zrath

"When we last left our Hero, he was struggling with lower back pain and trying to figure out which combination of medication worked best for him through trial and error and visits to the emergency room."

Well, it's December 22nd now and my back has been healed for a couple of weeks.
But it took a while to get there.

My previous post was on November 25th and I was on Cyclobenzaprine, Ibuprofen, and Tramadol.
Turns out the Ibuprofen wasn't doing anything. I had forgotten that stuff didn't work on me.
So I went back to using the Midol Complete instead of the Iburpofen.
On November 26th, I went to see Plaid live at El Rey Theater in Mid-Wilshire.
When the staff saw me hobble in on my cane, they pulled a chair out for me to sit on.
The venue is standing-room-only with a few chairs against the wall, but they pulled a chair
out and put it in an alcove near the stage. What sweethearts! :)
John Tejada opened for Plaid and played some nice House/trance of his own devising.
Lots of nice bass giving me a free back massage. :D
Then Plaid came on and played 90% stuff I'd never heard before, which is not surprising since I hadn't listened to their new album just yet. Good stuff...
After the gig, I drove to the LAX MArriottttt to hit whatever room parties were still going at LOSCON, the L.A. literary sci-fi convention. I saw Spino and spouse and Tadao and Warren...
I stayed until 2:30am, then the parties shut down one by one. I was only there for 2.5 hours but I got gouged for parking for $23.50. Wow, really? No wonder the con was underattended.
From there, I went straight to the ER to try and get something strong that worked!
They actually took a couple of x-rays of my back this time and wouldn't you know it? They found a tiny gremlin gnawing on my lower back muscles. HAR!! :D
No, they found nothing out of the ordinary, which seems to confirm that I had pulled a muscle. They gave me a prescription for Toradol, which is the pill equivalent of the anti-inflammatory injection I had been given on my previous visit that did so much good and had me walking almost normally within the hour. I went to the 24-hour pharmarcy to get the Toradol, then went home.
It was 7am on Sunday November 27th and I went straight to bed.

I woke up at 3pm, took my new meds regimen 1) Midol Complete, 2) Cyclobenzaprine, and 3) Toradol, then stayed in bed until 5pm to give time to the meds to work. I then got up.
The pain was a lot less severe and I was able to stand up within 5 minutes of sitting up. The
Toradol was the missing part of my treatment. I still needed an hour of sitting in my nice upright desk chair to become flexible enough to shower and get dressed though.
But this was awesome news! I could actually go back to the office! I set one alarm at 6am to take my pills then one alarm at 8am to get up, and I could be at the office by 10am! Huzzah! :D
And that was my routine for several weeks. I ran out of the Cyclobenzaprine, which was not
refillable, and continued with the Midol and Toradol as my back slowly healed.

On Thursday December 1st, I left the cane at home. It was no longer needed. :)
By Monday December 5th, I was taking the Midol and Toradol only in the morning.
On Wednesday December 7th, I stopped taking the meds, and also learned that the office would be closed from Friday December 23rd to Tuesday January 3rd. ZOMG REAL PAID VACATION! :D :D :D
We were gonna be closed for Christmas and New Year's anyway, but there was uncertainty about the days in between the two. Mystery solved! :D
And my back has been getting better and better. Strangely, I get occasional pain in my hips, but I figure it's "aftershock" pain from the lower back. I'm also getting used to the new bed.

