It’s a crazy year for the Frenches.  A good kind of crazy.

The dice in my head (you know, like Mat from the Wheel of Time series? I’ve literally felt like that for the past month - it was maddening!) finally stopped rolling on Friday.   And it was a pretty good roll.

Everything went through, and after 24 hours with a nigh zero balance in all our bank accounts, they are back to normal AND we’ve got a shiny new set of house keys.  OK, so they’re not THAT shiny.  But I can polish them!

Jen started in her new position as Office Manager on Monday!

I finally heard back on my position title change and raise request…with a positive!

So, after 18 annoying months in Vancouver, things are really looking bright!  Not that they were “bad” before, but man were we so ready to get back to Portland.  It was just something we did to save money and adjust to the financial burden of a new child, and it worked for that.  But…SEE YA!

Next month is our Hawaii trip, 5 year wedding anniversary & Jen’s 28th, then November is my 30th, for which I’ll be meeting some old friends in Vegas (baby!).

Funny/odd world coincidence thing: we both started our new/promoted positions on the same day (technically, if not actually).

ok, the movers will be here in about 2 hours, but you get the idea.

Comcast decided to shut us off 2 days early or something….so right now I’m connected via bluetooth over my cellphone running as a modem.  Fun stuff.

oh, and we didn’t really get to sleep last night because it’s SO FUCKING HOT here.  Portland does not need to be  100+, it just doesn’t.  We had a fan blasting us all night last night and man, unpleasant.

We stopped by the new house to get the keys last night and Z was just loving running around in circles - the whole house progresses in  a circle kinda, it’s neat.

I went back later that night to take over all the fragile/electronic stuff, and now we’re just waiting for some men with less sore backs than mine to haul all the boxes and furniture.

Of course, we ran out of boxes, so there’s a bunch of stuff unpacked (mostly kitchen junk) that we’ll have to come back for later…but who cares!  I have to be here Monday anyway to meet the carpet cleaners.

and keys should be in hand tomorrow. I don’t see why they wouldn’t…but if they don’t we are mini-fucked because I have the movers scheduled ;p

yay!

then maybe i’ll be able to sleep saturday night.

pictures will follow, hopefully Sunday when our internet is back.

by: John Twelve Hawks (not his real name of course)

I really shouldn’t be reading depressing books.  For some reason I’m having a predilection for tending towards melancholy…and this series’ bleak outlook on life is not really what I need right now.

Nonetheless, I picked up book two and blew through it, leaving the half-read history of Ethiopia book languishing for attention in my bag.  Don’t worry little history book…soon I shall get to you too.  But there was more meat here.

Sort of. This is a rather direct, simple book for “technological thriller”/conspiracy thriller/modern-day-sci-fi.  The author knows where he wants to get, and gets there pretty fast, only stopping briefly to drop DaVinci-code-style infobits on the unsuspecting reader.  Luckily there’s not too many of them, and this is a much more obvious “not” reality book than the DVC….isn’t it?   None of these things could happen, could they?

And that’s where the depression kicks in.  They really could.  They could already be happening, and we’d be screwed.  They probably already are.

Yar.

It’s a good read though, at least if you enjoyed the first book.  It’s not quite as good, but I get the sense that it’s a bridge book - things need to be in a certain place for them to fall correctly in the next/last book (which I’m really curious how he’s going to end), so this book has to get them there.

THREE AND A HALF STARS

Note: For whatever reason I wrote this like … a month ago and forgot to post it.

People are protesting the movie  Tropic Thunder! But not for what you think!

This was a step past absurdity for me.  (Summary: people are offended at the word “retard” in a movie, and that movies SATIRICAL portrayal of Hollywood’s attempt to Orally Oscarize itself via actors portraying retards in movies).

Money quote:

The studio arranged screenings around the country for disability advocates yesterday and last Friday. “I came out of it feeling like I had been assaulted,” said David Tolleson, executive director of the Down syndrome group, who saw it last week. “I counted 16 uses of retard, not counting imbecile, moron and idiot.”

