Blue Hell

The Maid was on the docket today, so I had set the alarm for 9:00 AM to make sure that I had some time to be up and aware before she was ringing the bell. Imagine my frustration when the stupid smoke alarm chirps and wakes us up at 6:30 in the Christing morning. I got up and stabbed the thing into silence, then struggled to settle the Yorkie and get back to sleep myself. The wife gave up and got up to start her day, so I would hear her bumping around the house a bit while I tried to sleep though it eventually got quiet when she split to run the Yorkie to the Groomer.

I woke a couple hours later with the alarm, then got up and moving, put some water on to boil for tea and opened the house up for business. I spent time on the PC in the Office polishing up a blog post, then let the Maid in when she turned up at 11:00. She got started on her routine and I holed up in the Office to piddle around with the blog a bit further, eventually chilling with an episode of The X-Files courtesy of Netfux Instant Watch and a sandwich for my lunch.

The wife returned with groceries and the dog, fresh from the Groomer, so I helped her unload and put stuff away, then we released the hound so that she could go and keep a watchful eye on the Maid.

I had started watching Hell Night on Netfux in the Office, but since the wife was home and had some phone calls to make I decided to step out and run a Swap A DVD trade to the Post Office.

The Maid was gone when I returned, so I was able to move into the den to finish out my movie, which was quite an ordeal, as the Netfux option on the TiVo continues to stop and stall frequently, around every 15 minutes or slightly longer, which makes for an annoying afternoon. I did finally flip over to the Blu-ray player to see if it fared any better, and it worked great, until it crapped out about 6 minutes before the end of the movie, which really super pissed me off. I may have to look into some new solution with the cable people, as I'm beginning to suspect that this isn't anything to do with the devices and may be about the signal strength.

All that annoyance stated, the movie turned out to be something I'd seen before, which surprised me. Sporting a cute Linda Blair in her early 20's, dolled up for a party to be Little Red Riding Hood and featuring some nice cleavage, you'd have thought the film would make more of an impression on me. The sad thing is that the movie wasn't all that good, with the director having mistaken 'suspense' for a series of sequences of actors creeping slowly through darkened halls or tunnels, peering to and fro with no real point until they find a dead body that we (the audience) already knew would be there. Yawn. It's a bit tedious and if the dogshit pacing were tightened up maybe the film would be a bit more fun, but as it stands it's about 15 minutes longer than it needs to be.

The wife had a party to be at in the evening, so she split to go and do that as I was shaking up a martini, so I selected Blue Velvet off the To-Watch Pile for a re-watch since I haven't seen it in quite some time and I know that there's now a Blu-ray release, so why not watch the DVD just in time for to upgrade to another format, right? The film holds up well, though there is a strange schoolboy quality to Kyle Maclachlan's detective work that would honestly make me wonder if he were a little slow, were I to deal with him in real life. Dennis Hopper's unhinged Frank Booth character is an absolute joy, chewing scenery from start to finish, well worth the price of admission.

The wife returned as the film was wrapping up, so she and I wound down the night with some television, including an episode of Ghost Hunters and then the new American Horror Story and The Soup, since it's been moved to the middle of the week for no good reason.

The wife crashed out and I eventually moved into the Office after channel-surfing for a bit to work on this post and then call it a night myself.

Be seeing you.

Seven Deaths In The Television's Eye

I woke this morning feeling edgy and possibly still a bit drunk, to be perfectly honest.

The Yorkie was still chilling with me in the bed, as the wife was long gone, running her various errands. I got up and looked at e-mail on the iPhone, then drank what felt like a gallon of water and fired up the PC to see what the world was up to. I spent some time on the web, then nailed down lunch plans with the fellas, as we tried to expand our horizons a bit with a visit to a local deli to spice things up.

I still wasn't feeling very good at this point, so I had an apple, which the Yorkie noticed and turned up immediately to beg for a nibble of. I would periodically let her have little chunks of the meat of the fruit, which she was rather happy about, as she does enjoy her fruits quite a bit. That went a long way toward settling my stomach, so I dressed and headed out to meet the guys.

Lunch was good, we visited a bit and the food went a long way towards helping my mood, the body started to feel a bit more normal by the meal's end. We'll all be seeing one another again this weekend for a local artists showcase, which the wife and I will be working admissions for, as well as hosting a party here at some point, very much against my will as you can imagine. I grabbed a coffee on the way home to try to shake off the fatigue of my late night, then pointed the car towards the house to go and see what the wife was up to.

The wife was working on printing some invitations to something else that we'll be hosting here, which will probably be mentioned in my suicide note, so I don't need to go into any real detail about it here, now do I? All I'm saying is that I would love to go about a month without hosting a party, entertaining house guests or having any oddball gatherings to attend outside the house. C'mon, January, do me a solid here.

The wife split to attend a couple more meetings in the afternoon, so I eventually fond myself in the den and watched a weeks' old episode of Nikita, then spent some time in the Office updating a few things on the PC before selecting something from the To-Watch Pile to pass the time until the wife got home.

Seven Deaths In The Cat's Eye is an interesting little Giallo in which Jane Birkin is menaced in the Gothic ancestral manse of her family by an unknown killer. There may have been one too many red herrings for my tastes, but overall it was a pretty watchable flick and Birkin is pretty easy on the eyes, so it was a decent way to kill some time.

The wife returned with some dinner and we ate while catching up with a few more things off the TiVo, including the season finale of Bored To Death and the 'mid-season' finale of The Walking Dead, which was fairly predictable in it's revelations. We also checked out last week's Dexter, which might've pissed me off with the twist it took, but I suppose we'll see how it all plays out in the next few episodes.

We have the Maid tomorrow, and the Yorkie goes to the Groomer, so I decided to piddle with this post a bit and then call it a night, as I'll be spending a good amount of time in the Office tomorrow anyway.

Be seeing you.

Twenty Four Hour Trainspotting Groove

The wife had to get back into the normal run of things today, her quiet weekend of relaxation over at this point.

The Yorkie seemed out of sorts without her here, following me around as if she was afraid I would disappear if she didn't have me in her line of sight. I piddled on the web for a bit, as I had a message from the Geek Squad saying that they would be by after 10:00 to calibrate the new television. When that guy turned out to be running late I did finally call and confirm the time, as I wasn't sure from the message if they needed to hear from me before they turned up. When the dude finally got here he turned out to be one of the guys who originally did our install when we first moved into this house; he even remembered how they were stuck here for about 12 hours that day, not leaving until well after dark.

