well, the yuletide spirit has been purged until next season. low key holiday at home with debbie and her family away in a manger (read: harrisburg), but nice otherwise. I'm taking bets on when the cleanup process will finish. insider tip--we still have to completely straighten up from '06.

my biggest Christmas present was to myself, though: a new computer. it was time. my old machine hated me, that was the only explanation. I did so much for him and he repaid me with heartache. all the new hardware, repeated os reinstalls, to no avail. that's not to say--ahem--that I wouldn't recommend him to a new home, one who might be less demanding. so he's up for sale.

new pc, ergo I finally had to bite the bullet and switch to vista. I have likes and dislikes. even with a fast beast like this one I had to disable most of the flashier features to get full performance. according to my firewall it's MUCH more secure than xp, though, and it hasn't crashed yet...knock all possible wood. and reports of poor backwards compatibility have been, in my experience, exaggerated. I've decided to play dr. nerdenstein and install linux for a dual boot. why? because I can. getting linux up and running, however, is enough to make you want to kiss bill gates' ass. but hey, it's a constructive hobby.

I greet the upcoming new year with some apprehension. but then, shouldn't everyone with any sense do the same? 2008 is a nice, solid number though. I'm a big fan of multiples of 4.

another personal hero.

so dad had knee replacement surgery last monday. it went well; he's been doing some walking and isn't in too much pain. I'm totally getting him an oil can for Christmas.

speaking of Christmas, every year I can usually say definitively that I am or am not ready for the holidays. for 2007 I'm not sure. everything seems very neutral. the weather's been cold but not snowy. I'm staying on track doing my shopping--neither ahead nor behind. my mind accepts that Christmas music and lights are everywhere but isn't annoyed by it. it's all very...complacent. I can deal with that.

three homicides in gso over the weekend. significant for a city our size. word is that at least two were gang related. yet there are still bigwigs in this town who deny that we have a gang problem.

when it comes to entertainment, I'm naïve in a lot of ways. no matter how weak a plot twist is in a film, it'll probably take me by surprise. similarly, I have the tendency to read books solely for entertainment value. oh, I'll usually pick up on metaphors and allegories and whatnot. I just overlook them.

take the chronicles of narnia, for example. the Christian references are impossible to miss even as a kid, but they've never had an impact on my relationship to the series. and the great gatsby. despite analyzing it to death in senior english (particularly that damn green light), I managed to love it just the same. it's not that I'm anti-intellectual or boorish about literature, and I could still turn out a decent AP paper with my cliff's notes tied behind my back. it's just my way of doing things, and it's helped me give some of "the great books" a fair shot when I otherwise might not have done.

I ramble like this because I'm tearing through his dark materials, the philip pullman trilogy of which the recently adapted the golden compass is the first. I dig this stuff, and I'm leery of the fantasy genre as a rule. but before I'd read one page I'd heard loads about how anti-Christian pullman's work is; one reviewer said that he "pisses on religion." that's a little strong, but there's no denying the strong opinions voiced in the novels. and unlike narnia, his dark materials doesn't bother to couch them in metaphor--the author deals with Christianity as we know it. rather than say that his work is flatly against religion--although he's a confirmed atheist--it's easier to agree with the archbishop of canterbury, who sees the series as an attack on religious oppression and dogmatism.

and how much does all this matter to me? well, other than giving me an excuse to spout off paragraphs like the previous one here, not at all. I read to be taken out of myself. I read to fuel my own imagination. for a long time now my own worldview has been set enough (perhaps stodgily so) to prevent me from shifting my philosophy based on a work of fiction. reference my earlier spiel on ayn rand, for example. let other people argue about whether it's better to swim in a lake versus an ocean versus a pool versus a river. I just like to jump in and splash around.

now wasn't all that impressive? for someone who hates deconstructing, that is.

I don't know how many vinyl collecting dorks read this blog...well, that's not true. I'm pretty sure it's one. anyway, if you hanker after the prehistoric platters, I can't recommend musicstack.com highly enough. you don't get the thrill of the hunt, but there seems to be literally nothing that this site can't find for you. besides, bending down to sift through all those orange crates on the floor will kill your knees.

choosing a calendar is a big deal in my house. we have only one; it hangs just above the kitchen phone. it's a decision that must be lived with for a full year. 2008 has yet to be decided. if I was just a LITTLE more distasteful, I think I'd have to push for this one:







yes, it's real. a Mormon missionary beefcake calendar. tres funny.

I spent some time this evening looking between my reflection and old pictures of myself and came to a conclusion. I've suspected it for a while, and it's true.

four years of wearing headphones 7+ hours a day have flattened my ears.

before you scoff, keep in mind that I wear big 70s lookin headphones. no piddling earbuds for this fella. and my ears have always been unusually elastic. in high school, tiffany discovered that tugging upward on one of my ears can lengthen it by almost a full half inch (don't ask why we attempted that experiment; I don't honestly remember).

this is excellent news. my entire adult life I've wanted otoplasty, and since I've been self-supporting I've considered it seriously. I've always hated my jug ears, only now they're not so juggy. I got the benefits of surgery without the pain and expense--in fact, you could say that I got paid to have my ears "done." oh happy day!

now I can focus more on how I loathe everything between my neck and waist.

generally reading any of my old poetry makes me want to barf, but this one's not too bad:

youth wasted on children

I think about standing at washington square
in new york watching a tweed-clad boy
with a super 8 camera film pigeons and
feeling more envious than I ever had

and I wonder if I want a bonfire by the lake
or an old house filled with wood for my
children to slide down banisters and
smear peanut butter on the oriental rugs

and I hope that it’s not always necessary
to leave one life behind for another, and if
I can’t at least put off growing up long enough
to get away with a few more fits of hysteria

and I grow smug looking back on the
teenaged me that had so much fun affecting
adulthood with jim beam and cigarettes
and think man, if you only knew

if you only knew

© 2007 jeremy ball. all rights reserved.

