Jul 31, 2005

American River Rafting


Who knew white water rafting would be such a blast!!

All you need is a nice HOT day, coolers full of beverages, snacks, sunscreen, water cannons, good friends and...oh yeah!... a raft!!

Got up there late morning. Applied our sunscreen (some of us needed more than others!!). Had a couple of drinks, launched off and we were set. Just sat back and relaxed, we just flowed with the river. But watch out!! There are water wars and don't expect that MAC make-up to stay on because they are not friendly wars. People build their own water cannons (that are made out of pvc and are 5 feet long!!), bring out buckets and some of them even try to jump on your boat to attack. No one was succesful at taking over our raft. Our raft had mad women with cannons and mad paddling men!! No one ever came close to touching our raft. We throw 'em a beer for trying though. : )

There are a few fun stops along the way. You can jump off the edge into the river, swing on a rope and even watch some mud wrestling. But my favorite stop was when we stopped and sat on the rocks as the river ran through it. So relaxing.

I do have one complaint. That bus ride back to the beginning SUCKS ASS!! It's long, HOT and full of dark, stinky, drunk people. YUCK!!

Next time, more people, more alcohol and better cannons!!



Constantine - Still Not Sure If I Liked It

Since most (all) of my movie watching now consists of DVD, I won't be very up to date on any of my reviews.

Last night, we rented Constantine. I'm just not sure I liked it. Part of the problem is that even through the awesome Matrix movie, I still see Keanu in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. Some movies just ruin people's careers for me and that one did it for Keanu. I still feel that every line in every movie should end with DUDE!

Another problem with the movie is I couldn't follow it. Maybe it was the kid screaming "MOMMY COOL" and "MOMMY EW" beside me. It could have also been that the movie truly did just suck. I am not willing to give it another chance to prove itself, though. Especially since it is only a 2 day rental. =P

Jul 30, 2005

Yakov of the day..7/30 weekend edition..


"Yakov Smirnoff is still funny after all these years."

-George W. Bush







okay..this isn't really a joke..but a pretty funny quote from President George W. Bush...

The Wedding Crashers


I like this movie for the same reason I like any movie that puts together any combination of the Owen Wilson/Vince Vaughn/Ben Stiller team -- their comic timing is perfect and they play off each other very well. You stick them in different situations (this time Wilson and Vaughn as, well... wedding crashers) and let them do their thing.

It's a formula that works, and these movies are just fun to watch. After a montage of the pair crashing weddings and bangin' a bunch of vulnerable hot chicks, we get to the turning point of the movie that brings Rachel McAdams onto the screen.

Y'know, after that I couldn't tell you if the rest of the movie was good or bad, because I became totally enamored with Rachel McAdams.


I'm not saying she's Jessica Alba hot, but she's definitely GOOD ACTRESS hot. She has this charm and charisma on the screen that a lot of bad actresses try to force with their head tilts and flatly delivered lines.

Rob Schneider knew what was up when he swapped bodies with her in The Hot Chick, the Plastics were smart to make her their leader in Mean Girls, and I've never seen The Notebook but I bet it was filled with little sketches and doodles of Rachel McAdams.

So in conclusion--come for the Wilson & Vaughn, but stay for the McAdams.

FJ

It's 2:26am. Get Off My Back.

Like every other heterosexual male walking the face of the earth, I enjoy pornography immensely. And also like every other living, breathing man with a working VCR and/or computer, I have an encyclopedic knowledge of the actors and actresses who peform in said pornography: names, ages, ethnicities, facial features, measurments, tattoos, filmographies, aliases, hair colors/styles, partner preferences (ex: no midgets, paraplegics, Asians, etc.), acceptable money shot targets, orgasm dialogue, penetrable orifices, and fan club addresses. It seems you can't walk down the street without that information nowadays. In fact, someone just asked me about orgasm dialogue today. But enough about Freefall Jones. Everyone has a favorite adult star name, that name that makes you giggle like a toddler every time you see it on the screen of your television or company computer. And I'm not referring to female pornstar names. They're too often boring, derivative, or artifically sexual. For decades male adult actors have been underrated in their creative aptitude, contriving pseudonyms that had men laughing hysterically while wishing they'd thought of the monikers for themselves. I could go into a laundry list of male pornstar names, but I refuse to exploit such a compelling discussion simply to garner cheap laughs. Okay, maybe just one: Dale Dabone. Hee hee. As I was saying, we all have our favorite, and the one that tickles me the most is Bob Terminator.