I left him to it, as I had no idea what he had to do, just that it would take about 30 minutes or thereabouts. He eventually called me back in to tell me that the television wasn't registering that it'd been used for the required 100 hours to allow the color palate to settle (if that was the terminology he used), so he was wondering how much television we normally watch. The TV apparently registers use in 4 hour blocks, so if it's on for 12 hours straight, it only registers that first 4 hour block because the television is never turned off, re-setting the amount of time that it's keeping track of. Since we're only at the 60+ hour register, he had to re-schedule for this coming Sunday, with the instruction that we might just take the time to power things down, then turn it back on between shows or movies this week, to basically 'trick' the Smart TV into knowing that it's been in use for the required 100 hours so that he can do what he needs to do and sharpen up that color scheme or whatever 'calibration' does for it.

The wife got back after he had split, returning with burgers for our lunch. We ate and caught up on the day thus far, then I loaded up tons of recycling to drop off while I went and ran some errands. I hit up the Post Office first, where I stood in line with the elderly for so long that I eventually began to wonder how old they were when they first went into the building. I dumped the recycling next, then grabbed a coffee at Starbuck's before the bank, then headed home.

Back at the house I noticed that the Blu-ray of Trainspotting that I had picked up cheap from Amazon had turned up from UPS, so after touching base with the wife I popped that in to see what the picture quality was like. It was indeed worth an upgrade, and the film holds up amazingly well.

The wife had yoga this evening, then a meeting afterward, so she split to do that and I popped in something off the To-Watch Pile for a re-watch since it felt like it fit my 'theme' for the evening. 24 Hour Party People gives a great look behind the music scene in Manchester, from the famous Sex Pistols show that was attended by some of the future members of the some of the most influential bands of the late '80s and early '90s. The flick is a lot of fun, and I enjoyed the frequent breaking of the 4th wall as Steve Coogan addresses the audience directly from time to time with anecdotes and asides.

I decided to have a cocktail while I watched, which snowballed into many a Redbull and vodka, which is always an enjoyable night, even if it essentially means that I'm saying I'm going to blow off sleep almost completely.

The wife returned with some really sad looking salads that weren't close to ebing what we'd ordered, so we had dinner and I popped in Groove for a re-watch, as it seemed to be a good way to keep the dance music vibes going. I really love that flick, it uses an ensemble cast of virtual unknowns to great effect, as you never have any real 'hey, it's THAT guy' moments, expect that a cop in the film is played by the gentleman who has now found fame playing Ron Swanson on Parks & Recreation, so that was a bit distracting.

The wife crashed out and I popped in a DVD compilation of techno videos while I piddled around on the iPad and made myself another healthy drink to keep my night going.

Eventually I threw on Wanted for a re-watch, because it's a fun flick that I wanted to see on the new television, as the visuals are pretty stunning and I figured would be really impressive with the new set-up. Great fun, and I finally moved into the Office late, where I decided to call it quits with my final drink, as I just didn't think I needed anything else as I was feeling 'over-served' as Morris puts it.

I fucked around on the web for a few hours and then finally started feeling tired, falling into bed near 4:00 in the AM. I woke about an hour later and walked briskly to the hall bathroom and barfed up that crappy little salad as well as what felt like half of what I had drank over the course of the evening. This left me feeling a bit silly, as I'm not in the habit of drinking to that kind of excess, so to be unable to 'talk myself down' over the gag reflex was rather annoying. I rinsed my mouth several times and made sure there wasn't any sort of mess to give with wife an unpleasant surprise, then headed back to bed to try and get some rest.

Be seeing you.

Sleepy, Cheapy, TeeVee

The wife was up somewhat early today, leaving me snoozing until around 11:00 before I finally got up and moving. I checked in with her in the Craft Room and got the house opened up for business. Once I had the sleep out of my eyes I decided to think about getting out of the house for a bit, as the last few days of laziness had left me feeling slightly stir crazy after awhile. The wife wasn't really interested in my outing idea, so she split to go and grab a bite to eat for her lunch while I got dressed and headed out to poke around at our Big Lots to see what Black Friday might've turned up.

Happily, I was able to turn up several of the MGM Midnite Movies discs that I had seen mentioned online, still at the rather affordable $1.88 apiece, so I actually ended up with a fairly significant stack of stuff from that particular cardboard dump near the front of the store. After I got out of there I weighed my odds of finding similar items in Odessa and figured what the hell, I'd give it a shot. I didn't find as much over there as I did in town, but I turned up a few things that made it worth the trip, so I was pleased.

The drive home was uneventful, though I did take time to touch base with the wife (who I had a feeling would soon be catching an afternoon nap) to see if she wanted any kind of dessert item from the burger joint I was going to grab a late lunch from as I got back into town. She wasn't interested, so I left her to grab some zzz's and pointed the car towards home, picking up some food on the way to tide me over until dinner.

I spent the afternoon with more random television off the TiVo, finally settling into an episode of Masterpiece Mystery! that I had left over from a few months back: Poirot: The Clocks. I still enjoy them, but I have to say that the later films don't have quite the same zest as the original episodes, nor the first handful of films David Suchet made with the character, I can only assume that this reflects different folks behind the camera, as well as different people doing the actual adaptations. Oh well, they're still watchable, but the earlier ones just seemed to grab me a bit more.

The wife and I spent the evening with the normal Fox animation fare and were about to call it a night when I happened to notice that our HD block of channels were MIA, with only a gray blank screen to be found, though this was not the case in the bedroom, meaning that our TiVo was the device with the issue. We spoke to the Suddenlink people, who told us that the people who deal with the TiVo side of things for them weren't available at this hour, though the wife had already asked them to re-set the boxes at this point. I dunno if this had any effect or not (as the TiVo has replaced the 'box' with two 'cable cards' that we had to have installed by special request) but a few minutes later the same channels had been restored. If this was something on their end that they fixed, or if whatever the lady did to the other boxes had an effect, I really don't care, I'm just relieved that it's all working properly again.

I put the wife to bed, then stepped into the Office to work on this nonsense.

Be seeing you.

TiVo Take Me Away....

The wife was up for awhile this morning before I finally woke at 10:30 or so, time which she spent picking up the house a bit and organizing in the pantry, which it kinda desperately needed, so that was a nice turn of events. We visited for a bit and I made myself some tea and got the house opened up to take in the absolutely disgusting weather outside. A cold front was blowing in and pretty much turning the skies a hideous yellowish orange color as the dust and detritus passed us by. We both resolved to stay indoors so as not to do any more damage to the sinuses than absolutely necessary.

I spent some time in the Office working on the blog while the wife piddled a bit more in the Craft Room, then we eventually settled into the den to watch some television and try to avoid the outside world as much as possible.

