Late Night Snack

Here's an extra treat for you late night blog checkers. You know who you are.

I'm not going to give a whole lot of explanation here, but here are some doodles I've been working on with yet another project in mind. Mainly this is an excuse to use my stylus and the fantastic Sketchbook Pro. The black and white sketch is of a character named Murphy making a sandwich. The color sketch is of some guy without a name who seems to have something to do with moose, though I have no idea why he has a staff with a golden pig head on it. It's a mystery.

Gimme Some of That Milk Shake!

It was a gauntlet that was thrown down yesterday; a challenging gauntlet hurled to the floor by the shakeless Burger King in my neighborhood. They challenged me to find a place to redeem my free small shake coupon, and by all that is good and holy, I have prevailed! (crescendo! thunder! tympani! the fanfare of trumpets!). I checked out all the nearby BKs, and it turns out that the shakeless wonder is the only one in the neighborhood. However, I drove down to the far reaches of the land of Littleton to go to Underground at Matt's church, and there in those distant lands I beheld a Burger King, bathed in holy loglo. I sallied forth, sallied inside, sallied to the counter, and wrested my shake from the hand of a BK employee. It was pretty good. It was strawberry.

And on a completely different note: It seems that my ability to enjoy multimedia has been crippled. For instance, rather than focus on the meaning of the songs and worship God, my attention is instead focused on the flaws in the presentation: That font is overused, that word is misspelled, that picture is odd, the words on the slide don't match up with what is being sung. For crying out loud, that's not what is important! I can't turn off the slide show in my head of media I've consumed in the past and will consume in the future. Between graphic design and the Internet and my own self-centeredness, I'm doomed!

Two-Tone Wednesday Evening

My Wednesday evening did not get off to a good start. Leaving work, I found that my bike's front tire was flat. Very flat. I tried pumping up the tire to see if I could limp home on it, but by the time I made it down to REI, it was already flat and wobbly ... and it began to rain. Well, there are worse places to change a bike tire, so I ran under their front porch and changed my tire.

The hole was small and round, and I have to wonder what caused it. My tires have the thorn-resistant tubes in them, which in my experience means they are very hard to pierce. I patched it up with minimal swearing, even though the pump's gauge lock lever thingy kept snapping shut on my knuckles. I'm glad it was the front and not the rear tire, or there would have been more swearing.

I rode home, and I figured to make up for my horrible tragedy (boo hoo hoo), I would cash in a certificate for a free shake at Burger King. Once I got in, I was informed that this particular Burger King doesn't even have a shake machine. Robbed of my reward, I got back on my bike and rode home, nearly getting hit by a car as I crossed Broadway. Needless to say, when I got home sweaty, dirty, and shakeless, I was not in the best of moods.

But here's the second tone of this Wednesday evening. I figured I would go get something sweet, creamy, and dairy-based anyway. So I set out to Wendy's for a Frosty, but before going I drew a map of the neighborhood surrounding my apartment building. This has been a project I've been thinking about pretty much since I arrived here. I'm going to make a parking map. The map will not only tell where a loading zone is and what is covered by meters, but it will also have a street sweeping schedule so you know when you need to move your car.

Here in Denver, different sides of the streets are swept on different days throughout the month. For instance, one side may be swept every 1st Friday of the month, whereas another might be swept every 3rd Tuesday of the month. All the streets around my building are done in the first week of the month. Since tomorrow is the first of June, I had to go make sure that my car was parked in a good spot. Once I have this map, I won't have to wonder any more. I'll just check it. I plan to put this on the web and let other people in my building know about the map. It's a project that will help other people out.

So, I'm pretty excited to be working on this project, and it felt good to be doing something creative, productive, and pleasant. The walk was quite pleasant, as was the Frosty. I truly had hoped to get a Frosty float, because I heard they will be giving away Wiis to lucky people who buy the float and have a winning token on their glass, but alas, that promotion isn't out yet. Soon. Soon.

Loud

Well, TNL was pretty good. If nothing else, it was loud. What? I said, loud. LOUD! Man, I'm getting out. When I had heard the name before, I had thought it was Tuesday Night Live, you know, as a counter to Saturday Night Live. But it is The Next Level, and evidently that level is 11, if you know what I mean. So other than making me feel a bit old, it was good, though I would have liked to have been familiar with more than one of the songs. I think I might start going to University Hills Church of Christ, which was ever so friendly, but had odd worship and then go to TNL to get the energetic worship.

Also, speaking of loud, we had one humdinger of a hail storm yesterday. It was like being under a hail waterfall. Some of it was grape-sized but most was around pea-sized. Thankfully Daria was undented from that experience, though most trees in the area got absolutely shredded. If I may throw in an obscure childhood reference, it was such a hail storm that Jumpman wouldn't have had a chance.

Birthdays of Our Lives

Yep. So I went to Elsa's surprise (SURPRISE!) birthday party on Monday. It was good and I enjoyed the barbecue, the company, and the creamcicle ice cream with the red velvet cake. Good stuff! It was good to lounge in the shade and watch kids playing and chat with friends. I went home and was pretty tired and ended up largely just dozing until the evening when I took a bath. That pretty much finished me off and I went to bed at 8. Watch out, ladies! This is the Wild Nils at his finest. Well, truth be told, I was still feeling a tad sick and wiped out. I'm feeling better today, though not 100%.

Today as I rode home I saw a guy riding a bicycle with ape hanger handle bars, each with an Iron Cross on top. He also had flashing lights on the bike and motorcycle sound effects. I soooooo wish I could have gotten a picture of that one.

