The Evil Of The New Year Gaga

The wife and I rose with the alarm this morning to go and make a final pass through the local library thrift shop, as they still had a 75% off sale running on their current inventory. This unfortunately for me meant that they still had most of the stuff I left behind on my last visit and not much more, though the wife found a few items since she hadn't been there in quite some time. We encountered the usual grouchy elderly woman checking us out, who whinged about the $20 bill I paid her with, because it ate up some of her change. I really have never seen a more miserable person, it's almost comical if it wasn't so irritating.

The wife and I hit the Starbuck's drive-thru for some coffee, which was filled with several of those idiots who refuse to get more than five feet from the vehicle in front of them, regardless how long the line is and whether or not we have people actually sitting in the street because they can't get into the parking lot. I truly hate these people. If they would pull their head out of their ass and roll forward a few feet, the line could compress dramatically, but instead they want to sit there as if they're on the highway and need a few car lengths between them and the person in front of them. Bah.

We picked up breakfast burritos on the way back to the house, then ate at the kitchen counter while looking through the newspaper and halfway watching part of a Marx Brothers marathon that had started on TCM. The wife took the time to set the table for the 'progressive dinner' that we were going to be a part of in the evening, then she and I moved into the den to watch something appropriate off the old TiVo.

I had never seen New Year's Evil before, so I jumped on it when it was shown on TCM last weekend. A horror film from 1980, it's about a nutjob calling himself Evil who calls in to a TV hostess celebrating New Year's Eve in grand New Wave style, telling her that he's going to kill a person on the cusp of the New Year in each timezone, culminating in a murder in L.A. It's a fairly silly film, and while I guessed the twist right away, it was still fun for the '80s setting and all the inventive kills, including a woman smothered in a giant bag of weed. Fun stuff.

I busied myself in the afternoon with the blog and getting some laundry done, as I had a certain dress shirt I had in mind for the evening. The wife got her dessert item prepped, so all we'd have to do was heat it when we got home tonight, then we both set about getting cleaned up and dressed for the evening.

Since the weather has been mild enough to accommodate me wearing a suit without sweating through it, I decided to dress things up, so the wife matched me on that, making us fairly overdressed for what was to be a pretty casual affair. We joked that we were just going to our own party, regardless of what the night held for us.

The progressive dinner was to begin at Brian's place, where we were to meet at 7:00 for appetizers and about an hour of socializing, then move on to the next stage of the evening. We arrived just ahead of Anastasia Beaverhouszen and Kno1, who brought their friend GH with them for the evening. We headed up to Brian's place, snacked on some pigs in a blanket and some chips & dip, then chilled and visited for awhile in his living room.

As the hour got close to 8:00 Kno1 indicated the time, so their party excused themselves to run ahead of us and get the final touches put on the entree for the evening. We spoke with Brian for a few, then left him to close up his place, heading to the Beaverhouszen's place where Brian joined us shortly after, and we tucked into a nice fresh salad and a chicken pot pie. More conversation and merriment followed, then the wife and I said our goodbyes and slipped away to get things ready at our place for the final stop of the evening.

The hour still being somewhat early, we didn't really encounter as many obvious drunks as you would expect, so we got home pretty quickly, I texted JH, who was to join us late, then the wife popped her little cheesecake confection in the oven to bake for a quick 20 minutes. Our guests arrived and we settled in for cocktails and then a nice little dessert at the formal dining table in the front of the house. We eventually spread out a bit throughout the house, as Brian soon had to split to be at a family engagement and the ladies spent time in the wife's craft room spit-balling ideas about the new configuration.

The gentlemen and I flipped channels until I settled on a couple new episodes of Cathouse on HBO, because the lives of whores are just fascinating. Plus, who are these fucking weird guys who allow themselves to be filmed for this show and outed as whore-mongers on national television? So crazy.

We all eventually settled into the den and watched an encore presentation of a Lady Gaga concert performance on HBO, which I really enjoyed the first time we saw it. I have to say, all weirdness and costuming aside, Lady Gaga has a great ass, so what more could I want from her? Great ass, weird theatrics and fairly catchy music, what's not to love?

The new year came and went, we flipped over to the Dick Clark nonsense to see that the ball had dropped an hour before, so all gave each other a kiss and toasted, then finished out the concert, at which point the guests bailed, as it was around one in the AM at this time.

The wife and I decompressed a bit and chilled, then called it a night shortly after.

Be seeing you.

Lunch And Smooth Peaks On The Television

I was able to manage a decent amount of sleep again last night, rising around 10:00 today to see what the wife and Yorkie were up to in the rest of the house. The wife remains on the weird cleaning jag that she got on when she discovered a series of possible storage methods for the Craft Room. She's been hot on the idea of getting the place into a workable order so that we can possibly re-paint in there before loading it up with the various shelving and tables to store her various and sundry craft elements and materials.

This was what she and the Yorkie had been up working on for an hour or so, though to be fair, the Yorkie doesn't really pull her weight, leaving the wife to do most of the actual moving and sorting. We visited a bit in the sitting area off the kitchen, then decided to go and have an early lunch. We left the Yorkie holding down the fort and hit up the alternative Thai place for a bit of food. Afterward I dropped something in the mail and we spitballed a few ideas about what to do with the afternoon, eventually settling on checking out some paint swatches for the Craft Room, then grabbing a coffee on the way back home.

The wife piddled with the Craft Room a bit more, so I spent some time on the PC in the Office working on the blog a bit, then eventually drifted into the den to chill out and watch something off the Tivo. As we get into the New Year I want to try to be more active in my approach to the rotation of the entertainment options, so I have been making an effort to keep the TiVo at least sort of cleaned out, by which I want to start watching the junk from January of this year,since we're almost done with December.

Smooth Talk is a movie I had grabbed months ago after reading an article about it in the always swell Paracinema Magazine. The film is the story of a 15 yr. old girl coming of age in the mid '80s, which stars Laura Dern (looking somewhat older at age 18 than the character is meant to be, but try to bear with things here) as the restless lead who alternates her time between arguing with her mother over....well, basically everything and wandering the mall with her two friends where they flirt and try to look older than they are. She eventually catches the eye of a couple different boys, as well as the oily older guy played by Treat Williams, who tells her quite blatantly that he's "watching her", complete with a pointed finger and a wicked smile under his aviator shades. The film ends on a rather ambiguous note, with the ultimate interpretation of events left to the viewer, which may not please everyone, but I enjoyed it pretty well.

The wife eventually joined me in the den and we spent most of the evening with tons of television that's been hanging around on the TiVo, wrapping up eventually with a new episode of The Life And Times Of Tim and our daily dose of Twin Peaks.

We called it a night shortly afterward, as we have plans to go poke around at the little library thrift store to see what they have in their year-end clearance.

Because we need more books. Right?

Be seeing you.

30 Minutes Or Trust

The upshot is that I managed to get a whopping 10 hours of sleep, the downside to this situation is that I slept half the day away to do it. I call it a wash, as I did wake up feeling a helluva lot better than I have the past few mornings, I guess the lack of sleep got the better of me again.

