Sometimes I write things

Memo to parents who have a child who is considering striking out onto the world: If you want to seriously dissuade them, tell them they have to do dishes. And probably without a dishwasher. They have to wash the dishes with nothing but their hands, some soap, a sponge, and their wits. For reals. And it almost takes longer than the time you have allocated for it. There will be sweat, tears, and yes, blood. It may be enough to make the kid recant.

Christmas is here. You, in the comfort of your own home, may not have realized it. But you, my brothers and sisters in retail, know that the time is upon us. The attack will come, and it may be subtle. Like vaguely Christmas-y music making it into the rotation. But it may be obvious, like an extra 49 boxes of Christmas product. Or a new table on the sales floor dedicated to products with the subject code "HOLIDAY". It is coming and, you who are about to go forth, enjoy these last moments of relative serenity and sanity among your customers, for these innocent consumers are about to transform.

On a happier note, TEKKEN 6 IS OUT! It's about goddamned time, seeing as 5 came out in 2005, with naught but Dark Resurrection to tide us over. I'm taking a serious approach to this game, learning juggles and combos and such while honing my skills with Asuka and Dragunov. Seeing as they're pretty close to their previous incarnations, I'll look at picking up some other characters like the spider chick or the Jackie Chan imposter. And seriously, screw Azazel. He almost makes me miss Jinpachi, the guy who could cause earthquakes and shoot fireballs from his gut.

FOX gives us House than takes it away for some other thing - I don't even know - and now I'm without Hugh Laurie for two weeks. And just when things were starting to get really interesting.

Heroes is not so much stupid this season as it is boring. Not much has happened lately, though maybe I'm just used to more epic, fast-paced storytelling. In any case, I'm betting ten bucks that with Hiro going to back to try saving Charlie again, he's somehow going to reset the entire show. I honestly don't know if that would help matters or make them worse.

Castle was awesome, even if the Firefly gag only lasted the first few minutes.

The television studies professor inflicted Flavor of Love on us today, and it may be several hours before I can trust television again. I already fear that I have forgotten how to love.

Borders Books is a comedy bistro

So, Halloween party at Borders. For kids. We host a lot of parties and nobody ever comes, but this was different. Kids in costume all over the store going to employees who are supposed to give out candy and gifts. The trouble is, kids these days are scared to say "Trick or Treat". And they're not proud of their costumes, either.

Rather than becoming Superman or a ninja or a race car driver, the costumes are merely a means to an end. You try to compliment a kid on their neat samurai costume or whatever and they're all "yeah whatever give me candy". When I was a kid, "trick or treat" was like a code word, something you said with pride and a certain knowledge that this was not something the grown-ups could do. Now it's just something the parents tell them to say so they can get candy.

I blame the schools. And, of course, Obama.

I watch the music layer of the store all by myself, so I have to watch the register for people wanting to buy stuff. Customers occasionally track me down, but mostly they just stare at the register waiting for me to spontaneously appear. It irks me.

I came home to find that my roommates had just up and purchased a Playstation 3 while I was out. One woke up this morning, told the other that they should go buy it and so they did. I wish I had their brazen disregard for financial planning.

Also, friends are over, which was a surprise.

But most importantly, I have Bailey's in the house, which is clearly the only acceptable way to end a ten-hour shift working retail.

Der Ranten und Raven

Things I didn't like today:

1. People driving ten miles under the speed limit on both Lake Drive and Port Washington Road. I'm apparently a way more aggressive driver than one might expect, but I'm also afraid to pass because the moment I do, an oncoming car will come out of nowhere and kill me. Pick up the pace, people. Everyone knows that the speed limit signs are merely suggestions.

2. I don't know what my Intercultural Communications instructor was doing since last we met, but it was clearly not grading exams or papers even though she said that she would totally have them done.

3. I have no idea what I'm going to write about for my paper on Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse and it's due on Thursday. I'm not sure there's anything in that novel I found interesting enough to talk about for four to seven pages.

Things I did like:

1. I saw a driver do an illegal U-turn at the Port Washington - Brown Deer intersection. Illegal U-turns really drive me nuts for some reason and I was already hurling invective from my car when I see a police car pull out from the adjacent parking lot, flip on the sirens and pull him over into the next parking lot. Justice is swift and all drivers but me are stupid.

2. The evangelists were back in the UWM plaza doing their thing again. Depending on my mood, this could make it onto either side of this post, but I was able to watch them argue with passerby while I had lunch inside. Why on Earth are they so concerned about lust as opposed to any other of the sins anyway?

3. I just realized that talking about the 1954 film Johnny Guitar and relating it to theories of genre put forward by the critics Robin Wood and Rick Altman will be a piece of cake and I can bang out a page on it for tomorrow easy.

And perhaps most importantly,

4. I realized that the one British dad on Flashforward? Mr. Simcoe or whatever? He's totally Comodore Norrington from Pirates of the Caribbean! But without a sword! Or naval skills! Or character development! And he's apparently evil and is working with Merry from Lord of the Rings!

!

