wii sports jazzercise

So I got Wii Sports on Wednesday, and after a couple of sessions playing, my back and arms are super sore! Wii boxing is absolutely hilarious (there's just something about punching someone in the head that I find so satisfying), but I work up a good sweat after only a few rounds.

I also took the fitness test: first day 41 years old, then 35, then 45. Not so good...

In non-Wii news, my new temp job at Bebe has been going well. It's fast paced, but not terribly difficult (I say that now), and everyone who works there have been super nice. It's definitely all about the product and the customer, as it should be. Even though I thought it would be fun looking at pictures of models all day long, clipping the background out of their hair is extremely annoying and zooming in to remove blemishes feels creepy. At the end of the day, it's just all pixels, though. This sounds bad, but I'm tempted to drive into work so I can have a car to drive to this Mexican place that serves up great burritos! Mmmmm..... global warmed burritos....

Now if I can only get used to the hour and a half commute! Bleh! On the upside of that, my BART EZ Rider card works great (seriously, that's the name they chose for a SMART card pass - their marketing team must have been on a break).

In older news, I watched the Transformers a few weeks ago. It was entertaining, but really violent and showed a lot of babe skin for a "kid's" movie. It was also like watching a commercial. There's product placement and then there's Transformers! It was almost as obvious as the Wayne's World Doritos spoof on product placement, but much less funny. The movie definitely didn't disappoint on Hollywood's long tradition of killing the token black guy though. Good joerb!!! I'd give this mainstream movie 2 stars.

crazy crazy

This past week has been busy for me. I signed up with a creative temp agency on Monday, set up an interview on Tuesday, interviewed on Wednesday, and started on Thursday. I also managed to get my hands on a Wii from eBay, but the seller didn't mention that Wii Sports (the reason the Wii is so fun) wasn't included in the auction. Totally dirty pool!

But the game it did come with was given to my nephew who will enjoy it a great deal I imagine, and Nintendo will be replacing my Wii Sports for a little over twenty bucks. So now all I'm doing is setting up characters and poking around on what it can do. As it turns out, it has a lot of fun features for connecting people who own Wiis. Send me your Wii number if you have one!

And now my new gig can help support another spending habit: getting crap for the Wii. I feel like such the consumer :)

vacancy

Almost as suddenly as they appeared, the nesting birds are gone! No more cheep cheep cheep cheep cheep. Although it drove me insane, I kind of miss it in a way. There was new life right outside my window! They left behind a nest made of mud and twigs and a pile of bird crap. Lousy tenants...

darn, it *IS* inconvenient!

So we finally watched An Inconvenient Truth and even for a jaded follower of the green movement, it was both extra scary and informative. I've read both positive and negative reviews on this movie and about global warming. I just can't understand why the naysayers just can't get past the FACT that polluting the environment is a BAD thing!

Whatever the politics, whatever the science, non science, hearsay, anecdotes, whatever you want to call it – spewing noxious fumes into the air just like dumping sewage into the ocean is not good for the planet and anything living on it and you don't need a scientist or years of studies to know something foul when you smell it. WHY oh WHY does there even need to be a film like this??? Let's just move forward and acknowledge that we all like to use energy, that there are much better ways of doing it, and that we should do it those better ways!

Speaking of which, if your energy provider is PG&E, go to their ClimateSmart page and please sign up for the program! It is a no-brainer way to help the environment by making the energy you use to be carbon neutral thanks to the offsets PG&E will fund through the program. Most people will see their bill go up less than $5 a month! (ours will be something like $2.75).

If you really want to put your money into carbon neutrality, go to Native Energy and buy carbon offsets for everything you do (drive, fly, fart, etc). I found that site through the Climate Crisis site that the movie endorses.

Think your contribution won't do enough? I say everything has to start somewhere, and if this planet melts into a big gooey mess, I want to have at least contributed something to fight it.

Want 100mpg plug-in hybrids? Go here!

home depot sucks

If there was a Lowes closer to home, I'd go there and forgo the torture that it is to visit Home Crapo. It really has gone down hill since it's heyday as the biggest home improvement supplier on the block. Now employees don't really know anything about home improvement, everything is dusty, and most of the time the inventory is in disarray.

