Like A Fish Out Of The Ripper

Last night I was up until just shy of 3:00 in the AM finishing up the WildC.A.T.S Version 3.0 collection, so that I can get started on the 2nd (and final) volume of that incarnation, then wrapped my night with another couple chapters of My Dark Places, which continues to be interesting if slightly dry and matter of fact in its delivery of the events surrounding the death of the author's mother.

The alarm woke me this morning at 9:30, so I looked at e-mail on the iPhone for a few and then went to see what the wife was up to in the Office with the Yorkie.  I fired up the PC and started fooling around with the blog for a bit while she fielded a couple phone calls, then she needed to be on the PC because her Mac wasn't playing ball with whatever project she was working on, which turned out to be the same stupid craft machine that's not been working for God knows how long now.  This kinda annoyed me, as I was looking forward to being able to work on the blog a bit before noon, but instead had to surrender the computer to the wife while she was on the phone with tech support, so I said the hell with it and checked in on The Simpsons on the iPad, then got dressed to get out and go buy some coffee instead of just sitting around.

I stopped by the bank to make a deposit first, then pointed the car towards Starbuck's to grab a couple tasty beverages.  Thankfully my Starbuck's run was much less annoying than the last few trips I've made to various drive-thrus, so that was a relief, as I was in no mood to deal with anyone's fuckery at this point, then I headed home and delivered the wife's coffee to her as a little surprise, she apologized for the computer thing, but hey, what can you do? She needed to use it and I went and did other shit, so no harm, no foul, minor irritations aside.

The wife and the Yorkie spent time in the bedroom while I worked on the blog in the Office, then I finally knocked off around 1:30 and made myself some pasta for my lunch, then ate while watching a Netfux movie that's been laying around here for longer than I'm ashamed to even admit.  I mean seriously, we might as well have bought the fucking movies that have been here for the past little while, as we've literally paid for them the past couple months with the standing Netfux bank draft.  

Watchable, But You've Seen The
Leads In Better Films.

Like A Fish Out Of Water is a French film that I'd added to the queue forever ago because of the cast, which included the always stunning Monica Bellucci, plus familiar character actors Tcheky Karyo and Dominique Pinon as the leads who lure a certain sad sack into a scheme to extort a gangster out of cash by stealing his expensive prize fish, then selling it back to him as another fish that the mark just so happens to have.  The film is watchable, but never really blew my skirt up as far as any of the twists or quirks they throw in.  I mean, it's a decent time waster but I doubt I'd come back to it, as there's no key performance or moment that just blew me away, and Bellucci (the main draw for me) is just a supporting character for the most part, more of a piece of the ensemble cast than the star, which kinda left me cold.

After the movie I actually worked on the collages that've been sidelined for the better part of two months, gluing in some more stuff while watching an episode of The Addams Family, then I settled back in the den to watch a couple more episodes of Neon Genesis Evangelion, which I had managed to miss yesterday.  I am happy that the watch of the series is proceeding at a reasonable pace, even if there are a few stops and starts here and there due to life kinda popping up and cocking it up.

The wife had an evening engagement that she'd wisely allowed me to tap out on, as I had zero interest in mingling with the 'uppercrust' that would turn out for it, so she dressed and split for that while I was in mid-cartoon, assuring me that she'd be home sooner than later.

The Pink Films Are Never Just
Quite What I'm Expecting.
Odd Genre.

After the wife split and I finished my Evangelion episode I decided to finally tackle something else I've been putting off, as I have a certain podcast that's been on the iPhone for a month or more that I was holding off on listening to because I happened to have one of the films that they were to cover on hand and I wanted to try to watch it before listening to their review.  Thus, I finally got around to popping in Assault! Jack The Ripper, which is a Pink Film from the '70s in which a quiet pastry chef and a waitress with a chip on her shoulder accidentally kill a woman, then find that it excites them and develop a taste for it, leading to bigger crimes and eventually them turning on one another. The weird thing to me was that it felt like more of a Bonnie and Clyde style tale than anything Jack The Ripper-related for the most part, as they are literally 'thrill-killers' who murder and then screw out of excitement, it's not as if they're only after whores or something.  At any rate, the Mondo Macabro DVD features some nice bonus material to put the film into the context of the history of the genre, which is always interesting to learn more about this little seen genre of cinema.

The wife returned for the last 15 minutes of the movie, marveling at a murderous pastry chef as we ate dinner, then we caught up on a couple things off the TiVo, including last night's episodes of 30 Rock and a new Dave's Old Porn, then I put the wife to bed and half-assed watched a couple Robot Chicken re-runs before finally getting started on this post.

Be seeing you.

Seriously, What The Fuck's Up With The People In The Drive-Thru?

With the wife out of town the Yorkie and I slept in this morning, which isn't to say that the wife would normally wake us, but if she's here the dog will nag her awake but she knows that I'll be pissed if she bugs me, so she just chills instead.  When we finally got up and moving I got the house opened up for the day, then fed the pup and settled into the Office to dick around with the blog for a bit, then finally dressed to get out and grab something to eat, since the wife would soon be home from her overnight trip to Dallas.

Since the wife would be home shortly after I got back, I left her a voice-mail to see if she wanted me to grab her anything just in case they hadn't had lunch before they went to the airport, then I hit up Starbuck's for a coffee.  Ahead of me in the drive-thru was a guy with a little hotdog cart that he was pulling behind his van, which I always find to be a dick move, since a trailer in the drive-thru kinda congests things behind you for at least a car length, then when he gets to the window, the guy hands him a drink and he hands the guy a brown paper bag (presumably hotdogs left over from his lunch 'rush'?) and drives the fuck away.  I pull up, this idiot kid at the window gives me a total about half what it was supposed to be, because he'd forgotten to take the hotdog guy's money, then says that it's 'ok', because he'll just charge me the lower price?!?  Suffice to say, I'll be checking my recent card activity tomorrow afternoon, make sure this asshole isn't running some weird scam on me since he's clearly cool with giving away shit in exchange for free food.

I grabbed a burger and headed home, where the wife was already chilling with the ecstatic Yorkie, so I ate while catching up on the past 24 hours with her, then I spent some more time on the web with the blog while she caught a nap.  I piddled around on the Guest Side of the house hanging the painting that EL had dropped off last night, then got caught up looking for a painting that we'd taken down when we had that side of things renovated, and have apparently hidden from myself entirely.  I mean, I literally have no fucking idea where this thing is and it may keep me awake tonight wondering where it's been squirrelled away.  Gah.

By the time I surfaced from this maddening endeavor I realized that I'd pretty well pissed away the afternoon and needed to start a load of laundry for the evening's festivities, so I got that going and hopped in the shower, shaved and got cleaned up.  Once the laundry was finally dry I dressed quickly so that the wife wouldn't just be standing around waiting on me and we headed out to the preview party for the Christmas season at the museum, which ended up taking up most of our evening.

We hit the museum about 15 minutes into the event and found it already seething with an array of humanity, which is nice to see the event doing well, but also a bit more than you just wanna go wading into after a fairly chill day at the house, y'know?  We mingled and visited our way through the place, catching up with folks that we'd not seen since before the Thanksgiving holiday, then eventually started edging towards the door.