We basically spent the day with the TiVo and the various television programming contained therein, so there's really not a whole lot to tell you people, aside from the fact that I did finally get caught up on The Walking Dead so that we can check out the 'mid-season' finale or whatever they call the cliff-hanger that they do over the December break. It's also nice to be caught up so as not to have any asshole casually comment on something on Twitter and ruin a plot point for me, which happened at least once over an episode a few weeks back. It's as if some people watch these with a running commentary of whatever they see on the screen, I may have to drop a few people if they can't keep their fucking mouths shut. The show is getting a little more interesting to me as we get further into this season, though I would still say that I have a hard time caring what happens to any of the characters, as their actions seem to constantly sway from will to survive to despair and back again several times within each episode, so who the hell do you really root for? Oh, and I know they've lost some of their budget this season, but their continuity is complete dogshit the past few episodes, as people can have dirt, sweat or grime disappear and reappear on their faces like 9 times within a single scene as the camera flips from one actor to another during a conversation; it's almost comical and rather distracting if they're talking about anything of any gravity to their situation.

And that was pretty much our day, just television punctuated here and there with breaks for some lunch that I made for us and later in the evening the wife ordered in some deli food that we had over an episode of Hawaii Five-O to round out the night.

Having spent the day with tons of TV shows I have to say that I'm still a little freaked out to see that we have stuff left over, I guess I didn't watch a stitch of television during the month of October in favor of focusing on horror stuff, and now we're paying the price.

We called it a night around 10:00, as is our custom.

Be seeing you.

Casino Meow 281

The wife got up early this morning and spent some time piddling around the kitchen with the last bits of cleaning from yesterday's meal prep, then was actually back in bed asleep in the late morning when I was roused by some random phone call that had my phone vibrating around the nightstand. I left her snoozing with the Yorkie and checked my voicemail, which turned out to be some credit card that's taken it upon itself to start calling me to touch base via a Goddamned automated message saying how happy they are to be serving me or some kind of nonsense. Bah.

I got some water boiling for tea and then fired up the PC to see what the world was up to on Black Friday, which mostly amounted to the usual nuttiness of someone getting pepper-sprayed over a $2 waffle iron or something X-Box related, which seems about par for the course of being in a worked up crowd at a Wal-Mart in the middle of the night. Yikes. I worked on the blog a bit, then started putting together a couple little orders of stuff I had my eye on with a few different websites, as the consumerism is getting the better of me this season. I think it will abate once I actually start shopping ofr the wife, but right now it's been hard to ignore several super cheap sales over this weekend, and Twitter hasn't helped, with all the cries of "Hey, _______ is currently cheap at _________ right now!".

The wife got up and moving around this time, so she and I both spent some time visiting in the Office, then she worked on sorting her closet a bit and I decided to get out and grab a burger, braving the sprinkling rains to do so.

The wife and dog chilled in the bedroom in the afternoon, so I retired to the den with my food to watch something off the To-Watch Pile, selecting something I had never watched before, Casino Royale from 1967. A fun spoof of the James Bond material, I have to say that I'm glad I watched this now rather than years ago, as I don't think I would have appreciated the material in quite the same way that I did today. Fun, zany little flick.

The wife and Yorkie turned up as we started getting into the evening, refreshed from their nap, and the wife worked on some laundry and sorted some stuff in the Craft Room while I hopped online again. I had a final Lightning Round deal I wanted to hit this evening before I would be able to take the weekend 'off' from Amazon shopping. I was happy to snag the 2nd season of Eastbound And Down for $9, then we finally ended up in the den and watched one of the bonus discs out of the Citizen Kane Blu-ray set, which contains the film RKO 281, a dramatization of the battles behind the scenes that happened once William Randolph Hearst got wind of what the film was about. The film holds up rather well, and the mention of a previous scandal in Hearst's life led me to our final selection to round out the night.

The Cat's Meow is based around the scandal from earlier in Hearst's life, in which director Thomas Ince was allegedly shot dead on the big man's yacht. This event was fishily covered up by all of Hearst's newspapers at the time, as well as the fact that those on the boat all seemed to benefit financially shortly after the events and Ince's body was cremated immediately after death, so there would be no chance of further investigation. The speculations of the film are interesting indeed, following a line of thought that the death is directly related to Hearst's mistress having a possibly dalliance with Charlie Chaplin (also present) and Ince getting in the middle of the situation. It's an interesting film, though I would say that it's not as polished as RKO 281 as far as period pieces go, and some of the characterizations are downright grating at certain points.

Okay, Jennifer Tilly as Louella Parsons. There. I said it. She almost drive me apeshit.

We called it a night shortly after the movie and I got started on this post once I got the wife put to bed.

Be seeing you.

The Traditional Thanksgiving Routine: Killer Turkey & Porn

The wife was up with the dawn to work on the Thanksgiving meal, with the traditional parade nonsense playing in the background. I was relieved to see that she was feeling much better than she had the night before, possibly it was nerves? Or just some passing thing related to the onion rolls that she made sandwiches with? Who knows, I was just happy to see her back to normal.

The Yorkie and I slept in and finally got up and about around 10:00. I made myself some tea and fetched the newspaper, then sat at the kitchen counter visiting with the wife as she worked for awhile, then I excused myself to work on the blog for a bit and get a post published to keep teasing things closer to being current.

Plus, full admission, I wanted to spend some time on the web checking out the various sales to see what else I can waste some money on before I finally bear down and start shopping for my wife instead of pissing away cash on crap for myself.

Anyway...

The Mother In Law called and spoke to the wife regarding the time-frame of the meal, as well as seeing if I would mind picking up Grandmother and dropping her off in advance of the meal. I agreed and got dressed, then had another cup of tea to kill some time before I went and shuttled Grandmother over the the MIL's home. The MIL's Beau was out of town for the afternoon to visit his Mother, so I dropped Grandmother off to visit with her eldest daughter, then returned home to start helping the wife load everything into the car to travel back over to the MIL's house.

We arrived and unloaded, then were joined by the Eldest Sister and her family, so we caught up a bit and visited in advance of the meal, then started getting down to business with some great food. The meal was pretty awesome if I do say so myself, the wife puts on a great spread and the turkey was gloriously tender and juicy. The meal was quiet and hassle free and it's always fun to visit with the Niece and Nephew and see what they've been up to.

We picked up after the meal, and since Grandmother was getting antsy we started getting things ready to take home and the Eldest Sister and her family split, as they still had another meal to go to at her In-Law's place and needed to be across town soon. We were loading stuff up as the Beau returned, so we said hi and bye before gathering Grandmother and taking her back to her place. I walked her inside and then we headed home to see what the Yorkie was up to.

