Anticipation of Exhaustion

The teachers had a small gang dinner yesterday, and I joined in with the missus. We finally tried the local Japanese steakhouse, and it's surprisingly good. At first blush, it's a typical Southern diner, but instead of slaw and taters, you get teriyaki steak and shrimp sauce. SHRIMP SAUCE. I haven't had this for years. The school art teacher asked me to talk to some of his cartoon-minded students next week, and I'm up for it. I've got tons of stuff to show them from my paper days, and I've got a handful of local minicomics too. My own may be finished and done; I made the most recent art adjustments last night after we watched the penultimate episode of "Six Feet Under." Tonight is the season finale of "Lost," too. We'll wrap up two series within three days of each other after which we'll melt into brain-drained puddles. I anticipate a good cry from at least one show. If not, I'll demand a refund.

I have a short work day today as I got to the oral surgeon. I don't know what to expect. I've put this off for so long that I may have an emotional breakdown when I leave the office. And if I'm missing the offending teeth, I may not be able to seek solace in ice cream. And I really ought to run again, but I don't see that happening while I'm whacked out on generic Loratab.

So, to recap: Comic done, "Six Feet Under" wrapping up, "Lost" takes its Act 3 bow, I fix my teeth. I need a beer.

In the Geek News
Every once in a while, the online geek forum eats itself in heated, breathless blather. This time it made national news, and when I say "national news," I mean "24-hour news networks that need filler." Here's what happened.

Comic illustrator Adam Hughes is renowned for his cheesecake art. This top-rated cover artist draws women that are statuesque, and it made sense to make statues out of them. The comic-fan market has branched out into everything you can imagine: posters, shirts, action figures, dolls, and the statue and mini-statue branch which has particularly taken off in the last ten years. Comic artists will often design a statue, and a sculptor takes over from there. Sometimes the sculptor will create a piece based solely on the style of a famous artist-character combination (a Jack Kirby Fantastic Four, a Frank Miller Batman, etc.) So Hughes drew Mary Jane discovering Peter's costume in the laundry. It looked like this:


This is quintessential Hughes. The style is called "good girl;" it's flirty without being salacious. The statue, however, mangled the statue.

It's loyal to the design, but it loses the flavor. This isn't the scandal, though. No, a number of hand-wringers emerged to complain that it looked like a harlot MJ was doing Peter's laundry, and this was demeaning. Instead of a laundry basket, they see a tub. And they see MJ presenting her ass for what's being smirkingly called "sexual availability." Fox News and MSNBC, for example, picked up on the story. Spidey 3 is a huge film, seen by a varied audience, but because the stigma exists that comics are only for kids, they ignored the angry feminist argument and argued that this is too sexy for the alleged child consumers. Now this statue is $120. A kid can't afford it. You can't find this in toy stores. You either buy it from the company's website or through a comic store. This is priced for the older collector. It's not marketed or produced or priced for kids.

But the online outrage continues. And now the discussion has jumped to the overall perceived dismissal of female consumers in the traditionally superhero comic market. Now obviously the comic market has shifted its focus to the older consumer. Simply put, they have more money to spend than an eight-year-old. Many comic covers are cheesecake pin-ups, and a number are similar to what you'd find inside Maxim. Kids are no longer the major demographic of comics, and the companies are using cheesecake and softcore to catch the eye of the older consumer in a very crowded market. It does go too far. But I don't agree that this kind of presentation automatically insults all women, either as the subjects of the art or the consumers. It goes back to the Frank Miller fiasco of a few months back: Your Sis likes his comics; therefore she's either imaginary or stupid. If she was bothered by this stuff, she'd stay away from comics. She doesn't like going into comic stores, but that's because the clientèle bothers her, not the products.

Into the heat of this debate fell this cover for an upcoming Marvel comic:


Many people went apeshit. Bondage is nothing new in comics (Wonder Woman used to be made powerless if you shackled her wrists, and then there's her magic lasso compelling the truth from the bound). But this image implies a niche of Japanese comics called "tentacle hentai," wherein women are molested by the monstrous. This did nothing to calm down the rhetoric. Neither did the revelation that the cover artist is a Japanese woman. I don't like the art myself. It's muddy and plastic.

But it's utterly in line with decades of horror comic imagery. Does that fact in itself confirm that comics are demeaning toward women? No. Comics are entrenched in their pulp origins and contain those elements, one of which is lurid situations. There's also violence and dark emotions. Now, you don't expect it in Superman or Spider-Man. But a comic featuring leather-clad women with 1970s blackspolitation and kung-fu fashion and attitude? Yeah, it's gonna be trashy. It's supposed to be. And it will be found in the same comic shop as X-Men (which has a history of occasional trashiness, to be honest) and Spider-Man (who used to date a leather-clad Catwoman ripoff with a neckline down to her navel). This is the diversity of the market, and I'd rather have that supply-and-demand dynamic in action then a dull-eyed homogeneity. The first rule of the free market is that you only buy what you want. And the golden rule corollary is that the guy next to you can buy what he wants, and the two of you leave each other alone to mind your own budgets and morals.

But that's not as much fun to say as "omigod, comics hate women." I'm curious to see if this lingers during the comic convention. Hughes will be there, and his prints of various women in various "good girl" images will sell like gold-plated hotcakes. Your Sis, by the way, likes his art. But she hates spin-off sidekick women like Supergirl and Batgirl on principal. BatMAN but BatGIRL? This she finds demeaning.

Heat Run

Even though I waited until it was cooler, Monday's run was escorted by a blasting sun and its best friend, the hot wind. I ran two miles in one shot, aided by perfectly timed intersection walk signs and an overall lack of cars turning right. I wish I knew a trick to expand my lung capacity because I find myself occasionally gasping like an asthmatic. Maybe it's the pollen. Maybe it's the heat. Maybe I have lung flab. I try to adjust my breathing as I go; I do have a breathing rhythm I try to maintain. But I'm getting bored with my route. I need to start running on side roads and perhaps find some straight planes to run instead of all these @&$% hills. The 5k race is less than two months away.

I finally made an appointment with the oral surgeon to yank out my wisdom teeth. My first appointment is only a consultation, even though I have a referral for the procedure from the dentist last November. The surgeon is only available twice a month.

Picture of the Day
The Cats Eye Nebula, somewhere up there.


In The News
Nobody liked the immigration bill. Both sides decry its lack of significant security measures, its merit system for entry, and its seemingly naive call for hefty fines from people working crap jobs. The right-wing media is apoplectic, saying it's the death of the GOP with some even calling for Bush's impeachment. And these are his party folk. The left-wing people say the bill encourages a serf class that splits families. The local radio people claim North Carolina is especially targeted by illegal immigrants for our lax law enforcement and numerous labor jobs. But these rabid talkers also claim our state is the front line on illegals and thus terrorism, because its just a matter of time, evidently, before Al Qaeda come through the Texas border. They've claimed this for six years now, and it hasn't happened yet. But this makes for a great distraction from the Gonzales and Iraq news.

Sunday Was a Week Long

The first version of the minicomic is done, and I'll proof it later today. I spent some time Saturday and Sunday penciling and inking the spot illustrations. I scanned them in and polished off their respective pages, all while listening to a commentary track on the new Re-Animator DVD. It has a brand-new making-of documentary proving what the earlier commentary track established: this is a fun buncha folks who struck gold with a tiny horror movie.

We were at Kathy and Travis' house Saturday night for a cookout and fire-sitting. We learned their exchange student is returning for a two-week visit, just in time for prom. She may not be going. We definitely are. I even took my suit to the dry cleaners. We're supposed to chaperone, but I'm not sure how much deputy power we'll have.

