mikelopedia

Dublin - Book Discussion - Sep 07

2007-09-12T17:41:00.000-04:00

Kafka on the Shore (海辺のカフカ, Umibe no Kafuka) [wikipedia] by Haruki Murakami is the book for tonight.

I must remember to talk to Dennis about A Mighty Wind and Eugene Levy's incredible performance and to ask about the CD.

(written 9/10/2007; future-posted to 9/12/2007)

PCPL - Book Discussion - Sep 07

2007-09-10T17:34:00.000-04:00

PCPL is starting up Book Discussion tonight after the summer break and the book is The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. I've only read a dozen pages of this 650+ page tome (ha ha!)since I didn't get it until last week. I'll go to the dicussion, and I'll read the book, but I won't be able to talk about it until next month. I've also got to finish the book for the Dublin Book Discussion on Wednesday.

Meet the Teacher

2007-09-06T17:18:00.000-04:00

Through the traffic to the daughter's school to meet her third grade teacher. It would be so nice if the school had central air conditioning. It would also be great if the school didn't try and raise money by selling nuritionally void Market Day products. It's ironic when she brings home papers about the Food Pyramid and Market Day flyers for pre-processed food items.

(written 9/10/2007; back-dated to 9/6/2007)

Films about teachers

2007-09-05T14:41:00.000-04:00

Turner Classic Movies ran Mr. Holland's Opus [imdb] at 8 in the evening. The wife and I watched this after putting the daughter to bed. I was certain I'd seen this before and I kept looking for Madeline Zima to make an appearence. It turns out that neither of us had seen this film, and I was thinking of The Sandy Bottom Ochestra [imdb] which which has Zima in it. It came out in 2000 and was a TV movie. Mr. Holland was from 1995. The film is excellent and the soundtrack (like Forest Gump, there are two albums out) is a wonderful mix of classical and contemporary music from the 1960s (and before) up to the then current 1995. Now I want to see Sandy Bottom Ochestra again. By a strange turn of events, Glenne Headly [imdb] has leading parts both films. As for Zima, in Sandy Bottom Ochestra she played a character named "Rachel Green". Friends [imdb] had been on for 6 years when this was made.

The next film up was To Sir, with Love [imdb] whichI've seen parts of several times, but never all at one sitting. The cinematography in the museum visit was very well done. Sidney Poitier's acting style is amazing. He was 40 the year that film was made. I was just born. He directed Stir Crazy [imdb]? I didn't know that. It seems that 1967 was a busy year for him with To Sir, In the Heat of the Night [imdb] and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner [imdb].

We went to sleep then, not watching Goodbye, Mr. Chips and Dead Poets Society.

(written 9/6/2007; back-dated to 9/5/2007)

Luna - my APOD

2007-08-28T18:33:00.000-04:00

Full Moon - 12+ hours after the lunar eclipse

Fuji FinePix A800, 12 x digital zoom, freehand

1024 x 768 crop from 3296 x 2472 original

saved at 90% quality in IrfanView 3.97

(written 9/10/2007; back-dated to 8/28/2007)

Krr-Pop! The Popcorn Shop

2007-08-28T18:11:00.000-04:00

While at the mall and waiting for the daughter's eyeglasses to be made, we had dinner. The wife and daughter shared Chinese food which they said was not as good as what they were used to over the summer. I wandered trying to see what looked good and opted for Subway.

After I was finished, I noticed that there was a place called Krr-Pop! The Popcorn Place and, that to my surprise, the sold not only popcorn, which I didn't want for dinner, but also Hot Dogs and other carnival fair, which would have been different. I went over and said the needed a bigger sign to show all they offered (this was printed too small) and I found that this shop is the only one of its kind. I'd thought it was a chain. Next time I'm over at the mall, I'll stop in. I wish them all the success they need.

(written 9/10/2007; back-dated to 8/28/2007)

Glasses for the daughter

2007-08-28T18:08:00.000-04:00

The daughter, wife and I went out to the mall and the daughter was fitted for eye glasses. She can use them on the computer and for reading and if she wants to, she can where them all the time. She loves the frames and I personally think she looks like a 25 year old fashion designer. We just need to get her a show on Bravo TV and all will be complete!

In the back of my mind, her having to get glasses was something that has worried me for years. I'm afraid it will just enforce the stereotype of the brainy child. Daughter, don't read this until you're much older, okay?

(written 9/10/2007; back-dated to 8/28/2007)

Third Grade

2007-08-28T18:01:00.000-04:00

The daughter had her first day of third grade today. Her BFF, who was in both first and second grade with her was not in her class and this was rough. But we think it will help her to grow.

(written 9/10/2007; back-dated to 8/28/2007)

First telephone call to Errol

2007-08-12T17:21:00.000-04:00

I still have money left on my onesuite.com account and after working on Errol Sitahal's website, I decided to call him on Sunday evening. His wife answered and then we talked for about 35 minutes. I admit, I was gushing like a fan-boy at first. We went over many of the items on his resume and he provided some much needed additions. He even added one other TV program he was on that I didn't have.

The greatest amount of content is the Biography and the Resume. I think I've got he resume much closer to chronological order. The biography was greatly expaned once I found his entry in The Cambirdge Guide to African and Carribean Theatre. I need to pick one thing and work on it with him. I'd say the resume as this should be accurate and can be send to his agent to update his professional resume. Then we should concentrate on the biography. I can send him the details as I found them in the guide book. It only runs to 1994, which is a good stopping point; his film career started in 1995. Still, it's out of date by 12 years now. So much we can be doing with it.

As for calling again, I think I will put that off for at least another month if not two since Errol and I have many things to do that we should be doing via email.

(written 9/10/2007; back-dated to 8/12/2007)

Live Free or Die Hard

2007-08-07T13:47:00.000-04:00

The wife and I went to go and see Live Free or Die Hard Tuesday night. Bruce Willis is looking old, or perhaps it was just John McClane looking old? The film was good, but could have been better. The theater was running their preview and advertisements show. Interesting things were:

We Own the Night (a film)
Bionic Woman (9/26/07 on NBC TV)
Journey Man (this fall on NBC TV)

Previews were:

The Brave One - a vigilante movie with Jodie Foster
The Game Plan - Disney fluff
The Kingdom - with Jamie Fox, this looks good and reminds me of Syriana
Hitman

(written 8/8/07; back-dated to 8/7/07)

Hiroshima book

2007-08-06T23:11:00.000-04:00

Tonight, 62 years after the atomic bombing I read Hiroshima [wikipedia] by John Hersey [wikipedia]. It follows the lives of six survivors of the bombing. It was published, in its entirety, in the August 31, 1946 edition of The New Yorker magazine. This edition is from 1983 and there are later copies that have a 5th section in addition to the original 1946 essay that detail Hersey's travels to Japan to see what became of the six people profiled in the book. Hersey died in 1993, so I'm wondering what edition, since mine is the 18th. The story is sad and graphic in places. Every August I tend to think about the bombings.

I've not gone out to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum [Official site, wikipedia] in a long time, but as I remember, the Virtual Museum was very well done.

Wife and daughter - Toronto to Columbus

2007-08-04T21:16:00.000-04:00

My wife and daughter are flying from Toronto to Columbus today.

(written 6/21/2007; forward-dated to 8/4/2007)

Wife and daughter - Beijing to Toronto

2007-08-03T20:34:00.000-04:00

Today, my wife and daughter fly back to Toronto, Canada from Beijing, China. Since they have an 18 hour layover, they are staying in a hotel for the night.

(written 6/21/2007; forward-dated to 8/3/2007)

Korean Zen Cinema

2007-07-25T17:30:00.001-04:00

Last night I finished watching the 1989 film Why Has Bodhi Dharma Left for the East? [IMDB, Amazon], a film I've been wanting to watch since I glimpsed the cover in the library. It has comparisons to Ozu (whose films I've not seen) and Tarkovsky (who did Solaris [IMDB], which I love).

