Thursday, August 16, 2018
Shopping Cart Perfection
Stopped to shop at Target. My shopping cart rolled across the floor like smooth and silent hi-tech silk. Not even one wheel going wokka-wokka-wokka. I never realized this was even possible. Just awestruck.
Busy Day in the Neighborhood
Ambulance and fire truck three doors down.
Coroner’s van.Apparently a house painter in his 40s working in the back yard three doors down had an epileptic seizure and died. Several hours passed before anyone noticed anything amiss.
Glad my house painter more or less finished his job.
Nineteen Year Old Memory
"A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum" at the Woodland Opera House, 1999.
Hooray For Social Distortion!
Happened at Ace of Spades. Amazeballs!
A Trump supporter claims he was attacked by the lead singer of a punk rock band when he jeered the frontman’s political statements.
Tim Hildebrand of Galt says the attack happened at a Social Distortion concert at the Ace of Spades in Midtown. Hildebrand says he grew up listening to the band’s music and was excited to attend one of their shows, but never thought he’d leave bloody and bruised at the hands of a famous musician.
Cellphone video taken at the concert captures the moment the Social Distortion fan says he was beaten up by the band’s frontman, 56-year-old Mike Ness.
...Hildebrand says the singer started badmouthing President Trump and America and the Republican farmer from Galt didn’t like it.
“I stood pretty much with my silent protest with my middle finger up for the next two songs.”
Ness didn’t like that and in the video, you can see him motion Hildebrand to the stage, where the singer spits in his face. Hildebrand says the two were yelling at each other when Ness lunged toward him.
“Takes his guitar off, jumps off the stage and proceeds to punch me multiple times in the head.”
Pinwheeling Soda Missile
In order to avoid carrying grocery bags up the steps to my back porch, I first raise the bags over my head and set them on the edge of the porch. Today, I was lifting two, two-liter bottles of caffeine-free Diet Pepsi over my head, when one of them toppled, hit the concrete, and ruptured. The pinwheeling, carbonate-fueled missile sprayed a liter of soda over me and my freshly-painted house siding. So, if there’s a certain eau-du-aspartame about me today, that’s why.
"Don't Dress For Dinner" - Theatre in the Heights
Very funny farce, where everyone lies to each other, and the resulting calamities just exacerbate the dilemmas.Leaning Towards a Chupacabra
I was out front watering plants about 1 a.m. Sunday morning when I heard a commotion down a side street. Some kind of animal was thrashing and thumping against a parked car. It sounded like a rabid dog devouring a whimpering puppy, but as I approached in the dark, I could tell it was just one animal, not two. In the poor light I could see the glow of eyes. Fear stabbed my chest.
I didn’t want to approach any wild animal in the dark without being able to see it clearly, so I ran home to get a flashlight. My mind ran through the possibilities: raccoon, skunk, dog, chupacabra, wolverine, bear, werewolf, Cujo.
When I returned, the gnashing, thrashing animal had retreated down a driveway at the end of the street. No way was I going to pursue a wild animal down those tight, dark confines! I returned home, and even though it was a warm night, I hid under my covers.
I didn’t want to approach any wild animal in the dark without being able to see it clearly, so I ran home to get a flashlight. My mind ran through the possibilities: raccoon, skunk, dog, chupacabra, wolverine, bear, werewolf, Cujo.
When I returned, the gnashing, thrashing animal had retreated down a driveway at the end of the street. No way was I going to pursue a wild animal down those tight, dark confines! I returned home, and even though it was a warm night, I hid under my covers.
Saturday Night Dinner at Cafeteria 15L
Some people (like me) had worked the "It's About Time" event in Davis, and others had seen "Mamma Mia" at Music Circus.
Long DMV Lines and the Holocaust
John Cox visits local Sacramento DMV, and makes cringing comparison between long lines there and the Holocaust. (Myself, I rather enjoy DMV visits, because you get to meet your neighbors. I'm not saying I enjoy the Holocaust):
“How long have you been waiting,” he asks the woman, who responds “close to an hour.”
Cox then relays a story of a conversation with a man he met at a DMV in Southern California:
“You know, I met a Holocaust survivor in Long Beach. He survived concentration camps, and he said this was worse. He’s 90 years old and he had to wait four hours down in Long Beach. Can you imagine that?” Cox says.
Wednesday, August 15, 2018
THIS is How You Deal With Trump Supporters
Make them pay for their positions:
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — A Trump supporter claims he was attacked by the lead singer of a punk rock band when he jeered the frontman’s political statements.
Tim Hildebrand of Galt says the attack happened at a Social Distortion concert at the Ace of Spades in Midtown. Hildebrand says he grew up listening to the band’s music and was excited to attend one of their shows, but never thought he’d leave bloody and bruised at the hands of a famous musician.
Cellphone video taken at the concert captures the moment the Social Distortion fan says he was beaten up by the band’s frontman, 56-year-old Mike Ness.