Sunday started early as I worked on the comic art. We watched the Preakness on TiVo, suffering through the sappy packaging of a Cajun jokey while doing nothing to inform us what kind of skill a jokey must possess. We noticed that all the jockeys and trainers and owners said the same thing on-camera: the horse will run his race. But watching a race, you can clearly see the jockeys whipping and steering. So why not focus on that? Why passively anthropomorphize the horse? The locker room interviews showed the top three jockeys crashed on the couch watching the TV coverage just a half hour before the race. This doesn't suggest any level of pre-race tension or preparation. After more than an hour of presenting the Kentucky Derby winner and one other jockey, neither won. We fetched groceries after a rare cup for coffee from me. Your Sis worked on school material while I finished the comic art and moved to the PlayStation for Guitar Hero. The death metal songs are aptly named as they murder your fingers. We had a small dinner and watched three episodes of "Six Feet Under." Only three more left. My Sunday felt languorous; I think she's exhausted from moving so slowly to the end of the semester.

Picture of the Day
Apparently the official Joker image from the new Batman movie. I like it. The new film franchise takes a grounded approach, and this style of Joker seems to fit right in. Geeks will be torn; the image is cool, but he's not smiling. A good chunk of comic fans will decry the lack of a cheesy grin, and, when I was younger, I would have been one of them. Joker's face is frozen in a smile, they'd say. But not only is this an impractical condition, but it limits the ability of an artist to express anything through the character. Also, he'd drool all over himself. The character, not the artist. No, Joker has to have muscle control to help him mock and mimic his enemies. Even though this image is of Heath Ledger, a total Brad Pitt vibe exudes. The first movie continues to grow in stature the more comic movies I see, and I have high hopes for the next one.

Accolades

The publisher seems fine with my schedule for getting him the minicomic next week. I laid it out in a horizontal format without doing much at all to alter the original comic. The original ran in vertical form, a little smaller than 8.5 x 11. The new format will be horizontal at 4.25 x 2.5, smaller than a dollar bill. But the comic fits just fine. I take two panels and make them a page, and take the next two panels, make them a page. Since the original comic was set up with two panels a tier, this creates no problem. Even when I have my two long page-wide panels, they aren't broken up in the layout. Unfortunately, this makes for a thin comic: 12 pages and four cover pages. But I can add eight more pages of related filler in the back for a nice 24-page comic, covers included. I've sent off the proposal and the new layout to the publisher for his comments. He hasn't seen the comic before, but I can't imagine he'd veto it.

Your Sis and I attended the annual school ceremony for recognition of students and teachers. This is, I think, the fifth consecutive year she's received an award from a student for her work. I'm not surprised. We ate finger food before the fairly short ceremony. I also got to see the student newspaper editor received a scholarship and congratulate her on her academic career. And then we were home for snacks and "Lost." This season ends next week, and we'll finish "Six Feet Under" before the end of June. We'll be exploding with free time just as summer vacation begins.

Picture of the Day

It's All Gravy

I ran yesterday for about two miles. It was the farthest I've run since the Halloween race, and I'm sure I'll be able to get up to the 5k distance before the July event. Adjusting my work on the comic will help; I won't have to sacrifice running to slap together a comic for the mid-June deadline. I'm feeling the run today. The legs are tight and surly. I also tried running without my iPod, and it made a difference. While I was a bit distracted by my breathing, the time went by much quicker. I think I get stuck in songs, figuring out when they end and how far I should run before then. It's an extra timing pressure I don't need right now. It's a big relief in general. It was going to be impractical if not impossible to do with any level of quality. I realized this morning just how little I would be able to do had I remained in the Shakespeare production. I still want another shot at it though.

After the run I made fried chicken and improvised on gravy for the mashed potatoes. I mixed the left over grease with milk, flour, and chicken broth. Your Sister seemed to like it. Because I ran so well, I treated myself to a bottle of Coke. A small glass one, not a two-litter. I treat soda as a reward now, as opposed to my halcyon days of yore when I was practically breathing soda.

Pictures of the Day
Lucasfilm and Disney-MGM are teaming up for exclusive knick-knacks at their Orlando location this summer. To promote it, they have a series of posters of the Star Wars gang in airports.

Short Work

As the comic unfolds, I don't think it's possible to get it done before the HeroesCon, but I do want to finish it as best I can. I think I'll offer the publisher my dream comic from a few years back. Even though it ran in another title, I own it. And it's not bad for a story originally set to 4 pages. I may be able to rework it with small panel edits as a 16-pager. Maybe add some sketches to pad it to 20 pages and a cover. If not, the publisher still has two of my stories in as many anthologies to sell at this year's show.

I started the new panel layouts and realized that I limited myself to a confined area of the spaceship when, logically and thematically, we need to see more of it. So that will be the next tweak. And then I'll stop fidgeting with it and start drawing the damn thing.

The potatoes are growing at a potato's pace, unfortunately. We are just six episodes from finishing "Six Feet Under." Your Sis made stir-fry.

Moving Picture of the Day
I'm very curious to see this. I enjoyed the graphic novel and its sequel, and I believe we donated the books to the school library.

Comic Notes

As I expand the story -- and new facets emerge from the Divine Facet Factory -- I'm encountering a trouble that I wanted to avoid: the story is getting bloated. I've written myself away from the original tidy ending, and now I have a nicely layered tale with no conclusion. Not that it needs a bold note to end on; I'd like to have a significant bon mot to leave the reader, but now I can't sculpt one based on the last scene. Something has to change, and it needn't be the plot structure. The dialogue can even be rejiggered to work with the panel construction (although the panels will change as I add more pages).

I just need a way to avoid three things:
1) Cliched dialogue
2) Stiff dialogue
3) Predictable dialogue.

I feel the story is safe; the more I consider it, the more I like it. It's a perfect mini-comic structure. If it never continues past this one issue, the cheese stands alone. But I pride myself on turns of phrase and clear communication, and I can't stand the thought of writing the reader toward a blah exit.

I'm getting closer to the time at which I shall lock myself in the work room to slap this comic together. I talked to the publisher and discovered he'll print the thing for me. But I realistically may not get this out before the June convention. And that's OK ultimately. I'd rather have the story done right than done sloppily.

Picture of the Day
Your Sister loves this song.



News of the Day
Rat bastard Jerry Falwell died today. While he is known mostly for creating the Moral Majority into a massive lobbying entity, he fell to inexcusable notoriety by blaming 9/11 on pagans, abortionists, feminists, and gays. In doing so, he displayed the same pigheaded religious intolerance that made a worldwide impact on 9/11. And because of this, I hold no remorse for my glee that I shall never have to hear fresh idiocy from his mouth again. He was joined in this horseshit by Pat Robertson, and I hope Falwell is preparing a pair of asbestos pajamas for him as we speak.

Mother's Taters

We planted seed potatoes Saturday morning, our first try at growing food. We made two rows, planting about 40 pieces of quartered Kennebuc potatoes. We'll add fertilizer and mulch as they sprout. If they sprout. Really, all the hard work is done. we've prepared the ground for the food. Now we just inspect, water, and weed as necessary. A late lunch followed, and I began the page layouts for the comic.

I finished a full script draft Saturday morning, writing dialogue as the story unfolded in my head and breaking the exchanges down into manageable panels. I know the dimensions of the comic will be small (4 x 5.5 inches at most) so panels can only hold so much information. If you start a new scene, you need an establishing shot (and of course my first page breaks this rule as I'm starting with a dream sequence, and withholding that info adds to the mood). If you have a conversation, the amount of words per panel limits the amount of art in that same panel.

I've found it much easier to write and then draw, but I tend to see the scenes moving like a movie. I make mental snapshots of each crucial movement or phrase, and then I tailor those snapshots into a coherent panel sequence. But sometimes, the mind presents a full developed location, and I find myself trying to write within it.

An example looks like this. I already have the established location, but this bit of script doesn't say how the heads will be located in the frames or which will be the dominant image. That will be figured out in the layout process. But, again, sometimes, I know exactly how the panel should look, and I'll note the details so I don't forget. Artist Me will sometimes forget what Writer Me was talking about.

PANEL
DR: Your rang?
CAP: Evening. Or afternoon. Whatever it is.
DR: It's evening.