You probably recognize Bob Terminator from such erotic standards as The Ass Collector, Anal Lolitas, and The Brazillian Snake, parts One AND Two. Classics all. But why Bob Terminator, you ask? Because-- well--his name's Bob. It's as if he set out on his adult career to be menacing, intimidating--thus the "Terminator" surname--but feared he would alienate his friends and family, the people that were there for him from the beginning, BEFORE he was the big movie star that masturbated between takes. So he retained the "Bob," newly powerful but respectful of his roots. To the women whose vaginas he's crushing he is Mr. Terminator; to his chums he's still Bob. Bob From The Block.

Or maybe he just couldn't think of anything better. I can just see him the set of his first movie, discussing the issue with the director:

"Look Bob, you can't call yourself 'The Terminator.' It's already taken."
"But sir, it's PERFECT. 'Terminator' suits my smashmouth style to a T!"
"No Bob. I could get sued. You understand that Bob? Do you Bob?"
"Yeah, I guess....wait a cotton pickin' minute....I've GOT IT!"

And Bob Terminator was born. Okay, he probably didn't say "cotton pickin," but it adds so much pizazz to a sentence. Anyway, the story reminds me of when I was a child, drawing comic books in my house. An idea sprouted from the fertile confines of my vast imagination: a young boy, bitten by a radioactive spider, becomes infused with the proportionate abilites of the supercharged arachnid, and devotes his life to fighting crime. Now his name couldn't be Spider-MAN, because I was a boy and men weren't nearly as cool as boys. But "Spider-Boy" just sounded wimpy. And in a flash of light it came to me. My amazing new hero would be known to the world as SPIDER-JIM. Watch out, evildoers!

It was PERFECT. Even though Spider-Jim's real identity was, well, a kid named Jim, no one would suspect a thing because what hero in his right mind would use his real name as his crimefighting name? And since Jim is such a common, everyday name, his identity would be impossible to pinpoint. "Sure, Spider-Jim's about four feet tall and 58lbs, just like Jim the half-Chinese kid across the street. And Jim always seems to disappear right before Spider-Jim shows up. And Jim never goes to school. But they couldn't POSSIBLY be the same person! I mean, there are SO many Jims in this country!"

I created Spider-Jim with nothing but my trusty No. 2 pencil. I didn't want to taint his awesome costume with that convoluted (and hard to draw) spider web pattern. And since I thought then, as I do now, that coloring was utterly beneith me, his spider-suit was a nifty shade of light gray, with white eyeholes, white gloves, white boots, and a white belt. And there was no spider on his chest. Now that I think about it, you couldn't really tell why he called himself Spider-Jim until he showed up and started shooting web out of his hands. But of course, with my aforementioned aversion to the traditional spider web pattern, I simply rendered his webbing as a bunch of criss-crossed lines, making it appear that Spider-Jim was ensnaring his deadly foes in fishnet stockings from Frederick's of Hollywood.

But I digress. Or am I regressing? I was talking about porn, right? Oh yeah, the whole porn name thing. And before anyone starts condescending, I'm fully aware of the fact that a man has to watch a LOT of porn to know who Bob Terminator is, but that's a different story, for a different post. For now, let us all stand up and raise our hooks to a true visionary, a trailblazer. For fusing the fierce and the mundane, an amalgam of intimidating and banal, I salute you, Bob Terminator. May your pelvis remain strong and your man-gravy remain salty, until the day you die of some unidentified South American VD.

Jul 29, 2005

Ghosts

Do you guys believe in ghosts?

