It's Coming

More on this later.

mike

Kevin Smith on Prince

We all have guilty musical pleasures and one of mine happens to be the that I like Prince. Ever since '83, I think, when I saw the video for "Little Red Corvette" (not my favourite Prince song, btw), he's always been on my radar to some extent. I'm not fanatical or anything, and I have nothing close to all of his albums, but there is a body of work within his discography which I think is bloody brilliant. I think he's a great composer, has some fantastic moments lyrically, and he's a hell of a showman.

I remember a while back he announced that he would be coming to Saskatchewan Place for a show, which was pretty cool. I also remember the ticket prices as being pretty steep, even at the lowest of three tiers. Still, I was totally going to figure out a way to go and see him because it wasn't the kind of act we normally got around these parts, and how often was I going to get the chance to see the guy perform?

Before I even had a chance to figure out a way to afford a couple of seats, he cancelled the show almost as quickly as it was announced. An article in the paper the next day spoke of how Prince's representation informed them of how he operates. He likes to do shows like an army does a beach landing. He comes in quickly, makes a splash and before you know it, it's over. They also said he could just as easily cancel on a whim because he felt the vibe was wrong or some jive like that. It maintained the spectacle of a Prince show, and shone a spotlight on the strange quixotic personality of his royal badness.

The point of that story is just to lead in to this Kevin Smith bit from his Evening With Kevin Smith DVD where he talks about his week up at Paisley Park and his experience with Prince and a documentary they were supposed to produce together.









Later!

mike

Omar's Garage

Went over to a friend's place tonight to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark and I noticed something for the first time. Omar's Garage is part of a scene that I've seen millions of times but, for some reason, I never managed to connect the dots. In the scene prior to the truck chase, Indy says to Sallah and Marion that he'll meet them back at Omar's. After the truck chase, they drive the truck with the Ark in it into Omar's garage and hide it. Why have I never noticed this before?

It's also an entertaining little tidbit because Sallah's brother-in-law gets another mention in Last Crusade during one of the chase scenes. I know, the whole movie is a chase scene, but it's in the desert, involves camels to repay his brother-in-law for the car that got blown up.

Anyway, that's what's on my mind right now.

mike

"If you have a problem, if no one else can help..."

I'm honestly not sure what to think.



mike

Women Drivers

Now, before I start a lynch mob here, I just thought I would post this article because it sort of ties in with my last post since they are both related to driving. Well, this article is about parking but you get the picture. Anyway, apparently it was scientifically proven that men are better at parking than women. I thought it was cute. Judge for yourself.

mike

Trucks and Traffic

I hate coming on here and ranting about other drivers but the last few days have made me angry enough (and the blog has been silent enough) that I thought I would come on and do a quick rant and retreat.

Why is it that if you have a truck, you have to drive like an asshole? I've had many, many, many bad experiences with trucks and SUVs over the years where the drivers of said vehicles have absolutely no consideration for anyone else on the road. They treat it as if they are the only ones there and it is their God-given right to drive wherever and howsoever they pleaseth. I hate to stereotype (since there's always the exception to the rule) but when I'm driving home from work on a two-lane freeway and there are three or four trucks all around me and their all speeding, following ech other and others too closely, changing lanes regularly and just generally driving recklessly, I can't help but make the statement that people who are predisposed to buying these types of vehicles must be assholes, or the vehicles make them that way. It has to be one or the other because the trend is just far too consistent. It stands up to the scientific method.

I know this will probably kill any chances of anyone ever helping me move furniture that won't fit into my wagon, but I just had to let that one go.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

mike

Chris Murphy on Being in a Band

A few years ago when Sloan released their album Never Hear the End of It they released a handful of making of videos on YouTube. While browsing around looking for the video to "Someone I Can Be True With" I ran across this, one of my favourites of the bunch, and I thought I would share.



Later!

mike

Bad Weather

Frickin' car won't start again today. Couple of days ago it got pretty cold overnight and the car froze. I didn't have it plugged in so when I went to start it there was no joy. I finally ended up getting it boosted and it worked fin for me the rest of the day (although she was a little rough on starting when I was leaving work yesterday).

