slipwind
life sliding through the air
The 4th
Jul 5th
I’m sure there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for not writing anything here in forever and two point five days, but I can’t quite figure out what it is. Probably just lack of inspiration. So this begs the question, how do I become inspired? I’m open to suggestions here people (or person, depending on how many people read this).
So this past weekend was the much needed 4th of July holiday. The Cutshall’s once again were gracious enough to have me up for the weekend. It was a really busy weekend. People coming in and out and through continuously. It was crazy. And a lot of fun. Jason and I went skiing pretty much every morning, which was a pretty good way to wake up I must say. I also spent a lot of time fiddling the Bob’s sailboat, which was prolly annoying to everyone else… but oh well. The fireworks were good, the food was great and the people were really fun. It was a good time, and I am very grateful.
I’m guessing it’s not too interesting reading about my relaxing weekend at the cabin… I’m guessing this because I’m boring myself. Going back to my first paragraph, I really need some inspiration. Inspiration usually comes from various forms of drama in my life… which has been incredibly lacking of late, but recently picked up a notch… nothing to say here yet though.
Oh yeah, I got a crock-pot for my Birthday. It rocks (in theory). Just thought you all should know.
Don’t Look So Mean
Jun 5th
I was walking home from Chino’s last night in Uptown, minding my own business, making my way down the street to my car. A woman was getting out of a car in front of me; I glanced at her, then back down the street where I was heading.
“Don’t look so mean!”
Huh? What’d she say? Was she talking to me??? She was, and it takes me less than a split second to realise how absolutely true her statement was, so I immediately turn back, put on my best grin and tell her I’ll try not to.
Ten feet later if another person had gotten out of a car and glanced at me… well, they prolly wouldn’t of said anything because that’s just weird and most people don’t do that; but if that same woman had somehow driven around the block, forgotten she had seen me and gotten out of a car in front of me again… well, she prolly would have said the same thing.
How did this happen? It reminded me (oh Lord it was too many years ago) of a Birthday card I received from my coworkers at the Marie Sandvik Center when I was in college. it was either my 20th or 21st and all of my friends/staff made this huge card that said something to the effect that I had a 20 (21?) million dollar smile… Because apparently, I was always just smiling at everybody and everything, no matter what the situation.
I’m trying to figure out how I went from that to “Don’t look so mean” … I guess I don’t intentionally have a I’m going to kick the shit out of the next person I see look on my face. But thinking about it, there’s no way I can really deny it’s there. I’m sure it is. I’m also pretty sure I’m not happy with this… I just don’t know what to do about it.
Aaaaaanyway…
Mem Day
Jun 1st
It occurred to me recently that is has been quite a while since I’ve said anything interesting about my life (this begs the question on whether or not I’ve ever had anything interesting to sat about my life… I’ll leave that question to future historians). In any case I figured I should say something about what is–or -has- I suppose–been going on with me. To sum up: Nada. But be that as it may, I did have a pretty good Memorial Day weekend. Filling the time quite nicely while not actually accomplishing much of anything (old hat I know).
The weekend started off on Friday (as almost all weekends do). For some inexplicable reason I had decided to host a dinner party. For some even more inexplicable reason I decided that I would cook, and I’m not talking about the normal form of cooking, involving removing various amounts of plastic from various sized packages and placing them into either the microwave, oven, or toaster… the last is terribly difficult for me because I don’t actually own a toaster yet. I say -yet- because it is inconceivable to me that I will make it through life without owning a toaster at some point… moving on… so I decided to cook. This meant a few phone calls to my mother and father (both incredibly good culinary experts who decided to pass none of it on to me, genetically or instructionally) inquiring as to how this whole preparing food for other people thing works. My dad gave me a few quick tips, provided a recipe and pretty much said “have at it!” … It was a nice strategy–trail by fire, just do it, you’ll never know unless you try, failure will only help you learn, etc.–but of course I called my mom next. She uses a different strategy: tell you explicitly everything you must do, but after each instruction, also tell you how you don’t have to do it that way but can experiment and try it another way… and she keeps thinking of alternatives, for hours and hours going on and on and on and on (only a few minutes probably)… I tuned in at selected intervals and eventually gleaned enough information to cobble together an idea of how I was to go about it, so then I did (went about it).
