Archive for January, 2009

The Bottom List

January 20, 2009 9:19 pm

Erin just posted her Top 30 list of favourite movies.

I thought I’d throw in my Top 10 (not complete as I didn’t give it too much thought) but also my Bottom List of some of the worst movies I’ve ever seen…or at least the most disappointing.

- Robin Hood: Men In Tights
- Step Brothers
- Constantine
- The Matrix 2 & 3
- Star Wars 1,2 and 3 (and 6) and The Clone Wars
- Dr. No
- Quantum of Solace
- Superman III and the subsequent movies
- Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
- The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe
- Hitman
- Transporter 3
- The Chase
- Queen of the Damned
- Lord of the Rings 2 & 3 (I know, I know, well they’re very professionally made, and expertly crafted but the stories stunk, it’s like, “Frodo, let’s go off to the Forest of Irigirigarden and fight the evil Malakor in order to ensure that the giant Bluenosed Squirrels don’t go foraging while we’re walking through the Bog of Shallowmoor”)
- The One

Edit: Danny just reminded me to add Spielberg’s horrid ‘A.I.’ to the list.

I’ve got The Look

2:18 pm

So I got a new pair of glasses about a month and a bit ago. People have made note of them a few times, not necessarily outright complimenting them, but sometimes those compliments that if you listen to it carefully you can detect the caveat, or clause that negates the presumed, implied approval of my new specs.

I get stuff like this:

Friend (usually female, though some guys have noticed): “Wow, did you get new glasses?”
Greg: “Why yes, yes I did.”
Friend: “They’re artsy/fashionable/suit your face.”

Now those of you who’ve seen my face will appreciate that anything which suits it properly would have to obscure most of it, but that’s not the point here.

The point is this: People are noticing my new glasses. They never noticed any of my older pairs.

My previous two sets of glasses were chosen by me with help from two different, very fashionable (oh, I hope they don’t read my blog) ladies. Both of whom design their own stuff, and both of whom actually liked me at the time of helping me.

No one liked those glasses.

Now I’ve got new glasses, which a fashionable dude helped me pick out and people are noticing. Then I got to thinking, many top fashion designers are men too.

I used to think that woman had inherently better fashion sense than men do, and that’s why I took my fashionable female friends to help me buy glasses. Maybe it’s time I rethink my assumptions.

I mean, I wouldn’t expect a man to be able to help a woman pick out an outfit, but I suspect that a man would be better off with a fashionable dude helping him pick out clothes like a suit or something.

Maybe the suit shops are onto something, when I go into them (not often, admittedly) it’s always dudes there to help you find something.

New Tune

January 19, 2009 11:15 pm

Here, and here (using different Guitar Rig presets).

Using Microsoft Word 2007 to make blog posts

7:26 pm

I got a great deal (thanks Nelson, thanks Adam!) on Office 2007, and the new version of Word comes with a handy feature to publish from Word to my blog. I’m not sure what advantages it has to over just logging into my blog’s admin panel (but I can think of some disadvantages, like not being able to approve comments (once again, thanks Erin for being my most consistent commenter).

This post is just to merely check the functionality of said function, but all in all I think Microsoft is slowly realizing that the feature set of their applications needs to be updated somewhat in order to truly be professional class.

I read this off Joey Devilla’s blog a while ago, quoted from here:

One of my big bones with MS stuff is that it always makes me feel like I’m eating out of the trash bins outside a cubicle farm. All of their software is designed to help busy executives plan their lives. Everyone I know uses it to try and write birthday cards and chat with their friends. When people use Microsoft Office they use it anywhere but in an office. Microsoft knows this – but it also knows that the money comes from their corporate clients, so there’s a limit to how much it can bend its software toward a wider customer base. Ultimately when you use MS software, you’re not the end user MS perceives at all: we’re just living off the scraps Microsoft leaves out after feeding its big customers.”

New tune Friday morning

January 16, 2009 1:56 am

Here ya go

Confirmation that the 80s were the best Decade Ever, Volume One: American Anthem

January 14, 2009 11:13 pm

Behold:

Duran Duran guitarist Andy Taylor was on the soundtrack. Check out the future Mrs. Gretzky Janet Jones giving an Oscar-worthy performance:

Movie Review: Enter the Dragon

9:34 pm

I liked this one, but I dunno – the 70’s aesthetic isn’t my cup of tea.

Movie Review: Slumdog Millionaire

9:31 pm

I don’t get the high acclaim this movie got. It was okay but I didn’t think it was anything special. The direction and production were awesome. The director was Danny Boyle (Sunshine, 28 Days Later, Shallow Grave) – who based on those three previous movies is one of my favourite directors.

The story itself wasn’t terribly interesting, kind of a ‘paint-by-numbers’ ‘up-from-the-ghetto’ type thing. Not terrible, but I wouldn’t watch it again.

Tueday morning massive update

January 13, 2009 1:51 am

I’m back in Toronto.

Thought you should know, gentle reader(s).

And now we’ve come to the end of the road…

January 9, 2009 12:30 am

I cried tonight, a fair bit actually.

I just finished packing up all my stuff for tomorrow’s move. The rest will go out in a smaller van at the end of the month. My pops is coming down with a truck to load up all my stuff.

I can’t really remember the last time I really cried, I didn’t even expect to get really emotional. The decision to leave was really easy (necessitated by economics, but I was really decisive and didn’t have any second thoughts). But now I guess I realized that this apartment is the most important thing I’ve ever had. I have lots of stuff, most of it junk, but nothing’s treated me as well as this place. You could say, and you’d be right that I was changed forever here. It wasn’t the apartment, it wasn’t me doing the changing – it was Christ but it happened to me here.

I’ve been here since Dec. 2004. Long time.

But I’m still thankful, that I’m going somewhere where I’m loved, where I’ll be (extremely) well-fed (my mother is one of the greatest cooks around) and where I can (most importantly in my post-career immediate future) live cheaply. I’ve met homeless who are suffering on the streets and who live with misery I pray I’ll never know.

So I’m really sad about leaving this apartment, but I can be comforted knowing I have opportunities. Opportunities for something better in the future.

I’ll see ya when I see ya.