let's party like rockstars .. I DON'T KNOW WHERE WE ARE

Movie Gong Show Marathon Saturday Episode I

2009-11-22T19:17:00.006-05:00

Thanks to everyone who participated in Movie Day! Here is your magical recap. (movie synopsis from IMDB.com) Note: I did not include any details about the favorite scenes in order to keep out spoilers. I highly suggest that you watch these movies to see for yourself.

1. Star Slammer - 7.7/10 beer cans
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087945/

from: http://images.contentreserve.com/
"Two women who have been unjustly confined to a prison planet plot their escape, all the while having to put up with lesbian guards, crazed wardens and mutant rodents."

Favorite Character Award:

All - Short Lunch Guy

Favorite Scene Award:

Molly - knife fight
Sara - arena of death
Dan - Dr. Po death scene
Lauren - mace whipping scene

Honorable Mentions:

misleading movie title
completely inappropriate soundtrack
need to watch the sequel - Torah and The Chain Gang Planet
never once is anyone in this movie wearing anything on this cover, nor do they ever get lazer guns from what I can remember.

2. Switchblade Sisters (the jezebels) - 7.425/10 beer cans
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073778/

from http://blog.tilos.hu/filter/archives/2005_08.html
"The "Dagger Debs" are a gang of snarling girls, and Maggie is their newest member. Lace, the ever tooth-gritting leader, befriends her but soon has doubts --it seems Lace's man, Dominic, head of the "Silver Daggers" fancies the new recruit. Lace struggles to keep control of the Debs, and a handle on Nick, as they face off against the rival gang of pushers lead by Crabs."

Favorite Character Award:

Molly, Sara, Lauren - Donut
Dan - the Principal

Favorite Scene Award:

Molly, Lauren - "Surprise" bedroom scene
Sara - opening scene at the burger place
Dan - Maggie's escape scene

Honorable Mentions:

the scene in the juvy center had some great action

3. 1990 - Bronx Warriors - 2.6/10 beer cans
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085124/

from http://www.movieposter.com/
A Heavy Metal Journey Into An Urban Hell Where Everything Was Done Wrong!

Favorite Character Award:

Molly - Trash's chest
Dan - Ogre
Sara - Mysterious Drummer

Favorite Scene Award:

Molly - the release of ashes into the river, but never made it into the river
Sara - opening credits
Dan - piano lounge party

Honorable Mentions:

Molly did not actually watch this entire movie, and requested a gong, which was turned down by majority vote

4. Crack House - 9.2/10 beer cans
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097119/

from http://www.rottentomatoes.com/
Rick and Melissa are a pair of young lovers hoping to get out of the slums for good and escape the poverty and crime their families and friends have gotten involved in. All this comes to an end when Rick feels he must rejoin his old gang to avenge the killing of his brother by a rival gang. In the course of getting even, Rick is arrested, leaving Melissa without anyone to protect her. She falls in with a crack dealer and quickly becomes addicted to the drug. When she gets sold to a drug kingpin by a minor dealer to pay off a debt, only Rick can save her.

Favorite Character Award:

Molly - OG Jammer
Dan - the teacher
Sara - Tripper
Vince - Chico

Favorite Scene Award:

Molly - dance party
Sara - pocho party
Dan - school bathroom fight
Vince - car crack shoot scene

Honorable Mentions:

everyone had a really hard time picking their favorite scene.
one of Sara's favorite movies ever
Steve and Sara must throw Crack House themed party
G FO LIFE!

5. Never Too Young to Die - 9.5/10 beer cans
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091621/

from http://www.amoeba.com/blog
A secret agent is murdered, and his son--a high school gymnast--teams up with a spy to catch the man who killed him.

Favorite Character Award:

Molly - Caruthers
Dan - Cliff
Sara - Pyramid
Vince - Pyramid
Greg - Cliff
John - Ragnar

Favorite Scene Award:

Molly, Sara, John - the payoff scene
Dan - guy getting bent up on rail (death scene)
Vince - Stargrove Sr. death scene
Greg - guy exploding on motorcycle

Honorable Mentions:

the only movie featuring an ex James Bond, Gene Simmons, John Stamos and Vanity
the best soundtrack of a movie ever
the winner for the night, and a MUST-SEE

I'm toying with the idea of dressing this review up a bit in the future. Thanks again to everyone who came out and drank beers all day. Stay tuned for the next edition, coming January-ish!

hey i got married!

2009-11-06T22:02:00.002-05:00

who knew!

Everyone always talks about the perfect wedding, but I don't think they really every feel like they got it.

The only issue I had with mine? I didn't get any cheese whore deserves.

Staarrrlllaahhhhhhhhhhh

2009-09-16T18:29:00.003-04:00

I had two dreams last night, both of which stayed with me all day. The first was shorter but the time lapse was longer. I was in a house with a friend of mine. The house was a guest house that belonged to her mother, and a guest was staying at it. We were staying there as well, but we weren't to disturb the guest. The guest, as it turned out, was Albert Camus. Somehow I ended up sneaking out of the room we were staying at and befriending him. As it turned out, another person was staying at the house as well. This person was Daniel Quinn. The three of us stayed up all night, drinking a lot of whiskey, and talking about the existential issues I have been having. There was also peanut butter cheesecake to eat. I remember the setting of this dream very vividly. I do not remember anything that we actually spoke of. I remember the looks on their faces as they spoke. This is very odd to me, because I don't know what Albert Camus looks like. The second dream took place at my parent's house in Brick, NJ. I had friends visiting there, friends that have children. We were on the dock, and my bad tooth fell out. This is a normal occurrence in my dreams. This time was different in that due to my missing tooth I was able to pull back my skin from my face and my gums from my teeth. I did this while looking in the mirror and saw that my entire skull was covered with tar. Tar from smoking. I spent the rest of the dream trying to pick the tar off my skin with a toothpick and wipe it off. I remember only having soap and nothing else, so the tar was very hard to get off my skull.

I almost called out of work this morning. Mike suggested I take a shower and see how I felt after that. I felt better, so I went in. When I left James was sitting on the couch in his pajamas watching a tv show about house cats, taking tea and giggling uncontrollably. I think he hadn't gotten much sleep last night; he was still in the light blue pajama pants I had bought him for his birthday.I had a BLT for lunch and some smoked Gouda and red pepper soup. I didn't finish all of it. I left early to go to the doctor. I got there late. I was in the waiting room for an hour and a half. The doctor didn't tell me anything I wanted to hear and sent me away with two prescriptions. I went to KMart to look for shoes to wear to the gym. I didn't find any sneakers in my size. I bought other items I needed instead. After that I went to the grocery store and bought noodles, hot dogs and fruit. Ice cream was buy one get one free, so I bought that as well. I came home and ate Disney Princess shaped spaghetti-o's and watched James on You Tube. I left the ketchup out all night by mistake.

A gentleman could, but he doesn't.

2009-09-15T19:49:00.003-04:00

Last night I had a very vivid dream about going back to high school. I was caught skipping class. My old middle school gym teacher placed me in handcuffs and took me to a room with other offenders. I also found sixty dollars that was dropped by a freshman. Today I worked, had not that great of a day. I clicked the show desktop button and saw James May wearing a shirt that says "i am the stig" on it. I was cheerful after that. I told Dan I was going to pretend from now on that I am married to James May. I imagined that I was going to go home and he would be playing his baby grand piano and watching some show on Discovery channel on mute, occasionally laughing about how unintelligent the programming actually was. Dan played along and we had chatter about how my conversations would my pretend husband would go. Then I went to the gym and met with my personal trainer. She had me do something called "rolling". It felt good, for the most part. I then went to belly dancing class. I flexed a lot. On the way home I bought Gatorade and beef jerky. I ate the entire bag of beef jerky, save for a small piece I gave to my dog. Now Mike is home and we are deciding on what to eat. He just discovered that he bought a tampered-with carton of milk.

Ham-Ham Heartbreak

2009-06-29T12:20:00.003-04:00

My hamster is very sick.

I first noticed it last Monday - the usually lazy, but healthy ham seemed to be staggering around his cage and obviously breathing heavier than normal. I also noticed that the left side of his face, around his eye and nose, were swollen. He was making small panting noises, and wasn't sleeping through the day as normal.

At first I thought he was just old and dying, but when I took him out of the cage he started to bolt around the couch as normal. Everything about him other than the symptoms above was normal. At this point I also noticed that he had not touched his food (not even his treats, which is completely absurd) in two days. I felt helpless for a little bit, hoping that he wasn't hurty, and then turned to the internet.

All of his symptoms showed up in a search for hamster problems - the culprit, according to several websites, was an abscess in his cheek pouch. I was somewhat relieved, but also worried even more now - especially due to the lack of appetite he seemed to develop. I took him to the doctor the next day.

Getting a hamster to a vet is kind of a pain. People on the phone at the vets offices seemed to be taken aback by the fact that I wanted to bring a hamster in. I think one of them laughed at me. Eventually I found him an appointment at a place in Fairless Hills for the same day. I learned that hamsters are considered "exotic" and therefore more expensive to bring in. Funny to me how they are probably one of the cheapest pets you can buy.

Having the hamster at the vet was very cute but very worrisome. I giggled the whole time the vet was handling him. He weighed him in a little bowl, used a stethoscope to listen to his little heart, used a little pointer thing with a little light to check in his mouth and ears. The vet said he seemed pretty healthy, he was acting very normal, but he did have a problem. He said that there wasn't enough puss in the back of its mouth for it to be an abscess, but he thought it would be more of a tooth issue. Either way he wasn't exactly sure what it was, but gave me some medicine for him and said it should help. He was prescribed an antibiotic which he is to take twice a day for ten days, painkiller that he can take once or twice a day, and some powdered diet.

I took him home and started him on the medicine. He seemed to like the painkiller, as it made him sleep a lot. I had a lot of problems feeding him, though. The dropper the vet gave me was too small for any food particles to make it into the dropper, so I was basically force-feeding him water for at least a day.

For two days he seemed to be alright, I gave him pieces of apple that he chewed a bit of, and he was still running around happily.

However, Saturday morning things took a turn for the worse. I woke up the ham to give him his morning dose of medicine, and noticed that he had diarrhea. I also noticed that his weight had dropped significantly more - I could now feel the little bones in his rib cage and back. This made me very upset - my hamster has always been very fat and seeing this physical change in him was quite a shock.

I assumed that the diarrhea was because of the fruit I had given him, so I made a change. Instead of giving him the apple I was going to feed him more times a day with the liquid diet. I cut the top off of the dropper and finally got it so it sucked up nothing but food. He ate for awhile, but definitely made it known to me when he didn't want anymore. He spent the rest of the day sleeping.

Sunday morning and afternoon he did not have diarrhea again, so I was relieved. he did eat, however, instead of running around a bit he just sat in a ball cuddled up on my lap. Every time he tried to move around he stumbled a bit - it was completely obvious that he was weak and starving. This morning his condition had not changed at all, but instead of eating a lot I believe he stuffed up his cheeks with a lot of the food. I hope he eats it.

So this is where we are now. I'm feeding him once in the morning and once at night, and I plan on adding another scheduled feeding after I get home from work today. The outlook is grim, I'm really unsure where to go with this, but I'm doing all I can.

50 Movie Pack - Nightmare Worlds MOVIE REVIEW TIME FUN YAY part deux (a French word for "2")

2009-04-22T18:25:00.002-04:00

Saturday and Sunday I was able to fit four more movies in.

ATOMIC RULERS OF THE WORLD
IMDB link
This is the first of the two Starman movies I watched. (There are 3 in the entire set, and also 3 American movies.) Starman movies are about what I discovered to be Japan's first on screen superhero, Starman, played by Ken Utsui. A little wikipedia digging informed me that Ken Utsui is a respected actor, but to this day refuses to talk about the role, mainly due to embarrassment. Apparently they used to stuff his crotch area with cotton. The suit was a little silly too.

Regardless of what you think about Starman's cape attached to his arms or his little antennae coming out of his over the head spandex costume, the movies are kinda neat. Originally parts of movies from a Japanese series called Super Giants (yes plural, and there's only one super hero.. he is not very giant either..), the plot revolves around a group of aliens from a distant planet who need to protect Earth from nuclear disaster. They do this in order to protect their own planet; nuclear fallout on Earth could directly affect them. Somehow, from space, many miles away. I'll allow it. Starman is their answer to Earth's bodyguard needs, armed with this watch that gives him the ability to speak every language on Earth, look like a human, and fly through space. I think he is also made of super powerful metal, because he has super human strength. It is Starman's duty to thwart any nuclear threat on Earth, which is convenient, because in these two movies a country that doesn't really exist and some aliens from another planet, respectively, are determined to blow up the Earth.

Starman is a friend to children, and boy that is a good thing because there is a group of sneaky orphan kids that sure do like to get themselves into trouble in these movies. In both movies one of them gets kidnapped and Starman, being the gentleman he is, makes it a point to save them. After all, children are the Earth's future. That's the movie talking, not me.

White people always play the villians in these movies. They're pretty decent, I think, and kind of cute. There's some really bad fight scenes, I think he was fencing in one of them. These two movies were basically the same plot with different people, but I enjoyed watching them both.

The Alpha Incident
IMDB link
I thought that I had finally reached a movie that wasn't about aliens coming to Earth, but boy was I wrong. This one definitely tries to sneak it past you though.

A space probe comes back with a deadly virus. It killed a bunch of rats. We aren't told how they died. These scientists for some reason think its a good idea then, to put this virus on a boxcar train guarded only by some guy that reminds me of a girl I went to high school with's dad (Mr. Rogers but less fun and totally scary). They don't even package it up well. It just kind of sits there in jars in a box.

The hillbilly that is driving this boxcar train gets so curious as to what those bottles are that he breaks them open. Now this guy is a piece of work. He's really endearing because of how silly stupid he is, and I felt bad for him the whole time to tell you the truth. Anyway, boxcar stops at a station, Evil Mr. Rogers discovers that the bottles have been broken, and is totally forced to quarantine himself and the three or four (doesn't matter) people who are at the station.

Long story short people start to freak out, wondering what happens when they die. We find out here that the way to survive is to stay awake. They do some drugs, a woman kills herself, one guy falls asleep and dies. And I'll spare you having to watch the movie, his skull contents like his brain and eyes and shit start to expand and bubble out of his head. The whole thing is pretty gory and gross, but its the only good part of the movie. In the end the government doesn't find a cure in time, and goes to exterminate or whatever the whole place. At this point Evil Mr. Rogers discovers he's fallen asleep but hasn't died, realizing he hasn't been infected. OOPS, TOO LATE, the government exterminators shoot him in the stomach. He's dead.

The end!

Beast of the Yellow Night
IMDB link
Yellow Night indeed! The whole film was washed out and yellow and dark and at times completely unviewable. Good job.

The only thing I got out of this film is that a man sells his soul to the devil in exchange for his life, he may or may not have become immortal. This said man also has a hot wife, who he either hates or loves. This man is the head of a company somehow and tries to dick a bunch of people over. Or not. He may or may not have tried to kill his wife. I am 80% sure he ends up turning into a vampire or demon or wereworlf at night eventually to pay the devil back. And according to this movie I am 100% sure the devil is a fat Philippino man in a bad suit and snarky attitude.

50 Movie Pack - Nightmare Worlds MOVIE REVIEW TIME FUN YAY

2009-04-18T15:56:00.003-04:00

I bought a 50 movie pack featuring Sci-Fi movies from Best Buy this weekend. I plan on watching each one of them and posting a review of each. I find it hard to keep up with blogging when there are so many things I'd like to write about, so I thought this might help me get my shit together.

Today while doing some freelance work I watched two movies. Please be aware that I might have some of my facts wrong because I wasn't paying complete attention to them the whole time, but I don't think that is mandatory to enjoy these to begin with.

First I watched:

ALIEN CONTAMINATION

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082000/

Alien Contamination is about aliens coming to take over Earth. A mystery occurs on board a cruise ship; mostly everyone is dead, or hopped overboard abandoning ship in the middle of their meals. A team is sent to investigate. They find some dead bodies that look like they've been "blown up from the inside". That is what the investigating team said, not me. I thought they had contracted some rare skin virus. The team also happens to find a glowing, pulsing, humming pod, which once picked up proceeds to rhythmically hum and glow faster, then explodes. The green goo turns out to be acid, and everyone starts bleeding and face melting, then exploding. (There are a lot of exploding people in this movie.) Somehow one of the investigating team members makes it back to whatever lab they had come from, and we're introduced to a cold-hearted bitch scientist CIA whatever woman who's name escapes me. She has some kind of fucked up love affair going on with some other member of her team. Somehow that is relevant to the rest of the movie because they talk about it through the rest of the movie.

They (the scientists, or some scientists, not really clear on this one) bring back a pod from the ship. Bitch scientist lady proceeds to explain to people who I have no idea what relevance they carry to anything be it government or what have you that when the pods warm up they explode acid everywhere. She then makes sure that they get the point by injecting some of that acid into a rat (WTF?) and everyone gets to watch the rat explode about five seconds later.

Later on they somehow seem to end up with a TON of pods in what seems to be a warehouse that may or may not be in the process of being robbed by thieves. Of course the scientists run into the thieves and try to warn them about the exploding pods, but they fail, and all of the who I am assuming are thieves explode.

Either before or after this the scientist lady contacts an ex-astronaut. Apparently he and his partner a few years back had traveled to Mars and might have seen these pods before. Of course the ex-astronaut is an alcoholic and accused of being insane. Its the lady scientist's job to get him to tell her what he actually saw (reluctantly because she was involved with his removal off the astronaut squad back in the day because no one believed him the first time). We have a nice little Mars expedition flash back here. She convinces him to help. He slaps her in the face (I think). No one explodes in this scene.

They decide that they're all going on holiday to south america. I think this is because ex-astronaut's partner, retired from the astronaut force, is running a coffee company down there. And why not? A bunch of things happen. Again, no one is exploding.

Once they get to South America scientist lady becomes a bitch because she wants to shower before dinner. This is really important. The two dudes don't get it so they go off to get drunk and play loud music in their rooms. Somehow scientist lady gets trapped in her bathroom. With a pod. No one can hear her screams because they are off playing loud music in their rooms. I guess she escapes though, because she's alive later. No exploding people in this scene either.

