Monday, December 31, 2007

Penance

I started the last post with a less than excellent picture of the Beck, so I'll start this one off with a stunning one of her. Entitled: Vet on a Plane

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Very nice. Before I forget, a couple of things Beck wanted me to share from the week in Nueva Rochester. When Meghan, Beck, Greg and I went to get coffee, both Greg and Beck were wearing their GPGDS regalia. This drew an enthused query from the coffee gal behind the counter, a pre-order "Did you guys go the show last night?" To which Beck replied "That's my brother," seemingly meaning the entire band. After the pleasantries and the "That James is soooo cute"s, the coffee gal actually went to the mid-'90s well* with this one: "I really wanna go to the New Year's Show, but I don't think my friends are gon'na go, so I don't have a ride." Pause. No one in team MGBN picked up on the ride request, we just smiled, nodded, ordered coffee. Another teenager's NYE dreams ruined.

* (Compare that to the following from Weezer's "Undone (The Sweater Song)":
[Mykel:] Hey, what's up?
[Karl:] Not much.
[Mykel:] Did you hear about the party?
[Karl:] Yeah.
[Mykel:] Um, I think I'm gon'na go but, um, my friends don't really wanna go. Could I get a ride?
Eerie).

The other story I need to tell is that the Grin and I had a pleasant GChat. He purchased the rights to the domain name "yellaphone," and after many jokes in the coward / chicken range, we settled on the concept that this would be a service where you could all us, give us a message, and we would phone your friend and yell it at them for you. This is only the preliminary stage, as undoubtedly the web 3.0 and such will get involved. Stay tuned.

Had ourselves a fun Sunday, full of meaningless football, Sephora-shopping and a little trashy pickup Ultimate to cap off the year. I made a no look catch behind my head of a blady hammer. That's all I got.

Pretty slow New Year's Eve today - Beck worked a short day and is presently delaying going running. I used some of my holiday cash to purchase (at Greg's brilliant suggestion) a backup internal hard drive, and spent some of the past two days backing up my music onto DVD and moving my entire iTunes library to the new drive. As a consequence, my iTunes is all bright and shiny and I have plenty of room for new tunes, photographs, artwork, recording music, videos, you name it. SWEET. In the spirit of hopefully creating some music with my computer, I changed strings on both of my guitars, a long overdue chore. But for more or less the first time, I did it absolutely perfectly, very tight and prettily done, so it doesn't look like some knock-off dumbass teenager with no clue strung them up (just a knock-off, dumbass near-30 year old). Good stuff:

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Nice! Of course, this left me with a two guitars-ful of grimy used strings. What to do with such a set of found objects?

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Ah, so groovy that I dig me. We're g.o.n.n.a.* take it easy for NYE tonight, eat some nachos, drink some drinks, and, if all goes according to tradition, celebrate the New Year as it occurs in Newfoundland and Beck falls asleep at 9 p.m. Insert the sound of a noisemaker here. Here's hoping everybody has a good one, stays safe, and makes all kinds of promises they have no intention of keeping in 2008. Drink some champagne, or sparkling white wine, whatever's available, for me. And here's personally hoping for the start of a productive 4th decade in 2008 por moi. I wanted to give a shoutout here to an old, well, not really a friend, just a person I knew, but his name escapes me. May I never think of him again.

* (Going Only Nowhere for NYE Activities)**

** - This has been an iPMM Shoutout.

Sunday, December 30, 2007

Back in the Sun / The Patriots Are Nobody

The Beck and I are reunited with the SW, having survived a 2:30 AM MST wakeup and an 8 hour plane trek from the splendid iPAbode in Rochester, NY, to our own sun-streaked abode in Az. (note that SW stands for "Sparkle & Wrigley" and "Southwest"). It is, natch, good to be home, though we definitely had a fun holiday in NY. A quick account of the past couple days:

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For obvious reasons, we went to World Hair on Thursday. This happened somewhere between the viewing of several episodes of "Flight of the Conchords" and "Aliens in America." FOTC is an HBO show about two New Zealand indie rockers living in NYC; they essentially play parody-rock of multiple genres and incorporate their songs/music videos as skits in the middle of a fairly typical inept-young-males narrative. The songs are really funny / good, and I would give the show aspect something in the B-range; maybe it's just because I watched them in marathon fashion, but I found the humor somewhat repetitive. AiA is a surprisingly sensitive show about a Midwestern family that takes in a Pakistani exchange student; hilarity ensues. This show was more sentimental and clever than the previews indicated; I was pleasantly surprised. Thus ends the vacuous review portion of the post.

