fontosaurus

Okay, I'm up. I'm up. Actually, I've been half-awake since about 4:30AM. I just figured it would be good to lay here and rest until it was time to get up.

I'm going to kick ass today. 10AM interview. I'm up against the guy who couldn't make it yesterday.

Congrats to snocat for finally getting around to reading Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy. (Hey, Josh, you do know there's a fourth book, right?)

I must hunt, kill, and devour a bowl of cereal and my vitamins. (Have I mentioned that I think skim milk is the light beer of the milk world? Blech.)

I recently reread Douglas Coupland's book, Microserfs. It's quite good. I have a feeling that it would be fun to do stuff the main character in there did with the funky formatting in his journal. And I'll probably do stream-of-consciousness stuff now, too, just for shits-and-giggles.

I've been cleaning up my area-of-occupation in the downstairs. Taking a break because, well, I'm tired.

Question: Why is it that my cats jump in the air and spazz when startled, but my parents' cats hunker down flat on the floor? Do they speak different dialects of panic?

A huge thanks to koroshiya for the gift. She got me Sam the Cat by Matthew Klam, off my Amazon.com wishlist. I'm so spoiled! *grin*

Man, I was at Barnes & Noble today, and I saw a book called Lost by Ian Phillips...had a kid's drawing of dog on the front. Picked it up, out of curiousity...it was nothing but lost pet posters from around the world... I got all choked up, especially at the posters drawing by little kids who lost their cats. Very sad. :-(

I got a sci-fi paperback, a sandwich from Subway, and came home. Watched about 5 minutes of the Harry Potter movie, but have no desire to continue, because I have my own vision of how the things in Rowling's world are...once I'm done with the current 4, I'll give the DVD a spin. Speaking of DVD's, I still have mso's copy of Snatch, that I have to watch...and I think I'm ready to burn my copy of Black Hawk Down...it's been giving me really fucked-up dreams about my stint in the Army. Yeesh.

Anyway, props to my kid brother for letting me use his digital camera today...I went around and snapped pics of various things -- the cats, my truck, the stuffed Spiderman I won at Valleyfair yesterday, and I had mah bro take a pic of me so ppl would finally get an idea of what my goofy ass looks like.

So without further ado...

( Shield your eyes, my picture's the first... )

I admit it! This Harry Potter shit is great. My belief that the average American has no taste in writing/literature has been severely challenged. Where's book #2?

These are only books that I am physically in posession of:

• Full House - Stephen Jay Gould. Mmmm...science.

• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - J.K. Rowling. I'm finally biting the bullet and reading the damn thing.

• Learning Perl - O'Reilly's. 'Bout time I learned this.

• Learning Cocoa - O'Reilly's. Mmmmm...Objective-C. Mac OS X.

• Core ColdFusion 5 - Hewitt. I get a hernia just lifting this thing. 962 pages of fun. Guess what's last on the list?

Other things I want to read -- Sam the Cat by Matthew Klam, and Band of Brothers. Those are both on my Amazon.com Wishlist. You could help an unemployed brutha out. Heh.

First Order of Business: I used to think I was the bizity-bizomb when it came to shitty customer service. This one wins, hands down. Gord, you should drop the "r". You are truly deserving of the Randall Award for Lifetime Achievement in Dealing with Shithead Customers. You're an inspiration.

I Really Need to Start Designing Fonts Again: I've been kinda lagging on that lately. Depression from the fruitless job hunt is probably a contributing factor. I have some cool art deco fonts in progress and I owe Chank a few glyphs for a new flavor of Garamond we're (the ChankArmy) working on.

Fucking Bookstores: I bought the Cocoa programming book at the Apple Store in the Mall of America today. $35 + tax. Okay. I figured they needed the money on the sale more than B&N did. I like to be loyal to the people that returned my iBook fully fixed in less than 48 hours. But c'mon people, 1.) Amazon's got it for $24 + shipping, and 2.) if I'm going to be developing for your platform you ought to at least recognize that and undercut the cost a bit. I mean, shit, it's skimpy and not very useful and you're charging $35? Christ, $35 can get you some phat O'Reilly's books. (This one was from O'Reilly's too...why the price discrepancy? I have no clue.)

My Cat Rules: Mooch has been exceptionally cuddly today. I know not why, but I like it. She's such a sweetheart.

Know Anyone With Money? More specifically, know anyone with a ton of money that would be willing to invest in or be an "angel" to a bike shop? I need about $1.5 million to buy a building, get initial inventory, and hire employees. I have spent most of my life around bikes, raced, even worked in a bike shop for a few years. I want one of my own. I love it.

I'm Going to Bed Now. There's nothing more to this post. You can leave now. Someone send me a couple of hot pornstars (preferably Asia Carrera and oh...Sky Lopez, I guess) to keep me warm? Thank you, drive thru.

