A year has gone by and once again my family has switched cell phone providers, although this time, thanks to number portability, we got to keep our respective numbers and didn’t have to deal with the hassle of activating new phone lines - often the most time-consuming part of the entire process. But I am now switched over to T-Mobile, which means no more rollover minutes (Nobody in my family really calls, so at the end of a year we had more than 3000 minutes saved up), but I do get free mobile-to-mobile with other T-Mobile customers, so anyone with T-Mobile feel free to call me all you want. Because I’m lonely and no one ever calls me anyway.
If anyone’s curious as to why we switched again, it’s because it is not worth it to go month-to-month since they give a lot of incentive to sign up again with a new contract. You need to go to the asian dealers though, because they’re willing to throw in some of the comission they receive to get you to sign up, and hence cheap phones or cash back. It’s fun to deal with the Mandarin-speaking employees too since it gives me a chance to practice the limited Mandarin I actually know.
The new plan we’re on now isn’t much better than our previous plan, but my dad wasn’t getting any reception with Cingular at his workplace, and me and my mom needed new phones since the Siemens s56 sucked hardcore. I got my trusted Nokia again (Best. Interface. Ever.) and my brother passed his phone off to my mom and got a Sony Ericsson T637. I love Nokias, they’re just so user-friendly, and I’ve now been scarred for life from Siemens after my horrible experience with their phone, until someone shows me otherwise at least.
I just set myself up for a lot of Siemen-Semen jokes, didn’t I?
Sky Captain just didn’t cut it for me. Something was missing from the movie that left me feeling merely as a viewer as opposed to immersing me in the experience like a good movie should. The lack of sets in the movie was fairly apparent with the way that transitions from one scene to the next were nearly non-existent.
The visuals were good…but only to an extent. After a while I started to get sick of the soft glow and sepia tones that everything had and was itching for some real color. The story didn’t fare much better though; I found myself wondering who the heck Sky Captain was since he’s never really explained in the movie.
Overall, not as well executed as I had hoped, and fairly disappointed since I’d been looking forward to this movie for a while. Worth a matinee price ticket.
My brother showed me how Opera had a feature for mouse gestures quite a ways back, but I always thought it to be just too inaccurate and too much effort for me to memorize all the different gestures. I gave it a try on Firefox though, and holy crap is it sweet. It almost eliminates the need for a mouse with lots of fancy buttons. Everyone’s completely amazed when I do it too…kinda cool for showing off.
Link here, enjoy. It should be rather self-explanatory. On a related note, I now count six people that I have successfully converted from IE to Firefox.
The bank is a very serious place. I went in to Bank of America today to close my savings account after having moved over to ING direct for a higher interest rate, and while standing in line I noticed how serious everyone always is. Not that this is anything new, but I think from the moment anyone steps into a bank for the very first time, they know that a bank is not a place to be joking around. Is it because of all the money being handled?
And am I the only one who cautiously scopes out everyone in the joint, to look for possible bank robbers? Everyone casually scans the room, looking at the people in line, thinking in their heads, “Nah, not him, too old. Not that lady, she’s here with her child. Maybe that guy in back, he’s dressed a little too business like to be running errands on a Saturday morning.” Then I get this urge to look for the security guard just in case someone’s sneaking up behind him so I can warn him, but if the guard sees me looking at him then I’d become suspicious.
Nobody ever makes eye contact either, it’s like a total sin to do that in a bank. Cannot make casual conversation. Gotta keep moving, next window’s open, move up.
I’m sure the tellers appreciate some humor from time to time though. Whenever I cash a check or withdraw money and they ask me how I’d like it, I have this urge to say in a completely deadpan voice, “Gold bars.”
The one time I actually said that I was busting up right after.
Postal Service Album Keeps On Delivering. I hadn’t really thought about “Give Up” being released almost two years ago, and here I’ve still got four of their tracks on my “Current Favorites” playlist. Their cover of Phil Colins’ “Against All Odds” didn’t seem as spectacular to me as it did to everyone else, but maybe it’ll grow on me. I’m excited to hear that their next video will be for “We Will Become Silhouettes”, that’s one of my favorite tracks on the album, but then again, the whole album is great.
After “Against All Odds,” the group’s next video will be for Give Up’s “Silhouettes,” which will be helmed by “Napoleon Dynamite” writer/director Jared Hess.
