Month: December 2005

Stinky Boxes and Dead TiVos

elvis16 Comments

Life’s trivial annoyances. Yesterday, I got a shipment from Sephora.com – items selected from someone’s wishlist for xmas. Like, a hundred and fifty bucks worth of high-end beauty products. So the box just reeks when I get it. Like a fucking french whorehouse. And I’m thinking, this can’t be good. Turns out one of the […]

Life’s trivial annoyances.

Yesterday, I got a shipment from Sephora.com – items selected from someone’s wishlist for xmas. Like, a hundred and fifty bucks worth of high-end beauty products.

So the box just reeks when I get it. Like a fucking french whorehouse. And I’m thinking, this can’t be good.

Turns out one of the products inside – a bottle of Jonathan Product shampoo, has burst during shipment, completely soaking everything inside, including all the fussy gift-wrapping, the paperwork, everything, with this stinking golden goo.

Fuck. So the labor-saving idea I had, to order it, turns into another xmas week mall trek to return this dripping slimy box.

Mmm. Dripping box. Wait, the clerks at Sephora are generally total babes, maybe this won’t suck.

And then there’s my TiVo. Which picked yesterday to die. And of course a TiVo is a commodity like a cell phone, you don’t repair it, you just buy a new one when it’s out of warranty. Which it is, of course. Nevermind the hours of teevee I had saved on it to be watched over my holiday break, movies and marathons of Nip/Tuck (which I admit I’m saving because it’s suckage seems to know no bounds this season; yet I can’t look away).

But it’s another of those fucking expenses I can’t really afford, yet have to pay.

I don’t even watch that much teevee. Why do I need two TiVos? Yet, of course, the few things I do watch are always on the same day, at the same time. And I never, ever watch teevee live anymore, once you get used to TiVo you can’t.

I’m thinking about bypassing the mall and just heading for the horizon when I leave work. Who’s with me?

Care and Feeding meme

elvis9 Comments

Swiped from Herr Wolfe, who is certainly a gentleman and a scholar. No idea the true origin of this, but it isn’t as trite as most of these.

Swiped from Herr Wolfe, who is certainly a gentleman and a scholar. No idea the true origin of this, but it isn’t as trite as most of these.

Read more “Care and Feeding meme”

Half Nekkid Nutkin

elvis23 Comments

Hiromi, that perpetually half-nekkid tart, just reminded me it’s Thursday. I’m not in a particularly half-naked mood, but you know, you start someon – uh, someTHING, you need to finish. Thus – this is my second tattoo, on the back of my left shoulder (Yeah this is reversed, shot in a mirror and I didn’t […]

Hiromi, that perpetually half-nekkid tart, just reminded me it’s Thursday.

I’m not in a particularly half-naked mood, but you know, you start someon – uh, someTHING, you need to finish.

Thus – this is my second tattoo, on the back of my left shoulder (Yeah this is reversed, shot in a mirror and I didn’t bother to flip it).

You might not be able to tell what it is; it’s old and faded and blurred, not that well done to begin with (By Pinky Yuen in San Jose). I’ve had sex with people younger than this tattoo. But for reference, here’s where it came from.

Nutkin-4

(click to see that bigger)

Who Killed Rudolph?

elvis1 Comment

My boss (Actually my director) Jeff just walked into my office and showed me this. ORLANDO, Fla. — A holiday display is getting some negative attention from neighbors. A homeowner’s display in the Hunter’s Creek subdivision features Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer hanging from a tree. That’s just too cool for words.

My boss (Actually my director) Jeff just walked into my office and showed me this.

ORLANDO, Fla. — A holiday display is getting some negative attention from neighbors. A homeowner’s display in the Hunter’s Creek subdivision features Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer hanging from a tree.

That’s just too cool for words.

I struggle with words for fear that they’ll hear

elvis1 Comment

This is what happens to me when I’m in that emotional, unable to express myself state. When the poet in me wakes up tries to claw it’s way out. That poet has no means of egress; on my best day I am a writer of decent prose, but poetry eludes me completely. Yet what I […]

This is what happens to me when I’m in that emotional, unable to express myself state. When the poet in me wakes up tries to claw it’s way out. That poet has no means of egress; on my best day I am a writer of decent prose, but poetry eludes me completely.

Yet what I feel, some days, can only be rendered correctly in poetry; and thus I wind up seeking the words of others to express what’s inside.

I haven’t heard this song in years – and just reading the lyrics I remember why it almost brings me to tears every time I hear it.