I guess the best thing about being unemployed is that I've managed to keep busy. I just got home from Dave and Kristin's place -- played some Chez Geek and some Scrabble. Discussed Dave's upcoming Mac system. Lots of bad jokes, as always.

Got to pick mso at the airport tomorrow. Also going to try to get over to Calhoun for some rollerblading.

I'm so happy with Apple's handling of my iBook repairs -- to fix the flickering screen, they replaced the battery/power sub-unit, and not only did it resolve that, but my battery life is much-improved. After an experience like this, I'm so pleased, I'd take a bullet for Steve Jobs.

Anyway, it's been a long day. I finally figured out what book I wanted to buy -- two hours after B&N closed. I'm going to pick up a copy of Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose. Yes, the book the HBO miniseries was based on.

But, I'm sleepy, so it's off to bed for me. G'nite.

I have now showered, and am presentable. I think I shall be heading for Barnes & Noble for a book, and either the grocery store or Bruegger's for some breakfast food.

I miss the old days of being employed where I could drop $100 on a B&N run and not even worry about it. Today, no more than $10. I need a job, if only to move back into an apartment of my own and to start buying books again. :-)

I'm feeling kinda feisty today. I want to ride, but my upper back won't tolerate it. Maybe I'll go over to Nokomis or Calhoun and use the rollerblades.

The quote of the month is from Neil Gaiman, in response to people saying "Information wants to be free."

"No, that's pizza," I want to tell them. "Pizza wants to be free. Concentrate on liberating pizza from evil pizzerias. Information, on the other hand, really hates being free, and is never happier than when manacled to a wall, like Kirk and Spock in some piece of late 70s bondage-oriented slash fiction."

I'm starting to feel pseudo-guilty for not having read any of the Harry Potter books. Part of me feels that since Joe Average loves them, and Joe Average is also a retard, that they can't be that great. Then people like my buddy Batgar (and I think even mso did) tell me that they're great, and I get more and more curious. Tonight when we were at Old Chicago, Batgar says, "Remember that sense of wonder you got from the first Star Wars movie? I got twice that effect from the Harry Potter books." Damn. My reading list is long enough as it is.

And on the reading front, someone sent me a book from my Amazon.com wishlist. Now I remember why I run the Fontosaurus site. Anyway, the book was The Monkey Wrench Gang by Edward Abbey. This is the book that became the bible for everyone's favorite group of eco-terrorists, the Earth First!ers.

Writing. I'm trying to get motivated to put the finishing touches on A Castle in the Sun. For those unaware, ACitS is the book I've been working on since last fall. Thematically, it's about growing up without a positive male role model, and how that affects your view on life -- goal-setting, what to do if by some miracle you actually achieve your goals, and so on. It's primary character is a professional bike racer in his rookie year. There's lots of parallels between it and my life (I was never a pro racer, obviously...and sadly), and I'm trying to make the writing eloquent and not a diatribe...it's hard to find the right balance, given that I'm writing it in the first person. I'm told that perspective isn't used much anymore. I'm also writing in the present tense, just to make it really weird. It reads nicely, I think. I just have to finish it up. (Don't get me wrong, I've written the ending already...it's just in strong need of final editing.)

In other fun, I've been talking to mso about starting a writers' group here in the Twin Cities. We could probably find a groovy coffeehouse in Uptown that would be happy to have us. Maybe I could use a group like that as the incentives to finish A Castle in the Sun. Anyway, I couldn't find any good writers' groups indexes on the web, so I registered writergroups.com, and I'm building a database-driven site that should be capable of managing itself. I think I need that support to get my shit together and actually write. Perhaps I'll call Uncommon Grounds later this week and see if they'd be willing to host us every other Wednesday or something like that.

The jobhunt isn't going particularly well. Not a lot of web design/dev/producer jobs available right now. Hell, I'd be happy with $55K, doing drone-work coding. Registered and set-up hosting for mso's site for her comedy -- bitterfatbitch.com -- I couldn't believe it was still available. Wow. maus asked me to do the design/UI for the porn site he wants to do, and he can pay me. Hallelujah. However, I'm taking that with a grain of salt until he talks to me about it while sober. The money would be helpful right now.

Game-playing has been keeping me sane. Chez Geek has been a lot of fun, thus far. Been getting my usual Scabble fiesta going, which rules. mso bought a learn-to-play-chess set, and she and Kellie are going to figure out the game. I'm tempted to buy her a copy of Bobby Fisher Teaches Chess, but I think the board/pieces she got will suffice. She's a smart girl...once she starts getting ahold of strategy, I'll bet she'll be able to kick my ass at that. I'm also wanting to find a group of people to play Apples to Apples with, and eventually scrape up some people to play Axis & Allies with. That would be good.

