Phone is phun

So I arrived...in slightly boozed-town. No, seriously, I arrived in Wilmington, North Carolina, the site of the New Year's Eve party. I took some postable photos before now, maybe I'll back up in my journey and put them up later. What you get know is a snapshot of a few partygoers. Mike is our host. He's the one standing next to Mike.

I got here early, so Mike and I had a chat and watched some of his news Simpsons DVD. High hilarity, I don't think I ever saw the one where Homer replaces Smithers.

Ah, sounds like more people are here. I have to get off this beast and get back to the party.

Take your shirt off / spin it round like a helicopter

Virginia is for lovers. I guess that's why I drove all the way through without stopping. They don't cotton much to us h8t0rz.

Baltimore to Raleigh is plenty far enough to drive in one day. Traffic on the beltway was pretty reasonable, but as soon as I got off the beltway, I-95 South in northern 'Ginny--that was a beast straight out of Revelations. Wormwood for real. The worst part was the fakeout. They had one of those digital signs up saying "bad traffic to exit whatever". It was aboot 20 exits down. When I finally got all the way down there, it turned out the bad traffic was hardly as finished as I had been led to expect.

Anyway, I made it. Tomorrow is the shortest leg of my road trip, Raleigh to Wilmington. Intrastate. Should be a breeze. Apparently it's too long a drive for Kenny, however. I'll have to leave him behind to fend for hisself on New Year's Eve, and come back and watch the Cotton Bowl with him. It's on at 11 in the morning (2 January), so he's going to "Tivo" (read: generic DVR) it. We have a bet going. Kenny, with a cry of "Roll Tide", is for [Ala]Bama, the old-school powerhouse foosball program. I, armed with superior intelligence, am all in with upstart Texas Tech. New York Times Sunday Magazine article by Moneyball author Michael Lewis, don't fail me now; there's a six pack of $6 or less value on the line.

So I've been reading more of Bill Simmons' Now I Can Die in Peace (I got sidetracked by Al Franken and read his entire book). Inspired by an early Simmons column, I decided "Night Train" would be an awesome nickname to apply to myself. "Night Train" Willemain has a certain poetry to it, and I do have a penchant for staying up until the wee hours. Not everyone appreciates it as much as I do, however. I'm just going to toss it out here and see if it has wings.

The camera honeymoon is over

Day two of the road trip from Albany to Wilmington, NC. Posting from Joan's house in Queens, on Joan's computer. I almost got a chance to mess up her facebook profile but she would have murdered me before I could get back on the Long Island Expressway.

So my two day old memory card isn't working. The camera monitor didplays an uninfomative "memory card error" text, and won't take any pictures unless I replace the 128 meg card with the lousy 16 meg cipher they give you with the camera. So I can take, like, fourteen pictures. Boo! Of course, it couldn't do this while I was anywhere near the store at which I purchased it.

Stellaaaaaaaaaaaa!

Matty's cats remember me.

Floraspora

I promised someone I would post an image of the insane, hideous wallpaper on just one of the four walls in my old room in my parents' house.

Landmarks aplenty

This is my 11th post, and as I set up the thing to show 10 recent posts, this is my first bumping of a post off the main page. Hooray for blogging!

This post also features the first picture from my brand new Canon PowerShot A520. It's a picture of one of several Marks. If my Dad had photoshop I would have cropped out the stain on his jacket. In Mark's defense, it was barely visible without the camera's flash.

This Mark was visiting our mutual boyhood home of Niskayuna from Chicago, Illinois, where he has become far more successful than I expected. He is joining the Actors Equity union to stage manage an open-ended run of a major musical in Chicago whose name escapes me at present. He will be proposing marriage to his long time girlfriend later in the week. And, best of all, he is editing the book for a new musical about the administration of Warren G. Harding. I shit you not. It's three hours and they want to cut that in half.

He promised to email me some rough versions of the songs, which he is very positive aboot. I told him that if they were any good I would use the blog to promote the show to my twenty readers, none of whom live in Chicago.