Standing firm on this stony ground
The wind blows hard
Pulls these clothes around
I harbour all the same worries as most
The temptations to leave or to give up the ghost
I wrestle with an outlook on life
That shifts between darkness and shadowy light
I struggle with words for fear that they’ll hear
But Orpheus sleeps on his back still dead to the world
Sunlight falls, my wings open wide
There’s a beauty here I cannot deny
And bottles that tumble and crash on the stairs
Are just so many people I knew never cared
Down below on the wreck of the ship
Are a stronghold of pleasures I couldn’t regret
But the baggage is swallowed up by the tide
As Orpheus keeps to his promise and stays by my side
Tell me, I’ve still a lot to learn
Understand, these fires never stop
Believe me, when this joke is tired of laughing
I will hear the promise of my Orpheus sing
Sleepers sleep as we row the boat
Just you the weather and I gave up hope
But all of the hurdles that fell in our laps
Were fuel for the fire and straw for our backs
Still the voices have stories to tell
Of the power struggles in heaven and hell
But we feel secure against such mighty dreams
As Orpheus sings of the promise tomorrow may bring
Tell me, I’ve still a lot to learn
Understand, these fires never stop
Please believe, when this joke is tired of laughing
I will hear the promise of my Orpheus sing

     –David Sylvian, Orpheus

Santa’s Little Whore

elvis5 Comments

I love what I find in my sitemeter. I got hits today on the phrase “Santa’s Little Whore”. I love it. C’mere, Santa’s Little Whore, wherever you are!

I love what I find in my sitemeter.

I got hits today on the phrase “Santa’s Little Whore”.

I love it. C’mere, Santa’s Little Whore, wherever you are!

RE4

elvis2 Comments

Ok, I’m on my second play-through of Resident Evil 4, and I have to say, I love this game. I’m not a huge video game guy. I lose interest in ’em pretty quickly for the most part. I don’t care about high scores. Never played a lot of donkey kong or mario, though I loved […]

Ok, I’m on my second play-through of Resident Evil 4, and I have to say, I love this game.

I’m not a huge video game guy. I lose interest in ’em pretty quickly for the most part. I don’t care about high scores. Never played a lot of donkey kong or mario, though I loved Asteroids, Tempest, Pac Man. I don’t spend a lotta time with my PS2. But I do love the survival horror games.

I don’t wanna do a full gave review – lots of sites have that. But I have to say, this game has more going for it in terms of sheer fun and creepieness than any other game since RE2.

It’s a winner. Great weapons, hard game play, some good puzzles. all sorts of new features, including the ability to buy and sell (and upgrade) weapons. AND a storyline that kinds-sorta makes sense.

Good stuff.

Getting through the day

elvis10 Comments

There are little things we do that get us through the day. A bite a chocolate in the afternoon. A cup of tea, or a stiff shot of espresso. A conversation with a friend, a favorite blog; a little bad teevee or a gossip magazine. Sometimes it’s something good for us – a run, or […]

There are little things we do that get us through the day.

A bite a chocolate in the afternoon. A cup of tea, or a stiff shot of espresso.

A conversation with a friend, a favorite blog; a little bad teevee or a gossip magazine.

Sometimes it’s something good for us – a run, or a workout at the gym, a basketball game with friends. Sometimes it’s not so good; too much to drink, drugs. We smoke too much pot or snort something or swallow something for pain when the pain isn’t physical; we go for the bottle and crawl inside because it feels safe in there.

Sometimes it’s simple pleasures; cooking or putting the kids to bed, doing something just for oneself, doing something that’s easy to finish and mark off as complete.

That’s what blogging is for a lot of us, I think. Something to help get through the day. Someone to talk to, someone to listen. In many ways a tribe, a group, a gang to belong to. Someone to listen to you with that bizarre intimacy faceless communication provides.

Some days though, you need a little extra. More than what gets you through. More than your drug of choice or your social ritual, your little tasks, your daily entertainments. Some days you just need something good to happen out of the blue.

The littlest things sometimes – a compliment where you don’t expect it, a little affection, a lucky break. A streak of productivity.

I wish there was a magic elixir; something in precious finite supply; a drop to produce those good moments when you need them, those lucky turns, those tiny gifts of good fortune. I’m not greedy though; that’s why even in my fantasy, it’s a tiny supply, not to be wasted.

Good things come out of the blue too rarely in life. for this reason I try to be honest with people; honest and free with my praise and my compliments. I want to be the person who makes someone’s day, the compliment out of the blue. I’ve been known to say “you smell good” to a stranger, to tell people who look fantastic that they look fantastic, for no reason other than that they made me smile. I try to leave the unexpectedly large tip, to thank the people who do thankless work. When something good comes, unexpected and unasked, unhoped and unsolicited, it makes one’s world better in tiny ways.

Unexpected pleasures are, nearly always, the sweetest.