He's Alive

Chuck’s Alive
Yes, gentle readers, Chuck is alive today. He is making great progress towards a full recovery.

Anniversary Date
Yesterday was the one year anniversary of the blog. I tossed up 234 posting and, surprisingly, they all stuck which is amazing.

There have been around 2,400 total visitors over the year. Obviously, some of you are regulars and you know who you are.

I do appreciate your continued support and hope that you find this interesting reading. If you find what I have to say interesting, please pass along the blog’s address because I can never have too many readers.

If you do have a question, go ahead and post it as comment. I will answer them eventually.

Errant Visitors
I have had some errant visitors over the year. Most of those who stumbled in here in error were probably looking for help in balance their personal checking accounts or wanted to reorder checks or something like that.

The Princess
The Princess called me this morning. She was looking for some information and did not ask for any money. Always a wonderful conversation for a parent; those of you who are parents or will be parents, please take note of this event.
The Princess was looking to get a birthday gift and wanted Dad’s opinion. I gave her my opinion and offered some further suggestions that would broaden the depth of her answers.

I found out she went out on Sunday night with a new name, Mark. Mark works for Cingular doing something. Either I didn’t listen that closely or we had a crummy cell phone connection on Verizon or my stomach was growling.

It is a small world even in Atlanta. Mark knows 17 Beer David [there’s an unshort story that I may tell you all one day]. 17 Beer David is the current boy friend, I think anyway, of the Princess’ roommate.

Doug
The Big Guy called today to see if his father was among the living. I told him that I was recovering nicely and thought that I would be ready in all respects for another run at the Original Tommy’s Burgers this coming Saturday.

We talked about whether to have a lunch or a dinner meal. Doug ended up saying lunch would be fine. It works well in my schedule.

Next Saturday will be our last meal at Tommy’s for a long while.

Tour de California
Did you know my home town is the final leg and finish line of the first Tour de California bicycle race?

Yes, it is. The race is in February and ends with a sprint type of race in Redondo Beach on February 26th in the middle of day to afternoon. The course will be close to the ocean so it should be nice.

I had thought about walking down to watch the race until I read in the newspaper that the city was expecting around 50,000 or more fans. I had no idea there were that many bicycle racing fans locally.

Time for me to rethink that decision.

At least, I still have almost a month to figure out what I will do. There is a NASCAR Nextel Cup series race in Southern California on the 26th also. Most likely, I will be writing on my dissertation.


Be well and stay happy.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year
Happy New Year gentle readers.

Yes, I know it is the Lunar New Year. But, why should I pass up a perfectly great opportunity to celebrate and party?

My Weekend Non-Events
I supposed that some of you managed to read my Weekend Preview from last Thursday that had some of my plans for things to do this weekend.

I was going to go to an art gallery show opening, hit the Original Tommy’s Burgers with Doug for a farewell to the Mega Combo meals, go to the cinema, and meet with my dean about the dissertation.

All of those plans went down the drain when I came down with a bout of stomach flu or distress.

The only place I went this weekend was the bathroom and often.

I could have spent the weekend there but it is very difficult to talk on the phone when the exhaust fan is running loudly.

I was popping Pepto-Bismol tablets like they wear pink M&Ms. I think I swallowed enough chalk like stuff to coat a blackboard.

The Pepto-Bismol tablets were labeled as chewable. Great; so why did the box say let the tablet dissolve on my tongue? Screw dissolving; I wanted relief now so I chewed those little suckers and swallowed them in small chunks.

The art gallery show opening is now behind me and I can not make up for lost time. H. G. Wells wouldn’t rent me his time machine. If I did rent the time machine, I could certainly straighten out a lot of messes in my life.

Can’t worry about the past anymore.

I will be meeting with the dean on Tuesday evening so there will be no blog posting for Tuesday. My meeting with the dean is at 6:00 PM and should last an hour or so. The drive home is a good hour. I need to eat so dinner sucks up another hour plus of my time so that puts me at 9:00 PM or later.

By now, I haven’t even checked on my email nor done any online chatting yet. Actually, my online chatting should be down for the next week or so. The majority of my regular conversation partners are Chinese and they will be offline with their families for the Winter Holiday following the Lunar New Year.

I did not see any films this weekend. I did not want to get caught in a crowded theater when I had to make a quick exit. Hopefully, MATCH POINT will still be in the cinema next weekend. Doug said it is a great film that is well worth seeing.

If not, there will be DVDs on sale soon then.

Doug and I had planned to make a pilgrimage of sorts to the Original Tommy’s Burgers, in downtown Los Angeles, for a farewell meal of Mega Combos on Saturday after the art gallery show opening. The pilgrimage has been rescheduled to next Saturday with the time to be set this week.

Doug may need the trip since he goes back to school after being off for just over a month. It must be nice to be Doug and have the time off.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with a Mega Combo meal, it is three hamburger patties, three slices of cheese, tomatoes, lettuce, and chili in a very large paper wrapper. You also get an order of French fries covered with chili and melting cheese and a very large drink to wash it all down. It is the only meal you for the day.

The Tommy’s out in the O.C. has sit down, inside, seating while the Original one only has stand up, outside in the weather, eating next to the parking lot.

Great for atmosphere if you favor auto exhaust fumes.

The Girl in the Short Skirt and Ugg Boots
The girl in the short skirt and Ugg boots from last week maybe just so much of a distant memory by Monday morning for me. Her company appeared to be moving out of the building during the last part of the week.

Obviously, I will miss seeing her; she always smiled at me when we passed in the building hall. Of course, she could have had a bad case of gas instead.

Coz Class Girls
The cosmetics class girls took a step to a higher level on Friday when I saw one young woman who had colored one half of her black and the other half blonde. Her hair was parted in the middle and divided by colors.

I wonder how expensive it would be to have your hair colored like that. How much time would that process require?

I guess I will have to live the rest of my life not knowing the answers to those questions.

OK everyone, I am over not knowing the answers.

Sharon
I finally caught up with my friend Sharon on Friday. It was one of our better phone calls.

Sharon is finally over her case of pneumonia now and is able to return to work. Although returning to work may not be all that wonderful since she has an evil boss who was probably pissed that Sharon’s doctor told her to stay home and rest and get well.

On the plus side, Sharon did confirm that she will be going to the traditional Douguary Dinner at the end February. Sharon also invited me out to dinner, at her expense.

Excellent.

That was nice and something for me to look forward too. Unfortunately, with Sharon’s complex schedule of weekend events and working late during the week, it may be a while before she takes me out to dinner. Still, it is something to look forward to.


That was my weekend gentle readers. It is a short update because most of what I did you really don’t want to know about; you’ll just have to trust me on this one.

Be well and stay happy.

JobSearching & Interviewing

Job Searching and Interviewing
Hello gentle readers. I was off doing some job searching last night which is why I wasn’t here. One needs to look for a regular job when one is only working as a temp, even a consulting temp who has his projects winding up now.

So, I searched Monster.com and Career Builder.com. I sent out some resumes and we will see what happens next.

Doug
Doug called me yesterday. He wanted to know what he should do with his Pixar stock, now that it is being acquired by the Walt Disney Company. I said that he doesn’t have to do anything right now because it will be a few months before the shareholders vote on the sale and it closes.

Based on my memory of his purchases, he stands to make a tidy profit on his investment of about $40.00 a share which is always very nice. Of course, he doesn’t own as many shares as Steve Jobs.

One should always remember that you will never go broke by taking a profit with every stock transaction.

Lab coats in the courtyard
It must be back to school time for one of the cosmetics companies in the building now.

The company must be running a series of “train the trainer” classes with employees coming from all over. I noticed a bunch of young and not so young women walk across the street from the building to the local hotel on my home tonight.

I did see one Latina in the courtyard with an aqua colored hair style. It caught my eye; what wouldn’t with the aqua colored hair on top of jet black hair. She was interesting and probably could have interested Doug, had he been here.

Doug Part II
Doug and I had planned to get together on Saturday for lunch at the Original Tommy’s Burgers and suck down a Mega Combo meal. It’s the one we love at Tommy’s.

I had to change our plans because my professor wants to have a meeting with me. I had suggested possibly Saturday afternoon. Since he was a little slow getting back to me, I figured that the meeting would not happen until next week.

Now, we will have a late dinner instead of lunch and we will go to the traditional, original, Original Tommy’s Burgers instead of the one in Westminster, California. That seemed like a minor change and Doug was able to make the changes.

