I wanted a banana cream pie last night at 1am.

And because I'm an adult, with a car, and no parents, I went out and found one at 1am.

Ah. Bananananananananana cream.

September of last year some friends and I went to Disney World. It was to celebrate the marriage of some friends. However it would be another year before they'd actually get married.

Our last full day at WDW and we wanted our last meal there to be a bit special. We traveled through half of Epcot only to find that all the restaurants were booked solid. And this is on a Tuesday!

This is what we get for not planning ahead.

Well, we called around and found the only opening still available was at Tutto Italia Ristorante. We grabbed it as fast as we could.

The food was great (of course) and the atmosphere was even better. Italian seemed to be the first language of ever person on staff in the restaurant. There was an old Italian couple there who spoke to the staff in Italian and seemed to put smiles on everyone.

As luck would have it, this was the restaurant's one-year anniversary. And so they served everyone a sweet sparkling red wine with dessert. It capped the evening off very well and it was a nice end to our vacation.

This is what we get for not planning ahead.

This past Saturday evening I was at the grocery store with some of these friends shopping for snacks and such for a night of gaming. And one of them, the bride of the couple we had gone to WDW to celebrate in the first place, pointed out a sparkling red wine on the shelf. She remarked that it was in fact the very same wine we'd had our last night at Disney.

She also remarked that at $20 a bottle it was a bit pricey for the moment and picked up a large bottle of her usual Arbor Mist, which is very cheap and tastes like fizzy Starburst.

Well I went shopping this evening for various bits of stuff (got a nice deal on some discounted 3-way light bulbs! apparently they're going out of style faster than 486 processors) and happened by the wines.

I honestly had completely forgotten about the conversation I'd had a couple days earlier and was picking through the chardonnays when I caught sight of it out of the corner of my eye.

So I grabbed it and headed home.

Okay.

So Greg writes a story in which a woman hangs herself in front of his kids, and then another kid is raised by the guy who strangled the kid's mother and then tells the kid she went away. What the fuck, man? Jesus.

And then what about the Matrix-encased lady at the end? She a new chew-toy for Fang or something?

Yes yes yes I know. It's just story. But that image of Erin's bug-eye looking out at Tasha while Thug's trying to keep her from looking and Benny all rolled up in a ball freaking out. I mean, DAMN!

Both pages just generate some serious rage. Which I suppose means he can write a story (HEY, WHO KNEW). Still. Fuck.

In 1995 my mom took my brother and I to Disney World. It was the first time I'd ever been there. She and dad had promised us for years they'd take us, but for a whole host of reasons it never happened. Now that they were divorced she was determined to do this. She had a co-worker friend who was a travel angent and scored us a pretty sweet deal and so we were off to Disney.

One of my lasting memories of that trip was Disney dollars. Disney had their own money?! Cool! Of course I got all my money converted to Disney dollars. I remember how absolutely crisp and mint the bills were.

I also remember the smell.

It's the exact same smell of new US money. Go to a bank, get some crisp, new bills and inhale. That's the smell of Disney dollars.

Every time I smell that scent of new money I'm right back in Disney World. It brings back random memories from that trip.

Of standing in line to Splash Mountain for an hour and enjoying it because of the "Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah" song being sung by what sounded like chipmunks from bushes and rocks along the path to get into the ride.

Of the odd, unpleasant tasting candy I bought in a shop along Main Street that came in a clear, plastic box. It was shaped like rocks, colored like rocks, and just tasted awful. I had that box of candy for months, having tasted maybe 3 of the candies that came in it originally, before finally throwing it away as I packed for college.

I remember Ursula from the Spectromagic parade shining her light in my eyes for what seemed like days.

I remember that journey to mars ride which has long since been replaced by what is now a ride involving Stitch.

Another ride about flight which has since been replaced by, I believe, a Buzz Lightyear ride, although the tunnel of light that so mesmerized me is still there.

I remember Mr. Toad's Wild Ride and how willing I was to believe a train was heading right for me.

I remember wanting to spend the rest of my life in that place.

And then, 13 years later, returning for my second trip to Disney World and feeling my age. That this number associated to my body somehow preventing me from being the kid I wanted to be inside that place again. It's an odd mix of happy memories and some odd form of regret.

Often in a dream I will come across a building, or a person, or a road, or some scene and I have a memory of encountering this thing before. And, as far as I can tell, these memories are exclusive to my dreams and not to any real-world object or event. Now it could very well be that the sense of remembering what I'm seeing is just a product of how my bean works when I dream and that I have not in fact ever seen this thing before in or out of dream, but I really like the idea that there's a waking memory and a dream memory. Are they separate? Could I access my dream memory while I'm awake or is there a block of limiter between the two?

