"12" of 12

Well, I started off with good intentions: to finally revisit 12 of 12. I remembered the night before, but not the morning of, thus forgetting my camera. I bought a new cell phone between the last 12 and now, and used it to take... 4 pictures.

They are largely boring. A picture of a building near where I work (ooh!), a perspective shot of the conference room in which I work job #2 (ahh!), and a sunset.

The sunset, which was pretty, is what you get. And a promise to try again next month!

1,000

I have seen one thousand movies.

Awhile ago, during the job hunt and at blogging "low tide", my movie list--you do know I have a list of every movie I've seen, don't you?--finally topped 1,000.

I am unsure as to what movie is exactly number 1,000; this is because I occasionally remember a movie from my past that somehow escaped inclusion on the list. For example, right as I was approaching the century mark, I realized "Silence of the Lambs" wasn't on the list. "WTF!" I said to myself.

So I am pretty sure that the milestone was reached with this movie; though it's quite possible it was actually this one.

I'm not really sure whether 1,000 movies is something to be proud of or something to be pitied. I definitely have to thank my parents, for giving us HBO when I was in middle school and socially leprous; Netflix, for making it oh-so-easy to fill out my list with movies I would otherwise be too ashamed to rent if I had to do it in person; and of course, the job market for keeping me only partially employed during the last 18 months.

Job

The problem with promising a big post is, life rarely ever affords me those "aha!" opportunities that would allow such conclusive presentations. That is, unlike most people who get a job offer, sign on the dotted line, and a paycheck all in a few short days, I get news that a job is available and that they want me, then a week goes by, then they say can we meet next week, and then we do meet and they say looks good, call me in three days, so in three days I call and we agree to meet the next day, where we agree on pay and hours and what I'll be doing.

But they're not quite ready for my closeup yet. So while I've had two days of work, I have no place to "sit" and I don't have a "computer", so you can see why I'm still hesitant to go around celebrating. No taking out mortgages, buying term life insurance, or other various adult things just yet.

Don't be mistaken, though; I'm confident it's the start of great, big things. But it has been too long a journey to announce a true end to joblessness without being sure--sign on the dotted line sure, for one thing, and paycheck sure, for another--so I am not giving details.

Not that I could anyway. It's a law firm, and I bet they frown on extracurricular blogging. But it seems to pay well and seems like interesting work.

So there you have it, oh dwindling stock of readership. I am hoping that this post will slate some of the thirst the previous posts may have caused, but also that I will, having "broken the seal" (to use the popular beer-drinking parlance) be able to post on all sorts of flippant topics. I mean, seriously, it's been almost a month! Celebrities have died, my sisters are practically engaged and/or joining convents as we speak.

Big Things...

...are happening. I am ever-so-sorry about the complete lack of updates (this year, even) but hopefully a more meaningful and news-filled update will grace us soon.

And by that I mean before Friday. Of this week.

UPDATE: It is a little known fact that the phrase "of this week" means, in the original Portugese, "sometime during this calendar year."

The more you know!

Seriously, these things usually do take longer than they mean to. But I will try and post something brilliantly illuminating today or tomorrow, if the gods allow.

The Poker Gods Have Forgiven Me

The first time I played poker, with real people and real (albeit coin) money, I was hosed. Not necessarily because I am bad at playing cards--I am not excellent but I can do okay--but because my luck was exceptionally poor. The second time I played was not much different, though I did manage to reach the bottom of my change dish slower.

But on Saturday, the Gods finally let me go. I got good hands (I was dealt an Ace high straight in 5-card!) and managed to come away with more money than I had entered with. At least, I think. It's hard to tell when you play with a big pile of uncounted change.

It was a fun evening, full of surprising hands and excellent pizza. And, above all, a clean slate of gambling karma.

Now it's off to DC and then Michigan for a few (nine) days! I may post while away, but clearly there are no promises.

If It Were In The Onion...

Once again, the Washington Post hands us a story that is so full of deranged quotes that it feels like it should be a satire of some kind. But no, the House really is going to work 5 days a week. The horror.

