This Sunday we stayed in bed all day and upheld our “Bad movie Sunday” ritual. This ritual general consists of finding a flick with Lou Diamond Philips in the cast list (lead role? EVEN BETTER!) and snack on Dorito’s or “Death by Chocolate” ice cream while occasionally napping. It really is the greatest thing ever. Well, this Sunday I got a wild hair to look up an old cartoon I used to love on Nickelodeon as a kid. Unfortunately, I could not find it, but I did find this:
After watching the dozens of intro’s captured in this amazing clip, I thought of dozens of other shows and movies that are a part of my nostalgic past. After having a good laugh and exhausting ourselves by jumping around the room screaming about how thrilled we were to rediscover our past, my wife and I considered just how much TV viewing that really was. And just in the 80’s! Remarkable. I was basically raised by Nickolodeon. Don’t get me wrong. Nick was a great dad. I just feel a little guilty that I got more excited about finding these clips than I have been since some time around Christmas of ‘89.
Anywho, I plan on getting as many of these as I can get my digital hands on and I’ll post as much as bandwidth allows. Hope you enjoy.
Do you know of any good classic cartoon collections out there? Please click “Add Comment” and leave me a link!
OK, its actually the second sweetest thing. Seriously, though I stumbled on to this great resource called PocketMod whilst reading Life Hacker. PocketMod let’s you build these handy little customizable little booklets to organize your life. I am a big fan of organizers but get frustrated with bulky, cumbersome calendars and don’t have the dough to drop on an iPhone or the like. Also, I have this neurotic block when it comes to starting to use a new journal or organizer. I want them to be so neat and clean that I never use them. This new solution eliminates all of those issues for me and fits into my wallet. Get it a try and I think you’ll dig it.
I love Wes Anderson films and feel that the further down the road he gets the better his work becomes. While The Royal Tenenbaums may never be outdone, Darjeeling is an instant classic. I admit that I had my reservations with Adrian Brody’s introduction into troupe of regulars. To my delight he was fantastic! His ability to play grief stricken, disturbed characters is uncanny and he turned out to be really funny as well. Owen Wilson and Jason Schwartzman are classically uncomfortably and awkwardly charming. I almost leaped in my seat when I saw Bill Murray and literally laughed out loud when I saw Pagoda. The colors and sets in all Wes Anderson films are amazing and this did not fail to please. Beautiful shots through Indian themed backdrops were absolutely classic.
Now for the brass tacks… I realize that this film doesn’t break a lot of new ground and in fact it repeats a few themes familiar in Rushmore and Tenenbaums. However, the transitions make a bit more sense than normal and the characters, though quite odd, are believeable enough to think you could see them in real life. At the end of the day, Darjeeling is basically what you expect when you plug in an Anderson flick. Whimsical, bizarre and completely satisfying.
So a couple of weeks ago on the 2nd or 3rd of July, my wife and I noticed that our tag had expired and needed a new sticker. I got a little freaked out and worried about getting pulled over and fined heavily. I assumed the fine would be substantial if one got busted for such a thing.
My wife assured me, “Nooo, they will see that it is only a couple of days expired and let us off.”
We are between paydays and a little stretched so the decision is made and the dice are rolled. One the next couple of mornings in to work, I strained and scrutinized to see the probability of getting busted. Content with my findings all worry was cast aside and heads held high.
The wife calls, “I just got busted for no seat-belt and they got me for the tag as well!”
Blind justice strikes for the first time.
I get upset for a while, but mostly laugh it off because the fine turns out to be relatively light. I also assumed that once you get popped you are done if you get a tag in a reasonable amount of time, and whether that is true or not we have already commited and have to wait until payday get a new tag.
6 days pass.
I drive to work and have great success on a linux project I have been grinding away at. The day is going great when I get an email from my wife informing me that Comcast just turned off the cable for which they had not been charging us.
Blind justice strikes again.
We have a good laugh and I finish my day and drive home. To my dismay, I get busted for the tag inches before making the turn onto my street. I tried explaining the situation to the officer, but apparently they don’t care if you have already been ticketed for somethings.
Blind justice strikes thrice…
The morals of the story:
- NEVER bank on the benevolence of an individual who gets paid to execute justice.
- NEVER get attached to cable television. It is a drug that wastes your life. But I so miss food network…
- ALWAYS assume police officers have an itch to ticket you and do not care how many prior tickets you have gotten ( unless it means the fine can inch higher… ).
Realized yesterday that I haven’t posted on this site since November! I’m like a plumber with leaky pipes. Fortunately for me, the reason for my absence has been due to a flood of work, both at the bread and butter job and at home building pages for a few folks. It’s funny, but since I moved to Nashville, I have gotten more work from Mississippi than here in Tennessee. And the jobs from back home have paid better. Maybe it’s something I haven’t iron out right here? Hopefully, I’ll get plenty of opportunity to figure it out!
