Happy Independence Day and Weekend Update
Happy Independence Day
Yes, gentle readers; it is our 230th anniversary of our Declaration of Independence from Great Britain. I hope you enjoy the holiday and are able to reflect on the true meaning of the day.
Remember, freedom is never free. It has a cost and always will. Be sure to thank a veteran for the freedom you enjoy today. Veterans always pay the biggest costs.
Programming Notes and Reality Check Part 2
I had planned to offer you a gianormous blog posting today with multiple photos including a new Babe of the Moment.
Unfortunately, that will not happen. The new Verizon modem that was supposed to be delivered yesterday did not arrive. It will not arrive until tomorrow, maybe. It seems the package was missent or left in a shipping facility, Verizon’s or UPS’s, for a day and it was delayed. All of which leads to me filing an extra blog posting this coming weekend, probably Saturday with the photos and minimal editorial writing.
I checked the status of my Verizon order on Saturday morning. You have no idea how surprised I was to learn that Verizon had activated my DSL phone circuit on June 29th. I was so less pleased to see that the delivery date for the software had changed to July 5th.
I checked again this morning. My software and modem are now at a local UPS facility and I can expect that they will be delivered sometime tomorrow while I am work.
You must admit gentle readers that your humble scribe has experienced more than his fair share of bad karma with the changing of DSL service vendors.
I will be busy tomorrow installing the new Verizon software and spending way too much time on the line with tech support dealing with the setup. Then I have a bunch of large newsletter files to download that I have been saving for three weeks now. I will also be sending out a monster email to let everyone know what the new email address is and to make the changes now. This all means that I won’t be tossing out a posting tomorrow night.
Sorry, but we all have to make some sacrifices in the name of progress. Think of no blog tomorrow as being one of the very small sacrifices.
Visitors
We had a bunch of foreign visitors this past week. I decided to list them in the order of their appearance. This seems as logical as any other method so here they are: Australia, Canada [2], United Kingdom, New Zealand [2], Ireland, Israel, Japan, Indonesia, and Norway.
The total visitor count for the month was 247; not as good as May but still a creditable month for 2006.
Anime Expo 2006
I went to the Anime Expo 2006 on Sunday. Doug thought that would be a good day to catch the show.
Catch the show was the operative phrase on Sunday morning and afternoon. If you have ever seem photos of people who dress up as characters when they go to a Star Trek Convention then you have a general idea of how many adults were dressed.
The Expo was held in the Anaheim Convention Center. It reminded me a great deal of the mammoth Comic-Con in San Diego every Summer. There were a handful of game and manga publishers there and a bunch of vendors who were selling everything from DVDs to costumes and makeup.
The Expo’s hours of 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM seemed odd compared to Comic-Con’s hours of 10:00 AM to 9:00 PM. But, I suppose when you are across the street from Disneyland that you need to accommodate those who want to visit the theme park as well.
This was the fifteenth anniversary of the Expo. I think it is smaller than Comic-Con, maybe because of the more limited fan base, most of whom seem to be Asian Americans and females.
I was walking in from the parking structure behind a mother and three young women [early teenagers]. One of them turned around and asked me what floor in the structure we were on. She recognized me from the structure elevator. Of course she would, she pushed me aside, even though I had been waiting longer, to get in the elevator. She was wearing some small horns on her head and had a fox tail coming out of the top of her jeans. She had blond hair.
I told her third floor.
Our cars were on the fourth floor; learn to respect your elders for we may be useful to you some day grasshopper.
As Bluto from ANIMAL HOUSE once said, “Don’t get mad; get even.” I think that was from his famous “When the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor” soliloquy.
Naturally, I have some interesting photos but I have been unable to upload them yet so this is another backlog for the blog once I get DSL service in action.
I have watched a lot of Star Trek so I could recognize who the people were trying to be at a STar Trek event. That was easy. At Anime 2006, I could only guess at what some of the people were since I am not much of a graphic novel fan or much for the anime cartoons. I did see one man dressed up as a Transformer, Optimus Prime. I could recognize him because Doug had Transformers when he was young but then every boy did.
I could recognize the girls who were dressed up as Japanese high school students with their short plaid skirts, white shirts with ties, and knee socks. This was easy. For a while, it looked like class photo day at school.
There was one young woman who dressed up as a French maid with fish net stockings.
