[Probably Illegal] Record!

I've awoken from a thirteen hour slumber... after a twenty-seven hour workday. This was following two thirteen hour workdays in which I got home at 3:30AM. I was told company policy states no one can work more than fourteen hours, and I have a small inkling that OSHA standards/regulations are similar, but I think all my hard work is about to pay off big time come Monday when our fleet of green trucks will start rolling down the streets of Seattle.

I left the office only for a nearby McDonald's (well, technically two as the first one shut their drive-thru lights literally right after we pulled up to the ordering speaker/screen) and to visit our sister office six blocks away. Luckily someone was kind enough to deliver me breakfast yesterday morning... so that I could keep on chugging along.

I'll be going back today -- but this time it will be a good weekend trip as the company is hosting a BBQ kick-off event. Nothing like free food to start off the weekend!

People Unrelated To Me

Bobby Engram has signed with the Kansas City Chiefs. A constant with the Seahawks over the past eight years, his fantastic hands and clutch third down play made him a personal favorite. He wasn't the fastest or strongest or create highlight reel material, but his consistent performance from week to week was in stark contrast to the streaky team that surrounded him. At 36 I hoped he would retire a Seahawk, but unfortunately that will not be the case. The Seahawks will miss him, Seattle will miss him, and my Madden game will miss him. At least he didn't go to Detroit, to which we have already lost Julian Peterson, Maurice Morris, and Will Heller this offseason.

Touchdown, Engram!

On the opposite end of my spectrum, Scarlett Johansson has been confirmed to play the Black Widow in Iron Man 2. This is the unfortunate result of Emily Blunt (from The Devil Wears Prada) being unavailable for the role due to her contractual obligation to star in a new Gulliver's Travels opposite... Jack Black. As some of you may know, I'm a big Iron Man fan. And it's not that I had someone else in mind in the role of Black Widow (a Russian spy turned American superhero), but I simply am not a fan of Scarlet Johansson. How can I put this delicately... costar Mickey Rourke's face is Batman Begins compared to Johansson's Batman & Robin.

To me, Scarlett Johansson has the least attractive face in Hollywood. I'm trying really hard to think of someone's I like less, but the only people that come to mind are Rosie O'Donnell and the Queen from Aliens (although Sarah Jessica Parker should have made the cut -- I just couldn't bring myself to Google Images her picture). The fact remains, Scarlett's mugg (made even more unattractive by her voice) will be emblazoned upon whatever movie theater screen I to get to during the movie's opening weekend as well as any later viewings on my TV. To top it all off, the Black Widow is one of the few characters in comicdom that doesn't wear a mask. I didn't think anything short of filming the sequel in claymation could make me want to see Iron Man 2 less, but Marvel and Jon Favreau sure proved me wrong.

Compare and... well, not too much contrast.

New Record!

I just got home from work...

Untimely Breakdown

I awoke this morning to find that at some point during the night my automatic watch had stopped working -- well, actually at exactly 1:40:37AM according to the frozen hands. I was pretty upset about this because I had just spent $20 last week getting it repaired. The original problem was that the date pusher button had popped out, and simply would not stay in. It turns out this was caused by a missing c-clip, which does exactly what its name suggest: a c-shaped piece that clips onto the pusher's bar to make sure it doesn't pop out. As I left the repair shop, I was given a warning: they couldn't find a c-clip in the watch. Either it never had one, or it was floating around somewhere within the inner workings. If it was the latter, it would be extremely expensive to get out because it would require systematically taking the watch apart piece by piece to find the clip. But I wouldn't have to worry about that -- unless my watch stopped working.

My first reaction was to smash my watch against something to see if I could dislodge the clip, but after hammering it into a myriad of objects ranging from my hand to an armchair I gave up. I put the watch on my desk and stared at it. If it cost $20 to put in a clip the size of a large grain of sand, it would probably cost more than the watch itself to perform some sort of part extraction. So with nothing to lose, I decided to open it up myself.