I won't ruin the end of the movie for you, but you definitely get to see a pretty creative alien named "The Cyclops". A couple more people explode, and someone gets eaten as well. This movie was a great start to this dvd set. It was both hilariously awful and hilariously gross. The special effects were pretty bad, but they weren't terrible, and exploding people definitely make up for everything else that sucks about this film. Actually the film didn't really suck at all.

I would recommend this movie to a friend.

I just finished watching the second movie, called Alien Species.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115506/
This movie is about aliens coming and invading earth.

It was so bad I'm not even going to waste my time talking about it. This is one of those movies where you just sit and wonder to yourself how it ever got made. It looks like it was shot on my parents camcorder from 1987. The acting is worse than Southland Tales. The plot doesn't make any sense. Nothing ever gets resolved. Somehow people are stuck underground with aliens. There's some classic early 90's special effects in there, the kind you'd see in the student work commercials for the Art Institutes. The song in the ending credits has seriously got to be from 1985.

If I was me now sitting next to me then watching this movie, I'd probably fast forward to a few parts for a laugh, but no way would I let myself watch it in its entirety.

All in all 50% awesomeness is a good start to this DVD adventure.

What one might call a "hairy" situation

2009-02-06T17:58:00.005-05:00

So I have been catching this show on the science channel called My Shocking Story the last two days. Its a pretty amazing show. Yesterday I watched people get face transplants (woah), and today, real werewolf-people. Well, children, rather. There are a few people in the world with a disorder that causes hair to grow all over their bodies.

According to hairweb.org,

This phenomenon manifests itself in extreme growth of hair all over the body - almost the whole body is covered in hair. It is known as an extreme form of hypertrichosis and it is one the worlds rarest hereditary diseases - due to a gene defect.

You can see pics of people with this on the internet if you're really curious, but it looks just like it sounds.

Anyway they were discussing a young boy from India who has this whole problem and the treatments he was receiving and you know all that good Science Channel stuff. They went on to explain how the doctor who was treating him in India was working with an American doctor from Columbia University who deals with genetic science. They showed a clip of the doctor from India on the phone with the American doctor, speaking about the genetic mumbo jumbo and discussing some options. The Indian doctor agreed to send her samples from the boy (hair, skin, etc) to see what they can or might be able to do. Sounds great for him, right?

Then they showed a picture of this doctor from America.

If I was the boy's doctor in India, I would hesitate to show the boy's parents a picture of this woman. Considering HER hair issues, I don't think they would feel very hopeful about their son's future relationship with his hair.

image from http://clonemyhair.com

Green Ginger Tea to the Rescue!!

2009-02-01T20:28:00.002-05:00

Sara and Lee and I sold a bunch of stuff at the punk rock flea market in Philly today. We had something for everyone! I sold mostly toys, Sara sold clothes, and Lee sold some stuff and records. We all did well! And I sold four pieces, two paintings and two bottles. Super! IT WAS SO PACKED. They overstuffed the place with tables, there was SO much traffic. I don't think they were expecting that many people to show up. There were people lined up AROUND THE BLOCK to get in. Jeez. R5 better make some adjustments here. We also all agreed that we will get a table in the future. We had a really good time. Even having to crawl under the table was fun in its own way.

I was just watching the commercials during the superbowl, and some of them were in "Real-D". Well I have a pair of those glasses from the movie My Bloody Valentine (which was AWESOME btw, a great slasher flick), so I put them on, and they didn't work. Are there some kind of differences between movie glasses and tv glasses, or were those commercials really not in Real-D?

Things that make you go hm?!

I met The Muffs!

2009-01-25T13:37:00.004-05:00

Jesse and Mike and I went to see The Muffs at maxwell's in hoboken. I went with every intention of meeting them, because their singer and guitarist Kim Shattuck has been a hero of mine ever since I got into them. In case you aren't familiar with her band at all, you might know her as the girl who guest sang on Lori Meyers on NOFX's Punk in Drublic. Being that they were playing at Maxwell's (a small hole in the wall to say the least), I figured that I had a big chance to make it happen, so I brought my autograph book with me and some of that liquid courage.

They played a great set - way better than what I had heard from their live recordings. They rocked out a lot, they sounded great, and they even played new material, which not only super surprised me, but got me excited for a new album!!

After the show we stood next to the stairs leading down to the basement of the place, which we were assuming was a large area with many rooms and corridors. I stood up at the top of the steps, nervous and giddy as all hell, trying to get up the courage to go downstairs and find them. Thank goodness for Jesse and Mike and their "DO IT" egging me on, because without them I don't think I could have done it. I almost fell down the steps from excitement, and when I got to the bottom of them to find only a single storage room, there they were, just hangin out. I couldn't believe it, it was way easier than I thought. I talked to Ronnie (bass) first, telling him that I have been listening to them since I was 13, that I'm so excited to meet them, to see them, blah blah blah, I was a wreck. I got Ronnie's autograph and then talked to Kim, telling her something like, I sent you a myspace message years ago and she's a hero of mine and I'm sure I didn't make much sense and thinking back to it I must have sounded like the biggest idiot ever ever ever. She gave me a hug, even. I got a hug from Kim Shattuck!! I know, it sounds like no big thing to you, but it was really just plain awesome for me.

Kim and the drummer both signed my book, and Jesse and Mike also came downstairs, so I even got this awesome picture thanks to Jesse's iphone. I could go on about what a complete toolbag I felt like I sounded like after we left, because I am rather embarrassed about the whole thing, but I think I will leave it at that. I mean, a 28 year old girl acting like a 12 year old groupie of the Jonas Brothers for a punk band that's been around for 18 years .. kinda silly.

Thanks to them for understanding how silly I must have felt and being so cool about everything, and playing an awesome set. And on a side note, Jesse Rohland has the coolest bedroom in an apartment I have ever seen in my life. And Hoboken sucks, by the way.

Killer Jellyfish!

2009-01-22T23:50:00.005-05:00

Image from: irukandjijellyfish.com/

These things are really tiny, only 2.5cm big. Its one of the most poisonous things on the planet! From wikipedia.com:

Irukandji syndrome is produced by a very small amount of venom and includes severe pains at various parts of the body (typically excruciating muscle cramps in the arms and legs, severe pain in the back and kidneys, and a burning sensation of the skin and face), headaches, nausea, restlessness, sweating, vomiting, high heart rate and blood pressure.

And to top it all off, there is no anti-venom. ANNND that pain lasts anywhere from hours to days. On the TV show on Animal Planet that I heard about this from a girl they interviewed while she was all doped up on morphine from a sting which they said barely masked the top of the pain and she talked about how painful it was ugh and she was in pain for two weeks. TWO WEEKS! That's scary!

I just heard that you can't keep them in a regular fish tank because if it runs into the wall it will die!

Obamamania!
I'm happy about the fact that our new president is just a regular guy who grew up in a regular family and got some pretty damn serious ambition to do some shit. I think that means more to me than anything, because it really does prove that anyone can do what they put their mind to it. All around I feel that we can only wait and see what really goes on for the next four years, but at least people are trying to feel good about something when things are obviously so bad.

The Muffs!
I'm totally going to see them tomorrow. YES!! I'm bringing my autograph book to see if Kim will sign it. I feel kind of embarrassed about it. But she rocks so hard! The Muffs! I wonder if they will have any new material. We're heading to a guy I used to work with's house up there to throw back before the show because I'm broke!! I really want a t-shirt tho. =o(

Punk Rock Flea Market
Lee and Sara and I are selling shit at the punk rock flea market on feb 2nd. Come check it out! I'm getting rid of mad 80's toys and stuffed animals and just some shit I have laying around the house. Should be a good time. At the Electric Factory, btw.

Animal Collective
Merriweather Post Pavillion is so good! They really reached a point where they can say the sound is completely theirs. Not that their other stuff sounded like much else, but this album is much more well fused than their previous material. I still love the Jam, but I can't get enough of songs like My Girls and Summertime Clothes.

I'm sleepy..

Happy New Year

2009-01-11T16:31:00.002-05:00

Sorry

So, I made my friends all their holiday presents this year except for Greg who I got a shirt with a screaming cat face on it that says "STRESSED OUT!". Sara and Lee got refurbished action figures made to look like Zed from Zardoz, John and Dan got Katamari Damacy custom cousins. I wanted to put pictures of them up but I completely forgot to take some. They seemed happy. I made Ralph a box with the logo of the French Foreign Legion on it, ha ha ha.

I just got back from Washington D.C. and we were there to a. pick up things from my aunt's house in Annandale VA (totally sweet area) and b. to go to the zoo. I will have to put them on Picasa later. I also have several videos of Tai Shan munching on some 'boo (that's what we pandas call "bamboo" around here) I will have to put up as well.

Pandas are so stinking cute I can't take it.

SO from my aunt's house I got a new sweet couch and furniture for upstairs in the extra room and oh man its just ending up to be sweet around here, but we have a lot of work to do rearranging and cleaning. I also got an asian (I think it is Chinese, but I can't be sure) ink painting my aunt's girlfriend was presented with in Korea. I know I know it might be Korean if she got it from Korea, but the text inked on it looks like kanji, though I've never actually seen any Korean calligraphy so maybe I am just being stupid. Its so beautiful, and its HUGE!

I've been doing nothing else besides playing Persona 4 and I plan on writing my very first full game review upon completion. Its cold, so I'm gonna go make some cocoa or some shit. Later, suckers

Recent Love Affairs

2008-12-07T17:03:00.002-05:00

Here are some things I have been obsessing over lately.

1. Vanilla Cream Soda
Soda is ok, it makes you pee a lot, but vanilla cream soda is the closest thing to heaven you can get in the soda department. At the Bent Spoon in Princeton, they have italian soda ice creams, and my next adventure in the Bent Spoon department will be to have a vanilla cream ice cream soda. heck yeah!

2. Leg Warmers
I've been searching for a good cheap pair of leg warmers for forever, always too lazy to order from catalogs and internets, but always on it when I find them in stores. This Sunday Lee and Matt and I went to Columbus flea market, and I bought 3 pairs of legwarmers, 2 pairs of tights, and 4 pairs of socks. The legwarmers are my favorite. They're just so practical, and, since I bought them in the brightest colors they had, guaranteed to make a statement to what might be an otherwise colorless work outfit. Bonus - they can double as arm warmers. Also, two pairs of them have lil buttons! Too cute. P.S. the two pairs of tights that I bought had nifty patterns - grey and black stripes, and get this - ARGYLE.

3. Dr. Mario
I'm good at this game. Some days, I'm great. I can beat everyone I know. I can't beat everyone on the internet though. There are things I see people who are better than me doing when I'm playing against them that I understand, but can't recreate with that amount of speed they do. Right now my rank on Wii kind of shuffles between 6600-6800. Over the last two months I've completely lost interest in Final Fantasy Tactics A2 (its just too much of the same thing over and over again, regardless of how many jobs they've stuffed in there it can be extremely boring to the point where i've fallen asleep playing it) and since Persona 4 comes out in a steadily decreasing amount of time I have refused to pick up another serious game. That has led to me playing Dr. Mario, sometimes for 5+ hours, online, almost every day. The big lure is that I am more often than not going to play against someone different every time, so its a constant gauge on my skills. I really would like to have some serious bragging rights to this game, so if you have a Wii, and you have downloaded this game, lets play. I'd like to prove to you that I can kick your ass. And if you're better than me, well hell, its awesome to play against you. You will never get better at a game unless you play people who challenge you.

That's that. Persona 4 comes out in about.. 2 days, so don't expect many things coming from here that aren't related to that game.

I got a new hat

2008-12-01T20:15:00.003-05:00

It cost five bucks. What do you think?

This is the last time I ever do this ever.

2008-11-28T01:16:00.003-05:00

Lauren and I went out on the porch to smoke, which is weird because I've been trying to quit and didn't really expect to smoke, and there happened to be two small white dogs walking through the street. One of them is shaggy, one of them is a chihuahua. The shaggy one they named Dusty, the little one Peaches. Peaches is a boy. He snaps at everyone, he sucks. Dusty pissed on my floor.

I'll post pictures tomorrow. I'm also going to call animal control. It sucks to have to keep them here in the cage, but I couldn't just let them roam. We put money on the idea that some family had mad people over for dinner and the dogs escaped. If I see a flier up I will call, but I can't keep them here. Wilma would flip.

In other news, we got an X-Box!! Heck yes. We don't really have any games that I'm super excited about right now, but the library will build. We have Bioshock, so good for that but its too scary for me to play home alone.

Happy Thanksgiving

//~DOG UPDATE, FRIDAY~//
This morning a guy was looking for a dog, so I asked him if the small dogs were his, but they weren't. I walked around the neighborhood and asked around to see if anyone had lost dogs, with no luck. Animal control is closed. Fuck. I let the dogs outside, and the chihuahua found a way to escape my yard and wander into Rocky's (the neighbor's dog). Well the neighbor pulls up, and I tell him about it, and we end up talking for about an hour cause some serious shit just went down in his life. Rocky tries to have sex with the small dog (who has attacked my neighbor and I a few times for no reason at this point), and neighbor guy goes, why are you putting yourself through this, and we kick the dogs out.

So that's that. I don't feel bad about it, because those dogs were assholes, especially the small one. Mike was right, again. We should have put them in the oven.

We painted the living room!

2008-11-24T19:45:00.004-05:00

Check out the living room!

We painted and cleaned for about 6 and a half hours on Saturday. This is how it came out.

The kitchen is half stripped of wallpaper, so I should have that done by the end of the holiday weekend. So cool! Home decorating is rad.

pho pho pho nom nom nom (plus aquabats = superrad)

2008-11-19T18:22:00.002-05:00

Mike bought us tickets to the Aquabats.

We left early (about 6:45) because I thought it would be a good idea to get some pho at anywhere in Chinatown before the show (at the Troc). We got to about Girard Ave exit (40 mins to get there, the exit right before the right one to get where we were heading), when Mike asks me if I have the tickets. I didn't. We turned around and drove back home, got the tickets, and headed back down to Philly. At this point I'm starving, so I ask Mike to call the Troc to find out what time the bats are playing. 9:45. Perfect. Its only 8:30, and we're right outside the city.

We roll up into Chinatown, and drive to the Troc. I think to myself, great, we're going to spend a half hour finding parking, and I'm still going to be starving.

Not so. There was a parking spot right in front of the Troc.

I'm not talking about down the street, I'm talking about RIGHT IN FRONT. HA! Fuck all you guys, its cold. We don't have to walk NO blocks to our car. Double luck hits us as well, because there is a pho place right across the street. We both get the same thing, pork with spring roll and verm noodooz, scarf that shit down in 15 minutes, and go to the show.

We missed Tragedy, the metal tribute to the Beegees, but whatever. We did see the end of Suburban Legends, who we thought were a boy band before the dancers picked up their horns and started playing, that was pretty cute. The Aquabats were hilarious - I had never seen them before, and now I am superglad I did! I did get a belly ache and missed a portion of their set while I watched a cockroach come alarmingly close to climbing up the toilet I was pooing on, but overall a great time.

There were lots of kids there which I'm sure you already knew, but they were really cute. Its good to see that there are plenty of kids out there still going to shows and having fun. We also saw a MIKEPASUNDOPPLEGANGER - this kid was just like Mike 5 years ago RIGHT DOWN to the flannel shirt. He didn't have the sleeves cut off, but it was cold, so I'm going to stick with the idea that he probably wears cut-offs in the warmer weathers. The thing I noticed the most about him though was how he was singing in the crowd and rocking out - so incredibly like Mike's mannerisms.. people, it was eerie. I should have gotten his number.

Sunday we .. well spent all day in bed, but we also went to SKA IS DEAD at the Starland, which I hate. Having slept until about 4:30, only getting out of bed around 530 and stopping at a bar to eat on the way there, we got into the venue right as the Toasters were finishing their set, which sucks, because they were the real reason I wanted to go in the first place. If we had waited to get bar food until after the show we would have seen it, but I was convinced that the Toasters were more important than the Pietasters and Mustard Plug. Turns out I am incredibly wrong. The show had started at 3, but the Toasters basically opened up the show for the other three big names (about 7 bands played, i think). THE TOASTERS PEOPLE! TWO TONE ARMY! I guess I am one of the few people in the world who think that they are one of the most important bands ever, or people just don't care. Who knows.

We left about 20 minutes after getting there.

At the bar, there was a bug hanging out on a chair. The bar's motto was, "A good place to hang out". I guess the bug thought so too.

So that's my ska weekend, in a nutshell.

(we also painted the kitchen and got verizon fios, but we no longer get MSNBC. KEITH OLBERMANN! NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Oh, hi internet

2008-11-06T11:54:00.003-05:00

Things that have happened that are cool:

Pumpkin carving party at Sara and Steves, we carved about 30 pumpkins in 3 hours
My brother moved out
I went to Salt Lake City for work, more on that later, because there are a few pictures I'd like to share
Works been ok
World of Goo is a great game
Saw a girls volleyball game at Princeton, was rad
I'm officially a Supervillian, arching Princeton, more on that later
Totally obsessed with the Venture Brothers
Keith Olbermann, what a douche, but so funny
Barack Obama is our next president!

Things that have happened that are not cool:

My brother took his Xbox and his computer (but my new computer is on its way)
I got serious depression (working on it)
Wilma got fleas
I have to give my brother 200 bucks (for the tv)
Mike's been working too much
When we get verizon, all of the DVR items are going to be lost.

So that's about it. I haven't seen any movies.
The games I have been playing are: Pokemon Pearl, Final Fantasy Tactics A2, World of Goo, Megaman 2 and 9 (fuck 9), Dr. Mario.

Japanese classes have started and they're half awesome and half shitty. We're covering things I've already learned, but it has made me feel so much more confidant in my skills. I'm pretty sure that I could have a serious conversation with a Japanese person at this point, so long as they talked a little slow. There are two reasons that the class sucks, one its kind of slow, and two its at 9am in the morning on Sundays. I really dislike having to get up early on Sunday.

Salt Lake was interesting, I didn't get to see the stupid lake again, but we had a good time. We hit a martini bar, I played shuffleboard for the first time with my boss (and got beat), we met some cool people, learned some stuff. I was really bored a lot though, and totally bummed that no one would go swimming with me. We ate SO MUCH food though, which was great, even though I'm starving now.

Money and I aren't getting along really well. But I wonder if that is really just me, or if things are really that stupid expensive now? My brother and I are also not getting along, mostly because I think he is a putz and lazy.

