don't go soft

That Dark Knight movie was pretty good, I guess, enh, y'know, whateves. Wouldn't Two-Face start to know what he flipped by the texture of the coin's burnt side on his arm? Anyway. As a fan of The Original "The Dark Knight" I was pleased with the part where Joker has the cop by the throat and the cop says, "It's my own damn fault..." which obviously is a reference to the part of the graphic novel where the caged Mutants grab their guard and he says:

"Murray....it's my own damn fault....don't go soft...."

...imploring Murray, his fellow cop, to shoot these punk Mutants, and probably him in the process. Good moment. I was disappointed that no one in the whole movie said "Batman don't shiv." Because for me that phrase kind of summed up the whole experience.

glow 08



You can't really tell, but this is two girls fighting with lightsabers next to the Santa Monica pier at 2 in the morning. And it's good that you can't tell, because I didn't ask to take their picture or anything. The "Glow" event turned out to be pretty great. I ran into Miguel, Luis, Susan, Taiho, Mark, and hecksa other fools who I would otherwise only see on Facebook. Thousands of people roaming the beach in the middle of night in Los Angeles....not a bad start.

168

So we had a big anniversary party for my folks last Sunday and my sister hooked it up with all The Food That Is Good To Eat. Here is the menu card, that is, my attempt at rendering The Food That Sounds Good To Eat:

** Sunday, January 29, 2008 **

Cucumber & Watercress Tea Sandwiches
Smoked Salmon Tea Sandwiches
Mah Family Potato Salad
Heirloom Tomato Mozzarella Salad
Arugula, Pear, & Goat Cheese Salad
Asian Noodle Salad with Shrimp
Carnitas Tostadas with Fresh Guacamole

Lemon Bars
Cherry Almond Bars
Chocolate Mozart Torte
Strawberry Tartlets
Berry Almond Shortcake

Sparkling Fruit Punch with Prosecco


I couldn't figure out how to sex up the Tea Sandwiches, but they were delectable. They should've been called the Ain't Nothing Wrong With Those Tea Sandwiches. My sister has a way of combining mild flavors with decadent ingredients to make food that you really could eat all day. I'm in the school that thinks all the Top Chef fine-dining culture is more a trick of marketing language than actual cookery. If I have to look at one more shellack-shined photo of some Asian-Fusion wok-tossed applewood-seared Napa Valley deconstruction of molecular gastronomy, my eyes will literally vomit. Happy Anniversary Folks!

it must be said i do love my dad

...he gave me a lesson on credit card debt management that may be the more useful piece of advice I've ever received, and which, up until my recent unsuccessful dalliances in real estate, I have dutifully and gratifyingly followed.

What's my motivation?

It'll be weird if the revolution finally comes because of gas prices. Because that's not really what the revolution should be about, is it?

this has not worked for me yet, for some strange reason...

Um. Whatever.

I think Yahoo's headline post before this one was, "Someone's Blog Had An Opinion About Jennifer Aniston."

songs the 90's forgot

The music in Applebee's today was amazing. The station ID tagline was something like "The 90's...you lived through them then... so you'll survive this." They played Celine Dion's "That's They Way It Is," which, after all this time, it still seems to be. They played the Backstreet Boys' immortal ode to their own popularity, "Larger Than Life." They played Vanilla Ice's "Play That Funky Music White Boy" from "Cool as Ice," for pho's sake. I believe they may have played the other song by Marcy Playground. It was that kind of set.

My two other favorite walkable restaurants are both closed on Tuesdays, as it turns out, not sure why. So I ended up at Applebee's because I'd never eaten there before, and I believe in trying all chains at least once, because that's what chains are for, right? Anyways, I'm sure the stuff white people like blog will do a piece on this if they have not already, but what is with American food and the extra tablespoon of Salt and/or Sugar that they put on everything? It happens at Applebee's, it happens at Outback Steakhouse, it happens less often at Denny's (where they instead favor grease, bless their hearts). It's like they're afraid the actual taste of the ingredients might leak through if they don't blow up a salt grenade over the food. I dunno what I was expecting out of my sampler plate, but it was definitely....more.

heard in the casino today:

"I bet, doh ma. I found some free rope and I'm going to hang myself with it, because, hey, free rope!"

bopping around LA

...today I took a break from organizing my mp3 collection to go buy printer ink and then eat chicken heart yakitori with pickles and also hang out with Lloyd from "Entourage" and Stephanie from "Better Luck Tomorrow" and somewhere in there I saw a short film with this svelte Singaporean guy masturbating himself, onscreen, close-up of hand on organ, for like 6 minutes as quotes from Allen Ginsburg flitted across the frame, OMG, and I also had some popcorn, and tomorrow I'm going to go get breast implants. J/K LOL that last thing but the rest of it was real.

the best line in "The Sting"....

"You know me. I'm the same as you. It's two in the morning and I don't know nobody."

I'm totally going to say that, at least once, when I'm at the Sundance Lab. I don't care what else happens.

how this guy rolls

Today, while walking from the parking lot into the casino, I was stopped and asked directions by a guy who was in driving in his car while clearly holding an an open 16 oz Budweiser in a crumpled brown paper bag. It didn't look like it was taking the edge off, either.

great acting

The main character in "In Between Days," this very indie Korean-American movie, does the most wonderful performance of being stoned that I've ever seen. She just shuts up and her eyes dart left and right and she looks completely out of her gourd.

thoughts on watching hobbits all day

The "Lord of the Rings" movies have not aged well in the, what, 3 years that they've aged. The whole trilogy was playing on cable the other day, and I was sitting there at work watching them, because that's what was on TV (all around the casino you could find players and dealers significantly distracted from their blackjack games, their eyes wandering off the money to be transfixed by the sight of slavering orcs.... it was really precious). Anyhoo, somewhere in the middle of the 17th hour of the Two Towers, I realized that I had no idea why the heros are fighting evil. It's not even clear why the Urukai/orcs are evil, except that they're, well....dark. It's also unclear what kind of higher ideal Aragorn & Co. are fighting to preserve, except that it has something to do with a White City where all Men of the West are brothers.

The whole story suffers when you don't care for the heroes, and I don't care for them because they come off as virtually indestructible, infinitely regenerating video game avatars, whose main purpose seems to be establishing order by whimsically slaughtering all the dark people with earrings and facial tattoos. Even compared to the Matrix, Star Wars, and the works of Jason Statham, I think LOR ends up the most Aryan and the least compelling.

Don't get me wrong, when you need to see a movie where a dude with bows and arrows fights a giant elephant, you really can't do better. But somehow the rest of it, just enh. I dunno, maybe I'd feel different if I lived on a Shire.