So, 2012. My official review: Awesomely terrible. Everything you inferred about this movie based on the previews is EXACTLY right. The writing is terrible, the acting is phoned in, but there are EXPLOSIONS!! And SHOUTING!! And PEOPLE DYING!! And GIRAFFES ON HELICOPTORS!! WOO!!

I enjoyed this movie for all it's cheesy glory. Obviously if you go and see this movie, you will need to shut your brain off. It is the very definition of a "popcorn movie." It is not in the least bit Oscar-worthy. It was all the fun of The Day After Tomorrow without Jake Gyllenhaal.

If you liked Godzilla (1998) and Independance Day for the horribly written awesome explosiony movies that they were, you will enjoy this movie.

Also, this movie has probably the best final line of any movie EVER. Liz and I have never laughed that hard at a movie that wasn't actually supposed to be funny.

So, to reitterate, awesomely terrible.

Last month was very stressful. I don't really have any specific definable reason (other than my pregnant wife, obviously), I was just having an off month. My work suffered. I looked at all my projects from my job last month and said to myself, "Self: You are better than this. You're just not trying hard enough."
This month has been significantly better. Of the 7 layouts I've already done, only two of them were "meh." The rest left me with a sense of self-satisfaction and pride in my own talents that I haven't felt in quite some time. One of them in particular I was proud of, because for the first time I created everything purely from scratch. Usually I'll use stock photography and vectors and build off of them, but this one was purely my own original content. I was pretty pleased with myself for that one, considering I've fallen into a bad habit of not using original content. My job has spoiled me in that fashion. On top of all that, we went and did a photo shoot and I took many pictures that turned out darn good.

In other news, I got my hair cut yesterday. I had been growing it out slightly, because, according to Liz, I didn't have an adult hair cut. Unfortunately I'm quite apathetic, so the hair has been growing since about July, with one trim in the interem from Liz.

In still other news, holy crap Christmas is not that far away. I hope nobody expects anything, because babies are expensive.

Good day.

I really enjoy seeing local bands and giving them all the support and love they deserve, but man... I'm starting to think I'm getting too old for this crap.

Tonight I went out to see my friend's band perform at The Conservatory. To give you an idea, imagine a two bedroom apartment that is completely gutted and a stage and bar are put in, and you can get an appreciation of just how small this place. I am all about small venues, because it's a lot more intimate a setting, and generally you don't have to worry about people moshing/slam dancing and ruining the experience, because generally the people who attend these smaller concerts are friends with somebody in the band, so the other attendees don't put up with such tomfoolery. I digress. My point is that people need to understand that the venue they are playing is insanely tiny, and they don't need 30 amps cranked all the way up when there are roughly 100 people in the building. Or I could just stop bitching and invest in some earplugs.

Other evidence that I'm getting too old for this kind of sillyness: Probably a good 70% of the people there were under 18, presumably there to see the first band who looked like they were about my sister's age (13). I felt like an awkward creepy perv, and Tyler made the observation as well. He also observed that having a band in high school is a really great way to get exposure, whereas his exposure is the 100 or so people he works with and whoever goes to his church, most of whom aren't at all interested in the type of music his band plays.

At any rate, the show was really enjoyable, despite what my petty gripes might lead you to believe. I think I'm getting quite crumudgeonly in my quarter-life. That or I've always been a bitter old man. My golden years are going to be enjoyable, I'm sure. You should follow that first link I posted and give them a listen, and tell them I sent you and they'll give me a free t-shirt! Okay, that last part probably won't happen, but I know that they'll appreciate the exposure beyond dinky OKC. I know I sure would! It's also helping me to expand my horizons beyond work and home and possibly allowing me to make new friends. That would be a bonus, let me tell you, because right now the only people I hang out with are Liz, and while she's asleep I chat with Mallory who lives in NJ. Not much of a social life.

Someone buy me an xbox 360 so I can play Brütal Legend.

I really wish I had something more interesting to say than that, but I really really don't.

People at work still don't know Liz is pregnant, which is neither sad nor unusual, it just means I rely far too much on other people to communicate for me. That's probably indicative of something, but I'm too lazy to figure it out.