Wow… that was a lot of words to describe not much… I gotta stop doing that.
Ingredients, check. Proper cooking instruments, semi-check. Time to start. At first, I cried… chopping onions, that was a first. Minced some garlic, cooked some noodles, seared some meat, prepared a classic roux, mixed it all together, gave it to some friends (Josh and Monie+1, Eric and Amy, and Jason). They approved, meal was successful. Yay me.
That was Friday. Saturday I did something in the morning (no idea what), went over to Adam’s where he had his phat new amp and double stacked cabs and we played some kick-ass loud guitar for a while… well he did.. I played some haven’t-really-played-in-years guitar for a while, and it was less kick-ass and more somebody kick my ass guitar… but it was still fun. Later that night, we went out downtown. I’ll skip the details but needless to say we had a good time. New Zealand girls have pretty sexy accents, but they turn out to be not very nice people(I had different words at the time)… just FYI
Stumbled out of bed around noon on Sunday, was lazy for most of the day until DK called and asked if I wanted to go to The Lion King with him that night. The Lion King? Normally not my thing, but my family had just gone a week or two before and raved about it, and besides it was free… why not. Went to the show. Absolutely-frickin-ridiculously-amazing show. It was pretty sweet. Thanks DK!
Monday. Shopping at the amazing Albertville outlet mall with DK in the afternoon. Fireworks at Harriet Island with the Beresfords, Elise and B that night. It’s sorta becoming a tradition to hit up the fireworks with Grahame, Aubben and the kids on Memorial Day. Lots of fun was had by all and the fireworks were amazing. Seeing Benjamin, Olivia and Amelie reminds me in unexpressable ways of all that is good in life; I love those kids. Hangin’ out with Lil Snu and B was good too.
So that was my weekend… oh yeah, I got a digi a little while back, so I’ll put up some pics at some point soon….
Episode III Review – not exactly mine however
May 25th
This isn’t my review of the movie, but if I wasn’t too lazy or afraid of the inherent geekdom associated with reviewing this movie, I would have written exactly this…
Don’t get me wrong; there were some very definite “Coooool” moments in
Episode III. Mostly in the latter half, where all the pieces finally
come together and you see everything slotting into place so as to be in
position for the beginning of _A New Hope_.However, these cool moments were cool almost in spite of themselves.
They were cool moments purely by association and nostalgia, not because
of any intrinsic quality of coolness in themselves. What I mean by that
is that seeing Anakin become Vader was cool because of the iconic
history associated with it, not because the scenes themselves were done
well, because they weren’t.And oh, please, don’t give me any crap on that score. You KNOW it was,
at the very least, sub-standard filmmaking. I can support my claim of
crapitude on the wretchedness of the dialogue alone. Some of the
stupider plot contrivances aren’t even worth getting into. And I’ll
leave the wrangling over the thorough mauling the laws of physics got
in this film to those far geekier than I’m going to bother being.I’m not sorry I went to see it. And I did enjoy patches of it … -snipped paragraph-
I think, though, that I would have far preferred to enjoy it on its own
merits, which I was only able to do in short bursts, usually derailed
every time I had to wince at a particularly idiotic line of dialogue.
(“Younglings”? From three different characters? Shut UP, George.
Jesus.)I did love the last shot of the film (which totally made me want to go
home and bust out _A New Hope_ immediately), and the music, and some of
the bits with Yoda, but again, all of that was memory of childhood love
and I can’t honestly ascribe it to independent excellence when I was
spending the majority of the time thinking to myself, “You know, this
moment is pretty cool, but just imagine if it had been written and
directed by someone who could, you know, actually write and direct.”Seriously. You could see that with even slightly better dialogue, and
with a director who was even half as interested in his actors as he was
in his electronic toys, it would have been, well, one fucking amazing
movie.But it wasn’t. And there’s no point in imagining how it would have been
if it had been directed by, say, Peter Jackson, because, well, there’s
no point. It wasn’t. And there you are.So I’ve seen it, and wrested, I hope, what enjoyment there was to be
had out of it, and… well, that’s it, I guess. And I really don’t have
anything else to say about it.I feel old.
