I know I have used that joke before, but it’s a reference to a jingle from Halloween III (i.e. the one without Michael Myers) which you’ll never forget if you’ve heard it before. You will wish you had never heard it, I can guarantee that.
So, I had an interesting week which involved me doing some things out of the ordinary. Monday the 24th was dull so I’ll skip ahead to the next day, where I went to Walt Disney World. Heh heh heh. I went to Epcot to enjoy the Food & Wine Festival. Surprisingly I had only been to it once before, a few years ago. While I was there I saw things such as a shithead young kid who looked maybe 13 loudly arguing with his mom (I really wanted to kick that punk right in his still-developing crotch!), but I also enjoyed some tasty treats and yeah, I consumed an alcoholic beverage. In this case it was something I’ve known of for years but never had: a Singapore Sling. It has gin, rum, and some other things in it. Wow, is it strong! It’s not bad at all, just strong. It was a good time there. On the way back I stopped at good old Planet Smoothie, and they have an Apple Crunch drink which is pretty damn good. I highly recommend that.
Wednesday and Thursday were uneventful so I’ll skip ahead to Friday. I went and saw the first of a two night tournament known as the Jeff Peterson Memorial Cup; it’s named after a late local wrestler who passed away almost 10 years ago from cancer; he was only in his early 20’s. Since ’03 they have had yearly shows for him, highlighted by a 16 person single elimination tournament. I’ve been to all of the shows since ’04 and some drama issues involved (i.e. BS with those damned Toadies) I always enjoy going to those events as each year they raise money for good causes, such as cancer research, and stuff gets donated to auction and it’s a really nice thing to attend.
I’ll say more about it on my Livejournal wrestling page*, where I posted something new a few days ago and I’ll post something new sometime in the first half of November, but I’ll be brief here by saying that this year’s edition of the tournament was pretty great. Some hardcore wrestling fans who were there said that this was the best wrestling tournament of its kind ever. I haven’t seen enough to make that sort of judgment… I will say now that out of the JPC tournaments I’ve seen it’s the best ever, and no I didn’t say that in a Comic Book Guy voice. All the guys really busted their ass and didn’t phone it in. So much good action, I enjoyed it, and I’m someone who isn’t as much of a pro wrestling fan anymore as I used to be back in the day. I’ll elaborate on that more on Livejournal sometime in the future, but everyone seemed to have a good time, from the hardcore wrestling fans to the regular folks, and even little girls.
• http://blairreviews.livejournal.com/
Friday night’s show was in Brooksville. It’s a town I’m not a fan of, for many different reasons. I had no problems this time, thankfully. I could have done without the issue of sitting by a young lady-as in, not even in high school, so no it’s not that kind of thing; I’m not a pervert!-who often accidentally kicked or nudged me and never apologized once. Then again, she IS a young teenage girl and otherwise acted fine so I guess I shouldn’t complain as the gal could have been a LOT more annoying.
Saturday’s show was in Crystal River. I didn’t go straight there, though. I took “the scenic route” and visited a random mall first. It wasn’t too large but it still was fine. I ate at Villa Pizza; it’s comparable to Sbarro, which isn’t the best compliment I can give. At least it was quantity over quality. I then had dessert as I had some yogurt. Yes, there’s more yogurt places out there! That is THE hot trend as of late; you know many of them won’t last, though. The one I had was Red Cherry; it was attached to a Chinese food place. What I had was lemon-flavored and was tasty. From the mall itself I got some cheap stuff from FYE. Yes, those are still around, and I did manage to find stuff in there that wasn’t outrageously priced.
At the wrestling show itself I can’t say too much there that I can’t save for Livejournal. Hopefully there will be future editions of the Jeff Peterson Memorial Cup. The attendance wasn’t as great as in previous years. Otherwise I’ll be positive as those events were well worth the price of admission and then some.
Oh yeah, and I did come across some horrid traffic on both days. No wonder why I don’t drive as much as I used to. At least now my car is at the 77,777 mile mark at this moment.
My Sunday was dull; however, from Saturday the 29th through this Saturday, some relatives from out of state are down here in Florida. I know I’ll be doing a thing or two with them that’ll be out of the ordinary.
I’ll actually be back Tuesday the 8th. That’s in part because the next Bears game isn’t this upcoming Sunday but rather a week from today. I’ll be talking about that along with the stuff with the relatives.
Monday, October 31, 2011
Monday, October 24, 2011
More Stories Concerning How Bustin’ Makes Me Feel Good
Before people think I’m being crude here, I’m quoting a line from the Ghostbusters song. To think, as a kid I thought nothing of it; as an adult, though, once I figured out what it really meant, I can’t help but laugh at that line.
So, up until Thursday things were not too exciting. Sure, I went to Barnes & Noble one afternoon to use their Wi-Fi and then I went to Planet Smoothie, but otherwise nothing interesting to write about. Thursday, though, I went to eat at Lime Fresh Mexican Grill; I’m glad that place is still around. My luck with restaurants as of late, I wasn’t sure if that would be opened or be closed due to lack of customers. When I’m there there’s always a few other guests around, although it’s not packed. I’m glad it is around as they have pretty good food. I ended up at the always sparsely populated Festival Bay Mall (where most of the spaces for stores are unoccupied; how they are STILL open will always leave me gobsmacked) as a pair of movies would be playing there in the evening. Various locations across the country showed Ghostbusters, a movie I never saw on the big screen. At the Cinemark at this particular mall, it started at 7:30 rather than 7, making it easy for me to get out of there and not have to wait at all before I go see Paranormal Activity 3 at 10.
