$$$

Emory and I got our security deposit back from the old place. I swear it's more than what we actually paid as a security deposit. I see that several repairs were deducted, which is fine, since we lived there a long time and also left the place in a bit of a state, but I have no idea how the amount of money wound up being so high. Is there some sort of arcane renter's math that I'm not noticing? Naturally, I won't be investigating this more thoroughly.

Silencio!

So now that I'm back from KC I apparently have nothing to say to you.

I spent most of Wednesday traveling, and for once was not the last passenger to be dropped off in the Super Shuttle. Go, Hollywood! I arrived home to find that the cats and rats were all still alive, and that the apartment was no more a disaster than when Leslie and Emory left it (of course, they left it as a complete and total disaster, so I'm not sure I could tell if the cats had been wrecking stuff, anyway).

Last night I played poker over at Jenni's, and managed not to completely embarass myself while still losing all my money. I did manage to essentially knock out Doug, so that was okay, but then I went all in when I had a pair of kings after the flop, and Jenni called with her own king, but I had a jack kicker and she had an eight, so I felt okay. Then the turn was an eight. Then the river was ANOTHER EIGHT. Odds-wise, I made the right call. In reality, it sucked. Oh well.

Emory returns today or tonight sometime, so that'll be nice. Normally I like some alone time in the apartment, but the new place is still sort of weird and unfamiliar and remote, so some company will be nice. Paul just called a few minutes ago, and immediately got off the phone when he found out I was at work. Paul, it's okay. Half my department's gone today, including my supervisor, and there's almost nothing to do. I've spent the day reading critical comic analysis, with an emphasis on Seven Soldiers. Scintillating!

Completely Arbitrary 2005 Wrap-Up Post!

The best of EVERYTHING!

Movies (in no particular order)
King Kong
Brokeback Mountain
Junebug
Serentiy
Munich
Syriana
Pride and Prejudice
Me and You and Everyone We Know
Batman Begins
The 40-Year-Old Virgin

Best TV show:
Veronica Mars
Runners-up:
Deadwood
Battlestar Galactica

Best Video game:
Psychonauts

Best Comic (single issue):
Seven Soliders #0 (not particularly earth-shattering on a first read, but becomes better and better as the larger puzzle is revealed)
Runners-up:
All-Star Superman #1
Ultimate Spider-Man Annual #1

Best Original Graphic Novel:
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Runner-up:
Top Ten: The Forty-Niners

Best Album:
Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
Runner-up:
The White Stripes - Get Behind Me Satan
Also, Gorillaz' Demon Days is really growing on me. Like a fungus.

Best Book:
Did I read anything published in 2005? Harry Potter, I guess, but I have problems with that novel. I just finished Tom Perrotta's Little Children on the plane today. It was great. Perrotta's rapidly becoming one of my favorites. Go find Joe College or Election (on which the Alexander Payne 1999 film was based) and check 'em out.

Did I miss any arbitrary "Best of" categories?

UPDATE: I DID miss one, but it's comics, so none of you care.

Best Limited Series:
Livewires
C'mon, the trade's only 8 bucks. You can afford that. Maybe if the trade sells enough we'll get another mini-series out of it. But really, this title was a damn good time.

That's very specific

I just saw an ad for something called "Urine Gone." It's a cleaner that is urine-specific. In case that's, y'know, something you have to deal with a lot in your household. You know who you are, I guess.

In other news, few shows are as delightful as Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends. Leslie, I finally saw the one where Blue is trying to build the massage chair. That's gold.

Comics again

Reason to wait for the trade #1,235: the fourth Teen Titans collection, "The Future Is Now," collects TEN ISSUES and costs TEN DOLLARS. That's absurd. Kudos to DC for keeping all the Titans trades at 10 bucks no matter their length. Singles are for suckers.

The only comic I can think of where it's advantageous to own the singles is Seven Soldiers. I'm always going back and re-reading random chapters, so I can put all the pieces together. That series is like crack.

Family news

My dad might wind up running for state legislature for our district.

My uncle might wind up being the president of the American Bar Association.

Crazy.

"There is no band!"

