Tom Shane vs George Zimmer... only one will survive.

One of the least enjoyable things about living in the Bay Area: Tom Shane. His voice gives me the creeps, his radio commericals are intolerable, and in fact the most recent radio commercials have him sounding like he's barely paying attention to the question asked of him before replying. BAD advertising. BAD. I'll take Men's Warehouse radio ads over his any old day.

And today at the gym someone had turned on The View and one of their segments reminded me of that bank ad on the radio that talks about how kids get rewarded for losing teeth, but adults don't get rewarded for losing their car keys. (I can't remember how that part ties into the bank part, but it does.) Anyway this segment had viewers voting online for the most disgusting bathroom, and the winner got a free remodeling job. This particular winner didn't seem particularly "needy" in the traditional sense of the word - she seemed to have just neglected to clean her bathroom for about 15 years. As a result, she was rewarded with a free remodeling job.

People. I ask of you. What kind of behavior is this instilling in our youth?? I mean, entire shows centered around household neglect on TLC are one thing (especially when said shows come with hot hosts/carpenters), but to feature such a thing on such a reputable show* as The View? That's just wrong.

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* Yes, I am kidding. But not about the "what kind of behavior is this perpetuating" concept... Even with TLC.

It's no longer raining men, hallelujah!

Today I went from approximately eight straight (no pun intended) fun-filled hours of KGAY to Glen Phillips at the Great American Music Hall. Talk about culture shock... Not quite the culture shock intensity level of going from rafting down the cool calm Colorado River in the Grand Canyon to the NEON LIGHTS IN DISGUSTINGLY HOT HUMID VEGAS in the period of about three hours, which I will never willingly do again. I would definitely do today all over again.

I am 100% certain that no one reading this shares my emotional connection to Toad the Wet Sprocket. (I'm actually fairly certain that no one has even heard of that band.) But he was their founder, and he did an admirable number of their songs tonight, and they are all stuck in my head right now. And despite the fact that those songs are mostly about dysfunctional adult relationships, that makes me very, very happy.

In keeping with the interest of belated top fives, which will not be a regular occurrence but is here because a) I can't seem to do this in time for Fridays, like, EVER and b) it came to mind tonight during the show, I hereby bring you the top five voices I would marry in a heartbeat. Regardless of the person attached to the voice - partly because these persons are, generally speaking, already married - but mostly because of the obvious limitations of this concept - in no particular order, the voices (of more people you have probably never heard of) that I would marry are:

• Glen Phillips
  
• Jack Johnson
• Grant Lee Phillips
  
• Shawn Mullins
  
• Mark Kozelek

Please note that this list is subject to change at a moment's notice depending on my mood at that particular moment. Sometimes Michael Stipe can really do it for me. (OK, really now, am I a gay man?!)

One small step.

Ashcroft Gone, Justice Statues Disrobe

SOOOOO Bay Area.

AKA the post-Friday five. The other morning KFOG did a listener survey of what "sooooo Bay Area" means. It made me think... And so I bring you what "SOOOOO Bay Area" means to me, in no particular order:

• KGAY, when Live 105* turns its station over to the likes of the Bee Gees, Erasure, New Order, Depeche Mode, Culture Club, DISCO!,** etc. for three days each Pride weekend.
• Being able to drive 2 hours in any direction and hit beautiful mountains, or stunning beaches, or both.
• More liberal bumper stickers per car than anywhere else in the United States.
• June 25, 64 degrees fahrenheit.
• I will never own a home here.
  

Add your own!

I guess "SOOOOOOO not east coast " would also be an explanation. On the way to my first temp job when I moved here (almost eight years ago - wow!), the person sharing the elevator ride with me started a pleasant small-talk coversation. I'd honestly never experienced that back east and it freaked me out. There's just a different vibe out here.***

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* I love this station in general, even though I don't always like the music they play. Any station that announces the days, hours, minutes and seconds that have passed since the last time they played Creed (last count: a looooong time) is a damn fine station in my book.

** Between my total thrill with this weekend's musical selections and my recent obsession with Queer as Folk, I'm beginning to wonder if I'm really a gay man trapped in the body of a straight woman. (OK, I'm probably just nostalgic for that music and curiously fascinated with the show, but hey, it's kinda funny to think about.)

*** And the award for stating the obvious goes to...

Damn.

Oh well, fellow former-Aquarians, we tried. At least the million robot march was successful.

