5-31-05 (23:01)
updated movies list.
saw star wars with melanie tonight. what a piece of crap.
meryl is in the bay area tonight. i miss her. i think she's good for me.
we're either complete opposites or exactly alike. it's kinda cool.
on occasion i'll get just the right perspective on life - i'll realize
that nothing really matters in the long run, but that the good stuff is
fun in the meantime. that perspective generally lasts for under 30 seconds,
but during that time anything bad that's happening is viewed with an ultra-long
view and anything that's good is infinitely good and all encompassing.
it's an almost surreal feeling. too bad those moments never last more than
30 seconds.
black bush is the best chappelle skit i've ever seen. mos def is in another
one of my favorites - the racial draft. mos def is pretty cool all-around.
added two new sections (actors
& worst of) to
the best of movies page. that page is always under construction.
after work i went to woodstock's and watched the first half of the pistons
game. they looked pretty strong tonight. they have so many guys who are
really committed to defense and i respect that. lindsay hunter is a quick
little fucker defensively, we could use a guy like that on the kings. oh
yeah, we had one and we traded him. i forgot. you know what amazes me though?
shaq has lowered the bar so far that his 8/12 performance from the charity
stripe on sunday garnered high praise. 67% that's not good. sure it's better
than his season average, but it's not good in the absolute sense. you know
what else is not good? five rebounds in 25 minutes. eddie jones got twice
that many. shaq fucking sucks these days, there's just no way around it.
he has good games, but he's not a good player anymore. when you're the
biggest (height and weight-wise) guy on the court and you're the fifth
leading rebounder (and seventh leading scorer) in the game then you suck;
it's just that simple. it's not that he's playing outside - ben wallace
doesn't have an outside shot and neither does shaq - so there just isn't
any excuse. you know who is a good center? ben wallace. he's a beast. or
how about alonzo mourning? he's a fucking g. a kidney transplant couldn't
stop that guy from getting four more blocks than shaq in nine fewer minutes.
fuck fucking shaq's lame ass. you know why detroit is going to win this
series? because they don't respect shaq enough to double team him the way
every other team does. that's how they won last year and that's how they'll
beat him this year. fuck fucking shaq. spurs and pistons, baby. defense
wins championships. stick that in your pipe and smoke it.
there are two cars on my block with the same first four characters in their
license plate. i've never seen that before. both start with 5FTJ. one is
5FTJ5.. and one is 5FTJ8.. i can't remember the final two digits, but i
know that they're different cars. wacky.
5-30-05 (21:41)
"Tom Cruise has declared a public war on psychiatrists because he fears
the "pseudo-science" has led to a drug-fuelled crisis for today's children.
The movie hunk was diagnosed as dyslexic when he was just seven, and doctors
suggested he should take drugs to control his learning problems. Memories
of that part of his childhood fueled Cruise to seek alternative ways of
overcoming his dyslexia - a problem that led him to the Church of Scientology's
educational programs. Becoming a scientologist in 1984 made the actor look
closely at the controversial religion's anti-psychiatry stance, and he
has since become a firm believer that the science and the medicating of
children is wrong. Speaking exclusively to US news show Access Hollywood
as part of a week-long special about his scientology beliefs, the movie
hunk declares, "I'm going right after psychiatry and these false labels
and this pseudo-science. I was diagnosed as dyslexic; I had a lot of energy
as a child. They wanted to put me on drugs... Never did; my mother said
no, absolutely not, no way and I'm thankful. Had I been put on those drugs,
I never would be here today... I never would have had the career that I'm
having. Am I making people aware of it by discussing it openly and saying
what a fraud psychiatry is? You bet I am. I feel a responsibility because
I care..." The actor also maintains that poor results in education in America
can be blamed on mind-altering drugs that are given to children. He adds,
"SAT (exam) scores have gone right down the toilet. The parents are blaming
the teachers, the teachers are blaming the parents and the psychs are putting
everyone on drugs.""
watched some golf yesterday. pate choked big time. he made the right decision
to lay up, but then he three-putted from about 20 feet away. what a loser.
reid seems like a great guy so i guess the better man won.
