(Sunday)
long weekend. spent thursday afternoon until earlier this evening up at Ft. Hood for drill. Spent the first day doing a lot of patrolling and jumping in and out of the back of a HMMV. then did some urban operations and demo work the rest of the weekend. fun stuff but tiring. this won't make much sense to anyone non-military but now that we've lost our boots to go augment a deploying battalion, my platoon (of which I am a squad leader) is now down to a total of 7 people including myself. I guess it makes my job pretty easy.
haven't updated in a while so I'm sure I'm leaving all kinds of stuff out. saw some really good movies last week, but I'm too tired to really do a write up. I think I have tomorrow off of work. the weather is really nice so the heating/air conditioning thing is a bit slow, and will be for the three weeks of Texas Springtime.
hopefully going to get out and actually see (and hear) some of SXSW this year. should at least get to hang out with some SG folkses on Tuesday and gonna try to get over to lil_tuff'y's poster art thing.
anyhow. I'm beat.
(Monday)
ok... I was lucky enough to have today (monday) off of work. I could use the money, but after working a four day weekend for the US Marine Corps, I think I will have a decent windfall for the month. I didn't really sleep in. My lower back is still killing me. I guess I am getting old. The sleeping on the uneven ground with my head resting on either some wadded up uniform items or atop a kevlar helmet did something to my spinal alignment. I can feel this shooting pain occasionally right where my spine should be fitting into my tailbone. It's not always there, but there was a while today when it was so bad it was making my hands shake. Thank the fuzzy bunnies (why not, who wants to thank Gawd for anything) for Tylenol and Advil Extra Strength.
so...anyway... spent the day enjoying some downtime. Went with Katy and watched 300. I liked it. It was very URMANMOVIE! both for the violence and the whole loyaltydutyhonor thing. visually it was nice and looked very much like the Miller book.
there wasn't a whole lot that you can do with the story. it's pretty simple really. I didn't expect it to be anymore true to the history than, say, the old Alamo movie with John Wayne in it. Leonidas was well played but not a very deep character. The other Spartans, though less focused upon, were more interesting characters. And the Spartan character wasn't entirely obscured. Even the whole manlove thing. Though it was played off in a five second comical exchange. Anyhow. good flick.
after the movie Katy and I wandered over to HEB Central Market. which is DEATH to my wallet. DEATH I TELL YOU! I like my normal HEB. they have everything I need and more. so...why oh why, did I have to wonder into the uberhip organic high end botique grocery store version!?!? for crikes I've got a Sun Harvest in walking distance from my front door. aren't I satisfied!?!?
apparantly not. food is one of my weaknesses. and one of the stronger ones at that.
they had samples and they were all good. I was wise and didn't grab so much as a shopping basket when we walked in, so my purchases were limited to what I could carry in my hands. They included a four set of cheddar and bacon scones from the bakery dept. some sesame oil and something my apartment has been needing for a long time. Not a Wok perse. (in my mind a proper wok is an iron affair with beaten sides so as to hold food up above the flat bottom and is to be used over an open flame) but rather a decent 12" nonstick stir fry skillet. I've been wanting to add stirfry to my repertoire
netflix movies I've watched recently:
Lucky Number Slevin: I was impressed. I didn't expect very much from Josh Hartnett and I figured that Bruce Willis as an assasin wouldn't be overly interesting or much of a stretch from him just stainding there looking earnest. The plot and the dialouge really exceeded my expectations. I wouldn't quite put it up there with Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, but it was good. and Lucy Liu was awesome as the frenetic next door neighbor. the plot had a couple holes in it and I started to really wonder why Slevin was taking all this so well about half way through the movie.
Miami Vice: Again, expectations exceeded. It wasn't campy at all. And while it wasn't on the level of Heat, it was an excellent cops and robbers (or drug lords or terrorists or whathaveyou) movie. Colin was a little over gravely but I think that was just to get him as far from the Don Johnson "Sonny" as he could.
I'm eagerly awaiting Samurai Champloo and Parrots of Telegraph Hill movies in the mail.
big accomplishment today. I finally just called a lift service and had my motorcycle towed to a repair shop to get the rear tire repaired and the battary charged up and oil changed etc. after three weeks of either having the tire aired up enough to ride or the battary charged up but never at the same time....I said "to hell with it". it was stupid of me to wait this long. free towing is included with my insurance.
so by the end of the week, I will be back on my motorcycle and enjoying riding in the Texas Spring weather.