"Bloody brilliant! Literally!"

For once, an IMDB user comment I agree with (and will therefore quote freely, though I reserve the right to correct punctuation and capitalization). Shaun of the Dead had me laughing out loud, heartily and often. "Clever, witty, sweet and nasty and, at times, gory and horrific, SOTD has it all." A lot of thought went into this film - it's really evident in much of the dialogue and in the scenes where Shaun is watching TV. "This film should be seen side by side with Romero's Dawn of the Dead as both films cleverly and sarcastically comment on our zombified society and virtually show no difference between the living and the living dead." I must argue that SOTD has many more amusing pop culture references than DOTD, though.

"SEE THIS FILM!!! You do NOT have to be a fan of horror movies to appreciate the sublime satire that is Shaun of the Dead."

Word.

Oh, and watch for cameos of some of our favorite, and not so favorite, English folk. (Pardon me. Favourite.)

How to be productive at work.

CANCEL ALL EXISTING MEETINGS IMMEDIATELY. For the past two days I have had NO MEETINGS. And over the past two days I literally checked off almost everything with a deadline on my to-do list. The few remaining deadlined items, I can easily complete tomorrow (despite the fact that I'm booked pretty solidly all day). And vacation can begin at 5pm - as it should.

This might sound like common sense, meeting-free days resulting in uber-productivity. But it has been a looooooong time since I felt like I got anything done at work, anything at all, and particularly anything of any quality, and I am starting to think it's because of all the meetings. Several regular gatherings are very useful, several are fun to go to (for various reasons), but the rest of them are just annoyingly time consuming.

On a totally-related note, how is it possible to have a blog and not talk about work? I spend [ ... pause while I do the math ... ] approximately 35-40% of my waking hours per week there.

YIKES. I sooooo should not have done that math.

Gay schmay.

Proof that Kyan and I are destined for each other (despite the fact that he "thinks" he's gay): his iTunes playlist. REM? Joy Division? U2? Jane's Addiction? Morrisey?

Man, we are soooooo meant to be.

Weird conversations du jour.

This afternoon... Ikea chair delivery guy, who apparently knew his Ikea deliveries and whose mind was clearly elsewhere, to other Ikea chair delivery guy: "Wow! This whole apartment is from Ikea! There's the matching Karlanda sofa... That's a Billy bookcase with glass doors, there's a Lack coffee table, that's the Skyberg side table... and they come in different colors too! Birch, beech..." Me: "Veneer..." Ikea chair delivery guy: "Beer? There's a color named beer?"

Outside the Albertson's tonight... Needy person asking for money: "Spare some change?" Me: "No, sorry." Needy person: "What the HELL you carrying a purse for if you don't got no change?"

For your (guilty) viewing pleasure...

A few shows I have been watching lately... All are utter crap, but in the train-wreck-can't-help-but-watch sense of the word. Shockingly, they are all on MTV/VH1.

Viva La Bam: It's been on forever but only recently have I become addicted. What can I say... He's hot, they're all certifiably insane, and every episode is another notch on my "hell no I'm not having kids" belt.

Pimp My Ride: Xzibit takes us on a tour of the crappiest cars in the universe, then turns them into the most ridiculous modes of transportation one could imagine. His mockery of the original car's state, and the 'board meeting' where all the tattooed guys with metal spikes coming out of their faces sit around a table with straight faces deciding what to do with the car, are totally worth my 30 minutes. Totally.

Strip Search: Fifteen moderately attractive guys with the maturity level of four year olds, competing for seven spots in a traveling striptease act. The drama that ensues is far greater than any episode of Seventh Heaven, let me tell you!

And, sadly, yes, Inferno II, which has long since been over but they keep replaying it and replaying it and replaying it... I think I only watch it because of Dan, the finest, funniest gay man east of the Mississippi.

I'm sure there are more that I'm forgetting. Sigh. Think it's probably time to update my Netflix queue...

30 Days, then back to your plushy lifestyle.

I guess I understand what he is trying to accomplish. After all, I watched and loved Super Size Me. But I'm not sure how I feel about this new show - perhaps because the topic I saw tonight (Minimum Wage) was really insulting - probably because of my volunteer life. Pretend to be poor for 30 days and then when you're done, go back to your swank New York apartment and on to the next gig. Why not pick a topic and actually DO SOMETHING about it? Hell, with the Oscar nomination under your belt you could easily take down McDonald's, one franchise at a time.

