MNAH

The geekiest thing I’ve ever done was to read an eBook of “Snow Crash” on a Compaq Pocket PC.  That one will be hard to beat – and I have done loads of activities deem-able as being “geeky”.  Not much nowadays, but that’s only because geek work requires idle time – and that’s one thing there’s not much laying around in my house or pockets or car.  Next week “Avatar” (I feel so pompous putting double quotes around movie titles – er, titles of films..  heh-heh) comes out.  Not something I’ve been really all that giddy over – maybe because of “Titanic” (which I don’t hate..  the sinking ship scene that lasted for, what, about an hour? – was super) but he did create one of the greatest sci-fi action movies— FILMS ever.  You know, “Aliens”.  That movie rocked my existence.  So, a few weeks ago I announced to my work peers I am taking the 17th and 18th off.  Yeah, to see a frakking movie.  (don’t even try to tell me “frakking” was spelled wrong – it’s not even a real frakking word!)  This is the first time since the second Matrix movie came out.  I was so worked up seeing that one, I didn’t realize it was.. BAD until DVD.  It became better when the 3rd one came out – only because it was even worse.  ANYWAYS – “Avatar” is the topic right now.

It’s going to be wicked amazing fun seeing this in IMAX 3-D on the opening day.  The CGI in the trailer blew me away – what is this going to look like on the big screen?  I’ll follow up this entry after I see it, and will let you know if it’s going to be a classic or just another blockbuster movie of the month.  Cameron isn’t the greatest at writing endings – that’s the only fear on this one.  He sets up the action better than anyone – why didn’t Lucas pay this dude to make his prequels?

I’m not a total Cameron geek – the only movie that modified my mind was “Aliens”.  That movie is on very short of list of great sci-fi.  It’s a must-see.  ”Terminator 2″ was really good, but that kid…  ”Avatar” is pg-13, so I’m expecting a lot of hollywoodness – and most likely a hollywood ending.  That’s fine.  If it’s half of what some people are saying – it will be worth it.  Don’t take too much from this – I like “The Chronicles of Riddick”, too.

It comes out today, so expect an update or two.

I ordered a new pc from hp last week from their website.  This is the first new PC purchase I’ve made since 1999.  That was over ten years ago – and that machine is still in my man cave.  And, is still used every once in a while.  The old machine was a killer PC back then: a dual 733 MHz Pentium III with 64MB of 400MHz RAMBUS.  I later upgraded to 128MB – which cost me something like $500.  That was a sick toaster and was paid in full from the money earned from the last animation job I completed.  That thing was my main machine until … until..  wow – 2004.  Late 2004 – the summer before Thomas was born.  It was a Prisicion 220 (I think it was a 220 – a desktop model..).

The new machine is a quad core horse of work.  It’s little – becuase it is not going to the man cave – but the living room.  It has Windows 7 pro, and will be used primarily for Media Center.  Windows 7 rocks.  (been using the final version for three+ months).  And, BLUE-RAY!!!  OOOWWW!  About time.  No plans on replacing my dvd collection.  Will rent for a while.  Until, probably, physical media is no longer the “media” of choice. 

So – I ordered it on-line early last week.  The frakken box came in this morning.  Wow – pretty fast.  It was a slightly modified machine, but they obviously had my configuration all ready to rock out the door an into my house.  It’s a Christmas present for all of us.  So, it won’t be set up on the tv un the 25th.  In the meantime, it will be the man cave.  I am tempted to swap the old Dell workstation for the new one..  Nah – I think even Thomas would notice how slow it performs.

Monday and Tuesday was spent, an a panicked kid of way , wondering what I should do.  It’s hard going from wake up, take care of two kids, go to work, “work”, come home, take care of the same kids and things around the house.  That was about it for almost a year.  (boy #2 wasn’t here yet!)  I was a kid left in a candy store with a blank check.  By Wednesday, things were cool.  And calm.  Now, poo – it’s Friday and the vacation is over.  In two hours, I slip back into the Way it Was.  The last couple of times I did this (take some selfish time off), I always strive to not just working and daily need things.  Taking walks and reading books.  Things like that.  Nothing new this time.  At least I’m getting old at doing this and can spend some time on why the past attempts to free myself hadn’t worked out.  No, I’m not going to do that right now.  Maybe while I’m cleaning my man cave after this post – and maybe then I will solve all my woes.  Ha.  The big thing, for me, is to not take on something at 100%.  Smaller steps.

It rained today.  The foggy streets and light rain was nice.  I love walking in the rain.  It makes things quieter than it normally is.  My excursion was a quick drive down to West Seattle.  After than I walked around Ballard again, but not in the commercial area – the residential area.  Walking around in areas with nice houses with nice gardens and nice people – is more motivational than anything else.  Motivates  me to getting stool done and move into a better area and house.  That’s all.  At least I was able to get out for a while and think.  It was easy – it was quiet.

