Bat Attack

As you may recall my car had a little run in with a bat back on the 26th of July, well the other night we had some more bat news. My family stumbled upon a dead bat on our porch. Damn that is a creepy little animal. The weirdest thing about it, is the way he had a smile on his face. And yes I know it was a he, you could see his little bat balls up close, although I don't think they're noticeable in the pictures. While we were trying to decide what to do with the bat it disappeared. We left it over night with the intention of burying it the next day, but it was gone. Apparently something ate it, we do have foxes and coyotes in the area, but it freaks me out to think they climbed a flight of stairs and came on to our porch to supper.

You can kind of see his smile in that picture, but the light was low and my hand unsteady so most of the pictures look like blurry crap.
This picture is a bit clearer, but as you can see it is upsidedown, but that's the way bats like it.




And here are some cute kittens to offset the dead bat.

Death of a planet.

Pluto you had a good run, but you are a planet no more. You have been demoted to some other sort of space rock. I am sorry, you were a planet for 76 years, that's better than the moon, and he's bigger than you. Perhaps sometime down the road in a more enlightened society we will recognize your beauty and grace once more, making you a planet for the ages.

Mazda's overboard.

I don't know how many of you read about the car carrier vessel that was in the process of rolling over in the northern pacific, so I'll update you. There is a very large boat, carrying about 5,000 Japanese vehicles, mostly Mazda 3 and CX-7 models, and it looked as if it were going to sink. See.


Well it looks like luck was on its side (no pun intended), because the vessel was able to safely make it to Wide Bay, Alaska. Although salvor work, the coast gaurd, and nautical mishaps are intriguing, what really got me were the pictures of the ship in harbour. They are absolutly breath taking, check 'em out, there are 36 of them. I'd love to join the coast guard and work at sea, but I just can't imagine putting my life of hold for about 4 years to do so. But, thats a story for another day.

As you can see above, inspite of the fact the vessel did make it safely to harbour, I would recomend against buying a Mazdaspeed 3 or Mazda CX-7 in th near future.

A couple of things.

I don't think I could imagine a worse weekend for the Red Sox. Loosing 4 straight to the Yankees? Two of those games they should have won, this is a disaster. I have never seen anything like it, at least not from the Red Sox. They are falling apart, along with my heart (sorry to sound sappy, but it's true). They're already 5 1/2 games back, and I don't see them making up that difference the way they're playing right now. Hell, they might as well throw in the towel.

--

It looks like the West African Black Rhino has gone extinct. I had assumed that after the last century and a half we had gotten out act together, and didn't allow for this sort of stuff to happen any longer. Perhaps I'm too optimistic, but I hope the same thing doesn't happen to the Northern White Rhino, of which there are only 4 known examples. I don't know how you can get a species to survive with enough genetic diversity with only 4 examples, but I hope it can be done. From what I've read it seems that political unrest is the main culprit behind the decline of both species.

--

Finally, it looks as if Steve Carell has at last made a funny movie. Little Miss Sunshine is damn funny. I can't stand Steve Carell, it seems as if everything he does is exactly like the last thing he did. The only two exceptions to that rule at the second season of The Office, and this movie. It took him a while to find his stride for The Office, but he did, and he is making it work. This movie is so well written that not even he can screw it up. The film is in limited release for the time being, but if you get the chance to go see it, and you like quirky films, take the time to find a theatre where it is showing. (Off Topic, sort of) Steve Carell will be starring in a forthcoming Get Smart film.

Future Jobs.

Although I've been happily self employed as a title search for the last 4 years (this month), I've been thinking of starting a new job, soon. I'm almost done with college, I have 1, 2 or maybe more years left, I've really got no idea. But, I won't let that slow me down. In order to better help me think of a future job, not carreer, I've made this list of things I'd like to do (mostly as a fantasy).

1. Drive a truck, a big 18 wheeler.
2. Be a flight attendant.
3. Work on a fishing boat.
4. Join the merchant marines.
5. Work at a radio station.
6. Drive a cab.
7. Tend bar.
8. Be a personal trainer.
9. Work in a music club.
10. Projector operator at a movie theatre.
11. That guy that uses the spotlight up in the rigging at a concert.
12. Anything at Disney.
13. Peanut/ Beer/ Pretzel guy at Fenway.


I'm sure there are others, and I may just add some more later, but those are the jobs I want. I just think most of those jobs would be fun, at least for a little while.

Disappointment.

Have you ever wanted something more than anything else in the world, only to either get it, or encounter it, and end up completely hating it? That happened to me today. I was standing outside my fathers office about to get in my car when a Lamborghini Diablo drove by.