played some basketball today with john. that was a fun time. we normally
just shoot around, but today a guy and girl came up to us and asked if
we wanted to play. so we played some two on two. john and i are in awful
shape, but we won because we played better as a team and had more height.
the guy was a cornerback at davis (i'm pretty sure) and the girl was pretty
athletic so it was an even match in that respect. i actually wanted to
learn more about the guy because he seemed pretty cool. he just graduated
from davis and is going back to school to get a teaching credential so
he seemed alright in my book.
went to john's the other night with meryl. his girlfriend was having some
friends from her program over and he invited me. i was thinking about not
going because i don't generally enjoy social engagements like that...i
prefer it when i know everyone. but we went and had a pretty good time.
i think it was good for john, too, because it meant his girlfriend's friends
couldn't just talk about agricultural econonmics all night long.
it was the first time meryl and i went out to any social engagement together.
i think it was good.
i haven't been watching as many movies, or updating the wepage as often,
as i'd like. clearly it's because my time is spent either hanging out with
meryl or being at work.
5-28-05 (19:03)
saw a shirt today that said "YRUU" i think it's a great question, one that
everyone should ask themselves from time to time.
eddie albert died the other day, he was pretty great.
got a jury summons the other day and just realized that i was supposed
to go in on the 25th. oops. i hope i don't go to jail for this.
5-27-05 (18:29)
updated movies list.
deepspace 5 have an album called "unique, just like everyone else." i once
wrote a short story called "different like everyone else."
5-26-05 (21:07)
wyclef jean has been a disappointment for me. after his first two solo
records i called him one of the best contemporary producers in mainstream
hip-hop, since then he's fallen off big time. that said, when i revisit
his early work i stand by my statement. stuff like gone til november and
street jeopardy show his moments of genius and his impact on modern beats.
stripped down, electronic/keyboard type beats that you hear from eminem,
50 cent, dr. dre. outkast are probably the best producers in mainstream
hip-hop right now.
5-24-05 (21:23)
forgot to mention my track record for concerts. a list of the concerts
i've paid for: hella, rage against the machine, blackalicious, beastie
boys and autechre. not sure if i paid for baaba maal or if that was melanie.
my point is that all the concerts i've paid for have either been great
shows or among my favorite current artists. i'm pretty happy about that.
also forgot to mention that i have high hopes for the usa olympic/world
championship basketball teams. jerry colangelo is going to be in charge
and they've given him complete control. after hearing his philosophy on
how the team should be assembled i think we're going to have a return to
international greatness.
also meant to remark on the spurs/suns game. it was a pretty fun game to
watch, but i felt that it would be unlikely to see the spurs win another
game if it got over the 105 point mark. tonight i was proven incorrect.
they took two on the road and look poised to go into the championship.
chris rock mentioned that steve nash was great, but that his old team actually
got better (record-wise) after his departure, while shaq's got significantly
worse. a good point, however it overlooks the fact that the lakers lost
three other hall-of-famers (payton, malone and jackson) at the end
of last year. while dallas lost nash (14.5 ppg, 3 rpg, 8.8 apg, and 1 spg)
they also gained jerry stackhouse (15 ppg, 3.5 rpg, and 4 apg), jason terry
(17 ppg, 4 rpg, 5.4 apg, and 1.5 spg) and keith van horn (10 ppg and 5
rpg). so, chris rock should stick to comedy which he does fairly well.
updated movies list.
5-23-05 (19:41)
melanie seems like such a different person now. i know that if i hung out
with her she'd more or less be the melanie i know, but it seems that there's
so much more going on with her that i don't know about. stuff that she
may have kept under wraps when she was with me, or stuff that the breakup
let out. after the breakup we were actually very close to each other and
it was sort of similar to how things were when we were first getting together.
everything was intense and it made me feel like the relationship we had
was real and it sort of validated the last four years...not that it needed
to be validated, but it was reassuring to know that even when things were
over we still cared about each other.