On the way home we hit a drive-thru for a light dinner, and I'll be Goddamned if the car ahead of us isn't acting weird, gunning forward as if they suddenly realized that they're in a vehicle instead of sitting on the couch safely at home.  Hell, when we pulled into the parking lot they were just idling in the way, as if they couldn't decide if they were even getting in the stupid line to begin with, then when they finally made it to the pick-up window they pause briefly and then drive away, confusing the shit out of the window broad, who tries to force their three bean burritos onto us instead of what we ordered.  Is it a full moon?  People are acting really weird and I need it to stop before I just start slapping folks at random.

You Don't Have To Be Crazy
To Work Here, But It Helps.

We headed home, got comfy and ate while watching last night's TiVo'd episode of American Horror Story: Asylum, which is still a helluva lot of fun, even if there's an increasing feeling that none of the characters we like may make it out alive, as everyone feels pretty expendable at this point. I'm very curious to see how they wrap everything up at this point, as I know we're over halfway finished at this stage of the game and things just keep getting weirdr and weirder.  As over the top as the show sets out to be, it's still a helluva lot of fun and I'm hoping we get another season.

We called it a night around 11:00, when I put the wife and Yorkie to bed, then headed into the Office to work on the notes for this post and poke around the web a bit more, as is the custom.

Be seeing you.

Wednesday Television Catch Up Day

The wife was again up at the crack of dawn to run the Yorkie to the Groomer, so she was getting back as my alarm went off and we visited briefly like ships passing in the night before she hopped in the shower to get ready for her overnight trip to Dallas.

I got the house opened for the day and the wife made us some coffee, then I settled into the Office to work on getting a blog post published and start working on last night's post notes just to try and keep up with my ever slipping grasp on the stupid thing.  It's really weird  I don't mind the process of writing this stuff, but actually getting it published is almost an afterthought at this point, I don't know what that's all about, but it seems like I had a similar malaise a few months ago, so I guess that this too shall pass.

The wife split to go to the Mother In Law's to pick her up, then I guess the two of them and the Older Sister would meet at the airport, where they were to fly to Dallas to spend a day with the Middle Sister in honor of her birthday, with some shopping and a nice dinner out thrown in for good measure.

I spent the morning in the Office with various web nonsense eating up my day, trading texts with EL regarding lunch, which he had to cancel, as something had come up and he was taking his wife to the doctor, but more on that later.  He offered to bring by the painting that we'd purchased on my birthday at the studio tour of his house, so we made tentative plans for him to drop it off after he got off work.

The Maid turned up around 11:30 with her mother in tow and they got started on the normal routine.  I eventually decided to get out and pick up some Thai for my lunch  but since I made this decision on the fly I found myself with about 20 minutes to kill.  Since the middle of the month was kinda eaten up with worrying about dealing with the old house on the far side of town, I drove out there to survey the area out of morbid curiosity, since it's now well and truly out of my hair.  As always when driving out to the ancestral manse in recent years, I was struck by how utterly Goddamned depressing the area looks, and I have to marvel at the idea that I was never truly struck down by depression as a child, because looking at the place now makes me want to put my head in an oven, it's all so beaten down and over grown, as if the wilderness is trying to take it all back.  I made a pass and then drove back into town to grab my food.

The Maids were still at it when I returned, though I naturally got the cal that the Yorkie was ready pretty much as I sat down to eat, so I put that off while I had my lunch and watched an episode of South Park on Netfux Instant Watch, then the Maids finally got the hell out of my hair and I ran across town to grab the dog and get her squared away back home.

The Lawn Guys turned up and kept her agitated and engaged for a good hour as they took care of the leaves that've been falling steadily since we've been back from our trip, then I finally settled into the den to watch last week's episode of Supernatural in advance of a new one this evening.

Still Don't Think The Hood Is THAT Good
Of A Disguise, But It's A Fun Show...

The evening came on with a new episode of Arrow, introducing the character of The Huntress to the show, which was kind of interesting, then I had to pause that when EL turned up to deliver the painting, taking the opportunity to explain his doctor visit this afternoon, which was basically that he and his wife are expecting a baby and had to check up on things since she'd had some odd bleeding over the weekend.  I gave congratulations and we caught up a bit, then he was on his way and I heated some leftovers for my dinner and finished Arrow before moving on to a new Supernatural.

Whitney Cummings had a new show premiering tonight called Love You, Mean It, which is another talk show on E!, and I have to say that I wasn't very impressed, just because it really captured the flavor of that catty bullshit that I despise about Chelsea Handler and her various endeavors   I finished the show, but I doubt I'm coming back for more, it just wasn't worth it.

I was in the middle of a couple episodes of Neon Genesis Evangelion when the wife called, so we caught up and related the days' events to one another before saying our goodnights, then I finished my show and moved into the Office to get the last couple days' worth of blogging done, just to feel like I got anything done today.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.

Archers Raiding Whitney

Today I completely overslept, finally feeling like I'd caught up on my weirdly jet-lagged sleep after the week in California last week.

I finally got up and moving and went to see what the wife was up to, only to find that she was out of the house running errands, as she'd been up at the crack of dawn unable to sleep, so she decided to attack her day with zeal rather than try to force herself back into bed.

I put away some of the groceries that the wife had dropped off (she'd been quite busy, apparently), then dicked around on the web for a few before finally getting dressed and stepping out to grab myself some lunch. In a really stupid move of assholery, I decided to try to have my cake and eat it too, so I stopped at a burger joint, where I got a drink and fries, because the place I was planning on picking up a burger has shitty fries, then I drove down the road to the other burger place, only to find out that the specific burger I had in mind is now off their menu, which left me crestfallen.  Plus I look like some kinda stoned asshole burnout type who has to stop at four different places to satisfy his weed-fueled cravings.  I ended up with a chicken sandwich as a consolation choice and headed home to eat.

The wife was home, so we caught up a bit, then I chilled in the den to eat and catch up on the last couple episodes of Whitney, a show that the wife has officially tapped out of, and something that I feel stupid for watching because I think Whitney Cummings is cute, even if the show's writing is borderline dogshit.

The whole Neon Genesis Evangelion project continued with three back to back episodes, finally making it past the original stuff that I'd started ages ago and into new material.  I continue to enjoy the show, and I'm curious to see where it all ends up, as Bucky has mentioned that things end on something of a controversial note, as fans were somewhat divided about how it all shakes out.

Nothing You Know Is Real.

As we got into the late afternoon I made a really random movie selection and popped in a little heist film starring Tony Leung and Ekin Cheng called Tokyo Raiders that I'd grabbed as a random Swap A DVD trade awhile back.  The whole flick feels like a music video, especially the action sequences, and I dug it fairly well, even if it gets off into a few more red herrings and double crosses than it might actually need, in that NO ONE is what they first appear.

The wife had an evening engagement, so she split for that as I was finishing up the movie, so I ended up making a cocktail and digging into a re-watch of Archer season one, which I'd purchased on Blu-ray during the flurry of Black Friday week activity that I had while poking around on the iPad in the hotel last week.

Archer still makes me laugh, even after several viewings, and I basically made my way through the entire season, pausing when the wife got home to visit with her for a bit, then I ended up staying up late to finish out the disc into the wee hours of the evening.

Don't Go! I'm The President Of
The United States!