It's not so much the workload (out by 2pm on Monday and Friday!), which is eerily similar to my own schedule, but the reaction from the Congresspersons who dislike the plan. I'm not assuming they're all GOP, but that's all the Post quotes (though a Dem Rep from Florida says she has a Brownie troop conflict). Roy Blunt (R-MO) says its a strategy to screw freshman Democrats, but even funnier are Rep. Jack Kingston's (R-GA) thoughts:

"Keeping us up here eats away at families. Marriages suffer. The Democrats could care less about families -- that's what this says."

Oh Jack, you stupid SOB, I'm sorry if you thought being voted into one of the highest positions in the free world would require only a half-hour of your time every 3rd weekend of the month, but it turns out this isn't the National Guard.

But he's right, though. I could care less about his family. Because millions of Americans see their kids and spouses far less often than good ol' Jack Kingston and his ragtag bunch of freeloading representatives. The article also mentions that this year's GOP-led Congress--the 109th--worked for a whopping 103 days (and how many of those were out-at-2pm days?) this year.

But I guess that's fine, what with there being nothing at all to legislate about these days.

Can we try TV chemotherapy?

My television, with years of excellent service under her belt, is dying.

I knew she* had a cancer of some sort when white lines began appearing
at the top of the screen when first powered on. But those lines faded
fairly quickly and I hoped they were merely a sign of age.

Sadly, whatever malady afflicts my poor JVC has spread so that now she
has become a defacto editor of all television shows, randomly fading
any given scene to black. While sometimes I appreciate the effort to
spare me further idiocy, the sound remains and after a few seconds,
the picture fades right back in.

This is simply unacceptable when one has The Office and Scrubs to
watch. Fortunately a backup TV exists, but it will not serve us in the
long-term. No, I must look towards the future. I must look towards...
a new television.

Since I'm not technically jobless anymore (lawyer w/clients =
employed, no matter how little he is making), it seems that buying a
TV is probably a wise move. I'm concerned about wasting money on a TV
that is obsolete out of the box (i.e. non-HD, non-digital, etc.) but I
do not have much to spend on such luxuries.

Suggestions are welcome, but mostly I just wanted to share my sadness
at losing a valued member of the household.

*Yes, my television was of the female gender. No, not for any particular reason.

Best Ends

Let's just pretend I've apologized profusely for the lack of updates, and then move on to an actual post, eh?

Best Movie Ending: This is a tough one for me, as I have seen a great many movies (984 at last count). But the first one that comes to mind was The Shawshank Redemption. Say what you will about the feasibility of two ex-cons living in a shack in Mexico, but from the moment Andy escapes, to the moment Redd begins his search, I was on the edge of my seat.

Best TV Ending: It seems to me that it's really, really hard to pull of ending a television show well. The format just doesn't lend itself to a non-episodic ending (problem, non-solution, failure of non-solution, realization of actual solution: all in 22 to 43 minutes) and many shows have met their end with decidedly mixed results. The best you can generally hope for is for a few kernels of excellence in an otherwise so-so finale.* The exception (you knew there had to be one) in my opinion is the series finale of The Office (UK version, of course). I won't give it away -- because it's absolutely amazing if you don't know what happens -- but it achieved exactly 100% of what I wanted from that series. Brilliant.

Best Game Ending: Another area that is rife with disappointment. Beyond the "YOU HAVE WON PLAY AGAIN?" of the NES days, even today's whiz-bang games still often lack a real punch at the ending. I'm not terribly well-rounded when it comes to games -- console titles like Resident Evil or Final Fantasy aren't my thing -- but from the many computer games I've played, the Starcraft and Diablo series stands out as pretty well-finished products. Perhaps that's only because the entirety of the storyline was good, and the endings just kept up the excellence.

Best Book Ending: Tough call. I am not as well-read as I'd like, so it's difficult for me to really say. In fact, I'm just going to leave this to the librarians and English majors, and plead ignorance.

Best Life Ending: Trick question. Life doesn't really end, does it? I guess if someone dies while saving 80 nuns and 120 children from certain doom while curing cancer and ending world hunger, that'd be a pretty good ending. Until I do that, however, the story is often better than how it ends, as far as life goes.

*Buffy ended this way; so did Angel. Seinfeld, in my opinion, didn't really even reach the so-so level. MASH probably holds the gold in this category, but since I didn't see it at the time, and thus did not have the emotional connection to the characters, I went with my own personal favorite.