PANEL, show more of Doc
CAP: How's Carter?
DR: I’ll run a scan on Carter once he wakes up and eats something.
CAP: You think he’s getting worse?

PANEL
Carter asleep, strapped to the bed, with the machine in his room. Maybe an attendant with machine.
DR: I think he wants off this ship and away from us.
CAP: Smart man.

I need to figure out names for my characters, but nothing depends on that information right now. Too often, writers will come up with a snazzy name and gimmick and construct a flimsy plot around it. I'm working from the opposite direction. Some folks have names. Some don't. I'm writing a situation, not a narrative.

With the script done, I returned to the comic after lunch and started sketching the panels. I made a page template at half the size of the mini-comic dimensions. The rule of comic design is that if looks good small, it will look good big. Also, sketching small restricts the temptation to draw in detail. At this point, I'm just trying to ensure eye flow and composition. This grid works out to nine panels per page with sketch and note space beside the grid. There is no standard way to do this. This is how the templates fit in my sketch book. As I look at the script, I see how many panels could conceivably and legibly fit on one page, and how the panels can accentuate dramatic tension. As I draw each panel, I check it off the script. And if a panel flow changes how the dialogue will play out, I'll note that on my script printout.

See how the third panel is crossed out and next to it is a replacement panel. I changed the perspective to allow more information. Currently, my script hits 15 pages -- pretty short. I now have the luxury of adding pages to pad out the story. Some pages are a little tight with panels, and I can space those frames out to let the pages breathe. And that's where I am now.

Sunday, we visited my parents, fed them dinner, and strolled Lowe's to talk gardening. I'm thinking we'll try corn next. We know we'll get tomatoes from the compost bin. This was my Parent's first time seeing the new car and Your Sister's new haircut. They liked both a lot.

This morning I checked a local printer to see how much it would cost to produce 100 copies of the comic. The estimate hit $230. That's not practical. So I'll print the comics at home. That may not leave me enough time to make and print the comics for the June convention, but I can still send my publisher the finished product for shows later this year. Still, I'd like to sell a few copies at my nearby show.

Moving Picture of the Day
An old scene amended for current movie audiences.

Sunstroke of Genius

I spent much of yesterday in a blur of creativity, pounding out conversations, panel sketches, and a story skeleton for the mini-comic. My Stupid Sense isn't tingling yet. Your Sis agrees the idea may have potential, but she chided me for writing an origin story. She knows I hate origin stories. I wish the majority of comic-book films would present their character origins in a five-minute montage and get on with the story. Except Batman Begins, which was incredibly well done.

We caught a school soccer playoff game after work. Our girls won 3-1. A strong sun blasted us, and I awoke this morning feeling weak. I only had one beer with last night's fajitarittos. I know I'm not hungover. I'm sipping Gatorade to stave off nausea.

Picture of the Day
Approximately 18,000 folks posed nude in Mexico City for artist Spencer Tunick.

The Idea Blooms

I had the notion of a publishing title for years now and considered it for a name of the mini-comic. It was a light-hearted, goofy turn of phrase. But as I started to compile story ideas, I brainstormed on building a tale around the title itself, and suddenly I have a Very Big Idea that can be a series of stories, all stemming from a once-throwaway joke name. And it would be darker, less screwball. I'm being vague, I know, but I'm still swimming in the happy ether of a thought explosion, and this is a temporary euphoria that could appear as pathetic delusion once my brain settles down. I might trash the whole idea. Or not. At this point, I have to pursue something to make the comic (or maybe comics) before the convention. So I'll work with this for now. The first issue of this would be all introduction with later stories to follow.

I have a handful of mini-comics from other guys working with the publisher so I have templates to follow in size and presentation.

We had a teacher pal over for dinner as part of our planned open-house events. We want to throw parties this summer, and a small dinner is akin to cracking our knuckles before getting to work. Your Sis made stir-fry, and many school matters were discussed. I contributed the geek topics.

Picture of the Day
Here's how far I got with the screwball idea before my mind turned a corner. This was going to be my cover art. The Podunk story did the exact same thing. It was to be a parody of 1950 atomic monster movies, and then it became a statement on simmering racism. It lost the fun but became something more substantial. This threatens to do the same, just without, so far, the social commentary.

I am so fucking jazzed right now. It's like I drank seven crackuccinos.

Quick Comic Work

I'm going to the local annual comic convention in Charlotte next month. My anthology publisher will have a table, and I'm going to whip together a mini-comic for sale. I won't make a profit here. I'll print maybe 50 copies and sell them for a buck each. I luckily have notes for a smorgasbord comic -- a mini-anthology by itself -- and I can produce it before the convention weekend, I'm sure. I have an extended story in the works, a few actually, but will need much more time to flesh it out. The trick for the immediate project is to not worry about making a classic, just get ideas on paper and get my name out there. There's an anthology title I worship called Dork! produced by Evan Dorkin, and it will be my template for this very sudden project.

I may sit behind the con booth and sketch for passers-by, a notion that gives me the holy-shit giggles. Me, sitting alongside pros and other indie guys, hawking my spindly brain gunk. I guess I'll need personal business cards too. I've been to this con before, a few times as a reporter for the daily paper. Most professionals there are quite nice to talk to. Lou Ferrigno, the TV Hulk, was not. An utter jerk. But there are a few regular attendees who have drawn comics forever, since before even Your Sister was born.

Now that I think of the usual attendance of 20,000 people, maybe I'll print 100 copies.

Picture of the Day
No idea where this is from.

Spidey Luau

I got home early enough on Friday that we zoomed to the local stadium-seat theatre to watch Spider-Man 3. I won't spoil anything for you, but it's a big, fat Spidey movie that will appeal to longtime comic fans more than casual moviegoers. The movie reviews seem to concur as critics are hitting the film hard for being dark and weighty. But that's what we loved about the Spidey comics in the '70s. I knew the reviews wouldn't keep audiences away, and the film made almost $150 million in three days. We scarfed Krispy Kreme doughnuts while we debated the film. There was quite a bit Your Sis felt she needed to know about how the film compared to the comics.

I ran at the gym on Saturday and outlasted all the poorly dressed seniors who flocked to the treadmills once I arrived. I don't know if my stamina or my funky doughnut sweat intimidated them, but they did ultimately peel away, leaving me along to run my 5k. We spent much of the weekend again poring over research papers, but we did catch the four hours of Kentucky Derby coverage. That night, we attended a retirement luau for local teachers. Good food, good atmosphere. We wore garish tropical shirts. We picked up a Smirnoff Green Apple 6-pack on the way, and man is that good hooch.

On Sunday, we worked over more papers, and I watched some playoff basketball. She tried a pork soup dish at the local Mexican restaurant, and we believe they used the entire pig for the dish. The bowl was huge, and it had various sizes of pig chunks within. We went to Pizza Hut for dinner, a place we haven't been to in ages, and made a run to the grocery store for cookies for her. No, she's not pregnant. I also had my very first Twinkie. No, I'm not pregnant. It's good. I expected a bland, muddy snack, but the cake is so tasty and light, you don't need the creme filling.

Picture of the Day
Neptune and its moon Triton.




In the News
You can download the anthology comic here.

+ + +

The photos from Greensburg, Kansas, are similar to images from The Day After.

+ + +

ABC announced that "Lost" will end in 2010 after three more seasons of 16 episodes each. The shows will run in uninterrupted blocks each year. I'm OK with that and relieved to hear the show will end on TV and not on the movie screen as rumored.

Nuttin'

Between research papers and eating, not much is going on at Chez Debacle. I watched this week's "Lost" with Your Sis last night, and the show is barreling toward the season finale with much greatness.

The Eats anthology is officially released tomorrow. Go to an area comic book store (Comicopia near the Fenway Citgo sign or Newberry Comics at Harvard Square, and I can't believe I know where the comic stores are in Boston) and you'll get a stack of free comics.