Oh, right. But then FX wouldn't pay you for it.

Maybe I've been watching too much of the Awful Truth lately, where actions are actually taken and bad people are actually brought to justice. Regardless, I don't think I'll be watching 30 Days again.

Friday five: how to keep your sanity at work.

Stolen from a very old, very extensive list of suggestions in my email archive. My five favorites, in no particular order:

• Every time someone asks you to do something, ask if they want fries with that.
• Put mosquito netting around your work area. Play a tape of jungle sounds all day.
• When the money comes out the ATM, scream, "I won!" "I won!" "3rd time this week!!!!!"
• Finish all your sentences with "in accordance with the prophecy."
• Put your garbage can on your desk and label it "in."

Off to the gym for more closed-captioning fun! Happy weekend everyone.

Must. See. Immediately.

Why was I not informed of this? According to the Dish, Colin Hart, director of the Christian Institute, fumes, "genuine religious debate and criticism is one thing, but this public service broadcast was an offensive, spiteful, systematic mockery and wilful denigration of Christian belief" and previously described the show as "the most offensive and spiteful show ever broadcast by the BBC."

AWESOME!!!

Attention, fine residents of California.

It's called rain. R-A-I-N. It doesn't sting you, burn you, melt you, or otherwise hurt you in any way, shape or form. It's really only water. Really. I promise.

Now please learn how to drive when it occurs.

Thank you!

File under: If I Hear This One More Time...

Lately my life (meaning work and extracurricular activies - I have no actual life per se) has consisted of a lot of people saying, in so many words, "thanks so much for all you do it's soooo appreciated you're so great oh and by the way here's a shitload more crap for you to do since you don't have much choice but to grin and take it."

It's gotten to the point where the "thanks so much" piece is just incredibly condescending and worthless and I just wait for the shitload of more crap. I know that part of it is my own fault - in some situations I'm a control freak who wants to be sure that things are done right, so I go above and beyond and, in doing so, set my own bar really high. And I know that part of it is pure cynicism, which I am trying to work on.

But the rest of it is just patronizing. Maybe if I thought that any what I was doing was remotely helpful or worthwhile in any sense, I might feel differently. But I don't, so I don't.

Therein lies my main issue with my "life" right now. And boy, if I had an ounce of energy to address it, I would change it... But I don't, so I don't. Lather, rinse, repeat again tomorrow.

Overheard on a conference call today...

... from someone who was attempting to summarize a particularly complex conference call for clarity: "Now I get to play my meathead role."

Also known from here on out as: my new disclaimer.

What to my wondering eyes should appear...

The perfect ending to an otherwise crappy day was a package containing TWENTY-FOUR CDs, including music I haven't heard for about twelve years...

Now Cracker! Now Primus! Now Elvis Costello and Offspring! On White Stripes, on Ozzy, on Mos Def, on [bunch of new things]!

I sprang to my computer and imported every single one; after an hour plus iPod update I was finally done. Donning headphones and sliding into bed with the greatest of ease, at last I was off to dreamland to sail the Seas of Cheese.

Thanks, Cousin Jay...

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Twenty-four = Christmas Eve. Twelve = days of Christmas. Package o' stuff = Christmas. See? This was justified.

Things that made me tired today.

In no particular order...

My crazy dream about a crazy ex-coworker. Technology. Being the (only) one to offer up a few hours of her evening in an attempt to make sure things go a little more smoothly tomorrow. Having to buy a lunch because no veggie options were available. The amount of extracurricular work I was going to have to do tonight. People checking email through the whole training session. The prospect of another day just like today.

And so back to work.

Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper.

I am still grappling with the concept that my company has a corporate rate at the Ritz. I walked into my room last night to find classical music playing softly in the background, robes at my disposal, the plushest towels and pillows I could ever imagine, and regal curtains adorning the windows. My coworker and I hit the bar for a quick drink-and-rant, and I felt supremely out of place in my tye-dye t-shirt and ratty tennis shoes. Yeah, I don't get out much.

Tonight I was a little surprised to find that they didn't put the ironing board away while they were straightening the room. The bath mat (the one with the rubber padding on the bottom) was folded on the bathroom sink, which was kind of odd. The end of the toilet paper roll wasn't folded into a neat little triangle. And I still couldn't figure out how the hell to set the alarm. My opinion started to waver.