Adult Swim fished me in afterward with an episode of Family Guy, as well as a couple Robot Chicken re-runs, then I finally drifted into the bedroom and read a few chapters in the Ed The Happy Clown book that the wife gave me for my birthday a few weeks back.  The book is as strange as I remember, discovering it as I did at a much younger age than could be considered appropriate while I was working at a comic store in my youth.  I also love that the fairly unrelated stories that Chester Brown started the book with are eventually morphed into a cohesive tale in a bit of ret-conning that ties things up fairly well.  This one is a fairly nostalgic read for me, especially since I've owned it in (I believe) all of the various incarnations over the years, from the individual issues to the soft and hard cover collections that've come out over the years.  Good stuff.

I finally crashed out in the wee hours of the morning, making certain to set my alarm so that I could be up to deal with the Maid and whatnot, especially since the wife was going to be going out of town for a quick trip to Dallas for the Middle Sister's birthday.

Be seeing you.

Movie Cercle Shame Rouge

And Here My Troubles Began...

The time difference continues to flummox me as I stayed up until well after 4:00 AM last night, first working on the blogging nonsense, then reading the first few chapters of James Ellroy's My Dark Places, which is a memoir about his mother's unsolved murder as well as his own life, a book that I'm fairly certain I've started before but probably never finished.  Having started slipping back into the film noir stuff recently I was thinking that now was as good a time as any to give an Ellroy book another pass, so this one seemed self-contained and easily accessible as opposed to his novels, which may or may not reflect at least a minor chronology or recurring characters that I may or may not be aware of.

In an effort to not sleep the day away I had made sure to set the alarm this morning, and even though some sinus issues woke me briefly about an hour after I finally crashed, I was thankfully able to get back to sleep and try to sleep in until 9:30, when the alarm startled me from the bed for good.

The wife was in the den on the phone, fielding what sounded like several phone calls in succession, so I left her to that and got the house opened for the day, then fired up the PC in the Office and got started on polishing up a blog post for publication, as I always remain behind on this stupid thing due to lack of interest and...well, that's pretty much it.  The wife and Yorkie eventually drifted through to say good morning, then they settled in the bedroom, where the wife spent time cleaning her closet and the Yorkie burrowed through laundry that was waiting to be sorted on the foot of the bed, one of her fondest pursuits.

After I finally got the post published I got the returned Swap A DVD trade ready to mail, since this dumb bitch finally saw fit to send me her new address after a week of waiting.  I swear to God I've never wasted $5 to mail a $1 item before, and I have come very close to being an asshole to this person about it, but I'm trying to be cool and not just ask her how fucking stupid she can be for not updating her address a FULL YEAR after a move.  Yeesh.  I got dressed and took the wife's lunch order, then headed out to hit the Post Office and then a drive-thru.

When I got home the wife and I ate in the den while watching last week's episode of American Horror Story off the TiVo, which went a good way towards cementing my love of the (SPOILERS) now demon-possessed younger nun, as she just seems sassy and fun instead of timid and cowering, as she'd come across when the season first began.  Lily Rabe seems to be having a blast with the character and I'm really digging it.  We moved on to last week's recorded episode of Dexter, then the wife and the Yorkie took an afternoon nap in the bedroom while I got the fireplace ready for a fire in the evening and then settled in with a Movie Shame Monday selection that I had been eyeing for a couple weeks now.

SO Worth The Wait.  Great Film.

Le Cercle Rouge is a movie that I feel like I may have once borrowed on DVD from Macguffin, though I know that I never watched it, as nothing about this one felt familiar at all.  Or maybe the cover is just so iconic and familiar that I think I have had it in my possession before, but at any rate it is the first film I've ever watched by Jean-Pierre Melville and stars Alain Delon as a thief released from jail who happens to fall in with an escaped fugitive and an ex-police sharpshooter to pull a jewel heist, which is the real showpiece of the film, as it plays out over a 30 minute period with no dialog as they men go about their work in the most methodical way.  The movie was great, something that I'd grabbed on Blu via one of the many Barnes & Noble Criterion sales, and well worth the cash.  The movie does clock in around 2 hours and 20 minutes, so having started it in the later afternoon I wasn't surprised to see it getting dark outside before the credits finally rolled, so I eventually paused it and made myself a cocktail, then lit up the fire in the fireplace to get the evening nice and toasty as the temperature dropped outside.

The wife and I eventually ordered in some deli food and enjoyed that while catching up on last week's episode of Elementary, one of those junk food shows that I'm still keeping around just because I couldn't deal with a television schedule that consisted of only shows as harrowing as Boardwalk Empire or Breaking Bad, then we caught up on the last couple episodes of Dave's Old Porn, a show that is always a delight from start to finish.

We wrapped the evening with this week's episode of Dexter, which I was forced to record this evening due to the usual clusterfuck of television programming that insists that every other program we watch must air simultaneously on the same night each week.  Seriously, Sunday evening can get a little tricky, but I have a feeling that a few things will get the axe for good, and others are about to wrap their seasons if I just relax and ride it out for a few more weeks.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.

Errands, Television And Shopping, Oh My

This morning I surfaced briefly around 8:00 or so, blew my nose and wiped my weirdly weepy left eye, which I chalked up to either sinus pressure or allergies, then dove back into the pillows, ignoring the fact that the wife and Yorkie were up and about and bumping around elsewhere in the house, because there was no way in hell I was getting up that damned early, especially after my jet-lagged ass had gone to bed around 4:00 in the AM.

When I got up and moving around noon they were both back in bed, so the Yorkie and I cuddled for a bit, then I spent some time piddling in the kitchen, gathering recycling and trying to generally pick up after the week away had left things in a disarray, from the piles of mail to the last vestiges of the birthday party we'd had just a day before we left.

The wife and Yorkie stirred as I was loading stuff into the Maxima to dump at the recycle bins, so I asked about her potential lunch order, then headed out to drop stuff off, hit up Best Buy and then grab food on the way home.  I had to typically hit up a couple different recycling bin locations to get rid of all of our stuff, which always makes me question why I even give a fuck about this stuff, as I'll be dead before it all really goes in the shitter, and why do I care about your kids and what kinda world they're left with?  I just feel fucking stupid driving around burning gas to get rid of stuff that should be easier to recycle if anyone really tried at all, y'know?

After I finally got everything dropped off I took a prowl through Best Buy, where I used a random $5 coupon they'd sent me via e-mail to pick up a few random things that caught my eye, including the most recent volume of Family Guy, then I grabbed some food for the wife and I at a drive-thru and headed home.

We ate under the watchful eye of the Yorkie, who eventually nagged her way into a few hopefully harmless nibbles of tortilla and bread from the wife's sandwich, then the two of them headed back to the bedroom to relax while I spent the afternoon in the PC in the Office working on a blog post and doing some last little dribs and drabs of shopping online, as I started winding down my Black Friday/Cyber Monday money wasting, even if I was just ordering stuff that I felt I had to jump on because the deal was too good to pass up, which was the case in more than one purchase.  I'm weirdly tight-fisted at most times, but can drop $100 or more if the right series of deals pops up, this is what I'm learning about myself from the past week.  Also being in a hotel room with limited entertainment options leads to much deal hunting on the web, and subsequent purchases.

Oh well, some people get into drugs - I'm buying and stacking up dumb shit to maybe watch before I die or the next format change happens; sue me.

Richard: Not A Man To Be Trifled With.