The Thanksgiving routine the past couple years has consisted of the wife and I relaxing in bed after the meal with a viewing of Thankskilling courtesy of Netfux Instant Watch, in which a killer talking turkey kills a bunch of terrible actors. It's a truly terrible movie but it's a lot of fun and only about an hour long, so it doesn't overstay its welcome.

After the movie I had to jump online for a few and snap up an Amazon Lightning Round deal for Mad Men season four on Blu-ray, as it was supposed to go for only $8.99 for the set. I was able to grab it and was surprised to see that the thing went fast, showing to be about 50% claimed only five minutes after the deal went live.

The wife and I relaxed afterward in the den with another little something off the To-Watch Pile: Wonderland, which tells the story of the latter days of porn legend John Holmes as his drug use and general sketchiness puts him into a tailspin of self destructive behavior that culminated in the Wonderland Murders, where some of Holmes' cronies found themselves double crossed and bludgeoned to death after a drug related robbery they commit. I really enjoy the movie, it's got a great cast and some really well conceived bits to indicate the stoned state of the leads or the passage of time as they scan newspapers or maps to move the film forward. Good stuff, well worth a look.

We wrapped the night with a series of television items, including an older Desperate Housewives, Bored To Death and the brand new episode of Dave's Old Porn from this evening, which was a helluva lot of fun as always. He had both Jim Norton and the legendary Seka on to take a look at some of her work, leading to some truly hilarious moments. Highly recommend this show if you have Showtime, it's well worth your time.

We called it a night shortly afterward and I got started on this crapola for the day.

Be seeing you.

Finally A Day I Can Be Thankful For!

The wife and I both got a great night's sleep last night, then she got started on the preparations for the Thanksgiving meal this morning. I slept in a bit later, then woke feeling rather refreshed and went to see what the wife was up to in the kitchen.

We visited a bit and I gathered up some of our recycling to clear off the counters and clutter in the pantry, then I retired to the Office to poke around the web a bit, as I've been catching a few deals here and there as part of everyone's push to make Black Friday last for an entire week instead of just one blissfully engorged day of commerce porn that blows its load by mid-afternoon the day after Thanksgiving.

I also took the time to finally post the blog relating the day of our party/death of our receiver, a post which I debated shit-canning altogether, as I know it may read a bit harsh, but I decided to just press ahead with the feelings as they happened, as I'm obviously over it at this point and would like to indicate the progression of events.

The wife took a break from her cooking to chill with the Yorkie for a nap in the afternoon and I left them to snooze while I moved into the den and watched something off the TiVo while I snacked on some chips and dip. I had been putting off listening to a certain podcast that covered a movie called Fear City that I just so happened to have recorded a few months back, so I finally gave that a spin and enjoyed it immensely. The film is set in NYC in the '80s, with a nutjob killer slicing up strippers for no discernible reason, as all he does is work out, do martial arts and work on some weird journal in which he writes about his crimes. He's actually a giant killjoy dickface and he's completely ridiculous as he attacks these women using martial arts and bladed weapons as though he's trying to take out a Navy SEAL, not a 120 lb. unarmed woman trying to catch the subway home, which is pretty amusing all the way around. The movie is alternately silly as hell and wildly engrossing because it features a ton of backgrounds set around the seedier side of NYC in the '80s, which is always fun to see since it's all been sanitized now. Great stuff.

The wife worked on more stuff in the kitchen in the late afternoon, baking some cookies and decorating them once the requisite pies were made, while I piddled on the PC for a few, then finally settled into the den again as we crept into evening.

The wife joined me and we watched The Killer Inside Me off the To-Watch Pile, which has been dramatically neglected recently in favor of clearing the TiVo out a bit, so it felt good to relax with some long form entertainment instead of something formatted to the hour running time. The movie was a pretty decent adaptation of the novel (or at least as I recall the details of the Jim Thompson novel from reading it many moons ago), though I would be hard pressed to say that Casey Affleck as the lead has anything resembling a small town Texas sheriff's accent. Oh well, it's a valiant effort and I enjoyed the overall look of the film, it was worth the $2 from a pawn shop.

We watched an episode of Hung to try and catch up a bit with that show, then flipped over to catch this week's episode of American Horror Story before calling it a night.

I put the wife and Yorkie to bed and then got started on this post in the Office before I heard distressing sounds from the master bathroom. I was surprised to find the wife feeling rather ill in the bathroom, neither one of us could figure out what might've caused this, as we both ate rather mundane meals today, just sandwiches and that sort of thing. I hope she's back to normal in the AM, I'd hate for her to feel awful all day Thanksgiving day.

Be seeing you.

Frankly, I'll Be Thankful When This Week Is Over...

Since I was sleeping so well this morning I was naturally driven from the bed by a strange beeping sound. When it finally registered that it was the alarm system I dragged myself from bed and turned it off, sizing up the issue and realizing that the power was off, presumably from some sort of issue on the end of the electric company. The wife was in the shower, and though I tried to get back to sleep it was too late, I could still hear the battery backup on the PC crying for help with its own little beeps of distress, so I finally said the hell with it and got up.

When the wife realized the issue after getting dried off she called to check on any possible outages in the area only to learn that the issue was on our end, as the bill hadn't been paid, slipping through the cracks while she's been tied up with other stuff. I tried not to let this piss me off while she made the emergency phone payment via her debit card to set things right, and as far as it goes I was fairly successful.

The wife had to be at a meeting where the presumably had electricity (sorry, slight lingering bitterness), so she split to go and do that and I looked at e-mail on the phone and checked on Twitter for a bit, then made lunch plans with EL for later in the day and decided to just get dressed and go run around for a bit, as I really wanted to be online and was unable to do so, so I figured out of sight, out of mind, right?

I killed some time in several pawns shops, as well as making a trip into the local books, music and video outlet and found a magazine, my usual meanderings, to be perfectly honest.

I met EL for lunch and found out that DR was unable to join us due to his holiday scheduling at work, so he and I caught up quite a bit, as he hadn't heard about the shenanigans this weekend, and he'd taken a trip with his wife, so there was that to hear about as well. We ended up staying a bit longer than usual, caught up in some odd subjects that we might not generally get into with another person around, so that was nice. We wished one another a happy Thanksgiving and went on our separate ways, as I had a hankering for a cup of coffee on the way home to shake off my early morning.

The wife had texted that the power was restored, so I was thankfully able to park in the garage when I returned, as I had earlier been forced to manually raise and lower the door for both of our cars, which is something of a pain in the ass.