Draw'ring of the Day
My website needed dusting off, so I redid the text for the art section, streamlined the photo section and changed the frontpage picture to a drawing. Here's what I slapped together in Illustrator. It'll go on the front page Monday. I should probably do a self-portrait once a year like the great painters did.



In the News
Spider-Man 3 hits domestic theatres today. The reviews are mixed, but that won't stop it from becoming the second hit of the year after 300, another comic film. I'm boggled that there's a third Spidey film. My geek brain can't grasp the idea or the fact that the franchise has made so much money and the character has become even more popular. It's like everyone is catching up to what we all knew 20 years ago. Even my dad admitted to seeing why I bought so many comics month after month, when he would drive me to the local convenience store, after seeing the first film. We're seeing it this weekend. No matter what.

And in honor of such geekiness, Entertainment Weekly has posted their top 25 scifi moments of the last 25 years, and it's a damn good list.

Deep Breath

Monday was fairly quiet. I started another level on "Guitar Hero" and discovered that extended metal songs are designed to kill fingers or us mere mortals. They're songs designed purely to one-up the guitarists in other bands. Artistry has nothing to do with it. It's technique porn.

Yesterday, on whim, I ran. First, I did not run down to the main road as before, and that solved my shin problems. But it was wildly hot and windy. A tailwind may have helped me run a nine-minute mile uphill. Or it may have been the inspirational power of "Disco Inferno." One can't diminish it's cosmic force. I alternated running and walking for an hour and eventually made myself run up both giant hills, the one downtown and the one near our house. I would walk for a few minutes, telling myself, "OK, that's enough. You don't have to do anymore." After a few minutes of walking, I'd hear myself say, "Well, this is a manageable stretch to run" or "I bet you can't run up that hill." And off I'd go like a moron. I think this worked best for my cardio as I still feel like I grew a third lung even this morning. This may be trick to prepare for the race in two months.

Your Sis made a great pork and potatoes dish last night, and she claims you gave her the idea for roasting the side items. If so, thank you. The apples and onions and potatoes were fuhntaztik.

I'll be able to post a link to the Eats comic anthology this weekend. The preview copy I saw looks solid. Apparently it will be printed in some fashion.

Picture of the Day
Here's the garden as it stands now. The right side is the one I dug up and leveled off. I researched potatoes and found that we can probably start planting within a week. And then we'll boil 'em, mash'em, put 'em in a stew.


In the News
This is cool. Tobey Maguire spoke to kids with a spider scientist at the American Museum of Natural History. In the alternate dimension where I was the right age and look to play Spider-man in a movie, I'm not sure this field trip would be worth the money and fame. Some of these spiders on display are huge.

Eye-Yi-Yi

We enjoyed the suddenly great weather with an outdoor Mexican dinner Friday night. I got up early Saturday to work on the garden. I chopped up a good quarter of it while listening to the NPR lineup (Morning Edition, Car Talk, Wait Wait). I hit dirt after days of chopping through clay. I found wood planks, no doubt used as a border for an herb patch or maybe composting. I also found chunks of concrete which looked like parts of an old driveway. I bet this was from the first homeowners before the drive was paved. But why bury it here?

We grabbed pub lunch and started talking through various marital matters, and unfortunately this led to an hourlong Serious Talk about things that were percolating between us. I'll take the heat for this one. There were comments I should have made earlier, and I didn't deal with them well. But we cleared the air and realized we had interpreted things distinctly, and then gave mutual apologies and that was that. Then we worked on school papers for the majority of the day. Your Sis had the hungers for pizza, and we grabbed two movies as well.

The Devil Wears Prada is a film I wanted to see when it first came out. It looked snarky and quick, and I worship at the feet of Meryl Streep. I was worried that it would be a teen girl's film, but while it wisely holds off on the language and sex, it isn't hollow. It is light. It's almost confectionery, but it's not stupid. I enjoyed it. I didn't buy Anna Hathaway as the former editor-in-chief of a major university daily newspaper, but she doesn't have much heavy lifting here. She doesn't have to act, just react. Streep gets exactly the right amount of screen time for her role. I wouldn't own the film, but I'm glad to have seen it.

A Scanner Darkly is the second animated Richard Linkletter film after Waking Life. It's a nifty small scifi film built mostly on scenes of people who sound like they're improvising their dialogue, and that degree of affecting performance goes a long, long way. I like Robert Downey Jr. as an actor, but if he were onscreen any longer in the film, I'd want to strangle him. Keanu Reeves does well as does Winona Ryder, but Woody Harrelson almost steals the film with some sharp comedy work. The animation is done on top of filmed performances, and it does add to the feel of the film. It also looks a lot like my cover work during the Greenville days (except I didn't outline in black). This is good, heady stuff.


I unfortunately woke up early Sunday morning (at 4:44, oddly) with what felt like a wisdom tooth in my eye. It took half an hour to get it out from my upper eyelid, despite using water, contact lenses, contact solution, a Q-tip, and my fingers. I don't know what it was. I couldn't get back to sleep, and I killed time until 7, when I went to finish my tilling.

We decided to only dig up half the garden. I finished my half a little before 9. Almost two hours of digging left a 29 x 6 foot mound that stretched at least 8 inches down. I raked all that back down to level the dirt. Once again, gardening builds muscles. Seeing development on an anatomy model is one thing, finding it on yourself is another. Also, I am sore as hell. We lunched on leftover, and I bought groceries while Your Sis tackled more school stuff. Later in the day, I mowed and weeded the yard. I am beat as beat can be, even this morning. We bought seed potatoes to plant maybe this week. We also got chicken wire to lay down around the garden. Supposedly cats won't walk on it. I also want to plant catnip away from the garden to distract them.

I killed time playing more "Guitar Hero," including a Rage Against the Machine song that I forgot about. I love this game. I'm convinced I can move almost laterally to playing real guitar when I finish this.

I filled up the gas tank today for only the second time. I got 440 miles on less than 13 gallons. Also got my crackuccino.

Last Night

So, yeah, I was in bed when you called but not fully asleep. I may have sounded odd when I answered because I thought three things all at the same time:
1) It's another prank call.
2) It's bad family news.
3) Your Sister, who sleeps next to the phone, isn't moving. The girl can apparently sleep through explosions.

Don't hesitate to call us when you wish. It was just the rare early night for both of us. Usually, yeah, I'm awake.

There are no grand plans for the weekend. She has to compile school information, and I find myself curiously, um, curious about the NFL Draft. That will last approximately 34 days starting tomorrow. I will also till the garden some more.

Picture/Geek Babble of the Day
Yet another comic-book movie is in the works. Robert Downey Jr. plays Iron Man, and these are the first decent pics we've seen from the set. The story from the comics is industrialist playboy Tony Stark was captured by guerrilla forces (originally Korean, then Vietnamese, now maybe Al Qaeda) to make high-tech weapons. In the capture, his heart was damaged, and he made a supertech pacemaker. Then he built a suit of armor around the gadget, fought the captors, escaped the wilderness, and returned home to run his billionaire empire and fight crime.


Here's what I spy with my geeky eye. First, Downey looks the part. Stark always had some type of facial hair, and his got the right age and complexion. Second, the boy is cut. I don't think I've ever seen him in such good shape. Third, that pacemaker design is nifty. I like that he can't fully disguise the device, unlike in comics where its subcutaneous. This makes him an obvious "iron man" even outside the armor. Iron Man is, essentially, Batman in armor. He's a sex mo-sheen with more money than God. Unfortunately, he drinks like a fish, and he gave up his armor to a sidekick while he dried out. But he's smart without being a geek, and he saves the world from such threats as the Mandarin (A Chinese tyrant with ten power rings), Crimson Dynamo (the Soviet/Russian Iron man), and a slew of c-level thugs with gadget-powered evil schemes. I loved the book when I was young but haven't picked up an issue in decades. The writers always seemed to overthink the premise, and it wasn't fun or engaging.