Funny story: I came home from work on Monday, and there was a note on our door. It reads as follows:

"_______ Pest Control [name removed to protect the stupid] will be out to spray your apartment on 9-30-09. 100% resident cooperation is needed for an effective cleanout. Please be prepared by having things removed from the KITCHEN & BATHROOM CABINETS, AS WELL AS COUNTER TOPS, AND/OR ANY OTHER PROBLEM AREAS. Pick up any loose items off of the floor such as laundry, shoes, toys, books, etc. and also clear away from the walls and corners of rooms. All pets must be locked in a bedroom with a note on the door stating which room the pest are in."

I give the full transcript just so you can get a scope of the rage I was feeling. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm fine with people coming out for pest control. It's a great idea, because it prevents fruit flies, bed bugs, and other creepy crawlies from invading our home because we have gross neighbors that let their dogs crap on the floor (I don't know for a fact that this is actually happening, but if you saw our apartment complex you'd get where the conclusion jumping comes from). What bothers me is that we were given 1.5 days notice to basically repack everything we had just finished unpacking. That in and of itself is only mildly irritating, but what really torques me is that we were told to do this durring the week. If they'd told us on Friday to get things ready by Monday, fine. We have a whole weekend. But we had to do all this schlepping in the course of two evenings, because Liz and I both have full time jobs with semi-normal hours. What ALSO bothers me is the fact that we have to move stuff out of the cabinets, but it can't be in the middle of the floor or against the walls. Where the hell else are we supposed to put it? The patio?!

Like most things in my life, this is just a petty gripe that isn't actually that upsetting or putting me out of my way a whole lot, it's just inconvenient and I would appreciate slightly less tool-bag practices from our management.

Oh yeah, and for those of you curious, Liz is still pregnant (This has been my stock response every time anybody asks "how's your wife?"). Further details: Nathan, Jr. (we still don't know the sex, this is just what I've been calling him/her/it since I've always thought it would be funny to name a child Nathan, Jr. because of Raising Arizona.) is growing healthy, roughly the size of a prune. Liz goes in for another OB appointment next Thursday. I think it'll still be too early to know the sex by then, but according to what I've read (and how far along I'm pretty sure Liz is. Have I mentioned that the conception date was roughly around my birthday? No more natal anniversary copulation for me!) we should be able to know by the following appointment. If it's a girl, I will still refer to her as Nathan, Jr. for my own amusement and because we still haven't really picked a name.

I'm worried about my mother and my sister.

At the same time, I'm tired of them putting me in the middle of it.

To preface, my sister is 13, so she and my mother are having all the regular problems that people in this situation find themselves in. However, this is compounded by the fact that my mother isn't letting herself be sad about Adrian dying, and she's never around when my sister needs her. Instead of dealing with the problem at hand, my mom chooses to instead ignore my sister. When she's not ignoring her, she's putting my sister on a pedastal and holding her up to these impossible standards and "why can't you be more like your brother?" She wants a best friend, which is what she had in Adrian--a wholy unusual relationship in and of itself--but what Chloe needs is a mother.

Chloe is acting out. She's apparently been stealing the car (or helping her friends steal it, I'm not clear because my mother isn't clear) and my mom found a used condom in the toilet, but rather than saying something about it, she chooses to ignore it. I don't know what kind of lazy ass parenting that is, but I certainly don't condone either sides of this. My sister needs to straighten up and fly right and my mom needs to be there to enforce this.

Another part of the problem is that my mom has a boyfriend. I'm not saying this is a bad thing, but the fact that she has to have two jobs AND has a 13-year-old daughter at home means she doesn't really have time for that. Apparently she's down to only seeing him twice a night, but rather than going OUT with him she needs to stay IN with him.

This is just stressing me out, because I don't want to choose sides here, but they're basically forcing me to by pulling me into it, and I'm honestly skewing in favor of my sister. Not because I approve of her actions, but because she's so clearly crying out for attention and not getting it because my mom is too involved in her own shit to notice there's a problem. I've tried explaining to my mom that she needs to be around more and I've tried explaining to Chloe that she needs to cut Mom some slack, but both of them just say "Yeah, I guess..." and do nothing about it. They're both frustratingly passive-aggressive. When my mom found out that Liz and I were having sex pre-maritally do you know what she did? Waited until I went to college before sending me a lengthy e-mail expressing her disappointment. That doesn't discourage me, it just makes me think she doesn't care enough to enforce the rules!

Bah.

After reading Karell's entry, I realized I never posted about our move from almost 3 weeks ago. Whoops.

The short version is that it sucked completely and utterly.

