... yeesh, speaking of peripherals.

My new job's computer has MS Vista. Just when you thought XP couldn't get any more bubbly, impossible to figure out how to operate, and tab-heavy - BLAM! I cannot even BEGIN to express how utterly obnoxious and annoying that operating system is. Whenever I try to do things like, oh, insert bulleted lists into word documents or shade rows in excel spreadsheets, I suddenly turn into my mom - who couldn't navigate her way out of a wet computer paper bag.

That metaphor I just used? Yeah. THAT is how bad MS Vista is.

However. If this is the worst thing about my job, or even if it's just the worst thing this week, that will make it worth all the pain and suffering I endured to get to this point.

"At five I got saved... because I just wanted more of life."

[Ed. note: This post brought to you by a borderline agnostic leaning more toward athiest and is not intended to poke fun at those who sanely, mindfully, rationally practice Christianity. Ah, screw the disclaimers - I think I'd be hard pressed to find a dear reader, religious or not, who wasn't appalled by the content of this documentary.]

So... I got around to watching Jesus Camp tonight, featuring a preacher boy of 12 who uttered the line in the subject, as well as some pro-life speaking-in-tongues repenting-for-their-sins 5-year-olds, Jesus Camp Lady praying to keep Satan from interfering with her powerpoint presentation, and Mike Papantonio, the [no pun intended] godsend who offered the only rational point of view in the whole documentary. I knew the documentary would bother me, which is partly why I rented it (gotta keep my edge up!) but I caught Joan Rivers interviewing the directors at the Oscars and they made it sound fair and balanced.

If, by "fair and balanced," you mean the liberal version of Fox New's "fair and balanced," then yes, it was "fair and balanced." For about 30 minutes I really, really, REALLY thought I was watching a non-animated episode of South Park. It was so horrifying and disturbing - but mesmerizing and hilarious - all at the same time.

But then. Then they showed a scene of the girls in their "bunks" at Jesus Camp - wooden bunk beds in a small lodge dorm room - and I had a scary flashback. {{diddleliddlelit diddleliddlelit diddleliddlelit }} APPROXIMATELY 18 YEARS AGO, I ACTUALLY WENT TO A CAMP LIKE THIS. Not as psychotic, mind you, but I went. It was a weekend youth retreat where my friend (age 15) and myself (age 13) shared a room with four strange girls (age 17) who - gasp! wore makeup! and hairspray! and talked about boys nonstop! As the awkward just-turned-teen, I was completely out of place. All I remember is the guy with really bad acne who played guitar, and this teambuilding thing where we had to pass oranges to each other while standing boy-girl-boy-girl and holding the oranges between our chins and sternum. In retrospect that activity seems "going to hell"-worthy to me... but I haven't read the Bible lately so what do I know. {{return to present day}}

And then Jesus Camp Lady proclaimed that Harry Potter was satanic, and then Anti Abortion Man passed around plastic replicas of embryos at 7 weeks and 12 weeks old and asked the kids to pray for the confirmation of Alito to the Supreme Court, and then Crazy Preacher Man Friend of Bush proudly said "If the evangelicals vote, they determine the election."

And then I turned it off, threw up, watched a Jon Stewart rerun, lit some sage, pulled out my Shrub voodoo doll and tossed it into the pentagram I chalked into the carpet. And all was right with the world again.

Eleventh hour final Oscar movie review.

This is the first year in a long time that I've actually seen a lot of the nominated movies. If only I'd had the energy to watch Jesus Camp Friday night, then go to the Volver and Babel double-feature at the Parkway yesterday, the total count would've been twelve - a personal record, I think - but alas, it's only nine.

I haven't yet mentioned Children of Men. This is partly because I am still stunned and partly because I am still completely unsure about whether I liked it.

The attention to detail, editing and cinematography were utterly amazing, and how they pulled off some of the longer shots is fascinating. I thought the violence was well-crafted, well-choreographed, suspenseful, oh and also, did not make me want to vomit (unlike with Pan's Labyrinth). But the story...?

I saw it with my Seattle friend who is very big into the "what if" type of sci-fi plotline... so of course, he thoroughly enjoyed it. Perhaps I am too much of a realist. Perhaps I read too much into it, and got annoyed with some of the biblical references and the idea that it was the WOMEN who became infertile, not the MEN (especially since the next day, I read something about men's sperm counts declining 50% over the last 50 years). Perhaps I don't know enough about the immigration issues outside of the US to really grasp the relevance of the story. Perhaps the line from Julianne Moore to Clive Owen, "You hear that ringing in your ears? That 'eeeee'? That's your ear cells dying. You'll never be able to hear that frequency again. Enjoy it while you can." freaked me out because of all the EXTREMELY LOUD CONCERTS and subseqent 'eeeee's I have heard in my lifetime.