Doug said this will be his last Mega Combo meal for a while he gets his junk food habits under control. That is good for him because once you gain the weight it is very hard to lose it.

For the record, Morton's is not now nor has it ever been junk or fast food.

Saturday Plans
Now, Doug and I will connect up after my meeting with my professor.

Then, we plan to go to an art gallery and see part of a show by our insurance agent. He is showing some recent sculpture work at a gallery out by my house. We figure to hang out at the show for about half an hour unless there are some really super hot women there.

Yeah, right, only in our dreams.

Shifting gears and gathering paper towels, we will rocket up the Harbor Freeway to the original; Original Tommy’s Burgers and eat our meal, standing at a counter in the cold.

After dinner, head back to Doug’ house and drop him off. Then, I drive home and crash into bed, full and happy.

I had asked Sharon to go to the art gallery showing. She has not called me back and so now I will go with the Big Guy instead. Time and tide wait for no man or woman; that’s an old Navy or old sailors’ saying.

Maybe next weekend, Sharon and I can do something. Next weekend makes more sense since Sharon is still sick with her bout of pneumonia. I guess she is having a difficult time getting over the disease.

Oh well, I should count my blessings that I have not gotten ill this year.

Women with Short Hair
Why do some women cut their hair short?

I mean really, really short. I saw one woman in the courtyard with hair that was shorter than mine is now. That is scary for me. I certainly do not find that very attractive by any measure. I have noticed that almost of the cosmetics students, or coz girls as I call them, have long hair, usually below their shoulders.

Sharon has her hair down below her shoulders and looks hot. Doug thinks so too.

Clearly, short hair is easy to care for. There is no need for costly shampoos and conditioners or blow drying in the morning. That must translate into fifteen minutes or more time saved each day.

Still, I think it is jut plain unattractive.

Weekend Preview
I will have another Weekend Update for you on Sunday evening in Redondo Beach [GMT-8].

Enjoy your weekend. If you need a reason to party over the weekend, remember that it is Lunar New Year’s Eve on Saturday. New Year’s is always an excellent reason to have a party or go out.

Be well and stay happy.

I had some notes about what I was going to write tonight somewhere

I had some notes about what to write tonight somewhere
I had some notes about what to write tonight somewhere gentle readers. I think I left them on a post-it note that was sticking, like it should be, to my desk blotter. I will see the post-it in the morning and that will be good.

Nice Guy Chuck again
It was Nice Guy Chuck again today.

I was leaving for work this morning when I saw a wallet on the floor of the parking structure between the Prelude and the tenants in another unit’s car. Since it wasn’t my wallet, I figured it belonged to one of the guys who parks next to me.

We don’t have the same schedules and live on different floors so I really don’t know him. I stuck the wallet under the wiper blade. I thought it would be hard to miss there.

I don’t expect any acknowledgement and that would be fine with me. Still, it was nice to be a nice guy.

Warmer Weather
We had some more warm weather today.

It was sunny and around 77F / 25C at the office in the courtyard this morning. The female smokers were wearing short skirts and that is always a nice sight. There were some early signs of Spring out today as well.

I saw a couple of the young female smokers wearing the Ugg brand of boots with their short skirts. Doug seems to think this is a positive sign. I think he is on to something here.

Naturally, the forecast for Saturday calls for rain showers.

So much for the shot of Spring at the end of January.

Geisha Makeup
I went out to pick up a cup of coffee at the sandwich shop everyday. I am not a coffee snob by any means. I just go there because it would wasteful to make a pot of decaffeinated coffee just for me when I only want one cup.

So, there I was at Trimana, the sandwich shop, standing in line and waiting to pay for my coffee.

There was a young woman in front of me. It was impossible to ignore her; she was talking on her cell phone, loud enough for everyone in the place to know what she did last night; she went to a really dull party as she told her girlfriend.

That wasn’t why I noticed her.

It was her makeup.

She reminded me of a geisha from MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA. Her face was all made up and, from what I could see when she turned her head to see who was watching her while she yakked on the cell phone, was very nicely done.

But the nice makeup job stopped just below her jaw line. Her cheeks were a nice tan shade while her neck was stark white and pale. It was almost as pale as my white dress shirt that I wore today.

Why not finish off the job properly?

I know none of my sailors would ever leave a paint job partially finished. They would finish the job so everything looked the way it was supposed to look. I would have thought she would have blended the makeup down her neck so she looked like she was fully made up and not missing a couple of large sections.

Oh well, it’s not my job to coach young women on makeup.


That’s my day gentle readers. I will try to do better tomorrow and remember to bring my notes home with me.

Be well and stay happy.

Lights, Camera, No Action.

Lights, Camera, No Action
One of the cosmetics companies in the building was have a still photography shoot today. I saw the photographer. I hope my daughter didn’t see the photographer. The photographer had a sort of orange Mohawk hair style with black stubble on the sides. Naturally, he wore all black.

Do you suppose he was trying to be a ninja warrior?

Doubtful.

I saw one of the models. I think she would have been perfect for Doug. She was tall and leggy and well rounded but not in a heavy sort of way. I was truly impressed with the tread strength in her jeans because she was straining on the seams when she walked around in the courtyard, talking on her cell phone.

The photographer’s assistant was a skinny small woman who looked way overworked trying to handle the equipment and cameras.

I had thought about getting up from my desk and going outside to help her. I changed my mind because I realized that if I did that it would be a nice gesture but one that would not translate into any benefits for me. In the end, the security officer helped her with the door.

Nice Guy Chuck – Part 1
I was being Nice Guy Chuck the older day by chatting with a young Chinese business woman. She was looking for some help with her company’s English language version of the web site.

Being Nice Guy Chuck, I rewrote the home page so it made more sense to an English language reader.

Unfortunately, she forgot to thank me for my efforts.

Tonight, she had messaged me just before I came online after my dinner. She wanted to know what the post code was for Lima, Peru.

Now, I like to think of myself as being reasonably intelligent. But, the post code for Lima, Peru; I don’t think so. Not in a million years. I said I was sorry that I did not know that fact.
She proceeded to get angry with me for not knowing. She was in a bind because she wanted to send a sample to a potential customer in Lima and she failed to get the customer’s full address and now her package was hung up in customs with FedEx or UPS or DHL.

I went to one site that I thought might help, http://www.cia.gov. That’s right Checkbook fans; I went to the Central Intelligence Agency web site to find the address for the American embassy in Lima. I learned that there are at least 33 post codes for the city of Lima since the Embassy is in Lima 33.

This was not what my acquaintance wanted to hear.

Hey babie, I’m sorry but the problem was not of my causing. Since it not of my causing, it is not my fault.

Where was my thank you for trying to help me Chuck? I guess that got lost in translation somewhere in the ether.

[Note to self: remove her from my ICQ contact list].

Nice Guy Chuck - Part 2
I was playing Nice Guy Chuck today with my friend Sharon.

Sharon is still sick with her pneumonia and can’t work because of her doctor’s orders. I know she hates her job so I forwarded a job I saw that she could fill and it would not be too far of a drive for her from her home.

I forget her regular email address so I forwarded the job information to the address I could remember. I thought I was doing a good thing. I called her and left her a cell phone message so she would pick up the email.

Did I get a thank you?

No.

I got a voicemail from Sharon while I was at lunch. She was complaining to me about calling her during the day and possibly using up her prime time minutes on her cell phone.

I don’t think I was being unreasonable in being put off by this. I called her on a different cell phone so that I did not burn up her precious prime time or whatever it is called minutes.

Some days, it doesn’t seem to pay to get out of bed. Days like this make you want to not help anyone any more except maybe for your kids and a job recruiter.

That was my day; crummy as it was gentle readers.

Be well and stay happy.

Weekend Update

Things I didn’t do this weekend
Let’s see; there were a lot of things that I did not do this weekend. First, and this is not nay sort of a numerical ranking by any means, I did not see the new Woody Allen film. MATCH POINT. I had planned to see but worked on my dissertation instead. That seems like a better use of my time. I can always go by the DVD in a couple of months.

I was going to exercise. I had planned to start by walking a mile or so and then lifting weights.

I had given some serious thought to writing emails to old friends.

I was going to learn how to transfer images from the new digital camera to the laptop so they could be stored and sent to friends.

I was going to fix my scanner so I don’t have a scanned in .jpg file that is 11.8 MB in size. The original image was a 5 inch by 7 inch / 13 centimeters by 18 centimeters.