The wife caught a nap with the Yorkie while I spent some time on the PC getting the blog caught up, then I roused her around 3:30, as we were expecting the delivery of a new box spring at 4:00 and I wanted to get the bedroom ready to receive it. We got the mattress and box spring moved, then I took out the slats that support the bed set, as our plan is to set it on the new box spring so as to stabilize the bed further and not worry about the cheesy slats threatening to break free of the sideboards or the middle supports on each one trying to chew up the wood flooring. I took the time to get all the dust bunnies out of there and the spare flooring that was stored there moved out to the garage storage room, then I brought in the spare carpeting that was left over after our renovations so that I could measure out a piece to place under this whole set-up to protect the floor from further damage.

The delivery guys turned up and placed the boxspring after a bit of finagling, as they still had to remove to little 'ledge' that it would sit on to allow it to hit the ground, then placed the other box spring in place. I told them that was sufficient, as I figured the wife and I would need to tinker a bit with it anyway before making the bed and could move the mattress ourselves. Once we got those guys on their way the wife got our dinner prepared to a point that she could step away while it baked and we got the bedroom restored to its normal configuration, which seemed to relax the dog quite a bit, as she didn't know what the hell to think with a mattress on the floor and pillows scattered everywhere.

The wife spent some time paying bills (thank you, Christ) in between keeping an eye on the lasagna she was making for dinner and I retired to the den to watch an episode of Prime Suspect, a show we're still a few weeks behind on that I understand is most likely cancelled, but I figure I'll ride it down to the end, as is my custom.

The wife and I took in last week's episode of Person Of Interest, then American Horror Story over dinner, rounding out the evening with an episode of Ghost Hunters, a show I know I still record out of habit rather than interest in the program, but I dunno what it'll take to bore me completely. We still have a decent amount of fun poking fun at it, so it does have entertainment value of a sort.

I tucked the wife into her new bed and then headed to the Office to get this post put together while poking around the web for Black Friday deals that interest me. Not for others mind you, just stuff for me, as I'm the worst kind of gift giver, shopping mainly for myself at most sales.

Be seeing you.

Planes, Receivers And Post Offices

The wife and I were both up early this morning to meet Morris at the Mother In Law's house and drop off the Jeep he'd borrowed to drive over the weekend, then we'd run him to the airport to catch his late morning flight home. The wife woke and spent some time with e-mail, I had the alarm roust me shortly afterward and got dressed, then she and I drove the few blocks to the MIL's place and waited in the pissing, shitty English weather for Morris to arrive.

We made our way through the grey dawn to the airport, said our goodbyes and then sent him on his merry way.

The wife and I stopped at the grocery store in the way back into town, as it was time for a good grocery run for the house, as well as a good time to try to beat the holiday crowds and load up for this Thursday's Thankgiving adventure. We spent a solid two hours in that store, trudging through the masses and winding up and down what felt like most of the aisles. I only began to truly feel the time when we finally made it to the check-out area and managed to select the poor kid who was having issues with pretty much every other item he was trying to ring up for people. I chit-chatted with the wife and amused myself by watching a redhead in line ahead of us try to keep her bored daughter entertained by putting her in the basket with what is the frozen corpse of a turkey that they planned to eat, which seemed to amuse the child to no end. She'd probably have a blast if mommy took her to a funeral! Whee!

I'm being stupid here, but seriously, just try to think about any other scenario in which the frozen corpse of anything is okay to just hang out with a little 3 year old in a wire enclosure and the mom doesn't get sent away for a few years. It just sounds crazy.

We hit the drive-thru at Starbuck's afterward, which left me wondering how many cumulative years of my life I will have wasted in that parking lot by the time I finally shake off this mortal coil, then I pointed the car toward the house and we spent a good 10 minutes or more making the several trips to drag all of our stuff inside. We put everything away and I cleaned out some off the odd stuff that was cluttering up the hall fridge to make way for the new stuff, then we went through the mail and I sent the wife off to run a few errands of her own.

I looked at e-mail on the phone, then noted the time and realized that I had an hour until the Best Buy's Geek Squad was set to arrive and survey the damage on the surround sound system, so I got a Swap A DVD trade ready to mail and hit the Post Office to get that on its way to California. On the way there I got kinda stuck behind this SUV whose driver was kinda drifting around as if he wasn't sure exactly where he was headed, but he naturally finally gets in my way in the turn lane to turn into the Post Office parking lot, indicating that I would most likely have to see this dude face to face. I sighed inwardly and hoped that I wouldn't get stuck behind this no-driving jackass in the line inside as well.

As you might naturally assume, I was directly behind the guy when I walked into the lobby, which was stacked out to the entry doors because it's the holidays and they sure as hell won't have any extra help, right? Adding to my growing tension was the fact that I noticed that this guy is talking to ANYONE who even looks in his direction, so I slip the phone out and study my e-mail like I'm cramming for an exam. I feel his eyes flit over me and I start texting the wife: "I'm texting you and Twittering so that the asshole in front of my won't talk to me and make me have to yell at him." I glanced up furtively to see that he'd actually put his hand around the shoulder of the STRANGER in front of him, guffawing conspiritorily about the fucking weather of all things, which made me grind my teeth and look at Twitter to see what the newest Lightning Deals are on Amazon were for the week of Black Friday. I eventually ran across a large list of sale titles and e-mailed it to myself, noting that my nemesis was next in line and I would soon be rid of him, then he suddenly turned to me and asked "Hey, whats that dog's name?" and I almost screamed "FUCK!" at the top of my lungs because I was so close to not having to make small talk about dumb shit with the town crier.

I said "Excuse me?" and he indicated a Scooby-Doo stuffed animal that inexplicably stood guard on the desk of one of the postal workers, so I told him who it was and since it wasn't the sound of his own voice he didn't hear me properly and I had to repeat myself and he still repeated something that sounded like Skibby-Doo back to me and I said yes and darted to the next available window while he jabbered at the guy waiting on him about Skibby-Doo before eventually purchasing some stamps. I got the hell out of there before I got lured into further jackassery, because some days the patience wears so fucking thin you can hear it making a noise like a rubber band stretched too far, waiting to snap.

Back at the house the Yorkie and I settled into the Office for a bit, though the Geek Squad's arrival pissed her off to no end and I was forced to sequester her to our side of the house while I related the scenario and subsequent issues to them. They ran the receiver through the various tests and eventually reported back that the patient was indeed dead, so they fetched a suitable replacement and spent another hour or so installing it, getting everything properly routed and the universal remote set up to deal with the new equipment. I spent this time in the Office, working on the blog for a bit, then caught most of a live recording of Outside The Cinema, which I'm usually never around for, so that was a nice happenstance of being trapped in the Office for the afternoon.

One new reciever and a couple upgraded HDMI cables later we have sound once again, so the fellas gave me a brief tour of the new functions on the universal remote, then they took their leave.

Cue massive sigh of relief.

