lol omg wtf?

Wow, five months. I suppose this blogging thing just isn't for me. Lesse, five months. Got a snake, almost done building a treehouse, dems took control of the house and the senate and they're still a bunch of fucking pussies, ate at Spago, gave up caffiene for a couple weeks, got five months older. *Shrug*. Life goes on. WWIII is now really ramping up in the middle east. It's looking like I will be writing the shaders for *******, which is OK but it means that I'm going to be *****'s bitch for the next ten months. My P990i is tres cool. Siggraph poker game II was cool. Butler kicked our asses, which is sad because he had no idea that the goal of hold-em was to take all of the other people's money. Got to see The Tribe at Fenway while I was at Siggraph. Of course Ortiz hit a 3-run bomb in the bottom of the ninth to beat the Indians. Coached RC's flag football team. We finished in first in the regular season, but got knocked out in our first playoff game. I was proud of 'em. They really came together as a team. I really think that the whole ended up being more than the sum of the parts. I turned 37 in there somewhere.

And zoooooooom, a month goes by. Everyone's out of town for three weeks at the inlaws, so I'm going to be pretty bored in my empty house. Siggraph's coming up, so I will at least get to go out of town myself for a week. Have the Second Annual Siggraph poker game. Catch up with everyone from all the other F/X companies.

In other news, it turns out that I won't be writing the shaders for ****, which is kind of a relief. And World War Three seems to be really getting going now in the Middle East, which is kind of worrisome.

Well, the smartphone that I lost should be covered by the computer rider on my homeowners insurace, so I got that going for me. If they pay me what retail is, it should be enough for me to just go ahead and get a P990. Yay!

In work related news, I'm going to be writing the **** shaders for ****. It's a cool character, but the reference is kind of scary, like **** from **** but 10 times harder. We have soooo much to to and no time to do it. Typical. I'm glad that I'm the shading lead. It's nice to have a say in things. Hopefully I can transition right from this into a CG supe position somewhere. GW has been making noise about coming back to ****, but **** would have to convince ****. I'm not sure the wife would go for it. It wouldn't be until after **** is over, so I have plenty of time to think about it.

No more

Well, another year of baseball has come and gone. Lost our playoff game today 4 to 2. It was very close, came down to 2 plays. It really could have gone either way. Hopefully RJ will want to play again next year.

Noooooooooooo

I didn't lose my life. I didn't lose my job. I did lose my smartphone. I am totally despondent. It is synched to my laptop so I won't lose too much data, but still, it hurts. To add insult to injury, the P910 has been discontinued, and the P990 release keeps getting pushed. What the fuck do I do? Grrrrr.

And another thing

"Kenny Boy" Lay and Jeff Skilling are both going to federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison. Fucking-a. Sometimes there is justice in the world. I got my fingers crossed for my boy Fitzgerald to start putting Rove, Libby, Cheney, et al motherfuckers in jail soon.

Shoes

So, it's just pissing down rain on Monday. So I did what I always do, put on all my gear, then put on all my rain gear and ride to work. The only problem was, on Monday I forgot to put my tennis shoes in my bag. I get to work, no shoes. Fuck. It wasn't too bad. What's one day with no shoes? Luckily I didnt' have to go anywhere. No dailies, no screenings, no meetings.

Yesterday. I'm doing my morning routine. Made sure I grabbed my shoes out of the closet. Ride to work. Get out my shoes. One right shoe. Another right shoe. Sigh. It hasn't been a good week for shoes. I got 'em both today though. Yee haw motherfucker.

NOLAJF

Was at Jazz Fest in New Orleans last weekend. Saw Jimmy Buffett on Saturday and Paul Simon on Sunday. Buffett was awesome. Great show. Simon phoned it in. He had no energy. Maybe that's what he's like live now. Saw Anders Osbourne on Friday in a room that couldn't have been more than 25x25. There had to have been 150 people in there. Met S and M and their friends J and D. Did a little parying on Bourbon street on Saturday. Got Beingnets at Cafe du Monde of course. The food in NOLA is unprecidented. It was pretty amazing that there was a Jazz Fest at all considering how fucked up the city still is. Half crushed cars, uprooted trees, collapsed houses and mounds of trash everywhere. I think that a good time was had by all and I really hope that we get back next year.

Satch

Saw Satriani and Eric Johnson last night at The Grove in Anaheim. Wow. EJ played for about an hour, and then Satch played for over two and a half hours. It was, in a word, awesome.

OMGSTFU!