I also learned on Sunday that Taylar's middle name is Grace, and sadly not something beginning with N. So she will be TGT, not TNT. Oh well. She makes up for it by being one of the cutest babies ev-ar!

Tonight I am going to The Next Level, a church that I hope is quite similar to Summit. Whoops! In fact, I need to leave now. G'bye!

I Think I May Have Overdone It

So, I'm sick, sick as a dog who is very sick. Wanna hear about it? Yeah? Good. In excruciatingly gross detail? No? All right then. Deploy euphemisms!

When I woke up this morning, every joint was aching. This is not a good sign. A trip to the bathroom and the unkind things my body did to porcelain fixtures there confirmed it. I am sick. This of course comes at the beginning of the Memorial Day weekend, the one that I had crammed full of plans.

Today's plan was to take the light rail down to the Mineral Station at the end of the line and ride back up the Platte River with Jason, whom I'd meet there. I figured, I'm young. I'm hale. I'm sure that an 18 mile bike ride will chase the aches from my body and calm my stomach. Amazingly enough, it did. I only had to make one pit stop, and Jason acted as a pacesetter, getting me to ride faster than I would by myself, which is just what I had hoped for. The weather was perfect for a ride. They were even having an event called Pedal The Platte, which meant that there were rest stops and free food along the way. It was a great ride.

Until REI, that is. The main event was there outside the flagship store, which happens to be on the trail. I had a yummy energy bar and part of one of Jason's peanut butter energy things, which was quite good, of course, since it involved peanut butter. But once I put something in my stomach, I began to feel a bit, well, ooky. I bid Jason adieu and he rode back down the Platte while I went up Cherry Creek. That's when things got unpleasant.

I was shivering and still ooky. I was gasping riding along the flat bike path. I limped into the bike room, wheezed my way up the stairs and promptly laid out on the couch and practiced not moving at all. I became very cold and was shivering and sweaty, but it took a lot of effort to get to the shower. When I got out of the shower's warm embrace, I was doing full body shivers and quickly dressed in wool socks, jeans, a t-shirt and sweater. It was in the high 70's today. I grabbed a couple of blankets from the bed and dropped onto the couch, where I haven't moved from much today other than to rehydrate, wreak foul havoc upon my commode, and remove or put on warm things as my body swung back and forth from shivering cold to woozy heat. At least NPR's Saturday programming was on and with my computer hooked up directly to the router I could actually listen.

I did manage to go down and talk with the apartment folks, paying my rent and reporting a couple of maintenance concerns in the building, and also to address the mysterious charges that were showing up in my bank account from them. They were nice in trying to track it down, but couldn't come up with any reason for the charges. Uh oh. After I recovered from a achy shivering fit, I called Washington Mutual, ready to freeze or change my card. Thankfully I asked the guy on the line if he could give me any more information about the mysterious transactions. "Is there a laundry room in the building?" he asked. Crap! Of course! These were charges I had put on my laundry card, and they were listed as coming from the apartment complex. Gratefully, I dragged my carcass down to the office and let them know the good news. Then back up to my apartment for some quality languishing.

And that's what I've been doing; languishing, trying to rest, and taking swigs of Pepto chased with ibuprofen. Currently that seems to be doing the job, but we'll see how things are tomorrow and whether or not I can salvage some of the weekend's agenda.

Rocky Mountain Picture Show

Hey, in case you were hankering for pictures of my trip with my parents to the Rocky Mountain National Park (and who isn't, really?), you're in luck. I just uploaded a few of them into my gallery. Why don't you check them out? It would take care of that hankering problem you've got.

Beautifully Frightening

I found this amazing artist by way of The Table of Malcontents. The site is in, what is that? Polish? Anyway, click on Galeria on the site nav to see this guy's stuff. Pretty freaking cool. Also through that blog, I found a link to this story about a book of photographs taken of creatures of the ocean's depths. Incredible stuff. I may have to buy a copy.

Baby, Baby

Hey, so congratulations to my brother and his wife on producing the newest member of the Thingvall clan. Taylar was born yesterday around 6 o'clock weighing in at about 8 lbs. 6 oz, if my memory serves me right. I could tell because all the sudden I had the new uncle smell. I don't know her middle name, but I hope it is Nicole or Nyssa or something beginning with an N so her initials will be TNT. I guess it's time to brush up on being avuncular.

Not Penny's Boat

Sorry if you haven't watched the Lost finale yet. Spoilers abound in this post, even right there in the post's title. In fact, of all the reveals of last night's episode, that was probably the biggest. So sorry if you haven't watched it yet, but if you're a Lost fan and you didn't watch it last night (or today) then you should know better. What are you thinking? Sheesh.

Anyway, I rather enjoyed the finale. There were plenty of big reveals and some awesome action sequences. I especially thought Sayid's neck-snapping skills were awesome, and the takedown of the Others in the Looking Glass was hardcore. Mikhail guns down two of his compatriots in cold blood, in the back before Desmond skewers him through the chest with a spear gun. Ouch. Still that cockroach manages to slip out of the hatch and blow a hole in it with the grenade. He must be related to Sylar. And then poor Charlie drowns, just as Desmond predicts. It was sad, but Charlie was at peace and even got his own eulogy episode last week.

Before he dies, Charlie passes along the most shocking revelation of the episode, that the freighter and Naomi have nothing to do with Penny and her search for Desmond. Then who the heck are these people? Ben says that they are the bad guys, and from the state Jack is in at the end of the episode, you have to believe him. Suurrre Ben, now you tell the truth. It definitely is a case of The Ben Who Cried Wolf. He has lied and manipulated people so much that no one will believe him when it really counts. Instead, Ben gets knocked around by Jack and then gets to introduce Alex to her mother in one of the episode's funniest moments. Unfortunately, his crappy interpersonal skills are going to doom a lot of people. Perhaps if you treated people a bit better, they might trust you. Maybe, just maybe, if you told people what the heck was going on with the island, people would wait and take your side. Communicate, people!

