This live DVD, shot in Paris, following the debut Fallen album, is muscular, energetic, and aurally very satisfying. Where it slips a bit is visually. Unfortunately the director felt that split-second shots of the band from strange angles, in a montage with crowd scenes, makes a better video than a straight ahead look from say five rows out in the crowd.
Rating: Play it LOUD
Yesterday I went to a friend’s house for a backyard cookout and 4th of July celebration. A family affair, there were kids, cold drinks, face painting, and fireworks.
Lots and lots of fireworks. It seems the neighborhood where my friends live, and the neighborhoods around them, all get into fireworks in a major way. The “show” started around dusk and last for two hours. Some of the shells were near commercial quality for height and burst. It was the most impressive fireworks display I have ever seen.
I’ve always loved fireworks displays and consequently thoroughly enjoyed myself. At the same time I was aware that fireworks were not Michele’s thing, and that, had she been there, we most likely would have left earlier. I am trying to be careful not to overly romanticize the history of our relationship nor to denigrate it. Finding the line of honesty that threads its way through my memories is not easy. But there are some occasions, like yesterday’s party, where I am acutely aware that, without her by my side, I had the freedom to do more of what I wanted rather than compromise and do some of what she wanted as well.
The saga of my windshield continues. Yesterday morning we had intermittent showers while I was out having breakfast and buying groceries and the automatic rain sensor failed to work properly.
When the windshield was replaced the old sensor stuck to the removable housing and cable assembly. The technician didn’t notice this and consequently there were two sensor pads (the old one on the housing and the new one on the glass) which doubled the thickness and caused the glue to fail leaving the housing dangling by its wire.
The technician on repair attempt number two also failed to discover the presence of the extra sensor and his glue and tape job failed within minutes of his leaving the scene.
Technician number three actually discovered the problem, and removed the old sensor pad from the housing resulting in a repair that at least looks correct. The housing has stayed glued to the glass since Saturday. Only it doesn’t work properly. When the control stalk is positioned at automatic the wipers cycle at a very slow speed regardless of the amount of rain on the windshield. So instead of having settings for automatic, intermittent, and high; I now have very slow, intermittent, and high.
I strongly suspect that I’ll have to have the entire windshield replaced again in order to get a functioning rain sensor pad. Hopefully that technician will be bright enough to remove the old pad completely so as not to damage the new one reapplying the housing.
I never should have allowed the claims adjuster to talk me into this installer, even with their guarantee and promise to back them up. Three times now I’ve had to make the car available for hours on end and wait for them to show. Calling them today will only mean more of the same. I should’ve lived with the damn crack in the glass.
Let’s face it – I’m fat. At five feet nine inches and two hundred forty odd pounds – I’m fat. At age thirty (fifteen freakin’ years ago!) I weighed one-sixty. How I managed to gain ninety pounds in fifteen years is beyond me.
Actually it isn’t beyond me. Ninety pounds in fifteen years is six pound a year or half a pound a month. All the nutritionists say that there are 3500 calories in a pound of weight, so doing the math, I’ve only been eating an extra 1700 or so calories a month for fifteen years. That’s roughly 57 calories a day more than my bodies needs. Calories scale.
In all likelihood I’ve been eating just enough to maintain my weight for the last five or six years, but even over ten years, the monthly gain is small compared to the sum. Reversing this trend has already been started. About three weeks ago I stated tracking everything I ate, the calories and fat grams of everything, and my daily weight. Using a spreadsheet I’ve got a five-day running average of my weight and it is creeping down. Tracking my intake immediately showed me that the three to four sodas and a candy bar or two that I consumed everyday was adding six to eight hundred calories to my daily diet. Multiply eight hundred by seven days in a week, and you have fifty-six hundred extra calories. A week. Over a pound and a half extra a week.
Or, looked at from a losing perspective, a pound and a half potential loss per week. I can pretty easily get my daily intake down to fifteen hundred to eighteen hundred calories per day, and that seems to lower enough that I am losing weight. My goal: two hundred pounds or less. At a pound a week I should be there late next spring. Extra workouts (walking mostly) on top of my twice weekly martial arts workout will help too.
For someone who usually spends his free time alone, huddled in front of multiple computer screens living life vicariously, this weekend has been filled with social outings.
