1 | What I Eat Seeing as I don't have any good stories about a cat throwing up in my slippers or me hurting myself on a slippery ice slope or other humiliating misfortunes, I'll explain a little bit about a really big part of my life: What I eat. It's easier in some ways to explain what I don't eat. One thing I've really gotten away from is sugar. There is sugar in places you wouldn't expect it: Vegetables, bread, toothpaste, etc. I don't go far out of my way to avoid that. What I mean is sugar as it occurs in foods like chocolate, the sauce they use on chicken wings, ketchup, salsa, etc. There are three things I've noticed since (mostly) going off sugar: 1) Everything is a lot sweeter than you think it is; nuts, vegetables, you name it. Once you're not so used to heavy sugar, you'll become more able to taste the sweetness in food as it occurs naturally. 2) My allergies have completely vanished. At one time I had a very severe allergy to cats, ragweed, dust, mould, dogs, whatever. Every night I would go to bed and only barely be able to breathe and, in the morning, I would wake up and sneeze until my nose bled. Now that's all gone. 3) I wake up in the morning without feeling like pure crap. This, I think ties into the other thing I've given up... Caffeine. I always drink decaf coffee and stay away from chocolate or cola. I've found that if I'm not injesting caffeine then my sleep is uninterrupted and I don't wake up first thing in the morning feeling hung over. Dairy. The main thing that happened when I stopped eating dairy is the pounds just fell right off. I'm about 215 pounds now and this time last year I was more like 250-260 (I used to tell people 240 because the sound of 260 made me feel lousy). Water. Drinking a lot of it. About 3L a day. The only problem is that I've lost enough weight that I have had to buy new pants, like, three times. |
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| January 29 | Horoscope I just read my horoscope from Yahoo. Now, I'm not a huge follower of horoscopes; I read them for fun and sometimes to scratch my head a bit. Take a look, though: After all this tension and ridiculousness, you're golden. The universe has seen fit to arrange for things to go easily for you -- yes, just this once. And as for that new admirer with whom it hasn't exactly been easy to get together? The roadblocks will officially be removed, and connecting will be easy. Now stop worrying about what's in the past. It might not have been pleasant, but it's over. I gotta say... if that's actually true and it works out that way then I may not have such a bad weekend after all. |
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| January 26 | Resolution As of today, I hereby resolve to do my best to stop using the phrase "let me put it this way". |
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| January 26 | Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue I'm issuing this as a challenge to the other bloggers who read coreytamas.com: To use the old wedding-day adage of "Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue" as a jumping-off point for a blog entry in which you cover all four of those criteria as they're relevant to your own life and thinking. I'll be checking your blogs to see if it's there. And yeah, I'll start. Something Old: From my own blog, back on January 23, 2004:Canadians Are So Incredibly Polite It's been snowing a fair amount here lately, then freezing, then melting a bit, the snowing again, etc. etc. You get a variety of walking surfaces from the powery, feathery dust of light flakes up to your armpits to the icy skating-rink-of-hip-breakgage of packed snow covered in a veneer of ice. Believe it or not, this relates to my story and the title thereof. I was in a town called Kanata a couple days ago to do a bit of business. I won't waste all my writing energy describing to you how the road system works in that area, but I will tell you that I will approach this place of business from the adjacent parking lot rather than the proper one because of how tough it can be to negotiate the roads appropriately. Just trust me on this. Anyhow, I've parked the car and am about to step out of one parking lot and into another. Between them is a hill of maybe 6'. Maybe a tad less. It looks innocent enough and my shoes certainly have nice deep treads, but it turns out that this hill is a deathtrap waiting to happen. Thanks to me, it wasn't waiting long. So I step from my car with aplomb, checking my watch and and furrowing my brow like I'm Remington Steele, and starting for the hill with the demeanor that communicates how I expect no trouble getting up. I'll make this brief: I take about two steps, freeze for a moment in terror as I attempt to regain my balance, take a third step and fall on my hands. Seeing as I'm not particularly good at holding myself upright on my fingertips while my toes are skating on slick ice, I fall directly on my face and get snow up my nose. Attempting a quick recovery, I roll on my side (distributing the snow evenly) and push myself up on one arm, getting my legs back under me. I'm making an attempt to bareface my way through this by adopting that look of offense and disgust that international men of mystery do when they've been troubled in their busy day by something ridiculous. Unfortunately, my iron-like facial expression didn't save me from the unfortunate loss of balance which actually caused me (no joke) to spin like a top and land on my back, facing upwards at the blue sky as my ass was slowly soaked by icewater. This time when I roll around I've pretty much given up on saving face (any attempt I could have made to look as if I thought I was still in control would have made me look stupider than I already did). I look around and, yeah... lots of people milling around who are watching me out of the corners of their eye. No one says "Are you alright?", but don't interpret that as callousness; Canadians are the type who wouldn't embarrass you by letting on that they noticed you just made a complete fool of yourself. They just act as if they didn't notice or they're too wrapped up in deep thought to think of you as silly-looking. As I'm watching the pedestrials parade by, each seemingly oblivious to me lying on the side of this hill below and above them, covered in snow, soaked to the skin with little birdies chirping in a halo around my head just like they do in the Flintstones, I realize that I have still got to get up this hill somehow. I huff. I close my eyes in denial. I then roll a bit more, shifting my weight onto one hand as I attempt to come around for attempt #3. I'm up on all fours, feet somewhat flat on the ground and I am looking up, rather like a large dog in position to leap forward, all dressed in twill and chambray. I tenuously rise up onto my feet with my arms waving about to keep my balance. I almost called to someone to throw me a parasol and a unicycle so I could complete the tightrope-walking look. Once I get my footing and balance, I stand motionless with my arms at a strange angle (not unlike how one will fool with the rabbit ears on the TV until they get the signal right and then they just... don't... touch it... again...). If I stayed there too long I'm sure pigeons would have started to land, so I decided to make my move. I realize that it's obvious to you by now that I fell again, but what you might not appreciate is how quickly I fell; I lost my balance just by thinking about moving. The really bad part was how my legs started doing the light-speed treadmill run, sort of like George Jetson. Just one step after another at hyper speed without actually moving anywhere. This time the fall was to the side as I attempted to crouch down and extend a hand, and it knocked the wind right out of me. I looked up as I laid there, thoroughly humiliated, and saw them: Canadians walking past me as if nothing had happened. Some glanced down briefly, some didn't. The last straw was when one older man with a dog gave me a nod and said "Lovely day, isn't it?" I got in my car and made the two difficult left turns necessary to change parking lots.Something New: I realized as I was writing this that if I had done the "Old, New, Borrowed, Blue" thing a few days ago I could have really populated it with ease (old archives, new design, borrowed quote that Jon showed me, new blue header graphic, respectively). My timing is stupid. One new thing: I am seriously considering getting a cat. I don't have a cat any more, but I love cats. I was a little wary of it because I have had terrible allergies to cats in the past, but a strange thing happened: When I went off dairy and sugar I found that my allergies disappeared. At the moment I am no longer allergic to 99% of the things I was this time last year. At one time I would get allergic reactions so strong that I could barely breathe or keep my eyes open. It was horrible. Now? I'm totally fine. And I think that's awesome. My kids would love to have a cat and, you know what? I think I would, too. So stay tuned to this blog because believe me; if I get one there will be photos. Something Borrowed: From Dan Dickinson's Vjarmy, a post so vile and so disturbing that I actually laughed out loud for days every time I'd think about it again. This has been described to me, more than once, as the worst blog post of all time. Brace yourself:Yellow When I came in on Wednesday, I was alerted to some sort of ceiling leak in one of the rooms I can often be found in. I helped to clean up the slightly yellowish liquid, thinking the coloration was caused by the pipes or the ceiling tile or something else. I was just informed that the leak in question was coming from Autopsy. Despite the fact that I've showered twice since then and washed my hands countless times, I feel like I could really use another shower right now. *shudders*Something Blue: Sorry I Am by Ani Difranco. If you've ever been in a relationship that didn't work out and yet you don't feel your heart torn apart when you read this, you should check yourself for a pulse. I can barely read all the way to the end without wincing in pain. Now I'll be checking your blog for your version of old, new, borrowed, blue. |
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| January 25 | Untitled "Beware the weeping of the wronged and orphaned children and the sighing of the victims of oppression, lest their tears should turn to floods and their breaths should turn to fire." - 'Abdu'l-Bahá Thanks, Jon. |
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| January 25 | Sad Weather I watch your eyes go off into a corner of the room Two years are suddenly just yesterday You ask me if I mind you bringing up her name again so soon I will shake my head and let you speak No, I will let you say what you need to say. Never before have I seen so close to me the workings of this wheel Turning and tearing up the ground. The soil where grows the heart of someone I've known so well. The furrowing has left you weak, crying "Why did all this rain come down?" But you won't wake up tomorrow with the spring busting down your door. It's cold again today and we may be in for more sad weather. Looking at the trees flying naked at the sky And somehow through the winter there forms another ring. Violent as it seems, confused and aching, rising, tumbling on this ferris wheel Sometimes we're forced motionless and still To remind us of the changeless things. But you won't wake up tomorrow with the spring busting down your door. It's cold again today and we may be in for more sad weather. Sad weather. Hearing your voice I see you clearly in my mind And you're dancing and saying you're no longer scared. The sorrow and joy like rose and thorn are married close on the same vine And you wrap yourself in all its leaves till I can no longer see you there. I'm longing to wake up to the spring busting down my door. We're all feeling so cold in this lack of something more. In this sad weather. Sad weather. - Roger Lee |
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| January 24 | That explains it. Today is the most depressing day of the year. |
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| January 24 | After Elf, Anchorman, Starsky and Hutch, Old School and Zoolander I've decided that Will Farell really mustn't be allowed to make any more movies. |
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| January 23 | Your Family Must Be A Bit Different Than Mine The thing about Denny's Restaurant that catches my eye is the big sign outside which says "FAMILY RESTAURANT OPEN 24 HOURS". What kind of family packs up the kids in the station wagon and goes off to eat a Philly Melt at 3:50 AM? |
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| January 23 | Thank You Thank you, Peter. I realized when we were in San Francisco that we're friends and brothers, and you were one of the only people who were able to help me feel better when I couldn't do it on my own. Thank you, Mom. Hundreds of phone calls and emails and you never run out of resources to inspire and restore me when all else fails. Thank you, Rachel, for listening and listening and listening and listening and listening and never once giving me the feeling that I was asking too much. Thank you Greg and Dave for being there for that bit of reassurance when I needed it. Sometimes all it takes is a hand on the shoulder from a friend, and you guys gave me that. Thank you Aaron for never stopping, under any circumstances, to be the real thing. Thank you, Dad, for saying exactly the right words at the right moment. Thank you, Terry, for sharing your happiness with me. It was medicine for my ailments. Thank you Ruth and Dora for teaching me what matters and what doesn't... possibly the best gift of all. Thank you to everyone who has hurt me in the last 12 months (and some of you did an excellent job of it). Because of you I had to learn how to be stronger than I've ever been before. Without you I might never have bothered. |
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| January 22 | Return See? I told you I'd be back. |
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| Jan 4 | I was just reading about how Britney Spears intends to leave pop stardom because she wants to become a crime scene investigator just like the scientists on CSI, who inspired her. *sNoRt* |
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| Jan 3 | Wellbutrin You might remember me taking something called Dexedrine and it turning me into a whirling buzz-saw of anxiety and freakazoidishness. Im starting something new called Wellbutrin. It's a different kind of drug for ADD than the Dexedrine. It's not a straight-up stimulant in the way Dexedrine is, but it also has some sort of an anti-anxiety agent and blahblahblah whatever. It's a pretty blue pill. I'm popping it. Expect a progress report. Unless I start clawing my eyeballs out in a fit of paranoid rage. If that happens I'll have someone else type it up for me. If I don't try to bite through their flesh. |
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| Jan 3 | Guitar I am on my way to Macworld Expo in less than a week. It's been a few years since I've attentended one of these shows and it's going to be an unusually big one for me, professionally and personally. MacGamer is ready to make some pretty unexpected and dramatic lurches forward (after a long, dry period) and I am so excited about it that I can barely keep my fat mouth shut. I can't lie, however; one of the main attractions for me (if not the main attraction) is my friends. I will be seeing people that I really like and haven't connected with in ages. One of those people is Al Schilling. Now, Al is the Senior Product Manager at MacSoft, and we've had professional dealings for a number of years now. When the business hats come off, however, we almost always pick up a couple guitars and start playing and singing. Al is just about my speed when it comes to music; good singer, great guitarist and really able to be a showman on a moment's notice. I'm pleased to say that almost every time we hook up at a Macworld show, we usually have a huge crowd of people gathered around us who just want to listen and sometimes sing along. They're usually drunk off their asses, but it's as close to performing as I've come in a long time. Right now I'm working on some songs to play with Al when the time comes. One of them is the Tragically Hip's "Ahead By A Century" (from their album, Trouble At The Henhouse). This is going to be very good for my soul. |
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| Jan 2 | My Life Flashing Before My Eyes That was 2004. |
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| Jan 2 | About Eating I have a pretty strict diet right now. I actually find it quite workable; as much water as I can drink (usually 2L a day or more is all I can stand). No dairy. No caffeine. No sugar. It's not for weight loss so much, but I'm finding: a) It's easier to get up in the mornings, b) My skin is getting clear and healthy-looking, c) My energy is way up, d) my sinuses are clear. I think the diet would work better if it wasn't for the fact that every five or six days I sometimes lose my self-control. |
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| Jan 1 | The Year That Was"Dear 2004, I love you, now please fuck off. Best, Heather." ~ Heather P. Champ(Thanks, Kris) |
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| Dec 31 | This One's For Bill Three names you go by: Corey Joel Hey You In The Bushes Three screen names you have: Jowicota Orbital DogStar Three things you like about yourself: I really like people of all sorts and kinds I make people laugh I'm good with dental hygiene Three things you hate/dislike about yourself: I have Attention Deficit Disorder Weight I don't care a lot about, but I'm not in great shape... and I do care about that Still woefully lacking in understanding of what love is and what it's for Three parts of your heritage: I'm from Cape Breton (I'm not actually sure about much else) Three things that scare you: Hurting someone's feelings My kids will grow up without knowing their spiritual selves That I can't/won't change Three of your everyday essentials: Prayer Water and Vitamins A walk around the neighborhood at night Three things you are wearing right now: My new socks Cargo pants Four days' worth of stubble Three of your favorite bands/artists at this moment: Sarah Slean Tool The Hives Three of your favorite songs at this moment: Day One (Sarah Slean) Main Offender (The Hives) Roll It Up (Crystal Method) Three things you want to try in the next 12 months: Finishing my overdue/outstanding projects Taking an actual, bona-fide vacation Giving up diary and sugar completely Three things you want in a relationship (love is a given): Flexibility Reciprocity Unconditional acceptance of one another Two truths and a lie: Money means very little to me I usually think of problems as opportunities Everyone who says "Yeah, me too" about those two things is always telling the truth Three physical things about the opposite sex that appeals to you: Most of the teeth still intact Eyeballs point in the same direction No moldy smells Three things you just can't do: Eat fried baloney Resist sushi or pho tai Take Dexadrine Three of your favorite hobbies: Playing guitar Drawing cartoons Warhammer Three things you want to do really badly right now: Eat a huge, steaming bowl of pho Get a massage. A good one. Work up the motivation to shave Three careers you're considering: Computer game developer Website editor (though I already am that) Teacher of some kind Three places you want to go on vacation: Mexico Italy Israel Three kids' names: My kids? Ruth and Dora. A third name? Countertop. Three things you want to do before you die: Visit the Baha'i Shrines in Israel again See my kids be happily married Live somewhere where the white people are outnumbered by the non-white people Three people who have to take this quiz now or die a painful death: Kris Boyer Peter Cohen Dan Dickinson |
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| Dec 28 | When It Works, It Works Sometimes in life you make good decisions and follow your heart and it pays off. In fact, most of the time it pays off... the trick is not to lose sight of the big picture and forget about the good decisions and following your heart. Well, this year is almost up and I'm looking back. I've made some really good decisions and I really see them paying off. No idea what I'm talking about? Doesn't matter. Just look at the monkey. |
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| Dec 20 | Winter Though many of you may be tired of hearing my quotidian rantings about my day to day life, I have to say that the banal topic of winter and the effects thereof is right at the top of my list of annoyances at the moment. Today it's -43 degrees Celcius (with the wind chill). When I tell my American friends this, they usually don't flinch because they assume that whatever temperature it is, the conversion to Farenheit will make it seem less terrifying. This is because the conversion usually raises the number, i.e. Zero degrees Celcius is 32 degrees Farenheit. What they don't realize is that there's a point at which the Celcius rating is actually *more* civilized than the Farenheit rating. It gives me great pleasure to tell my American friends that the temperature here where I live is -45 degrees Farenheit. The overall effect of the low temperature in my heated home isn't that dramatic, but the toilet seat is so cold I'm afraid that I'm going to experiene the same thing that happens when you put your tongue on the frozen fence in winter time. So I'm avoiding that. |
