GMail is Brilliant

This is hysterical, but it makes me a little sad for the human race.

And what do the poor schlubs who never learned basic math do if they're up late at night?

For those of you playing the drinking game...

MAVERICK!

This post really has nothing to do with politics, I just watched the SNL VP debate sketch this morning, and that one line cracked me up hard-core. I determined this morning I have a really hard time telling Palin and Tina Fey apart. But this election just seems to be ridiculous now. Not that it wasn't before now, but I'm just sort of done caring. I know who I'm voting for, and short of a kiddie porn scandal in the next two weeks I'm not going to change my mind. I just wish my bigoted mother would stop trying to convince me that McCain-Palin is the way to go. Maybe if she had ever done something with her life she would realize how ridiculous it is.

Meanwhile the economy is falling apart around us. And we're bringing the rest of the world with us! Ha! Take that, suckers! Don't support us in our unwarranted invasion of another country, we'll suicide bomb your economy. Seriously though, I hope everyone is studying their Chinese, Russian, and Arabic, because with increasing frequency I think that they're going to take over the world. I hope our historic tendencies continue and we elect the right person at the right time to get us out of this disaster. I haven't given up all hope yet, but I am beginning to seriously consider moving back to Japan to avoid America imploding. Or England, but shit isn't much cheaper there.

I have actually been wanting to move to England lately. Brian seems to be having so many new experiences there with so many interesting people, and I'm just not. I'm sure it's a 'grass-is-always-greener' situation, but nevertheless, I wish I could travel a bit more. I need to make a decision about where my life is headed. I've decided I want to focus more on international business than engineering, i think. Fucking Bruce Long ruined engineering for me. I remember when I used to look forward to Micro-controllers. Now I just think "oh god, i'll be stuck in a lab all day". But I want a PhD so i can go back to teaching. Who knows what I'll actually wind up doing. Maybe someone will discover my amazing acting abilities and pay me money to do that. That would be sweet.

This weekend I didn't do a damned thing, and it makes me so happy. I just sat and played Final Fantasy XI and caught up on TV. Well, sort of caught up, but I'm now up-to-date on Terminator! And House, and Grey's, and other stuff. Not Gossip Girl or Mad Men though. Saturday I got a haircut, manicure, and pedicure. It was one of the gayest things I've done in a long time. But it was a men's salon! With beer and action movies. So it kind of balances out. Except I don't think I like manicures because my hands are now kind of sensitive. I also worked out, and my abs are still sore, but it's a good kind of sore. Hopefully I can get back into the swing of working out regularly and lose some of the weight I feel like I've been gaining.

Tonight is Heroes and Chuck and How I Met your Mother and Big Bang Theory and Gossip Girl and Sarah Connor Chronicles. Fucking Mondays. It's only a matter of time until the ratings for one of those shows really dies (I know it's already Terminator, but still), and then I will be sad. I'm off to fake-work for a bit longer.

This weekend I did not do a damned thing

So not working

I watched lots of TV, but this blog should be more about just what I watched. I've enjoyed all the premieres I've seen so far, though. Brothers and Sisters is getting a little tedious, but not horrible yet. I like Scotty and Kevin at least.

Perhaps the biggest news of the week is Brian leaving. He left America again last night for Oxford, and arrived at like 4:30 AM our time. I'm such a big mix of feelings. Of course I miss him, and the long distance thing is tiring. Worth it because I love him, but tiring (It would be funny if someone from work read this as I'm not out there). At the same time though, it feels different than Japan cause England is only a 6 hour plane ride and a 5 hour time difference from us, so it's not so far. And I'm so busy and so tired lately that it hasn't really sunk in that he's gone for a bit. He'll be back around Christmas, which is good. And I think Oxford is good for him. The academics and the diversity and the pub crawls will be great fun. On some levels I'm actually jealous that I don't get to do any of that stuff, but then I think of all the stress required to move to another country and I get a little overwhelmed. I just need things to stop for a bit, I reckon.

In other news, I posted an ad on Craigslist looking for friends. It makes me kind of embarrassed for myself, but I'll wait to see how it turns out. I need a bigger social circle so that I don't keep bothering Michelle or Dan. After this play, I should get involved in something with more people my age I reckon.