Y'know, the Club Silencio scene in Mulholland Dr. is one of my favorite scenes in a movie, ever. Can you tell I brought the DVD home with me? I've had to watch it once the family's asleep, because the last thing I want to watch with my mom or dad in the room is lesbian sex.

Also, she's pretty

Man, Naomi Watts is SO GOOD in Mulholland Dr. The little wink she gives Rita when she calls the police from the payphone? Pure gold. You can see why she got famous after this movie. Shame she didn't do much worthwhile once she got famous, though. Still, King Kong.

Seven help us

This is comics, by the way.

If you're like me, you simply cannot get enough Seven Soldiers. The second issue of Bulleteer came out this week, and cast the events of Seven Soldiers #0 into a whole new light. For starters, we find out who was meant to be the seventh member of Vigilante's posse, and we also learn that one of the six soldiers was a traitor (and it's NOT I, Spydor, so who knows what his deal is). Oh, and we learn what one, or possibly two more of the seven lost treasures of Camelot are.

The amount of thought that's gone into this work is scary. Not just on the interconnections between the miniseries on a strictly plot level, but also in the interlocking themes and metatextual commentary. Granted, metatextual commentary is nothing new for Grant Morrison (it's even in New X-Men, where Phoenix was ultimately the Marvel Universe's "author"), but how does he make it so damn intoxicating every time?

If you really want to dive into Seven Soldiers, this series of annotations is where it's at. Detailed breakdowns of each issue, along with a character, location, and interconnection guide. So it was Ali Ka-Zoom in Shining Knight #2. I had wondered about that.

More like WORST Buy!

Today I felt the sting that Mike has felt so often. I went to Best Buy for the primary purpose of getting Serenity, and Best Buy was SOLD THE HELL OUT. And it looked like they had had many copies, too. They had some fullscreen copies left, but that's not how I roll. Remarkably, they had every CD I was looking for. That NEVER happens. I suppose they felt I deserved it, depriving me of my precious Serenity like that.

Shopgirl

Remember all those movies I said I was going to see? Shopgirl was not one of them, but it's what I saw tonight. I'd meant to see it long ago, but circumstances prevented it. So my mom and I caught it tonight.

I liked it a lot. It's a quiet, simple story, and the film is handled deftly, and is often hilarious, especially Josh Schwartzman's early scenes. I'm sure a solid criticism could be made against the film, but I had a good time throughout, so who gives a damn? Hell, this movie might make my top 10 of 2005 in a squeaker, but then it's been that kind of year.

Oooh, now it's the Sports Night where Dan drunkenly slurs "Then you are my sworn enemy!" That's one of my all-time favorite lines.

Sports Night!

And sometimes the television I watch in KC is good!

Well, I mean I brought my Sports Night DVDs out to KC with me in a panic move when I couldn't find Emory's copy of season 1 of Arrested Development before my shuttle arrived. Now I'm watching some of my favorite episodes. Right now is "Ordinance Tactics," the one with the bomb scare. Did I ever mention I love Rebecca? I loooove Rebecca. And in this episode she says "Hi" to Dan in a way that reminds me very much of a way a girl used to say "Hi" to me and it sets my spine a-tingle. I also love Sabrina Lloyd, but my passion for her is muted compared to my love of Rebecca. Perhaps I've said too much.

I Love the 90's

Too soon! It's too soon! Jay and Silent Bob and Mr. Moviefone aren't objects of nostalgia! They are still pop culturally active! Arrrrrrrgh!

What'd I tell you about when I'm in KC? It's just bad television, all the time. I'm switching between I Love the 90's and Room Raiders right now. God help me. So, uh, if you're bored, give me a call.

Tonight I start to catch up on my movie-viewing. Walk the Line, Pride and Prejudice, Capote, and Munich are all on the hit list.

Family Guy

Last Sunday's Family Guy had my favorite reference in the series' history with its extended riff on the old Sesame Street pinball bit ("One-two-three-four-five, six-seven-eight-nine-ten, ELEVEN TWELVE!"). But then Peter appeared as MC Scat Cat later in the episode so I had to declare a new champion.

"That was a bitch move, Santa!"

