Caught In The Whirlwind
Archive for February, 2008
[50 in 365] Book 3: The Amber Spyglass
01544 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
Ok. I admit it. I'm going to fail this challenge miserably. I just finished my choice for book three, which was…
The Amber Spyglass
By Philip Pullman
This book was the third and final book in the His Dark Materials trilogy. After reading the first two books and really liking the first one and sorta liking the second I was eager to read the conclusion to see how this all tied together.
And I must say…wow. This series of books is probably near the top of my list as far as book series goes. The second book makes total sense after reading this one because, as I suspected, all of that setup was necessary in order for the conclusion of the series to work.
My favorite part of the book was at the end, and that heart wrenching decision that the main characters had to make. I don't want to spoil anything in case somebody else is going to read this book, so I'll just say the ending doesn't disappoint. It feels like everything in the previous books were working towards the last 40 or so pages of this one.
I've hard some people say that this book is mostly aimed towards a younger audience but I'd have to disagree at least with this book. Concepts such as love, sexuality, religion, loss, etc made their way into this book by the end, and while it's written in such a way that there's a layer of understanding that can be achieved by a younger reader, I can see many layers of meaning which are only understandable by an adult reader.
Overall, I'd recommend these series of books to anybody who wants a good, fun light fantasy series. You won't be dissapointed. I'm not sure what I'm going to be doing for my next book at this point. I'll have to scout around. I do know that I'm going to fail this thing miserably though. Oh well. Onwards!
Of Binoculars and Periscopes
01545 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
As I mentioned earlier in the day, I watched The Oscars with my friends via long distance IM connection since they get over so late that it wouldn't make sense for me to watch over there with them. They've been doing this ritual for quite some time and the last 3 or so years I've joined in. Pretty fun to discuss it with other people as it's going on.
These are probably going to be kinda disorganized and train of thought-ish, but here's my thoughts on last night's academy awards:
First of all, the voice over lady doing all of the announcing was terrible. She had the most annoying voice and way of speaking. Not nearly dignified enough for the image the awards were trying to present as usual. The first thing I noticed was that the red carpet host on ABC was Regis Philbin and he seemed to be grabbing the hand of anybody who he was talking to. My theory was that he was holding them in place so that they wouldn't run away from him because he's a pretty scary guy. Regis also had a habit of telling everyone who was going to be on stage performing that they were going to be in front of billions of people and that they shouldn't mess up because everyone would see, which I thought was a horrible thing to say to somebody just before they take the stage. Horrible.
Moving on to the actual awards show…Jon Stewart was totally awesome. I thought the beginning part of his opening monologue was a bit weak, but he got it together and was totally ON the whole night. My absolute favorite part of the show was his segment on what would have happened if the writers hadn't come back. Specifically the Oscar's salute to Binoculars and Periscopes montage. I was dying laughing. He also wins for classiest moment (although this was probably the directors decision anyway) when he invited the woman who won for best song to come up and give her thank you's after they totally cut her off after she won the award.
As far as the award winners is concerned, I only have one thing to say considering I haven't seen most of the movies this year. First, in the category of special effects, I think Pirates of the Caribiean and Transformers totally got screwed out of their awards. The Golden Compass wasn't anywhere near the level of the other two movies as far as real looking CGI effects.
The one thing I thought we were safe from was the animated character bit they usually pull, considering the writer's strike was called pretty close to the awards. I figured they didn't have time to write or record anything. Unfortunately, I was totally wrong. Jerry Sienfeld's Bee Movie award presentation was the result. Not as horrible as usual I guess, but still pretty bad.
I'm probably leaving a ton of stuff out (should have written this earlier I guess) but, there you have it. Overall, I was entertained and came out of it with a lot of movies to check out via netflix when I get the chance to. Until next year then.
The Weekend Of The PSP
01546 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
Ok, I promised you a weekend update and you're getting a weekend update!
On Friday, I noticed that the government had been so kind as to deposit my income tax return into my savings account, so I had a little extra play money. And my friends had suggested going out to Syracuse to do some shopping so I was thinking I should finally buy myself the Sony PSP that I was trying to figure out how to fit into to my budget for several months now.
So I went out with them to Syracuse where we ended up (eventually) at the Carousel Mall where I purchased my PSP, as well as Final Fantasy Tactics and PaRappa The Rapper. After which we attempted to find a local indie music store, The Sound Garden. It ended up being in Armory Square in Syracuse which means the parking totally sucked. We found a spot eventually and walked over to the store and looked around. As far as music stores go, I thought it was pretty nice, but lacking a bit in the progressive selection. If the parking wasn't so horrible I'd go back there more often, but it's hard to justify a trip to that area just to visit that particular store. I should also mention, randomly, that on the way back to the car we were freaked out by some cops doing donughts in the somewhat snow covered parking lot we were parked in. It was an empty section, but still kinda freaky.