Works been good, I've been proud of a lot of the design work I've been doing lately, but I'm still interested in a different position.

My first arch in Princeton didn't really start as one. I gave Dr. Boyfriend some money to play tunes in a bar there, and there were stuffy jerks all over the place, I mean CRAWLING with them. So he put on six dollars worth of metal. They got so annoyed after awhile that they actually TURNED THE MACHINE OFF. HA.

I've realized, in this new endeavor that I am on, that it is very hard to come up with ways to arch without risking yourself being labeled a terrorist or being brought up on some kind of homeland security issue. I mean people are so scared these days, that even what I might think is the smallest prank ever may be taken so seriously. Its been harder than I imagined to really get a system down on how I am going to pull this off. In time, I suppose, I mean, I really just started this whole thing two weeks ago.

I'd like to take this final moment to recommend The Bent Spoon in Princeton. See, I have three soft spots for that town. One, the girls volleyball team, two, the store "Morning Glory" run by Koreans with tons of awesome import items in it, but also, The Bent Spoon. The people who run The Bent Spoon are my heros. Its an ice cream place, with THE BEST ice cream ever, and all kinds of home made stuff like marshmellows, whipped cream, root beer, hell, they even have HOT hot chocolate. Like jalepenio hot. No shit, right?

I promise, more to myself than whoever reads this site, to write more.

Bloomsburg Fair = Chicken Pretzels and Huge Cows

2008-09-29T20:16:00.004-04:00

So Sara and I went up to Bloomsburg for the annual fair they do up there. Its a pretty amazing event, with amazing people, livestock, food, I mean pretty regular state fair stuff but in coal country, the raddest place on earth.

Some highlights include:

Livestock: Holy crap I saw the largest cow I have ever seen in my entire life. I can't wait for Sara to get the picture over to me. I can't describe it anymore. You'll have to see it. Also there were giant cocks and cute bunnies. I'm pretty down with the livestock thing, except the size of the utters kind of upset me, since you know that was all kinds of hormone induced. I was definitely afraid of being shat on in the cow pen. And the horse show, for crying out loud young girls, stop putting glitter on your horse, its fuckin trashy. Also, it smelled, so bad. SO BAD.

People: I love you guys from the coal region. You did not disappoint.

Food: I still did not try the chicken pretzels, but I was tempted to this time. Last time not so much. I got some great chee fries, dollar ice cream, and a 2 for a dollar hot dog that was definitely only worth a dollar. It basically tasted like bologna. But man, you can't beat fair food. It actually seemed this time like there was more food than actual stuff to buy.

We saw a sideshow, which could have been cooler if it didn't seem like it was run by a bunch of kids. if they had really tried to sell it I think it could have been a lot better. They had the oldest working munchkin from the wizard of oz there, and man that guy was really creepy looking. They had a spider lady, a snake lady, a headless woman, but it was more of corniness than actual entertainment. You can get away with doing really corny shit if you just put a little OOMPH into it, and this really didn't have it. It kind of ran like a bad talent show. Now they said that they are trying to keep alive the traditions of the day back before we had YouTube and could watch all of it online, but honestly, they could have spiced it up, and with all the money they make, I think they could also have gotten better spider lady costumes.

Long story short we got exhausted even though we tried not to, ended up at the Silver Spur in Mt. Carmel, where we thought there would be karaoke, but no luck. We ended up talking to a really great older man at the bar for a few hours. Alex, I think his name was. He chatted it up with us about everything from the bail out to comic book movies. There is nothing better for the soul than some good wisdom and conversation with a stranger from Mt. Carmel. We thank him for a great time at the bar.

Our room at the Pine Burr Inn (classic 1970s decor Inn) was pretty awesome. It had plastic couches. They overcharged me. I have to call them about that tomorrow.

The next morning we went to get blastin blueberry pancakes at our favorite spot to eat up there, Yanni's. The horrifying thing about being there was the lack of customers due to the smoking ban and financial crisis. Honestly, I won't talk politics here, but fuck it was scary.

The drive home was the most horrifying drive I had ever been on, ever (with a sober person). The highway looked like a lake. And to top it all off, when we got back to Sara's, her street was blocked off because of a block party, that had been rescheduled from another time due to rain, but failed to tell anyone else about when it had been rescheduled to.

It was an exhausting, fun, disappointing, happy, long weekend. Cheers.

You can see pictures by clicking anywhere on this long sentence.

Ok, here is the cow.

Sea Creatures are Really Really Cool.

2008-09-26T12:47:00.000-04:00

From http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-94406:

Nerding Out in NYC

2008-09-18T18:33:00.005-04:00

Another adventure occurred last weekend. Mike, my partner in adventuring, and I camped out in NYC with Kathy and a few of her friends to get into the Nintendo Power 20th anniversary party. The magazine told us that the first 400 people in line with an issue of Nintendo Power would get in for free, but they lied about that. I think they basically let in as many people as that place could handle at once. I went mostly because I saw it as a perfect opportunity to battle some kids inside Nintendo World in Pokemon Battle Revolution, and Mike wanted to just get some free stuff. You know, nerds.

The camping out overnight was completely unnecessary, but super fun. I got to finally trade some Pokemon with people (I am now the proud owner of a Munchlax), battled some people (got the shit kicked out of my team), drank a bit, saw the sunrise, met some people from Florida, and saw some cute kids in costumes. I honestly had a good time, and embarrassingly enough it made me feel a little younger than I actually am for once. Once we finally got inside in the morning we got a shopping bag of free stuff (a wiimote keychain that I owned at one point, some gay trading cards for three games, plain stylus's, just, nothing good) and walked around a bit looking at the games they had to play. I headed straight for Pokemon central, only to find that THE WII THAT HAD POKEMON BATTLE REVOLUTION ON IT HAD BEEN REMOVED AND NO POKEMON GAMES WERE BEING PLAYED. My heart was broken. I turned on my DS a few times to see if anyone was battling or something just to see if there were some rouge trainers, but no luck. At that point I completely gave up on the event, and decided to stand with the goods and wait for Mike to finish having a good time.

There was some free food there which was kinda rad, rice krispy treats and cheese sammiches and french toast sticks and stuff, and at one point when I was getting very irritated Mike brought me a bag of sour patch kids, and man, just sometimes a guy can do a thing that doesn't seem to be that big of a deal but really is.. so there you have your "i love mike" moment of this adventure. Eventually he realized there was nothing much to do around the place, so we headed out the door. THAT is when I saw Mr. Zack Morris himself, the kids from the Wizards of Waverly Place (sans Selena Gomez, but fuck her, she sucks), COREY IN THE HOUSE (meant to be read loudly) and the kids from Run's House. and the mom. You can see them in the pictures. I really wanted to try to stay to get my picture taken with them or something, but they were taking pictures with "special" children and what not so I figured they would not be even trying to think about taking a picture with a 28 year old woman-child so.. we left.

The funniest part of this whole adventure was the walk back to the train station. We looked homeless. I'm not kidding. We were smelly, wet, ugly, fuck, you ever see those couples in train stations with backpacks and they look like they haven't showered in weeks and they're tired and you just don't even want to look at them because you know they need money? Yeah, that was us. We got so many looks. As tired and miserable as I was, that really entertained me. Oh, and there was a street fair there which was cool cause Mike bought me a parasol on the way back which I got to use the next day at the Septemberfest (uneventful).

The train ride home was half cute because there were brown toddlers in front of me and an annoying cunt behind me talking on the phone, not in a polite tone of voice way but in a FUCK EVERYONE ELSE ON THIS TRAIN IM TALKING TO MY BEST FRIEND CINDI (i dont really know what the girls name she was talking to was) voice. It was horrible. Mike and I talked a lot of shit out loud, maybe she heard us, maybe she didn't, but if I wasn't so tired I probably would have done something else. Actually, I probably wouldn't have. I don't really know. Maybe.

So you can see pictures from the night here, they're not very interesting save for the pics of the kids in mario costumes (I thought the really small kids sitting in NYC playing DS were really adorable), the buizel costume (eerily I found this kind of sexy) and the celebrities. The first picture is of me and mike on the train, because we waited a good hour and a half for one. They almost made us take the train to Trenton and then back up to NYC. They didn't though. Some ladies were really angry about that. Eh, public transit.

People in Japan don't have to deal with that kind of shit, unless someone kills themselves on the train tracks.

So, in other news, Japanese classes have started again for me and I'm having a good time.

In sadder news, we are currently mourning the passing of one of our furry family members, Jordan the hamster. She had some kind of skin infection that was obviously putting her in a lot of misery and pain, so the decision was made to put her down. Send Mike your love, because he was a great hammy daddy, and he loved her so much.

J-Money, you were the cutest hamster we had ever seen. love.

funny image thursday!

2008-08-28T14:04:00.019-04:00

The network's caption says it all.

WTF? This isn't even something off of engrish.com. Mail sent to Mike.

Summer of Sober Sara

2008-08-20T14:55:00.004-04:00

This is a long entry because its been awhile since I've filled the internet in on whats been going on in my life.

I went back up to the Walton campsite for a weekend with my dad, which turned out to be half a disaster and half a good time.

Bad News: We were lured up there with the promise of being able to use a tractor and rock out some land digging, but the trailer never made it. Traffic sucked. I heard the weekend after the whole thing broke down too. I got real sick and threw up a lot on Saturday morning. We went to fly a remote control plane and it ended up getting broken. My dad did not sleep well and he seemed to be pretty miserable the whole time.

Good News: We got to see some deer up close. I went on a really awesome ATV tour through the back woods with my pops. A guy and I caught a frog. We got drunk. I got to go to Panda's Parlor and got ice cream (panda tracks) and a panda water bottle and panda coffee.

Overall the trip was pretty regular, but it was nice to get out there for awhile. I plan on going back up with some people to camp on the hill because I've definitely sworn off sleeping in the trailer, but lack of money and really knowing who would be interested has kept me from getting my shit together.

Secondly, Mitsuwa had a summer festival fair, and Tina Dan and Xander and I went up to check it out. I was supposed to hang out with people from Japanese class while I was there, but it didn't work out as such - by the time they called me to hang out we had already left, me being tired and cranky and really ready to just pack up and leave for vacation. We got to see some taiko drumming, which was spectacular. We also ate some gyoza, beef bowls, ice cream mochi and the likes. I mean overall it was pretty nice, but it was crowded (as always, and that place is just not super for crowds), and hot. I spent more money than I should have. More than anything it was good to get Xander up there to see something that he hadn't before, mingling with the Japanese kids and what not. To tell the truth the only thing I was thinking about the whole time was

VAACAAATIIOOONNNN

Mike and I left for the outerbanks (duck, NC) that night, around 3am. I was throwing up during most of the drive there because I had drank a few shots before I went to bed and well that is just normal for me these days it seems, but Mike was able to drive most of the way there.

We had a really good time.

I won't bore you with details, because there aren't really actually, we did not much but lay around and play video games and watch the Olympics. We went parasailing, went to the ocean once, and took a day trip to Ocracoke which is an awesome island south of Hatteras. Here's the pictures I took.

I've been to the outerbanks twice now, and I've always wanted to stay north near Kitty Hawk and what not, but now that I have I know why Holly has always gone to Hatteras. Its just better there, calmer, less kids, etc. We're already planning on going back next year, but this time I'm bringing my dog, and more people. It was super nice to be there with just Mike because we had never really spent that kind of time together, but we both agreed it would have been more awesome with more friends. That way I could have gone fishing, and he would have someone else to pummel in Smash Brothers Brawl.

Here's some of our pictures from the vacation!

Friday Hilarity

2008-07-25T10:34:00.002-04:00

mollyann1224: oh
someone left a picture of david bowie article in blender open in the bathroom for me to see when i went in there this morning
you know how awesome it is to wake up and walk into a bathroom and see david looking at you circa 1972 with his red hair

Daniel: hahahaha
Ello, Molly
it's a good thing you're pulling your erogenous zone out, you're gonna need it on the roads we're driving

mollyann1224: emergency
brb
hhahahhashaiSAWOEHAOUYRAWIUERYAWODH A;
omg
AHADHASIDHAHHAH'
how am i supposed to do anything after you just said that to me
hahhhahahahhahaahahahaha

Daniel: i was just about to make him wink at your hemmerhoid and make it disappear too
i was just at a swingin' gala, molly.
EVERYONE SAYS HI

me: XD
always funny
ALWAYS

Daniel: haha
i'll be around, get outta here, ya knucklehead

600x800+Monday= frownyface

2008-07-21T15:46:00.002-04:00

I had to change my screen resolution to 600x800 today. It turns out that the client in Florida for some .. bizarre? .. inexplicable? .. totally fucked up!! reason has their screen at that resolution. My parents don't even have their screen at that resolution (though theirs at 1024x768 isn't a huge improvement).

I'm not one to sit and bark about how people should all have their screen resolutions at some high obscene number or anything like that, but if you're seriously using a computer at 600x800 at this point in time I think it might be a good idea to kind of sit back and reassess why it is that you even own a computer in the first place.

Tina and I made an awesome cake.

2008-07-16T16:19:00.004-04:00

My boyfriend's sister and I are friends. I helped her with her son's fifth birthday party. It was a medieval times theme. It was pretty fun. We did a lot of prep for it, though a lot of it was totally unnecessary.

The best part was the cake. Tina used the internet and found out how to make a dragon cake. She baked it, but we both put it together and decorated it. Man, it was rad.

The wings are made of sticks and fruit rollups. Tina had the brilliant idea of using pineapple leaves as dragon spikes.

The cake was really really good. Of course, the kids were pretty impressed.

Radda radda, radda radda radda radda.

2008-07-11T15:04:00.003-04:00

I really like the TV show Chowder on cartoon network. Its slowly becoming better as time goes on, and definitely is sneaking up on Fosters as my favorite cartoon. Fosters has a lot more episodes under its belt, so we will see how things go at the end of Chowder's second season, but I find myself falling a lot faster for Chowder than I did for Mac or Bloo, or even Eduardo. The thing about Fosters is that there were so many different characters I cared about, while in Chowder there's really only two (even though there are way more), so Shnitzel and Chowder get more love between the two as compared to say Cheese, Bloo, Mac, Eduardo and Frankie, who all got equal shares of the pot.

HELP CHOWDER BATHROOM PEE EXPLOSION

Spaceships of the (FUTURE)

2008-06-24T16:21:00.007-04:00

Sometimes meetings at work can get a little boring, and 90% of the time when I am bored I start doodling on my notepad. I never go into meetings without one, and every once in awhile I find that I've doodled something swell.

Today was not one of those days!!

We have weekly status meetings in my boss's office, which I guess are pretty helpful, if anything its nice to stop sitting in front of the computer for a half hour. Either way since some items of discussion only require the attention of two people that don't include me, I usually end up thinking about some kind of theme and then draw stuff based on that theme. Today it was safari!

You can see I've drawn an elephant or two, a giraffe, an ostrich, and I think that the guy on the right is some kind of hippo, but the jury is still out.

A few weeks before this masterpiece was conjured up we had a meeting about design drafts, and I had the song Purple Bottle by Animal Collective stuck in my head. I doodled some lyrics, and drew a bottle, and also some toothpaste for some reason. After the meeting the boss came over to my cube, and checked out what I had accomplished in my notes. He decided that the bottle was actually a lamp, and drew up a nifty little toothbrush to go with my tube of toothpaste, which according to him was called "Molly Fresh".

Don't ask me how Godzilla got there, because I honestly don't know.

Lastly, during a brainstorming session quite awhile back, my boss and I came up with different ideas for Spaceships of the (FUTURE). As you can see below, the highlight of this doodle-fest was the Octopus Bus. According to my boss, the Octopus Bus is a spaceship that is made mostly for public transportation. There are jets that shoot out of the end of the tentacles for navigating the skies and landing softly on giant Octopus Bus landing pads. I wasn't subscribing to this idea, so we actually had a pretty detailed discussion about how it would work and the pro's and con's of this kind of transportation system.

Basically the whole thing ended with me trying to prove his ideas as ludicrous and completely impractical for public transportation, or any kind of transportation for that matter. He claims to this day that I was just jealous of his creativity, but he is also responsible for the Penis Needle spaceship you see up there. So you be the judge of that.

Last week while he was on vacation I had the honor of being proved a moron by a CNN story about Google launching a race to outer space. Next to the article on the home page of CNN's science and technology section was this computer generated artist's interpretation..

I don't know if something like this actually is in some kind of production, but boy do I feel the asshole. Also please do not sue me if this image is not allowed to be here. It came from CNN.com. I don't know who is responsible for it. But I am not claiming that I did.

So it seems that not too long from now we'll all be riding in Octopus Buses. Or at least until the next big animal inspired space ship craze comes around.

The Best Parts of Movies That Aren't the End

2008-06-18T14:37:00.007-04:00

I saw The Happening this past weekend. I really liked it. I want people to go see that movie without some kind of predetermined idea in their head that its supposed to be this horrifyingly gory life changing movie. It was basically hilarious and fucked up. The director says he was trying to make the best B movie ever. While its definitely not the best, its got to be up there.

While I'm waiting for the rest of the world to get their heads out of their asses and learn how to enjoy themselves while watching a movie again I figured I would post up here my favorite parts of movies (that I can remember today) that isn't the end of a movie. I made that rule because while Dan and I were discussing what ours were he mentioned that the end of Big Fish and The Life Aquatic were two of his favorite parts of movies. While I agree with him I also think that generally the end of a movie is supposed to be the best part of the movie or at least the part that leaves the largest impression on you, so this has more to do with the parts of the movie that weren't intended to be such a big deal but in reality, are.

1. Blue Velvet - Ben's (Dean Stockwell) Karaoke Solo
After the first time I saw this movie every other viewing of it was pretty slow generally because there were no more surprises, but this scene still gives me the goosebump smileys and always demands complete attention from the audience. You have no idea if Frank is going to kill or hug Ben, and fuck if Ben doesn't lip synch this song like he's saying some kind of personal eulogy right before an infuriated rampage of fucked up drug induced slaying. I mean you get the idea when you meet him that Ben is a pretty chill guy, but for some reason watching him sing this song makes me think that when he does guys in the ass he is pretending his dick is a five sided saber sword and the fucker's head is exploding with maggots while his balls are duct taped to a pack of firecrackers. Here's the video, courtesy of YouTube.