The wife had returned during this time, but since she had yoga this evening, she soon split to go and do all that, so I settled into the den to see what the TiVo had been up to over the past few days left on its own. I was in the middle of last week's Supernatural when the wife returned, so I paused that and got the sushi we'd bought for dinner served up on the little tray we usually eat from, then we relaxed with some California rolls and watched the last of the show. We moved on to a weeks-old episode of Desperate Housewives later, then wrapped the evening with Sunday night's Dexter before calling it a night.

I put the wife to bed, then headed to the Office to work on the blog some more, getting another post published before starting in on today's, since I live about a week behind these days.

I'm off to bed to finish re-reading Less Than Zero.

Be seeing you.

The Venting Of My Spleen

I slept in this morning, woken only briefly when our two house guests presumably let themselves out and the Yorkie voiced her discontent. I had been so agitated as I tried to go to sleep last night that I ended up being up reading a book trying to calm down for the better part of two hours before I finally fell asleep. The combo of spicy foods and liquor ended up keeping me awake on and off for the rest of the night, so it was something of a pain in the ass to get to sleep for any real length of time.

I got up near noon and went in search of the wife, who was piddling around in the Office. I wasn't surprised to find my irritation over the surround sound situation unabated, waking up sober but still agitated about the entire situation, which the wife and I talked over and after I took one final pass at the machine, unplugging and reconnecting everything I could imagine would have a bearing on 're-booting' any safe mode it might've been shocked into. Afterward she was kind enough to put in a call to Best Buy so that we could see what the Geek Squad could do about this, lining out an appointment for tomorrow afternoon to have them come out and diagnose exactly how fucked we are. We're essentially $100 in the hole just by setting up this visit, so it's all downhill from here. Sigh.

Morris and the wife spoke on the phone while I vented my agitation on Twitter for a bit, then he joined us and we got out to drive thru a late lunch from a nearby chicken place. We ate back at the house while going through the newspaper, which got me in the mood to check out a few bargains at Best Buy, so we stepped back out to run by there and grab a coffee at Starbuck's. I located my various bargains in spite of the normal chaotic stocking strategies that Best Buy now has, tracking down the three movies I was after with little hassle, though I did pause to bug an employee to price check something, as none of these sale items had any signage placed on them yet.

We dropped in on the Mother In Law and her Beau on the way back to the house, spent a couple hours visiting with them before finally heading back to our house to chill out. With my den pretty much out of commission I decided to watch the normal Fox animation stuff in the bedroom, as I figured that all the other stuff we'd normally watch tonight (Dexter, Walking Dead, etc.) could be caught on re-run later in the week should there be any issue with the TiVo and its recordings this evening. I say all this on the assumption that the issues will be sorted out tomorrow, so perhaps I'm more optimistic than I would let myself believe.

Morris and the wife visited and piddled around in the den for a bit, then in the sitting area off the kitchen before finally drifting into the bedroom to join me for a bit of television. We watched part of last week's episode of Dexter before Morris headed out, the plan being that we'll meet him at the MIL's house tomorrow and then run him to the airport. The wife and I finished the show, then caught last week's Dave's Old Porn via the On Demand service, something that the damned TiVo kept dumping due to whatever issues it was having as far as recording space went, so I was happy to catch it at long last.


The wife crashed out for the evening and I headed into the Office to get this post started and possibly try to catch up the blog from earlier in the week.

Be seeing you.

It's Not A Party Until Someone Completely Fucking Destroys Your Home Entertainment Set-Up

The wife had been pretty coy about some final birthday surprise that she had for me, but would have to pick up Saturday morning, so I went to bed last night assuming that she had some sort of breakfast item in mind or something of that nature. The idea was that she had to be somewhere around 10:00, so if I was awake I would go with her, but if not she'd simply deliver the surprise to me at the house. As it turned out I was up late last night, so I got up today and was in the process of putting the kettle on and getting the sleep from my eyes when she arrived from her errand with our friend Morris in tow.

Color me surprised, as I knew there was no way he'd be able to get away for the party, so him flying in was the last thing on my mind, so this was a really big surprise, I have to tellya. We visited for a bit, then I got dressed and we headed out to grab some lunch at a Mexican place across town, in spite of the plan to have Mexican food again for dinner, as it just sounded good for lunch.

We had some good food, then ran by the liquor store on the way home to prepare for the night's festivities. Morris split to go and visit his mother in the afternoon and the wife and Yorkie caught a nap in preparation for our evening, so I watched a little something off the TiVo called Vice Squad in which Season Hubley plays Princess, a prostitute in L.A. who is used to entrap a vicious pimp called Ramrod, played by Wings Hauser in an early role. The film takes place over the course of a single night and once the pimp escapes custody the vice squad scrambles to track him down before he can seek revenge on Hubley, who is unaware of the danger she's in as she goes about her normal trick-filled night. The movie was pretty interesting, reminding me a bit of Paul Schrader's Hardcore with George C. Scott, which also just so happened to co-star Hubely as another hooker. Good stuff, worth a peep if you get a chance.

I showered in the late afternoon and got cleaned up for the evening, then spent some time picking up the house and getting things squared away as far as lighting and the bar set up went. The wife showered and dressed after I did, then went to pick up the food while I spent some time setting up the stereo, a process that would be our downfall, as the post title may have, um, hinted...

Since you can't really watch a film at a party because you can never hear it over people's various conversations, I had decided in advance to throw in a succession of subtitled films to play in the background, as they would leave something visual for people to enjoy if they chose to look into the den and they could 'read' without feeling like they were missing out on the dialog, but I put our normal assortment of CD's on random to play throughout the house, as I'd prefer that folks hear strains of music if there was a lull in conversation rather than people chattering in a foreign language. Again, I thought I had totally thought this through, but bear with me...

The wife returned with the food, just behind JH and Morris, who had both turned up a little bit early in case we needed help setting up. We visited a bit, Morris volunteered to play bartender and started making a few cocktails, then our other guests began to turn up shortly after 7:00. We greeted and visited and mingled our little hearts out for awhile, then someone finally made the first move on the food line and I had another drink as I chitchatted with a friend I rarely see and his new bride, then they settled in for some food and I moved on to try and play good host by making time to catch up with everyone.

The assembled included Brian, our friend Scrawny McTall and her sweet husband, The Minister and his Wife, the new executive director of the museum, lots of people that made for an interesting mix of folks. After the various feedings hard started to die down a bit the wife led folks on a tour of the renovations on the far side of the house, which I joined after grabbing another drink from Morris, catching up with Scrawny McTall and her hubby as Brian gave them a lingering tour of things behind the other group.