After that we went out to eat at Chili's, as I mentioned earlier, where I sorta stretched the limits of what was acceptable to eat according to my new healthy eating guidelines. But it turned out all right in the end. We went back to their apartment for a while and I played some PaRappa the Rapper (I don't think "played" is the correct word, considering I suck), under the false impression that I would be able to send it over to Wassy's PSP and we could try out multiplayer on the first level. Unfortunetly, all it sent over was a 1 level demo. Oh well.
I also received a call from my Mom in Pennsylvania while at the mall. I'm looking for a
chest or cabinet thingy to take the place of my CD rack in my
living room that a) looks nicer and b) I can stick a little 5 gallon
fish tank on so I can get the betta I've been wanting since I started
my whole fish adventure a little less than a year ago. So I sent her
out looking for something that was acceptable as she was heading down
to amish country and could probably get something of good quality
pretty cheaply. She called to let me know she found something that would fit my specifications and it
seemed reasonably priced, so I told her to grab it. So I'm one step closer to my betta now.
Sunday I spent a lot of quality time with my PSP because of me having to do laundry. I played Tactics quite a bit, very good game, as expected. I'm really enjoying the PSP except for the battery life, which pales in comparison to the DS Lite. However, that's not really a fair comparison and it gets enough to be useful anyway. I'm just going to have to charge it more often.
Sunday evening I watched the Oscars with my friends. Well…long distance anyway. It gets over with too late on a Sunday night for me to actually go over and watch it with them, so I watch it from my place and we discuss via IM. I've been doing this the past couple years and it's something I enjoy doing now. It's also good for getting ideas for movies I want to netflix. But I think I'll break out the Oscar section of the update into it's own post. More later!
Project Weight Loss: Week 6
01546 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
It's time again for last weeks weight loss project status report. This week kicked last week's long weekday plateau in favor of a slight gain back and then gradual losses.
The thing I'm surprised about the most this week is the weekend. On Saturday I went out to Syracuse with my friends (which will be detailed in a forthcoming post) and we went out to dinner at Chili's. I threw caution to the wind and had a little more than what I would normally have had, along with 2 glasses of strawberry lemonade. But as it turns out that didn't matter very much.
And this morning I passed my 20 pound mark, dipping down below 260 for the first time in a couple years.
QotD: One-Armed, of course.
01548 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
How many push-ups can you do?
Gasp…hack..wheeze…
3. I just tired it, hence the gasping. Upper body strength is not my strong point. Actually 3 is 3 more than what I have historically been able to do so that's pretty good for me! Must be a side effect of my efforts at getting in some kind of shape.
QotD: Who Should Pay?
01549 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
You crash your friend's car because you're driving too fast in bad weather. Everyone's okay, but the car has to go into the shop. Who pays the deductible?
I do. No question, and I'd be a rotten person if I said otherwise. It was my fault, so I'll pay the price to fix it. I'd be a pretty bad friend if I crashed their car and made them pay for it. The only time I probably wouldn't pay was if my friends were doing something stupid which caused the crash. Such as covering my eyes, or punching me in the stomach or something like that. It's reasonable to think I wouldn't have to assume responsibility for that kind of situation. Not that it would ever happen.
I'd also offer to pay the difference in their insurance premiums if my actions bumped up what they had to pay.
I keep trying to think of ways to make this post a little more substantial, but It's such a cut and dry issue for me.
Mid Week Update: Tea Bitch Edition
01550 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
Last night Wassy came over for the usual mid-week stuff. This time around we went out to dinner at Applebee's. I had shrimp for the first time. They were fairly tasty, but there was a little too much there on the plate for my taste. After that we went back to my place to hang out and watch some Slayers (more anime…she's totally corrupted me).
She's started calling me her "Tea Bitch" because whenever she's over I make her a cup of green tea since she seems to like my tea prep techniques and the resulting tea. I don't mind doing it because I can finally make something for somebody that they actually enjoy eating/drinking. I do like my green tea…glad other people do as well. So much healthier than the cup of hot coco I'd probably be drinking otherwise. I made her some White Monkey and I made myself some Casablanca Twist.
