Claire's blog

• COPYRIGHT: Oh. My. God. Marvel Moves To Shut Down Group Iron Man Screening
  Yup. Bloggers at TechCrunch.com called the group sales phone number on the official Iron Man movie site, and set up a screening. Marvel doesn’t like this, and sent them a cease-and-desist… WTF?
  (tags: politics corporations copyright Marvel IronMan TechCrunch media video movies AMC asshats)
• CORPORATIONS VS CUSTOMERS: Home Depot, Lord & Taylor, Walmart hire law firms to harass and blackmail shoplifters — even innocent ones.
  Looks like they’ve taken a page from the RIAA’s playbook? Now why should anybody shop someplace that sues its customers? Even after the charges have been dropped?
  (tags: corporations lawsuits customers HomeDepot Lord&Taylor Wal-Mart civilRecovery WallStreetJournal Consumerist news articles fromGlenC GlennRudge)
• DRUGS: LSD father Dr. Albert Hoffman dies at age 102 — see? Drugs will kill you!
  FACT: 100% of drug users end up dead. :) Moment of silence for a scientist who inspired minds worldwide.
  (tags: Gawker news articles deaths scientists science drugs LSD AlbertHofmann Dr.AlbertHofmann)
• VOTING FRAUD: Hard Evidence of Voting Machine Addition Errors with Sequoia voting machines in New Jersey
  Without a verifiable paper trail, it’s only pretending to be democracy.
  (tags: politics voting VotingFraud VotingMachines technology TechnologyWar corporations hardware Sequoia NewJersey Princeton EdFelton)

I’ve been working all day on a perl script that will massage my “links of the day” postings in the same manner that I have been doing manually for some year(s). It fetches a post by ID#, de-bullets the del.icio.us links-of-the-day via painstaking regular expression transformations. It scrunches each link into a paragraph, and bolds my “title category”) (e.g. “ABUSE OF AUTHORITY:”, “TECHNOLOGY WAR:”, etc). It also sweeps these title categories up to create a posting title automatically (“LINKS: abuse of authority, religion, censorship”). It observes the del.icio.us tags used, and consults these against a table of “tag icon” images that I have (for example, the silhouette of an officer swinging a nightstick for abuse of authority stories), and automatically adds a related image next to those stories. Alignment alternates between right and left automatically.

It also assigns applicable WordPress tags automatically, based on the del.icio.us tags entered — with some special alias mapping. For example delicious’s “WarOnTerror” needs to become WordPress’s “The War On Terror“, because I chose to use a “the” on my blog) (and some sick things too, like if it is del.icio.us tagged “media” and “tv” and “shows” but not “cartoons” then it gets my wordpress “live-action shows” tag). Obviously, it only uses existing WordPress categories, rather than creating a bazillion new ones.

Suffice to say that now, instead of doing 10-15 minutes work, I just need to run the script with the 4 digit posting ID to have it fixed. Well, once I’m done. Right now, it simply re-writes the cleaned post to an old post that no one sees anymore ( https://clintjcl.wordpress.com/?p=5 ), because I didn’t want to destroy the original. I still have more to do on this tomorrow. (more…)

• CENSORSHIP: Banned In America, the land of “free press”: French Documentary Film about Monsanto, genetically-modified crops, and the global food crisis (unrest in over 30 countries now) pulled from YouTube and Google.
  Considering food riots have started in over 30 countries, and Monsanto soy, for example, yields 10% less than normal soy–and their lawsuits–it is quite obvious they are in it for the money. So who’s censoring our documentaries?
  (tags: politics censorship food crisis corporations Monsanto health YouTube Google GoogleVideo banned media videos documentaries French TheWorldAccordingToMonsanto Marie-MoniqueRobin)
• UNDERLY-HARSH PUNISHMENTS: Nutcase Deputy Sherrif Brandie Hart detains ambulance (stands in front, prevents from leaving) on the way to hospital – arrests paramedic and forces patient to be moved into HER HUSBAND’s ambulance – punishment? Promotion.
  And what do you think her punishment was? Nothing. She got promoted. This is one of the most ridiculous stories I’ve ever heard — someone’s life is on the line, and a cop comes and makes them take someone with a broken back OUT of the ambulance?!
  (tags: politics AbuseOfAuthority police arrests ambulances paramedics St.CroixCounty BrandieHart Wisconsin news articles UnderlyHarshPunishments promotions accidents injuries backs brokenBack ABC)
• WAR ON TERROR: 1 in 3 women serving get raped–army covers up, calling them suicides. Remember these soldiers: Lavena Johnson, Tina Priest, Melissa J. Hobart, Hannah Gunterman McKinney, Jeannette Dunn, Kamisha J. Block, Marisol Heredia, Keisha M. Morgan
  Bush Voters, this is the war you wanted. It’s done little to stop terrorism (inciting more than it kills), and in fact has doubled the september 11th death toll. Nice going, Bushies. And women: DON’T SERVE IN THIS WAR IF YOU VALUE YOUR VAGINA.
  (tags: politics war Iraq WarInIraq WarOnTerror WarInAfghanistan Afghanistan women soldiers rape government corruption cover-up cover-ups autopsies suicides murders shootings LavenaJohnson Dr.JohnJohnson LindaJohnson Congress bodies victims TinaPriest MelissaJ.Hobart HannahGuntermanMcKinney JeannetteDunn KamishaJ.Block MarisolHeredia KeishaM.Morgan)
• BIOLOGY: Are Men Facing Extinction? Parthenogenesis may be key to our survival; Y chromosone has no error-correction.
  TIme to find a time machine and travel to the future!

  I actually think this is a good thing.

