Category Archives: Hobbies

When my butt isn’t in this chair…

TV Show Funtime Memory Blarg

Distractions, Hobbies

Quark: Buck Henry wrote this long before Spaceballs came out. Highly superior (which isn’t saying much, but hey, I was a geeky kid at home on a Friday night).

Project UFO: Again, at home on the weekend glued to the TV watching this crap. But looking at the episode synopsis, I think X Files borrowed heavily from this show.


Fantastic Voyage: Back when Filmation was making buckets of cash for one of the original Archies series, they made a few episodes of this bastardized movie.

Logans Run (TV): Pew pew pew! Pew pew pew!! Remember, no other element makes a 70s sci fi series converted from a movie more cheesier than an emotionless robot played by an actor at the end of his career.

Stone Me!

Celebs and Media, Hobbies, Personal Bits

Stone Angel movie I recently saw the trailer for the movie Stone Angel (with my new honest to blog, supa-fave actress, Ellen Page) and it borked up a solid, hard memory nut with two levels:

One of the more clearer memories I have of my alcohol and pot-fogged time in high school was studying this book by Margret Lawrence. You may have noticed that my spelling and grammar is a bit poor, I blame anything other than not applying myself. I would fight with my English teacher because my brother was his golden student and English class was an annoying block of time before art class. I digress.

Stone Angel is a story of Hagar Shipley who recounts her life in shards of flashbacks and fragments of memories as she comes to the end of her proud life. Okay that’s the book in a nutshell (eat that, Mr Darling!). I remember the book not because of it’s structure (actually I did love the Tarantino-like recount of vignettes from her life) but because while we peeled back the themes and metaphors of a life fully lived, it dredged up a horror from my childhood (the second layer of that nut) that I had to deal with, and in some ways, I still haven’t come to grips with when I was a child. When I was even younger, I think in grade 4, I freaked out at a short film where a family visits their aging (grand)mother in a home. She’s so far gone into herself that all that we see on the outside is drool, yet inside, through movie magic, we see she’s lived a full and amazing life and she still has her memory. At the end of the short film, ran from the class and hid under my bed. Mom found me in tears and made me explain what had upset me so.

Dear readers, I am about to share with you something highly personal:

I am deathly afraid of getting old.

If I were ever to get trapped within my body and could not communicate my needs, I’d like notice that I have four days to live and left alone in that time so I could recount my life, a la Stone Angel. Day four would come and some pre-paid orderly would quietly enter my room and make me eat my pillow. The end.

Will I see this movie? I don’t know. Maybe. Should I stop being such a 13 year old in a 42 year old body? Maybe.

Another for Rick Mercer

Celebs and Media, Hobbies

I’ve totally ripped this one off SharkBoy.

An office hallway. An upper twenties, well dressed man in business casual is walking towards us when he suddenly looks into a boardroom, just to his right.

Over-the-shoulder shot of him looking into the boardroom. Donuts and danishes are tantilizingly laid out on a tray.

Hallway shot again. Two well dressed, upper twenties women join the man.

Man: (flamboyantly) I’m going in!

He takes out a small brown bottle, unscrews the lid and inhales hard from it, while plugging one nostril.

Man: Woooo!

He dances into the boardroom, arms waving.

The two women take out Special K snacks and lazily munch from the pouches. Over-the-shoulder shot from the women as they watch the man in the boardroom. He’s got his shirt off and is gyrating around the table, rubbing danishes on his nipples. The thumping of techno music can be heard coming from the room.

Announcer: Special K! It’s not just for lonely secretaries who’s only male contact is that gay guy in accounting, anymore!

The Cake is a Lie

Distractions, Hobbies, Toronto

Torontoist has a great article about a Weighted Companion Cube showing up on Bloor & Euclid as it pops through from Yonge and Bloor (even with peek-a-boo visual clues where the other half of the cube is located)

AWESOME!