I made sure I plugged it in last night because I knew it would be cold again and went out to dutifully start it and get it warmed up and ready to take Jen into work and do some errands, and the damn thing won't start again. It's actually 7 degrees warmer than the other night but my freakin' car is still frozen. I'll have to get another boost when my father-in-law swings by later today so I can get my errands done. Until then I guess I'll continue to sort the house and make it somewhat presentable for the appraiser who will also be coming in today. Life is so full of fun things.

Later!

mike

"I Have Something on the East Lawn You Should See"

Considering the last week has been full of Lucas-themed fun (played Lego Indy, watched Clone Wars Season 2 episodes, checked out some cool Star Wars stuff online), I recently ran into this clip from MadTV on YouTube (one of my brother's favourites), and my current desperation in drumming up content, leads me to believe that posting this video is not just all kinds of groovy fun, it's a good idea.

Hope you enjoy it!



Take Care!

mike

Been Awhile

I've been playing the endlessly entertaining Lego Indiana Jones with the kids this week and it has me in a bit of an Indy state-of-mind. As a result, I thought I would post this article from the LA Times talking about the Young Indiana Jones Chronicles around the time of the Volume 1 DVD release. The show remains one of my favourite television programs of all time and any chance to read or learn something new about it is a good day for me.

Later!

mike

Return to the 'Verse

A friend sent me this and I thought it was cute.



Later!

mike

Live at the Rose Bowl

Here's the U2 concert that was broadcast off of YouTube if anyone is interested.



Later!

mike

When It Rains It Pours

For anyone zooming by this post there was a live streaming Foo Fighters concert here, but after they stopped streaming it, they had the video for "Wheels" going on a constant loop and it fired up every time you came to the page, which was kind of annoying. So, I took it off.

Later.

mike

U2 at the Rose Bowl

Just finished watching the U2 concert that was broadcast live online via YouTube and I have to say that I'm not as disappointed as I thought I might be. In fact, I would go so far as to say it was actually pretty good.

As a huge U2 fan through the late '80s and the following decade, I've found myself less than appreciative of their current output. Where I used to skip school to run down to the record store to buy the singles when they came out, now I wait months, sometimes years before picking up their 'latest' album. I grabbed Atomic Bomb long after its release date for $9.99 and I have yet to buy No Line on the Horizon (although I did buy two songs off of iTunes). I'm sure it must be a reaction similar to the backlash they suffered from old school fans when they unleashed Achtung Baby! on the world but, if you ask me, the songwriting just hasn't been as strong as it used to be. Their post-Pop material has been a little too...transparent and obvious. When Bono used the line "the air was heavy/heavy as a truck" in the song "Electrical Storm" I knew it was a love affair that had ended.

I jokingly told my wife tonight when the streaming broadcast begun that U2 and I broke up a few years ago but we've agreed to have coffee tonight, and I think that was a pretty apt description of the affair. The evening was spent with reintroductions, reminiscing over old memories and times spent together, and talking about what's been going on with each other since last we spoke.

To continue the metaphor, I think there was still enough good to agree to start seeing each other again on a trial basis. I may even spring for the new album on iTunes and give that a whirl. I'll definitely be revisiting my back catalogue of albums over the next few weeks and conjure up some warm fuzzies.

The rebroadcast of the concert is playing as I type this, so if you catch this and wanna check it out, hussle on over.

Peace!

mike

I Was Just Wondering...

...where is David Bowie these days and why haven't we seen any new material out of him in the last three or four years?

I can't be the only one wondering.

mike

'Porky's Shell Game'

Here's some more Pogo goodness courtesy of YouTube:



I wish I could find the full-length feature this was clipped from. Hell, I wish I could find most any Pogo merch without having to embark on a major expedition but such is not the case. I covet the two Pogo treasuries I have and what little scraps I can dig up.