This appears to be the film version of the classic Iron Man armor. The design has radically changed over the years, but it started off in the early 1960s as what you see above: a bulky, gray boiler with limbs. He's an old-school Marvel character, working alongside Captain America and the Hulk.

Digging for Mud

Working in the garden right now is a simple task. I'm just moving the soil. The upper row is the driest, and digging through that took some time. As I move closer to the compost bin, the soil is looser. And down the slight hill, the soil is fine. I used a shovel to churn the soil when I got home. Just me and the iPod and the shovel. I'm still finding a surprising amount of rocks. For a garden that appeared well tended when we bought the house, it should be clear of the quartz I'm finding. I found one rock, close to the surface that was almost two feet wide and 10 pounds heavy. How did they plant anything on top of that? It's not a decorative chunk, either, although I did find what appears to be a stake yesterday. It's developing into backyard archeology.

Your Sister pointed out that we have accidentally grown asparagus. I turned around, and there were the stalks, about a foot tall from the dirt. We'll let it grow a bit taller. When I finished, I had a 4 x 7 foot gouge in the ground, with fresh, moist clay piled atop of the pinkish topsoil. It looked like I just buried a body. I expect to do this to varying degrees in our delineated patch, but I can save some time by simply watering the dirt. I expected rain this week, but we've gotten nothing so far.

After that, I washed up, made dinner, and helped her look over school papers. Unfortunately, the digging had strained my wrist and I couldn't grasp the pen with my thumb. I hope she can read my notes.

Picture of the Day
This is a billboard for The Economist. It has a motion sensor, and when someone walks underneath it, the bulb lights up.

Space Veto

Did some floor exercises when I got home. Today, I plan to work the garden soil for a while to aerate it and work various muscles. Gardening is not a passive activity, I'm finding. Your Sister made a fantastic curry sirloin dish, and we threw back some wine with it. The end of the school semester is driving her crazy. Short deadlines, papers to grade, exams to prepare for -- this is the roughest patch of work this school year. I want to take her hiking, but I'm not sure we can spare the time. As it is, I'll be looking at papers with her tonight before "Lost" comes on.

Picture of the Day
Factory for WW2 bomber nose cones. If we were serious about waging a war, we'd ration resources and employ the citizenry in such activities.



In the News
This is the reason you don't have a presidential line item veto: Bush will either accept a withdrawal timeline or reject generous Iraq funding. The Democrats say they can outvote the veto, which will make the bill into law. That's pretty rare, but then Bush himself has rarely used his veto power.

+ + +

The news that a possible inhabitable planet has been discovered means very little to me. I support deep-space exploration, but we're not employing enough development or budgets to consider it seriously. And by the time we're able to look at this second earth with any reliable technology, we'll see something that throws our theories into chaos. It's inevitable with space research. We're still learning about the sun, and it's literally 1 million times closer to us than the new planet. Our sun is 8 light minutes away; the planet is 20 light years distant. It would take you 20 years to get there if you traveled at the speed of light.

The Running Cycle

I follow the same running route because the sidewalk follows the road so I'm not out of public view in case something goes wrong, but I'm not in the road either. It does cause some problems. The traffic drafting is tough if the construction vehicles belch thick smoke at me, and the route is peppered with intersections, so I have to watch out for people turning in front of me. Also, this route is all hills, and if I can manage that, I can manage the flatter sections of a 5k race.

I walk from the house to the start of the next road and start to run when I get to the speed sign. This is all downhill to the main road. I turn onto that road, and start a slow uphill, and this is where my shins start to hurt. Every time, regardless of stretching or eating habits. The downhill also curtails my stride, and the uphill combines with that to give me the first big lung hurt. Before I go half a mile, I'm already huffing. The sidewalk breaks in front of the school, and I have to run on the uneven grass. This does not help the shins. When the sidewalk starts again, so does a stronger incline. The cemetery is the halfway point. If I can pass that, I can make it to the first big intersection. This is one mile from the house. But I'm always hurting by then. It becomes a test of will, really, and the iPod helps a lot. If I get a good song to crescendo here, I can push myself.

Yesterday I made myself push pass the intersection and run a bit further. (Right before the last race, I was able to run for another mile before turning around.) I walked around the library park, turned around, and started walking back home. Before I got to the cemetery, I made myself run. My shins were killing me. I tried different walking patterns to shut them up. They calmed down a bit as I started to run, and I made myself run back to the first school entrance. I walked another 200 yards, and then made myself run all the way back to that speed sign. That's the sharpest incline of my possible run route. It's even harder than the notorious downtown hill. I'm gonna start making myself run this house hill every time, sometimes more than once. I want to be able to attack that downtown hill in a race, and I want to beat my time from the first race.

Sometimes I have to look down to avoid staring at my running benchmarks. Sometimes I imagine people I detest mocking me. Sometimes I imagine I'm in a musical montage like in a Rocky movie. Whatever makes me keep it up.

Picture of the Day
Every picture tells a story.

Fast Breaks and Shirtless Gardening

I got home Friday to learn that I was allowed to play in the faculty vs. seniors basketball game. I learned this 30 minutes before gametime. We talked on the phone briefly, and then I changed and ran all the way to the school. I had about 15 minutes of shoot-around time and introductions before we started. It was a loose game. Set up as a fundraiser, there were maybe 50 people watching in the gym as the nice weather kept everyone away. Each team had to play two women at all times, and I worked the game as a back-up. Two volleyball girls refereed, and neither knew the rules all that well. Also the scorekeeper was constantly confused as to which team was which, and another student gave play-by-play over the PA for the whole game. A tad distracting. I was happy with the time I had on the court, but it had abeen a while since I had even touched a basketball, so I didn't expect to hit all-star numbers. Didn't make a shot, mad a few bad passes, but I did block well (always my specialty), and I made a fast break or two. I was referred to by the announcer as Your Sister's Husband for the game. We won on a last-second shot. The team was carried by the basketball coach, who was throwing down threes all game. After, the faculty went to the pub for beers. I was sore. Your Sister stayed on the court for much longer and played hard. I was impressed with her effort. She did good. I wish more students were there to see that.

On Saturday, we took Your Parents out for lunch and to visit downtown. They like the new car, and we had a good time with them. After some coffee at Malaprops, we bought them some snacks at the Chocolate Fetish. It was oddly warm, and we got home early enough for me to attack the weeds and garden, and, per her request, without a shirt. I never do this, but a husband has to keep the missus happy. I also got to work our some of the soreness for the previous night's game. I have to say that I'm shedding the winter shapelessness, and I'm toning up a bit. I hope to run today to get over the last of the basketball soreness. I picked up a to-go order in the new car and discovered that driving it at night is like being in the Red October. It's black and silver and red and very, very cool. We filled up the car with gas for the first time since buying the car, and we got something like 425 miles on one tank. If we had decent gas prices, this would be quite a bargain.

We had lunch with Kathy, Travis, and their baby on Sunday. She's a good child, attentive, and happy. This led to a short conversation about us having kids, and we're both of the same mind: No. The good weather continued, and she declared I would grill steaks for supper. And I did. Again, happy missus upkeep.

Picture of the Day
I'm sure this says something about his ego.

Two Days

I cut the lawn on Tuesday as soon as I got home. Literally. I changed into the yard pants, grabbed the iPod, and made with the mowing. We're under siege by slow-moving, methodical dandelion weeds, and the weather prevented me from siccing the weedeater on them after work Wednesday. Your Sis ordered pizza for dinner Tuesday, and we ate the leftover for dinner last night. She went to bed early, and I watched "Lost." We're both working on her first round of student papers.

I also started writing a mini-comic for distribution at conventions through my unofficial publisher, the guy who prints the anthologies.

Picture of the Day
This is an obelisk chair sculpture. The chairs are lightweight, and the whole thing retail of more than $8,000.


