Wednesday, November 30, 2005

More sarcasm directed at Hollywood

Just a few minutes of writing before I take Geoana to school and engage in serious work (house painting).

So the E! network is going to revive "The Simple Life," with the qualifier that Paris and Nicole won't even have to see each other.

Feel free to look at my post below about Tinseltown's lack of originality reaching new lows. It just got lower.

C'mon people! Let it die! It's just "The Simple Life." It's not "_______________"

(note to self--insert name of quality television show above, once you can think of one)

Tuesday, November 29, 2005

Add this to the list of problems I never anticipated....


Routine afternoon yesterday. Pick up Geoana from school, bring her home, start cooking the evening meal. No problem, right?

But I didn't count on having a rooster on my roof.

Don't believe me? I thought not, so I made sure to snap a few pictures for posterity.

Of course, then I had to face of issue of how to get poultry off my roof, as I don't want it strutting around in my backyard. Throwing rocks at it didn't work. Neither did taking the garden hose and shooting a stream of water in the bird's direction. Finally I went inside and took my Daisy BB/pellet rifle (a Christmas gift from my father when I was about 12 or 13).

For you members of PETA, I just aimed at its legs. My purpose was to scare it away, not finish it off. (And, since little Geoana was outside with me, I did not want to traumatize her by wanton killing, plus I was not in the mood to deal with rooster carcass.)

One shot.

That shot did everything the rocks and water could not. Not only did that rooster fly off the roof, it flew all the way across the street and into one of my neighbor's front yards (cattycorner). Mission accomplished. I sure hope it got the message.

Haven't seen it yet this morning.

Monday, November 28, 2005

The Monday after........what?

As expected, many people hit the stores last Friday (Black Friday). Not me.

As expected, many people in this country ate turkey last Thursday. Not me. (Had steak instead, one of the best I've ever ingested!)

I did relax and spend time with Geogal and Geoana, which I think is the whole point of the Thanksgiving holiday. Who could ask for more?

Got the first cold weather (at least as we here in the desert know it) yesterday. There's just something refreshing about wearing long pants, long sleeve shirts, and jackets. Not to mention turning on the heater and throwing a blanket on the bed. Now I can drink coffee all day long and not feel guilty. And I can look at the webcams of Anchorage Alaska (we visited AK this past summer) and be reminded why I live where I do.

You're welcome to look at the webcams too:

Alaskacam

ACS webcam

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

And they wonder why box office is flat

Saw this item in my morning newspaper:

LATEST: JENNIFER GARNER, KATE HUDSON and LINDSAY LOHAN have emerged as the front runners in the race to land the coveted role of JEANNIE in the upcoming movie adaptation of TV series I DREAM OF JEANNIE.

______________________________________________________________
(warning--sarcastic comment ahead)

Gee, I'll be first in line to see that one.

When are the suits in Hollywood going to learn that originality is still important? I believe it was shortly before the release of "Million Dollar Baby" that Clint Eastwood said in an interview he was disgusted with the studios, saying most of the movies nowadays fall into three categories: remakes, sequels, or adaptations of TV shows. He's still right.

Didn't the poor box office of "Bewitched" (just to name one) say anything to the creative heads?

How about my queue in Netflix? Let me list some of the movies I've recently rented. Rio Bravo, The Producers, Saturday Night Fever, Remember the Titans, My Favorite Year, Westworld. Notice a pattern? I don't think any were remakes. Sadly, I hear "The Producers" and "Westworld" are currently in the remake process.

sigh.......

Message to Hollywood: Keep putting out garbage, and I'll keep renting classic movies. I haven't even scratched the surface of all the movies I want to see.

Monday, November 21, 2005

No, it's not just Monday blues...

...but why am I so irritable today?

Go get the mail. Nothing but bad news it seems. Can't remember the last time I sat at the table opening mail and yelling "You want a piece of me?!!"

Glad I took a few minutes, made a couple of phone calls, and engaged in some rational thinking before sitting down to write today's blog. I'm better now.

Truth be told, the weekend was all right. Good football games (both college and pro) and spent Saturday night enjoying this eating establishment with Geogal.

Also found this site, which had my attention last night. At least there's something that can be done about these insipid chain e-mails.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Radio--In a State of Constant Change

Not that anyone who works in the radio business or anyone who is a fan of radio should be surprised by today's title.