I should probably be asleep, but I think it's time I actually sat down and cranked out as much of writergroups.com as possible. Maybe I'll play some Roller Coaster Tycoon.

Who the fuck knows? All I know is it's time we kicked Israel out of Palestine. I'm not anti-Semitic, I'm just anti-genocide. I mean, Christ, is it obvious to anyone else that what Israel is doing to the Palestineans is the same was what Hitler did to Europe with his Leibensraum campaign? To Ariel Sharon I say this: the land given to you was a gift from the UN. The Palestineans are only asking for 22% of what you forcibly took from them. HAVE THE DECENCY TO GIVE IT BACK AND MAYBE YOU WON'T HAVE TO DEAL WITH THE TERRORISM ANYMORE, YOU JACKASS.

And on that note, I am going to bid you all a pleasant goodnight and go get writergroups.com up and running.

Peace out, lil honkies.

Thank god that weekend is over. I mean, it had it's ups and downs, and all in all, it wasn't too bad. I'm just glad it's over.

Friday...um, Spiderman. Spiderman rocked my afro (okay, I don't have an afro, but I wish I did). I don't care about the purists' whining about the organic web-shooters. Fuck you, fanboys. I have loved that comic since I was five (1977), and I say quit yer fuckin' bitchin'! This is a hell of a good start to the summer movie season. There's so much shit I want to see, it's crazy. I better get employed soon so that I can afford all this. On my agenda: Star Wars Episode 2 (of course), MIB2, Bad Company, Windtalkers, Sum of all Fears, Goldmember, Minority Report (MAYBE -- Tom Cruise can be offset by Phillip K. Dick, who wrote the story that became Bladerunner), The Bourne Identity, and I'm sure that there's some dramas, etc., that I haven't seen previews for yet, that I will probably end up going to. I love movies.

So that was Friday. Saturday I did housework, futzed around, read more of Gaiman's American Gods,etc. Went rollerblading...crashed. Badly. I'm sure it looked quite funny. Anyway, I wasn't wearing any safety gear, and I landed on my left hand and the top/rear of my pelvis. Until that moment, I'd never landed on my ass so hard I thought my face was going to explode. Anyway, I bladed home and groused about the pain for awhile. Rather than go to the doctor, I went to a party with mso at postumus and maus's place. Had a pretty good time, but there were some annoying underage chicks there that, while cute, were just irritating beyond all belief. (Discuss Fight Club and get an, "Oh my god, I am SUCH a BIG Brad Pitt fan!" *insert scatterbrained giggle here*)

So Sunday morning, I went over to the VA to have my wrist looked at. Supposedly, it's not, but a specialist is looking over my x-rays today, and if there's any question, I get to have an MRI! Whee. Went to breakfast with mso, Kellie (her roommate) and K's boyfriend, Seth, at this groovy place down on Lake. Went from there to the Mall of America, got some safety gear for rollerblading (about 24 hours too late). Went to mom's place to mooch a coupon for a free car wash at this place that charges like $23 for one...she gave me the rest of the book, which is groovy. Rain was on the forecast for Sunday and Monday, though, so I am going to wait on washing the XTerra until Tuesday. Played mom in Scrabble, and she beat me by 110 points -- in our last game, I used all seven letters on my opening move, this game, she turned the tables. Ow! How demoralizing. Then, I went over to Amy and Kellie's Sunday night, and Amy and I made a batch of cookies from pre-mixed dough and I bitchslapped her at Scrabble, then everyone else when the four of us from breakfast played again. (Seth is the Official King of the Three-Letter Word!)

So I came home, crashed. Woke up this morning with a nice headache and a bag of leftover chocolate chip cookies. Yum!

I always figured you could tell a lot about a person by their reading list. I'm in a sharing mood, so here's what's stacked on my nightstand at the moment:

• The Best American Science Writing 2000 edited by James Gleick
  
• Tokyo Suckerpunch by Isaac Adamson
  
• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey (this has been on my list for awhile now...I'm actually re-reading it)
  
• Hamlet by William Shakespeare -- all I've ever read prior to this are his histories, and even those I Cliff-Noted the fuck out of...
  
• The Odyssey by Honda. Er, Homer. Sorry lame attempt at humor. :-)
  
• The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien.
  
• Guitar for Dummies by Mark Phillips and Jon Chappell -- because I want to learn to play the blues, baby.
  
• Happy to be Here by Garrison Keillor -- my first foray into one of his books. Love his column on Salon.com.
  
• Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny by Robert Wright -- a book about the growth and direction of human societies...
  
• Bobby Fisher Teaches Chess by Bobby Fisher -- the man who was the youngest International Grand Master will help you develop mad skillz! Werd!
  
• Various cycling, science, writing, and computer magazines. (Like a good dozen of them.)