Movie Review: August Rush

Review of August Rush, starring Felicity and the dude from Bend it Like Beckham.

I only added this to my Netflix queue 'cause Season 2 of The Tudors isn't out on DVD yet and I needed another Jonathan Rhys-Myers fix.

The music is very good, Robin Williams is creepy, Jonathan RM is crazy hot even though he really should just keep his mouth shut...and Keri Russell does the EXACT same stupid mouth thing that makes me dislike Scarlett Johanson.



That half-open pout that denotes wonder and awe. Can't stand it. Anyway, I liked Felicity so I'll cut her some slack.

What rating out of ten would I give this movie? Whatever review you'd give a movie that you would watch on tv if it's 3am and you can't get to sleep. Or if you've got a hard-on for Jonathan Rhys-Myers playing a rocker-turned-San-Francisco-Executive.

Prelim review: Carbonite

So I'm sure in my random bitching I've demonstrated the bad luck with computers Kraig and I have had the past few months. (NOt to be confused with the plumbing problems, which surprise surprise, the knob shower situation is jacked up again and we're showering in the cats bathroom once more..but that's another blog for another time)...

I had researched external CD/DVD burners (because part of the computer problems I've had is having internal burners not working...better off having an external one that won't be impacted by internal issues)...I definitely wasn't going to go with an external hard drive after the WD MyBook fiasco as well. Anyway, yadda yadda, I decided maybe Carbonite would be the ultimate way to go, just effing pay someone else to deal with my problem.

So here's my review so far...

You can a free one month trial, so thumbs-up for the cost factor so far (sort of hard to complain when worst case, you get what you pay for**). Initially you select the file or folder you want to back up, right click, then select Carbonite-->Back Up This File.

**side note: now logic would tell you that you don't pay anything for spyware or viruses, so that's not the worst case. However I would argue that someone else using your computer for malicious purposes is more like, THEY should be paying YOU...and since they're not, then that's NEGATIVE money which is even worse. So worst case with something like Carbonite is that it doesn't work...they didn't benefit from you, you didn't benefit from them.

After that Carbonite just runs in the background backing up the files, and alerts you with a little green icon when it's all done. They warn you that initially it'll take a boatload of time, and then after that as you modify files it just automatically backs up, no action needed.

Now I didn't truly take the time to assess their fine print. Online reviews warned me that you have to manually push video files (since I have zero video files on the computer in question, I didn't care). Same for executables (once again, not something I was worried about). The problem? I didn't note how you also had to manually push files over 4k in size.

I have a gazillion mp3s from my Napster days, and almost all are over 4k in size each. So here I was all happy thinking my files had finally been updated, a little ghetto green dot was placed on the mp3 folder indicating my files had been uploaded...and then I realized that it had only uploaded small playlist files.

So there was my dilemma...was I going to right-click and manually push each and every one of those mp3s? Well the moron that I am actually attempted to this, and realized that the RIAA was going to find me long before I actually finished up.


In my infinite wisdom, I decided the way to go would be to zip a given music folder, and the push the single zip file.

Riiggght. Did I mention that this was at like 2am on Saturday night? Did I mention that this is for the older computer that we used because the "good" PC's hard drive went dead, and now it's fixed but contains no personal files?

Zipping A music folder containing a zillion files over 4k each, let alone MANY folders, on a computer that moves at the speed of molasses combined with the stress of Carbonite running in the background made for a painful, PAINFUL process.

Well that's pretty much all I can review so far. The trial runs out in 2 weeks, so eventually I'll get off my fat ass to nag at my husband to carry the "good" PC upstairs so we can try the next phase: Operation Copy My Music Back To Me.

Imaginationland....

So i have to give serious props to Matt and Trey...of South Park, naturally. Tonight's Major Boobage episode was effing awesome...and I've never even seen Heavy Metal, the movie this episodes parodies.