As noted in one of last week's entries, I took a road trip to San Diego. One of my longtime pleasures of visiting Southern California is taking out my radio and listening to a more interesting variety of stations than those that are available in many other radio markets. Adding to the radio stew of Southern California is the stations that broadcast from the other side of la frontera. Most notably XETRA. I remember my first visit to the area in 1991. One of the first things I did driving into the Riverside area was to tune the AM dial to 690. Back then they had a sports-talk format, which lasted until about this time last year. Now they play adult standards as 690 The Lounge. I took a listen to them on this recent visit and was suprised to hear that the format would soon be changing. A quick search led me to this Orange County Register article (registration required).

So it's going to Spanish.

End of an era. (And I wasn't even around when they were playing rock music.)
________________________________________

On a related matter, during the drive to and from San Diego, this was the first true long road test of the Sirius Starmate receiver I purchased last month.

The verdict? Perfect! I'm hooked. No more losing the signal during an interesting program. No more commercials or news to interrupt my music. I can pick whatever kind of music that fits my mood. I think Geogal agrees with all these points.

In future entries I'll blog more about how satellite radio is going to be a true competitor (IMHO) for terrestrial radio.

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

One more before the road

Will be traveling (with the family, thank goodness) out-of-state for the next few days. So, this entry will have to suffice for the next few days.

Undoubtedly Geoana will want to bring along her two Barbie dolls together with the singular Ken (now that's a fortunate plastic guy!). It's actually a Prince Ken to go along with Cinderella Barbie. Since his trousers are currently amongst a large pile of other toy remnants, he resembles an 18th century version of Zapp Branigan.
___________________

Caught the spectre of Steve Philips masquerading as the Yankees' general manager in a "fake" news conference this morning on ESPN. I was silent. Maybe even stunned.

Makes me remember when the show "Blues Clues," a favorite of Geoana, made a change to their format and created a segment of the show called "Blue's Room" in which the previously animated and barking Blue changed into a puppet and could speak English. When Geogal first saw it, she was eerily silent. I asked what was going on. She replied "I just don't know what to say." We both agreed that "Blues Clues" had jumped the shark at that point.

I'll ditto that for ESPN's latest lame attempt at entertainment.

Monday, November 07, 2005

Monday at random

Gutbuster of the morning, from ESPN.com's D.J. Gallo:

Headlines That Are Probably In Newspapers This Morning

Baton Rouge: "Saints game poorly attended due to fear of Tom Benson attacks"

Phoenix: "Cardinals games poorly attended due to presence of Cardinals"

New York: "Vinny Testaverde euthanized"

Philadelphia: "Eagles succumb to locker room cancer"

San Francisco: "Rodeo cowboy Pickett fails to lasso Giants, but arms headline writers with tons of lame wordplay options

_____________________________

And kudos to the Eagles organization, who finally had enough of T.O.'s attitude. I would like nothing more than to see the "team" concept return to team sports.


Friday, November 04, 2005

Some downtime

Due to a recent out-of-town journey, with two more coming up this month, this blog will be sparse during November. Just as good anyway, as I have little to say right now.

Caught this while checking my Yahoo e-mail. The 20-year time capsule is a nice idea but I harbor strong doubts that I will have the same e-mail address in 2025. Actually, I think by then e-mail will have evolved into something else that won't require whatever the PC will morph into by that time.

20 years. Let me just recall my world in 1985. Saving my money to purchase a rack stereo system (remember those?). Along with the requisite turntable, it had dual cassette decks. Also had an aux jack where one could add something called a compact disc player in the future. My mom and dad also purchased their first VCR, a two-head device with a wired remote. No cable TV in this house. (No way would my father have paid for additional TV channels, as he asserted most programs of that time were garbage anyway.)

Back to the present. The rack system became garage sale/landfill material years ago. No longer have any way to play my vinyl records. The only way me or Geogal can play cassettes is on one small system purchased a few years ago (with 3-disc CD) or on two vintage Walkmans. Still use VHS to record and play back programs, but that will likely go the way of the audio cassette as soon as our household obtains TiVo and a DVD recorder. Cable is yesterday's technology. Have had DirecTV for close to five years now.

I could go on, but I think I have made my point.