  “Lesbians just get so much done in a day.”
  -Scott Thompson, Kids In The Hall

  (tags: biology gender sex men women males females chromosones Ychromosone Ychromosones parthenogenesis news articles BryanSykes OxfordUniversity)
• RELIGION, ISLAM APPEASEMENT: BBC censored Christian party broadcast — can’t call a muslim extremist or controversial — it might offend them
  Never mind that this is a group that has said that it aims to rescue Muslims from the culture and civilisation of Jews and Christians by creating “such hatred for their ways as human beings have for urine and excreta”. Never mind freedom of speech.
  (tags: politics religion appeasement Islam Muslims censorship Christians UK mosques Olympics BBC lawsuits TablighiJamaat AbbeyMills AbbeyMillsMosque 2012 2012Olympics AlanCraig London news articles ITV Deobandi Taleban Afghanistan Sunni IrfanAlAlawi CentreForIslamicPluralism Dr.GhayasuddinSiddiqui TajHargey FaisalIqbal rights FreedomOfSpeech speech FreedomOfPress press)
• PROGRAMMING: PERL: Installing CPAN Modules
  I needed to look up how to make non-ActiveState (CPAN) modules work with ActiveState perl distribution. Turns out I knew all along, it just usually didn’t work. (This time it did, yay!)
  (tags: programming perl CPAN modules ActiveState)

[IMDB link] Carolyn & I are both big Arrested Development fans, and love the character G.O.B., played by Will Arnett. When we saw Janeane Garofalo at the Arlington Drafthouse, she made sure to emphasize that she thought Will Arnett was one of the funniest people right now, and that he was responsible for her back injury — from falling over laughing. Thus, we decided to get some Will Arnett movies. This is movie 2 of 3 for our Will Arnett Theme Week, which consists of The Solomon Brothers, Let’s Go To Prison, and Blades Of Glory. We are watching them in order of IMDB rating (lowest-to-highest; this movie received 5.6/10 on IMDB.)

PEOPLE: Bob Odenkirk directed this, and we are big fans of his comic sensibility (Tim And Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!; Tom Goes To The Mayor; Mr. Show). This was an added bonus to the whole Will Arnett angle that got us here in the first place. The main 2 characters were Will Arnett and Dax Shepard, who we just became acquainted with when recently watching Without A Paddle.

BAD STUFF: All-male cast. Extremely painful plot, mostly in prison. Painful in the sense that we were in disblief and horror as to how unrealistically destructive certain characters were to themselves and others. But it was a black comedy, so it was a good hurt. Even the threat of prison rape is made to be funny … and I don’t like laughing at that! So the movie hurt, but in a good way, like watching Steve Carell be a total douchebag in The Office. (Tangent: Carell is going to play the lead role in the Get Smart movie? That might actually be good.)

CONCLUSION: Despite being rated 0.6 higher on IMDB, I thought The Brothers Solomon was a funnier movie. Both, however, are utterly unrealistic. And that’s good — comedy is about escapism, not realism. This was a dark, dark, dark comedy about a bad, bad, bad place. All I know is that I do not want to go to prison! Even in a comedy, it sucks!

MOVIE QUOTE: John Lyshitski: “Our justice system sucks. You know, there are over two million Americans behind bars. That’s a little larger than the population of Houston. Every year, there are enough children born in prison to fill 250 Little League teams, and enough people are raped in prison to fill a stadium more than three times. Can you picture that? Three stadiums full of people raping each other? I know I can.”
(more…)

• MUSIC: Hypocritical assholes named “Metallica” actually find a way to make themselves twice as hypocritical — I didn’t think it was possible. Somebody please spit on them.
  Ugh. First, they become popular due to bootlegging. Then they set legal precedent and kill the first critical-mass p2p environment, stopping the very thing that made them popular. Now they are hinting at going “free”?!?!?! WTF!??!?! Great comments…
  (tags: media music metal bands Metallica hypocracy douchebags assholes free bootlegging p2p Napster Radiohead NineInchNails Slashdot news articles copyright GeekPolitics RIAA JamesHetfield LarsUlrich KirkHammett)
• GEEK LOGIC: What are the odds your marriage will succeed for X years? and Should You Get Married? — equations you can plug-and-chug
  19% chance we’ll be married in 30 yrs.
  9% chance we’ll be married in 50 yrs.
  I think that’s way low.

  When we got married, our ‘should we get married’ score was about 22 — you are supposed to get married if it is above 1. We waited a long time :)

  (tags: geek marriage relationships math equations GeekLogik articles Clint Carolyn)
• OVERLY-HARSH PUNISHMENTS: Douchebag Officer Timothy E. Matthews pulls over car because 14-year-old Lance Lewis blew him a kiss — felony arrests ensue
  Fucking ridiculous. I’d like to see the dash cam video. Interesting that the article points out that it is legal to resist in illegal arrest.
  (tags: politics AbuseOfAuthority police OverlyHarshPunishments bullshit felony charges BradentonBeach HeraldTribute news articles officers TimothyE.Matthews children teenagers LanceLewis kisses kiss arrests charged disorderlyConduct batteryOnALawEnforcementOfficer ClarenceLewis VeronicaLewis ManateeCounty)
• OVERLY-HARSH PUNISHMENTS: 2 police dislocate the shoulder of an 80 year old man for standing in a driveway shared by his son (cleared of all charges)
  Um, heavy-handed, huh? AN ongoing fued between 2 neighbors, and they arrest the guy for standing in a driveway that is also his son’s driveway?! And dislocate his shoulder? He’s fucking 80.
  (tags: politics OverlyHarshPunishments tresspassing injuries shoulders dislocated dislocatedShoulder rotatorCuff torn tornRotatorCuff elderly 80-year-old Waterdown cleared acquitted federal charges FrankSalvucci KeithParent OrlandoRodriguez Boston Massachusetts news articles juries FrancisDumornay JosephDeignan EdwardDeveau fueds police brutality policeBrutality)

