I want to party with these guys.
Particularly, Topi.
Saturday, January 24, 2004
The business continues.
I have been thinking this site needs livening up a bit. Maybe a wacky sidekick is the way to go. My first choice, "Guy Dressed as Mountain" from the Ricola ads was unavailable, though. My second choice, Slim Goodbody, is too distraught over the recent death of Captain Kangaroo. Where does that leave me?
Sidekickless. That's where.
Maybe I should look into corporate sponsorship. I envision My Life as an American Gladiator brought to you by Tostitos. I would be willing to eat a lot of Tostitos for some big corporate sponsorship payoff, I can tell you. Sure, they'll have to airlift my greasy, bloated corpse out of the house after a month of Tostito bingeing, but it'll be worth it. This site will turn into It's a Small World at Disneyland, which was a lesson for all of us in the evils of corporate sponsorship.
I didn't realize for years that It's a Small World was a big ad for Mastercard. The part at the end where all the multicultural dolls are tossing credit cards back and forth and gleefully signing their life away to credit card debt never hit home, until I got a little older and the horrible truth was revealed to me: sure, the English version of the It's a Small World song is all about living together in peace and harmony until your brain starts to dribble out your nose from the sheer cuteness and repetition of it all. But some of the other versions, they're not so innocuous.
Literally translated, the Burmese version heard on It's a Small World:
Buy buy buy buy
Waste waste waste waste
Leave your debt to your children.
My ox has escaped and savaged the village.
You need seventeen Mastercards.
I'm pretty sure on most of the words, anyway.
I have been thinking this site needs livening up a bit. Maybe a wacky sidekick is the way to go. My first choice, "Guy Dressed as Mountain" from the Ricola ads was unavailable, though. My second choice, Slim Goodbody, is too distraught over the recent death of Captain Kangaroo. Where does that leave me?
Sidekickless. That's where.
Maybe I should look into corporate sponsorship. I envision My Life as an American Gladiator brought to you by Tostitos. I would be willing to eat a lot of Tostitos for some big corporate sponsorship payoff, I can tell you. Sure, they'll have to airlift my greasy, bloated corpse out of the house after a month of Tostito bingeing, but it'll be worth it. This site will turn into It's a Small World at Disneyland, which was a lesson for all of us in the evils of corporate sponsorship.
I didn't realize for years that It's a Small World was a big ad for Mastercard. The part at the end where all the multicultural dolls are tossing credit cards back and forth and gleefully signing their life away to credit card debt never hit home, until I got a little older and the horrible truth was revealed to me: sure, the English version of the It's a Small World song is all about living together in peace and harmony until your brain starts to dribble out your nose from the sheer cuteness and repetition of it all. But some of the other versions, they're not so innocuous.
Literally translated, the Burmese version heard on It's a Small World:
Buy buy buy buy
Waste waste waste waste
Leave your debt to your children.
My ox has escaped and savaged the village.
You need seventeen Mastercards.
I'm pretty sure on most of the words, anyway.
Saturday, January 17, 2004
Once again, there have been no posts.
It's like some old industrial era Russian film, with two wizened old peasants huddled around a kerosene lantern for warmth. The crone looks up at the old man, the lamp's meager light dancing in her miasmic, cataract-cloudy pupils, and says "When, Aleksei? When will there again be posts?"
Except she says it in the cyrillic alphabet. You know.
And he replies "Olga, my love. There are no more posts. If God is dead, how can posts be?"
The camera pans away, to a black and grey landscape, past trees that will never bear fruit*, past the Mariachi band, and into the distance.
*ahem*
But the truth is I have been busy. Mighty busy. Like twelve hour days at work kind of busy.
Another thing that has kept me busy is that I took a beginning Photoshop class. I have been using Photoshop for years, but never with any sort of rhyme or reason, and I figured it would be worthwhile to start at the beginning and make sure I have the basic knowledge before moving on to the intermediate course. Consequently, I was in a class with some people who were not terribly astute in the computer arena. One particular woman, sitting a few computers away, would screech out at every instruction "What? What?? How do I do that? It's not working! Help!" and that sort of thing.
My favorite thing she blurted out was when she had to configure the program or something and she panicked and shouted "It wants to know what time zone I'm in!" as if her computer had just asked her to recite pi to twenty-seven decimals.
The class went pretty well, and I got to feel really smart as most of my fellow students lobbed rocks at their monitors and claimed that bad juju was emanating from the light-filled devil-boxes.
And the really important thing is that I learned how to use the Clone Stamp tool. So just back off.
* Because they're not fruit trees.
It's like some old industrial era Russian film, with two wizened old peasants huddled around a kerosene lantern for warmth. The crone looks up at the old man, the lamp's meager light dancing in her miasmic, cataract-cloudy pupils, and says "When, Aleksei? When will there again be posts?"
Except she says it in the cyrillic alphabet. You know.
And he replies "Olga, my love. There are no more posts. If God is dead, how can posts be?"
The camera pans away, to a black and grey landscape, past trees that will never bear fruit*, past the Mariachi band, and into the distance.
*ahem*
But the truth is I have been busy. Mighty busy. Like twelve hour days at work kind of busy.