Growing up, I had 4 posters on the walls in my bedroom. One featured a whole bunch of jets (not the football team), another a whole bunch of whales and other assorted cetaceans, another featured a Lamborghini Countach, but my favorite was my poster of a red Lamborghini Diablo. To me this was the greatest car ever. My dream was to be a pro baseball player so I could have enough money to buy a Diablo. I gave up baseball, I never gave up the dream of owning a Lamborghini, even if it wasn't the Diablo.

Back to the Diablo I saw today. I've seen plenty of cool cars on the road, including Lamborghinis. Just last autumn I saw a Miura and a Countach in the same day. I thought they both looked great. Everything about them was perfect. Even with though the Countach is one of the ugliest cars of all time, I loved it; because it's a good ugly, it's a wonderful ugly, it's the best ugly there is. Sadly the Diablo was just plain ugly. Something about it didn't tug on those heartstrings the way it did when I was 10. Not only did it look terrible, it sounded terrible. I know it has a massive V12 engine, but it sounded like farm equipment, it sounded like a Tractor. (And I'm not just saying that because Lamborghini started off as a Tractor company.) Nothing about the Diablo was as I wished it to be. Another dream down the drain.

PS: I'm pretty sure I also saw an Aston Martin DB2 (circa mid '50s) today, but that seems rather unlikely due to their rarity.

Thank You Very Much Mr. Thomas.

Not to sound like Jerry Seinfeld, but What's the deal with English Muffins? They're not even muffins. They are to muffins, what animals crackers are to regular crackers. But that is neither here nor there, my real problem has to do with the impossibility of separating the muffin in half. It is the only bread product that I know that requires the use of a fork to cut it in half? Why can't we just use a knife like with everything else?



As you can see I didn't have any luck with that muffin. I'd say a good 90% of my English Muffins end up looking like that or worse. I should talk to my grandmother; opening an English Muffin seems like the kind of thing a grandmother would be good at. (I know it is grammatically incorrect to end a sentence with "at" but deal with me here.) Regardless of their impossible nature, I will continue to eat English Muffins slathered in butter and then topped with Cloudberry jam. It's like dessert.

Sorry Baby Hitler.

If you were planning on raising you kid in Malaysia I hope you weren't planning to name you kid Adolf Hitler, or Stalin, because those names have been banned. Recently Malaysia has banned a number of names due to their "unsuitable" quality.

Some of the names on the list:
Adolf Hitler
Stalin
Ah Gong (unsound mind)
Chai Too (pig)
Kai Chai(chick)
Sum Seng (gangster)
Ah Kow (dog)
Karruppan (black fellow)
Zaniah (female adulterer)
Batumalai (stone hill)
Ah Kow (dog)

In addition to that you'll no longer be allowed to name you child after Japanese car companies, or car models. No more baby Honda, Suzuki, Toyota, or Nissan.
Numbers are also out of the question. Say goodbye to 007, 001, and K7.

Why would anyone want to give their kids these names to begin with? Could you imagine going home and having to tell your parents or in-laws that you named their grandchild Adolf Hitler?

I know many girls here in the states have already decided upon about 15 baby names by the time they reach the 5th grade, but do you think Malaysian girls are the same way? Is little Zaniah sitting there in primary school dreaming of a child named "Black Fellow" or "Gangster"? I hope not.

The Aficionado

*Sorry for the delay, I've been super busy, and I wanted this post to be JUST right.*


Have you ever received a gift that you hated at first? But then you fell in Love with it? Well I did this past Christmas. I was 20 at the time, and assumed my days of over the top Christmas' were over. I have 5 younger siblings, 3 of which are under 10, and I simply assumed their time had come. I was wrong. Sitting there Christmas morning, next to the Christmas tree, was a giant box, with my name on it. I thought it was just a big empty box with a little gift in it; perhaps a new iPod. What it was, was The Aficionado by Haier.



Initially I was disappointed. Why in the hell would I want a mini-fridge, even if it was a very large mini-fridge. But, I grew to love The Aficionado. It is like a child to me. I use it to keep things cool, or cold, and sometimes I even freeze stuff in it. Currently The Aficionado is close to empty. I have been neglecting her. As you can see in the photo it is lacking food. All I’ve got are beverages, condiments and jams.



Aficionado Inventory:
1 half empty 2 liter bottle of Polar brand Birch Beer
1 half empty bottle of Nantucket Nectar Lemonade
2 12oz Carlsberg
1 bottle of Domaine Ste. Michelle sparkling wine
1 bottle Wish Bone Romano Basil Vinaigrette
1 bottle Maple Grove Farms Asiago & Garlic dressing
1 jar of Lingonberry Jam, purchased at ikea
1 jar of Cloudberry preserve, purchased at ikea
4 bottle of Nestle water
1 roll of film

And that’s just what is inside The Aficionado, if we explore the surface we come across even more.