Tuesday: Little Leage game.
Wednesday: Laker game with kid #2, Batting cages.
Thursday: Work basketball game and Buffet concert with wife and kids.
Friday: Another Little League game.
Saturday: Adult birthday party.

Somewhere in there I have to fit in 60 hours of work. Fucking hell, I just got back from Mexico and I already need another vacation.

Alive

Yes, I am alive. Not that there's anyone reading this to wonder if I am or not. The day I got back from 8 days away from work (and instantaneous access to this blog) I got put on yet another fucking firedrill at work so instead of being on a relaxing 8 hour a day schedule, I'm back in the crunch. Fuckers. Between that and trying to bootstrap the Unreal Tournament clan that I started with a couple other guys and trying to set up a web server on my home PC so that East Coast family can log in and look at pix of the kids and actually finding time to manage my little league team and playing the occasional game of Assault, I'm a little busy. Should be a relaxing summer tho. We'll see.

Fitz

My man Fitz is supposedly wrapping up and is also rumored to be preparing indictments against Headly and Rove. Woo hoo. You can read about it here.

Fitzgerald Will Seek New White House Indictments

Busy

That's what I am. I'm trying really hard to get my shots finalled by Wednesday, even though I'm supposed to be done on Thrursday. I've got a little league game and Lakers-Spurs Tickets for Thursday, the last thing I need is to be at work all night pixel fucking my last shot to death. Plus Friday I'm supposed to get on a plane to Mexico. Man I'm busy as fuck this week.

Last.

Last. Saturady. At. Work. On. This. Show.

I can taste the margaritas .... Cancun in 6 days.

Hello?

When are people going to wake the fuck up to what's going on in this country? It baffles me.

In other news. My little leaguers won their second game, unfortunately that means that they improve to 2 and 8. I really think they've turned a corner. Unfortunately, we play the number one team this weekend. So it's straight into the deep end for my guys.

I'm trying to teach Pandora to play country music, but only funny, upbeat country music, like Brad Paisley, or Jimmy Buffett (I fucking know Buffet isn't country music, call Pandora.com and tell them). It's not working out too well, and now I feel depressed.

Going to Joe Satriani and Eric Johnson at The Grove in Anaheim. Fucking A. I can't wait.

Waiver

If you want to become a Scientologist, you have to sign a release.

Scientology Waiver

Those people are fucking crazy, and that, gentle reader, is from first hand experience. One fine day I shall regail you all with that fascinating tale of Religions and ISPs, but not today. Certainly not with ten days left until the show I'm on is supposed to be done.

Oil

So, the big five oil companies made a $115 billion, thats billion, with a b, dollar profit last year. Profit. As in revenue minus costs. Of course that means OPEC probably made the same amount of profit. The oil companies are only middlemen after all. What is OPEC doing with all that money? Buying the west, of course. All the state-run conglomerates in places like Dubai and Saudi Arabia are gobbling up companies around the world, from Korea to the US, as fast as they can.
You think the right wing is offensive? Wait until Saudi Arabia owns most of the US, and we all get to switch to Wahabbism. We're in big trouble here. I don't think, fuck, I know most people don't even realize it. Why? Because the US has turned into a nation of fat, stupid fundamentalist christians. I am so done with the US. It breaks my heart, but I really think more and more about leaving the country. The problem is, I think more and more that leaving isn't going to make any difference in the long run.
In other news, we won our basketball game today to improve to 2-1 ... so that's something. Now if my little leaguers could just turn the corner, I really think that they could start winning some games. We'll see tomorrow.

Stretch

Another. Saturday. At. Work.

It's really not too bad. Considering it's the last two weeks of the show, I'm not doing seven day weeks and I'm still only working 50-60 hour weeks. I can leave for baseball games. I've had much, much worse.

Russ

Well, we lost a close one in the basketball league today. 43-39. We were short our best player and we played like shit, so as much as I hate the phrase "moral victory", it kind of was one, considering we were playing one of the better teams in the league and it was close up until the last 30 seconds.

In other news, holy christ why won't the democrats fight? Why won't they support Feingold? Call your senator and beg them to support Feingold's censure resolution.

Feingold/Boxer '08

Clan

So I started a Unreal Tournament 2004 Clan. It's pretty casual for now. We'll see how it goes. Maybe it will turn into something great. A nice online community. Maybe not. If I could tell the future, I wouldn't be in here talking to you idiots.

War

Vote

So I was thinking about government the other day. Voting, to be precise. How you vote for a candidate that you think will best represent your interests in office. The problem is, Corporations are in charge now, so you can't change things, right? Wrong.

