So, last weekend, there was this New Year thingy...

[zrath]

Friday December 30th 2005
Since Pascal had a gig on New Year's Eve, we rented a cheap lil' automobile for the weekend.
This would turn out to be a bloody brilliant idea, as will be seen a little later.
The car rental guy picked me up from work promptly at lunchtime and took me back to the office.
Paperwork was filled, a car key was handed over, and off I went. I picked up the brother at the apartment, then
made a beeline for the Taco Bell drive-thru, the only way I was going to get lunch and be back at work on time.
I gots me food and zipped back to work, handing the keys over to El Siblingo.
After work, I started walking home, but Pascal intercepted me in the parking lot and give me a ride instead.
He was DJing at Nirvana, so we got changed and I drove him there. We had a nice little dinner on-site.
I asked the chef for some vindaloo, but he said "Vindaloo is the past! We make the future here!".
So I had a futuristic dish of chillie chicken with space rice. Jaaaaaane!!!! Stop this crazy thing!!

I then popped wheelies out there and rushed to Wal-Mart, in the bling-bling-yo part of town, 'cause that's the
only place where there is one in Los Angeles. It was already 8:45pm, and it was probably the only store that
would remain open past the magical retail pumpkin weekday hour of 9pm. I hoped...
Upon arrival, I was relieved to see that it was indeed still open, and would remain so until 10:30pm.
I entered and began stalking my prey.
I was hunting Lego sets, specifically 2006 Star Wars Lego sets. I had my eye on the TIE Interceptor.
Okay, what the hell is it with Wal-Mart and giant-sized radiocontrolled vehicles?!?!
I mean, I've been to Toys'R'Us, Kay-Bee Toys, Target, Radio Shack, and I've seen what they have.
Some of the R/C cars are indeed pretty big.
But Wal-Mart??! Holy freakin' crap!!! They're GINORMOUS!!
I saw a Hummer large enough to transport a squad of fully-armed Yorkshire Terriers!!
I saw enormous Escalades, monstrous Magnums, and even an International CXT (gigantic quadcab pickup TRUCK)!!
And they had a 1/9th scale R/C M1-Abrams tank. Think about that, 1/9th scale...
The real M1 is 387 inches long. That means the R/C toy is almost four feet long!!!
This thing could be used on the next Godzilla movie!!
You better have a big backyard for this thing!
Anyway, Legos! Yes, they had the TIE Interceptor, so I bought one. They also had the B-Wing and Slave I.
Click here to see someone's photos of these new sets, in and out of the box.
(I only have the V-Wing and TIE Interceptor so far. I have a whole year to get the rest!)

After this errand, I drove home, stopping at In-N-Out to get a chocolate shake. Long time no have.
I built my new toy, then worked on the computer, waiting for the evac phone call from the sibling.
It came at about 00:30, so off I went. Once there, we loaded the gear into the car then drove home.


Saturday December 31st 2005
I awoke to grey skies and the sound of rain. Awwww man!! The weather had been clear all week!
Good thing we rented the car! We were able to get everything done and stay relatively dry to boot.
We argued about where to go for lunch and finally decided on Chipotle, the Mexican fast food taste sensation
that kicks everybody's ass, including Baja Fresh, Poquito Mas, and Rubio's (in my humble opinion, y'all).
The clincher was the presence of a Chipopletay in Beverly Hills, a hell of a lot closer than the only two
locations I knew of before then: The Beverly Center (where parking is TORRRCHARRRR) and Marina Del Rey (FAR!).
This was Pascal's first time at Chipoodle, so I explained the intricacies of main dish assembly.
He agreed that the food was indeed really good, and the guacamole tasted fresh-made at your table. Success!

We went back home and started prepping his gear for the gig. The party was in Venice and pretty easy to get to.
We got there on time and unloaded all the gear. The host was caught short by the rain, as were a lot of people,
so he was scrambling to have plastic sheeting laid down on the parquet flooring of his rather nice house.
Unfortunately, this didn't make for very good traction, since the sheets were anchored at the edges, leaving
the center to slide around as it pleased. Bits of carpet would have worked a hell of a lot better, but, no time!!
Anyway, we set up the sound system and tested it. It worked fine. The host approached us, wanting us to plug
our system into his house system. Urrrrr, we had no idea how his system was wired. The back of his amplifier
was bristling with plugs and jacks. We tried a couple, but nothing worked. Oh well, too bad.
We were here to play music, not to play high-end sound system technicians for HIS house system.
My brother had told me the party was a benefit for "some animal thing". I hoped it was not for PETA.
Turned out it was for Los Angeles-based "Much Love Animal Rescue". Whew...