I REALLY wish I had money enough to blow on projects like this.

my nasty cold is almost better, thankfully. I wish that I'd known about this stuff when I was still hacking away, though. I'm gonna try it sometime.

you know what I find offensive? jokes about men being raped by other men. why is it horrific to laugh at a woman being violated yet perfectly okay to snicker about "dropping the soap" and that oh-so-famous scene in deliverance? I guess I'm a little wacky, but I don't find any form of sexual abuse funny. I tried to make this point in college once, in a class about domestic violence. I was more or less pshawed--more evidence that male rape victims are, to many people, a non issue. grr.

earlier tonight I tried to make a list of everything that I'd need to accomplish to get my daily life organized and on track. I ran out of paper. true story.

I enjoyed barack obama's appearance on snl saturday evening. I hope that he gets the democratic nomination, but if hillary comes through I won't cry about it. I mean, if someone offers you a new car, you might keep your fingers crossed for a cadillac but you won't turn up your nose at a buick. especially not when you've been driving an amc gremlin for eight years. that's a rotten analogy, but I ain't no writer. it also doesn't allow for the potential election of a republican president, simply because that's an alternative that I refuse to consider.

can't remember when I've gone so long without posting, but I sho have had my reasons. my computer was stone dead for two weeks. for the first time I ran into a problem that I couldn't work out myself. I'd love to tell the whole sordid story, but I'll be nice and just sum up with some bullet points:

* if you live in the triad, do NOT take your computer to pc plus systems solutions. they seem to have a nasty habit of ignoring the customer's requests, assuming that said customer doesn't know doodley squat about their machine, and not making their self-imposed service deadlines. I paid them $120 for data backup that didn't even have the data I needed.

* if your computer ever highsides it, get recover my files to help pick up the pieces. it's $69.95 but worth five times that if you've got data that's irreplaceable. it's also proof positive that deleting something does NOT make it go away--pretty much the only foolproof way to do that is take a blowtorch to your hard drive, in my experience.

* I'm this close to becoming one of those creepy mac people. my problems stemmed from a windows issue that I tried to fix...using a utility provided by microsoft. I find myself lingering by the new imacs at compusa. well, it's a moot point for a couple of years anyway.

I've got more to say, but I've got sleep to get.

if you claim you never wanted one of these, you're a dirty liar. I sure as heck still do.

does anyone else think it's stupid that a lot of guys wear underwear inside their swim trunks? I could sort of understand if you were wearing old school trunks--clingy issues--but men do this in board shorts.

oh, and speaking of amazon:

[read in singsong voice. suggested tune: "nana-nana boo-boo"]

bought myself a present! bought myself a present!

bout damn time they released a set for north america, too.

huzzah! amazon has finally launched their mp3 store. it's easy to navigate, the tracks are DRM free, and they have damn near everything. I got so excited about this that I actually spent money on digital music. whoda thunk?

understatement: bluefield, west virginia is not the most interesting place in the world to grow up. I've always thought that it would make a fine place to raise kids until they hit about ten years old--that's when they'll start to get bored. but even when I was young I recognized what a fascinating place the 'field must have been in its heyday.

it's hard to explain unless you've been there. all the old downtown department stores are gone but most of the buildings remain. same for the old theatres. the big old victorian houses in north side, gone ghetto but with gingerbread intact. the shell of the matz hotel. what's left of "vito's alley"--once a disreputable strip of ginmills near the railroad tracks. bluefield was THE place to go for a hundred miles around, back when the mines still boomed and no one had conceived of malls or interstates.

I think what's really been lost is that underlying feeling of depravity that must have accompanied the small town charm. in it, stephen king discourses on the lumberman's town of derry, maine. how it was where all the tough guys converged to drink, whore, and gamble. bluefield served the same purpose (although I'm sure the chamber of commerce wouldn't care to hear me say it), only for coal-men rather than woodsmen. I've heard more great stories about floozies hanging out of windows in the drake hotel, the goings-on at the old bus terminal, the badasses at the overlook. I just hate that I missed it all.

I dream about this gothic conception of bluefield, and my dreams always take place in the early half of the previous century. the sidewalks teem with people even after 9 p.m. the high schoolers mob the woolworth's luncheon counter and drugstore soda fountains. in the shadows are still darker shadows that you look away from and hurry past. and over it all looms the big appalachian power clock, visible all over downtown from its perch on the hillside.

I thought of all this after reading a poem by rick mulkey, a bluefield resident and poet. it's called "cain's apology," and this is the verse that grabbed me:

"We were only boys, fifteen and ten.
But I used the man talk. A kid
apprenticed to movie tough guys,
I imitated the slurs of punch-drunk boxers,
spit hanging from my lip,
or the bound-for-hell curses of rednecks
at the Milner Matz lounge,
welts and scars on their cheeks.
I spat bruising words tongued in rail yards
where peroxide whores, numb from Mad Dog,
waited for Norfolk & Western brakemen."