Another thing that has kept me busy is that I took a beginning Photoshop class. I have been using Photoshop for years, but never with any sort of rhyme or reason, and I figured it would be worthwhile to start at the beginning and make sure I have the basic knowledge before moving on to the intermediate course. Consequently, I was in a class with some people who were not terribly astute in the computer arena. One particular woman, sitting a few computers away, would screech out at every instruction "What? What?? How do I do that? It's not working! Help!" and that sort of thing.
My favorite thing she blurted out was when she had to configure the program or something and she panicked and shouted "It wants to know what time zone I'm in!" as if her computer had just asked her to recite pi to twenty-seven decimals.
The class went pretty well, and I got to feel really smart as most of my fellow students lobbed rocks at their monitors and claimed that bad juju was emanating from the light-filled devil-boxes.
And the really important thing is that I learned how to use the Clone Stamp tool. So just back off.
* Because they're not fruit trees.
Friday, January 09, 2004
Thursday, January 08, 2004
I actually watched a Curling Skins Game on Fox Sports World the other day. It was sponsored by "M and M Meat Shops", which I found entertaining.
Also, the guy that won had a gigantic shiny bald head that looked a lot like a curling stone. I wondered if he had ever glued a handle to his shiny pate for Halloween and gone as a stone. Or if his head had ever been curled by accident by an overenthusiastic curler. Also: are there curling idiots like there are American football idiots and, if so, do they wear some sort of celebratory Curling headgear, a la the Crazy Football Head below?
UPDATE: After a good seven minutes of surfing, I can find no Crazy Curling Heads.
Also, the guy that won had a gigantic shiny bald head that looked a lot like a curling stone. I wondered if he had ever glued a handle to his shiny pate for Halloween and gone as a stone. Or if his head had ever been curled by accident by an overenthusiastic curler. Also: are there curling idiots like there are American football idiots and, if so, do they wear some sort of celebratory Curling headgear, a la the Crazy Football Head below?
UPDATE: After a good seven minutes of surfing, I can find no Crazy Curling Heads.
Wednesday, January 07, 2004
Also, I ventured into Tower Records at lunch, to pick up Arcadia of My Youth on DVD. I should add parenthetically that cartoons featuring Captain Harlock are not geeky in any way, so just cool it.
Anyway, I was waiting in line behind a woman who had a double pram with two baby units in it. That was well and good. Unfortunately, the Tower cashier employed the usual Tower stratagem of not calling anyone else to help her despite the fact that there are seven people in line and she's never seen a traveler's check before in her life ever. Still, I am used to this at Tower, and when I'm in line I find little ways to distract myself, like picturing an elaborate musical comedy with all the main roles played by hermit crabs.
The problem was that the guy behind me in line was RIGHT behind me. Like I could feel him breathing on me. That kind of behind me. It's a strange phenomenon I've noticed in Southern California: people have no concept whatsoever of personal space. I tried moving around a little bit, veering off to the side of the line, and this guy stayed on me like a damn remora. Worse than a remora, really, because he didn't do anything vaguely helpful or symbiotic, like picking mites off my pelt. He just hovered there.
When I was done paying, some ten minutes later*, The guy was blocking my path to get out of the store. I seethed "exCUSE me!" hoping that somehow he would get the message that I don't need any remoras at this stage of my life, but I only succeeded in sounding like kind of a whack job. What would have been the right etiquette in that situation? Damned if I know.
* That's Tower Records Line Time, so I can't be sure how long I was really there. It could have been just a couple of minutes. Maybe I never did get out! Maybe I'm still there, slowly decaying into a small stain on the $2.99 CD stand...right between Gene Loves Jezebel and Herbie Hancock.
Anyway, I was waiting in line behind a woman who had a double pram with two baby units in it. That was well and good. Unfortunately, the Tower cashier employed the usual Tower stratagem of not calling anyone else to help her despite the fact that there are seven people in line and she's never seen a traveler's check before in her life ever. Still, I am used to this at Tower, and when I'm in line I find little ways to distract myself, like picturing an elaborate musical comedy with all the main roles played by hermit crabs.
The problem was that the guy behind me in line was RIGHT behind me. Like I could feel him breathing on me. That kind of behind me. It's a strange phenomenon I've noticed in Southern California: people have no concept whatsoever of personal space. I tried moving around a little bit, veering off to the side of the line, and this guy stayed on me like a damn remora. Worse than a remora, really, because he didn't do anything vaguely helpful or symbiotic, like picking mites off my pelt. He just hovered there.
When I was done paying, some ten minutes later*, The guy was blocking my path to get out of the store. I seethed "exCUSE me!" hoping that somehow he would get the message that I don't need any remoras at this stage of my life, but I only succeeded in sounding like kind of a whack job. What would have been the right etiquette in that situation? Damned if I know.
* That's Tower Records Line Time, so I can't be sure how long I was really there. It could have been just a couple of minutes. Maybe I never did get out! Maybe I'm still there, slowly decaying into a small stain on the $2.99 CD stand...right between Gene Loves Jezebel and Herbie Hancock.
I don't have all that much to report right now, although I did have a kind of weird dream last night that involved an HP Lovecraft Diner or Deli of some sort. I don't remember much except that the breakfast menu featured The Cheese Omelet of Unknown Kadath. It probably is not in your best interests to order a foodstuff with the word "Unknown" in the title. There may have been others, like The Hotcake Out of Space or The Croissanwich Horror, but I am uncertain.
On the whole, Cthulhu Mythos-related breakfasts are to be avoided.
On the whole, Cthulhu Mythos-related breakfasts are to be avoided.
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