Last night I had a dream that the world was coming to an end. And people were gathering together in a place, a big field or parking lot perhaps, and people had put a blanket down over their spot and they'd sit there with the rest and just wait it out.

But the world didn't end. And so the following day people are walking around wondering what the hell to do since the world didn't end.

(Now I love the story idea of finding out the world is going to end, you got nuts and do lots of crazy stuff you would never do because, hey, it's all over in a day or two, but then the world doesn't end and now you get to deal with the consequences!)

Anyways.

I'm walking down a street with a friend, passing through a T intersection, when suddenly some sort of military police force show up and barricade the road at the intersection. Soon it becomes clear that this force is, block by block, taking over the town. People run away and try to hide. It's a slow march from the military force, so no worries. We get to this area near the at the end of a road where there are a bunch of same-shaped and same-colored wood houses and we duck inside one of those.

I wake up at this point and spent the morning trying to figure out what would have happened next. I mean, if anyone's going to be able to guess that it should be the guy who actually dreamed the thing, no?

I figure the force advances further and I'd escape out into the woods. It'd be revealed that the whole "end of the world" bit was a ploy so this group could mount a means to take control of the town/city/state/country/world (pick one).

So what part of that did I have a sense of memory about? The houses.

Never have been able to do that thing where you become aware that you're dreaming inside your dream and then manipulate things.

Got a tour of the Holten House this past weekend. Turns out the lady who operates the house for the Daughters of the American Revolution (D.A.R.) is someone rather close. Apparently the outhouse at this place is one of a very few original "double privies" still in existence. And I sat in it. The double privy is split into two rooms. Each has three ... holes, plus a fourth low to the ground for children.

Originally home to Sarah Holten who gave testimony at the witch trial of Rebecca Nurse. Rebecca was ultimately hanged as a witch. The story goes that Rebecca Nurse confronted Sarah about some pigs having gotten loose and destroyed Rebecca's farm. Sarah claimed her pigs were not at fault and Sarah cursed Sarah and her husband. Sarah's husband was said to have started experiencing fits and other maladies that evening and, a few months later, died of some unknown disease. It's also said Sarah never believed Rebecca to be at fault and commented on this during her testimony. Nevertheless Rebecca was convicted and hung; Sarah's testimony having been a majory key piece to the case.

Later this house was home to Judge Samuel Holten. His desk is still in the house. The house was also used as a doctor's office.

It's old and creaks a lot and the I bashed my head on the low ceiling more than once. At one point I climbed into a side-attic where Judge Holten's slave was supposed to have lived. A very very tiny space with just a small window for light.

Thought about heading up to the attic, but apparently nobody's been up there in years and it was dusk and I didn't have a flashlight and there's no lights up there so I wimped out.

History is scary.

Looks like I'm not going anywhere for a while. Route 128 is now shut down and that's the highway I need to take to go home tonight. Looks like I'll be staying for at least a couple more hours.

Visiting my dad this weekend. Helped hook up a DVD player/recorder I got him for Christmas. I wasn't sure if it'd let him record his VHS tapes to DVD or not. Turns out it does! So he's happy. But so am I as, before I leave tonight, I'm making copies of The Big Blue and Cloud Dancer. Cloud Dancer you can't get on DVD and they don't sell the VHS tape anymore (haven't for years). The Big Blue you can (and I have) buy on DVD, but it's a different soundtrack on the DVD than the VHS tape. The soundtrack on the VHS tape is the one I fell in love with as a kid. Yay!

And as a bonus, I'll stay a little later than normal, thus missing afternoon traffic around Boston. Traffic that's especially congested after a tanker truck crash this morning shut down the major highway (I-95).

The downside is I will have to travel through Boston at night, which I'm not a huge fan of, but so be it.

Finally made all the reservations for the hotel and plane and shuttle to the airport for the con. All together it's probably going to run me about $1200. No worries though, I have an account set aside that gets a little infusion of cash direct from my paycheck to fund my con trip. Almost picked up a king bed, but figured I'd save the extra $100 or so and spend it on hookers and blow. And that also means since I've got a room with two doubles I can always let someone crash with me should the need arise. Preferably a lady who likes to walk around in very small and silky things. Oooo...