Let's do a recap of times South Park has mimicked other animation styles:
(in no particular order):

1. Make Love, not Warcraft
This was more genius than funny, although Kenny wanting to play Hello Kitty Island Adventure still busts me up every time.

2. Simpsons Did It
I love love LOVE the Simpsons, so combining my two favorite adult cartoons is like pure heaven.


3. Family Guy...
I don't remember the name of the episode, but it was the one where Cartman tries to stop Family Guy from airing an image of Prophet Muhammed (pbuh). Since I'm not a huge Family Guy fan, I respect Cartman's auth-o-ri-teyyy .

A side note: for some reason as much as I don't like Family Guy, I actually really like American Dad.

4. Fun With Weapons
I don't care so much for the animation of this episode, however it's one of my favorites just because Butters takes a chinese star right in the eye. It's awesome.


5. Major Boobage
I couldn't find any pics online yet (since it just aired this evening), so here's a small clip from SouthPark.com


Only one more week to wait for another episode...tonight's compensated for the depressing Britney episode from last week...don't be makin' me feel guilty 'cause I'm Britney-obsessed like everyone else....

Foiled again by this thing called life

Have you ever just wanted to catch a frickin' break!?!

So I got Kraig an in-car GPS thing, as an early anniversary gift as well as a "thank you for getting nose surgery for me so I can finally sleep"...i did a crapload of research, and it seemed like Garmin with MSN Direct for traffic was the way to go.

Ummm, yeah. NEVER have I had a problem relating to finding anything...i'm right in the middle of San Diego and Los Angeles, two of the most major cities in the US. As far as I'm concerned, the whole world revolves around California (in case anyone cares, OC to LA is like..San Jose to San Francisco...)...

Well go figure. MSN Direct works perfectly in LA. In San Diego. Apparenly in NORTHERN orange county.

Going south, it stops in Tustin.

WTF.

This is of zero help for Kraig, who needs to know like 10 exits before that if he should get on the 5 or the 405.

Returning that sucker will be a bitch (online purchase), but I tried to find another GPS device that had good reviews AND had definite coverage in South OC and I couldn't find anything online. Oh and apparently this OC thing is a big mishap on MSN's part.

So...now do I return it, or do I have him keep in hopes that eventually they'll expand their coverage? In the meantime, it DOES provide real-time gas prices and movie listings...

Seriously MSN...you provide traffic updates for f*cking Riverside but you don't for OC?!

When will companies realize that they need to cater to me and my needs before those of others? Geezus.

Dear USPS....

Dear United States Postal Service,

I get that in the grand scheme of things, you're still just a governmental agency. I get that you have to raise the price of stamps, and I get that you have to be closed on Sundays and hours outside of business hours (which always surprises me, organizations that are purely service-based should work the OPPOSITE hours of people who work in the product industry. But whatever).

I know you've got some stiff competition with UPS and FedEx and that other one that starts with a "D".

I figure you guys took a hit when people stopped writing by hand and started emailing people. Seriously, if you think about it, that's probably ALOT of dough lost. But in return, you guys are making BANK off online sales. You guys get a decent chunk of my cash as a result of online sales I make.

I was so excited when you guys allowed people to print postage at home. And for times where I couldn't do that, your Automated Postal Machine Doodads that work 24/7 were also life saviors.

Then...this week...I discovered the stupid sticker you have on your mail slots for packages: anything over 13 ounces now has to be physically handed to a USPS counter person due to "security" concerns (really? Sounds like a fantastic challenge for some dude to create a 12oz bomb). Plus, just because you put a little sign on there saying "13oz only" doesn't mean someone with a 5lbs package of anthrax will stop and say "damn! So much for popping this baby in the mail chute".

I can't begin to explain what a pain in the ass this has been for me. If I have to actually be at a post office during your retarded hours, then I might as well not bother printing postage at home or through your so-called automated device.

One step forward, eight steps back...way to go USPS.