now, though, it seems like that's gone. we've been so out of touch with
each other and it seems, from my perspective anyway, that she's transformed
so much that we've grown apart very quickly. it's amazing what people are
capable of and how quickly we can adapt. it sort of makes you question
the nature and resilience of all relationships. the whole thing is rather
discouraging. feeling like you're replaceable is one of the worst feelings
a person can have. the truth is that i am replaceable in most ways. you
can never replace memories, but a person can always find someone else to
have fun with.
i wonder why i care how i will be remembered. ultimately it doesn't really
matter, but i still care about it as if my universal image is being distorted
or something retarded like that.
phil used to be my best friend in the world and i thought that we'd never
lose touch. somehow, though, we grew apart and became different people
and stopped talking with each other. i knew the guy like 10 years and then
we just couldn't relate anymore. i've always felt shitty about it, as if
i did something wrong. i know that to a certain extent i did, but that
the larger problem is that we just grew in different directions. when i
was first with melanie i was sure that we'd be together forever. i wouldn't
really admit it aloud, but i wanted to be with her forever and actually
felt like it could happen. but within five years we've gotten to the point
where i'm starting to wonder if i'll know her in a year. you start to wonder
if it's a personal failure or if that's just the way life is or what.
it's such a sad thing that people move and lose touch with friends. the
non-family person i've kept in touch with for the longest is probably james
chai, who i've known since 10th grade or so. but even with him i haven't
really kept in touch on a really regular basis. i'm pretty sure that if
i lived still in la that i'd hang with him, but because of geography, we
almost never see each other. the same is true for jon, johnny and vern
who i've known for about 8 years now. i consider them all friends, but
i've spent more time with meryl in the last month than those guys in the
last year. i guess if i had my priorities straight i'd move to berkeley
and live with johnny and i'd be able to visit jon and vern more regularly.
but inertia, liking davis more than the berkeley, and the security of knowing
i have a livable salary keeps me here. of course i also regret not being
able to be around my mom, dad, sister and grandparents. i don't really
like la, but if i lived there it would be nice to drop in every other week
or so to watch a film with my grandpa. i don't know where in my life personal
relationships became so important, but they're definitely more important
than they used to be. maybe because i realize that they're the only thing
in life that matters and which i have an active role in creating. it's
fun to be able to deconstruct and reduce, but it's more fulfilling to create.
perhaps i'm too good at finding contentness in life; and too willing to
be fine with that.
5-22-05 (12:55)
updated movies list.
autechre show was pretty much what i expected. they didn't go on until
12:30 so we had dinner and walked around the city a bit beforehand. they
were done by 2am and i got home at about 4:30 because there was a major
delay getting on the bridge.
i feel very lazy right now.
5-19-05 (19:06)
life has been unusually busy lately.
have an autechre concert to attend tomorrow. it's in SF and it's going
from 9p-3a so i'm going to be screwed come saturday morning when i have
to open the store at 9am. oh well. they only come around once every few
years so i have to go.
detroit/indiana game is on right now. the playoffs always screw with my
movie watching schedule. i hope the pacers win.
went to berkeley/albany with meryl on tuesday night and most of wednesday.
went to johnny's, shopped around telegraph and visited her family.
updated movies i own list.
updated cds i own list.
updated recommendations.
cinderella man looks like a piece of crap film.
chris miller is on jeopardy again. go chris.
updated my movie site a bit.
i think it's pretty locked in at this point.
5-16-05 (21:12)
"A bipartisan coalition of 132 U.S. mayors -- led by Seattle Mayor Greg
Nickels (D), and recently joined by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg
(R) -- has issued a high-profile rebuke of Bush administration inaction
on climate change. The leaders have committed to reducing their municipalities'
greenhouse-gas emissions to 7 percent below 1990 levels by 2012, in line
with Kyoto treaty targets. While the Bush team says Kyoto would devastate
the economy, many mayors are signing on precisely for economic reasons.