In the News
The Supreme Court decision on partial birth abortions seems like a ruling that would only temporarily infringe upon those who don't want to carry to term. Even if this particular procedure is no longer available (and how many medial procedures are banned by Congress anyway?), others will be developed to replace it, and the legislative process will have to start all over again. I understand that the decision is seen as the first of incremental steps to make abortion illegal altogether, but I don't see that happening. Not so long as conservative lawmakers' daughters also find themselves with child at inopportune times.

+ + +

I have spoken to people who knew one of those killed at Virginia Tech. Jamie Bishop, an artist who taught German there, previously worked at Chapel Hill in the IT department. He was the first person I heard identified in Monday's attack via a message board. NPR presented a small report on him and his hometown friends this morning.

+ + +

Secretary of Defense Robert gates visited Iraq today and pointed out that the administration's military commitment is not open-ended. That sounds similar to the Democrats' rallying cry of a withdrawal time table which the administration very vocally denounces.

+ + +

I have no idea if you like Nine Inch Nails, but he/they have a new CD out, and it's pretty good. It's his first attempt at making commentary on current affairs as he usually writes about personal business and sexual interactions. Year Zero is his American Idiot, and his resistance to administration policies fits right in with his bailiwick of domination and resistance. It's a sparse production and somewhat light and poppy. He even commands his audience to sing along in one track, the first time I can remember him breaking the journal format of his writing and acknowledging his position as a performer. I loves me some NIN. This was the band I discovered and embraced when everyone else was worshiping Nirvana. When grunge took over, I was marinating in industrial.

It's a Bouncing Baby Toyota

The dealership called back Monday morning to say they could find no Matrix models with side airbags left unless we started looking at electric blue or white cars. We didn't want either, so we agreed to take the car they showed us on the lot Saturday. The still-turbulent wind knocked out power at the office right before 3, and I killed time at Barnes & Noble. I met Your Sis at the dealership at 6, and we emptied out the old Contour before trading it in. It was appraised at $1,000, a shock to both of us. I figured it would maybe fetch $200.

The salesman we talked to this weekend took our insurance information and the Contour keys and handed us to the finance officer for the billing. Then we signed about ten forms for contracts, registration, and warranty agreements, right before handing over the check for the down payment. Then we were handed to the service chief who showed us our manual and warranty paperwork. And he walked us out to the new car. Your Sis hadn't bought a new car before, so I made sure everyone was clear on what they were telling both of us. We moved the Contour contents to her sportscar, and I drove the Matrix home. I'd say we were there about 90 minutes.

It's a manual, and it's has been a few years since I drove one, but the gearbox is nicely built, and I had no trouble getting back into rhythm. It likes to go fast. Really fast. I like this car a lot.

Picture of the Day
The language makes it funny.


In the News
It didn't take long for the usual desperate blame-throwing to emerge on talk radio. It's the media, it's the liberals, it's a national move away from God, it's the anti-gun crowd -- everyone except the gunman. I almost understand the need to assign accountability. We face an boggling amount of mass shootings and have for decades. The California McDonald's shooting, the post office deaths, the office shootings, the school shootings. And the only way to make everybody safe is to also invite more danger. Arm college students? Arm teachers? Insert draconian safety measures (as if students didn't protest authority before)? Likewise the calls to fire the college president are in hopes that someone will face punishment when the gunman has escaped it through suicide. This, like 9/11, happened in the alignment of dark stars. A certain person on a certain day acted a certain way and did certain things. You can't escape chaos. By definition, you can't prevent it.

+ + +

The Pulitzer for fiction went to a sci-fi novel, The Road by Cormac McCarthy. I have to dig and see if the genre has won before.

Sedaris and A Funeral

David Sedaris, author and This American Life stalwart, came to Mayberry today in what must be the smallest stop on his 36-city tour. It's incredible that he held a two-hour reading just two miles from my house. Of course I attended. Of course Your Sis didn't. She doesn't find him funny; I think the voice annoys her.

Sedaris is a small man who looks like a cross between Anderson Cooper and Ben from "Lost." He read a short story about his Chapel Hill days called "The Heart Is A Lonely Menagerie," and then told us that he had never read it to an audience before. It showed. He was editing as he read, and he became stuck over word flow at points. But it was funny, and it was poignant, and it was good. It just was. Then he read a story published in the New Yorker called "All the Beauty You Will Ever Need" about how a water shortage in his Normandy house made him flashback to buying pot in a trailer outside of Raleigh.

He read a little bit from his diary concerning a recent trip to Japan. Many jokes were made about Engrish. He read some dog poems (The neighbor's pitbull named Cass/Bit the mailman in the ass/His lower teeth damaged his sphincter/ And now his walk's more distincter.)

But then he recommended a book for everyone to read, and it was the Zombie Survival Guide. Not only did he read the Q&As from the book (do zombies digest? how fast can they run?), but he went on to praise World War Z. Turns out, our gay nerdy New Yorker writer is a zombie-phile. Can't get enough of them. But you have to imagine the scene. This is a 500-seat house filled with couples over the age of 50, and he's going on for half an hour about zombies. He finds the book funny, but he's not sure if it's supposed to be. But he genuinely enjoys what each book does. And the audience is laughing in a mix of horror and habit. By this point, he could have read a soup can, and he'd get laughs. His rhythm was established, and he was working the room.

He mentioned that Night of the Living Dead was so good that it changed his life, but he was frustrated with those holed up in the house. He said he still gets annoyed that they didn't think to go upstairs and then destroy the stairs. The zombies couldn't climb. They'd be safe until the zombies got bored. He also complained about a woman from an earlier reading declaring that she'd be a vegetarian zombie. He was incredulous that anyone could think a zombie would have a choice. What would be the problem if we had zombie vegetarians? We could cut of their legs, chain them to the fence, and use them to cut the lawn. We'd sell them in garden centers. I tell you, the man has given this much thought. Somewhere in him lurks a definitive zombie story.

He went on to gripe about a recent letter to the editor in our fishwrapper. His publicity photo ran a few weeks back, and in it, he has a cigarette behind his ear. A reader complained. He's setting a bad example, she said. He'll be the funniest man with cancer, she said. And he went off. How dare anyone prohibit cigarettes in pictures, he asked. And he noted he's been smoke-free since January only because hotels are going smoke-free.

The two hours flew by, and I'm glad I saw it, but I can't believe that this guy was this close to my house.

Just as I left, Dad called to say my uncle Ray had died. He was my mom's oldest brother, I believe. He was diagnosed with cancer while back and beat the life-span estimate. He was a good and decent man. Retired Air Force too. His funeral was Sunday, and this was the first chance to catch up with some family for years and years. He received a full military funeral with taps and the flag given to his widow. I can't say I was close to him -- the family fell apart when my grandfather died 20 years ago, but the military honors and ritual hit me hard. I visited with my parents for a bit and drove back up the mountain during a small hurricane. The storm you're getting now hammered u for two days with big wind. It howled all night and driving through it was like hitting air turbulence. I don' recall being in a sustained storm like that before. There were reports of snow here and there.

We tried to buy the car on Saturday, but they didn't have a model with side airbags. A regional search turned up nothing, and I think we're going to break down and buy a model they have on the lot. By this time tomorrow, we may have a new car.

Picture of the Day
A most bridge-aceous bridge.

Let's Get Newsy

The Imus scandal has crafted a national dialogue on race and free speech that quickly became an abstract argument on propriety and fairness. "Why can they say those words but we can't? Isn't this the creeping fascism of political correctness?" The most often repeated argument I hear is that it's OK for rappers to say this stuff. That's a question that removes all context. You can't say that stuff on broadcast radio music. All such words are edited out on my local radio channels, anyway. MTV certainly removes it. If a rapper uses it on a CD or single, and you hear it, chances are you paid to listen. You know what kind of language to expect in that rap. You know what the intended audience and message is. Chances are you paid to hear it because the radio stations bleeped it out. If you hear it in concert, chances are good you paid to attend.

