eeeech!

I've been in training in LA all week and the drive has been gruesome. You couldn't pay me enough to move to LA. During rush hour this week, from the Airport on the 405 to the 101 took a good hour. Today it took 1.5 hours. It's less than 25 miles!!! The bumper to bumper traffic is just excruciating. I prefer to drive home rather than stay at a hotel.

During training, I get to peruse the web w/o big brother (at work) logging my web foot prints and came upon this horrific article. I can't even comment because I am sooo disgusted. He apparently has had mental problems for years......

AVATAR

Another anticpated sci fi thriller, Avatar is due to be released December 18, 2009.

Speaking of Sci Fi, the restart of the Large Hadron Collider has been pushed back to mid November. I'm getting anxious!

Dump Truck

An old friend used to call me a "dump truck". Everytime we talked, I would "dump" news, trivia, etc on him w/o a logical segue into the next topic of conversation.

Example of my recent dump trucking...


He: "How was your weekend?"
Me: "Not too eventful. How was your dad's wedding?"
He: "Great! The bachelor party was at golf course on Saturday and then wedding on Monday. Busy weekend"
Me: "Wynton Marsalis is playing at UCSB in Sept. Gotta get tickets."
He: "......okay...." (puzzled look...)
Me: "Golf, how fun! How did that go?
He: "Not one of my better games. I heard you were taking lessons?"
Me: "Yep, with Twin Lakes. Are you hungry? I made spring rolls..”

My boss recently also told me that she has also noticed this behavior of mine and wondered if I lost interest easily. It's neither that I'm a bad listener nor that I lose interest. I actually am a great listener and remember things about people very well. Too well sometimes, because I find contradictions or inaccuracies when talking to most people. Ie, they will tell me something they like or dislike, and then totally opposite the next time forgetting they had already told me differently. People can change their minds.. but forgetting that they told me something differently irritate me.

I am wondering if this dump trucking of information is due to my social inadequacies. Maybe I am uncomfortable with the silence and need to keep the conversation going by changing the topic?? Maybe it’s my type "A" personality—I feel a need to move the conversation along…. I believe in most cases, I am just pondering over many things and what should stay in my head, gets verbalized.

Frank McCourt

(19 August 1930 - 19 July 2009)

I heard on the news last night that Frank McCourt had died. Last year, Becky recommended I read his book "Angela's Ashes". I was captivated from the very first page and could not put the book down.

"Angela's Ashes" was as humourous as it was tragic. I read the book twice so I could relive his story all over again. It's one of my favorite books and one I recommend to everyone I know. He was a great master story teller.

My treptidations at the Dentist

Dentist Dropped Tools Down Man's Throat


Wow, for the longest time my fear has been the very same. In addition, I also keep my eyes closed because of fear having the tool(s) dropped accidentally into my eyes. Or choking on the rubber like material (when making molds of your teeth).

I know my dental hygenist would never be this careless, but I still have my trepidations...

Mo Money!

I've been looking for ways to supplement my income as paying both rent and mortgage are depleting my wages every month. I've resigned myself to the occasional indulgence of Sushi only once a month.

I looked at Elance.com with their plethora of IT development contract jobs, but I don't have the 20+ additional hours to complete the job(s). In addition, I don't have the proper tools on my home laptop (Visual Studio & Sql Server) and the laptop has very little juice!

While perusing the web, I came upon CrowdSpring - a community where people can post their creative project needs and get feedback from a global talent pool. Unfortunately, I have very little Photoshop (or other design app) experience and some of the completed projects are amazing!

4 Years

We met four years ago in Paso Robles. It's been rocky!! But it's also been a lot of fun. Here's to another 4 years.

Evil Children

I really like Vera Farmiga. She played the bad ass wife of a low-life gangster in "Running Scared", and the two timing girlfriend / Doctor in "The Departed".

She is going to be in a new movie called "Orphan".

Wait... she was also in "Joshua". Love the Soundtrack!

I started thinking that I have seen a few evil child movies. "Children of the Crop" scared me a lot when I was younger, as I got older, I wasn't scared anymore. "The Pit" was pretty brutal. By far the cutest was Gage in "Pet Semetary".