We woke up around 11 and decided to go yardsaleing for the first time this year, because we need lamps. We haven’t been yardsaleing as much these recent years, as we have most of what we need. But with the addition to our house done, and the downstairs room coming together, we knew that we needed lamps. And paying full-price for lamps is for superficial people who care about “matching” their room more than their financial survival. Certain types of things are just always going to be cheaper at yard sales. Lamps, fans, candles, clothes — stuff people end up with extras of. Yard sales usually die down around noon, but we were still going around at 2-3PM and finding stragglers. The best part about going late (if you want the best stuff, you better be out by 7AM) is that you get leftovers, and people often will part for stuff for nothing, just because it’s a hot day and they don’t want to go back outside. We literally had a car-load of stuff, plus a 2nd trip for a bookshelf. We then used google product search to find some rough estimates for how much these things originally cost.

Total spent was $22, counting $2 of gas (~12 miles). Estimated value of our take is **$429**. $254 of that was free, $288 of it was stuff that was most definitely need, and $110 of it was stuff that we would have had to buy in the next 2-5 years. In total, we “made” $429 for $22, a profit of $407 for about 4 hours. That’s $50.87/hr per person, or $101.75/hr as a couple. Also keep in mind, that $407 profit is equivalent to earning $590 before taxes. Many people don’t make that much in a week, let alone 4 hours. Yardsaleing is also for the environment — to re-use stuff, rather than have it rot in a dump. And you often find unique things that can’t be bought, period. Many people need the same thing at different points in their life, and corporations make a lot of extra money banking on the fact that their items will go to a dump, rather than a potential future customer. Re-using is good. So here was our take:

• FREE: full-size camping backpack. Not even a yard sale; someone just set it at a curb with some lumber and a huge pegboard. My current backpack ($3) has been repaired twice (once using from another $3 yards ale pack), so this will definitely come in handy. (EV:$70)
• FREE: BIG RC-car/remote/charger – haven’t gotten it to work yet (Estimated Value:$85,though it might be broken.)
• FREE: tall bookshelf — transported to our quite illegally by sticking out the side of our car with the door completely open and no red flag. Took back roads, pulled into the grass even if a car was coming the other direction, and generally were paranoid while doing this quite dangerous thing. (EV:$35)
• FREE: lumber mentioned above, 5 boards — more attic floorspace, one free piece of wood at a time. Space costs $130/ft to build; free space is a damn good price. (EV:$28)
• FREE: swimming pool wicker walkway rolls … We only took 6 out of the 20 or so there. We rolled them over the carpets walking up to our house. It’s both tacky and annoying and ridiculous at the same time, but it feels very “Hawaiian” walking up to our front door now. And it crunches under your feet. Change of pace from the carpets, and re-doing the walkway with concrete isn’t exactly high on our priority list when we have so many procrastination techniques at our disposal (EV:$20???)
• FREE: large green glass ash tray – reminds me of my grandparents’ taste in ashtrays (EV:$5)
• FREE: small clear glass ash tray – reminds me of my parents’ taste in ashtrays (EV:$3)
• FREE: “DVD Bag”, but it’s really more of a generic carrying bag – anyone want it? He had 50. I told him I’d take one to try to find it a home. (EV:$8, guy said)
• $0.25: Rehobeth Beach shotglass (EV:$3)
• $0.25: box of 5 or so long candles – these are fire hazards, but we use these to light hard-to-reach wicks of real candles. There’s just no other way to get them lit. Guaranteed use. (EV:$1)
• $0.50: 2 refill packs for edgers (weed whacker) – I don’t do yard work often, but I will definitely go through 2 packs in my life, so this will definitely save money. (EV:$3)
• $1: purse for Carolyn (EV:$10)
• $2: a gift which is something I gave a family member in the past, but in a different color – will give to same person (EV:$20 verified)
• $2: clip lamp – these are versatile! (EV:$16)
• $2: simmer pot – after Angel and various other party people having delicious hot melted cheese dip, and after throwing away the HUGE fondue pots we got out of our next door neighbor’s trash when she died/went to a home because our kitchen sink leaked grossness into them — we could probably use this. Literally 1/20th the size of these huge fondue pots. (EV:$14)
• $2: 2 multi-picture picture frames – might play around with flickr and printing a few pics out (not for us) (EV:$40)
• $2: shoes (EV:$8)
• $4: 2 lampshades – can’t talk about them because they are gifts. But they are awesome. (EV:$40 verified)
• $4: lamp – 2-ft wooden base (not as top-heavy as expected) generic lamp (EV:$20)

(more…)

• CENSORSHIP/CORPORATE INTERFERENCE WITH SCEICNE: Hundreds of EPA scientists report political interference
  This phenomenon is not unique only to EPA scientists — but this survey is. I wonder how many who DIDN’T answer were interfered with, but scared to report it? Our administration respects religion more than science.
  (tags: politics EPA government science scientists surveys interference UnionOfConcernedScientists StephenL.Johnson BushAdministratoin politicians GeorgeBush GeorgeWBush JonathanShradar OfficeOfManagementAndBudget OMB OfficeOfAirAndRadiation Congress HenryWaxman Democrats HouseCommitteeOnOversightAndGovernmentReform corruption fromRyanS)
• RELIGION: Idiotic religious Americans do not believe in evolution — ONLY TURKEY ranks lower than us in acceptance of evolution
  This graph is fucking astounding! We’re goddamned idiots!