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| Dec 17 | Trying Something New I'm ripping an idea off from the Flick Filosopher (one of the best movie review sites on the web) and, by doing so, replacing the idea I stole from Absquatulate (even she doesn't use it any more so why bother)? All those little things I got lined up at the top of the screen are like... well, you get the idea. |
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| Dec 17 | Quotidian I'm going to use this word as much as I can today, regardless of whether it makes sense in the context or not. |
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| Dec 8 | So Much For Those Days Of Looking Awesome Boy, am I sick. I feel terrible. Last night I couldn't sleep more than ten minutes at a time because I couldn't breathe through my nostrils, and breathing through my mouth is a nasty affair that turns normal saliva and lip-flesh into something the consistency of pancake batter. It's every bit as bad as it sounds. And my nostrils? Still packed with plaster of paris. Annoying. |
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| Dec 6 | It's Just Not Right I'm having another one of those days where I look great and yet there's no one around who gives a damn. I can't bear it. |
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| Dec 5 | Humanitarian "I'd feel guilty if I washed my pillows, drowning all those mites" -Rachel |
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| Dec 3 |
A Little Baloney Never Hurt Anyone
I took one of those online tests that are all the rage. Here's what I came up with
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| Dec 1 | Further To The Owie So I was leaving the pimple alone, which is what you're supposed to do. If you mess with it, it gets worse. Thing is, it itches and I involuntarily reached up to scratch it without thinking about it. Then it looked like this. Now, today, it looks like this. |
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| Dec 1 | Owie Mom told me once that when Troy Donahue, as a young actor back in the 60's, got a pimple while making a movie somewhere that they'd postpone filming for a week or more until it went away. I have a really nasty-looking pimple on my head. It's bright as day and sings like a sparrow. It's so nasty I took a photo of it. Here's the photo: Pimple. Now, don't go clicking on that and then complaining to me that you didn't need to see it. The link is labeled "Pimple" and you're the one that clicked it. |
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| Nov 29 | Astrology Mom sent me this a few days ago. It's cribbed from an astrology site she visits (she's not really serious about astrology, but we both look into it for fun from time to time): You're about to open your eyes to something you've suspected to be true for some time. It won't be bad, so don't worry. You will end up in an extremely different frame of mind than you've been in, though. I realized recently that I don't have enough really good underwear. I don't think this was the realization in question, though. I'll keep you posted. |
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| Nov 25 | Want To Get Me Something For Christmas? I want a kilt. A good one. |
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| Nov 18 | Christmas And That About It Which Sucks Every time I hear Annie Lennox singing Winter Wonderland over the speakers at Giant Tiger*, a piece of my soul dies. *Canadian department store that makes K Mart look like Macy's. |
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| Nov 3 | Colin On The Re-Election Of Bush "I'm just telling everyone I'm Canadian from now on. No paperwork that way. I'll be from the Province of Donutoba." |
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| October29 | Nicole Ritchie How stupid do you have to be to be paired up on a TV show with Paris Hilton, and you're referred to as the "dumb one"? |
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| October27 | This Is How You Say It "So, my day has been like swimming in an overflowing chamber pot." - Peter Cohen That about sums it up. |
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| October26 | Update, Or Something Like It Here's the update on my life: It's not really going well right now. There, I said it. I've always felt like there was a certain degree of shame in admitting that things aren't going great, so coming out and saying so doesn't make me feel all that wonderful. Saying it in a public forum is even worse. But there you have it. I felt like giving a big dose of truth here... if for no other reason than to be able to bring that quote from Fight Club to mind: "People with this kind of honesty make me go a big rubbery one" So what's not going well? 99% of you wouldn't care. What I can say, however, is that my attitude is simple: Things go badly so that you can build up the strength to get things going well. Trees grow dead branches, they get lopped off by someone who cares about the tree, and a better branch grows. A garden gets choked by weeds, someone who cares about the garden yanks them out, and healthy flowers/vegetables/whatever grow. This is how things work. My life is in rough shape right now, but... it looks as though it's a matter of something needing to be removed to make room for something better to grow in its place. Sure, it hurts to experience amputation, but it's better than letting the gangrene spread through your body. So, as it is, my life is going pretty crummy... unless you look at it in the perspective of making me a better, stronger person... in which case it's going not too badly. Here's hoping that when the wind tries to blow the dead leaves off my branches that I'll let them loose. |
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| October25 | Reality I was in a Games Workshop store recently talking to some guys about I forget what, when I overheard a conversation between some of the patrons and some of the staff. It was an animated conversation about how one of the Warhammer armies, named "Skaven" was created and came into the world. You see, there's this thing about a tower that some village was trying to build and then a stranger came to the village one day and said "I'll help you build the tower" and so they let him and when he did something bad happened and rats grew big and picked up weapons and started killing everyone. I kinda checked in and out of the conversation as it progressed, but what amazed me was the length of time that this conversation was spanning; it was a good 20 minute conversation about how Skaven came into the world. They then all joined into an animated discussion about who that mystery person who built the tower was. Could he have been this guy? That guy? The other guy? (The names escape me. Sorry). It was not a casual discussion... this was something these guys really cared about. This was something that they obviously gave a lot of thought to on those nights when they lie awake, staring at the darkness. I thought to myself "Is this how far these people are out of touch with reality? That they put this kind of thought and energy into wondering where non-existent rat people came into being and who was the other non-existent person who made it happen?" I felt a little weird being around this, so I left. I was a little worried that if I stayed there for too long that my own grasp on reality might start to dissolve, it was that serious. I wandered next door to a hair salon that I frequent and looked for some new shampoo, of which I was in need. Now, as you can imagine if you have ever been in a hair salon, there was no shortage of hair products. I stood before the shelf which served my usual brand and started rifling through the bottles to find the shampoo. I found conditioner, which isn't really that exotic of a choice. I found leave-in conditioner, which is a bit more unusual, given that most people use a conditioner before they get out of the shower/bath/whatever. There was a styling gel, which was also nothing unsual. "Firm" and "light" varieties indicated the differing degrees of hold that each could offer. I also found styling gel for thick hair and for thinning hair. Ok, good enough. There was also styling cream, forming cream, pomade and sculpting cream. There was a product I forget the name of, the purpose of which was to make your hair shinier and one called "mud" that was intended to make it less shiny. If the mud wasn't interesting to you, there was also "clay" and "stucco". There was a finishing rinse, for when you were done washing and conditioning, as well as a product I couldn't quite get the hang of but appeared to be a sort of varnish that held your hair in place once you got it "just so". In addition I also saw several varieties of hair spray and no fewer (I kid you not) than five permutations of shampoo. This is all from the same company, by the way. I did a little quick math and realized that if I were to use all their products in one sitting that I would be putting roughly a gallon of product on my head every morning, would take ninety minutes to get ready to leave the house and could pay about $200 monthly in upkeep to make sure the products didn't run out. There were several posted advertisements which shockingly indicated that, yes... this is what they expected you to do. At that moment I rethought my perspective that the nerds in Games Workshop were out of touch with reality. Though I didn't particularly care to waste my time trying to theorize on where the Skaven came from, I was definitely certain that a handful of shampoo, a handful of conditioner and a pea-sized blob of gel run through your hair is all the work a man should probably do on his coiffure before he goes out to greet the world. |
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| October 19 | I Got Nothin' Been a while since I've updated, but there's a good reason for that. I've been doing lots of living lately, but not the kind of living that makes for good reading. Don't worry; I'm not lettin' the blog expire. I'm just waiting for something *real* good to tell you. |
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| October 8 | What Attention Defecit Disorder Feels Like Today I took a look at my office, which is a small but cozy room that I've worked in for about five years now. It was a sty. I mean a complete disaster area. A horror show. As I surveyed the arena of disorganization and mess, I decided it was time to clean it up. When I beheld the scene, I realized that a few quick pick-ups, a little straightening and a bit of stacking would transform this room into a completely clean, completely habitable environment again. And so it began: I picked up a few things, moved them to the right place, and then turned my attention to the next thing. Following that, I cleaned yet another thing, tossed a bit of garbage that had been hanging around and sorted a few items. And then I went blank. Where only seconds before I had been busily cleaning along while humming to myself, I suddenly forgot where I was in the process of things. Where only moments before I coudl see the patterns and the logical flow of cleaning, I was suddenly struck with a sort of psychological blindness where I could not figure out what to do next. I could not figure out where to begin, neither could I decide which thing comes next. Do I move my books? Wait, if I move my books I have to make room with my DVDs, but... this DVD case is empty and I can't put it away until I find the DVD that's supposed to go in there... I think I left it in this pile, but this pile has CDs and DVDs mixed together, so I gotta sort them out. Wait a second, some of these CDs belong to friends of mine so I gotta make a new pile. There's no room to make that many piles though, so I'd have to move some things to clear a bit of space. Will I do it on the desk or the... wait. Where was I? (long pause) Do I move my books? Wait... if I move my books I have to make room with my DVDs, but... this DVD case is empty... The state of stunned paralysis came to an end an hour and ten minutes later when I realized I'd been sitting in the same position trying to figure this problem out for so long that my foot fell asleep. |
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| October 6 | Honk Honk File this in the "Stuff I Shouldn't Enjoy" category: When I have parked my car and have gone into a place of business such as a bank or the post office, I like to look out the window and see if I can actually see the car. If I can, then I will wait until pedestrians walking by come really close to it. Then I hold up my key chain and with the little remote-control button, I will set off the car alarm (which honks at full volume in short, never-ending blasts). I really shouldn't do this to people, but it just makes my entire day. I particularly like waiting until skater kids are really close (you know, the ones with the pants half way down their butts). They tend to jump highest when the horn starts blasting. |
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| October 4 | I Only Stare This Way At You... I'm on this kick where I can't stop listening to the Police's Does Everyone Stare? I used to think this was the dumbest song they'd ever written and now I can't stop listening to it. What's wrong with me? |
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| October 4 | Today's Quote "If you think you know me, you don't. If you think you want to, you do." |
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| Sept 30 | All Kinds Of Fine Damn, I look good today. What a waste. |
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| Sept 30 | Holy. 23,000 words written in this blog since February 6. And here I was thinking I was busy doing important stuff. |
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| Sept 30 | Chocolate, Star Wars, Hot Water, Squash, Perfume A small collection of thoughts I've had over the last few days. First thing: When a kid comes to your door selling chocolate, buy some. Even if you don't want any. Even if you're allergic to the chocolate. Ask what the fundraising is for, but just so you can be polite and take an interest, i.e. don't withhold on the basis of who gets the money. Buy the chocolate. Buy two bars if you can. This is important stuff. Just trust me on this. I rented the Star Wars movies (Episodes 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6. Obviously Episode 3 isn't available). It's an interesting thing how these movies can simultaneously be some of the best and worst of the sci fi genre. I think PVP author Scott Kurtz summed it up best in this cartoon, but I have to say that I think there's great power in Lucas' choice of symbols, archetypes and story. Here's something I whipped up about the ten best things Star Wars has to offer: 1. Watching Ray Park (Darth Maul) do his thing is like watching a symphony in motion. 2. Alec Guinness does more acting in one scene with the corners of his mouth than most actors do in their whole careers. 3. There is no such thing as a movie that isn't improved by Muppets. 4. When it comes to giant, awe-inspiring machines of war, nobody out-does George Lucas. 5. Boba Fett == Still Cool. 6. Jango Fett == Arguably even cooler. 7. The sound design of every film in the Star Wars series is downright amazing... and it keeps getting better. 8. I'm amazed how the sight and sound of lightsabres clashing can still quicken the pulse. I really am. 9. Darth Vader's voice. 10. Lots of awesome video games spawned from the movies. 1. Jar Jar Binks was one of the worst ideas ever in the history of stink-o ideas. 2. Mark Hamill? Carrie Fisher? Harrison Ford? Not really very good actors. 3. George Lucas? Not really a good director. 4. If you can get Sam Jackson, Ewan McGregor and Christopher Lee into a movie and still fail to make me go "WHOA! That was INTENSE!" then you're doing something wrong. 5. Jake Lloyd. Cute kid. Needs to die... 6. ...but Hayden Christianson is such a bad actor that he single-handedly makes points 2, 3 and 5 irrelevant merely by his presence. He really needs to die. 7. Lucas should never have screwed around with the movies and kept adding CGI to the old masterpieces. It wasn't necessary. If the story is good then adding new lizards or creepy crawly creatures or whatever isn't necessary. Look at a movie like Finding Nemo... that movie could be done with sock puppets and it'd still be amazing. Why? Because the story is great. Star Wars should enjoy the same distinction. 8. I'm not completely convinced that he had the whole vision from the beginning. He maintains that he did, but certain elements of how the six movies unfold give me the impression that he was making a lot of stuff up as he went along (like, if he had the story all mapped out from the beginning, am I comfortable that he had brother and sister Luke and Leia playing kissy-face so much? I dunno). 9. Some of the costuming is kind of ridiculous (especially on Padme Amidala in Episode 2... that's some pretty psycho-freaky-sex gear she's wearing from time to time). 10. If you're a little older, like me, you'll remember the disco version of the Star Wars theme that was on the radio for a while back in 1977. Whoever was behind that still isn't forgiven by me yet. In other news, my hot water heater went out of commission on Monday. It was 14 years old (which in hot water heater years is like 200000 years old), and so it suddenly decided to go south and spray water into my neighbour's basement. So it was slated for replacement, which happened today (after me not having hot water for two days and piling dishes up to the ceiling). On a seemingly (but not) unrelated topic, I took the kids to another fair on Sunday. After taking them to the wash-out that was Almonte's über-lame, ride-less fair, I felt that I owed them. We went to a nearby community called Carp that has a pretty impressive fair and we rode tons of rides and played skee-ball and man... what a great day. Oddly, though, the fair grounds were completely dusty and all of us (kids and me) got covered in fine dirt from the day out. I gave the kids a bath on Sunday night, as I always do, and though the kids protested I thought it really was a good idea given the day we had. The next morning I checked out the tub and I had to laugh because there was silt-like dirt all over it. It was quite amazing. You could actually write your name in it with your finger. This was totally unusual for the kids (even at their worst) and I knew that it was mostly them bringing the Carp fair grounds home with them on their dirty little bodies and feet. I couldn't rinse the tub out yet, though; I had to take a photo or show someone first. It was just too incredible. I didn't actually get around to it, though, and the next thing you know the hot water heater guy was in the house on Monday poking around with the pipes while I was out on an errand (I had given the landlord permission to let him in while I was gone). Well, the hot water heater guy went upstairs to check the bathroom and though he said nothing I know he saw the river of sludge that was in the bathtub. I was mortified because even though he was silent I think he believes the tenant of this home: a) Doesn't wash the tub out after a bath, b) Is a filthy, pig-like slob covered in dirt, and c) Plays with Polly Pocket dolls, as there were a few scattered around the bathroom. I cleaned the tub without taking the photo. I just had to do it for my own peace of mind before some other hot water heater guy comes in. Gah. Alright, moving on to a different topic; tomorrow morning I go to play Squash again with Rob. I've had a rather irregular schedule lately of playing, mostly because summer-time plans and what-have-you have made either Rob or me unavailable on Squash days, so... we just kind of gave up for a while. Now, I have to confess that even though I've dropped 50 pounds since the early spring, I have lately been eating like a slob and doing almost no exercise. In fact, that's kinda why I'm eager to get back into it, but I know that I'm going to do about five minutes of playing and then fall to my knees, clutching my heart, sweating like a waterfall, face purple and begging for a strawberry-and-cream frappuccino and a chocolate brownie. I just hope no one is there with a camera to capture that moment. The last thing I'd like to say before ending this really long and rambling blog entry is: If I can stand outside and smell your perfume from the other side of the Home Depot parking lot, you're wearing way too much. Go home and wash that off before someone lights a cigarette and ignites you in a churning ball of flame or something. |