The Korean title is Dharmaga tongjoguro kan kkadalgun. Yong-Kyun Bae [IMDB] is the Director, Writer, Cinematographer & Editor, and took 7 years and his own funding for the film. Not entirely unlike Mike Jittlov.

Like Solaris, this needs multiple viewings.

Looking over Solaris, at the IMDB, it's soon going to be time to watch this again. I wish I had the VHS and DVD versions myself. Lots of subtile changes between them. I remember how the VHS version had both letterboxing bars at the bottom to allow a bigger area for subtitling. None of the titles were on the picture. It's funny to remember watching Return of the Jedi in the theater and seeing the subtitles over the picture. But when you watch it on DVD in widescreen, the subtitles are below the picture, in the black bar.

Methinks there is something wrong with blogger again. The photo is showing here in the edit of my post, but not on the view of the blog. Also, the bold is gone. At first, I thought that an issue with the template I'm using. Perhaps I should go back to my old tripod page after all. I've got better control there.

Make your own Venture Bros Bonus Audio CD

2007-07-19T15:39:00.000-04:00

The Venture Bros has to be one of the best shows on TV and sadly, the new season won't be on Adult Swim until "winter" which could mean late 2007 or early 2008. I have season 1 and I still need to get the actual DVDs of season 2, even though it's been out for 3 months and a couple of days. There are quite a few extra songs and such out on the net and if you put them all together, it makes a nifty bonus CD. I was going to post this over a year ago and everytime I'd get close, I'd find something else to add. As it is I even found another person's blog entry in the same vain, but my list has a few more things. They are grouped in show order, then in order of release and the extra commentary is at the end. Feel free to choose your own order:

Venture Bros Open - 0:53 (ZIP file) [Adult Swim]
Revv Me Up - 4:09 ("Mid-Life Chrysalis", episode 8 - Brocks workout song) [Offical Site]
Look Away - 2:02 ("Return to Spider-Skull Island", episode 13 - end of season 1) [Offical Site] or (ZIP file) from [Adult Swim]
Everybody's Free - 3:32 ("Powerless in the Face of Death", episode 14 - start of season 2) [YTMND]
Mitre Storm - 3:04 ("I Know Why the Caged Bird Kills" - episode 23) [Offical Site]
Wedding Song - 3:20 ("Showdown at Cremation Creek (Part I)" - episode 25) [QuickStop]
Venture Bros Close - 0:33 (ZIP file) [Adult Swim]
Monarch Prison Phone Call to Henchmen - 3:21 [IGN]
Monarch Prison Phone Call to Dr. Girlfriend - 3:11 [IGN]
Little Drummer Boy - 4:48 (Christmas 2004) [IGN] or [QuickStop]
Hard Candy Christmas - 5:08 (Christmas 2005) [IGN] or [QuickStop]
Venture Aid - 3:07 (Christmas 2006) [QuickStop]
Lost Commentary (1x07) - 23:13 ("Home Insecurity" - episode 3) [QuickStop]

Yes, "Everybody's Free" by Aquagen featuring Rozalla is not actually a freebie. But I'm not telling you to save it.

There are plenty of graphics out there to make a nice cover for it. Of course, you can still go and and get your own Brock Sampson OSI ID at the official Venture Brothers website.

Westbridge Camera Club & Women Astronauts

2007-07-18T23:53:00.001-04:00

I met David at the camera club meeting and afterward were were discussing, among other things, a picture of Kathy Sullivan. I found some links out at GRIN (GReat Images in NASA). There are 50 photos specifically on women here. I put these pretty much in chronological order. Links for the photos in various sizes are at the bottom of the pages. The two I was talking about of Kathy are numbers 4 and 7:

Hope Vitellas is on MySpace

2007-07-18T11:04:00.000-04:00

I was listening to some small sample clips of Hope Vitellas and went out to see if she's added anyting new. Her official site is suspended for now. What the _? I checked and she does have a MySpace site here. I still need to get her CD from last year. She's got presence!

I'll go update my post in June 2006 and put the link there too.

Sydney Forest, where are you?

2007-07-15T23:31:00.000-04:00

I'm surprised I've not watched Kiki's Delivery Service (Majo no takkyûbin @ IMDB) since the wife and daughter have been in China. I do need to watch A Mighty Wind and return it tomorrow, so I shouldn't be posting now, but I am. Thinking about Kiki made me think of the new beginning and ending music for the Disney VHS release back on 1 September 1998. (That version was Pan and Scan. On 29 September they released the widescreen and I should have waited. Of course there was also the subtitled widescreen VHS that I didn't get either.)

The songs Soaring, used for the opening, and I'm Gonna Fly, used for the ending, were sung by Sydney Forest. I like the songs in the original Japanese but these are good too. One of the things Disney/Buena Vista did right. (Some of the other musical changes are good too.) Back in 2000, you could order a CD from her site called "Collected Film and Television Works" for $5 that had those two songs and three others by her. The CD is listed at here at nausicaa.net at the bottom.

I went out and using the mp3 search on AltaVista, you can find very good quality (192 k) versions of these two songs:

Soaring - you need to search the page
I'm Gonna Fly

I'd still like the original CD. Looking over the Internet Archive, her original site http://www.sydneyforest.com/ was up from at least 9 August 1999 to 2 August 2002 - looks like it was registed for 4 years. There is an email sydmail@aol.com, but it just bounced.

Her IMDB page shows nothing since 2004. I wish I could find her site.

TV Saturday Morning

2007-07-14T09:03:00.001-04:00

Up late last night, but up in time to talk with the wife on the phone. The daughter is not behaving as she should and so she's "in jail". That is, in her room, with nothing to do, except for meals and the bathroom.

The history channel ran "Beyond the War of the Worlds" about Mars. It featured Jeff Wayne's musical version of "The War of the Worlds" which is a 2006 computer animated movie.

Flipping channels and I see that Khaled Hosseini is on C-SPAN2's "Book TV" talking about "A Thousand Splendid Suns". It is from 5/24/07 recored in Philidelphia. He's reading the first chapter. But I've got things to do and I'm going to turn it off and either listen to the radio or to a movie that I've seen and don't need to watch. Maybe. I may just listen in, as it's not too distracting.

2007-07-07T23:52:00.000-04:00

(Why can't I put in a title for this entry? That's weird. It's not letting me in the field with IE or Firefox.)

At the showing of Transformers there was a 7th trailer for an untitled movie produced by J.J. Abrams. There is an entry on IMDB simply called "Untitled J.J. Abrams Project". The working title or code name is "Cloverfield", "Clover" or "Parasite". The offical site seems to be http://www.1-18-08.com/, but there is only a photo there. And the "analysis" of the space between the two women in the picture is total conjecture. I say it's nothing at all of any significance.

Youtube.com has copies of the trailer but they are being taken down soon after being put up. In one comment, some pointed a much better copy here, but it has the beginning cut off. Keepvid.com won't download it. But it does look quite a bit better.

Transformers in 25 words or less

2007-07-04T00:11:00.000-04:00

Here's my nutshell review:

Transformers is the movie I had hoped Independence Day was going to be
eleven years ago.

Sixteens words. For me, that is amazing.

In two words: "Wicked cool!"

(written 7/16/2007; back-dated to 7/4/2007)

Powerbook Screen Problems

2007-07-01T23:20:00.000-04:00

My wife is having issues with the Mac. I think the screen is going out. Here are a couple of pictures:

It looks like we will be replacing the screen when she gets back from China.