On Saturday December 10th, I went to my LUGOLA meeting. Got some good Lego parts from a couple of people and a set of those nifty Incredible Cross-Sections books on the Star Wars prequels. Just the thing for ship design and building! After the meeting. I hit the nearby Toys'R'Us to look around, and walked out of there with some brand new City sets, including the firefighting SuperScooper airplane. Yea BOGOHO sale!
It was supposed to be Movie Night but my guests were still entrenched in scholastic work, so it was put off. Instead, I got dolled up and went to my friend Fritz's holiday party out in Lakeview Terrace. It's always cool, with lots of people and lots of food. I saw Noel and Julianna, which is always fun, and talked to an older women who flies helicopters. She was happy to find someone to talk whirlybird with. :D
I finally went home at 4am.
Since I got home so late, I slept most of Sunday, finally getting up at 3pm. I did some computer stuff, then called my friends to see if they were still mired in scholastic stuff. They weren't and wanted to do short Movie Night (since Sunday is a school night for everyone). They came over at 7pm, bringing forth deliciousness from Tito's Tacos. We consumed the deliciousness ravenously. Then I showed them the launch of the most recent Soyouz rocket with Angry Bird charm inside capsule. It was snowing a little at Baikonour that day and the winds were light, so they launched. Is not Russian rocket if not launch in blizzard. :D
Then we watched our feature presentation: "Doomsday" (Unrated). Released in 2008, this British film was made for people who like "Escape From New York", "The Road Warrior", and "Aliens". It's got that same vibe, the heroine has an eyepatch, she commands a squad of soldiers, and instead of Manhattan, it's the whole of Scotland that has been walled-off after a plague killed millions. None of the dead turned into zombies though, it's not that kind of film. After 30 years, there are survivors, and some of them are right out of "The Road Warrior". It's a fun action film but the Unrated version is rather gory. It stars Rhona Mitra, Bob Hoskins, Alexander Siddig (formerly Siddig al Fadil, aka Dr. Bashir from DS9), Sean Pertwee, and Malcolm McDowell.

The company holiday party was on Thursday December 15th. We had a restaurant/bar in West Hollywood all to ourselves, with open bar and food. And there was musical entertainment from The Banned, which consisted of the company president on acoustic guitar, the studio manager on a guitar, the biker account guy on electric guitar, the intern on electric bass guitar, an IT guy on drums, and the energetic Christian gun-owning account executive on vocals.
And they ROCKED!!! They did some Rolling Stones covers (Under My Thumb, Little Red Rooster, a couple more), "Sedated" by The Ramones, and a few more tunes. Not bad!
I didn't stay very long as I was tired, and since I don't drink much alcohol, the appeal of an open bar is lost on me. The food was very good though.

I haven't shaved since my little stint in the hospital. It's an experiment to see if I can actually grow some kind of beard. My facial hair has notoriously slow growth and nothing grows between my lower lip and the tip of my chin. I had a pathetic mustache that I promptly shaved off, but I'm letting the beard grow to see how far it can get. Yeah, I'm 45 and this is my first beard. :D

Lego and Warner Bros made a big announcement last Friday. Our favorite plastic brick manufacturer will be making sets and minifigs based on Peter Jackson's Lord Of The Rings trilogy and the upcoming two The Hobbit films. The plan is to release LotR trilogy sets in June 2012, then The Hobbit sets around the time of the first movie's release in November 2012 or whenever.
I may get a couple, most likely the Shelob set. :)

On Tuesday, I broke a tooth. Granted, this was the tooth was root-canaled a while back and needed to be crowned, so it was already in a weakened state. It would have been crowned by now if it hadn't been for the hospital stay and the Lower Back Pain (Icelandic) Saga take me for a ride.
The tooth breakage happened while I was eating some Tim's Cascade-Style reduced fat kettle chips, which are incredibly HARD and which I will never ever EVER buy again!
I made a dentist appointment ASAP and saw him today. He says the rest of the tooth is fine and he wants me to come back tomorrow so he can sand it down or whatever and then put a temporary crown on it while we wait for the permanent crown to arrive in two weeks.
It's now about 6pm and I'm leaving work in a few minutes.
And then it's 11 glorious contiguous days of NOT working and NOT thinking about work! WOO HOO!

if I don't post before then, Merry Christmas everyone!
Joyeux Noël a vous tous! :D

So coyoteseven and I went to see "Clash Of The Titans" in 2D today.
(The 3D was a last-minute retrofit, we figured it would look like ass, so we saw it in plain 2D)
It was okay, I guess. Not nearly shouty enough, not "300" enough, and surprisingly not at all "God Of War"-esque.
Also, Perseus gets a lightsaber.
("Your father wanted you to have this - when you were old enough." "Gosh! Wowee! Jeepers! Golly willickers!")
And aside from Zeus and Perseus, the other gods pretty much just stood around and looked good.
So, it was the Zeus And Hades Show, with special guest Perseus! :D

In related news, cleolinda has just released her "Clash Of The Titans In 15 Minutes" parody recap.
Share and enjoy!