2. Zardoz - Zed's introduction to the Renegades
This whole fucking movie is amazing on so many levels that I don't think most humans are capable of comprehending. There are so many things in this movie that could arguably be the most fucked up things that happen, or the funniest, or the most confusing, but I'm going to go with the first time Zed sees who and what the Renegades are. I mean here you have a cold blooded killer, who rapes women in his name, Zardoz, on any given Zardate. This guy climbed into the mysterious stone head and without a second thought MURDERED his own God in COLD BLOOD.

So what is it that scares this beast, this massive perfect-bred human capable of destroying the tabernacle and the world as the Eternals know it? The only way you are going to find out is by scrolling about six minutes and thirty seconds or so into this clip below. Brace yourselves, you'll thank me later.

3. Ted Bundy - Mid movie music montage (camping scene)
My brother got into another discussion with a lady about why he loves Ted Bundy so much while he was at Bonnaroo, and the lady couldn't prove any of my brother's points to be wrong. I mean face it, regardless of how you feel about Uncle Ted, you have to admit that he was one of the smartest guys ever. He got away with murder and robbery countless times, broke out of jail twice, pretty much had everyone who knew him (including crime writer Ann Rule) fooled about who he really was, and to this day no one really knows the whole story of how many people he did or didn't kill because of how he was using the criminal psychiatrists to delay his death sentence. If you ever listen to the recordings of the interviews with Ted Bundy you'll get a glimpse of how hilariously cunning he was, its solid gumby gold.

Anyway, a guy made a movie about Ted, and its a great movie, again, regardless of how you feel about the guy. About half way through the movie there is a nice little music montage of a few of his murders, and the upbeat music makes it more than memorable. You'll find it about 7 minutes in on the video below. My personal favorite is the clip of him camping out having a smoke next to some very lovely, but quiet, ladies. Enjoy.

An honorable mention goes to the scene in I Heart Huckabees when Tommy (Mark Wahlberg) fucks shit up in the meeting room. Kind of an interesting coincidence that Mark Wahlberg is also in The Happening, basically playing the same dude, but a lot better dressed and clean shaven.

New York Field Trip!

2008-05-25T15:58:00.040-04:00

Squids just look so damn cool

Ever since Japanese class ended I've been having a hankering to visit the Japanese Grocery Mitsuwa in Edgewater, NJ. Problem is, its about an hour and a half drive away up the turnpike, and costs about 15 dollars in gas and another 7 in tolls to get there. That's kind of a lot of money to only go to one place for the whole day, and a lot of time traveling for only a small thing. So Mike and I decided that instead of taking that route (and since we had not been able to spend much time together recently aww) we would make an entire Saturday adventure out of it by taking the train to NYC and doing some New York stuff then taking the Mitsuwa shuttle to the store.

Though we didn't get as early of a start as we both would have liked, we ended up in the city around 1230/1, and traveled down to Chinatown to check out a place I think called "Elizabeth Place" on Elizabeth St. It was my first time really walking down Canal St. in the middle of the day, so I got pretty excited when I saw this squid hanging in the window. I bought some cherries, too.

The first thing I noticed when I got down the escalator was a giant tare panda (lazy panda) plush in the window of one of the stores. I dropped my jaw, as I have heard of such wonderful treasure but I had never seen it in the flesh. Before I could say the words "Lazy Panda" Mike was purchasing it at the register. Happy birthday to me! And yes, we carried it in the giant plastic bag it came in all the way through New York city for the rest of the day. But it was well worth it. The rest of the items in the basement of this place was mostly random jewelry, plushes, key chains, charms posters and the likes. I could have spent most of the day in there just picking out tiny things as gifts for people, but instead I made a mental note of what I saw for internet purchases when people's birthdays come up and the likes.

Mike and I smile in celebration of delicious food

After we headed out of there we both realized how ridiculously hungry we were, which was pretty stupid of us because we had planned to eat as soon as we got there. I kind of had an issue because I had eaten Chinese for the last three nights, but as luck would have it we found a place that had Pho, and inside this wonderfully cheaply priced place I was able to get the rice noodle dish with beef that I used to get for lunch when I worked in Pennsauken. I don't think I've ever mentioned it before, but we would seriously go a week eating this stuff for lunch every day, and I seriously missed it. I knew that I would be able to find something similar to the combo platter we used to get, but this was the exact same thing- even spring rolls on the side. I knew I would be able to find it one day, but I did not expect this to be the day. Even better was the fact that we got to sit in the window door jawn, and the two meals plus some chicken stick thing we got came to under 20 bucks. Such an awesome thing to have happened.

Mike vs. Pop Burger

We took the subway up to FAO Shwartz and checked that place out. They had a wall of stuffed pandas, a giant dragon over the front of the store, guys in toy soldier suits at the doors, and that giant keyboard that Tom Hanks and that chick played on in the movie Big! They had retro robot toys and jack in the box and really nifty Harry Potter merch. The store was neat to see mostly because of the giant stuffed things they had about. Across from there we saw a place called "Pop Burger". We had to go in to check it out, and Mike ended up ordering the 2 pop burger item.

As it turns out, Pop Burger has really great burgers. The 6 dollar item was basically 2 small White Castle sized burgers, but the patties were pretty damn thick, and the bun was a serious roll rather than thin white bread like roll. Mike swears it was worth it, and I had a taste and it was a pretty damn good burger, though six for two of those guys was asking a little much if you want my opinion. We then headed down to Nintendo World, and the whole place was plastered with Wii Fit posters. Up and downstairs every system was playing Wii Fit, and all the new clothing was Wii Fit Yoga stuff. I thought that was kind of lame. We DID find snorlax items though! Never before had we been there and they have had them. Mike and I both got the small 2" figure, while he bought the 6" plush. I'm pretty jealous that I didn't get one now that I've had the chance to hold it. He also got himself the keychain that I got for free when I subscribed to Nintendo Power that I lost at the Bloomsburg fair.

Mike Vs. Takoyaki

Lastly we headed over to the Port Authority and took the shuttle to Mitsuwa, where I bought two new books at Sanseido called "ehon o yonde roli poli" (read a picture book roly poly" and "Papa is Ultraseven". It turns out at Mitsuwa that day they were selling fresh takoyaki (fried octopus balls) of which I am seriously not a fan (but it was really awesome watching them make it!). Mike bought some and it turns out that he really likes them. I tried one because I am a sport, and I couldn't even swallow it. I did get some pretty decent sake though, and ice cream mochi which is probably my new favorite Japanese dessert. We didn't end up getting a real meal there since we were kind of still full from earlier and it was pretty crowded, but we did get the shuttle back to the city just in enough time to walk to Penn Station and basically walk right onto a train going home!

The train ride home was really crowded, so we had to stand for a few exits but kept ourselves entertained by playing a game Mike learned about from Excel Saga. When we stopped at Newark airport it smelled pretty bad for some reason. When we did finally get a seat we spent the rest of the time reading Ehon O Yonde Roli Poli out loud. We certainly peaked a few people's interests reading a picture book in a language they probably couldn't place and laughing pretty hard.

The end of the day was topped off by me beating Mike in Pokemon Puzzle League! Huzzah!

I have something to say!

2008-05-19T11:58:00.004-04:00

There are a few things that I would like to get off my chest, so lets consider this post my first and hopefully last where I actually talk about my feelings outside of superficial daily life happenings.

1. Its way too windy where I work.
This is pretty surface evident. When I leave my house at 830, its 70 degrees and warm. When I get to work, its 50 and cold. My place of employment's parking lot is basically a giant wind tunnel, and I just want everyone out there to know how much of an effect this has on the outcome of my day depending on how many times I have to go out into it. The wind is basically one of the largest problems I have with having to go to the work building every day, and this morning it really bummed me out. So now that I have that off my chest, lets move on.

2. Sometimes I sound like a complete asshole.
Last Wednesday we had our final Japanese class at MCCC, and since there were only 8 of us in the class we all agreed to take our sensei out for dinner and have a little post-class horrah. Sensei thought it would be fun to hear what the reasons for everyone getting into the Japanese language class were. As I was listening to everyone else's reasons I was preparing a list in my head of what exactly it is I love about Japan and its culture. I was half listening to the reasons everyone was giving and half exploring the feelings I had, trying to make sense of something that I really hadn't talked about in a long time. I had a bit of trouble, because I really have made this whole Japan thing a part of who I am, rather than just being a fan of anime and video games. Everyone had pretty interesting reasons, especially Nelly-san, who went on to explain her love for Japanese art and print making, and how she had grown up in Peru surrounded by her father's art books and literature. That woman is truly something amazing by the way.

When it finally came to be my turn, something inside of me completely collapsed, and I ended up saying how I had always been a fan of video games and anime, but never really fell in love with Japan until I went there and realized 'how much better it was there'.

How much better it was?

Are you kidding me, Molly? What exactly does that mean? Are you saying that Japanese people are better? Are you saying that America is such a crappy place to live? Do you really think that all in all that country is just 'better' than it is here? I never really got to explain myself. I think I might have gotten out something about how much prettier it is, but at this point I don't really remember. I can only remember being so saddened by the actual words that came out of my mouth and following it up with how I want to live there, but only in Tokyo (prompting my sensei to later refer to me as a 'snob') and also having to defend myself about my dislike for Japanese food.

How in the hell did I become so socially akward? Have I always been this way? Is this why people think I am such a retard? I never actually am able to say what I am thinking until hours later, it seems. Even when I do put a lot of thought into what I am trying to say.

Well to save some kind of face, what I did mean to say in those five minutes that I had, was that I feel that Japan feels like it would generally be a better place for me to exist in. That it is much more aesthetically pleasing there. That the care that goes into such simple things like the shapes of trees and landscaping and the general relationship between nature and the city is a wonder to me. That there are things in Japan that I am more interested in than in America. That I feel that push-button eateries are much more fun to eat in than a diner. That the McDonalds tastes better there. That the subways and trains are always on time. That the country is cleaner. That the people are more beautiful. That the fashion is more forward and innovative. That the music is more captivating. That the language sounds more pleasing to my ear. That it smells so much more like the Earth seemingly should smell there. That there is a culture there that people respect and love. That people are more efficient. That the television is more interesting and funny.

The reason I only want to live in Tokyo, also, is that it is a city! I'm not saying that ONLY TOKYO ONLY ALL THE TIME, but I am saying that if I am going to move across the earth you can be sure that I am going to move to a place where there are a lot of people and also there are going to be other gaijin. Not to mention I have only spent a lot of time in Tokyo, so if I am going to ship there for awhile I am going to, for my sanity, have to spend time there before I can gather the ambition to try living somewhere else. Japan, for me, is a land of complete unfamiliarities, which scares the shit out of me. Tokyo, I believe, would make that transition much easier. I believe it would serve as more of a stepping stone, rather than the only place in the country I deem good enough for me to live in.

I mean I could go on but I think at this point you can see how incredibly ridiculous I felt after saying 'its better'. So I while I apologize to everyone sitting at that table for sounding somewhat arrogant, I do want to stand by the fact that once you go there for yourself I believe strongly that you will better understand what exactly I mean when I say 'better'. I know very personally that Japan is not an awesome place all the time, especially for foreigners. However, I do also feel that Japan's feelings for gaijin are occasionally justified, and I feel that those downs that I have so brutally experienced first hand are a small price to pay for the bigger picture.

3. What the fuck is up with my art?
This is the last thing I am going to talk about. Its more of a curiosity thing than anything. I've been working with the same kind of style of art for awhile, and while I believe that the quality of the work I've been doing has somewhat been compromised by quantity, I used to get a lot of positive feedback about what I was doing. Lately, I've been putting things up for sale at etsy.com, and while many people have been saying, oh your art is great, no one ever buys some.

I have sold two custom pieces, but thats not enough for me.

Now I know buying art isn't really something people do as often as buying clothes or music or whatever, but its lead to me thinking about how much people like my art as opposed to how many people that I know and are my friends like to TELL me they like my art. I don't really have the same kind of access to critiquing that I used to when I was in school, and I guess its lead me to question the authenticity of what people have to say about what I do. Maybe I just need a break from producing illustrated things for awhile, maybe I really have been too focused on making many ok art pieces rather than a few great ones, or maybe I am trying to hard to make new kinds of art (objects etc), or maybe I need to move onto a new medium for awhile?

If you read this blog, I'd be happy to hear what you have to say about what I do. pandakabobs.etsy.com. I'm not trying to get you to go there to buy things. I want some honest feedback. I think about what kinds of art I make a lot, and criticism is something that I honestly take to heart, especially from strangers who can give me a fresh look on something that I really spend a lot of time doing instead of thinking about.

So thats all, hopefully something rad will happen soon that is worth blogging about.

THE INTERNET IS NOT WORKING

2008-05-07T13:42:00.001-04:00

dream come true!

Guess who went camping again!?!?

2008-04-10T17:56:00.005-04:00

Me!

So let me tell you how it went.

Thursday I left work early to get some things done, and around 2 my brother, father, and I headed out to our friend Ralph's 200+ acre property in Loomis, NY (about an four hour drive). On the way there we stopped at the Chester diner, which quite possibly was the worst diner I had ever eaten at ever. I'm not even kidding you when I tell you that the cole slaw was bad. I know you're sitting there thinking, who the hell eats diner cole slaw. Well I do. My dad does. Its a thing. My dad tried the slaw, said, "Damn this shit is bad." I said, "Pops, all diner slaw isn't that great," then I tried it. It was so horrible. It was the worst diner slaw that ever existed.

We stopped at a liquor store that a nice old lady worked at. I remember her because she was smiley and helpful and nice, and she had a very well put together hair do. She was from Jersey, as it turns out. We left Chester.

Driving up to Loomis none of us remembered seeing signs for the Panda's Parlor. This kind of put a new level of excitement to the weekend - we were all wondering if the place was still there. I don't know if I talked about that place or not, but in case you're unfamiliar with it Panda's Parlor is an ice cream/carwash/coffe joint. Panda-themed. Heaven.

The first thing my dad did once we got up to Ralph's was get his truck stuck in a ditch.

After that was taken care of, we headed into the trailer for some much needed winding down with some box wine.

Ralph had a sandwich, because pulling vans out of the mud is hard work.

Truthfully, he was going to take us out to dinner, but we had already eaten at that horrible diner.

The next day we woke up to snow, and temperatures quite colder than the day before. We were now accompanied by our pal Jun, and made our way into the nearest town, Walton. Walton has a castle in it. It also has the largest walk in cooler around. I'm inclined to believe they have the ONLY walk in cooler around. You could also purchase girls underwear at the hardware store. I thought that odd. We had lunch at a different diner, which had

freedom toast

But their food was bangin. The locals stared at us for quite awhile when we came in, all eight of them. It was kind of eerie, but I knew it was going to be the last time in 3 days I was going to be inside somewhere and warm, so I stuck it out.

After pickin up a tarp, some groceries, and food from the dollar store we headed back to Loomis mountain and hiked everything up to the campsite in the ATVs. Set everything up, got rained on for a few hours, drank quite a bit. It took us about 2 hours to get a solid fire going. After we finally had the opportunity to warm up and grab some firewood, we realized we had no dinner. Lucky for us, my trusty new cell phone got text message service up there, and we entrusted Ralph Jr. with the task of bringing hot dogs.

Ralph showed up about an hour later, not only bringing hot dogs, but the warmer weather with him. It stopped raining, which made things a bit more comfortable. Ralph and Jun and I at one point headed up to the phone booth at Lake Flappenralph (the phone booth is just a spot on the top of the hill where most people can get cell phone service). There was a bit of snow on the ground, and Ralph decided to do some donuts in it. That is how he flipped the ATV, which you see at the top of this post. We all kind of dicked around for the rest of the day, until the night brought in the fog.

The thick, horrifying, blacker than the blackest black fog. You could not see more than 20 feet in front of you near the fire. When you left the fire, it was basically pitch black. Since we were expecting company soon and Ralph Sr. needed to know when to take the ATV back down to the trailer to pick them up, Ralph Jr convinced me to take the ATV with him back to the phone booth. We honestly could not see a thing. Even with the headlights of the ATV on it was incredibly hard to see. I'm not embellishing in the slightest when I tell you it was exactly like a horror movie. When we got to the top of the hill, Ralph flipped the lights of the ATV off - I was riding on the back -- and I couldn't even see the back of his head. I'm not talking about closing your eyes maybe seeing a little light behind the lids darkness, I mean I can't see my hand when I hold it in front of my face dark. We even got lost on the way back trying to find the entrance to the next field, passing it twice before finally using the light of the distant campfire to find it. I honestly was terrified, and though I usually get scared over the dark and dumb shit like that, this was a kind of darkness that I had never experienced before, and I doubt that many people have ever experienced it.

That night we were joined by a family of four, Ralph's sister in law (ex sister in law? hm) and her 2 kids and her husband. Two more people showed up at about 3am, but stayed in the trailer and came up the next morning.

The next day I woke up to see the trees - which is not supposed to happen considering I have a flap that goes over the top of my tent. Well that flap, and the tarp, were blown over by the wind that night. No one slept well, and everyone was freezing cold. My brother's things and tent were soaked, so he came and sat in my tent while we listened to the state of the art stereo system, which was really just my ipod and headphones hanging from the hook in the middle of my tent. The day was spent trying to keep warm, going for ATV rides, chopping firewood, exploring the rock quarry, and playing DS. I had brought my markers and some plastic to draw on, but it was certainly way too cold to even consider that. It did get nicer over the course of the day, and we spent about an hour that evening trying to track down the sound of turkeys coming from a distant field. Turkeys sound just like a bunch of kids laughing and fighting. Its kinda funny. We never did get to see the turkeys, but that just gives me something to look forward to next time. Dinner was ab fab spaghetti and home made sauce, accompanied by a tasty salad concocted by yours truly.

We got pretty wasted that night.

The next morning we all woke up a little chilly, but the weather was gorgeous. My dad went down and slept in the trailer with Ralph because he was startin to hurt (first real thing he's done since he got out of surgery), so Ricky got to stay dry by sleeping in dad's tent. I was ready to jet - present company was really getting on my nerves and I didn't want to spend six to eight hours stuck in traffic like the last time we came home from Loomis. We ended up leaving around 1. I do hate leaving that place, because its just so damn beautiful, but because of the rain, and the mud, and the snow, and the wind, I just felt horrifyingly dirty. This is coming from a girl who sometimes goes a week without showering. Thats how dirty I felt. And I smelled bad. Not the usual camping woft, but this was some brutal camp fire mud shit smell.