  What bizarro world am I living in?

  (tags: politics evolution creationism religion statistics surveys graphs idiots Iceland Denmark Sweden Japan France USA UK Norway Belgium Spain Germany Italy Netherlands Hungary Luxembour Ireland Slovenia Finland CzechRepublic Estonia Portugal Malta Switzerland SlovakRepublic Poland Austria Croatia Romania Greece Bulgaria Lithuania Cprus Latvia Turkey 2005 acceptance)
• VOTING FRAUD/CORPORATIONS: Diebold Stock Soars After $3 Billion Takeover Bid by Defense Contractor Conglomerate United Technologies
  So now we are going to have a company that makes money off of wars counting our votes? Can we say “conflict of interest”? UTC will control counting of 30% of our votes, while making $5B in defense contracts.
  (tags: politics voting VoterFraud VotingMachines corporations Diebold war democracy stocks defenseContractors military UTC UnitedTechnologiesCorp SEC DOJ DepartmentOfJustice lawsuits JohnLauer EPA)
• NET NEUTRALITY: Belgium sexylady offers to take virginity of any nerd who puts up a website supporting Net Neutrality
  Um…. Belgium rules. I blogged about her once in the past, when she ran on a political platform of giving 40,000 blowjobs (wow).
  (tags: politics sex TechnologyWar NetNeutrality woman TanyaDevereaux sexy)
• WAR ON DRUGS vs. 2ND AMENDMENT: No-Knock raids violate Defense Of Premises Doctrine, enshrined in Arkansaw law — Yet Arkansaw man who picked up a gun to defend his home was charged with aggravated assault (among others). No drugs or residue were found.
  Cops executed a no-knock search warrant in the middle of the night, finding nothing. Dude woke up to the sound of people breaking in his house, and grabbed his (non-functional, legal) firearm. Got shot 5 times. Who do you think was charged here?
  (tags: politics GunControl 2ndAmendment ConstitutionalRights rights drugs WarOnDrugs no-knockWarrants warrants ArkansasTimes Arkansaw news articles TracyIngle shootings SWAT SWATteams NorthLittleRockPoliceDepartment LittleRock NorthLittleRockSWATTeam DefenseOfPremisesDoctrine HIPAA charged OperatingADrugPremise PossessionOfDrugParaphanelia AggravatedAssault)
• PEOPLE: George Soros: The Face Of A Prophet
  Soros has been a hero to me for quite some time due to his heavy financial support of organizations working to stop the war on drugs. Interesting to read this quick bio/news about him.
  (tags: politics economics people GeorgeSoros investors ThoughtCriminal articles hedgeFunds)
• RELIGION SUCKS, BUT WE ALSO PROTECT IT: Sweep of Warren Jeff’s polygamists’ kids raises legal and constitutional questions — it’s about time, don’t you think? Taking away a child is just about the worst thing you can do to someone.
  Nevermind the fact that the Texas Rangers made a little pit stop in Colorado to arrest a woman who has a history of making fake calls.

  I guess after Waco, you can’t just set all the children on fire, huh? Janet Reno, we learned so much!

  (tags: politics children parents religion cults polygamy marriage teenagers boys girls SanAngelo Texas MyWay news articles WarrenJeffs YearningForZionRanch Eldorado churches FreedomOfReligion FirstAmendment ConstitutionalRights childAbuse heavyhandedness CPS ChildProtectiveServices beliefs WontSomebodyPleaseThinkOfTheChildren?)
• WTF: Fractal Pizza
  Yes, it’s true. Though there are only 3 levels to this “fractal”, they have pizzas within pizzas within pizzas.
  (tags: WTF food fractals pizza fractalPizza weird)
• WTF: fractal cookies
  Sierpinski Cookies!
  (tags: WTF comedy fractals food cookies fractalCokies recipes)
• FlickRandom: random photos from your flickr account
  Just substitute your flickr username in the URL for your own link.

  I put this at the top of my Flickr profile. Chronology rules photo views too much, and this evens things back out by providing random photos.

  (tags: media images pictures flickr random best)

So Friday night I had this dream inspired by the latest South Park episode, which had terrorists take over a theme park. In my dream, terrorists took over this office building / compound I was at. It was not particularly pleasant; I guess you could say it was a nightmare. I would try to get away from the terrorists, and then they would kill me, and I would die. But like a video game, or Groundhog’s Day, I kept coming back to life. I was basically in a terrorized frantic race for my life, and death was not any form of release, because it would start over. But, building upon my memories, I systematically eliminated which paths would lead to my death. Going down a hall, I might remember that hiding in the first 3 rooms ended up with me killed all 3 times…So I would try the 4th room. Unfortunately, the terrorists found me every damn time. I’m not sure how it ultimately resolved; I don’t typically remember my dreams, and when I do — it’s just quick flashes here and there. I caught a large glimpse of this dream, when compared to others. (more…)

Even one of Arizona’s Senators thinks there was a 911 cover-up…. Whatever did happen, we are not getting the full story of. (WTC7 collapse didn’t have a single page in the 911 commission report, despite it being one of 3 steel structure to ever collapse from fire?) And of course there’s the predictable backlash from people who have already decided they know for sure what happened (I guess they know OJ was guilty/innocent too!). The comments on the original story are basically to the effect of “to even consider otherwise is craziness”. Of course, kindergarteners will think you are crazy if you say Santa Claus is just one big conspiracy. There are further comments from people whining that the WTC buildings were designed to withstand only small “office fires”, which is just more FUD. Actually, if you watch the PBS documentary about the buliding of the WTC — The WTC was SPECIFICALLY designed to take jet impacts (I can’t remember for sure, but I believe the architect said multiple jet impacts), after a plane hit the Empire State Building and caused a scare prior to the WTC being built. I think we need to build another WTC and fly some planes into it and see what happens, as a research project. At the very least, it would make a great Pay-Per-View event! (more…)

