right on bro!

Rumsfeld’s War
If you have 90 minutes to spare, this is a really interesting look at Donald Rumsfeld and how he and his squad engineered the response to 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq. His argument was for a “transformation” of the American military in order to get things done cheaper and faster. Along the way, he ignored his generals’ years’ of experience and knowledge, underestimated the resources necessary to occupy a foreign country, and as a result, we are in the position we’re in on Iraq right now.

Kind of reminds me of a company I used to work for…

Flaming Bag of Poo
There’s still a few hours left on the West Coast for Halloween, so I thought this was still post-worthy. I think that if Brian were a Flash animator, he would have been responsible for creating this.

This also kind of reminds me of a company I used to work for…

In other news, had a really nice time a Halloween party out in West Covina this weekend. I even saw Page from Page’s Pages.

After last night’s fun at 81st Street playing Halo and Burnout, I almost got taken out, Burnout-style. I was driving home, up the 405, when I looked in my right rear-view mirror and saw a Ford Expedition had sped up in the lane to the right of me, and had pulled about 2 inches from the right side of my car. I jammed on the brakes (btw I wouldn’t recommend doing this during traffic, but it was 2 AM and the highway was empty) and let the guy get ahead of me. Then I watched him swerving in and out of his lane for a few minutes until he finally exited at the Culver City exit. Scary.

So yeah, I was at 81st Street yesterday. Played the aforementioned video games, went to Hennessey’s in Manhattan Beach for a burger and a beer, and then played the aforementioned video games some more.

This week really flew by. I spent a lot of time playing poker online, but I’m starting to get sick of it. That, and I lost most of my bankroll after I cashed out my winnings from last week. I’m down to about four bucks, and if I lose it, I’m done playing. It’s too much of a pain in the ass to transfer money to them. Fun while it lasted, but time to do something else.

So yesterday we went to Hot Pot City in San Gabriel for dinner. It was pretty cool - a Chinese fondue place. After that it was Lollicup for boba.

I installed about 3/4 of the acoustic foam yesterday. It’s sounding better in my room - things are sounding a little more even overall. I still have 8 squares of foam left, so I’m going to put that stuff up soon.

What else? The new GTA game is dope…didn’t get a chance to play it yesterday though.

I forgot to mention - I saw Explosions in the Sky this weekend at the Knitting Factory. It was a really amazing show.

Yesterday I ran a bunch of errands and did a little work. Pretty chill day overall. I rented Tony Hawk Underground 2 the other day and tried playing it, but I can’t get the hang of it. It’s either too fast or I’m getting too old. I liked an earlier version of Tony Hawk, simply because it was a lot of easier. I just don’t want to spend my time learning how to do 10,000 different tricks. It’s too much like having a job.

This morning I set up an online radio station just for fun. You need either WinAmp or maybe Windows Media Player 9 to listen to it. Please check it and let me know if it works:
Click here to listen

Basically if you hear music, it works. If you don’t, it doesnt. I’m just testing, I probably won’t run this 24/7. Fuck it - I took the radio station down.

The new Grand Theft Auto game comes out today…

I am cat-sitting right now. The cat is the nicest cat I’ve ever hung out with. Even when I sit on her. (Har har har…)

I started playing online poker last week, at Ultimatebet.com. Actually I started a few weeks ago, playing the free games, but now I’m playing the cheap games (5-10 cent blinds). It’s rapidly becoming my new Unemployed Timesuck.

Gonna go out to the store and get me some Velcro today….

Sark is on CSI now, playing a lab technician. He looks really out of place there.

Not much going on lately. The gray skies and rain have been getting me down, although I welcome them - it’ll clear up the smoggy-ass Los Angeles air that’s been pervasive over the past few weeks. Most of the shit that I’ve had on my list of things to do is done now, and all I have left are the big things, which will take some time.

I jammed with the members of my old band that never got off the ground the other day. It was pretty liberating - I just spent the entire time improvising. Not very productive, but fun nevertheless.

What else? Now that I discovered I get G4/Tech TV, I’ve been taping/watching episodes of X-Play. Toby’s right, Morgan Webb is one hot broad.

I feel like I’m waiting for something exciting to happen. Good exciting, not bad exciting - too much of the latter happened last month. We’ll see.

It’s also time to start getting ready to buy video games. The new Grand Theft Auto comes out next week, and after that, I gotta buy an Xbox and Halo 2 and Xbox Live. Buying an Xbox for one video game is probably the most expensive video game I’ll ever buy, but what can I say - 81st street and my cousin got me addicted.

Hope all is well with you, dear readers….

Toby bought Get on da Mic yesterday. It’s the most ridiculous game I’ve ever seen. It’s like karaoke mixed with DDR, except it’s all hip-hop and with a career mode. You start off rapping in front of the mirror, and you work your way out into the streets, then into the clubs, and then into a record deal. Along the way, you can make money and buy things like gold chains, gold microphones, and giant boomboxes.

I guess they couldn’t use the original tracks, so they ended up remaking a lot of the songs available. Amongst the ones I recognized: “Get Busy” by Sean Paul, a bunch of Dre stuff (”Next Episode,” “Ain’t Nuthin’ but a G Thing”), and some commercial hits (”Baby Got Back,” “Push It”).

Watching Toby and Montez rap with the USB microphone was pretty hilarious. This game will invite all sorts of ass-beatings because the n-word is pretty prevalent throughout the songs. Keep your doors closed, white boys, and have fun!

I’m trying out the new Google desktop search tool. It’s still indexing right now but I’ve done a couple of searches already. It’s really cool and useful, and it’s way better than the search function that comes with Windows.

Spent yesterday working on some stuff, glued in front of the PC all day long. Finally realized at about 5:30 P.M. that I hadn’t left the apartment all day, so I went outside for a few minutes, sniffed the smoggy Los Angeles air, and then went back inside.

Also, ordered the acoustic foam package for my room from these fools. Hope it works well.