blog archive

Rant and Rave

blog archive

09/30/03 - Spook times a'comin.....

Yeah, yeah....I know. I've been neglecting the blog again. I hope my lack of blog entries isn't a reflection of how I'm doing as a husband/father because if that's the case then I'm a pretty bad one. I think I've mentioned how I'm under new management at work and this new boss is keeping us busy. Plus I've been watching the first two seasons of CSI. I've been renting them with my still awesome Netflix account. I mean it, it's the best $21.95 a month I spend. Screw Ballbusters and Hollyweird Video, Netflix is the only way to fly.

My favorite holiday of the year is coming up again, Halloween. Last year I did a pretty pathetic Superman costume. I wore a Superman T-shirt with a red cape and khaki shorts. Casual Superman. This year I'm going to really dress up since it's DJ's first Halloween. I was going to have to work Halloween night but I finagled my way out of it.

Have a nice week everyone.

09/11/03 - We remember, but did we forget?

I specifically didn't watch TV today so I wouldn't have to get angry at all the schamaltzy, over done tv specials on the 9/11 tragedy. I think most of the phoney emotional crap that CNN and the big three networks run insults the dead more than honors them. " Let's watch the planes fly into the buildings again but first this word from Alpo dog chow! Let's watch a sooty fireman cry then later JLo and Ben remember where they were when the towers fell." Yeah, ok.

Did anyone notice the new F1-50 ads during Monday Night Football? It's a huge and gas guzzling not to mention polluting monster. I'm really glad that the automobile corporations are pulling together to stop our dependancy on foreign oil so we can stop funding the terrorists. You'd think four planes being hijacked and slammed into buildings and fields with thousands of lives lost would finally make Americans stop and realize that we need to drive smaller cars and curb the stranglehold that OPEC has on us. The media, despite itself has shown that the oil rich Saudis donate funds to organizations attached to terrorism. This isn't speculation, this is a FACT.

Anyway, today really makes me think about sh*t like this. Sorry to vent on the anniversary of something so, so horrible but it does make me mad.

Go hug someone you love and tell them how special they are to you.

09/05/03 - Henri's Overrated

I'm at work on a rare Friday. I'm covering for a vacationing co-worker. I'm also riding out tropical storm "Henri". If you go outside, it's kind of gloomy and windy out but it's not even raining. If you turn the tv news you'd think we're in the middle of a nuclear holocaust.

I had a nice Labor Day. My folks came over as well as my wife's mom, sister and her husband. My mother in law bought the kids a little wading pool. Both Boo and DJ really dug it. They both got worn out playing for hours. We put the pool on the new paved area in the screened porch. Now we don't have to worry about the water getting buggy and the kids getting bit by mosquitoes. Now Boo begs constantly about getting to go out to play in her pool.

08/28/03 - Watch the Skies!

I've been going outside at work almost every night to take a look at Mars. It's an amazing sight. Hopefully I'll be able to pull out the telescope tomorrow see how much better it looks through that.

Boo is back from Disney. She got back yesterday afternoon. She had a really good time and is in one piece. She was supposed to go to pre-school this morning but my wife told me that Boo didn't get to sleep until almost midnight. According to my sister in law Boo napped from Orlando to Tampa so she was nice and jazzed up for the rest of the night. My wife called me a little while ago and said Boo went to dance class and had a good time but my son is miserable right now because he's getting some more teeth in, poor kid.

My wife surprised me by purchasing the new Animal House dvd. She knew I wanted it so it was a nice gift. I watched it last night at work and I love how it holds up so well after all these years, 25 to be exact. I kind of got a little bummed out because every time I watch Animal House it makes me sad that a comic genius like John Belushi had to waste his life with drugs and leave the world a little sadder because of it. The film is remastered very well with a nice picture and great audio, at $15 it's a nice buy.

The closet in our master bedroom came together nicely. After the handyman was done with the walls my step-father and I finished the painting and hung the rods. We still need to put up some shelves but that's not a priority.

On Friday my honey and I took in Priates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. All I can say is, "Wow!" Depp is our generation's best actor, bar none. I can truly say his body of work will be studied and revered for the next hundred years or more. If you don't believe me check this movie out and see what he does with a simple role of a pirate captain. It's Oscar-worthy.

Have a nice weekend and try to check out Mars some night.

08/14/03 - There's a Storm a'Brewin'

Tomorrow we're supposed to have a closet put in our master bedroom. That's all fine and dandy because my wife and I have closet space issue in our home. We've been looking forward to this improvement for a long time.The problem is we have a tropical storm that's supposed to hit us the same day as the closet is supposed to be installed. The storm isn't going to be bad but I don't want a handyman dragging mud through my house or forced to saw wood indoors.

Since Boo is going to Disney in two weeks on the weekend she usually goes to her dad's she's going to her father's house this weekend. I'm really going to miss her but there really isn't anything I can do about it. The only time I can spend any real time with her is on the weekends and she's going to be away two weekends in a row. At least no one can take DJ away from me.

Geez, I didn't want to end this on such a downer. I guess to make this a more "glass half full" situation, it'll be nice to have some time alone with my boy. Plus with DJ hitting the hay around 8'ish my honey and I can usually catch a dvd and knock some boots. (hee, hee)

I have tomorrow off so have a nice weekend everyone.

08/07/03 - Tooth Time

Well things have been hopping at Casa de Cinemax. Little DJ is getting yet another tooth to make it a total of four. He'll be nine months soon. He's growing up so fast. The boy's quite a character, too. He's so funny. I can tell my genetics are in there somewhere.

Boo's going to be going to Disney again at the end of the month. I think she's going to have gone there more than I have in my whole life. She should have a blast.

07/31/03 - You Wouldn't Like Me When I'm Angry....

Well,my love affair with the portable dvd player is over now. The damn thing scratched up TWO of my dvds. My copies of T2 and Die Hard are fubar'ed with scratches that make the discs skip and stop. AAAARRRRRgh! If I could turn into the hulk now I would......

oh no.....rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAA DAVE MAD!!!!!! CRUSH BAD DVD PLAYER!!!!!! (insert sounds of breaking things here) ROOOOOOOAAAARrrrrrrrr!!!!

Pant! Pant! Whew.....I feel better now. Although now I need a new shirt and my jeans have become frayed capri pants now. I went to Wal-Mart where my mother had gotten it for me and the only thing they had to give me as an exchange was a demo. I took that into work to check it out and the screen is all blurry from being a demo for so long. So I guess tomorrow I'm switching that out at another Wal-Mart, hopefully.

Have a nice weekend everyone.

07/29/03 - Crawling Terror

I watched a cool documentary called The Directors: Terry Gillam. He's one of my favorite directors.He's responsible for Brazil, Time Bandits, 12 Monkeys and many others. But let's not forget Monty Python and the Search for the Holy Grail, one of the funniest films ever made. It was really enlightening and gave me new insight into this creative and very funny guy.

We're going to have a handyman put in a closet in our master bedroom. This is the same guy that installed the AC in our bedroom. he's given us a two day turnaround to put in the closet so I hope it works out that way. Especially after the fiasco over the AC.

DJ is a all-star crawller now. My wife and I are going to have to bust out the Lowes card soon for the child-proofing tools to install around the house. He chases the cat, us his sister all through the house now. If you turn your back for a second he's trying to put a cd or dvd in his mouth. The boy is really growing up.

Have a nice week everyone.

07/17/03 - Banner Vs. Aunold

This past Sunday I treated myself to a movie double feature. A little after noon I saw Hulk. Despite the bozo who brought his loudmouth son to a older child/adult film I had a good time and enjoyed the film. I was impressed with the effects. I had heard they were bad on a lot of internet sites and was glad to see otherwise. The story was good as well. As I stated earlier this isn't a "kiddie" flick. The film is really story and not effects driven. The film has great performances throughout and the great effects are just icing on a nice movie cake. Any beef I do have with the film would be that the ending doesn't mesh well with the rest of the film and is a little on the dumb side. As long as you overlook that, no complaints. True fans of the genre aren't going to be dissapointed.

Later that day I took in T3: Rise of the Machines. I'm glad to say I was two for two good movie-wise. Let me just say it's not T2. Don't go to this film expecting something of James Cameron's calibur. It does bookend the series and lets Aunold be Da Terminator. The TX is an OK entry into the Terminator universe. She doesn't have the scare/dread factor that the T-1000 did in T2 or even Aunold in the original. It might be because she's so damn hot. I'd let her terminate me anyday.

I'd like to give a shout-out to my mother-in-law for letting me get away from DJ for a day and bask in the glow of a movie screen for a afternoon. It was really cool of her to do that.

07/09/03 - Finding an Awesome Flick....

Ok, Let me get this out of the way right now. Go see Finding Nemo. Please, you won't be dissapointed. I haven't felt this way about a Pixar film since the original Toy Story. I was lucky enough to see it at a Digital Projection theater so the visuals were just breathtaking. The film takes place in the Great Barrier Reef so the underwater sequences were stunning. The film is very cleaver and humorous as well, both for adults and kids. I laughed my butt off through most of it. I don't want to make this a movie review entry so I'm just going to say I loved it and I reccomend this film for kids and kids at heart.

My honey didn't feel good last Friday so I didn't get a chance to see Hulk so I'm going to try to see it on Sunday. Keep your fingers crossed for me. I might try to push my luckand see if I can get my mom-in-law to let me make it a double feature and see Terminator 3, too.

Boo had a great time at Disney with her Auntie. I think my sister-in-law has a better understanding of how hard it is to raise kids after taking care of Boo for four days. I asked her if she wanted to try to take Boo AND little DJ to Disney next year but she just laughed.

I think in November or December my wife and I are going to try to take Boo to Islands of Adventure. Boo has so many toys and stuff so we're going to suggest to relatives to help pay for the trip rather than buy her another Barbie she doesn't need.

Have a nice week everyone!

07/03/02 - Movie Nights and Absentee Kids

Well, my daughter is off to the magical world of Disney. She's going to be there for 4 days with my sister-in-law. My wife and I miss her but you can't help but be a little relieved that we only have to take care of one rug rat for a couple of days. My wife and I are going to take advantage of this situation by going out for dinner and taking in a movie on Friday and Saturday nights. We're going to try and see Finding Nemo and Hulk.

Today I'm working 12:00 pm to 10:30 pm to cover for a friend. My honey is going to hang out with some friends so when I get home my mother-in-law should have the boy in bed already. I rented Fraility so I'll be checking that out tonight. It's just going to be a movie heavy weekend for me. You won't hear me complaining about that.

Have a nice 4^th!!!!

07/01/03 - The Window Box AC Blues

I've been really busy lately and haven't been able to update as much as I'd like to. I'm really sorry and hope I've haven't lost too many readers. I was on vacation and I also got a new distraction as well. My mom helped me get a portable dvd player for Father's Day and I've been in love ever since. Now I've been using my dead time at work to catch up on some movies I've been meaning to watch.

My vacation was bitter-sweet. I liked having the time off but I spent it getting a air conditioner installed in my master bedroom. It was a job that was supposed to only take one day but to make a long story short it ended up taking three days.

Well, I'm back now and I'll be making a better effort to update.

Have a nice week everyone.

06/10/03 - Da Dum.....Da Dum......Dum,Dum,Dum,Dum,Dum....

Only a few more days and I'll be on vacation. On next Tuesday I'm going to set up our tent in the backyard and surprise Boo when she gets home from Pre-school. I'm going to see if she wants to "camp out" in the backyard. I don't expect we'll be oput there very long but it should be fun anyway.

I just read The Jaws Log by Carl Gottlieb who was one of the writers for the script and also acted in the film. The book does a great job going over the making of the 1975 film directed by Steven Spielberg. From problems with the mechanical shark Bruce, to legal hassles with filming in Martha's Vineyard the book covers it all. It was a great read.

Of course after reading how the film got made I had to take in a viewing of my DVD copy of Jaws. I'll be the first one to admit that with viewing the film in the age of cutting edge CGI effects that the fake shark looks......well, really, really fake. That aside, it's still a awesome film worthy of all the accolades it's recieved over the years. I was surprised that it still made me jump in some parts. Plus it renewed my love affair with the late great Robert Shaw. His portrayal of Captain Quint is simply magic. Give Jaws a viewing and you'll agree.

Boo had a great time at Largo Central Park on Sunday. We rode the trains and then played on the play ground. DJ and my wife's mom went as well. Fun was had by all.

I'm covering a co-worker's overnight shift on Friday. It's been awhile but I like the quietness of the shift once in a blue moon. Overnights on the weekend it's just you and the room, there's not a lot of work so you can just goof off most of the night. Sweet. The shift differential doesn't hurt either.

Have a nice week everyone.

06/03/03 - Engine No. 9

The AC has been installed. It's nice to have cool air blowing through the house but the freakin' thing is so powerful it sounds like a jet taxiing around the living room. DJ has had a little case of Montuzuma's Revenge. He's had the runs for a little over a week now so the wife and I took him to the doctor's so they could give him a once over. The doctor said it was a intestinal bug, just getting used to a regular dose of baby food everyday or something and just it'll run it's course.

The whole brood went to my dad's on Friday. We had a great time in his pool. It was too cold for DJ and the wife so they just watched me and Boo splash each other. Boo ended up staying in the pool for over six hours. She loves the water, that's for sure. She's my little pink prune.

In a little over two weeks I'll be on vacation. Whoo hoo! We're not going anywhere so I decided to pull out one of our tents and set it up in the backyard so Boo and I can have a camp out. The weather is getting a little warm but I think she'll like the novelity of it.

This Sunday my mom's folks are coming into town from Crystal River to see David and Morgan. I assume they want to see me as well but ever since I've gotten kids my wife and I seem to blend into the background as far as relatives are concerned. The wife has to work but I'm going to take the kids with my folks and grandparents to Largo Central Park and ride the scale model trains. This park has installed scale model train tracks throughout the park and the first weekend every month lets kids and adults ride these scale trains free in the park. The trains are really neat because they're real oil burning locomotives. They puff and sputter and poof out real steam and smoke. The kids and adults straddle train cars with seats in the back and every train has a engineer that controls the locomotive in the front. We had so much fun when we did it last year. I want to try to go more often.

Have a nice week everyone!

05/26/03 - A Sweaty Day is A'Comin

I hope everyone had a nice Memorial Day. even though I'm stuck at work I still took a moment to remember all those men and women who gave their lives so we can live free. Although in this day and age "free" doesn't mean all that much anymore. Still I consider myself lucky to be born in and have automatic citizenship in the United States. Soon we'll be celebrating our freedom by blowing our fingers off with Chinese made fireworks on the Fourth of July. I sure can't wait!

I saw The Matrix Reloaded last night. It was pretty good. It was certainly dumb in some spots and dragged in some areas but all in all a good flick. I had some problems with Neo flying all over the frickin' place like he was some cross between The Flying Nun and Superman. Plus a lot of the Morpheus speeches seemed to really drag the film down to a almost screeching halt. Some of the fight scenes will blow your mind and the chase on the LA freeway was in-f*cking-credible. It's a good popcorn movie but it won't change your life.

Tomorrow we get the new AC unit put in. Boo will be at school and the wife is going to take the boy to her mom's house. I will be taking the day off from work so I can sweat it out with Jeff the AC guy. Fun for me, I just hope Jeff doesn't mind me in a tank top.

Have a nice week everyone!

05/22/03 - A Matrix Memorial Day

Just when you think you've got all of your ducks in a row and you're finally going to get ahead money-wise, life decides it's going to f*ck you up the bum once again.

I guess what I'm trying to say is my home AC unit has taken a sh*t and I'm shelling out almost 2 G's to have a new one put in. We had a AC repair man come over to flush the tubing ( and now I can poop right again! ha!) but as he was about to start he pointed out that the coils on the unit had many freon leaks, the motor was wobbling bad and our drainage pan was rusting out. I was waiting for him to tell me that I had testicular cancer and that he has just raped my mother as well becuase it would of been the cherry on my sundae for that day. So all of the repairs are going to be done this Tuesday and I get to be the one who gets to melt in a AC'less house while our buddy Jeff installs the new AC guts. Let's all hope he gets it right the first time.

Sunday I hope to go see the new Matrix: Reloaded flick with some guys from work. I keep hearing mixed reviews of it so I guess it's going to be one of those love it or hate it movies. The first one was a little like that, too.

Have a nice weekend and a great memorial day everyone!

05/20/03 - X Men With Sleeping Problems

Another weekend over and another week is now starting. I had a pretty nice weekend. It was mostly spent taking care of the boy and watching movies. I got to watch Insomnia with Pacino and Williams. I really liked it. It had an almost noirish feel to it. I highly recommend it. If you've got HBO look for it, that's how I caught it.