Doctor Visit
I went to see my doctor on Friday to get a prescription refilled. The refill was sort of automatic; it is one of the prescriptions that you stay on until you want to die The doctor was pleased with my blood pressure; I think it was 130/78 so if he is happy then I am happy with the blood pressure.

He said I had put on a little weight. I blamed the holidays; we ate well in the office, plus vendors kept bringing in candy and other sweets.

I get to go back to him in two months for my annual physical examination. I wonder which one of my pleasures he will want to cut out then.

Courtyard Views
It wasn’t windy on Friday so that was nice. Instead, it was just really cool so that kept the short skirts away and the long pants and coats out in plain view.

I saw one young lady who really caught my eye. She was wearing a white knit sweater with a bright green bra underneath. The bra did show through the sweater and it made an unusual image. I am pretty certain she is not Irish and planning to get a head start on St. Patrick’s Day. She is Asian American and works for Japan Air Lines.

It certainly was an unusual courtyard view.

Gas Pump Lines
I go to my local gas station for gas regularly. We all do that it in Southern California. This is not a news flash.

Filling your gas tank is rocket surgery by any measure. It is very simple. You drive into the station so that your car’s gas intake pipe will be next to the pump. And, you pull up to the forward pump so someone can pull in behind you and fill up at the same time.

Right, of course, we all know this.

All of which brings me to my observational humor of the night.

Why is that when someone is waiting to fill their vehicle; and, you can see from their facial expressions that they are not happy about the wait, stop their car or truck at the first pump instead of pulling forward?

I mean, there is no additional work involved. The car or truck provides for the movement. The driver’s effort is the same regardless of the pump.

For some strange and unexplored and unknown reason, these drivers act like the jerks that upset them when they had to wait. I could have used a blunter term than jerks but we never know when young children might read the blog so I try to use less harsh terms.

Where are Scully and Mulder when you need them to investigate something this strange?

Visitors
I want to thank the visitors from foreign countries for visiting Balancing Checkbooks. We have had visits from, in alphabetic order, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom. We used to have a couple of regular visitors from South Korea but they stopped visiting when THE IMMORTAL YI SOON SHIN series ended.

The blog had around 270 visitors in December and 2,378 for 2005 that the blog was online.

We also had a visitor from an Arab country in the Middle East. I thought that was absolutely fascinating.

Then, last week, we had two visitors that hung around for almost twenty minutes each on a single visit.

Thank you all for stopping by Balancing Checkbooks.

Movies I Did See
I did make it to the local cinema and saw Terrence Malick’s THE NEW WORLD. I really liked this film; it has an almost surreal nature to some of the cinematography. Like Malick’s last film, THE THIN RED LINE, this film tells much of without the use of dialogue. Malick is visual storyteller and I think this may create a negative audience reaction by the main stream American audience.

The cinematography is the best I have seen in a very long time. The bulk of the film appears to have been shot on location and recreation of North American of 400 years ago in very compelling.

I saw the film at a Saturday matinee because I like saving a couple of dollars here and there. It does add up over time. My particular screening room in the multiplex was less than perhaps a quarter filled.

Changing the subject and venue, I watched three Pinky Violence DVDs that I borrowed from Doug. These films are a unique sub-genre about girl gangs in Japan. This is an acquired taste and I doubt that many of you would enjoy them.

I liked ZERO WOMAN RED HANDCUFFS staring the legendary Miki Sugimoto over FEMALE YAKUZA TALE and SEX & FURY that starred Reiko Ike, another legend in this genre. I think I have developed a taste for the genre and Doug gets the credit for pointing me in this direction.

One of the unfortunate outcomes was this style of film had a very brief window of popularity from about 1972 to 1976 or so and then it vanished. I am not certain why the films lost fans but I suspect that changing habits and society’s views towards violence had an impact. Also, the end of the period of the Pinky Violence films coincided with the rise of video games. Video games are played primarily by young men, the same market as the films. Video games could be played for a fraction of the cost of a cinema ticket.

Doug and I were talking about this genre when we had lunch at the Original Tommy’s Burgers on the last time. We came to the conclusion that an ultimate, no costs be considered road trip would be to go to Japan and see if we could meet the actresses that played in these films.

Then, I did some quick math with going through the Mega Combo triple chili cheese burger. I figured out that the actresses would probably be in their 50s by now or very close to that age. Maybe we should just remember them as they were in the films.

Second choice for the road trip was a Cannes Film Festival instead.

Douguary and Chuckay Event Missed
We missed a potential Douguary and Chuckay Event last weekend. It seems there was an import car tuner event last Saturday. The weather would have been on the cool side and slightly rainy but we still could have made the event.

The event venue location would have been ideal for us. It was out by Sharon’s house so we could have gone to the event and then gone by Sharon’s for lunch or dinner, depending on schedules.

It would have been interesting to see if the import car tuner models wore their bikinis or dressed more appropriately for the weather.

I will, of course, keep you posted on this potentially important event.


That was my weekend. I hope you had fun and rested on your weekend.

Be well and stay happy.

Long coats covered short skirts in the windy courtyard

It was windy in the courtyard and long coats covered short skirts
It was windy today and that was nice. For most of the day, it was clear and cloudless. There was little in the way of warmth since it is our Winter after all.

Then, the bad part of a windy day. There were fewer of the smokers in the courtyard today. Even some of the regular, die-hard smokers were not out today. Those that were in the courtyard were either wearing long pants or long coats. It was not a day for viewing and such.

Die hard smokers; there’s a fascinating concept for you.

Office Lottery
The California Lottery is going to have a jackpot of around $83 million for the Saturday night drawing. One of the administrative assistants organized a pool and everyone in the executive office put into the pot.

At lunch, we were speculating who would come into work on Monday if we won the lottery. All of us had an interest in the pot with an individual share amounting to around $10 to $12 million before taxes. I said the one of the senior manager was out and therefore not in the pool so he could be in charge and handle the board of directors meeting on Tuesday night. We all wondered how he would explain to the directors where all of the other senior managers were.

I will also but my own tickets. So, if I win, I won’t have to share my winnings.

Cosmetics Class
It must be back to cosmetics school time because there was a new class session today.

Even though I don’t go to the class, I have still learned a bit about women’s fashions. It seems that the new in-color for lipstick will be a burnt orange. Everyone in the class left the building wearing the lipstick shade.

I’m not sure I am ready to embrace this color. I think it reminded me of red lead based paint primer that we had on the good ship USS Leonard F Mason. It was either red lead primer or International orange, the color for emergency equipment like life jackets and life rafts.

I also learned that deep lavender – light purple is not a flattering hair color if you are an Asian American woman. I wonder what possessed her to color her that way.

Then, there was an African American woman who had her hair colored a pumpkin orange color. That color choice did not sit well with me. I was glad it was not close to lunch time when I saw her hair color for it might have upset my eating plans or digestion.

Maybe the school changed instructors today because there was no sobbing student outside of my window. I enjoyed the silence.


Not much of a blog but I will try for a more detailed weekend update blog on Sunday.

Be well and stay happy

Captain Ahab turned to the mate and said, "The course is west by southwest Mr. Starbuck."

Missing at the Blog
I know I wasn’t here last night. I had every intention of showing up for the blog posting. But, things happen in life.

The building called an unscheduled meeting to discuss a “sudden, new,” problem. The problem was neither sudden nor new. The building roof has been leaking off and on for at least fifteen years and maybe as long as twenty years.

Here’s the real news flash, if you don’t attend to problems when you discover them, they only get worse.

So your humble scribe sat through ninety minutes of hand wringing and moaning by the board of directors about the fact that we need to take out a loan to pay for a new roof. We can not qualify for a loan unless the building hires a professional management company so manage the finances. The bank wants a management company in place to help insure the loan is repaid. Banks were never stupid when it comes to lending money. The management company will cost more money; another brilliant news flash.

I was tempted to ask the board of directors why they spent money to remodel the lobby three times when they knew there was a problem with the roof; why they spent money on an unnecessary front door awning when they knew there was a problem with the roof; why they paved the third floor atrium when they knew there was a problem with the roof; and why they spent money on painting the outside of the building when they knew there was a problem with the roof.

I could have asked that question. But why be a complete jerk and needless prolong the meeting so I remained silent. I know some of the directors would have been really uncomfortable with that question.