I did feel pretty proud that our group figured out early on that Jack's flashback was actually a flash forward. I figured that if they weren't going to tell us who died or who Jack was calling, it had to be a big reveal, especially in light of the fact that this is a finale that we're talking about. So who would it be most shocking to have Jack talking to? Someone from the Island. And how would that happen without it already having come up on the island? If it happened after they had left the island. And lo and behold, we were right. Also, someone said that he was a hero twice over; once for the island, once for the car wreck.

It certainly looks like the show is going to take a darker turn. Whatever happens between Jack's phone call to the outside world and his flash forward is bad enough and depressing enough to turn our fearless leader into a suicidal, alcoholic, painkiller-addicted burn out. Yeah, that sounds like fun. It will be interesting to see what they do with the next season. Will they shift perspectives to make the flash forward time the main timeline and flashback to the island or will they continue on the island timeline and flash forward with other characters? Or is this flash forward a shadow of things that may be? There have been hints about time travel in the show.

A few random thoughts:

• Best line: I'm a dentist, not Rambo.

• Yay for Locke being back! And maybe Walt is back? Or Smokey? Or Jacob?

• I think that the person in the coffin was Jacob. Jim found a picture of the newspaper clipping, and it looks like the name of the person is something like J. Lantham. It looks like the first name can be Joe or John or Jacob.

• Is Naomi dead?

• All in all, I'm stoked for the next season. Too bad it isn't until February 2008.

The Woman in the Drain

This is where everything I own with “waterproof” on the label earns its keep. Yesterday as I left work, rain was coming down pretty hard so I suited up in my waterproof jacket, waterproof pants, waterproof gloves, and my waterproof boots that I had wisely chosen to wear that day. My head got wet, but the rest of me was relatively dry and comfy. I set out on the bike path and saw that Cherry Creek had surged and become once more the surly stream that I am starting to get really irritated with. The floodwaters were over the path in many places once again depositing silty hazards under my tires.

What struck me, was near the Market Street overpass I spied a figure in a red hoody and jeans standing on the opposite bank. At this point, the path is split. One side is for cyclists and one is for pedestrians. As I rode along, I saw the figure in red start to step down the rocky embankment towards the churning water. I couldn't tell much about the figure, because the hoody obscured their face and body, but I think it was a woman. She gingerly stepped down the rocks right to the water's edge. I slowed, wondering what this person was doing. Then she stepped into the creek.

The water was up to her calves and rushing along, soaking her jeans, but she started to wade along the side of the creek. I stopped to gape at this scene. I watched as she gingerly walked back towards a storm drain outlet downstream from her. The drain outlet was probably about 6 feet tall and quite wide, maybe around 12 feet. Water from Denver's streets was gushing out of it and commingling with the turbid water of Cherry Creek. Slowly, the figure in red worked her way back into the drain.

I felt like I should say something. I felt like I was watching a movie. I was so dumbstruck at the sight, I didn't know what to do. And as the figure slipped back into the drain, I shook my head and rode on through the rain. I don't like that. I should have said something; shown some concern for this person engaging in a reckless act. But I didn't. Have I really become so passive that I can't even bring myself to shout a warning to someone? Didn't she know two people died in these streams last week? I saw something that is like something out of a movie, and I acted like I was watching a movie. I did nothing but watch. At least I could have acted like someone in the movie. I could have yelled something. I could have intervened. Better yet, I could have acted like someone with the good sense God gave gravy and at least checked to see if the person wasn't suicidal or in distress. I could have had some freaking compassion. Instead, I just figured that the person knew what they were doing and had good reasons for it.

We are so afraid to confront strangers nowadays, especially when we're going to point out something that they are doing that is wrong. Well, to people's faces anyway. We may rant and shout advice at other drivers from inside our cars, but we're not going to have an intervention for them. Well, I generalize and say “we,” but this is really a big problem for me. Even with people I know, I seldom speak up to point out something they're doing that is stupid or wrong. The general air of relativism makes it slightly taboo in our society to tell someone that the way they're acting is wrong. Who are you to tell me that wading into a flooded drainage tunnel without a flashlight is wrong?

In talking this over with Isaac and Elsa, we figured that the person could have been homeless, crazy, or a druggy in search of a secluded place for a hit; maybe all three. Those are the few things I can think of to incite a person to venture into the gushing mouth of a flooded drain. Now what can incite me to intervene?

Brevity

Hmph. Today I was first into the office and last to leave. I didn't get done until 7. I freaked out while trying to set the alarm and ended up calling David and interrupting him in class, only to find I had done everything right. But when an alarm starts making the sound it made right before I tripped it the last time, I get nervous. Stupid alarms. I worked a lot with swfMill and fonts and a bit on some mock-ups for a cool project. Maybe more on that later. I've got a couple of big posts in the works. This'll have to tide you over for now.

Distracted

Oh, yesterday I spent all day reformatting my computer and reinstalling all my software. Today, my Photoshop wouldn't work, so I spent a good hour or so trying to get it reinstalled and working. But now I have a faster machine and more current software. Hello, Office 2007!

Anyway, I'm distracted, and I just want to go home and watch Lost. Only 6 more hours to go!