I was ready for anything -- except for how to open the thing up. Luckily we live in the internet age and after five seconds of Googling, I managed to get the back off using a Dr. Grip pen as my unscrewing tool. You could say that thanks to the internet, it really took no time at all.


What the heck was I looking at? I saw the automatic winder, some gears, and tiny screws; they were... minute. I played with the crown and day pusher for a little while to see how they worked from the inside (gaining no knowledge whatsoever), and after killing some time with that I was ready to go with my tools.


Fortunetely for me, I was hit by a timely jolt of [what I'm not afraid to admit as] genius. A c-clip is a very small piece, and it supposedly loose and causing havoc probably meant that it was dislodgable. If not by physical blunt trauma, then perhaps with the power of wind! I assumed that with the cramped confines of the watch combined with the small size of the clip, it would probably be like Twister in there (the clip, of course, being the cow) with my friend, a can of compressed air. So I stuck the red tube into the only part that I thought could be a viable opening...


...and pulled the trigger. Nothing flew out, but the previously motionless gold wheel started to turn! I flipped the watch around in my hand and sure enough, the second hand was ticking away -- a heartbeat. I had successfully performed a watch repair. I looked around for someone to hand me a merit badge, but the only one I could celebrate with was my Blund bear -- and he doesn't give out merit badges for just anything. I had fixed my watch, but really it begs the question of its quality if it just randomly stops working. Only time will tell if it happen again, but if it does I'll be ready for it -- although I'll be pretty ticked tocked.

Could Be Worse

Hrm... not too shabby. I have a three paneled desk and a brand new mesh chair. The door has a window, so it's not like I'm totally shut out from the world. And yes, it's almost 12:30AM but I'm still going strong. I probably have another half hour left until this process I started will be completed - I very much hope it doesn't crash midway through.

I'm actually not in that bad of a mood, which is probably due to the fact that I was able to engage in baseball activities for the first six hours of my day. The PSSBL held the second of three tryouts this morning, and I volunteered to help. Through the course of the day, I was able to throw long toss, take infield and outfield, hit, and finally take throws at first base for pretty much the whole last hour (impressing people with my capable leather, I might add). The weather cooperated pretty nicely as it remained sunny throughout. The field (BCC's; my favorite field that I've played on) was pretty wet from overnight showers and my socks were soaked five minutes in, but it was a small price to pay for one of the best days of 2009 so far.

Good Bye Office...

I'm moving into an office at our newly renovated Operations facility tomorrow. Can't say I'm going to miss this current one, which sits 3 people and is half the size of my bedroom. Half of my desk is actually a counter. The shelf doors don't work well, but it wouldn't matter anyway because they currently hold old papers and garbaging supplies - used garbaging supplies. I do have a very large window though that looks out at four dumpsters, which are frequently invaded by seagulls/pigeons and occasionally infested by rats. And yep, my office chair is essentially a waiting room chair while my roomies have either a nice leather executive chair, or a mesh manager's chair. One of them is the VP of Operations though...

You might think I'm getting an upgrade tomorrow, but I'm moving into a second story windowless room. I'm told that a window will be put in eventually, except that it will open up into the floorspace below where I will be able to see garbagemen congegrate and mill about. I haven't seen it yet, but I was told the room was originally supposed to be the Asset Manager's storage room, so my hopes are not that high.

Oh, and you might be asking, "Don't you mean Monday, David?" To which I would chuckle and respond by telling you that I'll probably be working more than eight hours tomorrow. I digress though... Good Bye, office! I'll miss you with your large windows and clean smell despite being adjacent to all the garbage trucks and a row of dumpsters.

