Tuesday, January 31

Frozen rope.


Posted by Picasa

Didn't they call Jeff George's 30-40 yard passes that? Frozen ropes? What a waste of talent. Well, that's my superbowl week football reference.

This is the back yard on Sunday morning January 22, 2006. Hoar frost covered everything. I took these and some others before running out to get a DVD. Mr. and Mrs. Smith. It was so so.

Anyway, unless the movie is a big screen blockbuster, it makes more sense to me to buy the movie for 20 bucks or less than spend about the same at the show. Plus I can do my laundry during the day.

Audio wiring tip and some mp3s.

Link from Tricks of the Trade:

http://www.tradetricks.org/archives/001560.html

I want to see if this shows up in the bloglines reference to this post.

And, if only by coincidence, I ended up with this audio gem: TPOH - (click link for mp3s).

"I'm an Adult Now" by The Pursuit of Happiness came on the radio just as I was posting the Tricks of the Trade hint. So, on a whim, I went to the excellent music site LargeHeartedBoy and ran a google search.

Amazingly, I found it.

I remember the old days. When I wanted a somewhat obscure band (like Wiretrain) I had to put in an order with the local Flip Side records and wait a week or so. Now it's instant gradification. In fact, if I like the sampling of songs by The Pursuit of Happiness I might actually buy a CD. Yea sure. No really.



Monday, January 9

Mr. Blue.


Blue boy
Originally uploaded by
busterp.

Clint and I went to see Hostel Sunday.

Bonding, family entertainment. Quentin Tarantino NOTE:(introduces - actually produced by Eli Roth). Blood and gore. Actually a semi-believable plot with good looking unknown actors and a very believable, moody, gray, movie set. Parts of Europe are quite scary. Without giving anything away, as the final credits rolled I did count all my digits and appreciated coming up with 10.

As Tarantino movies go, I've seen Kill Bill, Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs and From Dusk to Dawn and bits and pieces of some of his other stuff.

One of my favorite movies and probably the first of his (Tarantino's) movies I ever saw was
Reservoir Dogs. I went to it without knowing what to expect other than I had heard it was pretty good. I walked out whistling "Stuck in the Middle with You." Bloody. Great movie. Great casting. Great character names.

Tarantino was a big fan of Sam Peckinpah's Straw Dogs
which was made in 1971 with a very young Dustin Hoffman and Susan George.

As a tribute to Peckinpah, Tarantino used Dog in the title Reservoir Dogs.

I should have had that one to watch the other night.

Just this last Saturday, we were all home watching cable tv movies. Not because we normally do this all together on Saturday nights, but because Amy (with Josh) had to work early Sunday and Clint was broke.

After about a half hour of Jeepers Creepers 2 we gave up on that movie. Some, but not all of us wanted to watch Goonies. (It was on regular cable with a 5 minute block of ads each twenty minutes.)

With a little selling, I persuaded them to watch a Sam Peckinpah movie I had picked up not too long ago:
The Wild Bunch. Made in 1969. I remember it as one of the first blood spurting, slow motion, gory projectile movies made.Plus it had William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan and many other big stars.

Turns out the only actors Amy, Clint and Josh recognized were Ernest Borgnine and Struther Martin; from god only knows where.

I had always liked William Holden (for his wild side) and offered that he had taken up with Stefanie Powers in his later years - they spent a lot of time in Africa. Of course no one knew who she was either. Or Hart to Hart. Or Robert Wagner. Or Natalie Wood. Or It Takes a Thief. Or, forget it, I give up.

Needless to say I was the only one up to watch to bloody finale. Forgot there was a machine gun in that scene – but I did remember it lasted forever.

Wednesday, January 4

Oops.


Barn too close to road. Posted by Picasa


2006 is only 4 days old. I hope it's going to be a better year year than last.

What a strange night. Watched CNN, went to bed around 11:00. Dozing off to the radio, not much later I heard the dozen miners were found alive in West Virginia. Nice. Went to sleep.

Woke to the news that the earlier news was wrong. All except one of the miners were dead. Telling those families had to be one of the hardest things ever. Families that thought they lost someone; thought they got them back; lost them forever.

Damn.


Around noon today I went out and bought four extra early editions of the Chicago Tribune exclaiming the 12 miner's survival. Poor man's Dewey - Truman.

---------------------------------------------

I had monday off for the holiday. Being sick of football and too wet outside to do anything else, I went for a ride. Found a photogenic barn. It looks like urban sprawl is inching up to it. Actually this picture is from a very hilly area and the road and barn have co-existed for many years.

McHenry County which is one of fastest growing areas in the state I'm sorry to say.