The wife was out running errands, so I greeted the Yorkie, who was still chilling at the foot of the bed, then got up and got the house opened up for business. I looked at e-mail on the iPhone and browsed through Twitter a bit, then decided to get dressed and grab a bite to eat.

I picked up a burger and headed back home to watch a little something that had been hanging around for longer than I care to think about from Netfux: A movie from director David Schwimmer (of all people) called Trust, in which a family is nearly destroyed when their teenage daughter falls victim to an online predator over the course of several months. The film is surprisingly realistic in the portrayal of the fallout after the incident, as well as the unfortunately depressing realities of how hard it may be to track down someone who is accustomed to spreading disinformation and lies over a period of time. Good little flick, though it may leave you wanting something more final in the finale.

The wife returned during the movie and we caught up a bit, then she chilled with the pup in the bedroom while looking at e-mail on her iPad. I decided to get out and throw the Netfux movie back in the mail sooner than later, so I took her order for a beverage from Starbuck's and headed out to hit up the Post Office.

Starbuck's was surprisingly painless, then I headed home to drop off the wife's beverage and see if the mail had arrived, as I was still laying for the Postman to see if he came through with my missing package from yesterday, or if a kind neighbor would drop it off. I was rather pleasantly surprised to find the missing parcel in the box, but casually tossed in with the regular mail, which to me says that the Postman fucked up yesterday afternoon and marked it delivered, but decided to let it lie overnight and drop it today as if nothing happened. I was both relieved and annoyed, as there's no other real explanation of why it was MIA for 24 hours, but I'm just happy it's here and I don't have to dick around with filing a claim for lost goods, etc.

The wife was piddling around on the web a bit, looking at some new organizational options for her Craft Room, so I spent some time in the den with the last episode of Nikita that I had been ignoring on the TiVo, then the wife joined me to check out another movie, as I wanted to do a clean sweep of our Netfux rentals to get a fresh start in the New Year.

The wife had made a beef stroganoff dish in the crock pot over the course of the afternoon, so we tucked into that over 30 Minutes Or Less, the Jesse Eisenberg film in which he plays a slacker pizza delivery guy who finds himself strapped with a bomb and sent into a bank to rob it for a couple of half-assed local criminals. The movie was filled with funny folks (Aziz Ansari & Danny McBride) and didn't overstay its welcome, clocking in at a short 83 minutes or so, making for a breezy, fun little flick.

We caught up on our Twin Peaks for the evening, as well as last night's ep of The Soup, then called it a night so that the wife could work on the Craft Room a bit more and I could get a jump on this crapola for the day.

Be seeing you.

Bringing Up Wednesday (Or: Where The Fuck Is My Package?)

Having made a point of trying to get to bed at a reasonable hour last night I was able to get up with the alarm this morning with little incident. The wife dressed to go and run a couple errands, so I got some water on the boil for tea and opened the house up for business.

I spent some time on the web working on the blog a bit while the wife ran her errands, then she returned and we put away some groceries, the odds and ends of what she missed the other day when she went to the store. She and The Lobbyist had been texting back and forth about getting some lunch, so they finally nailed down a time and a restaurant, meaning I needed to get dressed so we could leave.

We picked up TL from her mother's home and headed to a Mexican restaurant downtown, which was fairly empty when we first arrived, as we'd made our move early. The food was good and I let the ladies visit for the most part, as they have more mutual acquaintances to catch up on than I have an interest in trying to keep track of. When we finished with lunch I asked if the ladies would humor me with a visit to our local public library, which is located within walking distance and is a place I haven't set foot in for the better part of a decade.

The idea for me was to see if I had the same gut feeling that I had the last time I was in there, which was basically a feeling that you can't go home again. A quick wander through the place confirmed this, as a renovation some 10 years or more ago dramatically changed the layout of the building (moving the entryway from one street to what was previously the 'side' of the building, which just doesn't feel 'right' to me anymore. Call me an old stick-in-the-mud fuck if you like (because I probably am), but I just can't get used to the new layout of the place, nor what feels like overly bright, antiseptic looking lighting thoughout. In my mind's eye I see the old place as a large, darker building where I spent countless afternoons and weekends during my youth, happily browsing the shelves and discovering new writers and subjects, but this new place just feels hollow and empty to me. Maybe this is because I just haven't been in the habit of absorbing information in this way in a very long time, or just because that time has passed for me. I guess at this point in my life, since we have the time and means I would prefer to spend time building my own personal Library to have on hand to refer to should the need arise than hoping our local will have something I'm actually interested in.

So today's lesson for me is that you can't go home again.

We grabbed a beverage at Starbuck's afterward, no real coffee though, as they were out of espresso, then we headed back to TL's house to drop her off and say our goodbyes. The wife and I headed home, where she chilled out in the bedroom with some trash TV and the Yorkie to keep her company while I moved into the Office to work on a few of my nerdlists, which remain ridiculously behind. That ate up the majority of the afternoon, then I managed to end on a down note by checking the status of a package I was expecting, only to find out that it was marked delivered two hours earlier, yet was nowhere to be found on our porch. Considering that half of the mail that was left for us yesterday turned out to belong to our next door neighbors, I can easily imagine whatever clown delivering our mail this holiday week accidentally leaving it God knows where...this block? Two blocks over? So now I guess I play the waiting game for 24 hours or so to see if anyone is honest about it and drops it on our doorstep or if I have to figure out what the process is for collecting on a lost package, or if the sender has to do that and then re-ship stuff. Blah.

I had a sip of the Macallan while watching Bringing Up Baby off the TiVo, just to try to fill in more holes in my Cary Grant viewing. I have to say that maybe my mood wasn't what it should've been due to the mail fiasco, but I wasn't all that blown away by this one. The slap-sticky nature of a not of the humor just left me a bit cold; I definitely enjoyed Grant opposite Katharine Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story a helluva lot more. Oh well, it's by no means bad, it just wasn't as amusing as I was expecting it to be.

We snacked on some leftovers for dinner while watching a couple Family Guy re-runs on cable, then took in tonight's Twin Peaks episode before pretty much calling it a night.

I got started on this post and poked around the web a bit, as is my custom in the evening.

Ninja, Please!

The first part of me ruining my next day usually starts with me having some random though about a subject/interest/what have you while on the way to the Office in the late evening. This usually means that instead of sitting down and logging into Blogger to dutifully catalog all the stupid shit I wasted my time with that day, I instead sit down and hit up Google for information about this or that, and that road never leads anywhere good, because I look up two hours later and I've written nothing for the blog beyond a title like 'Sunday Shits" or some other kinda placeholder instead of anything 'clever'. There are those that would argue that I have yet to write anything clever even after numerous drafts, but those people aren't nice and my mother once told me that I don't have to listen to them.

This is a long winded way of saying that instead of getting down to business with this dumb shit last night I found myself lost down a rabbit hole of idiocy on YouTube, watching videos of fellow social retards showcasing their movie collections, which always makes me feel a bit better about the amount of junk we have here, as there's always someone who's gone further overboard, God bless their pale, pasty and unsocialized asses wherever they are out there in interweb world.