The Boondocks has been pretty uneven thus far, but last night's episode totally knocked it out of the park. I love Jasmine's mixing of Jesus and Santa, and all the stuff about Huey's play, "The Adventures of Black Jesus," was gold.

"Don't look at Quincy Jones! Quincy Jones is not gonna help you!"

If you missed it, try to catch a re-airing. Hopefully future episodes will keep up the quality.

Yesterday's movies, today's criticisms!

Why is the opening wedding scene in The Godfather so long? I mean, Brando's a gangster, his daughter's getting married, we GET IT. And there's that big scene with Luca Brasi, just so we feel bad when he gets killed later. Nice try, Coppola.

Oh, that closet

I know I'm a little behind on the whole "Trapped in the Closet" phenomenon, but VH1 helpfully aired the first eight parts today. It's a master class in unintentional comedy. And why didn't anyone tell me that The Wire's Michael K. "Omar" Williams played the cop? I love spotting Wire cast members. Jim "Prez" True-Frost was on Law and Order last night.

You can tell I'm in KC because all I can talk about is bad TV.

Project Runway? Really enjoyable! As Leslie said, "I like this show because they actually have to make things."

I'm out

I leave for KC early tomorrow morning, so updates might be sporadic. KC does not usually offer me a lot of blogging material other than "Today I watched a lot of shitty TV."

We'll see how it goes.

Go. Read.

Enjoy this strip while you can, folks. Apparently "the T-shirt company" was none-to-pleased with it.

Backlash

Does anyone else get the feeling that Brokeback Mountain, just like Sideways last year, is going to face a rather large backlash? Like it gets all the praise and critic's awards since it's a great movie in a really lackluster year, but this is all before most of the nation has seen it, and then a lot of people see it and get pissed off, since it's not the sort of movie that most of the nation enjoys? Perhaps I am overestimating how many people will see Brokeback. It is about gay dudes, after all.

Updates a-plenty

Also new at The Atrox is our brand-new Prose section, and our inaugural column is by none other than world-renown advice columnist Albert Wellington Whiteye. We were quite lucky to get him, so please partake of his weekly column!

Also, enjoy the next two weeks as the Atrox goes into hibernation!

New!

A new comic is up, up and away at the Atrox.

Last time, promise

Last night's Top Model reunion show was pretty bland, save for Tyra's hilarious delivery of "Why'd you go crazy?" to Bre. And let me just say that Nicole is even hotter with straight hair. That girl is ATTRACTIVE.

Oh, Nell's appearance on House was delightful. You should all come over and watch it on the DVR, in case you missed it.

Crushed, I tell you

So it looks like Scott Pilgrim and the Infinite Sadness has been pushed back until at least February. BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Boo.

Ladies and gentlemen...

I give you the resurrection of one of my favorite properties on God's green earth. (Scroll over the panels to reveal their terrible secrets.)

Atrox

Oh, there's a new Atrox comic up. Enjoy the last few strips before we break for the birth of Christ. They'll be a new one up Thursday morning RIGHT, LESLIE?

The Onion feels my pain

Buried in the AV Club's feature about 2005's music, there's this short list:

THREE THINGS TO DO WITH A TIME MACHINE

1) Warn Lincoln about going to Ford's Theater.
2) Kill Hitler.
3) Prevent the Black Eyed Peas from recording "My Humps."

Globes

If anything, the Golden Globe nominations confirm what a damn dull year it's been for movies. Brokeback Mountain is great, as I said. As far as left-leaning poltical potboilers go, for my money Syriana is superior to The Constant Gardener, but I suppose the HFPA didn't want to slather too much prais on Clooney and Soderbergh. Then again, I think Syriana is better than Goodnight and Good Luck, as well.

Some of my friens have high hopes for The Producers, but I am skeptical. My remaining hopes for the year are pinned squarely on King Kong. Emory's seeing it tonight, so I'll see what he thinks before I catch it on Friday.

Groggy

Groggy: c'est moi.

I am too old to just get four hours sleep. I was at NBW's (I wish one of their names started with a vowel so their initials spelled something) place way too late last night, and now I am paying for it today. I would have left earlier, except Frank passed out on the couch for an hour or so. And Nell and Brooke are charming enough company, I suppose. But seriously, why should Frank be allowed to gain sleep while I am losing it? I have to work! You know what Frank had to do today? NOTHING. I hate him. We're divorced.