WAIT.  Holdthafuckatrukkaminnite. Backup. You want me to stop saying idiot, imbecile & moron?  Nevermind that I’m still holding on to retard - you can’t have that!  How am I supposed to describe someone that is an idiot, imbecile or moron, or acts in a way that is idiotic, imbecilic or moronic? … Fucking reactionary morons.  This is almost as dumb as Guiliani’s son suing Duke over being kicked off the golf team.  Almost, but not quite.

Neverminding that they obviously missed the point of satire, the word “retard” is not going away.  I’m sorry.  Mentally handicapped/retarded/imbecilic/WHATEVER people are different than non-retarded people in a very measurable and functional way.  We’re not talking about the imaginary differences that racists see, we’re talking about actual, functional differences in living and quality of life/etc.

Just like people are not going to stop using the word “fat” to describe well, fat people.  Look I’m sorry to all the whiny bitches who can’t handle having their flaws (sorry, but being mentally handicapped is the textbook definition of a flaw) mocked, or used to mock others.

Oh, one more thing, since these folks are all up in arms and joining together to fight for “rights” for the disabled and all that.  I’ll put it in bold and all caps.  YOU DON’T HAVE THE RIGHT NOT TO BE MADE FUN OF (in general, in specific can be a different story).  Sorry.  Oh, you want special treatment?  Hmmm.

I think I’m failing in my attempt to eloquently present what I’m trying to say here, but what else is now.  Let me try one more time:

*Comparing someone to someone of lesser physical/mental capability is always going to be an insult.  Insults are often an integral part of jokes.
*Mentally handicapped people have lesser physical/mental capabilities - that’s not something you can sue out of the world.
*Therefore, people will taunt other people by referring to them as names used for the mentally handicapped.  Just like if someone is running/performing some physical function slowly you may jokingly compare them to a physically handicapped or fat/overweight person.

Do you expect to legislate/protest insults out of the American collective conscious?  Because frankly, that’s what you’re attempting here….which is part of why it’s so stupid.

Yes, I know this may be the post that forever damns my future political career but look, I’m all for rights for the disabled, but no group has a right not to be made fun of.  This is not hate speech, which you do have a right to be protected from to various degrees..  Sorry.  It may be cruel, but that’s life.  Buck up crybabies.

Also, keep in mind that no one in specific is being insulted.  I’m sure someone with a retarded family member would take offense to that person being specifically insulted, but to be insulted by the word “retard” being used as an insult is just ignoring reality.

I’ll post again whenever I finally see the movie (I’m guessing after it hits Netflixx), maybe at that point I will be so offended by what I see I’ll change my mind, and call myself shortsighted for writing this.

But I doubt it.

to this article, appropriate quote being:

So I take heart from Tony Parsons and his “Fear of fake breasts”. If only there were also men out there who would rail against all the other elements of porn culture that seem to have invaded and pervade our everyday lives and beauty predilections (the orange tans, Hollywood bikini waxes and bleach-blonde extensions…) But women, too, need to stop aspiring to the fake silhouette.

I hate orange/fake tans (as I’ve mentioned on a few occasions), & blonde hair ranks low on my “hot” list, especially fake blonde.  On waxed vag in general I’m kind of indifferent, either way is a-ok.  Fake breasts are naaaaaasty.  I fully agree that women should “chill” on the overkill.

On an unrelated note, this really amuses me:

No, I’m not talking about whatever the latest zombie game or movie is.  I’m thinking about coffee actually.  Coffee and cigarrettes.  I go into Starbucks at least once a week for their (better than) McDonald’s style breakfast muffin thing and uh..chocolate milkshake.  Ok, not really, I get a mocha frappunico…but it’s basically a cracked out chocolate milkshake right?  Anyway, I’m addicted *blush*.

But whatever, my point is that, I’m highly amused when I go in there and everyone looks fucking DEAD. Just staring into space like ..you know, zombies.  They perk up after some coffee though…

We’re a nation of addicts!

And then Jen is watching Made Men lately and I see all that smoking and I wonder if coffee in 30 years will be like smoking is now: “Ohhhh, you drink coffee?  So you want to get <insert name of whatever disease that coffee will be found to kill you with>?  Well, just don’t drink it near me, I don’t want to get secondhand coffee aroma fumes.”

Smoking is seriously nasty though.

