Laguna Biatch Reloaded
MTV showed a marathon of the first season of Laguna Beach yesterday. Reminded me of what a great show it was. I did some searching on Amazon and found that the DVD for Laguna Beach Season 1 comes out in July. Think I'll have to get that.
Hotel Rwanda
It was a good movie, though it's hard to tell in these movies what was real and what was exaggerated or added. Either way, it was a sobering reminder of how much we take for granted in this country, in terms of basic things like political stability and personal safety. We work every day to save up money and provide a better life for ourselves and the ones we love, but if one day an army were to pull up to your house and wanted do whatever they felt like doing to you and your family, what could you really do about it? At that point, all the stuff we normally think about and care about is out the window and the only thing that matters is survival.
Original Star Wars
Found my old original Star Wars trilogy on VHS and watched "A New Hope". I still remember when I first bought it for $30 in high school and that was a big investment for me back then. But they said it would be the "last chance" to own the original trilogy on video, so I decided to pay up. Since then, I think we can all safely say that it was a good thing I did, because look how scarce these Star Wars movies are these days. Anyways, I was disappointed to find that my tapes had deteriorated since the last time I watched them (probably at least 5 years ago). Still watchable, but a little flickering in some parts of the picture. I really did not get my money's worth in buying that VHS trilogy. At least the next time when I buy the sixlogy or whatever the complete set ends up being called, it will probably be DVD or some even more advanced digital format and will last longer.
Baseball Tonight
I used to like watching Baseball Tonight on ESPN every night. There was the story (I think recounted either on my blog or P's blog) one year when me and P were so excited to see the first BBTN of the season, but were hungry, so we raced across the street to Mykonos for some food and rushed back within like 10 minutes so we could catch the beginning.
Unfortunately as I've been watching that show this year, it has turned into a borderline unwatchable program for me. Half the time it turns into John Kruk and Harold Reynolds yelling over each other about something stupid, like whether or not Juan Uribe was wrong to trick Derrek Lee on that "foul ball" play. Honestly, if I wanted to see annoying arguments about pointless topics, I would just watch PTI, Around the Horn, I, Max, or any of the 20 million shows on TV that do exactly that.
The other day they were showing a highlight of Dae Sung Koo giving up a monster home run on a 3-0 pitch, when Harold Reynolds made some comment like "this isn't the Japanese leagues anymore". At first I thought I didn't hear him right, but then he went on to talk about how "in Japan, they don't swing at 3-0 pitches, but here, we'll make you pay".
What an ignorant thing to say. Sure, the talent level in the US is higher than in Japan, and there's differences in the style of play. But it's not like American pitchers have never grooved 3-0 pitches and gotten burnt before. To say something like "you're not in Japan anymore" is just condescending and unnecessary. And on top of it all, I don't think Koo is even from Japan. Pretty sure he's Korean. Not that I would expect Harold to know or care about the difference.
I get a little tired of complaining about race issues all the time, and I think overall I just let most things go, but sometimes it just has to be pointed out. Anyways, back to non-racial topics, I also noticed Harold Reynolds sucks at his fantasy advice too. The guy has little to no clue what he's talking about, and most of the time his explanations on who to trade and who to keep make zero sense. Honestly I used to think he was a good anaylst but he and the BBTN show have really gotten a lot worse in recent times.
Willie Harris Quote
White Sox article in the Sun Times
I got a laugh out of the quote at the end by Willie Harris: "Like Ice Cube said, today was a good day"
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Monday, May 30, 2005
Wedding
I was at a wedding yesterday. Don't worry ladies, it wasn't my own. I got to watch a couple of old friends, Jeff and Laura, get hitched.
As a non-female human being, weddings are not really my favorite place to be, not my ideal way to spend a Saturday. But I did enjoy this one and I was really glad I got to watch them get married.
It helped that I have known both of them since high school and they are two of the nicest and coolest people I know of. And having seen them together as a couple for 7+ years (?) now, this wedding was a really nice celebration for a relationship that I honestly felt lucky to be there to see.
As far as the actual ceremony and reception went, it was a pretty good time. I don't like being in a suit and tie, but I haven't had to be in one for a couple years, so I guess it was alright. Not a big fan of how everything has to be so formal and stuff, but hey, what do I know? I clearly lack culture.
I noticed my blog has been boring looking lately, so in an attempt to spice things up a little, here are a couple pictures we took at the wedding ceremony. Hopefully I will be getting more from other people's cameras because for some reason a lot of mine turned out blurry. But that's ok, gives the bride and groom some anonymity in case they don't wish to be identified on this webpage (the lady behind me and Olivia in the second picture was not as lucky):
I was at a wedding yesterday. Don't worry ladies, it wasn't my own. I got to watch a couple of old friends, Jeff and Laura, get hitched.
As a non-female human being, weddings are not really my favorite place to be, not my ideal way to spend a Saturday. But I did enjoy this one and I was really glad I got to watch them get married.
It helped that I have known both of them since high school and they are two of the nicest and coolest people I know of. And having seen them together as a couple for 7+ years (?) now, this wedding was a really nice celebration for a relationship that I honestly felt lucky to be there to see.
As far as the actual ceremony and reception went, it was a pretty good time. I don't like being in a suit and tie, but I haven't had to be in one for a couple years, so I guess it was alright. Not a big fan of how everything has to be so formal and stuff, but hey, what do I know? I clearly lack culture.