Dream Car

Many people hold a nice car as one of the big goals to reach in life, next to having a large house and a trophy wife. Many of this group aim for something along the lines of BMW, Audi, or Mercedes -- Ferarri or Aston Martin if you're doing it really big. To me, a vehicle has always been a four-wheeled contraption that got me from point A to point B. While there have certainly been cars that I've been fascinated with (the VW Beetle in high school, Audi TT in college, and more recently Tesla or Aptera's electric offerings), getting a car has never been number one on my priority list -- it may or may not beat out a soft-serve ice cream machine. But if someone handed me a large pile of cash and told me I had to use it to buy myself a car, I don't think there's any doubt in my mind what I would begin searching for:

1990 Toyota Corolla station wagon, sky blue

My family had one for as long as I can remember (which, as it apparently turns out, is when I five-ish years old) until my dad sold it after I left for college for some ludicrously low price of four hundred dollars (probably a gross underestimate). But man, if I had the money I would find one of these babies and be satisfied with my whip. Any money left over would go to pimping this car out -- not with plasma TVs and Playstations or even NOS to make it go faster, but rather simply with reliable brakes. That's my dream car.

The above picture is one snapped on my cellphone in the Albertson's parking lot recently during one of the few chances I get to see one of these things anymore. The below picture is the only one I have of what used to be my very own:

Cassette -> CD player adapter necessary.

Notice the simple yet well thought out console plan, the cruise control button and the crusty gear shifter -- crafty late 80' detailing and ingenuity still hold up today. I can't help but let out a sigh of longing after viewing the above -- one day perhaps, one day...

Joys of Bussing

I like riding the bus. I don't have to worry about the stresses of driving (lane changes mainly) nor deal with traffic. I get to occasionally talk to people I would otherwise never meet (sometimes a bad thing), randomly see a friend I haven't in a while (usually a good thing), or if I'm really lucky spot a local celebrity. I feel good about helping the environment (or at least that's what the Metro posters tell me) while at the same time not have to pay for gas (nor bus fees with my pass). And while waiting at bus stops, I get a chance to work on my tan. What could be better than that?

Watching Men, Max, and Brothers

I saw Watchmen in theaters, but the other two movies make me glad that I have enough self restraint to wait for them to come to Netflix. If I dropped $10 on every movie that looked interesting to me from commercials or trailers, I could probably no longer afford trips to the OCB.

Who watches the Watchmen?
I did, and I'd have to say it's pretty much ripped (although condensed) from the comic book -- with one big exception (p.s. it's near the end). Zach Snyder (300) has taken the effort to almost transfer the frames right out of the "graphic novel" (as Watchmen is more widely known as) keeping intact the look of the characters, settings, and time. I finished watching the movie with the same feeling I had after my friend G lent me the book -- nyeh.

If you're expecting a traditional superhero movie you'll be surprised. The good guys aren't that good, the movie is ultra violent, and it's not a fairy tale ending where the heroes valiantly triumph over evil. Starting with a history of a twisted timeline, the movie is well paced with continual switches to the past that helps us understand the characters and the world they live in. While a comic book not suited for "Summer Blockbuster" status, Watchmen is a sweeping mystery without a predictable ending that mixes action (mostly good), sex, special effects, and a bad-ass ginger. Because it is so different than everything out there, I'll give it:
My Score: 7/10, Catch in Theaters

Which brings me to Payne... Max Payne that is.
You'd think a movie based on a shoot 'em up game that revolves around "bullet time" (made famous by The Matrix -- essentially slow motion) would be a solid shoot 'em up movie that revolved around "bullet time". Unfortunately for us, that is not the case. I played Max Payne years ago, so the only part of the story I remember is that his family is murdered and Max (played by Mark Wahlberg in the movie) goes looking for answers and revenge.

What we get from the movie is a confusingly loud cacaphony of explosions (not from when things blow up, more from when the sky turns to fire), angels, Chris O'Donnell for ten minutes of screen time, and a lot of unanswered questions -- the biggest one to me being: why did Beau Bridges stop Max Payne from being impaled in the face by a drugged up super soldier when he wanted Max dead and was actually there to kill him? I mean, besides the fact that the whole mystery needed to be explained by BB (to us). The film starts off painfully slow, and I can't say it really picked up to a point where it became enjoyable. I can say it got weirder and weirder, but unfortunately that will only negatively affect:
My Score: 1/10, Not Worth Your Time

... Step-Brothers.
I had a small inkling to see this movie in theaters where I had missed out on Talladega Nights and Blades of Glory, both Will Farrell movies that which I really enjoyed. However, it ended up being a good call because while having some funny parts, Step-Brothers is not a very good movie. I felt the deleted scenes (as played by themselves) were more enjoyable to watch than the actual movie because then I wouldn't have to spend my time viewing the ridiculous familial interactions of the ridiculous characters.
My Score: 4/10, Rent (if you've got nothing else to)

Wrong...