Concerning what I saw first, sure it’s an odd and goofy movie, but it’s still wildly entertaining. It sure as hell is a lot better than Ghostbusters 2! And who knows if the discussed for years Ghostbusters 3 will ever get made. I hope it does, if only as an apology for how disappointing the second one was. Anyway, with the movie I saw at 10… I know I’ve mentioned it more than once before but I heard about the first movie two full years before it got released, so by the time I got to see it for the first time at one of those random screenings they had across the country (remember those?) I was more than pumped for it, and I thought it delivered. I know quite a few people who dislike it, but to each their own. I’ll never forget watching it with a crowd apparently filled with people who had zero idea what it was going to be about, and by the end quite a few of them were apparently soiling their pants from fright. I dug it watching the movie in that perfect environment, with a crowd soiling their pants from fright. It was the same when I saw the second last year and the latest installment this year. I’d say that the movie was the worst of the three but that is not a slight. I still enjoyed watching it for sure; it’s just that as they expanded the mythology I thought it was goofy, and be warned that much of the advertising you’ve seen for the movie features clips that are NOT in the movie! I kid you not. That really got my dander up as I was expecting to see one clip in the film (what I thought would be the obvious ending) and when it didn’t show up I got pretty peeved about it. I’m not as upset now but whoever is responsible for that Jared David St. Laurent-level of thinking… at least with both movies I saw on this night, the crowds were good, i.e. not filled with dumb shits flapping their gums while the motion picture was playing. Not too surprisingly, I saw some poor driving skills on the way back and on the way home, but let’s not
Friday and Saturday were dull-aside from the weather getting cooler-so I’ll skip ahead to Sunday and boy, what a day. Sad to say it was filled with quite a bit of anger, and that’s with the Bears winning the game. I did what I usually and I went to Friendly Confines to watch the game, even though I could have watched it from the comforts of home. They have pretty good food there, it’s nice to watch all of the games going on at the time. Plus, it’s also nice for people-watching at times… as I mentioned before, they were playing the Tampa Bay Bucs but not in Chicago or Tampa, but rather London. If only I could have road tripped there to see that game; it’d be great to visit the UK as hey, that’s part of my heritage. As I predicted, the game was going to be close. For most of it the Bears were doing well but by the end they started playing poorly and the Bucs came back. Thankfully Chicago ended up winning the game. As for my time there… oh boy.
I got there and sat at a random spot at the bar. Not that far away sitting at a table was a pair of guys, one a Cowboys fan and the other a Redskins fan; those two people being pals is surprising if you’re an NFL fan. Anyhow, on the Fox stations before the games is a pre-show and every week they have on Frank Caliendo, an allegedly funny comedian who has only done ONE character that I’ve so much as mildly chuckle at, which is impersonating Charles Barkley. Otherwise, what a loathsome personality who I wish would go away… Frank I mean, not Sir Charles. I heard those two guys laugh at his awful attempt at impersonating Jay Leno and from that point I was already expecting trouble. Indeed it was true, and the Redskins fan was a boor to an incredible degree. Literally the first play of the game on he kept on running his mouth almost constantly, and he wasn’t even praising his team but instead berating them, and cussing up a storm too. I quickly got tired of that Troglodyte cretin knuckle-dragging oaf so I decided to move to another spot at the bar, far away from that dick.
My troubles didn’t end there.
The people who sat right by me were fine, but the surrounding area, full of loud-mouths who cried and bellowed and bitched and moaned about how their teams were doing. What meatheads; sports are NOT the end-all be-all of this world, I say, but seemingly most people take that bullshit WAY too seriously. Thank goodness I am not one of those people. Who I got the most aggravated with was a loud douche who whined and belly-ached about his Tampa Bay Bucs. That’s why I took special glee when the Bears were able to get the win over Tampa Bay. He was real quiet after that, much to my amusement. I’ve complained about loathsome boors there in the past (it hasn’t been much of an issue this year) but this way was pretty bad in terms of guys who I wish would be water-boarded.
At least for about the last hour I was there I sat by right a rather cute blonde. She was there to chat with another guy sitting at the bar, not me; that’s usually how it goes. At least she didn’t seem like a bimbo, came off as pretty nice, and best of all wasn’t someone who was crowing about their team. After my latest experience there I’m sort of glad the Bears don’t play a game next week. Although, I know that when they do play next, on the night of the 6th, I’ll be there and I’ll consume an alcoholic beverage or two, which I really should have done here.
By the way, on Facebook last night I mentioned my frustrations with the crowd at FC. Some people basically said I should accept having to deal with that sort of crowd, and it’s like going to a strip club and expecting the ladies to keep their clothes on. While the analogy got a chuckle out of me, I disagreed and said I never put up with stupid people no matter where they are, and I should never accept people acting that dumb. To throw out an analogy of my own it’s like me accepting that people in Florida are likely to act stupid at a movie theatre and not shut the F up at all. Am I supposed to accept that? No! I’m going to get mad at that A-hole, and I’ll always be proud to live my life not having to accept the status quo and just put up with people being obnoxious oafs and disturbing others with their oafish ways.
Anyway… I ended up going to IKEA to pick up some small items before going to the nearby Zaxby’s restaurant. I hadn’t been to one of those in too long. I first ate at one of those places in their home state of Georgia way back in ’05 when I was returning from a summer vacation where I drove to Illinois and back. A little later they opened up a franchise in Orlando and I haven’t been there enough since then. Their chicken fingers are fine but their fries are real good. On the way back home I was on a two lane road and I saw the aftermath of an accident! One car’s front was smashed and the other had its side destroyed, so it was obvious what happened. I could smell what I presumed was burned rubber in the air. I wish I could have seen what happened live, not because I’m a masochist but more for curiosity’s sake. Both drivers were out of their cars so I didn’t stop; not that I could have done much, and plus other drives passed them by.
I will be back on Halloween, talking about the usual. I won’t be going anywhere for football on the 30th, but there still will be things to discuss, including me attending a pair of big local wrestling shows and a relative visiting the area on vacation; they live in another state so it’ll be nice seeing them.
So, up until Thursday things were not too exciting. Sure, I went to Barnes & Noble one afternoon to use their Wi-Fi and then I went to Planet Smoothie, but otherwise nothing interesting to write about. Thursday, though, I went to eat at Lime Fresh Mexican Grill; I’m glad that place is still around. My luck with restaurants as of late, I wasn’t sure if that would be opened or be closed due to lack of customers. When I’m there there’s always a few other guests around, although it’s not packed. I’m glad it is around as they have pretty good food. I ended up at the always sparsely populated Festival Bay Mall (where most of the spaces for stores are unoccupied; how they are STILL open will always leave me gobsmacked) as a pair of movies would be playing there in the evening. Various locations across the country showed Ghostbusters, a movie I never saw on the big screen. At the Cinemark at this particular mall, it started at 7:30 rather than 7, making it easy for me to get out of there and not have to wait at all before I go see Paranormal Activity 3 at 10.