Eh. Perhaps I just need to watch it again?

Public service announcement.

Indie fave Spoon on Austin City Limits tonight, 8pm, local channel 15. And also the Killers if you care (I, myself, do not).

Oh and also? Rainn Wilson and Arcade Fire on SNL. Super sweet.

Good thing I don't have any hot dates tonight!

Fly on, little wing.

Skyline from below...


Skyline from above.

The end of an era.

It still floors me that up until today people were asking, "so you've been here, what - 3 years?" Yes. Three PLUS SIX years.

It still floors me that neither of my managers stopped by or called to say good luck today or any other day. In fact, I haven't seen one since last Monday, and I can't actually recall the last time I saw the other.

It still floors me that one of the higher-ups did stop by and say good luck. (I was actually hoping to avoid that. Fake smiles and fake good cheer is just so tiresome. But in the interest of not burning bridges I gave a fake smile right back.)

It still floors me that Monday morning, I am starting a brand new job... People DO do this all the time, right?!

T minus 8 hours and counting.

Tomorrow is my last day in Dilbert-land. I have five things to do: clean out my desk, fix one minor problem, show someone how to do something really easy and fun, forward all my calls/emails to my replacement, and send my "thanks and good luck and keep in touch!" email to a select list of recipients.

To be uber-cliche... what a long, strange trip it's been. What started as a temp admin assistant job nine and a half years ago, which I only agreed to because I was looking for a social welfare-type job and the temp job offered me flexibility to interview, and also I could type 947 words/minute which was apparently a requirement, turned into a nine and a half year endeavor. Six years of which were really good.

I've had several opportunities over the last few days to reflect upon my experiences (good and bad), thank fellow coworkers, actively avoid other coworkers, and promise everyone that I will keep in touch. Because this was my first job out of college, and I've been here for-freaking-EVER, it's a bit surreal to realize that come Monday morning I will have no idea what the hell I'm doing. I keep reminding myself that people change jobs all the time... But *I* don't, and this is all just very weird.

(That said, I should really change jobs more often because I've gotten more free drinks and random presents over the last few days than I probably have in a lifetime.)

And the whole "keeping in touch" thing feels a lot like high school graduation. I still talk to 4 people I went to high school with. Post Dilbert-land, I think the number of coworkers I keep in touch with will be slightly higher for a while, but it will eventually trickle down to 4 people who I can eventually proudly say I've known for 15 years or more.

With so many light years to go and things to be found, I'm sure that we'll all miss her so. I just hope they don't call me after I leave. For any calls beginning with certain prefixes, I'm already prepared to answer my cell phone with the greeting, "Hello, you've reached the winter of it's NOT MY PROBLEM!!"

Woah.

Wikipedia on the meaning of life.

The "Tuesday is the new Sunday" Friday five.

Top five reasons you know you're not in the Bay Area anymore, Toto, in no particular order (except the first one which is really lame but never ceases to amaze me):

• It rains off and on every single day for five days straight - it even rains while the sun is shining, for Pete's sake - and no one is carrying or using umbrellas but boy, do you wish YOU had one.
  
• Attention to architectural issues like the viaduct warrant the level of attention that the Fatburger debate brings about in your hometown.
  
• And speaking of the popular Seattle profession - the architectural wonder also known as the Seattle library contains seven different books dedicated to deconstructing Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but the local record store only has three Grateful Dead albums.
• While standing in the aforementioned local record store waiting for the free Shins noontime show,* people all around you are talking about how "yeah, this record store is okay, but there's this one? in Berkeley? called Amoeba? dude, it's AWESOME."
• You're eating the best tater tots you have EVER EATEN... at Goth Night at the local bar, 11pm on a Sunday night.

________________
* I was booking my flight six weeks ago and I randomly decided to get a Tuesday late afternoon flight home - figuring I could putz around downtown that morning after my friend went to work. Sunday I learned that James & Co were doing a free show at the record store 3 blocks from my friend's apartment at noon today. Pardon my overuse of the uber-overused word, but it LITERALLY could not have worked out any better for me.

That's right. I was standing 30 feet from the Shins nine hours ago. Who wants to touch me? I said who wants to fucking touch me??!

Ofelia, you're breaking my heart.

I held off on Pan's Labyrinth. It didn't really appeal to me. But Children of Men, which was in the cards for today, wasn't playing until 9:45 pm and... well, I'm too lame to stay up that late for a movie. So I went to a matinee of the aforementioned instead, mostly on the recommendation of someone who shall remain nameless.