So, I was reading a friend's livejournal and had strong feelings when I read about myself in there. It made me think, then, about the potential for pissing people off through not mentioning them in my blog, and I think I'm going to try and shy away from describing what I do with friends, because it's just be a pain in the ass trying to get u'urybody in there and make sure they feel like, you know, whatever, they are getting as much love from me as they warrent. I couldn't pass up the Mark thing, though, because the new musical about the administration of Warren G. Harding was too good. I think it's called The Teapot Scandals of 1923. Stay tuned.

The bad thing about the Simmons book

It's fairly well concelead in wiseassery, but I'm a little down on Bill Simmons apologetics for his minimal displayed literacy. Maybe it comes with the territory for a sports journo. Maybe I'm just a little testy because of the retrogade intimations of the cover of the Albany [Hearst] Times-Union I saw in the vending machine ootside the Denny's in East Greenbush the other day. The two lead stories were aboot 1) a sharp decline in adult literacy and 2) new success in the fight against polio. Did we just lose 75 years of progress? What's going on here? Maybe they had to quarantine those two Denny's' for a polio outbreak.

Speaking of literacy, I'm having a hard time determining how much copy editing to do to my blog posts. It's tearing me up on the inside, and devouring my time and attention. The most precious stuff we have. I got a lot of same from Stephanie on the phone today, that was the best.

I read on the internet aboot someone who enjoyed a Mothra tamagachi (sp?) that you raise from a larvae, and if you do it right it beats Godzilla. That does seem cute, but, damn, people could be accomplishing real things or with other people. Maybe you should let Godzilla get away with this one. Robot Mothra is an emtpy pit.

New toys!

Chrimmastime brought me any number of delightful gifts (including the Marizpanstollen upon which I presently sup). The most significant for the enthusiast of this blog, however, is a digital camera. It is a Canon Powershot, so it is very similar to the camera I used most at the Stony Brook Press (which makes all the more embarassing my difficulty getting open the part where you put the batteries in). Finally, I join all the cool kids in digital camera having.

The camera affords many opportunities for additional purchases. Today I went out and got the bare minimal accessories - battery charger and 128 meg memory cahd. I got the batteries that last longer but take 8.5 hours to charge instead of 15 minutes. So...as soon as they, you know, finish charging, I'll put a picture up here as a threat of what is to come.

Along with camera boosts, I took a gift card (from my Aunt in sunny Los Angeles) to the Barnes Ennobler. The goods for which I exchanged most of the invisible money represented by the card joined a book I got earlier from Devon and Brooke (at the lunch mentioned in the previous post they pelted me with a hail of treasures, foreign and domestic), a book I was no less excited about even though I knew it was coming to me. So now I have a meaty stack of reading, which I will detail in the following graphs.

Now I Can Die in Peace: How ESPN's Sports Guy Found Salvation, With a Little Help From Nomar, Pedro, Shawshank and the 2004 Red Sox by Bill Simmons, better know, unsurprisingly, as ESPN's Sports Guy. This is my first target. From the marketing on the jacket I learned that Simmons was a writer for Jimmy Kimmel Live. Joel Hodgeson, the creator and original star of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 wrote from Jimmy Kimmel Live. All sorts of strange, brilliant people wrote for Jimmy Kimmel Live. Why isn't it any good?

Next on my list is the new Al Franken book. It took me a moment, but I remembered that it's called The Truth. They should just call it Al Franken Politcal Book 3. Save everyone a lot of time. Plus, calling your book The Truth is like changing your name to The Artist. What a douchebag. I guess calling your book Al Franken Political Book 3 is kind of like the way they name nuclear reactors like Indian Point 2. There must be some sort of happy medium.

Anyway, I'm pretty confident that this book is gonna be great, although maybe I have should have waited for the audio book--Franken nailed the last one in that format. But I couldnae wait.

I'm having a hard time reading just the one book at a time and not switching costantly between Simmons and Franken. Graphic User Interface, you ate my brain!

I was stoked to get the Franken book, it was one of two books I had in mind when I went to the Ennobler. I was a little more interested in the recent book by Chris Elliot, but they didn't have it. I think maybe I was leaning towards it out of charity, though. Chris Elliot should get a pension. He was on some crappy Comedy Central crap McCrappington hosted by Dennis Leary the other day, and he was as good as ever. Comedy Central should pretend to do a reality show and put Carlos Mencia and Dennis Leary on an island, but forget to bring any cameras. Leave them with a bunch of Name Brand Hard Lemonade and gettothechopper!