But free broadcast, syndicated radio like Imus -- whose show was also simulcast on MSNBC -- has two things rap doesn't: media credibility and a predominantly white audience. Imus's show, while it does feature broad humor, plays host to journalists and politicians. He has a cache of respect that, say Howard Stern, doesn't. And, yes, Imus has said similar things in the past while still retaining this clientèle of guests. It could be easily argued that Imus didn't go one step too far with his comments about the Rutger's team but that his cumulative commentary finally caught up with him. And let's not forget he said this during a news segment, not a comedy skit. Context is vital. A 19-year-old black rapper lives in a different realm of obligation than a 40-year white veteran of talk radio.

I still say this is a matter of chivalry. These women did nothing to earn such remarks. They didn't hire a stripper, they didn't throw a kegger, they didn't do anything that college kids could do to garner national news and catch flack from comedians looking to score easy laughs. A 70-year-old man taking potshots at a women's college athletic team is rude. But would the backlash have gathered such career-ending momentum had he called them lesbians? I doubt it. He played the race card, and he got bit by it. You put your neck in that guillotine, you can't whine when you get cut.

And, you know, if a double standard does exists -- "those people" can say "those words," but "we can't" -- I can live with that. The civil rights act isn't 50 years old yet. We're not that far removed from federally-approved separate facilities. I can live with consensus-mandated separate vocabularies. I don't feel in any deprived by a polite inability to call someone a crude slang word. This is hardly a cruel yoke which we can deem a white man's burden.

To all those talk radio people who decry such censorship and call out for a universal patois, I say this: If you think your shtick is hampered by a lack of access to such language, you're in the wrong business.

+ + +

As mentioned here a few weeks back, the administration has employed a shadow email server to avoid federal laws denying the deletion of official communications. Some of these emails apparently dealt with the prosecutor scandal, and despite White House claims, the Democrats say those emails haven't been deleted. They still may exist on a Republican party server, they say, and should be subject to subpoena. This expands further the argument of executive privilege and Congressional checks and balances. The administration claims previous White House staff as have done the same, an obvious admission of guilt that one usually outgrows after elementary school. At the center of this growing ugliness is whether the justice department and White House discussed the firing of prosecutors because they were investigating Republicans connected to lobbyists or voter fraud.

Picture of the Day
Everyone needs a home-security octopus.

Small Stuff and Death

I ran a soil test yesterday, and I'll spare you the nit and grit to say that we have passable food-growing dirt. Chicken alfredo was made and devoured and "Lost" was watched and beloved. We checked the regional inventory of the Matrix that we want to buy, and only two popped up. We may have to pick another color, but I believe we're going tomorrow morning to put in the order. None of the cars on the lot were what we prefer, but we might be tempted to buy one if we get a good offer.

The rehearsals for Romeo & Juliet start Saturday, and the auditions for Much Ado are next weekend. I want to do the latter much more now that I'm relegated to spear-carrier for the former. I'll read the play starting tonight, and get ready to have a more successful try-out. Maybe I can move out of R&J to do Ado.

Picture In The News
Kurt Vonnegut died yesterday. His works have stuck with me, including a short story from our seventh grade lit book. I remember reading Slaughterhouse Five on an airplane, and that must have been while I was flying to Michigan so often in college. As I mentioned a while back, he had a great cameo in Back to School.

His legacy is one of fierce cynicism, and he may be the closest thing to Mark Twain that the science-fiction genre could boast. His material was fundamental in reshaping literature after World War II, along with the Beats and the Northeasterners (Mailer, Caopte, etc.)

Thwack!

Tuesday was the big day for Your Sis. After a little under two years of care and delicate pruning, she decided to cut her hair for a cancer charity. I went with her to take scrapbook photos of the process. She didn't show anxiety, but her many thank-yous for support afterward revealed she was feeling it. I think she likes it a lot. I know I do. She's on Spring Break and made a nice stir-fry dish and apple pie for dinner. I could get used to this.

I got home and worked over the tilled garden. We have a number of roots from various weed shrubs, and I spent at least an hour raking the garden and digging out the weed roots. I also gathered dirt for a Ph test. I don't think we're too far from putting something in the ground, be it seeds or fertilizer.

We tried out a new wine with dinner, and after emptying the bottle, the evening drew to a quick close.

Picture of the Day
Ta-dah.


In The News
Don Imus is an idiot. The scandal has nothing to do with free speech or racial sensitivity. He insulted a successful women's basketball team. This is a matter of chivalry. You don't knock college women for succeeding in their sport. Someone as old as he should know better. Unfortunately, morning radio shows seems to exist to create controversy/free publicity with stupid humor and pranks. We're not a year removed from the death of the West Coast woman who wanted to win a Nintendo Wii from a radio station. The local shows here are unbearable, and thankfully, one station (one!) has no morning show and plays music I can handle.

Snow, Movies, Cars

I watched three movies this weekend.

City of God, a Brazilian street gang movie I TiFauxed a year ago. This took two viewings as it's a mighty long film, but it is stylish and energetic. Also, the soundtrack is fuhntaztik. This is Romeo and Juliet without the romance as we watch kids grow up and dominate the slums of Brazil.

Grindhouse, a marinade of every bad film our parents won't watch. The first half, Planet Terror, is gory and camp, and it starts to wear after a bit. But Death Proof decides to forgo mocking the targeted genres of car stunts and female revenge flicks and actually IS a car stunts and female revenge flick. I prefer it much more, and it's a shame Your Sis will in no way watch the first film to get to this, a movie she will adore. Rumors abound that the startling BO failure of Grindhouse may lead to separate releases of both films. However, each film must include all the fake trailers as they brought the house down when I saw them. There's so much to love here, but Kurt Russell as the bad guy is just dead perfect. The combined z-movie glory of Jeff Fahey and Micheal Biehn is almost too pure a dream to capture in the measly flesh of the human brain. This is crap-movie nirvana.

The Host, a South Korean monster movie that brings dignity back to its genre. It's very, very good and in no way shrimps on the monster or the suspense. But it doesn't try to make the monster sad or misunderstood. I liked this a lot and was shocked when Your Sis suggested we see it. She caught the trailer for it while watching The Namesake and knew I wanted to see Host. Maybe the most satisfying monster film since Jaws.

Amid the films, we shopped for a car. On Sunday we hit the Land Rover dealership and laughed out loud at the prices and accompanying gas mileage, but were momentarily distracted by the used BMW Mini Cooper for $18,000. But we need more cargo space not less. We needed a four-door hatchback, preferably not an SVU. The BMW lot was also a herd of cars out of our range and on we went to the Saturn dealership. However, not only was it cold as hell, it had snowed, and all the outside cars were covered. We couldn't even read the sticker prices. The nearby Nissan dealership had a showroom Versa, and it charmed us with a small price and good space. Unfortunately, it has a thin candy shell. We tried the Pontiac dealership to look at Vibes (a car we noticed years back in a mall show), but the cold drove us away. As the snow melted, we enjoyed a fabulous Chinese lunch and browsed for garden plants. We then hit a Subaru dealership for our first look at those cars. We went back to the Saturn place, and the salesman tried to sell us a tank of a car called the VUE. I told him it was just too big for us. Next door was the Toyota lot, and we checked the Scion (too small), RAV (too big) and Matrix (just right). But the lot was closing, and it was cold, and we went home.

On Monday, we went back to the dealerships. Online comparisons made us reconsider the Vibe and Versa. We checked out a Matrix in the showroom and took to it. We tried to find something wrong with it but couldn't. We moved on to the Nissan dealership to see the Muranos, but man are they expensive. We liked the luxury options (such as the rear-view camera), but the price removed it from our list. The Subarus looked rather old inside, like late '90 cars, and the price wasn't comparable to the front-runner Matrix. So they were out. Once more to the Toyota lot and we actually drove a Matrix. Here I have to commend sales guy Allen who talked with us just barely and gave us time and room to browse. The perfect car salesman, I think. He gave us the Matrix key and an hour to try it. It runs great, sounds great, handles great. But we checked a used model for price comparison, and really the used prices aren't that much different. We'd rather spend the extra money and get the color and options we want. But that's for another day. We also looked at a Prius, the Toyota hybrid. It's sharp to look at, but it doesn't seem any safer than a economy sedan. The Matrix has traction control. We killed time at Barnes & Noble and had Chick-fil-A before seeing The Host. And then it was time to go home.