As I said in a previous entry I saw X2: X Men United last week. Even if you have just a passing fancy for super hero flicks, go see this now. It was great. I'll admit I'm a little partial due to the fact I liked the first one as well. I dragged my wife to the film and even she enjoyed it. That was surprising to me because she never likes these type of action films. the film contained lots o' Wolverine and that was fine with me. It also teased you with many, many minor characters from the Marvel universe but wouldn't elaborate on any of them due to the plot whizzing at a break-neck speed. But thankfully there's going to be one more film in a few years and maybe they'll give us a little more development when that hits.

Have a nice week everyone.

05/14/03 - Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?

It's Wednesday and I'm at work. Blah! There was a company meeting today and our CEO told us that there may be some lay offs in the future if the economy doesn't pick up. I'm not really all that worried about my postion. Our company has a lot of dead weight that makes a hell of a lot more money than I do. If they're looking to trim some fat my department doesn't have many good targets, we're the lowest paid in our IT division. Still it's kind of sad, Baby Bush is doing a great job as we spiral deeper into a depression.

I'm taking the week of June 16th off. DJ has a doctor's appointment on that Tuesday and I decided to take the whole week off. I might try to take a ride up to my buddy Dragon's house that week as well.

Speaking of Dragon, him, his lovely wife and their baby girl will be visiting our little neck of the woods this Sunday. My cousin Shea is supposed to come with her baby boy as well. When you add DJ into the mix it's going to be baby central at our house.

Tomorrow I'll give you my take on my viewing of X2: X-Men United.

05/07/03 - Happy pre-Mother's Day to all the Sexy Mamas!

My wife's grandmother passed away on Sunday. I've never met her but I felt sad for my wife and my mother-in-law. Her grandmother has been in a nursing home for sometime now and my wife's grandfather just passed away two months ago so it was only a matter of time now. I hope my wife's mom is going to be ok. I can't imagine having both of my parents leaving me like that. It'd be tough to say the least.

My wife, the kids, her sister, my brother-in-law and I are going to take her mom to the beach on Friday. Even though I live in Florida I'm not a beach person. I live here for the weather and the reptiles. The beach is kind of pointless as far as I 'm concerned. It's rrrreeeeeaaally hot, really sandy, really buggy and really touristy. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the ocean. I like to snorkel and as soon as I win the lottery I'm going learn to scuba. But going to beach and enjoying the ocean aren't the same. My kids will be there so it won't be too bad.

Sunday were going to my mom's condo for a little swimming in the pool and some Mother's Day grub. It should be fun. My wife only has to work on Monday so she'll be home Saturday and Sunday, yipee! Sunday I'm letting her sleep in a little since it's her day.

05/01/03 - The Princess and the Transvestite

Aaaaahhhhh.... Thursday at last. Tommorow Boo and I are going to "Disney's Princesses on Ice" in Tampa. She should have a blast. My wife is going to stay home with the boy and have some quality time with him. Boo is going to wear her Belle costume from Beauty and the Beast. I may wear a shirt and tie to compliment her outfit. I'm still not sure yet as this was a suggestion by my wife and mom-in-law.

I saw a excellent film last week, Hedwig and the Angry Inch. It came out in 2001 and a lot of hubbub was made about it. I never got to see it at the theater because it was an "art" film and that meant driving way out of my way to go to a cramped movie house in St. Pete Beach. I rented it through my Netflix membership and now regret not seeing it on the big screen.

The film is about a tranvestite and his/her band as they play at bad resturants in the U.S. The film passes back and forth to tell the story of how Hedwig became the way he/she is. It's funny, sad and amazing. The film has a whole rock opera thing going on in it and those pieces are great. I found myself really rocking out to the musical numbers. It was easy for me as I'm a big David Bowie fan and many of the songs have a real glam rock sensability. To give a better description I'd have to say it has equal parts Moulin Rouge and Rocky Horror but it also has originality all it's own.

A word of warning though. If you have any issues with "gay" stuff you might want to pass this by, although you're missing a great film. I only mention this because I tried to reccomend this to some of the more macho guys at work and as soon as I said "transvestite" I got some sour faces. Anyway, use your own judgement.

Have a nice weekend everyone.

04/23/03 - When in Florida be sure to visit....

The week is half over. Finally. I'm feeling wiped out but I'll be glad later this morning when I can see Boo again. I haven't seen her since Easter Sunday. Hopefully this Sunday my mom or my wife's mom will watch DJ so we can have a daddy/daughter day. I never see Boo very much during the week so these Sunday's are important to me and her.

The Sunday before Easter Boo and I explored Sunken Gardens in St. Pete. She and I had a good time walking all the trails and looking at the animals they had on display. I love watching her react to new things. She really liked going through the butterfly garden that they had set up there. The garden was enclosed in a screened porch so when we went inside they butterflies flew all over us and landed on our clothes and hair. Boo freaked out a little because she's never been a big fan of insects. I'm trying to get her to be more tolerant of nature but I got her mom, aunt and various grandmothers working against me.

When she gets older I want to take her camping. I miss sleeping in the woods and cooking over a fire. I want my kids to learn to love doing that. In a couple of weeks I'm going to set the tent up in the back yard and Boo and I are going to pretend to camp. I think she'll love it.

04/21/03 - Stuffed Bunnies and Eggs

I hope everyone had a nice Easter or if you don't celebrate that particular Christian/Pagan holiday then I hope you had a nice Sunday. Personally I just like the candy. I love Cadbury Cream Eggs but I'm a diabetic and Easter is my worst nightmare. Mmmmmm....chocolate.

You'd think it was Christmas time for Boo. She got at least 3 Easter baskets and she also got to hunt for more eggs Sunday morning. Our house is now filled with stuffed bunnies. DJ got some stuff too but nowhere near the magnitude of his sister's loot.

We did get Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets from my wife's mom. I've never seen it but I really enjoyed the first Harry Potter flick so I should like this one. We also got Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory but it's the pan & scan version and the film is so visually stunning that I think widescreen is the only way to see it. Have a nice week everyone.

04/08/03 - McAmerica the Beautiful

Today I'd like to use my blog as a soapbox. I know you're saying,"Huh? Dave never belts out his opinions on his blog." Anyway, I'll continue.
I HATE big business. My momma always said you shouldn't hate anything but them damn Yankees due to the War of Northern Aggression. (That's the "Civil War" to you ugly Yankees.) I think most major corporations in this day and age don't the plight of the average man in their best interest and basically only see us as cattle. They dig our country deeper, deeper in debt by crying bankruptcy while at the same time giving CEO's huge pensions all the while sobbing over how the economy is making them tightening their belts. Most of these CEO's have no conception on how the other half live. They're not in tune with how most Americans get along. Do you think when Lowe's or Wal-Mart slide into a small town they have any care at all on what's going to happen to the other small businesses are going to fare because the "little guy" can't compete with the slashed prices of the corporate conglomerate mega-store?
Nope. Most people in those small towns will only visit the little mom & pop later when it has it's Going Out of Business sale.
I used to love to go to the small locally owned video stores because the library of videos there would usually have little tidbits of selections that would reflect the owner's taste in movies. I would be kind of proud to rent from a store that wasn't owned by some octopus arm of some self-serving media empire. When I check out a film from the Joe Blow Video Store I was helping a guy live out a personal and a part of the American dream. My dollars were making this guy his own boss. He didn't have to answer to some regional office; he didn't have to push the new Julia Roberts flick if he didn't want to. This was his store and he rented out what he wanted.
Well the mom and pop operations that used to be so abundant are dying out. The Joe Blow Video Stores are being snuffed out by Blockbuster and Hollywood Video. The local Hardware store? Sorry, you'll have to go to Lowe's or Home Depot. The local diner for a plain hot cup of joe? Pardon me, you'll have to get a Hazelnut Frappe' Grande from Starbucks. Slowly all the signs saying "Bill's Diner" or "Thompson's Hardware" you see on the streets are morphing into the logos of orange and navy blue that were designed by some think tank of some Manhattan advertising firm.
Hey, I'm a turncoat. I've got both a Blockbuster and a Hollywood Video card. I'm a regular shopper at Lowes and I've been known to enjoy an iced coffee or two at the smooth jazz speakered Starbucks. What choice do I have anymore? Everyone else is gone. What are you supposed to do when the only choice you have is one? But that's what Corporate America wants. When you don't have any other competition most people will give in to the only choice available. Gee, a country where the people aren't allowed to have choices and have to answer to an all-powerful ruling class and they don't have any way to vent their frustrations to the overlords? Wow, I thought communism was dead. It just turns out that it got a better PR firm.
Don't get me wrong. I love America. I don't begrudge anyone's right to make a buck or a million bucks. There are better ways to do it though. Wal-Mart doesn't have to place several stores within two miles of each other just to drive all the K-Marts and locally owned businesses out. The home improvement giants are known for doing the same thing as well. Wal-Mart is also known for sending spies into local completion and making sure their prices are so much lower that they'll slash the profit margin out of whatever the items are. That's pretty f*cking evil.
Not all corporations are evil, some are able to balance fair business practices and strive for a nice profit. But then you get companies like Phillip Morris who live to cloud your lungs with cancerous smoke or fill your veins with heart clogging Kraft cheese. I guess I'm just starting to get scared of waking up in the world and only being able to make choices that are Oked by the R and D department of Procter and Gamble. This is America after all.

04/01/03 - Adventures in Babysitting

I'm finally catching up on my sleep. DJ gets up so early in the morning and on weekends I'm the one who gets up with him. This includes Monday where I still have to go to work and work until 2:30 am. My head isn't hitting the pillow until 3 or 4am.

I think we must be freak magnets when it comes to finding a sitter for DJ on Mondays. My honey doesn't get out until 5pm on Monday and I have to be at work by 4 so we have a hour and a half gap. Boo is still at pre-school so at least we don't have to worry about her.

We were directed to one lady a couple of months ago. My love and I went to her house and she seemed ok but a little light in the brain department. She seemed safe enough and we were kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place so we agreed to let her watch our boy. Then fate stepped in and the woman called and bailed on us two days before she was supposed to start. Now we were stuck again. She did give us the name of another woman that might be able to watch our poor waif.

We took little DJ to meet her and she said she didn't have any problem watching him. We went out of our way to warn her that my son spits up a lot. He doesn't have anything wrong with him, we've had him checked out by doctors many times and they've all told us that he just barfs.....a lot. He's also very fussy. He cries....a lot. Whether or not the spitting up and the fussiness are related, I don't know. He's a good boy, don't get me wrong. He's a fussy, barfy baby. But he's mine and I love him and his faults. To be honest I've learned to live with it. It's just a part of his personality. But I digress- we warned this chick about all this, quite a few times. The following Monday when I dropped DJ off I reminded her about when feeding him to be aware that he'll spit up....a lot. I also said he's never been to her house before and he doesn't know her so he might cry.....a lot. She said ok and I went to work.

About an hour later I got a call from her saying that he's spitting up a lot and he's also crying....a lot. I told her this is normal for him, that he's a fussy baby. I also told her that he might be tired so she should put him down in a crib to take a nap. She said that she tried that and he still cried. I then asked her if she just let him cry for a few minutes in the crib so he'd tire himself out. No, she replied but she would try it. I asked her if his fussiness was making her uncomfortable and if she wanted me to alert my wife to leave work early but she said no and that she'd tough it out. I told my wife would be getting out shortly so we said our goodbyes. I hung up the phone and began to have MANY misgivings about this woman's ablities.

Later, at home my wife and I decided that this may have been just a rocky start for this sitter and our boy and we'd give it another try next Monday. My honey and I both had our doubts but were still in our rock, hard place nitch.

That rolled around in no time and I again dropped him off and told the sitter she would not have to feed my boy as I had already done it before we left the house. I also said I had given him a nap earlier so his spirits should be ok. I didn't get any phone calls that afternoon but my wife had quite the experience with the woman when she came to pick DJ up.

The woman proceeded to tell my wife that I didn't feed my son enough because moments after I left he started to scream uncontrollably and that she could hear his stomach growling from hunger. My wife found DJ sleeping in a crib and he woke up when she picked him up, then spit up all over her shirt because, in my wife's words, he ate too f*cking much. The babysitter then told my wife that my son screams so often that she did us the favor of tape recording his cries so we could hear what he sounds like when we're not there. I felt like calling her and asking her if she thinks he has the lungs for maybe....American Idol?

Why did she do that? My wife and I never made any indication that we didn't believe the woman. I just think maybe she's a little overwhelmed. My mother and my mother-in-law are able to watch my son and my four year old successfully and manage to have a mostly nice time doing it. My son doesn't spit up ALL the time and he doesn't cry ALL the time. But I think this chick just isn't used to a baby like DJ. Maybe she was lucky and had a kid that wasn't fussy so my little gremlin is too much for her. So be it, but she really creeped me out when she decided to record my son so my wife and I could hear his screams. My wife assured me that this woman still seemed like she wanted to watch my boy. But I didn't want anymore drama involving this nutjob sitter. So we're back at square one.

If anyone knows any winos who'd like to watch a four month old boy for a bottle of Boone's Farm email me with the street corner they hang out at.

03/31/03 - A Futurama Placebo

You know your weekend sucked when you can't wait to get back to work. My kid, Boo has caught a bug and had a fever for a day or two. All day Sunday my mother-in-law and I took turns caring for DJ or Boo. My wife felt terrible being at work instead of taking care of her babies but there was nothing she could do.

I consoled Boo by having a living room screening of my recent Best Buy purchases of the Who Framed Roger Rabbit DVD and the Futurama season one collection. It seemed to help her pass the time since she was running a fever of 101.

Have a nice week.

03/24/03 - Getting the Terran kicked outta me....

This weekend turned out pretty ok. My wife had to work over the weekend so that left me with the kids. My mom took Boo to my grandfather's house in Crystal River on Saturday so it was just me and the DJster at Casa De Dave. The Boyz ruled! My mom didn't get Boo home until after 8pm so my plans to watch Babe: Pig in the City that night were thrown out. Sunday, she went to her dad's and my mom came over to watch my boy so I could go to Dragon's house to have a little StarCraft LAN action.

The hour drive to his house sucked to the rain that seemed to follow me all the way up to his house. I had a pretty good time. I just wished all the people that told him that they were going to come had actually done so. I didn't sweat it because I just like hanging out with him and his lovely wife at his place. Ladybird's cool. Plus I'm sure Dragon had fun kicking my ass up and down the StarCraft map. Next time I'm not going to let him be the Zerg EVERYTIME he plays. You know Dragon, there are other races in the game!

I joined the Columbia House Mystery Science Theater 3000 dvd club a couple of months ago and Friday I got the MST3K copy of Manos: The Hands of Fate. F*cking Great! Its' one of the best/worst films they've ever done. I watched it with Dragon and his wife when we were done with the LAN games. I hadn't seen it in a while, and it's still as funny as ever.

Have a nice week everyone....

03/19/03 - Good Beer and Sprained Toes

Well I guess March is going to come up short as far as blog entries go. Sorry everyone. I was off from work for about a week and a half and work is where I do most of my internet stuff. Nothing like mantaining a personal website on company time, hee hee.

My buddy Raunchman came down from ol'Bawlmer, Merlin (Baltimore, Maryland). We did some local stuff and played with my kids most of the time he was here. Raunchman, my wife and I did manage to go out to dinner down in Ybor at The Tampa Bay Brewing Company. It was a little like Hops but the food and beer was a little better. I got a cool Jack the Quaffer T-Shirt while we were there.

The day before he left the Raunchman and I went down to Central Cigar in lovely downtown St. Petersburg. While there my buddy Dave who's the manager hooked us up with some nice brews and some nice stogies.It was a nice send off because the next day Raunchman had to fly back up to chilly, cold Maryland.

I had the rest of the week off and it was nice to hang around the house with the wife and my babies. Friday, we all went to my mom's condo to swim in the pool. Boo and I swam around and my honey let DJ stick his piggies in the cool water. He started to zonk out in the shade so my wife went to take him back upstairs to my mom's place. As she was heading for the elevator she tripped on the cement. Luckily, she thought of my three month old son's safety first and managed to hold him up as she fell. I was underwater swimming when a neighbor of my mother's ran to the pool and told me my wife fell. I jumped out of the water and ran across the street (leaving Boo unattended at the pool-BAD DADDY!) I saw my honey holding my screaming son and then I looked down and saw her bloody knee. Dj was scared but ok but my wife had hurt her foot and scraped her knee when she fell.She started to complain about her toes hurting so we headed upstairs and put her foot on some ice. After a few hours her foot started to balloon up so to be safe, we left Boo at my mom's and left DJ at with my wife's mother at our house and went to the emergency room. After spending a LONG evening there they told us she sprained the ligaments in her toes. So now my wife is walking with a limp.

