seriously EPIC fail

EPIC FAIL happens all the time.

Do you have too many kids and are looking for a way to get rid of one or two?

Do you have trouble finding good parking spaces?

Are you confused about gender traits?

I could read this frickin' website ALL DAY.

"Terminator Salvation" - trailer

So, as much as I'm dying to see "Terminator Salvation", I had decided that I did NOT want to see the trailer online - I wanted to see it in a movie theatre. Well, I held out and was finally rewarded. When we went to see "Watchmen" Saturday night, they showed a trailer for "Terminator Salvation", which we were hoping for since it made sense. (It was actually rather interesting that every single trailer they showed before the movie was for a film I wanted to see. In addition to "Terminator Salvation", they also showed trailers for "Star Trek", "Knowing" (which I'm going to see in spite of Nicolas Cage), "Public Enemies", and I'm not sure if I'm forgetting anything. I don't think it's happened before where every single trailer being shown is for a film I'm interested in.)

Here's a link to the trailer we saw. It looks awesome. And at this point, now that I'm satisfied at having seen a trailer, I don't really want to know much more about it. I just want to see the film. We have plans to attend a midnight screening of the film on opening night.

"Watchmen" - spoiler movie review

While I've never read the "Watchmen" graphic novel, I do know enough about it to know its history and the reverence with which it is held by many in the comics community. When I saw the trailer for the movie "Watchmen", though, I was intrigued.

Overall, I really enjoyed the film. Not knowing any of the characters, I thought it might be difficult to get adjusted to the story and the world that the characters are set in, but it wasn't difficult at all. It's set mostly in our world, though an alternate reality version, since Nixon is elected to something like five terms and the U.S. actually won the war in Vietnam. And while there is a fairly large cast of characters, it was interesting to learn the backstory of each of them.

There is a lot of time jumping because they talk about not only the current batch of heroes but also the first batch, and how the two are intertwined and how they're connected. I also liked the stylized look of the film, which I think fit in well with the story of the film itself.

The opening sequence, when the Comedian is killed, set to Nat King Cole's "Unforgettable" was brilliant. They actually use quite a number of iconic songs in the film, which made me wonder exactly how much they paid just for song clearances alone. But then, that's a particular quirk of mine.

I thought the reveal that Janey Slater was involved with Pyramid was going to be the big twist, that she was behind the whole thing mostly because of her residual resentment towards Dr. Manhattan, but the real story was even more sinister - the culprit behind the murders is actually one of their own. And his reasoning is actually for benevolent reasons - well, at least in his view. It's not just because he's power-hungry. He's doing what he feels is necessary to save the human race - but in the process, millions of humans have to be sacrificed. But is that tempered by the fact that the loss of millions is going to save billions? An interesting question.

Malin Akerman plays Laurie/Silk Spectre II. I liked her, though I found it fairly distracting because she looked so much like a young Lucy Lawless, from her "Xena: Warrior Princess" days. So then I was surprised when I saw pictures of her, and it appears that she's normally a blonde. With the blonde hair, there's no resemblance at all. There's one picture of her that I saw where she kind of looks like Natalie Portman. So even though I don't think I've ever seen her in anything before, she looks familiar because she reminds me of other people.



Oddly enough, her mother is played by Carla Gugino, who is entirely not old enough to be playing her mother, being only seven years older. I think she did a pretty good job as well, though it took me a while to recognize her. I know her mostly from the TV show "Threshold". I did think they did a horrible job with the makeup in her scenes as the older version of herself.

Carla, left, plays mom to Malin, right.

Billy Crudup does a good job as Jon/Dr. Manhattan, though he spends most of his time glowing blue, kind of like the Blue Man Group. The exploration of him losing his humanity was pretty interesting, though I wasn't expecting the full frontal naked view of him on several occasions.

Jackie Earle Haley is pretty incredible as Rorschach, though I wish they'd explained how his mask did that thing which gave him his name since his face itself didn't do that. And maybe it's just me, but at times, especially during the prison sequences, he looked kind of like Danny Bonaduce.