Both were pretty formulaic, but the second was somewhat surprising in its exact subject matter.  Pleasantly so.

SemiPro is showcasing Wil Ferrel’s declining career.  There’s really only so many times you can play the same character without just doing Anchorman 2 (which might actually be good!).  That being said, there were some funny parts.  I’ve already forgotten them though, so they must not have been that memorable.

Jack Black…eh, he’s just not that funny, at least in the last few movies I’ve seen him in.  I know he must have done something funny at some point, but I can’t remember what.

It was interesting to see Mos playing someone stupid.  Not as stupid as Jack Black’s character, but still pretty low on the Brain Team’s pick list. In general, it’s tough to play stupid without it coming off as retarded (Jack Black’s character for example) or obviously fake stupid, but he pulls it off.

Honesty is the most efficient policy for a low functioning brain.

See here for image & brief story.

Fake?  Who knows.  Certainly interesting looking either way.  Commenters on Dvorak’s blog seem to think it looks like a sea turtle without the shell.  I can see that.

We’re under a ton of stress lately with the new house purchase thing, and with (finally) moving Z to a new daycare (starts next week! scary!) and some other stuff.   Hence the low post count.

So here are some interesting/amusing links to tide you over until I have more to say.

Media reporting on media, and doing it badly.  We love you Fox, because at least you’re up front about what you stand for.

The grooviness of a language without numbers.  Specific ones at least.

An (old, but still interesting because he doesn’t give many) interview with John Twelve Hawks (not his real name of course), author of The Traveler & Dark River.

In stark contrast to 12Hawks’ media scarcity is the website of Brandon Sanderson, author of the Mistborn series and the upcoming final Wheel of Time book.  He blogs regularly, as well as actually documenting his progress on the books he is working on!  He also provides annotations on the individual chapters in the Mistborn books - and these are fascinating reads to someone like me.  I only hope he finishes the book 2 annotions soon!  Here’s an index of the blog posts he made about re-reading the Wheel of Time series in preparation for writing A Memory of Light.

The religions hardliners (I still think “Christianist” is a silly word) are taking over the GoP…at least in Iowa.  Surprise!

The most beautiful suicide.  That’s what the folks are calling it.  Definitely one of the more serene images of death I’ve seen, especially such a horribly violent one.

Everyone loves stupid crooks.  Not quite a darwin award contender, but amusing nonetheless.

Stephen King’s acceptance speech for the National Book Award in 2003.  I must have thought this was interesting for some reason, but I can’t remember why now.  I think it was a big deal because “consumer fiction” doesn’t usually win?

A useful comparison of McCain & Obama’s tax plans.

That Novak guy, he’s some famous journalist I guess I’m not familiar with him, ran into a pedestrian with his car and then tried to get away.  An eyewitness claimed that the man was “splayed up onto the windshield and hood”. Sure, he’ll be able to afford a fancy lawyer and probably won’t see a second of prison time, but at least he got caught.  PS. I love the way our legal system favors MONEY MONEY AND MONEY.

An insider’s commentary/opinion on the suckiness of air travel (in the US).

The famous “Last Lecture” video.  There’s a lot to explain, so I won’t bother, you can google stuff for yourself (Randy Pausch), but it IS worth you making the time to watch it, even if spread out over a few days. Even if it doesn’t seem relevant to your life, check it out.  He is (or *was* I should say ) a very inspirational figure, and (especially by the end) you can tell what a great lecture writer he is.

Piglet with monkey face. The only thing I can add to that wonderful headline is that I think it looks more like a cyclops face.

They forgot a few.  I guess “Conservative”  = “Christian” these days…which is funny, because I’ve known many “liberal christians” and “conservative atheists/agnostics” over the years.  Not that the Conservapedia is anything worth taking seriously…good for some amusement though.

by: Brandon Sanderson

Interestingly, I couldn’t find an image of the cover I have (the paperback), this one is from the hardcover.

This is probably the best new fantasy book I’ve read in a while.  Not that that says much, because I don’t read much new fantasy.  It’s at least as good as George R.R. Martin’s stuff, but very different.

