Thursday, February 23, 2006

Enzo & Evil

Thank God it was only an Enzo, which is just a butt-ugly car (actually, the back end is probably its best side). I would have been upset if it had been an older classic Ferrari.

You Are 18% Evil

You are good. So good, that you make evil people squirm.
Just remember, you may need to turn to the dark side to get what you want!

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Do your part to protect the seals

And if you care about the plight of the seals (there will be a huge hunt in Canada in March where the seals will be skinned alive just so someone can wear a fur coat), please go here and sign the pledge.

Handsome Devil

There is so much I wanted to write about today.

First off, the Detroit City Council really pissed me off. On Friday they had to vote on whether to transfer running of the Detroit Zoo to the Detroit Zoological Society. There was $4 million at stake. They transfer and the Zoo gets a badly needed $4 million. They don't transfer, they don't get the money and the Zoo closes. I mean, really, how fucking hard is that bloody decision? I'm beyond furious! I am a friggin' member of the Detroit Zoo and my membership expires April 12. I called them yesterday to see what I could do. They thanked me, took down my name and member # and said Yes, bombarding the Detroit City Council with phone calls would be great. I filed a complaint through their website, but I have a feeling it's not going to do me any good.

I'm positive it's a power play issue between the Council and the Mayor. To understand City of Detroit politics is to be insane – for the record. It's all about control and they're willing to destroy one of the top 10 zoos in the country for their fucking egos! I'm so angry I could spit nails. In today's paper, they defended themselves saying they didn't have time to read the proposal and that they were being forced into a decision w/o adequate information. The next paragraph debunks that and says that they had the proposal in front of them since November. I don't know about you, but I think I would have had time to read the damn thing.

I honestly hadn't been worried about the vote which took place on Friday because it was such a no-brainer! How could anybody in their right mind vote AGAINST the zoo!!!??? Do they have any idea how much money major corporations, including Ford and GM, have put into the Zoo just in the past couple of years??? There have been major projects going on as the Zoo works hard to be an educational tool and not just a place to look at animals. They have events and educational programs happening all the time there. The ones who will suffer from this aren't the stupid ass City Council, but the children of metro Detroit. And we just got rhinos!!!!!!!! I'm ready to take Friday off from work (it's supposed to be in the 50s) to go and visit the Zoo before short-sighted dumbasses who care more about power than anything else close one of places I love most in this city.

FUCKERS!

If you live in the Metro area or even if you just care about things like this, please call and pitch a fit! Here's the website for the Detroit City Council. Harass the shit out of them.

Sign this petition if you think the Detroit Zoo shouldn't close. A petition like this helped save Wanda & Winky last year. Let's see if we can do it again!

Oh yeah, I'm going to try to give up swearing for Lent as well. ;-)

Monday, February 20, 2006

Forever Lost

I had to laugh at my friend Dave's comments in my three previous posts. He has offered to help me with my gaydar which I will admit sometimes needs a little help. I remember when my friend Sal started working at the SF consulting firm aka Hell on Earth. I thought he was cute as did my gay teammate. Gay Teammate aka Bane of My Existence (BME) was positive Sal was gay, I had only seen Sal for the briefest of moments, so my gaydar hadn't had time to kick in. He turned out to be my best friend in SF and yes, he is gay, although I wouldn't say he exudes homosexuality out of every pore or anything. In fact, he was not in the least bit fond of the "extreme" homosexual. One guy in our office was Isaac Mizrahi-gay and he just made Sal nuts. Sal is out and very comfortable with himself, but the whole in your face gayness doesn't sit well with him.

I've been gone from SF for almost six years now and although the first few years we would call each other regularly, the time between phone calls is definitely longer. I find the three hour time difference to be an incredible deterrent as he's usually just getting home from work when I'm going to bed. I miss him. When working at Hell on Earth he would get to work around 8:30 and then he'd come and get me and we'd go out to get breakfast from the two nice Korean ladies just down the street. We'd walk in and they'd hand Sal his breakfast sandwich and say to me, "The usual?" And they'd whip up an egg and cheese sandwich on an English muffin. We'd then go back to work and hide out in the serving kitchen and chat about whatever life had presented as a topic that day. It was in February that I had determined that I was completely miserable and wanted to come home. I remember sitting at an All Hands meeting and looking out the window at the Transamerica Pyramid building and thinking "I'm going home." I tried to send the message to Sal telepathically as we ate our overpriced muffin and listened to the presentation which was all about how we were helping other companies do things that would help their employees be happier at work – none of these ideas were ever incorporated at Hell on Earth – which is one of the reasons I call it that. For the record, Sal didn't get my telepathic message, I had to tell him the old-fashioned way – whispering as we walked back to the office amidst our fellow "associates."