Being 25 is very surreal for me. It's not that I mind getting old, because I accept that it's a part of life. More that I watch all these people around me who seem to have some sort of direction. Everyone's in Graduate school or they've been working at jobs they at least appear to enjoy, and I'm neither of those. I think this bout of melancholy is probably due in large part to the four hours of sleep I got last night. I love this play and I love Brian, but the combination was killing me. I'm so looking forward to doing nothing this weekend but locking myself in my room and playing ffxi while catching up on TV. Of course after that I'll feel guilty. Thanks Dad!

Ok. I should go back to faking it at work.

You're amazing you're amazing you're amazing you're overthinking.

Last night I actually watched live TV for the first time in months (not counting the emmys), and on the menu were America's Next Top Model and Project Runway. Sadly, I missed Bush's speech. I'm sure it was filled with lots of rousing messages about how the economy isn't falling apart around us. He's good at that.

Anyway, Model time. I really, really, really like this season. It's been so long since I've liked so many girls, and not hated any of them. Clark is a little bitchy, but nowhere NEAR as offensive as girls in shows past. I'm pulling for Mckey (although not nearly as much as Brian, with his "I LOVE MCKEY" comments every 5 minutes), Marjorie, Sheena, and I was pulling for Isis until she let her penis get in the way. But I will get to that later. For the runway show, that shit was crazy. That fashion was horrible, horrible. Most of them did really well, but Samantha's walk was almost a joke how bad it was. I thought it was a little anti-climatic to send Hannah home, but at the same time I didn't care because I never really liked her all that much anyway. And she wasn't doing a very good job. So bye bye hannah. Now the photo-shoot was really cool, with the water and the eyes. Sheena's was great, and so was the one with the arms (lauren brie? i dont' know. bitch was blonde). Marjorie was pretty good too. And I didn't hate Clark's. There wasn't a bad picture in the bunch, there were just less-good pictures. I did want Isis to go further than she did, but her eyes were not good. She let her penis get into her head. I'm sure I would too, but by the same token I feel like it's easier to photoshop out a strange bump (how big can it be after all of those hormones, anyway?) than to photoshop in a good body or good eyes. Especially in this show when you couldn't even see under the water. Like, did someone not explain it to her? But we knew she wasn't going to make it to the end, so c'est la vie. After her snip snip, she'll be amazing I think. Maybe they'll invite her back?

And to reference the title of this post: Elina. They do this every. fucking. season. They love a girl up one wall and down the other telling us how amazing and fantastic and banoodles the bitch is, and then in the span of a week "You're overthinking. you're not giving us anything new". I swear the secret to this show is to phone it in for the first 4 weeks so then when you do a good job later they're all excited. Cause if you come out of the gate doing the best by far, you basically screw yourself over. I should so be a Top Model coach. I know shit about fashion, but I know how to win this competition. Claim to be abused, do mediocre through the first half, dress properly at panel, and don't walk like a fat hunchbacked linebacker *cough* Samantha *cough*.

For runway, let me just say how the hell did we get to 5 designers? The episode started and I was watching them going "ehh? wtf? when did this happen?" And this season BLOWS for the models. I think calling this a competition for the models is ridiculous anyway, but after a double elimination, then the college girls-as-models, and now this week with the designers-as-models, they're not even in the second half of the show. Sucks to be them. Now let me say, I love the "design for the designers" challenges. it's interesting to see what they do for each other, and I think the menswear challenges are good too. The music twist I was not feeling, however. That made it bitchy. Although Kenley's interpretation of "Hip Hop" was just not there. Kenley's ass should have gone home. I know that she was probably a victim of editing (and in hindsight I think Daniel was too. They picked every shot where he looked dour), but you can't edit in an argument if there wasn't one, you can just make it look bitchier. And her outfit was RIDICULOUS. And she blamed it on Leanne several times. LEANNE IS NOT YOUR PROBLEM. Matt wasn't sorry to see suede go home, because Matt has never liked Suede. Or his third-person self-references. I hope we get someone next season that uses the royal we all the time. Next week's episode looks like a hot-mess, though. SO MANY TEARS. I use capital letters a lot. But only when I yell at the tv.

In other news i have no freaking free-time ever. I have to somehow find time to buy Yukiko and Ryoko a costume for halloween and mail it to them by the 18th. No idea when that's going to get done without me paying like $100 for shipping, so that's one more charge to look forward too. And I haven't played nearly enough FFXI. Im actually slightly relieved that my laptop won't play Warhammer Online because it gives me an excuse to not play it right away. I will play it later, no worries, it's just right now I'm far, far too busy. I have a secret hope that I can convince Jared and Brian to play FFXI so that I can pay for the gold world pass and get the cute hat and other assorted bonuses. Anywhoo I'm at work and not working, so I'll get back on that.