It’s a crazy day today! Check it out… The Jessica Rabbit picture is a realization of many childhood fantasies! (more…)

[IMDB link] Carolyn & I are both big Arrested Development fans, and love the character G.O.B., played by Will Arnett. When we saw Janeane Garofalo at the Arlington Drafthouse, she made sure to emphasize that she thought Will Arnett was one of the funniest people right now, and that he was responsible for her back injury — from falling over laughing. Thus, we decided to get some Will Arnett movies. This is movie 1 of 3 for our Will Arnett Theme Week, which consists of The Solomon Brothers, Let’s Go To Prison, and Blades Of Glory. We are watching them in order of IMDB rating (lowest-to-highest; this movie received 5.0/10 on IMDB.)

PEOPLE: Bob Odenkirk directed this, and we are big fans of his comic sensibility (Tim And Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!; Tom Goes To The Mayor; Mr. Show). This was an added bonus to the whole Will Arnett angle that got us here in the first place. It was written by Will Forte (who voiced Abe Lincoln in Clone High, and can be seein in various Tim And Eric shows), and also starred Kristin Wiig (Knocked Up). It also had a bit part played by Jenna Fischer (Pam from The Office), who has been popping up in movies that we watch a lot lately (both her and Kristin Wiig were also in Walk Hard:The Dewey Cox Story).

BAD STUFF: The movie is not at all realistic. It’s a comedy. It’s not a romantic comedy, though there is pointless a romantic sub-plot that is basically an excuse to get Swedish beauty Malik Akerman on the camera for a bit. It’s about having a baby — and Carolyn & I hate babies and children. I think I originally passed this up when I ran into the Netflix page many months ago, because the idea of two men trying to have a baby was not at all appealing to me — I had enough of that with My Two Dads. Fortunately, when I looked at the names involved, I changed my mind.

CONCLUSION: I never would have thought to make the comparison, but Carolyn pointed it out to me: This was waaay better than Knocked Up. This was a hilarious comedy!! Knocked Up was amazingly funny during the first half, but basically declined into a romance movie that could barely even be called a romantic comedy. The 5 of us in the room for Knocked Up (Us + Mark I, John The Canadien, Evan) were all disappointed. Suffice to say that with The Brothers Solomon, I came in with lower expecations, and they were again surpassed. The two main characters are two brothers who live together (and are mistaken as a gay couple at least once). They were home-schooled at the north pole after their mother died. In other words, they are incredibly and completely out-of-touch with reality — much like G.O.B. in Arrested Development. They act like total spazzes, and there are a few VERY VERY DARK jokes in the movie. I wont go into it, but me & Carolyn laughed out loud many times, at least once to the point of having to rewind because we couldn’t stop.

In other words, it’s hard to put words into what makes this so funny — but it is mostly the ridiculous acting, and ridiculous situations. Even the opening hospital scene is quite dark in the humor — [highlight for spoilers]→ They get a call from their dad at the hospital, but on their way contest a late fee at the video store. When they get there, the doctor says they missed their father going into a coma by 10 minutes. The doctor then keeps gradually revising the number downwards, until we reach 4 minutes, where there is zero doubt left that the reason they missed their dad’s final moments of consciousness was because they went to the video store on the way. “Dad would have wanted us to contest those late fees!” Suffice to say that most of the humor isn’t dark, it’s out there, in-your-face, ridiculous-acting by clueless characters — These guys easily could have been the protagonists of Dumb And Dumber, except that in this movie, they are looking for a baby instead of for romance.

MOVIE QUOTE: “I think we maybe need to broaden our search to include less conventional methods of having a baby.” “Like anal?”
(more…)

• OVERLY-HARSH PUNISHMENTS: U.S. prison population dwarfs that of other nations – 5% of world’s population, 25% of world’s prisoners; 6X the avg rate of incarceration. We even have more total prisoners than China! “Criminologists and legal scholars in other industrialized nations say they are mystified and appalled by the number and length of American prison sentences.” (tags: OverlyHarshPunishments prisoners WarOnDrugs)
• ABUSE OF AUTHORITY: Pathetic excuse of an Officer Cory Bachnicki “protects and serves” the public by arresting a father who tried to get to his son’s accident scene. Son died 5 hours later. For all we know, dad missed his last opportunity to talk to him because Cory Bachnicki is an asshole. Remember FEMA not allowing people to help rescue Katrina victims? Dad now faces 6 months in jail for doing the right thing. This is another case where the letter of the law is perhaps evilly wrong. The establishment is supposed to use at least a modicum of discretion! (tags: parents)
• TECHNOLOGY WAR: FCC reports Comcast P2P blocking was more widespread than Comcast said And in other news, the sky is blue. Want to use your connection? Don’t buy from Comcast. Don’t have any other providers? Double-check on http://BroadbandReports.com (tags: NetNeutrality bittorrent)
• OPERATING SYSTEMS: List Of Apple security updates (I’m a bit tired of people saying their Macs are virus proof) Less virii Fewer viruses work on a Mac (just like with real software — much MUCH less runs on a mac than on windows, unless you start using emulation). Of course, this list of security updates here shows critical vulnerabilities allowing arbitrary code execution, some of which were only patched in the last 6 months. Of course there are always undiscovered ones too. Unix vulnerabilities are occasionally found in code that is decades old, right? And of course, considering how many windows users turn off automatic updates — how many Mac users are actually patched to the current security level? I’m curious. (tags: Apple security)
• TECHNOLOGY WAR: Everything bad in the UK comes here a few years later – “Mosqito” device repells young people. Technologically that physically herds a specific subset of people. Just great.
  I love the claim it only annoys people once they are 12, but stops by the time they are in their “later 20s”. I am sure they are trying to prevent someone from screaming “Wont Someone Please Think Of The Children?!?!” But seriously — couldn’t this hurt a baby? The cause would likely never be traced, and a lawsuit would likely never succeed… not enough proof. (tags: TechnologyWar Mosquito teenagers)
• RELIGION: Islam: Muslims in Nigeria riot over an unsustained “insult to islam” that 1 Christian wrote on a wall. The idiots threatened to burn down their own police station. How civilized. Christianity, Judaism, Wicca — all do not demand summary execution of “blasphemers”. (I don’t know about Hindu — someone care to fill me in?) Fortunately, Nigeria is a shithole anyway… and nobody sane would live there voluntarily. Hell, just writing a report on it when I went to Virginia Tech was annoying! (tags: religion Islam Muslims Christians)