I noticed my blog has been boring looking lately, so in an attempt to spice things up a little, here are a couple pictures we took at the wedding ceremony. Hopefully I will be getting more from other people's cameras because for some reason a lot of mine turned out blurry. But that's ok, gives the bride and groom some anonymity in case they don't wish to be identified on this webpage (the lady behind me and Olivia in the second picture was not as lucky):
Thursday, May 26, 2005
Episode III
* May contain "spoilers" to the plot. Skip this part of the blog if you have not seen Revenge of the Sith yet.
Based on the recommendation of pretty much everyone I know, I decided to suck it up and watch the latest Star Wars movie this weekend. It's been a long time since I've watched a movie in the theater, and a really long time since I watched a movie in its opening weekend.
Anyways, I liked the movie. As I mentioned before, though, I also liked Episodes I and II when I watched them. Still, this one was definitely the best out of the 3. I heard when George Lucas was writing the story, he had 60% of the story focused on the last movie, and 40% on the first two. That would explain why there's so much crap filler in those, such as the pod racing, or any scene with Jar Jar Binks. And what was really the point of Darth Maul? None of those things really had much significance in the story.
I heard the guy who plays the Senator/Chancellor/Emperor is the same guy from the original movies. If that's true, that's pretty impressive. Now I'm wondering, is that also the same guy who played Grand Moff Tarkin too, in the scene at the end of Episode III?
By far my favorite line from the movie, by Padme to Anakin: "Hold me.... like you did by the lake in Naboo" hahaha so cheesy. Another great moment was at the end when the Emperor tells Darth Vader that he killed Padme, and he goes "NOOOOOOOO!!!!!" and starts shaking his fists.
See, I never really minded the corny dialogue, bad acting, or even the pointless side plots. The one major thing that bugged me in these movies was how the Trade Federation had accents that were blatantly Asian-sounding. I guess people of other ethnic groups also have their complaints about certain characters too, i.e. the Jewish shop owner, Jar Jar Binks, "sand people", and maybe more that I didn't pick up on. Not gonna make me hate Star Wars or anything, but there's no way it could all be an accident or coincidence - you gotta wonder about what George Lucas was thinking when he made these movies.
While I'm talking about Star Wars, I thought I'd throw out some questions I have about the movies (this includes the original trilogy too):
1. What purpose does the Stormtrooper suit serve? It doesn't seem to protect them from lasers, nor did it save them from getting beat by the Ewoks and their rocks. Is it just to make them look cool?
2. I think in Return of the Jedi, Leia tells Luke that she remembers her mother being very beautiful but looked sad. How could she remember this if her mother died shortly after childbirth?
3. When Obi-wan, Yoda, and Qui-Gon die, their bodies disappear. Supposedly this is a part of them gaining immortality? How come when Anakin/Darth Vader dies in Return of the Jedi, his body doesn't disappear? Yet he still gets to be immortal after Luke burns up his body.
*****
Cyclic Redundancy This
Over the past couple weeks, I have been witnessing the rapid deterioration of my laptop's hard drive. It started when some programs stopped working for no reason. Then when I tried copying or deleting some files, it would lock up my computer for a few seconds before giving me an error message. When I tried to scan my hard drive, all these sectors popped up as unreadable, and it took forever to get through the scan.
Eventually I determined the exact problem with my hard drive: something about "cyclic redundancy". What that means, I have no clue. All I know is that it sucks and basically means I need to replace my hard drive with a new one.
So I called up IBM, and the good thing is that I am still under warranty. (The bad thing is that my hard drive is dying in less than a year of owning it and I have no idea how it happened or how to prevent it). They sent me a new hard drive in the mail, and told me to swap it out and send my old one back within 30 days.
The good thing is that they sent me recovery disks along with the hard drive. The bad thing is that they don't seem to include Windows or any sort of operating system. So after spending hours installing 7 CD's worth of stuff, I can't get anywhere after booting up, other than IBM's Rescue and Recovery program.
I guess there wasn't much point to this blog other than telling my sad sad story. Sorry.
Toys
Some friends were talking about buying a Star Wars Lego set for like $500 the other day, which made me think about my own experiences with Legos and other toys when I was little:
1. Legos - As far as Legos go, I don't remember ever having any of those special sets, where they give you all the pieces you need to build a fire truck, X-Wing, or whatever. All we had was a giant bucket of generic rectangular pieces in the basic colors (red, yellow, blue, green, black). Also, you know how they had those little Lego people? Like there were construction workers, firefighters, cops, baseball players, women in dresses, etc. Well, I think all I had was 2 random guys with interchangeable legs and hats.
So that kind of limited the kinds of stuff I could do with my Legos. I think I just built walls all the time and occasionally a square building. Most of the time my walls had at least a few bricks that were a different color than the rest too, because I always ran out of the original color.
2. He-Man - I might've written about this before, but I had a He-Man action figure that was designed with some sort of spring so when you rotated his torso backwards, he would spin forwards in a punching motion. Unfortunately this also meant that at rest, my He-Man action figure was always facing sideways. I hated that thing because of that, but I loved the cartoon, and that was the only figure I had of him, so I had to deal with it.
3. Transformers - Don't think I ever had one. I do remember having something that you could transform, but I'm pretty sure it was one of those copycat brands, cause I remember it being a pretty crappy toy.
4. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - I've written about being Donatello for Halloween before, but I don't think I had any of the Turtle action figures. I remember really wanting the Turtle Van though, it just looked cool. Too bad it cost too much.
