The Spiders Strike Back

Remember my post last week about my infestation of DVD stealing spiders? Well, they're expanding from my house all the way to Tarzana! This could quite possibly become a worldwide epidemic!

The DVD 'Cinderella Man' was stolen from my living room by said spiders, hoisted on their spidery backs from Toluca Lake to Tarzana while avoiding detection and traffic, made it's way into the living room of said former loanee John, and finally placed INTO his DVD player. INTO - people! That's one step above getting it out of the case, and clearly indicates a sentient being. I have no idea how they were able to determine his address. Maybe they stole my address book too - I'll have to check tonight. This plan seems a bit unwieldy unless they knew it belonged to him, and were just returning it? Perhaps they just watched it at his house...I'll have to ask him if he heard Russell Crowe in the night.

Detractors from my theory may posit that John neglected to put said DVD into it's case when he loaned it to me, that's why it was still in the player weeks later, but I can kibosh that theory by saying that of course my pal would have checked his player the moment, nay second, that he noticed it was missing. He would never had suggested to me that I lost it, and made me purchase him a replacement DVD. He just wouldn't do that! And even after I posted the theory about the DVD spiders - said friend would have also verified his collection and confirmed that indeed he had not just left it in his DVD player as I subtley claimed in the post. That is simply not possible, so the spider theory remains.

And said friend would also not have told me about the spiders coming to his house if he hadn't seen them himself. He wouldn't have used my blogged story to 'explain-away' his negligence. And he definately wouldn't have giggled like a schoolgirl on the phone while using my commentary on spiders to draw attention away from his mis-deeds, and trying to be 'cute-sie' about it.

So, anyone want to come over and watch my new DVD of Cinderella Man? Anyone but John.

International ___ Day

Here it is! The group project! Go Team International! (I really think we need spiffy sweatshirts that say that.)

For those who can't link: http://internationalday.blogspot.com/

Starting on April Fool's Day (of course), we have the April month covered with a new celebration every day. Yes, we're all dorks with free time on our hands, but hopefully something will strike your fancy or give you cause to celebrate. I'm personally hoping for Beef Jerky day.

This site will BLOW YOUR MINDS. Prepare.

My favorite of all is my first post coming up on the 5th "Take MacGyver to Work Day". Richard Dean Anderson watch out. I'm putting on my 'stalker' T-shirt and heading to Malibu. Shhh...don't tell him. It's going to be a surprise.

Flower Fanatics

Pretty flower. Pretty.

Went to the orchid show in Santa Barbara Saturday. There are some serious orchid fanatics out there, people.

I went to mainly take photographs, this being the artsy fartsy best, but possibly more interesting was the crowd of 55 and over retirees who were fawning over these blooms like long lost children. And who set up lawn chairs and buckets of sand to re-create large 'Paradise' dioramas in a corner of the fairgrounds. Someone even brought in a full size dune buggy filled with orchids. Not sure how that fits the theme 'Paradise', but to each his own.

Personally, any plant that requires hourly attention isn't worth growing unless it produces hallucinogenic fruit, or 100 dollar bills.

But they're prreeeetttttttyyy.

Thumb Twiddling

This here to my right is Kelly. In his spare time, Kelly takes photographs of himself, and draws a beard on them. He then photoshops the photo to make it appear that he's been growing this beard for decades a la Rip Van Winkle. He then sends the photo to his friends to illustrate his fantastic thumb-twiddling photoshop talent, humor and dashing good looks.

Now I bring this up because what people do in their spare time to amuse themselves is a subject of interest. Personally, I wouldn't draw a beard on me and photoshop myself to look like a freak, but that's just me. (Of course you're not a freak, Kelly- I'm talking about other people.) I prefer the old fashioned surfing random websites until you fall asleep as a method of time-wasting. Also I like looking myself up on imdb.com or googling myself and seeing if anything is new. Apparently one of my student films is on a site in Germany, in case anyone cares. Far be it from me to bother finding out how anyone over there saw it.

Is googling yourself a form of narcissism? Hmm...maybe I shouldn't have admitted that. And randomly, there are a lot of s' in narcissism. And is the plural posessive of "s" s' ?

Sometimes I even google my old high school boyfriend to see if he still exsists. If anyone knows a John Dickey - let me know. Yes, that's his real last name.

