oh and in an unrelated event...

i purchased tuna flavored cat laxative today.


for reals.

what i nobody wants to say

ah hell, I'll say it.

I'm scared shitless about the economy. And its normally not something that I give much thought to. But the more I read the more I'm sure that the world just changed. And not in a good way. And while all this stuff has yet to trickle down to a mid market television station and a senior writer/producer at said station...its coming. We're owned by a group of bankers, who right now are sitting in a smoke-filled room with a map of all our stations. And they aren't happy.

Perhaps I'm overreacting. And there are actually plenty of jobs in my field. Elsewhere. And then I'll have to sell the house (not that anyone is buying houses). And then I'll have to move to a city where I don't know anyone. And then I'll have to....

Ugh. I need to stop reading and go back to playing video games.

The Gee Mail

It is no secret that gmail is the business. I am not going to write a blog telling you of its virtues. I have 2 close friends who are still using Yahoo. I'm shocked they aren't on AOL and Compuserve still as well. Askin' Jeeves, bustin' out Mosaic and using Pine for their email (yeah, I'm old)

Anyways, this is for my gmail brothers and sisters. And apparently its old news.

Click on settings, and then Labs.

There's 20 something features that you can "add on" to gmail. Including the one that drove me nuts- when i respond to a group email, it now defaults to "reply to all" instead of reply.

Very cool. Gmail is where its at, ya'll. I got 2 turntables and a microphone.

yeah so

So Auburn lost to LSU. Let's metaphor that up with the rest of the night:

We played great defense, but in the 2nd half still let the offense through. We tried our hardest to keep it close, but in the end, even with 3 timeouts, just couldn't move the ball down the field.

The better team won tonight.

lobes

Sinus headaches are here. It seems to coincide with fall and spring. I try not to offer your usual complaints here but damn this hurts.

I've been playing lots of Rock Band 2. It's not really a new game, its a glorified expansion pack. But that doesn't really bother me- there was nothing wrong with Rock Band 1. I've yet to try the drum trainer, but the next time I can not feel like my head is going to explode, I'll give it a try.

The most enjoyable songs so far:

Singing "Feel the Pain" by Dinosaur Jr
Guitar on "Hungry Like the Wolf" (really!)

The lows:
Every instrument on "So Watcha Want". Singing is fun, of course.

There is no other news. Spore/Rockband/Trivia/Head throbbing can't think/sleep. So it goes.

Trivial

Oh dammit.

The trivia question was- put these in order from oldest to newest based on the year they won Best Picture.

Braveheart
Schindler's List
Driving Miss Daisy
Silence of the Lambs

I immediately wrote down the years they won. We discussed it for a while, and we agreed-

Driving Miss Daisy
Silence of the Lambs
Schindler's List
Braveheart

So I wrote this down on the card to turn in:

Driving Miss Daisy
Silence of the Lambs
Braveheart
Schindlers List

In my defense, I showed it to everyone at the table. But I still screwed up. And it cost us $25 bucks EACH. There's this pain in the pit of my stomach that won't go away. I'm completely disgusted with myself. I went to bed beating myself up over it, and it was the first thing I thought about this morning. I much prefer when I can direct my anger towards someone else. But not this time.

Dammit.

What Birmingham has to offer...

So I am all Iphoned up. An interesting application I've found is called Graffitio. Basically, it sees where you are and if someone has posted a message nearby, it shows up. For instance when I was downtown there were "walls" for Urban Standard, Nana Funks, and some other places. But there is also a generic "Birmingham" wall.

And that's what made me smile tonight.
Yesterday, some jackass wrote:

"Is this the best Birmingham has to offer?"

I assume he was referring to the fact that there were only a handful of messages on our wall.
Well someone, and if I met him or her I'd buy them a drink, said this:

"No. Birmingham can also offer you a swift punch in your face."

Awesome.

Spore Review: ?/10

I was going to write a hate letter to Spore. I've been waiting on Spore for about 3 years- the guy who made Sim City making a game that starts at the cellular level and ends up with you colonzing outer space? That's the kind of thing I'd get excited about.

But playing it for 8 hours yesterday did not make me joyous, and those kinds of game usually do.

You start out as a cell. And you basically play a fancy version of pac-man for 30 minutes.

