My · Bucketload · of · Wriggling · Chucklebait

I've done this before, and it was a lot of fun. Reusing the ones that didn't get guessed last time.

1. Pick 15 of your favorite movies
2. Go to IMDB and find a quote from each movie
3. Post them for everyone to guess
4. Fill in the film title once it's guessed
5. No googling/using IMDB search functions



* * *

1. "You want to talk to me about an ambush? I just ambushed you with a fucking cup of coffee!"

2. "All right, sweethearts, what are you waiting for? Breakfast in bed? Another glorious day in the corps! A day in the Marine Corps is like a day on the farm. Every meal's a banquet! Every paycheck a fortune! Every formation a parade! I LOVE the corps!"

3. "Mother! Turn the cooling unit back on! Mother! ...You bitch!"

4. "It's not a matter of where he grips it!"

5. "At the end of time, a moment will come when just one man remains. Then the moment will pass. Man will be gone. There will be nothing to show that we were ever here... but stardust."

6. "I've always liked you Byron, but you never know when to shut up. Even bad men love their mommas."

7. "I'm not going to kill you. But I don't have to save you."

8. "You think you're scared now? Wait till your parents get the bill for breaking Daedalus."

9. "Twenty years after an Irishman couldn't get a fucking job, we had the presidency."

10. "A foreign substance is introduced into our precious bodily fluids without the knowledge of the individual. Certainly without any choice."

11. "All right ramblers, let's get rambling!"

12. "I'm Winston Wolfe. I solve problems."

13. "I can't believe what a bunch of nerds we are. We're looking up "money laundering" in a dictionary." Nyelene, Office Space

14. "There he goes. One of God's own prototypes. A high-powered mutant of some kind never even considered for mass production. Too weird to live, and too rare to die."

15. "They all have husbands and wives and children and houses and dogs, and, you know, they've all made themselves a part of something and they can talk about what they do. What am I gonna say? "I killed the president of Paraguay with a fork. How've you been?"

Wow. Got back from Chicago at 4 this morning. That was an awesome show.




We stopped at Three Floyds in Munster on the way up. Had some incredible beers, some okay food, and I got a Dark Lord t-shirt. Alpha Kong is spectacular, as is Rodenbach Grand Cru, and Dogfish Head Fort. They limit the Fort to 1 bottle per customer...it's 18%, but drinks like wine. Good stuff.




Got to the Riviera around 5:30, seating didn't start until 6, so we went to a Border's across the street. We were the 9th and 10th people in the door. It was general admission, so we got to the wide-open area pretty early. A security guy saw us and informed us that there was a balcony, with first-come-first-serve seating. Well, after how my back felt for standing through the Ween show, we decided to check it out.


Got some great seats on the balcony, two rows from the front. Show was supposed to come on at 7:30. 8 went by, and I started getting antsy. Finally, the opening act came on. Not impressed. They were called the Ike Reilly Assassination. Ike Reilly is like John Dylan, if John Dylan only had a fraction of his normal talent, and sold out to do pop songs. After they were done, it took 45 minutes to change the instruments out. By the time they were done, I was getting pretty pissed, and impatient.

When Shane stepped out on stage, though, all was forgiven. Let me say, I understand that Shane is no longer a capable, or even acceptable, singer. Back in the day, before he rotted away from boredom and booze, he was barely passable as a singer. His gift was in writing songs. Now that appears to be gone, too. He exists now purely as a personality. But what a personality. He came out on stage in a top hat, and the crowd went nuts. His vocals were better than I feared, but I can't imagine anyone not already familiar with them being able to make them out. When he spoke to the crowd, he was so slurred I didn't understand a word he said all night.

After the awe of seeing Shane passed, what really struck me were the other members of the band. James Fearnley is, in a word, phenomenal. He plays accordian like Angus Young plays guitar. He runs around, he jumps onto and off of things; he did a jump from the drum kit and landed on his knees that should have put him down. The man is simply amazing.

Spider Stacey was spot-on, but I feel bad for the man. He's the tin whistler for the band. About 2/3 of their catalog has a tin whistle, and even those only have chunks of it. The man has spent half his life whistling for 15 seconds at a time, then tapping his whistle against his thigh in time to the song.

