Back at the Grind

Thoughts after the Memorial Day weekend:

• I am not terribly fond of headwinds while bike riding.
• I intensely-dislike (hate, even) fluorescent lighting.
• Corrupt files are not something I care to deal with while only having one cup of coffee in my bloodstream.
• I forgot my hat and that makes me sad.
• Noisy neighbors do not please me.

I'll miss the mostly-slackery downtime I had over the four-day weekend (I took extra time off). It's going to be pretty non-stop for the next four months.

Breezing Through

Bright idea: I had to run errands so I thought I'd bike to my destination (some five miles away).

Conditions: windy

End result: goddamn I'm tired.

Doing the Kessel Run

May 25, 1977.

I was... well... still a kid. We were in Honolulu. My folks took me to see this movie called Star Wars. There was a ridiculous line.

Hours later, I was hooked like a little prepubescent crack fiend.

I have seen Star Wars: A New Hope in its various incarnations hundreds (literally hundreds) of times.

During my college days (daze) I worked a summer job for a record store in their video department (raise your hand if you can conceive of these kind of dinosaur jobs). We played the Star Wars trilogy in the background, with the sound off, and lip-sync'd every line and action. We were flawless.

A lot has changed in the intervening... decades... yikes. For all that, I can still remember the wide-eyed wonder I had as that rebel blockade runner streaked across the screen pursued by the mammoth power of the Imperial Star Destroyer.

So it begins

Semi-inebriated discussions of Irish pubs and American politics with fellow barfl... um.. patrons at local-ish drinking establishment. Check.

I had planned on eating in tonight, but... oh who am I kidding? It's an early weekend for me.

And the beer is so very good...

Soon. SOOOOOOON....

I plan to take a four-day weekend in honor of Memorial Day.

Okay, that's a lie. I'm taking advantage of the Memorial Day holiday, burning some time off, and making it a four day weekend of utter slackery.

I'd like to go do something fun but funds are tight. Such is the way of things.

'Tis the little things

• Discovering that someone got their act together and I can finally register for that class.
• A good night's sleep.
• Replacing those frayed shoelaces before they broke.
• Four day weekend.
• Having a solution to a vexing problem.
• Having a deadline shifted further down the road.
• Having pending treats that indirectly make up for more than a few disappointments.

It's the little things that make the foundations of what will hopefully be a good day.

Though, the BBC is not getting Xmas cards from me this year...

Because there's not enough bullshit in the world

Have you ever heard of the Smith-Mundt Act of 1948 and Foreign Relations Authorization Act in 1987? In a nutshell, these acts make it illegal for the government to spread propaganda (lies) in order to further an agenda.

Sounds pretty crazy, doesn't it?

Well, no worries. Some jackasses in Congress want to lift that ban and make it legal for the government to lie to us.

'Cause it's not like they don't already do that. (*cough*WMDs in Iraq*cough*)

Warrentless spying, indefinite detention... I mean why not add legalized lying to the list?

I'm so glad I don't have kids.

Bits of Random

I woke thinking I've shaken the bug that shut me down on Saturday. So I rode my bike to work today.

Probably not my smartest move.

The head-wind was slight but enough to make me realize I'm still a bit off. I'm starting to wonder if this is "just" severe allergies instead of an actual cold.

Guess it doesn't matter.

---

Been watching "The Legend of Korra" of late. For an animated kid's show, they're going in some interesting directions with this story.

So of course I think they just went on hiatus.

KHAAAAAAN!!!!

---

Saw Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol.

Okay... I have to admit a guilty pleasure for the Mission Impossible movies. They're implausible and ridiculous, but they are fun flicks. I can even get over the excessive Tom Cruise-ness in them.

"Ghost Protocol" was pretty much up there in the ridiculous but I liked how it tied itself to the previous movie and kept the story running. I was also happy to see Simon Pegg return. Funny how a lot of those IMF agents seem to be from countries other than the U.S., but take their orders from the Department of Defense.

Better Living through Nyquil

Nyquil-assisted fourteen hours of slumber coupled with a Sunday of complete and utter sloth and I feel mostly-human.

I am a fan of Nyquil.

A huge fan.

bleah

Either allergies are setting in with a vengeance or I've caught a bit of a bug.

Or both. It could be both. Either way, I think I'll be crashing early tonight. Ugh. Shitty way to spend a Saturday.

The Fun has Begun

It's been a weird, weird week. Now it's time for the unwinding.

Yes, that means booze. If that means I'm an alcoholic, then so be it.

Enterprising

There's an engineer out there who proposes that we can build a fully-functional Enterprise (like the one from "Star Trek") in 20 years.


Okay... why?

I mean, I get the idea of building a spaceship capable of interplanetary travel. That's brilliant. I think we should be focusing on that as a species.

I'm down with that.

But why pick the Enterprise as a model?

Just look at it? The Enterprise is... just counter-intuitive as a spaceship model.