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| Sept 21 | Update Server hasn't changed yet. I'm too lazy to worry about that. Actually, it might be more of a matter of me just having other things to worry about. Anyhow, like I said, I doubt it'll be much of a difference on your end except for a few little things here and there. I will not be enabling comments, however; I'm asked about this sometimes - why I don't. I don't wish to seem particularly self-congratulatory or –even worse– arrogant... but I do like to keep control over a certain tone on this blog and it's too easy for all those who enjoy the anonymity/impunity of the internet to see comments section of a blog as an engraved invitation to be an ass. I have a rather long trip coming up where I will be trying to knit together several professional, medical and personal stops along the way. Even now some of the details are tentative, but I can already see that I'm going to be quite exhausted by the time I return. Alright, you don't really want to hear about all this. What you want to hear about is Canada's Wonderland. I went to Canada's Wonderland with my buddy Jon (here we are at a bookstore the night before, and here I am walking along Bay street looking like a drug dealer, while Jon looks like... er... not a drug dealer), and it was great. For those of you who are yankees or whatever, it's a theme park that's kind of below Disneyland but above Six Flags and stuff like that. We kinda did it on the cheap (which wasn't as hard as I thought it would be), but it was still terrific. Jon and I have a very different perspective on how to "do" a theme park. I like the spend the least amount of time in lineups for rides because I figure that if you only have a little bit of time then you should try to spend it actually doing stuff, even if it's not the Biggest Attraction™ stuff. Jon is completely different; he basically picks the biggest, barfiest ride and decides that it's worth waiting in line for 45 minutes (yes, that is a photo of ONE LINEUP TO ONE RIDE) so he can get 90 seconds of barfy thrills. That thing you're looking at in that photo is a spire where you go up 22 stories and then get dropped on your can at about 60 MPH. It was not incredibly pleasurable, but I did it because we had to wait in line for half an hour to get on it. We did go on some legitimate coasters rather than just the Can-Drop-O-Matic, so it wasn't a wash. I didn't take my kids with me and I'm sort of glad I didn't. As much as it appears to be a kid-friendly place, it's really a 10 to 12 year old friendly place mainly; I think a lot of the rides are too intense, the walking around is too long (it's a big place) and the lineups are asking way too much of smaller child (especially in the hot sun). What's more, the branding and advertising that goes on at this place is totally off the meter; I'm not particularly fond of the way my kids get subjected to so much advertising as it is, but this would have totally overloaded them. I'm going to take them to another "Old-Style County" fair this coming weekend (one with rides, like a normal fair... because I don't want more henna tattoos this time). I think that'll be better... lower-intensity rides, shorter lineups and probably just a better overall day. Oddly enough it may not be a lot cheaper than Canada's Wonderland (as you can do that really economically) but I have to say that fairs and rides and stuff are about kids having a good time. Anyhow, you were probably reading up to get more entertaining stuff, right? Here's a picture of me jumping on a bed. How's that? |
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| Sept 16 | Moving I'm going to move this blog to a different server. You're not going to notice a lot of difference from your end except that I'll be basing the blog in Moveable Type technology which will enable me to do RSS feeds and more some other advanced features. If you just pop in here to read and leave, you won't notice any difference. If you're into RSS feeds and searchable archives and so on, then that might interest you. As you were. |
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| Sept 16 | Good Times I had a chat with Jon Menon recently. He lives in Italy, but is currently visiting family and friends in Canada. When we connected a couple days ago, he asked me if I wanted to meet him in Toronto this weekend. My response was basically this: "Yes, I'll go if you promise me I'll have one f*@%king good time while I'm there. I'm completely serious. I have to have a seriously riotously good time. I need this. I need to have some fun."His response (without delaying for a split-second): "Fine. Canada's Wonderland?"What could I say? "Perfect."And that, my friends, is why Jon is The Man™. This weekend I'm off to ride rides, eat sugary crap and I may also get one of those giant foam fingers with "#1" printed on it in neon pink. |
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| Sept 16 | Ping I'm curious about something... who reads this stuff I'm writing? I don't keep a counter or anything and I never check my stats. Tell me if you're reading. |
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| Sept 14 | Reaching Out To Embrace The Random...I embrace my desire to- Tool, Lateralus |
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| Sept 13 | If You Don't Know Anything About DOOM 3, Don't Bother Clicking That thing about the the pants that I said below kind of reminded me of this. |
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| Sept 13 | You Smell Bad I'm going to begin this post with a digression and state that saying "You smell bad" is the right away to indicate that someone has a disagreeable odor. A lot of people believe it's correct to say "You smell badly", but this is wrong; "badly" is an adverb, which modifies a verb, and therefore that statement would communicate that you perform the act of smelling without skill or aptitude. "Bad", on the other hand, is an adjective that describes the smell (rather than the act of smelling), so when you say "You smell bad" it means the person to whom you are speaking has a bad smell. Now on to the point of this post: I want to say a few things to people who smoke. Dear Smokers, You smell bad. Sincerely, The Rest Of Us. It needs to be said: People who smoke smell bad. Non-smokers don't say it out loud very often because, instead, we just get used to it or get tired of saying it. It's true that a few of us will militantly strike forth to express our disgust at the way smokers smell, but there are so few that do it ends up looking as if they are only a handful of nutjobs and are, therefore, easily dismissed. Sadly, this isn't the case; every time a non-smoker sees another non-smoker going off on someone who smokes, we secretly think "Awesome. I wish I had the balls to do that". We don't think "Wow. What a nutjob". What smokers don't realize is that the smell is very strong. if I'm in a car at a stop light next to a car with a person smoking in it, I can often smell their cigarette, even if the windows of both cars are rolled up. When someone who smokes hangs their coat next to mine, I can smell their odor on me for days unless I clean it. Kissing a smoker is the worst thing in the world; the taste of their mouths is like licking out a garbage can full of butts. In fact, as I walk down the street and I see someone who is smoking coming the other way, I often hold my breath for as long as I can so I don't have to get a whiff of the person or the trail of stink that follows them for several seconds. Non-smokers have to deal with this all the time, and smokers don't realize it. In fact, they often don't believe it. It might be because they have diminished senses of smell due to smoking or maybe they just don't want to face the fact that they smell so bad, but most smokers will disregard these claims. Non-smokers know I'm telling the truth, however. Disregarding for the moment that your fingers turn yellow, your face gets haggard (it really does... just because it happens too gradually for you to notice doesn't mean it doesn't happen) and you waste an enormous amount of cash on buying cigarettes, the bottom line is that you smell just plain terrible. It's not that we don't love you (well, those of you that we would love anyway, regardless of your habit) and it's not that we're unwilling to put up with a lot of nasty pollution coming from your person, but it's sort of an insult for you to actually try and say that you don't smell bad. It's a complete diss when you think you can toss back one Tic-Tac and the stink just magically vanishes. It's an affront to basic physics to suggest that you can crack the car window roughly half a centimeter and every last trace of stench will be whisked magically out of the car. I guess the thing is... smoke if that's what you want to do. There are far worse things in this life. Just remember, however, that you can't pretend that you smell great. You don't. Peee-yoo. |
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| Sept 12 | Pants I'm wearing pants right now. These are pants that I used to wear a few years ago. I then gained a lot of weight and I couldn't wear them anymore. Haven't been able to since about 2001 or so. Today I saw them in my drawer and I decided to slip them on. They don't just fit... they're loose. Like, too loose to wear without a belt notched up to the fourth hole. Little victories like this make a difference. The truth is that I've lost some weight from stress. there's no arguing that. I have also lost weight through improved diet, exercise and generally decent living (as best I can). Overall I think it's a good thing. I have more to say about weight and so on, but I'll do that later. Nap time right now. |
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| Sept 11 | Nice I just gotta say that when I get told four times in one day by different people that I look like I've lost a ton of weight, I get all "Awwww yeah". |
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| Sept 11 | Please... someone... Take these nacho chips away from me. I can no longer help myself... |
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| Sept 11 | The Fair The Almonte Fair is in town this weekend. I got the two girls dressed up and ready to go, and off we went. Unlike the fair in previous years, the midway stuff (i.e. rides) didn't come because apparently there's some problem with insurance or something. Needless to say, a fair that != rides is a fair that == teh suck. When the girls and I got there and there were no rides, they were pretty crestfallen. And me, stupid as I am, was building the whole "ride" thing up all morning. "Which ride are YOU going to go first? What about YOU?" ...things like that. While I tried to come up with a decent plan B, I plied them both with hot dogs. As you can see here and here, Dora is easily plied. Ruth not so much (Dora did her impression of Puss In Boots from Shrek 2 as well, so there was much levity). The two of them spent a bit of time playing midway games like scoop-a-plastic-duck-with-a-stick (here and here), and get-a-crappy-prize-for-your-trouble. We also spent some time looking at really fuzzy chickens. At one point we ran into their cousin Jeremy (here and here) and they liked hanging out with her for a while. Dora did get something vaguely ride-like when she cut loose in the inflatible castle (here and here) while Ruth slurped down a sno cone (here and here). One of the highlights of The Incredibly Sucky Fair was how we all got henna tattoos (Ruth's was a vine, Dora's a rose, and I got two: God and Heaven in Japanese characters). Like most fairs, it was a sort of collection of crappiness thinly veneered with a layer of sugar coating (check out this picture of one of the trailers that sold sno cones; their brake light is jury-rigged from a metal ruler. That struck me as truly trashy for some reason). In the end analysis, however, the kids did manage to have some fun and no one got a sharp stick in the eye. I give it one thumb up out of two. |
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| Sept 10 | All The Stupid Ideas Most of my really, really stupid mistakes aren't done consciously so much, but more because I don't actually use reason or logic to think about what I'm doing before I do it. For instance, I smoke approximately one cigarette every eighteen months because it takes about that long for me to forget how absolutely nasty and vile cigarettes are. At that point I have successfully traveled from "Get this disgusting implement of Satan out of my mouth before I throw up on the carpet" to "You know, a nice smoke would be kind of refreshing right now". Then I take a puff and eighteen months of denial are washed away. I made just such a mistake tonight. I decided that I wanted to do something kind of take-out for the kids (because usually Wednesday is take-out day, but instead we had healthy, home-made meals), and I didn't want to do pizza again. And I didn't want to do Chinese. And there were a lot of the staples that I didn't want to do. So I stopped at the worst possible place in the entire world to get food... a place that I could only go for food if my memory was completely wiped clean of the last encounter I had with the establishment... the place that makes food so bad that it can almost be classified as toxic in and of itself... Kentucky Fried Chicken. Now don't get me wrong... I firmly believe that McDonald's is garbage. I believe that Wendy's is garbage. Taco Bell, Burger King, White Castle... all garbage. It's not that I think those things are somehow mystically good for you. It's just that Kentucky Fried Chicken is *worse*. The chicken is literally soaked in grease. I've never seen anything like it. After handling a drumstick I was literally unable to touch anything else without leaving a trail of slime. My poor kids are usually able to do things like eat chicken and then hold a fork, but their hands were so nasty they couldn't even keep a smooth dining implement in their tiny fingers. The french fries that came with the meal were awful... equally greasy but also mushy and soft and bound together by some strange bonding action that comes from being soaked in oil as a collective. The gravy was starchy and had that near-gelatanous texture while being salty almost past the point of my ability to keep it in my mouth. The pinnacle of nasty, however, came in the two side-salads: Macaroni and potato. each of them was crafted with some sort of mayonnaise mixed with sunscreen and the exotic, mysterious essence of athlete's foot. I tried both salads before serving them to the kids and I literally had to spit it out, as if I'd eaten something that normally lives in the small intestine of a goat. Not good. Vile, disturbing, horrid. Now I have reset the counter on my memory; I will not touch KFC again until the memory of this evening has completely left my consciousness. I am estimating ten years. Check back on my blog in late 2014 to see if I have wandered up to the counter and asked for the Family Meal, complete with cardboard, oil-absorbing bucket. |
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| Sept 8 | Writing I write. A lot. I didn't always think I was going to be a writer. I thought I'd be a visual artist or a musician or anything but a writer. You see, I never really had a lot of respect for writers. I think it's because most of the people I knew who called themselves writers were really just too lazy to learn a skill such as an instrument or how to dance. This isn't to say I never respected any writers, but in general I found most people gravitated to that identity because it's so hard to say when someone is a bad writer. When you can't sing, people know instantly. When you can't write... it's not as obvious. I think there's a lot of truly bad writing out there just because people think that they can hide behind the fact that most of the public can't tell good writing from bad. I've found at this point in my life that I am, in fact, a writer. I didn't choose it. I don't even think it'd be my first choice. It just is what I am. On an average day you could add up everything I write; blog entries, email, AIM, reviews, stories, pen-and-paper letters and you would probably find a good 5,000 words, easily. When I get up in the morning, I start writing. I write for work. I write to keep in touch with my loved ones. Once I've done all my work-related writing and my daily correspondence, I write more. I write to unwind. I write as my treat to myself at the end of the day. I write stuff most of you will never see. I write stuff that most of you will see. I can't keep enough journals and blogs to contain it all. I don't know if I'm really that good. I know that my writing sometimes entertains me, which I like. I know that people enjoy my writing sometimes, which is also awesome though I know that sometimes that's just a matter of casting a broad-enough net. I know that my writing makes me money, so it's got to have something special enough to distinguish itself for financial compensation. I know that when I'm in the groove of really writing something I have a solid grasp on that it's like shooting fish in a barrel; I have the sense – and it's usually right – that I simply can't lose. That the piece will be good. That it'll make sense. That people will understand. When I was a kid of 10 years old I used to write strategy guides for video games... sometimes 20 pages long or more. I would sometimes write commentary or editorials, all by hand. I'd write all this baloney and have no where to put it. After these stacks of foolscap would live under my bed for a few months, they'd usually go in the garbage. Funny about the video game thing, as I now do that as a living. I was just thinking about how I now have a few online journals going, belong to social networks that encourage writing (which I do), have papers all over the place... etc. etc. It is now occurring to me that I am not quite where I want to be yet. At the moment I am thinking about a book. Maybe a couple. Unlike a lot of my stupid ideas that seem great at the time and later turn into old gum, these thoughts about writing a book have been haunting me endlessly. I think that it's going to happen; I just need to let my thinking catch up with the inevitability of it. |
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| Sept 7 | On Second Thought ...if you wanna buy a picture of Chris Barylick on a T-Shirt, you can write to him here. I may have been a bit harsh in my analysis of the market potential for shirts with his face on it. |
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| Sept 7 | Well. Isn't Chris Precious? I ran this a few days ago at MacGamer when our Senior News Editor, Chris Barylick, turned 27. You gotta take a quick look at it before you read this next part. Done? Ok. Cool. Now check out the ensuing conversation with Chris from today:  At least he didn't want to have the fetus discussion again. |
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| Sept 7 | My Night 9:45 PM: Go to bed 3:45 AM: Wake up, play Total Annihation 4:10 AM: Back to sleep 9:10 AM: Wake up, make online journal entry |
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| Sept 5 | Movie Review Nobody wants to read an extended blurb about why I think Hero is such a fantastic movie, but I just have to say something about it (I saw it last night). So here are five reasons why you should see Hero: 1. It depicts almost superhuman hand-to-hand combat (even with the wires and special effects you still have to marvel at the staggering skill of the actors who do the fight scenes) but does so in a way which progresses a tale of love, betrayal, devotion and honor. In this way it's the only worthy successor to Crouching Tiger that I've ever seen. 2. The director is someone who understands the importance of beauty in film. This is a point that seems completely lost on Western film-makers. Some of the scenes are so beautifully created you can almost taste them. I made a joke to Rob (with whom I saw the movie) about how you could freeze-frame at any point of the movie, take a screenshot and use it as your desktop for years to come. 3. The story is quite excellent. I love watching foreign films of most types because, unlike Western movies, you don't always know how they'll end. This tale has great characters involved in an interesting plot, and both are unraveled a little at a time as the film progresses, revealing a bit more until you realize how very complex the story actually is. 4. Interestingly, there's a distinct lack of blood or gore. I'd hazard a guess that this is because of Chinese censorship laws which prohibit the depiction of peoples' guts falling out or spurting jugular veins and stuff, but I'll say that I find it quite a refreshing change. Without the distraction of stomach-turning effects I find that the attention stays on the story, the concepts and the ideas. After Kill Bill I have to say that I don't really believe that spraying blood everywhere makes a story or the action within it any better. 5. If you like seeing arrows stuck in things, boy... is this the movie for you. I can't say there are no criticisms, mind you; the fight scenes are numerous and, while beautifully created, tend to be a bit repetitive (though the scenic backdrops are always very luscious and appealing). Despite the abundance of combat, it might also seem a little slow to people who are looking for a non-stop action roller-coaster thrill-ride. Regardless of my checks in the "con" column, I'd say that Hero is the best movie I've seen this year. We'll see if I still think so after I watch The Station Agent tonight... |
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| Sept 5 | Keltie Turns 30 Keltie turns 30 today. Aside from her liking Pho Tai soup and being a general pain in the ass the two of us don't actually have much in common. But hey... happy birthday. |
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| Sept 3 | Dare To Dream This morning from Peter Cohen on AIM: what happened on penny arcade's home page today is largely what I imagine would happen if you and I ever started working together. If you're going to go look, scroll down... it starts with "My Day At Work". Do it quick, too... they change their home page content on Monday. Anyhow: God, he's right. He's so right. And the thing is, the roles could easily be reversible. I'm going to make myself a Darkspur this afternoon. Just FYI. |