2006 - The Omen Remake	2004 - GodSend
1993 - The Good Son	1989 - Pet Semetary
1984 - Children of the Corn	1981 - The Pit
1978 - Damien _ Omen II	1976 - The Omen
1976 - "Communion" / "Alice Sweet Alice"	1968 - Rosemary's Baby
1953 - The Bad Seed

If you know of one I haven't seen...

Middlesex

Back in 2005, I decided to attempt to read all the fiction books that have won a Pulitzer Prize.

Some of them I read back in Jr or HighSchool ("The Caine Mutiny", "Old Man & The Sea", "To Kill A MockingBird", "Executioner's Song", "The Color Purple").

Since making this attempt, I have read "Confederacy of Dunces" , "The Known World" , "The Hours" , "The Road" , "Empire Falls" ,
"Breathing Lessons" ).

Most recent book was "MiddleSex" by Jeffrey Eugenides. It won the Pulitzer award in 2003.

I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day in January of 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of 1974.

That's the first line of the book and it had me hooked. Not having read any reviews about it, I actually assumed it might be some story about re-incarnation. I was wrong. It was once again another book that I couldn't put down. Think Chastity Bono.

So 12 down and 44 more to go....

Of the most recent ones I have read, my favorite has been "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole (1981). I've read this book couple times because the dialogue was extremely colorful and funny. Great character description and development. Plus I really like his style of writing and the vernacular used.

He won the award posthumously. Ater failed attempts to get the book published, he became depressed and committed suicide at the age of 31 (1969). His mom found a copy of the manuscript and succeeded in getting it published.. some 15 years afterwards.

He also had another manuscript entitled "The Neon Bible" that he wrote when he was 16 old and it was finally published in 1989. The book , although short, was very insightful and very well written. Extraordinary for someone so young. I only wish there were more from this author.

Customer From Hell

So I thought I would start documenting some of the customers from hell at my boyfriend's work because I just can not believe the audacity of some people. My boyfriend, who manages the branch, comes home every day with stories that are jaw dropping. The things customers will do to get 15% knocked off their rental bill.

Yesterday, a woman was picked up (They offer free pick up and delivery) from an auto shop and driven to their branch. The woman placed her drycleaning items in the trunk and upon arriving at the office, she darted inside. After fifteen minutes of doing paperwork, she was lead to another rental car and after inspecting the car, she drove off.

An hour later, remembering that she had left the drycleaning items in the trunk of the other rental car, she calls up and inquires about the items. On an average day, his branch rents 6-8 cars an hour. No one at the branch nor herself could recall what model car was used to pick her up an hour earlier. She excoriated my boyfriend and the sales person for losing her drying cleaning items. They immediately called all the rentals within that one hour time period but to no avail. Today, she called threatenng to sue them for neglect and wanted Enterprise to reimburse her for the missing items.. supposedly she had over 1000 dollars worth of clothing.

When are some people going to take responsibility for their mistakes. So not only do some people want to others to share the wealth, they also want others to share in the responsibility of their own mistakes. He is in the business of renting cars not babysitting people's personal items. (You should see their lost and found box). I don't know how many times I have forgotten my cell phone or purse in a taxi cab or have left my sunglasses at a restaurant. I would never think to blame the taxi driver or the restaurant for my carelessness.

Michael Jackson Memorial

"More Than 1.6 Million Michael Jackson Fans Learn Who Won Memorial Tickets"

Yesterday, I registered online for random drawing of tickets to Michael Jackson Memorial held on Tuesday at 10 am at the Staple Center in LA. I just checked and.. wowsers... I got a golden ticket!! I've never won anything of this magnitude..!!

The only inconvenience is I have to go to Dodger Stadium on Monday before 6 pm to get the two tickets then go back to LA on Tuesday for the memorial at 10 am. It's a pain, but I know it will be worth it. Kevin can't take the day off... I'm not sure who to take. I don't know if anyone of my friends are a Michael Jackson fan like I am.