I watched the new Doctor Who when I got home, "The Beast Below".
Not a bad episode, but something feels... . . ...Off...
Next week looks interesting: Spitfires in space! For real!
And the ol' British Bulldog himself! And everybody's favorite shouty pepperpots. :D

Once again, cleolinda suffers through another blockbuster movie so you don't have to.
This time, Our Intrepid Snarker tackles that monument of utter nonsensicallity (that IS too a word!) that has teen
and tween girls (and their moms) screaming like fangirls at a Beatles concert. The earplugs! They do nothing!
Brace yourself for a sparklerific and Volvolicious Moon-sized dose of WTF as Cleolinda Jones Industries presents:

"New Moon In 15 Minutes" (contains spoilers, sparkling, Volvos, world's most useless heroine, 'vampires' and 'werewolves')

Enjoyez vous! :D

So, on Saturday, I went to see coyoteseven and we caught "X-Men Origins: Wolverine".
I had planned to be at Chez Coyote at 13:30, but I arrived 20 minutes later.
I swear, every light from the Kzinti Freehold to the La Cienega/405 junction was red!
And every idiot was on the road, pulling all sorts of stupid stunts and getting in my way!
I almost turned back, thinking that maybe this was a sign from Fate or Urd or something.
But I perversed, I mean I persevered, and once I hit the 405, it was smooth sailing.
I grabbed the 105 Eastbound and went into Hyperspace (to find another race! :D)
I rode the 105 to its end at the 605 and took a tricky exit I had spotted on GoogleMaps.
Success! I was very near Chez Coyote. I snagged him and we went to the theater.
The show was at 14:30, but I like to show up early to get good seats.
The theater was ridiculously understaffed for a 20-screen AMC. There was only one ticker seller,
though a second one appeared when it was our turn. There was no ticket taker inside, the post was empty.
Anybody could have walked in and watched a movie or two. Damn sloppy, really damn sloppy.
The screening room was not cleaned, I had to remove popcorn from the seats that 'Yote and I were gonna use.
We had the room to ourselves. Seven went to get some concessions while I stayed put and got caught up on
commercials I don't get to see since I have no cable and no broadcast reception at home.
One commercial caught my eye and made me think of kibbles, it's a TV show called "Nurse Jackie".
And because cops, lawyers and doctors/nurses still dominate the airwaves, another ad pushed a new TV show
called "Doctor Will Smith's Wife". Okay, not quite, but the show does feature Jada Pinkett Smith as
A Tough Doctor With A Heart Of Gold Who Doesn't Play By The Rules.
You know what I would like to see? A new TV show where the main character is an architect. :)
El Coyote came back with a mound of food, and 12 other people had come in while he was gone.
And then, we had trailers, and I went into Adam Sandler RAGE! That putz is in a new movie by Jud Apatow!
RAGE INCREASING! It's called "Funny People" and also includes that dumbass Seth Rogen! MASSIVE RAGE!!
The MASSIVE RAGE prevents me from remembering what the other trailers were.
Eventually, the movie starts and Coyote Seven whispers, "I almost forgot which movie we came in to see."
Wolverine: fun, but dumb. People doing dumb stuff for scripticular reasons. And what a waste of Wade.
Be sure to watch for SuperAirwolf at the end. :D
I don't know which ending we saw, and I don't care. I'll check when the DVD comes out.