I found myself reading in bed just before I went to sleep at 5:00 in the freaking AM, so I naturally pissed away my morning today, waking at 11:00 grudgingly when the Yorkie alerted me to someone ringing the doorbell. I figured it was a package delivery and ignored it, pulling myself from the pillows and finally getting moving.

The wife got home from running errands about an hour or so later, so I helped her put away groceries and visited a bit about the day thus far. She spent some time with e-mail in the Office, then she and I went through the large pile of mail that'd arrived while we were in the kitchen. I decided to go mail something and pick up a bite to eat for my lunch, so I dressed and got out to do that. I also dropped off the rather sizable handful of mail that we'd gotten by mistake for our neighbors next door, so I had to sort of wonder where the rest of our mail had been dropped off. Oh well, maybe we got lucky.

With the wife and dog relaxing in the bedroom, I ended up on the den to eat my take-out food and watch soemthing off the TiVo, as I want to get back in the habit of rotating the entertainment options and it's been rather ignored of late. Enter The Ninja was the first of three Cannon Films that I watched today, which is a company synonymous with '80s action and the VHS boom of that decade. I did start to recall the movie as I got further into it, but figured I would set it out again just for the hell of it. Franco Nero as your ninja lead is amusing, because God forbid we not shoplift something interesting from another culture and then shoe-horn a fucking white guy into the lead, right? It must also be noted that there is a weird variation of tone to the movie, because you have really violent bloody things happening for a good amount of screen time, then there's a scene in which a man's hook hand is yanked off and thrown back to him, which is accompanied by the comedic sad trumpet, which felt amazingly out of place. It's not like the guy dropped his dessert that was eaten by the family dog, his hand replacement was brutally torn from his body and thrown at him. And then this happens. Weird.

Since I was going for a theme, I had made sure to watch these in the order of release, so next on the docket was Revenge Of The Ninja from 1983. This one felt like the quintessential '80s actioner, from the gawdawful clothes to the fairly predictable plot 'twists' that you can see coming a mile away. I really dug this one quite a bit and was keen to move on to the final selection off the TiVo.

The wife joined me for Pray For Death, which again starred Sho Kosugi as a man trying to live a quiet life who has outside forces throw him back into a word of violence and blood. I think I would have liked this one a bit better had the final villain that he squares off against been more of a threat, but he was a middle-aged gangster type (played by James Booth, who I've most recently seen as an elderly man on Twin Peaks) who looked as if he's a bit past his prime and relying on a handgun, then he proceeds to go toe to toe with a ninja, a guy we're supposed to believe has near supernatural skills when it comes to killing and assassination. Yet they fight for what felt like 30 minutes in the final reel, which just felt ridiculously padded. At least give me another ninja or someone with martial arts skills dammit, Shooty McGangster here is just not believable as a guy who can fight a trained assassin to a standstill several times over the final reel, but what can ya do at that point? Oh after writing out that little ranty paragraph, a bit of further web digging tells me that Booth actually wrote the script, so maybe that's how you have him magically be such a badass, eh?

We had some sushi for our dinner, then watched the normal episode allotment of both Twin Peaks and Battlestar Galactica before I put the wife to bed and got started on this post.

Be seeing you.

D.C. Paul

I was able to somehow sleep for a reasonable amount of time last night, presumably my week of piss-poor rest finally caught up with me, but whatever the reason, I'll take it. I was down from 2:00 in the AM until noon today, which left me feeling refreshed if a little guilty for sleeping so late in the day.

Since my sweet wife had been up for a bit in the morning, I actually found her back in bed napping with the Yorkie, as she t3ends to take advantage of these days when she's not tied up with tons of meetings and other dumb shit. I got up and spent some time in the kitchen doing some dishes, then moved into the Office to work on a few things and look at e-mail.

The wife and pup eventually got up and said hello, then I joined them in the bed and we watched most of Mr. Mom (of all things) on cable while I enjoyed the rest of my tea, then I decided to get out and grab a bite to eat. I left the wife and pup chilling and drove across town to pick up a burger, then headed back home to relax in the den.

A quick shake of the iPhone offered up the random selection of D.C. Cab from the To-watch Pile, so I popped that in while I ate. I can honestly say that I know I've seen the movie, but it was so long ago on network television that I'm pretty sure I didn't recall anything about the film beyond the premise of it being set around taxis in (duh) D.C., so it was like watching it for the first time today. It was pretty amusing, though being an early '80s film it managed to be in that weird area when you could casually say shit like 'nigger' and 'fag' in a movie without having people turn out in droves to crucify you; I honestly can't imagine this getting made today. I enjoyed the movie well enough, it's an interesting capsule of the time period and offers a look at Joel Schumacher being a decent filmmaker before he fucked his career up good and proper with the Batman franchise.

The wife and Yorkie got up from their long winter's nap and she got on the Mac in the Office and looked at e-mail for a bit while I picked up the Christmas shrapnel in the kitchen counter area, putting away this and that, cologne and clothes that turned up in the stocking, busying myself with stuff like that.

We eventually settled into the den and I popped in the Blu-ray of Paul, a movie that I watched on our flight to England on our way to that cruise over the summer. I had been wanting to give it a re-watch with the wife if possible, so I figured since I had her cornered for the evening no was as good a time as any. It holds up well on the re-watch, and the wife seemed to enjoy it pretty well, so that's cool too.

We rounded out the evening with an episode apiece of Twin Peaks and Battlestar Galactica, then I put the wife to bed and got started on this post, which will be published God knows when, as I now approach this blog more as an overall record of my boring ass life rather than a daily journal.

Be seeing you.

Sunday The Christmas

The idea I had when I went to bed last night was to sleep 6 or 7 hours and then get up with the wife and make a fire, relax with tea and presents before we had to head over to the Mother In Law's house to spend time with the extended family. What actually happened was that I slept about an hour and a half, then woke up with sinus issues that had me hacking and cooughing to the point that I finally gave up on sleep and read for about an hour and a half, finally falling asleep again after 7:00 this morning. I had made the effort to set my alarm, so I woke at 10:00 and was greeted by my sweet wife, who had been up and making some breakfast since around 9:00 or so.

I got up and started some water boiling for tea, then made a nice roaring fire in the fireplace before we settled into the den to do the traditional stocking routine. The wife seemed pleased with her customary charm bracelet selections, and I really do think I may have to start a second Pandora bracelet for her, as the first one has to be getting full at this stage of things.

We did our gift thing in the front room this time around, sitting under the warming glow of the tree in its new placement, which kinda drove the Yorkie around the bend, as she'd already gotten some treats from her stocking and was really curious what the hell we were doing in the front room. The wife treated me to several variations on a certain cologne I was keen to try out, as well as several items from the Amazon wishlist, including several Blu-rays in the Roger Corman collection from Shout! Factory and some books as well. She seemed happy and pleasantly surprised with her gifts, including the assortment of frames that I had purchased to start displaying our wedding 5 X 7 pics, so that will be a fun little project we can tackle in the hallway once we get into the New Year.

Once all the hubbub wound down a bit, the wife caught a short nap on the couch, which I found amusing since I was the one who only got 4 hours of sleep last night, but whatever. I checked e-mail and piddled on the web for a few, then we both dressed for the mid-afternoon Christmas lunch/dinner thing at the MIL's place.