My nephew turned one on Sunday and so I headed up to hang at my brother's house with family and celebrate. The kid is fucking awesome. He's starting to walk (a good 6 or 7 steps by himself before he plants on the floor) and starting to talk. At one point my brother dropped some food (Cheerios) on the kid's plate and turned to go grab some more juice. As he walks away Connor says "DA DA" and it's like "HOLY SHIT LITTLE DUDE TALKED!"

Now my brother is into cars and has a '69 Baracuda. And at one point in the day he says to everyone that the next word he'll learn to speak will be "Baracuda".

Within two seconds the grandmothers are saying "BA RA CU DA". And little dude was totally doing it! Now the "BA" and "RA" he could pronounce. He still needs work on the "CU" and "DA". But the really hilarious bit is that as the grandmothers were saying each syllable they would bob their heads as if to punctuate each sound. Well Connor imitated that too! Little dude was head-banging while saying "BA RA CU DA".

It's like people silly putty, that kid. Better now say "fuck" around him.

But what are the big gay social web sites?

Some ex-coworker of mine is trying to startup a gay social networking site and he tells me there's all of two of them out there and they're expensive and/or suck ass (no pun intended). So he figures he'll make a mint by starting up his own.

I gotta believe there's more than two or three out there. What are they? So I can destroy his hopes and dreams.

The purchasing of new glasses is a fine art. There's quite a lot to choose from. This is why one should take their time and, perhaps, not feel rushed by that "in one hour" specialty of the store's.

The new frames I have today are not that far off from the ones I had before. In fact I anticipate nobody will notice.

The frames the salesman was handing to me to try on all felt a bit too big. Too "Dan Dreiberg" (if you've seen the Watchmen movie). I wanted something a bit smaller.

In that moment of purchase I had that Seinfeld episode in my head, and yet I didn't really bother to look that close at the frames.

Tonight, however, I have. Yup. I've bought women's frames. Frames that I have since googled and found described as "for todays modern business women with style and finesse".

Oh jolly good.

This whole social networking thing.. I like to have a one-stop-shop for it rather than spread out across three or twenty sites. I get on Facebook and I ignore LJ. There's that twitter thing too, but that feels like a glorified RSS feed that should be sitting in a small box on the right of some other web site I use.

Food poisoned on Friday. That was fun. Puked so much and so hard my abs were sore for a couple days after. Still feel slightly feverish, but pretty sure it was food poisoning as it came on me so fast (from 0 to hurl overnight).

Need a list of Gargoyles web sites to populate the reincarnated "avalon now" random link thingie. Got any? this is what I've got so far.

Would have finished rolling out the s8.org changes if I hadn't been sick this weekend. I'll have to run through those quickly to get back on track.

So I go out last Thursday to a local bar. I park my car in the usual spot, backing it into the spot like I normally do.

After a couple hours I leave. It's dark out.

The following day I head into work. It's there, as I walk around my car towards the building, that I see it. A hole in my car's bumper (bumper COVER, to be technically correct). A hole about the size of, say, a trailer hitch.

FUCK!

I'm annoyed. Pissed off. But it's just cosmetic. I can live with it for a little while. A replacement cover will probably run me around $250. Well.. in a few months, after I get my tax return, maybe I'll replace it.

That evening I'm driving to the store. It's getting dark out. I notice that.. something doesn't seem right with my headlights. At first I think the passenger's side is either going or gone. It's much darker than the driver's side. Then I realize what's really going on. The driver-side headlight is pointed slightly down. So it appears brighter, but only extends a few yards in front rather than many dozens of yards like the other headlight.

Cock.

Again.

So I get to the store. I pop the hood and give a quick look-see. The headlight is pushed up against the frame behind it. I give it a tug to see if maybe I can jiggle it back into place. It doesn't budge. I pull harder. The car starts to roll forward. Alright, so the thing is really stuck in there.

So where's it attached to? The cover? I look around. NOPE! Looks like the quarter-panel.

The following day I'm driving into work and I notice there's an unusually large gap between the hood and the quarter panel. Ah. So it's bent a bit, then?

Fucking COCKSMASH!

Take it in to have the shop give me an estimate. There's a backlog. The past few weeks have given us lots of nasty weather (hello Mr. Verglas, responsible for my wrecked knees and the backlog).

So then. That's it? Until March or April. No worries. The light still works. Maybe I just don't drive it so much at night. Then I'll take it back and get an estimate. And pray the quarter panel can be quickly shaped back into place at the body shop and not cost me much a fuck-ton of money.