End my ridiculous hours at work have not. Let's recount my times for the last eight workdays:

Saturday: 9:30A to 5:30 (I don't work Saturdays...)
Monday: 1P to 1 (oh yes, AM)
Tuesday: 2 to 12
Wednesday: 2 to 11
Thursday: 2 to 11:45
Friday: 12:30 to 12:30
Sunday: 4:20 to 5:15 (nor Sundays, and it turns out I didn't need to go in...)
Monday: 9:30 to 6:30, 9:30 to 12:30 (yep, had to go back)

And thus, at 1:15 AM I have finally come home and can let sleep claim me. In theory we're in the home stretch of getting service started in our new areas, but I will say this: this had better not keep up...

And, like my last bitching post, I'll end with another recently released trailer. Not as good as the Terminator: Salvation one, but definetely has me pumped for May:

Star Trek Trailer Uploaded by Lyricis

Ehehe the lady doctor from House (not Olivia Wilde) is Kirk's mom. And Winona Ryder is Spock's. And I get a haircut tomorrow!

Cursed Zippers!

I've had two zippers break on me in the past three days. The first was on my Reebok duffel bag which has faithfully accompanied me to sporting activities and the gym for nearly six years. The second was on my beloved Seahawks lunchpail which I bought at J.C. Penny three years ago for $9.99 (plus tax), having spotted it from across the store whilst shopping for underwear.

To make matters worse the best option for a replacement duffel bag right now at SportsAuthority.com is a model called the "Ballbusta"...

Grapefruit Pink for a higher level of ridiculousness.

Pretty Disgusted...

As you might be able to ascertain from the title of this post, I'm pretty disgusted right now. Leaving work Friday night (at 10PM), I went home thinking I would have to come in on Saturday for only a couple hours to finish up a project. Going into work on Saturday sucks enough, but it got exponentially worse as the hours ticked by and I left eight hours after I got there. At the very least I was done -- or so I thought.

I had a dentist appointment yesterday and rather than go home for an hour before heading out to work, I went to the office immediately after my teeth cleaning. I got to work an hour early, thinking I would be able to get out an hour early later that evening. Turns out the project I was working on wasn't exactly done, and with the deadline the next day I would have to get crackin' on it. Problem is because we only have one software license for the program we use (it's really this reason that is prompting my 2PM - 10PM shift) I wasn't able to get onto the computer my first three and a half hours there. No problem though, at the very least I could finish by 9:30 or 10 and be out of there with minimal overtime.

Let me explain to you how the mapping program works. I input some parameters and then let the computer process the data. Unfortunately it takes a seemingly large amount of time for the computer to chug through the data and spit out the result. As I got closer to my usual stop time of 10PM I got more and more worried, as the whole workflow was tediously slow at best. Throw in a few computer crashes and the fact that one of the monitor's I'm using decided to start randomly shutting off that day, and the result is that I didn't get out until 1AM. A 12 hour workday, which could have been potentially saved if I had been able to start work when I got there. Best part? No overtime pay as I'm on salary.

Oh well, it's over and I don't foresee any other deadlines that would require overtime in the near future. I'm just wondering if I can take a day off later without cutting into my PTOs...

In the meantime, I can ogle over the new Terminator: Salvation trailer. I wasn't expecting too much after T3, but this sequel is shaping up to be pretty bad-ass. There's a rumor that Arnold will have a small role in this movie (cameo?), which would be pretty cool. We'll have to wait until May 21st to find out though.

Terminator: Salvation Trailer Uploaded by Lyricis