I came back to my flat feeling depressed. I decided to have a double shot of Chivas Regal Scotch whisky instead. That was an eminently better solution. I would add that I slept very well last night.

Captain Ahab and the Whales
I was listening to the radio this morning when I learned that what I considered to be thong creep on a young woman [her thong is above the top of the back of her pants] is really called a “whale’s tale.”

I thought that was fascinating knowledge.

It does lend a new meaning to the phrase, “thar she blows!”

Douguary and Chuckay Event Planning
I was talking to Doug about a potential event for our month long birthday celebrations of all things Doug and all things Chuck.

I suggested that we add a visit to an import tuner event since we both have an interest in the models that work at these shows. Doug said we should think about this for Chuckay. I said we could do in both months. He agreed with me.

I doubt anyone of our friends will understand why we will do this. Doug said none of his friends would understand, even the R or Mark.

I started doing some research by checking the models’ web sites for appearance information. I guess they are less detailed oriented than I am since some have appearance information that only goes as far as mid-2005, not very helpful when you are in early-2006.

One model had a journal on her web site. Promising, potentially.

The most recent entry was March 5, 2005.

We may have to resort to buying an import car tuner magazine to get the show details.

Cosmetics Class
One of the cosmetics companies was holding training yesterday and today. I could tell because there were a bunch of young women in black with white laboratory coats coming into the building with note books.

I was out in the courtyard talking to Doug on the cell phone when I noticed one student come out and sit down. She was crying loudly and her friend was trying to comfort her. I wondered what was causing her to be so upset.

I figured it was nothing to do with her family since she was out crying again outside my office after my lunch. She was crying loud enough for me to postpone a telephone call.

She came down one more time to cry in the middle afternoon.

Maybe the instructor said she had no talent or that she couldn’t do make up for a Halloween clown.

New Business Referral
I had a call when I got home from the office on Friday from a former colleague. He was asking if I was interested in some lending consulting work.

Of course I was interested; so I phoned him yesterday.

His company doesn’t need the help but he was calling on behalf of another company who needed some lending help. I told that I was interested and felt I could really help the other company fashion a simple solution to their needs.

I asked him to pass along my contact phone numbers. I will sit back and wait to see what develops from the call.

After I hung up the phone, I looked the other company financials up at an online site. Yes, they really do need my help. I wonder if the company is too far gone to be turned around. It may face new competitors that are better capitalized, provide better service, and are much more aggressive about gathering up new business.

I need to get my billable time in early before the company is acquired by a larger competitor.

Anyway.

Old Coworker
I had a phone call from an old coworker from the bank today.

He was searching around for some esoteric information and was having no luck. He phoned me because he was frustrated and thought I could find what he was looking for.

My friend was right to call me. It took me some time but I came up with answers he was looking for. My suggestions will help him meet his business unit’s goals for the year. Yes, I know it is only January but some goals require long lead times to achieve so every day saved is important.

Then, we talked about the old bank. It looks like it and a bunch of other banks are going to get extra examination scrutiny because of a change in banking policy in the United States. I am not saying he bank is in trouble, just that it will get more examination attention than it would like to have.

We both thought that was ironic and were very happy that we could not be blamed for the potential extra work because of the policy changes.


So now you are up to date with me.

Be well and stay happy.

Weekend Update

Three Day Long Weekends Are Great
Three day long weekends are great. I did not do very much this weekend. I did complete several planned events so the weekend was not a complete loss for me.

I did not waste much of my time viewing the professional [American] football playoff games. Frankly, none of them were that intriguing for me. I did other things like go to the cinema for one.

Getting the Prelude washed was one of my plans. I mentally cancelled that idea because of the rain in the forecast. The rain prediction was for close two inches in the part of town where I live. As things turned out, the rains were largely very light and very scattered in my part of town.

Cinema
I managed to get into see MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA on Saturday morning. I really enjoyed this film. I had some misgivings about the fact that all of the major female roles in a largely women’s film about a class of Japanese women were being played by Chinese actresses. In the end, I thought the actresses were convincing in their roles and created believable characters that I could become eomotionally involved with.

Here’s an interesting political side note for the film. With all of the current vitriol pumping forth between Japan and China, which nation should be upset about the cast of MEMOIRS?

Fascinating, isn’t it.

Anyway, I thought the cinematography, production design, and set design were excellent. I am told the story line followed the book it is based on reasonably closely. From my readings and study of Japan and this era, it seemed fairly accurate. The plot does get complicated with some twists and turns and leaves some unanswered questions that could be answered if I read the book.

I liked the music; John Williams did an excellent job of incorporating traditional Japanese music with contemporary Western songs from the era. I thought the contrast between taiko drums and jazz was intriguing and yet mutually supportive.

If you are a male reader and you need a film to balance a male oriented film with explosions and car chases and bikini clad girls in it to appease your girl friend, then this is the film for you. Your girl friend will think you actually have a sensitive side after all and are not a complete leering lout.

Balance is important; remember the Force.

Doug said it was a “chick flick” and he was right as usual. I saw the film at the first afternoon matinee. The theater was maybe two thirds full and there were only a handful of men there besides me.

For the record, it did not owe the girl friend a “chick flick” film so I was under no pressure to go see. The film is good enough on its own to merit your serious viewing consideration.

Just to prove my point about not needing a “chick flick,” I saw CASANOVA right after MEMOIRS.

I should point out that two period films, back to back, may not be the best viewing plan. Going from mid-twentieth century Japan to mid-eighteenth century Venice is not the easiest time travel.

CASANOVA is one of those semi-lavish period pieces that Europeans seem to do so well. It is interesting and you certainly do not have to use your mind to follow the plot line; it is fairly well laid out for you in a semi-straight line fashion.

The cast is either mostly unknowns and over the hill actors and actresses. Heath Ledger seemed to miscast to me; he lacked the roguish nature that the role of Casanova called for. Had the film been made sixty or seventy years ago, I would have cast Errol Flynn in the title role. I don’t know who I would have chosen instead of Ledger but if I had the time I would have found someone else.

I can highly recommend MEMOIRS while CASANOVA only rates a suggestion to see it at a bargain matinee or maybe wait until it comes out on DVD. Judging from the size of the audience and comparing it to MEMOIRS, I would think that CASANOVA will be at your local video store in the not too distant future.

Courtyard Views
My courtyard viewing days at the company where I am working now maybe limited. The company is interviewing candidates for a senior management position. If one of the candidates is hired, he or she will sit in the office where I have been working.

It has been a great viewing run and all good things must come to an end soon. It is perhaps better to have the viewing run end sooner rather than later. My viewing run was in the Winter and not in the Summer when the younger females are likely to wear short skirts.

Emily’s Cigars
I smoked and enjoyed the last of Emily’s cigars on Sunday. It was cool out on the balcony [59F/15C] so I was dressed warmly. This cigar was the Partagas. It was mild even though it was made with the maduro [dark tobacco] wrapper.

Job Searching and Interviewing
I got an email today from the disorganized and confused company, the one with the missed and broken interviews, that said they were looking for someone with more ideas on creating a training program and someone who belonged to training trade groups.

I think the hiring manager is not up to speed on training practices. I suggested the company adopt Internet based training for the scattered employees. This methodology has been proven by a number of universities including Duke and Harvard and the Department of Defense as a highly effective teaching method that can convey the knowledge across the globe.

I got over that in about a minute and a half. Being a member of trade group only proves you can write a check out for the membership fee. I could do that but why go to the trouble? I couldn’t see any reason to do that since it would have been patently false on my part. That would have been dishonorable.

The Princess called me to talk about a possible contract job offer she might get from a large company in Atlanta. We talked about the pluses and minuses for about twenty minutes or so.

I thought the potential job made some sense. It would provide some economic benefits to the Princess and I encouraged her to continue to talk to the company if they maintain an interest in bringing her on board in a contract status. She told that the company seems to like to hire people as contract players and then move them into a regular employee status sometime later on.

We will have to wait to see what develops next.

After getting over the confused company, I sent out a bunch of email applications.

When I got home from work on Friday, I had a message waiting for me. It was another credit union, one that I have not worked with before, that wants to talk to me about some work for them. This is only a preliminary inquiry on their part. I think I can develop a nice little business from them that should generate a couple of hundred dollars a month. Nice work if it comes to pass.

Obviously, I will be following up with them on Tuesday to see what they would like to talk about.

Lunch with Doug
I drove out to have lunch with Doug today. We went to Albertacos since it has been at least a month since we were there.

