I got up and ran around Sparkman Park a couple of times. It was a nice changeup from the treadmill even though it's still too cold.

Below is a trip report I wrote up from our last trip to St. John. I doubt we'll go this year, but I'm all ready jonesing to go back.

19 Oct 03
Got up at 4, left the house at 4:30. Getting through security at Huntsville International was a breeze - beat the hell out of going through Atlanta which we did last year to save a few bucks.

The flight from Atlanta to Charlotte Amalie was uneventful. Landing, getting our luggage, taxi to Red Hook, all without incident. Jon retrieved the Jeep while I sat on the Cruz Bay dock with a silly grin on my face. I was so glad to be back. It was a dark blue 4-cylinder Wrangler with 18,000 miles on it. I had to listen to Jon again grouse about how much better his jeep at home was.

We drove to Moonsong; it wasn't too far from where we stayed the year before (French Cap). We met a nice woman whose name I have forgotten who works for the rental company who gave us the rundown. It's a pretty villa with a nice view of Hart's Bay except for some power lines.

I could also hear some construction but it's in the background; not loud or annoying at all.

Jon and I agreed; Moonsong is no French Cap. One advantage that Moonsong had, however, is it comes with its own cat. Leo is a sweet little orange fellow who knows a pair of suckers -er, cat lovers, when he sees them. We spoiled him rotten. Tip to future guests: Leo is all for leftover scallops.

20 Oct

We drove into town to finish up paperwork on the Jeep. St. John car rental folks are very nice. Depending on who was working that day, sometimes we could park there, sometimes we couldn't. If someone could figure out a way to make a multi-storied garage in downtown Cruz Bay he would be a billionaire in a year.

Anyway, we went to Low-Key Watersports next to plonk some cash down for scuba diving. We dived with them last year and had a great time. We arranged for our first dive (the 21st), then drove out to Trunk Bay, a place we missed last year.

The beach is indeed beautiful, but the snorkeling, even with the trail, was somewhat disappointing. But dang, it felt so good to be in the warm Caribbean water. I can see why
cruise ship folks are taken there for Snorkeling 101. It is calm, and it did have plenty of fish and coral.

We spent the rest of the day unwinding, after a trip to Starfish to stock up on food. We went
to Rumbalaya for dinner - I had the shrimp parmigania and plenty of Amstel Light. I loved the food because they didn't overcook the shrimp.

21 Oct

It rained last night, but the interior of the Jeep is magically dry. In the early morning, we had no trouble spotting St. Croix off in the distance from the deck.

We did our first dive with Low-Key: the first spot was Calf Rock. It wasn't a tough dive; a nice ease back into scuba diving after a long layoff. The only place to dive near Huntsville
is a rock quarry; we use it only to stay current. Calf rock had lots of typical Blue Tang and Parrotfish.

One spiffy note: some of the Low-Key people remembered my husband and I from the year before.

They let us go off on our own on the second dive (Little St. James) which was nice because when you're with a big group you can run into each other a lot, but on the other hand my husband likes to scuba like he's trying to set a speed record.

Steve Simonsen, the photographer, was aboard. He was one of the people who remembered us. He is a very nice man who has a knack for storytelling. He and my husband talked shop - Jon is a skydiving videographer so they were comparing camera equipment and contrasting trying to get a good picture in their respective environments.

Chicken wings and Amstel light at the Beach Bar for lunch.

We took the ferry to Charlotte Amalie in the afternoon to look for a charger for the digital
camera. We skipped out on the shopping experience last year; I'm glad. I thought I was going to be kidnapped by some of those salespeople.

Ribeyes on the grill, accompanied by steamed rice and salad for dinner. I had Sam Adams for a changeup. The kitchen in Moonsong is decent sized, but somewhat underequipped. I tried to stay up for the World Series, but I was pooped.

22 Oct

Today we went to what is probably my favorite place in the known universe: Cinnamon Bay. The snorkeling is much better there. We saw a ray right off.

We went on our first night dive tonight; for some reason my mask kept filling with water until I figured out how to keep my nose pinched. Embarrasing. There were 4 of us; our guide was a nice young fella named Travis. Tip him well if you ever dive with him.

I saw a squid on that dive - oh, yeah. This was Stephen's Cay. Lots of critters come out at night; Travis had us stand on the sand and turn our lights out to view the glowy critters.

We ate at the Beach Bar again - fish and chips, and Amstel light. Jon invited over the other 2 divers who went with us; a woman and her dad from California (that plane trip must have sucked) who were staying at the Maho Bay camps. I remember looking around the bar - no young beautiful people; just us ordinairy schlubs having a good time in paradise.

23 Oct

Man, I'm writing a novel. I'll try and speed this up:

Today is goof-off day.I slept late and read something forgettable. Hell, even Jon read a book and he never reads for pleasure. Later that afternoon, he drove to the dock to pick up two of his friends that were joining us. I sat in the hot tub (which was not hot - I didn't want it to be), drank some beer, and finished my book while waiting for them.

2 people in Moonsong is just fine. 4 adults is way cramped.

24 Oct

We took Steve and Sylvia to Cinnamon Bay to pick up some snorkeling skills. They did okay - Sylvia was a bit nervous but she got the hang of it. Jon talked them into trying Scuba.

25 Oct.

They tried to learn, at least. It wasn't for them. All four of us went diving with Low-Key again. We did a drift dive at Lind Point. Steve and Sylvia worked on their tans.

26 Oct

We rented a 28' and trawled. We caught 2 fish, a mooring float, and a boobie (the bird, people!). All were safely freed. We tried snorkeling at Waterlemon key, but the tide was awful strong. As we trawled I sat on the bow and enjoyed watching the islands slowly drift by.

27 Oct

Scuba! Little St. James and Calf Rock again. The currents are preventing us from going out to other sites. Jon was excited because we finally saw a turtle.