In the early evening I relocated to the den and made myself a cocktail in advance of settling in for the normal run of Fox animated material, including a new Bob's Burgers that homaged Jaws in hilarious ways.  We had to jump into The Walking Dead next because of the usual spoilery assholes on the web that could potentially ruin plot points for me, then the wife wrapped her night with me by watching the penultimate episode of this season's Boardwalk Empire, which again proved to be the most tense hour of television we've seen in quite some time; this show routinely gives Breaking Bad a run for its' money as far as that kinda thing goes, since you tend to feel that a lot of the main characters could easily be killed at a moment's notice.  This show has some really great storytelling, and I have to say that Richard, the haunted, disfigured sniper, introduced as a running buddy for the Jimmy character back in season one - he's now quite possibly my favorite character.  He carries himself with a quiet calm that most in the series seem to take as a weakness but is in fact a stone cold killer if the situation calls for it; it's quite chilling.  It kind of reminds me of the Driver character in Drive, the rage boiling just beneath the surface, waiting for some one to push their luck too far...great stuff.

The wife and Yorkie headed to bed, so after I settled them I watched the last couple episodes of Comic Book Men to get caught up, then half-assed watched the episode of Talking Dead that TiVo had suggested while I finished my drink and went through the last few newspapers that'd accumulated over the past week.  I have always shied away from that show, as the host Chris Hardwick always strikes me as somewhat disingenuous, and his demeanor tonight was no different.  I feel like he may even be a fan of the material, but the way he speaks about it gives me the idea that he feels like he's just a little better than the rest of us nerds who are into it.  Maybe I'm way off base here, but it's just the feeling that I get.

I finally headed to the web to get started on this post and poke around a bit more for any bargains that were to be had before calling it a night.

Be seeing you.

Napa Day Six

We hadn't set the alarm this morning, figuring that we'd wake whenever, as the plan was to split around noon to start the trek back to Oakland to begin the entire day of travel to finally make it home around 10:00 PM in the evening.  The wife woke shortly before 9:00, so I eventually stirred as well and we started the whole packing process, because she wanted to take a quick field trip back into Yountville to check out the Napa Style store that she'd spotted while we were out to dinner last night.  We came perilously close to getting into an argument when she decided that instead of wearing or carrying the large coat that she'd brought on the trip that she'd pack it, meaning that about half the shit in her suitcase was now my problem to pack in mine, which came here stuffed to the gills to begin with.  I naturally got agitated about this and we danced around a big blow-up until we both re-packed entirely, with only the stupid coat left over, so she decided to see if it could live in the Mother In Law's luggage on the voyage home, to try and remove it from the table, so to speak.

Things calming down, we visited the In-Laws, got the keys to the suburban and the wife drove us the short journey back down Highway 29 to Yountville, where we took a quick pass through the little shopping center, bought a tiny painting of a vineyard and browsed the Napa Style store before heading back to Meadowood to finish packing and start the great exodus process.

We loaded things up and I walked the ladies through the reception area so they could check out the Christmas decorations that'd gone up virtually overnight, then we were on our way, heading back to Oakland, which proved to be much easier to get into than to get out of, as the directions seemed much more concise and easy to follow on this trip than they had on Monday.

After checking bags I went through security with the ladies while the Beau returned the rental vehicle (getting busted for he and the MIL smoking in it in the process!), then he met us in the terminal where we were having a bite to eat to tide us over for the FIVE HOUR FLIGHT ahead of us.

Twelve Racketeers Take
Over A Whole Town!

The flight touched down first in Burbank, where we offloaded cattle and then filled that mother right back up for the flight to Las Vegas, where the process was repeated again.  I spent this time reading the rest of The Score on the iPad, which was a book that I'd started on the last trip we'd taken...wherever.  Luckily, I was able to pick right back up where I left off with no loss of plot or whatever, and the story of a giant heist perpetrated by Parker and a group of other criminals kept me company for the duration of the flight.  The wife alternated between magazines and napping and I did my best to ignore the various seatmates I was saddled with on my left.

When we finally touched down at home it was about 20 minutes later than expected, as the flights had been running behind all day.  There was a weird bit in the terminal where the In-Laws were looking for keys tot he vehicle that'd been left in the garage area, but they finally turned up in one of the suitcases that the Beau had packed, so he went to fetch the suburban while I waited with the ladies and guided all the luggage out to the curb.  On the way back into town we hit a drive-thru for some late night burgers, then the In-Laws dropped us back at our place.

We were greeted by an ecstatic Yorkie, who bounced all around us as we took the time to unpack and go through the significant piles of mail.  We eventually settled down long enough to dig into our food at long last, which calmed the dog a bit, then the wife crashed out with the pup in the bedroom and I spent some time trying to get my groove back on the PC, after being away from a keyboard for almost a week.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.

Napa Day Five

Today the wife got up and moving fairly early, but I ignored the sounds of her stirring and slept in a bit as she dressed and apparently went for a stroll around the grounds, something she'd made noise about doing several times but something that we'd really nailed down a time for specifically.

I woke to the sounds of the wife showering after her return, so I spent some time checking e-mail and looking around for any other possible Black Friday deals that were to be had online while I waited for her to be ready to discuss the days' plans.

The wife had made lunch reservations 'off-campus' for us, so we went to pick up the In-Laws and had the Mother In Law's Beau decide to sit the afternoon out because lunch and shopping didn't really grab him.

The three of us headed out and the wife drove us back down Highway 29 to Brix, where we had a nice lunch, arriving just ahead of the rush. Good food, good service, plus a nice view of the area out the back of the restaurant, where they grow a lot of the herbs that are presumably used in their kitchen.  All of this is overlooked by the surrounding mountains; just a gorgeous view.

After we ate we headed back up the highway a bit and poked around in Dean & Deluca, then the wife wanted to stop by the Napa Soap Company, where the lady at the counter kinda shook her head at me when noticed that I picked up a wine barrel plank (re-purposed as a votive holder) and pantomimed swatting the wife's ass with it.

"That's not what that's for!" she said, smiling.

"Now ma'am, if I buy this thing you can't tell me what to do with it!" I replied, then had to explain to the wife what that whole exchange was about, since she and the MIL where shopping.

Her reaction? "Oh, good Lord."

We eventually made our way around to the same area where Bistro Jeanty is located, where the MIL found a cute little fur hat and then we headed further up highway 29 toward the heart of Saint Helena, spending some time in the various shops on Main Street before finally heading back Meadowood.

The wife napped in the afternoon and I idly watched the croquet people on the lawn and poked around on the web a bit while channel surfing.

The Pig Has Been Very Very
Good To Us...

Dinner was to be at 8:00 back in Yountville at a Thomas Keller restaurant called Ad Hoc, so we headed out around 7:30. The Beau's directions were a bit off, as he'd transposed numbers within the address, so we floundered around a bit before I finally looked it up myself and threw it into the iPhone, which easily guided us a few blocks down to our destination.

The food is served prix fixe, as a set menu each night, with wine options and slight additions available as requested, so when we first sat down the wife and I were a bit concerned due to the Beau's slightly fickle tastes, but as it turned out the meal was a big hit all the way around and we left feeling stuffed to bursting from a meal that included a great salad, then an entree consisting of scallops and fatback.

We head back to Oakland tomorrow to begin the trip home (arriving around 10:00 PM our time), so we said our goodnights and went to our respective rooms to rest up for the day of travel.