Another Letter to the Editor

You and your husband don't have any computer nerd friends that can help you out?? Between Ray and I we fix our share of computers for friends. Sounds like a weekend fix'er upper. :)

Dude, this IS all we know thanks to people who are total techies (and i'd like to think that have a B.Sc. in Computer Science gives me some street cred myself)...this is the end result of taking PCs and hard drives and everything to every tech person I know, including my last company's IT department.

EVERY single one of the hard drives from all of our sources has completely gone to crap, i.e. stopped spinning...once that happens, you're outta luck.

I started researching external DVD burners so I can back this stuff up to a format that won't get jacked up (i.e. something without internal components that can get screwy), but then I think we're going to go with an external company that does data backup as a service. I was thinking Carbonite, and it turns out that at the memorial service I went to today I spoke with someone who said that they've been using Carbonite for over a year and they love it...so I think that's the way to go. Plus for $50 a YEAR...that's a pretty sweet deal for unlimited stuff.

Of Life and Death

Today I went to a memorial-slash-life-celebration for a friend's grandmother up in LA. I guess I'm pretty lucky that in my life so far I haven't had to go to that many services (the only true funeral-type that I went to was for a friend's boyfriend in highschool, Bryan i know you know who i'm talking about, and that was just bizarre 'cause I just went to the wake which no one warned me i'd see a BODY...anyway...), so the times I do go I tend to get emotional pretty easily.

I can truly say this will go down in history as the best memorial service ever. Not so much because of the surroundings or the food or any of that (although I'm pretty sure they snuck some crack into their sandwiches, I seriously inhaled at least a dozen, and it was all absolutely gorgeous), but because everyone had so much to say and their comments showed what an absolutely incredible woman my friend's grandmother was.

The best part I think was the video interview my friend's sister put together shortly before her grandmother died, which is absolutely brilliant...this is now the perfect excuse for me to get a camcorder (side note: were they super expensive in the past? My parents made it sound like a camcorder was thousands of dollars. I went on Amazon and you can get a decent Canon or Sony handycam for under $400. Then again, my mom made the Pizza Hut buffer sound like a month's salary).

During the services I started to wonder...if I died tomorrow, what would people say about me? Or 60 years from now, what would I have done with my life that could possibly make people speak so fondly of me like they did for my friend's grandmother? If i died tomorrow, people would say "Oh, she knew her TV trivia. She had an obsession with pop culture. She could win Vh1's Celebrity Pop Culture challenge. She donated $20 to the Donkey Rescue charity in 2007. She had high anxiety about paying off debt."

Sad, very sad people. So I think I'd like to make it a lifelong goal to live in such a way that my actions will be meaningful to others, that I'll be remembered for more than the girl who freaked out when her interest-only-no-cash-down-house plummeted in value.

Hmmm, let's see how long THAT lasts....

Letter to the editor

I am a guy. I pick my toe nails, drink milk out of the jug and twist the bread and wrap it under to keep it fresh.

GOD i hate when people do that! The only way it stays fresh is if you're already 1/2way through the loaf. If you've only had a few slices, then the "tuck under" concept doesn't keep it fresh! That being said, the end piece can be used as a tab of sorts to maintain some level of freshness.

Bryan, I tottalllly remember our book idea...sadly I think it would have ended up what He's Just Not That Into You later became...

Oh, how times have changed...

This weekend I saw Die Hard, which I haven't seen in awhile. I love me some John McClane, but only in the early series...I wasn't impressed with Die Hard 4.

What cracked me up is how different today's work environment is from the 80s.
Here's how I figure work life went:
Neanderthals to pre-WW1: it was all dudes, and they ran the show
WW1 and WW2: women were stuck working out of necessity, not 'cause they had to prove anything
1950s: men took their pants back and women (in their infinite wisdom, which I wish stayed this way) were like "eff the workforce, if I gotta cook for you mofos then I'm going to do it on my terms...wearing a polka-dot dress and using my new Maytag oven"

1960s and 1970s: birth control pills REALLY take off, women are so high on drugs they think entering the work force is a GOOD idea (and so is the birth of the 2-income society. Just effing fabulous).