—Leigh Butler
Those darn judges
May 24th
“Plato argued for government by philosopher-kings, but who could argue for a system of government by lawyer-kings? No one can argue openly that leaving the final decision on issues of basic social policy to majority vote of nine lawyers–unelected and life-tenured, making policy decisions for the nation as a whole from Washington, D.C.–is an improvement on the democratic federalist system created by the Constitution. Yet that is the form of government we now have.”
http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110006730
Europicans? Ameropeans? Democrats.
May 19th
http://www.nationalreview.com/script/printpage.asp?
ref=/goldberg/goldberg200505190810.asp
“The ideas, assumptions and prejudices held by the statistically typical Democratic voter, according to the Pew study, are quite simply, European. Europeans believe in a strong social welfare state, for rich and poor alike. Europeans are cynical. They look askance — these days — on patriotic sentiment (hence the rush to form a new European nation). The church pews of Europe would make a great hideout for bank robbers since they’re always empty. The United Nations is, in the typical European’s worldview, the last best hope for mankind. From the death penalty to gay marriage, the more similar you are to a typical European in your political and social outlook, the more likely you are to be a Democrat.”
Okay, so it’s a pretty broad generalization, but we’ve all thought the same thing! (Yes, all of us, you can’t deny it.) Too bad we still don’t have those spiffy European dance clubs too…
BWCA Should’ve
May 16th
So today I’ve been thinking about a vacation. Aaron, his dad and his sister are on their way to the BWCA (Boundary Waters Canoe Area) for a week long trip right now. I was over at their house last night observing Steve methodically packing the remaining provisions for the trip and scowling furiously about the missing map. (In my experience, there is always a missing map at some point in a BWCA trip, and the beginning is definitely a good time for this). I could have gone on this trip. I was asked, and at the time, analyzed my meager vacation time and decided against it. Right now, I’m thinking this was a very poor decision.
The last four vacations I’ve taken (aside from going to my–or various friends–cabin(s)) all involved visiting foreign countries and endless worrying about schedules and trains and flights and money. They’ve all been really fun too (for the most part). But seeing my friend pack for a camping trip, the kind we used to take when we were in highschool and college, really made me sorry I didn’t go too. It would have been a great chance to relive the “good ol’ days” of the past, and right now, I’m missing those days quite a bit. It would have been a trip free from overly stressful travel, foreign languages, strange people (aside from the Nelson clan in general… of which at times I consider myself a part, and prolly the strangest of all), and free from the worries of how much money I have left at every given moment. That’s the best thing about a canoe trip. It’s all paid for up-front. Aside from gas to get there, and money for dinner on the way home, you know what it’s costing you, and I’ve never found the price too high.
Plus, you can’t put a price on spending some quality time with your oldest friend, fishing, playing cribbage or poker, joking around, seeing Steve Nelson blow his top over some little thing at one moment and then forget all about it the next… and having the only thing to worry about be rain, mosquitos and trying to avoid the wrath of an inexplicably hostile sister… ahh, it would have been just grand.
But nope, ever the idiot that I am, I chose to be sitting in front of a cube worrying about things I could care less about.
Yay me.
Now That’s Just Funny
May 5th
LOL… from a review of Kingdom of Heaven
“As a war hero, Orlando Bloom reminds me of the nickname Truman Capote’s father gave him: Little Miss Mouse Fart.”