Weighted Companion CubeThis was a triumph
I’m making a note here
HUGE SUCCESS
It’s hard to overstate my satisfaction
Aperture Science

we do what we must because we can
for the good of all of us except for the ones who are dead
but there’s no sense crying over every mistake
you just keep on trying until you run out of cake
and the science gets done and you make a neat gun
for the people who are still alive

I’m not even angry
I’m being so sincere right now
even though you broke my heart and killed me
and torn into pieces
and threw every piece into a fire
as they burned it hurt because I was so happy for you!
Now these points of data make a beautiful line
and we’re out of beta, we’re releasing on time
so I’m glad I got burned
Think of all the things we learned for the people that are still alive

go ahead and leave me
I think I prefer to stay inside
maybe you’ll find someone else to help you
maybe black mesa
that was a joke, haha, fat chance
anyway this cake is great, it’s so delicious and moist
look at me still talking, when there’s science to do
when I look out there it makes me glad I’m not you
I’ve experiments to run, there is research to be done
on the people who are still alive

and believe me I am still alive
I’m doing science and I’m still alive
I feel FANTASTIC and I’m still alive
While you are dying I’ll be still alive
and when you’re dead I’ll be still alive
STILL ALIVE, still alive

Scotiabank Theatres, Rattily

Hobbies, Toronto

klingon vs enterpriseWhat has become of the Scotiabank Theatres lately? Since they’ve taken over the old “Paramount” theatre, it’s now become the Second Scuzziest theatre downtown (first is the Cumberland 4 where you can get electrocuted by space heaters in the isles). It use to be an “experience” to go to movies there, and I mean that in a good, non-sarcastic way. Now when I go, I steel myself for all sorts of theatre mishaps that can happen.

The big video cube precariously balancing over the corner of John and Richmond has been on the fritz since the hand-over and can barely show the 3 story tall trailers it once broadcasted, not to mention being garishly covered in the eye-bleedingly sharp Scotia red. Lately at least one escalator is off or broken. The theatre use to boast about the incline of the trip up to the lobby but with the “down” escalator constantly in repair, the descent is dizzying. Although energy-consuming, the fancy show lights that project designs in the stairwells and floor haven’t been running, making amature DJs weep as they pass by hundreds of dollars worth of unused lighting equipment. The concession staff are not the most well trained in customer service, which comes as no surprise since they’re now programmed to welcome you to a Scotiabankpropertyandenjoytheshownextplease – it’s not a friggin’ bank! Let the minimum wage staff have some fun! Meanwhile the general manners of movie-goers that frequent the Scotia has dropped to sub-Neanderthal levels. Ironically the last movie I went to there without chatting or cell phone interruptions was Cloverfield. And using the upstairs washroom has become a hazard.

What of the poor Enterprise/Klingon Bird of Prey? They haven’t been dusted in months!

With the bright and shiny AMC* opening at Dundas Square (Digital picture! Free butter flavouring! Better rewards program! Free refills on regular sized snacks! Cheaper Snacks! Comfy seats! Legroom! Better Sound!) I officially put the Scotiabank Theatres on Death Watch.

Or at least I’m not going there for a while…

* A friend of mine tells me that during the AMC’s free movie preview weekend, a verbal fight broke out between rival student factions during The Mist. While all manner of plebeian schleps come out of the woodwork when you mention “free”, I’m convinced (read: hoping) that this kind of behaviour will evaporate.

Batchelor Living

Hobbies, Personal Bits

Tonight, SharkBoy is going out to dinner with some friends of his so I’m at home alone.

I wonder what I shall make for dinner?

Later, I’m off to Big Momma’s Boy for their Tuesday night open mike comedy stage up standing laugh riot dang… thingy.

UPDATE: “Thingy” indeed. When I got to BMB’s just after 8:30pm, there was me and the MC. I made my excuses (“I guess I’ve been stood up!”) and sulked out of there. On the way home, I passed Jet Fuel Coffee and noticed that they’re renovating which might come to some relief for hipsters who read Torontoist. I had to do a cartoon double take when I noticed at the back, at the top of the small stairs, a naked man. Not a naked man, but a full on lookit-my-willie! naked man. He saw me and smiled and started to put on pants. What?

Grab Bag!

Celebs and Media, General, Hobbies, Improv/Comedy, Personal Bits

No, not another post about the showers at the Y.