1 half empty bottle of Fresca
1 Campbell’s Soup at Hand
1 bottle Kikkoman brand soy souce
2 bottles of McCormick seasoning: Garlic Salt & Cilantro Leaves
840g of Beef Bullion cubes
1 Crystal Light packet
1 package of Lipton Pasta Sides: Alfredo
1 packet of developed film
There is also two cameras, a frog shaped Easter Basket, 7 lala envelopes, and a chopper.



Recently I thought I killed The Aficionado. I was relaxing in the black chair you can see in the photo, and I put my feet up on the white box next to The Aficionado, and suddenly it started making this horrible noise. I didn’t know what I had done, but I was convinced The Aficionado was dying. It wouldn’t shut up, it made this noise for about 15 minutes. And trust, even 15 seconds of this noise was enough to make you leave the room. When it did stop, it only did so briefly. I had to deal with the same noise on and off for about a week. Then one night (Sunday night) I was having trouble sleeping, it was one of those nights where you go in and out of sleep before you fall asleep for good. I finally did fall asleep, only to have The Aficionado wake me up after about an hour of sleep at 4am. I lost it. I was going to kill The Aficionado. I got out of bed in the dark, and was looking for this plug. I didn’t care about my food, errr, water and condiments, it had to stop. In the dark I couldn’t find the damn plug, and decided to just throw my shoulder into the side of the beast. It worked. The Aficionado shut up, and hasn’t made a peep since.



I hope that when I finally move out, which I hope will be soon, The Aficionado will find a place in my new place.

Don't forget to keep up to date with The Aficionado Here.

Wait for it...

Wait for it...

Throwin' Away The Hamiltons.

*I was going to post this earlier, but Blogger was acting up like a crack head on the 1st and 15th*


With family visiting from California we (the local family) needed something to do with them, and what better way to bond than with gambling. So we, (mom, 3 siblings, 2 aunts, 2 grandparents, 3 cousins, and 1 girlfriend), took a trip to Mohegan Sun.

I've never done well with gambling, and by never done well I mean the one time I blew through $40CAN in about 10 minutes while at a casino in Montreal. However, when you consider the exchange rate I may have actually come out ahead that time. Last night was no different. I signed up for the Mohegan Sun Players Club, and received a free $10 pre-paid AMEX card to spend anywhere at the casino, just not the gas station. (But gas was $3.99 a gallon, so I wouldn't bother anyway.) From there on it was down hill. I quickly went up $4.25, but even quicker I went down one Hamilton. Meanwhile my girlfriend was down $3.75 when she won $80 on a Monopoly Slot, and called it quits while $76 ahead. One of my cousins won about $100 on the tables, this was after being down $50, so she came out $50 ahead. I just got worse though. Before I knew it I was down $22. I figured it was time to quit, but then I started to win again, I was only down $19. That's when I called it quits. I used my free $10 on food, and I consider myself as only coming home down $9. Not bad for a fun night of gambling. Maybe next time won't loose.

On the bright side, my girlfriend will be treating me to Sushi for dinner tonight. Looks like I'm a winner after all, or at least that's what my mom always says.


I almost forgot to mention Kansas was playing a free concert at the casino while we were there. Before seeing them for all of 2 minutes, I almost forgot how much I hate Kansas. If I ever have to hear "Dust in the Wind" again I could kill a mid-westerner.

Don't Hassel the Hoff.

Check out this video. The best part is when he starts to dance infront of the shooting stars, and then the American flag.


I Love Kit!!

A Bat?

Two nights ago I was driving home, at around 11:45. I wouldn't say I live in a rural area, but it can be wooded. I see animals all the time, I saw a coyote earlier that day. I see deer on a regular basis, and dead raccoons and opossums are a regular sight on the side of the road. What I don't see often are Bats. Well I saw one the other night, and I was the last thing it saw. First the details. I was coming around a corner on a very secluded/ dark road, and what did I see in front of me? It was either a) a gigantic moth b) a retarded bird or c) a bat. I tried to slow down, thinking it would fly away as I got near, but it didn't. If you haven't seen a bat fly you need to realize how bad they appear to be at it when feeding. They fly very much like a moth, they are all over the place, and they look like they have no control over their direction. But, it only looks that way because they are flying around chasing bugs. When they are headed to or from their roost, they can fly just fine. Back to the story, I slowed down, but the thing didn't move, and before I could do anything about it C (the bat) whaped right into my bumper. Because of the area, I didn't want to go back to look for the bat, I just drove home (about 1/2 mile away), and checked for bat guts on my car. Thankfully there was none. I always thought it was strange when you'd see bird get hit by cars, but this takes the car. I don't think I've ever seen a dead bat on the road, or heard of one getting hit by a car.

