Expert Testimony

June 12th, 2008Blog2 comments

So I’m eating some sundubu jigae the other day and it seems pretty good. I was pretty hungry so at that point anything would have tasted pretty wonderful.

I finish eating and I’m thinking that I should bring Dave to this place to see what he thinks of the sundubu. Then I think — hey — would his opinion make the sundubu taste different? If he said, “This is pretty good,” would it taste better to me? Vice-versa?

Initially I’m thinking yes. After all I want the opinion of an expert, someone who has grown up on this stuff. How the hell would I know if this is good sundubu or bad sundubu? If he thought this place was good I would definitely come back. It’s like if you want to start reading graphic novels or X-Men or something — you grab your trustiest nerd and have them point the way. Otherwise how would you know?

But then I thought, does it matter? This tastes decent to me, perhaps even good, so does anyone else’s opinion matter? Why not read/eat what you like?

And this all comes down to a crucial test of character: Do I care more about what I, myself, like? OR do I care more about what other people think? Is my judgement more valid than the judgement of so-called experts?

Thinking about this, I’m leaning toward the latter. All sorts of people continue to do stupid things because they don’t know any better. I need expert advice. I want to know if I’m eating crap so that I’ll stop eating crap.

But then… What if I like crap?

Techmology

June 11th, 2008Blog0 comments

People want to know if I’m gettin the new iPhone. I’m pretty satisfied with my present one. The screen is the perfect size for my collection of midget porn. If my porn was a different variety of porn (fat chick porn or giant porn) I would probably need a bigger screen.

I don’t really need 3G yet — I mostly only check my email, and that tends to tell me if I have any messages right away. Plus version one of the phone can use all the apps that are being developed for it, so I’m future-proof for the time being.

I think the only feature I’d really like on the phone is the ability to take video. Also the ability to send pics directly to this blog and post them. I see a lot of weird crap in my everyday living, and I would like to share these things with you.

My Xbox is finally on its way back! Yay hurray yay! Now I can finish GTA.

In the meantime I’ve been tiding myself over with Hot Shots Golf Open Tee 2 for the PSP. It’s the latest iteration of my favorite portable golf game. It’s a super-cute Japanese made game where you can earn accessories and dress your character up. It’s the only golf game I know of where you can play golf while wearing a necklace made of skulls and use a Kendo stick as a driver. I’m not making this up.

The best part of this is that you can play a couple of holes, put the PSP in sleep mode, and pick it up again where you left off. This is very useful for taking quick breaks while working, or while Photoshop is processing something.

Speaking of which, I’ve realized that I’m not a very good multi-tasker. When I do two things at once, I tend to do both poorly.

I need more ram.

Holy Shit

June 10th, 2008Blog0 comments

According to the NYT, Viggo’s in The Road. That’s the best possible news I could hear coming out of that production. This is going to be one bleak movie — a movie whose only competitor in that department is probably Auster’s In the Country of Last Things, which is also in production as a movie.

The Road was the last book I read that shook me hard. The last one I couldn’t put down. And I read a lot of books. My expectations are super high. In fact, my expectations are such that I’d rather that it never be made into a movie. But there’s sort of a weird duality going on there for me — I don’t want to see it, but I also really, really do — in the hopes that it will be really great.

In this case I do absolutely recommend reading the book before seeing the movie. The movie doesn’t come out for another few months, so there’s plenty of time to go get it.

Another adaptation they’ve been trying to do for years is Confederacy of Dunces; for a while there was talk of getting Will Ferrell to play Ignatius. There was even a staged reading of a script. Mos Def would be a mos excellent Burma Jones. But something tells me that this would be an impossible-to-market movie: “What’s it about?” “This fat, overeducated idiot in New Orleans in the 1960s.” “Ummm, pass — the new Scooby Doo is out.”

And Confederacy is another one of those books that I feel should probably just stay a book. In fact, it’s much more than that, probably — it’s a progenitor of many other things that have come after it, kind of like how The Fortress progenitor-ated Star Wars. Every chubby Internet forum reading basement dweller is a direct descendant of Ignatius Reilly, even if he/she doesn’t know it.

Travels

June 9th, 2008Blog0 comments

In Minneapolis we were at the Guthrie Theater. This is probably the largest building I’ve ever seen that’s devoted exclusively to theater.