After the movie, early dinner! We drove around and mulled over various places to eat. We passed a brand
spanking new Shakey's and put a pin in it to remember it as a possibility. We drove onward into Downey
and started regretting it. It's not a nice place, Downey, all industrial and liquor stores and stuff.
We turned back and went to the brand spanking new Shakey's with the pin stuck in it. :)
The Shakey's was busy, with a couple of little league teams and several families.
We each ordered a medium pizza and a drink. I ordered a thin crust, El 'Yote ordered a pan pizza.
We got our drinks, picked a booth and chatted while our orders were being made. My buddy's pizza arrived
first and he proposed some of it to me. I thanked him and ate one slice, slowly, because it was hot.
My pizza arrived, and it was a pan instead of a thin crust. We verified that, yes, the order was taken
correctly, but the pizza was made wrong. I sent the wrong pizza back and asked for the correct one.
The server returned with the pan version of mine and said we could keep it. The correct one was baking.
Dude! Free pizza! W00T!!
I ate 3 slices of the pan version of mine and put the rest in a box.
The thin crust version of mine showed up and I tucked into it, after waiting for it to cool a bit.
I ordered a canadian bacon/mushroom/extra cheese and it was delicious. I ate the whole damn thing!
Hmmmmmmmmmm, cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze........

Dinner concluded, we went back to C7's place and watched most of "Star Trek: Generations" in full screen.
Boy, that felt weird. Everything I watch lately is letterboxed and watching that movie in full screen
format on a widescreen TV was bizarre. I heckled the heck out of the movie and in the process, realized
that it was a dick move of a Star Trek movie when you stop and think about it.
I mean, they kill Kirk, they destroy the Enterprise D (which I disliked, so no problems there :D),
Picard's family estate and family gets wiped out in a fire. Seriously, what the hell?!?!?
And the whole thing with the Nexus Ribbon? If Picard and Kirk screw up, they're back in the Nexus.
Which means they can get out again and try again. And again. And again. It's like a save point for life!
Oy gevalt...
Once the movie was over, El Yote switched to Bravo, where "Coming To America" was just starting.
I stayed a bit and watched to see James Earl Jones. And we noticed that the "royal penis" scene was cut.
Ah Bravo. Remember when you used to be a cinephile channel with a no-editing policy?
I do. And now you suck, like all the other non-premium movie channels, except TMC.
'Cause TMC is keeping it real, yo!
Anyway, I bailed and I drove home. It was a pretty smooth ride.
I watched "Astérix: Mission Cléopatre", the second live-action movie and laughed a lot.
They really worked within the spirit of Astérix and went nuts with the anachronisms and puns.
I got hungry and ate some of the Shakey's pan pizza. :)
Then I watched episode 7 of "Dollhouse" and laughed. Not as much as with Astérix, but still a good amount.
If you're a fan of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" and you remember Season 1, I have three words for you:
"The Naked Now"


Sunday: I stayed home. All day. I did stuff. I ate the last of the pizza.
Oh yeah, I played the "Minerva: Metastasis" mod for "Half-Life 2" and the last chapter really kicked my ass.
It also crashed, three times. I'm 95% done with the game, but between the onslaught of zombines, howlers,
combines and elite combines, AND the game crashing, it's just insane! Good mod though.
I need a new computer.

And I need sleep, it's late.
Got a busy week this week.

As a big (HUGE!) movie buff, I would be remiss in not honoring THE VOICE upon his passing.
Yes, Don LaFontaine is no longer with us.
Don who?
This guy!


Some of the other voice-over actors have been basically impersonating Don for years now.
Including this guy, Hal Douglas (aka East Coast Don LaFontaine):


(Disclaimer: I do not endorse Jerry Seinfeld or any of his work. I find it all deadly dull.
But I must admit this trailer is hilarious. And that is all I will admit.)

Must. Post. More...