On Sunday, my buddy Dragon, his wife and their two week old soon to be adopted daughter came over. We had some pizza and watched The Simpsons and Malcom In the Middle. Later I showed Dragon some GameCube games while our neglected wives looked on. Fun was had by all.

This Sunday Dragon is having a StarCraft LAN party. I've never been to a LAN event before and I love StarCraft so this should be pretty cool.

Have a nice week everyone

02/25/03 - Polio shots and ear aches

Today I went with the wife to take little DJ to get his first set of vaccinations. He got four shots. It was almost unbearable to watch. Now I found out from the wife that she might be getting an ear infection. Sheesh, just when I thought we were finally getting through all the cold sicknesses. I just hope she's feeling better by the time Raunchman comes down.

DJ is still barfing a little. According to my honey some feedings are better than others. We talked to his doctor and she said that we just need to deal with it. I guess I'm just going to have to wear my more "used" T-shirts whenever I feed DJ, maybe I'll lay down a painting tarp as well.

02/24/03 - Baby barf and GameCube

The concept that life doesn't work out like you plan it is becoming more and more painfully aware to me. As I had said on my last entry I was going to have my mom watch DJ on Sunday and I was going to get my locks snipped then try to take in a flick.

Life doesn't always work out like you planned. DJ got up about 5am to eat. I warmed up his bottle and let him chow down. He ate then ended up falling back to sleep. I heard him gurgling on the monitor and then heard him coughing. I ran into his room only to discover that he had blorged most of the formula onto his crib. Now he has been spitting up more than normal for about 3 weeks now. I called his doctor's office yesterday and they just told me to feed him less and make sure we keep him upright for about a half an hour after he eats. That's what I had done that morning. Looking down at my yak covered kid I knew that what the doctor's office had said wasn't working.

I went into our bedroom where my wife was getting ready to leave for work and told her what has happened. She just looked at me and said, "That's it, let's take him to the emergency room." So she ended up calling out from work and then we called her mom to watch Boo until Boo's bio-dad came to pick her upto spend the night at his house.

At the hospital they poked him and proded him and did an ultra-sound of his belly and came up with basically nothing. They perscribed him some Zantac and told us to mix in some baby cereal in with his formula. We then went home and my mom still came over so I jetted off to get my haircut then came back home. My dad also came over as well.

We've been trying OPERATION NO PUKE for over 24 hours now and my wife just called me here at work and told me that DJ just barfed up most of what he ate. We have a doctor's appointment tomorrow and I guess we'll mention it then. He's got to get his first set of vaccinations. It should be a blast.

On a more upbeat note, I got to pick up some new games over the weekend. I got The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and Metroid Prime for my Cube. I really like The Two Towers game and Metroid is starting to grow on me as well.

This week I'll be helping the wife get the home ready for my buddy Raunchman. He's from my old stomping grounds in Baltimore, Maryland. We've been buds since high school and he was my groomsman at my wedding. He'll be here at the beginning of March. Fun should be had by all.

02/21/03 - Baby Merchants need not apply

Well I've reached the end of another work week. Tommorow the wife, the kids and I are meeting with a possible Monday babysitter for little DJ. I hope it works out. This problem has been a real pain in the *ss for the wife and me. I have to be at work by 4pm and the spouse doesn't get out until 6pm so who's home to watch our little boy? There's the rub.

My mom is watching DJ on Sunday after Boo leaves with her dad. I'm going to finally get my hair cut. I've been looking a little shaggy lately. Plus, I'm going to try and take in Gangs of New York by my idol Marty Scorsese. I've been wanting to see it for awhile now. I always try to see Scorsese pictures at the theater because he's such a good cinematographer. This is supposed to be a pretty good film.

Have a nice weekend everyone.

02/17/03 - There can be only one....

I hope everyone had a nice weekend. Mine was pretty good. I'm still getting used to the 3 a.m. feedings that I take care of on the weekends when my honey works. At least it allows me to catch me up on re-runs of COPS.

I took Boo out to lunch on Sunday to Steak and Shake. Afterwards we went to Pet Smart where I bought her a hermit crab. It's not the most cuddly pet in the world but I had to pick something that could defend itself against two cats. I wouldn't want to explain to her why there are hamster bits all over her room sometime. She named the crab Tommy and he has a little cage on her book shelf. The wife wasn't too pleased but it wasn't like I bought a boa constricter or anything.

I watched my new DVD of Highlander. I had bought it before on DVD and got burned because it was a sh*tty transfer. My VHS copy had a cleaner picture than the DVD. I really felt ripped off. But this new version is pretty sweet. It's a cool movie. I got really nostalgic when they have the battle on top of the Silvercup studios. I used to pass it all the time on the subway when I lived in NYC and used comment to friends "Remember the ending to Highlander?...."

I wish I could convince my wife to live there but I can't even get her to consider moving to downtown St. Pete. I tried to tell her about all the cultural benefits of city living for us and the kids but I think she can only see the crime problems. Oh well, I guess I just have to be happy as a suburbanite.

02/14/03 - Trying to put into words....

I dedicate this day's entry to the one constant of my life. My wife. She's my best friend, my true soulmate and my reason for living. She's given me the two most wonderful things in the world, my two beautiful angels-Boo and David Jr. I'm the luckiest man alive to be married to her. She gives so much of herself to me and my kids to make sure we're healthy, happy and safe. I don't know what else to say but I know I found a rare jewel in the universe and I'm proud and lucky to say she's all mine.

To my wife I say- no piece of jewelry I would give to you can compare to the passion I feel for you. I would lay down my life a million times over to save yours. You truly are the best thing in my life. I can't wait to see what the future brings us as long as you are by my side. My love for you shows no end and I would yell it from the rooftops if you asked me to. I go to sleep every night with you by my side comforted by the thought that our love has a bond that can never be broken if we believe in each other.

Happy Valentine's Day....

02/10/03 - Bounty Hunters and Bad Bass

My birthday was....eeehhh. I caught a pretty wicked cold and being in the true spirit of giving I turned around and gave the virus to my wife and son. The dinner at the Backfin Blue was nice but I would of enjoyed it more if I wasn't congested to death. I did get a $75 gift certificate to Best Buy from my Mom and step-dad. After dinner we went for a walk around gulfport then went home.

Saturday was pretty uneventful. I hung around the house most of the day. Then my wife, DJ and I dropped Boo off with her bio-dad and went to Best Buy and then went grocery shopping. I picked up Star Wars: Bounty Hunter for my Cube. Wow!! I'm still getting into the swing of things as far as the controller is concerned but it still rocks the casbah.

One of my speakers is blown in my car. Damn! It's my favorite place to listen to tunes and now it's been tainted. The wife has given me the o.k. to buy a new one but in the meantime I have to deal with a sub-par listening enviroment in my fortress of solitude.

Have a good week everyone!

02/04/03 - Nightclubs and Impending Middle Age

I'm going to be 35 on Friday. In one perspective I'm only five short years from the big FOUR ZERO. Yikes! Soon I'll be getting the urge to wear black socks with my sneakers. In another perspective I'm a little wiser and I've achieved many goals I wanted. I'm a proud husband and father. I own a pretty nice house. I think I've got a good job. I'm doing o.k. for someone who's very close to FOUR ZERO.

My family is taking me out to the Backfin Blue Cafe for my B-Day. It's a nice place but I don't care what anyone says I'm getting some f*cking sushi on my birthday, and some sake too. 'cause it's my day! I think I'm entitled to a little selfishness on my birthday.

Saturday, we're supposed to go to a local nightclub with my wife's sister and some friends. I don't know what it is but now that I'm married I don't get that "thrill of the hunt" feeling of going to clubs that I used to when I was going to clubs when I was single. I guess trying to score adds a certain pleasing element to "nightlife". Ahh, the good old days.

Whatever! I wouldn't trade my married life for anything. Even when my wife and I get in blazing arguments and I want to kill her I still couldn't imagine my life without her. I can still remember being single and going to bed alone. Sorry, but a housecat can't substitute the warm body of your wife sleeping next to you.

01/30/03 - Amending Quality Time

Well, the weekend's coming up. I'm looking forward to spending time with Boo. I feel I've been neglecting her a lot lately. It's not anyone's fault really. Now that her little brother,who I'll now call "DJ", is in our lives he seems to suck up a lot of quality time. Boo has also started daycare as well. She's usually gone before I wake up and comes home after I've already left for work. I never see her anymore. Plus, I spend all my time helping my wife take care of DJ so I feel extra sh*tty about not spending more time with her. I promised myself when DJ was born I wouldn't devote all my time with him and try to give my love equally to the both of them even though Boo isn't of my blood. But now that I never see her anymore I feel like I'm breaking the promise I made to myself. I still love her and I'm going to try to make amends.

Have a nice weekend everyone!

01/28/03 - Super Bowl Dreams Realized

I can't believe that I can now say with confidence that I support a local Super Bowl winning team. The Bucs won the Super Bowl. Can you believe that sh*t? I've been a supporter of the Bucs win or lose. I've been an athletic supporter for years. (hee....hee) it hasn't always been easy. During the age of the orange and white it was just hoping that they'd win at least ONE game during the season. Then during the Dungy time it was the time of getting so close to the Super bowl you could taste it then watch them blow it. But now that has all changed. They aren't just the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, they're the Super Bowl winning Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I'm such a fan that I'm wearing my Bucs hat at this very moment.

I survived my first weekend of soloing it with my son while my wife went to work. My mother in law helped out in the a.m. so I could sleep a little. Boo was at her bio-dad so I had a break there. This weekend coming up will be the big test because on Saturday my wife is going to see Kenny Chesney (barf) in concert so I'll have both kids day AND night. Ahhhhh....the burden of parenthood. Oh well my wife does it all the time, Buddha bless her.

I watched the Abyss on DVD over the weekend. Wow, it was cool to experience the film through the Dolby Digital 5.1 on the surround system. This system has really elevated movie watching at home to a whole new level. My wife doesn't appreciate the home theater system as much as I do but I'm hoping that'll change over time.

01/23/03 - Plastic Doodles and Super Bowl Dreams

Another week has come and gone. My boy has been pretty cranky this week. He got his surgery done last Friday. They fixed a small hernia and did his circumcision. Ouch! In the spirit of Bill Clinton, I felt his pain. But all in all, the only scars are two really small ones on his abdomen and he had a little plastic cap on his doodle. I'm happy to say the plastic hat has already fell off. I think he's still in pain a little bit though. We're weaning him off the Tylenol with codeine because it seem like it was making him constipated. So now it seems like he's going through a little detox. MMmmmmm....codeine. Now he's fussy to the max.

My buddy Fast Eddie came over on Saturday night and brought his Xbox with him. We played some stuff on my GameCube first. Fast Eddie is a Simpsons fan like me so I knew he'd get a kick out of Simpsons Road Rage. We did a couple of rounds on the head to head mode. Playing against Eddie was much more of a challange than my video game-impared wife. It was nice to go against someone that is closer to being my equal in gaming.

I checked out Splinter Cell on his Xbox. Wow! It was sweet. I had to keep saying to myself, "You can't afford a Xbox. You're fine with what you have. Your wife will get really pissed off if you buy yet another game system."

I'm glad I've lived long enough to see the Bucs make it to the Super Bowl in my lifetime. Last Sunday's game against the Eagles was great. I hope the Buccaneers make the effort when they go against the Raiders this Sunday. I'm probably just going to stay home and watch the game with the brood. My honey and I got offers to watch it at a bar or at someone's house but now that we got the little one I'd rather just stay home. Maybe I'm starting to fit into my age group now. Uh oh, soon I'll be getting those AARP mailings.

Have a nice weekend everyone-GO BUCS!

01/15/03

Just wanted to give a heads up on my upcoming weekend. My wife, Boo and I are NOT going to Disney on Monday. Wanna know the reason? My oldest cat Sydney was looking pretty bad earlier in the day. He was wobbling around and looking like he was drunk so I took him to the vet. $221 dollars later I was bringing him home still without a clue what was wrong. They checked him out, took some blood and cleaned his ears then told me to keep an eye on him. I really got my money's worth this time.

We got my boy's surgery on Friday morning then my buddy Fast Eddie is coming over on Saturday to check the new sound system and play some GameCube. He's also bringing his Xbox so that'll be cool to check that out. So hopefully the weekend will pan out on a high note.

Cheers!

01/13/03

Another Monday here....sigh. I got my new surround system hooked up on Friday. It rocks the casbah. Boo and I watched Monsters Inc. and it blew us away. Wow, what a difference! If you're a true film fan I highly recommend investing in a good sound system. I also hooked up the GameCube to the system as well. It just made me love Simpson's Road Rage even more. There's nothing like having Ralph Wiggum tell you his cat's breath smells like cat food in stereo.

I only have to work three days this week. I took Thursday off because my son has his surgery Friday morning and they want us there at 6am. God, I'll be glad when this is all over. It's like waiting for the other shoe to drop. Boo is going to my wife's sisters for the weekend so we can focus on our boy. My wife also has to work on Sunday so I'm going to be taking care of my son myself. I hope he'll be feeling a little better by then.

Boo will be coming home on Sunday evening and then on Monday my wife and I are taking her to Walt Disney World. My mom is watching my son. We want to put some attention on Boo so she doesn't feel left out. Both my wife and I have noticed some behavioral changes in Boo, most not for the better. She's lashing out a lot more, especially at my wife. We both agree it's probably just a phase she's going through trying to get used to the fact that she's not the only cutie-pie in our house anymore. Boo must of had her TV taken out of her room two or three times last week. She started pre-school today and seems to be enjoying it. I'm hoping that she'll even out a little with going to school.

01/09/03

I'm a happy boy, or at least I'll be happier soon. I finally bought a better surround system. I've been itching to get one for a while now. Best Buy had a good system on sale and I went for it. Then I discovered they only had one left of the system I wanted and the box had been opened so the sales person knocked another $30.00 off the already sale price. Sweet, huh? It's a Kenwood 600 watt 5 DVD player and receiver package. I'll be setting it up this weekend, Boo is going to her dad's and I'll have a little free time on Saturday. Now I just have to pick a flick to break in the new system.

Boo starts pre-school on Monday. Boo's dad will be dropping her off there on Monday and my wife will be meeting him there to help her get registered and settled in. Wow, I still remember her as a baby. It doesn't seem that long ago. My little girl is growing up so fast. It won't be too long until we'll be looking at colleges.

01/07/03

Hoppy Nude Ear!!! I really apologize for not keeping up with my updates but the last few weeks have been really busy for Clan Wright and me. I hope everyone had a nice Christmas or whatever holiday you and yours celebrate. I also hope that your New Years celebration was fun and drunken puke free for the most part.

My Christmas was nice. My family gathered Christmas Day at my house for some turkey and trimmings. Boo got some Barbie stuff and the Barbie Talking Townhouse as well as a Leap Pad Learning System and some of the books. My wife got a $100 gift card to the local beauty salon so she could get a cut and her locks highlighted.

Me? I made out like a bandit. I got the Band of Brothers DVD set, the Back To the Future Trilogy, The Lord of the Rings Special Edition, E.T., Grease and Tombstone. I got other stuff too but I can't recall at this time.

I also got a terrible case of the 24-hour stomach flu at my aunt's house the day after Christmas. God, it was awful, I really wanted to die. The worst part was I turned around and gave it to Boo and my wife. So soon the whole house was praying to the porcelain god. My mother in law came over to help take care of our boy and the next day she was puking her guts up too. Nice week, huh?

But that's all behind us now. My boy has his surgery rescheduled for the 17th. I want that to be over with. We've had the whole hernia surgery hanging over us ever since he was born. I don't know how I'll be seeing my son in pain like that. I hope he sleeps through the brunt of it.

More tomm...

12/23/02

Happy Holidays! Sorry...sorry.... Yeah I know I've been neglecting the blog. I'm sure everyone knows how hectic the holidays can be. Well, try the holidays and having a newborn in the house. You could say I've been a little busy. But that's going to be all coming to a close within the next few days...thank God!