We eventually heard a weird blaring noise in the other room that dissipated
quickly, so I honestly thought nothing of it, figuring someone had maybe fiddled with the remote and then turned it back down.

We made our way back to the other side of the house and I noticed that the Minister and his Wife were in the den checking out the movie, but thought nothing of it, as that was sort of the plan, watch it if you want, or socialize if you want, right? I drifted back ot the kitchen table and was speaking to JT and his new bride when a sudden shrill noise had everyone in the house covering their ears, only to stop suddenly.

As it turned out, the Minister's Wife had decided that she "wanted to hear the French" and evidently maxed out the volume completely on our surround sound system trying to get it to play something besides the CD's it was spinning. The 'protect' warning flashing on the front of the receiver gave me a sinking feeling in my stomach, so I fiddled with it as best I could in my frankly buzzed state and was rather alarmed to find that there was no sound to be had on any of the devices plugged into the surround sound system. I completely shut down everything several times, got no response from the speakers, tried turning it all off by pressing the power button on the surge protector that everything is plugged into, still got zero response when the TiVo re-booted, none of that familiar THX logo bass, leading me to believe that we are well and truly fucked.

I got apologies from both the Minister and his Wife at this point, which I think (sorry, but I was drunk) that I accepted without being an asshole, something I don't know that I will be able to do if they want to talk much further about this, as the situation is so amazingly alien to me. I would never dream of messing around with another person's stuff this way, and since I thought I had gone out of my way to accomodate both music and visuals, I was slightly furious that someone would go out of their way to cock that up, if even accidentally. And I know it was all a big accident, but there was absolutely NO REASON for it to happen, and I was seriously told that she was sorry, but she had just wanted to hear the French. Hear the French.

I was able to resist the urge to scream "Hear the French? Y'mean the language that you don't speak and that is being simultaneously translated on the screen for you? REALLY?!?" It's times like this that I really wonder what a stroke feels like.

Since I was drunk and seething with anger at this point I kinda stepped away and hit the bathroom and tried to re-group mentally, then re-joined the party, grabbing a stiff drink in hopes that it would take some of the sting away. I'd already resigned myself to giving up on the sound system until I was sober and able to deal with it logically and not just start yanking cords in frustration. I'm not sure how much this turn of events colored the rest of the evening, but people did start splitting shortly after this clusterfuck happened, and I got another apology and a note from the Minister's Wife requesting that we send her the bill for the repairs, which we'll of course never do, because it's not worth it, but by the same token I don't know that I'll be able to not yell at this woman the next time I see her. Hell, I had made tentative plans to have lunch with her husband at some point, so how the fuck am I supposed to get through a meal in a Chili's without asking him to his face if his wife is an idiot? That's no lunch I wanna go to; I feel so completely fucked in this situation, which may abate slightly once we get a chance to start planning the repair process, but holy shit, why did this have to happen?

I mean fucking yikes, if you're in someone else's house and something doesn't appear to be working, wouldn't you find your host and ask what's up? Not just keep hammering away at buttons? Or am I the idiot who's too nice for my own good and this is just how people normally act? So Goddamned frustrating. Sigh.

If we ever host another party (chances are slim at this point) I'm sticking the remote up my ass where it will be safe and warm, just so no one can start fucking around with it.

At any rate, as the party eventually dwindled down to Brian, Morris, JH and the museum's executive director we all settled into the kitchen and I continued to hammer down cocktails and alternately whinge and bitch about the stereo system, because frankly it's easier to do that than throw shit and yell, which is pretty much what I wanted to do, because Goddammit, can't we just have nice things? DR eventually joined us after 10:00 when he got off work and I spoke to the Hairdressers to see if they would be by, as they were our only other 'maybe' folksthat I really expected might still turn up. They begged off, as one of them was feeling sick and they had worked later than usual. They did mention something weird about Anastasia Beaverhouszen (who is in Italy at this time) planning to send by some kind of surprise, which I only halfway registered, as I was pretty well half in the bag by this stage of the evening.

About 30 minutes later I'll be Goddamned if the doorbell doesn't ring, and it's a couple pizzas delivered courtesy of our friends in Italy, who couldn't join us but instead sent some Italian food in their stead.

What a sweet couple, I was very touched to be sure.

We snacked some more and the evening began to wind down after midnight, as the wife had to call it a night since she was totally exhausted. Our final stragglers ended up being Morris and JH, who would crash out over on the Guest Side of the house as I finally retired to the Office to start working up the notes for this post and venting my rage a bit.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.

Television After-Birth Day

After being up until the wee hours of the morning I went to bed around 5:00 AM when I finished reading about 50 pages into Less Than Zero. I slept a scant 6 hours and got up around 11:00 this morning to find the Yorkie still lounging bed with me and the wife gone to volunteer at some sort of charity thing that was setting up for an afternoon event.

I got the house opened up and looked at e-mail, then dressed and got out to mail a few things for Swap A DVD trades and hit the bank, then picked up some lunch after a coffee from Starbuck's started to get me fully alert and aware.

The TiVo has still been being something of an asshole, leaving me paranoid that it will just arbitrarily decide to delete this show or that, so I sat down to eat and watch a couple shows, just to try and stay ahead of the recording schedule that threatens to max it out even though I've essentially stopped recording any new films until the thing is at least half empty.

I blew through several episodes of Nikita and was in the middle of a Prime Suspect when the wife returned from her afternoon outing. We caught up and visited a bit, then were eventually joined by JH, who had spent the afternoon volunteering with the wife and brought over some dinner for us to enjoy.

We visited over food, then watched a string of television, including a couple episodes of Person Of Interest and this week's Fringe just to be sure that the TiVo didn't try to fuck me on it. Seriously, I've become rather paranoid about it, it's kinda sad.

We rounded out the evening with The Soup, Gigolos just because that show is the train wreck that I can't escape and a new episode of Dave's Old Porn, which had me rolling with laughter as Dave Attell and Adam Carolla described Georgina Spelvin as an 'anal pioneer' and the 'Rosa Parks of anal sex'. Carolla also cracked me up during a particularly spicy scene when he suddenly exclaims "wait, you mean to tell me that this is that old gal in the next room?", as they actually had Spelvin herself on hand to talk about her time in the business, which was pretty interesting to hear from an elderly woman.

Our guest split and I put the wife to bed before stepping into the Office to work on the notes for this post before I called it a night my damned self.

Be seeing you.

Harold And Kumar's Pulpy Brown Zero

The wife and the Yorkie let me sleep in on this, the day of my birth. I turned 37 today, so I woke around 9:30 and got up to greet the day and see what this new year would hold for me. As it turned out it seemed to be just the same doting wonderful wife I had enjoyed the day before as well as the same pain in the ass, lovable dog, so I suppose it's all good.