Nickels was jarred by a series of dry winters, threatening Seattle's drinking
water and hydropower sources. The mayor of Bellevue, Neb., is worried about
the effects of droughts on farms. The mayor of New Orleans is concerned
about the effects of rising sea levels on, uh, "the very existence of New
Orleans" (economic enough for ya?). And so on. Says Republican Alan Arakawa,
mayor of Maui County, Hawaii, "I'm hoping it sends a message [Bush administration
officials] really need to start looking at what's really happening in the
real world.""
worked today instead of taking the day off. will work tomorrow and then
have wednesday off. will work thursday, friday and saturday and then see
what happens after that. i wanted to try splitting up my off days for a
couple weeks so that i could spend time with meryl on wednesdays and see
how that works out.
melanie and i haven't seen each other in quite some time. that situation
is pretty lame right now.
having intermittent problems with e-mail. fucking mercury in retrograde.
my movie watching habits have been downright pathetic lately.
fixed a minor problem in my all movies sorted alphabetically tab, which
found on the movies listed page.
5-15-05 (09:26)
had to get a new isp and i'm having trouble sending email to certain accounts.
fucking obnoxious.
jon - autechre is coming to the mezzanine in SF, friday 5/20, $18. one
of only two shows in california. wanna go?
5-14-05 (18:39)
updated movies list.
so hot in my place that i don't feel like writing reviews or anything.
going to watch hitchhiker's guide tonight.
5-13-05 (18:15)
in a lot of ways i have the worst self-confidence of all the people i know,
but in other ways my self-confidence is rather strong. i've pretty much
always refused to compromise my values for others and i've settled very
infrequently. it's odd that i can think i'm bad at all sorts of things
and that i'm not worthy of affection, but i can stand up for myself, and
my values, when it comes to peer pressure and such. when it comes to my
career, i think i've definitely settled and rationalized that decision,
but i'm pretty okay with it.
this sucks.
i always thought chappelle to be a very stable, sane person.
"Yokohama, Japan, a city of 3.5 million, recently sent its citizens a 27-page
instruction book on how to sort trash for recycling into 10 different categories,
detailing how to dispose of more than 500 separate items, from used lipstick
tubes to old socks. The city aims to slash the amount of waste being sent
to incinerators by 30 percent by 2010. Kamikatsu, a small town of 2,200
residents, has set its goal even higher -- no garbage thrown out at all
by 2020. To achieve this lofty aim, the town requires citizens to sort
their waste into a growing number of recycling categories -- now standing
at 44. Of course, some residents grumble that the sorting is too complicated
for mere mortals, but despite complaints, in the last four years, Kamikatsu's
recycling rate has hovered around 80 percent. Intense social pressure helps,
with volunteer garbage guardians across Japan inspecting their neighbors'
sorting efforts and pestering laggards to get with the program."
5-10-05 (19:42)
i don't like drugs, but i do wish that aerosmith still did them because
they were much better when they were high. oh well.
well, hoop dreams came out on dvd today. that means i'm almost a complete
person. that documentary is so boss.
bought some great films today. updated movies i own list.
apparently the new weezer album sucks chode.
updated movies list.
5-9-05 (19:53)
updated movies list.
just got an email from melanie that said she doesn't want to hang out with
me for a while. i generally construct my life to avoid drama, but this
time in my life seems to be the exception to that.
melanie had a drunken rant on her webpage where she told me to fuck off
and go to hell. the whole thing is so contrary to the majority of my life.
it sounded like she genuinely hated me for moving on and for holding her
to a high standard (with regard to drinking and drugs) while i was with
her. i know that it's mostly the alcohol and grief speaking, but it still
hurts. i guess i can only wait to see how things will settle. my overriding
feeling right now about the whole thing is worry because i don't want her
to do anything that will hurt her in the long run.
i'd definitely consider myself more of a democrat than a republican, but
i think that people should be held to high standards, rather than simply
forgiving them for all their transgressions and screw-ups. forgiveness
is certainly important and more powerful than vengeance, but i think that
too often it is the response of liberals to forgive without expressing
disappointment and the expectation of better behavior. with everything,
though, it's about balance and flexibility.
i always felt that melanie needed to have high expectations with a foundation
of love and understanding and i always tried to convey that to her, but
i apparently failed.
i also failed to relay my feelings about her here. not that that changed
the outcome of us, but i suppose it was a mistake.
i met meryl's mom, stepdad and brother on saturday. i was extremely nervous
beforehand, but at ease once we sat down to eat.
blackalicious are great.
i was thinking about marriage the other day and that one reason i don't
like the idea of it is that it seeks permanence in an impermanent, ever-changing,
chaotic world. in that sense nietzsche might call it life-denying. i think,
though, that that's the most romantic part of it for many people. then
again, marriage doesn't mean much these days anyway.
www.millersmovies.com
the nba playoffs are shaping up to be quite boring.
didn't do shit today.