Thinking about all these toys I had, seems like the common theme is that there was always something more I wished I had in every situation. Whether it was Lego pieces with actual shapes that had "angles" instead of just blocks, a He-Man that didn't look like he had a severe case of scoliosis, a "real" Transformer instead of a fake one, or the Turtle Van, I was never fully satisfied with the toy I had in my hand.
Maybe that says something about the insatiable forces of human nature. Or maybe that just says that all my toys sucked and I was deprived as a kid. I'm not sure which.
*****
House Hunting
Now that I'm 25, I guess I don't really think about toys anymore. I think about buying a townhouse.
As I've mentioned before, I went looking at townhouses a couple times in the last month or so, but haven't seen anything that really inspires me as being "perfect". Everything is either too old, too far from work, too small, or too expensive.
Problem is, almost all of these places are still being bought pretty fast by other people on the market. It surprises me that there are so many buyers who are willing to pay so much for these townhouses, but I think that also means that I am being too picky in my search.
My original plan was to decide on a place and close by mid-summer. I still plan on meeting that goal, so I guess that means decision time is soon.
It's an exciting time but also more stressful than anything else. The thought of being in hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt and possibly having to make mortgage payments every month until I'm in my 50's is hardly a nice thought.
Committing to a house around here also kind of forces me to commit to this job for a long time, at least for a few years I would say. Now, it's not like I hate this job or anything. But I have to admit that throughout throughout the past few years, there have been times when I have thought about just up and quitting to go do something else. Go back to school for a grad degree, become a professional poker player, or start my own business.
If I take out a big mortgage to buy a house right now, that really limits my options for the future. I wouldn't say it's impossible to change my career path, but it will definitely be a lot tougher. I'd have to really think twice before considering any of those things I just mentioned.
It just scares me to picture myself in a few years, feeling trapped in a life that I can't get out of. I don't want to paint myself into a corner, but in some ways that is what this home buying stuff feels like.
At the same time, I know I'm not getting any younger. And if I don't start making some tough decisions now, I might never move forward. As nice and stress free as it might be to continue living where I am now, paying rent so I don't have to commit to anything long term, I know I can't do this forever. To stay would be wasting time, like the Dave Matthews song says, and I don't want that either.
* May contain "spoilers" to the plot. Skip this part of the blog if you have not seen Revenge of the Sith yet.
Based on the recommendation of pretty much everyone I know, I decided to suck it up and watch the latest Star Wars movie this weekend. It's been a long time since I've watched a movie in the theater, and a really long time since I watched a movie in its opening weekend.
Anyways, I liked the movie. As I mentioned before, though, I also liked Episodes I and II when I watched them. Still, this one was definitely the best out of the 3. I heard when George Lucas was writing the story, he had 60% of the story focused on the last movie, and 40% on the first two. That would explain why there's so much crap filler in those, such as the pod racing, or any scene with Jar Jar Binks. And what was really the point of Darth Maul? None of those things really had much significance in the story.
I heard the guy who plays the Senator/Chancellor/Emperor is the same guy from the original movies. If that's true, that's pretty impressive. Now I'm wondering, is that also the same guy who played Grand Moff Tarkin too, in the scene at the end of Episode III?
By far my favorite line from the movie, by Padme to Anakin: "Hold me.... like you did by the lake in Naboo" hahaha so cheesy. Another great moment was at the end when the Emperor tells Darth Vader that he killed Padme, and he goes "NOOOOOOOO!!!!!" and starts shaking his fists.
See, I never really minded the corny dialogue, bad acting, or even the pointless side plots. The one major thing that bugged me in these movies was how the Trade Federation had accents that were blatantly Asian-sounding. I guess people of other ethnic groups also have their complaints about certain characters too, i.e. the Jewish shop owner, Jar Jar Binks, "sand people", and maybe more that I didn't pick up on. Not gonna make me hate Star Wars or anything, but there's no way it could all be an accident or coincidence - you gotta wonder about what George Lucas was thinking when he made these movies.
While I'm talking about Star Wars, I thought I'd throw out some questions I have about the movies (this includes the original trilogy too):
1. What purpose does the Stormtrooper suit serve? It doesn't seem to protect them from lasers, nor did it save them from getting beat by the Ewoks and their rocks. Is it just to make them look cool?
2. I think in Return of the Jedi, Leia tells Luke that she remembers her mother being very beautiful but looked sad. How could she remember this if her mother died shortly after childbirth?
3. When Obi-wan, Yoda, and Qui-Gon die, their bodies disappear. Supposedly this is a part of them gaining immortality? How come when Anakin/Darth Vader dies in Return of the Jedi, his body doesn't disappear? Yet he still gets to be immortal after Luke burns up his body.
*****
Cyclic Redundancy This
Over the past couple weeks, I have been witnessing the rapid deterioration of my laptop's hard drive. It started when some programs stopped working for no reason. Then when I tried copying or deleting some files, it would lock up my computer for a few seconds before giving me an error message. When I tried to scan my hard drive, all these sectors popped up as unreadable, and it took forever to get through the scan.
Eventually I determined the exact problem with my hard drive: something about "cyclic redundancy". What that means, I have no clue. All I know is that it sucks and basically means I need to replace my hard drive with a new one.
So I called up IBM, and the good thing is that I am still under warranty. (The bad thing is that my hard drive is dying in less than a year of owning it and I have no idea how it happened or how to prevent it). They sent me a new hard drive in the mail, and told me to swap it out and send my old one back within 30 days.