I have two boys.  The oldest will be five in eleven days.  He is starting to use language past the ultra basics, and is also starting to use pretty big words – he picks up from school.  The other day, which jumping on his bed – he abruptly stopped and said there was a bump.  I was standing just outside his room, and he hadn’t noticed me there yet.  He peeled back the covers just enough to dig in like a tick.  He said, “I am going to investigate this.”  Wow.  Not a toddler anymore.  It was funny (in the odd sense) with him – he seemed to  age really slowly.  There wasn’t any “I can’t believe how fast he’s growing’.  At least not until now.  It’s hard to see the little person who would get tired after walking halfway down the block and want “shoulders”.  He’s still small, obviously (not for his age, though – he’s about an inch short of being four feet tall).  But, he jumped from being completely helpless to the beginnings of a whole person.  He doesn’t like to sleep.  Sucks ass for me.  He would love to stay up until about 10:00 every night and get up by 6:30 the next day.  When he wakes up in the middle of the night, I tell him he needs to get back into bed – because it’s, well, the middle of the night.  He argues that one – “it’s NOT the middle of the night.  It’s just the side of the night.”  Oh.  Well.  In that case….  His big thing now is bopping off heads with bam-bams (swords – that’s a word that started when he was about one and a half).

I think I’m going to leave my new coffee house hang out and go pick him up from school (ok – pre-school) early.  Maybe do something before the hum-drums of daily life sucks the daily life outta me.

That’s it for now.

The only plans for today was to eat a Cuban sandwich and down an IPA.  Done.  That was about it.  Literally..  Two more days left of my “vacation”.  My plans for tomorrow are to take a walk at a nearby park if the sky is clear – so I can photograph the Olympic Mountains in the morning.  The Internets say the sky will be clear.  That’s good.  It will need to be fairly early in order to make the two mile “hike” (more like a stroll – there’s essentially no gain) to where I plan pulling out the camera.  One bonus living in this area is the view of the mountains.  And, we just got a lot of snow – they look really good.

So – that Cuban sandwich was painfully amazing.  I mean, what could be exciting about a goddamn sandwich?  Bread and meat and stuff spread over everything.  No way, this place rocked.  Subtle use of spices and herbs, excellent skill grilling the meat and onions.  This place from the outside looks like a tin shack just north of the main Fremont area.  About a year and a half ago, I used to go on adventurous lunches and this place was noted, but never did make it there.  What caught our eyes was how insanely busy they were.  Word on the street was “it’s good there”, that translates to “must try”.  It’s the size of my garage (which is never used to park my car because it’s too small!!) and has only five to seven tables.  It opens at 11:00 – and by noon, the place is packed and the phone ringing off the hook.  WTH?  There’s not even a sign on the front of the building saying WHAT they are.  One look at the menu, and you’ll know..

The IPA was conveniently consumed a couple of doors down at one of Seattle’s final dumpy dive bars.  Sure, there are a couple dozen of them – but they are disappearing fast.   This place is comfy and is too bright for daytime visits.  But, they do maintain a decent IPA inventory – which is really the only reason why any of us really get up in the morning.

Hmm..  tomorrow… What else, after the stroll and photo-shooting?  Maybe start reading “The Third Policeman”..  and …  that’s enough.  Stroll, read, stroll and nothing else.  Maybe some coffee.  But, I will be thinking about that Cuban sandwich..

I used to dream a lot more than I do now.  Probably what’s happening is the dreams are not being remembered.  Multiply that with nowhere as much interest in remembering dreams.  Those days were when interesting dreams were written down on a pad a paper next to the bed – and that “when” was about twenty years ago.  From around the time of being eighteen to very early twenties – that pad was there.  Most of the time a sentence or two was all that was needed – it’s weird how dreams are permanently forgotten if you don’t think about them.  It’s equally bizarre on those mornings when there is only the faintest recollection of even having a dream – when there is just one item remembered.  Repeat that item a couple of times, and it will be remembered who else was there and eventually what that other person was doing.  After spending that much time and effort, the barely remembering turns into a very long lasting memory.  Damn – I remember dreams from so long ago.  From when I was a kid of maybe five or six years old.