Enjoy!

mike

World of Disappointment #3467

[This post may contain small bits of hyperbole]

I saw this in the bookstore today and, after briefly catching my eye as a possibly interesting thing, I set it down again and walked away disgusted.

Originally I thought to myself, "WTF, yet another Dracula edition?" before having my eye caught by the Jae Lee cover and the promise of an illustrated text. This could be a cool little thing to have, especially at the bargain price they were offering it for. I opened it up and saw that virtually every single image that Jae drew was a figure drawing with no background and very little detail in anything but exposed bits like hands, faces, etc. Any item of clothing being shown is just a grey tone shape and anything that is not humanoid in shape is a silhouette. How cheap is that.

I know he did some astonishing work on the Dark Tower comics and I've followed the guys work in the past so I know he's just totally phoned these images in. It probably shouldn't, but it bugs me.

Anyway, if you see this item and get tempted to pick it up, buyer beware! Flip through before purchasing. Or better yet, ignore it and grab the one illustrated by Ben Templesmith.

As an addendum, I wanted to add that some good did come from my bookstore trip since I grabbed a copy of Pullman's Once Upon a Time in the North, a copy of Christopher Golden, Stephen Bissette and Hank Wagner's Neil Gaiman wankfest, Prince of Stories: The Many Worlds of Neil Gaiman and the lavishly illustrated and very eye-catching children's book, Varmints. I almost walked out of there with Hornby's new one, Juliet, Naked, but I have to finish The Beautiful and the Damned before getting into a new book. I read the first chapter sitting in the bookstore waiting for my daughter and I just knew I would get home and keep reading it with Fitzgerald odyssey of love and excess feeling the full on force of how fickle I can be.

Later!

mike

How Cool Is This?

Need I say more?

mike

Clone Wars Season 2 - Not Disappointing

I've been posting a lot of negative thoughts on the ol' blog of late, which may be bad juju since I'm trying to do the whole 'Hey, I'm back and blogging regularly' thing, so I'm going to change gears briefly and throw out some positive thoughts regarding the second season of The Clone Wars.

If you saw season one, you probably were very aware of the various limitations of the show. Not a lot of characters, not a lot of settings/environments, characters whose models were a little stiff and whose faces did not move quite right, and the usual first season stumbling around and finding your rhythm kind of thing. With season two a lot of that has changed. Subtle bits of acting are not uncommon, better mouth movements to match the voice actors, humongous improvements to details, textures, editing and story. Most of all the stories.

Before there were a lot of two or three part arcs that were generally interesting, but there was a rhythm to the storytelling that felt off. Whether that was due to budget and time restrictions, I'm not sure. But lately I've just been feeling that I am, indeed, watching Star Wars, or a logical extension of it. Plus, watching the relationships develop is nice because it gives some context that was missing from Revenge of the Sith and, at the end of the day, may just make the prequel series a little bit better than it was a couple of years ago.


I'll leave you with the trailer for season two. There's some nice teaser stuff in there if you've yet to see any episodes, and other than that, it's just fun to watch.



May the force be with you.

Mike

Grisms

I was posting a message on a friends blog and I was prompted, both times, to verify that I was, indeed, a living breathing entity by punching in the random set of 7 letter combinations they provided. Looking at the two 'words', meaningless and random though they be, it reminded me of Douglas Adams and John Lloyd's wonderful little dictionary of non-words, The Meaning of Liff (an online version is available here). Wikipedia describes the book as 'a "dictionary of things that there aren't any words for yet"; all the words listed are place names, and describe common feelings and objects for which there is no current English word.'

Looking at the two 'words' I was prompted with - Wizizi and Grisms - I can't help but wonder what possible meanings they could have if they existed as real words. It is very early in the morning for me right now and I have a splitting headache, so I'm not going to venture a guess. I will, however, open the floor to anyone out there who is interested in kicking it Liff-style. If nothing comes of it, I'll return at some point and take a crack at it myself.

Either I am really reaching for blogging content or Meanwhile... just got mondo interactive.

Later!

mike