It's been a great trip but I'm kinda ready to be home and see if the Yorkie even remembers us.

Be seeing you.

Napa Day Four

Not a lot to tell you about today, Turkeys.

We had Thanksgiving 'dinner' scheduled for noon today in the Vintner's Room, so we kinda slept in a bit this morning, though I did wake around 10:00 and start poking around on the web for any pre-Black Friday deals that caught my eye on Amazon before we had to be out and about for the meal.

Happy Thanksgiving.

As it got past the 11:00 o'clock hour I finally decided to wake the wife, as she was still snoozing pretty hard, so we lay in bed for a bit longer comparing notes on the trip thus far, highlights, etc.  We finally got dressed and met the In-Laws at their room, then took the little forest path over to the restaurant area at the crest of the nearby hill, where we were seated in a large room that quickly filled with other families of varying sizes.

The meal was a series of courses that started with a light pumpkin soup, then moved into a salad before the meal proper was served to the table family style, which was a nice way to allow you to build your own plate and not force cranberry sauce on someone like me, who would avoid it altogether if possible.  The meal was great and the waitstaff quite attentive in spite of being here dicking around with us instead of home with their family.

We finished the meal in the early afternoon, said our goodbyes to the In-Laws and headed back to the room to relax.

The wife napped in the bedroom while I literally spent the entire afternoon and into the early evening chilling on the couch with a fire roaring in the fireplace and surfing the web for further Black Friday deals.

We eventually ordered in room service and had the In-Laws 'over for dinner' while watching the end of The Girl, which is currently in steady rotation on HBO.

The wife and I flipped around and caught parts of a couple Comedy Central Roasts (Charlie Sheen and Roseanne, for what it's worth), then she took a soak in the tub before calling it a night while I flipped channels on the couch.

I caught the new Dave's Old Porn on Showtime, then wound down the night with a re-watch of some stuff on Adult Swim,and then stumbled into a re-watch of Bruno off HBO just for the hell of it.

Be seeing you.

Napa Day Three

Today we woke at 8:00 to give us enough time to be ready for the winery tour that the wife had scheduled for us.  We dressed quickly and then picked up the In-Laws at their room and made our way to the reception area, where we waited a short time for our tour guide Scott, who was to show us around for the afternoon.

Vineyard 29

The wine tour started around 9:00 and we loaded into the suburban and headed out into the cool morning to visit three different wineries.  Our first stop was Vineyard 29, where we met a young woman named Kelsi, who guided us through a tour of their giant production area, then we went downstairs into an ornate cellar to sample several different varieties of their wines.  I have to say that this only reaffirmed my feeling that I'm just not much of a wine guy, no matter how much I swill and swish it around, it's just not all that intriguing to me for whatever reason.  Maybe it's a nasal issue that effects my taste, or maybe it's the acidity of the wine itself, which always tickles at my acid reflux almost immediately, but I just don't think that it's something I can get into, especially beyond one glass here or there.

We loaded back into the suburban after the In-Laws smoked and drove across the valley to visit Chateau Boswell, where a gentleman (I believe) named Matt gave us some history of the place and we sampled several of their varieties in a large round domed room set into the hillside.  This place was pretty cool, as the acoustics sent any small sound booming around you, and our host was a really friendly, jovial guy, which made for a fun, more conversational experience.  This vineyard was really pretty, as everything that they showed us was cut into the side of a hill like some kind of Hobbit house or something, and the general area was covered with fall foliage, so it was like walking into a postcard or calendar image. Such a gorgeous area.

Chateau Boswell

We piled back into the suburban at this point and made our way into 'town' as it were to take a break for some lunch at this point, ending up at a place recommended by our guided called Tra Vigne.  The place wasn't very crowded for the lunch hour yet, so that was kinda nice, then Scott managed to piss me off by calling me down for wanting to order a cocktail with my lunch, as it can 'overpower' all the delicate bullshit I'm supposedly experiencing with the wine tasting nonsense, so I'm fairly done with the tour at this point because as a grown man, I don't particularly care to have someone telling me what to do. Rather than tell him that I'm essentially humoring the family with this whole wine song and dance and that I couldn't care less about the tasting (likely making a scene), I pretty much ignore the guy for the rest of the afternoon, including our final stop.

Oh and for what it's worth, the food at Tra Vigne was was pretty decent, in spite of my barely withheld agitation with our host.

The tour of the Martin Estate Winery was actually given by the couple who own the place. They're antique collectors who showed off their home on between servings of their craft, a tour which was also attended by four members of their wine club, who unfortunately for us turned out to be a bunch of hipster-y types from Oregon and Seattle, all seemingly shocked that we knew about this vineyard, which I guess means they have to move on to the next obscure thing now.  "How do you know Martin? No one knows about Martin!" (I shit you not, one of these guys actually said this) Please, give me a fucking break Mr. Cooler-Than-Thou.  Yawn.

Martin Estates

Interestingly, the man of the house is a collector of antique weapons (I believe both he and his wife were antique dealers before retiring and going into wine) and their home and various relics have been featured in a book called Chicks With Guns, with their daughter gracing the cover.

Afterward we headed back to Meadowood and said our goodbyes to good old Scott (the Mother In Law tells him if he's ever back in Texas, to look us up, get in touch with me, to which I called "Yeah, THAT'S gonna happen!"), then the wife and  In-Laws napped and I spent the afternoon poking around for any Black Friday week bargains online on the iPad, then we got ready to head back out for dinner.

Dinner out for the evening was at a place called Press, which had a casual upscale dining vibe and I believe that everyone thoroughly enjoyed the meal.  The wife and I split a mixed grill that they were happy to pare down into two separate servings rather than us having to hack at it ourselves, and we ended up trying a serving of Wagyu beef, which I was less than impressed with.  The texture is too fatty for my tastes, and the really strange thing is, the burger that I had for lunch back at Meadowood the previous day was made from the same beef.  I suppose I only like it once you've grilled a bit of that fat away.

Oh, and I finally had a couple of those cocktails I had wanted for lunch, which was nice.

We made our way back 'home' with no problems, then said our goodnights in the hallway and then headed to our respective rooms. The wife and I had a soak in the tub, then I put her to bed while I got to work on the notes for this post before it all slips away.

Be seeing you.

Napa Day Two

There was a hot air balloon ride scheduled for the crack of dawn this morning, but we went to bed knowing there was a danger of it being canceled with the weather threatening to be rainy for the next few days. Thus, we were supposed to get a call at 5:00 (in the Christing morning!) to tell us if it was canceled or not.

Imagine my surprise when I woke to use the bathroom at almost 9:00 and found the wife sleeping contentedly beside me, unperturbed. Guessing she'd spoke to the front desk folks without waking me, I just hopped back in bed and slept until nearly 11:00 before finally getting up and moving.

I started fire in the living room fireplace and poked around on the iPad for a bit before the wife finally got up and moving, shocked at how late she'd slept.

We made contact with the In-laws only to find out that they had apparently been the ones who got the call at the crack of dawn canceling that balloon ride that I mentioned awhile back. We made plans to meet them for lunch, then dressed and headed over to their room.

We walked up the path the short distance to the Grill in the on-again, off-again showers and took seats at their bar, as the place was already booked up for their lunch seating. This worked out well, as we enjoyed appetizers and some really great fish tacos and burgers over a couple Bloody Marys and visited a bit with the staff, who have proved to be really friendly and helpful across the board.