I also trolled the discount table. I got, on the cheap, some sort of autobiographical work by prominent teevee newsman D. Brinkley (here abbreviated because I can't remember if his first name is Dennis or David) and some sort of sweaty confessional by an IRS goon. Past the bargain table was a bin of sloppily dumped books labeled "Last Chance!" They had the Communist Manifesto for $1. Last chance!

Updates on previous posts! Warning: spoilers to my riveting blog narrative! A certain fellow named Brian, who doesn't seem to appreciate being compared to Popeye nemesis Bluto, produced compelling documentary evidence that the mustachioed magician was, in fact, named Mumford. The Amazing Mumford. I blame Daddy Warlegs for guessing correctly. But then he is profligate with his propers and spends them all for bad looking out whilst I was watching the road. It seems as if the Bennigan's at the intersection of Route 7 and Interstate 87 is still right there. There's a Ruby Tuesday's two boxes down in a generally more overdeveloped area there. All the Denny's' within the Albany city limits definately look condemned, though, that much is true of a world gone mad.

I wonder if you can make money being affectionate with cats for absent richies.

Memory is a funny thing

Has it been decades since I watched Sesame Street? How many times have I recalled characters and routines from the show? I feel like I know specific elements I've been remembering - Oscar, the space aliens, the word halves that slide together, "follow the arrows / they show you where to go / follow the arrows / follow, don't say no...arrows lead you to an octopus!" What the hell was that programming me for? Anyway, the point is, I have this fixed set of Sesamie Street memories I always revisit when I think of the show.

Last night, driving to Denny's (oh, Denny's! Tragedy! See below!) San Diego Mike (who will now go by either of the nicknames Daddy Wronglegs or Daddy Warlegs--he's tall and bellicose) uses the phrase "a la" meaning "in the manner of", and from somewhere deep down in the mental recesses comes, from me, "peanut butter sandwiches". I can't remember ever remembering that there was some sort of mustachioed magician on Sesame Street. At first I didn't know what I had said. Then, when I narrowed it down to a line from Sesame Street, I thought the speaker had been The Count--they both were purple and wore a lot of black?

We couldn't remember that dudes name. The magician who goes "a la peanut butter sandwiches". Thrashed around with it a while; the best we could do was Mumford. But that can't be right. That's a shitty movie from 1999 with supporting appearances by Jason Lee, Martin Short and Ted Danson.

Albany - Denny's' = ???

So we head out to Denny's, late night after Christmas Day. It was, I dunno, 2:14 when we got to the Wolf Road store. Apparently we stretched their 24/7/365 ethic to the limit...they get three hours off all year, apparently, it was midnight to 3 that night. So we went to the bad Denny's on Western Avenue. Had a little trouble finding it--because it was pitch black--because it was boarded up! OMGS! So we went to the really bad Denny's, on Central Avenue--the same! There are no Denny's in Albany proper! I no longer feel it is a competitive metropolis. What of the Mayor's promise that "we've got it all in Al[l]bany"? Anyway, we went out of the way to the good Denny's in East Greenbush. Which was hard to find because of the massive fogishness. Anyway, I am holding up lunch for Devon, Brooke and myself, so I will wrap this up. I am sad about Denny's.

Also, at the intersection of Route 7 and Interstate 87, the Bennigan's is now a Ruby Tuesdays. But chocolate rations are up, so that's plus good.

IMDb verifies it

That dude, the Prime Minister in Temple of Doom--totally Dhalsim from Street Fighter.

How come nobody told me?

So after the familial brouhaha, I celebrated Christmas with notorious Jew Jeff. Perusing my collection of video casettes, most purchased for a mere dollar apiece in the `Cuse one balmy day (at that price, Terry "Hulk" Hogan's Thunder in Paradise was a steal) , Jeff settled on The Temple of Doom.

The high point of the movie, of course, is the inimitable opening sequence--the bilingual song and dance number that starts in the outrageously oversized soundstage, the lazy susan shady dealings, the crawling amongst the stampede, etc. I've seen this movie a dozen times, and never once did I notice that that whole shebang happens in Club Obi Wan. You guys knew that, right? You've got to clue me in to these things.