I love how he takes common fantasy cliches and tips them upside down (he’s pretty upfront about this being intentional too).  The first book’s thing was basically that evil had already won.  Sure, good “won” in the end, sort of, BUT there was this overwhelming sense of dread inherent in the win in that it didn’t actually make things “good”.  Also, to a lesser extent the hero/catalyst was actually killed, and there’s the fallout from that too - how do you live under his shadow?

So in this book we have a great, awesome continuance of this “upside down” effect that comes into play (hah mtg term…funny) only near the very end of the book but when it does..wow!  I think you’ll be very pleased, unless you just want to read the typical tropes.  In that case, steer clear.

Before the ending though, the upside-downness continues in the sense that this book is “after the good guys win, how the hell do they manage a kingdom?”. I haven’t seen that done before, at least in such a realistic and depressing way (depressing in a good way).  The one good thing (for the characters) that comes out of the final ending is so overshadowed by the continuing foreboding that it almost seems like an afterthought.  Vin gets the entirety of what she thought she wanted in a man, and Elend can finally feel less of an inferior, but neither of them even really gives it a moment’s thought…they can’t, because what’s coming will be even worse than what’s come before.

(I know, my writing is horrible today.  That’s ok though, I’m ok with it.)

I was left with a lot of things to think about as I went to sleep last night, lots of comments I wanted to make, but I can’t remember most of them.  I know I’m glad I waited for the paperback, as the final book is only right around the corner now (October?)!

Without giving any spoilers, I’m very curious about what was in the pill at the end…it seems like if it had pewter in it as well as whatever caused the “big” effect, it should have had many, if not all, of the other allomantic metals as well - potentially even the ones they haven’t rediscovered yet.  I was frustrated that he didn’t go into that at all, the final chapter was way too short.  I have no idea what’s coming in the final book …hell they could even “lose” for real.  I doubt it, but it seems possible.   The characters are left with almost zero clues about what’s actually going on.  The only lead I can see is the “helpful” mist spirit thing…other than that, all Sazed’s massive discovery does is remind them that they got royally fucked.

His character arc is also particularly interesting and unsuspected…it seems like he’s being set up to lead the Terrismen, but lead them to what?

Brandon has an excellent section on his website with notes on each and every chapter in the book.  I love how open he is about the writing process.  You can see that a) he really loves his work and b) he is very confident in his skills as a story teller.

FOUR AND A HALF STARS

So, headed west on Broadway….one of those silly double-decker-clown-bikes.  Guy is riding in the middle of the right lane.  Right next to the bike lane. Next to the bike lane.  FOR BIKES.  He’s next to it, not in it.  They made a special lane…just for his special ass, and he’s decided he’s too special even for that and needs to occupy MY lane, very slowly.

So yeah, I pull into the other lane and go around him.  He gives me a dirty look.  SERIOUSLY?

Jesus people, you wonder why drivers get annoyed with you?  Don’t be a goddam jackass.

Soooo yeah, we’ve been in California for a few days, no thanks to United Airlines or Avis rentals.

Let’s start with United:

True, by United’s standards we were late (we arrived at the line 45mins before our flight, and you are supposed to be through the line at that point) - still, we’ve never had that problem with Southwest.  Hell, we’ve gotten there 20 mins before a flight before and still been good.  45 mins would be golden with them.  Interestingly, nothing in the confirmation email we got from Orbitz said anything about a time cut off but whatever, I’m sure this is “common knowledge” for air travel.

Anyway, so the lady tells us “You too late,  just go through line anyway it will be ok, the computer will tell you you are late just click continue” (she doesn’t speak the best English) so we think it is cool. NOT!  Clicking continue gets you on standby..which would have resulted on us waiting around in the San Francisco airport for like 11 hours (until a 9PM flight!..our original eta for Santa Barbara was 10 AM).  Keep in mind this is happening at 515am and we’ve been up since 3am…so we’re not incredibly conscious.  That’s their first suggestion…standby and wait in an airport for 11 hours.  WITH A BABY.  Oh, and we can’t get refunds because we bought our tickets through an online  thing too…so from now on I’ll just get tickets direct from the airline in case we need to bitch at someone.  Lesson learned.  So yeah, we’re frustrated and saying “The plane doesn’t leave for 40 minutes!?!? Can’t you just let us on?”  Well no, because the computer won’t let you in..awesome; I love how they removed the human element so there is no one truly “to blame” - “Oh sorry sir, the computer won’t let you do that.”  Right, I’m sure you’re sorry.