I left the sibling and went home for a bit. I had been calling various people to see what they were doing.
After a while, I took the car and headed Northeast. I dropped by Spino's on the off-chance he was there,
but nobody was home, which didn't surprise me at all. I continued North and crossed through Hollywood.
The whole place was lit up like the amusement park it was. I went to the In-N-Out drive-thru and got me a
New Year's Eve dinner: 2 Double-Double Animal Style no pickles, 2 fries, and a large Coke, easy ice.
Well, here, look at the receipt:



I then headed North into the San Fernando Valley and made my way to the LASFS clubhouse to see who was there.
A handful of people were watching the "X-Files" episode of "Babylon 5: Crusade", which is pretty funny.
I didn't know "Crusade" had been released on DVD. gizmoelf had brought it in, along with other DVDs.
The episode ended exactly at midnight, so we brought out the bottles and toasted the New Year!
People apparently wanted to get a good night's sleep, so the group broke shortly before 1am.
I was supposed to evac Pascal at 2am, but decided to moosey on over to the gig site just in case.
So I got there at about 1:30am, and boy, things just seemed quiet for a party place.
The place was empty, save for my brother and the party host. Apparently, the cops showed up at 12:45 and
shut down the place. Complaints from the neighbors, charging for valet parking and admittance, the cops said something about selling liquor without a license, but didn't write anyone up. Man, it's hard to party in L.A.
Anyway, I evaced the bro and went home.


Sunday January 1st 2006
I awoke to more rain. Yea.
We had to return a speaker to Nirvana, so we went there. Nobody was home, so we went off to get some grub at
Jan's Coffee Shop on Beverly Blvd., a favorite of the well-to-do and law enforcement types. I ordered a plate
of scrambled egss, hash brown, and polish sausage. Said plate was HUGE. And it was delicious!
I don't remember what Pascal ordered. It was huge and delicious too.
We want back to Nirvana and dropped the speaker off.
Then I'm a little fuzzy on what happened.
Nothing terribly exciting I'm afraid.
Next!


Monday January 2nd 2006
Jamdat was closed, so no work that day.
Went to Trader Joe's to get grocery for the week. Got home and couldn't open the trunk. Thankfully, the back
seats could fold forward, so we pulled the groceries out of the trunk that way. The case of water barely fit.
Had to return the car by 2pm. It wasn't raining much. Matter of fact, it looked like it was clearing up.
Worked on some website stuff, probably watched a DVD (see below), other normal stuff.
Got ready to go back to work the next day.

So there you go. That was my weekend, pretty much.

Happy belated New Year!

Bonne année, bonne santé, et toutes sortes de félicités!





Blockflixing: The Final Countdown
The last movie shipped by the highly defective and suck Blockbuster Online service was:

Sky Captain And The World Of Tomorrow - because, gosh-darn-it, big wind-up toy robots are FUN!!
I like this movie. I'd like to see more movies like that. I'd like to see a decent "Doc Savage" movie.
Wouldn't that be cool? Or a Cthulhu movie! Now that, that would be something. Anyway, the movie was fun.
When I saw it in theaters, I didn't have "King Kong" on my mind, so I totally missed the various hommages
that this movie pays to KK. There's the sunken wreck of the Venture, with the big cage in back. There's the
fact that the Totenkopf island basically looks like Skull Island, complete with dinos and tree-bridges.
During the New York attack, there's a silhouette of KK climbing the Empire State Building.
I'm sure there are more hidden away here and there. I will hunt for them when I buy this for my collection.


Netflixing
I go back to 3-movies-at-a-time on the 8th. Boy, I can't wait! Hey, it's today! W00T!!!
In the meantime, I got...

Star Wars: Clone Wars Vol. 2 - which, you know, is quite possibly better than Vol. 1
I'm gonna have to actually buy these, because they kick ass, especially Vol. 2. It's nice how it fills out
certain details that happen between Episode II and III, and I really like how it essentially ends right where
Episode III begins. That's just groovy. The whole side-quest with the missing warriors was really interesting.

Next up, "Marathon Man", and whatever Netflix ships me tomorrow.

Comments

[dagoski.livejournal.com]

Speaking of the Cthulu movie, the HP Lovecraft Historical Society recently released a silent version of Call of Cthulu. The idea being that they wanted to use the medium of the period it was written in, thus a silent movie. I'll have to dig up the url later. The movie was actually pretty good. Lots of fun if you see it at a con. They're also selling it on dvd.

[kensan-oni.livejournal.com]

Dang it, Now I'm going to have to watch skycaptain again. ;'D

Yeah, the Clone Wars were about the best things to come out of the prelude trilogy. Kinda sad that they only got it right for the cartoon, though. :'*

[porsupah.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes.. I'd love to see more films in the Sky Captain milieu. Sure, there were plot holes, but who cares? ^_^ It was so wonderfully clear everyone involved was having a great time - there was a movie with real heart.

Chipotle? Okay, that does it - next time you're in San Francisco, you are required to visit El Farolito, just outside the 24th St station, and have one of their super burritos with extra meat. Or even just the tacos (non-American style, served flat), if you're not feeling too hungry.

Actually, given what a meatatarian you are, I'm surprised you're not a near-regular at one of the area's churrascarias, like Fogo de Chão. I'm itching to get along to one sometime, but they seem to've been a long time coming to the Bay - but there are some in SoCal. Maybe you could try orchestrating a group outing to one sometime? (Photos would be required, of course :)