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| Sept 2 | Steve To The Rescue He made me feel better with this email: "I put it in the dishwasher, turned it on, and in about five minutes I watched foamy bubbles ooze out from between the edges around the machine's door." This is the absolute, honest truth: there is nobody on the internet who makes me burst out in loud, unexpected laughter as much as you. You'd think I'd learn to expect it, but it always takes me by surprise. You should be making money doing this somehow. The problem is your humor is probably a tad too smart for all the stupid people who spend money. True? I dunno. But it was nice to hear it. --bliss-- :) :) :) |
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| Sept 2 | Dumb Song Gets Through The Defenses In the last few years there's been a wave of heavy metal crossed with teen angst that's hitting the radio. Groups like Nickelback are a good example of that; heavy guitar-driven music that talks about self-esteem problems and regret (among other things). It's not that I don't think there's a place for it, it's just not generally for me. I like heavy music, to be sure, but I find the top 40 "pop" style of metal a little less than challenging for my palette. More power to them for being able to play guitar on the radio and have it make them money, though. The lyrics also don't speak to me very deeply. I'll take the more seasoned, evolved lyricism of Tool or The Deftones over Nickelback. It just feels more adult. Again, I'm not trying to slight anyone's tastes... I'm just talking about what I'm into here. Pop metal and teen angst aren't generally my diet. Imagine, then, how surprised I was when I heard this song on the radio one day; it barely registered with me at the time but I've been playing it over and over in my head until I finally acquired the single. "Cold" by Crossfade is the song, and it's such a Nickelback ripoff that it almost makes one laugh; the throaty, overwrought vocal... the thick wall of distorted guitar... the predictable verse-chorus-verse... and, of course, the self-loathing, teen-angst lyrics intended for every sad, 16-year old boy in the world to see themselves as the modern-day Job, lonely and alone and steeped in regret for things they've scarcely had the lifespan to accomplish. I say "surprised" because even though most of the song is a throw-away for me (lyrics like "I never really wanted you to go / So many things you should have known / I guess for me theres just no hope" ...it's the early 21st-century version of "Moon, Spoon, June"), I was caught by the throat by a very simple line that penetrated my defenses and wouldn't leave my head. What I really meant to sayIt struck me as so simple and cutting that I almost think these top-40 skids must have arrived at the lyrics by accident, like that million monkeys at a million typewriters thing. There's a place that everyone arrives at where they want to say "I'm sorry for what I did". Some people can say that, some can't, but it's just part of human emotional existence... to be sorry for something you've done. Referencing it in a song has to be done with skill because it's so commonly felt that it's banal and unprovocative. There's a place beyond that, however, which is goes deeper than simply doing something wrong. There's a place where you stop looking at what you do as the mistake and you start to look at yourself as the mistake. What I really meant to say...The apology isn't for doing something you shouldn't have when you knew better. It's an apology for not knowing what you're doing wrong because it's simply what you do; not until you've left a smoking hole behind you does it begin to dawn that your way - the one that comes to you naturally - is the wrong one... and there's no changing it. ...is I'm sorry...The apology says "I'm sorry you met me", "I'm sorry I was in your life", "I'm sorry that you made the mistake of coming close to me". ...for the way I am.I wish I wasn't spending so much time repeating this to myself and feeling it touch me in a place I'd really rather not think about. I wish I could listen to this song and not hear my own voice talking to everyone I ever loved. |
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| Sept 2 | Kleenex Thanks to changes I've made in my diet, my yearly bout of severe allergies has arrived with significantly less strength in its muscles. Normally I'm laid out like a beached whale for the month of August and early Sept due to allergies to ragweed and whatever other crap might be floating around. This year, however, it's much less. I'm sniffling and everything, sure, but it's not like I want to scratch my eyeballs out with a fork. Nonetheless, the allergies have set in and I had a rough wake-up this morning because it felt as though someone had poured plaster of paris in my nostrils and somehow got red ants *inside* my eyeballs. I keep a roll of toilet paper by the bed to blow my nose in. As you can see, I've been busy.  |
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| Sept 1 | National "Do Everything Wrong" Day I've always had a problem with the detergent I put in my dishwasher; it clumps up and sticks to the dishes. I didn't make it to the grocery store on time to get some of that slick, sexy, "Liquid" detergent, so I thought I'd be a real genius and mix the dry detergent with some liquid dish soap until it was smooth so that it didn't get stuck to everything in sight. I put it in the dishwasher, turned it on, and in about five minutes I watched foamy bubbles ooze out from between the edges around the machine's door. It reminded me of those old episodes of the Brady Bunch where someone would put a whole box of detergent in the clothes washing machine and the hijinks would ensue with everyone in the family up to their armpits in soap... except this was my kitchen, and I did not feel hijinky. Earlier I tried to force an nearly-full pot of soggy noodles down the sink, thinking that if I smushed them up as they went into the hole that there would be no blockage. Well, as you already know, physics wasn't really my strongest subject, and there was about four inches of water in my sink that wouldn't drain. I went and got the plunger and started plunging but, on the first stroke, squirted myself in the eyeball with a jet of liquified and partly-solid wheat noodles that were mixed with dish soap and some of the broth they had been soaking in. Needless to say, I won't have any appetite for that dish in the near future. Worst of all, I really hurt Lori's feelings today. It was one of those things I wish I could have stopped time and somehow gone back to fix, but... there's no doing that, is there? It brings to mind how Hell is reportedly nothing more than being in the presence of God when you are exposed to the reality of His holiness, and the regret you feel for all the opportunities in your life that you missed to do the right thing. I find that easy to believe tonight. I just feel terrible; she's so sensitive and I can be so careless (particularly when jacked up on dexedrine). I listened to sad music all night and cleaned my home (I always clean when I'm upset). There's no feeling in the world like hurting someone you love and, afterwards, being able to see clearly that it was your fault. I will concede, however, that little bits of salty noodles in your eyeball can add insult to injury. |
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| August 31 | "...And In The Darkness Bind Them" Alright. Let's talk Dexedrine. It reminds me of The One Ring in a lot of ways; it transforms someone into another person. It's heartily sought-after. I love and hate it just as I love and hate myself. It's not going to last. I'm going to try it for a few more days just so I can say that I did it and did it right, but it's not something I can really work with. Every time I take it I spend the day feeling like I've taken a tazer shot to the head. I imagine that my doctor and ADD consultant will advise me to try different doses or different schedules or whatever, and I will, but... I'm keeping an eye open for other things because I don't believe this is the thing that's going to smooth out my wrinkles. |
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| August 27 | Not That Kind Of Abuse. Sorry. A friend who shall remain nameless (because the embarrassment would cause many problems) pinged me today and demonstrated a lack of care in composition. Anyhow, this is about the post just before this one. Friend In Question: abuse my ass... Corey Tamas: WTF? Friend In Question: your latest entry Corey Tamas: I think the punctuation you're looking for is "Abuse, my ass." Corey Tamas: Not "Abuse my ass" Friend In Question: Oh yes! *blushes* Friend In Question: anyway, what i meant was that i think that dog is very cute |
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| August 27 | Only You Can stop the abuse |
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| August 25 | You Can All Relax Now My favorite pair of socks was split up, one of them having gone missing. I just found it. I feel a lot better now. |
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| August 25 | Quote Of The Day "And while New York has had a mild summer all around, I still seem to be the only one who is standing in the humid subway stations, soaking in sweat; the single sloppy, dripping loser amongst an army of perfectly coiffed, impossibly thin hipsters." It gets better. Read the rest. |
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| August 24 | Heal It Up I just mentioned this song in the "Hear, Feel, See" area above. It's by Concrete Blonde, one of those bands that I will adore until the day I die. I go through phases like this: Listen to some Concrete Blonde, check out another band for a few months or a year, back to Concrete Blonde, then off to another band. Return again to Concrete Blonde, then off I go. Back, forth, back, forth, etc. After having been listening to their album, Mexican Moon (available at the link I gave in the header area) for about ten years or more I am ready to say that Joanette Napolitano is one of the greatest rock vocalists ever. It pales so quickly when you take something as powerful and flexible as her singing style and try to reduce it to words, but even so; her voice is incredible to me. In an era where female singers tend to have little-girlish (Britney Spears), choked-in-the-throat (Gwen Stefani) or laughably hystrionic "R&B" embellishments (Christina Aguwhatsherface), I'm not surprised that Napolitano didn't make more of a splash in the top 40. Heal It Up is an excellent example of what she's capable of. She starts low in a threatening contra-alto range and builds the intensity nice and slow through the first two verses leading into the chorus. At first I always have my hair completely blown back by her Hammer-Of-Thor voice in the chorus cutting loose, but I am also always struck by how she can deliver the verse with with such power and transition into the four-bar-long, fortissimo notes of the refrain. In particular, my jaw just drops when I hear her move from the howling final note of the second verse right into the long chorus. It makes the hair on my arms stand up. Sometimes it makes you wonder how many female musicians are out there in the world, making their mark and creating definitive rock music that we'll never hear. |
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| August 24 | Coffee So this morning I decided to go out into the sunshine in my stylish jeans and my new black long-sleeved T shirt and take a very quick trip around downtown Almonte. In doing so, I stopped into the Bread and Butter bakery and picked up a coffee and a croissant, which I had been craving (yes! I am craving food! With sugar and caffeine!). When I got home I realized that I had not taken my daily medication yet, so I popped one and went back about my business. Well, as it happens, the coffee is still sitting there cold and the chocolate croissant is going stale. I am suddenly overtaken with a revulsion for both of them. Oh, the cruel irony. Today no fewer than three people all independently asked me if I've lost weight. I believe I have. Thing is, it's in part because of the drugs... but not for the reasons you may think. I am still eating three meals a day (ok, well, two... though I try to do three) because I force myself to eat them. The last thing I want is to forget I have to eat, pop a handful of chips once a day and end up dying of scurvy. So that's not going to happen. What has happened, however, is that my desire to take portions that are too big for me has subsided and my desire to snack just because I'm bored has completely died. What's more, my desire for sugary, sweet food has also abated, so I've been living on modest but healthy portions of the four basic food groups and water (no dairy in general, though I am eating yogurt). In addition, I'm also trying to exercise semi-regularly, though I find this to be a challenge; I'm doing it, but it's not easy. So yeah, I have lost weight. Time for new pants. |
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| August 21 | Drugs If I were you I'd be getting sick of hearing that there's lots going on, but very little that I want to share here. Yeah, it does kinda suck to be you, but... I'm hoping you'll understand. I will share something now that I wans't going to talk about: Drugs. I'm on a medication called dexedrine. It's for the ADD I mentioned, and it's the drug I've been waiting for that I spoke about on August 2. So far it's nothing but a big gift basket full of side effects. Here's what I'm experiencing so far: 1. Sleep is disturbed. I took the first capsule on day one at 4 PM and didn't sleep for 36 hours following it... and I felt no fatigue whatsoever. So that couldn't have been good. I am sleeping a little better now that I'm a few days into it, but sleep hasn't been the same. 2. I have no appetite. At all. I have zero interest to eat. I actually find it kind of interesting because the foods that I've been really addicted to (for instance, Pepsi) I simply cannot even look at. The thought of drinking that stuff makes me want to throw up. I believe it's my brain hanging up a big red sign saying "no more stimulants, please. KTHXBYE". Anyhow, one thing I have been trying to stay on top of is my over-eating, and though starvation or malnutrition is no substitute, I am finding the urge to "snack" has evaporated. This does qualify as something of a victory in my book. 3. Dry mouth. When I wake up in the morning I need to use a butter knife to pry my lips open. This has another interesting and not undesirable side-effect; I'm drinking tons of water. Not soda. Not juice. Not coffee. Water. It's what I crave right now when my mouth is dry. I have been trying really hard to drink more water and, let me tell you, it's a lot easier to succeed when you're actually craving it while not craving something else that's loaded with caffeine and sugar. 4. Anxiety. This is hard to put my finger on; I think I have more anxiety, but I'm not entirely convincced. Ok, yeah. I'm lying. Yes, I do have more anxiety, and it sucks. Anxiety is so very much not what I need right now. It's not constant; it sets in the second half of the day after the real good part is over (I have a nice, mellow, Rocky Mountain high for the first half of the day when I take it). 5. Pooping. We won't even discuss this. 6. Spelling mistakes. It's not that I don't know how to spell anymore, it's that my brain just seems to stop putting all the letters into words. These aren't standard mistakes like their/they're/there mistakes. These are mistakes like spelling my name Coey, or orey, or Crey. It's not that it's such a crime, as there's always a spellchecker to tell me when I'm going off base, but I'm getting teased now. How about the benefits? Well, I'm holding off judgment on that for now. As it is, I haven't been able to get used to it enough to actually try functioning while under the influence... so I can't report any great victories, yet. On the other hand, it takes several days for the body to get used to this drug and I believe once mind does I will start to find ways to use the highs and lows to my benefit. That's what it's all about after all. In the mean time, it's all about getting that last bottle of water down before I head off to the bathroom. |
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| August 17 | Man ...do I ever smell good today. Why is that, I wonder? I only wish that there was someone here with me tonight that could enjoy how awesome I smell. As it is, I don't even have a cat to share that with. Oh, well. One-man party of smelling myself, I suppose. Try not to be too jealous. |
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| August 15 | Scratch One Curly Straw So my kids are eating very well made hamburgers and drinking freshly squeezed orange juice through curly straws, and my youngest, Dora, has a problem. She says that there is meat -as in bits of hamburger - in her orange juice and she has NO idea how it got there. So I've decided to start with a challenge to her to help herself. So I had her a fork and tell her to gently take it out and put it on her plate.Fast forward a minute later. She tells me that the straw is blocked and doesn't work anymore because there is meat in it. She's been sucking like a lamprey eel on the straw and managed to pull a hunk of hamburger - which never should have been in the orange juice in the first place - about five inches into the twisty straw canal. I tell her that she can get down from the table and go play. The straw has been retired. |
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| August 13 | Next Up... Still nothing to report just now. I'm having a sad day. Get lost. Well, actually, I have lots to report, but not here. There's stuff that goes in the blog and stuff that doesn't. This doesn't. Not just now, anyhow. You can still get lost, though. |
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| August 9 | Indeed. Nothing to report just now except that I have a mild cold (very low grade) and I blow my nose a lot. |
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| August 6 | Tango Every step in life is meant to orchestrate itself with a step taken by someone or something other than you. The point isn't so much where and when you put your feet down while you dance, but only that you create a beautiful dance with your partner, who or whatever that might be. Cha, cha, cha. |
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| August 4 | False Alarm I'm not nearly as burned as I thought I would be. I'm quite comfortable, actually. Thing is, I'm lightly burned... but in strange places. Like my lips. And my palms. How did my palms get burned, exactly? It's a mystery. |
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| August 3 | The Inevitable Happens I use a tanning bed about twice a month. I have a minor skin problem that clears right up when I do. Sunlight does have a similar effect, but the convenience of the tanning bed as far as being able to do it all when I feel like it or have time is really nice for me. Ever since I've started using it, however, I've been a little concerned: What if I burn? I did once on a tanning bed about four years ago. I went in for my first time, there was a new kid at the desk and he asked me how much time I wanted. I said "I dunno. Half an hour?" and he said "Sure", forgetting to notice that I was fish belly white and that he'd have been smarter to just put me in a microwave instead. After that session I basically spent the first day feeling like I was one of those marshmellows that gets roasted over the fire too long; Sheathed in a barely-there, crispy outer layer of brittle shell, holding all the soft parts in... but just barely. I spent the second day pretty much the same, cursing things like light and air and the anguish they caused me. Third day I peeled like a gigantic reptile and could be found anywhere in the house by following the diaphanous, tissue-like layers of skin that were falling off my body. I didn't have an experience like that today... but I did burn. I was in for too long. Now I'm at that delicate part of the process where I can feel the strange buzzing of my skin having been baked like a cake but have not yet seen the spread of red, crispy flesh. It's these in-between times that torment me most, knowing it's coming, knowing that I will wake up tomorrow morning cursing myself. More later. I'm off to sit in a tub of aloe vera and pray for death. |
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| August 3 | Rained Like Hell, My Ass Got Soaked Last night it rained like hell. That was kinda nice. Thing is I left the window in my car open just a hair and the rain drenched the seat. Went for a little car trip earlier. My ass is soaking wet. Wet denim. It's not pleasant. |
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| August 3 | That Kind Of Night The last few nights here in Ottawa have been real stinkers. Humid, muggy and sweltering. I don't have air conditioning in my house, so there wer several fans laboring throughout the night to keep me and the kids cool. I am more interested in their comfort so they get the best fan while I get a fan that I think was assembled in 1945 by the same people who used to assemble those all-steel-and-rivet airplanes. I have not enjoyed trying to sleep through those nights. Tonight is different. It's cool. I'm not sure why, but all that humidity is gone. The air is not killing me. The heat is not making me flop like a fish on the dock. The air is sweet tonight and there's a breeze coming through the window. I can smell the air. It's rich and lovely. My feet and legs are getting cold from the draft coming in through the window, but it's such a relief I'm just going to let it happen for a while. |