The long version: We went to pick up the u-haul in the morning, and that was all well and good. We did that first because we wanted to go and pick up our new couch (which, incidentally is the most comfortable couch ever). So, we got the couch, no problems. I was quite surprised that this hasn't sucked so far. Well, we were in for a rude surprise.

We got to the new place to sign the lease after dropping the u-haul off at our house. We go into the office and sit down and say, "okay, we're ready to sign the lease and move in!"

"Oh," says the girl at the front desk, "I thought you were moving in on the 8th." It was the 28th.

Cue shocked looks on Liz and Nathan. "No, we have to move in today, because our lease at our old place is up on the 31st." The ensuing hour-long phone call session finally found us with an apartment that wasn't quite ready, and had a washer and dryer. We originally planned on not getting a washer and dryer in the unit, but that was before we got knocked up, so this will actually work okay. It just sucks that we'll have to play a little more a month than we thought we had planned on, but we're still saving like $200 a month since all bills but electric are paid.

Moving out was pretty miserable, but it was a little easier since we put all the furniture in the garage over the last few months. We had originally planned on hiring movers, but decided against it to save a few bucks. Next time, we are hiring movers. No question. Especially since we'll have a toddler by that point in time. It took a lot longer to do all that, so we ended up just loading up all the furniture and a smattering of boxes that we shoved into corners and wedged under furniture. Realistically we probably could've gotten everything into the u-haul, we were just tired of hauling crap.

Moving in was pretty horrible too, because most of the furniture had to go upstairs, so we just left a lot of it downstairs for the first week. This was made all the more challenging since the entry way diverges in a corner: one way leads upstairs, and one way leads to the living room. Getting the couch in sucked since we pretty well had to Hulk-Smash it into the living room. It was even worse because the a/c didn't work in the new place, so we had to keep stopping every 10 minutes for fear of overheating. That took from like... noon to past dusk, which was annoying. Surprisingly the only casualty was a desk, but it was a cheap-ass Sauder desk, so it wasn't a really big loss. That and we had an extra desk that was just going to be a bills paying desk.

On Sunday we got the rest of the boxes and Liz cleaned the old place. Fetching stuff from the old place was pretty exciting, because I had to play "shove things into the car and hope they don't break." We had left our futon chair because Liz was certain it would fit in the car. It did, but I had to take the legs off and ride with my knees in my chest for that load.

Anyway, we're moved in, the cats and dog are adjusted, blah blah blah. We still have a metric crapton of boxes to unload, but we'll get that done eventually. It's at least livable now. For week one we had just left the mattress downstairs and shoved it out of the way during the day. Fun times indeed.

Huzzah, I got a new phone! I know that was a harrowing 2 days where you weren't sure you wanted to continue not sending me text messages, but worry not! I'm at the cutting edge of the technologic age now with my shiny new iphone! Huzzah!

My phone is broken.

By which I mean somehow the screen cracked, so about half the pixels are dead. It still works, but I can't see anything, so if you really need to contact me, call me.

Or, you know, keep contacing me by facebook, because phones are so last century.

Alright, so I know a couple of people have already mentioned this, but I felt like I needed to get a few peoples input on this. I know there are a few conservative people on my f-list, so your opinion is really the one that I'm after.

Can somebody please explain to me why people are up in arms about President Obama addressing school children? The arguments I see thrown around are that people fear he's going to impose his political agenda onto the easily impressionable children. Really there is nothing that he can say that is going to brainwash these children into believing what he has to say. I can honestly say that I wouldn't find it to be that big a deal if a president whom I didn't vote for and whose political ideals I don't agree with was adressing my children. I would just explain to them that they need to keep an open mind and to come to me if they have any questions about what they're hearing.

They don't have to just straight up forbid people from seeing it. Why not give them a choice? The students and the parents can choose if they want the kids to watch this televised speech. It would be the same thing as with sex ed! The students would get a waiver if the parents don't want them seeing the speech, and they can just have a study hall or something of the like durring the speech. Some schools are taking this approach, which is great. Some schools are also taking the aproach of reviewing the speech before broadcasting it, which is at least a step in the right direction.

Really I just don't understand why it's such a big screaming deal. The president addresses people durring the state of the union all the time. Besides, this is just a speech about the importance of education, and I think everybody can agree that it's a GOOD thing to get kids to stay in school.

Comments?