Concerning what I saw first, sure it’s an odd and goofy movie, but it’s still wildly entertaining. It sure as hell is a lot better than Ghostbusters 2! And who knows if the discussed for years Ghostbusters 3 will ever get made. I hope it does, if only as an apology for how disappointing the second one was. Anyway, with the movie I saw at 10… I know I’ve mentioned it more than once before but I heard about the first movie two full years before it got released, so by the time I got to see it for the first time at one of those random screenings they had across the country (remember those?) I was more than pumped for it, and I thought it delivered. I know quite a few people who dislike it, but to each their own. I’ll never forget watching it with a crowd apparently filled with people who had zero idea what it was going to be about, and by the end quite a few of them were apparently soiling their pants from fright. I dug it watching the movie in that perfect environment, with a crowd soiling their pants from fright. It was the same when I saw the second last year and the latest installment this year. I’d say that the movie was the worst of the three but that is not a slight. I still enjoyed watching it for sure; it’s just that as they expanded the mythology I thought it was goofy, and be warned that much of the advertising you’ve seen for the movie features clips that are NOT in the movie! I kid you not. That really got my dander up as I was expecting to see one clip in the film (what I thought would be the obvious ending) and when it didn’t show up I got pretty peeved about it. I’m not as upset now but whoever is responsible for that Jared David St. Laurent-level of thinking… at least with both movies I saw on this night, the crowds were good, i.e. not filled with dumb shits flapping their gums while the motion picture was playing. Not too surprisingly, I saw some poor driving skills on the way back and on the way home, but let’s not
Friday and Saturday were dull-aside from the weather getting cooler-so I’ll skip ahead to Sunday and boy, what a day. Sad to say it was filled with quite a bit of anger, and that’s with the Bears winning the game. I did what I usually and I went to Friendly Confines to watch the game, even though I could have watched it from the comforts of home. They have pretty good food there, it’s nice to watch all of the games going on at the time. Plus, it’s also nice for people-watching at times… as I mentioned before, they were playing the Tampa Bay Bucs but not in Chicago or Tampa, but rather London. If only I could have road tripped there to see that game; it’d be great to visit the UK as hey, that’s part of my heritage. As I predicted, the game was going to be close. For most of it the Bears were doing well but by the end they started playing poorly and the Bucs came back. Thankfully Chicago ended up winning the game. As for my time there… oh boy.
I got there and sat at a random spot at the bar. Not that far away sitting at a table was a pair of guys, one a Cowboys fan and the other a Redskins fan; those two people being pals is surprising if you’re an NFL fan. Anyhow, on the Fox stations before the games is a pre-show and every week they have on Frank Caliendo, an allegedly funny comedian who has only done ONE character that I’ve so much as mildly chuckle at, which is impersonating Charles Barkley. Otherwise, what a loathsome personality who I wish would go away… Frank I mean, not Sir Charles. I heard those two guys laugh at his awful attempt at impersonating Jay Leno and from that point I was already expecting trouble. Indeed it was true, and the Redskins fan was a boor to an incredible degree. Literally the first play of the game on he kept on running his mouth almost constantly, and he wasn’t even praising his team but instead berating them, and cussing up a storm too. I quickly got tired of that Troglodyte cretin knuckle-dragging oaf so I decided to move to another spot at the bar, far away from that dick.
My troubles didn’t end there.
The people who sat right by me were fine, but the surrounding area, full of loud-mouths who cried and bellowed and bitched and moaned about how their teams were doing. What meatheads; sports are NOT the end-all be-all of this world, I say, but seemingly most people take that bullshit WAY too seriously. Thank goodness I am not one of those people. Who I got the most aggravated with was a loud douche who whined and belly-ached about his Tampa Bay Bucs. That’s why I took special glee when the Bears were able to get the win over Tampa Bay. He was real quiet after that, much to my amusement. I’ve complained about loathsome boors there in the past (it hasn’t been much of an issue this year) but this way was pretty bad in terms of guys who I wish would be water-boarded.
At least for about the last hour I was there I sat by right a rather cute blonde. She was there to chat with another guy sitting at the bar, not me; that’s usually how it goes. At least she didn’t seem like a bimbo, came off as pretty nice, and best of all wasn’t someone who was crowing about their team. After my latest experience there I’m sort of glad the Bears don’t play a game next week. Although, I know that when they do play next, on the night of the 6th, I’ll be there and I’ll consume an alcoholic beverage or two, which I really should have done here.
By the way, on Facebook last night I mentioned my frustrations with the crowd at FC. Some people basically said I should accept having to deal with that sort of crowd, and it’s like going to a strip club and expecting the ladies to keep their clothes on. While the analogy got a chuckle out of me, I disagreed and said I never put up with stupid people no matter where they are, and I should never accept people acting that dumb. To throw out an analogy of my own it’s like me accepting that people in Florida are likely to act stupid at a movie theatre and not shut the F up at all. Am I supposed to accept that? No! I’m going to get mad at that A-hole, and I’ll always be proud to live my life not having to accept the status quo and just put up with people being obnoxious oafs and disturbing others with their oafish ways.
Anyway… I ended up going to IKEA to pick up some small items before going to the nearby Zaxby’s restaurant. I hadn’t been to one of those in too long. I first ate at one of those places in their home state of Georgia way back in ’05 when I was returning from a summer vacation where I drove to Illinois and back. A little later they opened up a franchise in Orlando and I haven’t been there enough since then. Their chicken fingers are fine but their fries are real good. On the way back home I was on a two lane road and I saw the aftermath of an accident! One car’s front was smashed and the other had its side destroyed, so it was obvious what happened. I could smell what I presumed was burned rubber in the air. I wish I could have seen what happened live, not because I’m a masochist but more for curiosity’s sake. Both drivers were out of their cars so I didn’t stop; not that I could have done much, and plus other drives passed them by.
I will be back on Halloween, talking about the usual. I won’t be going anywhere for football on the 30th, but there still will be things to discuss, including me attending a pair of big local wrestling shows and a relative visiting the area on vacation; they live in another state so it’ll be nice seeing them.