Patrick Wilson is pretty good as Nite Owl II. Again, the actor looked familiar. In looking at his credits, I do remember him as the husband in "Lakeview Terrace", but I completely don't remember that he played Raoul in the film version of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "The Phantom of the Opera".

Matt Frewer has a nice little role as Moloch. I didn't really recognize him, but I certainly recognized his voice. But then, I'll always know him as Max Headroom. I wish he was in more things.

The film is pretty long, coming in at close to 3 hours. But I never felt the length, and I was never bored. I'd like to see the film one more time in theatres.

she's turning 50 and she's finally getting her dream house

Barbie is turning 50, and on Monday, March 9 (I think she's had a lot of surgery, because she looks a little plastic to me), she is finally getting her Malibu Dream House - in real life.

Adler lined Barbie's bedroom with wall-to-wall pink carpeting emblazoned with her initial.

Wall to wall pink carpeting emblazoned with her initial. I can't even begin to imagine what that would look like. Like someone had poured Pepto Bismol on the carpet? Even pinker than Circus Circus in Las Vegas?

Following the festivities, most of Barbie's custom decor will be shipped to the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas to furnish a special pink-tinted Barbie Suite that will be available for bachelorette parties, birthdays or anyone who wants to live like Barbie.

OK, someone go and rent out the place and take pictures, ok? I'll admit I'm not all that familiar with the Palms, but they don't seem like a Barbie-type place to me. Isn't/wasn't there a woman who really had a billion surgeries to make her look like Barbie? She should get a free weekend stay there.

Here's a link to Barbie's site. And here's the site celebrating her 50th birthday.

"Push" - spoiler movie review

The husband had originally mentioned the film "Push" to me, but I never saw a trailer for it. His description of the trailer he'd seen sounded interesting, and he did want to see the film. From what he said, it sounded like a cross between "X-Men" and the "Star Wars" video game "The Force Unleashed".

And then I saw the one-sheet.



Yeah, if I didn't know any better, I would totally have thought this was a poster for "The Force Unleashed".

Overall, I liked the film. The characters were interesting, as you tried to figure out what each of their abilities were and what hip name they were calling it.

The twists were a bit convoluted and sometimes hard to follow, but that might also be attributed to me not feeling well when I saw the movie, so maybe that made it more difficult for me to follow.

The screaming guys were really annoying, so of course, they had to die. And lollipop girl, yeah, she was annoying and bitchy, and WTF with the lollipop, so she had to die too.

OK, I had figured out ahead of time that the soy sauce would be substituted for the magic liquid at some point, but wouldn't that still be poisonous or at least bad for you if you INJECTED THAT INTO YOUR BODY? I mean, I like soy sauce and all, but ewwww.

I was also curious about seeing Dakota Fanning in a non-child role, and I thought she was quite good. Smarmy but still cute. I'm looking forward to watching her as she grows and she starts playing actual adult roles.



Djimon Hounsou is also in the film, and I really liked him in this, but then, I think I've pretty much liked him in everything I've seen him in, especially "In America".



It's a decent enough movie, but if you missed it in the theatres, that's ok - I think it would make a good film for Netflix.

March 4, 2009 - A Day at the Park

I arrived at the Disneyland Resort parking structure at about 3:40pm. It had rained really hard on the drive from the house, but there, it was sunny with some clouds in the sky, some of them even puffy white ones.

Disney is currently offering a promotion whereby people can get into one of their U.S. parks for free on their actual birthday. If someone already has one of the qualifying admission media that day, they can then choose from a few alternate choices. People can register their birthdays through the Disney website ahead of time, and shortly before your birthday, they send you a letter by email.



Oh, and also, on the day of your birthday, if you've signed up for it, they also send you an email about your virtual birthday party. It includes a link to a page that has a couple games you can play.