Clearly I'm lying - after waiting for a skipped Greg (nay, Jason) to get his haircut, and after coffee with Meghan and Greg*, we went to see Juno with the iPFam. Juno is straight-up indie fare, rife with snappy, witty dialog, emotional content, hipster-alterna clothes, attitudes, and Belle & Sebastian tunes. The lead actress nailed it, though this was simultaneously impressive and rendered the movie a self-conscious star vehicle. So, a good overall movie, and right up my alley. By far the highlight was the character portrayal by Jason Bateman; the entire dynamic between him and Juno saved the film from a stereotypical suburbanite indictment. There were a lot of problems - the dialog felt terribly forced in a no-one speaks that constructedly that fast; it was clearly written. Plus the pace of dialog died off roughly halfway through the film. The romance between Juno and Michael Cera did not occur on-screen enough to deliver the emotional impact it intended. Actually, a lot of the movie didn't occur on-screen enough; a huge chunk of the relationship and narrative felt under-developed. Blah blah etc. All of that said, still a very good movie; funny, enjoyable, and at least emotionally touching (though man, that pan-out guitar duet ending was PAINFUL, and not in a Yo La Tengo kinda way).

* (I used one of my go-to lines at the coffee shop. There was a small child screaming that he wanted water at the table located about 18 inches behind me. I said "Desire is the root of all suffering!" in response. I feel this comment stands as metaphor for my existence nicely: accomplishes nothing, but makes you laugh**).

** (Of course, my joke of the week was when Beck said that she "spread word about the book Lamb like gospel!" Lamb is a Christopher Moore novel about an apocryphal text by Biff, Christ's childhood pal. It's fantastic - funny and spiritual. I said "Beck, you're the Jesus Jesus!" This is funny, in a constant iPodJesus joke environment).

After the movie, we went to a restaurant called Lentos in Rachachachachacha for which I was ridiculed for the entire day due to my non-vegetarian leanings. Thankfully, the food I had was super-delicious. We were there celebrating Margie's birthday; I look forward to my birthday celebration in early February.

MG headed out on Friday morning. They had a thoroughly-mentioned adventure en route to iPHome, involving car accidents, AAA and hotel bartenders, so they needed to get back to Boston to start taking care of things. PLUS their cat Simon (see reference here) has been very ill for the past couple of weeks, so they needed to get back in to take care of him (not only to, ha, make plans for Nigel) (their other cat). An update on that front is that beck, supervet, correctly recommended that they check Simon for pyelonephritis, so hopefully some abx will be able to help the little kitty. Great as always to see MG; hope their universe becomes more orderly in the near future.

Beck and I spent the bulk of Friday lounging, reading, playing pool (Beck crushed my self-image by beating me at nine-ball TWICE), and, especially for Beck, sleeping. We eventually roused ourselves enough to eat dinner, and were visited by a very serious Liz:

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Not really. Liz (aka she who saved Xmas) brought Lilly, her new lab puppy, over for a kitchen-wide romp.

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There are a few more cute shots of the pup over at flickr; just click any of the above pics and navigate. We would be remiss if we showcased Lilly without giving the current CBS canine matriarch a shoutout, so here's a few snaps of the Hollister:

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That brought us to early early Saturday, a plane ride, an afternoon run for me (first since my contused thigh, yah!), a nap for Beck, and a settling in to watch a very exciting Pats win. 16-0! The Pats are perfect. I am nobody. Therefore, I am the Pats. I think that's how it goes.