I think that just about sums it up.

just wanted to take a sec and insist that everyone read running with scissors by augusten burroughs (if you haven't already; I'm years behind the curve on this one). I put aside ms. rand on a whim long enough to do so myself, and gee-whiz-wow. if you're the kind of person who gets offended by things like hunchbacks eating dog food, graphic descriptions of gay sex, and using bowel movements to predict the future, by all means read another tome. otherwise I can't recommend it enough. it's the most outlandish, horrifying, funny memoir I can imagine. it would be hard to believe in its veracity except for one thing: no sane person would make up a story like this. if nothing else it will make you thank your lucky stars for having a comparatively normal upbringing...no matter how twisted you think yours has been.

oh, and: I know this is awful, but does anyone else think that marcel marceau's tombstone should be blank? rest in peace.

this rules! raleigh and boone both participated this year; next year I say gso gets involved. who's in?

a bit late, but five thoughts on the emmys:

1) when did all these people get so old?
2) ryan seacrest is straight. here's why: it's so obvious that he ought to be gay that he circles back around to the other side of the spectrum. robbie williams does the same thing.
3) censor, schmensor. sally field should be able to say whatever she pleases on the air.
4) I never even watched "the sopranos," but I'm so glad it's over.
5) I promise, promise, promise to start watching "30 rock." I promise.

after several years of talking about doing it, I recently read ayn rand's the fountainhead. it is an excellent book. it is also a very dangerous book, and I think that objectivism is a dangerous philosophy. I mean that with all due respect. I'm champing at the bit to start atlas shrugged.

sorry so silent so long. busy is an understatement. I don't know what the hell's going on at my office. before long we'll start bringing sleeping bags to just camp out.

labor day weekend was great. it was my granny's 90th birthday party and many friends and relations were in attendance. pics posted.

I traded cedric the nissan maxima for eartha the cadillac seville two weeks ago. it was a good financial move; the maxima had held its value so well that the new payment is actually a lot lower. the seville is also three years newer and has less than half as many miles on the clock. twenty-six year old white guys driving cadillacs get the funniest looks. I love it. she's black and beautiful; I'll have to take some snaps.

would it be a bad idea to capture as many skunks as possible, de-scent them, and release them back into the wild? I'm all for it.

does anyone know what could cause windows XP to randomly start refusing to go on stand by? it's got a rogue agenda. I've posted on several tech forums to no avail. if you tell me to install linux I'll kick you in the nuts.

this may be the weirdest thing I've ever read.

the new imperial teen album is...well, I'm at a loss. I've always liked them, but this record catapults them into my personal stratosphere. insanely catchy, lyrically solid, and so tongue-in-cheek that it runs the risk of being taken seriously. it makes me want to grab people on the street and yell "buy the hair, the tv, the baby and the band right now, dammit!" surely they'd know what I meant.

the new rilo kiley album...jury's still out. need to give it a few more listens.

you know what I hate? when you go to sleep either mad or depressed, then you wake up and for a few seconds you think, "my! what a glorious day!" then you remember that you're supposed to be mad/depressed and it's like, "well, shit." hasn't happened recently, thankfully, but it does bite.

I don't want to hear about zac efron anymore. I just don't. I'm actually less sick of hearing about paris hilton.

so I love my honda and all, but I'm getting absurdly excited about the upcoming debut of the smart in america.


$15k fully loaded, 40+ mpg, and as safe as anything on the road. it'll be a few years before I trade cars I'm sure, but I may have my next one all picked out. you can bet I'll be at the "street smart" road show when they hit gso next month for a test drive.

pet peeve: being behind middle aged ladies at starbucks, walgreens, etc. who take EVERYTHING out of their voluminous purses to get to their money/cards, pay, and hold up the line while they stand there putting everything back in. it's even worse when the gals are over seventy...they usually pay with checks.

related note of etiquette: when making a deposit at a drive thru atm, pull over to the side if you have to endorse your checks, fill out the envelope, or what have you. once you have your shit together get back in the queue. that way people can conduct their business unimpeded in the meantime. I do it, but I'm nicer than most people.

I think that john d. macdonald is to contemporary fiction what carole king is to contemporary music. they've influenced everyone, they get lots of respect from other practitioners of the craft, and there's a 90% chance that whomever you ask on the street hasn't heard of them. I'm about to finish my first macdonald novel and am very favorably impressed.

I love adrienne barbeau and nicholas brendon. unfortunately I did not love unholy, which I recently got a chance to see. it tries so hard to make sense and just never does. it's like someone fed the script into a shredder, pulled half of it out of the bin, and taped it back together--wrong. the resulting hodgepodge was used to make the film. sadly I think that if it did make sense, it might have actually been worse.

people of the world: please don't say filthy-dirty. pick one or the other.

two things I can't understand paying for: cardboard boxes and clothes hangers. either can be readily obtained gratis with a minimum of effort.

here's the kind of thing that keeps me awake at night. if you could be in just the right place under just the right circumstances, somewhere in the world there's a rich person that you could walk up to and say, "I'd like a million dollars, please." and they'd give it to you. maybe they're nuts, maybe they're impressed by your audacity. maybe they're walking along thinking, "I hate money. if someone asked me for a million dollars they could just have it." and if you came along presently, there you go. I honestly believe this.

speaking of crack brained ideas, here's my best one of late--a sort of time capsule. I'm going to get a year's subscription to mad magazine. when I get each issue I'm sealing it in a manila envelope, writing the date on it, and packing it away. in ten years I open them. seriously, old copies of mad are the best when it comes to encapsulating american pop culture.

take note, stephen king fans. forget bangor; greensboro is derry. I'm convinced, anyway.

two quick notes, both having to do with pictures:

several people asked me to let them know how the Great Hair Coloring of Ought-Seven turned out. I look like this now.



no, I'm not actually wearing it this spiky--it just looked good for the pic. and yes, I know it doesn't look natural. with these eyebrows, nothing but black would.



second note. for several weeks justin has been telling me about this unbelievable house he found after making a wrong turn, and today we went to see it. look at these and tell me it isn't...awe inspiring. I'm just glad that someone's taking the trouble to renovate it so painstakingly. if you know ANYTHING about this domicile, clue me in.

so yet another soldier has been discharged from fort bragg after appearing in a gay porn vid. this news prompted me to read the text of the u.s. policy concerning homosexuality in the armed forces. under the code, granted, the military has the right to discharge these guys. but I noticed an interesting thing: exceptions can be made if the man/woman can demonstrate that "such conduct is a departure from the member’s usual and customary behavior."

how does one do that, exactly?