We were supposed to eat at 2:00, so we arrived just after the Older Sister and her family turned up, and the Druncle had already brought Grandmother over. The Middle Sister had called to say that they were running late, so we could start without them, which is what we did, serving up food and settling into the formal dining room...

...just in time to hear the others arrive, which kinda left us in that weird place of 'do we eat or do we wait?', watching our food get cold and the gravy develop a skin before our very eyes. Once the late arrivals sat down it was fairly apparent that the MS had 'come in hot' again, as she just seemed put out to have to sit down to a meal with us, because what's worse than the holidays? Family holidays, amirite, internet?

We finally tucked into the food and were having what passes for a decent time when something must've disturbed things at the other end of the table, because the next thing I notice, both the MS and her husband are MIA, and when someone finally goes into the kitchen for seconds it's revealed that they've moved into the other room to eat. Huh? Since we're all unwilling to make waves, no one really asks "Hey, what the fuck are you doing in there?", so we instead finish the meal on our own, kinda commenting among ourselves about the general oddness of the situation.

Then it gets really weird, because the Older Brother In Law goes to put away his dishes and finds the Druncle and MS smoking in the next room (which always irritates the OS's family's allergies), so he decides he had had enough and leaves for their house back across the street. I dunno if his departure caught the attention of the MS or what, but the next thing we know, she's again taken it upon herself to start washing all the dishes, obviously fuming at the prospect of doing so, as she has nothing but terse commentary for anyone who speaks to her while she works.

Being that I don't really care what her problem is, I find all of this endlessly amusing, because who cleans to 'show them', y'know? "I'm pissed off and I'm gonna wash their dishes and then make all the beds! See how they like them apples!" Again, I say: huh?

Anyway, long story short, the rest of the family kinda tiptoes around this whole 'scene', visiting at the table and then the next thing I know the MS has gathered her child and is out the door, completely ignoring me when I tell her goodbye, so Merry Fucking Christmas to you to, eh? I mean, she even paused mid-cleaning to snap at her son to sit in his own chair when he was sitting on the Niece's lap, as if anyone showing him attention was a bad thing. He wasn't doing anyone any harm, and was asked to sit there.

I also feel like I have to pause here to reflect on how pissed off I would have been had we actually given her the piece of art that the wife had intended, only to have her make this kind of scene about the holidays? If we'd given her a piece of art that I like, only to have her act like a total asshole when we saw her? I would have loaded it back into my trunk without a single fucking word. Yeesh.

Once we got them out of the house, they were followed by the Druncle and Grandmother, who had another houseful of relatives to go visit, then we spent about an hour decompressing from all that bullshit. We were even joined by the BIL, who returned freshly medicated and showered to venture once more into the smoke and scented candles to see what his family was up to.

Morris turned up around 4:00, as we'd made plans to have him drop off the Jeep and let us drive him to the airport to catch his flight. He visited with everyone for a bit, then we said our goodbyes and swore to never speak of this again (okay, maybe it wasn't that bad but Jesus Christ...), then we took him out to the airport and dumped him off with time to spare.

The wife and I headed home to see what the Yorkie was up to, then the three of us relaxed in the den with another fire and popped in something from Netfux so that it canget back in the mail. Super 8 was something that got a lot of great reviews, so it was nice to finally give it a look since I'm apparently too old and curmudgeonly to get my ass into a theater more than once a year these days. It has a nice feel for an era that I can definitely be nostalgic for, though I have to admit to being a little over the way JJ Abrams uses the Goddamned lense flares almost constantly, as it adds to the tension in certain instances but is distracting if they're there in every other scene.

We snacked a bit and spent the evening with the normal Fox animation fare, calling it a night around 10:00.

Honestly, aside from the weird drama from the Middle Sister's side of things it was a really nice day, but it's nice to have another Christmas put to bed.

On to the next.

Be seeing you.

Saturday The Eve

The wife and I both slept in this morning, which was a nice change of pace, as I actually got a decent amount of sleep in the process and was able to get up and about to spend the late morning with my lady love.

Once we finally got up and moving we fed the Yorkie and checked out the still-falling snow, which didn't let up for the entire day, which is a real rarity for this area.

I got the house opened up and made myself some tea, then fired up the television and started a little Christmas film while the wife grabbed a shower. I hadn't seen Silent Night, Deadly Night since last year around this time, so it was fun to watch a murderous Santa run amuck. The wife joined me for the movie and we enjoyed a little summer sausage gift basket thing that our friend JH had given us when she was over the other night. We eventually moved on to another perennial favorite, the always awesome Bad Santa, then Morris called about dropping by and doing the gift exchange thing with the wife and I and visiting a bit before his family dinner this evening.

We visited a bit, then a friend of Morris' came by briefly to drop off a phone charger than Morris had left at his house, because Morris would forget his head if it weren't attached. I love him, but God bless him, he leaves stuff scattered in his wake sometimes. The movie ended and I put in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation for the wife as background noise while she worked on some gingerbread cookies, then I hopped in the shower to get ready for the evening.

Since the In-Laws always do a Mexican dinner thing for Christmas Eve I had offered to make some queso for the meal, so I started browning the meat and sausage to go in that while Morris got ready to go and pick up his mom for the evening. We said our goodbyes, then made plans to meet at the In-Laws house tomorrow afternoon, as the wife and I have to take him to the airport so he can be at work the day after Christmas.

The wife and I finished up the various dishes we were to take, then gathered the gifts and other stuff we had on our plate and made our way to the garage to load everything up. We drove through the winter wonderland to the Mother In Law's place, then unloaded and kinda settled in to visit with Grandmother and the Druncle, who is in town for the holidays. The Older Sister and her family soon arrived and we sort of all compared notes on whether or not the Middle Sister would turn up, as that's always sort of up in the air until they actually hit the door, y'know?

They did actually show up, so we settled in for a meal, all kinda crammed around the large (though not quite large enough) table in the kitchen area. The Middle Brother In Law managed to open his conversation with me with something about comic books, which isn't something I'm ashamed of reading, but why do you want to discuss it in 'mixed company' in front of a roomful of people who don't give a fuck about them? I read all sorts of different shit, so why would I lead with Spider-man? So annoying.

We did have a nice moment of levity when the new Beau asked the Middle BIL if he watch "hardcore porn", by which he meant the show Hardcore Pawn, and even though he immediately corrected himself it was still making me giggle hours later, so it had to be preserved for posterity both here and on Facebook. Great moment in the family for sure, will definitely come up again in the future.

In a puzzling turn of events, the MS decided to take it upon herself to start doing all of the dishes, which never happens, so no one knew quite what to make of that. I suppose it was something of a martyr move, in that she came to Christmas dinner and 'had to do the dishes, because they treat me like the help' or some other poor me type shit. The bottom line is that she certainly didn't seem to be doing it as a joyful favor to help out, more as a way to getting out of having to socialize with anyone. Very odd.