28 Oct

Oh, my Diety - We spent the day shopping in Charlotte Amalie. A word of advice: if you are going to go on vacation with people who have different tastes than you, AT LEAST make sure they are comfortable with going off on their own!

Jon and I did another night dive, this time at Grass Cay with a new mask. I had a much better time. Saw a stingray, octopus, tarpon, and a teeny nurse shark.

29 Oct

Steve and Sylvia's last day - we went back to Cinnamon Bay yet again and snorkeled. I can't get over that place. I need to become a bazillionaire one of these days and just buy the whole island.

We got them to the ferry and I hate to say it but I was relieved that they left. To celebrate, (well,I was celebrating. they are my husband's friends), we went yet again to the Beach Bar and had buffalo wings and beer.

30 Oct

Jon and I ended up being the only people on the dive boat besides Travis (and the way cool and ever reliable Billy the captain). Steve Simonsen showed up again, as well. It was nice of the owners to let us go out any way. That couldn't have been profitable, but it does wonders for your customer service reputation. We did a drift dive off of Hart's Bay which Jon and I agree was our favorite of our stay. Travis found a ledge where we counted 7 lobsters lurking about. We passed an incredible Wall-o-Tarpon. This place was chock-loaded with fish. We were with a strong current and we barely had to kick. I also got to see a sea turtle up close.

31 Oct

Yet more diving, this time with more people on the boat. Congo Cay and Mingo Cay. We were greeted by the sight of a waterspout way off in the distance. I live in tornado alley and I have to go on vacation to the Caribbean to see one. It didn't affect our dive. On Mingo Cay Jon and I went off alone again. These are our last dives so we take our time (Jon finally managed to learn some self-control).

We did not do anything Halloween night but watch horror movies on TV. And drink beer.

1 Nov

Oh, woe is me. I ran into Low-Key before the ferry left to buy a tee-shirt. One of the dive guides, Penny was behind the counter. She saw how upset I was at leaving and tried to cheer me up. Did I mention how much I liked this company?

We took the ferry to Charlotte Amalie and killed a little time before going to the airport to shop some more (AAAAAAAAAAAIGH!). That was Jon's idea. Last year we killed time by renting a Cessna 172 and flying around a bit. Now that was fun.

I remember when we flew in being excited and feeling bad for people leaving. Now I felt bad and was deeply envious of the people coming in. I spent some of the money remaining on several gallons of booze, although I'm mostly a beer person (if you didn't notice). Hey, it makes great gifts.


Anyway: Overall, despite the complaining I did in this commentary, we had a great time. The best part about it, besides the cat, was Cinnamon Bay and scuba diving with Low-Key. I whined about Moonsong but it was actually a nice place. It just suffered in comparison to the last place we rented. We did get to see the interior of Sundance, its companion home, and *that* place is really nice.

The weather was perfect; it rained some but never for long. I think Jon and I got very lucky, because it wasn't more than 2 weeks after we left the islands got drubbed by rainfall. The ocean was clear and beautiful; next time we go I would rather go again in July because it seemed calmer at that time of year.

Shoulders and legs day. Do you know why I love squats so much? Because if feels so good when I stop!

I'm feeling back in the exercise groove; I've decided I should run on Saturday and do a little more weight training on Monday to supplement my Tue/Wed/Fri workouts.


Last night I watched a movie I haven't seen in ages: The Towering Inferno. Unlike The Swarm, this movie is actually decent meow. I won't say great; it is somewhat dated. But what a cast! Both Paul Newman AND Steve McQueen. I spent some of the movie wondering whose eyes were bluer. My vote is McQueen.

I fondly recall that when my sister and I saw that movie, she decided she wanted Newman, and I wanted McQueen. I was 11 in 1975. In some ways I miss all those hormone rushes. Middle age sucks.

It also had William Holden, Faye Dunaway, Richard Chamberlain - you know, when he came out of the closet I was relieved I no longer had to feel guilty over all those times I saw him and thought "I bet he's gay". Not that there's anything wrong with that meow.

While the movie held up its tension in some places, in other places my eyes were crossing at how slow the action was creeping. I found another use for TiVo at that point: I sped up the entire 'scale down the twisted stair railings sequence' from about 5 hours to a half a minute. TiVo rules!

Some of the fun of this movie is the old-fashioned sexism: Newman and Dunaway are a couple - I could never figure out if they were married or not. Newman has just gotten a job out in bumblefuckmeow, Montana; and Dunaway has just been promoted in her job in San Fransisco. You don't have to be psychic to figure out who gived up his or her job by the end of the movie.

I taped Midway, a movie about the turning point in the war in the Pacific. It has an amazing cast, including Charlton Heston. He's not an ex-listee, he has always had his own little niche in my heart.

Oh, yeah: editorial note. To all the people who mealy-mouthed Mr. Heston for becoming the head of the NRA. How dare you paint a man who marched with Martin Luther King, Jr. as some sort of ultra right-wing fanatic! I'm glad that Bush got elected; if nothing else because you aimed your 2-minute Hate sessions at someone else. Disagreeing with his stance on the 2nd amendment is one thing; making fun of his Alzheimer's is another. Yeah, you, George Clooney, you little meowdweeb!

Enough of *my* 2 minute Hate. More like a 2 minute grudge. I don't hold Clooney's stupidity or politics against him. If I did that, I'd have to do it for other actors then I'd probably never see another movie again.

Back to Midway. Heston or no, cast of thousands or no, it is a boring-ass movie. I must have seen it a million times when I was a kid but this time it's slow going. I think I mentioned this before; it suffers from Titanic syndrome: much of the story is about a young pilot who is in love meow with a Japanese-American (whoopsie!). It hasn't really gotten to the battle scenes yet, so maybe I'll appreciate it more later on.