And this morning ... well, that will wait for tomorrow's entry.

Picture of the Day
The Toyota Matrix, a wagon on the Corolla chassis. Palm trees not included.

Plow, Plow, Plower Wheels

I ran Wednesday and again experienced the unusual leg pain. I stretched out well (I thought) and eaten well enough to avoid cramps (I thought). But my shins kill me before I go a half mile. I wonder if my stride was gone out of whack. I also wonder if my weight is more than I thought. The scale says I'm just a little heavier than I was when I ran the 5k. I'm not experiencing the side pains yet, but I don't think I'm running that much slower to cause a paid reduction. I'm confused.

I got home last night to find Your Sis tilling the long-dormant garden. We talked about starting it back up since we moved in, and we even tried to rent a tiller last year but the weather confounded us. She got out of work and decided to plow the ground, and so she did. She mentioned that the renters gave her a full procedure and that she had never even cranked up a lawnmower before. We'll fix that next week. I want her to be able to use all our equipment in case something happens to me. As she tilled, I did my exercises. She showed Unbreakable for the school movie room was was surprised by how many kids didn't know about it.

As we make our way through the last 25 episodes of "Six Feet Under," the characters are currently in a stretch of universal bad stuff. No one is happy, and everyone is getting bitchy. I need a drink after deleting each finished episode.

We got some surprising news from Your Aunt yesterday, and it's the kind of revelation that knocked me off my feet almost literally. She said she had talked to you as well about her plans, and I'm still not sure I can put into words just what I'm feeling. It certainly will help this here at Chez Debacle.

I'm working today and will be off Monday. I uploaded the Saturday Night Fever CD to my iPod so I can BeeGee my way to work.

Picture of the Day

We Got Movie Sign!

As Spring Break approaches the Mayberry district, Your Sister's school holds its occasional "screw it, we're not getting any work done" day on Thursday. She is in charge of a movie room but doesn't know who's supposed to bring movies. I recommended some of ours, but she reminded me that you can't show Disney movies in schools, or they'll sue you. Yes, they sue over large-scale babysitting viewings. That knocked out Incredibles and Pirates of the Caribbean. I suggested maybe Star Wars or Casablanca. The kids will dig the latter if they give it a chance. It's got Nazis, smart-ass humor, the French Resistance, a venal police chief exploiting the desperation of female refugees, gunplay, gambling, and drinking. It's a family-friendly parade of vice with a hundred quotable lines. I thought about Serenity as well, and I can't think of any major objectionable scenes from that film. I'll let her decide obviously since she'll be accountable. She's buried under school projects (which is why I commandeered the tech display), and this week is gonna be rough on her. She got out of school late yesterday, and we hit the local sports bar for pizza.

Picture of the Day
A new still from the upcoming FF2 movie. I wasn't fond of the first film for a lot of reasons, but it wasn't the blasphemous attack the vocal majority of comic fans would have you believe. I mean, the X-Men film franchise takes just as much liberty with the source material, and most people dig those films (except for those who think it fashionable to be grumpy killjoys). But this FF picture retains the sad resistance to go with the comics' outrageousness. The costumes are needlessly adjusted from the classic designs, and Thing is just too small. He must be broader, more inhuman, so we can immediately acknowledge the difference between being freakishly removed from the rest of us and merely inconvenienced by his new form. He should be CGI. And if I can nitpick, Sue and Johnny's hair don't jibe with what we seen for more than 40 years on paper. But the new film possesses the potential for a big-screen Galactus the World Devourer, and if the producers can just trust that original, cosmic-crazy design, then the movie will get my ticket money.

Victory of Creativity

I met up with Your Sis at the local library to view the technology displays. It was larger than we thought, featuring teachers from the entire district. The dedicated room was packed with displays, laptops running PowerPoint, and students of all sizes. Our display did indeed stand out. But another teacher brought a giant mess of props for her sewing demo, and those items were blocking our display. We simply turned the display around to be read from the other side, a vantage that had more traffic and better visibility. As soon as we moved it, people started reading it. I overheard her talking to another teacher that some students jokingly planned to steal and burn our display because it blew theirs out of the water. The lesson for all: Don't fuck with art majors. We will stylishly bury you. The whole affair was like a mini-convention -- slowly strolling attendees, a corner for heavy food, both vendors trying to make eye contact and hawk their material. Not that I'm slamming the event. I'm shocked it was that well populated. The parking lot was a mess, and folks left their cars anywhere they could find ten feet of asphalt.

After this we went to the recently reopened eatery for bar food. It's just so weird eating a languorous supper and exiting the establishment to encounter bright daylight. And yet I'm surprised by this every year. When will it become old hat?

Picture of the Day
And just how can this be done, anyway?

I Assemble Things

I walked out of the office Friday to discover the back left tire was dead flat. As I walked up to it, I saw the embedded metal shard that caused it. No problem, I thought, I'll get the spare. I had to call Your Sis to find where the jack and wrench are located in the car, and when I finally did replace the tries with the spare, I find the spare is also dead flat. It's almost falling off the rim, and there's no way I can drive it to a garage for a fix. Now it's right at 6 p.m., and tire stores close at that hour on Fridays. There's a tire garage within eyesight of the office, and the garage bay doors are still open. I write down the tire numbers, and run flatout to the front door, nor their posted hours indeed say it's practically closing time, and plead my case. The very nice clerk says they can help me. He looks at my tire numbers and notes they have a similar tire in stock. I run back to the office, grab the dead tire, and run it back to the garage. Yes, I'm running with a flat, wide, sports car tire in my arms. They confirmed it was dead and beyond repair, but sold me a new one and put it on the rim. They clerk then drove me back to the office, and I put the new tire on.

As I'm driving home, I take the back roads to break in the tire and witness, in the opposite lane of traffic, a dramatic arrest involving a running K9 unit, guns, and two shouting cops in all-black gear. So, yeah, my day could have been worse.

Your Sis got home late from work, and my hops for working on the tech fair display were dashed. We briefly talked of my ideas, but shelved it for the next day. I got up Saturday to reassemble the lawnmower. The manufacturers recommend winterizing the mower -- sharpening the blade, changing the oil and air filter, and cleaning the spark plug. I did all that and put the mower back together, and, to my shock, it cranked up and ran fine. But the grass was too wet to mow, and I went to work on the display.

After getting the picture files from her classroom, I showed her my idea on the home PC in a page-making program. We went with a Frankenstein theme, narrated by Igor from Young Frankenstein. I wanted it to be light-hearted. These kinds of display are usually so dull, and I always advocate the use of humor to present potentially dry material. Because she had to work on research papers, this became my project to assemble, but she checked off on all facets. After raiding K-Mart and Wal-Mart for the last 3 bottles of rubber cement and getting Igor images through Google, we started the tight design work. After getting the package ready on the PC, we let it sit for the next day. That night, we went to a local house party, drank some, ate some, and listened to a teacher couple play the gee-tar. It was a good break from working on the display.

I got up early Sunday to make the text. She proofed it after I cut out the header text and images. We ate, got groceries, and went back to the school to grab sound file samples for a CD to play along with the display. I printed out the text with the accompanying classroom pictures and we glued the whole thing together. Then we prepared for the night's WrestleMania PPV party by putting out a spread of eats and cleaning the house. It was a great time. We had four guests, gave a tour of the house, and they watched most of the show before heading out. The short report: It was a good show with some standout matches amid a few utter crap bouts. But the spectacle was worth it. I drank so much that I'm still a little bleary this morning.

Tonight, we go to the library to see the other tech displays. There's no way anyone can beat ours.

Picture of the Day
See? The white spaces around Igor's head were cut away in the printed version, and the final topper includes lightning behind the text.