The evening eventually dwindled, the Middle Sister and her family split first, though it's always hard to judge the 'mood in the room' with her, so we don't exactly know if that was due to being over the evening or that they were actually ready to split for the evening. We ended up doing some gifting stuff between us and the Middle Sister's child, and after they split so early the remaining two sisters both opened their gift from the MS, though the idea has been that the family isn't really exchanging gifts in recent years, though this invariably gets ignored by someone and makes the others involved feel slightly weird, so it's all an exercise in futility. I mean seriously, once the gifts were opened we ended up putting them back under the tree, re-boxed and ribboned, lest the MS be pissed that they'd been opened in her absence when we do Christmas lunch/dinner tomorrow afternoon. We visited for a bit with the Older Sister and her family, then they split to be at an evening church service, which I took as our cue, though the wife kinda lingered afterward for a bit.

When we finally split I decided to take her for a long wandering drive through the still-falling snow, as this is a very rare occasion here locally. We wandered through several neighborhoods, admiring the weather and the various Christmas light set-ups before finally making our way back to the house shortly before 10:00 or so. I had to finally break our Twin Peaks rule and just watch part of the 24 hour (!) marathon of A Christmas Story that's currently happening on TBS this weekend.

The wife and I each took time to get the other's stocking stuff together, then I put her to bed and I settled into the Office to work on this post for a bit before calling it a night.

Be seeing you.

Damn Friday, You Cold!

The sinuses naturally didn't allow me to sleep very well last night, so I was up and down pretty much every forty five minutes between 4:00 AM and when my alarm went off at 9:00 this morning. I got up and kinda made a pass through the house, but since Morris wasn't stirring yet I figured I'd lay back down for another hour or so, which helped to take the edge off of things.

We finally got up and moving around 10:00, so I got the house opened up for business and picked up in the kitchen a bit while the wife checked in with Morris, then he showered while we got ready to pick up the Jeep and send him off to make peace with his mother. We were going to stop to drop off a few gifts at the Older Sister's house on the way, which turned into an actual visit, as she seemed agreeable to guests, so we spent about an hour or so there catching up with her and the kids, then headed across the street to pick up the Jeep.

The Mother In Law and her Beau were actually home, so we chitchatted with them for a bit, then went our separate ways, leaving Morris to keep the peace with his mom and the In-Laws to go and work out, as is their mid-day custom.

The wife and I had sandwiches at a deli across town, then stepped into Target, as I had the idea to use the two freebie $10 giftcards I still had to pick up another Amazon giftcard, which they were naturally sold out of. I said to hell with it, as I had been thinking about doing the same thing at Best Buy, but figured that they would likely be sold out as well, which would just piss me off after we fought our way in there, so we just headed home and pretty much headed straight to bed, as I was really feeling my late evening and wanted to try to catch a nap, something that I rarely (if ever) bother with.

We slept most of the afternoon away, under the soothing glow of the firelogs in the bedroom. The wife got up around 5:30 and piddled around the house with various Christmas wrapping and things of that nature, though I found myself falling back asleep and woke up after 6:00, finally forcing myself out of bed as I heard the dog starting doing her weird hacking and gagging routine, because why wouldn't she get sick here on the holidays, right?

She thankfully seemed to bounce back after hacking up a small amount of that weird white foam that she produces, though she did kinda mope around for the rest of the evening, finally seeming back to normal as we started heading to bed.

The wife and I spent the evening with some television, including a new episode of The Life And Times Of Tim, then our usual doses of both Twin Peaks and Battlestar Galactica while I made a fire in the den to keep us cozy. The pup seemed to feel better as the evening progressed, so I kinda of had to wonder if her earlier hacking was possibly related to her hair around her muzzle, which will sometimes get into her mouth and down her throat. Thankfully, she seems fine as I type this.

The wife and I spent some time picking up the house, then I got started on this post while the wife hopped on her Mac, working on sorting through some photos from the limo ride and party last night.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.

Tour It: The Christmas Edition

The wife and I woke early this morning, having set the alarm to make certain that we were up and about to go and fetch Morris from the airport. He is to be in town over the holiday weekend, leaving in the late afternoon on Christmas day, so that's something nice to look forward to for the holiday season.

Thankfully his flight was right on time, so we grabbed him and then hit up Starbuck's for a tasty beverage before heading back to our house, as we couldn't pick up Morris' borrowed vehicle from the Mother In Law's place until after 4:00 in the afternoon, since it had to be available for her Maid or Handyman to use should they have to run any odd errands.

We hung out at the house visiting for a bit and the wife piddled around the house while Morris and I chilled at the kitchen counter, then I finally had to voice my opinions about giving away one of our recently purchased sculptures, because the wife has been making noise about gifting it to the Middle Sister as a Christmas gift and I have repeatedly said that I kind of don't want this to happen. The wife finally got it, but this left her stumped for a gift for the MS, so that kind of sucks. With that on our minds and since it was after noon, we finally decided to head back out into the world and grab some lunch.

We hit up Barnes & Noble after food, as Morris had a few odds and ends he was after and I can always give it a browse, then we headed home where the wife and Morris worked on Christmas stuff like wrapping a few gifts and things of that nature for a bit while I flipped channels on the television. Once they came to a stopping point we stepped out to drop off a handful of gifts at various friends' houses, a trip that included a stop by the Hairdresser's place of business to say hi and give them a little something to celebrate the season.

We drove past the MIL's house on the way back home and since it was only 3:30 the vehicle we need is naturally gone, presumably because the Maid had an errand to run, so we head back to the house, figuring on picking it up later in the evening.

We burn down the remaining 3 hours before people are meant to start arriving while I watched a few things on cable to pass the time and the wife and Morris get the house ready for the evening and started putting together a gingerbread house kit, which is something of a tradition for them if Morris is able to be here for Christmas.

Our friend The Lobbyist (as I call her every other time she turns up here, particularly tonight, as her initials conflict with another friend involved in our evening) turned up a bit early to visit, and once we noted her mode of dress as well as what the wife was wearing, both Morris and I decided to change clothes for the evening.

I kinda gave up and threw on a suit while Morris put on a nice sweater and jeans, then we joined the ladies in the kitchen to visit and have a cocktail. Morris and I both got into the Macallan I had on hand, while TL had brought some wine along with her.

Our other guests arrived, as well as the food the wife was having delivered, then we ate and visited for a bit over more drinks while waiting for the limo that the wife had arranged to drive us around town. Our friend Anastasia Beaverhouszen was very kind and brought the stuffed jalapenos that she made for her last party, as she knew how enamored of them I had been, so I loaded up on those before we even got into the actual dinner we had planned: take-out barbecue and all the trimmings for simplicity's sake, plus some sweet tea.

While we were kinda milling around waiting for the limo to turn up, a little group of kids randomly approached our door and the wife said something like "I think we have carolers" as she went to answer it, which I thought would be a strangely appropriate turn of events. Typically, we find out that they were selling some kinda candy bin crapola and didn't even sing a single note after Morris gave them a $10 donation for whatever bullshit charity they were collecting for. What a rip-off.

Oh well.

I was on the phone with the limo guy when his driver finally turned up a few minutes late, but we were kinda antsy after this same company stood us up completely at our wedding. We loaded up and spent the next couple hours taking a tour of the various noteworthy Christmas light locations in town, stopping a few times here or there to grab a few pics of either ourselves in the setting or of the lights themselves.