This day I joined my mother's side of the family in Christmas celebration. It as also perhaps the fifth or sixth time I was afforded the opportunity to hang with my newphew in the past month. Up until now I had averaged maybe 0.5 visits a month with my 9 month old nephew. This alone was enough to get me out and on the road to see family once again. Little dude is awesome. I genuinely hope that I get to see him grow up over the next thirty years. It's something I look forward to with more anticipation than the next Batman movie.

However the night before I had little sleep. When I left the family gathering I wanted nothing more than the comfort of my trusty bass-fish pillow. However I was locked into an evening at Medieval Manor. This was a present from some friends of mine and a group of six (including myself) made the trek into Boston on a cold Saturday evening for this entertainment.

Hard it is to describe the manor or the people within. I will try. It is of medieval in flavor, but very perverted. I would think to call it dinner theater an insult to something as brilliant as this.

When we arrived we, that is the group of six I was a part of, found ourselves seated at the right of the stage. I was told to sit in one particular seat. I was distrustful and apprehensive about the particular assignment of ONLY MY seat. The beer wench Molly quickly settled things with a "sit the fuck down, Eric".

How did she know my name?

It was a portent of things to come.

Each table is given six tokens. Tokens may be turned in for a pitcher of light or dark beer or lemonade. Each patron finds at their seat a small glass with the Medieval Manor logo on it. We are told this is ours to keep. It was not my first time here (I have one such glass already in my collection) so I knew my assigned seat was a sign of things to come.

The court jester appeared and asked me if I would deliver to him a proclimation about the King when asked to do so. After several minutes discussing that I was to slap the proclmation he had given me, and not my cock, into his hand when asked, he was satisfied I'd do the job and left.

As the dinner got underway the king appeared and, as informed by my waitress, I did cheer very loudly to appeas the king and get on his good side. At the right moment I was asked to deliver the proclamation to my friend jester, which I did. Upon reading the proclimation there were several jokes about the size of the Queen's ass (who was currently on vacation). The jester promptly told the king I was at fault and the King, in turn, told me that I was in for a world of shit.

The evening progressed. I drank more beer. I was the butt of many a jokes. Several "Grizzly Adams" references were made by the king, as well as the apparent child (of 18 years of age) I had bore who was also in attendance (the resemblance was quite uncanny).

I then was asked to lead the court in song ("Twelve Days Of Christmas"). I was the partridge in the pear tree. I had props. I used them. Quite vigorously.

To the right of my table of six was a very long table of 12 or so. Eat seating spot had a man. Each man had a white hat. Each white-hatted man was no more than 25 years of age. As the night progressed (along with my involunteered involvement) they grew to cheer me on.

And I had to pee.

You see, you cannot pee, or leave, or move, for any reason during the show unless you ask the King for permission. I knew this going in and had gone before sitting down. However the evening had progressed in an unexpected manner and to cope I had copious amounts of beer. In fact, at one point, it was pointed out by the king that my glass was of such a small stature that perhaps it was representative of my cock. At which point the king offered me a larger glass (and then he announced others may have a similarly larged glass for a price. Mine, however, was free.)

My bladder was quite beyond full when the king asked if anyone needed use of the facilities. I raised my hand. He laughed and told me there was "no fucking way" I'd get to leave.

A man versus woman battle was then had with participants selected by the king (I was not one) to duel with bread. The winning sex would have use of the facilities. The male representative won by mere centimeters and before declared the winner, I was running for the bowl.

In the bathroom I was cheered. My popularity had grown considerably since my singing of "AND A PARTRIDGE IN A PEAR TREE". Many of the white hats were included in this group.

Later, I was handed a toaster. Nobody from the crew took it back, so I kept it. I was going to make merry with the toast once I got home.

At the end of the evening the King introduced his court and then myself. I was presented with a T-Shirt to the cheers of many, particuarly the white hats.

As the meal was concluded, I made to leave the manor (after finishing our pithcers of beer single-handedly). Many applauded as I left. I raised my toaster in triumph. The king, who was manning the door as the patrons left, saw the toaster and requested that I leave it behind. So it was.

In the parking lot the car of white hats did cheer upon sight of me. I lead them in a fine song of beer as we completed the eveing and went home.








holy fuck. that was fun. come to boston. go to medieval manor. that shit it awesome.

Spent the switch over to the new year with some friends. Crashed. Had some kind of sausage and egg thing for breakfast the following morning. With lots and lots of Gatorade.

Christmas is not over. Still have one part of the family to sit down and exchange presents with this weekend. Got a couple pairs of shoes as "crazy shoes" were top of the list for me. Also got Watchmen. Can't wait to read that. Though I'm going to finish Sandman first.