We also talked about about the total lack of a ticket sale date for the Progressive Nation show that we're planning on going to in May. It's one of the few shows on the tour that haven't gone up yet, which figures since that's the one we wanted to see. I'm getting a little antsy to just get tickets so I no longer need to worry about checking ticketmaster every 30 seconds.
QotD: Your Last Twenty Bucks
01551 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
List three things you'd buy with your last $20. One practical, one frivolous and one of your choosing.
I'm going to assume that since this is my last $20, I'm going to be spending a lot of time sitting on park benches in the near future. With that in mind, here's my choices:
- Practical: A 2 person survival blanket ($5)
If I'm going to be sitting out on a park bench, it's probably going to get pretty cold. And this survival blanket should help me stay a little warmer. Well, not sure how warm for $5, but it got good reviews anyway. - Frivolous: A top hat ($6)
Nothing completes the homeless guy look like a ragged top hat. It also has the added benefit of allowing me to use it as a place where people passing by can throw their spare pocket change. And I'd use the change to refill my… - Other: 8 Ounce Liquor Hip Flask ($9)
Because if you don't have a hip flask, all the other homeless guys in the park laugh at you and you can't join the club.
Project Weight Loss – Week 5
01552 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
If you'll notice, I'm starting to make the charts span the previous 2 weeks so it makes a little more sense. 1 week is too limited to show any progress.
This was the week of the great flattening. I seemed to have plateaued for most of the week, for unknown reasons. Over the weekend I varied my routine a bit and it looks like that did the trick as I've started dropping again this week. Also important to note that during the flat part, my body fat % was dropping according to my maybe not quite so accurate scale. So maybe that was a good thing.
Anyway, I've started to work more fruits into my diet for snacking and stuff, trying to get more natural nutrients instead of processed foods. This makes grocery shopping more of a challenge, but I really want to start eating more healthily.
I am starting to notice a change in how my clothes are fitting, as well as my stomach and arms (hey, look, there's some muscles there now!) so visible progress makes the whole thing worth while.
Long Weekend Report
01552 days
by Jason
in Uncategorized
For many in the US, they're just coming off of a long weekend due to president's day. I'm one of those people. I also didn't really feel like posting running updates, so you're going to get the whole thing right now.
Saturday
This weekend was another one of those weekends where I headed over to my friends house for a lot of general hanging out and doing stuff. I had placed an order for a Gamecube controller for in store pickup at Circuit City because I needed one to play Tales of Symphonia on my Wii (very nice RPG so far). It would also be useful there because we had planned on Smash Brothers Melee and they only had one Gamecube controller. I figured that going the in store pickup route would be faster and I'd just pick it up on my way to my friends.
Well, I was wrong. The guy in front of me in line at Circuit City was trying to return some car speakers. And they wanted to exchange them for a different model, but he wasn't having any of that. This argument took at least 10-15 minutes, so had I not already paid for the controller, I would have taken one off the shelf myself and tackled a salesman so they could ring me out and been out of there faster than if I did the in store pickup. Bah.
I arrived at my friends about a half hour later than I had planned because of the Circuit City incident. Most of the afternoon was spent just watching Slayers (An anime series. A very good anime series) and general hanging-out. After dinner (pizza) we were going to go bowling, but unfortunetly, all of the lanes were booked until 8pm which was a little late for us, so we headed back to their place for some margaritas (with an awful lot of tequila) and Super Smash Brothers Melee. Followed by the now traditional late night game of Trivial Persuit which lasted about..3 hours. But it was a fun 3 hours. After that, Robot Chicken and then I dropped off at about 1am. I really suck at staying up late these days. Must be getting old.
Sunday
The next morning I went off to the gym with Wassy because Jay sleeps in late and doesn't usually get up in time to hit the gym in the morning. I really wish I had a decent gym within a close driving distance to me because it was pretty nice having all that equipment right there. But unfortunetly the only close gym is nearly 20 minutes of driving time away and I'd never go regualrly so it wouldn't be worth it for the membership.
I hung out around their place for a while longer and watched some more Slayers, then headed home. Not too much to talk about Sunday really. Just a lot of relaxing and doing not much of anything.
Monday
Monday was the day where I was supposed to get stuff done. The plan was, do laundry, get the low tire pressure light on my car to go away finally and get some homework done. The first two worked out pretty well. As it turned out, my tires were just slightly low (all 4, so it wasn't a leak or anything) and adding a pound or two fixed the problem.
The homework didn't go so well though, since the site hosted by my school where I had stashed all the work was totally dead, so I didn't really have anything to work on. So that pretty much killed my productivity for the rest of the day. Hopefully I can make it up tonight (if I have the energy to do so that is)
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