Ah, a pet peeve of mine. When did employees become "associates?" Or Target customers become "guests?" Give me a freaking break! I was at Target last week and needed to find out why they still didn't have my contact solution on their shelves, so I waited at Customer (or maybe it says Guest) Service for a dog's year. At one point, the lone customer service representative answered the phone and said, "I'm with a guest right now, may I put you on a hold for a moment?" I turned to the lady behind me and rolled my eyes and said, "Guests?" She rolled her eyes back and agreed. WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THE WORD "customer?" Please someone tell me!!! I'm not a friggin' guest of Target or Sears or even Nordstrom. I'm a bloody customer!

Oh yeah, my contact solution? They've stopped carrying it. I guess that single row on the first bottom shelf was just too important to stock my solution. The funny thing (peculiar funny, not ha ha funny) is that my solution is to used in conjunction with this particular case…they still carry the case which is no good with the solution. Bloody idiots.

I'm in the middle of celebrating Fat Fortnight. Next Tuesday is Fat Tuesday/Shrove Tuesday/Mardi Gras, but I decided that since I'm going to go whole hog and give up everything this Lent that I was going to partake for longer than one silly day! By everything I mean alcoholic beverages, snacks, sweets, and nachos at Cheli's. Sometime before next Wednesday I need to get some Cheetoh's or I'll spend the entire 40 days pining for their dyed orange cheesy goodness. There is beer in my house and chocolate bars. I might need to pick up some ice cream to indulge in before Ash Wednesday.

And going to the gym more than once a week (my present rate of gym-going) is definitely on the docket, too. In fact, I'm going to try for everyday (M-F). My goal last week was to go every day. Yeah, right. I went on Monday and that was it. Pathetic! I've been absolutely pathetic.

And at the end of Lent is Good Friday which usually ends up being the day I go for my annual physical (read: blood test, read: cholesterol test) and I want to kick butt so I can go off the cholesterol medication.

I'm so officially throttled by Netflix it's not even funny. I've watched SIX Netflix movies this month and it hasn't been because I'm slacking!!!! Ah well, thank goodness for my very own Hitchcock collection. Tonight just to piss them off I'm watching both of the movies I have at home right now and mailing them back tomorrow. We'll see how long it takes until that little red envelope shows up in my mailbox.

I had a very good weekend, considering how bloody cold it's been. Friday was the symphony with my cousin and it was as fabulous as we had expected. We went to TJ's for dinner beforehand and back afterwards for dessert. They had this incredibly yummy peanut butter ice cream brownie pie that I had had the week before and needed to have again.

Saturday I slept in and then ventured out into the freezing butt coldness that is February in Detroit. The sky was blue and cloudless and the wind chill was a -14˚F (-25.5˚˚C). Ah, lovely. I drove out to Ann Arbor as I was desperate for a new pair of all Black Chucks. The pair I had bought in downtown Detroit last summer are the only pair of Chucks I've ever had that hurt my feet. I have no idea why that is, but if someone wants a pair of size 5 Chucks (that's men's size, it's a size 7 womens, and I could even tell you the European and Japanese sizes if I wanted to take them off my feet), let me know and I'll put them in the mail. Besides the monochrome black ones (aka work shoes), I bought these orange ones and these charcoal monochromes. I really need a pair to wear when I wear blue, but the charcoal ones will have to do for now. And trust me, I did not pay the amount they're asking! Those are absolutely ridiculous prices!!!

It's now time to go home, put on workout clothes and get my sorry ass to the gym!!! If it put this off any longer I won't go – because I'm a pathetic lame-ass!! ;-) Hope you all had a good weekend!

Friday, February 17, 2006

Lamest Post Ever

Dear Ol' Michigan. At midnight it was 52˚˚F outside (at 9:00 p.m. it 58˚F), at 5:08 when was listening to "Traffic and Weather on the 8s" the temperature was 25˚F with a RealFeel in the 4˚F (-16˚C) thanks to the wind – to me that means windchill, but whatever. Let me summarise for you…it DROPPED FIFTY FREAKING DEGREES in FIVE HOURS!!!! I bundled up like Nanook of the North for my walk in today.

