March 2006 - Page 3 of 4

Move fast through tunnels of the underground

General

Now that I’ve got my MacBook Pro, I’ve added all the pictures in my gallery to iPhoto, and installed FlickrExport, a plug-in that allows me to send pictures straight from iPhoto to Flickr.

I have, in fact, just added a few pictures from a “ghost tour” of the Portland Underground I took with my sister and her family in December ’02.

The Portland Underground is the name for all the tunnels and rooms below street level that were used in the late 1800s for smuggling and slavery, including impressing hapless drunks and loners into serving as ships’ crews. It was a fun tour, although the emphasis on “ghosts” during the tour seemed a little overdone…

I’ll be adding more pictures later… now that’s it’s easy-peasy.

Smacky not amused

Smacky

It’s March, for crying out loud. What’s with this snow?

Smacky was outside last night. Around midnight he was anxious to get back inside. It was funny ’cause it seemed like he was giving me hell for all the cold, wet, white stuff outside.

He thinks he’s in charge of making me laugh and bugs, and I’m in charge of everything else. That includes weather. Obviously I’ve fallen behind in my duties.

Not about farting

exercise

Oh, sure, I see how it is.

I stop writing about my exercising, and Dooce goes and blathers on and on about her and her husband and an elliptical trainer and farting and a chatty gay exercise nut she used to know.

Web 2.0 is so unfair.

Is that what I have to do? Do I have to write about farting while exercising?

I’m running tonight. After my dentist appointment. And, yes, I might even fart.

Meta: tired

Switching

Tech

Is it just me or has there been a rash of Windows-to-Mac switching going on lately?

On a personal level, one friend switched last fall, plunking down the cash for the last PPC iMac (he’s not bitter at all that his machine was obsoleted in just a couple of months – he’d hoped for at least a half-year before that happened but it was not to be). Another friend is considering purchasing a shiny new MacBook Pro to go along with his career change from government functionary to graphic artist extraordinaire.

Then comes word of a more momentous change: Gabe and Tycho, a.k.a. Mike and Jerry of Penny Arcade, hard-core PC and console gamers, have in the last week purchased their first-ever Mac OS systems, soothed in their decision by the presence of a familiar piece of hardware inside: Intel.

Jerry’s musings on the topic of switching are well worth reading.

Then, prominent political blogger Josh Marshall, of Talking Points Memo, after manfully not complaining bitterly about problems with a Gateway computer, and the company’s support (or lack thereof), initially resisted the siren call of the Mac loyalists but eventually succumbed and appears to be quite happy with his decision.

Even professional attention whore (I mean that in the nicest way, I swear; after all, look what I’m doing right now, only I’m not getting paid for it – pity me!) Heather Armstrong at Dooce found and linked to a post from someone who fought against the mental image she had of a Mac user… and only gave in when she realized that defying the stereotype would be satisfying. Y’know, as opposed to just realizing that the stereotype was incorrect…

And John Gruber at Daring Fireball, after reading about Josh Marshall’s initial resistance to conversion, had some interesting thoughts on the topic, pertaining to why folks might resist switching when, in all likelihood, they would benefit hugely. Somehow, because of the wide choice of commodity hardware, using Windows on top of that cheap hardware is seen as a more cosmopolitan platform? Crazy talk, to me.

Mr. Gruber is a confirmed Mac user, and by his own admission to me in email, never uses any other platform but isn’t evangelical about the platform – unlike someone like, say, me, who is forced to support Windows at work and retreats to the comfort of the Mac OS at home.

So what’s with all the switching lately? My first thought is that it’s because Macs now have Intel inside and that makes them somehow less exotic. But maybe this is a longer-building trend that is only now reaching the point where I start to notice. I had an ex-girlfriend who purchased an iMac two years ago after her home was broken into and her H-P PC was stolen. And my father switched quite happily almost 10 years ago when he became more involved in photography as a hobby. And, of course, my friend mentioned above switched prior to the PPC-to-Intel change-over (and he’s not bitter about the timing of that at all).

I’d like to think it was because of my powers of persuasion… I’d like to think that…

Other people’s stories

General

What’s almost as good as having a missed connection of my own?

Watching one happen for two other people right in front of me.

This morning, gray, cold, damp but not raining. Pioneer Place Mall, outside Saks. Small group of 4 men and women, apparently employees, waiting by the employee entrance on the sidewalk.

From across the street, a Latina, mid-30s, black slacks, bosomy, about 5’7″ but wearing heels, comes running in that odd gait women in heels use. Her gray long coat flying behind her. She has keys (apparently the store keys) in her hand. She’s smiling. A store manager?