There was a golden era of dreaming for me.  It was immediately following my first college semester.  Full time student, new to it all, working, etc..  All that added up to maybe four hours of sleep a night (on average).  Being eighteen – it was possible to get that little sleep, somehow (how nice would that be to get away with now??).  I don’t remember having any dreams then – that wasn’t the Golden Era.  It was the break after that first semester.  When I finally started to sleep again.  I will someday write a post about that first dream I had.  Holy Fuck – it was intense and seemed to last for an hour.  And, I had no problem remembering it.  The dream was so intense, my fascination of dreams grew and became a bit of a focus of mine.  There was a stream of smaller dreams after that first one, but as I caught up with sleep – they lessened and became nothing.  There’s no way for me to tell you how incredibly intense those first couple were.  It was better than any movie – and I seemed to be slightly aware of being in a dream.  Most of the time I remember the dream.  These few were actively in the present – and hoping for something to happen was very much there and often felt heard.  That’s not the first time that’s happened – when I was younger the dreams were pretty intense.  And, I had a certain level of conscious involvement.  Nothing like what I read about in books – books about people controlling their dreams.  (non-fiction)  I would read those books trying to learn how to do it – that was when I was in high school.  Several years before the Golden Era of Dreaming.  There was also a very long period of nightmares – that spanned from maybe the ages of six to eight, or thereabouts.

What prompted this entry was a dream I had the other night – maybe two days ago.  Most of the dream has been forgotten, but one detail was a catalog I was looking at in this dream.  The time period was in the early 70’s and the catalog was for a store, similar to Sears.  The actors from the Brady Bunch were models in the catalog.  Marcia and Jan were exceptionally good to my eyes.  They were into a barely-retro 60’s get up.  Super-high boots that went up to their butt cheeks and little non-functional jackets with fur hoods while exposing their stomachs.  The piece of the dream that really interested me was a stupid little detail – it was apparently a fad of the day.  A little transparent plastic .. thing that little kids would curl up in.  Kind of like a seat, but it made no sense.  And, looked really uncomfortable.  It was vaguely in the shape of a ladybug, most of the detail was in a cover that sealed the kid in.  It just looked idiotic – to adults and parents.  But to anybody under twelve – it was the rage.  The staged look of glee on all the packed away children looked annoying.  At the same time, it reminded me of being a kid, and seeing things on TV and print that made me want them – only because the kids in the ads were enjoying them so much.  That part of the dream isn’t so earth-shattering.  But, where the hell did my mind get the idea to make transparent bowls with lids – big enough for kids to lay on their backs with arms and legs pulled tightly to their chests..  in the shape of ladybugs????

Talking out loud moves dreams from short term memory to long term, right?  Does writing blog entries about them make you dream about them again??

Trick or Treating went pretty well this year.  Thomas is going to be five in December.  Two years ago was his first try at it – and, I don’t have a clue what it was he dressed up as.  Last year he was a giraffe.   He wouldn’t wear the mask, but loved wearing the costume.   That was a change – a good change: he would never perform for anybody.  One year he had a great chicken costume, but refused to wear it when the time came.

This year he was dressed as a Black Knight.  Complete with a black helmet that fall off every time he looked up or down.  And, don’t forget about the black bam-bam-bam.  (duh – that is a sword)    It was well worn – he tested it out more than a few dozen times.  Swinging a sword is always accompanied with a “I will bop your head OFF!”

Last year he actually went to people’s doors – and held out his basket without saying a word.  This year he did the same.  Same meekness – except with a bonus.  In a clear voice he would say each time, “Happy Halloween!”   Haha – he was really getting into it.  With me getting soaked in the rain, standing pathetically a the bottom of the stairs trying to not hamper his coolness too much (wait a second… he’s not even five…).

It was really fun.  Half-way through the collection of crap, we stopped by Chocolati.  It’s a wicked good chocolate shop.  He had a kid’s hot chocolate with a bit of peppermint.  He typically hates anything with any amount of spice in it - except hot chocolate.  The preference there is to make it so minty, “it tastes like toothpaste”.  Sickening - but, it was for him and his Sweetie Loot of 2009.

In six days, I’ll be 40.  That age was always one of those ages I would never seem to get to – it was so far away.  Then again, when I was ten – being twelve seemed just as far in the impossibly distant future as being twenty-one and thinking about being 40.  It’s the beginning of the End.  If things were played out the right was, 20’s would’ve been for learning, experimenting and finding a direction to go.  30’s should have been chugging along with some goals – making money, saving money, etc.  The 40’s should be getting ready to slow down – without slowing down.  Should have been.  I can say that, even though 40 is still next week.  That is a safe thing to say because I’m sort of just out of the phase best suited for those in their 20’s.  Argh.  I recently made up my mind about something, and, to my horror, may be too late.  It was something that could have been about ten years ago.  Then again about two years ago.  Now – not too likely.  Not unless I pray the worst on somebody, which isn’t going to happen.  Poo.  Turning 40 needs to include the biggest New Year’s resolution ever.  … ..  what could that be?  :)

Okay, enough prattle.  I’ve been “should do”ing and “need to do”ing for almost 40 years.  That’s what’s going on now – as I write this.  Sure, it’s  a meaningless little blog entry – but think of the benefit of doing a little cleaning around the house so there’s less to do over the weekend would have been.

Later, readers.  Time to do something regardless of renewed regret.