Blogger Mods

2007-06-21T23:22:00.000-04:00

I'm still not too happy about blogger being so narrow. I finally dug around and found where in the template code to set to width for the page and this posting column. It's screwed up some of the images, but it gives me more than an index card's width to type.

I changed to a different template so that I could get dates to stand out more. I'm torn between wanting to blog everything for a given day under an entry named for the day, or post in pieces over the course of a day.

Waterworld - ABC version

2007-06-21T23:09:00.000-04:00

Tonight I found out that the longer version of Waterworld, the one that was on ABC years ago was on the SciFi Channel. Unfortunately, it was already an hour into the broadcast. It would be a good project to get that recorded and then to integrate it with the wide screen footage of the DVD. You could even make it so that the full screen parts were properly centered within the letter boxed area. It would look funny when it transitioned, but it would be cool.

Ramsay's $#%*@! Nightmare

2007-06-14T08:25:00.000-04:00

Worked late getting things done so as to take Friday off. When I got home, watched some of Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmare on BBC America. I've never heard a show with so much bleeping. I don't get it. What's the fascination with such a huge level of crude language? It's childish and it gets old quickly with me. I saw this show years ago. Lenny Henry was in it, it was called Chef! and at that time it was enjoyable to watch.

(written 6/15/2007; back-dated to 6/14/2007)

Gas Prices - Holy Schnikes!

2007-05-23T11:33:00.000-04:00

Today gas was $3.49 at both the BP and Shell on the way to work. Yesterday it was $3.19 - the weekly day of when it goes up seems to be Wednesday.

Wally Schirra 1923 - 2007

2007-05-08T10:03:00.000-04:00

Walter Marty "Wally" Schirra (March 12, 1923 - May 3, 2007) died today. He was one of the original seven Mercury astronauts and the only astronaut to fly in the Mercury (MA-8 "Sigma 7"), Gemini (6A) and Apollo (7) programs.

His death leaves only two Mercury astronauts still living: John H. Glenn and M. Scott Carpenter.

(Written 5/8/2007; back-dated to 5/3/2007)

Eighteen years ago today

2007-05-01T15:18:00.000-04:00

Supersize Me - again

2007-04-30T15:22:00.000-04:00

Morgan Spurlock's Supersize Me was on MSNBC last night. The wife and I watched it a couple of weeks back on a Friday. I've still missed just the beginning. I'm still eating out from time to time, but I've kept my resolution about no McDonalds for all of 2007.

Retro Post to May 2006

2007-04-27T21:06:00.000-04:00

I just made a retro post about something I submitted to the IMDB and amazingly it was on the same day as my post about the Edwin J Hill Social Club Bash at Studio 35. I didn't see that coming.

I suppose I should see about using labels for my posts.

Ken Gage in the News

2007-04-27T10:42:00.000-04:00

I spoke with Ken a few weeks back on a trip to Chillicothe. He told me about Face of the Screaming Werewolf ([Wikipedia] [Amazon]) that he had published recently through Xlibris - part of Randolm House.

Today I got an email from him (sent yesterday). There's a write about him in the Arlington Heights Post. He's having a book-signing on Saturday. Here's the link. Don't know how long it will be up there.

24-Hour Short Story - Day Two

2007-04-22T11:08:00.000-04:00

I worked on the story in the moring and did word counts periodically as I went along. The limit was 1,000 words minus the title and my contact info at the end. The last count I remember was around 670. With the deadline getting closer, I focused on just writing and when I finally was happy with the story, I was shocked to see I had 1,374 words and I would need to cut more than one-quarter of what I had.

Ultimately, I got it down to exactly 1,000 words and send it off. I was 5 minutes late and I knew it would not be accepted, but I wanted to complete it. Angela, from Writer's Weekly did send me a confirmation noting the time and letting me know it was a disqualified entry. After reading all of the tales in the rules about how people try and fool her, wrote back an honest reply: I knew it was late and I was editing like a mad-man to get down to the limit. I enjoyed it and I would definitely enter the next contest. I hope that she was surprised a bit by an email that was out of the usual.

As for my story, I've not worked on it all week - work has been too busy. I did send my submission to Darren to review and told him of my goals:

To get it much more polished and fitting the 1,000 word limit. Just in case the next contest has the same word limit. Not that I'd resubmit the same story. You can't do that. But I want to prove to myself I can do it.
To take the longer version, clean it up and send it to Darren for review.
Expand the longer version to perhaps 2,000 characters and see where it takes me.

But when can I work on it? And book discussion is coming up again soon. Can I get it done?

"If he has the time, doctor. If he has the time." - Mr. Spock

(written 4/27/2007; back-dated 4/22/07)

My first 24-Hour Short Story - Day One

2007-04-21T10:51:00.000-04:00

After speaking with Darren last week, lamenting my desire to write, I entered the Writer's Weekly Spring '07 24-Hour Short Story Contest, at his suggestion. Darren entered it back in Fall of '05 and posted his entry to his blog. We talked about the winning story in the Winter '06 contest. I thought it was too much like the Warner Bros. cartoons that parody Of Mice and Men.
The morning of the contest, The daughter went over to a friend's house while I went to an optometrist visit. I may get glasses for all the time wear - possibly no-line bi-focals. I'm glad I didn't have the OD dilate my eyes as it would take 6 hours to recover and I was driving alone. Plus I was going to write later in the day. I headed home to check my email and was going to pick up the daughter by 4:30 PM.

I didn't get the story stub in email, so I went out the site and found it. Here's the stub:

She could hear the buoy bell ringing in the distance but it was too dark to see anything beyond the receding foamy water. She shivered as the wind picked up, knowing a late-season Nor'easter would hit in the next few hours, and knowing this was her last chance. She raised her arm and threw the glass bottle into the darkness...

I read it over quickly and then I began to work up the story. I ended up not getting it completed Saturday which was a big mistake.

(written 4/27/2007; back-dated 4/21/07)

Venture Bros. Season 2 on DVD

2007-04-17T10:38:00.000-04:00

Today is the release date. And I've still not bought it. Target's got it on their website for $20, but I don't think they will match their prices in the store. I'm still watching the VCDs of it, but I want it for the better picture and the commentary. Can't wait until season 3. When the heck is "winter".

(It looks like you can set any date on the post time. Finally, I can post back before 1990.)
(written 4/27/2007; back-dated to 4/17/2007)

Yuri's Night

2007-04-12T17:21:00.000-04:00

April 12, 1961 - Vostok I
Fourty-six years ago today, Yuri Gagarin became the first person to orbit the Earth. Six years Nearly seven years later, on March 27, 1968, Gagarin and his flight instructor, Seregin, died in a crash of their MiG-15.
(Photo from Russian Institute of Radionavigation and Time http://www.rirt.ru/ )

April 12, 1981 - STS-1
Twenty-six years ago today, John Young and Robert Crippen launched on the first shuttle flight aboard the shuttle Columbia. Nearly twenty-two years years later, on February 1, 2003, Columbia and her crew of seven would be lost during the retry of STS-107, her 28th mission and the 113th shuttle flight overall.
(Photo from NASA)

Kurt Vonnegut, gone but not forgotten

2007-04-12T16:43:00.000-04:00

Got an email from Dennis, my friend at book discussion:

From: Dennis (snip)
To: Michael (snip)
Subject: Kurt Vonnegut
Date: Thu, 12 Apr 2007 07:42:01 -0700 (PDT)

Kurt Vonnegut died yesterday. So it goes.

And my reply to him:

From : Michael (snip)
Sent : Thursday, April 12, 2007 11:06 AM
To : Dennis (snip)
Subject : RE: Kurt Vonnegut

"Everything was Beautiful and Nothing Hurts" - the tombstone from (I believe) Slaughterhouse Five.

