Submitted for your approval: Godzilla, the 1998 remake of the 1954 monster-movie classic.

It was awful…I somehow avoided seeing this disaster during the summer between my Freshman & Sophomore year of college, but I thought, “I’ve got Netflix, so why not?” In any case, I can now join in the complaints about this movie that promised so much, but delivered so little.

My main problem with the film is its unoriginality: In changing nearly everything about the classic Godzilla, you’d think they’d come-up with some original stuff. Instead, you see stolen bits from other movies here: The eggs in Madison Square Garden, reminiscent of “Aliens”, the desperate escape from young that they lifted wholesale from “Jurassic Park”. And why is it raining the WHOLE TIME? I felt sorry for Matthew Broderick having to endure 6 weeks of shooting under rain machines.

Random Slashdot quip of the day :D

Slashdot | Can Your Car Get 1,700 MPG?: “I’m not impressed. The Spanish in the 15th century in their voyages to the New World and back were getting thousands of miles per galleon.”

The Autocross

Yes, that’s a Ford Festiva with a motor-swap.

Last Sunday was my first autocross with the Cincinnati Sports Car Club, also known as The Guys Who want to Autocross, but Can’t Follow the Rules. Basically, this is a parallel group to the Cincy Region of SCCA, but they do their own thing at the deathtrap of a site known as Scarlett Oaks.

The site’s on the northside of Cincy, just East of I-75 on I-275. There’s no way SCCA’d allow an event there: The course cuts between buildings, beside big ditches, and it’s rimmed with 3" concrete curbs. You get off-line, you kill your car. (On the bright side, LOTS of good accident stories while you’re in grid.)

It was a fun, exciting, and tiring weekend for me.

Saturday saw Whitney, Joey, and I head up in the Green Dragon to Joe Huber Family Farm, just north of Louisville in Starlight, Indiana.

Huber’s is a Louisvillian tradition, apparently, though I’d never heard of it. (Gotta say I love the name more than Georgetown’s own Double Stink Hog Farm) Anyway, Joe Huber has invented the best racket since Tom Sawyer himself: He gets thousands of city folk per year to PAY HIM to harvest his own produce. But hey, when in Rome, right?

Wonderful site that Joel Jirak just showed me: 2BlowHards. Don’t worry, it’s very Safe For Work (SFW).

Everything a blog should be: Incisive, personal, devil-may-care, provocative.

Forgive me…just can’t get enough:

- The requirements you give your real estate agent are (in order of importance):

1. 8 car climate controlled garage with an attached shop.
2. Outside parking for 6 cars, a motorhome, a crew cab dualie, a 28’enclosed trailer and a 34’ 5th wheel.
3. 3 phase 220V outlets in the garage for your welder.
4. A grease pit.
5. Convenient to a hazardous waste disposal site.
6. Deaf neighbors.
7. Across the street from a paint and body shop.
8. Some sort of house with a working toilet and shower on the property somewhere -or- hookups for the motorhome.

ROFL!

LOL!! THIS IS ME!

I particularly like:
- Your email address refers to your race car rather than to you.
- You have car parts in your cubicle at work.
- After your answer to “What did you do this weekend?” the next question is always: “And you do this for fun? Right?”
- Your first date involves asking her to crew for you.
- A neighbor asks if you have any oil, to which you query, “Synthetic or organic?” and they reply, “Vegetable or corn.”
- Everywhere you go, you try to find the fastest line through the turn.
- You always do a toe & heel downshift while whoever might be your passenger gives you a real funny look.

viz

\Viz\, adv. [Contr. fr. videlicet.] To wit; that is; namely.

[Try Merriam-Webster Unabridged.]
Source: Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.

I always thought viz. was short for ‘vis-a-vis’, but I was totally wrong. My guys in India use this abbreviation all the time, and for like 2 years I had no idea what they meant.

From Slashdot:

when the economy is good treat your company with the level of loyalty and respect that they showed to you.

This is typical American neurotic thinking (I’m American too, I’m not trying to flame you here).

Loyalty is to other people. Respect is something you show other people. It is nonsense to be “loyal” to a company, or to “respect” a company. This idea is simply American corporate brainwashing.

“All your base are belong to us!”

The next trip has been (re)scheduled:

Whitney and I will be heading to Rocky Mountain Nat’l Park via a non-stop Frontier Airlines flight from Indianapolis to Denver on August 25th, returning August 29th.

I’m looking forward to it greatly…getting to be Out West again, if only for a few days, at altitude, enjoying nature. I really liked Colorado on my abbreviated trip through in 2000, and I think I’ll enjoy spending more time there, visiting some sights, my lady Love in tow :-)

>>sigh«

I have no idea why today feels like such a bad day, but it just…does.

I’m not sure if there’s some conspiracy against IM traffic here at work, but neither Trillian nor MSN Messenger will connect through our firewall. I’ve always predicted they’d block ’em, but it would seem they’re finally following through.

I just feel unmotivated somehow, which is not a very good feeling. Guess it’s just the wear and tear from running all weekend from Louisville to Jackson and back. Did very much enjoy it, though. :-D

Well, it’s official: Kerry/Edwards ‘04 is off and running.

Meh.

Best suggestion I’ve heard all day: “Why doesn’t Cheney resign and let John McCain jump on the Republican ticket.” Heck yeah! Remove the greatest objection to the Bush/Cheney ticket (Cheney’s corporate connections + general creepiness), then add the most compelling Republican since Ronald Reagan. Makes sense to me…

On Blogs with comments enabled:

(or “Harry’s Blog Comment Manifesto”)

Some blogs allow readers to comment on the articles. Mine does not, and will not. I can’t say this in a way that doesn’t come off as mean: I think they’re stupid. (er…‘silly’, for those households that have banned the use of stupid.)

Why do you ‘Blog? I think in essence, it’s to get your views on life out there for others to see, and to express yourself, be introspective, practice your writing, and comment on the course of your life and the world in general. (and given that last sentence, it also allows one to be highly redundant…)

Just a moment to mark the passing of Marlon Brando. Renowned as a Method actor, Brando means just one thing to me: Don Corleone.

Random, bawdy, offensive bumper-sticker…

Racing: The only sport that requires TWO balls.

:-) Kinda silly, but made me smile.

Latest Neflix:

Dr. Strangelove (or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)

Kubrick’s satiric masterpiece, aided by Peter Sellers (a.k.a. Inspector Clouseau), George C Scott, and the unforgettable Slim Pickins, the movie delights and terrifies. Though we face a world fraught with terrorism and uncertainty, this movie is a window into the time of Mutually Assured Destruction, when the only certainty was the concept of global annihilation in 30 minutes or less.

The process chronicles, day 27:

Perhaps the most preposterous thing in our overworked, self-involved world is going to work and being told not to work, but that’s where we are. After three meetings today, each resembling a ’talking to’ from a teacher to a relucant, whiny pupil, my manager rolled-over and said, “My people won’t do the work you promised them they could do? SATISFIED?!”

I feel let-down. It’s not that I don’t have other stuff to do; rather, it’s that for once it seemed we had opportunity and approval to do things “The Right Way”. Seemed a *little* too good to be true, and it is.

A story for all you frappuchino lovers

You know what jealousy is?

It’s walking up to your truck and two spots down from you, you see one of these puppies:

I love working here, but I hate working here, because someone has this sexy beast and I don’t.

It’s a Caddy CTS-V. Basically, it’s a somewhat sporty rear-wheel-drive Cadillac sedan, with the engine, transmission, and brakes from a Corvette Z06. 348 cubic inches, producing 400 horespower.