And occasionally I look at Physics Today, or maps of rural France, or the MacGyver fan site (he's going to be a guest voice on the Simpsons next week!) just to round out my daily boredom.

And just to clarify - Kelly is a computer programmer. I think that explains a lot.

Here's to you, Mrs. Greggory...

"Thank you Mrs. Greggory"

I took this comment from the Von's check-out girl in stride, and said 'You're welcome" without a thought. Actually the thought I had was 'how cute!' imagining my little blond haired bi-racial kids with Devon Greggory - my former producing partner. It was with him I got this Vons card, for our craft-services needs.

I felt a twinge of betrayal for feminism that I wasn't offended that this check-out lady had assumed I was married, and assumed my card was with my spouse, and of course - I was shopping for my little family of 2.5 kids, dog and hardworking husband. Only a twinge, since the thought appeals to me. Possibly years from now when I am buying groceries for my screaming brats as my no good husband stays at home waiting for his unemployment check - maybe then I'll appreciate the humor in accepting the stereotype early.

But there were an awful lot of cute single-looking men with carts full of frosted flakes in there. Maybe I should go back in and flaunt my newly-married status. I hear that reels them in.

Mrs. Greggory you're trying to seduce me.
Aren't you?

The gnomes got my DVD!

Not nearly as dramatic as South Park's underwear-stealing gnomes, I unfortunately have an infestation of DVD stealing spiders.

I borrowed my friend John's DVD of 'Cinderella Man', and despite NOT watching it and returning it without even opening it (I'm lazy), the case was empty. Now...far be it from me to accuse said friend of loaning me the empty box in the first place...ahem...naturally, I just have DVD stealing spiders.

I say spiders because how else could a creature get into a closed DVD case! Far too big for gnomes. Gnomes also have 4 fingers, so without opposible thumbs, they're out. Spiders can just slllliiiiiiddddee in there. And then, consider the logistics of getting that case open from the inside, and sliding the DVD out without detection. They know teamwork. How else could they spin those 10 foot webs that stripe my walkway that I run into after just fixing my hair? Also - spiders just seem the type to want to see 'Cinderella Man'. It's their machismo. And everyone knows Renee Zellweger has a huge following in the black widow underground.

Evil geniuses. Although they didn't steal 'Schindler's List'...which is a judgement call wherein I question their intelligence. Granted, it's in a bigger case, but I think 'Cinderella Man' is more of of an acquired taste. I mean, they should at least have stolen 'Caddyshack'. It's a cult classic! I don't have 'Spiderman', otherwise...well, I think that's obvious.

But what I can't figure out is where their DVD player is. Possibly in the walls. It might explain those late night booming sounds from next door. I always thought it was my neighbors getting it on...but it's just Russell Crowe. Honestly, I'm relieved.

I'll trade you a Unicorn for a Pegasus

I am a girl.

I realized this while at the drugstore, as I flipped out over the cuteness of toenail stickers. Seriously. I actually said 'Awww' aloud.

I bought them, and had an entire pagan sacrifice candle ritual last night wherein I cleaned my feet, re-did the polish(fire opal), applied said stickers, and top coated them 3 - count em! *3* times. All while watching Alias.

And the stickers have rhinestones. I have sparkly feet.

And if I wanted to, like Jennifer Garner, I could silently kill you with these pointy deadly-weapon diamond-encrusted toes. And be cute while doing it. Ben Affleck beware.

You like me, you really like me!

Somehow after only 7 days of blogging experience, I was tagged to be part of a group blog project. I feel like the high school nerd that's suddenly picked to be the mascot. Hey wait...that was me. It's all coming back now. Go Tigers!

SO... Hyperion came up with the brilliant idea of the 'days of the month' blog - like President's Day or the Breast Cancer Awareness Day...but ours are 'Pirates vs. Ninjas Day' or 'Beef Jerky Day'. Because Pirates are way funnier than breast cancer. And Beef Jerky.

Personally, I'm considering 'Take MacGyver to work Day' and possibly 'Lettuce Wedge Salad Day'. I'm also bitter I didn't come up with 'Pirates vs. Ninjas Day', because that's funnier than MacGyver and Lettuce. And breast cancer.

I'll post the link here every once in a while to remind you all when we're done. And if you hate it, remember that I wasn't involved at all. It's Hyperion's fault. I've been blogging 7 days, what do you expect? Get off my back.

Totally Talking Turtle, Dude!