We finally ended up back at our place, snacked and visited further over more cocktails, then our guests started calling it a night around 11:00 or thereabouts.

Since we never got back to the MIL's place to grab the Jeep, Morris was figuring on staying with us instead of heading to his mother's place, which instigated a phone argument between the two of them over how inconsiderate this was, which of course blows my mind a bit, as I haven't had family of any real description to deal with in years, so it throws me how a grown man is getting this kind of guilt trip dropped on him.

We kinda talked him down over the whole situation, then watched the normal evening diet of Twin Peaks and Battlestar Galactica before I finally called it a night, though I did lose the wife and Morris after the 'Peaks, as they were both wiped out.

I jotted down notes for this post before calling it a night myself, making a few notes as well for a few things I need to get done on the web tomorrow before I run out of time for the month.

Be seeing you.

Errands, Grooming And Customer Service

I managed to sleep like total shit last night, due in no small part to the idiot snacking I did while re-watching Battlestar Galactica in the late evening/ealry morning hours. I was thus awake on and off for most of the 'night', having crashed out around 3:00 in the AM. I finally got to sleep for an extended period of time after 7:00 this morning, waking just shy of noon. Bleh.

The wife and Yorkie were out of the house, as the pup had a Groomer's appointment and the wife had numerous errands to run. I started gathering the recycling, as things are starting to get out of hand a bit and will only get worse over the holiday weekend. The wife returned while I was piddling with this stuff, bringing some lunch with her, so we visited over a sandwich or two and made plans for the afternoon.

She had a meeting to be at around 2:00, then would be home unless the dog was ready at the groomer, so I agreed to pick up the dog if she was ready while I was out running my own errands, which included recycling and exchanging a belt that I had picked up yesterday as if I was buying for myself in the '90s, back when I was actually relatively thin. The wife split while I loaded stuff up, the ran it to the bins and took a moment to stop into the books music and video outlet to look for a few periodicals that I was still in the market for here at the end of the year. I picked up a few things, then pointed the car towards the old menswear place to see if they gave me any hassle about the exchange.

The were markedly less busy than they were yesterday, though the amazing service was still the same, which is to say that no one acknowledged me walking in and the manager (of all fucking people) who checked me out yesterday made the exchange with the same lack of conversation, which makes me really want to go back in there all the time and spend money. Oh, wait, no. It actually doesn't. I just can't believe how far customer service has fallen, and this is from an older man, at least 20 years my senior, who should fucking know better. I mean, I can kind of give the kid pouring my Coke at a McDonald's a pass, because he's of a different time, when no one gives a shit, but a person older than me should remember what the hell service is, especially if he's the fucking manager of the store. Yeesh.

End rant, suffice to say I got the belt I needed and got the fuck out of there.

I grabbed a coffee at Starbuck's, speaking to the wife from the line about her plans regarding the dog and her ETA from the Groomer. We decided that I would pick her up and then the two of us would go grab the dog, so I swung by and grabbed her and then we fetched the pup, who was happy to see us and damned well ready to go home.

The wife busied herself with some dinner-related chores in the kitchen while I got the rest of the house presentable, as we were to be joined for dinner by the Mother In Law and her Beau, so I figured things should look decent in case we had to tour the place or anything.

The In-Laws arrived around 5:30, so I let them in while the wife was putting the final touches on the food, then I made some drinks and we settled in for a quick little meal. I gave the Beau a tour of the finished renovations on the Guest Side of things after the meal, then they were both kinda craving a cigarette and decided to call it an early evening. That may sound abrupt, but honestly it was cool by me, as I knew the wife had other baking junk she wanted to get to and I could relax with some television in the meantime.

I watched last week's episode of Person Of Interest, then the wife and I settled in together for another Twin Peaks, which is now getting into the backside of the series which kinda begins to flounder a bit for my tastes. The wife worked on some more Christmas related stuff in the kitchen while I started in on the 2nd disc of my Battlestar Galactica re-watch, then I called it a night and moved into the Office to work on this as well as last night's post, none of which will be posted anytime soon.

Be seeing you.

Food, Clothiers, Annoying Friends And Television

This morning I found myself sleeping in late, rising with just a scant hour before I was to meet the fellas for lunch at a deli across town. I confirmed the location via text, then frantically threw on some clothes and rushed out the door so as not to keep anyone waiting.

I still managed to arrive a few minutes early, which is typical of my normal timing, so I headed inside and was killing time looking at e-mail on the iPhone when I ran into EL's mother and his kids, who just so happened to be having lunch at the same restaurant. I chitchatted with them a bit, then we were joined by DR, then finally EL himself. He mentioned that BR was going to join us, so we waited around for a few until he turned up and then we said out goodbyes to the mom and kids before ordering up sandwiches and chilling in a corner booth to eat and visit for a bit.

In a rather random turn of events I decided to check out a sale happening at a local menswear store on the way home, so I stopped there to see if I could turn up a few dress shirts as part of a 'buy one item, get two free' sale that they were having, presumably in an effort to scare up last minute shoppers before the holidays. As it turned out I ended up buying several shirts and a new belt. I was slightly dismayed that such a niche store had fairly lackluster customer service, as I think I was browsing (with merchandise in my hands) for nearly 20 minutes before anyone even said hello to me, so when I checked out and the store manager cheerfully asked me who had been helping me I made sure to tell him "Actually no one at all.", just so he has a good idea of what they might need to work on.

Once I got back to the house and got my new purchases unloaded, I visited with the wife for a bit and then started to kinda steel myself for the evening ahead, as I was rather dreading the whole process.

In a rather surprising turn of events, dinner with Blather & her new beau was actually pretty painless save for feigning interest in her life. The only real thing of note was learning that her new beau isn't actually her fiance, but rather her husband, as they eloped at the time she started sending people pics of the ring a month or so back. Cool? I guess? I mean, the guy seems decent enough, but he almost studiously ignored making any kind of eye contact with me, speaking more to the wife, which I found slightly odd, and they did manage to casually bring up their sex life and how he's feeling slightly neglected in the past week because she had ankle surgery, so that's a weird turn of events in the first month of wedded bliss. I only note this because the whole sex life thing is something that she tended to use as leverage in her previous relationships, so it's maybe fucked up to have it coming up when they've been married about 8 minutes or so. Hell, this gal fucking bragged that she wasn't sleeping with her second husband, as if that was something she dangled in front of him like a carrot, which I find amazingly shitty. Oh well, she's not my problem.

We were happily able to extricate ourselves after the meal without the usual 'so what're you doing now?" chitchat/hassle, so that was cool, then we headed home to see what the dog was up to and relax with a bit of television.

The wife and I watched another episode of Twin Peaks once we got home, which included the reveal and fallout surrounding Laura's killer, then she called it a night. I decide to stay up late on a really wild hair, pop in the first disc of the Battlestar Galactica set for a re-watch, as the whole 'one episode a day' procedure has been successful for the Twin Peaks refresher, so I may continue to apply it to other shows, instead of the 'feast or famine' approach of marathoning shows and ignoring other shows and movies altogether.