In Which Nothing of Any Particular Import Happens, and Yet I Write About It

I've got brown streaks up the back of my pants. It's up my shirt too. What a mess. You think I'd be able to prevent this sort of thing by now. You'd think I'd have learned my lesson last time. But everyone makes mistakes, right? It rained a lot this afternoon before I left work, and the Cherry Creek trail flooded again. I missed most of the underwater parts, but I wasn't paying attention and plowed right through a couple of puddles. My tires made the most of the opportunity to spray muddy water all over my work clothes, and the cuffs of my jeans instantly picked up a truckload of sand. I sort of figured that my clothes were bespeckled with grime just from riding over the moister bits of pavement, so why bother avoiding the little lakes that popped up on the trail. But I forget what being ankle deep in turbid water does to a pair of jeans and so I had a gritty, damp ride home.

I ventured out later to Target to grab some household goods and get some supplies for tomorrow's Lostravaganza at Isaac and Elsa's. I am expecting big things from this finale, so don't let me down, Damon Lindelof! You're our only hope! And, speaking of inane rants, ... oh, we weren't? Oh well, anyway, here I go: What the heck is the deal with the music selection at Target? I went to go see if they had the new Andrew Bird album while I was there. I have ever so much been enjoying his Mysterious Production of Eggs, that I thought I'd buy the new album. Now, I wasn't necessarily expecting to find it at Target, but their collection is so excruciatingly eclectic. I just don't understand. It isn't that it is just filled with popular Top 40 crap or only mainstream bands as you might expect. They have people like Regina Spektor, indie favorites like Arcade Fire, and bands I've never heard of. They have their popular stuff in there, too. But they don't have more acclaimed bands like The Decemberists. And they only had one Dave Matthews CD. It's like they chose what CDs to stock by way of a dartboard. Anyway, no Andrew Bird for me. It was but a whim and a fancy.

Finale, Finally

Soooooooo, Heroes finale. Hmmm. I'm still processing, so I don't know if I should even be writing, but the world must know my opinions ... even as I am formulating them. Okay, I think this is going to be pretty stream of consciousness (with SPOILERS). Aaaaaaaaaaaand, go!

Okay, Micah and Molly are very cute together. Linderman getting his brain punched in is not cute at all, especially now that we get the side view. Ick. Best Line: "Didn't I kill you already?" "Didn't take." Interesting token of the next season to come with Molly's "There's someone worse" revelation, but it was dropped as soon as it came up, like, "Whew! I'm glad all that foreshadowing's over. Now, on with the finale!" And, really, couldn't Peter just fly away himself? And why not just shoot him? He'll calm down and regenerate and Nathan won't mess up that nice suit of his. I figured that Peter's visions came from Simone's dad, but it was a pretty cool interlude. I hope they explain that more fully and that we'll see Ma Petrelli's power. She'd prolly give a super spanking to her boys if she could find their irradiated/atomized butts. And is Peter dead, or is he going to regenerate? Hmm. It just seemed a little forced. And if Sylar can react in time to stop Parkman's bullets, you think he could have slapped Hiro around rather than take a katana in the breadbasket. But there's time for that later, eh? I wonder how he'll fit into the next season. Between surviving getting shot by Bennett earlier this season and Hiro's letter opener, he must have some sort of regenerative power. Maybe he ate the Energizer bunny's brain! And now he keeps going, and going, and going... And the whole opening exchange between Hiro and his dad was dumb. His dad was all, "You gotta complete your mission!" and Hiro's all, "But I gotta save my friend!" and back and forth and back and forth and DUDE, if you kill Sylar now, you'll save your friend AND complete your mission. They're completely complementary goals, now go stick a sword in something, boy! Ahem. Let's see, anything else? Well, I wonder if Parkman's toast. Probably not, but man he ate a lot of lead. But he can't die, or it will break Molly's heart, and the writers can't live with that over their heads. They just can't. A totally cool moment was Sylar's evening art session with the clouded painting coming out of the canvas. That's some wicked effects right there, I tell you what. Oh, and I figure that Simone's dad (Frank? Charles?) was how the League of Elderly Superheroes knew about the man-bomb. I imagine we'll see that powers of the League of Elderly Superheroes align with the powers of the Hip Young Justice Force. I'm betting Claire will find down the line that she can heal others ... but then that'd mean Linderman isn't dead ... hmm, so maybe not. Well, I guess it could be analogous and not identical match ups. A healer of some sort, a clairvoyant of some sort, etc. Anyway, Hiro's in the past, but that's something for the future, in that, er, we'll find out about the past in the future, or ... something. If he turns out to be Kesei, I will be disappointed. But if he gets a chainsaw for a hand instead and fights an army of demonic undead, now that's good television!

Everybody's Blogging From the Weekend

Now that, my friends, is a well-packed weekend. It started with dinner with the folks at Forest Room 5. The herbed french fries weren't quite as good as I remember, but the mini forest burgers were every bit as delicious and delectable as my memory told me they were. The Woodchuck cider I had was awesome as well.

From there we went to Bear Creek Park where Mom and Dad had holed up and chatted and made s'mores with Jill, Dean, and Tirzah, who were also in the campground. Then it was more calories in the morning when I made Dutch babies for my parents. We then set off to the Rocky Mountain National Park. This was my car Daria's first trip up into the mountains, and she did quite well. I could feel a little sluggishness at times, but for the most part she gamely sped up hills and went around corners with tires chirping. I don't think Dad liked that part. Anyhow, we went up the back way into the park, going over Berthoud Pass and up through Winter Park, Granby, and Grand Lake.

We got to the park under a menacing sky and went into the visitors center and watched a video with some amazing footage. Then it was back on the road. The road was cut short because it is still closed for the winter, but we were able to get about 10 miles into the park. We took a side road in order for me to get some pictures and saw a few moose, as well as scads of elk. We continued on the road and came to a nice streamside spot where we lunched upon sandwiches and artichoke dip. We walked back on a road and saw more moose and an old barn.