And in other news I'm hoping to talk Jon into going to see Club Dread with me. It's been a while since Bill Paxton's been in anything humorous. I found the humor in Super Troopers a little uneven, but the stuff I found funny I found to be really funny meow.

My Husband the Engineer part 3

Actually this is to praise him; he went out and bought a little gadget that people use to blow up air mattresses, and he used it to get a fire going in the fireplace stove. This time it got hot enough to heat the chimney so all of the smoke went up the flue. It also got the heat in the house up to around 90 degrees. When we went to bed the fire was nothing but embers and the stove was still warm when we woke up in the morning. The (expensive gas) heat never kicked on during the night.

I love the tropics; nothing like watching TV in your underwear in the middle of winter. I should have whipped up some frufru tropical rum drinks but I have to stop that for a while.

I'm always amazed by cats. Both of them sat in front of the fireplace and happily melted. Domestic cats are descended from desert creatures and they love being warm.

Speaking of cats, we have two: Vasquez, who is about 18 (I got her when I was in college); and Eruo, who is maybe 3. Euro is twice Vasquez's weight and he loves to pick on her. She can barely jump up on the table but she'll fight back if he's in a playful mood.

Vasquez is blase about moving; God knows she and I have moved to about 10 different places in the last 18 years. We got Eruo (actually, I can't pronounce that damn name either so I just call him Big Fat Kitty) at an animal shelter and he's only known our old house. He was pretty psychotic when we moved but he's adjusting. I can't keep him out of the kitchen cabinets though.

And even though cats are pretty much useless, Big Fat Kitty has one good but odd habit: at night when we've gone to bed he'll hop up on my legs (I sleep on my belly) and give my butt a massage. Jon thinks it's sick, but hey he's not getting one. Personally having a 16 pound cat kneading my gluteus maximii is quite soothing, especially after a heavy leg workout day. He's just jealous.

Speaking of workouts, yes I went yesterday and today. I am thinking that the new gym's treadmills are adjusted differently than the old gym's treadmills because I can't run as fast on the new gym's. At least not by their little gauges. But a weight is pretty much a weight so we have had no problems adjusting our weight training to the new gym.

I have had to quit doing dips; my left shoulder is hurting. Not bad, but I don't want to make it worse. I'm thinking I'm having a classical rotator cuff problem that comes from exercising one set of rotator cuff muscles and ignoring another set. Instead of the dips I'm doing some of these exercises and stretches. . Don't ask me why I'm looking at Dragon Boat pages. I have no idea why my right shoulder doesn't hurt.

I'm starting to experience insomnia again; I am now convinced it is because of hypocaloric eating. Oh, well. I have more energy like this anyway and can handle that metallic tired feeling better.

Top 10 favorite meals: (just because I'm hungry!)

10) Grilled ribeye (medium rare) with romaine salad
If I'm in a carb mood a baked potato or fries goes well with this meal.

9) Spicy Shrimp Scampi
This is basically shrimp cooked scampi style, then cayenne pepper, parmesan cheese, and italian bread crumbs are added to the pan. Mmm. I usually eat this with plain fettucini. Modified for low carb by omitting the bread crumbs and eating with spaghetti squash.

8)Curry
This is just a stew. Some sort of meat, stock, and veggies. The curry is curry powder, cream or milk, cayenne pepper, and a little sugar (or splenda). Infinitely variable.

7)Sushi
Especially a spicy tuna roll. I will eat sashimi, but I'm not too adventurous for that one.

6)Chicken Wings
And beer.

5)Lechon
Puerto Rican dish. It's basically a pork picnic shoulder that's marinated in mashed garlic, salt, pepper, olive oil and lemon juice (called adobo). Once you start roasting it in the oven, the smell is overwhelming and the entire neighborhood spontaneously starts drooling.

4)Angel Hair pasta in pesto sauce w/ italian sausage
Okay, I'm making myself drool

3)Chicken and Dumplings
Grandma's recipe. Veggie of choice: Green Beans.

2)Barbequed Ribs
mmmmmmmmmmm ribs, mmmmmmmmmm

1) Arroz con Pollo
A Puerto Rican dish that I absolutely adore. I haven't made it in years because Jon doesn't like it. The chicken is marinated in adobo.

Some day I'll have to put these recipes on the web. Here's the one for the Arroz con pollo:

Adobo: for each pound of chicken:

1 Garlic clove
1 tsp of salt
3 pepper corns
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp vinegar
1 tablespoon olive oil.
Mash the dry stuff to a pulp; add vinegar and olive oil. Slather the meat w/this marinade and refrigerate for about 24 hours. This marinade I use on just about any meat in existence.

1 cut up chicken
1/4 pound ham, diced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
1 can Ro-Tel diced tomatoes and peppers
2 cups long grain rice.
4 cups liquid (combo of water, stock, Ro-Tel liquid)
1 Tablespoon turmeric
Cayenne if desired.

In a dutch oven heat olive oil in medium high heat. Add chicken and brown. Toss in ham and onions somwhere. After a while add rice and stir so that the oil will coat the grains. Add the tomatoes and peppers, turmeric, and a little cayenne. Puerto rican dishes are *not* spicy, that's my addition. So is the turmeric, to be honest. They use saffron.
Add liquid and leftover marinade. Bring to a boil, put lid on, and set stove to low for 20 minutes. Turn off heat and leave alone for another 10 minutes. Stir gently and then it should be ready to eat.

This stuff tastes even better the next day.

What a gorgeous weekend that was! I jumped 7 times; 3 student jumps and 4 fun jumps, including a sit-fly with my brother. Our little DZ needed a weekend like that. One of the student jumps was with a young man named Richard Winters, which tickled me to no end.