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| August 2 | Speaking of Waiting I ordered chicken souvlaki from a local restaurant. I do this on certain days because the food is really good and not very expensive. I've been counting the minutes until it arrives; opening the screen door a few inches, poking my head out to look, coming back in... opening the screen door a few inches, poking my head out to look, coming back in... opening the screen door a few inches, poking my head out to look, coming back in... I've finally come to realize that I'm acting like Marlin in Finding Nemo where he's teaching his son how to poke his head out of the anemone and look for predators: Go out, look around, come back in... go out, look around, come back in... go out, look around, come back in... and if you want to do it a fourth time, that's ok too... |
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| August 2 | Waiting waiting waiting As I have mentioned a few other places in my blog, I have ADD (attention deficit disorder). I haven't provided much detail, but it's a fact. With the stress I've been experiencing lately, the pressure of it has really mounted and it's really bothering me worse than ever. Luckily, I've been prescribed some medication to take care of it and, reportedly (I've done some reading) the results are very good. But I don't have the medication yet. There are two doctors involved with handing these pills out. They are both going on vacation, alternately. So I'm waiting for them both to be in the area at work at the same time so I can get ahold of this stuff and get started using it. The ADD and all the sattelite problems that go along with it are really knocking me off my game. So I'm waiting. And waiting. And waiting. |
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| August 1 | Nastiness It's time to wash the cloths in the kitchen. I have dish towels, tea towels, wash cloths, whatever. It's time to wash them. They're in the machine right now. They've been basted in detergent until they're sopping, and I've added bleach to the little thingie you pour bleach in. They're being washed with scalding hot water to boot. You see, I've never been satisfied with how clean these things are (or aren't). After 100 washes they still smell wrong. I can't take it. I'm supposed to wash my dishes with these. I'm supposed to wipe my kids' faces with these. Every time I pass one of the towels or cloths under my nose I want to herk up all over myself. Tonight is the Alamo for those little bastards. Tonight I keep washing them until they smell like daisies. And yes, I'll change the lint trap in the dryer before I throw them in there. I'm not an idiot you know... |
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| August 1 | Sleep So last night I had great plans. I put the kids to bed at 8:15 or so (a little late for them, but not very). We did our usual round of snuggles, prayers and the rest. Then, when I was finally done, I left their room and got ready to do all the things I had lined up; cleaning, writing, laundry, you name it. It was the perfect plan except for the fact that I put my head down at about 8:30 and didn't wake up again until 6:30 the next morning. The kids will be up within half an hour but, strangely, I feel quite ready for the day and don't even mind losing the chance to do all that work I wanted to do. My back, however, feels like someone spent the entire night whacking it with a nine iron. Otherwise, I'm good. |
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| July 31 | Plans This month I don't feel like hanging around at home much. I am thinking about visiting the Baha'i temple in Willamette, Illinois, and maybe taking a trip to Montréal to visit some Baha'i holy places there as well. I wouldn't mind seeing my family a bit, either. I'll get back to you and let you know if I manage to accomplish this or not. |
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| July 31 | NSFW Wisdom "...this life is all bullshit, except for a couple of reasons. It will be over quick, and there will be no more shit like this." That's what my friend Jon told me today. He's right. It's got a blunt edge, but he's right. |
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| July 30 | A Footnote I wrote sort of hastily that I want to do art. There's a little more I could say about that. I have a degree in music. I have been playing guitar for 20 years. I have five guitars and several other instruments. I have several independent recordings, have done probably a couple hundred gigs if not more and I even used to teach. Do you know how many songs I wrote last year? None. Not one. I can forgive myself that for the last year or even two, but when I get to the end of 2004 I don't want to look back and have my greatest artistic accomplishment of the year be an expert job of painting a space toy. |
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| July 30 | Kind Of Like An Update, Only Not So Much It's been hard for me to know how to update here. I've got so much and yet so little going on at once. Some great fortune, some bad misfortune, but I'm having trouble spinning it into something that would be interesting to people that aren't *me*. Those of you who have blogs of your own will understand just what I'm talking about. I do want to thank all of you who have stepped forward to call me a moron for not changing the lint filter in the dryer more often. I have, in fact, learned that you can set fire to your home by leaving the lint filter in for too long. That's quite a little tidbit! I suppose I should stop trying to make winter clothing out of the pads of thick lint that I pull out of there, but I have to say that it almost seemed like a perfect plan. Well, it seemed like the perfect plan until I started getting emails calling me an idiot. I suppose you all had my best interests at heart, right? I'm about ready to give up Warhammer. This is going to meet with some incredulity among those of you who have come to know me lately, but it's true. My life has both high and low points right now (it is far from without happiness, but the average day is an uphill struggle a fair amount of the time). Even so, there just doesn't seem to be room for this kind of hobby either financially, schedule-wise or even just in my brain or heart. I don't feel like playing games right now; I feel like making art. So I'm finishing with the paint on the last of my Warhammer stuff and I think it'll be going on Ebay. If you're the kind of person who wants to start a kickass Warhammer army, I may be the guy you're looking to connect with. I was going to wait until tax refund season to sell it all off on Ebay (because that's when I figured the suckers would be spending in full force), but I think I'm going to go ahead sooner and get it out of the way a lot sooner. I've got lots of other stuff I may want to share soon, but not quite yet. I do, however, have some smaller-scale advice for you until that time comes: - Check out Triplets of Belleville - Avoid House Of 1000 Corpses (I believe we covered this) - The Bourne Supremacy is actually pretty good unless you get motion sickness easily That's about all I have for the moment. Keep your pants dry; I'll post again as soon as. |
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| July 25 | Kill Me. Last night I watched Rob Zombie's House Of 1000 Corpses. All I can say is that I'd like to remove my brain from my skull now and rinse it out under the tap for several minutes. Why do I do things like that to myself? |
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| July 20 | Party Time My little girl is turning 7 on Tuesday. Wednesday she's with me at my place. She will already have had her birthday party by then (at her mom's). Any suggestions for something I could do for a 7 year old girl and her 4 year old sister to make the day feel special? |
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| July 19 | The Lint Filter The lint filter for the dryer is an astonishing piece of technology. As most of you know, a lint filter catches the shmutz that falls off your clothes while they're being dried and helps keep it out of places where it doesn't belong. My interactions with the lint filter are very rare because I keep forgetting it exists. I throw clothes in, I punch the button, the thing turns on, they come out dry. It's like a magic trick. Over a period of weeks and months the lint filter starts to get very full and, as a result, the clothes don't get dry as quickly. This is because the air doesn't move efficiently inside the dryer anymore and the result is that less drying happens. I keep forgetting this is why the clothes take so long to dry. As I put a load in tonight and punched "105 minutes" I started thinking "Man, that's a long time for this thing to do its job", especially considering that the contents of the dryer are basically a face cloth and a sock. Then it dawns on me that the lint filter could be full. At this point (which was tonight) I look at the little drawer from which the lint filter is pulled with a certain amount of trepidation; I haven't been in there for six months. I'm a bit afraid of what could be inside. I pull the drawer and the dense mattress of lint literally springs out, it's so compressed. This little rectangle of fabric shmutz, roughly 10 inches by 5 inches, could stop a bullet. I cannot begin to imagine how something can be fashioned from the dusty offspring of my shirts and underwear. I'm charmed by it, though. My plan is to empty the lint filter every six months for the next few years and save what I pull out of it. By the year 2008 I will have enough material to make nice, thick winter coats for myself and both my kids. |
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| July 19 | Regarding The Abundance Of PC Games I wrote this in the MacGamer Forums tonight and felt like copying it here. The subject is about how people can get so much more quality gaming by buying a PC instead of a Mac. "...the illusion of choice is really just that; an illusion. I say this because I review Mac games and I play almost everything I get my hands on (which is usually given to me by the publisher). After having done this for about six years, I can say that there isn't much variety out there. You have your Warcraft clones, your Quake clones, your Civilization clones, your Rainbow Six clones, your Myst clones and your Sims clones. Sure there are small differences between them, but essentially every game I play, at best, rates as a tiny evolution of the genre as a whole or a gimmick to make the old standards seem temporarily fresh. I don't mean to sound particularly negative, but this definitely is my feeling about most games now. Even within the smaller pool of Mac gaming you see the same stuff over and over. I really don't consider playing $30 - $50 to play Warcraft or Quake over and over again as much of a 'wide range of choice'. So when I see arguments about how there's a paradise of PC gaming out there that we're all missing, I have to laugh. Why? Because if you play just a dozen of the hundreds of Mac games available you're probably playing the exact same games at least three to six times before you're done. The promise of playing the same games over and over again two or three hundred times doesn't really hold a lot of allure for me. When there are breakthroughs in game design, and I mean breakthroughs (I'm not talking about the evolution of Unreal Tournament 2003 to 2004), those almost without exception come to the Mac platform. The rest? I seriously could not care less if they ever get ported or not. I've already played Quake/The Sims/Warcraft/Rainbow Six/Civilization/Myst, thanks." |
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| July 14 | Sometimes Things Just Work Thank you, Rob and Kris, for the cool soda water, the popcorn, and the refreshing of my perspective. I'm now ready to meet the day tomorrow with a big smile on my face and sunshine in my heart. And I was due for that. |
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| July 14 | Speaking of Quotable... Why do you read blogs? I read only a select few and, to be honest, most of what I read is dreck. People out there, by and large, are not good writers. Sure, they give it their all and they're even kind of regular sometimes with the updates, but there's no entrance exam for Livejournal, and I sometimes think there should be. That being said, once in a blue moon you find these little gems that just make the internet worthwhile. From Queserasera.org: "I skip town tomorrow to do my stint on the Texas bridesmaid circuit, where I have been informed that I have a hair appointment with the bride and the bride’s mother on the day of the wedding, and I think we all know what this means: there’s an updo in Texas with my name on it. Also, the rehearsal dinner is going to be held at a barbecue restaurant, and while several people have encouraged me to make eyes at the groomsman with the biggest belt buckle, I just don’t think I have it in me." From Tikkabik.com: "So tonight Bonnie and I stopped at Wal-Mart to do some shopping after dinner. I spent about a buck on a black baton with a yellow nylon string affixed to the end of it. At the end of the string is a rubber bauble with plastic feathers. It's a cat toy." "As far as the cat is concerned, I just bought him an Xbox with a 51-inch projection TV and a 5.1 surround sound system." |
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| July 10 | Fight Club I own the DVD. This is, by far, one of the best movies I've ever seen. It's not easy to watch, but it really does something incredible. It's called Fight Club. Fight Club is, by far, the most quotable movie I've ever seen. "Bob. Bob had bitch tits"If you haven't seen it yet, take a look just so you can throw these quotes around in conversation. |
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| July 9 | Alanis Would Say It's Ironic I was just noticing that at the top of this page I have "Be kind. Everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle", and yet my May 24 entry demonstrates how mean I can be to Chris Barylick. I find that amusing. |
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| July 8 | Surprise Ok. I'm updating. As we can see from the last entry (May 24, right below), I haven't been updating my blog much. Kind of hard to articulate what the delay is all about; just so many unusual and strange things going on with me, both good and bad, and I don't think I'm going to actually try to sum everything up. You'll just have to bear with me. I did decide to change the color of the site. I'll keep last year's entries (linked above) in the old color and this year's entries in this color. I think. Unless I change my mind. So what's new? I'm traveling a lot; some business, some pleasure. I'm playing some Warhammer. I'm making some music. I'm getting ready to do more writing in my blog, so if you keep checking hoping that something is going to appear here, stay tuned. |
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| May 24 | Hammerhead Haven't been updating much lately, as you can tell, but I thought I'd post this thing that happened lately between me and Chris Barylick, a guy who works for me. It was about this photo.  |
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| May 17 | Most Accurate Description Of Me I've Read To Date "You're like a little lab animal. "Gimme my pellet!" <click click> "Come on!" Yeah. Thanks, Lori. |
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| May 14 | What Did You Think It Was For? I have a cell phone, but I buy my minutes ahead of time. This is my way of protecting myself. If I don't have a limit to how much time can be used then I'll chew through minutes like nobody's business and run up an astronomically high bill. I know. I've done it before. Now I like to keep things under control as much as possible. I buy time for my phone in the form of a "phone card" that can be picked up at the convenience store just around the corner. There's a whole lot of staff there that rotates in the usual way that staff do, but the one I dread is the large middle-aged woman with the glasses perched on the end of her nose (with string around neck). She's not bad-natured. She's just not real smart. I don't usually hold that against people, but she's not real smart to the point where she impedes the process of buying products. For instance, she'll be in the middle of slipping lottery tickets into their holder thing when I come to the counter with a newspaper and a bottle of water. She will ask me to hang on while she finishes placing lottery tickets in the slots. I say "Sure". Then this leaden, plodding process begins: She stuffs a ticket into a slot, eyeballs it through her bifocals, repositions it, looks again, removes it and replaces it, shifts it a bit, gives it an appraising look and then gets another ticket. The process repeats. I check my watch. I drum my fingers. The store is empty and I'm standing there. One minute goes by, two minutes. Finally I say "Maybe I could ask you to please ring this through and then you could return to the lottery tickets?" A moment of blank staring and then she agress. "Oh! Right!" she says. There have been several incidents like this. Anyhow, I go to the counter and, in my sweetest voice, as for a $50 phone card. She looks at me for a moment with a stunned expression and asks "For your phone?" I pause and blink. "No," I say. "It's for my barbecue." |
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| May 14 | Recycling Guy Sorry I haven't been setting up the cam. Friday mornings have been a little weird here lately. Anyhow, last week RG came at 7:05. That's quite a difference from the previous week when the bastard came at 9:16. Right now? It's 10:01 and he's still not here. What the hell is he doing? I think I'm going to get a BB gun. Edit: Recycling guy showed up at 10:43 AM. |
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| May 13 | The Week That Was Summer is finally here in Almonte, Ontario. Today I sat out on Rob and Kris' patio with them while the sun beat down on me and it was that amazing clear-blue-sky but almost-too-warm feeling that I love before the real dog days start in earnest. I'm sitting out on my own front step tonight eating my dinner as the sun goes down (well... it's actually down now, but whatever). No mosquitos, spiders or other creepy crawly things yet. The week has been hard for me. Increased turbulence (that I'm not going to detail here) has made me sad at times. On the ther hand, some new things that are very happy... downright blissful for me are taking place, and that's a gift I never expected at this time in my life. Oh, and by the way: Susan, don't sweat it. It's all good. |
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| May 10 | Some Updates It's been a strage few days. My life has been on a non-stop vortex lately of up and down; pain so bad I never thought I could ever experience something so severe and survive. On the other hand, there have been some new gifts and new blessings that have straightened my back and reminded me of how much I love my life and, like the pain, it's the kind of happiness I never used to think was even possible. Not much in the middle. For those of you who pray: Don't pray for my happiness. Pray for my strength. |
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| May 6 | Ticket to Heaven Ou Dong soup. Added Vietnamese Fish Sauce while cooking. Then add Thai chili/garlic sauce and Hoisin sauce. Eat and go straight to heaven. It's not as good as Pho Tai, but at 12:10 AM in Almonte Ontario it's a really damn good substitute. |
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| May 4 | Breakfast This morning the kids got up before I did. This isn't so unusual because I often sleep until striking distance of Ruth's bus coming. They get up way before I have to and they are good at entertaining themselves. This morning they were rattling around downstairs, which didn't set off my red flags for two reasons: They don't usually get into any trouble when up before me and, also, I was dead asleep for the most part and unable to properly process incoming data. Later, Ruth came up the stairs with Dora in tow and a giant cookie tray with two bowls and a glass of something on it. This was Ruth making breakfast for me. I sat up and tried not to breathe directly on them as Ruth set the tray down. She's aware that I am on a somewhat strict diet, and so she chose the breakfast entreé very carefully: - A bowl of plain Triscuit crackers - A bowl of plain tortilla chips - A glass of Rice Dream fortified rice beverage She also drew a little good morning picture for me that said "I LOVE YOU DAD" on it and there were lots of multicolored sketches of I-wasn't-too-sure-what on it (my eyes were somewhat bleary). And so it was this morning at 7:09 AM, EST: I sat in my bed with my two little girls eating nachos, crackers, drinking rice milk and having a lovely little time. |
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| May 3 | Baked Beans Note to self: The kids don't like baked beans. They won't eat them no matter what you do. Stop lying to yourself. |
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| April 30 | Foiled. The cam is off now and no-one (including me) got a look at the Recycling Guy this morning. I believe he arrived around 7 AM EST, but I'm not sure. I slept in kinda late. I did cap some pics through the day. Interestingly enough I managed to catch him going in the other direction (as you can see from the pics below). And, just for the hell of it, I caught a schoolbus. But... I'll have the cam back up next week.