After that excursion, we went up to the end of the road and hiked on the Colorado River trail. Not too long ago I was near the other end of this waterway, and now I was close to its headwaters. The trail was covered here and there with snow and there was quite a bit of water all around, so we didn't get too far before turning around. By that time, it was perfect timing to head back to Idaho Springs and get some Beau Jo's pizza.

Before that, though, we saw a huge flock of large white birds huddled in the shallows of Shadow Mountain Lake. We took Daria down a dirt road to get closer and found that they were white pelicans. Now, an alpine like in the snowy heights of the Rockies is not a place I associate with pelicans, but there they were, about 70 of them. Weird.

After gorging on Beau Jo's pizza, we went back to my parents' place and chatted with Jill, Dean, and Jill's parents. I was pretty exhausted, so I didn't do much of the chatting. I stayed the night at my parents' place, and then in the morning we went off to church over by Washington Park. We followed that up with some barbecued steaks and an abbreviated game of Scrabble. I hurried on over to Matt's graduation party, leaving Mom and Dad to clean up from lunch and head off to Oregon, where there's a grandchild waiting in the wings.

At Matt's party, we tossed the frisbee around, and I am reminded of how long it has been since I did running of any kind. Back in Orlando, I was getting pretty good at sprinting after the disc, but now, I am out of shape, at least out of running shape. Anyway, sweaty and exhausted, I headed home and attempted to do laundry and take care of all the things I had let slide during the weekend. D'oh! Those library books were due on the 19th! How mortifying. I got 'em in transit today, so OCLS can stop putting fines on my account come Friday. I miss the benefit of not having to pay those.

Shinigami Only Eat Apples

I've been meaning to write about Death Note for a while. It's an anime show that I've started watching, and it is exceptionally good. The premise of the series is a student named Light Yagumi finds a notebook outside his school. It belonged to a shinigami (Japanese angel of death, essentially) named Ryuk. The titular notebook is imbued with the power to kill those people whose names are written inside it. There are all sorts of rules attached to it, such as specifying time and cause of death and having to know the face of your victim. Light essentially gets a God complex and starts meting out fatal justice to criminals and "evil-doers" under the name Kira (the Japanese pronunciation of killer) and the baleful eye of Ryuk. The police set out to stop Kira, headed by the secret detective known as L.

The series is largely a battle of wits between the two geniuses of L and Light. As soon as one learns the other's name, the game will be over. The suspense is thick and the writing is fantastic. Each episode brings the two hunters closer to discovering each other's identities, and usually is followed by me saying "Dang!" or an equivalent phrase. After about 16 episodes, I thought that the series had turned a bad corner and gone the way of average anime, but now I am on episode 20 and the series is as good and surprising as ever. The characters' actions usually make more sense than those of the folks on Lost. I highly recommend this series, and if any of you good people are interested in the series, I can help you find a way to watch it. Then you can find out the significance of this post's title. Death Note is currently only available as subtitled Japanese, JSYK.

Hell and High Water

So I found out yesterday that I'm lucky to be alive. I rode my bike home on the bike path as normal when I left work around 5:30 on Monday. I made it home about a hour before the skies burst open and dumped an inch and a half of rain in 30 minutes. At least that's what they told me. It certainly was a spectacular show of wind, rain, and hail at my place that turned the sky interesting colors.

I found out yesterday that two people died on those bike paths from flash flooding. I didn't ride in yesterday morning due to the rain, and I think that it is a good thing that I didn't, because even today there was some water on the path and a considerable amount of debris. The debris lines reached higher than they were during the dreaded letting of water from the Cherry Creek dam. They're still looking for the bodies of the people who died to my knowledge. I don't know if they were on the Platte or Cherry Creek trails, but it is a sobering thought.

Didn't I Throw You Out a Window?

Hee. I finally got to watch Heroes on my new TV. Amazing what awareness of time zones can do for a person. The subject of the post is the best line of this most recent episode, coming surprisingly from Niki/Jessica (Nessica? Jiki?). It was a mighty fine episode, and yes, SPOILERS are ahead, though really, if you haven't watched it yet, what's wrong with you? There was a lot of action in this episode. Eric Roberts goes down! Take your slimy self with you!

Ted also undergoes the Sylar hair treatment, unpleasantly while upside down. Man, all the blood rushing to your head ... out the top of your head. Nasty. Ooh, ooh! Clea Duvall is back! Oh how I missed your pert FBI agent. Sigh. Mohinder and Bennett face off in a Mexican showdown I wouldn't have imagined. I'm still having trouble reconciling pretty boy Mohinder as a man of action, even after his takedown of Sylar. And Sylar is now badder than ever and ready for a bit of mass murder despite the fact that he was disturbed by it less than 24 hours ago. I guess the slaughter of innocents takes a bit of warming up too, eh Brain Boy?

The takedown of the show, despite all these gripping ones, definitely was DL's phasing fist of fury. Linderman took the nasty dive after DL put his hand through the back of Linderman's head, and from the gross hints they gave, evidently squishing around in brains and nudging Linderman's eyes out of their sockets. Aleve's not going to take care of that headache. Gross.

I still expect Linderman to hop back up though and pull a Claire. He does have healing powers, so who's to say he doesn't have the advanced state of Claire's powers and can heal others and himself? I wouldn't count him out. I read how Tim Kring doesn't have a history with comic books, but the villains-that-never-die gimmick is a hard one to resist. Who wouldn't love another season of Malcolm McDowell being deliciously evil? We still will probably have Ma Petrelli around to give us nightmares, though. They haven't revealed her power yet, and you know she's got to have a doozy.