I didn't need the free admission and would instead be getting one of the alternate options, and I'd heard reports from people that you can obtain those at places other than the main ticket booths, but since the line was negligible there, I just waited in the main ticket booth line. When a cast member (CM) became available, I presented her with the letter that I had printed out, as well as my driver's license and my annual pass, so she would know I didn't need admission. You don't have to pre-register to get any of the benefits, but having the email makes the process quicker since you would have already filled everything out at the time of your registration. She asked what alternate option I would like, and I told her I wanted the gift card, which is in the amount equal to the cost of a one-day, one-park ticket, currently $69 for an adult. She gave me back my license and AP, and then she handed me a gift card and flyer with instructions. In total, the process probably took about 5 to 10 minutes.

I had thought that the gift card would be one of the designs that can be purchased around the resort, so I was surprised to see that it was a completely different card. I love the design - it's really cute.



The back of the card has some terms of usage that I found to be quite interesting.

Click here for a larger version of this picture.

I thought it was interesting that the card states that it's non-transferable, that only the person who received the card can use it and that verification might be required. I later talked to a CM in a store about this, and I asked if they really did that, and she said that there was really no way for them to check. She said that originally, they had planned to actually print the recipient's name on the card, but then they didn't end up doing that. Originally, the promotion had been that the entire balance of the card could ONLY be used on the person's birthday. The wording on the card would seem to indicate it was created when that was still the intention, since it has the provision about "birthday validation" - you would only have to prove it was your birthday if you could only use the card ON your birthday. It seems that when they changed the terms of the promotion, they just didn't change the wording on the cards.

The gift card is also combinable with other forms of payment, so if you want to buy something that's more than the amount on the gift card, you can pay the difference with another gift card, credit card or cash. I didn't end up spending my gift card, partly because the item I was thinking of was no longer in stock at Disneyana, so I'll look again another day at Off the Page in DCA or at World of Disney.

Here's the flyer that they gave me.

The front of the flyer.
Click here for a larger version of this picture.

The back of the flyer.
Click here for a larger version of this picture.

I went into Disneyland and to City Hall to get my birthday button as well as a "I'm celebrating" button since I hadn't gotten one of those since the promotion began. I like that when you're wearing a birthday button, CMs who see you with the button will generally wish you a happy birthday. Sometimes, other guests will too.


It was later in the day than I had originally intended to be there, so I didn't have a lot of time before I would need to meet the husband for dinner. It wasn't so much that there were lots of things I wanted to do that day - I really just wanted to be at Disneyland. I had something that I needed to do that I brought with me which would require sitting down at a table, so I decided to go to the Golden Horseshoe. That turned out to be a very good idea because it started to rain as I made my way there, so the respite was nice.

There was no show going on at the time, and the place wasn't very crowded, so I made my way upstairs and settled down at one of the tables. I didn't think that Billy Hill and the Hillbillies were playing that day, but I wasn't sure what was. I remember there was a revue there before that I'd never had the chance to see, but I guess they're gone because after a while, the show started, and it was Laughing Stock, a comedy group than normally performs outside, right in front of the Golden Horseshoe. The show itself was ok, with some funny parts, and I finished what I needed to do right as the show ended.

Laughing Stock performing inside the Golden Horseshoe.

I headed to Main Street and then was contemplating heading to DCA for a couple of minutes when the husband let me know that he'd arrived at the resort, so since there wasn't that much time before our reservation, I arranged to meet him instead.

Napa Rose is one of my favorite restaurants, and that's where I had chosen for dinner. We had an amazing dinner that night. Click here for the dinner review.


All in all, it was a lovely day.

magical memories - where everybody knows your name

I am going to be spending part of my day at the Disneyland Resort today. Yeah, I know, big surprise. Those who know me probably don't find that odd, but there are people who know me who still don't understand how I could possibly spend so much time there without being bored, and how many times can I go on the rides, and what the heck do I DO there all the time anyway?