But then I got a rose, and the best damn sourdough rolls I've had in years, with my room service and all was forgiven.

Super duper.

Good to know.

I learned last night that I can get the same Wilco show at home on my couch with the CDs, that I can by paying money to see them live.

For the record, the same can be said for Cake and the Pretenders. Don't get me wrong - I'm glad to have seen all of them live, but I probably won't be paying money to do that ever again.

All I want for Christmas...

Aw, c'mon. It's only $130,000 dollars at Costco!!

Because no one died when Clinton lied...

The "email your friends" text from the confirmation screen of a petition I just signed:

Hi,

I thought you might want to join me in asking Senators to speak up about the Downing Street Minutes. They were secret minutes taken at a meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair -- they document that the Bush Adminstration made the decision to go to war in Iraq no matter what the intelligence or the truth about the threat. We have to alert the American public about them.

Senator Kennedy is speaking out about this memo, ask your Senator to do the same:

http://www.tedkennedy.com/page/petition/downingstreet/fdfzzp

Senator Kennedy said the following about these Minutes:

"The contents of the Downing Street Minutes confirm that the Bush Administration was determined to go to war in Iraq, regardless of whether there was any credible justification for doing so. The Administration distorted and misrepresented the intelligence in its attempt to link Saddam Hussein with the terrorists of 9/11 and Osama bin Laden, and with weapons of mass destruction that Iraq did not have.

In addition, the Downing Street Minutes also confirm what has long been obvious – that the timing of the war was linked to the 2002 Congressional elections, and that the Administration’s planning for post-war Iraq was incompetent in all its aspects. The current continuing crisis is a direct result of that incompetence."

Please stand with Senator Kennedy and ask your Senator to speak out:

http://www.tedkennedy.com/page/petition/downingstreet/fdfzzp

Thanks!

Please leave a comment about any other relevant links to petitions or information about this if you have it... This is what I get for actively avoiding all news sources like the plague for the last 3 weeks. I had no idea there was even buzz about this.

A little coincidence and a little serendipity.

Yesterday I had to fly to LA for an afternoon meeting. Everything was going great - I got up on time, even tried to go to the gym* before heading to the airport, and got to the airport with plenty of time to spare (unlike last time when I was one of those people I absolutely hate, who runs to the front of the security line waving their itinerary frantically while everyone else wonders why they got up two hours early instead of pulling that same stunt).

But then IT happened.

Not having anyone with me to watch my stuff, I had to shlep everything including my full cup of coffee into the bathroom with me. I was worried about leaving my coffee on the sink counter - I didn't want anyone to throw it away - so I took it into the stall with me.

Note to fellow Oaklanders: the t.p. roll holders at Oakland airport are not completely flat, but if you're careful and lucky, you can balance a cup of coffee on them successfully. Suffice to say that "careful" and "lucky" were not on my side yesterday. The stall next to me became immediately occupied with a door-slammer and there I was with coffee literally ALL OVER my nice "trying to look like I have a professional job" shirt and pants.

Before I got mad or sad or upset in any way, I took a moment to reflect on Zack's post from a few days ago, and after that moment, said to myself, "yeah well you kinda knew that would happen, really now, didn't you?", put my jacket on over my coffee-stained shirt, and left the bathroom figuring I'd just wear my jacket for the rest of the day. About 10 minutes later, to my complete and utter shock, it turned out that the coffee blended so well with my avocado button-down that it wasn't even visible after it dried, and the pants were black so it really didn't matter. MAGIC! Even more magic when the afternoon meeting we were all dreading ended up going really well instead.

And then a little serendipity when it was time to head back to the airport... I asked a local (or so I thought) at the meeting for help getting a cab, and he ended up not being a local but as a result had a really good taxi service that he called for me. I spent the 20 minute ride to the airport talking with the Hungarian ex-patriot driver, who came to the States because his government sucked even more then than ours does now, and who used to be a rural veternarian and is seeking to continue practicing here in the States. He and I made a promise to each other that even though it's expensive, and even though a lot of our school credits are no longer useful so it will be hard, and even though some situations you find yourself in are not entirely pleasant, we will pursue becoming practicing vets on the West Coast.

I'm not entirely sure what that means. I've been thinking about it a lot though. Everything happens for a reason, eh?

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* "Tried" being the operative word... It seems that, as usual, you get what you pay for. My $18/month gets me a lot of days of an empty-other-than-me gym, and the occasional day when the building security system doesn't trip the gym door locks at 6am like it should, and I end up sitting outside the door with the trainers for about 15 minutes before I give up and go home.