Okay, I guess I better defend myself re: my comment yesterday about not knowing Isaac Mizrahi was gay. I had never actually seen him before. I knew he existed and I believe one of my bathing suits is by him, but I had always pictured a little old Jewish man, not a tall flaming homosexual. It took me about 15 seconds of seeing his show to figure out that he was a tad on the gay side.

Thursday, February 16, 2006

And now I'm leaving...

I wrote this Tuesday night but never got around to typing it up and posting it yesterday. I'm lame, what can I say?

Am I the last person in the world to know that Isaac Mizrahi is gay? I was flipping channels after watching Hotel Rwanda and needing something to cheer my ass up. I had thought about watching Shrek 2 but not even five seconds in I realised that I was not in the mood for that. So, there I am flipping channels and hoping to find something fun on Style. And there is Isaac interviewing John Waters. He's not as big a freak as his movies would make you think – or at least he wasn't being too freaky. They were busily comparing gay bars between New York and Baltimore. It make me long a little bit for San Francisco. I really miss hanging out with gay men.

Has everyone seen Hotel Rwanda? Just so you know, those are two different links. The first one is a synopsis. The second is the Review page from rottentomatoes.com. There's only one green splat on the whole page. Although someone used "mawkish" in their good review and I think its use trivialises the movie and its message.

I was so tired on Tuesday night after watching it because I cried during half the movie. It's hard to watch and know that we did nothing to help those poor people. I'm getting the documentary on the Rwandan genocide from Netflix (thanks for the "throttling," Netflix) sometime this week, I hope, and I'm interested to learn more about it. It broke my heart to know that the Hutus killed babies and children because they were literally trying to wipe out the next generation of Tutsis. I was completely drained after this movie. The little blurb on the Netflix Tyvek envelope called it "Africa's Schindler's List." If you haven't seen it, please rent it. It's worth the half of a box of tissues and the tears to learn about countries we normally pay no attention to. I dragged out the atlas to see exactly where Rwanda is and was surprised to see how incredibly small it is.

As I'm being "throttled" by Netflix I had no movies from them to watch last night, so I put in one of my new Hitchcock DVDs (I ordered a bunch from DVDempire last week). I watched Saboteur which I had seen once. I remembered liking the ending where the title character is hanging off the Statue of Liberty's torch. And then I watched Rope which I bought in my first round of Hitchcock Movie Buying last year sometime. I now have to re-watch Strangers on a Train since I read that at the end when the carousel goes out of control that there was no stunt guy and that the little old man crawling under it would have been killed if he had lifted his head an inch. That freaks me out!

The 2006-2007 DSO schedule came out this week and I read this article which frightened me. A Tap Concerto? With a Tap Dancer? I'm just so scared that's going to suck like a Hoover. And apparently this piece of music was co-commissioned by the DSO. I'm sorry, but someone asked for that???? The last world premiere I attended at the DSO was so godawful it wasn't funny. It was a Concerto for Saxophones and Orchestra. Sixth paragraph down on that page is where you'll find the description. If he had left the saxophones parts out, it would have been beautiful. The really annoying thing is all the jazz types in the city showed up for that piece and left immediately. I sat through their craptacular piece of music, the least they could have done was stay and listen to some music where all the notes actually fit together and don't jar the nerve endings. The fact that I'm not really a fan of the various saxophones (James Carter played two different ones that night) certainly didn't help this piece's case. ;-)

Nightclubbing

Yesterday's link didn't work, let's hope this one does.

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Secret World

This made me laugh.

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

You Don't Believe In Love No More*

Just one (I'm sure) of the Feel Good stories of the Olympics. You are my new hero, Joey Cheek.

More Olympics stuff follows…

My friend HRH called me yesterday to give me some Champ Car news (Katherine Legge will be in a PKV Champ car this year) and we ended up talking about a variety of things, including curling. I was watching the U.S./Finland Men's Match (well, I had been watching a movie, but couldn't very well do that while on the phone) and I have to say that the Finnish skip's last name was impressive – Uusipaavalniemi. I think it's much easier to pronounce than you'd think too.

