Insignifica

nudie bar

For the first time in about a year, went to the nudie bar - Ecstasy in Santa Ana. It's probably one of the nicest clubs I've ever been to, very expensive, and very attractive dancers.

Ah, the dancers. All of them "professional" quality, good at dancing and putting on a show and super attractive. A good mix of real and "enhanced" bodies (probably 50-50), and they were all (and always have been) very friendly. It helps also that the girls are not at all pushy about private dances. A good friend of mine used to dance there, that's how I discovered it (although it's about 1.3 miles from my house, too).

The only drawback is the price. $10 in the door for cover, plus two drinks (at $6 a pop). And because it's full nude, you're paying $12 for 2 waters, small sodas, or O'Doul's. After that it's $1 a dance (or more if you're so inclined) on the stage, no tipping from the off-stage seats. This way, you can get your money's worth after being jacked on the drinks by sitting just off stage and enjoying the show as long as you want. The most expensive aspect, however, are the private dances - $50 each, one song. They're on a couch, full nude, and vary greatly depending on the girl. I've had two in my lifetime going to this club, one was spectacular, one was awful. I'm not sure if either was worth $50, however.

A good evening, overall. Since I hadn't been in so long, and had been saving a bit, I thought I'd treat myself. Dropped about $45 total, which isn't much considering you're down $24 - $10 cover, $12 drinks, $2 tip - before you even sit down. Got a LOT of "up close" attention (I think it's the new haircut and persistent smile), and got to get in some quality ogling time.

gay sex!

Woo Hoo! Supreme Court strikes down Texas sodomy law!

A big "fuck you!" to Texas, as well as Kansas, Oklahoma and Missouri (states that have specific anti-gay sex laws) and Alabama, Florida, Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Utah and Virginia, who ban sodomy for everyone. If it's consensual and not hurting anyone, it's not your business.

Another big "fuck you!" to Rick Santorum - who said "If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual (gay) sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery, you have the right to anything."

We can hope so, Rick...those things aren't the state's business either.

no replay for you

Looks like I won't be getting my ReplayTV after all, although it's by my own doing. The story so far:

On June 10, I purchased the ReplayTV 5040 refurbished, bundled with lifetime service activation for $329. A very good price; usually the units themselves are $150 or so, and activation is now $299. The Item was listed "IN STOCK", and according to SonicBlue's website, "IN STOCK" items ship in between 24 and 72 hours.

I telephoned customer service on Friday June 20, after having waited 7 days after the estimated ship time and still seeing my order listed as "processing" on the website. After a bit of a hold, I was told my item was about to ship, and would be coming from Tennessee, meaning I should have it at the end of the next week. A little late, but still acceptable.

I called back on Monday afternoon to check on the status, still reported as "processing". The folks at the call center told me it was about to enter the shipping process, and would be going out the next day. I got the feeling I was being jerked around, but took them for their word. As noted on Monday's entry, I said I would cancel my order if it hadn't shipped by today, Wednesday. I telephoned their call center again tonight (still showing "processing" as my online status), and told them I'd like to cancel my order. They said they couldn't cancel because it was "already in the shipping process", although it was still being processed and my credit card hadn't been charged yet. When I asked how long until I received the unit, I was told it wouldn't ship for 2 or 3 days, but I should return it when I receive it.

This didn't sound good to me (very non-specific; companies tend to know when product ships), but I hung up with the call center. Tonight I called my credit card folks to check if it'd be charged, and whether I could block it should it come in later. SonicBlue had not charged my card, but they couldn't block specific venders. Instead, I set it up so all charges require my authorization before going through. That card's not being used for anything else, so MBNA will call me when SonicBlue attempts to charge the card.

From here, I'm not sure what'll happen. In the whole time I've been waiting, I haven't received as much as an email or phone call to say "we're sorry this is taking so long; it'll ship soon" or "we ran out of stock, do you want to wait, or have us cancel your order?" Instead, they've just expected me to wait, which I consider especially unacceptable with online orders. Hopefully they'll try to contact me when I deny charges, and hopefully they won't ship the product.

yeehaw!

Yeehaw!

I found my hat. It's the only hat I own that's ever fit me.

In other news, I'm reading the newest Harry Potter book - so far, very good. A little darker, with some great character development. I got it at Costco, which had a huge stack on Sunday (unlike Barnes and Noble), and was only charging $16 or so.

I'm really liking Howard Dean. He's very liberal, very smart, and is doing better and better in the polls. I think he'd be a great presidental candidate.

My lady and I rolled my collected coins - 4 liquor bottles half-full amounted to almost $100 in change. Party time!

My ReplayTV, which was ordered 14 days ago, is still listed as "processing" on my order status page. I've called the company twice (well, I've called their call center, which I have good reason to believe is somewhere in India), and they told me on Friday that it would ship by Monday, and told me today it was "in the process of shipping". We'll see. If it's still "processing" on Wednesday, I'm canceling my order.

I started college almost 7 years ago. Yikes.