“He talks exactly like all the characters in the movie,” Gibbard said. “He’s like, ‘Dude, I’ve got a sweet concept for the video.’ “
At long last, Asian men everywhere may now rejoice at the chance to get back at the white man for stealing our women, thanks to How to Date a White Woman: A Practical Guide for Asian Men, sent to me by Andrea. The book seems to be real, although a bit ridiculous to me. The best part though is the reviews for the book, which makes it fairly obvious that not a single one of them has even read this book.
I can’t wait for the sequel, titled ‘How To Date Asian Women - A Practical Guide for Non-Asian Men’
There is a sample of one of the many points on the website: ‘Asian women love it if you’re in a violent gang that hangs outside of arcades and looks menacing. They also prefer you to dress in completely white clothing and shoes, with your hair slicked back with gel. Bonus points if you’re only 4 foot tall.’
This one had me cracking up though:
I built the machine according to Mr. Quan’s detailed instructions, spliced into the local power grid, and flipped the switch. AMAZING!
My house is now COVERED in white women of every size and age, and more are attracted every day. You can see my house from the expressway now, the pile is so huge.
THANK YOU, Adam Quan! Your machine has truly changed my life, and also the lives of countless others in my immediate vicinity.
-Dr. Lazlo Bonaparte
I hate how there’s all these really cool-looking foreign sci-fi films, and most of the time they come in really nice DVD packaging as well and I can’t decided whether it’d be worth it to buy them before watching them or risk owning a really craptacular movie that just looked good.
Immortel looks to be another of them. The city scenes look very much like those from The Fifth Element, but the rest of the movie has a totally different vibe to it.
I really need to find some arty indie film dorks who buy these movies, that way I can just leech from them like the good friend I am. So let’s start it off: someone get Casshern so I can watch that one.
A chess park? In Glendale? Could be interesting…but they better have really witty homeless people there who tell me interesting stories about life as they beat the crap out of me at speed chess (Just like in Searching for Bobby Fischer), or else I’m not going.
New nickel is unveiled. Eh…I guess it looks okay? Feels like they keep trying to break away from the traditional look that was established with our currency, so I guess that’s okay.
Great post over at kottke.org about iPod guilty pleasures. Not really anything too surprising since I’m sure anyone with an iPod has thought about this, and I really hate how ‘N Sync is always the first thing people see when they browse my iPod…grrr. The comments are great though where people are posting tracks they’re guilty of having, but what the heck is Journey doing there? And Bangles? Those are great tracks in their own right, I’d rock the Journey any day. Love the cowbell comment though.
This is Rock ‘n’ Roll. This guy totally sold me on the keyboard. From Lawrence.
I just noticed the slogan for the Taste of Newport website: It’s All Good! Hah. Anywho, I forgot to mention that I attended this food festival on Sunday with Tommy, Mary, and Richard. $18 admission, still had to pay for food, and lots of really slutty OC women. Then I ate some bad paella and destroyed Mary’s bathroom.
In short, the festival was kinda fun, but only if you live in Newport (read: stinking rich and white).
‘Excuse Me. May I Have Your Seat?’ The New York Times has an article about an experiment carried out in the subways to ask someone for their seat. What’s interesting though is not how many people actually gave up their seats, but rather how the participants in the experiment all felt sick or nauseous while asking.
More than three decades later, the memories are still surprisingly vivid, testimony perhaps to the trauma of their experience and an unintended postscript to a rare study on the delicate subway order.
Maybe this says a little more about human nature than we first thought?
Back to the Future hat. This thing is hawt. Now we can truly re-live the 80’s.
Your brand new U-Lock is not safe. A forum posting accompanied by a video showing a bike lock being opened with a Bic ballpoint pen. What kind of people design these things, and how much are they getting paid? This has to be one of the biggest blunders I’ve heard of. Who wants to get some free bikes?
Here is the video that was shown at Comic-con this year as a preview for Sin City, based on the graphic novel of the same name by Frank Miller. Looks really good, lots of blue screen used from what I recall. Jessica Alba as a stripper can only lead to good things.
Might have to open the link in IE to view, or wait a bit for it to load.