I stayed up late last night and poured the net for cool flickr links… And if anyone is wondering, the NIN single is encoded VBR. (more…)

[IMDB link] From the writers of Heathers, one of my favorite movies of all time, comes an incredible gimmick: A man receives an email containing a list of names of everyone he has ever had sex with, and everyone he ever will have sex with. At first he thinks it’s an April Fool’s joke. Of course, his wife-to-be is only [highlight for spoilers]→ number 26 out of 101 on the list. Hijinks inevitably ensue. That was all I needed to know to know I’d probably enjoy this. I love a good gimmick movie. Little did I know that it would be deeper than expected, and exceed my expectations by a remarkable amount.

CAST: The leading man is played by Simon Baker, but I do not really know of him. Notable to me was Winona Ryder‘s presence, playing a character that has similarities to her character in Heathers. I was also very surprised to see Mindy Cohn (aka Natalie Green–the fat chick–from The Facts Of Life) playing Simon Baker‘s lesbian secretary. It was quite fun to to see her go to a club with the intention of [highlight for spoilers]→ hooking up with these 2 famous lesbian models, only to have Simon Baker “cockblock” her.

BAD STUFF: There’s only one bad thing about this movie: The 2 major sub-plots seem like they are a bit stretched to relate with each other. However, this is already a completely unrealistic movie to begin with, so this is no detriment. I actually don’t think there’s anything else bad about this movie. However, some people will doubtlessly view it as a bad romantic comedy; as an excuse to parade a bunch of beautiful women on screen; as a flimsy fantasy movie that never really explains the premise; or as a repeat of What Women Want, only with fate instead of mind-reading. But they would all be wrong.

ORIGINS ARE UNNECESSARY: Sex & Death 101 isn’t about the origin of the sex email — The movie in fact goes out of the way to NOT tell you how the email is generated, by having a government agent explain the origin of the sex email in the vaguest possible terms, ostensibly for national security. Word for word, the explanation was: “Some people you don’t know found some things you don’t know in a place you don’t know… And these things have been very useful in making a new thing – one that apparently knows everything.” And that’s all you’ll ever know. And that’s all you should know. This is a gimmick movie, and a gimmick shouldn’t really need so much explanation when it is a given.

Sex & Death 101 isn’t about sex, either. Granted, dudeface gets laid [highlight for spoilers]→ 75 times in the movie — but you have to realize that having the list literally drives him mad. There’s even a voice-over at one part, where he declares, “This is when the madness started.” At one point, he considers [highlight for spoilers]→ having sex with a corpse, just to prove to the list that the list doesn’t control him. And this is the actual central theme of the movie: Fate. Immutable and unchangeable fate, and what you can do to escape it.

FATE: Imagine knowing the future and being helpless to control your own fate.
Imagine burying the list because it drives you mad.
Imagine digging it back up again.
Imagine the conflicts that would come to mind when faced with the toughest of choices: Do you decide to accept the rare gift of knowing your destiny, and live a helpless life, unaltered by changes that you try to make, knowing exactly where you will end up? (“The Destination” approach.) Or do you decide to forsake that knowledge, and live life knowing that you have a defined destiny — but then purposely going out of your way to ignore that destiny. (“The Journey” approach.) And here’s where the real conflict is — Neither “The Destination” approach nor “The Journey” approach are acceptable to a reasonable individual.

“The Journey” approach still acknowledges your immutable fate, but leaves you wandering like The Fool (from Tarot carts). You may wonder if the person you are with is going to be “the one”. After all, your own emotions are absolutely meaningless; the list still controls you, and you know it — even if you don’t know the names. Are you going to waste years in a relationship with someone, knowing that the list is what ultimately controls who you will be with? Aren’t you curious about what’s going to happen next? The answer is right there. All you have to do is… Switch over to “The Destination” approach.

But “The Destination” approach sucks too! Now instead of wondering if the person you are with is “the one”, you know that they aren’t. And since you know who all the next people you’re going to have sex with, you could exhaust the list really quickly. The last name implies death, doesn’t it? Do you really want to rush to the end of that list? Choose: Sex, or Life? “The Destination” sucks as much as “The Journey”. It is best for one to never receive such a list.