Back to HRH, she sucked me into watching two shows I hadn't planned on watching: 1st Skating with Celebrities and the Olympics for Pairs Skating. She said that watching Bruce Jenner skating was too good to miss. Why, oh why did he get a facelift? He looked like Joan Rivers the skin on his face was so taut. In fact, I would say he's had more than one (and if it was only one, he should be suing the pants off that surgeon). It was painful watching him skate he was so stiff. Apparently he's improved a thousandfold since the first week. I have to say that he handled his loss very well and that he's a very gracious man.

I didn't want to watch the Pairs Finals as I know too well that NBC wouldn't show the interesting stuff until about 10:45 and there was no way in hell I was staying up that late just to see some poor Chinese skater hitting the deck. Thank God for the CBC. HRH had told me that earlier in the day the CBC had shown the Pairs Finals live and to watch for the Chinese couple where the guy threw his partner so hard that she fell. I watched two Chinese couples and saw no botched throws and it was way past my bedtime. I called HRH and she said, Nope, one more Chinese couple and they go on last. Bloody hell!!! I just wanted to go to bed!!! I have to say that it was worth staying up for, not to see her fall which was hideous, but to see them finish their routine. Oh yeah, her fall came 38 seconds into the program! The announcers said she fell on her knee and that's what they wrapped when they came off the ice after the full program, but I have to say that it looked a helluva lot more painful than just her knee. I swear she hit the ice in a full splits and I would bet money that her groin is causing her tremendous problems today and if she can walk at all I'd be surprised. Poor 90 lber! I would say that adrenaline got her through the rest of the program. And I would say that she would say it was worth it as they ended up with the Silver. I was rooting for the Chinese couple that came in 3rd and although I have issues with giving a medal to a team/person who fell (think Oksana Baiul getting the gold over Nancy Kerrigan even though Oksana fell flat on her butt – and trust me, I was not a Nancy Kerrigan fan), I'd have to say in this case that it's hard to argue against as the rest of their program was very difficult and darn near flawless. I have to say though that I'm not very fond of the new judging system and you don't see who gave what score. So, how do we know that the French judge isn't selling her vote yet again? Fair question? Probably not, but it's just makes me wonder.

More curling today!!! Check out CNBC, people! It's fun!

*Sorry about the grammar, but thems is someone's else's words.

Monday, February 13, 2006

Petrouchka

Well, that was an unintended break for you all. I have been so swamped at work I didn't have time to think much less post anything. And I was so tired of being on the computer that there was no way I was doing it at home. Why do I always have so much to say until I sit down to write?

Two Thursdays ago I had the worst massage of my life. It was completely worthless. First off, it was supposed to be deep tissue and it was barely Swedish! Secondly, it was supposed to be a full hour and I would say I was lucky if it was 45 minutes. And I won't even mention the fact that they messed up the appointment time. If you live in the Detroit area, avoid the Silk Spa (spa here is used to denote a place so un-spa-like that it's unimaginable) on Michigan Avenue. The "atmosphere" was appalling, the people were "interesting." The hair stylist in the front chair spent one entire hair cut on his CELL PHONE! And at one point, he left his "client" to write down a phone number. It was just incredibly unprofessional all the way around.

That massage was so worthless that I scheduled another one (different spa) for this past Saturday. I tried going to my regular massage therapist but some reason she wasn't doing full body massages on Saturday, just chair massages, and that was not going to work! I had rec'd two $50 gift certificates for spafinder.com which is why I was trying new places. I used the first one at the shitty place and then the second one on Saturday. If you are looking for a good deep tissue massage, I highly recommend the Om Spa. I had lucked out when calling because there had been a cancellation just 30 minutes before. My plan to sleep until noon on Saturday was blown all to hell as the appt. was at 9:00 a.m. but I was too desperate for a massage to worry about that. My body is essentially one big knotted pained muscle. Jill, the massage therapist, was just getting started and she said, "I don't know where to start." since I was so incredibly tense. And about 15 minutes in, she asked "Have you ever considered getting a 90-minute deep tissue massage?" I laughed, since I had just been thinking that it might be necessary. In the end, I would definitely recommend Jill to anyone who is interested in a true deep tissue massage, even at Om Spa's prices!