So what happens next? Honestly, I don't know. Future Hiro's actions seemed to have knocked the timeline off its course, but there's no telling if this isn't how it happened anyway, though I got the impression that President Sylar didn't have Ted's nuclear knuckles.

Anyhow, before I babble on too long, I'll just say that I am super-stoked for next week's finale.
Lost and Heroes finales in one week. It ... may ... be ... TOO MUCH! Must ... contain ... glee!

Congrats, Jason!

So Sunday I ended up going with Sarah and Gavin to Southern Gables church. It was all right, though probably not the place for me. The preacher did make a good point though when talking about whether God speaks to people these days. He quoted a book that said that, (and I'll paraphrase here) divination does not require transformation. If we are just trying to live on our own and get phone calls from God when we have the big decision, we're not living in such a way that we need to immerse ourselves in God's word and transform our minds to think like Him. Anyway, I thought that was a good point.

Later we came back to my place and we had some of the sausage and potato vinaigrette I made the night before. We then hustled over to the convention center and paid 20 (!!!!) dollars for parking to make it into the center in time to get to Jason's graduation. Go Jason! We got to see Governor Ritter speak at the graduation and Jason walk by and also grab his diploma. We did, uh, leave a bit early though, since he walked towards the beginning of the 1,200 or so students whose names were being very carefully enunciated.

We reconvened and went down to Jason's sister's house in Parker. It was a gorgeous drive and a gorgeous house. The food was good and I was glad to meet more of Jason's family. It was also my first time driving on the E-470 toll road, which is more expensive than Orlando's roads. Anyway, it was a good Sunday. Congrats again, Jason!

Visions of Lake Powell

Okay, the pictures from Lake Powell are now up. You all can stop sending the threatening letters and holding vigils outside my apartment windows. I put them up in three sections so they won't quite take forever to load. They are in the gallery on my site, so why don't you go check them out?

Cycling Saturday

Just in case you were impatiently waiting, checking your watch and tapping your foot, I'm almost done with the pictures from Lake Powell. I've reduced 850 plus pics down to around 70. It takes time, people!

So anyway after a little hedonistic sleeping in and breakfast, I gleefully discovered that the mail packet from my housemate in Orlando finally got here and I had a Wired magazine to read through along with a lot of other mail, so I rode my bike down to Washington Park and lounged in the shade while going through my mail. After that, I pedaled over to Bonnie Brae's for some tiramisu ice cream. If you ride your bike there, the calories don't count, right? I certainly hope so.

I figured I'd follow up the ice cream with the delectable, flaky chips from Lime, so I rode my bike to their downtown location, figuring that I could use the exercise. However, for the second time, the hours there tricked me. They aren't open for lunch there. I know they have a different location now that is more of a restaurant than a bar, so I pedaled back up to 6th and Clarkson. It was sort of warm outside and since there were no patio tables free that had umbrellas, I figured I'd go inside and enjoy the air conditioning. Unfortunately, the air conditioning was not happening and it was sweltering inside. I did get my chips though. Oh my goodness. So good.

I ordered a sandwich and some limeade and set to reading my new Wired. I put my feet down on the base of the table and pushed myself back to adjust myself in the chair. The previously stable-seeming table lurched towards me and sent my limeade all over my magazine and onto the floor. That combined with the heat made me seek a quick completion of the meal and a speedy exit. I returned home for some quality time spent in a food coma. Those chips were worth it, though. Mmmm.

Glorious

Man, you cannot beat this weather, not even with a stick, not even with a special weather-beating stick. It was cool, bright, and calm this morning making for an ideal bike ride into work. This afternoon it was warm, drinking-beer-on-a-patio warm. It's the kind of weather that - ZOOP! - sucks the moisture from your mouth in its delightful heat. Aromas waft on the warm air into the street from restaurants. Racine's today smelled like things that'd make people give up on finding ambrosia and nectar and sit on the patio with a Blue Moon and order some queso fries.

That's how you can tell it is finals time at the schools in the area. The weather is so excruciating beautiful and students across Denver are interspersing readings on communication theory and papers on organic chemistry with longing glances out windows. But not Matt! He graduated today from the School of Mines and now is free to enjoy this blissful climate. Congrats, Matt! Now get a job!

Cupcakes of Catan!

Anyone up for trying this?
http://www.adorablog.org/2007/05/cupcakes_of_cat.html
Winner eats it all!

A+! Enthusiasm!

Wow. Last night's Lost episode was amazing. All sorts of questions were raised, and a few were answered. But for now, you must know this: there are SPOILERS in this post. Read if you dare.

So, it appears that Ben is a bad, bad man. Not only is he manipulative, but brought about the death of Dharma, especially his dad. Man, that scene was cold. He just sits there while gassing his dad. Sure he was an alcoholic jerk, but dang. Well, at least Hurley's microbus now has some actual plot significance. And he shot Locke! Locke was laying the verbal smackdown on our bug-eyed friend, and up until Jacob starts his Poltergeist routine he was in control. Now he's in a mass grave with a hole in his gut. Jim pointed out a good theory that it'd be funny if that's the side where he's missing a kidney so there isn't as much damage. I think we'll see Locke back in action soon enough.

Locke seems to have fans in the Others. The apparently immortal Richard Alpert seems to want him to wrest control from Ben and get the Others back to whatever it was they were doing before they started gassing hippies and toting AK-47s. What the heck is up with them and their hobo clothing and high tech weaponry? Maybe they knew how to work the "magic box." Anyhow, how wonderful was the scene where Locke is smacking Mikhail around and Ben's trying to get Tom and Richard to intervene, and they're all like, "I'm staying out of this one, thanks."