The wife offered to get my kettle boiling so that I could have my morning tea, then she presented me with the first of three gift bags of birthday goodies, which contained an assortment of films, including the big fat Blu-ray release of Citizen Kane, which is one of my favorite films of all time, something that I hope I can say without sounding predictable or corny, as well as a few of the Shout! Factory Roger Corman releases, taking us from one end of the cinema spectrum to the other.

The wife and I visited a bit, then decided to have an early lunch at a Japanese steakhouse, as I was mulling the idea of sushi for dinner and figured that if we 'got it out of the way' for lunch that it would free up the evening for a pizza and some quiet time at the house, an idea which appealed to me a great deal. The In-Laws had been sweet enough to offer to take us out to a dressy dinner for the birthday, but I begged off, as it just sounded like a pain in the ass to get out and all fancy dressed just to have a good steak, especially since this is something we could do pretty much any night of the week. I kinda felt like my birthday should truly be my own to enjoy as I would prefer, which is home alone with the wife, relaxing.

We had a great lunch, the restaurant was basically empty and allowed us a quiet meal for the most part, then we wandered around Target to pick up a couple odds and ends that we needed for the house, which helped kill time before we had to be at the theater to catch a movie.

We turned up about 20 minutes early to see A Very Harold & Kumar 3-D Christmas, the 3rd film in the series about a couple of pot smoking pals who frequently encounter Neil Patrick Harris playing a drug-addled pussy-hound version of himself. The ticket gal who sold us our tickets actually said that this was the best looking 3-D that she had been privy to, so we went in looking to have a good time and were not disappointed. To be quite frank, I had the impression that the ticket gal wanted to go and burn one and then check out the movie again with us, as she was being besieged by people turning up for the release of the new Twilight nonsense, so who could blame her? The movie has a ton of cute bits, as well as some obviously irritating moments of predictable stoner humor, but that's to be expected, considering the subject matter, right?

We picked up a pizza to cook for dinner after the movie, then grabbed a coffee from Starbuck's and headed home to chill out and see what the Yorkie had been up to.

We piddled around the house for a bit, eventually settling into the den to watch some random television off the TiVo in an effort to clear it out a bit further, then I popped in a little something of the To-Watch Pile that I had been saving up for a special occasion.

Pulp Fiction on Blu-ray: what better way to celebrate my birthday than with a film that would easily make it into my top ten of all time, right? The movie holds up well and looks great on Blu, though it is hard to not hear Tarantino's inflections and coaching when actors are delivering certain lines, especially Uma Thurman's dialog in the Jack Rabbit Slim's scene. Oh well, it's kind of the love/hate thing I have with Tarantino, as his personality bleeds through into the movie so easily.

I popped in Jackie Brown on Blu next, just to give it another look for the first time in I don't know how many years. It's definitely the Tarantino I've seen the least, which is a shame, as it is a really good film and was surprisingly watchable given some distance and time away from the feature. Good stuff, I'm now actually curious to read the novel on which it was based at some point.

The wife crashed out in the latter half of the movie, as she has things to do tomorrow, so I finished the flick and even got fished into Less Than Zero on cable, having only missed about 15 minutes of the beginning, so that was an interesting way to end the night. I found myself keen to re-read the novel after the film ended, and I was surprised to scour the Library only to find that I only have a hard cover copy rather than a paperback 'reading' copy, as I do with the rest of the man's catalog. I may have to remedy that soon, but for now I'm off to read a bit before I finally crash out in my still slightly buzzed condition.

Be seeing you.

It's Bedlam I Tellya, Sheer Bedlam!

Composing this post using the 'new' Blogger interface, which I list in quotes there because I have no idea how long it might've been around before I finally noticed it and decided to try it out, which would be this very evening. Having said that, I think I may completely hate it, as it's a lot less widget-looking where one composes within a small window and resembles more of a simple page of type (at least in the HTML side of it, which I prefer to use), making me feel as if I'm hunting and pecking this out on an old Royal typewriter instead of a wireless keyboard on a PC; it's somewhat disconcerting but may be worth getting used to.

But enough about the behind the scenes details, you're not here for that, you're here to let me catalog the boring details of my daily life, so let's get started, shall we?

The wife and Yorkie woke early this morning and were piddling around the house for a bit before I finally got up to see what the hell the dog's problem was. The wife had stepped out and picked up coffee, so the dog was already edgy because she'd parked in the front of the house when she returned, then the Mail Ma'am turned up with our mail and she went off. I came in and asked her what the hell her problem was and she settled down for the most part, taking her place in the Office in her little bed while the wife worked on e-mail.

I dug into my coffee as the wife had to split for a meeting, so I got the house opened up and got dressed, weighing my options of updating the blog for an uncaring audience or just going to grab a sandwich for lunch before watching some more dumb stuff off the TiVo. The Tivo/food plan won out on that argument, so I picked up a pulled pork sandwich and then headed back to the house to see what assholery the Yorkie was up to while left to her own devices.

Since I find that it's been the television piling up that has the TiVo so stressed recently I decided to finally dig into the first season of Bedlam, a BBC America series that had recorded back during the month of October. The concept is that a luxury housing development is filled with ghosts due to the building being an asylum that's been in the lineage of a certain family for three generations, and this renovation as an apartment block is the last ditch effort to turn the place around after some scandal shut it down many years ago.
It's interesting enough, though I would question the ad wizards who want to call a former asylum Bedlam Heights, as I doubt that people are clamoring for housing associated with madness and chaos, but I obviously don't know what the housing market is like in the UK, maybe they'll just take what they can get. The first season was comprised of 6 episodes, though I had somehow only managed to catch 5 of them, so I hadda pause between episode 4 and 6 to read up on what happened via the interwebs. It's an okay show, though I wish the season finale had more...um, finality to it, instead of just setting up interesting stuff for a second season. Oh well, I guess I'll check that out whenever it happens to turn up in the States.

The wife returned while I was watching all this, we visited a bit, then she spent some time in the Office before leaving to run a couple more errands.

Upon her return she and the Yorkie retreated to the bedroom to chill out for a bit, with the Yorkie only emerging to bitch at the Lawn Guys when they turned up to half-ass their way through our yard.

The wife and I ordered in some food for dinner and watched several episodes of Ringer off the TiVo, as we were at that tipping point where it would stop recording them next week unless we took action, then I rounded out the evening with an episode of Prime Suspect, a show that I knew the wife could take or leave, so this left her free to poke around Facebook if she wanted to.

We called it a night shortly afterward, as we're planning on doing some running around tomorrow for my birthday and figured we should get a decent amount of rest for once in my life.

Be seeing you.