As usual, we each had a Number 8 with a medium drink, to eat in the restaurant. The meal is so filling and pleasurable. I should go to Albertacos more often.

One of our big discussions was over import car show models. Doug says this could be the source of a couple of really great jokes. I tend to agree with him.

I am agreeing with him because I visited one web site and checked out the import car show models home pages. One model listed herself as an actress in addition to a number of other skills. Since she was Asian American and an actress, I decided to check out her acting career on the Internet Movie Database.

To my surprise, the model – actress has been in a total of four films, the most recent one was in 2002 where she played the part of the bar dancer. It was a non-speaking role. I think she should rethink her acting career and maybe concentrate on something more solid since car show models have a very short half life.

I did find one model that has a real job of being a director of finance at a company. I think she will be a survivor and financially sound on her own. Most of the models plan to marry a rich man and then have him take care of her. Simple work if you can find it.


That was my weekend gentle readers. It was not very exciting but then I did not plan to do very much this weekend.

Be well and stay happy.

Cosmetics Classes

Programming Note
The regularly scheduled and large Weekend Update will not be out until January 16th. Monday is a holiday in the United States. This extends my weekend, always a wonderful event, so the Update must be extended as well.

Cosmetics Class
One of the cosmetics companies in the building had a training class today. For a moment, I thought I was at some hospital with all of the people walking around in long white laboratory coats.

I am highly confident that I would not want to talk to the females with tats for any sort of beauty advice. How can you accept that person’s opinion on beauty when she has a tribal design tat the wraps around her ear and disappears below her collar?

Before everyone tells me beauty is in the eye of the beholder; just let me state for the record that it was my eye that was doing the beholding.

I did see some very attractive Asian cosmetics company employees in their white lab coats and black clothes so i know what to look for.

I did help one of them who got lost in the building. She was short and with her high heels, she barely reached my shoulder. She looked very professional and all of that stuff. After I gave her the directions, she flashed me a big smile and a warm "Thank you." As she walked away, I noticed she was wearing the most intriguing fishnet stockings.

I would have liked to know her better.

Most Western cultures do not embrace tats for their females.

The same seems to be true in Asian cultures, especially in China, Japan, and Korea. I don’t feel comfortable speaking for other Asian cultures.

So what is the point of the tats? Besides the needle’s business end.

I guess it must be a need to rebel against the norms of society and parental authority.

Personally, I could think of a lot of less permanent ways to show your personal rebellions. You could color your hair; it can always be changed. You could cut your hair short or shave your head; your hair will grow out. Eventually. You could adopt views that are opposite of your close friends and parents.

I think I have made my point here and therefore I will move on.

Weekend Cinema
I spoke with the Big Guy today about the weekend cinema.

I told him that I planned to see MATCH POINT and MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA for certain. Doug said those were good choices since I had seen everything else.

He did suggest HOSTEL but I said that was just a whole lot to violent for me.

I may try to slip in THE WHITE COUNTESS if all goes well with the schedules. If I miss the film in the cinema, I can always wait until it is out on DVD and purchase it then.

Have a wonderful weekend gentle readers.

Be well and stay happy.

I wasn't here yesterday

I wasn’t here yesterday
I wasn’t here yesterday gentle readers. But, you knew that. I was off working on my dissertation. I will be doing that off and on during the week for the next few months. Once I am finished, I will have much more time to devote to blogging.

Coffee
I drink coffee regularly. I drink it without any creamer or sugar; plain, hot, black coffee. Simple coffee.

I drink decaffeinated coffee because it does not cause my blood pressure to go up. Caffeine will do that to you. High blood pressure is not good for anyone. The coffee tastes the same whether it has caffeine or nor.

Did you know that caffeine is actually a bitter tasting ingredient of coffee? It adds absolutely not flavor and it does not take any flavor away. Some people react as if caffeine was the one source of flavor for the coffee beverage.

I learned to drink coffee when I was in the Navy. We never had milk on the ship for very long when we put to sea. I think the milk was gone in less than a week and we were at sea for months on end. Milk was never around so I never learned to put it in my coffee.

The ship did have sugar but only it five pound / two kilograms and some change bags. When the ship was rolling and tossing in a heavy sea, sugar could get easily spilled and would be difficult to sweep up. Sugar stayed on the mess decks along with the rest of the food.

I can still remember one four hour watch from midnight to 4:00 AM. I was on watch with three enlisted men. We went through a 64 cup coffee urn and started on the second batch before the watch was over. I should mention that it was extremely cold then and the coffee helped keep us warm. We drank so much of the stuff that it did not affect our sleep at all.

So why do I mention my association with coffee. Simple; there are people out there that just do not understand how to drink coffee. I go into the sandwich shop every morning for a cup of decaffeinated coffee. It is a self serve operation; you buy the cup and then you fill it with the coffee from your pot of choice.

The guy in front of me was taking a little of coffee from each pot; there are six pots including four flavored ones. Then, he added some regular low fat creamer and then some half milk and half cream mixture. I don’t recall or maybe it’s that I don’t want to recall how many bags of sugar he added to the cup but I believe it was more than four bags. Each bag is equal to a teaspoon size amount of sugar.

How could anyone possible enjoy that vile mixture of hot colored and flavored water?

Why even go to the trouble of getting a cup of coffee?

I think this was a sign the end of Western civilization is near and that we should all begin to make our peace with our respective religious doctrines before it becomes too late to repent.

I also drink tea from time to time but not very often. Usually, I like to drink what we Americans call an “Arnold Palmer.” In theory, it is very good but most restaurants do a terrible job of serving the drink. The drink is half iced tea and half lemonade.

What could be more simple than that I ask you?

More and more restaurants in Southern California think it is trendy to serve flavored ice tea. I guess I am in the minority who only prefer regular plain and simple iced tea where the only flavor comes from the tea leaves and not some chemical additives.

I once walked out of a restaurant after the server told me they had no regular iced tea. The manager was upset that I would walk out of the restaurant. I think he thought I was joking when I said I was leaving because all he served for tea was only fit to clean mud off of boots.

Bad Tattoos
I thought I had seen the last of the really bad tats for a while until this afternoon.

I was out in the courtyard talking to the Princess when this youngish woman walked by. I lost my train of thought and conversation until the Princess yelled at me and brought me back to my senses. She has always been able to yell at me.

More on point.

This woman had a big tat of a spider web on her calf and then some other tat on the arch of her foot. She had a tribal design style tat around her neck and it was above the collar line, assuming she was wearing a collar.

Since she was wearing a scoop neck top, I could see that she had a series of tats that went across her upper chest. She did not have a tan and the colored tats just stood out for all to see.

Then she had this really ugly dark red and green tat on the back of her hand that went up her arm. I couldn’t tell what it looked like since she was wearing long sleeves. I could just tell that it was probably not very nice to look at.

One of the other men in the office called my attention to the woman. We both wondered what possessed her to get some many ugly tats. She had more tats than most of the young sailors who were in my division on the good ship USS Leonard F. Mason back when I was in the Navy.

I am getting too old for scary sights like that. Doug and his friend Mark are into horror films and probably would have enjoyed seeing her.

It was enough to make me think three or four times.

Be well and stay happy.

Slow Day

Slow Day
It was another slow Monday for me gentle readers.

Contract Review
I spent almost all of my day reviewing a twenty two page contract for the company I am currently working for now.

For the most part, it is a very good contract for both parties. There is very little in terms of over reaching by the other party. It is a flexible contract with reasonable terms and conditions. I actually liked the contract and that is difficult to do for me.

Having said that I liked the contract, I still was able to fill a four page, mostly single spaced memorandum about things that needed to be changed. Sure some of the changes were minor ones like consistent paragraph numbering while others were near deal killers. One provision is a deal killer and I hope the other party comes to its senses and agrees to make the requested changes.

The last contract review I did for this company was a painful process for me. The initial contract was only woefully inadequate at only four pages. When I got finished with all of the changes that were necessary to protect my client, the contract was close to twenty pages long.

It was a good thing that the vendor made the changes because they defaulted before it came time for implementation so the client saved a bunch of money by walking away without penalty.

Doug
The Big Guy called to check in today after he heard the Howard Stern satellite radio program this morning. He said he got up in time for the 6:00 AM start. This was a remarkable feat since he is usually up until 2:00 AM sometimes. Doug said he planned to get up at 6:00 AM everyday this week to catch the show. The broadcast went very well with no commercials.