And how about that Jacob fellow. He seems to have hangups about flashlights, but that's about all I can tell. There was a theory from a writer for Entertainment Weekly that said the island was haunted by the ghost of a powerful psychic. I'd say that theory just got a lot more fuel to put in its hopper. The question is, is Ben keeping Jacob captive or does he need Locke's help for something else? Is Jacob Smokey, or is he the Island, or what? Man, all sorts of questions arise.

Kudos to the Lost crew, though. The past few episodes had me wondering about the show, but this last one has got me on fire. I can't wait to see next week's episode and see what Jack and Jules have in store for the invading Other army. Oh, and I bet unstable Rousseau and her unstable dynamite will make an appearance. Chaos shall reign and good television will ensue. And someone's gots to die. You know it has to happen. The trailer suggested Charlie, but generally if the trailer suggests it's one person, it'll be another.

Pix Ahoy!

Okay, wow. The episode of Lost was amazing last night, but I need a longer amount of time to write about that. So instead, I bring you news of pictures! I know I should be working on the Lake Powell pictures, but I took on a more manageable project last night and put up the pix from Corrie's visit to Denver. You can check them out in my gallery.

Never Hit Your Mother With a Snow Globe

So, it took me an hour and a half to watch a 40 minute show, but I did manage to watch the latest episode of Heroes. The buffering of video was out of control; it took 5 minutes after running 30 seconds of video. I finally hooked my laptop up with an ethernet cable and that seemed to make a difference.

X marks the spot for spoilers! X! So, it was weird to see Sylar's sensitive side. Given what we've seen of him now, I was surprised that he was troubled by the thought of killing millions of innocents. It makes him step back from the brink of super evil evilness, which is nice, because it makes him more 3 dimensional as a character. Too bad he follows up this tenderness by sticking scissors in his mom. Geez. And speaking of mothers, Ma Petrelli is one stone cold woman; echoes of Angela Lansbury in The Machurian Candidate. And speaking of resemblances in pop culture, if any of you have read the Watchmen graphic novel, you might notice a few similarities between Linderman's grand plan and the villain's plot in that book. If you haven't given it a read, I recommend it if you're up for a dystopian, bleak Cold War era super serious comic book. Boy, can I sell a story or what?

Durrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrh

Heh. I turned on my TV at 9 to watch Heroes. I caught the last minutes of it. What?! Oh. Right. Time zones. You'd think that since I know that Lost starts at 9, an hour earlier than its unjust 10 o' clock EST start, that I might realize the same would happen with Heroes and put it at 8. Ptthhbbbbht.

Corrie

What a delightful weekend and what a delightful person to spend it with. I picked Corrie up at the airport and we went out for a night in style, all dressed up. We had an amazing dinner at Le Central and then went downtown for a stint at Double Daughters. My goodness, I haven't seen that place that busy ever. Corrie got me the first season of The Tick, which is one of the more awesome gifts I have received. So we watched a few episodes of that and stayed up talking.

Saturday morning saw us head over to the Denver Art Museum (slogan: DAM! That's good art!) and we toured both the old and new buildings. The new building is pretty cool, though a bit disorienting when you're inside. They really have some nifty pieces I haven't seen before, and some I wish I didn't see, like the decomposing cow head in formaldehyde. I will have some pictures up ... uh, sometime in the future. I'm still working through the 850+ from Lake Powell.

After the DAM, we went to Little India and gorged ourselves on pakora and curry. Put into a sufficiently vegetable state, we went down to the Mayan and watched Hot Fuzz. Oh my goodness, that is a funny movie. It had some incredibly gory moments, but it was a brilliant film and I haven't laughed so hard in many a moon. Bobby, I second your opinion. After that we toddled down to DU and I gave Corrie the walking tour of the campus in a soothing drizzle. After that, back to the apartment for popcorn and The Incredibles, which she had not seen yet. Good thing I rectified that. After that, we found that it was actually snowing outside. Sheesh. Nothing stuck, though.

Sunday we sojourned out to Red Rocks and gallivanted around there. We came back to the apartment and walked down the Cherry Creek bike path to downtown where we tried to get some of those delectable chips from Lime, but the cheeky monkeys were closed on Sunday, so we went over to the Wazee Supper Club and had a great lunch. I had one of the best reubens I've ever had accompanied with frings (fries and onion rings mixed together) and a Henry Weinhard's vanilla cream soda. Man, I haven't had one of those in ages. So, so, so good.

After lunch we hit the Tattered Cover and then made it down the 16th Street Mall to the theater and decided we'd take in Spider-man 3. It was decent, but certainly not up to snuff with the other films in that series. Then we came home and watched another episode of The Tick before heading over to Scum of the Earth for church. Yeah, doesn't sound like a church, does it? There's a reason for that. Unfortunately, just about every technical difficulty that could happen did. Then back to the apartment for more Tick and good conversation. Oh, and I gave her a copy of Blue Like Jazz.

I got Corrie to the airport this morning and yawned my way through work, doing the rare act of drinking a cup of coffee. A great weekend, but exhausting. Let's do it again!

Da Bed is in Da House!

Glee! I have a bed now. I just went out an purchased myself mattress set to go with the frame that John and Sarah gave me. Thanks to the wise folks at Denver Mattress Company, I was able to get it home tied to the top of my car. My car's antennae detaches. Who knew? The people at Denver Mattress Company, that's who! So I now own a new queen size mattress that I pretty much bent in half trying to get into my room. I don't think that's good for the mattress. It was a very reasonably priced mattress, and well worth it to finally end a month plus of sleeping on the floor. Of course, Corrie is coming in tomorrow (Extra Supreme Biggie Size Glee!) so I'll give her the bed and ... sleep on the floor.