Last Thursdsay:
MyBodyIs4Sale (3:35:28 PM): dude, i know how i am gonna make my millions of dollars
valloq (3:35:32 PM): …
MyBodyIs4Sale (3:35:44 PM): i am going to invent a product that is half cheese, half mayonaise
MyBodyIs4Sale (3:35:50 PM): cheonaise
valloq (3:35:56 PM): …
MyBodyIs4Sale (3:36:27 PM): bitch, that better not be that sneaky silence like, “Hmm, i am stealing your idea right now”
Today:
MyBodyIs4Sale: oh dude
MyBodyIs4Sale: did i tell you we made some?
valloq: …
MyBodyIs4Sale: it smelled so horrible that we couldnt juyst throw it awa
valloq: lol!
valloq: idiots
MyBodyIs4Sale: we had to take out the trash
valloq: I told you it was a bad idea
MyBodyIs4Sale: and it still smelled
MyBodyIs4Sale: it was baaad
valloq: how did you make it?
valloq: you just mixed up mayonnaise and cheese in a jar?
MyBodyIs4Sale: micowaved some cheese until it boiled
MyBodyIs4Sale: then took it out
valloq: LOL
valloq: omg
valloq: hahahahah
MyBodyIs4Sale: and threw mayo in
MyBodyIs4Sale: and started stirring
MyBodyIs4Sale: as it harded
valloq: oh shit
valloq: I’m busting up here
valloq: I gotta post this
MyBodyIs4Sale: but it kinda cooked the mayo
MyBodyIs4Sale: and that is when the smell started
Yeah. I wonder too.
Firefox 0.10 Preview Release is out today (essentially a preview of 1.0). A few of my extensions no longer work, but there are some nice little changes like an enhanced find feature.
isnoop Gmail invite spooler. Anyone who still needs an invite can sign up here, or if you’re like me and you have more invites than you know what to do with, you can send them here as well to give them to any of those unlucky souls out there still without Gmail accounts.
The Real Reason We’re In Iraq. Nothing really new here, just some more of the good ol’ “Why are we in Iraq” stuff we’re so used to. Just kinda good to read an article every now and then to refresh my mind as to how jacked up things are. Link from everyone’s favorite socialist, Abdul.
How much sense does that make? Saddam has enough weaponry to attack the western world, and we can’t lead the UN inspectors to it because we don’t want Saddam to know how we got the information? Give me a break!
So we invaded Iraq not to save ourselves from weapons of mass destruction, not to rid the world of a brutal dictator and not to avenge the murders of Sept. 11. We invaded Iraq because Bush and his pals think America should rule the world.
A first for Boredom: A text-message conversation. To set the scene, she’s lying in her bed and text-messaging people cause she’s too lazy to go to the computer and trying to go to sleep.
dotsloke: Nice… Good night…. Fingers getting tired… You go read
valloq: LOL. I’m soooo taking that “fingers getting tired” thing the wrong way. Dirty!
dotsloke: Oh my gosh… Im glad that was entertainment to you… I meant from typing on the phone… Besides thats not how i do it… Hah. Eww shivers. End of that convo.
valloq: LOL, omg! I can’t believe you said that. Do I want to know how you do it? LOL! You’re making me crack up right before I sleep. G’night!
Now how does she do it…
George Lucas’s first movie, THX-1138, was re-released into theaters this past weekend, with his now trademark CGI-additions and changes to help realize his original vision. The plot is the all-too familiar one of a dystopian future where feelings and emotions aren’t allowed and human behavior is controlled by taking the daily dosage of pills to help restrain these urgings of the human soul.
Our protagonist, THX-1138 (Robert Duvall) goes off the dose, falls in love with his female roommate and yeah…we know what happens after that.
The movie was a lot better than I had expected. I was really tired when I went to watch it, but I was very much into the film the entire time. The changes that Lucas made are all fairly subtle, at least considering I hadn’t seen the original version in its entirety but there didn’t seem to be anything as drastic as was done to the Star Wars trilogy.
Some very nifty camera-focusing techniques were used and it just felt like lot more of a solid movie than any of Lucas’s current Star Wars prequels. If only he still made movies like this. Worth the student ticket price.
100 Photographs that Changed the World. This one of the protestor holding up the column of tanks in Beijing is still arguably my favorite and most inspiring photo. Human Resolve. Man versus Machine. Determination. Frustration. Revolutionary.
Bra stuffing from Target. Posting this merely for the description of the product:
Durable and doable in a swimsuit, yet not designed for surfing, cliff diving, extreme groping and other high-impact activities.
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