My Favorite Stuff of 2006
Favorite Song of 2006: “The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth”, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah — Even though this song came out in 2005, it was still the one I rocked out to the most in 2006.
Favorite TV Show of 2006: “Mythbusters” — I love science and I love beards.
Favorite Video Game of 2006: “Dead Rising” — Smashing zombies with other zombies never gets old. Also chainsawing cultists and saving whale-tail’d survivors.
Favorite Books of 2006: “Life of Pi”, “White Teeth”, “Confederacy of Dunces”
Favorite Gadget of 2006: Sharp PWE-550 Dictionary — My constant friend and companion… Until a better one comes out.
Favorite News Story of 2006: World’s Tallest Man Saves Choking Dolphins
Giant Fucken Pocky
I got a lot of toys for Christmas this year: A Nerf dart launcher, a Robosapien, and some monkey-headed slippers. And then I got a box of this:
It was from Rick. When I unwrapped it I experienced a sense of vertigo similar to what Alice must have felt when she ate the cake labeled “EAT ME”. I felt six sizes smaller than usual.
Each pocky from this box is like a chocolate-dipped baseball bat. Finally, pocky that can be used to club someone to death!
Addendum to Yesterday
Chainsmokin’ Chimp. Put him in front of a typewriter and a page of Hemingway will pop out. Put him in front of a waiter and said waiter will be clubbed to death by drunken fists.
No matter what anybody says, I’m filing this one under cuteness.
Chainsmoking
I watched Good Night and Good Luck again recently — it’s such a simple and effective movie. Each sequence is an actor’s delight — tight, well-designed scenes full of great dialogue and confrontation. Plus everyone’s under hot, hot lights required for black and white film.
Also people smoke a heckuva lot in that movie. Even as a former smoker, my eyes were watering. But that’s part of the beauty and mystique of smoking, innit? To be cocooned in a curtain of smoke, hammering at a typerwriter with the filter clenched in your teeth — now that’s real grinding, my friend. Real, ass on the line grinding.
Cowboy Versus Samurai Is Coming to Vancouver
Vancouver: Land of Battlestar Galactica, The X-Files, and Expo ’86. Cowboy Versus Samurai will be landing there in July of 2007, at almost the exact same time it activates in San Francisco.
I’m pretty excited about this production because it will be the first showing of my work outside the United States — unless you count that production of Achievers with an all-penguin cast at McMurdo Station. Everyone, including myself, was paid in fish.
This sucker is world-wide-international!
Canada is one hell of a country, and VACT is one hell of a group. Hopefully I’ll be able to make it up there for the opening and then flap my arms real fast to get back to the Yay Area.
Keep Your Socks in the Garage
My dad, being a master of efficiency, keeps his socks in a drawer in the garage. This is so that on the way out he can take off his slippers, put on a pair of fresh socks, and then head right to the car.
I asked him what he does with his dirty socks, and he slid open the drawer underneath. “They go here,” he said, “And then the washing machine is right there.”
Additional Internet Viewing Fun: Tetris: From Russia With Love, a BBC documentary on the creation of Tetris and the ensuing rivalry between Nintendo and Atari.
Feliz Navidad
I am all hepped up on Christmas cheer (and goofballs), having eaten too much and slept too much and humbug’d too little. It’s the last merry week of 2006, so I’m taking it real easy for the next few days.
My favorite Christmas gift so far: Foot Duvets from Restoration Hardware given to me by my cousin. These things are pretty much goosedown sleeping bags for your feet. They are Restoration Hardware green, and wearing them is like strapping pillows to your feet and walking on infinite mattress top in every direction. Also they look like robot feet from a puffy Michel Gondry robot made out of pillows and felt. I highly recommend them!
My Work in Print
Year Zero
Available from Samuel French and Amazon.com
Cowboy Versus Samurai
Available from Samuel French and Amazon.comFor a complete list of books containing my work, please click here.