Monday, October 17, 2011
The Lions, Vikings, & Bears, Oh My
Here is a recap of what I’ve done in the past week, which includes having to watch TWO Chicago Bears games. Just from the first one, this wasn’t necessarily a good thing. The only thing I really did on Monday was watch the Bears play on national TV against the Detroit Lions; the Lions for most of the past 50 years have just been a horribly-run franchise, which explains why most of those teams have been just putrid. They’re a lot better and after a start where both teams played some of the worst football you’d ever see, the Lions got better and for much of the game Chicago played like diarrhea. I wasn’t too happy with how the people that run the team didn’t do enough to help protect the quarterback, which has caused problems the last few years and it continued in this game. That made me rather frustrated. The Bears ended up losing 24-13 in a game not as close as the score would suggest.
My Tuesday and Wednesday was boring so I’ll mention that during the past week I found out about a pair of restaurants closing. The first one was the local Perkin’s in Clermont. I had been there a few times before and the food was at least decent. I was just there relatively recently with someone I know; I noticed there wasn’t much of a crowd there, so this wasn’t a surprise. I then looked online a little later in a week to see if a certain restaurant in the Dr. Phillips area was open. As I unfortunately figured, the joint I had been to two times before-known as Twisted Burger-was closed after being open for only about 6 or 7 months at the most. That was really not a surprise to me, as the times I had been there it was practically deserted. Leave The Memories Alone…
Thursday night I picked up my pals at the airport; remember, I dropped them off the preceding Sunday; that was about as exciting as Thursday got. I didn’t really do anything on Friday either, so let me skip ahead to the weekend, which did have some interesting things to talk about.
Saturday I stayed at home until late at night. I went to the Orlando-area… no, not downtown Orlando. Rather, I went to the Enzian Theater to watch an infamous 1980 horror film called Maniac (the Michael Sembello song of the same name was originally written after he saw the movie; he really toned down the lyrics and that’s how it ended up on the Flashdance soundtrack); it was my first time seeing it and it’s not the easiest movie to watch. It’s just intense, graphic, and pulls no punches, to use some clichés. You see someone’s head explode in slow motion via shotgun blast! It does suspense very well in some spots, though. I’m not quite sure how I feel about it; it didn’t suck, though. What also didn’t suck was that the Enzian have a haunted maze sort of deal going on (no, I didn’t go through it) and thus it was a real party there, with employees dressed up and two tables set up with food and alcoholic drink on them. I ordered a spiked punch sort of deal, as why not? Plus, that AND them selling Jello shots reminded me of, well, me consuming that sort of thing at parties at Illinois State University, which was back around TEN years ago; I’m flabbergasted myself those good days of college were so long ago.
Oh, and on the way back I was on I-4 and in a non-shocker of non-shocker I saw some horrible driving on that stretch of road, including a guy who I swore was going at least 100! If I didn’t have to turn off of the highway to the 408 soon after I saw that, I would have tried to floor it to go after him… no, not to kick his ass, but rather get his license plate number and call him in. Honestly now, going 100 when the speed limit was 50… that’s yet another reason why I always complain about all the traffic in this state… I have good reason to do so.
Sunday, I went and saw the Bears play in the evening. It was on national TV but I still went to good old Friendly Confines to check it out… and have some alcoholic beverages. In hindsight, maybe I should have gone to a birthday celebration someone I know (not all that well, but I’ve still briefly chatted with them in person before) had in Orlando at around the same time. I got invited to it via Facebook awhile ago. I just never really thought of going there. It turns out, quite a few people I knew were in attendance; that was breaking news to me when I found out about that online after I got back from watching the Bears game. Eh, oh well. It was a costumed party sort of thing and I did not have any ones on hand, at least anything worthwhile unless I wore some 70’s clothes and went as a hipster… whoops, I mean a guy from that decade. Plus, it involved karaoke and while I’ve gone to those sorts of things before and been fine as people knew NEVER to ask me to do that sort of thing as I’d rather catch leprosy than do a karaoke song. As I remember mentioning in one of these earlier in the year, way back when in my Illinois days I got pretty pissed off at some acquaintances due to them constantly asking me one night to do a song and I had to constantly tell them “no”; maybe I’m the only one who hates having to repeat something over and over…
Anyway, that night there probably wouldn’t have lived up to my expectations and would have been rather awkward. At least I did wish that individual a Happy Birthday on Facebook.
I did manage to have a decent time at FC watching the Bears play against the Minnesota Vikings. It sure as heck helped that the Vikings are a poor football team this year, but Chicago looked far better than they did this past Monday and they kicked some ass, winning 39-10. I enjoyed seeing the Bears play well, needless to say. While I was there I had some beers, including my first-ever taste of Guinness Black Lager. To say something that people would consider blasphemy, regular Guinness tastes like liquid bread to me, and that’s not a good thing. I’ll stick with regular lagers, hard ciders, and drinks like berry-flavored beer, thank you very much. Black Lager was more drinkable to me, and yet I didn’t think it had much of a taste at all, so I’d rather drink something like Pabst Blue Ribbon or some other beer that is known but not the standard fare like Bud or Miller Lite.
As for my upcoming week, I really have nothing planned aside from watching a movie or two on the big screen, and watching the Bears this upcoming Sunday. I could watch them at home but it’ll be more fun to go out and watch them play. They’re against the Tampa Bay Bucs but the game is in London, England. If only I could go to that; it’d be nice to leave North America and visit a lot of spots in Europe. Maybe one day… also, maybe one day I’ll go and attend an NFL game live as I haven’t done that yet. I have no idea how the game will turn out except that it’ll likely be close. I’m sure I’ll find stuff to do to occupy my time (not occupy Wall Street; that whole thing is just lame and I'm sure most of those people don't even fully understand what they're protesting against; they'd be better off finding jobs rather than standing there for days on end. Now, if it was Occupy Wall Street and you're talking about the row of bars in that plaza in downtown Orlando with that name, that's a different story).
My Tuesday and Wednesday was boring so I’ll mention that during the past week I found out about a pair of restaurants closing. The first one was the local Perkin’s in Clermont. I had been there a few times before and the food was at least decent. I was just there relatively recently with someone I know; I noticed there wasn’t much of a crowd there, so this wasn’t a surprise. I then looked online a little later in a week to see if a certain restaurant in the Dr. Phillips area was open. As I unfortunately figured, the joint I had been to two times before-known as Twisted Burger-was closed after being open for only about 6 or 7 months at the most. That was really not a surprise to me, as the times I had been there it was practically deserted. Leave The Memories Alone…
Thursday night I picked up my pals at the airport; remember, I dropped them off the preceding Sunday; that was about as exciting as Thursday got. I didn’t really do anything on Friday either, so let me skip ahead to the weekend, which did have some interesting things to talk about.