(I'd not heard of this until I saw your email and I knew what happened just from the subject. Damn.)

- Mike

(written 7/31/2007; back-dated to 4/12/2007)

Second Blue Heron

2007-03-28T18:18:00.000-04:00

This morning, on the drive to work, I saw a second blue heron. I saw another one a couple of days back, on my way home from work. This one today was flying towards the north: a long, slender bird, high above the thining fog. There was a group of three other birds it was heading toward, but I don't think it was going to congregate. It was solitary and flying with a purpose someplace else.

Graceful and determined, it moved - its course set.
Just like my course.
But it didn't have to work. :)

No time now for a Heron Haiku - perhaps later.

Terebithia

2007-03-20T19:38:00.000-04:00

The wife, daughter and I went to go see Bridge to Terebithia as part of our 7th annual Family Day. The film was good, but sad and made all the moreso by how cute AnnaSophia Robb looked as Leslie. We all want to read the book. (The daughter is a very good reader. She's in 2nd grade and reading at a 5.0 in the Accelerated Reader (AR) program. She's been reading the Harry Potter books and is more than half way through the fourth one.) As I said, it is very sad and I was surprised that the daughter didn't cry at a few places. I've told her that it is okay to cry and I'm thinking that she may talk about it a few days later.

There were four previews:

Nancy Drew
Ratatouille
The Lost Mimzy (looks very good)
Meet the Robinsons

(written 3/21/2007; back-dated to 3/20/2007)

My daughter's Mondrian

2007-01-18T15:48:00.000-05:00

My daughter come into work for a bit in the early evening and did a little artwork in MS Paint. In art and technology her class was studying painters and so she worked up her own version of a Piet Mondrian. Here is her painting along side Mondrian's Composition with Yellow, Blue, and Red, public domain from Wikipedia.

(written 9/11/2007; back-dated to 1/18/2007)

War of the Worlds

2006-11-18T22:42:00.000-05:00

Came home and the wife and daughter were watching Eloise at Christmastime. I'd just made it to the lbrary in time to pick up War of the Worlds (2005) the one directed by Spielberg. The wife and daughter were tired from their swim lock-in and sleepover and went to bed early. I watched it and it's quite good and fast passed.

Browsing channels, there's quite a bit on, commercial breaks not withstanding. Bravo has Apocalypse Now (1979) but too many commercials and full screen (ugh). I think this is the redux version. I thought I watched that some months back, but I don't remeber Clean's burial or Willard talking with some women French woman. AMC has Taxi Driver (1976) but again commercials and full screen. TCM is running Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982) in letterbox.

Football: Ohio State vs Michigan

2006-11-18T10:13:00.000-05:00

After hearing on NPR that a Bo Schembechler, who coached Michigan from 1969 to 1989, died yesterday, I predict that this will rally Michigan to a win. We'll see later today.

Went in and worked. Found that the score was Ohio State 42, Michigan 39. Close. I wish I'd seen some of it.

T.G.I. Friday's with David

2006-11-17T23:09:00.000-05:00

(Woo hoo! This is my 100th post!)

Worked late and called David who was doing the same. Went over to Vineyard and chatted for a few while we decided where to go. We went to T.G.I. Friday's and the bacon chesseburger was so-so. I think I got the heart of a mediterranian onion. It was acrid and terrible. Normally, I love onion, but not this time. I think I'm just spoiled by Chesseburger in Paradise. They are just excellent. And the Cuban sandwich was great too.

Conversation was all over, including his cool new phone with videos from YouTube. I need to be using Firefox. We talked about being able to save videos off of YouTube and hopefully other sites using it. There's a couple of Miracle Legion videos I've seen streaming elsewhere that I'd like to keep.

Aluminum foil makes an excellent "lamp-shade". David will understand this.

I'm off to get some sleep as I will need to go back in to finish up several things that all showed up in the past couple of days at work. But, I'm wearing sweats!

(written early 11/18/2006; back-dated to late 11/17/2006)
(I need to adjust the time or this will show before my other post for 11/17)

Found - Shawn Colvin

2006-11-17T16:21:00.000-05:00

I've been wanting to play Sunny Came Home for nearly a week and last night I found the CD. I kept looking when I was in a hurry for a yellow CD, but it's only yellow on the inside. I brought it to work and added it to my music here. I immediately played Sunny Came Home and enjoyed it, and I was thinking that I didn't need to keep any of the other tracks from it since I've tried to listen to the entire CD for years and have never been able to get into it.

Growing tired of my current "stuff3" playlist over the past new weeks, I've been looking for some new music and had the player jumping randomly after each song later in the day. It picked If I Were Brave which is so simple and yet so powerful.

I'm so glad I found this song today.

Retro Post - 12/24/2004

2006-11-16T21:19:00.000-05:00

I was looking over some older files and found photos from the ice storm we had over the night of December 23 and 24th, 2004.

Click here to see the post and photos.

Morning Radio

2006-11-15T10:49:00.000-05:00

Heard most of Tracy Chapman's song Fast Car this morning on the drive into work. I like that song and I love the way she sings. Hope Vitellas, from the free show in June at the Carabar, reminded me of Chapman with her power and presence. It goes back to something I read about the mid or late 1990's concert at Woodstock - the commercial one. There was something about how she and her lone guitar went out after other bigger name bands, U2 comes to mind, and that she still captivated the audience. I checked on Wikipedia and there were several Woodstock Festivals. Looking over Tracy Chapman, I don't see her listed there. The event that I read about may have been either the Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute or the Amnesty International Human Rights Now! Tour. Both of these took place in 1988. Or she could have been on tour with U2.

One station is playing Christmas music already and I caught most of John Lennon's Happy Xmas (War Is Over).

Vanity Plate - R WE THER

2006-11-14T10:47:00.000-05:00

Saw this on the way to work: "R WE THER" short for "Are we there?" I wonder if anyone has "THERE YET" or similar?

(writtten 11/15/2006; back-dated to 11/14/2006)

Ed Bradley (1941 - 2006)

2006-11-10T00:48:00.000-05:00

Just found out that Ed Bradley [wikipedia] died yesterday. Damn.

Happy Halloween from Number 21

2006-11-02T23:28:00.000-05:00

Below are a couple of pics of Monarch Henchman #21 which were my inspiration. It looks like I need to re-dye the shorts, top, gloves and "boots" in a shade of orange. Rit's Golden Yellow #42 is not the color I needed.

Defragging Smart Media Cards

2006-10-09T16:58:00.000-04:00

My camera is so very old. It's way past time to get a new one. It's an Olympus D-320L from 1997 - older than my daughter. A lot older than her. It uses up to 8MB smart media cards. I've got four of these - 3 in 8 MB and one 2 MB card. I've begun to notice that the camera is erroring out on these cards more often. I'm not sure if it's the camera or the cards. But I take a picture and then I get a rapid tweeping and the display flashes. I have to close the camera and that picture is gone. This happened before, but it would also come back up in low-quality mode.

I talked to David and he suggested defragging the cards, especially since I'm still using a 3.5 floppy adapter to read them. I tried this today and got the following message:

Disk Defragmenter cannot run on this volume type.

So, it looks like it may very soon be time to shop around.

Venture Brothers - Look Away

2006-07-06T11:24:00.000-04:00

On Sunday, I caught the opener of season two of The Venture Bros on Adult Swim. I had seent he final episode some time ago and wish I'd been following this all along. I can't stop playing the song Look Away by Nick DeMayo. Here are the lyrics:

Two angels are plucked
From the heavenly sky
In an instant they're gone
In the blink of an eye
If you listen close
You'll hear cherubs cry
Oh, look away

(The rest of the song contines on the mp3...)