5-8-05 (12:03)
i don't think seattle has a chance against the spurs. defense wins championships
and the spurs have very good defense and more experience.
i never once considered shaq an mvp candidate. he's good and he's made
a difference, but wade is more important to that team. nash was the clear
winner to me so i don't understand the controversy.
george lucas is such a whore and a wannabe spielberg, it's rather pathetic.
watching yoda trying to steal some guy's diet pepsi was the low point of
my day yesterday. i'm just waiting for the end of "revenge of the sith"
when yoda kicks some ass and then opens a bag of reese's pieces (ala E.T)
to celebrate.
alonzo mourning is a good guy and all, but i hope he realizes that he was
able to survive his kidney problems more because of the great healthcare
he received as a millionaire, than because god wanted him to live longer.
having the day off is pretty nice. actually i have to work an hour today
because someone called in sick, but i'm really enjoying time to just sit
around and watch basketball and eat a leisurely meal.
5-6-05 (18:19)
"The Bush administration yesterday gave the heave-ho to the sweeping Clinton
administration roadless rule, which put some 58.5 million acres of national
forests off-limits to development. In its place, a new rule will put 34.3
million acres of that land back into play, at the discretion of governors,
who will have 18 months to petition the feds either to open national-forest
land in their states to development or keep it protected. Agriculture Undersecretary
Mark Rey claimed that "the way [the Clinton rule] was done developed a
substantial amount of ill will." As more than 90 percent of the public
comments on the Clinton rule were positive, while more than 95 percent
(nearly 1.8 million) on the Bush rule were negative, said "ill will" likely
came primarily from the oil, gas, logging, mining, and road-building industries.
Said a spokesflack for the Independent Petroleum Association of America,
"We have to find ways and work with local communities to evaluate these
lands and see if they are best for oil and gas activities, recreation,
whatever." Whatever, please."
updated movies list.
5-5-05 (19:48)
updated movies list.
watched one of the worst films of all-time last night. god it was awful.
got my tax return the other day and made a big payment to my credit card.
i have a good amount of debt to go, but it's all 0% apr so i'm in pretty
good shape right now.
5-4-05 (22:07)
updated movies i own list.
updated movies list.
5-2-05 (18:38)
needless to say i'm very disappointed by the kings' loss yesterday. i'm
not going to count them out because i know better than that, but it's not
likely. the playoffs this year have been boring.
ray allen single-handedly beat us. it should be clear to anyone who follows
the kings that we lost yesterday's game because we didn't have doug christie.
mobley is a good player and very good offensively, but doug christie would
have turned a 45 point day into a 30 point day. it's too bad, too, because
peja had his best effort of the series wasted. that said, he didn't score
any points in the fourth quarter. we need to trade him.
it's pretty warm right now.
worked on getting a search tool for the webpage today, but it's going very
slowly. i found one that's good, but it takes all sorts of configuring
and i don't know anything about perl so i'm having trouble working everything
out.
guess i'll go watch another movie or two.
5-1-05 (11:50)
i think allen iverson is great. whatever you may say about his personality
i think he's a great player and a real warrior on the court. he plays every
minute, makes his teammates better and has an amazing amount of talent
for his (or any) size.
i've had a lot going on lately. today will be a good day to clear my mind.
watch some basketball and just hang out. going to the kings game tonight.
it's pretty nice to be able to go to so many kings games. i wish i had
espn right now so i could watch webber.
cut my hair today.
13:17
as soon as i saw that the game went into ot i biked over to woodstock's
to catch the ot period. needless to say i was very disappointed by the
result.
i wonder if shaq has ever gone an entire half without scoring.
bill walton is just a shaq apologist. i wish they'd just fuck each other
already.
i have 60 days of music now.
updated movies i own list.
updated cd list.
updated movies
list.