In other Nell-related news, everyone should be sure to catch these week's House, because she's so totally going to be in it.

And take your little llamas

We've opted to name our apartment Llama School, since we live on Las Palmas. Why Llama School, you ask? Perhaps these lyrics from the classic Sifl and Olly tune will explain things.

(Before the song starts, a bus driver runs into Sifl and Olly's studio, having hit his head and developed amnesia. He's got to get these llamas to school, you see, and Sifl and Olly give him directions in the form of a song, and during the course of the song you see the little puppet llamas in their little puppet llama school bus and God almighty Sifl and Olly is just endless joy.)

LLAMA SCHOOL

Yeah, I think.. I think you take, uh, Las Palmas
Take Las Palmas to Colorado
Take Colorado down to Pico
And that's how you GET TO LLAMA SCHOOL!

You go to Pico,
You take Pico to Colorado
Take Colorado to Las Palmas
And that's how you GET TO LLAMA SCHOOL!

Pico!
Take that to...
Colorado
Then go down to...
Kopico?
And that's how you GET TO LLAMA SCHOOL!

Now you say Pico
And take your little llamas
Colorado, Colorado!
Las Palmas... GET TO LLAMA SCHOOL!

Get to LLAMA SCHOOL!
You got to go to LLAMA SCHOOL!

Naturally, those directions don't make any sense. They are just random street names Liam Lynch picked out when he was in LA. This was a mild disappointment when I moved out here.

Fin de semaine

Good weekend! Full of adventure.

Friday night was Mike's birthday, where we had delicious Palermo's and there were a million of us. Poor Adam and Liz blew a tire just as they arrived at the restaurant, so they missed the whole meal. The whole meal that they ORGANIZED. That was terrible. But Mike's birthday was good.

Afterwards we went to see Narnia. If I were 10 years old and The Lord of the Rings had never been made, I probably would think it was the greatest movie ever. But neither of those things are true. It's a passable entertainment, but only passable.

Saturday I spent the day with my former college-mate and now coincidental-co-worker Sarah seeing Brokeback Mountain at the Grove. That movie is EXCELLENT. Were I one for making lists, it would be in my top three for this year. Great stuff. Also, "I wish I knew how to quit you" is my new favorite go-to punchline.

Saturday night was Amanda's third annual wine and cheese party. My emphasis was on the wine. It was a delightful affair, as usual, thankfully sans awkward "spin the bottle" like last time.

Sunday (and Saturday morning) I set to painting my room. It's a great shade of green (with just a hint of blue). I'm more than half finished, but I ran out of paint. Guess it will have to wait until I'm paid later this week. But painting makes me feel so productive!

Later in the evening Mike came over (since he lives about two seconds away) to watch some Mystery Science Theater. We watched The Day the Earth Froze, which was one of my favorite episodes when I was 14. Joel and the bots would say some line and Emory would say "Jeff said that all the time in middle school. I have this whole episode memorized because Jeff quoted it all the time." He wasn't far wrong.

Sunday night I went to a holiday party at Nell, Brooke, and Whitney's. There was much nog consuming and raucous singing of carols. We even had enough people for a fine rendition of "The Twelve Days of Christmas." Paul tried to steal a bag full of Emory's and my stuff that we had lent to Nell for Chrome Embrace research, claiming that I would get drunk and forget it. Screw him! I totally remembered it! I didn't even get that drunk. Frank was the one who fell asleep on the couch.

See how full of adventure my weekend was! Don't you wish you had my exciting and vivacious life? You DO! I can TELL!

Boo-ya

Aw yeah, there's a new Kitty-Face Kitty up and running at The Atrox RIGHT NOW. We're back on schedule for this week, before we take a two week break for the holidays. The new Atrox strips came to me all in a rush on Friday, so we'll have two new ones this week, and be back on track after the new year. Enjoy!

Company man

I've been with PSI for three years now. Jesus.

Our big holiday party/dinner was last night. Sarah and I won some hockey tickets. Hockey time, suckers!

