Office Silliness
I hate to be a dud around the office, but is it really worth all the energy to come up with a costume just to sit around at your desk all day? Oh, I'm still playing along, but just bitching about it. There is something about this that taps into an insecurity that I thought was gone. This morning, I felt a high school-like anxiety the moment I walked into the building: Wait, did I read the memo right? We are all dressing up, right? Weren't we all going to dress up? I'd probably have to find a new job if I ended up being the only person in costume. I couldn't live that down.

Theaters
I've seen a few things lately about this debate over closing the video window, you know the timing from theatrical release to DVD then to Cable Pay Per View and then to cable. Here M. Night Shyamalan weighs in with someting that gets to the true demand for seeing a movie in the theater:

In what points to a growing debate over same-day theater/cable/VOD movie releases, famed director M. Night Shyamalan said in a speech at ShowEast that theater owners should have "zero tolerance" for the practice. "If this goes through, you know theaters are closing down," Shyamalan said.

I guess that's true, at least the marginal ones. There will probably always be demand for seeing something on the big screen. But why deal with the hassles of annoying theater patrons and their cell phones and sweaty elbows if you don't have to?

That Was Quick
First the Red Sox, now the White Sox. Congratulations to all of the fans on the South side. You know if the Red Sox last year can win their first since 1918 and the White Sox then go on tho win their first since 1917, simple mathematics tells you that the Cubs are due in 2014!

Poll: Hypothetical Polls Are Stupid
CNN is hyping it's latest poll:

Poll: Bush would lose an election if held this year

(CNN) -- A majority would vote for a Democrat over President Bush if an election were held this year, according to a CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll released Tuesday.

In the latest poll, 55 percent of the respondents said that they would vote for the Democratic candidate if Bush were again running for the presidency this year.

Thirty-nine percent of those interviewed said they would vote for Bush in the hypothetical election.

First of all, tell us something we don't already know. The guy's approval ratings are in the toilet, and mostly for good reasons. The sad thing is that the Democrats don't have a "hypothetical candidate" in their ranks. They have actual candidates with who are either big time losers (Gore, Kerry), have big time baggage (Shrillary) or are just too unknown. I'd probably vote for my favorite hypothetical Democrat too if there was an election. I'm thinking divided government is where it's at.

Bad Haircut
The lady that usually cuts my hair went and got in a car accident. She's fine but needs some "time to recover". Well, after this butcher job her stand-in gave me, so does my hair. I should have known going in that it wasn't going to work out well. She was like 18, overweight and clearly not a sophisticated urbanite. The kind of person who think nothing removing my sideburns completely and leaving me with a mullet. Then when she started cutting it and was facing away from the mirror, so I couldn't really see what was going on. If felt so helpless, like maybe she was going too short, but I couldn't tell. It wasn't until she had to answer the phone that I saw the true extent of the damamge.

It's actually not that bad, but I feel kind of silly because it is shorter than usual. It reminds me of that old SNL skit, the Bad Haircut Support Group, which had a group saying that I can't find of the internet. It went something like "I got a bad haircut, this does not mean I am a bad person. When it grows back, I will take a picture in to the stylist to show exactly what I want...." something like that.

Sahara
I wanted to like a movie like Sahara, but it just didn't happen. I sort of wanted to see this in the theater, hearing that it was an Indiana Jones-type movie, but am happy to have saved the $8 or so.

Matthew McConaughey's character (Dirk Pitt) is intense, annoying, and unlike Indiana Jones, someone who you really can't connect with. Penalope Cruz sure is purty, but clearly can't act. She speaks with an accent that sounds cute, but that doesn't work for the whole movie. Steve Zahn does an OK job of playing the buddy character, but he isn't quite believable.

It is a burden to follow the plot because the movie kind of loses you early on. I found myself staring at the leaves outside and wondered if the were about to fall. My advice: if you are going to make a boring movie, keep the story simple.

We bought this off Pay Per View and DVR'd it and watched over 3 days, almost as an obligation to make up for the $3.95 (which as a cable company employee only costs me $2.50!), so this one might not be worth the effort.