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| April 29 | RGC is Live Ok. The cam is live and the link is here. If you don't know about the Recycling Guy Cam yet, read the April 22 entry below. Be on the lookout. I'll be watching, but you guys are my ears and eyes. |
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| April 29 | It's That Time Recycling Guy Cam getting set up tonight. If you see him on the cam, make sure you note the time and, by all means, grab the photos. I might miss it, depending on when he shows up. Hang in there. I'll get it set up shortly. |
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| April 29 | Learn Something New Every Day "People with ADD don't have enough neurotransmitters, especially dopamine, and so the brain doesn't work unless you are genuinely interested." My friend Jon told me about that. It explains an awful lot. "the minds of people with this issue--he [author of a book we were discussing] didn't call it ADD, but a "reward system dysfunction"--follow a very efficient strategy--> maximize the production of dopamine, since we don't have enough. No interest in something, no dopamine. The brain's survival strategy kicks into gear." Survival. Interesting, huh? |
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| April 28 | Stinkyfeet Diary Not for the faint of heart: This is a journal from a site called TheSpark.com where the author spends the better part of a month trying to give himself athlete's foot. I seriously laughed out loud while reading this, and I never do that when I'm on the net reading stuff (sorry, folks... even if I tell you that I'm LOL, I'm not LOL). In a world of Livejournal Entries where people talk about how much they hate their job, how their schoolwork is lagging or how they like candy, this guy really writes the kind of stuff I'd love to have the ability to write. Not that I want to go to that extreme, but I love the guts and I seriously burst out chuckling many times. But take that part I said about it not being safe for the squeamish seriously. Really. |
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| April 28 | The High Point Of My Day My bright point of the day was this morning with my youngest daughter Dora. I realized just how darn well Dora and I get along. We have amazing chemistry and it's such a great feeling. I had a great morning for that reason. The rest of the day was vomit in a travel mug. |
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| April 27 | I Want A Cookie As you all know, I'm on a rather tight diet. It's of my own doing; I wasn't forced onto it. I just thought it'd be a good thing to do. Well, I bought a bag of cookies for my kids because I thought they'd like to have one occasionally (parents will know that once in a while we stoop to bribery to get them doing what you want them to do. It's shameful). The problem is that I can't be anywhere in the house where I don't think I'm smelling those lousy cookies. Now I can't get them out of my head. It's torturing me. Must not give in. Update... No, wait. It's not the cookie I want. It's something else. I can't put my finger on what. As I have alluded to before, I haven't had a great month. I've lost a career opportunity that I thought might be excellent. I've lost my best friend. I've lost my true love. I've a certain amount of access to my kids. I've become aware of some serious health problems that are probably going to affect me for the rest of my life. All in one month. My gyroscope has officially been tipped over. I'm profoundly lonely and making my way forward in this strange morass of emotion, mostly because my children are watching me and learning about how one deals with adversity by studying my every move. I'm struggling, but I'll land on my feet. I promise. In the mean time, I want a cookie. Diet be damned: I'm going to go eat one. |
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| April 23 | If You Had 9:16 AM, EST In The Recycling Guy Pool, You're A Winner! After running the Recycling Guy Cam all night, I finally caught him taking the recycling away (the cam is off now by the way). It was a solid 9:16 AM EST that he showed up, and this small photojournal below illustrates it (click to enlarge).
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| April 22 | Recycling Guy Cam Now Online It's Thursday night. That means tomorrow the Recycling Guy is going to come and pick up the recycling. I decided to set up a cam by my front door so that you can see what I'm talking about. This cam will update every 30 seconds so you can check out how long my recycling has to sit on the curb. Here's the cam. It'll be active till tomorrow AM. I should warn you that during the night hours it may not be so clear (not sure how this cam deals with low light), but in the morning hours it'll be 100% visible. And then you can see my arch-nemesis. Will it be 7 AM? 10 AM? 12 noon? No one knows. Least of all, me. You can grab the latest image here. The image will appear foggy because the window the cam is looking through is foggy due to me doing some drying of clothes in the house. It'll clear soon. Safari users might have to empty their cache between viewings (it's a Safari thing). If you don't want to do that, I suggest you check the image in a different browser like IE. Anyhow, yeah. That's my car. This is my street. Last but not least... that is my recycling in the blue box. |
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| April 22 | Important Message Tonight I'm going to try to set up a webcam that I'll leave on all night and, hopefully, you can watch to see what the recycling guy does and when he's going to show up. I'm currently looking for software to run this that I don't have to pay for. Any suggestions? (Macintosh-only please. Duh) Update: I ended up using something called "Wuffcam". Check back in a bit and I'll turn the cam on. I want you to see the recycling guy. |
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| April 18 | Regarding Tron And The Desire To Be Part Of It I was just reading a thing about this guy who set out to make himself an outfit/costume based on the movie Tron. A fellow named Jay Maynard goes through the various steps he took to actually create a "Tron" suit which includes fabric paint, electroluminescent wire and stuff he bought off Ebay. Now, it's clear that there's lots to make fun of there; first off, the guy doesn't have Superhero written all over him (not that I'm throwing stones; I'm not exactly Adonis myself). Secondly, I can't really figure out what the real-world application of an outfit like that would be. Do you wear it to the supermarket? Do you use it to pick up chicks? What exactly is its purpose? I mean, sure... I play a purposeless hobby called Warhammer, but I don't dress up like Warhammer dudes (though some do). I don't suppose those things are so important, but what really keeps me scratching my head is this: Who is going to look at this and then think that this belongs alongside it? I do kind of admire the guy's tenacity though. |
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| April 18 | Happy Birthday, Shawn. Who knows when or if I'll get a chance to tell you. You were co-star in many of my happiest memories over the last 12 months and I hope your next 12 months are full of joy, whether I'm there to co-star or not. |
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| April 18 | Crisis and Opportunity In Chinese, it's the same thing. |
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| April 16 | The Recycling Guy I hate the Recycling Guy Every Friday morning is "Garbage Day". The Garbage Guys come around and pick up the garbage (I'm sure you were able to piece that together on your own, but I'm trying to be thorough). They're normally here between 9 AM and 11 AM. Those are civilized hours; by that point Ruth is at school, I've been up for a while, everything's moving along. It's simple and easy to take care of. The Recycling Guy also comes by on Friday morning, but he's a little different. As a responsible citizen in my community, I do make a point of trying to recycle. I almost always have a blue box full of empty plastic containers, boxes and newspapers, so getting it dealt with on Fridays is always of interest to me. The problem is that the Recycling Guy isn't reliable. He comes at different times. For a while he was coming at 6 AM. If you know me at all you'll know that there's no way in hell I'm going to get up at 6 AM to sort recycling and put it outside (particularly during the winter months, which is when the 6 AM visits began). I therefore put the recycling out the night before, no matter how little I felt like it. I got into the habit of doing this and before long the Recycling Guy stopped coming so early and started showing up at around 10 AM. A person can't help but ask themselves why it is that they're going out in the middle of the night to put out recycling when they could just as easily do it at 8 or 9 AM and still come in well under the deadline. I stopped doing the recycling late at night (which was nice because I found it hard to remember and inconvenient) and started doing it first thing on Friday morning. That was about the time when the Recycling Guy decided to start coming at 6 AM again. Regularly. On goes our evil chess game of me trying to strike a balance between having to put the recycling out so long before it arrives that it's impossible to really remember and putting it out too late and having to bring it back into the house for another week (which I always thought of as a "mock execution", if you will, for cereal boxes and maple syrup bottles). I've spent too much time waking up at dawn and fretting about whether or not I have the time to get the recycling out before he arrives, and forcing myself out of bed to do it despite the fact that (unknown to me) his arrival is still three to four hours away. I've spent too much time coming home at the end of the day to see the recycling still sitting on the curb, a sure sign that –no– 7 AM wasn't actually early enough. Try again next week. Last night I put out the recycling. I got in at about 1:30 and I was really dog tired... so much so that I had to literally drag myself back out with my eyelids nearly shut and put the damned recycling on the curb, just in case he put in an appearance before I was awake the following day. Today I stood at the window and watched Recycling Guy as he arrived to pick up the blue box of goodies. He had the Doobie Brothers' "Listen To The Music" blaring from his truck (you have to play while reading this story it to get the full effect: .wmv or .ram). He empties the recycling and then drives on. I am incoherent with rage. I am stupified with anger. I very much desire to cause him physical harm. Why? Because it's 1:00 PM. |
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| April 15 | We Have A Winner Today. Today was definitely the worst day of my life. No matter what comes after this, it can only get better. Lucky me. |
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| April 12 | Oh, look at that. I was wrong. At first I thought April 9 was the worst day of my life. Ho ho ho. How wrong I was. It turns out TODAY is the worst day of my life. Really makes me look forward to tomorrow, I can tell you that much. |
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| April 11 | On the subject of ApostrophesDear Mister Language Person: What is the purpose of the apostrophe?Thanks, Christine. |
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| April 10 | Felt Like One More This is the week's Friday Five. Thought I'd answer it while I was on a roll. 1. What do you do for a living? I play and review Macintosh computer games, and am published in both print and web. 2. What do you like most about your job? I love the people I get to meet. I love writing. I love that I can be at home with my children. I love that it brings out the best of my characteristics and seems not to touch on my worst. 3. What do you like least about your job? I often feel as though I am contributing exactly zilch to the world by doing this job. 4. When you have a bad day at work it's usually because _____... ...someone didn't do something they said they were going to do. 5. What other career(s) are you interested in? Honestly, no joke, I've often thought I'd like to work in Florida on the beach renting Jet-Skis to tourists from a small shack under a palm tree. I know that sounds like I'm making it up, but I'm really not. It'd be such a 180 degree change from where I am at present that I have to admit... I daydream about it from time to time. |
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| April 10 | Filler. I'm doing one of those dumbass Livejournal-style quizzes, mainly because I can't stand seeing that last post at the top of my blog page anymore. Ok, buckle yourself in because this is probably going to be pretty boring. // series one - as usual -- Name: Joel William Corey Tamas -- Birthdate: May 28, 1969 -- Birthplace: Sydney, Nova Scotia -- Current Location: Almonte, Ontario -- Eye Color: Green -- Hair Color: Brown -- Righty or Lefty: Righty -- Zodiac Sign: Gemini -- Innie or Outtie: Innie // series two - describe -- The shoes you wore today: Black Doc Martins, thick sole, could use a bit of a shine -- Your hair: Short, neat, unremarkable -- Your eyes: Weary -- Your weakness: Too many to list -- Your fears: Also too many to list -- Your perfect pizza: Sun-dried tomatoes, soft crust, oregano you can actually taste -- One thing you'd like to achieve: Balance // series three - what is -- Your most overused phrase on AIM: "____, Amigo", as in "Thanks, Amigo" or "Hey, Amigo" or "Don't spread those naked photos around, Amigo" -- Your thoughts first waking up: "How much longer can I sleep before I risk putting the trash out too late and missing the garbage truck?" -- The first feature you notice in the opposite sex: Attitude and personality. -- Your best physical feature: I have an extremely straight nose. -- Your bedtime: I aim for 11:00 PM, but usually achieve 1:00 AM. -- Your greatest fear: Going through my entire life without realizing my full potential -- Your greatest accomplishment: I doubt I've done it yet. To date? Probably learning how to pay rent on time. -- Your most missed memory: Too many to list. // series four - you prefer -- Pepsi or coke: Pepsi, but I don't drink either. -- McDonald's or Burger King: Just the thought of either makes me feel ill. -- Single or group dates: I don't date, myself, but I think group dates can be very good. -- Adidas or nike: Whose life is so empty that they seriously give a sh*t? I mean, really. -- Lipton Ice Tea or Nestea: Neither. Make it yourself. -- Chocolate or vanilla: Chocolate, though I don't eat that either. -- Cappuccino or coffee: Latté. -- Boxers or briefs: Boxers // series five - do you -- Smoke: Just a cigar every year or two. -- Cuss: WAY too much. It's something I really need to work on. -- Sing well: Well enough for what I sing, but not well enough to sing more than I do. -- Take a shower everyday: Normally I do, though I might skip a day here or there. -- Have a crush(es): I may have had one in the past but it registered so low on my richter scale that I can't even remember it. -- who are they: Who knows? Not me, obviously. -- Do you think you've been in love: Yeah, only every day since birth. -- Want to go to college: No thanks. Been there, done that. Got the degree. -- Like high school: I actually believe that high school is one of the most harmful things a young mind can be subjected to. -- Want to get married: A second time? No thanks. I'm still recovering from the first time. -- Type with your fingers on the right keys: Pretty much always. -- Believe in yourself: Depends when you ask. -- Get motion sickness: Never. -- Think you're attractive: At times, sure. Everyone can be attractive if they want to. -- Think you're a health freak: That's my objective, yeah. -- Get along with your parents: Can't complain. -- Like thunderstorms: I think so. There's something about staring out the window at a torrent of rain with flashes of light behind it that makes me meditative. -- Play an instrument: Guitar, mostly. // series six - in the past month, did/have you -- Drank alcohol: Last time was 20 years ago. -- Smoke(d): Never had the interest. -- Done a drug: See "Drank Alcohol" -- Have Sex: That's a bit too personal, but yeah... I have. -- Made Out: Is this suggesting that one normally has sex (see above) without making out? WTF? -- Go on a date: Uh, no. -- Go to the mall?: The mall? I don't think so. A mall? Sure. -- Eaten an entire box of Oreos: (vomiting sound) -- Been on stage: No, but if you had asked a little earlier I could have said yes. -- Been dumped: I've put in a status request. I'll get back to you. -- Gone skating: No. Too busy having all that sex I mentioned above. -- Made homemade cookies: I don't think I've ever done that in my life. -- Been in love: In the last month? If you count it as a continuation of one that started a while back, sure. -- Gone skinny dipping: I'm in freaking Canada. The snow isn't even gone yet. Give me a break. -- Dyed your hair: No. -- Stolen anything: No, but I'm thinking about taking it up. // series seven - have you ever -- Played a game that required removal of clothing?: No... or yes, I did, but it was so unremarkable that I can't remember it now. -- Been trashed or extremely intoxicated: 20 years ago, yeah. -- Been caught "doing something": Something? Yes. Something? No. -- Been called a tease: I wish. -- Gotten beaten up: Not really. -- Shoplifted: No. -- If so, did you get caught: WTF? -- Changed who you were to fit in: Haven't we all? // series eight - the future -- Age you hope to be married: Bit late for that discussion, I think. -- Numbers and Names of Children: Two girls, Dora and Ruth. -- Describe your Dream Wedding: Three things: a) Iron Butterfly, b) Macaroni salad, c) Wireless high speed access. -- How do you want to die: Sword. Straight through the heart in one stroke. -- Where you want to go to college: Again? No where. -- What do you want to be when you grow up: Ninja with laser eyeballs. -- What country would you most like to visit: Different countries for different reasons. Let's say Iran for the moment.. // series nine - opposite sex -- Best eye color? Don't care about the middle part, but I do like white around the outside. -- Best hair color? If she's got hair then hey, she's got the interview. -- Short or long hair?: Short or long doesn't matter. Don't go in-between with the mullet. -- Best height: Tall enough not to need a phone book on the chair while we eat dinner. -- Best weight: I really have no preference, aside from the aversion to extremes on one end or the other. -- Best articles of clothing: Kangaroo costume with working pouch. -- Best first date location: Mental instituation, Obsessive/Compulsive Disorder Ward... because it'd be clean. -- Best first kiss location: Right here, right now. // series ten - number of -- Number of girls I have kissed in my life/Number of girls you have made out with/Number of girlfriends you've had/Number of boys I have kissed/Number of boys you have made out with/Number of boyfriends you've had/Number of drugs taken illegally: Not answering any of these. Sorry. I will say that if I were to answer them, I would most certainly take exception to the distinction between kissing and making out. I would like to see the manual, please. -- Number of people I could trust with my life: Right now? List is kinda thin. -- Number of CDs that I own: Maybe about 100. -- Number of piercings: One in each ear. -- Number of tattoos: One. A triple forte on my shoulder. Kinda looks like this, but without the box around it. -- Number of times my name has appeared in the newspaper?: Too many to count. No, really. -- Number of scars on my body: Maybe about four. -- Number of things in my past that I regret: I don't know if numbers go that high. |