(Really, fun to watch, but the Pats clearly have some chinks in ye olde armor. I would like to see the 19-0 phenomenon come to fruition, but I don't know if I'll be able to bear the coming storm of willtheywon'tthey. Exciting time for the NFL, for better or otherwise).

SO welcome home to the collective nyetverse - more commentary / posting in the coming hours. Today, it's football and the first dose of Ultimate in the past week and a half. Here's hoping for survival.

Thursday, December 27, 2007

GPGDS, Boxing Day Edition

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Greetings from the Wintry Wonderland of Wachachacha, New York. The Beck and I survived a ten hour trip up from Phoenix on Monday the 24th, including a lovely four hour stopover in Newark, New Jersey. (Nothing a few episodes of Mr. Show and a delving into The Corrections couldn't handle). Rolled into the iPAbode just in time for Xmas eve dinner with the extended iPClan, enjoyed a fantastic and throughly lazy Xmas day, and visited with the B of CBS on Wednesday (and super thanks to Liz for saving Xmas and giving me the Simpsons Movie which we've already watched for the first of four hundred times). That's a superfast version of three days which brings us to last night when we saw the ever-evolving and mind-blowingly improving (mind-blowing because it seems like they would have run out of cap room, but they do keep getting better and tighter, more emotionally transcendent, etc.) Giant Panda Guerrilla Dub Squad. This post is primarily an excuse to post pictures, but let it be known that the GPGDS continue to smoke musically and drew a GIGANTOR crowd last night (though, as noted by superstar IPJames, a lot of them neither met the five feet tall nor the 18 years old requirement). (Though of those meeting the requirements, there was an awful lot of fangirl talk in the waiting line outside the venue centered around the cuteness of the bassist). (I'm just sayin', the rock star life maintains its aphrodisiac-esque qualities, even after all these years). (Beck, of course, insisted that her blood-relatedness trumped the shrillest of their admiring screeches). So, head on over to My-GPGDS-Space or check out some youtubeage of the band. Fantastic stuff; you want to get on now to say you knew them when. Or, just check out a little phototable below, a little visual reminiscence of the excellent aural experience that was last night:

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Sunday, December 23, 2007

Hockey Night in Glendale

The Beck graciously took me to a Coyotes-Canucks game last night, approximately the third regular season NHL hockey game I've attended in my life (Blues-Blackhawks a long time ago, Sharks-Stars in Dallas for a Christmas present during college, and now, Yotes-Nucks in lovely Glendale, AZ). We had sick seats for this one - one of the docs in Beck's group has third row, center-ice behind the penalty box season tix, and sold them to us at a big fat discount. So that was sweet. Here are some views of the action from our keep-all-our-money-in-a-big-brown-bag vantage point:

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So yeah, SWEET seats. FTR, this is what the greatest hockey player in the history of ever looks like from across the rink when shot with the wrong setting on the camera:

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I apologize for the focus / graininess of some of these shots; I was trying to use the sports setting for the first time and in the low light (and being shot through the glass), a lot of the shots used a very high iso setting and resulted in a whole lot of noise. My bad. The shots of the arena came out decently well:

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Beck noted that both anthems were fantastic and met her approval (a rare event), though she prefers the Canadian anthem. You know, being commie and all. So a great intro, and in case I didn't mention it, this game was the Hockey Night in Canada game of the night. So there was a lot of bonus hoopla in addition to the usual Howling fandemonium that one can expect at a Coyotes game. (This is a lie; it may have been the most apathetic crowd I've seen). But there were a fair number of Vancouver Canucks fans in the house, making for a nice mix of cheers and boos at any given play. Of course, and this is probably the story of the game, it was very hard to pay attention to either the arena or the action on the ice (that's clearly a lie; I was absorbed).