"sarge, as you can see from my daily planner, I had sex with ladies one hundred and sixty-three times last calendar year, while I only boned a guy twice. each of my sexual partners has signed a notarized statement concerning the accuracy of these numbers. furthermore, my shrink will testify that, when it comes to guys, I only do it for the money."

just wondering. also, I haven't read any accounts of exactly what these discharged fellas were DOING on video. I am no fool--I've forgotten more skin flicks than most people will ever see, believe me. and in a lot of military themed amateur clips there is exactly one guy in front of the camera, all by his lonesome. ergo, no homosexual contact. therefore, while he may be knowingly titillating the minds of gay men, he is doing nothing to warrant a discharge under the law. I'll just believe that these former military men were doing work of the more...intense variety. thinking that they got canned for doing solo work would finally drive me over the border and into canada.

and on a slight tangent, is it fair to equate "homosexuality" with "homosexual acts?" on the one hand it's a no brainer. on the other, well. I still maintain that there's no such thing as clear cut sexual orientation. whatever the conscious mind tries to kid itself into thinking, it's all one shade of gray or another. that's not to say that one's orientation can be changed or controlled, far from it. I think that we just need to say that human beings like sex and leave it at that. just sex in general. it can be about love, it can be about one another's naughty bits, or it can just be about friction.

[author's note: these news stories rarely mention the name of the site causing all the flap, but most of us know which it is. and I'll tell you something. the site's webmaster still has soldiers lining up around the block to go on film. fuck you, uncle sam. oh, wait. that's against code.]

I ramble too much. so today I'm letting steven wright do it for me.

some of my favorite steven wright quotes:

42.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

I went to a restaurant that serves "breakfast at any time". So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance.

Sponges grow in the ocean. That just kills me. I wonder how much deeper the ocean would be if that didn't happen.

You can't have everything. Where would you put it?

All of the people in my building are insane. The guy above me designs synthetic hairballs for ceramic cats. The lady across the hall tried to rob a department store... with a pricing gun. She said, "Give me all of the money in the vault, or I'm marking down everything in the store."

I installed a skylight in my apartment. The people who live above me are furious.

One time the power went out in my house and I had to use the flash on my camera to see my way around. I made a sandwich and took fifty pictures of my face. The neighbors thought there was lightning in my house.

If a word in the dictionary were misspelled, how would we know?

On the other hand, you have different fingers.

When I was a little kid we had a sand box. It was a quicksand box. I was an only child...eventually.

The sign said "eight items or less." So I changed my name to Les.

When I turned two I was really anxious, because I'd doubled my age in a year. I thought, if this keeps up, by the time I'm six I'll be ninety.

I hereby decree that "mony, mony" be regarded as the greatest song ever. don't argue with me. I only recently discovered that it was inspired not by a girl but by the sign on the Mutual Of New York building (which I can't find a good picture of, dammit--see midnight cowboy for a good view of it as it looked in 1968 when the song was released; in fast, see midnight cowboy anyway). that cemented its status for me.

incidentally, when I was a kid I thought that "mony" was a play on "mona," as in mona from "who's the boss." it made sense to me, since mona was all sexy and things.

wake it, shake it, mona mona.

[postscript: I see that in january of 2006 I stated that "harper valley p.t.a." was the greatest song ever. forget I said that.]

I'm glad that it takes children a few years to develop a real sense of irony. otherwise kids would be more vicious than dorothy parker ever was.

I love living in a world where I can download audio files of john cage's "4'33" for my listening pleasure. go ahead. download and listen.

is anyone else rankled by how many recent low brow comedy films use LPs--that's "little people" here, not long play records--for comic devices? am I the only person who thinks it's demeaning to LPs in general? I'm not one of those people who takes political correctness to extremes, but it seems wrong to me. besides, what's the big attraction? okay. they're smaller than the majority of the population. and?

yes, I got deathly hallows yesterday. no, I haven't finished it, nor have I started. I also picked up the audiobook, so I'm going to read it at work where I can more easily justify spending six hours plus per day on it. justin bought it at midnight, went home, and read constantly until last night when he finished, stopping only to eat and take a short nap. crazy fuck.

have you seen barefoot in the park? well, sometimes I'm so much like corie bratter that I can hardly stand myself. probably no one else can, either.

chocolate covered dried cherries are so superior to cherry cordials.

a rarely considered cardinal truth of life: horny men should not have access to credit cards.

I'm a big hypocrite. I always talk trash about the reality TV craze, and I went and got myself hooked on "the next food network star." seriously. I mean, it has the performance aspect of "american idol," the team building of "survivor," and the close quarters of "the real world." and the cast members are actually working constructively to better their lives, not just hog the series' spotlight. can't wait until sunday when they announce the winner!

speaking of TV, I knew when I saw the preview for "pushing daisies" that it HAD to be from the writers/creators of "wonderfalls." I was right. that bodes well.

happy belated fourth, all. ah, independence day! a time when, as Americans, our minds turn to the question of the ages: given the choice, would you rather have the body you've got or the body of your dreams--only your dream body would be covered with numerous moles? it's a tough one. maybe because I'm lucky enough to have very few moles, or maybe because I'm averse to moles in general.

edit to above: confused independence day with useless introspection week. my bad.