It’s huge and blue, nine stories tall and designed to look like one of the giant mills/factories that dot the city. Inside it’s like Space Mountain — there are very tall escalators that take you up into darkened high-tech halls. Whether it’s day or night outside, inside it’s always shadowy and hard edged. Even the urinals in the men’s room look like they were designed by Fritz Lang — they’re square metal boxes. The sinks are from a 1950s space station — steel rows w/o faucets or knobs, appropriately confusing.

It’s a really cool building but also a really scary building — it feels like it’s haunted by holographic ghosts that will take control of your iPhone and make it explode in your pocket. It’s not something you’d expect to find in a city like Minneapolis, but the fact that it exists there is pretty neat. Also the bar is great.

I’m going to New York soon and apparently it’s currently hotter than satan’s choad. People are melting in the streets, and the various chemical slurries on the sidewalk are heating up. I like the cold better than I like the heat, so I’m just going to stay indoors and not wear pants for the duration.

(Off topic, but this needs to be addressed: “Choad” or “Chode”? It’s somewhat of a neologism I think, so the spelling isn’t secure yet.)

I love going to New York. It’s fun, there’s no pressure, and there are a lot of things to do. This time I will see how many bags of nuts I can eat from a Nuts 4 Nuts cart.

I’m assembling a list of things I haven’t seen in Chicago for my trip there in July. Any suggestions can be phoned in.

eBama

June 8th, 2008Blog0 comments

After reading a couple analyses of Clinton’s defeat in the primary (New York Times article here, for instance), it’s clear that Obama is the first politician to effectively use the Internet and social networking to win. Apparently the founder of Facebook is actively working on his campaign, and that the core of his fundraising is his website.

The Times article cited above even mentions that the male Clinton doesn’t use email or a Blackberry. That’s crazy. Without that stuff it made it easier for him to go off the reservation and hurt Hillary with his big ol’ yap. He didn’t get the text telling him to rein it in. Now I like the male Clinton as much as the next guy, but in my mind he’s gone from a statesman to a possible pitch man for Viagra. He needs to take a note from Gore: Use technology, and be more boring and predictable.

Hiawatha

June 8th, 2008Blog0 comments

I spent the last couple of days at a conference in Minneapolis. Observations:

Honor: Their light rail transit system operates on the honor system. That means that you buy a ticket at a machine for two dollars, then get on the train. There is no gate mechanism or swipe machine to test whether you hold a ticket or not. I rode the train six times, including to and from the airport. No one ever challenged me or asked to see my ticket. This is mindbottling since I live in a city without honor or humanity, where such a thing would be exploited on a constant basis. It may be exploited a lot there too, I don’t know. But the fact that it exists simultaneously makes me happy for humanity and creeps me out.

Drinks are Cheap: A Stella is $3 in a bar in Minneapolis. The same beer is $6 in Los Angeles. It is a damn dirty shame.

People Talk Like in Fargo: “Oh geez. That’s super! All righty.” People actually talk like this. It’s highly amusing to me — they’re so cute. Like gnomes or something. It makes you want to pinch their motherfuckin cheeks.

People are Nice: When things fall down/out of your pocket/your limbs fall off, people scramble to help you. They want to help you. In LA and NYC, it’s your own goddamn problem. Actually, I don’t think it’s that people in LA/NYC aren’t nice — they are — it’s just that they don’t want to get involved. Because peoples is crazy.

Mall of America is Big: I’ve been telling people it’s like a giant donut with an amusement park in the middle. It has three rollercoasters and a shark aquarium underground. It’s so big that, like the human body, it contains superfluous elements that don’t really need to exist — like a store that only sells fridge magnets. That’s all they sell. Fridge magnets. And it’s not a small store — this was double the unit size of a regular mall store.

And on the plane back there was a Minnesota lady traveling with her grandson to LA, saying, “Oh geez, yah — I just love fridge magnets. That’s all I’m lookin out for as far as souvenirs go. I collect ‘em. Yah — don’t need to bring an empty suitcase for fridge magnets.”

Fist Bump

June 3rd, 2008Blog0 comments

After tonight, I can’t wait for Obama’s speech at the convention. It’s going to be incredible. Real honest history right before your eyes, on TV.

I have a coke habit: I drink too much Diet Coke. I’m not so hard core that I call it “DC” like certain others, but I have a four to six can a day habit.

I’m not sure if this is giving me a brain tumor or not, though my head has been feeling extra heavy these days. It hasn’t affected my health in any obvious way, so I think I’m going to keep doing it. I’ve gotta have at least one vice left, right? And this one isn’t even on the list of the seven deadlies.

Wild thinking here, but I am currently considering a career in rap music.