“I wasn’t able to defend myself because people in the crowd were holding me back,” he said.
Hildebrand says he the singer gave him two black eyes, a busted lip, a concussion and almost knocked out one of his teeth. The chaos broke out at a concert on July 17, but before things turned physical, Hildebrand says the show turned political.
“I pretty much said I paid for your music, not your politics.”
Hildebrand says the singer started badmouthing President Trump and America and the Republican farmer from Galt didn’t like it.
“I stood pretty much with my silent protest with my middle finger up for the next two songs.”
Ness didn’t like that and in the video, you can see him motion Hildebrand to the stage, where the singer spits in his face. Hildebrand says the two were yelling at each other when Ness lunged toward him.
20th Anniversary of "...Baby One More Time"
Britney!:
It was …Baby One More Time that convinced Spears of the merits of pop. She initially saw herself as making “Sheryl Crow music, but younger”, while Larry Rudolph, an entertainment lawyer friend of Spears’s mum Lynne who had been tasked with getting her signed (he’s now her manager), had her record a clutch of songs originally recorded by Toni Braxton. It was those recordings that lead to auditions for Mercury, Epic and Jive (the first two labels said no; she signed with the latter) which included Spears covering Whitney Houston’s version of I Will Always Love You. With the more R&B-leaning early material not working, and with a clause allowing Jive to terminate her contract after 90 days if they felt an album wasn’t on the horizon, A&R Steve Lunt approached Martin, who had already delivered success for Jive’s boyband the Backstreet Boys. A meeting was set up with Spears in New York. “I was pretty young at the time, so I was nervous,” she says, “but he was so nice and put me right at ease.” For Martin, his song had finally found its home.
My Next Project
I have an ability - one of my few real talents - to associate random images obtained in the Albuquerque area with their physical locations. I have used that ability to explore the "Breaking Bad" universe in depth.
Now (by request), I'm doing something different - trying to quickly assemble an atlas of significant filming locations for movies and TV shows filmed in the Albuquerque area. Since New Mexico's famous tax credit went into effect in the 90s (which lowers costs for film crews), filming has proliferated throughout the state, numbering at least a hundred completed projects and more on the way.
Since I've seen almost none of these films, caring as much as I do only for "Breaking Bad," my first task has been to quickly scan a whole bunch of films that have little to do with each other except for having been filmed in the Albuquerque area. I've started with about 2 dozen films.
So far, the movies I've been watching fall into three categories: 1.) Post-apocalyptic America, 2.) Cynical border dramas, and 3.) Quirky character studies.
I've started with post-apocalyptic America. As you might expect, the Albuquerque area looks pretty battered after the Apocalypse, with large robots and dangerous flying machines of all sizes zipping hither and yon across the desert. People rarely bathe after the Apocalypse, but fortunately important landmarks like addresses and street signs remain.
Nevertheless, I haven't determined very many post-Apocalyptic filming locations, either because they happened to have been interiors with no reference to the outdoors or required so much work to prepare for the camera that filmmakers didn't like to break free of them.
Cynical border dramas share some of these same flaws. A dungeon still looks like a dungeon, no matter which side of the border it happens to be. When torture is on the menu, no one ever asks 'are we there yet?'
I'm much more optimistic about finding quirky character study filming locations. The lack of investment in any one place frees characters and film crews to wander across the landscape for their many quirky adventures. I'm moving to these filming locations next.
Now (by request), I'm doing something different - trying to quickly assemble an atlas of significant filming locations for movies and TV shows filmed in the Albuquerque area. Since New Mexico's famous tax credit went into effect in the 90s (which lowers costs for film crews), filming has proliferated throughout the state, numbering at least a hundred completed projects and more on the way.
Since I've seen almost none of these films, caring as much as I do only for "Breaking Bad," my first task has been to quickly scan a whole bunch of films that have little to do with each other except for having been filmed in the Albuquerque area. I've started with about 2 dozen films.
So far, the movies I've been watching fall into three categories: 1.) Post-apocalyptic America, 2.) Cynical border dramas, and 3.) Quirky character studies.
I've started with post-apocalyptic America. As you might expect, the Albuquerque area looks pretty battered after the Apocalypse, with large robots and dangerous flying machines of all sizes zipping hither and yon across the desert. People rarely bathe after the Apocalypse, but fortunately important landmarks like addresses and street signs remain.
Nevertheless, I haven't determined very many post-Apocalyptic filming locations, either because they happened to have been interiors with no reference to the outdoors or required so much work to prepare for the camera that filmmakers didn't like to break free of them.
Cynical border dramas share some of these same flaws. A dungeon still looks like a dungeon, no matter which side of the border it happens to be. When torture is on the menu, no one ever asks 'are we there yet?'
I'm much more optimistic about finding quirky character study filming locations. The lack of investment in any one place frees characters and film crews to wander across the landscape for their many quirky adventures. I'm moving to these filming locations next.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)