I guess that's enough for now.
long weekend. spent thursday afternoon until earlier this evening up at Ft. Hood for drill. Spent the first day doing a lot of patrolling and jumping in and out of the back of a HMMV. then did some urban operations and demo work the rest of the weekend. fun stuff but tiring. this won't make much sense to anyone non-military but now that we've lost our boots to go augment a deploying battalion, my platoon (of which I am a squad leader) is now down to a total of 7 people including myself. I guess it makes my job pretty easy.
haven't updated in a while so I'm sure I'm leaving all kinds of stuff out. saw some really good movies last week, but I'm too tired to really do a write up. I think I have tomorrow off of work. the weather is really nice so the heating/air conditioning thing is a bit slow, and will be for the three weeks of Texas Springtime.
hopefully going to get out and actually see (and hear) some of SXSW this year. should at least get to hang out with some SG folkses on Tuesday and gonna try to get over to lil_tuff'y's poster art thing.
anyhow. I'm beat.
(Monday)
ok... I was lucky enough to have today (monday) off of work. I could use the money, but after working a four day weekend for the US Marine Corps, I think I will have a decent windfall for the month. I didn't really sleep in. My lower back is still killing me. I guess I am getting old. The sleeping on the uneven ground with my head resting on either some wadded up uniform items or atop a kevlar helmet did something to my spinal alignment. I can feel this shooting pain occasionally right where my spine should be fitting into my tailbone. It's not always there, but there was a while today when it was so bad it was making my hands shake. Thank the fuzzy bunnies (why not, who wants to thank Gawd for anything) for Tylenol and Advil Extra Strength.
so...anyway... spent the day enjoying some downtime. Went with Katy and watched 300. I liked it. It was very URMANMOVIE! both for the violence and the whole loyaltydutyhonor thing. visually it was nice and looked very much like the Miller book.
there wasn't a whole lot that you can do with the story. it's pretty simple really. I didn't expect it to be anymore true to the history than, say, the old Alamo movie with John Wayne in it. Leonidas was well played but not a very deep character. The other Spartans, though less focused upon, were more interesting characters. And the Spartan character wasn't entirely obscured. Even the whole manlove thing. Though it was played off in a five second comical exchange. Anyhow. good flick.
after the movie Katy and I wandered over to HEB Central Market. which is DEATH to my wallet. DEATH I TELL YOU! I like my normal HEB. they have everything I need and more. so...why oh why, did I have to wonder into the uberhip organic high end botique grocery store version!?!? for crikes I've got a Sun Harvest in walking distance from my front door. aren't I satisfied!?!?
apparantly not. food is one of my weaknesses. and one of the stronger ones at that.
they had samples and they were all good. I was wise and didn't grab so much as a shopping basket when we walked in, so my purchases were limited to what I could carry in my hands. They included a four set of cheddar and bacon scones from the bakery dept. some sesame oil and something my apartment has been needing for a long time. Not a Wok perse. (in my mind a proper wok is an iron affair with beaten sides so as to hold food up above the flat bottom and is to be used over an open flame) but rather a decent 12" nonstick stir fry skillet. I've been wanting to add stirfry to my repertoire
netflix movies I've watched recently:
Lucky Number Slevin: I was impressed. I didn't expect very much from Josh Hartnett and I figured that Bruce Willis as an assasin wouldn't be overly interesting or much of a stretch from him just stainding there looking earnest. The plot and the dialouge really exceeded my expectations. I wouldn't quite put it up there with Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, but it was good. and Lucy Liu was awesome as the frenetic next door neighbor. the plot had a couple holes in it and I started to really wonder why Slevin was taking all this so well about half way through the movie.
Miami Vice: Again, expectations exceeded. It wasn't campy at all. And while it wasn't on the level of Heat, it was an excellent cops and robbers (or drug lords or terrorists or whathaveyou) movie. Colin was a little over gravely but I think that was just to get him as far from the Don Johnson "Sonny" as he could.
I'm eagerly awaiting Samurai Champloo and Parrots of Telegraph Hill movies in the mail.
big accomplishment today. I finally just called a lift service and had my motorcycle towed to a repair shop to get the rear tire repaired and the battary charged up and oil changed etc. after three weeks of either having the tire aired up enough to ride or the battary charged up but never at the same time....I said "to hell with it". it was stupid of me to wait this long. free towing is included with my insurance.
so by the end of the week, I will be back on my motorcycle and enjoying riding in the Texas Spring weather.
I guess that's enough for now.
300 was amazing. Now all my friends are talking about how they saw it and they all have me totally pumped to go and see it again!
Lucky Number Slevin was a movie that I was very impressed by. It took me months to see it, but I wasn't disappointed when I did. And I think Miami Vice is going to be a movie that I see, but then don't tell people I saw.