LWW

Woo! Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe this weekend! I don't CARE that it's a heavy-handed Christian allegory. It's the first actual novel that was read to me as a child! You just have to say "Mr. Tumnus" or "Turkish Delight" and I'm right back in Mr. Silverforb's kindergarten class.

ANTM

So Nicole won Top Model. I would not have predicted that. While my heart was with Nicole, I would have put money on Nik. But I'm glad Nicole won, even if she's as dumb as a bucket of ball bearings. Her "This is NUTS" bit alone was more charming than everything Nik did the entire season put together.

I'm also kind of glad the whole thing is over, because now it will stop coming up in conversation literally everywhere I go. (I don't bring it up! Everyone else does!) I mean, it even came up at the Zombie High shoot. One of the high school girls thought it was hilarious that I watched the show.

You know, I don't think I'm shooting any more Zombie High and I didn't even say goodbye to everyone. Oh well. I know most of those kids, anyway.

Sweet relief

We are FINALLY completely out of our place in Glendale. Thank the lord. Now it's time to start unpacking in Hollywood!

But first the painting must be done. I'm going to paint my room this weekend! I've already started cutting in! My room will be the greenest of greens. Painting again is nice. Besides my current job, it's the job I most enjoyed. By which I mean, the actual act of painting. My boss and most of my co-workers were awful. And sometimes we'd be outdoors in the blazing hot sun and I would pray for death. But it's nice to be painting something simple. Indoors. With air conditioning.

Skeptical

When I read about comments like these, I can't help but think that Philip Pullman isn't as nonchalant about religion being removed from the His Dark Materials movies as he seems in the press releases.

OH DAMN

Oh sweet Jesus they read my mind.

I mean, I can't buy this. Because I'd end up singing the song while I was wearing the shirt and that would be nowhere near acceptable.

Right on

Today's Overcompensating should have particular resonance for Leslie and anyone else who finds those American Apparel ads unsettling.

Public transport

Man, my new bus is vastly superior to my old bus.

The 94 was consistently late and filled to the brim, with standing-room only for a large chunk of both the trips there and back. Not to mention that time where a homeless guy stared at me menacingly the entire way home, and then started yelling obscenities in my direction when I was a few minutes from my stop. Good times!

The 163 this morning was right on time, had a maximum of 15 people the entire trip, and dropped me off a few minutes before 8, where the 94 usually dropped me off 10 minutes late.

Moving is awesome.

Zombie weekend

The vast majority of my time this weekend was spent shooting a zombie show pilot for my friends Meredith and Ethan, along with the Psychic Bunny kids. I play a janitor, so I feel my acting hobby has really come full circle, since I played a janitor in my first actual play in school back in seventh grade. Ah, Ghost of a Show. You were terrible.

Anyway, while it was time consuming, it was also a lot of fun. The cast is all really talented, funny, and pleasant to be around, which is always a plus, and most of the stuff I shot this weekend just involved me being in the background. I got to come up with weird, funny shit to do. Even if none of it makes it into the show, it filled the time nicely. Particularly the shot where Frank and I were paired together and we got to just improv insane conversations for an hour. Unfortunately I made Frank break character for one take. I can't even remember what I said. Wait, I think it might have been when I told him that I carved my own marionettes and put on puppet shows at my house.

There are a couple of actual high schoolers in the cast. This one girl is 16. That means she is 10 YEARS YOUNGER THAN I AM. I am ancient. Fortunately several members of the cast are older than I am, so it works out.

Spoilage

This is sort of how I felt when Frank got mad at me for revealing that Julius Caesar gets killed in the season finale of Rome.

Pros and cons

Things I will miss about Glendale:

Hot Wings Cafe

Things I will NOT miss about Glendale:

Absolutely everything else

So tired

When you spend all day lifting heavy things and exerting yourself, obviously you want to cap that day off by only getting five hours' sleep. I am the walking dead.

So sore

Dudes, you have no idea.

All large things have been moved. Now it's down to random boxes and sprucing the old place up so that maybe they'll give some of our money back.

Man, I haven't even gone to bed yet and my muscles are SCREAMING.