That certainly sounds better than the local replacement programming with Adam Carolla. Carolla is getting dull, boring, and old very fast. I am about ready to tune out and drop out.

Doug says I should get satellite radio for my car. If I did that, the value of the Prelude would be close to double. Besides, I don’t want to spend a bunch of money on satellite radio in a car that I may not retain past 2007.

Last Friday’s Lunch
I went to lunch on last Friday with an old co-worker from my old bank. I had not seen my friend in six or seven months so it was good catch up on things. He told me the old bank’s chief auditor had left. No one likes auditors so I suppose the going away party was held on the day after the auditor left.

My friend also told me that the compliance officer had left with in the last few weeks. I was surprised to see the compliance officer go. The staff probably had a going away party on the day the compliance officer left.

As I said, it was a slow day for me.

Be well and stay happy.

Weekend Update

It’s the end of the first week of the new year. So far, I am still alive and well so all must be good for me. I don’t really have all that much of a Weekend Update for you because I sort of rested this weekend.

I also started cleaning up my place. Actually, I started cleaning up the room I use as an office so I can work on my dissertation in relative calm. I think it will take me another weekend to finish off what I have started. I did make good progress in being able to toss out two bags full of accumulated trash and no longer necessary papers that went into recycling bins at my building.

Progress through recycling.

Sharon
My friend Sharon’s health seems to have not gotten much better. Her nasty cough has become pneumonia now and that has to be bad and ungood. I had thought about asking Sharon to go to the cinema this weekend with me. I decided to not ask her when she told me about her pneumonia. I have never had pneumonia and do not want to get it either.

I sent her a humorous get well card. I think humor is always appropriate when one is ill or otherwise unhappy.

Utah Alpha Chapter of Phi Delta Theta
When I was younger, much younger really, I attended the University of Utah as many of the regular readers already know. I joined the Phi Delta Theta fraternity as a freshman and have never regretted that decision. In fact, it is one of the few major decisions in my life that I would repeat without a second thought.

Even though I live at the beach in Los Angeles, I still am an active supporter of the chapter and the national fraternity. I have a room named after me in the chapter house because I gave the chapter house some personal computers to create a computer study.

Before anyone thinks I was touched with good thoughts, I also needed a tax deduction and this worked out just fine for everyone.

My friend and long time fraternity brother Scott called me on Thursday after I posted the daily blog. He had wanted to catch up with me since we had not talked in a couple of months.

Scott also called to tell me the chapter had been closed by the fraternity because of a hazing issue. Our fraternity has a less than zero tolerance policy on hazing. I support what was done; I think it will be for the best in the end. It is better to completely stop and end the wrong message than to allow it to continue.

Certainly, I was disappointed since I was acquainted with some of the young men that were undergraduate members of the chapter. I had expected more from them and I felt let down by them.

I felt much better when Scott told me the University has already written a letter of support that invited the fraternity back on campus as soon as we are ready. I also felt better because this action allows us to clean the house and start over with a fresh group of young men.

Hopefully, these new young men in 2007 will be able to meet our standards for moral and ethical behavior.

On the plus side for me, I won’t have to worry about finding anyone to take to the Founders’ Day dinner dances in Salt Lake City until 2008. I could already see the cash flowing back into my wallet.

Maybe I should ask Sharon. Sharon has gone to these Founders’ Day events in the past and enjoyed herself.

Doug
I did have some good news this week. Doug called to let me know he got his grades. He felt he did well and I would agree with him. He ended up with two As, one B+, and one B. I did some quick mental calculations and I think he will be able to stay on the Dean’s List again this semester. We will know in a couple of weeks whether he stays on the List or not.

Doug thought he was going to get an A in the class that he received a B+. He thinks he just may have bombed the final examination and that dropped his grade; he had an A average going into the final examination.

I told Doug that it is not the end of the world and that finals are sometimes a disaster.

Weather
The weather was not very fair this past week for me. It was warm and sunny on Thursday and Friday and then the temperature dropped off for the weekend.

When I got home from the interview marathon and after I changed from my suit and tie, I went out on my balcony in shorts and a golf shirt. It was that warm; I think it was 80F/27C at the beach. It was perfect weather for smoking one of Emily’s cigars and reading.

Friday was warm and that brought out a flock of young female workers in short skirts in the courtyard on Friday. One of the more popular combinations was a short skirt with knee length, high heeled boots. Doug and his friend Mark should have stopped bye Dad’s office if only for the view.

There is one down side to short skirts so soon in the year; too much untanned flesh. But, this too will pass soon enough for Summer is never very far away in Southern California.

For the record, I was out in my shorts and Utah hooded sweatshirt on Saturday. I was just great to be in shorts again.

Bad Tats
There is another down side to the warm weather and that was the exposure to bad tattoos. One of the young women that I thought was just in training at a cosmetics company seems to be employed there now. I got to see way more of her tats than I could ever want to see in a 100 years. I think she has more tats than some of my sailors in the Navy. We all know that sailors love tattoos.

This young woman had tats of spider webs on her elbows and more geometric designs on her arms. She had more of what the Bug Guy calls tribal design on her neck that started up around her ear and then disappeared below her shirt collar. I would never ever want to see the whole picture.

On the plus side, I blew off going to the Los Angeles International Tattoo Exposition this weekend. I save some money on admission by staying home plus the cost of gasoline to get there and back. I also saved my eyes since I didn’t see any of the fully covered female bodies.

Lone Wolf and Cub DVDs
I was watching one of the DVDs the Princess and Doug got me for Christmas this weekend. The DVDs are a set called LONE WOLF AND CUB. It is a Japanese samurai epic in six DVDs. From time to time, some of the female actresses had what I would consider to be artistic tattoos.

In one film, the actress played an assassin who shocked her victims when she exposed a tattooed breast. The victim would be distracted and then she would kill him. Nice touch. I could not understand why the woman would submit to a tattoo that covered half of her breast and went down her chest to her waist. I know this because the tattooing was part of the film.

I know that the tattoo was only paint and nonpermanent and all that. What I don’t understand is why have a tattoo in the first place? Maybe it is a cultural thing or an act of rebellion by the youth.

In another film, I noticed a real continuity problem. It was one of two films that used firearms as primary weapons instead of the usual swords. Some actors used crude flintlock pistols while others used what looked Navy Colt single action revolvers. The Navy Colts were not produced until the 1840s when Japan was a closed nation and importation of Western goods was largely banned.

I also noticed that when Lone Wolf fired off the rifles in the baby cart, they acted like a machine gun and had an effective range of several hundred yards or meters. Machine guns did not come along until after the American Civil War or as the Princess refers to it, the War of Northern Aggression with the Gatling gun in the late 1860s. The bad guys in the film were armed with matchlock muskets that had an effective range of maybe 30 yards or meters on a good day. The matchlock was likely to be available in Japan when the film was set so that made some sense to me.

Cinema
The only film I saw this weekend was MUNICH.

This is a very powerful and violent film about revenge and how the revenge affects the agents of Israel. It is not a film for those who find the use of force sometimes the only effective solution. Negotiation is good for a time and in its proper place. But, negotiation only works when both parties have some thing to gain by talking about the troubles.

I think it is very well made and probably close to the truth. The truth is often in the mind of the speaker so it can be transactional in nature.

As I was walking out of the multiplex to my car in the car park, I was struck by how little has changed in the thirty years or so since the events that were depicted in the film took place. We still have Palestinians and Jews trying to kill each other and peace in the Middle East seems as illusive as ever.


And that gentle readers was my weekend.

Be well and stay happy.

My Best Films for 2005 List

My Favorite Films of 2005 List
I diligently worked on my list of the films I enjoyed most in 2005. I am highly confident that my list will have some films that did not make it on to your list of films. I have my list down to eleven or twelve films right now.

My film list will not be alphabetically or by ranking. The list is chronological, based on when I saw the film. This seems like a much easier process for me. Not the most rational approach, true; but, it works for me.

Doug ranks his films from 1 to 10 with 1 being the best film on his list.

Here is my list of 2005 Films:

BRIDE AND PREJUDICE
SIN CITY
LAND OF THE DEAD
HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE
WEDDING CRASHERS
CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY
THE ISLAND
2046
BROKEN FLOWERS
THE CONSTANT GARDENER
GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK
CAPOTE
SYRIANA

I already have the some of the 2005 films on DVD now. I expect that I will pick up the others as they become available in the coming months or on my next trips to the DVD stores.