My mom keeps saying 'you should blog about Crush the Turtle!'

Now - to clarify, I've told my mother a very detailed insanely long story about my experience at 'Turtle Talk with Crush' from Finding Nemo at Disneyland recently. It's a voice-activated real-time animation system. Which -- thanks to this CG Crush character's real-time lip sync (Not to mention the 30 frames-per-second that his image is rendered in) -- makes it seem as if a living Crush were actually on the other side of the aquarium 'glass'. He says stuff like "You. Little Dude in the second row. The one with the bright red shell. Are those your parental units seated directly to your left? Your mom's a total babe."

It's then that you see a hundred jaws drop all at the same time. Mostly parents, since the kids knew Crush was real all along. The parents suddenly realize that this isn't some lame singing animatronic parrot that clicks and whirrs. Animatronics blew your mind in 1963, but recently they're tired to anyone but a die-hard fan like me who knows all the Tiki Room lines to sing along. (Ah ha, I see, Schmitt has no hair! Mi Amigos, stop your clucking, it's time to start the show!)

Yes, it was amazing, but not blog-worthy, as I've been failing at attempting to come up with a really super-cool way of re-telling you the story. So since I've given up, I'm just going to cut to the end of the previously written blog, that has the one joke I came up with :

It's possibly not as amazing-sounding on this blog as it is in person, but live animation that talks real-time, directly to you using your name, answering anything you want to ask, is pretty impresive and Disney Magical. Walt would be proud.

And since I'm sure people are mildly predictable, I doubt Crush the turtle gets questions like 'What is the nature of Space-Time?'

But if he did, I feel confident he could answer it better than me.

: Now wasn't that better? You didn't need to know the whole story anyway, and it was just as funny. Really, I'm just looking out for you.

Go, um...Kings?

So I went to the Kings Vs Avalance game last night, but I have this memory blur that is the game - and for the first time in a million years at a hockey game, I don't believe I actually watched it.

What was far more interesting was the man-friend sitting next to me, who until about an hour previously, had been the source of much anger, resentment, pride and downright stupidness for a month...a month where I steamed and listed numerous reasons to my friends (both his and mine) about why men were stupid, and how male friends were the worst perpetrators of stupid-ness since men can't be friends with women (thank you When Harry met Sally), and how this man in particular was the king of the aforelisted stupid men. All friends agreed that yes, he was the king of stupid men, and that made me feel vindicated, and also gave me a sweet image of him with a crown of broken TV remotes and beer bottles.

But here we were, not talking about his stupidity or my resentment... and as he randomly tried to shove a chicken-tender up my nose, I remembered why I thought he was stupid. But for some reason, it was funny this time and I laughed in spite of his crown.

And the Kings lost. I think. It was hard to see while fending off nasal chicken.

Oh Brother, where art thou?

Jay and Corinne are 'good people'.

In the slum of LA, where everyone is willing to shiv their best friend for a three picture deal, to find 'good people' is not only rare, it's just about impossible. And to discover them married to each other, and almost sickly super talented in music...it's enough to make me beg off bothering to be a good person at all.

And...they're still good people after I already abused them once and made them paint my house. (I claim they 'wanted to do it!', and 'I paid them with food!' but I think it's only me that relishes re-painting my bedroom a different color every month. Currently, Winter Sage with a Chocolate accent wall.)

After not bursting into flames upon entrance to the All Saint's Church in Beverly Hills on Friday night, I was honestly NOT surprised to find this same friend Baby J (aka Jay Tuttle) to be a brilliant beautiful bass, emotional and reverent. The performed Passio by Arvo Part was extrememly moving (and for an athiest - that's saying something). Brilliantly provided 'read along' lyrics made made me feel like I was at that church on Crenshaw and 56th, where you're allowed to shout out 'Amen!' or 'Right on sister!' at any open moment. I didn't, but I thought about it.

I took off my shoes and walked barefoot in the freezing church so that I didn't make any noise over Jay's singing. And after they sang 'Cricifige, eum!', I felt that little twinge of heart pain for the death of their saviour...which although being mildly irreverent...made me feel like I was a 'good' enough person to be their friend.

Tag - You're it, no backsies.

"Tracy blog-tagged you! Did you see?"

Wha? Huh? 42?

I went to bed thinking I was a pretty smart kid with my Physics degree and all, and woke up realizing I'm a kindergardner who badly needs to be potty trained.