IN SUMMARY: I actually found this movie to be surprisingly deep. Although the ending is not a surprise, and you will probably see it coming, I still found it incredibly powerful and moving. I left this movie incredibly impressed, and my mood was elevated for days on end. Heathers ruled, so it’s no surprise that something just about as good came from writer Daniel Waters. I’ve watched around 90 movies so far in 2008, and I’d place this near the very top. I give this no less than a 9.5/10 and 5 stars on Netflix.

MOVIE QUOTE: “I’m certain that some very interesting things will occur this evening… Your penis going into her vagina will not be one of them. But have a lovely evening.” (No, it’s not as low-brow of a movie as that quote makes it sound.)
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REALLY COOL OPTICAL ILLUSIONS!: This one is really really cool! It’s an example of how your brain sees whatever color it wants to see, based on its surroundings, rather than the color that is actually there. A Flash version is included, which turns the illusion on and off, so you can verify it’s real. Awesome; this one is skeptic-proof! (tags: OpticalIllusions eyeCandy).

COMEDY: NEVER BEFORE SEEN Kids In The Hall sketch (2m40s) Need I say more? If anyone figures out how to download this, please tell me. HT Vicky. (tags: shows) Read on for the other 2 stories. (more…)

[IMDB link] Being a big Anna Faris fan, and a fan of almost anything “super-powered”, this seemed like a logical viewing choice. We were not at all disappointed.

CAST: I was so surprised to find out that the super-heroine was not Anna Faris, but Uma Thurman. I actually only heard of this movie via Anna Faris‘s Netflix page, and had no clue Uma Thurman would be in it. Uma and Anna are both definitely hotter as blondes. Also: Luke Wilson. Carolyn likes him a lot better than Owen Wilson, and although I hadn’t thought of it, I might agree.  And don’t forget Dwight Schrute from the american Office!

IN SUMMARY: Super-hero movies kick ass, and this was no exception. It played out like Superman, if it were a modern 2000s romantic comedy. So yes: “Super-Sex” is covered, and quite hilariously. Anna Faris is as adorable as Uma Thurman is neurotic and crazy. The super-villain could have been much better played by Tim Curry, but Eddie Izzard worked out decently. To me, this is a romantic comedy that any Superman fan should be able to enjoy.

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• WHY RAPE NEEDS EVIDENCE: DNA frees man who spent almost 23 years in prison for rape. Guess what color he was? Of course he was black, and of course it was Texas. 23 years in prison for doing nothing is far worse than being raped. Far, far worse. And he probably got raped in prison too… Before DNA testing, he’d rot for life. Before 1900, he’s probably have been lynched.  Eyewitness accounts are frequently inaccurate, which is why actual evidence is unfortunately needed.  (tags: wrongfullyAccused rape DNA exonerated Texas)
• NET NEUTRALITY: ISP’s that serve up fake advertising pages (instead of 404 ERROR) when you mis-type a URL are a grave security threat. Have fun being phished, Earthlink and Comcast users.  Furthermore, Comcast is the worst ISP ever (and I have had 7 DSL ISPs, and a few dial up ISPs as well). If you deal with them, you more or less get what you deserve. They were the worst.  (tags: NetNeutrality DNS Earthlink Comcast)
• FLICKR: BigHugeLabs.com flickr tool — see which of your photos made it to the explore page.  Just another way of looking at your flickr account and finding some stuff out.  (tags: flickr)

[IMDB link] This was a pretty generic 2008 flick, with a low IMDB rating of 4.6. It was quite generic, and the plot was thin, but the movie made no attempt to play itself off as at all serious. We often enjoy party movies on a Sunday night as a method of mentally clinging onto the weekend a bit longer, and this worked. This was sort of in the same vein as Can’t Hardly Wait and the Trojan War, where there are love issues that must be resolved before the party ends.

QUIRKS: Characters would sometimes talk to the camera to say how they feel — This movie definitely went out of its way to let the viewer know that it’s not to be taken seriously. The very ending of the movie of course has the love interests kiss, and then talk about how long they waited, except they are talking as the actors and not the characters, and start arguing about whether or not they had kissed in rehearsal or not. It was quite strange, and for all we know it was totally staged, but it sort of strange to see chracacters change into actors before you eyes, other than in David Lynch movies. And of course the principal was delightfully deranged, and went on an utterly insane goose-chase looking for the senior skip party — dealing with the mob, cocaine, funerals, and more.
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[IMDB link] This is (apparently) the 2nd Appleseed anime movie, except that IMDB shows 2 previous ones: 1988, 2004. So I’m a bit confused about that. We watched this in 720p with Jon, Kevin, & Mark, and the cgi-based animation was quite good. The faces almost had a rotoscoped look, like A Scanner Darkly. The fact that I was not familiar with the previous movie (which Kevin was nice enough to loan us) did not seem to hurt the viewing experience, as this was an eye candy movie. Jon B joked about only reading every other subtitle, though I certainly would not have been able to follow the plot without knowing what people were saying. Cyborg and cybernetic terrorism come into play, and there are definitely interesting moments, plot-wise. This was not superb by any means, but I enjoyed it. (more…)

As usual, shows at Jaxx provide an unusual level of intimacy, and Carolyn & I are virtually guaranteed to be within a literal arms’ reach of our favorite artists! 11 songs were played; 5 of them from the Dreamweaver album (that I just posted a massive review of). Unfortunately for us, we missed most of the 1st song. Jaxx is a great club due to the acts they book (and 15-minute proximity to our house), but they have very poor information management. Earlier calls said they would come on 11:30-12, so we decided to play it safe and arrive around 10:50. We somehow got the 2nd-closest parking space, and they started playing when our car pulled in. So that sucked. They also said we can’t bring cameras, but for the first time ever we decided the camera has depreciated in value such that it is okay to leave it in an unattended car in Virginia. Good move, because when I asked at the door, they said everything was allowed. The band itself was taking video too. Tons of cameras lined the place.