Well, I finished up the Forsyte Saga II and it did not end as bad as I thought it would. Matter of fact I was very happy with the ending even if it wasn't 'happy ever after'. Soames and Irene, both in their 60's, finally made peace. And since I was sniffling into my hankie on the couch, this leads me to my top 10 list:

Top ten movies/TV shows that have made me cry (in no real order):

The Forsyte Saga II
Near the end, Fleur expresses a great deal of hatred towards her father, Soames. She blames him for destroying her chances of marrying Jon. Jon's mother, Irene, was married to Soames, remember (also remember this is a soap opera). She left him after he raped her. Fleur lashes out at her father, saying he must have done something horrible to make Jon's parents hate her so much (they did. Boy I was pissed at both of them for blaming Fleur for what Soames did.) Soames tells Fleur exactly what happened. And in a jaw-dropper, he expresses great remorse for doing something so horrible to someone he loved so greatly. Soames up to that point has never expressed *any* emotion. Fleur sees the agony her father is in; has always been in; and forgives him. And I am a sodden puddle on my couch.

Untamed Heart
I curse forever my sister for showing me this movie. This is exactly the type of movie I detest. Usually I can sneer cynically through them, like I did with City of Angels or Phenomenon, but I shamefully cried at the end of this one.

Saving Private Ryan
I cried both during the invasion of Normandy sequence and the end, though I felt more manipulated at the end. Still. I know people think the violence is bordering on pornographic, but if you were to watch war movies from the 50's and 60's only, you would get the impression that most soldiers died of acid indigestion (they wince, clutch their chest, and slump down). I don't think it's a bad thing to show exactly what happens in war.

Spartacus
It wasn't Spartacus' death (oops, hope I didn't ruin it for you), it was the death of freedom through political machinations. Spartacus is very much a Libertarian-themed movie. I also got misty during Maximus' death in Gladiator, but I was left feeling manipulated.

Band of Brothers
Of course. I cried at the ending of the last episode, not for the men who didn't make it, but for the men who lived. Most of them put the war behind them and lived their lives. I was crying as Major Winters voiced over everyone's fate - I was hit with a big wave of melancholy as I realized those that the war didn't take were slowly being taken by time. At least they had lives, but it's still sad to think about.

The English Patient
A gorgeous movie with gorgeous actors. I don't find this movie romantic one bit. Well, a teeny bit. It is a horrible tragedy, a good illustration of the Law of Unintended Consequences, as two people have an affair and the destruction that follows. Very sad. *Sniff*

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
I was a basket case during that particular scene. Compare the characters in this movie to those in Love Story a movie that meant nothing to me. Honorable mention to The Ice Storm, another Ang Lee movie: when Kevin Kline bursts out crying at the end, so did I.

The Return of the King
When Frodo said goodbye to Sam Gamgee I was sniffling along with him.

12 Monkeys
Not being able to escape one's fate. Quite depressing. Honorable mention to Brazil, which left me teary-eyed as well.

Grave of the Fireflies
Oh, god. These were in no particular order, but this one is number One with a bullet. Emphasis on the bullet, which I would have gladly used on myself after watching this movie. This is a Japanese animated movie about two World War II war orphans. Holy shite I was a basket case after seeing this one. Absolutely guaranteed to make you bawl your eyes out.

I sent my first text message yesterday via cellphone. I am slowly being dragged, kicking and screaming, into the 21st Century.

Good news: we have rented out the old house. That's a load of financial worry off my mind. Unless they are late with payments.

We finally seem back into the swing of things since moving. I took it easy on Shoulders and Legs day at the gym, but it's been three weeks since we've done them so I took it easy weight-wise especially when doing squats and stiff-legged deadlifts. I can all ready tell though I'm going to be sore in the morning. Bad me! No cookie!

Spike TV (how cool to name a network after a vampire!) has this show called Extreme Elimination or something like that. It is kind of like "Iron Chef" in that it's an overdubbed Japanese show. The dubbing goes for yuks (aimed at 5 year old boys, just like the entire network); the only reason I watched more than 5 minutes of it was because I was shocked that any one would let themselved be abused on TV like that. Oh, who am I kidding? I was laughing at those poor fools.

It reminds me of a Dilbert strip, where Dogbert (who had acquired a large amount of money) offered a man $10,000 dollars to wallow face-down in a puddle of mud. He enthusiastically complied; and Dogbert said to himself "I don't see how rich people could ever get bored!"

I remember a conversation about Fear Factor, which is as close to that Japanese TV show as we've got; where I said if someone gave me $10,000 bucks, sure I'd chow down on a plate of roaches. I'd have to be guaranteed the money though. I wouldn't go through that kind of hell and humiliation for free! Or a chance to be on TV. Matter of fact, I try to avoid cameras.

Jon and I saw bits and portions of Extreme Elimination while watching VH1's I Love the 80's Strikes Back. I did not realize how weird the 80's were. The big hair, the music sung by guys wearing lipstick, and of course the beginning of the computer age (Atari 2600, anybody?).

I wonder if we realize that we are living in a science fiction world. I may be wrong, but as a child I don't recall any science fiction book predicting the World Wide Web. The first computer I learned to program was a Radio Shack Trash 80; now I own a cell phone that's ten times more sophisticated than that thing. I own an mp3 player that can store 20 gigabytes of information (or 5,000 songs, approximately). It can hold pretty much any type of data, however. I do seem to recall them predicting CD/DVD players.

I just heard a rumor that Ken and Barbie (who just broke up) were originally marketed as brother and sister. Great! Alabama Trailer Trash. And don't get on my case about stereotyping! When Jon and I went to the courthouse to see about our marriage license, the lady behind the counter told us the day before an uncle and niece tried to get hitched. Ew. Anyway, Barbie has thrown Ken over for an Australian Surfer Dude. Oh, yeah, that will last.

Speaking of Spike, FX is showing season 7 Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes. I wish I had found out sooner because I missed the first 5 or 6 episodes of that season. As it is I did see one ep I hadn't seen before, "Selfless" which is about Anya's decision not to be a vengeance demon again.