Update Monday:
The drive to LA was not so bad... 1.5 hours. We had left at 6 and got into LA around 7:30. The 101 looked pretty desolate this early morning until we arrived into LA. The diurnal construction slowed traffic a bit when we exited Alvarado St off ramp onto Sunset Blvd. Upon arriving at Elysian Park Ave from Sunset Blvd, a cavalcade of police officers diverted us back onto Sunset Blvd, to Echo Park Ave and onto Scott Ave. Not too bad of a detour.

After 15 minutes, we were in the Dodger stadium parking lot. It was still pretty empty at 7:45 am. It was a fast in and out as they checked my paper work and placed the wrist bands on. They didn't check my identification. Fortunately, we got there early and got out early. I was back on the 101 around 8 am (after getting lost on the myriad of highways).

Update Tuesday:
Got on the road at 5:30 this morning and got into LA around 7 am. Someone up there must have really wanted me to attend this memorial because I had no delay arriving in LA even with all the off ramp closures. I got off on 6th street inadvertently and ended up making a right on Hope street unknowingly and found myself next to a parking lot right in front of the Staple Center. How effortless was that? There was no hindrance whatsoever.

It was a memorable event for me especially being in the same room as Kobe Bryant, Magic Johnson, Jackson family, Mariah Carey, John Mayer, Lionel Richie, Stevie Wonder, Brook Sheilds, Smokey Robinson...Lou Ferigno..etc etc... Unfortunately, I didn't have a camera on hand other than the feeble camera in my cell phone:


Choked up little bit when Mariah Carey sang "I'll Be There". I even thought John Mayer was awesome with a cover of "Human Nature". Tianna loved it! I really got tired of people asking "What was John Mayer doing there?" and calling him untalented. . Crazzzzzy! I'm not a huge fan of John Mayer, but I do agree he is truly a talented guitarist.

My favorite performances were by Lionel Richie & Stevie Wonder. More so because they were my some of my favorite performers growing up and I never got to see them perform live when I was younger. Paris Jackson brought me to tears at the end as I'm sure she did others.

So much negativity on the radio from NY congressman to Hannity to other local LA radio personalities about how over the top this coverage has been of Michael Jackson. So stop covering it. Stop taking surveys. And if you're one of the listeners and you think it's over the top, tune out! Go read a book. You don't need to be glued to the television or your iphone/blackberry. Since this broke out a week ago, I've stayed clear of the media regarding Michael Jackson. It was only a fluke that I clicked on a link regarding his memorial service and registered and won a ticket.

The Hangover

My favorite genre of films in order of preference are Sci Fi, Action, Thriller & Suspense (not the Paris Hilton slasher kind of movies), Foreign Films, Drama, Romance, Comedy. Comedy is last because I can't stand slap stick movies ie. Wayans Brothers or movie spoofs. I'm not a big fan of Jack Black ("Be Kind Rewind", "Nacho Libre"). Not a huge fan of Jim Carrey. He's too over the top for me (although he was great in "Eternal Sunshine ...."). Neither did I enjoy the "Naked Gun" nor "Airplane" nor "Harold and Kumar.".... Somehow I get dragged to a myriad of these movies and sit in drudgery. My one exception - Adam Sandler. He's just adorable.. ("50 First Kisses", "Happy Gilmore").

However, I loved the movies: "Planes, Trains and Automobile", "What About Bob", the skimble-skamble creations of Woody Allen, the oenophile like Miles (Paul Giamatti) in "Sideways" and tv shows: "Seinfeld", "Cheers", "Wings", "King of the Hill", "The Office". Most recently - "Tropic Thunder".

So when friends told me about "The HangOver", I was skeptical. I just sat through Carment Electra in the spoof of "300" so it can't get any worse than that!

"The Hangover" was hilarious. It had you rolling on the floor in the first scene. I laughed so hard --- feared wetting my pants. There were a couple of scenes where I thought.. "don't go there.. it will be cheeeeeeeesy".. but the film quickly turned around (the scene in the desert with Mr. Chow). Ed Helms is a riot!!

There were a couple of unanswered questions for me... maybe someone can fill me in..

1) Where did the chicken come from?
2) Who undressed Mr. Chow?

Looks like the characters Stu, Allen and Phil are all in the works for The Hangover 2... I have strong feelings about sequels - Don't make 'em! (unless it's Star Trek or Iron Man :) )