Yesterday Daniel put up the Christmas tree. Today it was 45 degrees out and rained. I did, however, get this cool photo from my office in the house towards the living room where the tree is. The rain looks pretty sweet on the glass.
I read this yesterday - Fenway Park opened the week the Titanic sank in 1912.
Crazy.
So I've had the last three days off for Thanksgiving Weekend. It's been nice to have some down-time. Daniel and I just stayed in Maine for Thanksgiving so there wasn't even travel. It was seriously the most low-key Holiday I've had since, well, probably college. But even in college I had to travel home. So the most low-key Holiday in 10 years.
We did, however, take a little trip on Friday. Drove up the coast (of Maine) up Route One past Damariscotta to Rockland. It was a beautiful day, but a little chilly. Got some coffee at this shop our friends love, and then some Holiday presents in town.
Yesterday we did the tree lighting in Casco Village, which was fun. A little cold, too. Of course today it's warm and probably going to rain, but we can still put up the decorations and listen to the music to get in the mood, right?
In 1974 James Longley was elected Governor of Maine. He was the first popularly elected independent governor in the history of the United States.
This week I've missed both The OC and Arrested Development due to VCR error. I so need TiVo. How else am I going to see my Orange County land developers drama/comedy and comedy/drama respectively?
Have you ever noticed how the premise and themes are the same in both shows? Evil old men get rich but eventually their due and go to jail, riling up the family, and isn't that the most important thing? We all have crazy families, it's so true to life. It sounds like my family, I'll tell you that, with the stripper aunts and semi-retarded mama's boys who are joining the Army.
No, I'm not joining the Army.
So I know I bitched a lot about my back pain and leg numbness back a few months ago, so I wanted to let you know that the situation has gotten much better. In fact, yesterday I saw my neurologist, and he was damn amazed at my progress.
It was six weeks ago that I saw him and he diagnosed my ruptured disc. He said it might take up to a year to heal properly, but now, a month and a half later, it's looking really good. I don't have any more numbness in my foot/leg/ass, which is the main problem of a ruputured disc, apparently. The only thing missing is the reflexes in my foot - I have none right now. Nope. He tapped my left ankle and my foot bounced, he tapped my right ankle - nothing. That's an odd feeling.
The best news is he said I was all clear to do anything I want now, including downhill skiing. That's awesome.
Saw "The Incredibles" again this weekend. Dammit that's an impressive film.
Caught something else in there this time - there's a "Mallrats" reference. I swear! When Mr. Incredible meets Jason Lee's character, he can't remember his name and says something like, "It's 'Brodie', right?"
Brodie Bruce was Jason Lee's "Mallrats" character's name.
That's cool.
So sometime between the close of SNL last night at 1 am and before 8:30 am this morning we got snow in Bridgton! Granted, it was only a dusting, and now the temperature is in the mid-thirties, so it probably won't stick around for too long, but it's still exciting! Wake up in the morning, and there's snow!
The earliest recorded snowfall in Portland was September 15, 1959. The first measurable snowfall was October 10, 1979. The date of the latest snowfall is December 9, 1973. The median date of the first snowfall is November 4, and the first measurable is November 17.
Okay, I was thinking about this the other day. How is it possible that pigeons are the same in every city? The pigeons in Portland, Maine look exactly the same as pigeons in New York or even San Francisco. How does that work? Did the pigeons migrate from somewhere? When did pigeons show up? Are they all descendants from the same ancestorial pigeon? Are there wild pigeons out in the boonies somewhere?
I mean, I remember hearing in the Grand Canyon there are two species of squirrels that once were related but have diverged somewhere in evolution. How is that possible, but every pigeon is the same? Any pigeon experts out there got any info for me?
So I haven't heard from my ex-girlfriend in a few weeks now, and I'm starting to get scared. She was the one, you might remember, who was being recalled to Iraq to serve and protect. We talked a few times that week, and then a little afterwards, but now she hasn't returned my mail or my messages. Hol, if you're reading this, I hope you're in the woods of Canada (or the tropical beaches of the South Seas) with your man, and that everything is okay ...
Remember Trishelle from The Real World Las Vegas and the first Surreal House? Well, she really is a ho. She put herself on eBay!
The thing seems pretty jacked up, because A) they call her a "reality super star" (isn't that an oxymoron?) and B) the auction is over and the reserve price was not met! Someone did, however, bid $1,150! So sad.
Here's the text of the auction:
This package includes airfare to and from your home town to LA (continential US only), 5 star hotel accommodations on the Sunset Strip, limousine service for the duration of time in Los Angeles, Lunch at Aston Kutcher's exclusive restaurant Dolce in Hollywood, and the chance to hang out with Trishelle.
Auction bid only includes the following associated with travel, accommodations, meal at Dolce, 1 DAY ONLY meet and greet with celebrity, autographs, and security. Any additional expenditure to that listed above will be the sole responsibility of the bidder. Length of trip may be extended by the purchaser, but additional costs are to be incurred by bidder.