when people discuss stereotypically gay music, you can usually predict names that will come up. judy garland, madonna, billie holiday, bette midler. you hardly ever hear the carpenters or tori amos mentioned, and I've known more gay men into them than any of the usual suspects. could be a generational thing?

speaking of celebrity recipients of mass gay adoration, rose mcgowan rocks my world. yep.

my gigabeat is failing. battery time dropped from eight hours to five. am going to try and replace the battery myself. if I don't succeed, there goes my bankbook for a new device. seriously, I waste money on a lotta stuff, but a functional MP3 player is essential for my sanity. I still stand by the gigabeat as the ultimate, though. I've used mine an average of six hours a day, five days a week, for a year-ish. I doubt any of its competitors could have withstood any more. these friggin electronics companies make $300 pieces of equipment to be disposable, which really gets me steamed.

been hanging out with carra more lately. that's a very good thing.

I feel like I'm squandering my summer. I need to take advantage of more summer...well, stuff. the beach. wet n' wild. drooling over half naked joggers, all that sort of thing. of course all that would require waking up earlier. ugh. mebbe not.

have returned from the rock. lovely time, but too freakin hot even there. chetola was full, so we stayed at crestwood. even better. not so much a hotel as a country club with fifteen guest rooms. also reminiscent of kellerman's in dirty dancing. took a few pics with my amazing new canon sd1000. they are here-uh.

big endorsement here: if you're ever in the high country yourself, go to stonewall's in banner elk for a new york strip. best I've ever had. tell them I sent you. they'll look at you funny, I'll bet.

somehow I still haven't succeeded in killing the salvias.

saw 1408 tonight. not bad--say a 7 out of 10. didn't freak me out the way the story did, but the best stephen king adaptation in a while.

I don't know why I read trashy celeb gossip message boards. they never fail to piss me off. especially when folks start coming down on this male celeb or that, saying things like "he needs to work out" or "he's gotten really fat." nine times out of ten said famous guy has a body that I'd kill for. have any of these critics ever REALLY seen a fat person? evidently not.

if you have five minutes and thirty-four seconds to spare and haven't seen the film happiness, you should really watch this. I think it's my favorite opening scene from any movie ever. warning: contains oogy language and jon lovitz.

have lost ten pounds and counting. hope it's the elliptical and not the gypsy curse.

I promise to only say this once until fall: too damn hot here.

last week, bush said this of his upcoming Papal tete-a-tete:

"sometimes I'm not poetic enough to describe what it's like to be in the presence of the Holy Father. it is a moving experience."

um, georgie? you hadn't met this Pope yet. were you implying that if you've met one Holy See you've met em all? I can't be the only person who finds that quote odd. maybe it wouldn't seem so off kilter coming from a Catholic. or if I was Catholic myself. hmm.

if you don't ever use your computer to watch video (dvds, tv, etc) stop reading here. you'll get bored.


...okay, since you do, you should get this cute little piece of freeware called power click. download the files and put em wherever. open the program and go to "options." check "disable windows idle timer." right click on the red icon in your system tray and exit. put a shortcut to power click on your desktop, and there you go. whenever you click the shortcut your screensaver and power settings will be disabled until you exit power click. no more moving your mouse around to keep the video goin. this is a lifesaver to me, so I wanted to share.

shit. geico really does save people money on car insurance. I switched from allstate and am saving over $200 every six months...and my new policy cuts my deductibles in half, so I'll only be 50% as financially screwed if I wreck. for the first time I don't feel like my car insurance is a ripoff. I won't soon forget the bad old days--in the wake of my unfortunate accident--of paying through the nose for the privilege of driving the miata.

people saying "shut up" to express astonishment. I don't like it. "no way" was good enough for my generation, and I'm sticking to it.

why the hell haven't more people read cold comfort farm? it's that rare treasure: a quick, hilarious read that also has legitimate literary cred and historical value.

justin got his new job! yes, I know I haven't mentioned that he was in the market for one. you know how I am about jinxing things. choral director at graham high (not the one I attended, naturally). farther drive but better kids and a really strong program. the situation at eghs had become...strained. long story short, he made a good decision in leaving.

we're headed back to blowing rock in a couple of weeks. in light of economic issues--not the least of which is gas prices--we've scaled our vacation back from a two hour flight to a six hour drive to a three hour drive. I'm out of the office for a whole damn week, that's the important thing.

instant viewing on netflix rules. does blockbuster total access offer such a boon? no, they do not.

latest endorsement: neilmed sinus rinse. washing out your sinuses isn't the most pleasant thing to do, but it's great at getting rid of those pesky sinus headaches. and when you breathe it actually feels like more air's getting into your lungs. probably it is.

you know "the ghostbusters symbol?"


yeah, that's it. I can't believe that this oh-so-useful insignia is graced only with the official name "the no symbol." that's just not right. so join up with me in calling it the "negatrix." that's neh-gay-triks. I think it's much more appropriate and easier to throw out in conversation.

charo's real name is María del Rosario Pilar Martínez Molina Baeza de Rasten. yeah, I'd shorten it too.

I'm glad josh introduced me to extremely rare tuna steaks.

george washington had a dog named sweet lips. even then, could no one see how wrong that was?

my sinuses have gone on strike. I go around feeling like my aching head's attached to a string and floating about three feet above my neck.

it seems that, no matter how high gas prices go, many people are too stubborn to change their guzzling ways. it seems that desperate measures are needed, so I guess I'll start slashing the tires of SUVs . nah, that's not fair. first I'll find the owner and ask, "do you really need an SUV?" if I don't get a convincing argument, then I'll gut the goodyears. and leave a note explaining why. that seems just. I'll also include exoticars--ferraris, lotuses, and the like--just to be inclusive.

seriously, what gets me here in the south are the number of two wheel drive SUVs. I mean, just what the hell is the point? minivans were good enough for that set in the eighties; what happened?

and speaking of conservation, be proud: I've cut out my pre-work starbucks run. not so much about the money, though. I just discovered that my beverage of choice contains 330 calories and 13 grams of fat. by contrast, the pseudo-lattes I at make home to put in my travel mug run about 180 and 4. every little bit helps, I suppose.