Then, I came to the characters from either the manga or from cartoons or possibly both. I had no clue. I saw one young woman, well I think she was a young woman, who was wearing a kimono, had a long white hair wig with little horns, and her skin was blue. She was very pleased when I asked if I could take her photo. I guess being asked for your photo while you are in costume is a sign that your costume is good.
The Anime Expo did have some booth bimbos but they were not on the same level as Comic-Con. Yes, I do have photos of them as well but they will have to wait until DSL is restored.
Friday at the Office
Actually, my Friday started off very well when the traffic news reader [Vera Jimenez on KCBS 2, www.kcbs2.com] on the local early morning television news show had a bit of skin peer out from under the bottom of her sweater that rose up while she was telling everyone that traffic this morning would be light and the drive to work would be good.
Of course the drive would be good Vera; a firm belly is a perfect way to start the day.
Friday at the office was an interesting day.
Not many of the staff were focused on their work at hand. Most, including me, were thinking about the weekend and what they would be doing. Perfectly logical reaction.
It is now Summer at the beach so the dress in the courtyard for the smokers has improved from my point of view. There were three or four who were sporting belly shirts and they were worth more than a second glance since they did not have any fat to spoil the views. That was sweet.
The Los Angeles Times [our local major newspaper] ran a feature today on what it called “Sausage Casing Girls.” The article tended to decry how young women were wearing may too tight clothes that made them look like sausage casings. It said that this style was not flattering and the extra weight was neither attractive nor healthy for them.
There was one young woman [27] who said that she was “fat, cute chick.” At 230 pounds / 104 kilos and 68 inches / 178 centimeters tall, she certainly was fat but she could never be cute in my mind. I guess she has no self esteem troubles.
After seeing a photo of her, I gathered a new sense of calm about not dating while I am writing the dissertation.
Back to Friday.
Since it was sunny and Summer, there was more flesh visible than in the Winter and Fall. No surprises here. That meant that there were more opportunities to see bad tattoos.
I did see one cosmetics class student with a clipper ship tattooed to her bicep. It immediately reminded me of one of my gunner’s mates on the good ship USS Leonard F. Mason. He had clipper ships on both biceps. He also had a lot of other tats over most of his upper body. The tats continued on up her arm and spilled out over her shoulder and then ran down the back and front of her body until they disappeared under her black dress. That was enough for me.
Dissertation
I worked on the dissertation this weekend. I did get some writing in but I did not write as much as I had hoped I would be able to write. Between the Summer and other things, I got distracted.
This blog took over two hours to write. I know it may not seem like it took two hours to write but it did. You should try writing your own blog sometime. It is often difficult to make a dull day or experience sound interesting.
Komyo Ga Tsuji
That’s the name of the historical samurai drama I have been watching lately on television. I have no idea what it means. The show translates most of everything else except the title and the commercials. The subtitles are fairly good translations but every once in a while you notice a translation that was done literally and not idiomatically.
The drama is based on the rise of a samurai during the warring era of Japan in the late sixteenth century. When I started watching, the samurai had only a handful of vassals and a 400 koku stipend and now he has a large retinue of followers and a 1,300 koku stipend. I believe that koku is a measure of rice since metallic money was only coming into circulation widely in Japan. He has an independent wife who seems to be the smarter one of the couple sometimes.
I find the series interesting for several reasons. I now have a better understanding of some of Kurosawa’s samurai epics since they were set in the same period. Some of the characters in this drama later, chronologically speaking, showed up in the Immortal Yi Soon-Shin series that I watched last year. For example, the founder of the great Tokugawa Shogunate was only a minor or middle level lord in this series. The principle character’s immediate and middle level lord appears to be Lord Hideyoshi who later launched the Japanese invasion of Korea.
Their clan lord, Nobunaga, is certifiably crazy; he thinks he is a god. From history, I know that Nobunaga leads his army against several other clans and dies rather badly.
This has me wondering how Hideyoshi and the rest survive. I am thinking that some where along the way in the series they will have an epiphany and change sides. Changing sides does not seem to be so bad of a solution to a difficult moral problem. Surprisingly, leaving a bad lord to join a good lord who may be on the winning side does not result in a loss of honor.
Anyway that was my weekend. I hope you all had a good weekend.
Be well and stay happy.