Saturday I stayed at home until late at night. I went to the Orlando-area… no, not downtown Orlando. Rather, I went to the Enzian Theater to watch an infamous 1980 horror film called Maniac (the Michael Sembello song of the same name was originally written after he saw the movie; he really toned down the lyrics and that’s how it ended up on the Flashdance soundtrack); it was my first time seeing it and it’s not the easiest movie to watch. It’s just intense, graphic, and pulls no punches, to use some clichés. You see someone’s head explode in slow motion via shotgun blast! It does suspense very well in some spots, though. I’m not quite sure how I feel about it; it didn’t suck, though. What also didn’t suck was that the Enzian have a haunted maze sort of deal going on (no, I didn’t go through it) and thus it was a real party there, with employees dressed up and two tables set up with food and alcoholic drink on them. I ordered a spiked punch sort of deal, as why not? Plus, that AND them selling Jello shots reminded me of, well, me consuming that sort of thing at parties at Illinois State University, which was back around TEN years ago; I’m flabbergasted myself those good days of college were so long ago.
Oh, and on the way back I was on I-4 and in a non-shocker of non-shocker I saw some horrible driving on that stretch of road, including a guy who I swore was going at least 100! If I didn’t have to turn off of the highway to the 408 soon after I saw that, I would have tried to floor it to go after him… no, not to kick his ass, but rather get his license plate number and call him in. Honestly now, going 100 when the speed limit was 50… that’s yet another reason why I always complain about all the traffic in this state… I have good reason to do so.
Sunday, I went and saw the Bears play in the evening. It was on national TV but I still went to good old Friendly Confines to check it out… and have some alcoholic beverages. In hindsight, maybe I should have gone to a birthday celebration someone I know (not all that well, but I’ve still briefly chatted with them in person before) had in Orlando at around the same time. I got invited to it via Facebook awhile ago. I just never really thought of going there. It turns out, quite a few people I knew were in attendance; that was breaking news to me when I found out about that online after I got back from watching the Bears game. Eh, oh well. It was a costumed party sort of thing and I did not have any ones on hand, at least anything worthwhile unless I wore some 70’s clothes and went as a hipster… whoops, I mean a guy from that decade. Plus, it involved karaoke and while I’ve gone to those sorts of things before and been fine as people knew NEVER to ask me to do that sort of thing as I’d rather catch leprosy than do a karaoke song. As I remember mentioning in one of these earlier in the year, way back when in my Illinois days I got pretty pissed off at some acquaintances due to them constantly asking me one night to do a song and I had to constantly tell them “no”; maybe I’m the only one who hates having to repeat something over and over…
Anyway, that night there probably wouldn’t have lived up to my expectations and would have been rather awkward. At least I did wish that individual a Happy Birthday on Facebook.
I did manage to have a decent time at FC watching the Bears play against the Minnesota Vikings. It sure as heck helped that the Vikings are a poor football team this year, but Chicago looked far better than they did this past Monday and they kicked some ass, winning 39-10. I enjoyed seeing the Bears play well, needless to say. While I was there I had some beers, including my first-ever taste of Guinness Black Lager. To say something that people would consider blasphemy, regular Guinness tastes like liquid bread to me, and that’s not a good thing. I’ll stick with regular lagers, hard ciders, and drinks like berry-flavored beer, thank you very much. Black Lager was more drinkable to me, and yet I didn’t think it had much of a taste at all, so I’d rather drink something like Pabst Blue Ribbon or some other beer that is known but not the standard fare like Bud or Miller Lite.
As for my upcoming week, I really have nothing planned aside from watching a movie or two on the big screen, and watching the Bears this upcoming Sunday. I could watch them at home but it’ll be more fun to go out and watch them play. They’re against the Tampa Bay Bucs but the game is in London, England. If only I could go to that; it’d be nice to leave North America and visit a lot of spots in Europe. Maybe one day… also, maybe one day I’ll go and attend an NFL game live as I haven’t done that yet. I have no idea how the game will turn out except that it’ll likely be close. I’m sure I’ll find stuff to do to occupy my time (not occupy Wall Street; that whole thing is just lame and I'm sure most of those people don't even fully understand what they're protesting against; they'd be better off finding jobs rather than standing there for days on end. Now, if it was Occupy Wall Street and you're talking about the row of bars in that plaza in downtown Orlando with that name, that's a different story).
Monday, October 10, 2011
Toshiro Mifune, Drunken Clams, & Epic Rainstorms
While my week did not feature any Chicago Bears action (they’re playing tonight, and I’ll be watching that from the comforts of home) it did feature something interesting which proved to be a lot of fun.
Monday and Tuesday were rather uneventful so I’ll skip past them in order to get to what I ended up doing on Wednesday and Thursday. The whole gang left early on Wednesday (a little too early for me but it wasn’t my decision) in order to go to Satellite Beach, a small town on the highway known as A1A-as name-dropped by that master wordsmith known as Vanilla Ice-which is a few miles south of Cocoa Beach, home of The Model Rick Martel.
The pal of one of my pals (but I’m not pals with them; confused?) was renting a condo but they couldn’t go due to circumstances beyond their control so they asked people they knew if they could stay in there and our turn came up for Wednesday and Thursday. It was right on the beach and it was nice. A lot of room and space and the expected amenities such as a fridge, microwave, oven, and all that. There was also a large balcony and indeed, time was spent on there as the windy conditions of Wednesday and Thursday meant you got to experience a great breeze right from the Atlantic. Pretty groovy. It was nice to relax in the room, but there was also going out…
OK, so it wasn’t club-hopping or anything, but I still went out. Wednesday evening we went randomly searching for a nearby restaurant. Satellite Beach must be hurting for business as on A1A there was hardly any sort of businesses and some restaurants were recently closed. It took going to nearby Indiatlantic to find a spot, and because it was the first decent-looking place we found, we stopped at a place with a silly name… Bunky’s Seafood Grille. To show you the type of place it is, the logo is a clam that looks to be hammered; that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The place looked decent-enough and the service was fine. However, everyone thought that the food was just average. Me, I had my almost-always of a burger and fries (hey, I don’t eat too much in the way of seafood) and the burger had a rather unique taste to it, although at least the fries were good.