I've decided to start collecting Mike Doss merchandise. Why not?

Do you hate SUVs and other man-made nature killers? http://www.vhemt.org/

early reviews

It's currently just before 2pm PDT on June 20 - still 2 hours before the Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is released in England. The book has a strict embargo, but all of a sudden some reviews have popped up. How'd they get past the embargo, when not even reviewers were supposed to have the book before tomorrow?

end of the weekend

End of another beautiful weekend here in Southern California. Sun's been shining (after two weeks of June Gloom), the grass is green, and the local mountains are mostly obscured by a layer of smog so fine you don't notice it until it's lifted. This weekend was also the first day in about 10 where I haven't had horrible amounts of packing/moving to do, all in preparation of this week's painting and carpeting. It's all done, so now we move to selling.

Perhaps it's because I use the internet all day at work, or because my friends haven't been online as much, but I haven't been spending as much time online at home. Whenever I have sat down for mindless webbing, I find other things to do much more interesting. This would be an ideal time to sit down and write, but I just haven't been in the mood. I'm sure tonight, by about 12:30/bedtime, I'll have something great to write that'll keep me up way too late.

I've been talking to Tori a lot recently, since I saw her in April on our trip to Santa Cruz. Also been reading her site and we've been keeping up with eachother's lives. It's great to be in touch with old friends again.

In case you haven't noticed, the webcams have been down recently, and probably will be until I move. I may have one running, we'll see.

I'm considering putting myself on a budget. I've been spending like crazy lately, mainly because the house hasn't been in "easy to cook and clean in" condition. I can afford it, but I really should put a little away. So we'll try it this week. I'll be liberal; food I buy at stores and put together at home doesn't count, it's just an allowance for going out to eat (work lunches included) and entertainment. I think I'll start with $60 a week ($5 a day for lunch, plus $35/week for other fun). We'll see how it works out.

military recruitment

Is military recruitment as bad now as it was when I was in school (mid 90s)? This article at CNN reminded the harrassing I got from the military. After turning 17, the calls would come at a rate of between 1 and 4 a month, from all four branches of the armed services. I had absolutely no interest in joining the military, so I offered a variety of excuses, including that I have asthma (true), I'm a pacifist (true), I have allergies (true), I'm a communist (more of a socialist, really), that I was already accepted into college (true) and that I was gay (not true).

None of the callers ever liked to take "no" for an answer, but you'd assume they'd figure it out after a while, and stop wasting their time and tax payer dollars to try to recruit someone who didn't want to, and couldn't medically, serve. I was eventually told that the different services had a congressional mandate to call every male of age at least once every 6 months while they're in school. I still don't know if this is true.

I don't only take issue with their calling methods; their name-gathering process bothers me too. At different times during the year we were pulled out of class for both tests and assemblies given by the military. We would fill out information for them, because it's school, and that's what you do in school. The tests we couldn't opt out of, and real names were required. The military liked to identify honors students, appearently (I was told this at one point), hence the tests. At assembilies, however, we'd fill out an information card. It even had a box to check if you "don't want to be contacted by the Army/Navy/Etc.". Just for kicks, I checked the box, and filled in my name as "Thatcher McMichael", my common alias at the time. Low and behold I get a phone call 3 months later for Thatcher McMichael. Not only are they wasting my time, they're lying to waste my time.

What to do? Obviously, the military needs recruits...more and more people are going to college instead of signing up for America's Army. But is there a good way to not waste the time and money of the thousands of us who already know what we're doing? Share your stories and advice here.

term of the day: myoclonic jerk

Term of the day:

Hypnic jerk (n): Massive, body wide muscle twitches that often occur just before the onset of sleep. Also called myoclonic jerks.

two thumbs up

Pet peeve: People, who upon performing a review of a product, give it "two thumbs up" (or down).

When Siskel and Ebert (and Roper) give a movie "two thumbs up", it's because there are two of them, jackass. They don't give it 4 thumbs up - it's one thumb per person. And that's the way it's gonna be.

replaytv

I just purchased the ReplayTV 5040 Digital Video Recorder from SonicBlue. I've been considering a DVR for a few months now, more from a "want" perspective than a "need" perspective. Slashdot had a thread about the removal of features in their new 5500 models, and one of the posts had a link to an offer from SonicBlue for a refurbished 5040 model for $330, including the lifetime subscription (typically $250), bringing down the cost of the unit to $80, about one-half/one-third of the regular price. Seems to be a great deal for something I've been meaning to buy anyway.

visit atheistweb

Traffic over at Atheist Web is down - how about taking a visit, leaving a message, and helping to get the ball rolling?

New stories about Bush, religious language and the ten commandments. Check it out!

busy weekend

Had a fun but really busy weekend. The misses and I were going to have a simple dinner at Old Spaghetti Factory on Friday, but called up Adam and Beth to see what they were up to. Turns out they were meeting some college friends up in LA, so we turned around and joined them - great to see friends you haven't seen in a couple months.