The good thing is that they sent me recovery disks along with the hard drive. The bad thing is that they don't seem to include Windows or any sort of operating system. So after spending hours installing 7 CD's worth of stuff, I can't get anywhere after booting up, other than IBM's Rescue and Recovery program.
I guess there wasn't much point to this blog other than telling my sad sad story. Sorry.
Toys
Some friends were talking about buying a Star Wars Lego set for like $500 the other day, which made me think about my own experiences with Legos and other toys when I was little:
1. Legos - As far as Legos go, I don't remember ever having any of those special sets, where they give you all the pieces you need to build a fire truck, X-Wing, or whatever. All we had was a giant bucket of generic rectangular pieces in the basic colors (red, yellow, blue, green, black). Also, you know how they had those little Lego people? Like there were construction workers, firefighters, cops, baseball players, women in dresses, etc. Well, I think all I had was 2 random guys with interchangeable legs and hats.
So that kind of limited the kinds of stuff I could do with my Legos. I think I just built walls all the time and occasionally a square building. Most of the time my walls had at least a few bricks that were a different color than the rest too, because I always ran out of the original color.
2. He-Man - I might've written about this before, but I had a He-Man action figure that was designed with some sort of spring so when you rotated his torso backwards, he would spin forwards in a punching motion. Unfortunately this also meant that at rest, my He-Man action figure was always facing sideways. I hated that thing because of that, but I loved the cartoon, and that was the only figure I had of him, so I had to deal with it.
3. Transformers - Don't think I ever had one. I do remember having something that you could transform, but I'm pretty sure it was one of those copycat brands, cause I remember it being a pretty crappy toy.
4. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - I've written about being Donatello for Halloween before, but I don't think I had any of the Turtle action figures. I remember really wanting the Turtle Van though, it just looked cool. Too bad it cost too much.
Thinking about all these toys I had, seems like the common theme is that there was always something more I wished I had in every situation. Whether it was Lego pieces with actual shapes that had "angles" instead of just blocks, a He-Man that didn't look like he had a severe case of scoliosis, a "real" Transformer instead of a fake one, or the Turtle Van, I was never fully satisfied with the toy I had in my hand.
Maybe that says something about the insatiable forces of human nature. Or maybe that just says that all my toys sucked and I was deprived as a kid. I'm not sure which.
*****
House Hunting
Now that I'm 25, I guess I don't really think about toys anymore. I think about buying a townhouse.
As I've mentioned before, I went looking at townhouses a couple times in the last month or so, but haven't seen anything that really inspires me as being "perfect". Everything is either too old, too far from work, too small, or too expensive.
Problem is, almost all of these places are still being bought pretty fast by other people on the market. It surprises me that there are so many buyers who are willing to pay so much for these townhouses, but I think that also means that I am being too picky in my search.
My original plan was to decide on a place and close by mid-summer. I still plan on meeting that goal, so I guess that means decision time is soon.
It's an exciting time but also more stressful than anything else. The thought of being in hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt and possibly having to make mortgage payments every month until I'm in my 50's is hardly a nice thought.
Committing to a house around here also kind of forces me to commit to this job for a long time, at least for a few years I would say. Now, it's not like I hate this job or anything. But I have to admit that throughout throughout the past few years, there have been times when I have thought about just up and quitting to go do something else. Go back to school for a grad degree, become a professional poker player, or start my own business.
If I take out a big mortgage to buy a house right now, that really limits my options for the future. I wouldn't say it's impossible to change my career path, but it will definitely be a lot tougher. I'd have to really think twice before considering any of those things I just mentioned.
It just scares me to picture myself in a few years, feeling trapped in a life that I can't get out of. I don't want to paint myself into a corner, but in some ways that is what this home buying stuff feels like.
At the same time, I know I'm not getting any younger. And if I don't start making some tough decisions now, I might never move forward. As nice and stress free as it might be to continue living where I am now, paying rent so I don't have to commit to anything long term, I know I can't do this forever. To stay would be wasting time, like the Dave Matthews song says, and I don't want that either.
Thursday, May 19, 2005
Been stressed out lately. Mostly due to work and the house hunting, maybe I'll distract myself by writing blogs on other subjects.
1. Star Wars Episode III - came out today. It's kind of hard to believe that the series is actually ending now. I think it was 1999 when they released the first prequel, and back then I was pissed because their plan of releasing the movies 3 years apart seemed like it would take way too long. I was like "man, by the time they get to the last one, I'll be old and I probably won't even care anymore". Well I guess I still do care, but not enough to go line up and battle the crowds on the day it opens. (That, and my 4 year anniversary with Olivia happens to be the same day).
It's getting pretty good reviews, which is a good sign, but honestly it doesn't matter much to me what other people are saying about it. I thought Episodes I and II were alright, when almost everyone else I talked to hated it. But some didn't really even know what was going on, and others complained about the acting. Did they not realize that the acting in the originals was just as bad or worse than the new ones?
By the way I was reading an article about the original Star Wars and George Lucas said that Christopher Walken actually was second in line to play Han Solo (after Harrison Ford). Of course that reminded me of the old "Star Wars Tryouts" skit in SNL when they had Kevin Spacey playing Walken trying out for Han Solo: "Fast ship.. what... you've never heard of the Millenium Falcon.... she's fast enough for you... old man... I'm sorry that sucked". I wonder if they knew that fact when they were making that skit, or if it was just a random coincidence?