On the way home we DID see Panda's Parlor, so we stopped, but the ice cream place was still closed. I got some coffee from Panda's Java Joint instead. It was pretty damn good coffee! I actually didn't expect it to taste good at all, considering we were in the middle of nowhere and I figured that pot had to be stewing all day long. I was wrong. And it was only a dollar. Plus I got a cup with a Panda on it. How rad.

So thats about it - I'll probably have to come back and amend this if I think of anything else super rad that happened - but in the meantime here is a link to the pictures I took. Can't wait for next time!

Photos of us camping!

Photos of artsy things around Breezy Acres

What a funny looking food

2008-03-25T12:36:00.003-04:00

The orange I ate today was slightly more deformed than normal.

Also Dan and Mike and I went to see the Pillows and Noodles in NYC on Friday. We had a great time because instead of rushing right to the show we actually had a good amount of time to spend in the village and Toy Tokyo. We ate at a very good Korean restaurant, and Mike paid an extra 4 dollars for his meal to come in a stone bowl, something that he swears was worth the extra money and still is talking about to this day.

I also want to mention something that is not so obvious but impossible to ignore - that the New York City subway is so incredibly fucked. Why is it that Tokyo is so awesome, but NYC's is so horrible? Why is this? Are subways across the earth like this, with Tokyo as the exception? If so, why?

Noodles is my second favorite all girl Asian rock band, but they were not as interesting and pleasant to listen to live than they are recorded. Their songs have a pretty slow pace, and though they sounded tight, I did not get the same kind of satisfaction seeing them live as I thought I would. My opinion of them has not faltered though, I still love them. They were all sold out of L and M concert shirts though, since NYC was their last stop on the tour, which I think totally sucked.

The Pillows basically played the FLCL soundtrack, which I guess was to be expected, but it was honestly a good thing to hear after being such a fan for so long. They sounded great, they had a lot more energy than I thought they would given their ages (their drummer looked like he was late for his blood pressure screening), and the singer was extremely funny to listen to when he talked. He did the kind of things that would sound really silly for me to repeat here, but believe me when I tell you that Dan and Mike and I will be cracking jokes in the singer's fashion for some time to come.

I came home to my house full of people, which was to be expected, but the window was open and the smoke and music was pouring out loudly - at 130am. Some floozy was making out with a boy with his car running and headlights on in front of my house so I could not park.

Needless to say that my brother and I are having some words this week about him not having parties anymore, and relinquishing his house keys when I am not around on a weekend.

Other things that interest me this week:
Bioshock (360), Smash Bros. Brawl, new earrings, my dog knocked over my new shoji screen and broke a panel, Rock of Love 2 written by Steve Revesz (Sara and Steve's house is very awesome by the way), and I'm going camping next weekend with a possible pre-game Saturday.

Kinda gross, hilarious

2008-03-17T10:12:00.001-04:00

Sometimes I wipe my boogers on things. Boogers are funny. A few weeks ago, a few days ago, I don't remember when, I wiped a booger on the wall of a bathroom stall. I figured someone would clean it up.

totally still there! Wonder how long it will live there for??

In other news, I've been playing Bioshock. I know I'm pretty late on the train for this one, but fuck is that game awesome. The best part about it? Now I understand all the "little sister" jokes all the video game cartoons had been making.

Grocery Store Novels

2008-03-14T11:18:00.008-04:00

Not much that I find interesting enough to blog about has been happening. I threw a party last week that went alright, I've been doing a lot of cleaning and rearranging of the house, taking care of my dog's ear infection, and also doing a lot of sewing and drawing. Its apparent to me from my drawings that I am very out of practice and I haven't done anything that I'm particularly fond of yet, but you can check out my etsy store to see what I've been up to. Right now I'm working on a commissioned piece for an old friend of mine. I've been getting better at sewing, I finished a skirt that I have to alter, I made a bag that could be better, but my skills are slowly improving. I haven't sewn in over a week because I've been constructing a studio area in the front of my house, but that's irrelevant to this blog.

Mike and I went to the grocery store the other day to get a salad. We are both on a health kick. My doctor put me on a weight loss program that involves vitamin b-12 shots and once a day appetite suppressant pills that are basically amphetamine, and Mike had some blood work done that came back in not the best shape, so we're working on the getting healthier thing. The salad bar was closed when we got there.

On the way out we stopped at the novel section of the grocery store to see if we could locate a book that we saw at a Rite Aid once - Habeas Corpses - which from the title I can only assume you understand how awesome this book probably is.

//sidenote// I was just doing a google search for information on the book to share with you and found out that Habeas Corpses is also episode 8 of season 4 of the television show Angel. Disclaimer: I do not watch/endorse watching the show Angel. //sidenote//

I feel that the cover art of this book speaks for itself:

But here's the Habeas Corpses plot summary just in case that didn't sell you:

Summary:
[From author's web site] Two years ago Christopher Cséjthe survived a blood transfusion with a master vampire only to discover that he was infected with one of the two viruses that transform the living into the undead. Since then he has survived by his wits as men, monsters, and government agencies have hunted him for secrets his mutated blood may hold.

His personal life is almost as troublesome as the assassins that keep turning up in ever increasing numbers: his bodyguard is a sexy vampire, his jealous werewolf lover can't abide his touch after a silver bullet poisons his blood, and the ghost of his dead wife is being siphoned off by some dark and mysterious force that transcends the grave. The "neighbors" from the cemetary next door tend to drop by every night and someone is sending him grotesque messages in the form of dismembered body parts that are still alive!

Being almost undead has already provided a coffin-load of challenges. But this time around an assassin's bullet knocks Csejthe out of his body and into the afterlife as he journeys through the realm of the truly dead before a final showdown with an evil spawned in Nazi Germany. An evil kept alive through genetic manipulation and nanotechnology and waiting only for Csejthe's blood to overcome the last hurdle to immortality!

How could you not want to read this book? And what kind of person does it take to write this stuff? Turns out that William Mark Simmons, author of Habeas Corpses, seems like a normal dude..

From his wikipedia page:

Simmons has worked a journalist, educator, entertainer, and broadcaster, spending over 30 years in the latter category working in classical music formats and NPR affiliates.

So anyway, we're in the Giant, looking for this book, and though we didn't find it, I came across some other gems that I thought I would share.

Now the lone cowboy had more than his honor to uphold—he had a petite, pregnant powerhouse running his senses wild.

Elle James, the author, is not fortunate to have a wiki written about her, but she does have her own web page, located here. It features a flattering black and white portrait of her with a red rose in her hair, a biography where you can learn about her "military brat" and "exotic bird raising" past and present. She describes her books as

written especially for those who like a little mystery and a lot of edge-of-the-seat suspense.

Lastly, be sure to check out her blog: http://ellejames.blogspot.com/ I seriously suggest you head over there, because her most recent blog is about the research she did on cowboys for this novel.

Next we have a set of two from what seems to be a series of baby-romance themed books.

The only thing I am going to say about these books is that one author (from their respective web sites) is from St. Paul, Michigan "with a Bichon-poo who thinks he is human", and the other "knows how to use a credit card as a lethal weapon, and proves it regularly by putting major dents in the household budget. Abby and her family recently moved back to the city after a few years in the country. Watch out, malls, here she comes!" Abby Gaines has also written The Natural
in A NASCAR Holiday 2.

Finally we have

The emperor has outlawed dragons and dragonborn ordering them killed though he has bonded with a dragon. Natiya is the surviving daughter of two dragonborn whom the emperor had murdered. She dreams of avenging the deaths of her parents while hiding the queen dragon egg she is carrying hidden in plain sight as a naval jewel; one day that Unhatched dragon will live in a sacred bond with her.

I implore you to read Jade Lee's biography. It features an entire list of ancient Chinese rumors about her family. My favorite line explores the relationship she has with her current family:

At home, her husband and two daughters try to ignore her stacks of zen sexual texts.

Other books by Jade Lee include:

The Tao of Sex
Tigress Erotic Romance Series (including Cornered Tigress (#5) and Hungry Tigress (#2)
Miss Woodley's Experiment and
a book that falls under the category of "Futuristic Paranormal Romance" called Oracle

I don't make this stuff up.

Daily Cuteness

2008-02-11T14:41:00.000-05:00

Here is a picture of some sleeping mice that I saw at the pet store.

I Went to the Public Library

2008-02-11T13:38:00.000-05:00

A lil backstory.

I've been in kind of a personal rut lately, overcome with boredom, unhappy with my appearance and overall having a time that to sum up could be a lot more fun. Long story short I decided to start sewing my own clothes, initiated by the revelation that this spring I will not be wearing any pants, only skirts. Problem is, I'm usually broke, and its hard to find a good skirt these days that I don't have to pay at least forty dollars for. However, its not hard to turn my jeans into skirts or find five dollar patterns and 40% off fabrics at a chain store (see how that plays into the whole money issue? I'm so awesome).

So Saturday in all of my DIY glory after successfully turning two pairs of pants into two skirts that look exactly the same (two different colors, of course, and one of them sewn much better than the other) I decided that perhaps our trusty Hamilton Township Library might have some good DIY sewing books. Its not every day that I think about utilizing the library, but the day before Mike and I had planned on studying there (which we never did) and I have really fond (for lack of a better word) memories of that place from when I was little. My dad used to take me there all the time to get books, and I still honestly believed that the public library is that magical place where amazing things happen that they told me in elementary school.

For some reason before I went I got a coffee. When I got in my car I realized that I probably couldn't bring food or drinks in with me. When I got to the library I walked up to the door with it and saw the NO FOOD NO DRINKS sign like I thought I would and put the coffee back in the car.

Also on the way up to the door (which for those of you who are unfamiliar is a long walk up a hill) I saw two young girls with library books in their hands leaving with their mother. This brought back some nifty little feeling and further induced the notion that this visit to the library after five or so years was going to somehow change my life and who I was. I was completely convinced that I was going to find this treasure trove of information, and I would never have to go anywhere to get any kind of information on anything again.

Its all in my library. I KNOW it is. I FEEL it. Like the young girl feels the cosmos in Katamari.

I go inside, it all looks the same, theres the front desk where you check out, the children's section to the left (I almost walked into it just to remember what it was like to be there), the adult and etc section to the right, and right at the front door the steps to the downstairs area where they have little township get togethers. I took my cousin to one when we were like 11, I thought it would be cool, but he totally thought the dude was lame, it kinda made me feel bad.

So I go to check out the little electronic card catalog and see that every computer except one is being used. I go over to that computer and its just got its windows screen, and I'm pretty much like, fuck this, I'll just browse the shelves, because if memory serves me correctly the crafts are over here near the gardening and VOILA! After about a 10 minute browse by looking like I know what I'm looking for I find the sewing section.

There were about 35 books there, most of them about sewing techniques and making your own patterns. I grab the ones that are about making clothes from old clothes, using your old clothes, making patterns from old clothes, everything that looked like it remotely might help me out without being a technical guide because lets face it, I don't really care how to do special stitching. I took my books, I found a secluded desk, I dropped all my shit, pulled out my notebook and my ipod, turned on some Deerhoof (thanks Greg!) and got excited to have my mind filled with knowledge and ideas.

The first book I opened pretty much set the pace for the next half hour of "research". I was looking at this book, I have the name written down at home i'll update this later, looking at these horrifyingly outdated outfits that I didn't know to laugh at or cry that these things may have actually gotten made in someone's living room. I'll let my favorite piece in the publication speak for itself:

Awesome. Look at that style. Look at that sleeve. Fuckin planets people.

I kind of chuckled and put the book down after I did a thorough front to back scrutiny of what other amazingly horrifying things I could find. There was some great stuff in there; full body jumpsuits, overalls, pure gold.

I kind of got the idea at that point that the rest of these books were going to be as outdated as that one, if not more. My curiosity and my hope pushed me to continue - even though at this very point I realized I was probably doomed.

Something inside of me propelled me to open the Vogue magazine style guide.

I was treated to about 500 pages of this:

sigh.

I spent about 15 minutes leafing through the rest of the books I had - none of them were anything close to what I was looking for - regardless of how outdated the styles looked on everything they were also really tasteless, I mean 70/80s style is one thing, but these were the kind of clothes that Aunt Maureen from Ohio sends you on Christmas that your mom makes you wear when she comes to visit - you know what I'm talking about - you've seen that movie too.

Finally I get up to put the books back, I've admitted defeat at this point and I've decided that while the library might be the place to come for a slew of other ideas for craft projects, gardening, civil war history etc, its just not the right place for fashion tips. The library will have to induce inspiration in me for another project, on another day.

For some reason while I'm putting these books back though I have the urge to look to see if there are any gems that I missed out on, pretty amused by the books I was looking at previously. I find a book called "Make it in Denim". I get excited, half because there has to be some kind of rad 70's outfit in there that I hadn't seen yet, half because I actually expected something good to be in there. What I found was more than I could even hope for.

I laughed out loud at this one. I put it back after I snapped that picture and went back to the car and finished my coffee.

Between the time I sat down to look at the books and the time I got to my car I made it through 12 1/2 of the 13 songs on the Deerhoof album.

Maybe next time, library. Maybe next time.

Yesterday Was Pet Doctor Day!

2008-01-25T15:31:00.000-05:00

Wilma, my dog, had her first visit to the vet as a member of the Schneider family last night. While she was a little frightened she behaved very well. I took her there to get a check up, and to see what was up with her ear scratchin habit. Turns out she did NOT have ear mites like the shelter thought, but she does have very dirty ears and what could be a yeast infection (in her ears!)

Other than that we found out that she is pretty healthy! I also found out that the size of her nipples (they are large) COULD mean that she had puppies, but it could ALSO mean that she is just very well endowed, which sounds like a better explanation to me since big breasts are something that runs in my family, and I am proud to be able say my dog has huge tits too.

Doctor Addler-Bush (or Bush-Addler?) gave me some ear cream which is supposed to help out her ear issue, and taught me how to clean her ears with this liquid cleaner that smells bad and gets everywhere which I need to do once a week. I had the shelter fax over all her information regarding previous tests and treatments, and she goes back to visit in two weeks.

I was very proud of the monster (her nickname)! The only time I think she was very worried was when she initially jumped up onto the puppy elevator (the examining table moves down and up for easy placement of animals) and it started to move. She looked at me with very frightened eyes, but since the tech was hugging her and we were all talking to her nicely I think that she realized that no one was trying to hurt her, and she didn't panic or struggle. She received compliments for that on her check up report card! The vet also complimented my brother and I for adopting an adult dog, something that I am very proud of myself.

The trip was rather expensive, but my brother is helping out with the bill and that means a lot. My brother and I are also looking into perhaps getting puppy insurance.

All in all it turned out well. I will give you an update on her status after we visit in February.

Here's a picture of the healthy girl (and Greg!)

Oh Yeah! Giraffes!

2008-01-14T13:33:00.000-05:00

Dan told me today that he saw a video last night of a Giraffe falling down.

I didn't know that they could! I mean its a giraffe! Its so tall and nifty looking, you don't really think about them being able to fall over. They don't exactly look clumsy. Dan cleared up my disbelief by saying that two giraffes were swinging their necks at each other and one fell down. OOOH! Ok, so the jury is still out on if there are clumsy giraffes falling down for no reason (I would probably be that giraffe), but we do know that they can fall while swinging their necks. Totally believable (have you ever seen how long their necks are!?!?)

So then Dan told me that maybe the giraffe died, he didn't know. It was on mute.

Well thanks to Yahoo Answers, we have solved that mystery:

Loren Asks: What happens to a giraffe or an elephant if they fall down?
do they die?
can they get back up?
i just thought of this because i just saw the video of giraffes whacking each other with their heads

Shreyan (who apparently gave the best answer as selected by the questioner) replies: They can get back up. Giraffes fight only for mate, not food. They can stand up more easily, than other animals because they have long legs. Elephants can stand up. They take time, but at any cost, they stand up.

The only animal which cannot get after fallin or getting tilted is the turtle. The struggle for their best to get back to their original position when tilted & sometimes die in starvation in that way.

Poor turtles! But we're not talking about them here, are we.

I went to Youtube to find a video of a giraffe falling down, but I found this instead. The poster describes it as

an elephant and giraffe fall deeply in love in this heart-warming romantic comedy

Enjoy!

Persona 3, Food Adventures

2008-01-14T13:13:00.001-05:00

I beat Persona 3 this weekend, except for needing to watch the final fmvs and some talking to people. I logged almost 100 hours of it - and decided to just run through the last month of play. Kind of regret it, kind of don't. Got the boyfriend playing it now though, so I can more than likely live the dream through him.

The ending did not produce as large of an emotional response as the events that happened in the game did, to tell you the truth it ended exactly as I had expected it to, so I guess it was more closure than anything else. I have yet to see the very ending of the game, but the last boss is beaten. So ends a chapter in my life that I am inviting to end with open arms - there are SO MANY other video games I could be playing..

At least until Persona 3:FES comes out.

In other news, I have been going on some food adventures!

First off, the apples.

Mike and I went to the WORLD CLASS Shoprite near the Sbucks he works at for dinner, and while we were there I decided that I needed to buy some damn food. When I went to get some apples I was pretty surprised to find that there were over 10 different kinds of apples. We stood there for about 15 minutes trying to decide which ones to get, but I ended up getting one of four different kinds.

I got Macintosh (sour!) Jazz (tastes like snapple apple!) Pink lady (tart, with a funny aftertaste!) and Stedman (havent had it yet!). So far I have not found the right apple for me (banking on the Steadman by the looks of it) and next trip to that Shoprite I will be getting four different kinds of apples. Pretty soon I will be an expert on what kind of apples I like to eat.

Secondly, French Press!

Mike, for no reason what-so-ever (and this, by the way ladies, is why I am luckier than you) bought me a french press coffee maker from his work. I wasn't being smart enough to realize that when I ground up coffee to use in it that I needed to get it ground in the biggest chunk possible, so I tried to make it using the fine grounds. The coffee pretty much came out like very thick coffee, pretty much espresso-like. I drank some of it and had to throw the rest out. I have decided that I'm going to use up the rest of the coffee (Ubora blend, again courtesy of the boyfriend) thats fine ground in the one cup coffee maker. Which, by the way, kind of stinks, because I only have one mug that will fit in the coffee maker. The rest of the mugs are too tall! So once the fine Ubora is gone I can move on to the special Princeton blend, get that ground thick, and try this french press thing all over again. I'm sure there is some kind of water/coffee special balance that I have to achieve, but thats the best part about it - always an adventure!