Last weekend (first of February) was spent in Chicago with friends, Julieu, DWD, BST, C&P and DC. We went for a friend's wedding and it was a very fun weekend. We laughed a LOT! I got to dance at the wedding to Sisters, Iggy, Nick, and Peter, so it was all good. We got home on Sunday in time to see Aretha singing the National Anthem at the Super Bow, so that was pretty darn good timing. I actually paid attention to the game this year (the last couple of years I haven't even bothered with the commercials) and was very happy for Pittsburgh. We blue-collar cities have to stick together!

It's now Olympics time and I will confess that I generally don't get too excited about them. I did watch a bit of the second period of the Sweden/Russia Women's Hockey game on Saturday, but that's literally been all I've seen so far. I might watch some of the Men's hockey and I hope to catch some of the curling, but that's about it. I don't think the U.S. Men's Hockey team has a chance in heck, so I'm rooting for Sweden. Not over the U.S., of course, but they are my first choice after the U.S. I so hate Wiyne Gretzky that I hope Canada doesn't get a medal. I'm really sorry to all the players on the Canadian team that I like, but as long as that man has anything to do their team I won't be rooting for them. The way he whined at the last Olympics "Nobody wants us to win. Wah." Yo, Wayne, here's a shocker. We might all be rooting for our own countries. Dumbfuck. Sorry…

I have a couple of movie recommendations today. First, if you haven't already seen Crash, do yourself a favor and move it to the top of your Netflix queue. I was blown away by it, so much so that I watched it TWICE that night. The second time with the commentary on, but I rarely ever watch the commentary. I've now seen three (Capote and Brokeback Mountain) of the Best Movie nominees and I have to say that I'm hoping for Crash. The other movie is a bit older (1950) and stars Humphrey Bogart - In A Lonely Place. If you don’t like movies that are a tad sad, don't bother with this one. And if you read the synopsis, please note that there are mistakes in it. The girl was a coat checkroom girl, not a secretary, and Gloria Grahame didn't lie about seeing the girl leave alone. Details, perhaps, but it makes you wonder what else they got wrong.

Friday was my first official DSO concert of 2006 (the Mahler in January was not part of my season tickets) and I got to see/hear Midori play Tchaikowsky's Violin Concerto. It was FABULOUS. This week's concert is called Classical Fairytales with The Sorcerer's Apprentice scheduled along with two Stravinsky pieces and a Ravel. I had been thinking of finding someone to take the tickets, but that was before I saw the schedule. I have a thing for the 20th Century Russian composers. Hell, I have a thing for Russian composers, in general. Except Borodin…can't stand Borodin.

Now I must get back to the battle. I hope all is well in blog-land and that I have time to catch up on everybody's lives.

Wednesday, February 01, 2006

Ivory Tower

New feature this year is that I'm going to bore you with monthly listings of my book reading and movie watching. I'm hoping it'll help me to keep track of what I've read and watched. So, without further ado, here is January's list (the books are in order read, the movies are not in order as watched):

Books

Queen of Freedom Trilogy by Christian Jacq
Empire of Darkness
The War of the Crowns
The Flaming Sword
S is for Silence by Sue Grafton
Bloodsport by Dick Francis
Hell Is Always Today by Jack Higgins

I started The Hitchcock Murders by Peter Conrad on Monday, and I was apparently VERY tired when I bought it as I thought it was a murder mystery based on Hitchcock's movies, wheras it's an academic treatise of Hitchcock's films. I am finding it extremely interesting and although I had dinner plans the last two nights and spent 2.5 hours on the phone on Monday I'm already up to page 83 and can't wait to read more. It will be on my official February Book List.


Movies

K-Pax (R)
Finding Neverland (N)
And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself (N)
The Sting (K)
Brokeback Mountain
Ocean's Eleven (K)
Ocean's Twelve (K)
The Italian Job (K)
Princess Caraboo (N)
The Truth About Cats & Dogs (K)
How To Steal A Million (K)
Sliding Doors (K)
The Void (N)
Benny & Joon (K)
The Man Who Knew Too Much (K)
Uncovered (N)
Throttle (N)
Moscow Heat (N)
Nemesis Game (N)
Million Dollar Baby (N)
In My Country (N)
Fahrenheit 9/11 (N)
Motorcycle Diaries (N)
Swordfish (R)
A Mighty Wind (R)
Phone Booth (R)
Taxi Driver (R)
The Aviator (N)
The Spy Who Came In From the Cold (N)
Lost In Translation (R)

Key: N = Netflix, K = Kathleen, R = Rob (friend from work)

I would say that I'm getting my money worth's out of Netflix.