Our cat "Max" had to be taken to the vet last week because I noticed a large lump on his neck after he came home from escaping outside the billionth time. It turns out he got bit there a couple of times by another cat and the wounds became septic. The next day the lump exploded and some nice greasy pus was oozing out of the wound. My loyal wife took him to the vet and they admitted him. He's home now with most of the hair on his neck shaved off and there's a large incision on his neck being held closed with surgical staples. What a nice holiday vision. Maybe I'll hang tiny ornaments from the staples or maybe bells so he'll jingle when he walks.

My son has to have minor surgery on the 31st. He's got a small hernia and has to have it repaired. I'm a little worried but was assured by the urologist that it's no big deal. We can even bring the kid back home the same day. He'll also be getting his ding-aling snipped that day as well. What a way to ring in the New Year, huh? I wish I was going with my wife and son to the hospital but I have to work on New Year's Eve 4 to 9 and then New Year's Day 7 to 7. Lucky me.

I'm sorry to cut this short but I'll get everyone up to date a little more in a couple days. Don't drink too much eggnog.

12/16/02

I'm back at work now after being off for two weeks. As much as I love being on "vay-kay" I like being back at work. I'm also fighting a cold virus that my lovely daughter gave me. My head is feels like it's gonna pop off any moment now.

Now for the big news- I'M A DADDY!!! (again.) At 1:55pm on November 29th 2002 my handsome son entered this physical plane as a human. His name is David Edward Wright Jr. I'll post some pics when I can. My wife says he tends to favor me in the looks department. Lucky him.

I was there for the whole thing. Witnessing the birth of your child is simply amazing. Words really can't describe it. I was so dumbstruck that my wife was focusing less on the birth and kept asking me if I was o.k. It was such a key moment of my existence. I'll never forget it. The mid-wife asked me if I wanted to "catch". I wasn't that comfortable with that much responsibility. Plus what were we paying her for? I settled for cutting the umbilical cord.

My wife went ahead and got her tubes tied that same day so she had to stay at the hospital for about two days. Let me tell you, those hospital chairs are not as comfortable as they look, at least for sleeping in. I stayed with my honey and my boy the first night and my mother in law was nice enough to take the second night. I came back the next morning and took the two of them home. Boo was at her dad's so she had a nice surprise when she came back that Monday.

We had a little scare when my wife got a bladder infection and had to be rushed by ambulance back to the hospital. The doctor's poked and prodded her then sent her home with some good antibiotics. She's doing good now.

More tomm.

11/27/02

Just wanted to drop a quick note to say-NO! My wife didn't have the baby yet. We went to her doctor today for the final appointment. The Nurse-Midwife we saw says that if my honey doesn't have the baby on her own within the next couple of days then we'll go to the hospital on Friday morning and they'll induce her. It's about time we've had some sort of closure on this. It' s strange, I gotten so used to seeing my wife pregnant like this for so long I'm a little sad that it 's coming to an end. We can finally see the finish line. As of next week we'll be a family of four. Soon there'll be THREE David's in the family, my dad, my son and your humble narrator. What's the world coming to?

Anyway, I'm a little too nervous to write anything else today. So here is a little link to learn how to give the Heimlich Maneuver just in time for Thanksgiving. Enjoy!

11/26/02

I know I'm bugging the sh*t out of my wife. She's ready to pop any day now and is having little pangs of pain here and there. Every time she says that she's having a twinge of pain I get kind of antsy and ask her if it's a labor pain. She then has to remind me that if it were labor pains she would let me know. We're both just ready for it to happen. I'm at the point where I want it done and over with so this new chapter of my life can start. It's the waiting that's starting to drive me batty. I'm at work right now just looking at my pager, waiting for the thing to buzz with my home number displayed with a 9-1-1 following it. It could be ANY time now, but as of this moment-still waiting.

I got Brotherhood of the Wolf on DVD on Saturday. I had rented it about a month ago through NetFlix and really enjoyed it. I was racing with the mailman to send it back so I didn't get to watch the extras so it'll be nice to watch them now. As I believe I've said before it's a great film, check it out if you get the chance. Plus the chicks are hot in it as well, but that could just be because I got a thing for French chicks.

11/20/02

One of my cats now takes valium. It's nice to live in the modern age isn't it? We now psychologically medicate our pets. Spooky started to lick at her fur continuously a few months ago and to this day has not stopped. She is now missing about 80% of her fur on her body. It's really sad because she was a gorgeous all black cat. We took her to the vet who said it was part of a nervous condition and she should be medicated. I guess if I get too depressed I'll steal some of Spooky's "meds".

My wife went to her OBGYN hoping they would set a date to induce her to have the baby. But, no dice. They told her she's ok so she'll probably have to wait and let David Jr. pick his birthday on his own. She was a little bummed about that. She's just so tired of carrying all that extra weight around and always feeling kind of drained. I feel bad for her. I wish there was more I could do.

11/18/02

Monday...Monday.... The wife still has a bun in her oven. But it could happen at any time now. I don't know what's worse, the waiting or the actual birth. My wife is to the point that she just wants it over with. I don't blame her. She's been to hell and back with all the ailments and such. I want her to have the baby soon but I'm still a little nervous as far as the "life altering" part goes. My wife and I have been through so much that I'm sure we'll be able to handle this as well.

My weekend was good. Friday was my kid's birthday party. Fun was had by all. Boo's life is complete now that she has all the accessories regarding the "Barbie Rupunzel" collection. Most of the family came over to our house for the party. Boo dressed up in her Belle costume and my sister-in-law wore her Snow White costume. My dad brought my grandmother to the party which was nice since due to her health I don't get to see her that much anymore. Boo is quite fond of her.

I finally got to watch my DVD of From Hell. I saw the film when it played at the theater and I was very impressed. The Hughes brothers have really matured as filmmakers since Menace II Society. The story follows the Jack the Ripper murders as an opium-addicted detective played by Johnny Depp investigates them. Heather Graham also stars as a prostitute who becomes a love interest for Depp's character. The film really shows the grittiness of London in the 1800's. I highly recommend it.

Have a good week everyone.

11/14/02

Happy Birthday, Boo! Yup, it's my kid's B-Day! She's the big 4. Friday we're having a small party for her. Some of her friends and some family members will be getting together at our house. Fun should be had by all. Boo is getting to the age now where she loves parties especially if they're for her. It's amazing how fast she's growing up. It doesn't seem too long ago when we had her first birthday at my old condo. I guess time flies when you're having fun.
My wife may have bronchitis. Boo spent Tuesday night at my mom's because my wife had a bad cold. I came home from work Wed. morning and settled into bed at about 4am. Then at about 6am my wife woke me up complaining of chest pains. She thought she was having a heart attack or something. I called 911 and an ambulance arrived and the paramedics hooked her up to an EKG and told us it wasn't her heart. Whew! The ambulance went ahead and took my wife to the local hospital and took some more tests and then did a chest X-ray. I won't be surprised now if my kid comes out with super powers or gills with all the drugs I did in the 80's and now with this radiation. The doctor at the emergency room determined it was bronchitis then gave us a prescription for some pills and an inhaler.
We got the prescription filled and went home. By this time it was almost 11am and I've only had two hours of sleep. I wasn't tired because I had reached that runner's high of sleep deprivation. I went ahead and called my work and told them I wouldn't be in that night. My wife was pretty stoked about that. Boo was spending the night at her bio-dad's and that let my honey get a night off to recover from the day's harrowing experience.
We went to her OBGYN today and they told us she should be ready to deliver in about two weeks. I'm getting antsy. I suppose all dad's go through this anxiety. Will I be able to handle it? Am I going to raise the next Ted Bundy, or worse the next George W Bush? My wife has faith that I'll do ok. He'll be raised on a steady diet of NIN, Ministry and Clive Barker. He should be pretty well adjusted.
Are all pregnancies this exciting? I feel so sorry for my wife. Between the high blood pressure, my bigheaded kid causing pain in her womb and now the bronchitis. They should use her pregnancy as a form of torture in third world countries.

11/12/02

I hope everyone had a nice weekend. My poor wife is at home with a bad cold. What a terrible time for that to happen. She's eight months pregnant and coughing her brains out. She called her OBGYN and the office gave her a prescription to make her feel a little better. I picked it up for her before I went to work. My mom picked up Boo to spend the night at her house so my wife could get some rest. I hope she gets better in time for Boo's birthday party on Friday.

Max the cat is officially part of our family. We took to the vet on Friday and found out for sure that he's a boy and is fixed. They kept him overnight to bath him and give him some shots. Mom brought him back home to our house on Saturday morning and I spent the rest of the day yelling at Sydney and Spooky for hissing at their new roommate. Things have settled a little between them now.

My wonderful, wonderful wife despite being pregnant and on death's door with a cold from Hades went out this morning with our soon to be four year old and bought me Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones at Toys R Us for an unbelievable $9.99 on DVD. What a great woman. I sometimes think I truly don't deserve her. She's so good to me. I watched a little before going to work today and let me tell you, from a technical standpoint it looks great. The true digital transfer makes such a difference picture quality.

Bear with me as I explain a little in Cini-fan-boy speak. Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones is the first live-action film to be filmed purely in the digital format. This means the cameras used no film stock and filmed using digital cameras with computer memory chips. Then the film was dumped into a massive computer memory processed, edited all in a computer. The finished product was transferred to film for standard movie theaters but a lucky few were able to see it digitally shown if you had a theater with the proper equipment near you. I did and I was impressed.

What this means to a DVD owner is this, because the film was made digitally the version you watch at home is almost the exactly the same as if you were watching the master copy at George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch in California. I've never watched a cleaner, smoother version of a film on my DVD player ever. The Pixar flicks like Monsters Inc. and Toy Story come close, as does Shrek but as far as live action goes this flick is the sh*t.

11/07/02

Another Thursday and another week has gone by. It's going to be the first weekend that my wife doesn't have to go to her stinkin' job. She's on that FMLA. She's still going to get 70% of her pay so it won't hurt us financially too much. It'll be kind of strange to have her home with the kid and me on Saturday and Sunday. Boo will be really happy though. We hope to go to the Clearwater Aquarium sometime this weekend.
My family may get yet another addition. The stray cat that hangs around my house may soon be able to look through our windows from the other side. He's (at least I think he's a he) been named "Max" by our family and we've feeding him ever since we moved in to our house. My mom wants to eventually take Max to live with her but she can't right now because of my step-dad's recovery from leukemia. So on Halloween I got tired of her pestering me about taking Max in and finally caved in. Mom's are good at that aren't they? I'm really hoping Max gets along with Sydney and Spooky, my other cats.
Even though we're holding Max for my mom I won't be surprised if we end up keeping him ourselves for some reason or other. I don't think I'll mind though because he's a really good cat. He even lets Boo pet him; the other cats are kind of standoffish to Boo and my wife. They love me though, and that really bugs my wife. When she moved in with Boo Sydney didn't really pay attention to them because he's always lived with me. She ended up getting Spooky from Friends of Strays because she wanted a cat that would love on her and Boo. Well, Spooky latched on to me right away because I showed her a lot of attention as soon as we got her. I think she might have imprinted on me as her mother because she was still a kitten when we brought her home. She still sleeps right on my side almost every morning. I'll really think it's funny if Max latches on to me as well. That'll really burn my wife's bacon. Hee Hee Hee....

Have a nice weekend everyone.

P.S. I'd like to do a shout out to my man, Dragon. Get well buddy! We miss you in Ops!

11/06/02

I voted today, but it almost seems like it didn't even matter as all the persons I voted for didn't win. I usually vote Democrat and I pretty much did this election as well. I checked the news and it showed that my nightmare is coming true. Florida is becoming a Republican state. Who is to blame? The f*cking non voters from my demographic group, that's who. These are the same people who are going to whine and complain when all the state money gets sucked into programs helping the Republican senior citizens instead of education, the environment and other causes that effect our age group.

I guess I shouldn't complain too much since this is a collective of my peers. All that apathy crammed down our throats from the grunge we all listened to in the 90's is taking effect. Ours is a generation of people who just don't really think they can make a difference. Well, it certainly shows.

11/05/02

Halloween was cool. It was the first Trick or Treat outing in the new neighborhood. Boo and I went out by ourselves while the wife stayed home and gave out candy. Everyone the kid and I encountered on our nighttime quest for goodies were really nice. I look forward to future years of Halloween activities in this 'hood.

I picked up Spider-Man on Saturday. Boo and I may watch it tomorrow before I go to work. The Sam Raimi and Kirstin Dunst commentary should be interesting.

I watched a couple of other films over the weekend but I don't have time to go into it today so you'll just have to wait until my entry tomorrow.

Have a good week everyone.

10/30/02

Only one more day till All Hollows Eve. I'm pretty excited, so's my kid. I had to go to three stores until I found a red cape for my pseudo-Superman outfit. Yesterday we did our Jack-o-lanterns. Mine came out pretty good but my wife's looks like it has downs syndrome. They should look creepy Halloween night. I'm looking forward to taking my kid trick or treating in our neighborhood. When we lived in the condo we had to go to other neighborhoods because so many of our neighbors were losers. Where we live now is pretty nice.
I'm off tomorrow, yay! I hope to have the shed in our backyard finished. My step dad is going to help me put in the floor. Then it's off to collect candy with my kid. After Boo and I get back were going to go through our candy loot while watching a VHS of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. It should be nice.
Friday we're hanging out with my mom and step dad. Boo is getting her photos done at Sears then we're supposed to go to Roger's Christmas Wonderland. Yuck! I really don't like Christmas all that much, especially the decorations. It's all so fake. Fake trees, fake lights, and fake snow, all of it. The season even brings fake generosity, fake sentiment and even fake happiness. Whatever, Bah Humbug!
The upside of Friday is that Spider-man comes out on DVD. I've got clearance from the wife to purchase it so the wife, the kid and me are going to settle in on Friday night and watch it. It's a little over Boo's head but maybe she'll like the action scenes. I'm trying to de-sensitize her to simulated violence early like I was. I didn't turn out so bad. Did I?
Have a scary Halloween!

10/29/02

Only a couple of more days till ooooooooohhhhh.... Halloween. My kid is dressing up like Belle from Beauty and the Beast. I had NO part in the costume choosing this year. I still think homemade costumes rock the most. Last year I made her a cool robot costume with blinking lights and everything. This year it was my wife's turn and of course she had to get the Disney Store purchase. My kid never even liked the film. Oh well, next year it's my choice again.
I saw The Ring on Friday with a buddy from work. It was pretty creepy. They definitely released it at the right time of year. The only other real horror film this season is the sh*tty Ghost Ship. The Ring is a totally different movie as there's almost no gore in it. I thought it was a good, intelligent, well made film. Its even rated PG-13, that impressed me more than anything else. It's amazing to see someone make a successful horror film in this age of over the top uber-gore and still get it through the MPAA at PG-13. I was a little skeptical because there was so much hype about it when it opened. I was afraid The Ring was going to be another The Blair Witch Project. Where the hype was scarier than the actual film. I'll admit it-I was a little scared. Don't take my word for it; go see The Ring before Halloween.
I have Halloween off. It really is my favorite holiday of the year. I guess it has a lot to do with the celebration of the darkness and the fun side of evil. It's too bad I didn't get a chance to go to any cool haunted houses this year. For some reason my wife doesn't want to get the sh*t scared out of her when she's pregnant, go figure.

10/24/02

Another Thursday here and another week gone. My wife is having a baby shower for a friend on Friday. I really don't want to go but it's at my house so what am going to do? Later that night I'm going to try to see The Ring with some friends. I've heard a lot of good things about this film. It's supposed to be pretty scary.

Another cool flick I watched last week was the film Hard Eight by Paul Thomas Anderson. As a fan of one of his other films Boogie Nights I wanted to see a early film just to see how much he changed. It didn't hurt that it also starred John C. Reilly whose work I've really liked for many years now.

Hard Eight is a small film but has an engaging story. It follows Sydney a aging gambler played extremely well by Philip Baker Hall. The film opens in front of a diner outside of Nevada where you see Sydney offering to help a down and out young guy named John.

Sydney takes John to Reno where he shows him the secrets of gambling in casinos. The reason for Sydney's generosity is revealed later in the film. While in Reno Sydney and John meet a cocktail waitress named Clementine played by Gwyneth Paltrow. Sydney decides to help her too and in the process John falls in love with her. Added to the mix is John's creepy friend Jimmy played over the top by Samuel L. Jackson.

Overall it's an impressive film for a young director. If you get the chance check it out. I've been seeing it being run on IFC these past few months.

Have a nice weekend everyone.