Thursday I was out on my own before we left in the afternoon. I drove up to Cocoa Beach as I hadn’t been there in awhile. It’s largely the same as it’s always been. I went in RonJon and the next door Cocoa Beach Surf Company to look around, as I’ve done every time I’ve been in Cocoa Beach. This time I actually bought stuff from both. I did the tourist thing and got a RonJon shirt. I also got PJ pants and a real cheap shirt from the Surf Company. Good deals, I say. As for the beach we were on, it wasn’t exactly Daytona or Cocoa. A lot of shells on the beach, the sand a weird color, a lot of seaweed… yet it was still nice to walk on said sand and go a little bit into the ocean. Not too much, mind you, as the waves were pretty strong due to the wind. Overall, though, I enjoyed that short trip to the Atlantic coast. It was nice as something out of the ordinary.
Friday through Sunday… it was mainly a LOT of rain. I mean, pretty unusual given it’s Florida to receive that much rain and it not be due to a hurricane. The only thing I did on Friday was end up in the Sand Lake Road area and I did indeed check out Pinkberry to see if there was anything new there; there wasn’t, but I still got a bite to eat there. By the way, in no surprise to me at all, due to it raining the total IQ of the Florida driver took a noticeable dip, and as I was on the road all three days I saw some of the dirt-worst driving I could imagine seeing. I sometimes think that wrapping my car in bubble wrap would be the safest thing for my vehicle with all those clowns on the road.
Saturday, there was college football then the UFC pay per view at Buffalo Wild Wings. There was a lot going on that night with a big baseball game and some college football games. Those guys trying to figure out which TV would show what event was pretty poor and resulted in many people getting angry about it, which I didn’t need to hear as I was trying to pay attention to the action in the cage. At least with the TV I was watching there were no problems at all. I have no idea why they showed the pay per view in standard definition instead of HD, but compared to the other problems they were having… I shouldn’t really complain. As I was watching the pay per view I did pay a little bit of attention to the other sporting events going on, so it wasn’t a dull night there. The pay per view was quality stuff, as I figured it was going to be. So, despite the drama (and the rain) it was good times there.
By the way, it was pretty dope seeing the shirt that fighter Jose Aldo wore on the way to the ring. It was a blue and yellow deal which advertised one of his sponsors, Dethrone, and it had a tremendous image on it: Toshiro Mifune from the classic Seven Samurai. It was pretty dope. Also, it’ll be my last time seeing a UFC pay per view there until next month, as the next big UFC pay per view on the 29th I won’t be able to see as there’s a big local wrestling show going on which I have to attend; it’s an annual deal and I’ve gone to all of those events since ’04 so I don’t want to break that streak to see some fights which I know what the likely outcome will be.
Sunday, the only thing I did was pretty nice of me; I dropped off some people I know at the airport as they went off on a fantastic voyage to a location out of the state. I was able to use their car so on the way back I got to enjoy some satellite radio. It’s nice, although if I had it full time I don’t know if I would maintain the enjoyment of using it. I still like listening to the burned CD’s I make, and I have I don’t know how many dozens of those. It beats listening to the local radio stations around here, which as of late have turned terrible and now I don’t listen to that as much as I used to. No wonder why satellite radio has become so popular.
As for my upcoming week, I’m expecting it to be not too exciting; at least there will be two Bears games to talk about, as they play tonight and this upcoming Sunday night. The second game is against a poor team, the Minnesota Vikings, so I’ll be shocked if they don’t win that. The game tonight, though, I’m more worried about. For pretty much the entire past half-century, except for a few years the Detroit Lions have been a putrid team. I mean, embarrassingly bad. However, this year they look rather impressive and are undefeated. I’d love it for Chicago to win; I just don’t know if they’ll be able to.
Monday and Tuesday were rather uneventful so I’ll skip past them in order to get to what I ended up doing on Wednesday and Thursday. The whole gang left early on Wednesday (a little too early for me but it wasn’t my decision) in order to go to Satellite Beach, a small town on the highway known as A1A-as name-dropped by that master wordsmith known as Vanilla Ice-which is a few miles south of Cocoa Beach, home of The Model Rick Martel.
The pal of one of my pals (but I’m not pals with them; confused?) was renting a condo but they couldn’t go due to circumstances beyond their control so they asked people they knew if they could stay in there and our turn came up for Wednesday and Thursday. It was right on the beach and it was nice. A lot of room and space and the expected amenities such as a fridge, microwave, oven, and all that. There was also a large balcony and indeed, time was spent on there as the windy conditions of Wednesday and Thursday meant you got to experience a great breeze right from the Atlantic. Pretty groovy. It was nice to relax in the room, but there was also going out…
OK, so it wasn’t club-hopping or anything, but I still went out. Wednesday evening we went randomly searching for a nearby restaurant. Satellite Beach must be hurting for business as on A1A there was hardly any sort of businesses and some restaurants were recently closed. It took going to nearby Indiatlantic to find a spot, and because it was the first decent-looking place we found, we stopped at a place with a silly name… Bunky’s Seafood Grille. To show you the type of place it is, the logo is a clam that looks to be hammered; that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The place looked decent-enough and the service was fine. However, everyone thought that the food was just average. Me, I had my almost-always of a burger and fries (hey, I don’t eat too much in the way of seafood) and the burger had a rather unique taste to it, although at least the fries were good.
Thursday I was out on my own before we left in the afternoon. I drove up to Cocoa Beach as I hadn’t been there in awhile. It’s largely the same as it’s always been. I went in RonJon and the next door Cocoa Beach Surf Company to look around, as I’ve done every time I’ve been in Cocoa Beach. This time I actually bought stuff from both. I did the tourist thing and got a RonJon shirt. I also got PJ pants and a real cheap shirt from the Surf Company. Good deals, I say. As for the beach we were on, it wasn’t exactly Daytona or Cocoa. A lot of shells on the beach, the sand a weird color, a lot of seaweed… yet it was still nice to walk on said sand and go a little bit into the ocean. Not too much, mind you, as the waves were pretty strong due to the wind. Overall, though, I enjoyed that short trip to the Atlantic coast. It was nice as something out of the ordinary.