High Grade 00: GNW-20000 Arche Gundam

At the end of Season One of Gundam 00, the mercenary Ali al-Saachez hijacks the Gundam Throne Zwei. Promptly afterward, he is hired by Ribbons Almark, who has initiated his plans to control the fate of humanity. Ali accepts, and Ribbons phones up his buddies at the newly created Earthsphere Federation peacekeeping force "A-LAWS" and they begin reverse-engineering the Gundam technology. The result is Ali's new machine in Season 2, the Arche Gundam.



The kit turns out to be a little larger than the others in the line, but assembly is still pretty simple. Despite the Arche Gundam's lanky proportions, poseability is strong. The kit is molded in all the correct colors, and transparent pieces are provided for the GN Particle Condensers. All that needed painting were the tan parts of the GN Buster Sword and the white tips on all of the wings and fins.

Features include the transformable escape pod on its back and the transformable GN Buster Sword which can switch to rifle mode. In addition, the pods for the GN Fangs can open and the Particle Condensers on the legs can open up revealing way more details than I feel like painting.

If you have a base, the model can do some decent kicking poses with the foot beam sabers, but I have a feeling those will stay in the box. The sword is, of course, pretty heavy, and you have to be very careful about how you pose it, because otherwise it'll just flop over from the weight.

Overall, an excellent representation of one of the more unconventional designs from the series.



Mine is in the crappy cell phone picture. The one right above is some Japanese guy's.

Out of my way, I got OPINIONS!

Occasionally I will review things.



The Brothers Bloom is possibly one of my favorite films of the year. Wikipedia describes it as postmodern, which I guess is a little bit accurate. It's a comic, fantastical heist thriller that seems almost play-like in its mise-en-scene. It stars Adrien Brody and Mark Ruffalo as gentlemen con-artists, with the former playing whichever parts the latter writes up for him. Rinko Kikuchi rounds out the team as the hot Asian chick mute demolitions expert. Rachel Weisz has a comic role as a secluded heiress who happens to be their next mark. Hijinks and romance ensue.

The film is delightful, switching from comic to tragic in turns, with the script and actors never missing a beat. It's just the sort of whimsical story I can really get behind, and I'm sure I'll try and make everyone I know see it.



I also finished Alan Weisman's The World Without Us, which was fascinating. I don't usually read much non-fiction, but it may be that I have a predilection for thought-exercises involving the end of mankind. It's at once easy to read and understand while being perfectly scholarly. There are chapters on what will survive, what won't, and even one on how we will go (who knew there were people pushing for voluntary extinction?) However, I think I'm tickled most by the fact that Mount Rushmore will be around long into the future, so that whichever civilization replaces ours may still have the mug of Teddy Roosevelt looking sternly down upon them.

"I don't know what this even is!" "Drink it, you'll be fine!"

So there may have been drinking last night. But only because our dear friend turned 21 and I found it unacceptable that I be sober when I went out of my way to not have to drive to the venue. I will neither confirm nor deny the possibility that Karoake was involved. There was, however, an expedition to meet this guy. Also I can tell you that the threat of public urination was a very real threat for a little bit. I may have been overenthusiastic as I did not really get the traditional 21st birthday blowout due to circumstances beyond my or anyone's control and I'm really susceptible to peer pressure.

At work, I found that some customer, in their own little "Fuck you" to the Democrats, turned around the faced-out copies of The Audacity of Hope and then further obscured them by putting this book in front of them. I know creative book shelving is how I deal with all MY problems. And, increasingly, alcohol.

My roommates are having fun and talking, but here I am on the computer by myself. I've only been at work for ten goddamn hours and important news may have happened on THE INTERNET! Like the fact that the Unicorn Gundam apparently only comes with its bazooka, so you have to buy the Unicorn Gundam Destroy Mode too, if you want the Beam Magnum - I ask you, IS THAT JUSTICE?

In other news, I interrupted my reading of Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jhumpa Lahiri's The Namesake so that I could read this. I'm the worst English major ever.

That's Futuristic Imagination Industries, offering you more links-per-paragraph than the leading brand.

Dear Publishing Industry

Hey, it's me again. Alex, the guy who helps keep your books on the shelves? I need a favor, home-slices. Now I know my last letter didn't go over terribly well with you ("Knock it off with the Twilight bullshit"), but this one's actually important. It's a list of things that you do not need to release anymore.

1. Stupid reference books filled with useless facts. One or two publishers may have gotten lucky with the stupid trivia books, but there are only so many useless "lol random, teehee" facts out there. I don't want to pay fifteen bucks to find out if and how fish fart. And they shouldn't be hardcovers.

2. Reference books filled with exciting things for kids to do. Often there are separate books for boys and for girls. Sure, there was one that hit it BIG, but that was two Christmases ago. I can assure you as a bookstore inventory worker, they are nowhere near that popular regularly.

3. Books that involve Fitzwilliam Darcy but are not written by Jane Austen. Sure, Austen books may have been the original fanfiction fodder, but how hard can it be to come up with your own dark, aloof, handsome, romantic anti-hero with a heart of gold? Hell, Stephanie Meyer did it and she's a moron.

4. Books that are not A Dance with Dragons, the eagerly-awaited fifth novel in the award-winning fantasy series, "A Song of Ice and Fire", written by George R.R. Martin and published by Bantam Books.

5. "Books" written by Glenn Beck.

No need to thank me, guys. It means a lot to me.

Yours,
Alex