I have a new hobby that I'm incredibly excited about. I've started collecting antique postcards with pictures of insane asylums on them. you'd be surprised what a popular postcard subject mental hospitals used to be. I've got the first two in my album and have two more on the way. when I get a few more I'll scan pics of them into my online gallery.

I'm in the process of upgrading this blog to take advantage of all the "new" blogger stuff that I'm behind on. don't worry if you hate the way it looks now--I'm not too fond of it, myself. it's a work in progress.

I'd been considering creating a separate blog with a more specific purpose than this one. I gave up the idea when I found this site that does pretty much exactly what I'd intended. shoulda known someone would beat me to it.

you know those little quik-brite lights they advertise on tv? well, they really are that great. my car finally has illumination in the glovebox.

if you're reading this and haven't seen it--as I'd say most people haven't--rent the movie black cadillac and tell me if it sucks you in the way it did me. maybe because it watches like a film version of a christopher pike book.

speaking of books and guys named christopher, I've become a disciple of christopher moore. I've read bloodsucking fiends and you suck and found them both excellent. don't go into one of his books expecting some highbrow modern miracle of literature. go in expecting to have a helluva good time. clever, quick, and most of all funny. you may laugh until you pee. you've been warned.

I bought flowers to brighten up the front porch. help me hope that they live. I have a black thumb rather than a green one. I bought salvias because I read somewhere that impatiens were tacky. I don't remember where or if the source was trusted, but I'm very suggestible like that. I once changed my facial cleanser because I knew someone who knew someone who knew someone who said that it dried out her skin.

dammit, why can't the u.s. have a channel like this? canada is so cool.

a lot of convenience stores don't carry eye drops. this is odd to me.

in case it was keeping you up nights worrying, the new coffee table is up in here. southpark's new crate and barrel is the bomb.

I'm still the last of the red hot bloggers. I've just been workin hard and stayin tired.

I'm proud to say that this organization is n.c. based. check em out.

went to the d.c. area recently and had a swank time. I hung out in arlington, falls church, and bethesda. never once did I set foot above ground in the district itself. bizarre.

I can't believe how I'm obsessing over choosing a new coffee table for the living room. it makes me feel materialistic and un-Quaker. starving children in indiana and I'm moaning about how that particular oval cocktail table comes in mahogany but not espresso. I think I just need psychological reassurance that my life is stable enough that I can obsess about a coffee table. well, it's cheaper than therapy.

speaking of coffee, know what I miss most about college? if I got bored and wanted to go out for coffee, I could find someone to tag along. didn't matter when, one friend or another would be free. I didn't have to call around and make plans a week ahead, and no big production was made out of it. we just went. you know?

also on coffee and other food type things, I need to rant. if you're going to order from a drive-thru window, you should not have questions. take starbucks, for example. if you need to know what the difference is between a latte and a cappuccino, what kind of "kids' drinks" they have, how many shots go into a venti, ANYTHING--go inside. when you pull up to the speaker and open your mouth, what needs to come out is your order. if you feel the need to say anything else, inside. if you need to take a minute to decide on what you want, okay. by all means. but if you're gonna strike up a dialogue, inside. the drive-thru is for people in a hurry. by making your time there inordinately long you are defeating the purpose. you're holding up other customers. being a bad person, in other words. does asking questions at the drive-thru mean that you're more likely to go to Hell in the afterlife? it wouldn't surprise me. would hitler have had questions at the drive-thru? probably. do you really want to go to Hell? do you want to be the next hitler? I didn't think so. hurry = drive-thru. questions = inside. there, I'm done.

wha? wha...ha ha! ha ha ha ha ha! hhhheeeehaaaaahaaaaahoooowhooooohaaaa! and dare I say, rotf (lmao).

according to scott stapp's lawsuit against world wide red light district, the released footage of his 1999 sex tape caused him to suffer "loss of reputation."

that is the funniest thing I've ever heard.

want to be a member of a really exclusive club? netflix/otherwise rent wonderfalls on dvd. it's the most original tv series I know of, which is probably why only four episodes ever aired (the dvds contain the entire, mostly unaired first season--13 episodes). or, if you live in my neck of the woods, I'm all about weekend wonderfalls watching parties at my place.

why don't wal-mart employees understand that restocking the shelves does NOT have to involve blocking the entire aisle?

this is the greatest idea I've heard about in a while.

I've never thought of myself as a type A personality. I'm starting to wonder.

I've never thought of myself as being very much like my dad. wondering about that, too.

ben and jerry's cinnamon rolls ice cream is the best thing I've ever tasted. seriously.

been reading more dean koontz. more hondas, more interior design. I'm going to go through his novels, compile data on those topics, and arrange it into a spreadsheet.

about a year ago I speculated that I was in the throes of a quarter life crisis. I did so in a somewhat smirking fashion, however, as is my way when I'm not quite serious. see this? this is me now, NOT smirking. does this mean I have to run away and join the peace corps?

I never would have guessed watching "the mary tyler moore show" that ed asner was a left wing activist.

talk about something being funny because it's true.

