Archive for April, 2005

Last night we rented Napoleon Dynamite—after a couple people recommended it to me. A few weeks ago, we rented Garden State—another recommendation. Is this a new trend in movies/story telling? It seems to me that both movies were less plot driven and more about letting these odd characters just take the movie wherever they happen to go.

I really didn’t clue into this until last night, but I immediately equated Dynamite with Garden State—as being similar in style. I think Dynamite takes the oddity further though. I had no clue what the point of the movie was supposed to be (or even that it was about to be over) until the last scene—all three guys find their soul mates, right? In Garden State, Zach Braff (and by the way, I felt much better about the movie at the end when I found out that Zach wrote and directed the film) decides in the last scene that his life doesn’t need to be only about himself.

A few months ago, we rented About Schmitt and I think, to a lesser extent, it is a similar type of movie. They all have me thinking “I have no clue what’s going on here.” I find it hard to judge the time (and timing) of the movie and the significance of the scenes. I expect some big twist to give the movie direction and it never comes. In some ways I’m disappointed at the end of these movies, but last night, I watched Dynamite twice.

So, these are character driven movies, where the point is only revealed at the very end. I dunno, I guess they still baffle me. PS: Zach’s dad was played by Bilbo.

So, the other day I was ripping a bunch more CDs into iTunes—ones that I didn’t get to in the first round of imports a couple months back—and I noticed that none of my Kim Mitchell tunes were there! Where’d he go? So, I dug out the CD again and started the ripping and it stalled. I popped the CD out and then tried it again. Another stall. Was my Kim Mitchell CD so abused that I couldn’t rip it?

Well, I tried again yesterday and noticed that even though it looked like it was stalling, it hadn’t. It was just going really, really slow. This morning, the CD was ripped. I know it took at least eight hours to rip eight songs. And guess what? Only one of them came out without a discernable glitch!

So, if anyone knows any tricks that I could employ to “fix” my ratty CD (even though it doesn’t look too bad.) let me know.

In other news, I found this online earlier this week. There’s an iTunes-ish connections, so it’s applicable to this post. Check out Randy Dinkus’ iPod adventure. You’ll be so glad you did. (The police remind me of Blue Laser.)

Yeah, I don’t know the song, just the title. So, I took Jenn to the airport this morning. She’s working at the Toronto office for two days—learning how the smarty-pants-types do things in Hog Town. I pick her up tomorrow evening. This is only the second time that we’ve been apart since we’ve been married. The last time was when Andrew took me away to Fundy for a five day camping adventure. I survived that, I’ll survive this. It shouldn’t be too tough, because or small group is meeting tonight for supper (and maybe a sauna, I hear.) That’ll keep me busy.

I’d gladly trade my banjo for one of these. Heck, I’d even use my banjo as a down payment for one. In other news, the whole tire shmozle has been taken care of. Two free tires with the purchase of two tires of my choice. I’m satisfied, Tim, you can be satisfied too.

I was in the shower this weekend (having my weekly shower) and started thinking, “Gee, it was nice of Jenn’s friend to ask her to be in her wedding party. She should get bonus points for that.” Bonus points, sure, but what’s the game and who’s keeping score. So, I started formulating The Wedding Game and seeing as the wedding season is just about upon us, you can all play it and tell me if you like it.

Here’s how it works. There’s a list of events, situations and conditions that allow people to get wedding points. Print the list out, take it to the next wedding you go to and add up your score. The following are just a few that I thought of in the shower…

• Get invited to the wedding: 5pts (If you’re a guest of an invite, no points)
• Be a member of the wedding party: 10pts (+5pts if you’re not related)
• Sign the register: 5pts
• Be a reader at the ceremony: 2pts
• Perform music at the ceremony: 3pts
• Have your name mentioned at the ceremony by the pastor: 2pts
• Give a speach at the reception: 2pts
• Get mentioned in a speach at the reception: 1pt
• Be seated at a table with a blood relative of the bride or groom: 2pts
• Join in the first public dance: 2pts
• Catch flowers/garter: 5pts

These are easy, I bet you can come up with more creative ones.

Well, I haven’t, but my Visa card has. Yesterday, Jenn and I were out of the house running some errands. We came home for a quick lunch before heading out again. While we were eating, the phone rang. It was the Visa Fraud Department. Apparently, my credit card had just been used to buy some gas ten minutes previously and they noticed that I’ve filled up a few other times in the past 24 hours.

Yup, someone made a fake card with my info on it. Kudos to the Visa people for catching this gas guzzling, movie theatre visiting, dry cleaning crook who tried to steal my credit. Apparently, I won’t be charged for any of the stuff either. I asked how it might have happened. They suggested that perhaps some place that I used my card at was robbed and the theives stole credit card receipts and made the fake card using my info. Either that, or those dishonest people at the gas station just did it on their own.

Anyways, I get a fresh new card, so it’s all okay. See, I’m easy to please.

Jenn and I were biking tonight after supper down the canal to Hogsback locks and back. On the way home, just before Dow’s Lake I thought I saw something in the canal. “Jenn, did you see that?” I asked. She did, but didn’t know what it was. It was black and about the size of my forearm and it came poking up out of the water and then slipped back down.

I suggested it was an otter, but we pulled off the trail to stop and take a look. We saw it again, about a dozen times, up and down the stretch of the canal we were beside. It was fish. They were wriggling up out of the water, like they were trying to stand on their tails. I guess they were eating bugs. But you have to wonder, for all the engery they expend getting themselves out of the water like that, is it really worth while for a bug or two?

Remember my tire fiasco from last week? Well, it’s been resolved to my satisfaction. The dude from the tire store has agreed to give us two new tires for free if we buy two new tires. I got to pick out the tires I wanted too. I did some research and then called another tire store (the same company, different location) across town and got their oppinion on tires. Funny, the guy across town quoted me $20 more per tire than the guy near us—so a little bonus. We weren’t prepared to buy a new set of tires this spring, but given the situation, I think it’s working out okay. I’ll let you know on Monday if everything finally comes together when I get the tires.

Remember earlier this month I told you I switched banks to get a free iPod shuffle? Well, I was wondering how things were going to work, becuase I had to set up either two automatic monthly withdrawls or one automatic monthly deposit and it took until yesterday (three weeks) before the auto deposit got re-routed there. Anyways, no later than the first deposit arrives (yesterday) than my free iPod Shuffle arrives (today!) Now, I’m enjoying uncertainty.

I’ve had a number of vivid dreams the past few nights. Two nights ago, I was wandering around with some hobbits. It’s no wonder seeing as I’m finishing off The Lord of the Rings before I go to sleep. I don’t think I was a hobbit in my dream, but I was just with them. Although it was a vivid dream, it was non-specific. It was night and we were traveling by a forest. I’m sure we were heading back to the Shire, because that’s where I am in the book and because it wasn’t a fear filled dream. Too bad there were none of the hearty hobbit meals that they like to often stop for.

Last night I dreamt that Jenn and I were renting two other places, in addition to our apartment on Hazel St. One of the places we were renting was a small brick bungalow a few blocks south of where we live now. We were at the small house, walking through it, and I thought to myself, “Why don’t we live here instead?” The owner was an older lady who left much of her possessions in the house. The dining room table was set and her books were in her bookshelf. I noticed one book and the cover reminded me of another book I had recently dreamt about. I think it was from the same series—the series that I’m remembering/inventing in my dreams.