Okay, here's a bunch of random stuff that happened over the past 3 weeks:


Three weekends ago, I went to see "Iron Man".
I drove to Norwalk to connect with coyoteseven, and gizmoelf also drove down to join us.
We rendez-vouse at an AMC theater. I hate AMC theaters. They don't do matinées on weekend. They play tons
of commercials. Last time I went to an AMC theater, the movie played in a room the size of a bus.
But, what the hell, this was opening weekend for "Iron Man", and I really wanted to see the flick.
So we went in, got our tickets and went to the screening room immediately. We claimed decent seats,
then we took turns going to the bathroom and/or getting snacks while one of us stood guard.
True to my French upbringing, I bought nothing. :)
The seemingly endless parade of commercials. Holy crap! I usually to a Pacific theater or to The Bridge,
and neither shows nearly this much crap! Eventually, we got some trailers: Indy, Batman, and a couple of
truly horrid ones ("The Love Guru" and "You Don't Mess With The Zohan").
Then the film finally started.
I hate to sound like everyone else, but there's no avoiding it: "Iron Man" is awesome fun.
I'm definitely getting it on DVD and standing in line for the sequel.
Robert Downey Jr. is frakking PERFECT in the role!
After the movie, C7 was incredibly cool and treated us to Outback Steakhouse! OMG!
I had a porterhouse steak and it was insanely good. EVERYTHING was insanely good!
Man, the last time I had a porterhouse, it was at Houston's and I looooooong time ago!
C7 and Gizmo had some booze, and I was tempted to imbibe, but I stayed dry.
It was really late when we were done, so I gave C7 a ride back and went home.


On Friday May 9th, I went to Amoeba Music in Hollywood to sell some of my late brother's records.
I had 6 milk crates full of vinyl, and it was going to take the guy a while to look at 'em, so I gave
him my cell number and left to get some food. I got into the Fnord StRanger and turned the key.
Click.
Uh oh.
I tried again.
Click.
I moved the shift lever to make sure it was in Park, and tried again.
Click.
Okay, at this point, it was useless to call AAA because the Amoeba guy wasn't done with the vinyl yet.
So I left the truck in the Amoeba underground lot and went to a nearby Baja Fresh for a late lunch.
I also called C7 to share my misery with him. He said he had never had this kind of problem with the truck.
I went to Amoeba and futzed around, looking at various things, waiting for vinyl to be done.
Eventually, he was finished. I took cash instead of credit, and took the 2 leftover crates to the truck.
I called AAA, they came and tried to jumpstart me but nothing happened. Something was seriously wrong.
The AAA guy laid a screwdriver across both solenoid terminals and aside from a few sparks, nothing happened.
He told me that a car would usually start if you did that, so this was serious.
I had them tow the StRanger to an auto shop nearby (it was 8pm by then) and took the bus home.
The next day I called the auto shop to see what was what. I was told the starter motor was dead and needed
to be replaced. But the mechanic wasn't in today. But the auto shop next door was open and had mechanics
on duty so was it okay to puch the truck next door and have them call me? Why, sure! I had a job interview
on Monday 12th, so I kinda needed to have the truck to make it. So the auto shop next door called me and
pretty much told me the same thing as the other guy: dead starter, must be replaced, gonna cost the same.
The gentleman on the phone was Russian and very nononsense. He said:
"I can fix truck today if you say yes. If you say no, have nice weekend."
So I said yes.
They closed at noon, but he agreed to stay a little longer since I had to rely on the bus to get there.
I showered, dressed and grabbed the Santa Monica Blvd. bus to get to the auto shop on time.
The mechanics were just finishing up as I arrived. The Russian gentleman pointed at the shiny new
starter installed on the truck (waaaaaaaaay down in the engine compartment, under the oil filter).
He also showed me a frayed and cracked battery terminal that he had replaced free of charge.
He was actually rather friendly, just not frivolous. :)
I paid the bill, thanked him and drove the truck away.
It was lunchtime, so I stopped at a nearby Shakey's pizza, which also been renovated recently.
After lunch, I got back into the StRanger and turned the key.
Click.
I wish I was kidding.
I called my new Russian friend, who happened to still be at the shop. He was nonplussed and said he was
coming right over. I then called C7 to share this latest insanity with him. Mr. Russian arrived in style,
at the wheel of a shiny E-series Benz, with one of the mechanics in shotgun position.
The grease monkey immediately found the problem: one of the wires on the starter had come loose.
He put it back in and used pliers to crimp it in place. I now know where to look if this happens again.
I called C7 back and let him know of the happy dénouement.