Cover Letters
I guess it's just impossible not to sound arrogant when giving job hunting advice. This article in Craigslist from a CEO giving advice to job seekers is well-meaning, but I just can't help feeling a little put off by the slightly condescending tone.

Here is a summary: I'm a very busy and important person. Your letters bore me. Let me offer the masses important advice about the kind of cover letters I like to read. Now I must get back to work. From Newmark's Door.

Rocky?
Well this is just kind of sad. Another Rocky movie? This one with a 59-year old Sylvester Stallone? Who knows, it could be fun.

That being said, check out the shoes on Sly in this pic here. He's clearly got about 3 inches of lift in those shoes. I get a kick out of reading some of the stuff at www.celebheights.com on him and some of the other celebrities who are known to exaggerate their height.

Go Sox
Well I wish this was happening about 8 miles up the road, but best of luck to the Sox and my fellow South-siders. Here is something I linked to earlier about the Sox.

Busy
I've been pretty busty this past month working on our annual budget here at the cable company and it looks like most of the work is finally done. The quality of blog posts here has suffered as a result, and I'm hoping to remedy that soon (or not). Of course now that this budget thing is all over, I get sick. I've had a fever the past 3 nights, the kind where you go to bed shivering and cold and wake up soaked in a pool of your own sweat. Kinda weird, but today I think I'm coming back around.

New Bond
They finally picked a new Bond, Daniel Craig. This might end up being the worst choice since Harriet Miers:

He has just proved his ladykilling credentials by seducing Sienna Miller from under the nose of his friend, Jude Law.

Now Daniel Craig is about to become the biggest seducer of all - Ian Fleming's James Bond.

The actor, who found fame as Geordie in the BBC series Our Friends in the North in 1996, got the job after an 18-month mission to replace Pierce Brosnan.

If they were shooting for a younger looking James Bond, I'm not sure they succeeded. I don't even know the guy, so I could be wrong.

Blues Traveler
Blues Traveler rolled through Charlottesville on Friday and I went and saw them. John Popper supposedly lost a lot of weight, but he must have put some of it back on. I'd say if he was 350 back in the day and got down to like 200 that he's maybe 240 today. A big guy, but not obese like before. They sounded OK but didn't play too much of their older stuff.

The have this new Pavillion here in Charlottesville that has been getting some bigger acts recently: Spin Doctors, Widespread Panic, The Pixies, Blues Traveler. They still haven't quite got the sound right in there though.

Stones
I went to the Rolling Stones concert last night and had to deal with three hours of traffic and this:

The Rolling Stones' concert at the University of Virginia was interrupted Thursday night while several police officers and three bomb-sniffing dogs searched the stage.

The show resumed after about a half-hour intermission. University, state and city police did not immediately return phone calls about the incident, and no announcement was made to the audience about the reason for the break.

About eight songs into the show, lead singer Mick Jagger announced that authorities had told them to take a break. The stage at the university's 61,000-seat Scott Stadium and about the first 20 rows of spectators were cleared until police finished their work.

The Rolling Stones are touring North America to promote their latest album, "A Bigger Bang."

But, all in all, a great show by those old guys. That Mick Jagger is pretty amazing at 62. Keith was still sneaking smokes between songs, but you figure if they haven't killed him yet, they probably won't.

Nuts
What actor or actress would play you in a movie? You know, if for some reason they made a movie about your life, or even if they made a movie about someone else's life and you happened to be in it, who would play you? I used to always say Nicholas Cage but now he has gotten a little too bald, and a little too crazy. He used to be edgy in a funny kind of way, but now he's kinda nuts I think. Did you see that he just had a son with a wife half his age and he named him Kal-el, after Superman. That's actually kind of clever, but he's still nuts.

Who?
I don't really have a dog in this fight, but it is kind of fun watching Bush's supporters getting quite upset with his newest choice for Supreme Court, Harriet Miers. His nomination must have been based on something substantial, since she clearly isn't doing so well in the looks department.