Next, I made miso soup from scratch for the first time last week.
The thing that sucks the most about that though is that there is APPARENTLY some kind of secret miso/water/stock combination formula that I don't know yet - so every time I make the soup its a giant experiment of whats going to taste good. Other thing that sucks is that I don't readily keep broth in the house - so I had to use shitty campbell's chicken soup broth which has tons of sodium in it and really threw off the flavor. Other variations of miso soup use fish stock instead of chicken, and different kinds of miso, so there is a LOT of experimentation that is going to be going on over the next few months.

Finally in some kind of celestial breakthrough I found a kind of mushroom that I like! They're called enoki mushrooms, and they're cute AND delicious! I put them in my miso soup and they act as a kind of noodle since they get mushy. They don't really taste like anything, its more of a texture thing, but thats rad!

Like I do with most things, I bought them because they looked cute. Who knew they would be so tasty (in miso) as well!!

Its David Bowie's Birthday!

2008-01-08T09:14:00.001-05:00

He is 61 today.

Happy birthday, Ziggy.

Best Bands That Don't Exist Yet

2008-01-05T09:57:00.000-05:00

Dan and I spend a lot of time during the work day trying to find ways to keep us both entertained. Sometimes we do surveys like the ones you find on myspace, but they got boring. We did mad libs for awhile too. Thursday we came up with some really great band names. I decided to share them with you.

Rad Kids Who Also Knit
oyster cracker nut pants
Grounded Astronauts
Bottle Rocket Flight 77
No More Ducks
Scissor Kick Swim Team

Folk Bands
Gene Twist and the Sun Dollars
Solemn Forest
Changing Leaves Changing Minds (this band only put out one EP, then went seperate ways to form bands with better names and more successful, but they had a small follwing in the late 90s.)
The Midwest Maple

Album
Oscar Frontbottom and the Swooners live from the Gabbin' Cabin
dan: one album and they think they're so good they do it live with probably a bowie cover in there
molly: changes or something like queen bitch, a hip tune
dan: kids come to our shows, what of it?
molly: the younger ones like to dance

don't touch the sides
OPERATION
molly: like some kind of daft punk ripoff?
dan: probably. like Clinic

Hissy Fitt and the Flatliners
molly: Hissy Fitt is a rad chick
dan: totally
molly: like, the opposite of beth ditto
dan: she has the exact haircut of Izzy Sparks

The Barn Fire
molly: barn fire is a good one man. like, if there was a band like that, i think people wouldnt think of arcade right away, but they'd probably sound a lot like them
dan: yeah, but you'd be like, these guys are definitely from the country

Needles in Haystacks
Cherry Chee and the Chocolate Mousse

novelty folk band
Grits Again!?
dan: and then hipsters will call them GA!?

the devil's advoCUNT
Winston's Farewell (definately assholes)
the Supermen
Pink Elks
Comedy of Slaughter
Pickles (that could be anything, but probably a three piece pop punk band)
Gary In Diana (like the city, probably a better song title)
Peyton's Arm
lazer guided rocket pussy
Empty Boxes
origami (no capital letter allowed in that one)
My Tears Wrapped in Tissue Wrapped in Your Arms
The Fascination
Understanding Your Body
Swans in Tron (electro folk??)
Enterance to System 42
Octagon Snatch
Israel's Vow
My Teenage Pregnancy
We Will Sing When the King Sleeps
Sonic Euthaniasia
Solution: Lasers
Star District
Foot Long Hot Dogs
Hank Huskee and the Mush
Drama Between the Henchmen
Thunderturd
7th Grade Tour Jacket
The Hobo's Cry
Pizza Town
Pizza Delivery Noize
Pizza Pi
She Smelled Like May 25th
A Noose and Stepladder Fable
Mechanism
the virginia tech hokie pokie against the kansas st. whocares (this isnt a band name but its really funny)
Manilla Fold Her
Acropolis Gateway
Puppy Playground
8th Place Trophy

aaron: speed limit of sound
dan: ::: shrug :::: IDENTIFICATION CONFIRMED
molly: aaron sucks. who invited him to play
dan: he started me on it
aaron: johnny rockstar and the mnemonic devices

Aaron and his Self Loathing Imaginary Friends
Aaron and the Self Loathing Invisible No-Fun Gang

Paper Plate Halloween Masks
Sinisturd
Wheelchair Gary and the Handstands
The Flaming Crips
Dan Stern and the Fighting Spirit of the Non-Jews
Dan Stern and the Too-Shys
An Anagram Solved
Knock KnINTERRUPTING COW
the spotted zebra complex
Jason's Football and the Wishful Thinkings
Jason and the Bummouts
Pico de Gallileo
Lisa Needs Braces
Japan Massive Attack Big Style
DENTAL PLAN
Super Fire Pink Guitar Robot
Uncouth Youth Booth
Planes Falling on the Plains
Handicapped G-Spot

If you wish to use any of these band names please send us money or else we will sue you because they are obviously copyrighted for our protection.

THERE IS NOTHING TO DO IN DALLAS

2007-11-28T15:57:00.001-05:00

This Thanksgiving holiday my parents thought that it would be a great idea to take my brother and I to Dallas with them to see a football game and spend some quality family time together. While in theory this sounded like a great idea and we were all happy with the prospect of being able to forget about having a traditional Thanksgiving holiday, I have to say that it was probably the worst family trip I had ever been on, and I will never intentionally be in Dallas, Texas again.

We saw the Cowboys play the Jets, and went to Midevil Times.

Yep. Thats about it.

Giant Bluefin Tuna Cut Performance!

2007-11-12T09:00:00.001-05:00

Mike and I went on a date this weekend to Mitsuwa Japanese Marketplace in Edgewater, NJ. Usually we just go there to eat some Japanese food (they have several restaurants including places for tenpura, udon, soba, ramen, etc.) and pick up some okaashi (sweets) and things to drink, but this time we went because of an event our nihongo no senseii told us about.

Pretty much this was really awesome. We got there around 1pm, it was incredibly crowded, we had to park at a different shopping center and walk over. We went to the honya (bookstore) first, and picked up a kodomo no hon (children's book) called Soremame-kun no bedo (Broad Bean's Bed). They had lots of cool Japanese fashion magazines and music magazines and that was pretty rad. I like going there because you can pick up a lot of Japanese conversation around you.

Then we went over to the marketplace, which was SOOOO crowded. We got some tonkatsu and rice and had a hard time finding a place to sit but eventually we did and that was relaxing, but it was really hot in there. We then watched the meguro (tuna) cut performance.

This tuna was bigger than Mike! It was over 400 pounds and the fish-cutter used a sword to cut it open! The man with the microphone said that the tuna was alive two days ago in Spain. He also told us that most sushi restaurants don't get this quality fish because its simply expensive. He went on to talk about the quality of the fish, and Mike decided that we should buy some (or he should buy some for us, rather). We waited in line for an hour but once we finally ate it we realized that it was completely worth every minute of the wait because it was soooo delicious. It melted in your mouth almost! It was the best sushi I had ever had. One of the guys making sushi flirted with these nihonjin onna no hito behind us. They had really tan skin for nihonjin - I bet in the homeland they hang out with ganguro!

We also bought some pocky, chocolate covered mushroom cookies, and of course I got saku-saku panda cookies. Don't ask me what that means, they're just really tasty. I got two bottles of Ramune but accidentally drank Mike's peach one. I also got party pop, which is a "children's party drink". Party pop tastes like sugared beer. I'm not even kidding you.

It took two hours for us to get home but once we did we played video games for five or six hours straight. We told everyone about our delicious adventure and they of course were all jealous. I only hope that these people come around again and when they do I have the 50 dollars to spend on the oishii meguro.

On the injured list..

2007-11-02T14:00:00.000-04:00

Halloween night I sliced my thumb up with a kitchen knife while preparing bagels. Having an injured thumb really makes me miss having a not injured thumb.

Here are some of the things that I find difficult to do or cannot do with an injured thumb:

Hook/Unhook a bra
Pop zits
Cut meat
Operate a belt
Text message my friends
Navigate my iPod
Use a game controller
Put on a band-aid
Channel-surf
Ash my cigarette
Light a lighter (I just thought of this one - but I haven't tried doing it with the injured hand)
Use my hands as a cup when brushing teeth
Screwing/Unscrewing toothpaste caps
Shuffle cards
Rip up things

Thats only the short list, too. There are a lot of things we use our thumbs for as humans, and I certainly am thankful that my thumb is only injured and not severed.

Here is a picture I took of my hamster this morning!

Pocari Sweat, nectar of the gods.

2007-10-31T09:01:00.002-04:00

Mike and I went to the Azn food market last night. We got some omoshiroii okaashi (interesting candy) and five bottles of Pocari Sweat. Pocari Sweat tastes mostly like Gatorade, but in a lemon-like flavor that isn't available in the states. Its pretty much my favorite drink ever, and I am very thankful that I have that much of it to drink right now.

We also went to Best Buy, and played the demo of Rock Band. I played the drums through "Suffragette City", and tried to play the guitar through Faith No More's "Epic", but the guitar's buttons were a lot harder to press (I mean pressure wise) than a guitar hero guitar, and Mike and I could not finish any songs playing it. I did enjoy playing the drums very much, though I would have liked to try out the mic (but it had no buttons on it, we couldn't figure it out). I really can't wait to play the full version and rock out the mic and drums at the same time. I also almost bought Sing Star but then remembered, I have no money.

My Dad, Top of the Pops

2007-10-30T22:29:00.000-04:00

I just remembered while driving home that I found out last weekend that my dad likes the Beatles. I never really knew that cause he was always listening to classic rock from the 70s. I knew he liked them but I didn't know he liked them. I said, "Hey Pops, do you like the Beatles?" as we drove up to Moon Base Alpha. Pops said, "Of course, they're the Beatles."

Duh.

The party stops here..

2007-10-30T09:21:00.000-04:00

My brother is going to move in with me December 1st. Rather torn about it, but as I've been telling everyone I have to have a positive outlook on something since I've been in this rut for the last few weeks, and I might as well have a positive outlook on that.

Last night in Japanese class these two girls, one of whom I am sure is gay, kept talking throughout class and distracting me. I find that incredibly rude, and if one of them wasn't so unattractive than I might have been inclined to say something, but I figured looking like that has to be punishment enough.

Also in Japanese class one of Mike's friends kept talking about something regarding police being outside of her sister's apartment due to some kind of suicide. No one really cared, but she kept telling us about it, while Mike kept trying to get her to practice Japanese with us.

My mother made steaks last night, and these things were huge, I mean at least twice the size of a normal portion, and I cut mine in half yelling, "No wonder none of you lose weight! And don't put butter in the potatoes!"

The rape at MCCC didn't happen, as I predicted, no offense to real rape victims out there, but to you women who think its cool to make claims like this - this is why the real victims sometimes don't win their cases, you assholes. I hope you go to jail. And I hope you get raped there.

I really need a T.V. in my room. I also had a dream where I lost most of my teeth last night, while wrapped up in some kind of Power Rangers Mystic Force plot. This morning I woke up when the alarm went off at 7, but I was still tired, so I did what I thought was setting the alarm to an hour later. What I did however, was set my regular clock an hour later, so when I woke up at "9" and freaked out getting ready for work skipping my shower, it was really 8, and I felt very silly.

Mike and I have a date tonight! We are going to the Asian Market and then to the Halloween Store and then we are going to play Wii together. I enjoy spending time doing things with him. I do not enjoy spending time on the couch watching TV with him. I don't like doing that with anyone, to tell you the truth.

Tomorrow is Halloween!

Here is your picture for the day!

Outhouse by Pops with appropriate rainbow.

Rabanastre Declassified Information

2007-10-10T11:19:00.001-04:00

Heres a conversation Dan and I had back in August about ffxii.

me: dude i had the most awesome fight last night too
i fought three marks and like, 4 minibosses last night
Daniel: damn!
me: can i tell you about them
i only want to talk about one mark and one miniboss
Daniel: of course
hahaha
I've narrowed this topic of conversation down into two subtopics.
me: so i started reading about the marks because i wanted to speed up
haha
so i started reading about the marks because i wanted to speed up how long it was taking me since greg was leaving shortly and taking his game with him
Daniel: hahaha
me: and there are two marks that i set out to defeat last night, one in the Necrohol of Nabudis, and one in the Nabreus Deadlands. Two very obnoxious places to be in.
I read about the one in (I'm saving this so i can finally blog about a game)
Daniel: (okay)
me: I read about the one in Nabudis first, and figured it wouldn't be too much of a problem - the one in the Nabreus Deadlands was incredibly foreboding (right word there?) of danger and even began with "So you're at this mark, eh?" so naturally I got scared and decided to revisit that one after a few more levels
Sent at 9:42 AM on Friday
me: However I had to go through the Deadlands to reach the mark in the Necrohol. I thought I was lucky because the one in the Deadlands was "hidden" in a "secret area" and I didn't think I would have to worry about it.
Sent at 9:43 AM on Friday
me: SO I'm running through the Deadlands for a bit because I figured while I am here I might as well get the stupid map, and as I'm running through this little tight piece of land before I get to the map urn I decide to try to find a secret area, which blows my mind, because I KNEW that the mark was IN a secret area..
Sent at 9:44 AM on Friday
Daniel: hahaha
goofball
me: I mean I kind of stumbled across it and kept traveling deeper into it but I knew what I might find - For some reason though I thought since this was the Deadlands (which in itself is a very scary place to be, its filled with thick mist and theres, well, dead shit in it everywhere) there had to be at least more than one secret area and maybe I'll find a chest because even though this was that "area through thick fog and tall grass" I thought maybe there was more than one
Well I'm running around like an asshole
And I start going up the side of this hill.. and all these skeletons are popping up at me, I mean, every three steps, I'm fighting 3/4/5 at a time
Daniel: sweet combo boost though
me: And believe me I am not really plowing through them but I'm doing alright so I keep going up a little bit more until suddenly somehow my fucking brain starts to function properly and I says to myself, I says, "Oh, so this must be the hill of skeletons you have to fight your way up before you get to the mark, oh and HEY LOOK THE HUGE RED DOT right up the hill past this fuckin army of undead right
Ok Molly, fuckin you're here, just deal with it"
Daniel: good good
me: And I'm pretty terrified, I'm using a LOT of magick to keep everyone alive and this mark is a magick user and uses fear on my people to drain their magick and holy shit its fucking HUGE its this GIGANTIC GOLEM LIKE THE SIZE OF RABANASTRE
All the while the fuckin skeletons are still comin at me
Daniel: hahaha
me: So I don't know, I kill off about 30 of those skeletons and finally get up to the golem who isn't really moving but hey thanks for casting fear on Penelo and draining my MP
Oh, thanks, there goes Fran
So here I am, with my arsenal of status spells, Blind, Silence, Slow, ok cool slow sticks, Dispel
I don't know how I did it, it took me a good fuckin 20 minutes to kill this thing just because ... ok well if you focus on the golem the skeletons stop coming at you but since Fran is magick using and bow using and in the back she kind of drums up a few of them here and there
So I'm running back and forth trying to save her while more skeletons pop up since I stopped fighting the golem and the golem is casting Blizzaga on me and shit and I'm just like
THIS SHIT IS BANANAS
Makes me wish I had this one Esper Greg was telling me about who's only ability is, well, to cast DEATH on everyone.
So I get up to chain 50 something at least with those skeletons
I kill that Golem.
I feel so fucking good at this point
I go and I kill the mark in the Necrohol, another Golem.
I go back, and I get mad shit as rewards.
So then I head back and visit Montblanc, he's like, man you are so slammin, Vaan, and I'm just like, yeah yeah I gotta go man see ya
Daniel: the only tim vaan will get a compliment.
me: I head out to The Port at Barlthformheim or whatever silly name they gave that pirate town
I talk to Reddas
Plot, plot, plot
I end up at this fucking huge dungeon
Greg says, you're only on the first ascent, or descent, or whatever the fuck they call it
"Don't even bother me"
There are three minibosses already in the first hour I have been in there
They have all gone down with ease
I mean I am slaughtering these guys
But I've got about five more marks I have to kill
An Esper I want to get, and some side quests I want to look into
However, I might just beat some more marks and end the game, and then go back and revisit once I move.
So thats my ffxii story, I can't stop thinking about it, right now all I want to do is go home and play it.

I saw Bonde do Role!

2007-09-17T14:33:00.000-04:00

When I first got back from this show my immediate reaction was to sit down and write a review, but it was so damn late, and I was pretty intoxicated. I figured it wouldn't be a good idea to write it right then. I decided to put it off until the weekend, but that didn't happen either. Now, four days later, I know I don't remember everything awesome about everything I wanted to mention, but there are a few things that I can cover here with confidence.

First off, I went with two of the four ex-roomates, The Vegan and The Pharmacist. Since they are no longer part of a much larger circle of people that I frequently refer to in my life, I can from here on in call them by their real names, Lee and John, respectively.

First thing I should mention about this show was the venue. A small club in the Fishtown area of Philly, two floors, definitely posh, definitely not a place I would be going to if it weren't for the group performing that night. I don't know what other events happen there, but I can say that nothing led me to believe that anything but electronic music was played there in the last ten years. Also, the people there were more or less dressed way nicer than I ever would dress to go out on a Thursday night to see a group perform, and absolutely beautiful. I'm talking like hand picked top of the line Philly 20-30 crowd photo shoot stuff. Even the fat chicks looked good. Not hot, but good.

We got there during the tail end of a little group called GANG playing, consisting of a bass player, a drummer and two female singers who could try a little harder to look better if they're going to be relying on their charm and and looks to sell the crowd on their music. They were a direct rip off of the B-52's, with that kind of mis-matched we make our own outfits but don't look as good as Punky Brewster edge to them. The two girls sang over a taped track written by the two remaining band members, while the drummer plays his riffs while listening to headphones and the bass player stands in place with her back half turned to the crowd looking like some soggy unenergized cross between Kurt Cobain and Janice Tanaka (but less cool).