I've recently discovered the wonder that is annie ross. well, I already knew her as mrs. hazeltine from throw momma from the train ("dive! dive! yelled the captain through the thing). and as tess trainer from short cuts, where I got a sampling of her vocal talent. but this babe's career as a jazz vocalist began in the fifties--the EARLY fifties. and she's still got it. in fact, she performs at the metropolitan room in nyc every tuesday night. I'm so tempted to fly up just for that reason.

whenever anyone mentions norman mailer I get really irritated. I've never read him; I just do.

I was all set to haul ass for savannah this year when I found out that st. patty's day was on saturday. then I find out they scheduled the stinkin parade for yesterday maybe next year I'll just take a few days off.

warmer weather should be here to stay soon. here's a shocker: this year I'm going to put out flowers. I give them two weeks. I have a black thumb.

the neon bible is an excellent book. I wish I could have written like that at sixteen. or that I could now.

in bedknobs and broomsticks, emelius browne lives in a posh london mansion that he doesn't own. the manse's rightful owners have fled--along with the rest of the neighborhood--due to a massive unexploded bomb in the street directly in front of it. browne loves the bomb because it enables him "to live like a king;" he stays put despite its constant threat.

I wish that I didn't see his situation as such a perfect metaphor for my life.

more introspection: is it possible to feel ashamed of an action without regretting it? the more I think of it, the more I think it is.

digging daylight savings time. it's lovely to see the slant of the setting sun paint the top eighth of my cubicle walls orange.

the boone/blowing rock trip was a smashing success. I had no idea how picturesque the area is; it reminds me of pictures I've seen of aspen. the mountains are just a bit less pointy. turns out there actually are ski slopes in nc, too--wasn't sure I believed it. lots of cute shops and cafes. best of all, we woke up to actual SNOW on sunday morning. a few pics are here.

okay, folks. toshiba is doing a crap marketing job, so I guess it's up to me. now hear this: at amazon.com, the toshiba gigabeat MES60VK is now $229.99. that's a 60 GB media player. for less than a 30 GB ipod. not to mention that it's the superior device anyway. why the hell isn't toshiba plugging these babies?! I mean, I know that they were busy developing the zune...which is more expensive and the size of a small suitcase in comparison. trust me, people. if you're in the market, get a gigabeat.

dean koontz is an excellent novelist, but he writes entirely too much about furniture. I'm all about character development, but I just don't need to know how many coats of lacquer were hand applied to the protagonist's cherry wood armoire by capuchin monks ten thousand years ago. the man should have been an interior designer. and what's up with the hondas? can I read one dean koontz book where someone doesn't drive a honda?

I can't figure out why my car smells like a mixture of sulfur and b.o. I'm not in the habit of not showering and then repeatedly striking matches in it. and no, I haven't used valet parking in quite some time.

finally saw notes on a scandal. it was just as good as I'd been told. finally saw infamous. it wasn't. to each his own. I mean, it was okay, but...maybe if I hadn't seen capote first.

yonder lies the trip to blowing rock. hopefully it won't rain; it's been bad for that lately. I didn't authorize it, either. someone didn't fill out the proper forms.

is it weird that one of my life's ambitions is to move to pittsburgh? seriously, in my opinion pittsburgh's pretty freakin sweet. great indie scene (both music and film), nice museums, actual winter weather, and a truly awesome landscape--mount washington overlooking the three rivers and downtown. not to mention cheap as hell to live there, provided you can find gainful employment. I haven't been for a visit in almost four years, which is four years too long. one day. just you wait.

I hate living in a world where some dumb broad shaves her head and it makes headlines. but I guess once you start taking the hair off of certain areas of your body it could get addictive and spread to others. kinda like tattoos.

remember the video game burger time? that shit was hard.

I'm so sick of time warner jacking up cable prices that I'm thinking about switching to satellite, directv probably. thoughts?

I love that daylight savings time is starting earlier. what I won't love is resetting all the electronics in the house that ordinarily set themselves and will later become confused and require further resetting.

it's generally known that I loathe and fear robots. that said, will someone please buy me one of these? $24,500 seems quite reasonable.

I hope that everyone had a pleasant v-day, whether or not you viewed it as a holiday. justin and I exchanged goodies. as my big contribution, I reserved us a lakeview crown suite at the ultra swank chetola lodge in blowing rock for a few weekends from now. except for trips to asheville, I haven't been to the n.c. mountains for many years and am looking forward to it.

a note to my creditors: if you don't enable me to pay your bills online, you're just asking for them to be paid late. just thought you deserved a warning.

attention all hot tea drinkers! you should buy an ingenuitea; they're great. my only regret is that I paid $24 (including shipping) to order mine and then found them at teeter for $14. still, it's well worth it. of course, if your idea of a cuppa involves the use of teabags then it doesn't really apply. I'm only speaking to serious hot tea drinkers here.

today's pet peeve: captions on photos that identify the people in them WITHOUT doing so from left to right. it's just common sense.

I enjoy the new apples in stereo album. it's kitschy without being nauseatingly cute--a line that they haven't always drawn well.

why I almost pissed myself with joy tonight: this and this. have I pre-ordered both? you bet. do you care? probably not. I'm a big nerd, after all.

everyone who's anyone has heard of equus by now. well, any and all harry potter fans, anyway. I'm not saying daniel radcliffe is the hottest thing goin. from a legal standpoint, I shouldn't even say that a 17 year old is the most lukewarm thing goin. but there really is something undeniably...am I allowed to say tepid?...about the promo pics. they're easy to find--just google "daniel radcliffe equus." don't expect to find any nudes, though. not yet anyway.

one of my biggest recent pet peeves: people who think that ethanol is the solution to america's oil dependency. am I the only person who researches things before I start flapping my jaw about them? I'm all for alternative fuels, but I won't even get into all the reasons why increased ethanol usage could do as much harm as good, both economically and ecologically. do what I did: read. it's not hard; been doing it since I was three.