It's really sad, I think, that she's stooped to this. However, they always say "any press is good press" and what, is an auction like this really going to tarnish her rep?
So you know how I got the ticket the other day? Well, as I'm walking to work from my car yesterday morning I see the other coordinator from my department. She rather slyly asks how my night was, if anything exciting happened.
She knows!
Yep, I was pulled over in a very visible location. I knew that. But I didn't, however, figure that anyone from work, especially my sidekick, would have seen me. Alas, she and another woman from work were driving to the grocery store and saw a little Jetta with California plates. Immediately they knew it was me. They even tried to get a photo with a camera phone, but it didn't work.
Then, to add insult to my injury, they ran into the guy who sits right next to me while they were in the grocery store. So even he knew!! I mean, what good is it to have a story if everyone already knows it?!?
Last night I got a $126 ticket for running a red light in Portland. Yep. $126. As you can imagine, I was fuming last night.
See, it's really, really frustrating, there's this fairly steep hill down High Street, then bam all-of-a-sudden plateau to Park Street. Yeah, the speed limit is 35, but if you do 35 on High Street in rush hour you're going to get yourself run over. If you slam on your brakes when you get to Park Street, you'd probably be rear-ended by thirty cars.
Or you can get pulled over. As the cop approached my car I saw that he was about five feet tall. Great. Cop with a Napoleon complex. And I still have Cali plates on the car. Way illegal.
So after about fifteen minutes of waiting, he comes back to me with the $126 ticket. Says something about evading the excise tax on a car is a $900 fine, but he's going to let that slide. "Oooh! Thank you so much, diminutive police officer!"
Last night I was so stewing in this. The whole hour home. But then I thought of these three things:
B) If I had slammed on my brakes and been rear-ended (like I was last fall in Burbank) the ensuing insurance hoopla is more than $126 worth of a pain-in-the-neck
C) George W. Bush is still an idiot.
This morning I ran out of deodorant. That's not weird. It was mid-application, however. Yup, I'd done my right pit (as I'm left handed and do all of my rights first, right contact goes in first, right hand nails get clipped first, etc.) but I hadn't done the left yet. It's one of those gel deodorants, so you click the wheel and more gel spluges up. Well, I clicked, and no gel.
The foolish part is the other deodorants I have are either different brands or different scents. So I went with another Speed Stick brand, but a different smell.
So if you see me today and my left half seems more Ocean Surf and my right half seems more Icy Surge, you'll know why ...
Rapper O.D.B. from the Wu Tang Clan is dead and George W. Bush is still alive.
In 1948, Skowhegan native Margaret Chase Smith was elected to the U.S. Senate - making her the first woman to ever be voted into the office and also the first women to serve in both houses of Congress.
I forgot to share this with you. Last week at the Maine Brewers' Festival I actually said this sentence. "No, the other guy in the kilt."
"No, the other guy in the kilt."
There was a dude with a crazy t-shirt that I wanted to point out to my brother, so I said, "Look at that guy's shirt. The guy in the kilt." my brother immediately looked at the band that I was playing, at their kilt-adorned bagpipe player. So I said, "No, the other guy in the kilt." 'Cause there were two guys wearing kilts. How many times in life do you get to say that, really?
"No, the other guy in the kilt."
Yup. It's been confirmed. One of my friends I used to work with at the Disney Store at the Maine Mall in 1994-1995 is on the NBC show "The Biggest Loser". That's the one where larger people have to lose weight or be eliminated from the show.
Her name's Kelly and she's on the Blue Team. Tune in next, um, what night is it on? Tuesday? Yeah. Tune in Tuesday and check her out. I guess now she lives in Boston and is a stand-up comic. So it makes sense that she'd want to be on TV. She was always the sweetest thing to me, like a big sister. When my girlfriend would come in she would totally act like the big sister that I didn't have. She's awesome, I hope she wins.
It's really weird, living in LA for as long as I did, you'd think I'd know more people on the TV. This guy I lived with for a minute was on Blind Date. This asshole from Boston was on Blind Date. My buddy's roommate's girlfriend was on a couple of TV shows (including the ever popular "Undressed" in MTV). And Mike's roommate was in some commercials. Oh, and Chris Wylde was in a couple of shows, including some new show on AMC.
So I guess I actually know quite a few people on TV. But Kelly might be the first Mainer I know on TV.
Holy cow! Last night we turned on the TV and NBC's "The Biggest Loser" was on. You know what? I think I know one of those people! Seriously! Stay tuned ...
So Chris Van Allsburg, the writer/illustrator of the book The Polar Express that the movie is based on, said this recently. "This story didn't have a bunch of goofy characters. It wasn't a hippo and a couple of penguins going to the North Pole. It was kids. You had to see the emotion of the story conveyed through their expressions, and you can't get that on a face through conventional animation."
What?!? Has he ever seen little Simba after Mufasa is dead? Or Dumbo? Or just about any other properly animated feature film? Jackass. Thus, in my head the quote continues ...