Regardless of what they looked like, their music was forgettable. The beats/riffs/hooks/bass/whatever wasn't anything remotely funky enough to support the energy of the two singers, who had forgettable voices but kind of nice smiles. They did a pretty gray cover of Rock Lobster (suprise!), and even though we only saw two more songs (three more songs?) after that, the only thing I can still remember from their performance is the choreography of the interactions between the two girls, which was more weird and over-thought-out than entertaining. I'm not sure if they were going for funky or performance art, but if you're going to be doing this kind of thing with this kind of "listening to this in the background at work and not really paying attention" music they really should pick one and run with it.

Seondly a group I can't remember played, and I'm not going to comment on them, because I honestly didn't have any feelings for or against them, but I am going to comment on the group's DJ spinning a 20 minute set of not-quite-main-floor house music before the group went on.
Number 1- What is the deal with that?!
Number 2- Where the fuck is all the vinyl?
Number 3- Just because you can cue some tracks up doesn't mean you deserve to be called a "DJ".

Lastly Bonde do Role came on.

WOO!

They were great. I mean, its pretty hard to screw up a performance when you're in a group like that when 90% of the crowd doesn't even know what you're saying anyway, when your DJ has the shit already cued up on his laptop, and when you look as good as Marina does. However, their energy was over the top, their little stage antics are just incredibly hot and somewhere in my heart it just makes me so happy to see bands from all over the world do well in other countries. It was also a little gold star in my heart to see a group from another country perform, especially one that plays music that I otherwise would not have been exposed to if it weren't for my former roomates. On a final note, they all looked like they were having loads of fun, and everyone in the place was enjoying them on top of that.

When we got back to John's house, somewhere around 3am, Lee ran upstairs and put his stereo on full volume. He then tripped and fell somewhere and put a hole in John's wall.

So that's pretty much what I remember from that night. If you're really interested in reading some technical stuff about Bonde or just a better review of their performance, I'm sure you can google something up. I read a few over the weekend and well, its pretty much the same thing no matter what. Just keep in mind the next time they roll into town, and you're not sure if you should go or not, that Marina is way hotter in person than any picture of her I have ever seen.

The coolest thing on the web that I haven't seen yet.

2007-09-14T14:15:00.001-04:00

Three foods I have written off

2007-08-29T09:08:00.000-04:00

This morning I was feeling a little hungry, and since I was up rather early thanks to The Boyfriend motivating the two of us to wake up early enough for him to get to class on time, I had a few minutes to spare and decided on using them to stop at the 7-11 that is on the Pennsy side of my drive and directly on the way to my employer.

(Regardless of what time I woke up I still would have stopped there; I feel like I should note that. However, I must declare that waking up early enough to get to work before 9 does help me to justify my actions more, and I do not (did not?) feel guilty stopping somewhere when I have so much time to spare.)

I perused the aisles for some grub, and while originally I had intended to get a blueberry muffin for some reason my stomach told me to get a breakfast sandwich instead. I think that had something to do with how many calories I presumed are in a muffin compared to the sandwich, which when looking back doesn't make much of any sense at all considering how greasy and fatty the breakfast sandwich looks, not to mention tastes. I opted for what I THOUGHT was a bacon egg and chee on a croissant, but upon opening the sammich in the car I realized I had not read the entire label, and I mistakenly bought a sausage egg and chee sammich instead. I continued opening my morning grub up, only to be disgusted by the what seemed to be plastic slab of cheddar, soggy-ass bread substitute they were trying to pass as a croissant, paper thin egg-substance, and sausage that looked like it had been shat out of the last person to eat one of these horrendous concoction's ass formed back together in patty shape and placed right back into where it had originally called it's home.

Of course I ate it anyway, I was hungry. I did remove parts of the cheese that had been hardened for what I could only assume was hours of abuse under the warming lamp in the store, I kind of pushed/brushed/picked off the parts of the bread that had been liquefied, and I nibbled at the parts of the sammich that appeared to contain some kind of flavor or solid chew-able ingredients. Of course it tasted horrible, of course I couldn't finish the whole thing, I think I got about 3/4 of what was left after my redecorating and balled up the rest inside the wrapper.

Never again will I buy one of these sandwiches. Not after that. The risk of ever getting a sandwich that is even half less as bad as that is way too high for me to ever spend money on that item again.

So in lieu of that, here are the three basic foods that I have sworn never to eat again:

1. Cup Ramen
Ramen is good. Everyone loves ramen. Heck, I still love ramen. However, the pre-packaged ramen that comes in those environmentally unfriendly containers with the freeze dried "meat" is something that will never pass my lips again. The last two times I had this food I have thrown up within the hour, and this is without having drank any alcohol beverages. Fans of mine may know that I puke a lot after a night of drinking, and my stomach can be set off by a variety of simple things that have to do with the preferred drug of Christians and Jews everywhere, but when food accomplishes making me hurl all by itself I have no other choice but to raise the white flag and call it quits.

2. Mushrooms, sans Portabella
I do not like mushrooms (except portabella)!!! Mom, Dad, get that through your head. For the last 27 years I have been trying every concoction that the two of you make using mushrooms, and I have not liked a single one. Does that tell you something? This isn't one of my five-ten year old phase fits where I just refuse to eat something. I just DON'T like them. I don't like them in my salads, I don't like them with my steak, I don't like them in my chicken. You have seen me try them. You have seen me say "NO I DONT LIKE IT" every time I try it. Please stop asking me to try things with mushrooms in them. When you invite me over to eat please do not cook things with mushrooms in them. I will not like them. I do not like them. Maybe in ten years my palette will change, but until I directly instruct you to use them, please don't waste yours and my time.

3. Squid
One time in Japan my ex boyfriend and I were attempting to eat at a place and something looked good on the menu. I pointed at it and ordered it, thinking it was chicken. Nope. Some kind of squid. I think that at every meal I had in Japan that I attempted to order myself there was squid in it. I don't think I ever really *LIKED* squid, but I never *DISLIKED* it either until I had it by *MISTAKE* so many times. The experiences I had in Tokyo completely ruined that half-assed fish for me, because every time I sit down and look at a squid-meal I am remembered of how horrified, disappointed, starving, and disgusted I was when I accidentally ordered that food.

This post is a bit hasty, yes?

In Retrospect...

2007-08-27T15:55:00.000-04:00

I moved about 90% into my new home, and I am sleeping there now, life has really taken a turn for the better, and I believe I'll fill you in later but for now here is a little thing I had been thinking of all day...

I was reading how my morning went in that post below (or on the next page depending on how many posts have been added since, and I thought I would let you know how my first morning before work went since the move.

I woke up at 6:30 this morning because The Boyfriend had school and wanted to be showered and on time with no rush, so we woke up to some obnoxious rant on NJ 101.5 (forgot to change the station back to the oldies station!) about how the illegal immigrants should be rounded up somewhere in north jersey and then bussed right over to the airport.. it was completely silly and ignorant, but I digress..

We hopped in the shower, and I noticed the little wall hanger convenience for your shower caddy jawn had broken and was hanging on by one suction cup, this thing isn't even 48 hours old yet..

We showered. We got dressed, but made a mess looking through all the clean clothes for one of his t-shirts even though I swear I washed about seven of them over the course of the day. He left for school by quarter after seven, at which time I promptly made myself a bowl of cereal, sat down, watched some Home Movies with commentary for about a half hour, and went to work.

How work went after that is irrelevant - you should already notice how ridiculously laid back and smooth my morning went - regardless of the fact that I was up at 6:30am I had plenty of time to relax in a comfortable surrounding before leaving for the headache that is my workplace.

Sorry for the short, rather uneventful post, but THAT IS THE WHOLE POINT OF IT GET IT!?

Onstead is hella polished

2007-08-07T11:30:00.000-04:00

There is an interview with Chris Onstad of Achewood (achewood.com) fame located here. I haven't read the entire interview yet, but there's a pretty spiffy picture of Chris with Beef and Ray on there.

The reason that I am posting this link is not only because of the interview or what just might be the only known picture of Chris ever taken, but also because of the comments made by the fans of the strip. The fans are hella funny, and you can see how each and every one of them has taken some kind of achewood-ish speak or behavior or attitude out of Chris's strips and into the "real world". The one liners are almost all hilarious, and its apparent how seriously (but comically) fans of the strip take the whole scene.

Dan would probably be a lot better at explaining this to you since he is perpetually connected to the central cortex of the Achewood universe by a series of cable wires that plug into several different kinds of electrical outlets and gas station free air tanks, but word on the street is that he is a flake and generally avoids any and all contact with the world due to his recent accident which led him to only able to communicate through David Byrne (and if you've ever heard THAT guy talk you can only imagine what Byrne's translation of Dan's gibberish sounds like..)

My favorite comment:

Mine.
by Andreabobandrea
You assholes better stop reading my comic.
3:28 PM Mon August 6, 2007

bleed out the flood

2007-07-18T19:36:00.000-04:00

Thinking about my progress over the past few years. It hasn't been by much, but since i took the one crucial step of moving to my grandmothers house, things have (and are) slowly teetering over the fulcrum of my mood into the gravitational pull of what some may consider success. i still, to my best ability, am able to remain individual to the point where iam not depressed becasue i feel liek a sellout, but also to meet the outside worlds standards of what is bearable, even as far as how i look these days. i've lost a few pounds in the past few weeks, too. this haircut seems to look great every single day thanks to this homo-erotic surf hair wax that i put in it before i go to work. and i mean, sometimes i am kicking myself in the ass for spending the majority of that social security money, but the things i did get with it, namely a new TV, my subs in my car, and my iPod, have increased the way i feel a degree that is beyond value. knowing i can go home and play any game i want and it will look great is excellent incentive to want to get up in the morning. as does my dvd collection, no more dealing with garbage on TV and having my favorite show son when i cant watch them. it is inconvenient in that i dont get to se anything new that i may like, but it is better because i dont get caught up in the gaiety of the newest prime time drama about hospitals or new yorkers or polygamy. nearing my 22nd birthday, things finally seem appropriate.

if i keep up this trend i might jus tbe exercising regularly. ive decided to quit delivering pizzas and i would like to go into detail as to why. when ig ot the job, it was excellent. i got paid 25$ a night to clean up at teh end of the night and i got tips for delivering. last summer, that was like 90$ a night on average, considering i only worked fri and sat. in recent weeks, he has been trying to get me to pull my own weight. meaning, not sitting aroudn playing DS ll night and getting 25 bucks for it. this means, to me as an employee, that he is getting me to at least double my output for no increase in pay, and this sumemr so far im lucky if i make 65 dollars on any given weekend. p[lus, it is just getting to me, and i want out. i dont want my car to be abused anymore, so the week i go on a road trip to FL i am also leaving tha pizza delivery behind. also, with leaving this "job" i feel that, symbolically, i am bleeding otu all the blood of irresponsibility and teh attitude of having a different person at work and at home. starbucks, iropnically, has found a way to bring out the mikepasun inside that can be honest with his bosses about everythign and anything, mayeb becuase nowadays i am not involved in as much chaos as i was in previous years.

so what with my snazzy well cared for car, my sexy haircut, my boosted friendship stats all around, my excellent new job, and my upcoming road trip, i think that life couldnt be much better right now. there isnt even a single thing i can think of to be embarassed about. woo!

Five Things I Like, Followed by Five Things I Dislike!

2007-07-03T10:11:00.000-04:00

Here are five things that I like, and why!

1. Cherries! Cherries are red fruits that grow on trees. Although cherries are not very cheap usually, they are very healthy for you. According to wikipedia.com:

"Cherries have been shown to have several health benefits. Cherries contain anthocyanins, which is the red pigment in berries. Cherry anthocyanins have been shown to reduce pain and inflammation[1]. Anthocyanins are also potent antioxidants. Cherries have also been shown to contain high levels of melatonin[2]. Research has shown that people who have heart attacks have low melatonin levels [3]. Besides being an anti-oxidant, melatonin has also been shown to be important for the function of the immune system. Research also indicates that melatonin suppresses COX-2. There is considerable interest at present in the use of fresh cherries or cherry juice to treat gout - a painful inflammatory joint condition. [4]"

That is why I like cherries so much! They are not only extremely healthy for you, but delicious as well!

2. Nintendo DS! The Nintendo DS has two screens, for double the fun! There are not an incredibly large amount of games that I like to play on this system, but because it plays Game Boy Advantage games also I can pack hours of fun into a day with my Nintendo DS. It also has wireless gaming functions which make for an excellent time when one or more of your friends also brings their DS along with them. Most of the time they don't even have to own the same game to allow for a wonderful experience. Also, new games keep coming out for it all the time, so it never loses its flavor! (Plus I decorated my DS with a smart black, white and pink Hello Kitty skin on the inside so it looks sassy and cute!)

3. Comic Books! Comic books are great because not only do they tell you a story, but they also show it to you in pictures! There are many different varieties of comic books also, so even the pickiest of readers should be able to find a comic book that they can enjoy. Two of my favorite comics are Sonic X and The Watchmen. Sometimes they make comic books into movies, but the movies are usually not that good. Other times they make comic books into cartoon shows, and usually those are pretty good. Amazingly enough, sometimes they make cartoon shows into comic books too!

4. iPod! The iPod really isn’t one of the most reliable items on the market these days, but boy howdy is it one of the most convenient to own! I got a 30gig iPod for Christmas from my Mom and Pop, and even though I sometimes misplace it, I haven’t gone more than 24 hours without listening to it. It lets me have one convenient location for my music, and also allows me to play it in my car with the adapter that I bought. I think it is mostly the best because I can take it to a friends house and let them listen to songs I like, and vice versa! Some people have engravings on the back of their iPods, but I don’t.

5. Japanese Candy! The Japanese have the best candy in the whole world! They have kiwi squishy candies that really taste like kiwi and not some random sugar-flavor that most American candy seems to have. Their chocolates are really good too, and there is even a brand called Apollo that is both strawberry and chocolate flavored! They seem to really be into coffee flavored chocolate as well. At the Japanese grocery store all the snacks are in the same aisle, and there is dried fish next to the candy, but I don’t think that the Japanese consider dried fish candy, but rather a tasty between-meal snack, perhaps? Either way, I don’t think I would like to taste dried squid, or herring, or any dried seafood for that matter.

Here are five things I do not like!

1. The Flavor Purple! Purple flavor usually means grape flavored, but I think that grapes are pretty good tasting. There must be some kind of strange grape that is grown in a country far away for very cheap that they use to flavor all things purple, because it does not taste like any kind of grape that I have ever had. It tastes yucky! Well at least to me, because I know a lot of people who DO like the flavor purple. What a weird bunch! Get it? Bunch? Grape? Ha ha!

2. Working past 2pm! I am a web designer at a company working for people that I get along with very well, so I like my job a lot! However, at about 2:00 every day I become extremely lazy and I find it hard to want to continue working on websites when I am constantly thinking about playing video games, or going to the beach, or hanging out with friends! I do not mind coming in at 9:00 in the morning, it is good to get an early start on your day, but no fun at all to waste most of it in doors staring at a computer! If my day was over at 2:00 pm, I believe I would feel better knowing that I contributed to society, made some money, but also got to go play at an arcade from 3:00 – 6:00 before I got too tired in the evening to go out (like I am after work all the time!)

3. Spiders! I hate spiders! I have no problem co-existing with them in a world where all are Mother Nature’s creatures, but I do have a problem when they sneak up on me in my bed at 2:00 am, or when they hang down from their little spider wires and surprise me in the shower when I can’t see them coming because I am not wearing my glasses! They are so creepy looking and feeling! All those eyes! And some of them are hairy! I am not going to talk about them anymore because I am getting a little bugged out! (That was not a joke! Spiders are arachnids, not bugs!!)

4. Nightmares! Sometimes I have good dreams, and I feel good for the rest of the day. However, the exact opposite happens to me when I have a nightmare! It is a sure fire way to ruin my day before it has even began. Sometimes nightmares are scary with demons and hellfire and flying monsters, but sometimes they are also sad. Watching a friend die or having a loved one cheat on you is an example of a sad nightmare that I have had before. Once in awhile I wake up from nightmares crying, and I call my boyfriend to make me feel better. Sometimes he does, sometimes he is sleeping too! I hope he is not having a nightmare!

5. Untied Shoelaces! I do not tie and untie any of my shoes when I take them off and on except for my Converse All-Stars. This keeps my shoelaces from becoming untied on those other shoes. (A few of my shoes don’t even HAVE shoelaces!) However, my Converse All-Stars often come untied, either because the shoelaces are wonky or I am not good at tying shoes. I’d like to think that I am a good shoe-tier, but I have no evidence to use against my shoelaces to support my argument that they are faulty. I wish I didn’t have to tie and untie them all the time, but they are high tops. I can’t get my feet in them without doing it!

Thanks for listening, I hope this inspires you to go find things you like and don’t like too!

Just the facts, ma'am.

2007-07-02T13:59:00.000-04:00

I'm sick of talking about my taste in music, because everyone seems to think I am a dumbass with horrible opinions. Maybe this is true, but the FACT is, music is subjective. And thus, I subject myself to the music I like. I'm not going to discuss it with anyone anymore, at least in the subjective sense. I'm going to review a song that I got yesterday, and I'm going to review it factually only. This can NOT be disputed in any regard.

The song is by Tilly and the Wall, and it's called Brave Day, from their album, "Bottoms of Barrels." The band features three women and two men, all of whom sing at some point. There are guitars and drums, and a lot of vocal harmonies. At one point, the percussion is formed by tap dancing. The song is a little over four minutes, and can be placed in the genre of rock and roll.

Well there, there goes all the fucking fun out of that, hmmmm?

I went camping!

2007-06-26T13:38:00.000-04:00

Last weekend I went camping up in the Adirondacks Mountains with three guys named John, two guys named Ralph, a guy named Jun, and my parents. We spent four days on Raccoon Point on Little Long Pond, having to portage our canoes and items from St. Regis lake through two other lakes to our destination. It was hard work!

Boy did I have a lot of fun! I spent a lot of time on the eight hour trip up there wondering what I was going to do in the woods for four days straight to keep myself entertained. The ironic part is, the days flew by so fast that I wasn't ready to leave! I could have stayed up on that mountain for at least another week living off ramen noodles and other campers passing through the area. We ate very well, having been treated to a Filipino dish of ran-Dang beef (I believe?), some turkey and noodle concoction that Ralph number two and I swear did not taste until the third night (due to interference of everclear memory blockage, and the absolutely divine taste of peanut butter and toasted marsh mellow sandwiches.