This put me up until the wee hours of the morning, so I finally called it a late night after getting some notes jotted down for this post.

Be seeing you.

Dinner Undead

The Yorkie was acting rather skittish this morning due to a storm that rolled through in the wee hours of things, which had her 'treed' at the head of the bed, trying to get comfortable on our pillows and failing miserably. Her scratching at them woke me, though I made a point of not looking at the clock, as I knew I wasn't destined to get even the 6 hours of sleep I was shooting for and didn't want to know how much I was getting shortchanged. I burrowed back into the pillows and slept what felt like another hour or so, then finally gave up and turned the alarm off, moving into the Office to fire up the PC and put some water on to boil for tea. I spent some time on the web, poking around a bit, then eventually heard the wife and Yorkie stirring, so we visited a bit while the wife baked some rolls using a new recipe that she'd been keen to try out.

The rolls turned out really great, so I heated up some leftover beef tenderloin from our party late last week and made little sandwiches for our lunch, which were rather tasty if I do say so myself and I was happy to be able to enjoy such a simple little meal with the wife in the middle of her weirdly busy week. She had a meeting in the late afternoon, which was to proceed our dinner with her friend Blather and her new fiance, which will be husband number three for those of you keeping score at home. Third time's the charm, right? Anyone? Who had three in the pool? You could very well be our winner...

I freely admit to not looking forward to this dinner at all, as the woman's company simply exhausts me, and I have little faith in her finding a guy who will be able to tolerate it for very long, but since it's an 'occasion' I felt that I should accompany the wife, where I would normally just let them go have lunch and catch up, leaving me out of things entirely.

The wife eventually started getting ready for her afternoon meeting while I piddled with other stuff around the house, including a watch of a movie that Buckaroo Banzai had loaned me months ago at this point, that I'm ashamed to admit has just been sitting on the coffee table. Rammbock - Berlin Undead is a short little film (barely over an hour) that is set in a small block of apartments in Berlin during a zombie outbreak. It's watchable enough and doesn't overstay its welcome, though it does still manage to hit the standard plot points of people saying shit like "...but they're still people!", even though said people are hyper-violent and eating others at this point, which to me puts them in a different category altogether, but I guess I'm a judgmental sort. It's worth a look, and I understand from the web that it's now turned up on Netfux Instant Watch, so you've got options, y'know?

The wife split to make her appointment while I started getting cleaned up myself, showering and shaving to make myself at least remotely presentable for the evening.

When I got out of the shower I notice several texts from the wife indicating that Blather will be arriving late to town due to some weather she's encountering on her drive here from Austin, so we instead made plans to meet the Executive Director from the museum and his boyfriend for dinner, where we were to finally meet the BF after hearing about him for the past 5 months or so. He has finished school and was finally able to join his boyfriend here, so it's nice to finally have a face to put with the name. We met them at a Mexican food place somewhat near the house, visited and got to know each other over a good little meal, then called it a night an hour and change later, pausing to visit with EL, his wife AGL and their kids in the lobby of the restaurant where they were waiting on a table. We said our goodbyes, then I made the random decision to pop into a liquor store on the way home, as there was a little gift set that I had sen onlin that I wanted to check out.

Happily, I was able to grab a Crystal Head Vodka gift set, which comes with two little skull shot glasses and looks really cool, even if the bottle and the glasses would probably be a pain in the ass to actually serve from or drink out of, due to their odd shapes.

We headed home, watched tonight's Twin Peaks installment, then got fished into a few episodes of Family Guy on television before finally calling it a night.

Be seeing you.

Life And Times Of Romance

The only thing that happened of much note today was that I packed in a ton of time with the television and that I realized that my evenings for the rest of the week are going to be eaten up by various and sundry dinners and entertaining, which is just fucking frustrating to consider, regardless of whether or not I actually want to spend time with any of the people involved.

'Tis the season, I suppose.

The wife and pup were up this morning around 10:30, while I slept in until around half past noon myself, finally catching a full 9 hours of sleep for one night of the week.

The wife had been up wrapping gifts and piddling around the house a bit, so she and I visited for a few, then made plans for me to pick up some lunch for us while she continued to work around the home. I dressed and drove across town to pick up food, then headed home to get back into my pajamas and chill out for the rest for the day, as I figured the rest of the week may be a bit hectic.

We ate and watched the season premiere of The Life And Times Of Tim, which was a show that I had all but given up hope on, as it feels like it's been off the air for well over a year. It was every bit as amusing as the previous seasons, so I'm really happy to have it back at long last.

The wife napped after the show and I spent some time flipping channels, then the Mother In Law dropped in for a visit and we shot the breeze with her for about a half hour or so. During that time I fielded a call from a friend who I haven't seen in forever and then made a fire in the fireplace in the den, as the chill in the air caused the MIL to mention it and put it on our heads. She eventually split after finding our new sculptural art lacking, but whatever, I don't think a lot of people will really 'get' them, they're just fun, whimsical little pieces involving hamburgers (of all things), so you'll either think they're cute or be a killjoy about it. I'm more amused by the technical proficiency of taking a bunch of odd metal parts and managing to somehow forge them into a reasonably convincing facsimile of a food item than anything else, but to see these in a strange context pleases me to no end.

A shake of the iPhone suggested a movie called Romance from French director Catherine Breillat, so I popped in that little selection from the To-Watch Pile next, as I knew that we'd spend the evening with a ton of television. Breillat never disappoints with her transgressive approach to film making, but the general storyline of a put out woman whose lover refuses to sleep with her yet tells her he loves her, all the while she starts finally acting out in other ways sexually with other men; it's a very strange experience to be sure. The main thing that agitated me about the film is that there's absolutely nothing to indicate why she would even stay with her asshole boyfriend at all, he's not even vaguely affectionate, much less loving to the point that you'd understand why she'd stick around if he's basically making her beg for sex. The one-two punch of the ending is worth the wait, but you may be frustrated along the way getting there, so there is also the odd draw/notoriety of having some actual penetrative sex thrown in here and there, which was an odd trend in French indie cinema circa the late '90s and early '00s.

When the film was over we were getting into the early evening, so the rest of the night was comprised of the normal Fox animation stuff, including what I hear was the last episode of that awful Allen Gregory show, so good riddance if that is indeed the case. Awful, unfunny show. Bleh.

We caught the season finale of Dexter next, which ended on the first cliffhanger that they've ever bothered with, presumably because they've already been renewed for the next two years. I would guess they figure they can play a long game with the plotting instead of wrapping things up as neatly as they have for the past seasons, as there's more than a few questions left hanging, including what the deal is with the intern kid who seems so fascinated with Dexter, plus stuff that I would be a jerk for mentioning here for fear of spoilers. Still a great series, though one of the mid-season reveals still kind of annoys me, even if I know why they plotted it the way they did. Oh well, it's still a show I will always turn up for, as they've never let me down completely and I love Michael C. Hall in the role.

We rounded out the evening with another episode of Twin Peaks, which finally reveals to the audience who Laura Palmer's murderer actually is, making for some great visuals and leaving us on a cliffhanger again.

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

Be seeing you.