So then they tell us to get in another line…ok wait back up, first the lady talking to us leads us out away from the lines and then just takes off for a while.  Eventually she comes back and tells us to get in a line which LOOKS EXACTLY LIKE THE LINE WE JUST WENT THROUGH.  So we’re like what the fuck why do we have to wait in the same line again?  What no one has the brains to tell us though is that while this looks like the same goddam line, it’s actually a different one and while it goes to a window labeled EXACTLY the same thing as the window we just waited in line for, it is somehow magically different.  Which it was I guess, there was a person who actually talked to us there, and eventually got us on standby flight to San Francisco (2 hours later) and another standby flight to San Luis (arriving 2-3 hours later than we would have originally arrived in Santa Barbara).  Standby with a baby….fun….but luckily no one took the spots and we were all good.

While we were waiting I called Avis’ 800 # and had them move the car rental/pickup from Santa Barbara to SLO (so we could then drive to Santa Barbara only arriving 5 hours late!).  No problems right?  Of course not.  When we get there the guy has no information in his system for our reservation.  Double awesomesauce!  Handy for us they had an Impala available.  Because we really wanted to drive a boat with choppy breaks.  But whatever, we made it to SB, visited Eric for a while, then made it back and dropped it off the next day.  And all was good right?  WRONG!  Jackalass motherfuckers called me that night and were like “Sir you returned the car with less gas than you took it with so we’ll have to charge y-”

Me (these are my actual words): THE FUCK YOU WILL!  I filled that thing up right down the goddam street, filled it all the way up.

Avis tool:Well sir we uh won’t be charging you for this but it says that we pumped 15 gallons into that tank -

Me: THE FUCK YOU DID, we only used half the tank anyway
(I only had to put like 8 in, we only drove to SB and back).

Avis tool:I uhh, ok I’ll go check the car myself but we won’t charge you

Me: Fucking right you won’t charge me.
(I was realllllly tired of idiots by then).
They never called back.  We shall see what shows up on my credit card.

Yeah, so all that was fun.  Hope the return trip tomorrow is much less eventful.

After all the drama we went to my Uncle’s wedding, hung out with family, and visited my grandpa in the hospital and he got to meet his great-grandson for the first time.

Finally, a “good” good album!

This year needed something, as I’ve been moderately disappointed by the offerings thus far.

Yes, you guessed it, this is a “positive” review.  Har har.  Don’t get carried away though - it’s not the best thing since sliced butter (mmmmmm…lard), nor is it their best work yet, but it is very good.  I’d rank it around the second album (with my rankings being that the second was a bit better than the first, and the third was debateably better than the second).

With a band this …predictable (?) it’s hard to just throw judgments out there and have them mean anything, at least for me.  The new single (which you can hear on their myspace page) might not be the best indicator because, honestly, when I heard it on the radio it kind of annoyed me with all the repitition of the chorus.  However, it all blends nicely in the album context.

Sound-wise, it’s got the fun and energy of the third album mixed with the grittiness and dreariness of the first.  If you thought you couldn’t have dreary & fun at the same time…you were wrong!  It also makes me think of truck stops for some reason.  I haven’t had a chance to go through the lyrics yet…so maybe there are some truck stops in there I’ve just been picking up on and storing in my subconscious.

We get the return of Charlemagne and some of the other “classic” Hold Steady characters as well.  One of these days I’m going to have to go through all the lyrics and actually track down these characters’ stories in full…or maybe someone out there on the magic web has done it for me already!  I suppose I should look.  OK nothing on the first page, and I’m lazy, so maybe I’ll dig more later.

So, anyway…FOUR OUT OF FIVE STARS.  If you dig the other albums, definitely pick this up.  Otherwise, check them out and maybe you’ll like it…they definitely have a specific style,  and you may love it (like me) or be driven crazy by it (like Jen).

Argh, I just found out that the Australian versions of the first 3 albums have bonus tracks…I really hope they put out an EP with all of those. /annoyed