The days went by pretty much like this:

Wake up at 830-930.
Have coffee mixed with Frangelica or whiskey.
Go "looking for firewood".
Sit around and play "the game" (will explain in a minute!)
Have lunch.
Play "the game" some more, and begin drinking river water and everclear.
Have dinner.
Become incredibly intoxicated while feeding the fire, roasting marshmellows, and hanging out with my good pals! Also, play "the game".
Sleep around 11-12.

"The game" is something that I was introduced to last year while camping in northern PA in the winter. It started like this:

Flap: You guys. I got this great game.
You guys: OK..
Flap: You say a famous person's name, and the person to your left has to say another famous person with the first name starting with the first initial of the last name of the person you just said. If the person has the same first and last initial, it gets passed to the person on your right. Ready?
You guys: OK..
Flap: Loretta Lynn.
(You guys look around, completely confused as to whose turn it is.)

While "the game" usually picks up the second night of camping and is limited to one round until all parties have either exhausted every name possible and/or have fallen asleep and/or passed out from being drunk, during this camping trip, "the game" was played about four to five times a day, every day, in separate spurts, and mostly while intoxicated, leading to ten minute interludes of two people arguing as to whether or not someone said "Donald Duck" this round. To this day I am still sitting here, sending my friend text messages with "Fredirico Felini" and "Sam Snead", who by the way, if you can tell me who those people are, WITHOUT looking them up, I will award you superstar "the game" player medal honors. Thats the other frustration of this game, playing with people from different generations also leads to the argument of whether or not each generation is making up certain personalities in order to trap the other players in a two man battle of double lettered names. Incredibly frustrating, to say the least.

It was absolutely beautiful up there though, and I certainly felt like a completely different person when I came back - fresh, healthy, rejuvenated, until we pulled up into my parents driveway and noticed the empty box of beer left in the trash by my supposedly ill brother, along with the notice that his driving privileges have been suspended for a situation completely out of his control. But thats a story for a different day.

I give this camping trip 8 out of 10 stars, losing points for the most painful ride in a car ever (8 hours with my parents drinking martinis while driving, WTG), one of the most irritating people I have ever met in my life being present on the trip, the spider webs that blocked my way to a haven of un-tapped firewood resources, and the absence of my brother.

the freedoom of recovery

2007-06-21T10:18:00.000-04:00

the music from the radio that igrew up with was all pretty awful. hearing it now and knowing that i enjoyed it once someTImes maKes me cringe. but having music that you dont fully enjoy Makes you appreciate the good taste you have.

I got this huge ipod sothat when I travel, its like my own porsonal MiKepasun Radio. I haue quite a bit of music on it that i dont necessarilly find enjoyable, but that's what helps me to appreciatewhy and how Much i really LOVE My taste in music.

updated using my DS browser, sucKas

growing up

2007-06-20T22:40:00.000-04:00

So why haven't there ben a million Mario games in the past million years? i was playing new super mario bros. and thinking this to myself. there are a lot of games that are sidescrolling action platformers, but what is it about mario that makes him so friggin popular? it certainly isnt because plumbers are hip. Let's see if i can count the genuine mario games, excluding party games, sports games, and edutainment games. i believe that the New Super MArio Bros is in fact the 5th side scrolling Italian plumber adventure (not counting game boy games). And to my own surprise i find myself being able to state all the differences to each one, even being that i tend to distaste the popularity they have accrued. they were pretty much garbage until 3, and the real gold is mario World on SNES. NEW SMB does not have the ability to fly, but instead you get to rock a blue turtle shell and go crazy with it. The DS was a fine platform for this game because, in my opinion every 3D mario game has been trash, and it also eliminates that annoying 2-player take-turns gameplay that nobody really liked anyway. the only multiplayer allowed is for fierce battling and wacky minigames.

another thing i find interestign about mario is that i cannot remember a time when i did not just know where everything was in a mario game.then when i was about 18 or so i decided to try and get 100% in SMW, not realizin gjust how much of a feat it really was.... there were many hidden levels and paths in that game, and if you wanted to change the season to fall you better have been ready for a fight. the first three mario games were wrote to me in all of my memories regarding them. it dawned on me one day that maybe that was the only reason i even like them: they were easy and i knew them like the back of my hand.

So, in comes new SMB for the DS, i am ripe with skepticism and ready to talk about how terrible mario is in general, and to go on about how much this new title will just fall into a useless category that everyonew ill love for no good reason. and to my pleasure and chagrin i noticed that i really, really... REALLY enjoyed playing it. it is about a hundred thousand times easier (im struggling to keep my lives... at 99) but its got just the right amount of sameness and differentness to be a really remarkable title. and now that i am not blessed with teh ignorance of carelessly running through games, it is STILL tons o fun. i am currently resting on th efinal castle having gotten every single giant gold coin in previous levels. some of them were painstaking, but i wanted to have them all. the gap between mario games has been so great, that in the span between mario world and new smb i have grown out of turning on a game and just playing it from the beginning every time until i remember everything abou thte first twelve levels for the rest of my life. i am running these boards through a fine sifting device and takign all the treasure available to me. from warp cannons to hidden mushroom houses to alternate exits, i am tearin this game about a hundred new assholes, and i am seriously enjoying every minute of it.

so i guess what i am saying, is sorry everyone for bitching about mario sucking.. it was just my way of conveying that i needed a fresh new mario fix that wasnt something i had played a million times over to the point of full memorization. (seriously tho this game is gooood)

-mvp

Pancake Wars

2007-06-17T15:52:00.000-04:00

First of all, happy fathers day to all you dads out there.

I would also like to mention that our hero of this story Danosaur should currently be where I would like to be today - at the free Jonas' Brothers concert in New York. That lucky dogg. Now on to the good stuff.

So there is this town called Mt. Carmel, which is in Coal Mining country PA (about 3 hours away from where I live now). The reason this town is so cool will have to wait for another blog, but their role in this story revolves around a diner in town that serves "Blastin Blueberry Pancakes" for the whopping price of three dollars and fifty cents for a stack.

Before my first visit to this amazing corner of the country my friend Sara (prior to my first visit to the town) had told me about these pancakes, singing their praises like she was a widowed black mother who had lost her son in a gun fight praying to the good lord on sunday morning church in her starkingly large pink hat and matching petticoat. I have to tell you I was so excited for these pancakes that my hairs stood on end. While we were out drinking the night before I had the honor of trying these pancakes all I could think about was these delicious breakfast materials and how good they would taste to me after a long night of drinking 50 cent beers and chugging energy drinks mixed with vodka for five or six hours straight.

I was not let down.

These pancakes, be it because of novelty, price, or the feeling of overwhelming joy you get when you are hungover and food finds its way into your mouth, were the absolute best pancakes I had ever had in my entire life. They were not only cheap, but they were just enough to rid my stomach of that "holy shit I might throw up stomach bile" feeling, and good freakin lord they tasted so god damned delicious. I am telling you that the ratio of pancake to blueberry was absolutley perfect (keep this in mind), and though the pancakes were no different than any other diner food that I had ever tried, the fact that they were, and still were after the second time I indulged on my second trip up there, the best pancakes I had ever tried had resonated in my mind every morning I woke up with an hour to spare for breakfast food.

HOWEVER!

This weekend my friend Holly took Dan and I to breakfast for my birthday. We went to a cozy little place that I had been to once before, a small diner/grocery store on Spring Garden street in Philadelphia. I was struggling with the menu for about five minutes, half hungry for hash browns, half hungry for eggs, when I heard Holly say, "I'm having the banana pancakes". I looked up at her, eyes *trying* to be wide open, and said, "Yes".

These pancakes came to my table completely opposite of what I expected. I was waiting for these thigns to show up just bana flavored, like they had squirt some kind of crazy syrup into the mix to make them banana flavored. No. Completely wrong. These pancakes, and I cannot express in words how suprised I was, showed up SUPER fluffy, bigger in height than any pancake at a diner that I had eaten at. They were super light, but completely cooked, like the chef had some exquisite super power on knowing exactly when they would be awesome. But the best part was that they had banana slices COOKED INTO the pancakes.

I know that sounds like its nothing special. But you have to understand that after a morning of dancing and house music and beer and Wii and expecting just some shitty diner food breakfast, that these pancakes were like getting the red power ring for the first time in the original Zelda game. The ultimate expression of power in pancakes. The. Best. Breakfast. Ever. Now I gotta make this quick cause I have a father's day thing to do....

I immediately thought about the Blastin Blues. How did these pancakes chalk up to that? Well:

1. They were lighter and fluffier
2. They had more flavor to offer: While the blueberries were good, they were way sweet. These bananas weren't overpowering in sweetness, they were just enough to lighten up the taste.
3. I used mad syrup with the blastin blues. These banana pancakes only needed the slightest touch of that. They were already juicy from the banana mush being inbedded in them.
4. They were a dollar more expensive. In my eyes, that was totally worth it.
5. Blastin blues are 3 hours away. Banana-cakes are only 1.

So, in lieu of that, I hereby declare the banana pancakes the new King of Pancakes.

2007-06-15T14:06:00.001-04:00

molly: last night i had this awesome idea for a blog
molly: about turning old
molly: but now i cannot remember anything was going to say
Danny Dreamboat: lol
Danny Dreamboat: cause you're old
molly: :-(
Danny Dreamboat: laughing my ass off
Danny Dreamboat: OH WAIT SHOULD BE POLITE TO THE ELDERLY
Danny Dreamboat: LMBO
molly: man
Danny Dreamboat: owned on ur bday

The band evolves... ALMOST.

2007-06-14T16:30:00.000-04:00

Dan (me!) : i think we should start an avant post-tweegazing hip-hop strum-core sextet.

Aaron : we dont know 4 other people.

Dan-o-saur Comics!

2007-06-14T09:10:00.000-04:00

Dinosaur fan comic by Dan and Molly!

Please don't sue us we're just trying to be funny!

The Human Condition

2007-06-13T17:09:00.000-04:00

The most fun thing in the world is Dungeons and Dragons (or some similar role-playing phenomenon.)

Unfortunately most of us are far too insecure to do such a thing, so we just get jobs and watch television instead.

Invention Corner - Gigglecandy

2007-06-12T21:28:00.000-04:00

I wanted my first post to be really good. I was like, "man, I should start this blog with my friends and then we could pretty much just post whatever, that would be so rad!" I was gonna do it around one this afternoon, but I had to go to the front desk and be receptionist, so I didn't start til' half past two. So I got everything all ready, just all geared up, just happy to have such cool friends who'd be interested in just talking about shit for no reason, and then I just sat there. I just sat there, and couldn't think of one fuckin' thing to write about. I still can't either. I made some soup, and watched some television, and played Lumines, and I've been grinding my gears for a good idea to write about, and still, nothing comes up. All day, since like twelve.

One good thing, though? Gian got some Halo Farm juices. Halo Farm is a local microdairy, and you can just get milk and juices and some grain products there, all cheap, all good, just so delicious, it's nuts. Juice makes me happy; my favorite is grape, but at Halo they don't have grape juice, they have grape drink. I always giggle when I see it, cause what if one time, it turned out to be wine? You know, grape drink? I just think of some little kid coming in and reaching past the Sunny D, and grabbing some grape drink, and being a polite kid, he takes a cup out to his friends, everyone gets to quench their thirst. Then, shit kicks in, just kids drinking wine, not even knowing, being belligerent, breaking toys.

My grandpa pulled that trick on me when I was a kid, man. He'd drink a glass of wine some nights, and one time I asked him for one, and he just gave it to me. You never saw such a cocky little bastard. I even did that weird kid thing, too; my grandpa gave it to me, but I knew it was an Adult thing, so I felt the need to go into the other room and savor it away from watching eyes. I drank it, and it tasted like millions of hells coursing through my body. I spit it out into the trash can, and I came out and gave him the dirtiest look I could fathom, and oh, how he laughed. "I'm glad you drink it yourself, it tastes like crap!" I ran out of the house, like that was some kind of punishment to him. Yeah, I'm totally sure it sucked that the little brat ran out.

Anyway, this all actually does equate to something. I made a cocktail. I poured some grape drink into a half glass of wine, and it's so good. I have a good name for it, too: Gigglecandy. That's what it is, I'm not even kidding. It takes the mild bite of wine away, replacing it with the sweet delicious taste of grape drink, yet the alcohol still takes effect. I had two glasses and I'm already being very very silly, and I've again got that childlike naughtiness going on. You should see how proud I am, walking around, stirring my drink for no reason, chuckling at my own genius, just being a total lame-o. Keep this in mind, boys and girls. If you concentrate very hard, and put your mind to something constructive all day, maybe you can completely bypass your goal and come up with a stupid idea and bless it with a somehow even stupider name. I wrote a blog, didn't I? Thanks internet, thanks Gigglecandy, thanks Halo Farms, thanks Aaron and Chinese food, and thanks Jimi Hendrix, for playing right now and basically being a stone cold ice machine.

Molly's Abode for Real-Life Aquaintances

2007-06-12T15:40:00.000-04:00

There are a lot of shows on television now that I cannot stand to watch, or even stand to think about watching, or even stand to hear people tell me that I should watch. Its not because I dislike television, or dislike drama, or dislike having to wait an entire week in agony wondering what my favorite character's fate in the next episode is. Well that part I could do without. What my issue with most programming on television is these days is the fact that you barely ever can just turn on an episode of any given program at any given time and know not necessarily what exactly is going on but at least who the damn characters are and what they are talking about or be able to pick up a general plot line in five or so minutes without going, shit I can't watch this without watching last week's episode.

What I am trying to say in too many words here is that there are barely any shows on TV anymore that are remotely FUN to just WATCH. You've got your general comedy show here and there starring humans that can fill the void in your heart left open for hilarious television, but that black hole is suddenly ripped open again as soon as the credits roll and the next episode of LOST is practically shoved down your throat so hard when you scream for help your voice comes out sounding something like Denise Russau's voice on that call for help they picked up on their transmitter in the first season.

That said in too many words, the same issue seems to slowly be creeping into cartoon shows. Take shows like Ben 10, or Naruto, or Shaolin Showdown, or (wtf?) Winx Club, and even Pokemon now a days. These might not be the best of examples but you get my point. These shows all have these drawn out obnoxious pretenses that lead to episode after episode of plot and character development that eventually gets so involved that your average "i just got home from school" kid who might have had detention 3/5 days that week cannot be telling the truth when he goes over to his friends house and says "Yeah man I totally know how messed up it was when Jizzon stole the power watch from Dark Lord Roundworm" because the other kid is saying "yeah well if you saw episode 3384 on Monday you would know that The Argonaut totally was Flying Deluth's brother and they saved him from the evil Miss Flotsombottom so when they took the power ring they were really.." etc. What is happening is that these kids are being trained to pretty much marry themselves to the television show and taught that you cannot just watch a show just to watch a show you need to watch the whole SEASON of shows and that no matter HOW the season ends you are going to be disappointed because it is all LEADING UP TO SOME KIND OF DEFINITIVE END.

Because of this Cartoon Network and every other station on TV was beginning to lose my support until I saw Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends. This show is practically everything that I could ever want in a TV show. And its practically the opposite of everything that I just said.

I didn't start liking the show right away. What kind of happened with me and this show is sort of what happens when you kind of start hanging out with a boy, or girl, and you kind of like them cause you know, you've hung out with them a few times and you've had an OK time, but then out of nowhere they invite you on this awesome adventure and well the timing is just right because you've been sitting in your house all day listening to your roommates argue about whether or not the new Killers album is worth even trying to listen to because that first single was just really unattractive, and you've been avoiding them by sitting in your room but its gotten a bit too stuffy in there and you wanted to go outside and do something but its hot and you weren't exactly sure what, but then this boy or girl calls you and they tell you they will come pick you up and they get there JUST in time in this really comfortable car with excellent not too strong on your face air conditioning and when you get in the car that boy or girl is listening to this song you haven't heard for ages and suddenly you don't care about what you two are going to do because you know you will have a great time with that person no matter what and you fall in love.

For a long time I struggled with why I liked the show so much, other than the obvious. Its drawn in a very attractive bright colored Victorian house style, the characters are ALL lovable and are extremely easy to attach yourself to (favorites are not hard to pick with such extremely defined personality types) and well, its funny. But I knew there was something more there than the fact that I enjoyed comparing Bloo's antics and inability to take the blame for any kind of situation to my boyfriend's identical "problem" and how much Wilt reminded me of this site's wonderful creator, Dan. It was upon reading some posts on this Foster's blog that seems to have been since abandoned that made me realize that I like this show because I can just sit down and watch it, and have a wonderful experience, and be done. There is no OH MAN I WONDER IF MAC IS COMING BACK NEXT WEEK, there is no THEY NEVER RESOLVED MR HERRIMANS CARROT ADDICTION, you get the point. When the episode is over, it is over, and I am reassured without fail that next week the same characters are going to be there getting into another crazy situation without having to worry if one of them will be whacked by the end of season 2. I'm not even thinking about season 2. Well I am because the DVD should be coming out sooner than September 11th, but again, you follow me here.

I have to get back to work but real quick - I know a lot of you might have been thinking I am wrong about the first part of this post - that there are plenty of shows out there like that, but give me one that is actually GOOD - BESIDES Lucky Louie and DAMN that show got canceled! Disney shows do not count here because even though I love them WE ALL KNOW THEY SUCK when it comes down to it and it takes some kind of fucked up tween to really appreciate those shows. Lastly, I refuse to count toddler-oriented shows such as The Doodlebops (sucky) and BoohBah (awesome). Cartoons Spongebob (overrated) and Ed, Edd, and Eddy do not count either because they have both been on the air for so long that they are either completely overdone, or everyone has been exposed to the show through some over-saturated marketing campaign. Something, again, which Foster's has avoided.

gotta juice -

The thing with music

2007-06-12T15:32:00.000-04:00

The thing with music is that it's really exciting when you find a new band you like. The first time you hear a song by a new band you might decide that you kind of like it. The second you are starting to learn the song and have probably made a final decision. But the third through about ninth time you hear that wonderful new song will be among the best moments of your life, and when it is over you will want to start it over again. (And if no one is around, and you've disabled Last.fm, you just might!)

But beware! After eight or nine listens in the first week, the song may begin to lose its luster, and you may end up getting disappointed in modern music, and after finding out that this wonderful new band has now been declared "Band of the Millenium" by Pitchfork media, you may just end up sulking and listening to Belle and Sebastian for the next two months.