My head is heavy
Their bodies bruised
Our spirits shattered
When we heard the news
The chorus is singin'
Its final tune
Oh, look away

We ran to the mountains
We shouted on high
We pled to the gods
And in answer replied
What was once is now lost
Yet could never die
Oh, look away

Look away
Whoa-whoa,
look away
Look away-hey

Quite a song for a pair of cartoon brothers who die in their prime.

You can find the mp3 out at The Venture Bros page at Adult Swim.

(edited 10/9/2006)

Local Music at Carabar

2006-06-09T14:32:00.000-04:00

Earlier in the week, Ryan Smith did a friend invite on my MySpace site. I checked his page and official site and was quite taken with his music. I listened to California all week and went to the show on Friday. The flyer said 10 PM and I was driving like a loon so as not to arrive late. As it turned out, Ryan played last (the order on the flyer was reversed.) and I was in plenty of time.

Here was the line up:

Jonathan Hape [Offical Site, MySpace]
Hope Vitellas [Offical Site, MySpace]
Ryan Smith [Offical Site, MySpace]

I picked up Ryan's and Jonathan's CDs there. I wish Hope had CDs there. She was amazing! Jonathan is going to Chicago in August. I'll drop another letter to Darren to see if he wants to check it out.

(written 6/30/2006; back-dated to 6/9/2006; updated 7/18/2007)

IMDB submission - Kiki's Delivery Service

2006-05-23T20:49:00.000-04:00

My one and only submission to the Internet Movie Database.

Reference: 060523-222343-275000
Date/Time: 2006-05-23 15:23:43
Summary: Majo no takkyûbin (1989)

Alternate Versions - 1 item added

Fun Stuff: Alternate Versions
Action: New #1
Alternate Version:

When the Disney dubbed version aired on the Disney Channel, shortly after the VHS release, there were two brief lines of dialog removed. After "rescuing" Jiji and replacing him with the stuffed cat, Kiki and Jiji are flying home and she tells about meeting the artist and adds that she (Ursula) wanted to paint of picture of her (Kiki). Jiji's question, "Naked?" and Kiki's embarrassed reply, "Jiji!" are both removed with a jump cut.

Submitted 11 months ago and this still hasn't been added to the IMDB.
Perhaps they don't believe me? :)

(written 4/27/2007; back-dated to 5/23/2006)

Edwin J Hill Social Club Bash

2006-05-23T20:27:00.000-04:00

Margaret, a friend at work, who is leaving Wednesday has a son who acts in local theater, as does his roommate. And together, with others, they have created 7 episodes, 30 or so minutes each, of a local sitcom titled The Edwin J. Hill Social Club [MySpace Group]. There was a free showing at Studio 35 [Official Site] this evening.

We got to see:
Episode 2 - the Sliding Doors parody
Episode 3 - George's Mom
Episode 4 - Hypnoboobs
Episode 7 - Vice Versa

As for Edwin himself, he is shrouded in mystery. But you can check out his MySpace Profile.

(written 5/24/2006; back-dated to 5/23/2006)

Sunday Watercolors

2006-05-21T20:20:00.000-04:00

The daughter and I did a some watercolors in the afternoon. She still paints much faster than me - at a rate of 4 to 1. These are not done, as I want to outline them with a fine tip black pen or marker. The scanner is on the blink again. Can you tell that these were photographed?

I'm not overly happy with the evergreen trees. I put the trunks in after the fact and it really shows. But I think I did a good job on the still-life. What started as a banana in the fruit bowl is looking more like a pear every time I look at it.

(written 5/24/2006; back-dated to 5/21/2006)

Retro Post - PLANETES theme

2006-05-15T23:03:00.000-04:00

Look here for the post on the theme music for the Anime Planetes that I simply can't stop playing.

Old friends from Qwest

2006-05-15T21:38:00.000-04:00

I can't recall the last time I was over at Nutt org, but it can't have been all that long ago. I'd say less than three weeks - tops. It looks like Eric, is reinventing his website again. For six years it's been like Madonna - changing, different, moving. I always like what he does. I should use this inspiration on my own neglected Tripod pages. I'll stay tuned and see what takes shape.

Thinking of Eric makes me want to check in on Jeremiah. I've not seem him online in ages. And he never has sent me any commentary on my short story.... Hmm.... DesignBox Media is still there and has some changes made this year. I will send him an email before the month is out.

I also had an instant message from Tony, another Qwest alumni. I will get back to him before the week is out.

Kochi Photos

2006-05-10T14:43:00.000-04:00

Chatted with Matt for a bit this morning. He sent me a pair of huge (file size) photos from his 5 mega-pixel camera. He's getting a great eye for photography. I will eventually post those other photos from his Camera Phone.

He said that he would get the daughter's letter to his student who wanted to correspond and I should have a reply back for her soon.

Here are his photos:

Click for larger views. These are reduced to about 30% original size but still nice.

Time Traveling with Netscape 4.76

2006-05-08T19:42:00.000-04:00

I'm over at the city library and browsing around a few sites. My blog and others look totally different on this older PC. Some dont' even load completely. It's running Windows 98 and Netscape 4.76 - in fact, blogger is telling me that this post might not save so I'll be brief.

Funny thing is that my friend David's site looks pretty good in it. I'll try either Publishing first and if that doesn't work, I'll at least try to save. Here goes.

Amazing! It worked. It's funny how different this all looks though. Like just now, I saw the link for editing this post while I'm signed in, but it was just the underline - the in-line image was not there. It's also funny how the images show up and all can be clicked and load up in driectly in the browser window. Backgrounds, at least in Blogger don't seem to show and tables are all funky

V for Vendetta

2006-04-29T17:08:00.000-04:00

Met David over a the IMAX in Easton and arrived just in time for the opening credits of V for Vendetta. (Are there previews for IMAX?) It was quite good. Natalie Portman was good and I was pleased to see Stephen Fry up on the big screen. I was very surprised to find out in the credits, that "V" was played by Hugo Weaving. I did not recognize his voice. But he speaks differently in the Matrix movies and in The Adventures of Prisilla, Queen of the Dessert.

Fry's character's comments about the Koran were great. In the society depicted in the film, it was a banned book - carrying with it a punishment of death. The collections of forbidden objects were wonderful, especially the poster of God Save the Queen. John Hurt was powerful as the British "Chancellor". This was in contrast to his role as Winston Smith in 1984.

After reading about Alan Moore's views on what the film became, I want to read the graphic novel. However, I don't know how much of the politics of it I will understand.

This film belongs with Gattaca in that is scares the hell out of me. There are things in it that could become part of everyday life and erode personal freedom and liberty even more than the are today.

After the film, we swung by California Pizza Kitchen but a look at the prices made me suggest we go someplace else. The average price was $10.49 and a soda was $2.19. It could have been worse since many places don't list the prices for soft drinks. After spending $9.50 for the ticket, I was wanting to save a bit of green.

We walked over to the Apple Store and looked around for a bit, killing time for me since I don't have a Mac. We did have a good chat with one of the ladies working there.

On the way out of Easton, David and I discussed ordering a pizza. We decided to meet back up at the church, where I was supposed to meet him before the film, but time and distance had been against me. We first went up to Fazoli's who turned out to not have what we wanted and instead headed up to a local Cici's Pizza. That was well within price range for me - $5.75. I'm glad that David indulged my fickle pallet.

While on the road, I played him a couple of mp3s from my keychain drive. One was the theme to Boondocks. The other was the opening theme music to Planetes, which I will need to blog about. I've been playing that music for weeks nearly non-stop.

(written 5/10/2006; back-dated to 4/29/2006)

No Movies for You - Work!

2006-04-20T16:46:00.000-04:00

David surprised me with a call to see if I was free to go and see a movie or do something tonight. I've very glad he called. He gave me a call last week too I think. Sadly, I'm so swamped with work now that I can't get away. I'd like to, but I can't. But, I will go and see V for Vendetta with him at least by the time it gets to the dollar theaters.