We basically had only 1 person in between us and the stage, and were mostly directly in front of Gizz Butt, the only non-original member of the band, having replaced Frasier Craske. But we were also about 3 feet away from singer Martin Walkyier. (Hey Eve – he performed a handfasting the week before!) I really wish, however, that we could have crowded over to the right of the stage, where Andy Sneap (usually a record producer) was playing. Andy Sneap is the mastermind riff-writer & guitar-player behind the music of Sabbat. Martin Walkyier joked that there’s no way they would ever write another album, because it’s simply not possible for them write songs like they did 20 years ago. Andy Sneap (I think) joked that he used all his riffs up in their 2 albums, which is quite appropriate: Dreamweaver has the most riffs-per-song of practically any thrash metal out there.

During the show, Martin Walkyier did not seem satisfied with the audience’s enthusiasm level. He was pressuring us to scream and raise our fists up during just about every musical interlude. I think it is true that American metal fans, at least in Springfield, VA, are a lot more docile than European metal fans. He was nonetheless very enthusiastic, and quite happy to be playing for us, and ready to party — They said they hadn’t had a party in a week, which was unheard of for them, and so they were going to go back and drink some beers and chat with the fans. (And Jaxx pooped on everybody’s party by only serving alcohol to the band members. I guess they only want to be open during those periods of time that they make the most possible money — i.e. during the actual show.)

Some of has had waited 18 years for the show. I was wearing my Sabbat shirt that I bought in 9th or 10th grade, c.1989-1990. I was the only one. Andy Sneap later remarked that it was a bootleg, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t. I thought that I ordered it directly from the Noise Records catalog (i.e. their record company) using an order form from a cassette inlay card. I sure as hell didn’t get it online — back then it was BBSes only. The back of the shirt simply had the band members’ names, so I would think that he would be impressed that I’d been wearing his name for 18 years, instead of declaring it a bootleg. :)

[UPDATE] And although I was the only one with an 18-year-old Sabbat shirt that I saw, there was nonetheless one guy who had an issue of Power Metal Magazine — the exact same issue that I had. I think I finally gave a few to Shehab around 2000, but they probably ended up in the trash. He had Sabbat autograph the picture of them in the magazine — the same one I had ripped out and put on the wall of my bedroom in my parents’ house (along with other stuff. Friends: Imagine my kitchen cabinets, but covering an entire room, and mostly being metal-oriented.) So I made sure to photograph the autograph, and the cover (feat. King Diamond) of the Power Metal magazine as well.

AUTOGRAPHS! So yes: The band members came out, autographed everything for everybody, and talked to everybody. Even to point where the swarm died down, and it became a bit more casual. Band members just sitting at the bar, talking to whoever was around. Eventually they left — Martin wanted white wine. But they hung around for a good 30-45 minutes.

Martin Walkyier & Us

I even had some one-on-one talk with Martin Walkyier, and got to break the news to him that New Line Cinema had at least at one point been interested in making The Way Of Wyrd (which the Dreamweaver album is based on) into a movie. Martin seemed very excited by the prospect, declaring that he would absolutely love to even have a wee part, like a hobbit in the background. Carolyn later (over the next 20 hours) erupted into laughter at several points, because of the way I told him this: “Hey, you know The Way Of Wyrd?”, I say to Martin. “Yeah?” I mean, it’s a pretty stupid question to ask someone who you know wrote an entire album based on the book. But to me I just had to make sure he knew what I was talking about, before saying, “New Line Cinema was interested in making it into a movie!” I suppose I could have blurted it all out in one sentence, but I had to make sure I had his attention before delivering the “punchline”. Martin Walkyier also said that he really liked it here in Virginia, and liked this area better than Los Angeles. Before they left, I managed to get a picture with Andy Sneap as well:

Andy Sneap & I

SCHWAG: Carolyn got a shirt with the Dreamweaver cover (the one that caused me to buy the album c.1989 with no knowledge of what it was, other than being a Noise Records album). It was the last medium. She was kind enough to give it to me, and buy the newer shirt style for herself. So now I have an old and new shirt, she has a new shirt, and we have an autographed original pressing of the Dreamweaver cd ($54 on Ebay):

Sabbat Schwag – old, new, and autographed

No drumstick, however, because it bounced off Carolyn‘s head. You see, I had to run back to the car to get the vinyl record (which I would note dare to take into a mosh pit setting). The security guy basically said re-entry is not typically allowed, but I told him why, and he said “make it quick”, so I feigned running, even though we were the very first car. (Ironically, his girlfriend had just left, so my rushing, and her choice to walk beside our car, caused me to run quickly towards her in a dimly-lit parking lot… She probably would have thought she was being attacked if her boyfriend was not right there.) So anyway, asking for the keys to leave and do all this caused Carolyn to turn her head and miss the drumstick. Damn! But at least we have an autographed NoMeansNo drumstick, and a non-autographed Chemlab drumstick.

The setlist for this concert is posted HERE.

A full set of pictures will eventually be posted HERE.

To see every concert I’ve ever been to, go to my List Of All Concerts page.

Here are some videos from the concert [added 7/25/2008]:

Band member introductions:

Die hard fans for 20 years:

Dreamweaver album is now re-released on Sanctuary records:

Martin hates racism, and expected to see a bunch of Homer Simpsons when he came to America:

Martin talks about not having had a party all week (unheard of for them), and his disdain for Christianity:

Introduction for the song The Clerical Conspiracy:

song excerpt – probably “The Church Bizarre”:

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