Before I split, let me put in a plug for my wife. She has started baking these delicious cherry cordial cupcakes in preparation for Valentine’s Day. They are chocolate cake with a black cherry buttercream frosting. Incidentally, I just started a new workout regime and am desperate for you to buy her inventory before I am force to consume it. I’ll have images up soon in order to woo you further.
So, I got some “me time” in this weekend and got the old site updated a bit. I have added a games section where I will be displaying a few of my favorite flash games. Also, I have posted a couple of images. Soon I’ll have those images organized in separate albums, but for now… you get a sample.
There they are. The cutest cats around. Also the daily proof of my miraculous allergy healing! Ever since I was a young child, I have been violently allergic to cats. My face would swell and I would sneeze and cough and my throat would get inflamed and threaten to seal up. Pretty crappy. When we moved into our current house, the neighborhood cat would stop by and I would feed him. Every time he made me ill, even when I only briefly came in contact with him. One day I noticed that I was not sniffley at all, so I decided to test it. I picked Waldo {who we called Grievous at the time} and buried my face in his side and inhaled deeply. I then put him down and rubbed my eyes furiously with my hands, because there was cat dander on them. At this point I waited, as Hannah looked on in wide-eyed curiosity. This contact would have nearly killed me a while ago. This time however, I was fine. After weeks of petting on Waldo I am totally cool around cats. So, we got a couple. Now, I am pretty much the happiest guy around and am quite sure that cats are the best pets you can have if you are a home body. That said, Sadie and Elly are complete terrors and are hellbent on systematically destroying my home… but they are really cute.
I’m working on a gallery in which I will be uploading some more pictures of the felines. I’ll keep you posted.
1967 Volkswagen Karmann Ghia for sale in the East Nashville area. She has a 1972 1600cc dual port motor and is in need of a good home with a loving partner.
Images and more information soon!
So, the wife stumbled upon what could possibly be the coolest job in town. Except mine, of course. After finishing up an administrative position at a local high-end architectural boutique, she has been without work for a while now. She has been looking around, but neither of us were interested in her settling for digging ditches or undertaking or the like. Recently, craigslist came to the rescue! A really cool shop right the middle of downtown that makes fantastic cakes and the like caught her eye last weekend, so she gave them a call earlier this week. Turns out that these cake decorating classes she took a while back really paid off. The owners and operators really seem to be like-minded people with Hannah, so we were both pretty excited about the prospect. Well, the phone interview went off without a hitch, they were pleased with Hannah’s experience and potential, and Hannah was really impressed with their talk as well. Finally, she went in on Tuesday for the really real interview and totally fell in love with the place. I got to see it yesterday and was surprised by the size of the place, not to mention the volume and complexity of orders they are currently taking care of. Now at the end of the week, Hannah is the newest cake decorator at “The French Confection.” I planned to name this post: Hannah “Popeye” Lehner. But I was informed that the reference was a little too obscure. {Popeye was the main detective in The French Connection, Hackman played him} At any rate, should you need a marvelous wedding cake or some other delicious pastry for a special occasion, look no further than The French Confection the Nashville. Keep my wife in a job!
Lately, I have felt really strongly that my approach to concerns and hard times has been a bit flawed. I get stuck in a pit and cry out to God about my needs. He pulls me out and I thank Him and move on. Every six months or so the cycle repeats. Well, I think I have found the exit strategy! Recently, we have been snowed in by some remarkably bad financial decisions that just decided to reach up and bite us on the arse. Instead of just fasting and crying out that God just fix it (not that there is anything wrong with that), I have felt compelled to worship and commune (feast even!) with the Father and remember His affections and faithfulness. Yesterday for instance, I was looking through the Bible hoping to find a pat on the back and maybe a thousand dollars I may have left between the pages. What I found was Psalm 145:
Great is the Lord and highly to be praised; and His greatness is [so vast and deep as to be] unsearchable.
One generation shall laud Your works to another and shall declare Your mighty acts.
On the glorious splendor of Your majesty and on Your wondrous works I will meditate.
In the economy of Heaven, your pocketbook is not the limit or the boundary. The limit is formed by our willingness to commune and align with the heart and direction of our Father, who is faithful. He loves us quite a lot and is constantly in the field making paths for His children. He is our breaker and desires our success. Our dreams and ambitions are not birth in us to create opportunity for failure, but to be the launch into something far greater than the dream or the ambition: a kingdom burden. I am discovering that His burden is light and easily carried, because it creates life.
For My yoke is wholesome (useful, good–not harsh, hard, sharp, or pressing, but comfortable, gracious, and pleasant), and My burden is light and easy to be borne.
His burden gives us direction and opens channels through which the kingdom can be injected into this world. I believe His burden is what empowers us to deliver healing to the sick, life to the dead and dying, freedom to the oppressed, and salvation to those that have lost their way.
Daily His grace and affections undo me and knock me on my rear.