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| April 9 | What we believe Today was probably the worst day of my life. I thought I had some bad days, but today was the worst. I'm scoping my memory as far back as I can and I really can't think of any day I've had which tops this one in pure horror. I am in extreme pain with no end in sight. Naturally I can't get into the details too much here. Some of it is just plain too intimate. Most of you will understand; some things don't belong in a blog. It begs the question of what it is that we think this is about. Why do we go through these things? Why do we suffer? I believe that gold is purified by fire. It exists in its imperfect form when it's mined and, with refinement and extreme heat, gold becomes what it is meant to be. So it is with the human heart. When the fire comes it's meant to burn away the impurities and pollution. It burnishes and polishes you. It makes you realize what matters and what doesn't. I'll sit here and savor the experience, terrible as it is. Why? Because this is how we grow. |
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| April 8 | Chicago O'Hare I was recently in the Chicago O'Hare airport for a short layover on a brief trip out west. O'Hare is a large airport and, unlike Ottawa's pretensions of being a teeming hub of connectivity, O'Hare really is a teeming hub of activity. There are peculiar technologies implemented there which exist for the sole purpose of managing enormous crowds moving from point A to point B. Case in point: on the way to terminal C, which is a roughly ten minute walk from the terminal where I first arrived, there is a long underground corridor that includes a roughly two or three minute ride on a moving conveyor-belt sidewalk (where you can choose either to walk or just stand still and be carried along by the machinery). Above the moving sidewalk is a gentle, soft light display of many soothing colors that undulates in nonthreatening, agreeable ways. At the same time, speakers pipe in a light, elfin chorus of soft bells, much like an idiot savant version of Lionel Hampton playing twelve-tone row. There's no melody or process of tension-release (as is the norm with most music). Instead, this is a never starting, never ending rambling of peaceful, meditative music meant to accompany the lights in creating an atmosphere of non-specific glee and safety. What I immediately realized is that the management of hundreds and thousands of travelers – all running late, tired and feeling uncomfortable in the bovine-like flow – has become an issue due to O'Hare's massive size. Thus, we find ourselves subjected to this mind-numbing display of non-committal sensory ticklings intended to keep us from feeling the urge to commit homicide. It seems to be working; I purposely played a little game with myself where I let the moving sidewalk carry me while I stood still and listened very closely to the bells and watched the lights. Then, I tried to imagine strangling someone to death (I'll decline to identify whom just at the moment). Oddly enough I had a hard time picturing how to do it and, instead, could only imagine me and my victim staring into each others' eyes, having completely forgotten why it was we were face-to-face and having a weak, puzzled discussion about why we can't remember our own names. A good parallel would be the scene from Finding Nemo where Dori and Marlin find that big fish with the teeth that has a light bulb hanging off its forehead. I begin to feel apprehensive about the fact that it could all be a trap to lure me into an abattoir and succumb to being filleted without putting up a fight. The moving sidewalk ends and bumps me back onto tile. The sensory hallucination is over. I head to gate C4. |
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| April 7 | Google Go to http://images.google.com/ and enter my name ("Corey Tamas"). The results are pretty impressive. |
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| April 6 | Simple I'm having a bad month. A really bad one. I don't feel like updating my online diary. I don't feel like doing much other than crawling under a rock and becoming compost. It's a bad month for me. Very bad. Extremely bad. I thought you might want to know. No need for flowers or Blue Mountain web postcards (in fact, please don't send those. They suck). I'm just having a bad month. I'l let you know when the horror of it is over. In the mean time, go look at something funny. I'll be back before long, I'm sure. |
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| March 27 | Dumb mistake == Nasty, sick feeling... Today I accidentally erased all the trash in my email client. That might not sound like much, because my in and out boxes are still intact. The problem is that I had over 22,000 emails in that trash box. I used to search them like they were my archives... finding email that goes back many, many years. If I ever found myself saying "what was the name of that guy who, in 2001, wrote to me and asked about a palmpilot", I could just do a query on my trash folder. I know that some folks probably would prescribe that I keep all that stuff in an "archive" folder somewhere, but... a bit late for that now. I sort of want to vomit. |
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| March 27 | The conundrum For some reason today I have itchy palms. They're extremely itchy. I don't know why. They're driving me nuts. The problem is that I don't want to tell anyone about it because I think there's a dirty joke about itchy palms and I just don't have the heart to hear it right now. |
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| March 26 | Oddly enough... So that was a real long break, huh? Today I felt really crummy. Very bad mood. See, I've had the week from Hell. Some people say they've had the week from Hell because of some extra work or some troubles at home. I would like them all to collectively shut it. This week has SUCKED for me. Sucked from day one all the way up to the last microsecond of day last. Bad week. Very bad week. So this morning I was feeling way blue. I decided I would try some self-medicating. I went to the nearby mall and decided to buy myself some jeans, as I haven't got any good blue jeans currently in my drawers. After I bought them, however, I still felt like crap. I went ahead and bought myself an awesome new jacket (this, in fact, but in a better color). Still didn't feel good. I then proceded to buy myself a pair of new sunglasses. Still not better. I got a shoe-shine. Still nothing. I even bought some writable DVDs for $2 apiece (that's really cheap). Still feeling like crap. Then I got my hair cut and you know what? I felt better. As far as the pants go, I'm glad to report something that shocked me: since the last time I bought pants (about 8 or 9 months ago I guess?) I've lost six sizes. It sounds like a celebration for me, except that I'm still sorta fat, which begs the question what kind of beluga whale I probably was 8 or 9 months ago. Ok, now stop bugging me. I'm on break. |
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| March 26 | Little Break I'll be taking a break from my blog for a short while. There's stuff going on in my life that I can't post here (I might later, though) and I'm not particularly inspired to write anyhow. I figured rather than listen to everyone tell me that I'm not updating enough that I'd try just letting you know that I'll be back at it probably within a week or so. Good? Good. |
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| March 24 | Various Ways To Lose Weight The first way I've been losing weight is in exactly the method you'd guess: My fat ass is shrinking. I shaved my goatee off the other day as a lark (the one on my face; I don't have one on my ass) and once it was gone I was struck by the difference in my appearance since the last time I had a clean face. At first my reaction was that I thought I looked like I was sick, but then I was like "Oh, no... that's not it... you're actually becoming less of a fat bastard". So that was good. I'm having trouble sticking to this crazyass diet I keep telling you all about; I like eating junky food a lot and it's convenient to get ahold of (what's easier to get when you're out on the town: Pepsi or Soy Milk?), but I'm trying my best to stick to it. I think the effects are becoming manifested, so I like that. I don't care about getting wrinkles. I don't care about getting grey hair. I don't really even care about my receding hairline. The fat, however, has to go. I'm also losing some weight by taking my Warhammer stuff and storing it in my back room. The amount of space opened up in my office by removing all Warhammer-related items is striking. I decided that I should pay a little less attention to Warhammer just now and that I should, instead, focus on my home and family a bit more. I was amazed, however, when I managed to fill about five really big boxes with various crap. I didn't realize I had THAT much stuff. It's a little embarassing, actually. I've also decided that I'm going to sell a big chunk of my stuff off on Ebay (my Necron and Tau armies, for those of you who are interested). The cash would be a treat to have, the extra space in my office would be great to keep and, most of all, I want to simplify my life a bit. I'm not quite ready to be completely done with Warhammer yet, but... I'm almost starting to lean that way. I'll probably finish a lot of my painting before I do though: Just to say "It's done" and also to get a higher price when I resell it. What I'll do after that, I have no idea. Perhaps I will begin to interact with cool people again and discuss things other than how dice might actually be sentient. |
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| March 24 | Overheard in the Bath: My two girls in the bath playing with their toy mermaids: Dora: ...and the prince wanted to marry me. Ruth: But you did not want to marry him because he was too scabby. Dora: And he was too kissy. He wanted to kiss me and stuff. Ruth: Yeah. Yucky. |
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| March 23 | Another thing: When I re-read my post of March 18 ("Right Now) I realize that I spelled "Soda" wrong. I decided to leave it because I think "Sodae" may be the plural of "Soda" in Latin, and I love that. It makes me want to say it more. Incidentally, yes... the wings and sodae were not part of my diet. I'm back on it now, btw. I had a few days of weakness. No more chicken wings and sodae for a while. p.s. Sodae. |
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| March 23 | For the record: Death Race 2000 sucks... like, a lot. |
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| March 18 | Right Now I'm about 1 minute from getting into the bath and soaking there while my laptop is on a stool next to the tub so I can watch Death Race 2000 and on another stool (lower) will be some chicken wings and sodae. I may be there all night. Seeya, suckers. |
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| March 18 | A Conversation with Devin Kent. Devin: I feel I should tell you, I read through the entire archive of your blog this morning. ;) Corey: Oh yeah? What did you think? Devin: Well, it was interesting to see your vow to not swear slowly crumble away. ;) But you must have been doing something right because I certainly kept reading. Corey: Oh yeah. I kinda let myself down on that, huh? Devin: Little bit, little bit. At least you tried, though. Corey: I did! Corey: At least I don't say FUCK Devin: Also, I could've gone my whole life without seeing your buttcrack and not have been unhappy about it, but alas. Devin: Other than that, I enjoyed myself. ;) Corey: Serves you right for clicking. Corey: And for the record, I think my photos of Celine Dion are much scarier. Devin: Unfortunately, most of the links are broken. So I only saw the thumbs-up one. Corey: That's the worst one anyhow. |
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| March 17 | Still got nothing... sorta. It's true. I still got nothing. Kris, however, did send me a little tidbit: It's a collection of dumb AIM conversations. It's not going to appeal to all of you, but... if you're like me then you'll recognize the strange humor of some of the teeth-grinding vacuousness of some of the users of this great big Internet. Let me give you an example of the kind of thing I'm talking about: SkyGurl4: yah know yuor icon...is that you?Here. |
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| March 15 | I got nothing I really do want to update my diary, here. It's not that I don't want to. But I got nothing. I don't really feel like telling you about what's transpired since the last time I made an entry (last Friday). Some of the stories are just too banal (Warhammer games) and other things that might be really cool (meeting of the Almonte Social Action Players) are really only interesting to me; at least to the degree that I don't know how to tell the tale to you to keep you reading. Come back in a couple days. I'll see if I can work up something to write about. There's still snow on the ground so the odds are good that during the week I'm going to fall in it while strangers pass by. |
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| March 15 | Dear Colleen, I told Colleen to read my blog (which she hadn't yet). Note to Colleen: References to you, specifically, go back no further than November 27, so you don't have to read back any further than that unless you want to read about how a can of Diet Coke exploded in my car, how I glued my eyeball shut and how my cat shoves her ass in the toothbrushes. By the way, I get about 150 - 200 hits a day on this webpage (on a good day) and now they all know you're a good kisser. Expect some email and phone calls. |
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| March 12 | Friday Five Here's the Friday Five. Corey is officially out of ideas. 1. What was the last song you heard? In its entirety? Probably the one I played on the bass this morning. It's a song I wrote that doesn't have a title yet. 2. What were the last two movies you saw? Prophecy (IMDB), which sucked. The Corporation (IMDB), which literally changed my life. 3. What were the last three things you purchased? Tickets to The Corporation (see above) Vietnamese dinner with Pho Tai and spring rolls Parking 4. What four things do you need to do this weekend? Get a can of paint from a guy (for use in the painting contest thing I mentioned below), go to a pot luck dinner for all the cast of Everyday Impossible (and write little love letters for them), have a birthday party for my youngest daughter tonight and I should really try out the press copy of the Return of the King videogame for Macintosh. 5. Who are the last five people you talked to? Sophie, Ruth, Dora, Rob Riendeau, Joy Stratford (wasn't that thrilling? There arent' many among you who know who they all are). |
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| March 11 | Oh, Yeah... a few other things... I got food poisoning today somehow. I sort of feel like what it would feel like to have a screwdriver shoved into your stomach, only with about 10 or 12 more trips to the bathroom per day. It's a real party over here. Some important stuff is happening that I'mdying to tell you about, but I can't yet. Maybe early April or something. Anyhow, I know something you don't know. Neener. |