After the meal we headed back to the rooms to drop off the In-Laws, then the wife and I picked up the provided umbrellas from ours and headed back out into the light drizzle to walk down the hill to the spa, which is located closer to the front of the property and the little entrance that has a guard watching it 24/7.

We were given robes and told where to get ready, then killed a bit of time on a nearby balcony sitting area where I helped myself to a cup of coffee.  Then I sat down on a chair that almost put my ass on the floor because it was so ridiculously low, spilling coffee all over my hand and the hem of the stupid robe. FML.
The masseuses turned up shortly and we were led to our various rooms. I assured the masseuse that I'd spilled coffee, not gotten excitement diarrhea on the garment, she assured me that she could get me a fresh one, so no big deal in the grand scheme of things, aside from the slight annoyance.  Oh, and for what it's worth I never mentioned diarrhea, as it's been my experience that people tend to tune out after you bring it up, even if you're trying to be funny.

The massage itself was great, a really relaxing 90 minutes, then I showered off the various leftover oils in the locker area and started getting dressed, which was about when the fire alarm started going off throughout the building. Since no one ran through screaming I had to assume that it was simply a malfunction, though if it has been 15 minutes earlier and shocked me out of my calm reverie on the table I might well have ended up oily, panicked and wrapped in a sheet in the parking lot.

The wife was also getting a facial after her massage, so I decided to just chill with some more coffee on the little balcony area and got started on the notes for today's blog post while I waited for her.

When the wife got finished we had the receptionist call up a valet to run us back to the room, where we stopped in to say hello to the In-Laws and visit for a few, then we went to our room to get ready for dinner.
We hopped in the suburban and headed 'off-campus' for dinner at Bistro Jeanty, which is about 20 minutes away in Yountville. The drive in the rain was pretty quick, though it was kinda surprising to see how much water had accumulated here and there from the day of steady drizzle.

Maybe They Need A List Of
Visual Aids Behind The Bar?

Dinner was really good, with a primo table near the front of the restaurant that turned out to be great for people-watching. My only personal quibble was that I ordered an Old Fashioned that was served straight up in a martini glass, sans any form of garnish, which was really puzzling considering there's even a damned GLASS specifically called an Old Fashioned glass, which should give even the most rudimentary bartender at least one fucking clue as to how it's served. That aside, the food was really great and everyone enjoyed their meal from start to finish.

We finally headed back to the hotel (Resort? I realized while at the spa today that the place is actually a country club - dunno what to call it anymore, quite frankly), taking a strange detour up through a mountainous residential neighborhood beyond the club after we missed a turn and the Beau seemed resistant to the idea of simply turning around in the middle of the highway.

As it turns out the navigation system isn't all that useful when the 'turn left' instructions refer to the most minor of crooks in the already winding roads, but we finally looped back around to the highway and backtracked to the correct turn-off that put us back on track and made our way 'home'.

We said our goodnights and then we relaxed in the room after I lit up another fire in the fireplace while the wife read up a bit on the basics of wine-tasting, which is our activity for tomorrow morning/afternoon. I ended up watching several re-runs on Adult Swim while finishing up tonight's blog notes and playing around on the iPad with The Simpsons.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.

Napa Day One

So I naturally slept like total shit the night before we have a solid day of travel ahead of us; last minute laundry and blog prep kept me up until well past 3:30 in the AM.  As I was trying to finally crash out the wife woke unexpectedly and completely, wandering off to the kitchen to poke through a purse to see which one she was taking on the trip.  Amusingly, the Yorkie ignored all of this strange activity and just stayed in bed as if she wasn't getting fished into our stupid reindeer games.  I woke on and off all damned 'night', not sleeping more than 20 minutes at a stretch and no more than 2 and a half hours total before the alarm went off at 7:00.  The wife was already (still?) up, so we cuddled with the anxious Yorkie for a few before we started getting things ready to pack up.

The In-Laws were to pick us up at 8:15 to head to the airport, so we grabbed down the luggage and started packing, with the pup alternately following one or the other of us around as we bounced back and forth from closet to bedroom to laundry room to gather everything we needed.

I was still trying to decide how everything goes into the new suitcase when the Beau and the Mother In Law arrived, so I kinda frantically wrapped things up and dragged my bag and rather overstuffed hanging garment bag out to the Jeep for the ride to the airport.

The Beau dropped us off at the curb, then parked the vehicle while we waited around on a skycap that never came, so the ladies and I finally said the hell with it and maneuvered things inside ourselves just to expedite things a bit.

We were soon on our way to a 2 hour layover in Las Vegas, which allowed for a slightly problematic meal in which the waiter returned to tell us first that they were only serving breakfast ( it was only 10:45), but then he came back after we'd ordered and agreed to wait for 11:00 to roll around, saying that their chicken was still frozen solid, so 3 of the 4 dishes we'd ordered were not going to happen. The In-Laws had stepped into the nearby smoking slot machine area to have a cigarette and piss away some cash, so the wife and I made the command decision that we'd just substitute both of our dishes as well as the MIL's with pork, because it was easier than going to another restaurant. As it turned out all of the food was good, and the MIL never acknowledged anything amiss, so no harm, no foul I suppose.

We killed the next hour or so poking around the tourist trap shops in the terminal while the MIL hit the slots a bit more, then boarded the plan to Oakland, California.

On the first leg of things the In-Laws had a free seat between them, and had sat similarly when we boarded the 2nd plane, hopelessly optimistic in the face of the packed terminal. We were sat behind them, huddled against the window because we'd accepted our fate of sitting with a random stranger, then a tiny Asian woman asked to sit on the aisle seat beside us. She proceeded to basically try to climb up on the Beau's shoulders as she fought her bag into to overhead compartment, which made both the wife and I laugh as he finally turned to look at this gal like she had ten heads when she got too far into his personal space.

The wife played around on her iPad for the duration of the flight, so I got out the iPhone and started working up the initial notes for this post because I didn't particularly feel like reading and I wasn't exactly sure how the time difference would effect me once we were finally settled in Napa.

When we landed in Oakland we made our way down to baggage claim and the Beau went to pick up the suburban that we'd be renting for the week while I looked after the ladies and gathered the bags as they eventually turned up.

We waited for what felt like forever, because the damned rental office was apparently in another county, but the Beau eventually turned up and we were soon on our way, a couple hiccups in the directions aside.

Reception Area At Meadowood
All Done Up For
Fall/Thanksgiving.

The traffic proved rather hellacious, though it finally started to calm down a bit as we got closer to the Napa Valley area, then we finally made our way to Meadowood, our little resort home the for the coming week.

We checked in and were shown to our respective rooms, given the various spiels about the amenities, then we kinda reconvened in the MIL's room to confirm dinner plans, which was thankfully something at the club instead of anything involving more driving.

We all got ready for dinner and I noted with dismay that I'm still not 100% thrilled with the new suit I was meaning to wear as far as how it fits even after being to the alterations place.  Oh well, I guess it's going to be something we fight with later, or there's been the threat of getting something tailored, but that seems like a ridiculous expense considering I don't wear the damned stuff that often.

We were scheduled to have dinner 'on-site' at the Michelin-starred Restaurant that serves a 9 course meal that's even catered to account for any allergies or personal preferences that the party may or may not have.