Yes, gentle readers; it is our 230th anniversary of our Declaration of Independence from Great Britain. I hope you enjoy the holiday and are able to reflect on the true meaning of the day.
Remember, freedom is never free. It has a cost and always will. Be sure to thank a veteran for the freedom you enjoy today. Veterans always pay the biggest costs.
Programming Notes and Reality Check Part 2
I had planned to offer you a gianormous blog posting today with multiple photos including a new Babe of the Moment.
Unfortunately, that will not happen. The new Verizon modem that was supposed to be delivered yesterday did not arrive. It will not arrive until tomorrow, maybe. It seems the package was missent or left in a shipping facility, Verizon’s or UPS’s, for a day and it was delayed. All of which leads to me filing an extra blog posting this coming weekend, probably Saturday with the photos and minimal editorial writing.
I checked the status of my Verizon order on Saturday morning. You have no idea how surprised I was to learn that Verizon had activated my DSL phone circuit on June 29th. I was so less pleased to see that the delivery date for the software had changed to July 5th.
I checked again this morning. My software and modem are now at a local UPS facility and I can expect that they will be delivered sometime tomorrow while I am work.
You must admit gentle readers that your humble scribe has experienced more than his fair share of bad karma with the changing of DSL service vendors.
I will be busy tomorrow installing the new Verizon software and spending way too much time on the line with tech support dealing with the setup. Then I have a bunch of large newsletter files to download that I have been saving for three weeks now. I will also be sending out a monster email to let everyone know what the new email address is and to make the changes now. This all means that I won’t be tossing out a posting tomorrow night.
Sorry, but we all have to make some sacrifices in the name of progress. Think of no blog tomorrow as being one of the very small sacrifices.
Visitors
We had a bunch of foreign visitors this past week. I decided to list them in the order of their appearance. This seems as logical as any other method so here they are: Australia, Canada [2], United Kingdom, New Zealand [2], Ireland, Israel, Japan, Indonesia, and Norway.
The total visitor count for the month was 247; not as good as May but still a creditable month for 2006.
Anime Expo 2006
I went to the Anime Expo 2006 on Sunday. Doug thought that would be a good day to catch the show.
Catch the show was the operative phrase on Sunday morning and afternoon. If you have ever seem photos of people who dress up as characters when they go to a Star Trek Convention then you have a general idea of how many adults were dressed.
The Expo was held in the Anaheim Convention Center. It reminded me a great deal of the mammoth Comic-Con in San Diego every Summer. There were a handful of game and manga publishers there and a bunch of vendors who were selling everything from DVDs to costumes and makeup.
The Expo’s hours of 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM seemed odd compared to Comic-Con’s hours of 10:00 AM to 9:00 PM. But, I suppose when you are across the street from Disneyland that you need to accommodate those who want to visit the theme park as well.
This was the fifteenth anniversary of the Expo. I think it is smaller than Comic-Con, maybe because of the more limited fan base, most of whom seem to be Asian Americans and females.
I was walking in from the parking structure behind a mother and three young women [early teenagers]. One of them turned around and asked me what floor in the structure we were on. She recognized me from the structure elevator. Of course she would, she pushed me aside, even though I had been waiting longer, to get in the elevator. She was wearing some small horns on her head and had a fox tail coming out of the top of her jeans. She had blond hair.
I told her third floor.
Our cars were on the fourth floor; learn to respect your elders for we may be useful to you some day grasshopper.
As Bluto from ANIMAL HOUSE once said, “Don’t get mad; get even.” I think that was from his famous “When the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor” soliloquy.
Naturally, I have some interesting photos but I have been unable to upload them yet so this is another backlog for the blog once I get DSL service in action.
I have watched a lot of Star Trek so I could recognize who the people were trying to be at a STar Trek event. That was easy. At Anime 2006, I could only guess at what some of the people were since I am not much of a graphic novel fan or much for the anime cartoons. I did see one man dressed up as a Transformer, Optimus Prime. I could recognize him because Doug had Transformers when he was young but then every boy did.
I could recognize the girls who were dressed up as Japanese high school students with their short plaid skirts, white shirts with ties, and knee socks. This was easy. For a while, it looked like class photo day at school.
There was one young woman who dressed up as a French maid with fish net stockings.