10/23/02

Yeah, yeah....I know. I've been neglecting my blog. Bad webpage owner! Bad! Alot has beeen going on at work and in life in general. Everyone in my family is stoked about the future David Jr. Last week I worked an earlier shift which didn't give me any real time to update the blog. Plus, I've started training a new guy. He's pretty cool. I found out he likes alot of the same music as I do. He pretty cool to work with as well. I've been showing him the ropes for about a week and a half now.

I've seen some movies over the past few days. I finally watched my Netflix rentals. If I haven't mentioned it before I'll say it now, if you're a movie lover then join Netflix. this service kicks @ss. They have over 10,000 DVD's to rent and their selection is great. I won't go into the specifics of internet DVD rentals so go to the site and tell 'em CineMax sent ya.

My first rental I watched last week was Yojimbo directed by Akria Kurosawa. This 1962 samurai film is basically a reinvention of the American western. A ronin (a masterless samurai) wanders into a village held at bay by two rival gangs that want to control the local silk trade. Both gangs want the ronin to work for them and he plays them both against the other. It's filled with humor and some great fights. I have to warn that it is subtitled but it is worth it.

Kurosawa is best known for The Seven Samurai which I really enjoyed but this is so much better as far as I'm concerned. The Seven Samurai had some humor in it but Yojimbo's humor is darker and the film seems to move at a brisker pace than The Seven Samurai . Plus, the characters seem to be better developed in Yojimbo.

Tomorrow I'll talk about some other good flicks I've seen. Have a nice one!

10/10/02

I'M HAVING A BOY!!! Well, my wife is. If I was having one I'd be really worried....and extremely confused. We went to the doctor today and the ultra-sound showed my boy's family jewels. I'm pretty happy now. The family name will live on. That's all I wanted to say today. Have a cool weekend!

10/09/02

Looks like Baby Bush is pushing us into another war just like his Dada did. That burns me up so much. If we didn't drive huge gas guzzling urban-tanks we wouldn't even be looking in the Middle East's direction in the first place. I laugh every time Bush or any Washington politico says that we're going to war because of a possible terrorist agenda-Nooooooo, that's not why. The reason we pay attention to that area of the world has everything to do with oil, black gold, Texas tea. We love to drive and rich people love those nice oily connections with the equally rich Saudi's who help line the pockets of the equally rich Washington fat cats and that brings full circle to why were going to war with a Third World nation that has already been beaten into submission a few years ago by us. Aaaahhh, that little rant felt good.

I hopefully will be seeing One Hour Photo Friday with my wife. I stress the word "hopefully". With the crazyness my life has been lately who knows what Friday will bring. I've got to put some stuff on lay-away for my kid with my wife early in the day, then I'm working a couple of hours at my job and then after I might see the movie. Kay....Sera...Sera.....whatever.

Feel free to click on the picture of the war-monger to go to a link that shows what you can do to voice your opinion about the Iraq situation.

Have a nice weekend.

10/07/02

The wife didn't wake me up in time to take our cat "Spooky" to the vet on Thursday morning. She said she felt bad that she kept waking me up during the night. Plus I was woken up by our lawn guy mowing and the guy we hired to build our shed in the back yard. It was nice for her to do that but our cat still needs to go to the vet.

I didn't go to see One Hour Photo on Friday either. Is just me or is a pattern developing here? I didn't motivate myself enough to remove myself from the couch and my PSOne system. The wife and kid did enjoy themselves at Sesame Street Live though. That was good. My kid is at that age now where this kind of stuff is now very entertaining to her. We took her to Blue's Clues Live about a year and a half ago and she got kind of scared and all I could think was what a waste of $25 it was because she kept her head buried in my wife's chest the whole time.

On Saturday I took my kid to a "Expectant Sibling" class that they were having at the hospital where my wife is having our baby. I got there a little early and saw that there already were 3 other moms there with their kids. I started talking to some of the mothers and one mentioned she worked for our local newspaper. I recognized her from her photo on her column. Boo played with the other little girls while I looked at my watch and noticed it was 10:15 and the class was supposed to start at 10:00. The woman from the newspaper commented that this wasn't going to look good in the article she was writing on the class. I was more annoyed at the fact that the hospital makes you pre-pay for the class so they're sure that you'll show up. I waited until 10:45 then grabbed my kid and left. I didn't want to totally waste a trip into downtown St. Pete so Boo and I went to "The Pier". If you're not familar with this St. Pete landmark it's really just a upside down triangle building that's a hip tourist trap. Boo and I ate some fries from the food court and then took a walk up to the aquarium upstairs. I bought her a plastic jellyfish and then we drove home so I could get her ready for her bio-dad's.

My wife's mom agreed to take Boo to where we meet her bio-dad so my honey and I could go to my aunt and her life-partner's 20th anniversary vow renewal. It was really nice. They had it at the church where Joyce, my aunt's other-half is the pastor. I think their relationship is stronger that most hetrosexual relationships I know. The reception was at a nice bed and breakfast in Gulfport. It was cool to hang out with my dad's side of the family. I even got to touch base with one cousin whom I never really get to see all that often.

On Sunday I woke up around 11 and straightened up the house a little and then proceeded to watch the Bucs stomp the Atlanta Falcons 20 to 6. Wow, I don't want to jinx anything but would it hurt to mention the words "Super Bowl" this early in the season? I mean Sapp is un-f*cking-stoppable! It's nice to watch a winning team again. I won't go on another rant about the other less stellar teams in Tampa Bay, we all know who I'm talking about. One of the teams rhymes with "gays".

I watched the utterly awlful, disturbing, annoying, piece of sh*t encrusted stinking, smelling garbage called Pearl Harbor. I'm not even going to do it any kind of justice by writing any kind of review on it. I will say this though. The director Micheal Bay likes to have Satan shove his hot steaming devil c*ck up his *ss. I mean it, the director of pieces of sh*t like The Rock and Armageddon loves to have his anus lubed with the seed of Lucifer. Why else would he create crap like Pearl Harbor or Bad Boys? I think he has gone through so much pain from having his butt tore from The Prince of Darkness's throbbing member that he feels compelled to pass that pain to us, the general public. He certainly looks like a intelligent person, so he must know the movies he makes cause little babies to cry. So why else does he make them other than the fact that he's the Devil's b*tch? It's just my theory, I've been known to be wrong in the past.

Have a nice week.

10/02/02

Well only one more shift to go and it's hello to the weekend. I had kind of a sh*tty day at work. My boss has a bad habit of basicly getting on my case for EVERYTHING that happens on my shift even though I work with two other people. I guess since I'm the one he sees first I get the brunt of it. Lucky me. Later he apologized but it still set the mood for the rest of my night.

Tomm. I have to take one of our cats to the vet for a shot. That should be fun. I hope it's quick. I like to spend some time with my girls before I go back to the old grindstone.

Friday we're all going downtown to my honey's doctor. My kid likes to see the tall skyscrapers in "the city". I don't have the heart to correct her about downtown St. Petersburg not having any to speak of. Then as soon as we get back the wife and kid are off to see "Sesame Street Live" with a mutual friend and her kid. That means Cinemax is all by himself. Hee Hee Hee....

Well, I'll probably be squandering that time by going by myself to the movies. Some people I've talked to can't seem to do this. I guess they're just self conscious about being there without someone. Personally, I like it sometimes. I like the lack of distraction. You can really get into the film. But some of my friends can't bring themselves to do it. Raunchman, I mean you.(ha ha) I think I might go see One Hour Photo. It looks pretty good. My wife wants to see it as well but nowadays she pees like every five minutes. I feel bad for her but talk about a waste of a movie ticket. I'll rent it for her when it comes out on video. I'll write a review on it on Monday if I see it. I still might just hang out at the house and catch up on all the Netflix rentals that have been collecting dust for like a month now.

Have a nice day.

10/01/02

Happy Rocktober everyone! I had myself a groovy weekend. First there was the guy's night out on Friday. Some buddys and I took our friend Jeff for a night on the town in the ol' Burg. That's St. Petersburg for those not in the know. We went to the yuppie capital of St. Pete known as BayWalk. We hung out at Wet Willie's for most of the night. It's one of those frozen drink bars. The bar has a outdoor set up so you can people watch (meaning chickies!) while you drink your overly powerful drink. Damn do those things pack a wallop! I had one large and one medium "Attitude Adjustment" and was done for the night. I was designated driver so I knew I had to take it easy.

We then strolled over a couple of blocks to Central Cigars to see a friend's boyfriend who bartends there. I don't usually partake of stogies but on that day I made an exception. To tell you the truth I liked it, I liked it a lot.

While I was out on Friday the wife had her Baby Shower at our house. She says she had a good time. We got a lot of loot from our friends and family. It was cool from what she said.

Saturday was PARTY NIGHT! The wife and kid went off to Nana's house (my mom's) and left Daddy to play with all his stripper friends. Yeah, right. Seriously, a bunch of guys came over for beer, booze and lasagna. Pretty much everyone from my department showed up. Dragon brought some PSOne games so we had a few Tekken 3 matches going on in the background throughout the night. Everyone seemed to like the leftover lasagna from my wife's shower and I proceeded to drink quite a few Mike's Hard Iced Tea's.

At about 1 a.m. we threw on the ol'DVD of Evil Dead. Boy, that just gets better with age. I have still to watch it with the commentary from Bruce Campbell. I'll get around to it eventually, it should be pretty good. It was fun to watch with the guys because we've all seen it and we made it into a kind of MST3K flick. When we were done I walked the guys out the their cars and locked myself out of the front door. I had to go around to the back of the house at 3am. I have to tell you it was kind of creepy after watching that film again.

GO BUCS! Oh yeah, my boys have done it again! Henderson came over on Sunday and we watched the Bucs take the Bengals 35 to 7. Then Henderson left to go to work and the wife and I ordered some Chinese delivered and spent a quiet night at home because the kid was at her dad's.

Have a great week everyone!

Whatchalookinat?!!?

09/25/02

If you look at the picture on your right you'll see that I've really been putting myself into a strict workout and diet regimen. Hey, those protein shakes buff you out fast.

The landscaping for my front yard is finally finished! Whoo hoo! I laid out the last of the mulch today. The only thing left is hammering the driveway lights back in where they were before this whole fiasco. It's looking good though.

My wife's van got fixed then she noticed it shaking again as before. She's taking it back to the repair place tomm. Boy, that was $700.00 well spent. I hope they get it fixed. We are a two car family for sure. Between my f*cked up work schedule and dropping off the kid and shopping and errands etc. losing a car would really hurt us.

Anyway, enjoy the rest of your week.

09/24/02

It's a little after midnight and I'm at work. Sheesh, where else would I be on a Monday? I just watched the Bucs beat the Rams 26 to 14. Whoo-hoo! It's nice to live in a town again that has a winning sports franchise. I used to live in Baltimore where we had the Orioles baseball team go from being World Series Champs to the lowest team in the division. It's sad to say but it's still that way now. Luckily we have the Bucs to offset the embarrassment of the Devil Rays. God, even the name is sh*tty! I love baseball and I've had the chance to see some of our best players play in some of coolest stadiums in the U.S. I guess I just got spoiled and now I have to watch crappy players play in a giant diaphram called Tropicana Field. Woe is me. Anyway, yay for the Bucs.

My buddy Jeff came into town today. We're going to hang out on Friday and I'm throwing a little party for him this Saturday. My wife has opted to stay at my mom's place that night. Yeah! Bring on the strippers and whores! We're gonna make a porno! (just kidding, baby.) I'll fill you all in on the details the following Monday.

I fianally got to watch a little of the Pulp Fiction collector's edition. I watched some of the extras and then about a half hour of the film. Is it the f*cking greatest film ever made or what? I liked being able to see some of the deleted scenes. Some of them were in the screenplay which I enjoyed reading and it was cool seeing them put on film. I'll try to watch more in a couple of days.

I'm going to be busy this week trying to finish up some yard projects in time for my wife's baby shower this Friday. My boss wants me to come in early Weds. and Thursday so it doesn't leave me much time before work. Sigh, but it's got to get done. I'll def. earn my partying on the weekend.

I took the "How are you going to die?" quiz and this is the result. Follow the link and see how you do. Have a nice week everyone.

09/22/02

Well I'm back from the exciting trip to Kissimmee. To be honest, we got back on Friday but who's counting? Last night my Honey and I went to the wedding of a close friend and co-worker. It was a Catholic wedding so the ceremony wasa little boring and dry but the reception was really fun. It was nice to dress up and go somewhere adult with my wife. We got to dance to some slow songs and the food was good. It was also cool to hang out with some guys from work and get a little goofy with them. Everyone I invited to my party next Saturday seems to be coming. It should be a blast.

Thursday was great! Everyone who went to Medieval Times had a fun time. We weren't sure if Boo would like it but she did. They even had a little village for people to explore outside of the main castle. We paid our admission then paid an extra $5 dollars to be upgraded to the first 3 rows. Well, since we got there early we got FRONT row, CENTER! Wow, talk about having the best seats in the house.

The food was good as well. The meal started with a nice beef soup, then for the main course everyone got a quarter of a chicken and one spare rib. You also got a large piece of toasted garlic bread and a half of a seasoned potato.Keep in mind that there isn't any silverware. Everything's eaten with your hands. My kid didn't mind since that's how she eats most of her meals.For drinks you can have Pepsi products or booze. Dragon and I went with booze because when we first got there we bought these really cool silver goblets and decided to consume vast quantities of chilled mead. Yummy!

Each section has their own knight, we had the Gold & Red Knight. The knights take part in various competitions like jousting and swordplay, it's mostly Reniseance Festival stuff but it's still fun to watch while you eat. The crowd gets loud and rowdy when the battles start to heat up.Our guy did pretty well but lost the last battle. He even threw a flower to Boo. She was so excited about getting that red carnation from our section's knight. After the show the King, the Queen and all the knights came out to meet the patrons. We had our photos taken with the King and Queen and Boo had her picture taken with our Knight. Fun was had by all. If you're in the Kissimmee/Orlando area I reccommend it. It's a little pricey but worth it.

Dragon and his woman went home and Boo, my Honey and I went to our hotel room. A little background on the hotel situation, we checked in on Thursday before we went out for dinner. The first room they gave us stunk of cat piss. I went back to the front desk and got a key to another room. We went to that one and it was a smoking room and that one smelled like a ashtray. So I go back to the lobby again and this time the clerk gave me two keys and tells me that "they're all pretty much like that." Nice way to run a business, lady. The room for the first key was really musty smelling but do-able. We decided that would be the "backup room" since I was expecting the next room to smell like cow-sh*t. But we lucked out with the last one. I guess it's my fault for booking reservations on-line for a hotel I've never been to. Progress is great, huh?

09/18/02

I'm so excited, and I just can't hide it, I'm about to lose control and I like it. Tomorrow the brood and I are going to Medieval Times. If you're not familar with this unusual dining experience, to put it bluntly, you dine like it's the Middle Ages but without the filth and diseases. The film Cable Guy had some funny scenes set at a Medieval Times location. My buddy Dragon and his wife are going with us too. The wife, the kid and I are spending the night near there and are taking Boo to FAO Shwartz. It should be a fun day for all. I'll let you all in on the fun when we get back. Have a nice weekend.

09/13/02

Whooooo......scary! Ch! Ch! Ch! Ch!.....ha ha ha ha....(my written imation of the Friday the 13th music. I'm looking forward to my weekend. Hopefully the weather will cooperate and it'll rain so I don't have to work on the yard. I promised my honey I'd lay down some mulch and do some planting. Yuck! Nothing is owrse than doing sweaty work in the Florida heat. I always feel like some 18th century southern sharecropper or something.

My TV was on the fritz this past week. It's only a couple of months old and last Saturday it just conked out on me. I was livid. Luckily it's still under the manufacter's warranty and someone was out the same day. The guy was really cool but he had to take a component back to the shop and have a replacement part ordered. I went through almost a week of 36 inch withdraw. We left the empty shell in the living room and I see it sometimes just sitting there.....sigh.

But everything is ok now. The guy came back today and my world is now at peace.

I watched more of my Traffic Criterion Collection director commentary. It's really good. Steven Soderbergh is a real visionary. I was so amazed when I heard on the commentary that he shot that film in 54 days. Hell, it takes me 54 days to clean my car! It's also nice to hear about the stylization of the film from him as well. I'm sure if you've seen it you've notice how the Mexico scenes have a yellowish tint to them and the Ohio/Washington scenes are bluish. Anyway, if you haven't seen this film you're a fool. Go out and rent and/or buy it now. Go! I'm not kidding, stop looking at this f*cking computer and go watch the film! We'll be here when you get back.