My son has me freaked out. A week ago, I was bringing him up to go to bed for the night and he pointed behind me and asked "Who dat?" I looked behind me and no one was there.

The next night, I laid him in bed and he pointed past me again and asked "Who dat?" I looked back and ofcourse, like I thought, no one was there.

Last night, He was running around like a "mad man" and had an asthma flare-up, so I pulled out the nebulizer and had him sit down up against the wall while he did his session with the machine. While I sat there with my back towards the rest of the house, he points and says "Who dat?" This time I was brave and I asked him "Where?". He pointed past me and said "Who dat?". I looked and told him that no one was there and asked him "Do you want to show me who you see?". He said no and said "cawee me mommy!!". I took the nebulizer mask off, left the machine plugged in and took him up to bed.

Who does he see?

My daughter once asked me when she and my son were in the kitchen "Who is saying 'HI' to Josh?" and we were the only ones in the house.

Yakov of the Day


"In America you put "In God we trust" on your money, but in Soviet Russia, we have no money!"

okay..thats really a Bobby Hill joke..but he did write it for Yakov..."WHAT A COUNTRY!!"

TOP 5 SONGS I SING IN THE SHOWER...

5. "I Guess That's Why They Call It The Blues"-Elton John
4. "You'll Never Find Another Love Like Mine"-Lou Rawls
3. "Emotion"-Bee Gees
2. "The Way You Look Tonight"-Frank Sinatra
1. "Ain't No Mountain High Enough"- MICHAEL MCDONALD!!!!

..honorable mentions:

  • "Swept Away"-Christopher Cross
  • "Oh Sherry"-Steve Perry
  • "Glory Days"-Bruce Springsteen
  • Basically any song by Journey

and..

  • "AMERICAN TRILOGY"-Elvis Presley






okay I'm bored...I do nothing all day but stare at the computer screen...

The Konica Minolta IKON CPP 500
(color laser printer)


We just got this printer installed at work and this thing is huge. It’s this big cube that’s about 4 feet wide, 4 feet tall, and 4 feet deep. It looks like the one power droid that was getting tortured by having its feet burned while he was upside down in Return of the Jedi.


The worst thing about this printer is that it sounds like a rocket engine. When it starts up in the morning the digital display shows an animation of a space shuttle taking off. I’m f***ing serious. This thing needs its own office far away from my desk. Who in the hell designs a printer this loud? It’s like working on a factory floor next to an industrial press. I feel like I should be wearing gloves, a hair cap, and goggles.

FJ

Anata-no namae wa?

My new infatuation is Japanese girls...well, there's two particular that got me "jonesing" for a taste of there domburi!...



First is Diane Mizota..she hosts a show called Filter on G4TV...she's just ridiculously cute...thats why I like her so much..and the fact that she was Fook-Mi in the last Austin Powers movie doesn't hurt..I WANT YOU DIANE MIZOTA!!!..oh, and she also hosts Trading Spaces: Boys vs. Girls on Discovery Kids on NBC...











Then there's current Jpop queen Namie(nah-me-ay) Amuro..I guess you can call her the Britney Spears of Japan but with talent..wait, I take that back..comparing her to Britney Spears is totally selling Namie short..basically she's been a mainstay on the japanese music charts since her pre-teen years...She sings and dances like no other I've seen!...and even though I have no freakin idea what she's saying,her songs are pretty damn good.. I WANT YOU NAMIE AMURO!!!





...oh, and I still love Jessica Alba but, freakin everyone and there grandma does too!..I prefered it when she was "flying below the radar" and nobody knew who she was..If I mentioned her to other people, my sentence would always start: "have you ever heard of...?".....granted she was probably only 16 at the time..but still!...I miss those days...*single tear...


Jul 28, 2005

"In America...."

"...you can catch cold...but in Soviet Russia...cold catches you!"


...god I miss Yakov Smirnoff....

I LOVE EXTREME MAKEOVER HOME EDITION!!!!

I LOVE EXTREME MAKEOVER HOME EDITION AND.........

they are in my town!! They are rebuilding a home off of Tolenas Avenue in Fairfield. Right up the street from the parents of FREEFALL JONES.