2. American Gladiators - For some reason I was thinking about this show the other day, wondering what happened to it, and remembering how I used to watch it all the time and think it was the coolest show. I think at one point I actually wished I had an awesome Gladiator name like "Turbo" or "Laser". Obviously all of that seems ridiculous now.
Then again, I turn on the TV today and there's this show on ESPN with NFL players running through obstacle courses that ends with climbing a wall, wasn't that pretty much the Eliminator? Or on MTV's Inferno 2, there's Brad battling Abe to dunk a ball into a can in the middle (great battle by the way, very intense). I could've sworn there was an event like that in American Gladiators too. Maybe it's not so silly.
3. Duke gets Scheyer - Any college bball fan who followed the recruitment of Scheyer during the past few months (or longer) probably should have saw yesterday's announcement coming from a long way back. We've seen the story before, most recently with Livingston: "Duke takes highly ranked recruit from the state of Illinois", so what's the big deal? Yeah, his coach is Bruce's brother, and the state team was #1 for most of the past year. But I guess when a kid grows up pretending to be Christian Laettner, reenacting the shot against Kentucky in his basement, you're not gonna change his mind easily.
Anyways, I mention this story here because it might be interesting to look back one day and see how everything turned out. Just like when everyone was mad we didn't get Livingston, I think we did alright. Will Scheyer become the next no-name guy on the end of Duke's bench or actually develop into an NBA star? Will Bruce Weber get Collins and Carlwell or whoever else and take this team to the Final Four again in a few years? Can Coach K make more commercials and become even more irritating?
4. Chaotic - I don't know why I still decided to watch the Britney Spears "reality show". I mean, I knew it was gonna suck. I saw the commercials for it, read the articles on what it was gonna be about, and pretty much knew for sure that I would not enjoy watching it.
And what do you know, it did suck. Honestly I changed the channel after the first 20 minutes and only caught pieces of the rest, in between innings of the baseball game. I never fully realized just how annoying the girl was, until I watched the show. My how far her star has fallen in my eyes.
I guess the lesson I learned is that hotness can cover many flaws. Which it did for the first few years I was a fan. But she is definitely not #1 in my hot list anymore. Probably not even top 10. I'm not sure when I dropped her, but it was most likely during the past year when she turned into a freak show.
Seeing the girl without her makeup, and close up, really showed how wrinkly her skin is underneath. Not cool. I might criticize her weight too but I'll try not to be that shallow, at least publicly. Let's just say the aging process has not treated her well physically.
But what really makes a girl most unattractive (in my opinion) is when she's all over the place with different guys. One day she's kissing Colin Farrell. Next she's getting married in Vegas to some guy she dated in high school. Then all of a sudden she gets engaged to a random dude who happens to already have kids with someone else. When I see that it's pretty much over right there between me and her. Goodbye.
It doesn't help that these guys she's with are all either trashy, dirty, or ugly looking. I mean it's one thing if you get married to Brad Pitt or something, I can't argue with that. Justin Timberlake I can even accept, reluctantly. The type of guys that a girl chooses to be with says a lot about her as a person. And I must say I am disappointed in the choices that Ms. Spears has made in the past year or so.
I guess it's her life so who am I to judge, all I'll do is just put her out of my life from here on out and live only in the past. Haha... Seriously though, I can live without watching closeups of Kevin Federline's butt and listening to the girl I once adored talk about how amazing the sex is with her husband. I'm just saying is all.
5. White Sox - continue to lead the majors with their surprising hot start. I won't say I saw this coming, but I did have a pretty good feeling about the season coming in. With all the hype about home runs, the most underrated things in the game are leadoff hitters and defense. We may have lost Carlos Lee and Magglio in the offseason, but improved both of those categories. Not to mention Dustin Hermanson's solid performances out of the bullpen and Jon Garland's emergence as a legit starter (finally!).
Obviously they aren't going to win 120 games or whatever they were on pace for, but at the very least they are fun to watch. I've been to 3 games so far and even though 2 of them were losses with horrible weather, I definitely liked what I saw on the field.
I'll probably write more about the team later. Baseball season is long.
1. Star Wars Episode III - came out today. It's kind of hard to believe that the series is actually ending now. I think it was 1999 when they released the first prequel, and back then I was pissed because their plan of releasing the movies 3 years apart seemed like it would take way too long. I was like "man, by the time they get to the last one, I'll be old and I probably won't even care anymore". Well I guess I still do care, but not enough to go line up and battle the crowds on the day it opens. (That, and my 4 year anniversary with Olivia happens to be the same day).
It's getting pretty good reviews, which is a good sign, but honestly it doesn't matter much to me what other people are saying about it. I thought Episodes I and II were alright, when almost everyone else I talked to hated it. But some didn't really even know what was going on, and others complained about the acting. Did they not realize that the acting in the originals was just as bad or worse than the new ones?
By the way I was reading an article about the original Star Wars and George Lucas said that Christopher Walken actually was second in line to play Han Solo (after Harrison Ford). Of course that reminded me of the old "Star Wars Tryouts" skit in SNL when they had Kevin Spacey playing Walken trying out for Han Solo: "Fast ship.. what... you've never heard of the Millenium Falcon.... she's fast enough for you... old man... I'm sorry that sucked". I wonder if they knew that fact when they were making that skit, or if it was just a random coincidence?
2. American Gladiators - For some reason I was thinking about this show the other day, wondering what happened to it, and remembering how I used to watch it all the time and think it was the coolest show. I think at one point I actually wished I had an awesome Gladiator name like "Turbo" or "Laser". Obviously all of that seems ridiculous now.