Vote. With. Your. Dollars.

You have to adjust to the mindset that every penny, every nickel and every dime you spend is a vote. A vote for whatever corporation you are patronizing. It's also a vote against all the other corporations that you could've patronized for that purchase. I hate Wal-Mart, for example. I will not shop at Wal-Mart, nor do I permit my Wife to shop at Wal-Mart. Ok, permit is probably a stronger word than necessary there. That certainly makes me seem like some mouth-breathing red-stater. Let's just say I strongly discourage my wife from shopping at Wal-Mart. Regardless of my matrimonial machinations, Wal-Mart sucks, and if everyone that thought Wal-Mart sucks would stop fucking shopping there, well, it might not solve the problem, but it would be a enormous first step. If you don't like what a company does, don't give them your god damn money. It's pretty simple, no? Oooooooh, but I need my so-and-so. Too fucking bad. Suck it up, open your eyes to the fact that the rules have changed Jethro, and you, unless you happen to be an exec at a large multi-national corporation, are holding the short end of the stick.

Over Under

So, Bush's/Cheney'a approval ratings are %34 and %18 respectively. So there will obviously be some kind of 'October Suprise' engineered by the current administration. Probably one of these.

1. Bin Laden captured or reported killed.
2. a U.S.-Israeli air assault on Iran's nuclear facilities.
3. a major terrorist attack inside the U.S. followed by martial law.
4. the announcement of a bird-flu outbreak. Again followed by martial law.

Of course, all of the above would most likely be followed by the cancellation of the midterm elections.

*sigh*

The world is really going to hell in a handbasket, and no one seems to care.

One way

Someone who works at the same company I do killed himself this weekend. I'd never met the guy, this is a pretty big place, but he seemed well liked. I feel bad for not, well, feeling bad, I guess. He went through a lot of shit and I suppose that he just decided that enough was enough. I was going to complain about the Oscars, but it really just doesn't seem like a big deal anymore. It's odd. This was a smart guy we're talking about. Is it the same to want to end emotional suffering as it is to want to end physical suffering? I'm really at a loss as to what to think. Could I do that? What would have to happen for me to take that step? I suppose that line in the sand exists for everyone.

Phew

Time sure does fly when you're at work every fucking day. Man, I got taken off the show I'm on and put on another show, for a week, to do about three weeks of work that wouldn't need to be done if people would have done their fucking job. It's straight up putting out a fire. Grrr.

In other news, I really hope Shane Acker's #9 wins the oscar for the best animated short. I would have to rank them in this order.

1. #9
2. One Man Band
3. Badgered
4. The Mysterious Geographical Explorations ...
5. The Moon and the Son

Hopefully I can get home in time to see the show. At least early enough to see the FX Oscar. I've got all my
fingers and toes crossed for Narnia.

Short Screeing

So I'm at a screening of the Oscar nominated animated shorts. Very cool.

Lakers

Went to the Lakers vs. Magic game last night at the last second with FP. First, I had no idea that Grant Hill was even still playing in the NBA. What is he, like, 50 years old? Regardless, it figures that since I decided to not try to get rid of the tickets for a change that the game would suck. The Lakers put an ass whoopin' on the Magic. I'm selling my Pistons tix for this Saturday, so the Lakers are guaranteed to win in a nail biter. Probably in overtime. Kobe will probably drop 45 and hit a fadeaway jumper at the buzzer to win it. Don't believe me, just you wait and see.

Every Day

How the fuck do people write in these things every day? Maybe I just don't have anything to say. Maybe I don't have anything interesting to say, which I think is probably about par for the course for most blogs. I mean, who really gives a rat's ass about the minutia of my life? It's not terribly interesting. The parts that are interesting I'm certainly not going to tell to you fuckers. I suppose when you get right down to it, someone who's blogging probably falls into one of two groups. Jounalists and Exhibitionists. I mean, I'm sure that there are plenty of people out there like me, who are just keeping a journal, or a diary, or that sort of thing, but I think that we must certainly be very much in the minority.

Funny how?

Another Day ...

Another final. Woo-hoo, you know, like "Whoooo-Hooo". Four more shots, and my eye is on the prize baby. Six days and five nights in Cancun when this fucker is in the can.

Victory!

Woot. My guys finally won a game. Some great pitching and clutch hitting got them a 7-0 victory to improve to 1-3.

Carrer? Bah.