I also got a nice Netflix rental on my vacation as well, Batman Beyond: The REturn of the Joker. Great flick. I'm a fan of all of Bruce Timm's work, Batman: The Animated Series, The New Adventures of Superman, The Justice League etc. He has a great sense of style that really works as a animator. I was pleasantly surprised to find one of the bonus features on the DVD was commentary with him and another animator. It was interesting to find insight into creating a film from a animation perspective. On one hand you have so much creative freedom because what you are making is drawn or computer generated but on the other hand it's very time consuming so you're usually under much more of a time restraint. I reccomend the film to anyone who's a fan of Bruce Timm's other shows or the Batman Beyond TV series.

Have a nice weekend everyone....

09/12/02

Well it's 1am and I've made it through 9/11. The wife went to the video store today and rented some dvds and videos for Boo. We watched Van Wilder until I had to get ready for work because every f*cking channel was airing something about 9/11.

Don't get me wrong, I have as much compassion for what happened last year as anyone. That day effected me a lot. I kind of hoped it would make the U.S. rethink it's dependence on foriegn oil since that was what started all this sh*t in the first place. But that's a rant for another day. Meanwhile we still drive our huge gas sucking SUV's. At any rate I'd rather think about that day with my own collection of thoughts and not have to relive those shocking TV images through the help of Peter Jennings compassionate commentary.

Is it really neccessary to have EVERY channel run some sort of special? Do they really have to have them run all f*cking day? My buddy Dragon says they might as well make it a national holiday since even our workplace had a specific "time of rememberance". I imagine they will eventually. And you know what? Give it 5 to 10 years and they'll move the "holiday" to a Monday so people can make it into a three day weekend. It'll eventually get lumped into all the other "holidays" people "kind-of remember" what they're for. Seriously, do you know why we celebrate Labor Day? Do you know its origins?

Sorry, I guess my cynicism comes from the fake sentimental attitudes that have come from that day. The country is rearing it's ugly bigot head at middle-eastern people now and cursing Muslims worldwide because a select few terrorists. It makes me sick. It makes me mad I have to live in a country that can rally itself up that way. We live in a country that now makes people of middle eastern descent go through more rigorous aiport screenings just because of thier religous and ethnic backgrounds. It's like,"Oh, you have dark skin and worship god in a different way than we AMERICANS do so I'm gonna have to pull you aside and check your *ss to see if you've got a bomb up there." Don't even get me started again on this whole pseudo-Nazi "Homeland Security" sh*t Bush has started. I adored the great plan of pulling Afgan-American men from thier homes just to "check" to see if they have any information or ties to terrorism. Thank god that the percentage of Afgans living in the U.S. is pretty small, could you imagine if the terrorists were hispanic or even "shudder" black? Somehow I don't think this witch hunt would have as much politcal backing as it does. A lot of guys in Washington wouldn't want to lose that nice "urban" vote. America, land of equality unless someone from your ethnic background blows up some of our landmarks.

09/09/02

Well I'm back to the druggery of work. My vacation was pretty good. I didn't really go anywhere. My father is now a professional photographer and he took some pictures of the wife, the kid and me on 08/30. We did them on Pass-A-Grille Beach at sunset. My aunt, my cousin and my cousin's boyfriend came along as well. My dad just e-mailed me some of them and some look kind of cool because we had this wicked storm brewing up behind us in some of the pictures. It started to rain so we went to Crabby Bill's for a nice dinner. Crabby Bill was even there, he didn't seem to be very crabby that night. It was cool to hang out with my cousin as she's about to pop out her first kid at the end of this month. I'm pretty happy for her as she's wanted a child for a long time.

I say "pretty happy" because she's not married to the guy she's having the kid with. I'm not even sure if they're dating or not. He's a really nice guy but you never know what the future will bring and there's something to be said for the stability that marriage brings when a kid is involved. He seems to be a really stand up guy so it should be cool. To quote Forrest Gump,"That's all I got to say about that."

That Sunday the wife, the kid and I drove up to Spring Hill. Whoo-freaking-hoo. We were dropping the kid off at her Auntie's for the weekend so my wife and I could paint the kid's room without having to have a certain 3 year old "help". My kid LOVES my sister-in-law, almost more than her Grammy or Na-Na. Well, as soon as we got there she said, "Bye mommy, bye daddy. I'm gonna play with Auntie now. You can leave." I laughed my ass off but my wife wasn't as amused. We left our very independent kid at Aunite's and drove home. I had some nice Chinese and the wife had Taco Hell for dinner. Then we got the kid's room ready for painting.

The painting went off without a hitch. It only took about two hours. We painted it in "butter" and when the room was done it looked good. But just to let you know....I F*CKING HATE PAINTING!!! Whew! Glad I got that off my chest.We had some pizza delivered and moved all of my kid's stuff back into her room.

Tuesday, my wife and her mom met my sister-in-law at her work and did the kid exchange. They brought Boo home and we were all glad that she really liked her room. We stayed in for the rest of the day just to decompress and just to chill out at the ol'homestead.

We met my dad on Wenesday afternoon at Sunset Beach so he could take more pictures since we were rudely interrupted by Mother Nature last week. On our way there I picked up a kite to fly with Boo thinking it would give her something to do since we weren't going to go swimming at 5pm. We were a little early so I put the kite in the air. My kid started going nuts! She immedately wanted me to bring it back in. I told her no and that I wanted her to calm down. Well, that wasn't the right thing to do because that made her cry. I kept asking her why she wanted me to bring the kite in, why was she afraid of the kite, but she wouldn't tell me.Oy Vey! Kids, it's like running a miniature insane asylum. Hey, I never liked clowns, neither does my mom. They creep me out, with the white face paint and the drawn on smiles. I guess we all have our phobias.

The thing about the pictures though is my wife is unhappy with them no matter how they turned out. She got her hair cut last week at one of the more cost efficient hair cutting chains and they cut her lovely locks a little too much for her. I like it and I can keep telling her I like it but she keeps calling me a liar for saying that I like it and so goes on the vicious circle called marriage. We looked at the pictures that my dad e-mailed and she didn't any of them because of the hair issue. At least it was a nice sunset though.

Tommorow: More of my vacation, recent film opinions and why I should of stuck with a Sony TV....

08/27/02

The wife started to complain about her shoulder on Sunday. She left work early on Monday and went to the doctors. The doctor told her to go see a chiropractor today and they diagnosed it as a pinched nerve. I stayed home with the kid and Boo let me sleep until about 9:30 a.m. My wife came home shortly after and I slept again until 11:30a.m.

My wife goes back to the chiropractor tomorrow and then she's taking Boo to Chuck E. Cheeses for a play-date. I'll be able to sleep in undisturbed and then maybe I'll watch a Netflix DVD before I have to go to work.

I'll be on vacation next week. Woo-hoo! Part of it will be fun stuff and part of it will be work. The wife and I will be painting and fixing the house up. But were also going to visit her sister up in Spring Hill, Florida. Those trips aren't too exciting for me. Spring Hill is one of those towns where the Super Wal-mart opening was the biggest news in twenty years. It's kind of in the boonies. But my kid loves her Auntie, so we'll go. That's what family is all about.

I saw a great DVD over the weekend. It was called Anatomy of a Murder. It starred James Stewart, Lee Remick and a very young George C. Scott. I'm a sucker for a good courtroom drama and this was an awesome one. Now it's hard to find Jimmy Stewart not be wonderful in a film but I was really amazed by Lee Remick. I only remember her from her role as the unfortunate mother of Damian in The Omen. By the time she did The Omen she was in her mid-forties. In Anatomy of a Murder she was quite young and I'll have to admit I was smitten by her and the character of the slutty wife of the murder suspect that Jimmy Stewart defends. It was produced in 1959 but it almost could have been filmed yesterday as it's pretty frank with the subject matter. I highly recommend it.

08/22/02

Well another Thursday is here. Im looking forward to the weekend. Tomorrow, the wife, the kid and I are going to my Aunts for a BBQ. Itll be nice to see family. Saturday, the kid and I have the house to ourselves. I think well go to MacDonalds for drive-thru and then go back to the house for a gander at the Spy Kids DVD we rented earlier this week.

I got a slight boost to my DVD collection on this week. Tuesday Best Buy had a special; if you bought the Jackie Brown and Pulp Fiction collector editions you got From Dusk Till Dawn for free. Being a Tarrantino fan I leapt at the sweet deal. Im so excited that Pulp Fiction is getting the DVD treatment it deserves. Both of the collector editions are packed with cool stuff. The only thing missing on them is some commentary by Quentin himself. He's one director I'd like some insight on.

Well, that night at work I noticed a coupon sticker on the Jackie Brown DVD that said if I bought Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown Id get an instant five dollars off at the register.

The quick-witted clerks at Best Buy didn't clue me in so I called them up and someone there told me to stop by on Wednesday and they'd credit me the difference. That was cool. Now I got all three DVDs for a little over $35. Nice!

I went to Best Buy, the wife and Boo went to Hollywood Video to rent Neverland and Spy Kids. I got my credit and walked next door to the video store. Lo and behold, Hollywood Video was running a 2 previously viewed DVDs for $20 and 4 previously viewed VHS for $20 sales. I was in heaven! I got snatch, The Wonder Boys, Harry Potter and I picked up the 1931 Dracula for my mom.

In case anyone is wondering, yes I did update my film list. I'm also now listing if the copy of the DVD or VHS is a special or collector edition or if its part of the Criterion Collection library. My Criterion Collection copies of Robocop and Silence of the Lambs are pretty valuable now that they're out of print.

I forgot to mention that last Thursday the wife and I along with Grammy and Boo went to get another sonogram of my unborn child. Yet again, the kid refused to cooperate as far as letting everyone know what sex he/she is. I was really pissed. The sonogram tech told my wife that when my wife comes in for another doctors appointment shed take a gander again if she isnt busy.

I just need to know so if it isn't a boy, I can mentally prepare myself to get excited over having another daughter. Boo is my kid but it really looks like her bio-dad will always be in the picture. As I said before I'll love him/her what ever they are.

08/20/02

Another weekend has come and gone. It was an uneventful weekend. On Friday I had some mulch delivered. On Saturday the wife went to her job and the kid and I stayed around the house. The kid helped me do some yard work. My mom came over later and watched Boo while I went to the mall to get my haircut.

While I was at the mall I ran into my old manager from Blockbuster. I worked at a branch of the chain about 6 years ago, maybe longer. Hes married now and has a little one of his own. I was one of his assistant managers. I love film so it was a pretty cool job. I do remember I had a lot more fun at work as a regular grunt than as an assistant manager. It brought back a lot of old memories. It was such a different time in my life. Now that Im married and have all of these new responsibilities it seems so long ago. I was a different person then. Dont get me wrong. I wouldnt trade that time of my life for anything. I really believe you should go through life with as few regrets as possible, youd go through life a lot happier.

On Sunday Boo and I met up with my dad and step mom in Clearwater to go on a dolphin watch cruise. It basically sucked. The boat was SOOOOO hot. If you went out on the deck you were baked by the Florida sun and if you went into the cabin where there wasnt any breeze the humidity killed you. Plus, there werent very many dolphins. When my wife got home from work we all went out to eat at one of the many country styled steak places that seem to be sprouting up like weeds in my area.

Hey, I love steak as much as any other red blooded American. But come on! There are so many restaurants that cater to that food group now. Outback, Durangos, Longhorn etcetc Jeez, and the Surgeon General wonders why heart disease is rampant in the U.S. You know there are OTHER styles of food. Would it hurt someone to maybe try something else other than burnt cow flesh?

Sorry, am I rambling on my little soapbox again? My old age must be making me cranky. Let me down some Geritol Complete and Ill continue tomorrow.

08/15/02

I just wanted to post the funniest movie poster Ive seen in years. It for The Rules of Attraction directed by Roger Avary. He directed a favorite of mine called Killing Zoe and helped write Pulp Fiction with Tarrentino. I read the book and look forward to seeing all these actors from the wholesome WB shows in a film that might make some a little uncomfortable.

08/14/02

I had a really sh*tty Monday. It started out ok. The kid was at her bio-dads so I had the place to myself in the a.m. I went to work as usual and got there in time to see my honey on her break. (We work at the same company but in diff. depts.) As I walked into her department I was met by one of her supervisors who said she was in someones office resting. I went to the office and my wife tells me she thinks she might be having labor pains. She called her doctors office who told her to go to the hospital and let them check out the situation.

I called my supervisor and told him Id be late and rushed my weepy wife to the hospital STAT! (ha!) They put us in a room in the maternity ward. The nurse hooked up the wife to a bunch of monitors and we sat and waited for about two hours. The wife then said that her back still hurt but she wasnt having any more labor pains. The nurse gave us the bottom line that was my wife shouldnt sit so much at her desk because it may cause pains in her abdomen area. Wow, all that concern and worry due to bad posture and the fact that her department is cheap when it comes to office chairs. But its better to be safe than sorry. It was nice to hear the babys heartbeat again. While we were waiting in the hospital room I put the cell phone up to the speaker and put the heartbeat on our answering machine. They told us to go home and let them know if any other pains start up. So we drove home.

My kid was at the house with her grammy by the time we got there. I called work and they told me just to chill with the wife at home and they had it all covered. (I love my dept. sometimes.) I didnt want the wife to sit at home all night and aggravate her back more so I suggested we go to the mall to have dinner and walk around. While we were there I bought my mom a birthday present and bought myself Rainbow Six for my PSone. So in conclusion, the day from hell turned out pretty low key after all.

My Sunday was nice. As stated before, the kid was at the bio-dads house so I hosted the monthly BattleTech game at my abode. Usually there are four of us for the game but Commander Ambitious couldnt make it. The game was set with Commander Dragon Commander Squee and of course, me Commander Cinemax. Again, the game ended with me getting my ass kicked. I dont know what it is with me and that f*cking game. I dont think Im that bad with strategy and planning. I do well at Starcraft and other war games. I guess I just suck when it comes to rolling dice. I was almost glad the game ended because I was just sick of the crappy luck I was getting.

With the game over we retired to the TV to watch the Milla Jovovich drool fest Resident Evil. We ordered some pizza and then my buddy Eddie came over to eat some grub and watch the zombie flick.

Resident Evil will not change the face of moviemaking as we know it. Nor will it cure cancer. But if you want a film that has the luscious Milla and you want to watch the undead get the crap kick out of them then by all means make this a rental. But dont forget to turn your brain off, there are some GLARING plot holes in this movie. As you probably already know this is a film based on a video game and I was not a great fan of the game, so that may be why I didnt enjoy it. The bottom line:

<In my old Jewish man voice> "The Milla I liked. The movie? Ehhhh, not so much."

08/08/02

Another week has come and gone. Thank god! I'm ready for the break. I worked some extra hours this week and I'm pretty tired of this stinkin' heck hole. Now it's Miller time! First round's on me!

I'm having some buddies over this weekend for some geek gaming and some movie watching. It should be fun. I'm looking forward to kicking some Battletech bootay on Sunday. Look out Squee and Ambitious, I'm coming to rape your villages and pillage your women! It'll be nice also to restart the "flick nights at Dave's". I haven't had one of those in a long while. It'll be cool to watch them on the new TV as well.

I'd like to end this broadcast day on a high note so I'm going to list:

TOP FIVE THINGS IN LIFE I'M MOST THANKFUL FOR:

1) My wife, who is always there for me. Who treats me like a king even though I don't deserve it sometimes. Who is also carrying my unborn child in her womb and is also being a pain in her ass (and other body parts) and isn't even born yet. I love you honey, more than I could ever tell you.

2) My kid. Even though I'm not her real father she makes me feel that I am. She makes me feel like I'm a better person and loves me unconditionally. I love her more and more everyday.

3) My mom and dad and their respective spouses. I don't know that many divorced parents that are cool enough to put aside old grudges enough to get together sometimes in the name of family. Well, my folks do. Holidays and family events are a lot more fun because of them. Thanks guys!

4) My friends. You know who you are.

5) My sarcastic humor that keeps me sane and makes life so amusing.

Have a nice weekend. Go call your mom and tell her you love her.

08/06/02

If you look under my intro at the top of my homepage youll see an image of the Planet Express ship trailing a banner that says Save. I put that there because the buttheads at Fox have decided to cancel this great television program. Ive decided to take a stand, because this portly TV watcher isnt going to sit idly by and watch one of his favorite shows get axed while drivel like Celebrity Boxing continues on.

