"...and a foot fell in High Point."

Hi. So I do not think we will be going to the furniture capital of the world tomorrow.

Teaser of the week.

My The Passion of the Christ review, which I am writing right now, quotes from "Secret Ambition." And it has a surprise opening quote that I've used on this weblog before. Also, my grade prediction was exactly right -- somewhat surprising, as I'm usually not good at that sort of thing.

Update: Rough draft (and, given time constraints, perhaps final draft).

Weird question of the week.

Are there any societies that don't have seven-day weeks?, because if there aren't, that's really strange.

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The place we are probably going this weekend of the week.

Here.

Ha ha ha. No, sorry, here.

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Onion article of the week.

Transformer Refuses To Change Back Into Volkswagen

CYBOTRON—Following an intense battle with Megatron and his evil Decepticons Monday, former robot-in-disguise Bumblebee refused to revert to his natural state as a yellow Volkswagen Beetle. "I hid my existence in this world by taking the form of a vehicle! I revealed my true nature when I was called upon to protect earth!" said Bumblebee, a member of Optimus Prime's heroic Autobots force. "I refuse to change back into a humiliating bubble-shaped compact car!" Bumblebee added that Megatron arrived on earth with one goal: Destruction!

Odd "Gilmore Girls" fact of the day.

No one tells me these things: "[Milo Ventimiglia's] return to Girls for three episodes this season [as Jess] has less to do with his gut and more to do with his heart. 'It was strange jumping back into the shoes of the character again,' he says, 'but was something I felt OK doing because of the people I was around.' He dates series star Alexis Bledel, who plays his on-screen love interest, Rory, but he gingerly rebuffs questions about their relationship."

Yesterday, cont.

Okay, we will not even discuss the jinxing power Kim and I have on musical acts, whereby Kim may now never get to see one of her (and my) favorite acts, Sixpence None the Richer, despite that they've been to Richmond twice since we moved here (one cancelled because it was on 9/12/01; during the other, we were in Europe), and how Steve Taylor has not put out an album of new material since I started listening to him just over ten years ago, and how Mark Heard has not put out an album of new material since I started listening to him just over ten years ago (although his deadness may have played a part in that). No. I will not talk about that. What I will talk about is how Kimberly and I close down restaurants. In less than five years of Richmond life, here are the restaurants Kim and I have really liked that have closed:

1) Roly Poly, which is the only restaurant in my life where one of the workers (who looked like Andrew, but that's neither here nor there) actually knew my regular order (a wrap with roast beef, BBQ sauce, apple butter, and either Swiss or provolone cheese).

2) The Blue Marlin, which was the best seafood restaurant I'd been to in Richmond (if also the most expensive).

3) Some eat-in movie theater that I can't remember the name of, which had the best burgers in town.

4) Damon's, which was the best place nearby to watch sporting events in Richmond because (a) they used projectors on movie screens rather that just measly rear-projection televisions and (b) they had decent food and (c) it was non-smoking.

5) Damon's again, because it reopened after about a year and then closed perhaps six months later.

6) The closest Mio's to our new house, Mio's being our favorite local pizza chain. (The next closest is about 20 minutes away -- certainly too far for delivery.)

Etc. There are more than I'm forgetting, no doubt -- chime in, Kimberly -- but you see the general trend, which is that Kim and I have this magical effect on locations that we visit, be it for the power of good or evil.

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I do not think I will like The Passion of the Christ (which I will be seeing next week for a review). Based on what I saw on the religious channel yesterday evening, I predict a C+. (Not that I've been updating my film grades this year.)

How to have something exciting happen in your hometown!

Kim and I visit Columbia, S.C. in 2002: On the one day we visit, the Confederate flag is removed from the top State Capitol; hundreds protest. Kim and I rubberneck outside the building (and get thrown out after trying to go inside, but never you mind that).

Kim and I visit Toronto, On. in 2003: SARS returns on day two of a long weekend there, after more than a month of no new cases and just a couple days after the U.S. CDC declares the city "SARS-free." Kim and I wash our hands incessantly.

Kim and I visit San Francisco, Ca. in 2004: On the day we arrive, gay marriages are allowed in the city -- the first time such unions are allowed anywhere in America. (How legally that allowation is is another question, but never you mind that.) Hundreds line up around City Hall. Kim and I rubberneck outside the building.

I believe induction shows the lesson quite clearly.

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What I like least about long-distance trips.
Going eastward, be it starting the trip (London) or ending the trip (San Francisco), because one of two things happens: I have a red-eye flight -- in which case I have to sleep on the plane, and I in my two red-eye sleeping attempts I've a combined two hours of sleep -- or I get in during the early evening, but because of the time difference I can't get to sleep until 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning local time, which means the next day I either have to get up terribly late (local time) or run on very little sleep, and if it's the former than I have the exact same problem the next night.

So. I have come up with a solution. For this summer vacation¹, Kim and I will only fly westward -- ideally about three-to-five time zones at a time, spending three days in each city, with one day in-between for travelling. I am thinking:

Washington, D.C. to Honolulu (five hours)
Honolulu to Sydney (four hours)
Sydney to Bombay (four-and-a-half hours)
Bombay to Cairo (three-and-a-half hours)
Cairo to Dublin (two hours)
Dublin to Washington, D.C. (five hours)

All destinations English-speaking except for Cairo, and if I were smart, I'd throw in a South American country just so I could hit all of the non-icicle continents.

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1 This is not a serious summer vacation plan. It would be very cool if it were, however.

Injury of the week.