Phil Chevron was great, and his vocals on Thousands are Sailing were spectacular. I'd only heard Shane's version, and it's a completely different (and better) song with Phil singing.

They did two 3-song encores, and the second one included Star of the County Down, one of my favorite songs, and one I'm relatively sure the Pogues have never recorded. It was a fantastic rendition. I'm pretty sure that if the band had been willing to do more encores, they'd probably still be playing. The crowd was nuts. There was a huge fight in front of us, where two drunk (middle-aged) women nearly came to blows, and their families started lining up for a tussle. Thankfully a security guy broke it up before it got ugly.

Overall, a real blast of a show. It was great to see Shane, but in all honesty, the real show was the rest of the band. There was a chemistry there that even I, totally musically stupid, could see. They're all immensely talented artists, and it was an honor to see them do their thing.

I'm sure I'm the millionth person to write about this on their blog today. But the passing of Gary Gygax hit me unexpectedly hard.

When I was younger, he was kind of a hero to me. He made a living being a geek.

I fell in love with my first wife through gaming. Our characters fell for each other, and that enabled us to admit that we had, too. I've gotten my second wife involved in gaming as well, and it has allowed us to spend many quality hours together.

Some of my dearest friends, past and present, I met or became close to at the gaming table. Several through high school that I won't name individually, Pendragon, the entire Egbert/Wright/Smorodinsky Co-Prosperity Sphere, my great friend Bob, Jerry, who owns the local game store. These are all people I wouldn't have met or become close to without RPG's.

Gaming is the one thing (aside from my wife and children) that I truly look forward to every week. Almost every day. If I miss a game, I get cranky and depressed. It allows me to flex my imagination the way nothing else I've found can. It allows me to blow off steam by slaughtering orcs and ninjas on Friday nights. This might sound laughable, but it allows me to explore parts of my personality that I otherwise might not. Demosthenia is a part of me, as much as it may scare me.

For all this and more, for the uncountable thousands of hours I've spent laughing and drinking and hanging out with my gaming friends, I have Gary Gygax to thank. I know he wasn't a saint...real people rarely are. But he was the father of, by my light, the greatest hobby in the world. Thanks, Gary.

From my Blogspot joint:
(http://lendme10bucks.blogspot.com/)

I spent 2.5 hours outside on Wednesday night videotaping and logging the eclipse. I have about 45 minutes of video, and a page full of notes. It was 10 degrees, -15 wind chill, but I really only got cold in the last half an hour or so. Good times. :-) I'll be posting the log here, maybe the video once I get it transferred.

My friends, join me in raising a glass, and think of me today, my first day as a free man in almost 10 years. I found out today that my divorce is final.

That seems to imply that K~ was a bad wife, but that's not the case. We were just NOT meant to be together. We had some fun, we gave life to three wonderful children, and we went our seperate ways. I'm just glad to be done with it. We started the process almost a year ago, and I'm just happy it's finally over. Now we can move on.

1) Of the various cultures, ethnicities or nationalities you belong to, which most strongly do you consider yourself?


American.


2) Is there a culture you cannot claim heritage from but which you feel quite close to?


British


3) What's one language you wish you knew fluently?


Spanish


4) If you could move anywhere in the world and be guaranteed a job, etc., where would you go?


Australia


5) If you had a time machine, and could witness any one event without altering or disturbing it, what would you want to see?

The Big Bang

1) 10 years ago what did you think you would be doing now?

Making fat cash as a security software programmer.

2) Where do you think you will be in 5 years from now?

I *HOPE* I'll be doing network security.

3) Do you live life one day at a time or look to the future.

A little of both, depending on the situation. Starting to look to the future more.

4) Do you wish you could go back in time and undo something in your life?

Too many to list...suffice it to say the answer is yes.

5) If you could send a message back in time and give a younger version of yourself some advice, what would it be?

Don't expect it to last, finish college, and take him to the hospital, it's not just a stomach ache.

Octavia Butler died yesterday. Sonuvabitch. She was an incredible woman. I mean, come on, how many black lesbian sci-fi authors are there, really? She was one of a kind. She will be missed.

I cried myself to sleep last night, sucking my thumb and clutching my Johnny Unitas doll.