Next to Spike, Anya was my favorite. In this episode we learn her origins as a vengeance demon and discover she has always been socially clueless, even before demonic status. We get a nice flashback to "Once more, with feeling", where Anya sings a song about being Mrs. Xander, then whammo we fast-forward to the present to see her pinned to a wall by a sword through her heart. Buffy-delivered, of course. Takes more than that to kill a demon though. I realize time was running short, but I wish she had gotten more of a eulogy at the end of BtVS than "That's my girl, always doing the stupid thing!".

And D'Hoffryn was kewl. "Never go for the kill, when you can go for the pain!" Very demony.

And it sucks about WB cancelling Angel. I have heard rumors that they are shopping the show around; maybe it will end up on UPN like Buffy did. Hell, maybe I'll be able to see it then! Here's hoping that no matter what Joss Whedon will get a job somewhere.

This blog entry is scattershot. Oh yeah, I found out the other day that they will not cut off Ewan's masculinity in the domestic release of Young Adam. Hooray, but I'll still have to wait until DVD, I bet.

I didn't have much time to write anything so I dug something I wrote up last year:

I have never had jury duty before so I was looking forward to it (it also gave me several days away from the office, which was pleasant).

All the cases were criminal - at the beginning of the week there were 136 cases. I was in the first group of 30 to be called out and we were asked a bunch of questions by the prosecutor and defense lawyer. The questions were pretty innocuous - were you a victim of a crime, were you ever arrested, do you know anyone in the courtroom, etc. After the questions, the prosecution and the defense 'struck' jurors - they took turns and called numbers out, striking out the people they didn't want on the jury, until 12 remained, one of which was me.

So the judge gave us some preliminary instructions - I don't really remember what they were. She told us what the charges against the defendant were - DUI, driving w/a revoked license, driving a car without a license tag. Then the prosecution gave introductory arguments, then the defense.

The prosecutor was a young man, I'd say in his early 30's. He was well dressed and confident. He had that Sam Waterston thing going pretty good. The Defense looked to be in his 50's, very much an Alabamian and a drama queen.

Any way, I won't go into a blow-by-blow, but the prosecution then had 4 witnesses, the arresting officer, a security guard who had radioed the officer when he had smelled alcohol, the officer who had driven the defendant to the jail, and the officer who was supposed to have administered the breathalyzer test.

The prosecution's argument was this: the defendant had driven to a housing project with a friend, and was stopped at the gate by the security guard. The defendant wanted in to visit a relative, the relative was not on the list of tenants (this place had a real bad reputation and was in the process of being shut down). The security guard sent him away and informed the arresting officer about his suspicions the people in the car had been drinking. The officer, in an unmarked car, followed the defendant and saw him weaving some, so he pulled him over. He gave him some field sobriety tests and the guy failed.

The arresting officer's car did not have a cage in the back. He radioed for someone to come pick the defendant up to take him to jail. That officer smelled alcohol on the defendant's breath. At jail, he refused to take a breathalyzer test. The officer who was to administer it stated she smelled alcohol on the man's breath.

Then it was the defense attorney's turn. He only had 2 witnesses - the defendant and his mother. The mom went first, stating that her son had been with her all day - there had been a death in the family and the funeral had been that day. At midnight her son had received a call from a drunk friend who had asked him for a ride from the bar he was at. Against his mother's pleas, he went to get his friend. She stated he had left her house about midnight. The trip to the bar would have taken 15 - 20 minutes. Since he was arrested at approximately 12:38, the defense claimed the defendant simply had not enough time to get drunk.

The defendant had had an accident when he was 18. He had a learning disability in the first place, and emotional problems. The accident included brain trauma which caused almost total hearing loss. He claimed the failed the field sobriety tests because of his disability, not any drinking. He claimed he and the arresting officer argued, and that he had been a bully. The defendant was skinny and short, and the arresting officer was a bulldog-looking fellow.

Closing arguements were made, then the judge told us what to do. We had to elect a foreman first off- I volunteered for some reason, and got the job because no one else wanted it. Then we had to figure out who the hell was lying to us.

We found that poor bastard guilty. Why? Someone was lying to us, and we found more problems with the defendant's story than with the police. The defense lawyer did not offer up one shred of proof of the defendant's disabilities. None. This lawyer wasn't incompetent - he was playing the sympathy card hard-core. Medical and social services documentation would have gone a long way into getting the jury on his side.

And his mother - she obviously loved her son and took care of him. She could drive - she knew her son had no license. Why didn't she go get the drunk friend?

On one hand we had police officers. Did they have a conspiracy? I doubt it. On the other we have a mother with a troubled (33 year old) son who had been in scrapes with the law before.

I felt really bad for both of them (all of us did), but I didn't feel bad about convicting him. It's a damn shame you can't sentence someone to 20 years to being a productive citizen because sending that poor sod to jail isn't going to do anybody good. But that wasn't up to me.

By the time we finished up, the rest of the cases either had juries or were pleaded out.

It's kind of tough to forget about what happened. I think of every one who left a party and got away with drunk driving. I quit doing it when I was 33, when I got out of a DUI by a couple of hours (a couple of hours earlier, I would have registered above the limit). I think I understand that 'jury of your peers' thing a bit better. It was very tough voting guilty because it could easily have been me.

On the other hand I received a letter from the D.A. which informed me that was the guy's 5th D.U.I. conviction.

When they sentenced him they gave him 5 years probation. Yeah, that will teach him! Sheesh, I hope he keeps himself clean.

Chest and Triceps day. I do like the new gym; it is about a mile from our house so when it gets warmer I may just run to the gym for my cardio. There's a pretty park on the way with a running trail, as well.

I didn't do any jumping last weekend; the weather sucked. We did have a chili cookoff which I'm embarrassed to say I won. Embarrassed because as an owner of the drop zone I should have disqualified myself. But I won a spiffy tee-shirt so screw them.