Well, if people don't get it, there's really no explaining. But, the times that I have tried, I've told them that it's really not that different than spending time at the park or at the mall or wherever else one wants to just hang out and sometimes even be with friends - it just so happens that when we're done shopping and browsing and eating, there are always rides nearby that we can go on or a show to see.

But oftentimes, it's the seemingly mundane things that I've enjoyed the most out of my experiences at the Resort.

Years ago, I spent a lot of time at Coke Corner on Main Street. There's a piano player there, and while different people would work at different times and days, the perennial piano player for years and years was Rod Miller. He played and talked and joked, and because of being around other people, I got to know him a bit as well. There were a lot of people who would regularly gather at Coke Corner to hear Rod play and just hang out with other regulars. I guess I could liken it to the bar at Cheers - a comfortable place to hang out, with the assurance that at almost every moment, you'd run into someone there that you knew, and whether it had been a good day or a bad day, that's where you wanted to be at the end of the day to either have other people commiserate or celebrate with you.

One night, I was there with the husband (I think he was the SO at the time), and friends J and K were there as well. We sat at a table that was right next to the piano, which itself was on a raised platform, so people could stand next to it and kind of lean on the piano. The four of us just sat around talking about various things and joking around, a non-moment of sorts, but a really fun one. For some reason, either J or K had a pad of post-it notes, and K was playing with it, and she ended up just writing stuff and tagging things, like she'd write "table" and then peel the post-it off and stick it on the table. She'd write "nose" and then stick it on J's nose - stuff like that.

And then somehow or other, we noticed the guy that was standing behind where she and I were sitting - we had our backs to the piano - as he was listening to Rod play and talking to Rod. We didn't know the guy, but he was wearing a light jacket, like a Member's Only jacket. I don't remember how it came about, but she and I made some comment about the guy and how she should tag him with a post-it. She ended up writing "random dude" on a post-it, and it took a while for her to work up the nerve and opportunity, but she eventually managed to surreptitiously place the post-it on his jacket without him knowing. And, of course, as soon as she was able to do it, she and I melted into silent peels of laughter (didn't want to draw the guy's attention and risk him immediately noticing that he'd been tagged). For a couple of us, "random dude" became a code word for all time, and it still instantly evokes that night, that moment.

Rod Miller retired several years ago, back in 2005, I think. I ran into him once or twice after that, but I haven't seen him since. I heard a while ago that he sometimes stops by at the piano for a little bit on Saturday nights, but I'm rarely at Disneyland on Saturday nights. I don't really know anyone who has kept in touch with him, but if anyone has, and you care to do so, please pass along my greetings and well wishes to him. I think about him every time I pass the piano, and I hope he's well.

I don't know if I can really say that K and I were friends - we didn't really know each other all that well, though we did hang out at various times. I really liked her and would have liked to have gotten to know her better, but that just never seemed to pan out. We did have a lot of good times, many moments of laughter and some moments of personal sharing, and I'm thankful for all of them. I think about her periodically as well, wondering what she's been up to. Just the other day, I heard the song "All Star" by Smash Mouth, and I've always associated that song with her because she would sing the song, mostly the beginning of the chorus, often. YouTube won't let me embed the video, but here's the link.

Wherever you are, and whatever you're doing, Kaz, I hope you're happy, healthy and well. Thanks for some amazing Disneyland memories.

out of the past

Yesterday would have been the 105th birthday of Dr. Seuss, so Google had an appropriately themed logo.





On a separate note, I've been meaning to look and see if there are any toys out for "Coraline", and I've found a few things, but they're all online and some are fairly expensive, so I'm going to wait until more merchandise is released generally, which I hope/expect it will be. But, in browsing around, I also found out about this "Coraline" exhibit that was presented at the Cartoon Art Museum in San Francisco. I love the picture in the article, and it would be so cool to see the maquettes and other figurines and sets and such used in the making of the movie. I'm really hoping that they decide to take the tour around because I'd love to have the chance to see it.

irony and presumptuousness

So, there has been no winning ticket for the MegaMillions lottery for a little while, so the jackpot is now at some ridiculously high number. I don't play the lottery much, but I was at a gas station this morning anyway, so I spent some money on lotto tickets. As the clerk handed the ticket to me, I took a glance at it and was amused by what I saw.