Apparently, I had just missed the crew while they were shopping at Sears for the show this morning. A couple of hours earlier and I could have seen them!! Ty Pennington filmed a commercial there yesterday. How exciting!!

My sisters and I will sign up to volunteer and maybe be able to see the new home on Tuesday. I always chant with the show and I can't wait to do it in person.."BUS DRIVER, MOVE THAT BUS!!!!"

It's great that ABC is giving them this blessing.

Jul 27, 2005

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

All right let's get this out of the way first. I still like the first Willy Wonka movie better. It's the one I grew up on and still holds up to this day.

Second, I will forever be scarred by the memory of some idiot at WonderCon this year commenting about the new Charlie and the Chocolate Factory movie trailer. Imagine a room full of people watching the trailer and then right at the end having someone yell, "Geeeeeeene Wilderrrrrrr," with a really cocky, smug attitude as he crossed his arms and leaned back against the wall.

Wow. Thanks buddy. I wonder how long he'd been waiting to use that line? And did he feel bad when he got practically no reaction from the crowd?

Okay, on to the new movie. I was able to tuck away the memory of the first movie in a small pocket in my brain and let this new one stand on its own legs. I thought it was great. Some of the problems that I'd heard and read critics complain about didn't really bother me. I remember reading the book back in grade school, so Wonka's dark attitude towards the misfortune of some of the kids wasn't a surprise to me. This movie is based on a children's book -- the message is good kids get rewarded and bad kids get what's coming to them. Pretty simple.

And Johnny Depp's performance worked fine - he was the quirky, detached tour guide. It's like he really wasn't the "star" of the movie, the Chocolate Factory itself was. There were amazing sets and visuals, and man, was I happy that the Oompa Loompas weren't as scary as the ones in the original movie. And all the not-Charlie kids were hilarious in their roles as greedy, overindulged, spoiled brats. The scenes with Veruca Salt make this movie worth seeing.

The only thing I was kind of "eh" on was the whole deal about Wonka's dad. This was something added by Tim Burton to help explain why Willy Wonka was the way he was. It's there for people who need to have everything spelled out for them, but not really necessary at all.

FJ

Jul 26, 2005

A question about Episode III

So... in order to HIDE Luke, Obi-Wan let him keep the last name "Skywalker," brought him to Anakin's home planet, and let him live with Anakin's step-family?

If I didn't know that this thing would work out, I would have thought that was the stupidest ending EVER.

FJ

Smelly clothes

The problem with the Emeryville Public Market is that it smells good. Too good. And if you go there too early--like when every shop is still cooking and grilling to get ready for the lunch rush—all the smoke gets into your clothes and you smell like Korean BBQ all day.

For the uninitiated, the Emeryville Public Market is an international food court where you can get all kinds of food. Mexican, Indian, Greek, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, etc. You can find some good stuff— like the Italian deli, the Vietnamese place, the gyro place, or the aforementioned Korean BBQ.

But you can’t go there often. And that’s because all the food starts to taste the same— probably because all the smells of all the foods just become one big klump of smell that permeates into whatever you're eating. Seriously, you’re not imagining things when that burrito you just got tastes vaguely of the jerk chicken from the Jamaican place across the way.

Today I grabbed food from the Vietnamese place. I ordered the fried rice and chicken curry. Some of the other choices I had were beef in oyster sauce, black been chicken, teriyaki chicken, egg rolls, and hot and sour soup. Is any of that really Vietnamese But the fried rice was good (nice and MSG-y) and the chicken curry was very mild, but good. Of course, afterwards I wished I had gotten some pad thai instead.

FJ

Jul 25, 2005

Blog Begins

What do you mean you haven't seen Batman Begins yet? Great, I've totally wasted that reference. Anyway, if you haven't seen it - go. I promise you'll hate Tim Burton and Michael Keaton afterwards for that "Joker killed Batman's parents" crap.

And then do yourself a favor and pick up Equilibrium to see Christian Bale out-Matrix the Matrix.

FJ