It's also embarrassing because my recipe is so damn simple. Chili is nothing but ground beef stew.

I finally crossed a border I hoped I would never have to cross. I got a cell phone. Now I have to remember to carry the damn thing with me. I bought the cheapest thing I could find and it still has more features than I'll ever bother learning about, including a color display.

Top 10 Songs I Would Set Myself on Fire Just So I Wouldn't Have to Listen to Them Again:

10: Cracklin' Rosie Neil Diamond

I know every lyric to every Neil Diamond song and it's my parents fault.

Oh I love my Rosie child
You got the way to make me happy
You and me, we go in style
Cracklin' Rose you're a store bought woman
But you make me sing like a guitar hummin'
So hang on to me girl, our song keeps runnin' on...
Play it now-ow, play it now-ow, play it now my baby

I should sue them for child abuse.

9: Dancing Queen Abba

Arg.

8: (Everything I Do) I do it for You Bryan Adams

A soul-sucking song I associate with a soul-sucking movie: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. Exacerbated by my husband's love of Bryan Adams AND Kevin Costner.

7: Staying Alive Bee Gees

Falsetto Disco Shite. I should sue my sister for sibling abuse for this one.

6: Billy Don't be a Hero Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods.

Double Arg.

5: Turn the Page Bob Seger

Mournful saxophone over Seger's whining about being a rock star. Oh, you poor man! If you can't stand being on the road, get a real fucking job!!!

4: Juke Box Hero Foreigner

I have a lot of hated memories from my teen years, Foreigner is one of them.

3: Lovin', Touchin', Squeezin Journey

Journey is another. At least I could laugh at Loverboy!

2: Safety Dance Men Without Hats

When the U.S. Army Rangers are sent to flush me out of my well-fortified compound, the Psy-ops guys will crank this up and play it night and day. I'll crack well before 24 hours are up and they can shoot me down as I run out of the compound screaming at the top of my lungs. It will be a mercy at that point.

1: Come on Eileen Dexy's Midnight Runners

Oh my god this song sucks. How the *hell* did it become a top-40 hit? It has a fiddle AND a banjo! Who is to blame? Tura lura kiss my big fat cellulitic ass!

What can I say? Music makes me passionate.

For Back and Bicep day we tried out Hartselle's one and only gym. It was decent; only really small. The free weight room was well-equipped; it has squat cage which is my main concern. The best thing about the gym is that it's so close to our house I can drive home and take a shower before going to work.

Some days I listen to my MP3 player at work. I have about 200 songs in one folder that I set on "random" but I swear the player has its own agenda. It started out on a Joy Division song (existence well what does it matter / I exist on the best terms I can / the past is now part of my future / the present is well out of hand) so I can tell it's going to be moody.

Top 10 television shows I wouldn't have missed even if I was set on fire:

10)Starsky and Hutch

Yeah, I had a thing for David Soul. What was I thinking? Most memorable episode: The scene-for-scene ripoff of Play Misty for Me. At least, that's the only ep I remember.

9)The Rookies

I had a thing for Micheal Ontkean, ok? I don't remember a damn episode from this series except a tie-in with SWAT (Robert Urich. Man, I am so predictable).

8)Kolchak: The Night Stalker

No, I did *not* have a thing for Darren McGavin, although he's always a hoot to watch. This show, nicknamed "monster of the week" by those who loved and hated it, was part of the inspiration of the X-Files.

7)Wiseguy

This show was the first real show to try 'story arcs', first with Ray Sharkey's Sonny Steelgrave arc then the then-unknown Kevin Spacey's Mel Proffit arc. This show was about an undercover cop going after mob figures. After the first season this show slowly deteriorated but I hung on to the lackluster end. Personally I think Ken Wahl is a fat tub of goo but I always appreciated Jonathan Bank's turn as Frank McPike. Any one who remembers Elvis and Priscilla Prim will understand what I'm talking about.

6)Quantum Leap

No, I didn't have a thing for Scott Bakula, either. Dr. Sam Beckett lept from body to body within his own lifetime, trying to correct the past. In a wierd way, this show was a reflection of everybody's frustrated daydreams: go back in time and try and fix something, even if it is simply a chance to talk some sense into some idiots. Think about it; go back in time and stop Klebold and Harris; go back to the set of The Crow and show the actor who killed Brandon Lee (*sob!*) the defective prop gun; warn airport security on 9/11/01.

5)MacGyver

Okay, I did have a thing for Richard Dean Anderson, though I so wanted him to get a haircut (He listened to me for Stargate SG-1. Woo-hoo!). But anyway, MacGyver was the nerd version of Indiana Jones. I loved his ability to think his way out of a problem, although sometimes his dislike of guns got annoying. Oh, sure blow shit up but don't use a firearm.

4)The Incredible Hulk

Oh, hell yes I had a thing for Bill Bixby.

3)Alien Nation

This show, short-lived as it was, has a special place in my heart. It concerned a space ship full of slaves that crash-lands on earth and how the survivors try to integrate themselves into society. The catch is is these ex-slaves are physiologically superior to humans in almost every way. I really liked alien police officer George Fransisco and his family (except his son needed some smacks), and his partner, Sikes. Sikes fit the mold of loner wild-cannon cop, except he was allowed to actually be somewhat pathetic, bitter and lonely. He had a thing for a lady alien despite some prejudices. Character development and interesting stories made this series. Release these on DVD, all ready!

2)Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Once I started watching it, which was the middle of season 7. Finally they managed to end a series on the correct note.

1)The X-Files

My brother made me watch this around the middle of the second season. Sure David Duchovny's cute but I watched this show for Scully. It's still my favorite series of all time although Buffy is a close second. Ended in a mess as the major uber-arc really never made sense. Big deal; there are so many standalone (or almost standalone) episodes that shone: Irresitible, Beyond the Sea, Bad Blood, Humbug, Squeeze, and Pusher. I'm sure I'm leaving out a huge chunk of great episodes. Oh, hey, Krychek was hot. He was such a bad, bad, boy...