Last night, while stepping out of bed, the toenail on my right big toe slashed across the back of my left leg (behind the knee), giving me a five-inch gash that hurts when I extend my leg. That must be the wackiest self-inflicted injury I've had since accidentally giving myself a blue mole on my right leg in high school (one that I still have today).

Bible verse of the day.

Ezekiel 16:34 (MSG)

"You're just the opposite of the regular whores who get paid for sex. Instead, you pay men for their favors! You even pervert whoredom!"

What I would like for my game room, and if it's free off the Internet, hey, so much the better, but of course it won't be, because it's a sofa.

Kim and I are in the process of setting up our game room so that we have pretty things like IKEA shelving and an IKEA computer desk and the ever-popular IKEA wastebasket (no picture online, alas), but other than the television for the room¹, there is one piece of furniture IKEA cannot supply: a modular sofa.

moM and daD, ever since we lived in Iowa Falls, have had modular furniture in the basement: nine or so pieces of same-shaped brown pieces of square furniture. Some had backs on two sides, some had backs on one side, and some had backs on zero sides, and they were light enough that even Kim² could move them into fun, sofa-esque shapes to fit the mood of the day or the activity³. That is what I would like for this room -- except, you know, not brown -- but I have absolutely no idea where to buy it. Help, please.

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1 Please decide your company needs a sale, Mr. Dell.

2 For those who do not know, Kim is literally a 98-pound weakling -- that is, assuming she's wearing three layers of clothes.

3 Also, they are good for building forts.

What I would like for my birthday, or for free off the Internet.

I would like a music program that (a) lets me integrate .wav samples (or .mp3s, or whatever) with MIDI files and (b) lets me use sound fonts on those MIDI files and (c) has a simple drag-'n-drop way to put in those .wav files from (a) so I can line them up with beats easily (a la Adobe Premiere) and of course (d) lets me export the file exactly how I hear it on my computer to some appropriate format (like .wav or .mp3).

Also what I would like for my birthday, or for free off the Internet, is a lead vocalist for my band and a name for it and some bass lines from Ed.

"You know what I blame this on the breakdown of? Society."

As a general rule, I prefer the computer part of my day job to the marketing part; I've never, never been good at sales -- even when verbal communication is not involved -- and, as I discussed with my boss today, I have a shocking aptitude in fixing software and hardware problems without having any clue what the cause of the problem is.

Today, however, I am convinced that Microsoft 2000 is the love child of Saddam Hussein and Harpo Marx. If I had more time, I would tell you why I have had to reinstall the operating system three times onto a single computer today. But I do not have the time. Because I am in the middle of the fourth installation.

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After last night's Fox Block (or whatever very clever name they are now using), I think I may replace "Gilmore Girls" at the top of my favorite shows list with "Arrested Development." There were more great moments in the Sunday's half-hour of "Development" (Howard's voiceover when everyone was yelling, "speech, speech, speech"; Michael's reaction upon meeting the second "Hermano"; George Michael's reaction to being moved to a different room; Buster's bag; Buster's realization about Lucille) than in the last three or four hour-long "Gilmore" episodes, I'm afraid. Also, I have a happy place in my heart for TV shows where small-time celebrities play themselves parodistically in recurring roles (e.g. Chuck Mangione in "King of the Hill"; compare/contrast with "The Simpsons" poor recent use of stars).

Film critic quote of the week.

From The Independent: "Michael Bronski, a film critic with the magazine Forward and a visiting professor at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, where he teaches a course in film history, said [regarding the movie Groundhog Day]: 'The groundhog is clearly the resurrected Christ, the ever-hopeful renewal of life at springtime, at a time of pagan-Christian holidays. And when I say that the groundhog is Jesus, I say that with great respect.'"

Haven't done a Bible Verse of the Day for awhile, so.

Proverbs 24:33a (MSG)

"A nap here, a nap there, a day off here, a day off there, sit back, take it easy."

No one notices nothin'.

I changed my right side slightly. Not that anyone cares.

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Annie and Edward, I told you so on Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, although I never would have guessed a pair of pluses for Intolerable Stupidity. I'm just not a Coen Brothers fan.

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You may continue to talk in the 39-count comment thread, but I'm staying out of it; I simply don't have the time or the energy or really the inclination, given what little power my (and Andrew's, and Opie's, and moM's) votes in deciding national public policy. (The argument of how much or what percentage of money is proper and God-heart-warming to give to church or to do-good charities is more interesting in my mind, because I do have a say on how my money's spent, although Kim has more of one, hi Kim.)

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Do not buy any of those cheap Microtel computers that Wal-Mart sells so cheap. We bought a few of them cheaply for work, and not even discussing the day-to-day problems we have with them, one of those cheap computers had the CD-ROM go kaput two weeks after the warranty expired and the cheap hard drive two weeks after that. They are cheap.

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My marathon training takes up too much time. I will be happy when it is over, and I can start training for shorter races instead.

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I have been commissioned to arrange "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" for five octaves of handbells with the instructions to "be creative; do whatever you'd like!" Heh heh heh. You will regret those words, commissioner.

Hmm. Perhaps I will add the melody of a certain "Guys and Dolls" song to my arrangement. I do not know.

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Also, anyone may commission me to compose original bell pieces and arrangements for only $650 per song ($500 for an arrangement, unless I don't like the song, in which case it's $1125). I know for a fact that is less than Michael Helman charges, and, I mean, really, who would you rather give money to, me or some guy you've never met?

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This is a cat.

Spam-filter-avoiding spam of the day.

It took me a good 10 seconds staring at the subject line to figure out what this e-mail was trying to sell:

To: mprins@namcp.org
Subject: Suoer Bonl Viagla