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| March 11 | Gee. Is It March Already? After getting pestered to update this site (thanks Rachael, Marla, Colin, Christine, Beth, etc) I decided it was time to actually do it. The problem is that I get into this repeating cycle where a lot of stuff happens and I don't feel like taking time to write about it yet, and then more stuff happens, and the less I wanna tackle that huge job, and then more stuff happens, and you get the idea. Then I've got people telling me things like "Your blog needs updating. Get to it nerd boy. Or else". Let's get down to it. Happy And Merry Intercalary... In the Baha'i Calendar there are nineteen days per month and nineteen months to the year. This leaves four days at the end of February (five on leap years like this one) we call "intercalary days" or, in the original Arabic (I think it is), Ayyam-i-ha. Ayyam-i-ha is what Baha'is do instead of Christmas. We exchange presents, we get together with family, in general we have a whole lot of fun during this festival. Most importantly is that for my kids, who aren't Christian and have to grin and bear it when the rest of the world is making a big whoop over Christmas, finally get to have a party all their own with presents aplenty. They get to dress up in their fancy dresses,do all sorts of fun things and enjoy a holiday as all kids should. It does a parent's heart good to see it. Fast Times In Almonte Following Ayyam-i-ha is the period of the Baha'i Fast, which we are currently in. Baha'is refrain from eating anything between sunup and sundown (including the drinking of water or whatever). Every morning before the sun rises I get out of bed (which for me is a Herculean effort) and woof down some food that will get me through the day. When I tell people about the Fast the reactions vary from "How the hell can you actually DO that?" to "Just sunup to sundown? You call that a Fast?" For me it's not that bad (Sophie is a different matter – she turns into a moron when she goes without food. It's actually kind of amusing). I do have to admit that, because of the diet I'm on (that I told you about before), it's kind of hard to get up at 5:30 AM and stare at a bowl of yogurt and flax seed oil, but... what's the point in believing in something if you're not going to at least give it a go, right? The fast ends on the 21st (on a holiday we call Naw Ruz, which means "New Year"). The Last Time I Will Ever Kiss Colleen (*sigh*) The play I was in is now done. For those of you who have been following the progress of my thesbian activities, you'll know that I had some trepidation about kissing a certain "Colleen" in the first act, scene 3. Well, I've managed to plant one on her upwards of a dozen times since (all within the context of the play, you pervert), and I gotta say – she got it down pretty good. I wanted to mention that to her, but there's no real way for a man to say to a woman "Hey, your kissing technique is really darn good" without giving the wrong impression. Just trust me on this. Of course, I also had to traipse around the stage in my underwear (silk boxers with red hearts on them) and make serious smoochola with Rachael Crowder which left my face and neck covered in lipstick and my lips bruised (it's all in the pursuit of dramatic excellence, ladies and gentlemen). After those two things I have to say that kissing Colleen was the least of my worries. Jokes aside, this play (called the Everyday Impossible) was one of the most magical, satisfying, rewarding exeriences I've ever had in my life. Both nights we did it the crowd was absolutely jubilent and – even though it sounds corny – I think we actually inspired some people to make changes in their personal lives. It was about as good as this kind of thing could ever get. I miss my fellow actors. I love them so much and we did such awesome work together. I just hope I'm blessed with a chance to do something like it again. Squash I now own a squash racquet. I do not, however, have the goggles yet. Rob has a squash racquet, too... but mine is better. I Gotta Be Me I've decided to enter a painting contest where you paint Warhammer miniatures up and enter them for judging. I've decided to do a squad of ten of these, except mine won't look like they're made from grape bubble gum. |
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| Februrary 21 | Friday Five Done Right I was considering doing the Friday Five this week, but I don't think anyone can sum up my sentiments better than Peter can. It's like he's right inside my head. |
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| Februrary 21 | Just Wastin' Time Today I listened to Otis Redding's "Dock Of The Bay" about 20 times in a row. I just set iTunes for loop and let it go. The song is so good I don't even have words. Why don't they make music like this anymore? |
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| Februrary 19 | STOP SITTING THERE STARING AT ME ...Stupid cat. |
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| Februrary 17 | Alarms I can't really use an alarm to wake up in the morning. I mean, I can, but it doesn't work the way it should. See, if I know there's an alarm that's going to go off, I start waking up hours ahead of time. I keep waking up every few minutes until it becomes ridiculous to wait for the alarm, and I just reach over, shut it off and get up. It's actually a very stressful way to wake up. No, I prefer to just let my 3 year old come into my bedroom while it's still dark outside and demand that she be fed immediately. At least I sleep right up until the second she arrives. |
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| Februrary 17 | Chimwemwe This is a photo of my best friend Chimwemwe on Kasungu Mountain in Malawi. Just looking at him makes my heart happy. |
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| Februrary 16 | I Am Not Your Help Desk The thing about running a Macintosh gaming site for a living is that people have this strange idea that you're their personal tech support desk and are directly affiliated with Apple – possibly even receiving shares from profits. I find myself getting email from people who not only expect me to fix whatever their Mac-related problems are, but are really huffy about it to boot. For instance, I once got an email with a very short message therein that said "THE GAME IS NOT WORKING!!! I DEMAND YOU GET BUSY AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!!!" No signature or anything. Just the irate message. I didn't even recognize the name on the email address. I think, however, my favorite thing is when people try to threaten me with buying a PC if things aren't going their way; like if I think you're going to buy a PC then I'm going to suddenly straighten up and fly right before that terrible calamity takes place. "Dear Sir, I find the performance of Halo on my Blueberry iMac unacceptable. You had best look into this matter because I am very, very close to giving up completely and purchasing a PC. Signed - Some guy". I get tons of these. No joke. So here's my response: Dear Some Guy Who Is Threatening Me With Buying A PC, |
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| Februrary 16 | Cleanin' Up This morning I took the entirety of year one of this blog and put it into the archives (linked at the top of this page). We'll see if that makes the bandwidth consumption any better. Not that I actually care. I added a brief "Who am I" at the top of this page. There are more people comin' through here reading my blog lately and I thought I should maybe post some kind of Corey Tamas summary. It was either that or the photo of my butt. |
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| Februrary 15 | Nerdfest Ok, let's not make a big deal out of this. I got my brother's digital camera and took a bunch of shots of my Warhammer miniatures. |
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| Februrary 14 | The Things We Learn Last night I went out with Shawn and my brother, Terry. We went to East Side Mario's and had us some wings. That's right; I had wings too. They don't happen to be part of the diet I'm currently observing, as the Coke I drank is full of sugar and the sauce for the wings is as well. But they were tasty. Yes, they were. Unfortunately, the taste of the wings is the last real chance I had to experience any pleasure where the food was concerned. It took maybe half an hour before the entire meal gripped my lower innards like an alligator with a Welsh Corgi. It seems that asking my internals to deal with hot sauce, caffeine and sugar after two weeks of yogurt, almonds and Perrier is too much to ask. I was having a pretty good time playing trivia and teaching Shawn sign language 101 until I had to run to the men's room and stay there for quite some time. So it goes in nature where things just right themselves on their own. I won't be eating any wings from East Side Mario's any time soon. |
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| Februrary 13 | Wow. Has It Been A Week Already? Friday Five. Q'uelle surprise. 1. Are you superstitious? No, but I believe in spiritual forces having an effect on the material world, so some people might accuse me of taking karma into account when making decisions and plans. 2. What extremes have you heard of someone going to in the name of superstition? I love the football/baseball/basketball players or coaches who win a game and then don't shave, shower, change clothes, fix their hair or anything because they think it'll keep the streak alive. They start out the season looking like Brad Pitt and end it looking like this guy. 3. Believer or not, what's your favorite superstition? Well, ok. This is muy stupid because I'm not even superstitious, but I've had this streak for about 10 years where every January 23rd something bad happens to me. Girls break up with me, gigs fall through, injury happens. Like I said, I'm not superstitious but I just keep noticing this. Except this year I was ok. Who knows why? I'm actually feeling a little sheepish telling everyone this. 4. Do you believe in luck? If yes, do you have a lucky number/article of clothing/ritual? Luck? Not really. I don't believe in randomness. I don't believe things happen for no reason. 5. Do you believe in astrology? Why or why not? I do to an extent. Its roots are in the Zoroastrian religion, which taught its followers to study the stars. You might remember the Three Wise Men from the Bible who found Jesus using a star; they were Zoroastrians. I believe the word "Zodiac" is a derivative of "Zoroaster". But how much of the original teachings are found in the Zodiac we know today? I doubt much, if any. Still, it's worthy investigation. |
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| Februrary 12 | I Almost Lapped The Friday Five The Friday Five is supposed to be done on Friday, but I didn't do it on Friday, did I? I'm doing it on Thursday evening. That means tomorrow there will be a new one. Those of you who read my blog who aren't too bright will see one Friday Five posted here and then tomorrow, when another one is released (and if I decide to do it), will say "Wow. Has it been a week already?" I'm doing this Friday Five, despite it being a bit lame, because I'm trying to make a point of updating my blog relatively often. Rachael gets upset when I don't and I don't want to fall out of favor with Rachael. She's vicious. 1. What's the most daring thing you've ever done? I asked someone to give me $15,000 of his own money so I could make part of a video game, and then another $85,000 for the rest of it. And he agreed. 2. What one thing would you like to try that your mother/friend/significant other would never approve of? Drop everything I'm doing, all my work projects, all my responsibilities, start a new band and start playing clubs and bars and other seedy places. Also, I'd get a Flying-V shaped guitar so I could pretend I was in KISS. 3. On a scale of 1-10, what's your risk factor? (1=never take risks, 10=it's a lifestyle) On the inside I'm a 9.5, but out of consideration for other people in my life I hover around 2-3. 4. What's the best thing that's ever happened to you as a result of being bold/risky? I tried mixing basmati rice with oyster sauce and balsamic vinegar once, and... it turned out to be a hell of a snack that I continued eating for years. 5. ... and what's the worst? I don't really know. For whatever reason, all my bold risks seem to work out. |
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| Februrary 11 | The Mind Boggles Why do people still use this? |
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| Februrary 11 | Getting Ruth Ready For School There are many days when I get both kids started on their day all by my lonesome, and today was just such a day. We have a routine where her and her sister get dressed, eat breakfast, play some, brush their teeth and hair, and then I take Ruth to the bus stop while Dora waits indoors (don't worry; the bus stop is about five paces from the front door. Dora usually watches me through the window). Most parents will know this without having to be told, but the key element of the morning routine is time; everything has to happen on a very tight schedule. Wake up at X time, dressed by Y, put on coats by Z and then catch the bus. This morning Ruth was dragging her heels because she wanted to color or play with Groovy Girls. I give her as much time to do this as I can. I also give her warnings as the clock ticks. I say "Twenty minutes until bus time, Ruth", and then "Ten minutes" and then "Five" and finally "One minute". This helps her to more easily transition from play time to bus time. The one thing I always forget is that the clock on my computer (the one I time the warnings by) is about four minutes slower than the one in the kitchen. I know that her bus arrives at 8:15 by the clock in the kitchen, and because I always leave five minutes' grace by the clock on my computer it turns out in actuality that we really have one minute until the bus comes when we commence with dressing in outdoor clothes. I sometimes wish that our coat-and-boots-putting-on-time could be video taped, because I am certain it's funny to watch. It doesn't always feel funny at the time, but I do really epitomize the means-well, but not-too-bright dad. This morning I put her snow pants on backwards. Add 20 seconds to remove and redeploy. I also put her boots on the wrong feet. Fixed that. I eventually grabbed a pair of mittens and put them on her. "Dad," she complained "these are wet inside". Oops. Remove those. Put another on. "DaaaAAAaad... these are wet, TOO" she moans. Ok. So I take a third pair of mittens and put them on her. I ask if they are too small. She says they aren't. Once they're both on she has a whimsical look on her face that says "I was kidding. They ARE too small", and the mittens only just cover her palms, but no further. What's wrong with me, seriously? I tell her to stand on the front step and watch for the bus while I look for another pair in The Bin. The Bin doesn't look deep, but it really is. There are mittens in there that date all the way back to the 18th century and earlier. There are mittens I've forgotten we owned. There are mittens I don't even recognize. I am rifling around in The Bin searching for a pair of mittens that match and having trouble doing it, all the while worried that her bus is going to come. The mitten search is rather like that card game "Concentration", where you flip one card, then another and try to get a match... and the point is trying to remember where all the cards are so you can flip two alike. I find a mitten that looks like it mated with a mitten I saw a few seconds ago. Is it the same mitten? Do I put it under my arm and search for its brother? I do this. Soon I am seeing another mitten that I know I saw a twin for. I store that under my arm as well. We get up to four mittens before I actually get a pair. By this time the outdoor portion of the morning is brief; after so much mitten-hunting and snow-pants-reversing there are only a scant few moments left before the bus arrives. I am standing on the sidewalk facing the corner the bus rounds to make sure I spot it at the earliest moment (lest we fail to leave ourselves time for a proper hug and kiss before she boards). Ruth is behind me on a hill of snow punking around doing something. I am speaking to her absently without facing her. She lifts a snowball roughly four times the size of her head, raises it with both of her little stick arms, and peels me in the back of the skull with it. This is the part of her personality that most reminds me of her mother. When she finally gets on the bus we complete our morning with the very brief but consistent ritual; I watch as the bus pulls away. For once she actually turns in the window and sees me before the bus is gone (she usually doesn't). She's smiling at me but, as the bus pulls away, her little smile melts. My heart breaks. This will haunt me all day. When she gets off the bus in 7.5 hours I will have an extra big hug for her. In the few paces it takes for me to get back to my front door, I spit in the snow. It's the color of green primer. |
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| Februrary 11 | Suffering For Your Art Sometimes after a night when I've been painting a lot of Warhammer stuff with spray-paint green primer, I'll get up in the AM and, after my morning tinkle, I'll blow my nose and see the color of the primer I used the night before filling the Kleenex. This worries me a little bit. I've considered switching to a safer hobby like Golf because you almost never hear of someone blowing Golf balls out their nose. |
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| Februrary 10 | I Am A Dog. With No Plans. Sorry I haven't been updating much lately. I've been meaning to; I often think of things in the car to write or maybe while I'm washing dishes, but it goes right out of my head. Right now I'm trying to manage MacGamer, my game project, my household, different finance things, some freelance work, Warhammer when I can squeeze it in, and some time being a miscreant layabout. That last part is really hard, but the payoff is so very good. I just finished a week-long visit from my mom which actually did not suck! She was funny and generous and easy going and washed dishes and did laundry and, overall, made my load a whole lot lighter. Thanks, mom! I love you! Now... to finish the work I didn't do while she was here. I think I feel an ulcer coming on already. Uggghhhh. |
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| Februrary 6 | Best Quote I've Seen In Ages "i enjoy the photos of dogs on indoor tables best. those dogs are rebellious and can form plans. outdoor table dogs are just being dogs. with no plans." |