I'm going to have to start rewatching the X-Files from the first season.

I finished watching The Longest Day and I don't have much to add. It comes across as several different movies, depending on whether you are watching American, English, or German points of view. That is because it was directed by four different men. The Americans come across as gung-ho, the British droll (one amusing scene has a young Sean Connery bitching about a bagpipe player), and the Germans intelligent, but frustrated by their own military beraucracy and a leader who's a wingnut (Der Fuhrer, of course).

This movie is the fourth that I have seen with at least portions of the invasion of Normandy portrayed. The others include Band of Brothers, the Big Red One, and Saving Private Ryan. I don't really have a point; just it is a fascinating point in time where the Allies start re-taking Europe.

Speaking of Lee Marvin (honest, I was) The Dirty Dozen is a fictional story that takes place just before D=Day. Turner Classic Movies just showed it. No commercials! Kewl!

He trains a dozen soldiers who had committed all kinds of crimes to go on an impossible mission. Who will survive? Pay attention to who committed what crime and you can pretty much guess. It wasn't as good as I remembered it.

One movie that was as good as I remembered it was The Great Escape, though it's a lot more downbeat than I remembered. Great cast, including Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, and James Coburn. One gripe about Coburn. He played an aussie and had a terrible accent. Other than that, it's a gripping three hours.

After all that testosterone it was a blessing to switch to estrogen-drenched british soap opera. I got through part one through three of The Forsyte Saga II. Soames has mellowed a little bit; I love the scenes he has with his daughter because he finally displays some real affection. It's maybe because Fleur honestly loves her father. There was a scene where they danced together where all of a sudden his hunched, stogy old self became graceful. And maybe he was a little, itsy bitsy happy.

I'm dreading part 4. It can't end well; it just can't.

Someone better cast Damian Lewis in a silly, girly-girl romantic comedy as the lead. I have a feeling however he's going to get stuck playing creeps due to certain prejudices.

Well I wrote something for Sunday - concerning a bunch of movies I saw that day because it rained, but I couldn't post it because something was wrong with our DSL connection. I'll post it later on when I get home if it's working.

And even though I promised to hit it hard for the next 90 days I didn't go to the gym this morning because I was up later than I wanted to be cleaning out a wood stove fireplace insert.

That statement is my segue to this: My Husband the Engineer Part 2

Our new house has a fireplace. The fireplace has what is called a wood stove insert. Neither the stove nor the fireplace has been used in years. Jon called a chimney sweep to come clean up and inspect everything. Once that was done, he bought a cord of fire wood.

He tried three times to start a fire; all three caused a great deal of smoke and frustration. Hey, our smoke detectors work so that's something. After his second attempt I told him to let the stove get cold then I would look at it. He explained he had all ready looked and couldn't see a problem.

Stove cooled down, it's now 9 at night and I have crawled halfway into a dirty stove trying to explore everything with my hands, because I couldn't see anything. I did discover that there was a big slab of horizontal sheet metal below where the stove opens up to its vent. This metal was blocking any direct view of the vent. By touch I was able to tell how the vent opened. I also found where the chimney sweep had knocked most of the carbon from the flue; right through the vent onto aforementioned sheet metal slab, effectively blocking the venting, hence the smoke flavored house.

So I got that cleaned and cleared and I kept my husband from trying to start another fire simply because it was so late at night and he had turned his attention to raging at Bell South because the DSL had quit working again.

He tried it again this morning but there was still copious amounts of smoke in the house. We are going to pull the stove out (it sucks, anyway. It might be more energy efficient, but I'd rather have a fire I can look at) and I bet we will get a nice shower of even more carbon. The damn thing doesn't have any kind of flue cap so it should be nice and nasty. Note to myself: buy some Lava soap this afternoon on the way home.

In time for Valentine's Day:

Top 10 Cutest Couples that I could think of off the top of my head:

10: Kim Cattrall and Kurt Russell Big Trouble in Little China

A fun, snarky couple in a fun, snarky movie. Sprinkle on some Kung Fu for extra flavor. Kurt Russell and Dennis Dun make a cute twosome, too.

9: Ron Livingston and Damian Lewis Band of Brothers

Especially Episode 10, where Nixon offers Winters a peace time job at his father's plant. Simply adorable.

8: Ralph Fiennes and Angela Bassett Strange Days

Her brawn and his brain. I wish more movies had this kind of spark between the leads.

7: Christian Bale and Emily Watson Equilibrium

As with 8. the scene where they barely touched fingertips had more electricity than some all-out naked pretzel sex scenes I've seen.

6: Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas Strange Brew

I don't think I have to defend this one.

5: Tim Roth and Amanda Plummer Pulp Fiction

Nor this one.

4: Tim Roth and Gary Oldman Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

Both of these guys play Evil Bad Guys so much, it was a shock to see them play such sweet, goofball losers. And they are adorable together.

3: James Marsters and Sarah Michelle Gellar Buffy the Vampire Slayer

I should also mention David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson here. The chemistry of both of these couples added a strong layer to both of their respective series. Alyson Hannigan and Alexis Denisoff make an awful cute real-life couple enough to deserve honorable mention.

2: Chow Yun-Fat and Danny Lee The Killer

This movie has been celebrated for its homoerotic undertones, almost to the same point as the Lord of the Rings (which I left off the list for being too obvious). Still, thier relationship is wonderfully poignant.

1: Ben Affleck and Matt Damon Dogma

Lots of jokes about these two have all ready been made. I'm not joking though, I think they do their most watchable work opposite each other. Good Will Hunting and Jay and Silent Bob deserve mention here as well.

Woo-hoo! Jon and I now have DSL in our new house. I can surf the web at home with abandon!