May I have my attention please?

Tomorrow morning, when I wake up to the alarm at 6:00am, which is really 5:25am because the only way I will psych myself out to get up is to set my alarm randomly early, and I hit the snooze till 7:30am, I need to acknowledge that snoozing for 90 minutes will only serve to make myself more tired than if I just got up and went to the damn gym as intended.

So - get my ass out of bed at 6:00am tomorrow.

No, um, really, don't panic.

The end is near... Oh well, at least it will get me out of all my work and extracurricular responsibilities.

I guess the other way to interpret this, if not in the Hitchhiker's way, is to say that females are smarter than males in other species too! Hah.

Hoots pa.

Two more long-overdue amusing closed captioning sightings:

1) The night the viagra/blindness story broke, they were referring to erectile dysfunction and I SWEAR TO GOD I AM NOT KIDDING one time it said "erectile did I function." No offense to anyone with this disorder - I'm sure it's traumatic and nothing to joke about etc., etc. - but between the irony of the myth and this particular mistype, good lord I nearly fell off the treadmill.

2) Last Friday I was reading along to the Michael Jackson story on whatever station was on when I got there, and there was mention of him not having the "hoots pa" to stand up to his father.

New phrase to incorporate into everyday writing: hoots pa.

And the Oscar for best crying scenes goes to...

... Imelda Staunton for Vera Drake. I didn't dislike this movie. I didn't love it either. I can't give really good reasons for either of those oh-so-eloquent critiques. She did cry a lot in the movie, though, that's for sure.

While I was out.

Got a catalog in the mail yesterday from Design Within Reach. I'm really not sure whose "reach" they are within, other than "not mine." But it did inspire me to seek out a chair for my bedroom like I've been meaning to do for weeks now. So off to Ikea I went.

Those of you who hated my orange corduroy "captain's log" chair will be sorely disappointed with my purchase. Those of you who loved it (which I am guessing, really just comes down to me and the cat) will be pleasantly surprised with the new dark red corduroy chair. I just offer the caveat that it is called the Lunna chair, so minus an "n" how could I resist? (It also totally matches the rest of the decor in that room, and it's really comfy...)

She has yet to grace the chair with her presence but given how little I paid for it, I won't be too sad when she uses it as a scratching post like she did the orange one.

I also bought a matching armchair for my couch, which cost me about five times as much as the red corduroy chair. So in some karmic universe it all balances out... Right?

The almost-Friday five.

My favorite five song lyrics at the moment, in no particular order, and for various reasons:

• "I have a tendency to wear my mind on my sleeve, I have a history of losing my shirt" (Barenaked Ladies)
• "Take a long drown with me of California wine" (The Decemberists)
• "We've got rules and maps and guns in our backs but we still can't just behave ourselves even if to save our own lives so, says I, we are a brutal kind" (The Shins)
• "I was always brave and kind of righteous, now I find I’m wavering... crawl out of your grave, you find this fight just doesn’t mean a thing" (Buffy)
• "If no out there understands you start your own revolution and you cut out the middleman" ... followed closely by "the revolution is just a t-shirt away" and "if you've got a blacklist I want to be on it" in the same song (Billy Bragg)

Add your own!

Auras and readings and healings, oh my.

Today I participated in a group aura photo. I think it was originally intended as a gag gift for someone's birthday, and I think some of the participants still think of it as that... But I was very intrigued by the whole thing. When the people conducting things like aura photos/readings/healings/etc truly seem to believe in what they are doing, it's surprisingly hard for me not to believe in it too.

The psychics were quite patient with us as we did our group photo, though I'm convinced they were cringing inside at our seven clashing auras the entire time. We only got one copy of the good one and all I really recall in terms of being able to interpret it, is a bright splash of yellow near one of the people. "In good health and friendly..." Yeah, that sounds about right.

They do pet aura photos too (and pet aura photo/reading combos, all of which I must admit I am not at all likely to buy into). But if I did, and if I could get her to sit still long enough, Luna's aura would be DARK RED. I'm pretty sure of that.

Low prices and inhumane working conditions aren't all they offer!

Attention single folk: "keep checking your circulars; the trend could arrive soon." Awwwwwriiiight!!

(In light of my post a few days ago, is this a spooky coincidence, or is it just me?)