Relief Lebanon *edited*

If you'd like to make a relief donation to those in Lebenon currently being terrorized by Israel you can do so here: www.relieflebanon.org.

New Blogs.

I've added two new blogs of interest. I'm pretty sure they're both run by the same guy. That guy also happens to be one of the contributing editors for Jalopnik, one of my other links of interest.

First you need to check out Hoopty Rides. This guy is awesome. He is to junk and flea markets as Logan Whitehurst is to music. I doubt you know who Logan Whitehurst is, so I'll describe this guy instead. He collects stuff, but not really. He just buys things that he thinks are cool, and then finds a purpose.

Check out the iPod Case he built from an old German police flashlight. If he mass produced, and sold these, I would buy one. It looks like it's straight out of 10,000 Leagues Under the Sea, with that porthole viewer.

Another iPod related creation is his MegaGiant iPod. I'm going to try and describe this, but you really should read about it on your own for a better idea of what it is. He took an old radio/ turn table cabinet, replaced the radio, installed an LCD monitor, a Mac Mini, a replacement turntable, a microphone, and a whole lot of other crap. He can control the iPod with the buttons that were supposed to be used for the pre-set stations on the radio. The thing is amazing. Once again, another item I would buy if sold to the public.

Jalopy Junktown seems to be more of the same. I has an odd collection of stuff; ranging from a piece on an old Dusenburg to 60's fashion. It's not nearly as entertaining as Hooptyrides, but it is a bit more intelligent. It has sociological commentary that is lacking from the other blog.

Check 'em both out, or at least check one of 'em out.

Sick of Summer.

I'm literally sick, and I blame the summer. I went hiking on Sunday, it was about 100 degrees (give of take 5), and have felt like crap ever since. The lymph nodes on the left side of my neck have swollen up. I have a sinus infection. Everything I eat makes me sick, yet I'm really hungry. I can't get enough food. Between Monday morning and Thursday morning I lost 6.5lbs. I've been sleeping really late because I'm weak from not having enough food in my system. My metabolism seems to be on overdrive; I eat, and within 45-60 minutes I'm hungry again. And, not for a snack, but another meal. The muscles in my jaw hurt, I try and avoid chewing on the left side of my mouth, and I don't open my mouth very wide. I have a tooth that feels like it's going to fall out when ever I step. There's other stuff too, I just can't remember it all. This is the most bizarre illness I've had in ages. Not to mention the fact my family hasn't had health insurance for the last 1-2 months, while my parents debate what plan we should get. I also don't have a general care physician. Since I've become to old for my pediatrician I've been to lazy to find an adult doctor.

All of the above is why I've more or less ignored my blog the last few days.

71 Years and Counting.

In case you were wondering, and I know you were, today is the 71st anniversary of the Parking Meter. I would like to say thank you to the great city of Oklahoma* for setting this burden upon the world. If you're anything like me, and I hope you're not, you've probably spent about $200, or so, on parking tickets in the last 24-30 months.

Thank You Oh Grandiose Meter Faerie.


Edit*: Just to clarify, OKC was the first city in the US to install parking meters.

We all hate ticketmaster.

I have never met a person with a single good thing to say about ticketmaster. I hate them. They are evil. They screw each and everyone of us every time we buy tickets. How is a $9+ "convenience charge" convenient?

I was trying to buy Flaming Lips tickets Saturday morning. I wanted to see them in Boston at the pavilion. I waited around until 10am, like the site said. Then at 10 o'clock what showed up? It was the American Express pre-sale. I had to wait about 10 minutes for that to pass before I was allowed to search for tickets. What did I come up with? About 40 rows back. No f-ing way am I going to spend $38.50 plus a $10 "convinence charge" for 40 rows back. The Flaming Lips are great, but not $50 for shitty seats. I seem to recall ticketbastard pulling this same shit when I went to buy Sigur Ros tickets a few months back. The least they could do is advertise the AmEx pre-sale.

The thing that really kills me is the lack of an alternative. Where else can someone buy tickets? Even if I went to a local Filene's or some shit like that I'd still have to play the "convinence charge." I really really wanted to see the Flaming Lips, but now I'm not going to, because of TicketBastard.

Sasquatch Update!

For those of you smart enough to check out the Messin' With Sasquatch Link you now need to check out Sasquatch's MySpace Account. Sasquatch also has a couple of friends, there is Owl, and Ghost Hiker (one of Sasquatch's victims).

Don't forget to check out each of their blogs and photo sets.

Finally!

Today my Google AdSense account finally reached the $100 level. I can't wait, in only a few short weeks I will have a $100 check in my hand. And for doing what? Nothing. I love you internet.