Ultranormal

Author: Kevin Lawver

  • If I Were Rich…

    If I were rich, I’d get one of these for the office, one of these for upstairs to go along with my work provided Powerbook and abandon the PC World forever.

    While I’m dreaming, I’d have 1.5mb/sec DSL, a wireless network and everything would have Airport cards so there aren’t wires strung all over the place. And because it’s OS X, everything would just work. I wouldn’t have to worry about Microsoft anymore, or the weirdness that is Windows XP. I might miss my games, but I have a PS2 now, and I don’t play games on my PC much anymore anyway.

    It’s a nice dream, isn’t it? It’s a $6600 dream, but still nice (I actually thought it would be a lot more than that)

  • Sacharin Home Alabama

    So, I took Jen to see Sweet Home Alabama last night. Oh my, what a crap movie. I’ll start with the two good things about the movie, and then go into the myriad sins it commits. There were three highlights: Candace Bergen, Ethan Embry and Fred Ward, all underused, but they managed to stand out like shiny bits of corn in this turd of a movie.

    Ethan Embry played a closetted redneck, and did a decent job playing it evenly and without queening out. It was well done and subtle. Fred Ward was funny and showed why he should get more work than he does. Ms. Bergen was caustic and had some good lines as the mayor of New York, but she ends the movie being completely humiliated, and kind of ruins her character, through no fault of her own.

    Now, on to the crap. This movie was equal to the horrible Serendipity in pure shmaltz and predictability. It was horrible. It’s an unspeakable abuse of the sacred romantic comedy formula. In a better movie, there would have been a twist or two, and something that sets it apart. This movie gave me nothing, nothing at all. There was no chemistry between Reese Witherspoon and her not-yet-divorced ex. There was no real drama either. Almost everyone involved slept through the movie, and nothing rises above the level of Lifetime Movie of the Week (alternate title, “Mother, May I Marry a Yankee?”).

    If you’re stupid, you’ll like this movie. If you have an IQ higher than 70, and have ever seen any other romantic comedy (both of which are used for this movie as aspiration and hyperbole, not as an indication of the actual content of the film), skip it and go rent When Harry Met Sally, Prelude to a Kiss or even Sleepless in Seattle.

  • Head of the Class

    I love that I’m ahead of the curve on something. I used to use definition lists because they were easy to style (back in the wild days before CSS was widely supported). Now, unordered and ordered lists are easy to style. My favorite is to use margin-left:-15px to keep those bullets lined up with that that horrendous whitespace to the left of list items.

    Yeah, I’m the ListGeek, bow before my orderly data!

  • My Name Is

    My name is Kevin, and I’m rockin’ the suburbs. That is all.

  • Photography is Yummy

    Through k10k, I found this lovely photography site. There are some amazing photos in the portfolio (like this one). A great use of Flash as well… pretty without being unusable or superfluous.

    mario_lalich.jpg

    I’ve got a lot to get done today, on top of getting my car fix (which I’ll tell you all about later). I’ll hopefully be back later today to tell you all about Lamb, the trouble with my car, and other deep Friday thoughts.

  • I’m Huh?

    According to one of the Ops guys at work, I’m Da MAAAAN. I’m not sure what I should do to cement my status as DA MAAAAAN, but I’m open to suggestions.

  • The Folds of Thieving Acid House Hillbilly Jams

    So, the big order from Amazon showed up yesterday with Jen’s Gift Pack and my CD’s. I got Jen the new remastered Grease DVD, the soundtrack, the Grease II soundtrack, Carole King’s remastered Tapestry and A3’s Exile on Coldharbor Lane because she loves the Sopranos theme song, but I don’t like the rest of the songs on the soundtrack. I’ve been listening to the album this morning, and it’s right up my alley. It’s a weird combination of styles, but I love it. Take a little bit of Robbie Robertson’s self-titled solo album, Leonard Cohen, Acid Jazz, rap, a little early Moby beat, and rockabilly. It’s crazy, and there’s some foul language (that’s for you, Heather), but it’s so much fun, I can’t stop listening to it.

    I also ordered Ben Folds’ Rockin’ the Suburbs, Thievery Corporation’s DJ Kicks and Lamb’s self-titled debut. I somehow forgot to rip Lamb, so it’s still at home and I haven’t listened to it yet. I also haven’t finished DJ Kicks, but I’ve heard almost all of those songs at some point on other compilations or from friends, so I’m pretty secure in saying that I’ll love it.

    Rockin’ the Suburbs is Ben Folds’ funniest album yet. All the other albums have funny lines and some songs that amuse and delight, but this one is far and away the funniest. The title track is great, but it doesn’t end there. On top of being funny, there isn’t a dud on the album. All the songs are tight, catchy and well-crafted. Not once did I skip a track just to get to the next song, or think a song was self-indulgent. It’s a great album.

  • I Have The Power!!!

    It’s sick and wrong, I know. I can’t tell you how disgusted I am by the whole thing. When I first saw it, I knew the end was near. What am I talking about? You don’t know? Oh, you’re gonna crap yourself. They’ve made a new He-Man and the Masters of the Universe!! It’s wrong in so many ways. Back in the Eighties, before you were born, there was a cartoon. There was even a movie. There were action figures with nipples, and a green tiger with fuzz on him. It was horrible.

    Now, He-Man’s a little leaner and has better hair, but it’s still the same old thing. You’d think people could do something cool like bring back the Shmoo’s. But no, it has to be muscle-bound platitude man, his green tiger and Skeletor. I blame professional wrestling.

    Did you know that they keep making new Transformers cartoons too? This is what I get for my intermittent insomnia. If only I could plan my sleepless nights for times when Cartoon Network actually has good stuff on, like Saturday and Sunday. If you haven’t watched them yet, check out Mission Hill, Harvey Birdman and Sealab 2021. They’re all brilliant.

    I’m gonna go drown in a vat of caffeine now and try to wake up.

  • Go Get Some Chen!

    Mary Chen is back! She used to work here at AOL, and she’s dang funny. It looks like she’ll be posting regular, so you can start keeping up with daily Chen goodness… and until then, you can go catch up.

  • Argh, Me Booties!

    In honor me being four days late for Speak Like a Pirate Day, my pirate name is Mad Dog Rackham, and I love it.