After frantically e-mailing Cheryl saying 'What do I have to do?! The stress! The anxiety! Agh!' I gave up my pre-conceived concept of forced labor blogging, and embraced the unknown - which is the coolness that is Tracy and her blog tag meme. I don't know what a meme is, or if I'm using it in context correctly, but hopefully Tracy won't shiv me behind the gym.

The rules: List 7 songs you're into right now.
1. Dare - The Gorillaz (Yes, I am a slave to trends)
2. Diamonds are Forever - Shirley Bassey Remix
3. There is no You - Nine Inch Nails (someone pissed me off)
4. My Doorbell - White Stripes
5. Tear you Apart - She wants Revenge
6. Juice Box - Strokes
7. Sinnerman - Nina Simone

And now... like a chain letter - I'm supposed to 'tag' other people...but alas, I dont know anyone else with a blog - so I'm going to just sit here on the jungle gym and pout until recess is over.

John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich

When one requires a moment of zen - the best alternative to the Daily Show with John Stewart is the Huntington Gardens in Pasadena. Specifically the Zen Garden, where you can look at the swirls in gravel made by a spiffy rake.

Very minimalist-buddhist-phoenixyard-ish.

However, more important than zen is a very simple word. Sandwiches.

If the 4th Earl of Sandwich were alive today (pictured to the left) he would proclaim "The tea sandwiches at the Huntington Tea Room are the best in all of the New World". Of course he'd say it in a British foppish way that makes you jealous you're not Sean Connery. And apparently he invented the sandwich so he could keep gambling at the tables...if that's not James Bond, I don't know what is.

And in locating his photo, I learned that Captain Cook named the 'Sandwich Islands' after him. They got re-named 'Hawaii' but personally...I think that was a mistake.

But those Huntington sandwiches...they're TEA sandwiches, which means that they're little, and you can eat a hundred and not realize you've just eaten the equivalent of the 12 foot party sandwich at Subway.

And as I always say...the world's problems could be solved by a good sandwich. Or is that cheese? All problems can be solved with cheese. Ohh...grilled cheese sandwich. And peace and justice shall reign. My name is John Montagu, you killed my father, prepare to eat.

Guys in white satin...

If 90's soft-core porn and Tchaikovsky had a love child, it would be Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake.

Really, that describes it perfectly clearly. Painted white bare-chested men in feathers manage to be graceful and cocky at the same time, while also managing a wierd androgynous David Bowie vibe. The White Feather Swan and Black Leather Swan (same dancer) illustrate a twinge of zen yin yang balance in everyone's dark soul.

Love/Hate, Swans/Princes, Tchaikovsky/Emmanuelle in Space.

Plus, with a threatening tag line like 'See It, or Live to Regret It!'... You better like it or they'll peck your eyes out.

Representin Deutschland

My random comment on Volkswagons got me thinking about those new VW commercials 'Un-pimp my ride'. What I mainly find interesting is that despite my loathing for the actual car involved, and the concept in general a.k.a. 'hood-ification'... I am intrigued
by the commercial. It's the 'pop' of it.

http://www.consumerist.com/consumer/ads/new-vw-ads-in-da-haus-156737.php

With Frauline Helga (seriously!) and a Swede playing a German playing a stereotype in 'da haus'...I feel oddly compelled to laugh - but why? And am I laughing at the 'all Germans are mad scientists' stereotype? Come to think of it, I've never seen a non-German mad scientist. Strangely, I also feel oddly compelled to sing the theme song to Hogan's Heroes.

Which by the way, is a hit in Germany. They just replace the Heil Hitlers with things like 'Heil Bananas'...which in all honesty, is a lot more interesting to visualize. And a bit mad.

Schrodinger's Kitten

I'm already having first blog anxiety. Was I funny enough? Will the one person who reads this be amazed or confounded by my lack of brilliant insights on the nature of man, beast and Volkswagons?

Personally, I think in the past 15 minutes, my writing has improved a thousand fold, so this 2nd blog will go down in the annals of my blog as far superior to the 1st.

But it's the catchy end phrase that actually makes it. And even though this one isn't catchy...it's the thought that counts.

First Blog

Buck Rogers has nothing on me. I'm now in the 21st century with the rest of the world, and have not much to say.

If a blank blog is not written in the forest, and nobody is there to read it, is it still a blog?