Then again, I turn on the TV today and there's this show on ESPN with NFL players running through obstacle courses that ends with climbing a wall, wasn't that pretty much the Eliminator? Or on MTV's Inferno 2, there's Brad battling Abe to dunk a ball into a can in the middle (great battle by the way, very intense). I could've sworn there was an event like that in American Gladiators too. Maybe it's not so silly.
3. Duke gets Scheyer - Any college bball fan who followed the recruitment of Scheyer during the past few months (or longer) probably should have saw yesterday's announcement coming from a long way back. We've seen the story before, most recently with Livingston: "Duke takes highly ranked recruit from the state of Illinois", so what's the big deal? Yeah, his coach is Bruce's brother, and the state team was #1 for most of the past year. But I guess when a kid grows up pretending to be Christian Laettner, reenacting the shot against Kentucky in his basement, you're not gonna change his mind easily.
Anyways, I mention this story here because it might be interesting to look back one day and see how everything turned out. Just like when everyone was mad we didn't get Livingston, I think we did alright. Will Scheyer become the next no-name guy on the end of Duke's bench or actually develop into an NBA star? Will Bruce Weber get Collins and Carlwell or whoever else and take this team to the Final Four again in a few years? Can Coach K make more commercials and become even more irritating?
4. Chaotic - I don't know why I still decided to watch the Britney Spears "reality show". I mean, I knew it was gonna suck. I saw the commercials for it, read the articles on what it was gonna be about, and pretty much knew for sure that I would not enjoy watching it.
And what do you know, it did suck. Honestly I changed the channel after the first 20 minutes and only caught pieces of the rest, in between innings of the baseball game. I never fully realized just how annoying the girl was, until I watched the show. My how far her star has fallen in my eyes.
I guess the lesson I learned is that hotness can cover many flaws. Which it did for the first few years I was a fan. But she is definitely not #1 in my hot list anymore. Probably not even top 10. I'm not sure when I dropped her, but it was most likely during the past year when she turned into a freak show.
Seeing the girl without her makeup, and close up, really showed how wrinkly her skin is underneath. Not cool. I might criticize her weight too but I'll try not to be that shallow, at least publicly. Let's just say the aging process has not treated her well physically.
But what really makes a girl most unattractive (in my opinion) is when she's all over the place with different guys. One day she's kissing Colin Farrell. Next she's getting married in Vegas to some guy she dated in high school. Then all of a sudden she gets engaged to a random dude who happens to already have kids with someone else. When I see that it's pretty much over right there between me and her. Goodbye.
It doesn't help that these guys she's with are all either trashy, dirty, or ugly looking. I mean it's one thing if you get married to Brad Pitt or something, I can't argue with that. Justin Timberlake I can even accept, reluctantly. The type of guys that a girl chooses to be with says a lot about her as a person. And I must say I am disappointed in the choices that Ms. Spears has made in the past year or so.
I guess it's her life so who am I to judge, all I'll do is just put her out of my life from here on out and live only in the past. Haha... Seriously though, I can live without watching closeups of Kevin Federline's butt and listening to the girl I once adored talk about how amazing the sex is with her husband. I'm just saying is all.
5. White Sox - continue to lead the majors with their surprising hot start. I won't say I saw this coming, but I did have a pretty good feeling about the season coming in. With all the hype about home runs, the most underrated things in the game are leadoff hitters and defense. We may have lost Carlos Lee and Magglio in the offseason, but improved both of those categories. Not to mention Dustin Hermanson's solid performances out of the bullpen and Jon Garland's emergence as a legit starter (finally!).
Obviously they aren't going to win 120 games or whatever they were on pace for, but at the very least they are fun to watch. I've been to 3 games so far and even though 2 of them were losses with horrible weather, I definitely liked what I saw on the field.
I'll probably write more about the team later. Baseball season is long.
Tuesday, May 10, 2005
I heard there might not be a 3rd season of Chappelle's Show. Don't know why that is, but whatever the reason, that ain't cool. It's bad enough how they delayed the 2nd season DVD for so long already, and then on top of that I think they cut out the Rick James skit too. How disappointing.
Last week I forgot to buy milk, which threw me off my normal morning cereal routine. I can't have dry cereal, I just can't do it. As I was thinking about what to eat instead, a jingle popped in my head, the voice of some guy on the street singing "trade in your breakfast for a Dannon Frusion Smoothie...." I guess advertising really does work.
Last week I forgot to buy milk, which threw me off my normal morning cereal routine. I can't have dry cereal, I just can't do it. As I was thinking about what to eat instead, a jingle popped in my head, the voice of some guy on the street singing "trade in your breakfast for a Dannon Frusion Smoothie...." I guess advertising really does work.
Sunday, May 08, 2005
Mother's Day, Poker, and the Oldies
First off, as I have done in past years, I should once again wish all the many mothers who read my blog a Happy Mother's Day.
For my own mom, my family had planned to celebrate Saturday by each of us (dad, sister, myself) cooking one dish for dinner. Unfortunately a headache started bothering me Friday night and then continued through Saturday. Having to go into work Saturday morning did not help either, but that is another story. So it ended up being just my dad who cooked, which was a good meal so it was all good.
The interesting part of the weekend started that night when my dad was watching me play poker online and I was teaching him the tricks of the trade. Kind of funny how he was getting so nervous about these little hands worth dollars and cents, considering he is a guy who has traded commodities for a living for over 20 years, and experiences ticks in the market worth thousands of dollars on a daily basis.