Monday Night Premieres

Last night after practice I watched Heroes, HIMYM, and Big Bang Theory. I can't believe fall tv is starting up when I am still so very, very far behind on summer TV (I have not watched a bit of Mad Men season 2 and it distresses me to no end). Anywhoo, rather than catch up on Gossip Girl, Greek, Stargate, Sarah Connor, or any of the other several hours of TV I have on my computer, I decided to watch the new stuff. And spoiler-alerts even though as far as I'm concerned if something has already aired they aren't necessary.

Heroes: Not a bad opening, although I could live a lifetime without Claire's shit. I mean, I'm sure it would be very traumatizing if someone performed brain surgery on me while i was conscious. But all in all she just overdid it a bit. And Peter's emo-ness was over the top as well. Hiro's trip to the future I'm pretty sure was a huge misunderstanding about Ando, and it's Hiro that is being bad and/or stupid. But I still like him. Ando's little "YOU LET HER CUT ME?!?" outburst was fucking strange. Sylar was awesome with all of his powers. Momma Petrelli was awesome as well, although "Sylar, I am your mother" comment I could do without. Same with Surresh going all Spiderman. Why did Nikki's power change? I'm intrigued to watch the rest of the season, despite all these other previously listed misgivings. And PS- DON'T FUCK WITH TIME. Nothing good comes of that.

HIMYM: Not really their best ever episode, but enjoyable. I like Stella a lot as Ted's girlfriend. Barney loving Robin is cute, but I'm not going to handle him fawning over her for the rest of the season. I almost hope it's something NPH is subtle enough to pull off without slamming us with. i.e. he drops the awkward laughter and every once in awhile we just catch a look or something from him. Marshall was a non-entity in this episode really, and I'm ok with that. It just left me feeling neutral, but that's better than feeling bad.

Big Bang Theory: The whole Penny-whatshisface dating thing isn't for me. It was cute how she was insecure, but I'd really prefer they didn't date forever, so much as realize it wasn't going to work and move on to other things. that's the only way these things can be resolved and not fuck over the series. Sheldon was funny, but I kind of felt nothing new came from this episode. They were sort of spinning the same wheels from last season. And I enjoyed last season, I'm just not sure how long I'll continue to enjoy the same notes.

In other news, Samurai Girl = Suckness. Above and beyond the fact that they completely mashed up all of their asian cultures, the acting was crap and the storyline was random as hell. I got through about half an hour and was so offended I just had to turn that shit off. Michelle was very right that one should avoid shows with Real World cast-offs.

Clay Aiken

Ok, I don't really give a shit that he came out of the closet or not, but I suppose "yay visibility" but I was reading this post on Dlisted about some of the 'Claymates' reactions and they are classic:

"This is a gut wrenching day for The ClayNation. Somebody wake me up, I hope its a dream."

"please tell me I'm not the only one who is shocked beyond belief! I feel numb I'm so upset. This can't be real!! How can you guys say this won't change anything? This changes EVERYTHING. I don't even know what to think right now"

"I wish him well and hope he gets some peace of mind now BUT I feel he lied to everyone-especially us fans. He should have just said so years ago. I feel like we were "used". I still love to hear him sing but I also feel he has now become like a Michael Jackson and it's a bit too weird! He isn't just the plain ordinary person with the values he first stood for.-but it's just my opinion."

"One really sad thing for me that sums this up. THis morning at the breakfast table my 9 and 10 year olds were there and the radio was on and they came on with the headline "FOrmer American Idol..." and I knew what was coming and I ran to turn it off. I didn't want my young children to hear that and ask questions about it. To me this is the saddest thing and the reason I won't be able to hold him as my idol. I remember the day when I ran to turn it on and called all the family to watch with pride. It just seems so in your face now and I don't want exposing my kids to this. "

"I just feel rather silly now having spent the last 5 years drooling over and being fan girly for a singer I thought was straight and now finding out he is gay. It does change my perception of who he is and how I see him. We always called him our boyfriend and that won't be happening anymore."

Seriously? I mean like, really? I wish I had the powers of self-deception of some of these bitches.

Orson Scott Card

I used to really like his books.

Seriously, I loved the Ender series, especially Children of the Mind. And I was really excited for the film version. Too bad he's a big old scoop of bigot with whip cream and an anti-establishment cherry on top.