When Beck and I attended the preseason game in September, there was this guy, let's call him "This Guy," who was sitting in front of us and banging on the glass, screaming his head off, heckling all the players in the penalty box, you name it. Did I mention that he was wearing a backwards Cubs hat? He was. But he was not a kindred spirit. "This Guy" got a C- in the clever department - most of his jokes / heckles were variations on the "you suck/stink/smell/there's something smelly on you" continuum. Yelled very, very loud for the entire game, and in a relatively empty preseason arena, this stands out quite a bit. Of course, normally you would laugh about an obnoxious fan and forget about it. But the Cubs hat stood out. And it stood out even more when Beck and I SAW THIS GUY on TBS during the baseball playoffs! During one of the games where the Cubs were getting their pathetic-in-October butts kicked, THIS GUY got several seconds on the screen hanging his head and cursing. Hilarious! Beck and I laughed quite a bit - really, when you spend three hours with a guy in person making an ass of himself and then get to see him continue the act on national television, it's pretty funny.

So flash forward to last night - this guy is there again! So the September night was not a one time thing; this guy has season tickets! (Beck correctly points out that maybe this is just a cosmic coincidence and we both happen to have attended the same two games. DUBIOUS!). So naturally, Beck and I are quite thrilled to spend anothe revening with this dude. Early on, he seemed relatively sedate...

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(Note also the dad and little girl in the foreground. During a goal review (which ended up going against the Yotes, d'oh), the dad yelled at the refs something to the effect of "if you need to look at the replay, it's right up there on the jumbotron! He scored, you idiots!" He then fist-bumped his daughter in a move that was simultaneously adorable and prompted Beck to get her PTA on and question "what is he teaching the children?" Excellent).

But soon, THIS GUY decided that he (and to a lesser extent, his friend who is in some of the above pictures and provided great commentary like "come on guys, shoot better!") was the Coyotes "seventh man," and his indomitable spirit alone would whip the crowd into a Coyote-pumping frenzy. This involved rousing cheers of "come on, stand up!" and "let's make some noise!" Of course, he had a go-to cheer, the age-old "Let's Go Coyotes!" (clap-clap-clapclapclap). Only he would try to start it repeatedly, and no one responded. He would at best get about five people joining him. Like I said, apathetic crowd. About the fourth time he tried this, the guy behind me chimed in:

"Hey, you guys wanna do the wave?"

SO for all of this guy's efforts, we found ourselves in the middle of an apathetic crowd watching a very exciting hockey game. (And an exciting 1st intermission peewee hockey match taboot, which felt a whole lot like watching NHL hockey on barbiturates, and maybe some of Lewis Carrol's pills, too). After two periods and a whole lot of ridiculous saves by the Coyotes goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov, the scored was tied at 0. Things looked like they were going to hold that trend when the Canucks snapped in a quick one timer with about 11 minutes left. THIS GUY was crushed, and did everything he could think of to get the crowd going. Nothing worked. But the Yotes pulled the same trick they did the other day, summoning five minutes of psycho aggression to attack the net. And when Michalek scored on a sweet pass from Doan, the crowd erupted accordingly - and no one was happier than THIS GUY:

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Lades and gents, your Nyet Jones picture of the year! YEAH! Dude was genuinely ecstatic. Fun times. The Yotes held on to the tie for the next five minutes which got us BONUS HOCKEY!

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And the Yotes survived an exciting overtime to give us... A SHOOTOUT! Tres exciting. Lots of great pics from the tension filled ending:

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Unfortunately that last one is the game winner for the Canucks - the little red circle is around the puck which is sailing past Bryzgalov for the win. Sadness. Here's a series of Beck pics showing the elation of the tying goal, the happiness at bonus hockey, and the sadness at the loss:

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You'll note that Beck dressed appropriately for the cold game, warmly enough so that even Dippin' Dots could not cool her spirit! (That's right, the Beck got her ice cream fix, and requests that her nickname be referred to as "Double D." Jessica Simpson's father has no comment).

So that was the hockey game - another late-gained point for the Phoenix club, even though the shootout win would have been sweet. No fights at this one, but a lot of hard-checking and nifty stickwork. Great night out, and a good start to our winter vacation!

(And apologies to THIS GUY - I am all in favor of supporting the home team, and I admire your zeal, even if I didn't comply when you scremed "stand up!" in my face. Keep up the good work, and I hope you don't mind this pleasantly mocking cameo in the Nyetverse).