But it is worth it! Absolutely! I am super-stoked that she is coming and that I'll get to be her guide to Denver. There are so many things to do, so many places to show her, and so much good food to eat. With her, I'll be making my first trip back to Le Central since forever, which is awesome. They better have a king-sized bread pudding waiting for me. Or maybe queen-sized to go with my new mattress. But Corrie's coming to-mooorrr-ow! Yay!

Also, I must give props to God (You da man!) for the ease with which I got the mattress to my building and into the apartment. Not only was I able to effortlessly purchase the mattress and the people were helpful in getting it here, but there was a parking spot in front of the building where I could unload and not worry about having my car blocking anyone in. Considering all the things I had to get done tonight, it went really, really well and that deserves a P-T-L!

Where is Lost Going?

Do I need to say it? SPOILERS ahead if you haven't watched the most recent episode of Lost. So, I like that Lost seems to be revealing some big mysteries. The next two episodes promise some good revelations, but we'll see how well they make good on those promises. The problem I'm seeing right now is that their revelations tend to be things that people on the forums have figured out a while ago. For instance, tonight we had it confirmed that Locke's dad is the guy who moved Sawyer's dad to kill himself and his wife. Great. I figured that out about two months ago with The Man from Tallahassee episode. Claire is Jack's half sister? Great. Guessed that waaaaaay back in Ana Lucia's episode where she moonlights with Jack's dad.

What really troubles me, is they're laying down heavy hints that everyone on the island is dead and that they're in purgatory or hell. This would be lame because:

1. The producers already denied this back in season one or two.
2. The book The Third Policeman, which they said was very important to Lost, was (SPOILER WITHIN A SPOILER ALERT) set in hell with a 'magic box' that could produce anything. So if they really are in hell, this means they dropped the big one way back in the beginning of season two.
3. People already guessed this back in the first season on the forums.
   

So is this just a red herring? I mean, we have at least one more season of the show to go through. Would they really confirm the big one about the island (with Locke's dad's revelation) now? I really, really hope that the plane in the ocean trench is a cover up by the Others and that the paramedics tending to Locke's dad were really Others doing a little smash and grab.

Two things that I think point to this being a red herring is that Lenny, the guy from Hurley's asylum, heard the numbers being broadcast while at a Pacific listening post. So unless the radio tower can transmit from the afterlife, the island is not hell. But this is Lost, so maybe it is a supernatural radio station. The second is that Penny's company on the outside picked up some signal and was able to derive coordinates from it. So unless hell has a lat and long...

Anyway, I feel sort of sad for the writers that came up with great ideas, but everyone's figured it out before the reveal. Well, they still do throw shockers like Juliet being a mole. Let's hope the next two episodes pack some wallop. Tonight's ep was mainly creepy. I guess the Others are into ritual sacrifice or something. And you thought fraternity hazing was bad.

Mmm. This Feels Nice.

I like this. Today David asked me to create an ActionScript class to add into the project framework. It wasn't a big class; just something to load in a series of images using a couple of other classes and to hold them in a queue if need be. But I was able to do it with only a few hangups (and these not related to the framework, but my own silliness with ActionScript) and get it done in a fairly timely manner. It's nice to be useful.

Also nice was that at the end of the day, the waters had largely receded from the bike trail and I was able to get home without much trouble. Also, yesterday I saw a new piece of graffiti on one of the ramps on the bike path. As much as graffiti annoys me, this one was awesome: a crying unicorn. Unfortunately, it wasn't there today, so maybe it was only chalk or the parks people took care of it.

So, I also now have a dresser and a bed frame ... but no mattress or box springs, which had disappeared. Haha. Thanks to John and Sarah for giving me the dresser and the frame. Both are made of beautiful Hawaiian mango wood, and the dresser ends 2 and a half years of living out of a suitcase. Corrie, you feel up for some mattress shopping? I dunno if I'll get to it tomorrow, though I may try. I will have a full bed some day!

Mleh.

Welcome to the Turbid Water Complaints Department. We don't take 'em. We make 'em. Here's today's list:

1. My breakfast ended up flipping off the table this morning. The bagels ended round side up on my lap, which means that the peanut butter and jam side was well smooshed into my clothes.
2. While we're talking about peanut butter, why the heck does no one here seem to carry the Smucker's crunchy natural peanut butter? They have the creamy, and they have the crunchy of other brands. Why not Smuckers? Of all the natural peanut butters, it is the only one to have the right consistency after being refrigerated. C'mon! Get me my stinkin' peanut butter.
3. Cherry Creek was still all over the bike paths this morning, so I had to ride along Speer this morning. On the way back it was lower so I kept to the path and ended up still riding through the sand and water in the higher water areas that hadn't cleared yet. I know turbid water is the name of this blog, but it needs to be in a creek not on my frickin' bike path. And it was raining today, thank you very much.
4. Where the heck is my mail packet!? My mail that got sent to my old address still hasn't gotten here, and my latest Wired magazine is in it. I want my magazine! Instead, all I had in my mailbox was junk mail.
5. I have freakin' high bandwidth internet, and I still can't watch an episode of Heroes without having to wait after each minute of video for a minute of buffering. The episode was good though. SPOILER! President Sylar dropped my jaw, I tell you what.
6. Why do people spell whine as whinge? I mean, really, just use whining rather than whinging. Sheesh!
   
7. Stupid hives!

Mleh. :P That's what I say.