I was expecting more of a fairy tale Brothers Grimm-stylie, with suspense and freaky characters and dark foreshadowing. And there was that. But holy bloody hell, I was not expecting all the point-blank gunshots to the head, torture, blood, utter disregard for human life... which far outweighed the fairy tale portions.

Sorry if I've ruined it for you. It was a beautiful film, don't get me wrong. (By beautiful, I mean gut-wrenching, engaging and amazingly acted.) And I get the messages the film was conveying, for the most part. But it was very, very violent. Very. Coming from a person who adores Fight Club, this is a significant statement, and the fact that I'm detoxing by watching a rerun of Growing Pains should emphasize that point.

After all that violence, it's no wonder I was so rude when I returned the call of a coworker who had an "urgent" question for me on my day off.

Oh, wait, maybe it's just because he called me on my day off.

Public service announcement.

Joss Whedon to direct an episode of The Office.

Still no sign of book, so more movies.

I like to kid myself that if I were to retire, or marry rich, I could easily fill the days without needing to work. This past week has proven this to be 100% untrue, as almost every day I have checked work email obsessively and also needed to do something structured with my day even when sleeping until 10am and going to bed at 9pm.

I received a gift card to AMC Theaters for Christmas, so I figured I could check out another Oscar nominee for free. The only films playing at the local AMC that fit my "schedule" (loose though it was) were The Departed and Children of Men. The latter is playing at the Parkway this week and I'd already decided to catch it Tuesday night, so I used my free pass on The Departed.

It's not a movie I would normally see. I hadn't even really planned on Netflixing it, to be totally honest. I grew weary of gangster/mafia/undercover cop flicks back in college and haven't really seen one since. But a film with Schmidt, Good Will, the Aviator, the only Baldwin who can actually act, Markie Mark, Charlie's dad - and directed by Martin - I was slightly optimistic.

Holy cow. That's the extent of my review: HOLY COW. I had no idea what was going on for most of the film, and then at the end I REALLY had no idea what was going on. (It should be noted that I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed when it comes to figuring out confusing plot lines.) But what the fuck EVER about the plot. I think I have a new favorite actor, and his name is Leo. I think that perhaps I have finally forgiven him for Titanic. Holy cow.

Markie Mark was awesome too, and the other actors put on a great show. Eventually I got the gist of the plot, which I guess is all that really matters, and I left nice and entertained... And questioning my previous statement about Forest taking the Best Actor Oscar. Just a little bit. I still think he'll win, but Leo is an excellent contender.

Off to put all his movies in my queue immediately. Except Titanic. May I live a long, prosperous life having never seen that dreadful endeavor that has sucked millions of hours from the lives of young teenage girls and wistful housewives.

Four out of five dentists agree.

Finally got around to switching my company-paid cell phone to a me-paid cell phone. You can keep the number but you can't keep the phone you have. Why? It took me three years to figure out all the toys and tricks on this phone (including how to silence/vibrate it, and boy was that a painful learning curve). Now I'm going to have to learn how to use a new one... Bah.

The sales rep at Working Assets went on and on about how my new "very thin and chic" cell phone has Bluetooth technology. Um, yay? I have no idea what that means, but it sounds like those tablets that you chew that turn your teeth red (or blue) where you haven't been brushing well enough. I don't think I want my phone identifying my dental plaque so I will be avoiding that feature.

Also, according to an Amazon review, there is a feature on this phone that allows you to screen calls as the callers are leaving a message. Just like I have at home ~ suh-weet!

Most importantly, though, it has a camera. Which means that at long last I can be like all the cool kids and take photos of Colin Meloy at the next Decemberists show... Awesome.

Because no one cares what movies I watch...

Now that I'm leaving The Office to work in a stable, productive, respectful environment, I am guessing I will be posting far less about work.

Never fear, dear reader. You will be happy to know that I finally ordered this book, which should give me ample material for the rest of the year.

I have already hunted down a couple of embarrassing photos for this entry, but I'm still working up the nerve to actually publicize them.

This should be interesting...

Gimme fiction.

Apparently the many documentaries (some more so than others) were not enough, so I took it a step further and watched Heavenly Creatures and The Lost Boys of Sudan earlier this week.

The former reminded me a lot of Finding Neverland, only with a more grisly ending. The latter reminded me that I needed to finish What Is the What, which I read about 300 pages of straight through and got depressed so I had to put it down for a while.

After that, I needed some fiction. So I went to see Hannibal Rising, mostly because the trailers looked interesting (a.k.a. bloody and suspenseful), and I'd seen something from the director about how the actor playing Hannibal really enjoyed going to morgues to get used to being around dead bodies. There was something creepy yet intriguing about that.