Tonight is also the first Columbus Cinema club (not the actual name) meeting. Per David, it's someplace in, did he say Granville? That doesn't sound right. I checked the Sonny Boo site, but can't find it. However, there is another Look At My Shorts on April 30th! Yeah! But I can't open the page. Back to work!

I am the stone that the builder refused...

2006-04-17T16:48:00.000-04:00

After the weekend, and getting too much sun, I napped for over 4 hours Sunday night. Is it really a nap if it's that long? I was awake from about 9:30 PM until 2:30 AM or so and had cartoon network on for a some of the time.

After Family Guy and American Dad (I've missed that show more than I realize.) I watched most of Boondocks. I don't know if it was a new episode or not. It was an alternate history wherein Martin Luther King, Jr. was not killed when shot but rather lapsed into a coma for nearly 40 years. The story was intreging and would have been more engrosing had I focused on it. The only other episodes I've watched of Boondocks are the one on the restaurant called The Itis and the one about the girl's Lemonade stand.

I should have paid more attention to it. I'll see if this going to be on again.

The title of my post is the opening line from the theme song. You can find it here: http://www.myspace.com/asheru1

(Thanks Adult Swim!)

Profile Update

2006-04-14T12:43:00.000-04:00

I finally added some to my profile, including an older cartoon-style self-portrait. Presently I have much less hair and no goatee.

For some technical reason, "U2" is not showing in my profile under favorite music.

(Written and posted in the same day - a rarity!)

Hedwig and the Angry Inch

2006-04-01T21:55:00.000-05:00

A co-worker of mine and I had been talking about Hedwig and the Angry Inch off and on over the past couple of months. I borrowed it from the library and we watched it this evening after the daughter went to bed. It was depressing, but the music was great. Some of it reminded me of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, but this is not really a far comparision. The story is different. Hedwig, born as Hansel in East Berlin, is the victim of a botched sex change in his bid to come to the United States, who becomes a punk diva icon in Amerca.

I want the soundtrack to this.

(written 4/13/2006; back-dated to 4/1/2006)

Brokeback and Outback

2006-03-31T18:55:00.000-05:00

The daughter had her first "official" sleepover, that is a non-family one, with a friend tonight and so the wife and I went on a date. We both wanted to see Brokeback Mountain and so off we went to the dollar theater. The film is being released to DVD on 4/4/2006.

I wish I'd not known that there was CG sequences in the film. There are CG sheep, CG vistas and some CG set pieces. And knowing this, I found myself looking for them. Still, cinematically, the film has some beautiful scenery.

NO SPOILERS HERE. The story was engaging and not a problem with me. The characters were interesting people and I thought they aged them well, especially Anne Hathaway. When she was talking on the phone to Ennis, you could see coffee or tea stains in her teeth. Randy Quaid seems to be in everything. I was remined of his role in Midnight Express.

SPOILERS HERE. High-light the lines with your mouse to read.

Jack's death immediately made me think of Matthew Shepard.

The switching of the shirt-within-shirt was poignant.

END OF SPOILERS.

The music was serene and I'm on the list at the library for it.

Afterward, we went over to the Outback Steakhouse for a late dinner.

<>
Mmmmm, steak....
< /homer >

I've not reviewed a movie or blogged in a while and I'm feeling pretty rusty. I should look at this in a couple of days and re-write this post.

(written 4/5/2006; back-dated to 3/31/2006)
(edit 9/11/2007 - hidden text didn't match the background color)

Music - TV & Anime Themes

2006-03-28T22:42:00.000-05:00

Surfing around for the new theme to the 2005 Doctor Who series and I found this which I've listened to so much that the TV theme sounds foreign: Evan Spence's Tardis Crash. Most excellent indeed, or in the words of the Doctor - "Fantastic!"

Also, while surfing around for the music from Kiki's Delivery Service, I found this page with the both opening theme and closing theme from the original Japanese version. It also has them in French, I believe. But the coolest thing I found there was the theme to Planetes [wikipedia]which is an amine from 2003 that sounds so very good. Oddly, there is no IMDB entry for this show that I can find.

I also found a old page from 1998 on astronomy that talked about using Greek letters in your HTML which is quite easy and lets me write Planetes as it is shown on the anime and magna as: PLANHTES

Spiffy!

(written 5/15/2006; back-dated to 3/28/2006)

Animated Gnome

2006-03-18T15:10:00.000-05:00

It was a GIF that, when posted, was coverted to a JPG by the Blogger software. It was over 500 KB, and that's a but much to ask of Blogger, so I'll code up a page someplace, put it there and link to it.

Funny thing is I was going to delete the JPG but then thought, how do I delete the copy that I uploaded in the first place? Hmmm. (4/5/2006)

(posted 3/26/2006; back-dated to 3/18/2006)

Book Discussion - Time and Again

2006-03-06T17:58:00.000-05:00

Book discussion today at the city library. We are going over Time and Again [Amazon] by Jack Finney. What amazed me was that this was written in 1970. Truly a bit of time travel.

I received this late after two other attempts. The city library doesn't keep books as long at the other library I go to does. I've only got three days to pick it up instead of a week.

I've read about 45 pages of this and have over 350 to go, but I'm enjoying it so far. However, the Amazon reviews are boths sides of a pendulum. I'll have to see myself just how wordy it is.

I just looked up Jack Finney [wikipedia] and had no idea that he had written Invasion of the Body Snatchers. It looks like most copies of the book on Amazon were published in February of 1995 - just 9 months before he died.

Look at My Shorts III

2006-02-26T14:19:00.000-05:00

Called David to see what he was doing today. I just didn't feel like going to Chinese class. I've been working a lot of hours outside of the regular work hours and needed a break from everything.

He said there was a short film festival Look At My Shorts III, over at the theaters near his apartment. I cleaned up and headed over to his place. We stopped off at Chipotle and ate and then headed over just in time for the start of the films. It was from 4pm to 8pm. There were 19 films ranging from just over a minute to just over 20 minutes with breaks every hour.

Some of the films were absolutely amazing. The last hour only had three films, all of which were shot on celluloid and then transferred to video. The last one, A Cold Blood is one that I will look into buying.

(written 3/3/2006; back-dated to 2/26/2006)

Henderbot

2006-02-13T12:50:00.000-05:00

Andy did a little caricature of me and emailed it to me today.

I have a habit of wearing my headphones back on my head and he said it looked like Lobot from The Empire Strikes Back.

Cool, a second Andy original after the Gnome.

(written 3/3/2006; back-dated to 2/13/2006)

A Dozen Eggs Minus 1

2006-02-01T19:21:00.000-05:00

If the year 2006 were a dozen eggs, one would already be gone. Oh, how the time does go.

I've been keeping a journal in a notebook - well, a couple of notebooks, and I do have entries for each day of the year. Will post them as time permits.

(Written 2/3/2006; back-dated to 2/1/2006; actually posted 3/3/2006)

Fourth Week of Miyazaki

2006-01-26T13:04:00.000-05:00

TCM ran the last two films in their nine film tribute to Hayao Miyazaki, with these:

Pom Poko (1994) [Amazon] [IMDB]
Only Yesterday (1991) [Amazon] [IMDB]

(written 3/10/2006; back-dated to 1/26/2006)

Third Week of Miyazaki

2006-01-19T22:52:00.000-05:00

Tonight at 8pm Turner Classic Movies ran a set of three more Miyazaki films:

My Neighbor Totoro (1988) [Amazon]
Porco Rosso (1992) [Amazon]
Whisper of the Heart (2000) [Amazon]

All were in letterbox and dubbed in English. These will be reran, again in letterbox and Japanese with English subtitles tonight. I was quite surprised to see Totoro. I knew that it was close to release (March 7, 2006) and didn't think that they would run it. There was a "TCM" watermark in the corner at 45 minutes into the show and again 63 minutes. The picture was wonderful, but I'm not crazy about the dub. I'm used to the version from 20th Century Fox [Amazon]. It's Full Screen and dubbed, but I'm so used to it. I suppose that I could get David to create a widescreen version using my preferred soundtrack.