Then, I came to the characters from either the manga or from cartoons or possibly both. I had no clue. I saw one young woman, well I think she was a young woman, who was wearing a kimono, had a long white hair wig with little horns, and her skin was blue. She was very pleased when I asked if I could take her photo. I guess being asked for your photo while you are in costume is a sign that your costume is good.
The Anime Expo did have some booth bimbos but they were not on the same level as Comic-Con. Yes, I do have photos of them as well but they will have to wait until DSL is restored.
Friday at the Office
Actually, my Friday started off very well when the traffic news reader [Vera Jimenez on KCBS 2, www.kcbs2.com] on the local early morning television news show had a bit of skin peer out from under the bottom of her sweater that rose up while she was telling everyone that traffic this morning would be light and the drive to work would be good.
Of course the drive would be good Vera; a firm belly is a perfect way to start the day.
Friday at the office was an interesting day.
Not many of the staff were focused on their work at hand. Most, including me, were thinking about the weekend and what they would be doing. Perfectly logical reaction.
It is now Summer at the beach so the dress in the courtyard for the smokers has improved from my point of view. There were three or four who were sporting belly shirts and they were worth more than a second glance since they did not have any fat to spoil the views. That was sweet.
The Los Angeles Times [our local major newspaper] ran a feature today on what it called “Sausage Casing Girls.” The article tended to decry how young women were wearing may too tight clothes that made them look like sausage casings. It said that this style was not flattering and the extra weight was neither attractive nor healthy for them.
There was one young woman [27] who said that she was “fat, cute chick.” At 230 pounds / 104 kilos and 68 inches / 178 centimeters tall, she certainly was fat but she could never be cute in my mind. I guess she has no self esteem troubles.
After seeing a photo of her, I gathered a new sense of calm about not dating while I am writing the dissertation.
Back to Friday.
Since it was sunny and Summer, there was more flesh visible than in the Winter and Fall. No surprises here. That meant that there were more opportunities to see bad tattoos.
I did see one cosmetics class student with a clipper ship tattooed to her bicep. It immediately reminded me of one of my gunner’s mates on the good ship USS Leonard F. Mason. He had clipper ships on both biceps. He also had a lot of other tats over most of his upper body. The tats continued on up her arm and spilled out over her shoulder and then ran down the back and front of her body until they disappeared under her black dress. That was enough for me.
Dissertation
I worked on the dissertation this weekend. I did get some writing in but I did not write as much as I had hoped I would be able to write. Between the Summer and other things, I got distracted.
This blog took over two hours to write. I know it may not seem like it took two hours to write but it did. You should try writing your own blog sometime. It is often difficult to make a dull day or experience sound interesting.
Komyo Ga Tsuji
That’s the name of the historical samurai drama I have been watching lately on television. I have no idea what it means. The show translates most of everything else except the title and the commercials. The subtitles are fairly good translations but every once in a while you notice a translation that was done literally and not idiomatically.
The drama is based on the rise of a samurai during the warring era of Japan in the late sixteenth century. When I started watching, the samurai had only a handful of vassals and a 400 koku stipend and now he has a large retinue of followers and a 1,300 koku stipend. I believe that koku is a measure of rice since metallic money was only coming into circulation widely in Japan. He has an independent wife who seems to be the smarter one of the couple sometimes.
I find the series interesting for several reasons. I now have a better understanding of some of Kurosawa’s samurai epics since they were set in the same period. Some of the characters in this drama later, chronologically speaking, showed up in the Immortal Yi Soon-Shin series that I watched last year. For example, the founder of the great Tokugawa Shogunate was only a minor or middle level lord in this series. The principle character’s immediate and middle level lord appears to be Lord Hideyoshi who later launched the Japanese invasion of Korea.
Their clan lord, Nobunaga, is certifiably crazy; he thinks he is a god. From history, I know that Nobunaga leads his army against several other clans and dies rather badly.
This has me wondering how Hideyoshi and the rest survive. I am thinking that some where along the way in the series they will have an epiphany and change sides. Changing sides does not seem to be so bad of a solution to a difficult moral problem. Surprisingly, leaving a bad lord to join a good lord who may be on the winning side does not result in a loss of honor.
Anyway that was my weekend. I hope you all had a good weekend.
Be well and stay happy.
posted by Chuck Reinhardt at 7:31 PM
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