1980s: with the exception of coke, women are pretty much sober but realizing that if they're gonna be in the workforce, they want to be at the TOP of the workforce...if that means dressing like a dude, so be it.

1990s: dropped the coke, less shoulder pads, bright colors a la In Living Color Fly Girls, while the birth of the Sensitive New Age Guy emerges

2000: we all just blend into the same working drones

So back to Die Hard, which obviously took place in the 80s. The scene is some 1980-something holiday party. The Hot Chicks of the office were blond. The Smart Chicks of the office were brunettes with big massive glasses and bad perms. Both Hot Chicks and Smart Chicks wore scrunchies even if they wore suits. Men snorted coke on the job. This was pre-sexual harassment era, so people were free to express themselves through groping and desktop "activities". Everyone looked 'roided out thanks to massive shoulder pads. You could actually SMOKE in the office.

Did no one back then think ANY of this was just a LITTLE BIT EFFED UP?!


Even though I've seen the movie a trillion times, I completely missed this wonderful gem of a scene:
Hans: The following people are to be released from their captors : In Northern Ireland, the seven members of the New Provo Front. In Canada, the five imprisoned leaders of Liberte de Quebec... In Sri Lanka, the nine members of the Asian Dawn movement...
Karl: [mouthing silently] Asian Dawn?
Hans: [covers the radio] I read about them in Time magazine.

Alright, enough man...err, woman-love for John McClane...

Damn you spam, damn you

I swear, whoever created spam should be shot. No wait, they should be forced to go through and personally be responsible for DELETING the spam that exists in my inbox....mutha effa.

So I have a bunch of random email accounts: yahoo, gmail, canada.com, hotmail, whatever...i have two yahoo accounts, one of them I used to use on occasion 10 years ago but now the only reason I even have it is 'cause it's my login for Amazon (that's where I was registered when I got married, and i've been too lazy to sync up that accuont with my regular yahoo email).

ANYWAY it's pretty much all spam, which on occasion I try to wipe out. Well I decided it's time to bring back that email account, and I'm going through all 3000 spam messages...problem is, I needed to filter out the ones from Amazon (that leaves Amazon.com, "auto-confirm@amazon.com", and the sneak peek emails i get from Cirque du Soleil)...

you'd think I'd be able to just select ALL and click SPAM, right? Sadly, no...yahoo email has some bug where it'll ask "are you sure you want to set all the mail to spam", if you select YES then nothing happens. So i'm trying to go through and highlight them all (using the new Yahoo Email format, where it looks like Outlook), but i'm on a crazy slow computer and the past HOUR has been spent trying to highlight a bunch, then click SPAM...

The slow computer is part of the massive computer problems we had way back when (see entry here)...it's actually gotten worse. Since I last posted, the "good" desktop PC's hard drive completely stopped spinning. So now i'm back on the crappy slow desktop PC, until I can either get an external hard drive or external CD burner to back up the personal info...after all the hard drive issues, i really want to get an external burner but those suckers aren't cheap (and i really don't feel like installing an internal burner onto this crappy PC only to later have to remove it and install it on the good PC).

Computer DRAAA-MAAAA...

Speaking of drama, some people make fun of me 'cause i'm in a book club. Y'all can suck my balls, at least I'm reading for God's sakes. Thank the lord for Meetup. Anyway, a whole bunch of stuff went DOWN...oh yes, people in the book club were ready to rumble. In the grand scheme it was all just chick drama, but it proves a few things:
1. Women are naturally drawn to drama. There's no effing WAY a guy's book club would ever have had this much drama. (Then again, no dude would join a male-only book club).
2. Women will bitch about ANYTHING.
3. Large gatherings of women creates nothing more than a clusterf*ck (i hate that word, but i can't think of a better way to describe it).

I wouldn't change items 1 through 3 for anything...