It's ungainly and is clearly developed with a concept of "artificial gravity" as a working technology. And even assuming artificial gravity, why would one make a starship that's so just... all-over-the-place?

I've long found a problem with certain types of spaceships (like Enterprise) portrayed in film and TV. So the Enterprise can't land on planets and it has artificial gravity, making "up" and "down" arbitrary. Why wouldn't the ship be designed in a more simplistic, cylindrical or spherical shape?

Seems to me those shapes would be more structurally-sound and offer better fields-of-fire in combat scenarios.

Further, why wouldn't the starship's "up" be the direction it's flying rather than 90-degrees from the ship's "up"?

Think about it: you've got no gravity to worry about. Why wouldn't the horizontal planes of gravity for the crew be perpendicular to the direction the ship travels? That way when you're accelerating with the ship's thrust, you use that thrust to generate gravity and don't need to use this "artificial gravity" magic technology.

Or does that just make sense in my head?

I think about this stuff too much.

Tesla

The Oatmeal's tribute to Nikola Tesla.

Read it. Bask in the awesome. Nothing else needs be said.

May the Piano Guys be with you

Am I the only person on the Internet who hasn't seen this already?

Midweek Post

It's amazing how just the slightest bit of a headwind can make one's ride in during the morning hours a wee-bit intolerable.

I guess I shouldn't complain. Unlike yesterday morning, the roads and sidewalks were empty. No vaguely-disquieting groups of fellows walking about along my destination, prompting me to opt to change course and avoid potential difficulties.

It pays to be "too careful".

---

Deadlines loom now. I've always been fascinated by that word: "deadline". One of my old professors summed it up best: "A deadline is a point on the calendar that stresses you out to the point when you want to die. Then after you've managed to meet it, you drink to the point where you resemble the dead."

Okay, I'm paraphrasing. After eons. Still, that was the gist.

---

Yesterday was a bit too exciting: helicopters, weirdness, too many people over-caffeinating, too many people under-caffeinating (I'm not sure where I fall in this spectrum), emergency vehicles every damn place.

Might even rain tomorrow (10% chance per the weatherpeople). Weird, weird, weird.

Rambling

It's weird how the bicycling thing works out. Last week, pedaling in to work was a freakin' nightmare for me. No good reason. Just worked out that way.

This morning? Easy peasy. Smooth as could be.

So the lesson learned here was that three days of debauchery and sloth were somehow good for me.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

---

While shuffling piles of paper in my cave-like dwelling, I found a novelization of the first adventures of Blake's 7.

Damn but I forgot what a hoot this show was. This is ripe for a remake.

Especially these days.

---

There's just something weird about the month of May. I always think it's a week later than it really is. Sad.

Huh

So it's Mother's Day.

My mother is out-of-town enjoying the fun life. I've already done the Mother's Day thing for her, so today is sort of free-and-clear for me.


So what have I done?

Well, beer was involved.

Big shocker.

Oh, and I saw The Avengers for the third time. Yes, there was beer involved. It was simply delightful but I think I'm done now.

I regret nothing.

Do the Friday Happy Dance

That's right party people! Friday has arrived!

Should be a pleasant weekend.

Thoughts

• The Avengers was just as fantastic on a second viewing. I may opt for a third.
• So, President Obama came out in favor of gay marriage. That's a good thing. It's surprising he came out and said it before an election, but the statement can't really hurt him. I mean, his base is in favor of the same. The conservatives already hate him for a variety of reasons (some valid, some utterly nonsensical). Seems to me the President was smart to just stop hedging and come out and back the idea.
• They finally fixed the air-conditioning in my office. I cannot express how happy that makes me.
• Apocalypse Equipped reviewed a shiny thing the other day that... well... suffice it to say I've ordered one and now wait anxiously for it to arrive.
• Unrelated... mostly. I cut my thumb right across the tip. No idea how. It's in that awkward stage between not-quite-healed but not needing a bandage. The annoyance factor is pretty high.

So wrong

Having had some Brewdog beer, I consider this a travesty.

Brewdog's retort is poetry, though. Pure poetry.

Required Assembly

Why yes I did go see The Avengers again today.

It remains awesome.

Death of a liver and other things

It's been a seriously alcoholic few days.

It started Friday with drinks at Forbidden Island

It was followed with a grand debauch Saturday of various alcoholic beverages around the viewing of The Avengers.

For perspective, there was sake, a "Black Widow" (some kind of custom vodka and kalua cocktail), some beer... um... I think maybe I had two Black Widows... then other cocktails at Local Edition. Yeah. That was a brutal night.

I returned to Forbidden Island Sunday with others.

Sunday barely counts, though. I was the designated driver, so I nursed some mild drinks and had a lot of water.

Flash forward to last night.


I met up with an old, old friend/mentor/teacher for some pizza and beer in my childhood hometown.