The movie explains how Hannibal got to be the Lecter we all know and love from Silence of the Lambs. Turns out, he's not just your run-of-the-mill psychopath, oh no - there is justifiable reason behind his transformation into a monster, and it's based solely upon revenge.

Revenge? Seriously? BOR-RING.

There were a few amusingly grisly death scenes and the Hannibal actor was decent, but otherwise, what an utter disappointment. So on the way home I redeemed myself by renting The Empire Strikes Back.

For the record, I {heart} Han Solo.

Realizing just how good you have it: priceless.

I was literally itching to get out of my apartment this afternoon (PTO = YAY!) but didn't want to spend too much money. So I figured I'd catch up on Oscar flicks by catching a matinee. It wasn't until I got there that I learned "matinee" now means $8.25. I mean, Jesus Christ already. And then I was hungry, so there went another almost-ten dollars on stale popcorn and watery diet coke. So much for the latter half of the plan.

Anyway.

The day Idi Amin died, my friend said something about how she remembered the day he was ousted from power and what a horrifying, genocidal disgrace his realm had been. Being several years younger than her, and having been brought up in the suburban white middle American public school system learning nothing but European history, I didn't recall anything about him. But I didn't tell her that at the time. Instead, I read a little bit about it, got disgusted (that was during the Carter years, right? Jimmy, COME ON!) ... and that was the extent of my Amin education, until this afternoon when I noticed that The Last King of Scotland was still at a local theater.

In the rare instances where I could let go of the cold, hard, brutal facts, I was able to appreciate the way in which the story was told. We see Amin from the doctor's perspective - at first a quirky, sometimes scary, but usually just "odd" man who loves Scotland and Uganda and wants to take care of his country. Eventually, of course, his true nature hits us over the head and we wonder how we never saw it from the beginning. That the plot is fictional is cemented in the last scene... Yeah, THAT would've happened.

I haven't seen any of the other films which have actors up for Oscars. But from what I know of those other films, the only one who might even come close to Forest Whitaker's performance in this film is Ryan Gosling, and if Gosling wins it will just be a crying shame heard 'round the world.

Oh and speaking of Oscars - cast your votes! He or she who guesses the most correct winners (and who includes their name on their entry, and who I actually know personally) will win a gift certificate to everyone's favorite local picture pub pizza joint!

File under: recently viewed.

This Film Is Not Yet Rated. The interviews and history behind the MPAA are interesting. That said, perhaps I'm getting conservative in my old age, but I think hiring private detectives to hunt down and publicly expose the people on the MPAA board took things a little too far. I understand the need to explain that no one on the board is a film student or artist so what gives them the right to judge a film ... I get that half the board has kids over 17 when the purpose of said board is to rate movies that their "kids under 17" might watch ... and I appreciate the critique of the ratings appeals board having two conservative clergy (not to mention the movie conglomerate execs) who vote on appeals ... but do I really need to know exactly who those people are? I don't think so. The Corporation, for example, was successful in getting its message across without publicly crucifying any specific person that the audience didn't already know was a capitalist pig.

Haven. Orly fans might enjoy this one. The non-linear sequencing seemed unnecessary to me.

The Lake House. SHUT UP. I KNOW. It ... wasn't ... that ... terribly ... dreadful. I actually watched it while doing a ridiculous amount of copying/pasting for a work project last weekend, so I didn't have to pay too close attention to the movie or the document. That was what you might call a "win-win," if you were to say such a thing, which I hope you never do.

Hustle & Flow. I can't say I didn't like this. Terrence Howard was very, very good, but... I watched part of the bonus material and the director made a big deal about how he wanted to make this character different from your run-of-the-mill pimp. The only differences I really saw, were that the main character was more of a chauffeur than a pimp, and he didn't wear shiny suits and gold chains (for the most part). Otherwise, between the verbal abuse, the physical abuse, and the jail time he seemed like your run-of-the-mill pimp to me.

Belated Friday Five.

Top five reasons I need a boyfriend, in no particular order:

• To be another lap for Her Majesty to sit on, so that I can move now and then while watching TV.
• To keep me from drinking nine gallons of wine at the next wedding.
• To be on call 24/7 to reassure me that the politics behind the new job will go away soon (or be replaced by other politics) and in the end, all will be just fine - so that I don't wear out my welcome asking my friends to do this 24/7.
• To drag me out on Saturday nights so that I'm not sitting at home doing laundry and watching documentaries about mammals.
• To encourage me to cook more often.