The program never had a chance to begin with. Fox in its infinite wisdom decide to air it after NFL football, which was at 7 p.m. How many televised sporting events do you know of end specifically at a certain time? Well, rather than air it after the post-game show Fox would just run whatever program came on when football ended. Usually it was King of the Hill. I noticed that THAT show was not in danger of being cancelled.

Futurama is everything that "The Simpsons used to be. It's fresh, extremely funny and wickedly sarcastic. Wow, I think I'm describing myself. (ha!) It would be a damn good replacement for "The Simpsons" when that show finally goes. Which is soon I hope.

I'm sure you're thinking, What?! Dave wants "The Simpsons" cancelled? That's his favorite show!"

I want "The Simpsons" to end on a high note. If you look at television's past you'll see many shows that lingered on far, far past their prime. "M*A*S*H" and "Happy Days" comes to mind. Over the last few years the quality of "The Simpsons" has faltered. It's hasn't been any one person's fault, the program has simply run it's course. I want to remember the show as a testament to great writing, not as a steamless, over-the-hill cash cow for Fox.

Anyway, the ship image is linked to a site that'll give you several options on how to contact the *ssholes at Fox to ask them not to cancel the show. If you've never seen the show, do it for me, then watch it. You won't be disappointed.

08/04/02

Well it's about 2 a.m. on Sunday morning and I'm stuck pulling the graveyard shift at work. The hours suck but the overtime will look nice on the paycheck though. I hung out with the kid on Saturday and just stayed around the house. It rained off and on and we watched cartoons in the morning and then we played. She was a really good girl. My wife and her mom took her to Target and she was behaving there too so they rewarded her with some SpongeBob Squarepants Colorforms. I'm sure I'll get a chance to play with them when I get up tomorrow.

I hooked the stereo system back up to the rest of the entertainment center on Friday. It's nice to have stereo sound with the awesome new TV. To break it in I put on a favorite guilty pleasure "Starship Troopers".

Wow! I had put the two main speakers farther apart with the new layout and boy did it make a difference. I still haven't been able to put up the smaller surround speakers yet but even without them it's still great. That project is for another day.

The wife and I went to her doctor for another check up. Things are doing ok. I got to hear the baby's heart beat again. That was cool. We go back in a couple of weeks to see if we can get the baby's sex and to take some pictures of his/her heart. I'm still wishing for a boy, but I'll add the addendum of it doesn't matter as long as it's healthy.

I hope everyone has a nice week.

07/31/02

Sorry it's been so long since my last post. We lost our internet privileges for a couple of days last week and I'll admit it, I just didn't feel like updating from home. My wife gives me enough crap about being on the PC for gaming.

I also took last Thursday off to be with my family and because I had only gotten probably 3 hours of sleep in the last 24 hours. Work would of been impossible.

Now to the good, wait it's better than good it's F*CKING GREAT news.

I finally got my dream TV.

It's a RCA 36" TV. It's sooooo sweet. As you can see by the picture it's more horizontal than a regular television. That's set up for watching films in the wide screen format. I showed it off to my mom and step-dad by playing the pod-racing scene from The Phantom Menace. They were impressed. My wife says she wouldn't be surprised to come home from work and catch me humping the TV. Don't tempt me, honey!

It's funny though, the first film I watched beginning to end on it was a VHS (yuck!) copy of "A Beautiful Mind" starring Russell "my poop don't stink" Crowe. It was a very good movie. Did you notice that I didn't say "great"? There were a lot of parts in the film where I felt like the director, good ol' Ronnie Howard was yanking on my heartstrings to the point of defibrillation.

Some people complain about the unnecessary violence in films. That some directors put violent scenes in their movies just for the shock factor. Excessive violence doesn't bother me that much. I thank my youth for desensitizing me to the horrors of modern cinema. I also think that a director can be found guilty for putting in too many excessive, weepy and overly emotional scenes in films. I point at "A Beautiful Mind" as a case in point. I wanted to put a gun to my head at the tacked on "everyone lived happily ever after" ending. All it takes is a few over the top tearjerker scenes to turn a possible GREAT film into a good one. The makers of "A Beautiful Mind" can cite a lackluster moviemaking year for the Oscar victories.

07/22/02

Well I didn't find out if the DNA in my wife's uterus is XY or XX. Crap! The kid just wasn't cooperating. It was kind of strange going to the doctor's and having to cram into the ultrasound room with my wife, her mom, the kid, my dad, my step-mom and my mom to see my wife's ultra sound.

It was cool to see my dad get excited about the future grand kid prospect. He took a lot of shots while we were there. I think he's glad he's getting a "real" grandchild.

Both him and my mom treat my kid like she's really "their" grandkid. I feel she's really mine, too. But unfortunately every weekend I get reminded that she isn't when my wife and I have to hand her over to her butthead father. It makes me so happy that my parents are able to see her as a part of my wife and me. Biologically she isn't but I'm the one who helped potty train her, I'm the one who goes to her in the middle of the night when she has a bad dream and I 'm the one who plays with her almost everyday. She calls me Daddy because as far as were concerned I am. The law may say I'm not but I don't give a f*ck what the law says.

Damn Straight!

But I digress.... The ultra sound was awesome and surreal. It was amazing looking at my future child moving around inside my wife. I kept reminding myself that I helped create that child. That very soon it would be born and I kept realizing the great responsibility that was going to be thrust before me. It was a little uncomfortable having all these feelings with my folks standing a foot away from me. But it was cool as well. We're doing another one in a few weeks and hopefully we'll know the sex then.

I watched a great film over the weekend. It was a 1944 film called "Double Indemnity" with Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck. It was a recommendation from a film book I read by the director Martin Scorese.

I love film noir from the 40's and 50's. Everyone is corrupt, even the heroes. The films are dark and moody. Plus, EVERYONE smokes. I think movies from that period were underwritten by the tobacco industry. I love in "Double Indemnity" how the film really uses the shadows to set the mood and somber atmosphere. The plot basically involves an insurance agent plotting to kill a woman's husband to collect a life insurance policy. Fred "My Three Sons" MacMurray plays the agent. It was cool seeing him as a kind of sleazy guy. He always is seen as a good guy in his later roles. He was kind of an ass in "The Caine Mutiny" though. Billy Wilder who also directed the Marilyn Monroe films The Seven Year Itch and Some Like It Hot directed the film.

I saw MIB II last week as well but I'll talk about that tomorrow.

NITE!!

this pic makes something as hard as a surf board

07/18/02

I don't know why but for some strange reason I really want to see this movie. It's weird, I'm not even a fan of surf pictures.

Tomorrow the gang (mean my wife, my kid, my mom, her mom etc.) and I are going to the doctor's to find out if I'll be the father of a strong junior or a nubile beauty queen who I'll have 10 ulcers about when she's a teenager and dated. I'll probably have ulcers over a son when he's a teen as well but that'll be over what he's doing to and in my car on weekends.

07/16/02

I hope everyone had an enjoyable weekend. I was able to have my yard sale on Friday but Saturday it got rained out. The funny thing about the whole "yard sale" experience was seeing all the yard sale vultures that come out of the woodwork to find a good deal. I specifically put that the yard sale was going to start at NINE a.m. I had senior citizens pulling up in front of my house at SEVEN. When I told one old man that I didn't have stuff ready yet he asked if he could come into my house and look around, the gall of some people! Then you get the old biddies that want to haggle over stuff that you're selling for 25 cents. By the end of Friday I was praying for rain on Saturday.

Friday night I put a sign on my front door with big bold letters stating that Saturday's yard sale is starting at NINE a.m. and not earlier, if you knock on my front door before that I'll break your f*cking arms like dry twigs in autumn.

No one knocked. But around 8:30 a.m. it started to really pour down rain. God must have heard me on Friday.

A little after nine my kid's biological dad called and said that my kid was throwing up and wondered if we wanted to pick her up early from his house. My wife left to go get her and I was busy in the kid's room changing her sheets in case she wanted to take a nap when she got back. While I 'm working I hear a knock at the door. Keep in mind it's still raining and I'm still in my boxer shorts. I wait a few minutes hoping whoever the bozo is at the door will get the hint that since are no items to buy in front of my house and due to the fact that Noah is building a ark down the street that there is NO yard sale today. Nope! They keep knocking and after a few minutes an old man OPENS my front door and starts saying,

"Hello? Is anyone home?"

I come out in my boxers with my gut hanging out and ask,

"Can I help you?"

"Are you having the garage sale today?"

"Does it look like I'm having a garage sale today?"

"Uhhh...."

"Did I say you could come into my home?"

"Uhhh...."

I think he got the hint and left. That made my morning. I would have been nicer to him if he hadn't trespassed into my house. He should be lucky he didn't try that sh*t if my wife had answered the door.

My kid came home and didn't get sick once. I think she just missed her mommy and her better daddy and all was right with the world.

07/11/02

T.G.I.T!!!!! For those of you who don't work Monday through Thursday that means Thank God It's Thursday. Tomorrow the wife and I are having a yard sale. We should pull in a tidy sum. We're using the money to buy a changing table for the (future) babys room. Friday night the wife her sister and I are going to see "The Sum of All Fears". I hope it's good. I've gotten so many conflicting reports about it. I'm keeping this short because I've got work related things to take care of.

Have a nice weekend.

07/08/02

Well, my nice little vacation is over and it's now time to go back to work. I had an extra 2 days off in addition to my usual 3.

Wednesday, the wife, the kid and I went to Ellington Outlet Mall with my mom and step dad. The wife and my mom found some good deals. I didn't find any bargains there so I made them go with me to the regular mall near our house. I bought myself some new Teva sandals. They were kind of expensive; the wife almost had a stroke when I told her how much they were. Keep in mind, if I'm not at work they are the ONLY shoes I wear.

I had a really nice July Fourth, thanks for asking. My buddy Dragon and his wife came over and we had some burgers, hot dogs, and homemade potato salad. We played some games and went down to Gulfport to watch some fireworks that night. Low key and real nice. Just the way I like it.

I went to my dad's on Sunday with my kid. She likes the pool there. It was a nice quiet afternoon. Later that night my dad and step mom met up with my cousin Shea and her boyfriend at my house. It was the first time that my dad has been to my house since my wife and I fixed it up. They really liked the living room furniture we got at Rooms To Go.

One sour note, my kid got one of those glow necklaces when we went to Gulfport to watch fireworks. The necklace must of sprung a leak and she got some of it on our NEW living room coffee table. That stuff was like acid or something because it took off the finish and now there are little spots on the table. It sucks because we've only had the table a couple of months. Oh well, when we have the second kid we won't be able to have anything nice.

Speaking of second kid, I got to hear the baby's heart beat when I went to my wife's doctors appointment on Friday. It was a little surreal. I guess the impact of all this really won't hit home with me until my wife is in the delivery room. Later this month we're going to find out what sex the future kid is. I'm so hoping for a boy.

07/02/02

As we thrust ourselves towards yet another BBQ smoky, fireworky July Fourth I think it's important we stand back and remember what a f*cking awesome country we live in. I also think we should realize that these freedoms that we hold so dear are slowly being chipped away at by persons that are supposed to be looking out for our best interests but instead are drafting bills and laws to take away the very freedoms that they are supposed to be protecting in the name of "homeland security".

I don't stand on very many soapboxes. I don't like to be preachy but when it comes to my American freedoms I'm pretty opinionated. You can take away my "Wet Beaver" magazine when you pry from my cold dead hands.

God bless f*cking America!

Speaking of smutty magazines, I have a July Fourth homework assignment. Over the holiday weekend try to watch the film "The People Vs. Larry Flynt". Edward Norton's character as Larry Flynt's lawyer has some great speeches about our freedom of expression and freedom of speech. Now I don't recommend gathering the whole family including Grandma and little 5-year-old Billy to watch this but if you happen to have a group of intelligent and open-minded folks around it'll make a nice holiday flick. Plus Woody is f*cking hilarious in it.

Don't blow your fingers off.

06/28/02

Sorry! I know I've been neglecting this site for a while. I have a lot to catch you up on.

Our homeowners insurance people are being complete penis lickers. (Is that one word or two?) They wanted everything that was listed wrong with our house from the home inspection repaired or our insurance would be cancelled. Bear in mind this home inspection was done BEFORE we bought the house. If we had been told about the repairs needing to be done to have our insurance we would of had the woman that owned the house do all the repairs BEFORE we bought the house. So now we have do all the repairs and pay for it.

My stepfather and mother came over on the weekend to help us. My step dad is great; he did all of the re-caulking of the windows himself. My wife and mother tried to help but they gave up because neither of them could do it as nicely as he could. A professional couldn't of done it any better.

Most of the things listed on the home inspection were bull crap stuff anyway. It was stuff that happens to a home from age. But since it was listed it had to be fixed. What really burns me up is the fact that the bitch at the agency says we still may be dropped even though we had the home inspector come out and verify everything was fixed. Assholes!

So, if my weekend wasn't filled up enough I also had another project to fulfill over my "break" from work. My wife and mother decide to buy a swing set for my kid. We originally agreed to have the company that the toy store recommended deliver it and put it together. I hate working outside in the summertime so I agreed to get it with the understanding that I did not have to put the monstrosity together in the hot Florida sun.

The price to deliver the swing set and put it up was about $180.00. Which in hindsight isn't too bad. But my wife complained that we weren't made of money and her sister said that my brother in law would come over and help me put it up.

I had a buddy from work that owned truck help me pick it from the toy store and bring it home. The next day on Saturday my brother in law and sister in law were supposed to be at my house around 11am. Well they showed up around 1 o'clock and we start to work on the swing set about 1:30.

I guess it was a combination of working in the heat and the crappy directions that caused my brother in law to begin to behave like kind of a dick while building the set. He was pissed about the fact we had already laid some mulch where we wanted to build the set on and he was pissed about the hard to follow instructions and ill made construction supplies. I tried to do the best I could about the mulch situation and raked out a large square for him to work in. While we were putting it together I hammered in a bolt in wrong into some wood and he barked at me for about 5 minutes because "I wasn't making this any easier for him." I bit my tongue and continued to work. Around 5pm we finally decided to call it a day because it started to rain. The playground wasn't done but by that point I didn't care. Keep in mind the 35 bags of mulch my mother and wife brought over didn't magically levitate into my backyard, I lugged them over there myself that morning. I said goodbye to my in law siblings and took a shower.

I mentioned my brother in laws behavior to my wife that night and she confessed that he might have been VOLUNTEERED by his wife for this job. I told my wife if the tables were turned I wouldn't have wanted to do either. My brother in law is a pretty nice guy usually and this explains his rather short temper that day.

On Sunday I finished the swing set and put down some more mulch that my mother and stepfather had brought over. I think my mom has some sort of mulch fetish because the more mulch I put down in the backyard she would keep telling me that it wasn't enough.

06/25/02

I found a cool link on WilWheaton.net that lets you design your own Lego person. I did some models of some friends and family. The link is at the bottom of the pictures.

even as a Lego I still need my 2 liter of Coke!

here's my buddy Dragon....

Here's my buddy Henderson....

here's my kid....

don't they make a Lego version of Trading Spaces?

my beautiful wife

http://www.reasonablyclever.com/

06/19/02

WARNING!!!

Under any circumstances DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT go to see that piece of steaming dog feces disguised as a movie called Scooby Doo. I know there's a lot of hype for young and old to plunk the admission for it, but don't be suckered in. Consider yourself warned!

I saw it Friday with my mother, wife and kid. What a waste of time. I could tell that even my three year old was bored. It had so much potential too. The only high point at all was Mathew Lillard as a very convincing Shaggy. But even his character was pretty two-dimensional. Everyone else including the CG'd Scooby Doo was a waste of celluloid. I found myself looking at my watch three or four times and the film is only 85 minutes long.

I guess my biggest beef would really be that it's been marketed as a kitschy nostalgia piece for adults and kids. But it fails that on both ends. It moves too slowly for the kids except when the CG'd dog is around then it really doesn't try at all to entertain the adult audience. I saw maybe one or two "adult" jokes and they fell flat.

It makes me sad because as I said before this film had so much going for it as far as a kids film and a film for grownups with a possibility of numerous inside jokes about the show but instead were left with a 85 minute long marketing scheme to sell cereal and ice cream.

06/18/02

I'm getting new glasses!! Yahoo! I know this doesn't mean that much to all you non-glasses wearers out there but I do know that there are many who share my joy and my pain of having to wear these shackles of vision correction. I went to the eye doctor today to get my orbs checked out and I also picked out some new glasses. I also got the optional clip on sunglasses as well. Now I'll be looking studly. Oh yeah.