There's only one, count 'em, one, reason that I'm at work today. I get my hours plus the 8 hours of pay for the vacation, which works out to, oh fuck, who fucking knows, it's a shitload of money for one day of work. Seeing as I know have a vacation for two to the '06 New Orleans Jazz Fest and a week in Cancun for six to try to save for, which is going to easily run me six large, I need to make as much money as humanly possible.

In other news, my little league team is 0-3 after losing an absolute heartbreaker last week. They gave up 4 in the top of the first and then won the rest of the game 2-1. Practice was good Sunday. If they don't win one soon it's going to turn into a mental issue. It's hard enough to get them to throw to the right base. If they keep losing I'm going to have to be a coach and a sports psychologist.The first I can hadle. The second? Jesus, I can barely look after my own metal health, much less 12 third graders.

Choices

Unfortunately, the choice I'm having to make, is selling my Lakers vs. Pistons and Lakers vs. Spurs tickets so that I can afford to go to Jazz Fest. Jeezus I need to win the lottery.

Dick

Ha, not that you fucking perverts. So Dick Cheney fucking SHOOTS a guy, who's a huge GOP fundraiser, while quail hunting. Tricky Dick may or may not have been drinking beer at lunch. It was kept from everyone, including clueless George, for almost two days. First the Whitehouse spins it as if it's "merely a flesh wound". Then the guy has a heart attack from a pellet that's next to his heart, and almost dies. Oops. Then it get's spun as if it's the other guy's fault . Just in case you don't know, when there's a hunting accident, it's never ever never never ever the fault of anyone but the shooter. Never fucking ever. You pull that trigger you better make damn sure that no one is standing in front of your gun. Jeezus. If the Dems don't sweep in the midterms ... oh wait ... of course they won't. They're fucking useless, spineless, clueless idiots. Fuck.

Jazz Fest '06

So the lineup for The New Orleans Jazz Fest was just announced. The big names are ...

Fats Domino
Jimmy Buffett
Lionel Richie
Dave Matthews Band
Paul Simon
Bob Dylan

Wow. Just wow. DMB and Buffet are on different weekends. Bah. I'm so there. Hurricane Katrina devestation? Don't fucking care. I will go and sleep in a tent on the damn levee for a lineup like that. I was there for #35 and this should blow that one away.

Abe sez ...

Just fucking do it. Make a difference.

Message

How can you change things? How can you get your message out. Get a sharpie, and write "Impeach Bush and Cheney" on every single $1, $5, $10 and $20 you spend. Write "There were no WMDs". Write "The war is a lie". Write "Bring our soldiers home". Write that shit on there, front and back, before you spend your money. Don't use a credit card or ATM card. Be creative. Take that $5 and give old Abe a voice bubble that says "Bush and Cheney have to go!". Write on that cash, and spent it.

Weekend II

At work again. You fuckers. Bah.

Cold

It's gotten warmer lately, but for a while where I live it was getting pretty cold at night. Down around 40 or so. Since we're up in the desert, it's nice during the day pretty much all winter, but at night, look out. So a couple of weeks ago, neither my wife or I wanted to cook. I can't honestly even remember why, so we jetted over to In-And-Out with the kids to grab a quick burger. I'm pretty sure it was a Friday, it was crowded. Not too many empty tables apart from the one right behind where I was sitting. Which is where the homeless guy sat down. Have I mentioned that it was fucking cold? Anyway, after a few minutes it's obvious that he's not going to buy anything, he's just trying to get in out of the cold. I figure that it's only a matter of time before the manager runs him off. So I went up to the counter and bought him a double-double, fries and a coke. I filled up the cup at the soda fountain and gave the guy the coke and the receipt and told him, "number 36 is you". Now, of course there's a point here. I'm not trying to break my arm patting myself on the back, but that restaurant was fucking full of Good Old Fashioned Americans. Christian Americans. People are throwing their leftover food away for fuck's sake and that poor bastard is just sitting there. I'm, and I hate calling myself this, but it's easier sometimes to just put a label on things, an atheist. And I was the one that stepped up. I'm so sick of the argument that you can't have morality without Christianity. That's bullshit. The utter self-servingness of it just pisses me off.

Fitz, you're our only hope.