The food was a series of near bite-sized portions ranging from appetizers to seafood, pheasant and a beef dish whose name escapes me, but suffice to say the wife and I enjoyed it all immensely.  Honestly, the food was great overall, even though a few nibbles here and there were a bit sketchy, overall  the presentation and general ambiance was amazing and the Beau showed a surprisingly open mind about some rather 'out there' dishes that I figured a 'meat and potatoes' guy might turn up his nose at, but he actually seemed more up for it than the MIL, which was funny.  Hell, while she turned away the first bite-sized appetizer the Beau was eventually nibbling at the various fresh herbs that were growing in boxes on the table for decoration.

Since the time difference is significant enough to be kinda messing with us we all called it a fairly early night, just to try to be on the safe side, passing on the offer to tour the kitchen in favor of pajamas and bed.

We said our goodnights after confirming plans for a hot air balloon ride at the crack of dawn, then retired to our respective rooms.

The wife and I caught a  nice long soak in the tub before calling it a night around 11:00 (which never happens) and I worked on the notes for this post and then crashed out fairly early.

Be seeing you.

So Much To Do, So Little Time (Or: My Lost Sunday)

I had set the alarm for 10:00 today, so as to be up and about at a reasonable time, waking to the sounds of the wife showering in the master bath.  I got the house opened up for the day and the wife made us some coffee while I looked in on The Simpsons, then we were eventually joined by Corinthian.

After morning coffee we started planning our attack on the day, as Corinthian had to be at the airport at 1:45 in the afternoon and we wanted to squeeze in lunch and a couple errands beforehand.  We loaded up around a quarter 'til noon and I drove us to the little Indian buffet across town, where we had a nice quiet lunch and then ran an errand to exchange a camera battery for the wife and gas up the car before I took us out to the airport to drop our guest off.

We said our goodbyes and then I headed back home, as the wife and I both had full afternoons ahead of us.

I worked on the blog for a bit, as I'm still a ridiculous number of days behind at this point, but hope to punch up a week's worth of posts that can then be published while we're out of town with relative ease as I write up the daily stuff from there on the iPhone for later publication.  The wife was in the Office for as time as well, working on this or that on the web, then she and the Yorkie eventually caught a nap in the bedroom while I finished up my interweb travels and spent some time picking up in the kitchen and den.

I eventually poured myself an enormous cocktail and was about to settle in the den when the wife joined me and we made up the guest room for our house/dog sitter for the coming week and then I made sure that the various evening programming was set to record properly.

Harrowing Stuff, As Always. LOVE It,
Love It Ever So Much.

We spent the evening with the usual Fox animation programming, then rolled over into a new episode of The Walking Dead and Boardwalk Empire before finally calling it a night, leaving Dexter for who knows when, as we'll be out of town for about a week.  Oh well, I'll just add it to the pile and hope for the best as far as spoilers go, but who knows, maybe we'll encounter it on the hotel cable at some point and have a chance to catch up.

I eventually put the wife to bed and started on the laundry that I'd been waiting to do for the entire afternoon, since the wife had her own laundry agenda to work on, then settled in the Office to work on the day's post before we get any further behind.

And now I'm literally typing this as I need to be answering the alarm in 5 hours' time, which makes me think that tomorrow will be a long fucking day, no matter how you slice it.

Be seeing you.

This, The Day Of My Birth

This morning I woke with the alarm at 9:00, showered and got cleaned up for the day.  When I was finally done with that I found Corinthian and the wife in the kitchen making coffee, then we sipped a cup of ambition while we waited for Buckaroo Banzai and Pookie to arrive. Since we were basically just killing time  I dug into the gifts that my sweet wife had assembled at the kitchen counter, which included a handful of DVD and Blu-rays, a couple books and a new piece of luggage that we've been putting off buying but which will come in handy for the trip next week.

Is It Bright In Here?

The crowning topper for all this is a pair of Tom Ford sunglasses, which I'd been hinting around about not too subtletly for the past month or so, just because they look amazing and I've honestly never worn sunglasses before and thought I should start with a really swanky expensive pair, right?  They are as cool and exciting as I was hoping, and were recently featured in the new James Bond film Skyfall, for which Ford also provided Bond's wardrobe.

Our friends arrived and gifted me with cards, giftcards and comics, which was super sweet of them, and even offered to chauffeur us around for the afternoon, so we headed out to take in the artists studio tour and see what we could see.

A long story short for the afternoon  the studios were easier to visit than last years' as they had selected locations more central to the city, rather than the strange outlying places that they'd used last year, where you could burn a good half hour in traffic out to a street on the edge of town.  We visited and ooh'd and aah'd over stuff at almost every stop, though at some point I lose the strength to care about yet another painting of cows grazing or your still life, which unfortunately accounts for a large portion of what we might see around this area.

We ended the tour at EL's house, as is the custom, just to rake a longer visit and stroll through their house to see what they've done with the place recently.  The wife and I ended up buying a piece of art from a friend, and Bucky and Pookie also purchased a piece of art from EL, which I know was cool for him, as he's recently made a breakthrough with his productivity, which had kinda floundered over the summer.

When we finally split it was in the mid-afternoon, so we ended up at a nearby pharmacy to have burgers at their soda fountain and milkshakes for dessert.

We ran several errands afterward, which included picking up keys for Bucky and Pookie so that they could get into her Brother's place later in the evening, where they were to spend the night, as well as another trip to the grocery store, where we picked up some odds and ends for drinks for the evening (more on that later) and then a final stop to grab pizzas from a place that you take them fresh and then bake them yourself at home.

The wife had been evasive about the evening, but I'd heard a few different folks kind of slip up and say shit about seeing us 'tomorrow' or whatever, so I kinda knew that something was brewing.  Then the wife orders like five pizzas for five people, so I guess the jig is up at that point, right?  You're obviously expecting more than a handful of people.

We headed back to the house, unloaded everything and I got into my pajamas, since we're still pretending that it's just us for the evening, and we watched some television over cocktails until folks started arriving, then the wife started cooking the various pizzas and I started playing bartender, a role that I don't mind particularly,  but just feel slightly stymied by because I know how to make my cocktails, but I have no idea what to suggest to someone who doesn't want specifically that, y'know?  Oh, and since the wife hadn't exactly said that we were having a party for around 17 people I hadn't really looked into our mixer situation, so those folks requiring tonic water were just up shit creek and forced to make due with 7-Up and other shit out of the fridge.

Oh well, I at least know what to add to the damned shopping list.

The last folks to arrive were the Hairdressers, accompanied by their grandson, who was of a slightly younger demographic than I would've imagined we'd have, slightly cramping our television entertainment options, but I figured that it was just nice to see them out and about, as they usually blow us off in favor of babysitting.

When the crowd started to dwindle we all eventually settled in the den and I hadda show folks the Midnight Blue disc where this crazy broad tied her labia into a knot (!), because that's the sort of awful thing you see and immediately want to scar others with.

We eventually moved on to another disc in the series, this one devoted to celebrities being interviewed by the sleazy Goldstein and crew, then folks finally fell away for good a little after 11:00.

I put the wife to bed and thanked her for another wonderful year, then Corinthian and I wrapped the last little bit of the DVD before I picked up a little more in the kitchen and then settled in the Office to get the notes from this post typed up, my evening buzz long since gone.