Walking towards me, a black man, over 6′, thin but athletically graceful, wearing a sharp gray suit and black woolen overcoat, a stocking cap on his shaved or bald head. His mouth open in amazement around his trimmed goatee as he watches the bosomy Latina running. The woman does not see the black man in the suit – her eyes are focused on her staff or co-workers.

The woman reaches the door and starts to unlock it, as the tall man in the suit, still gaping with amazement at the woman, literally plows into one of the other employees, completely oblivious to anything but the bosomy woman.

I walk past, smiling to myself, as the man in the suit and stocking cap apologizes to the Saks employee and the bosomy woman lets the rest of her staff into the store, ignoring the man she has so stunned with her appearance that he’s stumbled into one of her employees.

Was there a connection? I’m betting the man wished there was…

Ultraviolet (2006)

Movies

I saw “Ultraviolet” over the weekend.

One word review: dumb.

Longer rant-y review:

Take it from me, I’m a guy who loves all kinds of movies. No matter how bad, I can always find something good to say about it. Like, say “Howard the Duck” – oh, wait, I was out of town the week that was actually in the theaters. I never actually saw it. I swear.

And then there are movies that are so bad, they become fun again. An example would be, oh, just about any movie that Joel and the ‘bots were forced to watch on “Mystery Science Theater 3000”. Man, I miss those guys. (Sure, Mike was OK – but Joel was the bestest).

So where does that leave the vampire – oh, excuse me, “hemophage” – story of “Ultraviolet”?

Well… it had Mila Jovovich in it. And she was naked, once, briefly.

Unfortunately, even if Ms. Jovovich were naked for the entire running length of the movie it would not redeem this stupid movie.

Get this for stupid: The opening scene has Ms. Jovovich’s character posing as a courier picking up a very special package. The guards and defenses give her every test imaginiable to check if she is human or “hemophage” – ID and papers checked, DNA scans, blood scans, retinal scans, chemical baths, everything, all 100% unadulterated techno-babble-filled dialogue showing that these guys mean business and do not take their duties lightly. She passes test after test after test… when it’s obvious to everyone in the theater that she is, in fact, a “hemophage”.

But, uh, do they ever look at her teeth? You know.. the fangs in her mouth? Wouldn’t that be a big tip-off? Apparently not.

And, of course, they have to come up with some techno-babble reason for just why she then turns out to be, to the surprise of no one in the theater, one ‘a them there “hemophages”. Argh. Much better to have simply had her blast her way inside.

There’s so much to pick apart in this movie that it might, actually, be fun with the right group of ‘bots – er, I mean, people. Booze might help, too. But don’t waste your money on it in the theater, it’ll be in the DVD bargain bins soon enough.

Two separate trips

General

Just a quick note:

The Luxor trip was not the same trip to Vegas that I began describing in my post about the White Pines Motel.

I thought that might be obvious from the fact that I drove to Vegas in the White Pines trip, but flew to Vegas in the Luxor trip. But apparently not clear enough. They were separate trips.

It goes on and on my friend

General

Alas, my Creative Week has ended, but not without having an effect. I’ve now come up with at least one new theme that I can mine for stories and posts forever – the one (obviously) involving hotels and motels.

Lotta stories involve hotels and motels.

At any rate, I’ve seen the light. I’m going to log my running stuff elsewhere and keep the focus of my blog on more creative posts.

I might even try to write some poetry. I promise it will be better than the Vogons’ poetry, though.

Luxor!

motels

Fourth in a series.

Luxor in Las Vegas, Nevada

Man, oh, man, I want to post about my stay at the Luxor. But, damn, considering the length of previous entries in this series, my story about the Luxor would fill an entire novel.

I’ll just leave you with these two conversational snippets to try to encapsulate the whole experience, one from the first night, and one from the plane ride back.

Part the first:

The hotel room is completely dark. The room is silent except for the rattle of the air-conditioner. Then:

Me: Promise you won’t try to kill me in the middle of the night?
Her: [Icy silence, then] I’m not going to kill you tonight.
Me: [laughs] I want to find out how this story ends.
Her: [incredulous] You mean you can’t already tell?
Me: No! I can’t wait to find out!

Part the second:

She and I are settled in our seats, both reading different biographies of Philip K. Dick

Me: [more than slightly buzzed, I set down my book] C’mon, admit it, we had a great time.
Her: [considers this] It did turn out… better than I expected. After that first night…
Me: We’re passionate people!
Her: Are you crazy? Do you remember? We wanted to keeeeel each other [she makes a stabbing motion]
Me: But we got over it!

Someday, man… someday… I’m going to write that novel.