Then you get to design your creature- which is one hell of a good time. And then you play this weird Warcraft but simple game where you can either dance and sing and make friends, or kill everything that moves. Guess what I did? (I did both, but you know which one I enjoyed).

THEN you do basically the same thing, but there's resource gathering. I did a healthy mix of killing and dancing, befriending some tribes and wiping other ones off the map.

THEN you play a very dumbed down version of Command & Conquer until you take over your planet. The highlights here are you get to design your buildings and vehicles (or choose from a ton of them prebuilt). I had a blast designing my AT-ST walker- complete with blaring propaganda horns (by then I had become a "religious" nation).

By this time, it's 9 at night and I was incredibly underwhelmed. The character/vehicle/building creator is fun. But everything else is just so simple and limiting. I'm going to go through it all again on the hard difficulty, but I imagine that's just going to make it more frustrating and even less fun. We shall see.

After a break, I fired it back up to get to last stage- Space. I only got about an hour in before I realized it was ridiculously late, but it was the most fun I'd had all day playing it. I'm not convinced that it will save the rest of the game but it might. I'm going to figure out how to upload a pic of my starship- cause that was fun as hell to make. (This link might work- it doesn't look near as good at that odd angle.)

Anyways, I'll be playing it tonight, picking up creatures with my UFO's tractor beam, and throwing them into the atmosphere. That's the kind of thing I'm into.

Dr. Pirate Time Machine reviews Of Montreal's "Skeletal Lamping" 9/10

Ok. First of all, this album is probably not something you'll like. Cause I'm just going to say it. This thing is a little gay. There's a song that the chorus is, and I'm not joking, "We can do it softcore but I take it both ways." There are songs written from the perspective of prostitutes. And at one point, Kevin Barnes says "I'm just a black she-male, and i dont know what you people are all about."

Not something you normally sing along to.

But the weirdest thing (for me, at least) is that I don't care. I've never considered myself homophobic (but who does, really?) more like homo-i-dont-give-a-shit-about-you. Or something more eloquent.

And this album (which is due in October) has not awakened a new side of me. I am not wearing mascara right now. I bet the main guy of Of Montreal is though. Cause he's a weird dude. But also married. I can't quite figure that one out. He's very Bowie-esque I guess.

I love this album. I love this band. I love the sound, I love the profane-ness. I love the fact that every minute it completely changes. I'm left wanting more of a song but its long gone. This happens constantly.

If pressed, I'd say that Of Montreal is the Beatles taking ecstasy while listening to Marvin Gaye and the Cure, with a poster of Bowie in the background.

Maybe you should just listen to a song. "ID engager" is from the new album. It uses the phrase "phallocentric tyranny" and has a great chorus- "I can't help it if its true, don't want to be your man, just want to play with you". There's always some great lyrics... another favorite from the new one is "...a freaky permutation, something like Voltron". There was a Robocop line in the last one.

I can tell you I think its a bunch of beautiful music and seriously messed up lyrics rolled up into one. If you can handle the oozing sexuality of it (and for some weird reason I can) then I think you will see what I mean.

If you want to play it safe, but are intrigued, check out their previous effort, "Hissing Fauna You Are The Destroyer". It's less sex-filled- but perhaps even better. Look for "Bunny ain't no kind of rider". The problem with it is that I have completely and utterly worn it out.

Iphone Review 10/10

Holy crap. If you have the means, go buy one. I could complain about battery life, but I guess if I could leave the thing alone for 5 minutes I would have more.

It is as advertised. Hell, it's better.

If I had to be critical- they sell it without any sort of protective case and just looking at it causes it to have fingerprints on it. Go ahead and expect that you'll be buying a case for it. Also you are forced to use AT&T with it, and here in Birmingham AT&T sucks balls.

It's true. They do.

Other than that, completely and utterly amazed. It says a lot about an electronic device when my 75 year old father can hold it, play with it, and completely understand why it's great. He thinks it runs on magic and muttered something about how he never thought this would be possible. The GPS feature, which located his house, almost caused him to pass out.

Most of the time when I bring a new toy over for him to check out, he expresses mild interest and then asks how much it costs. When I told him how much I paid for the iphone, he thought that was a deal. I'm not sure I've ever heard him say that.