There were a couple of films that were just on the edge of making the list. I thought I would add them as well:


APPLESEED
STAR WARS EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH
MR & MRS SMITH
BATMAN BEGINS
TIM BURTON'S CORPSE BRIDE
SERENITY
JARHEAD
HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE
KING KONG

Be well and stay happy.

Interview Marathong Today

Interview Marathon
Today was supposed to be an interview marathon for me. Sort of a job searching and interviewing day long event.

As usual, with things like this, the event did not work out as planned. Life deals hands like that sometimes. I was supposed to have a total of six interviews scheduled from 10:00 AM to ending after 2:00 PM.

I figured there would be time delays and schedule slipping. It always happens like that.
My first appointment had to cancel as I arrived because of a large problem that blew up. It was rescheduled into the after 2:00 PM slot. That would have worked out just fine.

The second appointment went off about 15 minutes late because the person I was to see was still finishing up on another interview with a candidate for a different job. I was fifteen minutes into the interview when I realized the interviewer did not know what job I was there to talk to the company about.

I had to say to the interviewer, a senior vice president with the company, “I think you have me confused with someone else. I am not here to apply for the position you are talking about.”

Deadly silence.

“Ahhhh, well then, I guess we can skip some of what I was going to tell you. Why don’t you tell me about your teaching experience[the job is manager of training in a company unit]?”

Nice recovery.

This interview ran late because we started late and the interviewer got confused. The recruiter was worried that I had given up on the company and had gone home or was wandering around in the cube farm because I had not returned for the next scheduled interview on time.

The third interview happened late of course. It also ran late but that was expected.

The third interview was with the hiring manager. I thought it went well and that I answered all of the questions with solid answers and solutions on how to conduct internet based training.

I also had an excellent solution to the question of how do you test the students. I said, “You give them a factual data package and ask them to create a report or small project based on the material in the data package. This way, you can test and evaluate their ability to think and reason along with their ability to demonstrate mastery of the subject matter. The test, if you will, closely simulates their daily work environment and is highly job related.”

The interviewer had apparently never thought of that as a testing solution. Based on the interviewer’s reaction, I would say that I nailed the question solidly.

I finished up with the third interview and was taken back to the recruiter. The recruiter told me that the four afternoon interviews had fallen apart because one of the company’s senior officers had come to the location for a meeting and the meeting would last all afternoon. The remaining interviewers would have to be rescheduled late this month.

Bummer and waste of part of the day for me.

I came home and decided to hang out at home since it was warm and sunny today. I think the temperature was around 26C/78F at the beach today. It looks like it will be a bit warmer tomorrow and then hold the temperatures through the weekend.

If nothing else, the weekend will be excellent for smoking and reading on the balcony.

Be well and stay happy.

Fanciful Surveys

Fanciful Surveys
I had to take classes in research for my Doctor of Business Administration degree program. This made me aware of other surveys and I take a perverse enjoyment at finding glaring faults with other surveys. I stumbled across this survey and wondered how much it cost, why they needed to do it, and didn’t the answer seem rather obvious to all.

KPMG, one of the big world wide accounting firms, conducted a survey of auto industry executives, not the sharpest set of tools in the shed by any measure, and asked them which segment of the auto market would experience the biggest growth.

Anyone care to make a guess?

Yes, it was the very fuel efficient hybrid autos. When gasoline goes to $3.00 or more a gallon, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out consumers want fuel efficient cars. This should have been obvious since there were waiting lists months long for hybrids.

Come on guys, this is not rocket surgery now.

Care to guess what was the second segment?

Yes, it was low priced cars. Did those guys in Detroit and elsewhere sleep through Economics 100 when the professor explained supply and demand. With low prices, demand goes up.

Time for the sad part of the survey, the North American executives also believed the big land hog, gasoline sucking SUVs would increase market share. In fact, North American executives expected all segments to increase market share.

Time for the Reality Fairy to fly on stage. Market share must equal 100; if one segment is going to increase then another segment must, by definition, decrease.

Maybe KPMG meant to say sales volume which is different from market share.

In any event, I was amazed and shocked, shocked I say, that someone would pay good money for a survey like that. Automobile industry executives’ opinions are nice to gather, I suppose, but their ideas and opinions about what the customer is going to buy don’t really matter. KPMG would have been better off asking some other groups like the consuming public. After all, it is the public that makes the only important decision and that is what type of vehicle to purchase.

New Class Today
There was another new class at one of the cosmetics companies today.

The students or employees didn’t look much different than the group from yesterday. They were all wearing black and a lot of them were wearing jump style boots. If they had been a whole lot more athletic, they might have passed for tall ninjas.

Since it was warmer today, some of the students took off their coats when they took their smoke breaks. I saw one young woman that reminded me of my old Gunner’s Mate from when I was in the United States Navy except she had more tattoos plus her hair was shorter.

Frankly, it was a scary vision and I was very glad that I was inside and not out in the courtyard with her.

Catching up with the Big Guy
Doug called to check in this morning. We talked about the Adam Carolla Show; you can read my comments from yesterday. Doug said it thought it was really dull and boring.

I am going to give it another chance tomorrow. I have a meeting out of the office where I am working. It will take me an hour and change to get from my home to the meeting so I can give the show a good listen.

If I end up tuning out on the drive to the meeting, then the show will have probably lost me except for station surfing during commercials and when music I don’t like is being played on another station.

Be well and stay happy.

The week is almost half over.

The week is almost half over
Yes gentle readers, the week is almost half over. Technically, the week won’t be half over until tomorrow evening but I am going to say it is half over because that makes me feel much better about getting up in the morning.

Anything to make me feel better is good when you wake up at 5:45 AM five days a week.

Warmer Weather
For those you who watched our Tournament of Roses parade in the rain on Monday and felt much better about not living in Southern California, the weather is improving. Tomorrow, we should see temperatures around 72F/22 or 73F/23C at the beach where I live and work. By the weekend, the temperature should be around 76F/25C.

Swell.

Unfortunately, I have to wear a suit and tie to work so that takes away some of the joys of beach living.

With the temperature up to 76F/25C, I ought to be able to get outside and smoke one of the Emily cigars that I got at Christmas. That would be epic since I have some new books to read as well.

New Hire Day at the Cosmetics Company
It appeared to be a New Hire Orientation Day at one of the cosmetics companies in the building.

There was a completely new crowd of smokers in the courtyard today. I think they were from a cosmetics company since they were all wearing black and some were bizarrely styled with multi-colored hair. I am just not ready for a woman with black hair and have her with purple and orange highlights in it.

Too much time as a banker I guess.

The other giveaway that these were all new hires was they were wearing one of those crummy “Hello. My Name is ….” name tags. They were also on the younger side, like close to the Big Guy’s age.

I wonder if they will be there tomorrow or not.

Chuckay Update
Chuckay is coming. Doug and I settled on May 6th as the proper date for the annual Chuckay Dinner. We think this will work out nicely and avoid the Memorial Day rush and conflict from having the dinner at the end of the month.

For you new readers, well new since May of last year, Chuckay is a month long celebration of all things Chuck.

Adam Carolla Show on radio
Our local talk radio station that used to have Howard Stern now broadcasts Adam Carolla as his replacement.

Today was the first broadcast and I was not impressed. I should point out that I only have about twenty five minutes to listen to the program and I usually hit it is time to make the giant commercial break.

All I got from the show was that Adam Carolla’s father was there and so was Jimmy Kimmel. Nothing to get excited about and nothing to make me want to stick around. I thought the female news reader was a cheaper and poorer version of Robin Quivers.

Doug says the news reader is hot. I will take his word for that since it is hard to tell from the radio. I will give the show until the end of the week to win me over. Otherwise, I will switch to oldies rock and roll or news radio.

All in all, it was a promising start to the week.

Be well and stay happy.

Happy New Year Weekend Update

Happy New Year
I hope you all had a very Happy New Year, gentle readers. For me, my new year’s was a quiet one. For the first time in years, there was no New Year’s Eve party in my building so it was easy to go to sleep after watching the tape delay of the ball drop in Times Square.

I wish Time Square ball drop was broadcast live to the West Coast. Then, we could be in bed and sound asleep much earlier. It would save a lot of time and cut down on the drinking. I mean, why drink after mid-night when you saw the ball drop in Times Square?