Friday through Sunday… it was mainly a LOT of rain. I mean, pretty unusual given it’s Florida to receive that much rain and it not be due to a hurricane. The only thing I did on Friday was end up in the Sand Lake Road area and I did indeed check out Pinkberry to see if there was anything new there; there wasn’t, but I still got a bite to eat there. By the way, in no surprise to me at all, due to it raining the total IQ of the Florida driver took a noticeable dip, and as I was on the road all three days I saw some of the dirt-worst driving I could imagine seeing. I sometimes think that wrapping my car in bubble wrap would be the safest thing for my vehicle with all those clowns on the road.
Saturday, there was college football then the UFC pay per view at Buffalo Wild Wings. There was a lot going on that night with a big baseball game and some college football games. Those guys trying to figure out which TV would show what event was pretty poor and resulted in many people getting angry about it, which I didn’t need to hear as I was trying to pay attention to the action in the cage. At least with the TV I was watching there were no problems at all. I have no idea why they showed the pay per view in standard definition instead of HD, but compared to the other problems they were having… I shouldn’t really complain. As I was watching the pay per view I did pay a little bit of attention to the other sporting events going on, so it wasn’t a dull night there. The pay per view was quality stuff, as I figured it was going to be. So, despite the drama (and the rain) it was good times there.
By the way, it was pretty dope seeing the shirt that fighter Jose Aldo wore on the way to the ring. It was a blue and yellow deal which advertised one of his sponsors, Dethrone, and it had a tremendous image on it: Toshiro Mifune from the classic Seven Samurai. It was pretty dope. Also, it’ll be my last time seeing a UFC pay per view there until next month, as the next big UFC pay per view on the 29th I won’t be able to see as there’s a big local wrestling show going on which I have to attend; it’s an annual deal and I’ve gone to all of those events since ’04 so I don’t want to break that streak to see some fights which I know what the likely outcome will be.
Sunday, the only thing I did was pretty nice of me; I dropped off some people I know at the airport as they went off on a fantastic voyage to a location out of the state. I was able to use their car so on the way back I got to enjoy some satellite radio. It’s nice, although if I had it full time I don’t know if I would maintain the enjoyment of using it. I still like listening to the burned CD’s I make, and I have I don’t know how many dozens of those. It beats listening to the local radio stations around here, which as of late have turned terrible and now I don’t listen to that as much as I used to. No wonder why satellite radio has become so popular.
As for my upcoming week, I’m expecting it to be not too exciting; at least there will be two Bears games to talk about, as they play tonight and this upcoming Sunday night. The second game is against a poor team, the Minnesota Vikings, so I’ll be shocked if they don’t win that. The game tonight, though, I’m more worried about. For pretty much the entire past half-century, except for a few years the Detroit Lions have been a putrid team. I mean, embarrassingly bad. However, this year they look rather impressive and are undefeated. I’d love it for Chicago to win; I just don’t know if they’ll be able to.
Monday, October 3, 2011
Weather Vanes, Milkshake Drinking, & Lowly Versatility
I actually got this title from an ad I saw on Yahoo Weather which advertised some sort of aggregate of interesting tweets. It SO sounded like the title of one of my blogs, I had to use it here. And no, I have no idea what “lowly versatility” means, as I did not look too closely at that aggregate.
By the way, apologies for this being up a few hours late (yeah, that’s what HE said…) but I was occupied with other things. Next Monday it should be up at the usual time. Also, I won’t go ranting and raving about the traffic I dealt with the preceding week; I usually do that, and even though some of the stuff I experienced was notably horrid (at one point I swore I was driving on the Autobahn with people blowing by me like I was standing still, and I was going 70! To the shock of probably no one reading this if they are from the area, it happened on I-4 in Orlando.
I actually had a busier past week than usual. It was a nice way to end September and begin October. Monday was boring but Tuesday I went and saw Drive at the local Cineplex, as a lot of people on the Internet have been imploding their pants over this movie. I went and saw it, and personally I thought it was overrated; not awful by any means, but overrated. I explained it more in my movie reviews blog*. There were movies I happened to enjoy more this year than that one. There also weren’t as many car chases as you might expect from the subject matter.
* http://blairreviewsmovies.blogspot.com/
Thursday I went to have dinner at a Bahama Breeze which recently opened on 192 in Kissimmee. It had what you typically expect from one of those restaurants. I had my almost always of a burger and fries, and also a mojito; hey, it was a happy hour special! It was strong-tasting, which was fine with me.
Friday, that’s where my entertaining (but tiring) weekend started. In the evening I went to the AMC Theatre in Altamonte Springs to check out their IMAX screen; to Friday they have a special deal where for only 7 bucks you can watch either Star Trek, Inception, or Fast Five. Me, even though I’ve only seen the first two in the series, I went and saw Fast Five due to the strong praise it got from various circles. While it may have been the most ridiculous movie I’ve ever seen, it was also ridiculously entertaining, so I am glad I saw it in that format.
Saturday, what a long day it was. I went and ate at the Tilted Kilt again… hey, it has good food! Why else would I want to go there… actually, don’t answer that question. After that I went and saw some people I know at a wrestling show in Sanford. The show itself had only 4 matches, but as one of them was an hour long (if you’re reading this and know what the Royal Rumble match is, they had one of those) and it was a fun time overall. The highlight of my time there was seeing some dude who I believed wrestled up in the Northeast and was in the match to fill space. I am sure there is a great backstory to this which I am not privy to, but it was obvious he remained in the ring for more than a half hour to be a punching bag! It sounds strange to a non-wrestling person, but this isn’t as bad or criminal as it may sound. No one injured him or tried to break a limb or anything of that sort. It’s just that they decided to have him “pay his dues” a la what happens in sports with newbies being introduced to things by the veterans. He got hit hard many times and at least 8 times suffered blows to the groin… and I don’t know if all 8 times the wrestler held back on legit inflicting testicular damage! He really took a beating. Then again, you could tell he was a really poor pro wrestler; he had a real limited knowledge of what he was supposed to do, and I suppose the other wrestlers in the ring didn’t appreciate that. I’m sure that’s why he got his ass kicked. To his credit, he at least had his own wrestling gear and didn’t compete in what looked like his workout clothes, which I’ve seen quite a few times in the past. His name was Psycho Somethingoranother. After the show, he was walking around (which was good for him) and he had on a jersey with his name on the back! Pretty wacky, but OK.