I got there early. I haven't been back to the childhood stomping grounds in a long time. Even in my last few visits, I didn't really wander about and see all that's changed.

This time I got to see a lot. Jeeeeez... it's like a different town.

So I made a beeline for the restaurant/bar my friend and I were meeting at.

And had pints while waiting.

And my friend insisted on us having a shot of Jameson's on top of the pints.


Glad I took public transportation.

This morning was... unpleasant. And I made myself ride my sorry ass into work.

As bike rides go, it was... a bit more difficult than normal. It wasn't as bad as Erik's yesterday. So that's something.

But the day isn't over yet...

Wet Whistles

It started a few years back.

A buddy dragged me and another friend to some unmarked door in a sketchy part of the Tenderloin. After a brief chat on an intercom, he talked us in past the lovely young lady who greeted us.

A few mintues later, we were seated at the bar and I had my first drink at Bourbon and Branch

It was the first of about four trips I've taken there. It's a "speakeasy" in the traditional, Prohibition sense. It's a classy, dimly-lit drinking establishment with highly-professional staff and a code of conduct (including no cell phones, no cameras, and no Cosmos).

It's a reservation-only sort of place, usually. There's no standing at the bar. If there's no seats, you're out of luck. You book a table for a set time (a half-hour up to a couple of hours).

If reservations aren't in the cards for your evening, it's possible to find the door off the street that leads to the Library. There it's standing room only and the drink menu seems a bit more limited, but that could simply be that I dind't look hard enough. I've only been to the Library once.


A short time later, a sister establishment, The Rickhouse opened. It's done up in a saloon style and doesn't appear to require reservations.

And it gets crowded. Oh-so-crowded.

I've been there more than a few times. It's sort of an annual tradition, after a fashion. Great ambiance and, like B&B, excellent drinks.

Why the hell am I blogging this, you ask?


Yet another sister bar opened recently: Local Edition. Set in the old Examiner printing room, it's a newspaper-themed establishment of quite some quality.

Excellent cocktails, good staff, and a nice mix of reservation-seating and non-reservation bar area.


The news had some bit this morning about how this summer is supposed to be a big tourist season. So if you're touristing in San Francisco, consider giving these places a try.

The Avengers

In a word: awesome.

In a few more words: fun, crazy, and a blast.

Winter is Aligning

io9 did an analysis of some Game of Thrones characters and gave them Dungeons and Dragons alignments.

Clever idea, but I'm inclined to disagree with the Arya Stark alignment. She has always struck me as more chaotic neutral than anything else. And in the books... oh "good" isn't a word I'd use. Especially later.

I'm taking credit for this

It's possible someone else came up with this line, but I just came up with it independently a few moments ago and will lay claim:

It doesn't matter what the pig looks like as long as you can get to the bacon

No, I'm not going into what prompted that line.

Edit: The more I look at this post, the more that line sounds like innuendo, so I'm going into what prompted that line.

I'm working on a project and it has... flaws. I used that metaphor (of sorts) to explain that the audience for the project won't really care about the little things as long as they get what they want.

So get your minds out of the gutter.

Wait. Maybe mine was the only mind in the gutter...? I need a drink.

1987 gets closure

The only context you need here is:

Debbie Gibson

Tiffany

If you remember the late 1980's and early 1990's, this is all you need to know.

Cracked Points

Six ways Iron Man is "objectively" better than Batman.

I added the quotes to "objectively" as there's a healthy dose of subjective in the arguments as a whole. Still, I only find myself slightly-disagreeing with point #2. Slightly.

Via Cracked

A Vomiting of Electrons, A Spewing of Pixels

So... thoughts on Peter Jackson's take on The Hobbit:

I don't really care that he's expanding the story by telling the "off-camera" scenes with Gandalf. I'm a bit dicey on the likely tweaks to the mythology, but I accepted it without too much trouble in the Lord of the Rings movies, so I'll probably be ok with the film.

I am, however, not happy with the buzz surrounding the frame-rate methods Jackson's using with The Hobbit. Apparently, it's quite jarring. I wish he'd wait and experiment on some other kind of movie rather than mess around with this film. He's already going to have Tolkien-nerds frothing and screaming over the continuity changes he'll introduce.

*sigh*

Thoughts on The Avengers: I. CANNOT. WAIT.


Thoughts on Pinterest: I had no idea what this was until a few weeks ago. I don't understand the purpose or appeal. That's about as much thought as I intend to give on this topic.

Thoughts on Occupy riots: Seems like they're not really helping the cause. I'm having philosophical issues with the whole taking-over-buildings (or other locations) idea that seems to be happening frequently.

And yea. I've bored myself and you enough. Moving on.

May

It's May. It's May. The merry month of May.

I'm not going to sing the song. Relax. We're all safe. I'm not interested in waking the Elder Gods.

Yet.

How the HELL did MAY get here so fast?

Creepy.