The only noise of consequence was some fireworks that had been leftover from the 4th of July. The fireworks did not delay my falling asleep at all.

Emerald Bowl – Part 2
I have some more on the Utes victory in the Emerald Bowl. These are sports headlines from non-Salt Lake City papers:

Humiliating bowl loss for Jackets
Atlanta Journal – Constitution

No sting from Jackets as Utah rolls to Emerald Bowl victory
Macon [Georgia] Telegraph

Georgia Tech Dismissed by Utah
Los Angeles Times

I wonder what the Salt Lake City Tribune had to say about the game.

I did get an email from the University sports stuff sales agency on Saturday that announced that it still had some Emerald Bowl stuff available for purchase. Last year, when Utah won the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, they sold a commercial free DVD recording of the game. Of course you know the result; it is still nice to watch without all of those needless commercials.

[Written while eating Emerald Cashews.]

What Did I Do?
That’s a really great question. With four days to relax with, I should have been very active and accomplished a great deal.

But, I actually did much less than I could have finished.

Tommy’s and DVDs
On Saturday, Doug and I went to lunch at the Original Tommy’s Burgers on our way to DVD Planet.com. It was a perfect way to go buy some more DVDs.

We got to Tommy’s before the noon time crowds that did not appear. Maybe the cool weather and light rain kept everyone home. Moving on to food, we both had the Mega Combo which is, as you know, three patties of beef, cheese, lettuce, onion, tomato, and chili; chili cheese fries, and a large drink. For the record, I had a bowl of soup and two slices of sourdough bread with brie cheese for dinner later on that day.

The Big Guy and I got to talking about three young women who came into to Tommy’s for lunch after they had their workouts. I pointed out to Doug how great that was, to find an attractive women who liked Tommy’s. In my mind, that made dead solid, almost perfect potential young women to go out with.

Doug sort of rained on my images. He said, “Dad, what sort of woman goes to Tommy’s for a chili cheeseburger, fries, and a soft drink after working out? What kind of a message is she sending out?”

I have to admit that he did raise excellent points there. Anyway, since I had not shaved in two days and I had just finished a Mega Combo and all of the natural ingredients, I felt I was not in the best of shape to engage in a conversation.

So we left and went to DVD Planet.com.

DVD Planet had some nifty film bargains for me and the Doug. I picked up a copy of M*A*S*H and this brought me to having 93 of the American Film Institute100 Best Films. I also picked up some films that had been on my DVDs to buy if I don’t get a gift of them for Christmas list.

Doug helped me add to my foreign [French and Italian foreign film collection in Doug’s mind] film by Jean Renoir, THE RULES OF THE GAME, and two versions of the same film, THE LOWER DEPTHS, one by Kurosawa, one of my favorite directors and the other by Renoir again.

Doug was particularly pleased with himself as he found a DVD that his friend and co-writer Mark had been talking about. Doug said he may let Mark borrow it after he views it. That’s sporting of him.

Since I was in South O. C., behind the Orange Curtain, I had thought about catching a film at one of the two foreign film houses in the O.C. I was thinking of seeing either CACHÉ or THE WHITE COUNTESS. In the end, I gave up on that idea because I would have to kill a couple of hours waiting for the next showing after we finished up at DVD Planet. The wait did not appeal to me and if I had waited, I would have had a drive home in the dark and in the rain with some of my fellow drivers driving under the influence of alcohol. That seemed like that would be no fun at all for me.

My Favorite Films of 2005 List
I am diligently working on my list of the films I enjoyed most in 2005. I am highly confident that my list will have some films that did not make it on to your list of films. I have my list down to eleven or twelve films right now. I still have two more films to see; I should catch those tomorrow when the cinemas ought to be empty plus neither film is a film for small children.

My film list will be alphabetically. This seems like a much easier process for me. Doug ranks his films from 1 to 10 with 1 being the best film on his list. I expect that I will be able to post my list sometime during the week.

I had planned to go to the cinema on Monday. But, it was raining heavily when I would have had to leave so I decided to pass on the cinema until next weekend. This gave me the time to complete my Best Films of 2005 List. I decided not to rank them 1 to 10 or however many there might be. My list is arranged chronologically by the date that I saw the film. Not the most rational approach, true; but, it works for me. Here is my list of 2005 Films:

BRIDE AND PREJUDICE
SIN CITY
LAND OF THE DEAD
HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE
WEDDING CRASHERS
CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY
THE ISLAND
2046
BROKEN FLOWERS
THE CONSTANT GARDENER
GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK
CAPOTE
SYRIANA

I already have the ones in italics on DVD now. I expect that I will pick up the others as they become available in the coming months or on my next trip to the DVD stores.

What I Saw at the Cinema
I did manage to go to the cinema this long weekend and I did see some good films. I only saw three films instead of the five that I had planned to see.

KING KONG was the sleeper that Doug said it was. By the way, sleeper, in this context means, a film that put him to literal and actual sleep. While the film has some great cinematography and CGI work, it is still overly long. Its first act plods along like a desert tortoise with the slows.

When I saw KONG, I was sitting next to four teenage girls. They say next to me and not the other way around. The one sitting next to me must have been really affected by the film since she got up and returned three times during the film. Maybe she had a weak bladder or got scared by the big ape. Anyway, she and her friends were holding on to each other which was because having the one next to me hold my arm would have been out of the question unless I was may be 20 or so. Then, it would have been very good for a college guy.

Doug said the film could have gone a good editing diet and dropped maybe 40 or 50 minutes without suffering very much. I was of the opinion that a first year film student could have done a better job of cutting and editing the film and would have dropped its run time by a full hour. In the final and absolute analysis, the box office results, the film is beginning to flounder and it will probably be unable to recover its costs.

I was looking at IMDb today and noticed that the CHRONICLES OF NARNIA had overtaken KONG at the box office over the long weekend. I saw both of these films on Friday afternoon; NARNIA played to an almost full house while KONG only filled a quarter of the seats in comparatively equal sized theaters.

The CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE WARDROBE, on the other hand, moved along at a much quicker pace and delivered more action in a faster paced sequence. I think the CGI was less impressive in this film. Some of the extras looked like they were Ork [or however you spell the term] refugees from the LORD OF THE RINGS.

I also think the actors had something to do with the impact of these films. Naomi Watts, currently Doug’s Babe of the Week [two weeks running], certainly seems as good of an actress as Fay Wray was. Jack Black looked so much like a cardboard cutout whose sole acting skill seems to have been raising an eyebrow. That move works from time to time but not for almost every scene in a three hour film.

The CHRONICLES seemed to tell the story better than KONG. It almost seemed as if Peter Jackson was trying to recreate the scope of LORD OF THE RINGS with KONG. Some of the action scenes, while brilliantly constructed and executed, tended to distract me and this may have adversely affected my viewing enjoyment.

Here’s another statement of the film’s staying power. Half way through the film, at about the 80 minute mark, the film broke. It took close to 15 minutes to repair and no more than a handful of people left their seats and did not return. Even when the venue offered them a free replacement ticket for any other film showing at the multiplex.

My last film was SYRIANA. I found this to be the more compelling and most enjoyable of the three films. It may have been because it was an adult film while the others were aimed at younger audiences.

I liked the way the film jumped around with the parallel and interwoven stories. This added a nice layer of sophistication. It also made you pay attention to what was going on the screen. Unlike KONG were you could miss out of a scene or two, you could not miss any scene in this film.

The film moved along crisply to its ultimate conclusion. It is a sad tale of genuinely good people getting caught up in the ambiguity of super power politics and international business.

If I had to rank the films, I would put SYRIANA first, then CHRONICLES, and finally KONG.

Rock and Roll
I listen to a classic [oldies] rock and roll station in Los Angeles when I am driving in my car. I also listen to the news and traffic which are necessities in Southern California so you can avoid getting stuck in a mess on the non-moving freeways.

Every big holiday, the station conducts a listener poll of the top 300 best rock and roll songs. The end of year collection was called “The Greatest Rock and Roll of All Time.” I thought that was bit presumptuous on their part.

The No. 1 song was Carlos Santana’s “Evil Ways,” and that struck me as being very odd.

I would have been certain that the Beatles or Elvis Presley would have had the number one song. Maybe there was ballot box stuffing. I am already over it since the song list will be gone by the time I hop in the Prelude tomorrow and drive off to work.

That was my New Year’s Weekend gentle readers.

Be well and stay happy.