Also, how the hell does Indy know Mola Ram's name? His only introduction is the secretly observed heart-stealing ceremony, and then Indy's calling him out all of a sudden.

There's no business like it

I drove up into the wintry North today--to my parents' house for the Chrimmastime. I brought along with me a small library of books that were gathering dust in my apartment, to gather dust in an out of the way corner here. I had a moment of regret that no practical use would come of one book, The People's Business: Controlling Corporations and Restoring Democracy, by Lee Drutman and Charlie Cray (with forward by Mr. R. Nader hisownself).

I was an enthusiastic reader of The People's Business (second subtitle: The Report of the Citizen Works Corporate Reform Commission).

Hold that thought...I am to understand that shrimp has been made available downstairs, where the people is at. Time for a holiday break. I will edit this post and finish my dry story a little later.

So, anyway, I thought the book's objectives are really important. And I was largely disappointed by it, for a lot of reasons. I don't think it's written in a very readable way, or with any sense of proportianality--the attention dedicated the different subjects doesn't match up with their significance.

But the worst part is that it is billed as offering constructive things you can do to reassert populist democratic sovereignty over mammoth avaricous private tyrannies...and I guess there's a list of things you can do...if you happen to be a policymaker. Legislators maybe could act directly on their suggestions, but they don't really offer a program for regular people. I thought maybe there'd be something in there about citizen lobbying, or political organizing, or something.

They do, at one point, tackle a contentious topic along those lines: Nader's presidential candidacies. The goal of Citizen Works was to gather together the energies of a broad coalition of corporate reformers to focus on the underlying questions of corporate power in society as opposed to reacting after the fact to specific abuses. And they gathered a diverse group with very different opinions on the efficacy of Nader's strategy. The book totally cops out on this question. I guess they wanted everyone to get along, but they totally slide past the issue with a sort of pluralistic "we should all do things our own way" attitude. This only exacerbates the book's problems with living up to its promise of offering a course of action for people who get all hot and bothered by the abuses dutifully described.

Anyway, yeah, reign in corporate power. Maybe read the book. It didn't grab me, and so I'm leaving it to lie forgotten in a corner.

Joan will not abide

My always thoughtful friend Claudia snapped a photograph of me and our mutual friend Joan just moments after I told her some bad news. Joan appears, as you can see, to be quite upset.

All manner of options for photoshop hilarity ensue, playing on real life tragedy! An example is included.

I like to ride the trains

I got into some "comment" exchanges on the relatively new Stony Brook Press website. My buddy Sam is an editorial alum of that august student news-paper, and I think maybe even a professional journalist (I really should keep better tabs on the peoples). Sam has posted several "blog entires" and an "exclusive web content" article about the New York City public transit labor unrest on that site, and I, filled with civico-journalistic enthusiasm, lept (largely ill informed) into the fray. The article contains Sam's most complete appraisal of both the strike and the news coverage of same, most of the conversation is currently in his blog postings "STRUCK! Day 1" and "STRUCK! Day 2". They are linked off of the article.

Worst foot forward

I decided to start my blog off by both contributing to the echo chamber and telling you something you probably already know. As an added bonus, I think I will compare someone, speciously, with the nazis.

I want to direct your attention to post (itself, largely deriviate in that it mostly just refers you to an Associated Press piece on yahoo news) by my buddy Peter over at BrickBurner.org (BrickBurner is, apparently, a multi-author lefty politics blog).

If you haven't already heard the news, it seems as if the French executive's attempt to pursue the fashionable policy of intellectual property nazism--in the form of a new punitive law against file sharing--when delightfully awry when rebellious legislators instead advanced counterlegislation to legalize all dubious file sharing for a monthly royalty fee of aboot $8 and ½. I wonder if the "one half" character will read on blogspot.

It's worth mentioning that Laurence Frost, AP Business Reporter, is promulgating Big Content fantasies about the illegality of downloading, as opposed to uploading, pirated works. Maybe it works differently in France.

Hey, it was either this or link to somebody else's writing aboot Johnny Damon signing with the Evil Empire. Let's all of us, The Faithful, hope for the best and call him Samson.

Coming at you like a ton of clicks

Hello world. My name it is Sam Hall, it is Sam Hall.