How weird that "Problem Gambling Awareness Week" falls at the time of one of the biggest jackpots in MegaMillions history, when there are probably going to be a lot more people playing because of the jackpot size, people who don't normally play, like me.


And as I was about to step away, the clerk said to me, "If you win, don't forget about us." I think I kind of half-heartedly laughed or made some other non-committal noise before walking away.

So, if I end up with a ticket that has the winning numbers, I somehow owe that to the person who happened to take my money and push the button to give me my quick pick? That just seemed like a really odd comment. The entitlement attitude behind that comment really caught me off guard.

Now, if I were to win the lottery, sure, I'd probably want to share my good fortune with some people, commensurate with the size of the amount I won. And I could make you a list of people who would not be recipients of any of my good fortune. And I could make you another list of people who would be recipients of probably very small amounts of my good fortune. And then I could make you a list of people who would be *very upset* that they were on one of those two lists, who would be mad that I didn't choose to share more or at all.

I am not of the belief that *anyone* is entitled to a share of the jackpot. In my case, because of my relationship with my parents, I'd certainly want to use a portion to do something nice for them. I would also do something for some of my family members and some friends. But no matter how close someone is to me, I wouldn't think they'd expect that I would give them something. If my parents won the lottery, I wouldn't expect them to give me any. If one of my siblings won the lottery, I wouldn't expect anything. If my best friend won the lottery, I wouldn't expect anything.

So why would a random clerk even make a comment about being "remembered"? How can I remember you when I don't even know you, when it would be complete happenstance that you're the one who sold me my ticket? And frankly, I wouldn't have a clue which particular person sold me the ticket, other than that it was female. So would I have to then share my winnings with all of the women at that gas station, just to make sure I rewarded the right person? To be honest, I don't think it would ever occur to me to go back and give money to the person who sold me the ticket, even if I knew who it was.

Oh, well. Wish me luck.

"Man of La Mancha" - musical review

I'd previously mentioned that we had tickets to see Reprise Theatre Company's production of "Man of La Mancha", starring Brent Spiner. We ended up with pretty good seats, fifth row on the left side aisle. Sometimes side aisle seats can present a view problem, but with the staging of the show, it really wasn't an issue.

Because of problems at dinner, we were afraid we were going to end up being late, but we arrived just a couple minutes before the show started. However, there were already people on the stage in their characters, milling around and such. I'm not sure how long they'd been out there for. Shortly thereafter, the lights dimmed, an announcement was made about turning off celphones, and the show started.

Generally speaking, I enjoyed the show. The story was interesting, and I really liked the intertwined stories of the prison, the events in the life and family of Alonso Quijana, and the adventures encountered by Don Quixote. The show was announced as running 1 hour and 50 minutes, without an intermission, but I didn't notice the time at all. I will say, though, that while I'm glad to have seen this show, the story and show themselves didn't interest me enough so that I would be inclined to see it again, unless there was someone in the show I particularly wanted to see, which was the case this time.

I thought Brent Spiner was quite good as Cervantes/Quijana/Quixote, though I'll admit that I haven't seen him in enough roles to completely divorce him out of my mind from thinking of him as Data or as Brent Spiner himself. I did like the tone with which he sang the songs - my only exposure previously was with his CD many years ago, and that was a stylized format. He was pretty powerful in singing the signature songs of the show.

Julia Migenes played the part of Escalante/Aldonza, and she was really amazing. I loved her voice and her performance as well. She performed for the evening shows while another actress performed during matinees.





Lee Wilkof was also very good as Cervantes' manservant/Sancho. The entire company was actually very good, but those were the performances I specifically wanted to mention.

The show seems to have gotten very good reviews all around. Here's a particularly glowing one from Variety.

The show ends its two-week run on Sunday, March 1, 2009.