Be seeing you.

'70s Porno Carnage

I'd set the alarm for 10:00 this morning with the best of intentions of getting up, but since the wife hadn't made any movement to stir either as it went off, I ended up just turning it off and falling back asleep for a couple more hours.  This sort of came as no surprise considering the late night that I'd had.  I finally surfaced around noon and the wife joined me in the bed to cuddle with the Yorkie and discuss the days' plans, which included some kind of birthday surprise if I wanted to go with her to pick it up, or I could chill at the house and see what it was later.  I figured what the hell, so I checked in on The Simpsons on the iPad, then dressed and we headed out to pick up this 'surprise'.

She said we were going to to airport, saying that we were to catch a plane for a surprise trip to Vegas, which I knew was bogus, but gave me a hint that we were picking up someone rather than something, but I really had no idea whatsoever who it might be.

The wife totally surprised me with a visit for the weekend from Corinthian, who flew in this afternoon from Fort Worth.  We greeted one another just outside the airport, then headed back into town to have a late lunch.  I cruised us in via the Loop, as Corinthian hasn't been in town since the wife and I got married, so I figured he might be amused with a look at the ridiculous expansion that's happened in the intervening years.
We had lunch at a barbecue place near the house, then ran by the alterations place to pick up my two suits, which frustratingly turned out to be closed, because they keep really strange hours on Fridays.  We went next door to say hello to the Hairdressers and as it turned out they had a number for the seamstress, so were were able to squeak by on the skin of our teeth and get the suits after all.  It always pays to know people who know people.

We went to the grocery store afterward so that Corinthian could get some beer for the weekend and so that he and the wife could look into stockpiling a couple different Hostess products now that they've apparently gone under.  I guess you don't know what you have until it's gone, and at that point you REALLY want that last Twinkie.  Unfortunately, a lot of other people had the same idea, so they only came away with a box of cupcakes, but I guess beggars can't be choosers.

We hit up the liquor store as well, as I have a sneaking feeling based on a comment here or there that we'll end up having a party tomorrow night, so we might need provisions for all that, then we headed home to chill and see what the Yorkie was up to.

Grab That Remote!

We unloaded everything and gave Corinthian a tour of the house, then kinda settled into the den and had a drink while the wife busied herself around the house while we visited.  Another sign that there's a party: the wife is weirdly interested in picking up the normally junked up kitchen table.  Not a normal occurrence, that's all I'm saying.

We watched one of the TV Carnage discs, the volume 4 (Casual Fridays) that I'd watched recently, then stepped out to pick up some Thai for dinner and then I showed Corinthian the first volume of the TV Carnage stuff to see what he'd think of that, which I personally find to be a lesser installment, as they clips feel like they go on a bit longer than necessary, as the later bits are edited a bit more than these were.

I Think Half These People Are
Dead....

We had a few more drinks while watching Midnight Blue: Porn Stars Of The '70s, which was interesting and sleazy, as with other volumes in the series.  I swear to God though, Al Goldstein seems to always go out of his way to speak in the most vulgar manner possible just to be doing it, because he can't seem to ask people anything that isn't the most prying, filthy bullshit imaginable, which does the porn world no real favors in my opinion.  I mean c'mon, there gotta be a median between neutered clinical discussion and Goldstein sounding like he's talking to pervy kids on the playground in the grossest manner possible.  I guess I'm just saying that it's possible to talk about sex with someone without blathering on about how much she turns you on and how you imagine fucking her, etc., which is typically Goldstein's M.O. in all interviews, from the porn stars down to the actual celebs who are willing to sit down with him and it's really disconcerting.

The wife crashed out around halfway through the movie, which Corinthian and I finished before making plans to be up around 9:00 tomorrow so that we can get a jump on our journey through the artist's studio tour, which runs from 10:00 in the morning until 5:00 in the afternoon.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.

Cop Avenging Losers

My sweet wife was up early and went to run errands this morning, so I woke with the pup around 10:00, cuddled with the Yorkie and then we both slept in a little bit more.

When I finally got up and moving I opened the house for the day and fed the pup, then worked on the blog in the Office to get some thing published and maybe another post on deck for later. Noting the time I figured that I should probably get dressed and run to grab myself some lunch before the entire day got away from me.  I hit up a Starbuck's for a cup of ambition, then drove through McDonald's for my lunch, presumably because I hate myself and want to die.  If you're so overweight that you need a cane to walk, please don't be seen going into the fucking McDonald's, that's all I'm saying.  I clearly hate myself because I'm eating this shit, but seeing you dragging your half-dead carcass across the parking lot is amazingly fucking depressing.

You Blow Away A Broad's
Date, The Least You Can Do
Is Drive Her Home.

'Food' secured, I headed home, where I settled into den with my lunch and Cop off the TiVo, which is a James Woods film based on an early James Ellroy novel.  I was a bit surprised to see that it eschews what I think of as his 'normal' vintage L.A. settings in favor of a modern (for the time) tale set in the '80s.  The murder mystery is typically convoluted, as you'd expect from Ellroy, and while it kinda flounders here and there, the final line of the film is awesome and kinda made it all worth the wait, because Woods is such a sarcastic bastard.  It also kind of made me want to start looking at Ellroy's work again, because I've only read a couple of his novels, but I did like them a great deal and I know he's not the most prolific author out there, so it's not like tackling his oeuvre would take forever, since I think we're talking about less than 15 books or so at this point.

The wife returned, we caught up during the middle of the movie, then she spent some time in the Office dealing with customer service stuff relating to one of her crafting machines, which has been giving her fits and may yet go tits up on us.  Very annoying, but she seemed to be making headway with the tech support, so Fingers crossed, eh?

I eventually moved into the Office myself to work on the nerdlists a bit in the late afternoon, then made myself a cocktail and relaxed back in the den again to check out a couple more episodes of Neon Genesis Evangelion, which I had missed out on the previous day.

The wife returned from an early evening meeting with take out for dinner, so we ate while digging into the evening's episodes of stuff on NBC, including 30 Rock, The Office and Parks And Recreation to kinda wrap up the evening.

Assemble.

Afterward I ended up watching last week's episode of Person Of Interest while the wife tapped out around 10:00 as I was starting the one that aired tonight.  I paused to put she and the Yorkie to bed, then finished out the show to keep current on things.  Well in my cups at this point, I said the hell with it and decided to pop in a movie just for the hell of it.

I ended up giving The Avengers a re-watch on Blu-ray, which held up amazingly well and was every bit as entertaining on the second run through.  Good stuff, and one of the best super-hero outings to have ever hit the big screen.  The script is great, as I'm sure it must take a lot to keep things well-rounded for an ensemble piece of this size.

OutSTANDing.

That movie put me in something of a Chris Evans mood, so I popped in The Losers for a re-watch next, just because it's been around for awhile now and isn't going to watch itself.  I pretty much love every performance in this one, especially Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Evans, who is largely played for comic relief.  The movie is a ton of fun and having finally read the first volume of the comic it's interesting to see exactly how much of the comic has been translated to the screen.

My little re-watches were a lot of fun, but unfortunately kept me up until after 4:00 in the AM.  I eventually headed to bed, passing on the blog entirely, as I figured I could get it updated on Friday with a bare bones sketch of notes for the full post, which I'll punch up later.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.