Random Thoughts

First day off after a stretch where I worked 31 hours in a 51 hour period.  Don't ever go salaried in retail, folks.  We've got a couple of key component folks out sick.  We could cover it if one were sick.  Both is a stretch.  While you can make the argument that perhaps, as a company, there should be a body or two floating around to help in such situations, in a publicly traded company, stockholders don't like paying for possibilities.

I'm worn out.  And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried about how the next couple of months, traditionally the busiest and most difficult of the year, are going to go.  We could get one or both people back soon.  We could also get them both back after the first of the year.  Hooray

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The Knoxville Ice Bears have their regular season Home Opener tonight.  Shyam and I gonna head up.  The Ice Bears have a new coach, Jeff Carr.  Excited to see a new look for the team.  The SPHL has been moving away from the Enforcer-heavy style that's been the norm for the league since its inception.  The league's everything but publicly stated goal is to eventually become part of the official feeder system to the NHL.  There's been a change in stance on fighting, including longer penalties and suspensions for instigation, the goal being making the league a more palatable place for NHL clubs to send prospects.

The Ice Bears seemed behind that curve, especially last year.  I'm not generally a "Fire the Coach" guy, especially the unaffiliated minors, but Mike Craigen seemed unable or unwilling to adjust.  The product on ice last year was one that was slower than other clubs, and one that seemed lacking in fundamentals. 

Interested to see if Carr brings a more interesting product to the ice.

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I re-read Jurassic Park this week.  Read and listened.  It popped up for cheap on the Kindle a few weeks back, and then they said you could add the Audible version for cheap as well.  Blew through it in just a couple or three days.  Still a lot of fun.  I'd give the book an 8 or a 9 out of 10.  Just a great romp.

And, as great as it is, I think I still like the movie better, which is something of an accomplishment.  The movie manages to streamline the story a bit.  It manages to merge a couple characters that really are redundant, and it gives Ellie Sattler more to do, making sure the story isn't much of a White Male Fest.  It also manages to give dimension to Ian Malcolm, whose philosophy in the book grows tiresome, for me, even if I tend to agree with much of what he says.  I tended to append any statement he made with a stoner "Maaann...."

Still, the movie did cut out a couple of the best sequences from Crichton's book....the raft and aviary scenes where Grant and the kids are trying to get back to the compound are some of the book's tensest moments.  I was always glad to see Jurassic Park III finally bring the aviary scene to fruition.

Re-reading this one has gotten me curious about re-reading The Lost World, and perhaps watching the movie again--a flick I disliked enough that I haven't watched it since its release a couple decades ago.  The book had a handful of pretty intense scenes, even if the resurrection of Ian Malcolm felt pretty cheap at the time....

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I'm also about to finish Bill Bryson's Life and times of the Thunderbolt Kid.  Troy sent that one to me, and I'm enjoying the hell out of it....

VHS! VHS! VHS!

Somebody's VHS collection ended up at the Goodwill the other day.  And in 1997, their collection was On Point.  Some good stuff there.  A real film buff.  I wander in there once every week or three to look at books and movies and such, hoping to find something like this.  I think I actually gasped aloud.

I think I owed it to 1997 me to buy that copy of Meet the Feebles.  I was in the midst of a mini-tour of Peter Jackson's stuff, after having watched Heavenly Creatures in a film class.  I knew I'd dug The Frighteners (which my roommate had seen in the theater, but I had not until it popped up at Videoculture).  I'd watched Dead Alive and Bad Taste.  I'd run across people talking about Meet the Feebles, but had never even laid eyes on it.

Videoculture was a minor haven in college.  Lots of good stuff.  Not just porno, though there was that.  A good little video store, staffed with a couple of true film geeks.  It was a fun place.  I've spoken about it before, and when I did I was pointed in the direction of the Videoculture Store on Amazon.  The former owner still owned a bit of the stock, and was selling it there.  I bought a copy of a Leningrad Cowboys tape that I'd rented from them.

I've digressed.

Anyway, in the midst of that Peter Jackson frenzy, I was heading to Videoculture three or four days a week to see if Meet the Feebles was in.  It wasn't.  Until it was.

I watched it.  I liked it, but not in a way that I becoming a frothing maniac about it.  I think I've watched it once since then.

But, I did gasp when I found it at the Goodwill Monday. 

I do have a VCR, but I'm not sure if it works.  I'd have to give it a test toast before I decide to try my 49 cent copy of Meet the Feebles.

Also pictured:  Enemy Mine, another flick in the vein of Hell in the Pacific or Red Sun.  Fun flick.  I like the movie, and the cover.

Internet?

I might have decent internet again.

We'll see.

Update:  Yeah.  I've got internet.  It's not too quick.  May not be able to stream too much.  But it'll do for what ails us....

Thoughts from the Ass End of the Night, this day, 5 October, 2017

Insomnia night.

The cat keeps using me as a leaning post while it licks its arse.

I have had mostly closing shifts for three weeks. I open tomorrow. My alarm will go off in 78 minutes.

Yesterday was the seven-month Mark since Dad's death. It still hurts. I miss him fiercely. I couldn't figure out, for a second, why I'd pre ordered both the hardcover and Audible.com editions of Stephen and Owen King's Sleeping Beauties. Then I remembered that I'd pre ordered the hardcover to give to Dad for Christmas. So. That was a minor mind fuck.

Due to vacations and people being out sick, I'm working 15 of 16 days. And I'm in a mini stretch where I'm working 40 hours in a 74 hour stretch.

Maybe that's where the fucking Insomnia comes from.

I will miss the bulk of Hysterics at Eric's, a gathering of current and former bloggers due to this work stretch. I'll make it for evenings, but open every morning, so I can't stay late.

I've been lucky most years.