I don't really want to get too political, or religious, in there but, since this is pretty much stream of conciousness and I think about those two things a fair amount, there's no way to escape those two subjects from leaking into this blog. I hate what the current administration has done to the country. I hate the smug expression on W's face when he talks. I want to hit that smug smirk with a brick. I hate the way that the mainstream media has turned into an echo chamber of the Bush spin machine. Lied about Iraq to sell the war? Free pass. Lied about the cost of the medicare bill? Free Pass. Hurricane Katrina? Free pass. Lied about thier Social Security plan? Free pass. Tax Cuts for the rich (full disclosure: I'm probably in the top 5%, and a raging progressive)? Free pass. Stolen elections in Ohio and Florida and who knows where else? Free pass. Is there no hope? It seems like it most days. Some days, however, the future starts to look, well not bright, but let's just say that it looks less dim. Days you read news like this.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/10/politics/10leak.html

Ole' Fitzgerald is still plugging away. And you know that , like the whole Abramhoff thing, this one goes all the way to the top. The Right just loved it when they had Ken Starr as a special prosecutor. Something tells me Fitz is going to dig up a lot more than a stain on a blue dress. Rove, Bush, Cheney, Delay, Wolfowitz, Rice, Rumsfeld. Every one of those fuckers needs to end up in jail.

Bad day.

That's what I must've caught "Sam" on. Now we've made nice and I don't need to declare a jihad against her and her infidel friends in the north. We are back to DEFCON 1.

I lub teh 80's!

80's Hair Music

Youuuuuuuuuu suck!

Why do people suck? Is the world here just to piss me off? Why do people get so angry about the wrong things? They have their priorities completely out of whack. How can a person be so agreeable but when that person becomes some people they'll do crazy shit. Like hang people, blow up buses full of kids, burn down a church or kill everyone in sight that doesn't believe in the same invisible sky fairy as they do?

I called someone on a 3D/effects mailing list "him". Indirectly even. This person's name is fucking SAM for fuck's sake. She flamed Me, pretty much accusing me of being a chauvanist for assuming someone named Sam was a man. "Imagine that ... a woman doing 3D" she says.I don't understand the need to strike out at the slightest perception of insult. That slippery slope ends with people torching embassies because of a goddamn cartoon.

I mean, people just baffle me.

Superbland

The Superbowl sucked. Is it just me, or did it seem like both teams were trying to lose? I'm still not sure how Seattle was a four point underdog. Unless it was because the oddsmakers have a magic 8-ball that says "Yes", "No", "Not Sure" and "Seattle's gonna' choke like a motherfucker in the Superbowl". The bad news is, I bet a friend from college lunch at Hot Wings on Melrose that Seattle would win. The good news is, now I have an excuse to drive up to Hot Wings for lunch.

We're all Danes now.

Weekend

Yay, it's Saturday. Where am I? Fucking work. I hate you all.

Nailed

For the 4th or 5th time in the last three years, I got a nail in the back tire of my motorcycle. That's a quick $200 down the crapper. $200. $200. $200 every fucking time I need a new motorcycle tire. Either I've made an enemy, which is entirely possible, or there's some kind of nail fairy that scatters roofing nails in the carpool lane of the 405 at night. I suppose that I could just be unlucky, except that I don't believe in luck. Unless by luck you mean an excuse people use to not try hard or to be woefully unprepared for life. I'd love to buy stock in that kind of luck. Then at least I might be able to afford some new motorcycle tires.

God

If your answer to the age-old question "does God exist" is "yes", invariably, the only logical follow up question is, "Why is he such an asshole?"

This, is a test ...

So, you can post to your blog via e-mail? Well, that's cool. That also means I can post an entry from my cell phone, which is what I'm doing right now. I'm sure that also means something, but I'm not really sure what.

Oscar

So the nominees for the Academy Awards were announced and I honestly could care less about how many Oscars the gay cowboy movie is going to get. What aggravates me, is that Episode III didn't get past the bake off for the VFX Oscar. That's just got to be some kind of crime. I mean, sure it was a shitty movie, but it was stunning to look at. Meh, the vfx branch must have it in for Lucas. Narnia, Kong and WotW, that's a tough call, but once the vote gets to the full academy it's just a popularity contest so I'd have to say that Narnia's pretty much got it wrapped up.

Damnit!!

So I'm not as smart as I thought I was because somone had to point out to me that clicking on the little pencil is how you edit your posts. WTF is that? How about a little button that says "edit". Fucking clever assholes.

Why am I here?

I don't really know. I've got a composite and renders in the queue, and the discussion I was having about fark.com's page hits with the guy I share an office with morphed into how google.com brought blogger.com and how his brother should start a blog, cause he's a great writer and I said "how fucking hard could it be?". Well, the answer to that is seemingly "not fucking very" becuase here I am typing in my blog about thirty seconds later. Of course I don't really have anything to say. But I know how teh intarweb works, for fuck's sake.