Of course, after watching me play, he wanted to play too, so the rest of us busted out some chips and the Chen family played some poker for the rest of the night. Entertaining moments ensued.
At one point my sister was humming the tune to that Gwen Stefani song "Rich Girls", and out of nowhere, my mom started humming along with her. This shocked both me and my sister, because if you know my mom, you would definitely not expect her to know who Gwen Stefani is (let alone know one of her latest songs). She thinks Backstreet Boys is rock music and their beats are too heavy, to give you some idea of her musical tastes.
Turns out "Rich Girls" is a remake of an old song from the movie/musical "Fiddler on the Roof", which some of you may already know, but I and my sister did not. The original version was titled "If I Were A Rich Man" by the way.
While we were playing, I had my laptop next to me so I could check on my fantasy baseball teams, and I decided to dig out some of my oldies mp3s that I knew my mom and dad used to listen to. Stuff like Frank Sinatra, Carpenters, Andy Williams, John Denver, etc.
When I played the Bee Gees' song "How Deep Is Your Love", my dad started telling us about how the song reminded him of his college days and his first girlfriend and breakup experience. It was a little weird for me to hear him talking about that stuff, but at the same time I was glad to hear him share and show us some a side that we normally never see. One of the first times I can remeber being able to look at my dad as a "human being", rather than exclusively as a "father". Not just the guy who put a roof over my head, food on the table, and taught me discipline and almost everything I know today, but a living breathing person that I can really relate to.
So as we played poker Saturday night, I felt like it was a really great time of bonding for my family. With my sister travelling most weekdays, and me having moved out 2 years ago, it's been especially rare these days for all four of us to spend much meaningful time together. I mean, we're still under the same roof most weekends, but it's mostly just a matter of having lunch together after church, or just me watching baseball as my mom plays piano and my dad studies the market for the upcoming week and my sister watches Apprentice on her computer.
Also funny and worth mentioning is that the big winner of our poker game that night was my mom. Fitting on Mother's Day weekend I guess, good for her. Normally she is the first one knocked out because she is too busy snacking on her Chinese treats to pay much attention to the game. That, or maybe she had something like pocket 2's but didn't notice that there were 4 diamonds on the board, and think that with the 3 other people in the pot, chances are good that someone might have a flush, calling an all-in for all her chips with her one small pair.
Anyways, I have to say here that even though it was a simple night of the four of us playing a game of poker for a few hours, it was a really great memory for me that will probably stick with me for a long time. I realized later that night in bed, that the opportunities for us to do things together like that will only get scarcer as we all get older. And obviously I should really cherish these moments as much I can while I still have the chance.
First off, as I have done in past years, I should once again wish all the many mothers who read my blog a Happy Mother's Day.
For my own mom, my family had planned to celebrate Saturday by each of us (dad, sister, myself) cooking one dish for dinner. Unfortunately a headache started bothering me Friday night and then continued through Saturday. Having to go into work Saturday morning did not help either, but that is another story. So it ended up being just my dad who cooked, which was a good meal so it was all good.
The interesting part of the weekend started that night when my dad was watching me play poker online and I was teaching him the tricks of the trade. Kind of funny how he was getting so nervous about these little hands worth dollars and cents, considering he is a guy who has traded commodities for a living for over 20 years, and experiences ticks in the market worth thousands of dollars on a daily basis.
Of course, after watching me play, he wanted to play too, so the rest of us busted out some chips and the Chen family played some poker for the rest of the night. Entertaining moments ensued.
At one point my sister was humming the tune to that Gwen Stefani song "Rich Girls", and out of nowhere, my mom started humming along with her. This shocked both me and my sister, because if you know my mom, you would definitely not expect her to know who Gwen Stefani is (let alone know one of her latest songs). She thinks Backstreet Boys is rock music and their beats are too heavy, to give you some idea of her musical tastes.
Turns out "Rich Girls" is a remake of an old song from the movie/musical "Fiddler on the Roof", which some of you may already know, but I and my sister did not. The original version was titled "If I Were A Rich Man" by the way.
While we were playing, I had my laptop next to me so I could check on my fantasy baseball teams, and I decided to dig out some of my oldies mp3s that I knew my mom and dad used to listen to. Stuff like Frank Sinatra, Carpenters, Andy Williams, John Denver, etc.
When I played the Bee Gees' song "How Deep Is Your Love", my dad started telling us about how the song reminded him of his college days and his first girlfriend and breakup experience. It was a little weird for me to hear him talking about that stuff, but at the same time I was glad to hear him share and show us some a side that we normally never see. One of the first times I can remeber being able to look at my dad as a "human being", rather than exclusively as a "father". Not just the guy who put a roof over my head, food on the table, and taught me discipline and almost everything I know today, but a living breathing person that I can really relate to.
So as we played poker Saturday night, I felt like it was a really great time of bonding for my family. With my sister travelling most weekdays, and me having moved out 2 years ago, it's been especially rare these days for all four of us to spend much meaningful time together. I mean, we're still under the same roof most weekends, but it's mostly just a matter of having lunch together after church, or just me watching baseball as my mom plays piano and my dad studies the market for the upcoming week and my sister watches Apprentice on her computer.