Sunday afternoon and early evening I was at a friend’s house for a cookout. About fourteen people, some I knew from work and some new to me, were there. I had a good time and I am glad that I went. At times it was poignant for me as every one else there was part of a couple, but it was still good to be out and about.
This evening I am headed off to another friend’s house for a 4th of July cookout. This time I am bringing my chocolate frosted chocolate cake. The host family has had it before and raves about it; in fact they specially requested that I bring one today. I haven’t made too many cakes in the nine months or so since Michele died. She and I could polish one off in a week, but solo I can’t eat more than half. And it seems sad some how to have a cake just for one. So I’m happy to bake and frost today.
This morning I decided that I needed a pot of chili as well, so I spent an hour or so chopping a pepper, onion, garlic cloves, and celery, and putting it all together. I had a bowl for lunch and I think it turned out very nicely. I’ve got six portions left over, three in the freezer and three ready to eat, so I’ll be in chili heaven for the next couple of weeks.
I’m hopeful that the party this afternoon will be fun for me. Sometimes in a large group I shut down and end up not having as much fun. My goal today is to open up and have fun. I need some fun.
I attended a 4th of July cookout this afternoon and evening; the first of two I was invited to this year. I must admit it is nice to have a circle of friends and to be included in social events. I try very hard to stay in the moment and to enjoy the company of friends, but it is hard sometimes not to be envious of what I don’t currently have.
Everyone at the gathering was a couple, with the exception of one other guy. I don’t know if he is in a committed relationship or not. Having worked with him in the past I know that he is very sarcastic and cynical and I suspect that he doesn’t have a partner with which to share life. Seeing someone like that scares me as I can’t help but wonder if that is my ultimate fate.
During the years prior to Michele I coined the phrase “social leprosy” to describe what it was like to be single in a world focused on couples. Being with Michele cured me of this malady; however it has returned after being dormant for the last ten years. A lot of my thinking lately has been about my future and whether it will include a new love interest.
Hoping and dreaming about a future not spent alone is a dangerous thing. When you have nothing to lose it is easy to exist in despair. Giving yourself hope of a future without misery builds you up, but if you fall short of the goal, you fall back into the pit you just escaped. I’ve been so beaten down the last year, and was partially beaten down by job loss and moving prior to that, that I don’t have a lot of resilience left. I want so badly to get out and find someone and yet I don’t know how to start.
Going to parties or seeing people I know is wonderful. I look forward to the shared moments and their memories are sustaining. However there is a cost – I crash afterwards and have to find a way back to my lonely perch so I can exist one more day alone.
Senator Ted Stevens (R) from Alaska gives an absolutely incomprehensible explanation of the Internet.
Time to head for the life boats, the US is sinking….
The follow-up procedure I had to correct the vision setting in my right eye on Friday continues to be a success. As I learned the first time through the recovery process it will take a some time for the new focal range of the eye to settle and become permanent. Most of yesterday I was able to see very clearly at arms length. Even this laptop, with the resolution set to 1680x1050, is readable at arms length.
This morning things were a bit blurry upon first waking up; they have improved since then. I was warned that there would be more awareness of the flap in my eye this time and I am aware of a slight feeling of grittiness in that eye. Adding more artificial tears usually makes that sensation go away.
Since I have been wearing disposable glasses for the last three months that allowed my right eye to have the proper focal length while not correcting my left eye at all, my brain is already in mono-vision mode. I am no longer consciously aware of the shift from eye to the other based on the object I am viewing. If I stop to notice I can tell, mostly through awareness of which side of my nose I am seeing. (I guess a large nose has to be good for something.)
I want to wait a few weeks to see how my right eye heals before declaring this a success, but I am very hopeful this morning that the “enhancement”, as LasikPlus insists on calling this second procedure, has given me the vision I desired.
I watched Syriana yesterday, and I’m still trying to figure out just what the hell it was about. I got the part about oil being exploited by corrupt and greedy men. I got the part about how the American people don’t want justice but rather the illusion of justice. And I guess Matt Damon’s character had to fall from grace and nearly be blown up before he saw the error of his ways.
But I still don’t know what the movie was about.
Rating: Compelling if not entirely understandable
The initial assessment of my vision “enhancement” is that it was successful. I am type this at arm’s length without aid of glasses. Ha! I just need to survive the week of wearing protective eye gear at night, and not getting anything in my eye, and then then wait out the month or so for the eye to fully heal.