After that I didn’t go straight home. No, I didn’t go to downtown Orlando (I’ll probably be back there in a few weeks, though); rather, I went to the arty Enzian Theatre as they were showing a low-budget horror movie I’ve heard about for a long time now called Tucker & Dale vs. Evil, a spoof where some dopey characters think a pair of good old boys are killers but they really aren’t and it turns into a comedy of errors. It’s a goofy plot but it manages to be greatly entertaining so I’m glad I was able to see it in front of an audience. The hillbillies looked pretty authentic; after all, they had a love of Pabst Blue Ribbon! And it wasn’t a hipster love by any means either. Speaking of that, I hate to admit it but the Enzian is a real hipster place in the stuff they serve and show on screen (usually artsy-fartsy stuff) and how their customers dress and act; a lot of beards and glasses, you know. Damn hipsters…
Sunday, it was the usual of going to Friendly Confines to watch the Chicago Bears play. They went against the Carolina Panthers, who have some good players but as a team aren’t that great. That proved to be true as in many ways they played better than the Bears but they made some stupid mistakes and that really allowed for the Bears to win. I can’t complain. There were also no issues with eardrum-shattering audio and the people I sat by were all pretty cool so overall a fine, fine day there. It was also entertaining watching the other games when I could.
As for the upcoming week, there’s no Bears game for me to write about as they won’t be playing until the evening of Monday the 10th; yet, I have some things planned. There’s a huge UFC pay per view on Saturday night which I’ll be with bells on at the local Buffalo Wild Wings to watch, and I also plan on doing something a little out of the ordinary during the week; that will give me something to write about instead of the usual nothing happening during the week.
By the way, apologies for this being up a few hours late (yeah, that’s what HE said…) but I was occupied with other things. Next Monday it should be up at the usual time. Also, I won’t go ranting and raving about the traffic I dealt with the preceding week; I usually do that, and even though some of the stuff I experienced was notably horrid (at one point I swore I was driving on the Autobahn with people blowing by me like I was standing still, and I was going 70! To the shock of probably no one reading this if they are from the area, it happened on I-4 in Orlando.
I actually had a busier past week than usual. It was a nice way to end September and begin October. Monday was boring but Tuesday I went and saw Drive at the local Cineplex, as a lot of people on the Internet have been imploding their pants over this movie. I went and saw it, and personally I thought it was overrated; not awful by any means, but overrated. I explained it more in my movie reviews blog*. There were movies I happened to enjoy more this year than that one. There also weren’t as many car chases as you might expect from the subject matter.
* http://blairreviewsmovies.blogspot.com/
Thursday I went to have dinner at a Bahama Breeze which recently opened on 192 in Kissimmee. It had what you typically expect from one of those restaurants. I had my almost always of a burger and fries, and also a mojito; hey, it was a happy hour special! It was strong-tasting, which was fine with me.
Friday, that’s where my entertaining (but tiring) weekend started. In the evening I went to the AMC Theatre in Altamonte Springs to check out their IMAX screen; to Friday they have a special deal where for only 7 bucks you can watch either Star Trek, Inception, or Fast Five. Me, even though I’ve only seen the first two in the series, I went and saw Fast Five due to the strong praise it got from various circles. While it may have been the most ridiculous movie I’ve ever seen, it was also ridiculously entertaining, so I am glad I saw it in that format.
Saturday, what a long day it was. I went and ate at the Tilted Kilt again… hey, it has good food! Why else would I want to go there… actually, don’t answer that question. After that I went and saw some people I know at a wrestling show in Sanford. The show itself had only 4 matches, but as one of them was an hour long (if you’re reading this and know what the Royal Rumble match is, they had one of those) and it was a fun time overall. The highlight of my time there was seeing some dude who I believed wrestled up in the Northeast and was in the match to fill space. I am sure there is a great backstory to this which I am not privy to, but it was obvious he remained in the ring for more than a half hour to be a punching bag! It sounds strange to a non-wrestling person, but this isn’t as bad or criminal as it may sound. No one injured him or tried to break a limb or anything of that sort. It’s just that they decided to have him “pay his dues” a la what happens in sports with newbies being introduced to things by the veterans. He got hit hard many times and at least 8 times suffered blows to the groin… and I don’t know if all 8 times the wrestler held back on legit inflicting testicular damage! He really took a beating. Then again, you could tell he was a really poor pro wrestler; he had a real limited knowledge of what he was supposed to do, and I suppose the other wrestlers in the ring didn’t appreciate that. I’m sure that’s why he got his ass kicked. To his credit, he at least had his own wrestling gear and didn’t compete in what looked like his workout clothes, which I’ve seen quite a few times in the past. His name was Psycho Somethingoranother. After the show, he was walking around (which was good for him) and he had on a jersey with his name on the back! Pretty wacky, but OK.
After that I didn’t go straight home. No, I didn’t go to downtown Orlando (I’ll probably be back there in a few weeks, though); rather, I went to the arty Enzian Theatre as they were showing a low-budget horror movie I’ve heard about for a long time now called Tucker & Dale vs. Evil, a spoof where some dopey characters think a pair of good old boys are killers but they really aren’t and it turns into a comedy of errors. It’s a goofy plot but it manages to be greatly entertaining so I’m glad I was able to see it in front of an audience. The hillbillies looked pretty authentic; after all, they had a love of Pabst Blue Ribbon! And it wasn’t a hipster love by any means either. Speaking of that, I hate to admit it but the Enzian is a real hipster place in the stuff they serve and show on screen (usually artsy-fartsy stuff) and how their customers dress and act; a lot of beards and glasses, you know. Damn hipsters…
Sunday, it was the usual of going to Friendly Confines to watch the Chicago Bears play. They went against the Carolina Panthers, who have some good players but as a team aren’t that great. That proved to be true as in many ways they played better than the Bears but they made some stupid mistakes and that really allowed for the Bears to win. I can’t complain. There were also no issues with eardrum-shattering audio and the people I sat by were all pretty cool so overall a fine, fine day there. It was also entertaining watching the other games when I could.
As for the upcoming week, there’s no Bears game for me to write about as they won’t be playing until the evening of Monday the 10th; yet, I have some things planned. There’s a huge UFC pay per view on Saturday night which I’ll be with bells on at the local Buffalo Wild Wings to watch, and I also plan on doing something a little out of the ordinary during the week; that will give me something to write about instead of the usual nothing happening during the week.
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