I watched just a bit of Porco Rosso, it looks good. I knew nothing about it. This was released on DVD back on 2/22/2005.

I'd heard of Whisper of the Heart, but not thought about it much. It too is not released yet but will come out with My Neighbor Totoro.

(Written on 1/19/2006; no need to backdate.)

Watercolor Trees

2006-01-15T19:10:00.000-05:00

The daughter and I did a few watercolors this Sunday. She paints two or three for each one I finish.

This is based on a certain tree I keep seeing on the trip to and from work. I've got several photos of it. I'll add one when I find one I like.

This was the first watercolor I've done that I tried to paint in my outlining, with mixed results.

(written 4/5/2006; back-dated to 1/15/2006)

Second Week of Miyazaki

2006-01-12T23:47:00.000-05:00

Two more Hayao Miyazaki anime films on TCM:

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind (1985) [Amazon]
Castle in the Sky (1986) [Amazon]

(written on 1/19/2006; back-dated to 1/12/2006)

Miyazaki on Turner Classic Movies

2006-01-07T23:50:00.000-05:00

Two more Hayao Miyazaki anime films on TCM:

Princess Mononoke (1999) [Amazon]
Spirited Away (2001) [Amazon]

(written on 1/19/2006; back-dated to 1/7/2006)

Happy 00100101 B-Day David

2005-12-19T19:39:00.000-05:00

Happy birthday to my friend David. He's:

00100101 in Binary, or
25 in Hexadecimal, or
37 in Base 10.

DVD - My Neighbor Totoro

2005-12-10T21:54:00.000-05:00

We watched My Neighbor Totoro, the wife's choice, at my suggestion for Family Movie Night. This is the DVD of the Fox VHS. It's in pan and scan and dubbed, but I like it. Funny, I've read reviews of it and people said to stay away from it, but I rather like it. I don't know if Disney is ever going to release their DVD version. I want to get it just to see it in widescreen and with the original Japanese audio track. I could probably find an import someplace on VCD if I really looked for it. I might do that eventually. After all, the Disney version was supposed to be out in November 2004.

(written on 12/17/2005; back-dated to 12/10/2005)

Dr. Demento

2005-11-20T10:29:00.000-05:00

Listened to some of the Funny Five:

Reinstalling Windows
The Devil went to Jamaica - I just don't like this song.
Thank God I'm a Jewish Boy - extra song
Song number one was My Cat is afraid of the Vacuum Cleaner

Still waiting to hear Missing Him, Missing Limb or Dog with a Plastic Stomach.

Notebook Maps

2005-11-20T09:50:00.000-05:00

Years back, I picked up a plastic coated map that fits into a standard three-ring notebook. It has a world map on one side and US map on the other. It's made by Universal Map. I would like one with a China map with provinces and all in English. I checked the site and should send them an email. Of course, I could find a good map and just laminate it.

Family Movie Night Plus

2005-11-19T10:46:00.000-05:00

Watched most of Finding Nemo and later after running the old starter back to Auto Zone and some shopping, we watched most of Recess: School's Out, which has a great soundtrack. Went out to the library and reseved the DVD and the CD sountrack - it was that good. After the daughter went to bed, the wife and I watched Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl - known as Tian Yu. The scenery was beautiful.

(written 11/20/2005; back-dated to 11/19/2005)

Van Woes - No Go

2005-11-18T10:54:00.000-05:00

The wife called went Andy and I were in line at Chipotle. The van had not started and was still at the Post Office. She had walked home and was cold. Andy and I finished lunch and I called around and found an Advance Auto Parts in Hilliard that could check the van, if we could jump-start it and get it there.

Headed home and picked up the wife and first checked on the van - it would not start. I pulled the battery hoping that was the cause. We left a note on the van and she let the folks in the post office know we'd come back to get the van by tomorrow. We ran her transcripts out to the High School - she's applying to be a substitute. Then we went over to Advance Auto Parts and after the battery was checked and found to be okay, we price checked a starter. Then we drove down to Auto Zone and found one for about $10 less.

By now it was time to head back to be in time to pick up the daughter from school. Called the father-in-law and he said he'd be over early to work on the van.

The moon is rising too late to sketch it. The daughter and I will have to get up and draw it during the day.

Watched some of Acting and Directing. It is quite unusual. The wife and daughter went to flute practice and then the wife went scrapbooking in the evening until late.

(written 11/20/2005; back-dated to 11/18/2005)

Tom Cruise Kills Oprah

2005-11-17T17:59:00.000-05:00

Sure it's old, but it's funny. Go here for the clip.

Comedy Central Rocks

2005-11-17T17:42:00.000-05:00

I watch way too much TV, but sometimes it's great. It also seems that things I've been looking into have a habit of coming back up another way. Last week, I'd wondered why I never looked up anything on Scientology on Wikipedia. I use it as a reference all the time. So I did some reading.

Last night as I'm watching South Park, I was amazed at the episode shown. The "John Smith" & "Jane Smith" credits were a hoot as well.

The Daily Show continues to be one of my favorites and last night's program was great.

(written 11/17/2005; back-dated to 11/16/2005)

First Snow of the Season...

2005-11-17T09:00:00.000-05:00

Brrr! As much as I don't like cold weather, I wonder why I don't move further south.

City Library - Pt III

2005-11-16T17:31:00.000-05:00

Stopped by briefly and realized that if I need to talk to Rob, I will have to catch him at the book discussion next month.

(Written 11/17/2005; back-dated to 11/16/2005)

City Library - Pt II

2005-11-15T17:20:00.000-05:00

Went by the city library again to speak to Rob and he was not there. Browsed the DVD and VHS stacks and found several things I'd like to borrow:

Xiu Xiu: the sent down girl
Black Adder (seasons 1 through 4)
Black Adder Christmas
China: Dynasties of Power (documentary)
China and the Forbidden City (documentary)
From the Earth to the Moon
Beijing Bicycle
Acting and Directing an unusual title from Live Oak Productions.

(written 11/17/2005; back-dated to 11/15/2005)

City Library

2005-11-14T16:45:00.000-05:00

Stopped by the city library and picked up my reserve on My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult. This is for next book discussion on 12/5/2005. I should get through this book since I've got it in plenty of time.

Rob was talking to a large group of scouts. I wanted to ask him what he thought of My Neighbor Totoro. I suggested that he borrow it back a couple of weeks ago, and I didn't get to talk to him at the last book discussion.

(Written 11/15/2005; back-dated to 11/14/2005)

Natalie Dee handles critics

2005-11-04T09:42:00.000-05:00

I've been reading Natalie Dee's cartoon website since the middle of May and been meaning to post about it.

Today's cartoon was particularly good and reminded me of some critical email I received years back regarding my Adventures of Pete and Pete page. I think I fired back with something along the lines of "well, compared to your own page on Pete and Pete, oh wait, you don't have a Pete and Pete page..." It's not nice to be mean, but it would carry more weight if they had something of their own making to compare it against.

Family Movie Night - Snow White

2005-10-29T10:07:00.000-04:00

We watched Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs [IMDB] this evening again. Grumpy always reminds me of Mark from back at Randolph AFB. I should get back in touch with him.