Also funny and worth mentioning is that the big winner of our poker game that night was my mom. Fitting on Mother's Day weekend I guess, good for her. Normally she is the first one knocked out because she is too busy snacking on her Chinese treats to pay much attention to the game. That, or maybe she had something like pocket 2's but didn't notice that there were 4 diamonds on the board, and think that with the 3 other people in the pot, chances are good that someone might have a flush, calling an all-in for all her chips with her one small pair.
Anyways, I have to say here that even though it was a simple night of the four of us playing a game of poker for a few hours, it was a really great memory for me that will probably stick with me for a long time. I realized later that night in bed, that the opportunities for us to do things together like that will only get scarcer as we all get older. And obviously I should really cherish these moments as much I can while I still have the chance.
Tuesday, May 03, 2005
So the news is that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are dating. I heard they have a nickname already - "Tomkat". Spicy.
Work has been very busy. Since I am surrounded by other engineers I try to be constantly vigilant in preventing myself from becoming too nerdy. For example, no matter how convenient it might be, I refuse to use my front shirt pocket to store pens, pencils, highlighters, etc. I'll either just hold them in my hand or put them in my pant pocket. When there is a wall full of Dilbert cartoons at someone's cubicle, I limit myself to reading only one, instead of spending 10 minutes reading all of them. I also tell myself not to laugh too hard at them even if they are very funny and true.
Last week I went to look at townhouses. It was cool to walk into a place and envision where I would put the furniture, where I would watch TV, eat, play poker, etc. However, I was disappointed with the selection and surprised to see how much these places cost. There were a few that I liked, but every one had at least one or two significant drawbacks to it. It was like "this one's perfect, but it only has a one-car garage". Or "this has everything, but the property tax and assessment is way too high". "This one is cheaper, but it's too far from work and I don't like the area". "This one has great location, but it's too old." And so on.
I'm thinking about getting a new phone soon. The T-Mobile Sidekick looks kinda cool. Also a PDA phone or Blackberry might be nice too, but I'm not sure how charges would work for those. Kinda sucks cause if I get a camera phone, I wouldn't be allowed to bring it into the building where I work. But most of the newer nicer ones have cameras. What shall I do...
A couple weeks ago I was watching some NBA highlights on Sportscenter and one of them was a vicious block by Josh Smith on an Allen Iverson breakaway layup. I was like wow, that's gotta be a horrible feeling for AI, the veteran getting embarrassed by a rookie like that. Actually it reminded me of when Iverson was a rookie and in a game he faked Jordan out of his jockstrap with a wicked crossover move. A similar "changing of the guard" feeling about the moment. Not that AI (or MJ back then) is done yet, just a sign that the next generation is close to taking over.
One of my bosses was telling me about how he and his wife have golden retrievers and train them for those dog shows and stuff. Immediately I thought of the old original Triumph episode: "pekingnese, you suck!!". Classic. I asked him if they breed too, and he was like "well, we just got a bitch and we'll find out if she's ready in a few months." Does it make me a crass individual that I almost LOL-ed in his face when he said "bitch" and didn't even flinch? I guess that is really what dog people call females. Who woulda thunk it?
As a "gesture of goodwill", China gave Taiwan some pandas. Sweet, it's nice to know that we can all be BFF again...
Work has been very busy. Since I am surrounded by other engineers I try to be constantly vigilant in preventing myself from becoming too nerdy. For example, no matter how convenient it might be, I refuse to use my front shirt pocket to store pens, pencils, highlighters, etc. I'll either just hold them in my hand or put them in my pant pocket. When there is a wall full of Dilbert cartoons at someone's cubicle, I limit myself to reading only one, instead of spending 10 minutes reading all of them. I also tell myself not to laugh too hard at them even if they are very funny and true.
Last week I went to look at townhouses. It was cool to walk into a place and envision where I would put the furniture, where I would watch TV, eat, play poker, etc. However, I was disappointed with the selection and surprised to see how much these places cost. There were a few that I liked, but every one had at least one or two significant drawbacks to it. It was like "this one's perfect, but it only has a one-car garage". Or "this has everything, but the property tax and assessment is way too high". "This one is cheaper, but it's too far from work and I don't like the area". "This one has great location, but it's too old." And so on.
I'm thinking about getting a new phone soon. The T-Mobile Sidekick looks kinda cool. Also a PDA phone or Blackberry might be nice too, but I'm not sure how charges would work for those. Kinda sucks cause if I get a camera phone, I wouldn't be allowed to bring it into the building where I work. But most of the newer nicer ones have cameras. What shall I do...
A couple weeks ago I was watching some NBA highlights on Sportscenter and one of them was a vicious block by Josh Smith on an Allen Iverson breakaway layup. I was like wow, that's gotta be a horrible feeling for AI, the veteran getting embarrassed by a rookie like that. Actually it reminded me of when Iverson was a rookie and in a game he faked Jordan out of his jockstrap with a wicked crossover move. A similar "changing of the guard" feeling about the moment. Not that AI (or MJ back then) is done yet, just a sign that the next generation is close to taking over.
One of my bosses was telling me about how he and his wife have golden retrievers and train them for those dog shows and stuff. Immediately I thought of the old original Triumph episode: "pekingnese, you suck!!". Classic. I asked him if they breed too, and he was like "well, we just got a bitch and we'll find out if she's ready in a few months." Does it make me a crass individual that I almost LOL-ed in his face when he said "bitch" and didn't even flinch? I guess that is really what dog people call females. Who woulda thunk it?
As a "gesture of goodwill", China gave Taiwan some pandas. Sweet, it's nice to know that we can all be BFF again...
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