– Tim Appelo, SEATTLE WEEKLY
Home Again
Apr 28th
Well, I’m home again. It’s been a week since I’ve been here (upstairs, in front of my computer, typing away for all–most likely just some–to read). I’m finding that at the moment, I’d rather be sitting in front of my couch working on an important project of mine… it’s called “doing nothing” I’ve been working on it for a while now, but I don’t quite have it perfected yet. Therefore I think it would be most prudent of me to spend a little more time at it… right now. I’ll write more about the long week I just had a bit later… once I’ve made some significant progress on my project that is…
How I unexpectedly met a neighbor
Apr 13th
So last Friday night was a good night. Jason Hedrix and I managed to get some last-minute tickets to the Twins home opener (which unfortunately, we lost). And then went to what turned out to be a pretty fun party (Marcus and Julie’s not really St. Patrick’s Day anymore party).
As we were leaving downtown, Chad called me and tried his best to encourage us not to come to the party because there weren’t all that many people there and he was heading downtown. I assumed (correctly as it turned out) that this meant there wasn’t anyone left at the party for him to hit on/flirt with. Gotta love Chad. We made it to the party, hung out for a while, had a couple drinks, played some Dance Dance Revolution and were almost ready to go… but it was only around 11:30. People were starting to trickle out around this time and our lovely hostess (Julie) seemed to think this made her party look bad, or old or something like that… which it wasn’t. But in any case, she decided it would be a good idea to start some drinking games to keep people around.
I wasn’t in much of a mood for drinking games, but Julie followed her statement of intent with a statement saying this and that person were up for it. One (or maybe two?) of these people just happened to be pretty attractive women, and so staying a little longer didn’t seem like such a chore anymore.
All in all there were about eight of us who stayed and played some quasi-drinking games for about an hour or two and we all managed to get if not drunk at least pretty tipsy. This led to a number of interesting conversations. I could go on and on recounting what I remember, but I’ll just include a snippet of one conversation that stuck out and let you imagine the rest. This is prolly not completely accurate, but to the best of my knowledge anyway..
Girl: I better be getting back to the Grove
Me: You live in Maple Grove?
Girl: Yeah
Me: So do I! Where do you live?
Girl: Off of 95th
Me: So do I!
Girl: Do you live past the Target?
Me: Yeah!
Girl: Do you live in Centennial Crossing?
Me: Yeah!
Girl: No way, I live on the other side by Open Door!
Me: So do I! What street do you live in, do you know where Comstock Ave is?
Girl: Yeah, I live on Comstock!
Me: How far in?
Girl: About four units.
Me: No way! I live right off 90th! Wait a second! Were you in your driveway washing your car a couple weeks ago wearing really short jean shorts?
FYI – Her house is about half a block away, straight in back/front of mine
Girl: Oh my God yes! Except they weren’t jean shorts, they were short black shorts…
Me: Gotcha, black, yeah, I was coming home from work and I told my friend that I just drove by a really hot girl wearing short shorts washing her car…. you’re my neighbor!
Girl: No way! Awesome.
Me: Yeah, awesome!
Girl: OMG, I usually change with my shades open, do you think the neighbors mind?
Me: Thank you for that piece of information
Julie: She’s dating some dude named after some narcotic (paraphrase)
Girl: I wouldn’t say we’re dating
Julie: Yes you are. ck is the nicest guy ever. ck, isn’t she really hot?
Me: No, Hed is the nicest guy ever, I’m really an asshole, but yes, she’s really hot.
Julie: Yeah, but she’s dating this guy
Girl: I wouldn’t call it dating
Julie: Yeah you are
Me: How many dates have you gone on?
Girl: 12-13
Me: Yeah, you’re dating
Girl: Not really
Julie: Yes you are
This led into a lovely discussion about what the definitions of dating are… as well as other more serious and less serious topics… until about 3:30 when we all headed home (and to let you know, I -do- know the girl’s name–we’re neighbors after all–but out of courtesy I left it off.) It was just a really fun night. It was great to see Marcus and Julie (And Josh Sommer) again and just hang out with random people I’ve never met before (which usually, I don’t like doing)
Anyway, back to work…