My friend Squee and I took a drive up to Port Richey on Sunday for our monthly "Battletech" game with our mutual friend Dragon and others. It was a game geek fest as usual. It was nice though to just hang out with the guys for once. That was how I spent my Father's Day. The kid was at her biological dad's so I didn't want to stay at the homestead alone. Squee and I left around 5pm so I could get home in time to have dinner with the woman after she got home from work.

While I was at Dragon's his brother was there with his 1 1/2 month old daughter. What a cutie! It was weird playing with a newborn and knowing I'll have one very similar in a couple of months that'll be a part of me. I got to feed her a bottle and I played with her a little. Well, I played with her as much as someone can with a 1 1/2 month old newborn, which isn't much. I like them better at 6 months, there's a little more interaction then. My wife hates it when I say stuff like that. I guess she thinks I'll get bored with ours. I keep telling her I 'm going to love the baby, I know it's not a Nintendo or something. The baby isn't going to be there to keep me entertained; it's going to be my kid for Christs sake.

Anyway, I don't want to keep dwelling on kids and stuff, so I'll change the subject.

Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back kicked f*cking ass!!! I loved it! It lived up to all the hype I heard about it. My friend Eddie went on and on about how the flick was right up my alley. He was so right.

Kevin Smith is one of those directors that you either think his films are genius or you just don't get him at all. It has a lot to do with the fact that he puts so much of himself and his tastes into the movies he makes. In all his films starting with Clerks he wrote, directed and even played a role (as Silent Bob) in them. I find his films to be great if a little pretentious.

Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back reminds me of a classic road picture with a little of a Cheech and Chong thrown in. Smith does a great job of biting the hand that feeds him by making light of the Hollywood system. I especially like the self-bashing Matt Damon and Ben Affleck do throughout the picture. You'll really enjoy the parody of the Good Will Hunting sequel.

If you don't enjoy pot humor then this may not be the film for you because there is a lot of it. I, of course am not offended in ANY way by that humor. (wink)

06/11/02

I found a cool site on WilWheaton.net that lets you design your own South Park character. Check it out:

here's my wife....

Here' mah kid....she's looks like her mom doesn't she

and to be fair here's me...

http://southpark.gamesweb.com/flash/sp-studio.html

06/11/02

Well it was another manic Monday. The company I work for announced last week that they are doing great financially and they may cut our holiday bonus in half. It sucks for my wife and I because we were going to use that money to keep us afloat while she recuperates from having the baby. Plus, I was going to use part of mine to finance a new TV.

My mother and stepfather will be coming back from Seattle this Wednesday. My stepfather was sick and went there for treatment. They've been gone since last October. I don't know who's more excited to see them come back, my wife or me.

My mom loves my kid, A LOT! It's almost sick. My mother is always calling her "MY precious angel" and other stuff like that. I think my mom is going to be surprised how much my kid has changed. When they left nine months ago the kid was still in diapers and still sucked on a pacifier. Now she's out of diapers and has given up the "binky". I'll tell you one thing, giving up the pacifier did wonders for her speech development. She's always talked, but after she stopped using the binky she's a real chatterbox now. My mom's going to be pleasantly surprised.

Tomorrow: My rave review of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.

06/04/02

Sorry! I haven't updated in a couple days. I spent last night at my mom's place while my master bedroom is getting painted. My mother and stepfather are in Seattle for medical reasons so I have the place to myself. I still would rather sleep with my lovely wife. It's kind of spooky there because no one has lived there for about 9 months. I go there once a week to get the mail or water the plants but I never stay very long. I'm staying there tonight as well because the fumes in the bedroom are too much and I don't get out of work until 2:30am so I need to get some sleep.

I finally broke down and got a PSone over the weekend. That's an original PlayStation to those not in the know. It was $35.00 used at the Electronic Boutique. That was too good of a deal to pass up. I got my wife the "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" game. I got to play it once before I left for work. It seems ok. I think she'll like it. I also picked up the classic "Die Hard Trilogy" game. I highly recommend it to you PSone players.

Sorry I haven't updated the bio page. I havent felt like writing much lately with all that's been going on in my life. I promise I'll get to it this week.

Be sure to look at the Car Noise section to see the hot tunes coming out of my cool ride.

05/28/02

I hope everyone had a nice weekend. Mine was nice and uneventful, thankfully so. Friday we did some more unpacking. My wife wonders if there'll ever be a day when we don't have to trip over boxes.

Saturday the rug rat and I went on our first walk to the movies. It was nice. We saw that Spirit movie. It was ok. I would have like it a lot more if it hadn't had all those damn Bryan Adams ballads in it. I think the filmmakers felt every poignant scene had to climax with a heart wrenching song. I cringed every time I heard that freaking Canadian voice came out of the speakers My kid enjoyed it though. (The movie, not Mr. Adams.)

That night the whole brood took a trip over to Rooms To Go and we managed to put ourselves another $1500.00 in debt buying a living room set. Since we bought the new house we've been opening accounts at Home Depot and other places. Wait until X-Mas and I buy my dream TV. I'm so proud to be an American.

The wife's really starting to show now. She went out yesterday and bought herself a new maternity wardrobe at Sear's. I kind of got a little pissed at first because of all the money we're spending but after a while I knew it made her feel better about herself. She's been working so hard at getting the house cleaned up. She deserves it.

05/23/02

I finally hooked up the TV, VCR, DVD player and the stereo. I still can't figure out why I waited so long. Something subconscious, perhaps? I dunno. I'm going to walk the kid on Saturday to see Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron. It looks like it'll be enjoyable enough for both of us and I want her to like going to the movies. We only live 2 or 3 blocks from an "ok" movie theatre. It'll be nice to walk to the movies.

The wife and I bought a new bed today. We're going KING size now! The wife and I are both bed hogs so it'll be nice to finally be able to really spread out when we sleep.

It is so great to have both HBO and Cinemax (or as I call it Skinamax). I can almost always find something to tape to add to the vast flick collection. I saw a good movie last night called Ginger Snaps. It's about two gothic sisters and what happens when a werewolf scratches one of the girls and starts to change. It's indy film, but it has some great performances and a tight script. Try to catch it if you can.

Have a nice weekend.

05/20/02

Home sweet home....

Well we've moved! The new house is awesome. Windows everywhere. My cats, my kid and my wife love it. I haven't set up the DVD player yet so I haven't watched too much TV. It's so refreshing to be in a home where you don't hear neighbors outside talking loudly or the clomping of people above you. All four walls and the ceiling are all mine. The only thing that sucks right now is the wife being a little on edge because our bed broke during the move so now we're on the floor. The kid has yet to get used to her new room so tonight is a little tense. What makes it worse is I'm at work right now and she's on her own in the house by herself. I'll be home later but I can tell she wants me there.

I saw Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. I watched it at a theatre that plays it digitally. I liked it a lot. I was much better than The Phantom Menace. But it wasn't too difficult to top that. The Jedi battle at the end really made the film for me though.

The low point was any scene that had any "real" dialogue. That means any parts with Padme and Anakin. Lucas just can't write dialogue. He needs to realize that. Hes great behind the camera when it comes to action and general storytelling but when it comes to humans interacting he sucks, big time.

I also saw Snatch on cable over the weekend. What a great movie! It's definitely on my list of future DVD purchases. Mr. Madonna whos also known as Guy Ritchie directs it. He directed another favorite of mine Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. He reminds me of a British version of Quentin Tarrentino. Snatch and Lock,.... are both complicated heist pictures that take place in London.

I purchased the Criterion Collection copy of Chasing Amy on Sunday. I couldn't pass up the $12.99 price tag for such a great film. I'm going to watch it as soon as the DVD player gets set up. Who knows when that'll be?

Have a good week.

05/11/02

Packing.... packing.... packing...That's all my life is! If it belongs to me, throw it in a box and seal it with tape. That was my weekend. Thankfully I'm almost finished and if all goes well then the kid, the wife and I will be in our new home by Wed. night. (Send some good MoJo if you can!)

The wife had an ultra sound done when she went to the doctor. I now have the first photo of the newest member of the clan. Everything is going ok. The wife is starting to show a little. On the upside, her boobs are getting bigger. Yay for me!

I watched Caddyshack for the millionth time. I can watch that friggin film again and again and never get tired of it. So much comic genius compressed into one movie. It kind of makes me sad though to look at Chevy Chase and Bill Murray then as the guys on top of the comic game and as the has-beens they are now. It's a shame. Murray especially kicked ass in that movie as Carl. That movie will always be in my top 10 funniest films

05/08/02

The wife and I got into a tiff today. I won't go into the details but it got pretty rough. I guess the impending move, the impending pregnancy and my health is starting to get to us mentally. I hate it when we fight. It's hard for me to censor myself and I almost always say something I regret later. Luckily, I know my wife realizes that she and my daughter are the most important things in my life. Maybe I should show her more often.

I went and saw Spider-man today before work. Talk about an awesome movie! I love it when I watch a film and can't find any real flaws. Spider-man is no Citizen Kane but it's an all-around good movie.

There were a lot of critics blasting it for taking too long to build up the story. Many were saying it stayed too long on how Peter Parker developed into the costumed hero. It does take a long time, I'll agree. You don't see the real Spider-man until about 45 minutes into the picture. But I didn't have any problem with it though. I just think that a lot of film critics forget that even a summer blockbuster can have good character development.

Ouch! That's Hot!!!!

05/06/02

I had a pretty uneventful weekend. Thursday, my lovely wife informed me that my daughter's biological father would NOT be picking her up for his every other weekend visitation, which is Saturday to Monday. Evidently he's sick. I'm kind of glad he told us. If Boo picked it up then we'd have an ill 3 year old and that's just not pretty situation.

Well that nixed my plans that I had with my buddy Nathaniel, which had been made 2 months in advance. It kind of pissed me off but at least I got to spend time with my kid and put in some computer game time.

Boo and I built a tent in the living room and went "camping". I wanted to take her outside but Tampa Bay is having terrible heat wave. It's only May and we're already in the high 90s! I did my best not to make my kid a tater tot with some indoor games like tag and hide and seek.

On Sunday evening I did take her with me to take out the trash and made a quick pit stop at my condo complex playground. She went down the slide a couple of times and then I chased her around a little. It was almost 8pm so we went home, took a bath and settled in for another amusing episode of The Simpsons.

I can't wait to move into our new house so Boo can play outside pretty much whenever she wants. It's cool we have a screened lanai that we're going to put a jungle gym in so the kids can get fresh air and not have to be sucked dry by skeeters.

The big move is only a little over a week away. The wife and are still working on "Operation: Pack". It's so cute to start packing something and have Boo run over to help. I just want to scoop her up and kiss her because she truly wants to help and it's nice to see such pure and honest love come from someone. She's too little to have ulterior motives or any other ugly adult emotion yet.

I'm still on my diabetic diet. It sucks but I'm sticking to it. More news on that later.

Have a good week.

the can is red because it's filled w/ EVIL!!!

the foul red temptress, how I dispise your sweet nectar!

05/02/02

I got some bad news today. I went in to get blood work two weeks ago per my doctor's instructions and Tuesday her office called me to make an appointment to see her this week. I saw her today and she said I only have 3 weeks to live. Ha! Got you! No, she said told me that I'm diabetic. Not to the point where I have to take insulin shots but I have to take pills and I really have to watch my diet. I told my doctor I watch my diet all the time. I watch my hand pick up the Big Mac and then I eat it. (insert rim-shot here)

I also can't drink soda anymore. This where I'm really going to hurt. I love Coke. I mean really love it. I'm such a junkie of it in all its delicious forms. Whether it's an Icee, Slurpee or a Burger King Frozen Coke they'll all be missed by yours truly.

This is also a little hard on me mentally as well. This is the first time I've really experienced real health problem related to my age. I won't go into some "movie of the week" speech on how this illness has given me "a whole new look on life" but it has made me think on how I want to be around for my family. Now that I'm going to be a dad again I'm starting to really look at how my actions that I do now will affect the future.

But on the up swing of this I think it'll make me eat a hell of a lot better and exercise more. My eating habits have gone to hell in a hand basket in the last few years. Having toddler in your life makes you pretty familiar with the McDonalds menu board.

I know this is hard on my wife because now she'll worry about this as well as being pregnant and the big move coming up. I keep telling her it'll be ok and she says she knows. But I can tell she's fibbing a little. We've gone through so much together in such a short time I know this'll pass as well.

Talk to ya'll later.

04/30/02

Well, since my wife is now carrying my spawn and we're getting ready to make the big move to Casa de Dave things have become a wee tense at the condo. The wife is having morning sickness a lot. Why do they call it morning sickness anyway? My wife gets it noon, evening and overnight. It should just be called "The Sickness". That way ALL the bases are covered. I still love her though. She's so good to me.

I watched the collectors edition of Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Wow! What a great testament to the late, great 80's. The film holds up very well. Sean Penn's character of "Jeff Spicolli" is a true cinema icon. I can't wait to watch it again with the director Amy Heckerling and writer Cameron Crowe commentary. This weekend the kid goes to her dad's so I'm going to watch My Dinner With Andre. I've never seen it before but I've heard it's good.

Hope everyone has a good week.

04/24/02

I've had a busy week so far at home and at work. The only things that have kept me sane have been the guys at work cracking my shit up and the fine folks at the wilwheaton.net message board. There are a lot of cool people there. I tried the board at joblo movies and all the people seemed kind of snooty and assholish(is that right? maybe assholeish?) ANYWAY! The WWDN messge board movie forum is where I hang out and it's nice to talk to people who love film as much as I do.

Going to the movie forum has kind of made me miss my friend Dan. He loves film as much as I do. We went to high school together and kind of drifted apart after graduation. We drifted together again a couple of years later after I moved back to Maryland. We are really on the same wavelength. We share a lot in common with tastes in music, movies and humor. He's a cool guy. I made him the best man at my wedding. He lives in Portland, Oregon now. We still keep in touch.

A fond movie memory with Dan-

We went to the Charles Theatre in Baltimore to see NOT just one but TWO 3-D porn movies. A couple of other friends went as well and it was so much fun. Both movies were the old school 70's pornos so they had that weird techno-color look to them. The 3-D wasn't good at all but everyone would just crack up when a leg or a giant penis would "come out of the screen". It would be funny too when a guy in the movie would blow his load out into the audience because everyone would yell "Oh no!" or "Look out!" then hide from the oncoming(ha!) debris. It became like a "Rocky Horror" experience. That was a really great night. I remember it fondly.

RENT IT! You won't be sorry!

04-22-02

I convinced the wife to let me buy the DVD of The Emperor's New Groove. I told her I wanted it so the kid could watch it but I really bought it for me. I had borrowed the DVD from my buddy Ed before so I knew I loved it already. The kid and I put the the now traditional sleeping bag slumber party thing while the wife zonked out in our bedroom. Boo stayed up for the whole thing this time and kept asking me if the llama was ok whenever any cartoon violence involving him came afoot.

It's a very likable film with a lot of complex humor. I laughed my ass off when ever Kronk (Patrick Warbarton) was onscreen. I loved that he would make his own theme music.

We had the home inspection for our new house. It went over pretty well. I have a habit of expecting the worst whenever life is going my way, so I was expecting the home inspector to find a indian burial mound under the house or some toxic waste in the toilet. But lo' and behold it was ok. The seller's have to fix some stuff but it's all pretty easy stuff. May 15th(moving day) here we come.

04-18-02

Hey everyone!

Well, the wife and I are making the big move soon into our new house. My kid will have her own room as well as the future addition to our clan. He or she will be making his or her first appearance in the beginning of Dec.

With the move coming up in May and the kid going to her bio/dad's I plan on having a little moviefest this Sat. night when the wife hits the hay. I'm gonna watch my Netflix rental of Wonderboys. I also plan on watching a couple of other dvds that I've purchased but haven't had the chance to watch as well. The dvds and a couple of Guinesses should round the night out nicely.

Speaking of Netflix, I can't tell you how much I love that service. The rentals come pretty fast and the selection of dvds are awsome. If you love films and are tired of the crappy selections at Ballbusters etc then give them a try. You get the first month free. Sheesh, I sound like a friggin commerical.

Just watched Atlantis:The Lost Empire with the wife and kid. We opened up a sleeping bag out in the living room grabbed some pillows and popped some popcorn and threw on the dvd.

My wife and kid managed to stay awake for the first 45 minutes.

I loved it though! I think it was the best Disney feature since The Emporer's New Groove. Action packed, smart and it didn't have that "kid touch" that the Disney likes to tag on to make the film more family friendly. I picked it up previously viewed at Ballbusters for 15 bucks. Well worth it.

Talk to y'all later!

Dave