while I'm still up on my soaring steed, I guess I gotta comment on the situation at the old alma mater (link to most recent story, if you're shrugging at this). it goes without saying that I'm saddened and disappointed by both the incident itself and the manner in which it was handled. I think that it has brought to light issues that have plagued guilford since well before my time there, notably the lack of synthesis between athletes and the rest of the student body. not that a hate crime is representative of an athlete's mindset...but it can reflect the mind of a jock. there is a difference.

however, I don't believe that said student body is painting an accurate picture of guilford for the press, not unless it's changed considerably in the not quite four years (!!!) since I graduated. Quaker values are very much a part of the college as a whole, yes. they are taken to heart by many of the faculty and students, including yours truly. but at no point--as far as I know--has guilford been a paradise. no one has the right to expect that of it.

more importantly, though, it's much farther from being the demilitarized zone that some folks are talking about. I read students' reports of "rampant racism and bigotry" on campus. I was a pretty socially active guy there, and at no time would I have dreamed of making such a statement. you got sweethearts and assholes, just like any other campus on earth. in the grand scheme of things, guilford is--and, I hope, always will be--more open minded and accepting of differences than most colleges, particularly small ones. it's just that a few scratches on a new rolls-royce are more obvious and inflammatory than a couple dents in an '86 escort. and shouldn't I be seen as an informed source? about the colleges, not the cars.

I ask myself if I'd recommend guilford to my own son/daughter if they were getting ready to fill out their applications today. well, the school's been through a lot of changes, good and bad. but the answer is still yes. my time there was the formative experience of my adult life, something that I'll always treasure. I only wish that everyone could have such a joyous four years at guilford.

and that other people would let them.

fantastic birthday this year! dinner with justin, josh, parents, nadine, and half of carra (she only had time to drop by for bread and beverages) at the melting pot. got the present I asked for: a new kitchen faucet. nothing wrong with the old one, but this one arcs up higher over the sink for ease of use. so many people called/myspaced/texted me with well wishes, people I hadn't heard from in years. thanks!

if you missed this year's twenty-sixth birthday celebration, you can catch the encore in 2008. I'm finished for a while. not gonna turn 27, sorry. my age is frozen until I'm at least 38, hopefully.

random gift from dad: one touch can opener. usually the junk you see advertised on tv is just that, junk. but those things really are nifty.

tax return done. having a mortgage sure does help, oh yeah. my refund is obscene. next year it's justin's turn to claim the interest and property tax, though, so I'm not getting used to it. to celebrate I treated myself to a gig of RAM to punch up the computer a little in case I want to take the windows vista plunge at some point. once I get the money, however, the bulk of it is going into savings to help me bounce back from my post holiday brokedom.

hooray for tax time! at least I hope it turns out to be a hooray. hopefully the interest paid on the house will help.

what the tax preparation companies don't want you to know: if you made less than $52k last year you can e-file your federal return for free. this will be the second time I've done so with h and r block. you'll notice, however, that nowhere on block's website do they have a link to free filing--you gotta sneak in the back door. for a complete list of said back doors, looka here.

phrase I hate: "jimmy hat." please don't say it around me. ever.

can't believe we actually had a little snow last week. for a few shining hours I thought we might actually have a shot at a real winter.

as some of you may know, my birthday is a week from monday. I know it's gauche to ask for presents, but if you consider me a friend there's something you could do for me. if you haven't already, see the film happenstance (the one made in 2000). I netflixed it, but I'm sure that some video stores are cool enough to stock it. check foreign. yeah, it's in french, deal with it. seriously, though. it's been a really, really long time since a movie has left me speechless. just see it. I don't think you'll regret it.

by the way, that picture of audrey tautou in pigtails on the cover is actually from a totally different movie. bizarre.

hollywood filmmakers have completely run out of material. I've suspected this for a while. now I know. halloween is being remade. not another sequel, not even a prequel, but a straight up remake. shooting starts on my birthday, in fact. and I don't care if rob zombie is directing and dee wallace-stone does have a role. this is a bad idea.

it's finally starting to feel like winter. they're even calling for precip tomorrow. being dumb awful nc weather, though, it's "sleet and freezing rain." whatever happened to snow? it just ain't right.

too much negativity. time for a little scott caan to lighten the mood!




ah! I know I feel better. well, a little foolish. "little scott caan" is redundant, after all.

could someone please explain to me how a single person can make nearly $50k per year and have a for-fucks-sake overdrawn checking account? that's not a rhetorical question. I really can't figure it out. except for having a car payment--a pretty low one--my expenses really aren't that different from when I was making ten bucks an hour. I look over my bank statement and the majority of my money is spent on groceries. not really a trimmable expense. and I can't even remember the last time I bought lox.

rumor has it: ikea coming to charlotte. no longer is a trip to d.c. or atlanta necessary to replace a broken plate or glass.

tax time is coming up. please, IRS, let this year's pound of flesh and blood be a few ounces smaller. of course the house can be claimed this year. how it can be claimed I'm not sure, given the joint title and mortgage. I think I'll just break down and let h&r block handle it this year.

ah! she wised up after all!

my new year's wasn't what I planned. I don't want to go into it here--some dirty laundry should be very selectively aired--but the first few days of 2007 were very difficult for me. several very special people helped me through them. you know who you are. God bless and thank you.

I hate dubbed movies. not because I'm a film snob, but because it drives me nuts to see mouths and words not in sync. I'd much rather read subtitles than deal with that.

would someone with more technical knowledge than mine please author a blogger.com toolbar for firefox? it would make me happy. I'll buy you something nice.