"Yeah, so instead we decided to do the most wooden, ugly, unemotional CGI-mocap shit that has ever graced the big screen. Buy my book, suckers!"
Maine's Aroostook County is so big (6,453 square miles) that it actually covers an area greater than the combined size of Connecticut and Rhode Island.
You know, I've been thinking about it quite a bit lately. And it just struck me - I really don't understand Americans.
True, I was born in this country, and spent 28 of my 28 years here. But after this week's election, I just don't comprehend my countrymen. The average, middle America voter.
Why would anyone ever vote for Bush / Cheney?? (I should say George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, because you just know Jeb is waiting in the wings for 2008). I think most people picked that dynamic duo because ol' George feels like "one of the guys." You just know he'd be a good drinkin' buddy. So they choose the President on those merits, rather than who would be a good leader of the free world.
Beyond that, I don't get many, many of the other aspects of the Average American.
- I don't get NASCAR. It's just driving in circles, people! Jesus!
- I don't get who listens to Toby Keith and Randy Travis and Tim McGraw. True, I can understand watching Faith Hill and Shaina Twain - with mute on.
- I don't get who buys a computer with any Microsoft Windows operating system. Have you ever used an Apple? Wasn't it ten-thousand times easier? And no, they're not crazy-ass expensive anymore. A brand new 1.2 Gig G4 iBook with built-in wireless networking is a thousand bucks.
- I don't get who made 'Shrek 2' the 3rd highest grossing movie of all time. They ended the movie on a parody of "Livin' La Vida Loca"! For the love of fuck that song came out in the spring of fucking 1999!! That's five years ago, people! Jesus!
- That's another thing - I don't understand people who really feel that Jesus of Nazareth was the son of God and died for them. That's two-thousand years ago. Is anything written sixty generations ago and transcripted over and over and translated over and over really going to be anywhere near accurate?? If you seriously take a step back from the Bible, and read it for the general themes, that's okay. But when you follow the facts strictly (which, by the way, contradict themselves all over the place) then you have a problem. It's like what Rufus said in Kevin Smith's Dogma, "It's the message that counts." But nope. You all have to follow it like it's carved in stone.
- This leads into my next problem - separation of church and state. Pray in church, pray in your homes, pray in your heads. But don't bring it into schools, churches or courtrooms (unless it's ped ministers who are in court). You know, "In God We Trust" really shouldn't even be on the money. What if a person doesn't believe in God? How would they feel seeing that every day? Or if someone believed in many Gods? How would you feel if it said "In Satan We Trust"? In this day and age, "In God We Trust" should be relegated to churches alone.
- I do get people who go to McDonalds, however. Mmm. Fries.
So the new Episode 3 teaser came out the other day.
But the trailer panders in the worst way a trailer can. It uses a different film as a crutch. The trailer starts with the familiar title card, "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away ...". Tugging fanboy heartstrings right off the bat.
And that's what Revenge of the Sith is doing. Selling the Star Wars brand more than the film itself.
And then several of the new images directly steal from the first series of the films. The ones that we actually liked. Natalie Portman's hairdo looks like Princess Leia's. Darth Vader's costume is back. Yoda with the saber, and Wookies. (In fact, is that Chewy on the right?)
So lately I've been busy crying for the future of our country, and haven't found the time to mention this. But I think it goes without saying. I really, really want an iPod Photo.
And you know that I like the photos, too. So it would be a perfect fit. But they cost a shitload, and you know the 2nd generation iPod Photo will be technologically superior, so why not wait for that?
And honestly, do I need another device? I can't wait for the day that I can have my Palm Pilot, my cell phone, my digital camera, and an iPod all in one. Why doesn't Apple get to work on that?!?
So l wrote this little script yesterday on my way into work. I was hoping that Daniel might want to animate it for the web. But I guess it's fairly similar to a skit on SNL the other week. Thus you'll have to imagine it in your head like it's animated in Flash.
Check out: "A Call To Arms"
So it comes to this. My brother and I have officially succeeded from the United States of America. Fuck George W. Bush.
Last Updated on: November 29, 2004
© 2004 Joshua Paul Edwards
11/29/04 - Red Sox Trivia
11/21/04 - Snow!
11/21/04 - Sunday Morning Maine State Trivia - Snow Edition!
You're bidding on an all inclusive trip for one to Los Angeles to spend the day with Trishelle.
A) There are 30 lighted intersections between Daniel's house and my work. So I drive through 60 lights a day. It was bound to happen sooner than later.
So I'm not happy that I have to cough up $126 ... especially since I don't get paid for next Thursday or Friday, but it could be worse.
11/14/04 - Sunday Morning Maine State Trivia
- I don't get who watches Everybody Loves Raymond. It's not funny.
So my big problem is - how do I deal? How do I deal??
11/05/04 -iPod Photo
11/04/04 -"A Call To Arms"
A new flag waves over 83 Portland Rd. (11/3/04 photo)
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