Bonnie's Lanterns

The alarm woke me this morning and I turned it off and slept for roughly another hour, because I had again managed to be up later than intended. The wife and Yorkie stirring around the house finally got me up and moving at 10:00 so that I could hit up an estate sale that promised the magical trio of 'DVDs, books & CDs', which piqued my interest a bit.

I dressed quickly and grabbed a Red Bull to wake myself up a bit, then kissed the wife and pup goodbye and headed out across town, following the directions the iPhone had come up with for me when I mapped out the address.

Since the sale had begun Thursday I didn't really hold out a lot of hope for anything all that interesting, but I ended up picking up about 5 DVD's that I figured were worth the $3 apiece the sign indicated, then I find out that they're selling for $1 apiece, which obviously made for an even better deal. I headed to the car, vaguely considering loading up on some other stuff just for possible Swap A DVD fodder, then decided against it, as I already have a good amount of credits over there that I'm not really using for anything and it seems kinda pointless to continue to stack up credits to never use them.

The Starbuck's drive-thru line didn't look all that terrible, so I picked up coffee for the wife and I on the way back to the house, then we had some of the bagels that our sweet friends Dylan and Christine had sent to us in a little care package from NYC, which was a fun little Christmas surprise. The wife was working on a few baking items this afternoon, mostly prep work, then planned to spend some time on her closet for a much needed culling of the shoes.

I left her to that and spent some time in the Office piddling with a few things online that I've been having trouble tracking down, then finally gave up on that and settled into the den with some Chinese leftovers for my lunch and Bonnie's Kids off the To-Watch Pile.

The movie is directed by Arthur Marks and stars Tiffany Bolling as one of two sisters who finally shoot and kill their abusive drunk of a step-father, then take it on the lam to hide out with a rich uncle and become embroiled in further drama as the film moves along. Bolling is gorgeous (a Playboy pictorial is out their for those with a decent amount of Google-fu skills) and keeps things trucking along as she lures a private detective into stealing a huge chunk of money from her uncle, who has himself proven to be shady by sending his unsuspecting niece to pick up the cash. The movie was a tad long at an hour and forty five minutes, but Bolling makes it easy to hang in there for that final reel.

The wife and I killed the rest of the afternoon with various and sundry stuff around the house, then I eventually stepped back out to pick up some dinner for us before we chilled out in the den to watch Green Lantern courtesy of Netfux. I'd kinda been putting this one off for awhile now, as I had heard some really bad things, with the kindest reviews being along the lines of "...it's not as bad as some people are saying...", which isn't much of an endorsement. I was kind of hoping that the silly looking CGI costumes would look less fake on the small screen at home, and that my lack of interest in the character aside from a few casually read issues here and there would allow me to be forgiving of the faults, since I'm not 'invested' in the comics continuity or character backstory. For the most part this worked, combined with my enjoyment of Ryan Reynolds in most things, though by the time the credits rolled I have to say that the movie was...well, that was a movie, wasn't it? I don't have much of an opinion beyond that, there was never a moment when I thought "Wow, that's cool!" or when I felt like I was doing anything besides watching an almost animated feature. The CGI is so video game-ish it's just distracting from start to finish. I mean, people like George Lucas can make that shit look pretty tangible, this looked every bit like the interstitial film bits that one sees in video games nowadays and it never allowed me to be fully immersed in the film, because it looked so fake. Oh well, it's an okay watch, but good Lord it could've been better and a great start would've been someone veto'ing those silly ass CGI costumes.

After the movie the wife worked on her bread a bit and I spent an hour or so in the Library getting a couple of the wife's Christmas packages boxed up and ready to wrap, then I retired to the Office to work on this post and maybe get to bed early tonight.

Be seeing you.

Dreadfully Sexy Exports

Having taken care to note the hour when I finally bedded down last night, I adjusted my alarm to allow me to grab a whopping 7 hours of sleep, though I still managed to wake at 7:00 AM with a start, making that final few hours of sleep hard to get back to. Because why should I ever be able to sleep straight through the night, right?

The wife was off running several errands, pedicure, Christmas shopping, etc., so I got the house opened up for the day and spent some time in the Office on the PC dicking around with the blog and things of that nature, then finally got dressed around 12:30 and stepped out to pick up something to eat for my lunch. Being that it was right smack in the middle of the lunch hour this whole process took almost a freaking hour for the round trip, due to the perpetually backed up drive-thru at the restaurant where I decided to grab some chicken.

The Yorkie greeted me happily, then moved back into the bedroom to sulk and ignore me. Presumably she's still pissed about the party last night. I settled in to eat and popped in Penny Dreadful, a random horror selection off the To-Watch Pile. The movie wasn't bad, but ultimately the story of a girl with a car-related phobia being trapped in one while fending off attacks from without perpetrated by a vicious hitchhiker who has stranded her in the woods just never completely gelled for me. I enjoy Rachel Miner well enough, so it was an okay way to pass the time, though I doubt I will come back to this anytime soon. The wife returned from her outings while I was finishing up the movie, so she and I spent some time on the couch catching up on the day thus far as well as what the evening had in store, as she'd made dinner plans with Brian, along with their usual gift exchange in which they buy one another gift cards for presumably the same amount each year; it's kinda funny to me one some level, as it feels like they should just resort to cash at some point, like grandmothers.

The wife managed to catch a nap in the afternoon, so I popped in something short to kill the time until Brian was set to arrive. I'd had the Pink Eiga release of Sexy Battle Girls laying around for what feels like forever, so I popped that in and spent an hour puzzling over the plot sandwiched in between the typical pinku film ratio of one sex scene per 10 minutes of screen time. The disc actually has a decent little trivia featurette, which gives some (for me anyway) much-needed context to the story of a girls school student who finds herself at odds with her fellow students at first, then eventually the crooked staff once she learns what kinda of shady things are going on behind the scenes. Plus tons of sex. It's a fun watch, and I would recommend these films to people based on the sheer weirdness of it all, there's never a whole lot of time to get bored with these because something weird should be along in a few minutes.

Brian arrived and we visited for a few, then headed out to try and grab some Chinese before the restaurant got too packed. We seemed to arrive just minutes ahead of the dinner rush and were able to eat and split while the lobby area quickly filled up with irritable customers who didn't seem to understand that it was a Friday night and tons of other people would be out and about as well. We grabbed a coffee from Starbuck's on the way back to the house, then settled in to watch a movie I picked up last week on a blind buy, just based on the almost universal good word of mouth it has gotten.

Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale is a Finnish film that explores the older, darker mythology behind the Santa character, eschewing the jolly Coca Cola fat man in favor of a creepy tale that sees an excavation bringing a monstrous figure back to life, and the only person who knows what's going on is the young son of a reindeer farmer. The boy must find a way to convince his small village that something is amiss before Santa and his elves are allowed to fully run amuck. The Blu-ray made great use of the surround sound and the film looks amazing, I'd definitely suggest giving it a rental at the very least. Great stuff.

Brian split shortly after the movie, as he had an errand to run on the way home, so the wife and I watched tonight's episode of Twin Peaks, then called it a night.

I got started on this so that I can be in bed relatively early, as I want to hit an estate sale in the AM before all the dregs of humanity are out and about.

Be seeing you.