Saturday was spent cleaning, in preperation for moving, painting, and carpeting this week. We ducked out early to do dinner at BJ's, watch the Ducks win, then picked up Marek and headed over to Sing Sing for drinks, dueling piano entertainment and cleavage. A good time was had by all.

Sunday was the main cleaning day. A lot of the siblings came over, and we spent 8 or 9 hours moving, cleaning, packing and cleaning some more. All but three rooms are getting painted this week (the others were done recently), and the whole house is getting new carpet on Friday. After this week, though, the house will be in "show" condition for selling. Prep for moving also means I don't need to schedule time at the gym, especially in a two-story house.

So that's that. Hopefully everything will go smoothly this week, the house will sell, and the lady and I will be meeting with the credit union this weekend to talk about a home loan for ourselves.

yakuza

U.S. Government: "We currently believe (country A) to be developing Weapons of Mass Destruction. (country A) needs to cease this immediatly. If neighboring (country B), or the citizens of or (group C) in (country B) are found to be aiding (country A), then we will use whatever force necessary against (country B) to ensure (country A) doesn't acquire WMD."

If A=Iraq, B=Syria or Iran and C=terrorists, then the above can be said to be a paraphrase of what Bush has already said, supported by the administration and public opinion.

If A=North Korea, B=Japan and C=Yakuza, then Bush wouldn't even dream of saying the above statement.

Why the difference?

I don't like it when people say"literally" but don't mean literally.

For example, this article quotes someone saying "We're getting literally tons of e-mails..."

I think the worst offence was when Al Gore said he needs to go home to Tennessee and "mend some fences, literally and figuratively." This was after he lost the electoral votes of his home state.

oreilly and franken

Appearently Bill O'Reilly and Al Franken got into a bit of a tiff this weekend at the Los Angeles Book Fair, where they were both appearing on a panel. The most entertaining part is what O'Reilly said on his website of and to Franken:

Ordinarily, I would never deal with the likes of Franken, who is simply beneath contempt.

If you know Franken, you know he loves this stuff because he makes money from it. He profits from malice.

This was taken from his "Talking Points Memo" today. What's funny is that seconds after O'Reilly said "he profits from malice", he took the time to plug his own "Spin Stops Here!" doormats. He spends minutes talking about how horrible a person Franken is for "lying" about him and making a profit from his views, then sells doormats.

Also for fun, you may want to see if any or all of O'Reilly's statements about Franken can be said about O'Reilly himself - it's not a hard game. He thinks he speaks the truth and stops "spin", and he uses this excuse to say whatever he wants believing his fans won't notice. Based on the dedicated O'Reilly fans I've known, they don't notice.

estelle

This was too funny not to share with the world. Yesterday Gary made reference to the fact that it was Jerry Mather's 55th birthday with an email entitled "Old Beaver". The usual jokes flew, and the discussion turned to older women we still found attractive. Adam, as he tends to do, made the discussion laugh-out-loud funny when he said "here's a link you'd all enjoy - www.oldchickswithdustybeavers.com/estellegetty.jpg". Of course, that doesn't go anywhere. Last night, however, inspiration struck. I was giggling to myself the whole time I made it. I hope you enjoy.

peace crackdown

I know what CNN means here, but I think it's worded amusingly:

President Bush: Cracking down on peace since 2000.

flag post

Borrowed from an old post on Wil's site, this is exactly how I feel about the American flag, and it's why I don't (and won't) fly one.

country music fans

When I have a problem with a musical artist, I have several choices: I can ignore the issue and enjoy the music anyway (as I do with Frank Sinatra and Ted Nugent), I can respect the music but disagree with much of what the artist does (as I do with Eminem), or I can boycott the artist and their music. I don't think I've ever made it to the third option; most of the time my disagreement with an entertainer isn't the deciding factor in listening to their music. I certainly don't restrict my musical interests to those with the same political beliefs that I have; if I did, I'd get to listen to Dave Matthews and the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, and few others.

Hence my problem with much of the country music community and the Dixie Chicks. Instead of ignoring the political differences that many fans have with singer Natalie Maines, or even publicly acknowledging that while politics differ, the Dixie Chicks have done more for country music than anyone in a long time, fans, radio stations and other country artists have declared war on the band. They've been dropped from playlists, had CDs burned, and been called all the names one is typically called when disagreed with by patriotic idiots.

Now Maines has dared to tell Toby Keith, country's new favorite son and ALF co-star, to fuck off. Not in so many words, mind you. She wore a shirt with the letters "F.U.T.K." on it. Mind you, Toby Keith has been calling Maines names and putting her down in his shows and to reporters, without a word from the Country Community. Keith is applauded, Maines is called unpatriotic and un-American. Why do the moronic "love it or leave it" and "you can't say anything bad about our president" movements resonate so strongly in the hearts and minds of so many country fans? Why can't they separate what someone believes about a person from the music they create and good they've done for the genre?

I have no idea. Can you draw a conclusion for me?