I’m actually going back to the Y in the morning again. I think I’ve waited long enough for the New Year’s Resolution rush to pass. There was virtually nobody there this morning.

Last Thursday I had my first class at Bad Dog’s Writing for Stand Up with Dawn Whitwell. I liked it, so far: it’s like improv but sitting down. We were asked to relate two stories (one verbal, one written in a stream of consciousness style) to the class and both of them were about me crying like a baby in public. Awkward? Check! Funny? Only the bit about my brother’s gay 70’s moustache and his career as a Gay Russian History professor got the biggest laughs. I learned that you don’t fucking make jokes about people with RLS, it’s NOT FUCKING FUNNY. This week we’ll be dissecting a comic’s delivery. There are two people in my class I recognize from Video On Trial and other Much Music shows. I’m star stuck!

I’m loving Flickr. I love being able to flash up a photo and have groups of strangers view stuff I find funny, weird or beautiful. I know… 5 years too late for this trend. But I’m grooving on it, none the less. I’ve joined a few groups like “Gays and their iPhones”, “12 Months, Your Very Best” and “Sexy Men of Sci Fi”.

New Greasy SpoonSpeaking of which, I got a shot of the new restaurant opening steps away from my house called Chew Chew! It has a big train mural on the side of the building, duh! I’m not to warm to the colours they used for the walls, but the place looks clean and brushed metal new so I’m hopeful. I think they’ll be open by tomorrow!

Still off Facebook/Twitter/IM apps. Leave me alone! No, better yet. You come to me!

Da is still ok. He’s eating again, but not anything like glass or nitro. He meets with the surgeon tomorrow to see if he can bump up the operation. Hi Dalton!

The Vegas/Palm Springs/LA trip looms closer. So far, I’ve lost $1000+ dollars on my iPhone Blackjack game. Very telling. I guess I should stick to the nickel machines.

I’m incensed that I wasn’t chosen for Test the Nation – Bloggers. Actually I’m really glad they won. Though I probably would have brought their average up with my 50 out of 60 questions right, but never mind. I’ll just continue to blog over here about nothing at all. Which makes me wonder what the hell I’ve been doing with this site for the last 5 years.

Christmas

Hobbies

One of the earliest toy memories I’ve ever had was a barn with animals, which was the first time I can remember getting a gift where I said to myself “WTF?”. I also got a flashlight that would double as a Hanna Barbara film strip projector. The flashlight batteries died long after my interest in the barn. Moo.

One year I got my own bike. No small feat for the youngest in a hand-me-down family of 7.

I’ve told you about the Big Trak.

After my religious hajj to Star Wars (8 times the summer it came out), I would get model after model of space cruisers, battle ships and star destroyers. In my tiny bedroom, the fumes killed off most of my brain cells. I would hang the damn things from the ceiling and line them up neatly on shelves to gather dust and discolouration.

My last big hurrah of a gift as a kid was an Atari 2600. After that it was like I had matured and would get socks and shirts every year. Not that I’m complaining. I’ve had a banner year for gadgets this year and I’m quite happy for it.

I’ll be away for the season so I want all of you, dear readers, to have an excellent holiday, no matter what or how you celebrate it.

Why I Love Sharkboy, Part the 34nd

Hobbies, Queer stuff

I’ve finished BioShock last week and have been patiently waiting for my next paycheque to purchase a new game for myself on the Xbox. Last night, I was cruising on the free demo section of Xbox Live Arcade and got to playing UNO.

Yeah. UNO. The Crazy Eight style card game.

I dunno why I fixated on it. In the demo mode, you play against three computer players (while the unlocked version has live players) and it had no discernible strategy. All I had to do was press A button a thousand times to win or lose. Mostly lose. I guess I was playing for a long time, I don’t recall. The game is so lame yet it sucked me in and made me play for about an hour.

Today I get an email at work from SharkBoy:

I got Orange Box for you. I couldn’t stand it watching you play UNO… on Xbox 360 Live… UNO… I had to get you something else.. I just had to

Every day is like Xmas with him!

Hey look, honey! I’m playing these games on a crappy 32″ TV! It’s not a flat screen! How lame is that?