So there. Iphone- father approved.

Emo Blues

Wow I need to stop taking mescaline and listening to the new Of Montreal album.

I know what'll fix my blues- I'll buy an iphone today.

I'm cracking my sweet love (angst blog)

I don't know why, but lately I've felt completely off. It was even there on vacation. Just kind of out of sync. Seeing the world move and gyrate and being one second late to that critical moment- saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. Nothing feels right lately. I thought a week off would correct my spin- but it hasn't.

So I'm left wondering what it is. I start addressing other problems. I stay in on nights I typically go out. And I drink alone. The world moves and gyrates while I try to stand still. I try to perceive that line I'm supposed to follow. Cause right now, this doesn't feel like it. It feels like I stepped into something and I can't quite clean it off my shoe.

It's like immediately I don't care about all the things I thought I care about. My work has been listless. Going through the minimal motions. Not enjoying it, even though I know I should. I worked for 8 years to get here- and lately it just feels wrong. I'm reading this book about pattern recognition. It's all about these people who obsess over "the footage" that's posted on the internet- fretting over every release, trying to piece it together. Is it a narrative, or just a disconnected stream of video? Is the person releasing it to toy with people, or is part of the artistic vision the way its being released?

I feel connected to that, and nothing else.

Insanity, I tell you.

As of today, I have been blogging here for one entire calendar year. I am celebrating with the bold and innovative redesign you are likely not seeing because you use a feed reader.

I am as surprised as you are.

I'm not sure I've yet done with this what I wanted, but I love having an outlet for my brain. And I am very happy/honored/thankful to have people who I know and people I don't who read and sometimes enjoy it.

If you see me out and say that you've read this message, then I will purchase you an alcoholic beverage of your choice (within reason, scotch lovers). I realize that might be impossible for some of you- in that case just file this away in the back of your mind and next time you see me remind me and its yours.

Thanks again for reading. I am known to be slightly, occasionally sarcastic but I say this with love.

chris.

Fragile City Stories

I was going to write about vacation. And maybe I will eventually. But this past week has reminded me of a city I both love and hate, and I want to write about it.

I went to New Orleans when I was 5 to visit my aunt and uncle. I clearly remember him taking me to the levee. I remember that (and for some reason the layout of his house) because I was completely terrified by the levee. He held me up and I could see that water was ABOVE US. My parents later told me I was a mess for hours after that. I just remember that singular moment of terror- and it stuck with me for a long time. In fact I'm still a little scared of water for that very reason. It's primal- we don't belong in that shit. Things that eat us do. I love teasing a friend about his fear of sharks- but the truth is they terrify me as well. I'm just rational about it.

I've been to New Orleans probably 15 times in my life. A wing of my family settled there, and I'm a sucker for free places to stay. I've been 3 times since Katrina. And as detailed in the past, I check on the city when I'm there. I have certain places I go every time, just to see how they are. I don't know why I care- in college I once famously said I'd never go back there...but that was after a rough Mardi Gras that now is almost a fond memory.

So this week, a large portion of that wing of my family has relocated to Birmingham to wait out the storm. Well that's not true- they were coming up anyways for Labor Day, and are still here. They're waiting on the mayor to tell them its ok to come home. And power. They kind of want power in their house. Yesterday my cousin came over to use her laptop (parents are not wireless, but at least they aren't dial-up). She said something very revealing to me- she kind of wished her house had been destroyed this time. She's sick of it. They stuck to it through Katrina. They went back. They carried on, putting up with all the bullshit. But Gustav might have been it for them- its not that anything happened- its that they had to do this to begin with. I can't imagine psychologically what it must be like to have your home threatened like this. I don't consider New Orleans a home- but after Birmingham in some ways it is. It's certainly a base of operations for me. And I completely understand my cousin. Fuck it. Get the hell out of there.

In related news, the place I vacated to, Tybee Beach, is facing down Hanna. I have become death, destroyer of cities.

Laziness

I've been far too busy drinking, playing video games, and disc golf to blog about my trip. For now, head on over to flickr for more pics of it. You might have to wade past baby pictures- my relatives from New Orleans are understandably hanging out in the 'ham for the weekend.