(written 11/4/2005; back-dated to 10/29/2005)

Survivor, Apprentice, ER

2005-10-27T22:49:00.000-04:00

Survivor Logo (screen capture)

Survivor: Guatemala [official site] is just not captivating me like the previous seasons have done. I'm mostly rooting for Stephenie, Rafe or Lydia.

The Apprentice [official site] was a bit of a shock. The guys over-did it with the batting cage when they had dome so well the last two tasks by remembering branding. And the firing of 4 contestants was unbelievable.

ER [official site] was a rerun from last season. It was one featuring Ray Lolitta [IMDB] who is quite a good actor after all. I was still picturing him from Turbulence [IMDB] back in 1997. I think I saw that on HBO back in my Detroit days with Oracle around 1998. Looking over his IMDB entry, I was amazed to see that he was Shoeless Joe Jackson from Field of Dreams [IMDB].

(Written 11/1/2005; back-dated to 10/27/2005)

Grave of the Fireflies - AZN-TV

2005-10-25T11:36:00.000-04:00

Grave of the Fireflies (Hotaru No Haka) [IMDB] was on AZN-TV, formerly the International Channel tonight. (Checking the website after the fact, it was on at 8 PM, 11 PM and 2 AM on the 26th. I turned over to it just after it started at 11 PM and as I thought, it was full screen and dubbed. I didn't want to put myself through trying to watch the film that way.

GOTF needs to be watched in widescreen and in Japanese with subtitles. Plus, when I have time to think about it. I have had it on DVD for a couple of years now and I think I've only watched it twice. It's just so sad.

(written 11/6/2005; back-dated to 10/25/2005)

Chinese Class and Dinner

2005-10-23T20:45:00.000-04:00

We headed out early to breakfast at Bob Evans and then to the book store to look for a gift for the host family for Director Zhu and for the director himself. We also wanted to get to Chinese class early to meet him and his translator as he was going to have a walk through tour of school. Yesterday he had a brief tour of the COFCC KCAP classes.

We picked up a book on Chinese art for Trevor and Amy, the host family. Then Gail picked out the perfect book for the director. It was A Day in the Life of the United States Armed Forces [Amazon]. These were gifts for after class at dinner.

We drove over to Amy and Trevor's house and helped her finish getting things ready. It was a different menu with spiral-sliced, honey-baked ham, salad, strawberries and two types of pizza.

The director was very pleased with the book and we also gave him print outs of the Chinese Wikipedia pages on Shenzhou-5 and Shenzhou-6.

At one point Director Zhu expressed his regreat at not being able to speak any English. And I wish I'd remembered to say, was that I too regreated that I did not speak more Chinese.

(Drafted 11/1/2005; back-dated to 10/23/2005; posted on 11/17/2005)

East Meets West Conference

2005-10-22T22:28:00.000-04:00

The wife went out very early for the conference and so the daughter and I had a nice relaxing morning. We painted a few watercolors and she practiced her flute.

We went downtown for the conference and finally found a good place to park. The street where the wife suggested parking was having the surface stripped off when we arrived! Lucky, we parked only a short block away.

The conference was good even though the daughter had to use the bathroom four times while we were there. My wife was working, so I took her each time. I got to speak with Director Zhu a few times briefly. I was told he had first gone to New York and then to Hershey, Pennsylvania. He was formerly in the Chinese Army and enjoyed a tour in a Navy museum in New York. I told him through a translator that I wished there was time in his schedule to go to the US Air Force Museum. But there is not time as he has a full schedule tomorrow.

(Drafted 10/29/2005; back-dated to 10/22/2005; posted 11/17/2005)

Dinner with Director Zhu

2005-10-21T22:16:00.000-04:00

The wife's East Meets West Conference was this weekend. The guest of honor, as it was, was the director of the Yi Yang orphange in Hunan. The first meeting was at the Chinese restaurant where we had dinner with the wife's Chinese class last year, over near campus. There was a group of more than 40 people as we filled 4 tables that each seated 10 and a couple of booths. I was hoping to sit with the director, but there were a few familes who had adopted children from his orphange and so they were seated at his table. He recognized many of the children.

The dinner was fantastic - 5 or 6 different courses.

(Drafted 10/29/2005; back-dated to 10/21/2005; posted 11/17/2005)

Hurricane Wilma Watch

2005-10-21T10:00:00.000-04:00

Wilma & Hurricane Wilma
Animation Art Gallery & NOAA

There are some incredible and ominous photos of Cancun with the approach of Hurricane Wilma out at Yahoo's Most Emailed Photos and Slideshows. These wire photos normally only stay out there about a week, so check soon. Wikipedia has articles on Wilma individually and as part of the larger article on the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season.

The National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) also has an individual page on Hurricane Wilma along with other good information. The above image is from 10/21 at 1245 UTC (0745 Eastern time).

Animation cell from the Animation Art Gallery.

I have yet to understand how blogger or hello or picasa is resizing the images. The above image was sized at 691 x 240 but the linked image is 640 x 222. It must be cutting down to either 320 for small or 640 for bigger.

Bueller? Bueller?

2005-10-19T10:09:00.000-04:00

Finally got around to watching the Ferris Bueller's Day Off DVD that I received for my birthday. It's amazing that Matthew Broderick was 24 when this came out. Just like Ralph Macchio, 23 when The Karate Kid came out and and Michael J. Fox, 24 with Back to the Future, Broderick seems eternally young.

I still have the button and mini-poster from FBDO. I thought I'd lost the poster for certain, but it was with many other posters of mine that I just don't have wall space for right now. At one point, I'd even found it on EBay and was thinking of bidding on it.

Watched the whole movie and then watched about 15 mintues with the director's commentary. Sadly, this doesn't even have a single trailer for the film on the DVD.

(written 11/4/2005; back-dated to 10/19/2005)

Finished - The Kite Runner

2005-10-18T09:26:00.000-04:00

I read to the end of The Kite Runner this evening. Khaled Hosseini will have another book about Afganistan out in 2006 and I want to read it.

(Written 10/21/2005; back-dated to 10/18/2005)

Two chapters left - The Kite Runner

2005-10-18T09:12:00.000-04:00

Read last night for a couple of hours. Just two chapters left of Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner [Amazon]. The story is moving swiftly and has become somewhat predicable, but I am still enjoying it. This is a good story to learn to write from, I think.

Reading - The Kite Runner

2005-10-16T17:33:00.000-04:00

I read about 16 or so chapters of The Kite Runner [Amazon] by Khaled Hosseini. This was for the book discussion I missed back on October 12th. It's quite a good read. It flows well and has kept me interested. I only hope to write something this good.

Shenzhou-6 launches successfully

2005-10-12T11:53:00.000-04:00

Shenzhou-6 launch
AP photo from BBC

Fei Junlong, 40 and Nie Haisheng, 41, have become the second and third Chinese nationals in space with today's successful launch of the Shenzhou-6 Chinese spacecraft. The craft, atop a Long March 2F rocket was launched at 0900 Beijing time, 0400 US Eastern time from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest Gansu Province in the Northwest of China. This is the same launch facility and pad as the October 2003 flight of Yang Liwei aboard Shenzhou-5.

Welcome back, and best of luck.

Wikipedia article on Shenzhou-6

Xinhua News Agency - in English (Chinaview) main Page

Xinhua News Agency Shenzhou-6 page

Xinhua News Agency Shenzhou-6 photos

China Daily main page

China Daily Shenzhou-6 page

PLA Daily of the Chinese People's Liberation Army

PLA Shenzhou-6 page

People's Daily Home

People's Daily - Shenzhou VI

Rabbit and Crow blog with a post on the launch

Shenzhou-6 FAQ at Mark Wade's magnificent Encylopedia Astronautica

SPACE.com article

Space Facts

Shenzhou-6 page at Spaceflight Now

BBC Coverage