Well this sucks. Apparently, Master Hamster Wrangler is not an acceptable title. I got demoted to Player Designer, or some such shite. Oh well. I’ll have to come up with something REALLY good, but normal sounding for the Clapton series, I guess.
My fifteen minutes of fame begin tonight with the final Allman Brothers concert of the season at the Beacon Theatre. For all my hard work and dedication, I will be listed somewhere in the closing credits as the Master Hamster Wrangler. I should probably choose a bit more dignified a title for the Clapton concerts in May . . .
The Aaron Dragoon
The Daring Dragoon has been festooning the dead Christmas trees in my front yard with toilet paper. I may have to toss out an old refrigerator or a couple of Trans-Ams on cinder blocks to make his path more crowded and harder to navigate while prancing around in a red cape and black paper mask if he does not stop soon. I blame hulu.com for this. I also blame hulu for my nine year old son announcing that he is “thankful for the Wonder Bra, miniskirts and those little donuts that you get 12 for a dollar.”
Unfortunately for me, changes in hulu’s streaming may soon put an end to embarrassing quotes from the boy-child. After lulling me in with more television shows and movies than I could possibly watch in a lifetime, hulu switched to encrypted streams. Not a big deal to people with high speed Internet connections, I suppose, but for those of us in the hinterlands connecting via a slow as crap (no, not talking a ferret with diarrhea here, more like a constipated rhino) WISP, it is an ugly change.
Prior to this, I could use Jaksta to record my streams, an online Tivo, as it were. I could then play them back while wandering on my treadmill, or on my television via my handy Western Digital WD TV device. Unfortunately, Jaksta cannot get me the encrypted (rtmpe) streams, and is not smart enough to pull down the rtmp equivalent.
Now it is back to straight streaming. And buffering. And buffering. And buffering. A 30 minute tv show often takes an hour or more. Happy days, the Jaksta/WDTV marriage. But now it is gone. I can tolerate sitting through commercials (or wandering off to pee in the sink or whatever it is you are supposed to do during the breaks). I cannot tolerate five minute frozen screens and 15 second commercial breaks that run for several minutes as the buffer slowly fills. So, no more Damages, no more Eureka and no more Buffy. I has a sad. Damn you, hulu!
I’ve been busy, in case you haven’t noticed. If you look in the corner, it should be obvious. See that battered thing over there, scuffed and cracked? That’s my arse, worked off. I did some stuff, then did some other stuff, and never quite got around to updating anything. Lots of stuff. Some of that stuff, like my work on the video portion of this, insignificant though my pieces were, should probably have been posted earlier. And yes, you can’t really see much without spending the cash. So sorry. If I remember, I’ll put up a link to the Masters site once it goes live. Everyone loves a little . . . yawn . . . (excuse me!) golf, right?
Well, the snow is gone and it’s time for a little eighties flashback . . .
Something interesting must be going on here, so I’ll post once I remember what it is.
My hopegasm has faded. Obama’s been president for half a day now and the economy’s still in a rut, I’ve still got really nasty yellowish green snot with copious quantities of blood in it, and the parking brake on my gas-guzzling 4-by is still broken. Where’s my damned change? And not once did I see a unicorn farting rainbows during the inauguration. I feel used.
Let’s get this started properly, shall we? First, a Porn Orchard homage to Tom Waits and Peter Murphy. There, I feel better now.
I’ve been away a while, as one or two of you may have noticed. And if you didn’t, then in the spirit of the season, fuck off and die. Oh, it’s going to be one of THOSE mornings, is it? Yes, it is. So, Christmas came early this year, wandering in the day before Thanksgiving, covered in vomit and false cheer. We cleaned it up the best we could and put it to bed with a warm fire and a glass of hot cider. It was dead by morning and the cider had spilled all over the wife’s favorite comforter. The holidays are no longer welcome here.
Why so quiet the past month? Well, as in the adorable holiday tale above, we did have visitors the day before Thanksgiving. One of Jennie’s many sisters stopped by for an unexpected holiday surprise and ended up staying through Christmas. Her husband’s penis tripped and fell into another woman, possibly for years, which apparently wasn’t an approved part of their marriage. So, he sent his wife and daughter away and we ended up with a matching set of emotional wrecks for the season. It’s been an eventful month, and I am glad to see it gone. Now if only someone would shovel away the four feet or so of snow that blocks my basement window so I can watch the car crashes, I would be a happy man.
Ooh! Speaking of car crashes, we got to see a complete moron (CM) try to remove himself from the gene pool. Unfortunately, no semis were heading the opposite direction, so it was a futile attempt. As some of you know, it’s a bit stormy this time of year. Around here, that means we’ve had several feet of snow and the roads are ice slicks. We were out later than we wanted to be the other night, helping the aforementioned sister-in-law get her washer hooked up properly, and had to head home after dark. Silly me decided to go 30 in a 45 zone when I should have been doing 25. In my defense, everyone else (except CM) was also driving 30. CM, however, in a shiny red coupe and going almost twice the speed of the rest of us, decided to pass me on the right, then whip back into my lane to avoid crashing into the car in front of him. Did I mention that the roads were very icy and that there was snow everywhere? Good. So, for those of you raised by chimpanzees and unaware of such subtleties, driving on ice and driving on dry pavement are two different experiences. On dry pavement, whipping in and out of traffic isn’t that big a deal, although it does tend to piss off the other drivers that you are constantly tailgating and cutting off. On icy/snowy pavement, you tend to fishtail around a bit, which only gets worse if you also slam on your brakes. Eventually, you end up spinning circles as you slide uncontrollably into oncoming traffic. Fortunately, said oncoming traffic was sparse enough and far enough back that CM avoided being hit. I managed to avoid braking and fishtailing, and was quite glad CM ended up in the opposite lane rather than in front of me, as I would have broadsided him. The once polite former Mormon sitting next to me turned and screamed obscenities at the dazed CM as we drove past. I just breathed deeply and let the adrenaline fade. The kids in the back cowered, wondering who exactly their mother was swearing at and how long until they could start using that language.
So how was your winter holiday season?
Quiet desperation beats vocal frustration any day in my book. My book is rather thin at the moment, however, so your mileage may vary. Which is why I recommend properly inflated tires. And a hat. I should still be working, but I am waiting for the din above me to quiet. The boy-child is screaming in terror or pain, the girl-child screaming in rage. Stomping, pounding footsteps, bits of my calm slipping away in the swirl of angry emotions. Now would be a good time for a yell. Instead I sit in silence and try to count to three. Maybe it’s time for a beer break?
Jesus Carp on a crapsicle, I need to clean my office. I thought I’d get to it this weekend. Instead, I did something else. I’m not sure what at this point. Stayed up too late. Went out on the wrong night (yes, there is a wrong night and a right night for weekends in Spokane. Apparently the second-largest city in Washington can only afford decent night-life on Fridays). Didn’t finish putting up barbeque stuff. The screaming is done; the only sound now the tinny sound of Journey being played on the boy-child’s mp3 speakers. How sad that the modern-day ghetto-blaster is only four inches across. Sadder still is that it probably sounds better than anything back in my day. Fuck, that sounds like an old person comment, doesn’t it? Oh well — tomorrow I can spend the afternoon yelling at squirrels.
Ew. Just ew. Okay, back to work, dammit!
Are you a lonely lady? Looking for love? Or perhaps tired of looking and ready to have it thrust upon you? Well, look no more. Ladies, its your turn to pick!
Just a little something to get you through another sobering day. I want my economy back, dammit. It’s a pity Michael Palin’s presidency bid failed.