So, eventhough I got $405 in cash for the records, it took $243 to get the starter fixed.
This is my life. Le sigh...


So I had the interview last Monday. It was for testing a cellphone application that lets you share
pics and vids with all your friends quickly. The interview seemed to go okay (they always do).
The company had a lot of people working at folding tables and I didn't see any cubicles.
At this point, I'll take what I can. I have no income at all. My unemployment is gone, has been gone.
I really need to find something, and soon.


Last Thursday, infamous furry artist Mitch Beiro arrived in L.A. for the weekend and we did stuff.
On Thursday, we checked out the newly-opened Tesla Motors dealership in my neck of the woods.
I will make a separate post with plenty of pictures.
On Saturday, we went to Califur, which replaced ConFurence as the local SoCal furry con.
This will also be a separate post with pictures.
When I came back from Califur, I found an e-mail from the company I had interviewed with on Monday.
They didn't give me the job. Frak!


I saw a fanatic today.
I was at Trader Joe's, buying a couple of things.
The fanatic was at a register, paying for her purchases.
She had a credit-card-sized device on her keychain.
I thought it was a calculator at first, but it had no keypad.
It did have an LCD display though, with numbers counting down.
It had a picture of George W. Bush on it.
It had some words on it that said something like "Bush Presidency Countdown".
I overheard the fanatic hope that someone would shoot George W. Bush before the end of the countdown.
It all reminded me of a couple of lines from a song by Voice Of The Beehive:
"I know what I believe, don't need to wear it on my sleeve..."
I guess she never heard that song.


It's been hot in L.A., but the weather is finally cooling down.
I think I should sleep okay tonight.

My Stimulus check came in today's mail. It will help pay the rent. Yea!

"Pierrot Le Fou" by Jean-Luc Godard (1965).
Starring Jean-Paul Belmondo. Remember that name, it will pop up again soon.
Episode 20 of "Cowboy Bebop", which happens to be my favorite episode, is also called "Pierrot Le Fou".
The opening sequence of that episode has some of the best cinematography I've ever seen, anywhere.

Ganked from daphne_lage.

Movie-Going Meme

1. Name a movie that you have seen more than 10 times.
TRON

2. Name a movie that you've seen multiple times in the theater.
Spider-Man 2

3. Name an actor that would make you more inclined to see a movie.
Jean Reno, among others

4. Name an actor that would make you less likely to see a movie.
Adam Sandler

5. Name a movie that you can quote from.
The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai Across The 8th Dimension

6. Name a movie musical that you know all the lyrics to all the songs.
Phantom Of The Paradise.

7. Name a movie that you have been known to sing along with.
A Clockwork Orange

8. Name a movie that you would recommend everyone see.
Casino Royale (the new one, it's really damned good!)

9. Name a movie that you own.
Death To Smoochie

10.Name an actor that launched their entertainment career in another medium but who has surprised you with their acting chops.
Mos Def

11. Have you ever seen a movie in a drive-in? If so, what?
Midway

12. Ever made out in a movie?
Nope

13. Name a movie that you keep meaning to see but just haven't gotten around to it.
The Godfather

14. Ever walked out of a movie?
No. I usually pick them very carefully and they're never that bad.

15. Name a movie that made you cry in the theater.
The Iron Giant (at the end, you know where, "Superman...")

16. Popcorn?
Never. I'm French!

17. How often do you go to the movies?
2-3 times a month

18. What's the last movie you saw in the theater?
Ghost Rider (fun!)

19. What's your favorite/preferred genre of movie?
Science Fiction (though they don't really make great ones anymore)

20. What's the first movie you remember seeing in the theater?
Les Aristochats (come on, guess the English title! :)

21. What movie do you wish you had never seen?
Ghost Ship

22. What is the weirdest movie you enjoyed?
The Forbidden Zone

23. What is the scariest movie you've seen?
The Shining (back when it first came out in France)

24. What is the funniest movie you've seen?
Top Secret (funniest movie EVAR!)