This time around, I went to return some items and the 'customer service' line became mired by one individual with a stack of receipts trying to return every thing he ever bought from Home Depot. Instead of opening up another return register, jaded employees casually strolled by as passing customers (literally) gasped at the growing return line that went out the door. Several people just gave up and left - I'm sure the folks in front of me ended up waiting at least 45 minutes before they were finally taken care of. Do I blame the workers? Heck no! The management is always to blame for such situations. I bet they shop at Lowes.

Music Friday

In celebration of goofing off today, I've decided to share with you some more fun music picks from my collection.

Alive by Ima Robot
Scream by Ima Robot
I don't know of anybody who knows who these guys are and I think I found them through an iTunes suggestion. Do yerself a favor and listen to the rest of their album - it's awesome!

King Without A Crown (Live at Stubbs) by Matisyahu
I'm not a religious person, but this song is downright inspirational. The studio version of this song simply doesn't do ANY justice to Matisyahu's incredible talent and charismatic song preaching. Testify!!!

Tale of Five Cities by Peanut Butter Wolf
I found this song randomly while looking for Kid Koala music. It turns out that PB Wolf has an absolutely AMAZING album called My Vinyl Weighs a Ton. If you're into old school rap and DJ, this is the album for you.

Dosvedanya Mio Bombino by Pink Martini
I think this is the only song I've ever liked with horse clops in it. Seriously. This band is crazy unique, great fun, and sold out at all the shows that came to town! The entire CD is filled with great songs in different styles and languages. I've got to go see them live!!!

random tips

Internet Faster
If you use Firefox, go to preferences/advanced/network and change "how Firefox connects to the internet" to 'Auto-detect proxies from this network'. I used to know why this is faster, but that information got pushed out of my brain and was replaced with other things. I suggest you check it out for yourself and see if it makes a difference :)

Tivo Faster
Okay, this is everywhere on the internet, but in case you're a Tivo n00b like myself, you can change your Tivo skip button into a 30-second commercial blaster. Turn on your tv, then press 'select-play-select-3-0-select'. If you did it right, you should hear a few happy chimes. Once you do, your skip button (the one below your banana shaped fast forward button) will advance whatever you're watching 30 seconds instead of going to the next marker on the green bar. If your Tivo loses power or is reset, the button will revert to its default function and you'll have to do the trick again.

Read slower
Put on a blindfold and try to read a book. It's really hard! You have to read by smell, and since that takes a long time, you can really savor a good story.

the never ending house remodel

Check out the giant header Amit and I installed on Monday! It only took 10 hours and still needs to be properly secured to the rest of the framing, but now there's a bit more open space :) Hmmm... it would have been great to have a 'before' photo, wouldn't it have? Oh well - just use your imaginations to think of seeing a wall instead of seeing windows at the back of the garage.

Next up: cabinets! So all the crap you see lying around will actually have a home.

my iPhone iSaga

Ah the iPhone. Coveted. Scarce. Lots o' trouble. Well, it was worth the trouble I should say, because not only did I get to meet and observe all sorts of interesting people in line anxiously waiting to drop at least $500 on a phone (you don't see that every day), but what started out as a mission to earn some quick cash through reselling on eBay ended up as a tantalizingly difficult decision to possibly keep it as an anniversary gift for Cathryn.

After much deliberation, we decided to try to sell it on eBay and when that didn't work out, things went full circle to me standing in front of the counter at the AT&T store returning it. Even before the returning process began, the employee excitedly went to a fellow coworker and said, "Hey look! Another sealed iPhone!" His response, "Great. Put it on my desk." So it didn't even get back on the shelf before it was spoken for!

I immediately thought, "Aw man! I could have sold it to that guy!" Sigh... maybe I'm not greedy enough or don't have the nose for profiteering. Either way, I think I should give up anything that remotely smacks of grifting. Not because of high morals or anything, but because I don't think I'm very good at it :|

Japanese game shows are SO much better!

simpsons avatar

Thanks to The Simpsons Movie site and Sonia, I found this cool tool to create your own Simspons style avatar (I like Cathryn's blank stare). Fun!