Shouldn't really read Sandman before going to bed. It certainly fucks with your dreams a bit.

More snow. More shoveling. WHEE!

NASA released a new report detailing what happened to the orbiter and its crew in those final seconds. The hidden story in the report is how amazingly focused the pilot and commander were even when facing such a catastrophic event. When they lost hydraulic pressure (which they need to control the orbiter) at least one of them tried to restart the APUs (auxiliary power unit) which can have the side effect of creating some extra pressure in the hydraulic system. This is NOT standard procedure. Rather, they tried to hack the shuttle to get it back under control! At another point one of them bumped the flight control stick (they were getting knocked about at this point) which took the shuttle out of auto pilot mode. They then had the presence of mind to re-engage auto-pilot so they could go back to troubleshooting the warnings they were seeing. Amazing level-headedness in such an insane situation.

Virgin Galactic started doing flight tests of their WhiteKnightTwo aircraft. This is what will carry SpaceShipTwo up to some several tens of thousands of feet before releasing it, at which point SpaceShipTwo fires its rocket and blasts off into space. We should see that happening in 2010-2011. So close to commercial space flight.

SpaceX, another private space company, is close to achieving the maiden flight of their Falcon 9 system from Cape Canaveral. This could be the vehicle NASA hires to resupply the ISS once the Space Shuttle is retired next year.

Despite the Colubmia accident, man continues to push into space. The next few years are going to be an amazing time.

Bought an iPod Touch this week as a sort of Christmas present to myself. Selfish, to be sure, but fuck it. I've wanted an iPhone for a while now, but I didn't care much for the monthly price tag which would near a hundred bucks. Not unless I could legally tether my iPhone to my computer and thus ditch my DSL and landline. But AT&T have some fine print that say it's against their terms of service to tether your computer to your iPhone and there are tales of users doing so anyways and, after a few months of high data usage, getting their account canceled by AT&T.

The iTouch, on the other hand, will do everything the iPhone does except for the phone and GPS capabilities. Give it a WiFi connection to plug into and it's just as sweet as an iPhone. And when I bought it I got a free copy of Spore Origins ($5 value) and a $50 gift card to the store I bought it at, so essentially I got $55 off the price of the iTouch. Not a terribly bad deal.

Now I need to go buy a new set of screen protectors because I fucked up my attempt to apply the first two. *sigh*

--

Got a little over a foot of snow yesterday. Spent a couple hours today shoveling out my car. It's still snowing now, but at a much slower pace. Tomorrow we're due for another round of snow and it'll be back to digging out my car. I should grab my camera tomorrow and take some pictures. It's quite beautiful out there. Cold too.

--

My nephew is started crawling this week. My brother put some videos up on YouTube and passed it around the family via e-mail. Kinda cool, that. Families using the intertubes to be more connected to those kinds of events. Cool stuff.

iTouch.

Will this work?

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Been sick this week and stayed home from work. And the fever and meds and not leaving the apartment and reading Sandman and watching some fucked up Canadian flicks like Dead Ringers and Whale Music and Hanging Garden has thoroughly FUCKED MY SENSE OF REALITY.

WOO!

Felt it in the back of my throat Thursday. By Monday it had full reign over my sinuses and was migrating south to my lungs. Hopefully it will migrate out soon.

In between sleep I'm reading Sandman. A friend gave me his old trade paperbacks because he'd recently bought a more sturdy collection. Hadn't read Sandman before. Always wanted to. So far so good. But I can't get that damn "mister sandman" song out of my head now.

Wrote a story. In my head. Might put it to paper. It's just dialogue; two voices. The first innocently enough asks "Who's there?" and the sinister reply comes "Who do you think?" And from that point on the second voice (a human in my mind, though just as easily belonging to a toad or a spider) talks to the voice.

The voice being a manifestation of that time-honored device in your dreams where you know there is someone behind you, or behind the door, in the other room, driving that car coming towards you. You know who it is even if your dream self does not. And just by thinking of that person, that is who appears. It is, after all, your dream.

And so this voice is that seed, waiting to be planted with your first thought of who it is that is there. Except in this story the person expected to plant the seed, in fact, does not. And this irritates the seed, the voice, a bit. It's just not proper. And the planter, in this story, is quite oblivious to the need that he/she/it is not fulfilling and strikes up a conversation with this unknown.

At a point of extreme frustration the voice clearly outlines the task at hand to which the response comes something like "alright, how about a hammer?" or some other inanimate object. And high jinks ensue.