So, how have I been updating the blog? Erm, from work. Yeah, I'm a bad person.

No gym today. We were both too sore.

We went out last night and ate sushi; a celebration for a bonus I got at work. Good timing, considering I have to shoulder two houses and an airplane payment this month.

I love sushi. All it is really is a medium for soy sauce and wasabi. No, that's not true; the rice has a distinct flavor and texture. The seaweed and the fillings all have more texture than flavor, it seems to me. I'm perfectly happy with a sushi roll that consists of cucumber, rice and nothing more. A have developed a taste for raw tuna, however. Spicy tuna rolls are my favorite.

Jon had to return a pressure washer to a friend after dinner so I flipped on the tv and caught the very beginning of The Longest Movie.

I'm kidding. The Longest Day is a pretty good war movie about D-Day. The movie encompasses just about everybody's point of view, including German, British, and American military, as well as French Resistance. (One of the few woman's roles - and the only relatively big role for a woman in this movie - was a member of the French resistance. She was pretty kewl, and a nice change from the roles women normally play in mid-20th century war movies.)

When I mean encompass, I mean encompass. I don't think they could make a movie like this again. John Wayne, Richard Widmark, Robert Mitchum, Eddie Albert, Robert Ryan, Richard 'Master Thespian' Burton and a bunch of other familiar faces.

Wayne represents the airborne side of things; he commands a battalion of 82nd Airborne who has the objective of taking the French town of Ste. Mere-Eclise (sp!). These scenes amused me because they were the flip-side of similar D-Day scenes in Band of Brothers(which has a more intimate look at one company in the 101st Airborne Division). Both had scenes where members of the 101st and the 82nd ran into each other and the confusion it caused. Very few if any of the 18,000 paratroopers landed in their correct Landing Zones that night.

The Longest Day did not explain completely why everybody landed off; BoB - thanks to CGI - showed the terrific bombardment the jump planes were taking. Besides the bad weather and night time conditions, many pilots simply gave the paratroopers the green light so they could get the hell out of there.

TLD did have a terrific scene where paratroopers ended up landing in the town of Ste. Mere-Eclese (sp?!?) itself; they ended up being target practice for the German troops stationed there. Owie.

TLD also had a spiffy sequence of British Troops landing in these huge gliders. Damn, those landings were rough!

Anyway it's a long damn movie so I cranked up TiVo so I could go to bed. I'll finish the rest of it tonight.

My Top 10 favorite Villains:

10) Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman Die Hard)

Oh come on of course he's in my top 10!

9) Scorpio (Andrew Robinson, Dirty Harry)

A favorite because there is absolutely nothing likeabe about him. He is a completely evil creep. And when he starts whining about "I have my rights!" *I* wanted to beat him up.

8) Judge (Simon Yam Full Contact)

He's a hoot because he's an absolute flaming homosexual and an absolute badass. I'm absolutely impressed that Yam pulled this role off as well as he did.

7) Catwoman/Selena Kyle (Michelle Pfeiffer, Batman Returns)

Batman Returns is one movie I would have liked to Script Doctor. Hey! That would make an *excellent* top 10 list! Another time, perhaps.

I would remove any mention of the Penguin (no offense to Danny DeVito) and focused this movie on Catwoman, Batman and Max Schrek (Christopher Walken). Catwoman could never figure out whether she wanted to fight Batman, or boink him. She tended to try to do both at the same time. Batman Returns captures some of that with some chemistry between Pfeiffer and Keaton.The scene where Selena and Wayne are dancing and they realize who each other are is classic.

6) Archibald Cunningham (Tim Roth, Rob Roy )

Dresses like a pansy, in his heart he's a ruthless punk. He had an Evil Bad Guy checklist when he went after Liam Neeson's noble Rob Roy: "Let's see: burn the house, kill the livestock, rape the wife... what did I forget? Oh, yes. Shoot the dog!"

5) Hannibal Lector (Anthony Hopkins, Hannibal)

Yeah, he's on everyone's list too. However it isn't his elegant menace that I find interesting. I like how he expresses his outrage towards the world (by eating people. Most psychos grab a gun and shoot up diners or high schools; Hannibal kills people and turns them into gourmet dinners. Far more dignified).

One scene really appealed to my Inner Sociopath: Clarice Starling loses her job because of the machinations of a real creep, Arthur Krendler. Instead of eating Krendler, Lector drugs him up, cuts the top of his skull off, and feeds him part of his own brain. All in an elegant and classy way. Sorry; I haven't enjoyed cannibalism this much since The Cook,The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover.

4) Frank Booth (Dennis Hopper Blue Velvet)

HEINEKEN?!!? FUCK THAT SHIT!! PABST BLUE RIBBON!!!

Another bad guy so disgusting and unredeemable, he's a hoot to watch.

3) T-101 (Arnold SwarzeneggerThe Terminator)
Originally Swarzenegger was going to play Kyle Reese. He wisely talked James Cameron into letting him play the bad guy. Movie history was born; pretty Sarah Connor and slight Kyle Reese against an unstoppable machine? It didn't look good for our heros. This is why he's on this list. The Terminator has a very logical reason to maim and murder his way through the phone book, a dance club, and a police precinct: he was programmed that way. He can't be bargained with, he can't be reasoned with, he doesn't feel pity or remorse. Or fear. And he absolutely will not stop. Ever.

Oh, come on! It scared me...

2) Colquhoun (Robert Carlyle Ravenous)

Ravenous is one of my favorite movies nobody saw (another list for another time). Ravenous concerns two men who have discovered separately that if you eat human meat, it gives you superhuman strength. The down side is it also gives you insatiable hunger. Slightly built Robert Carlyle (another brit who gets stuck with a lot of evil bad guy roles) does a great job conveying both charm and animal hunger. He really plays well against Guy Pearce's equally famished but passive good guy who Colquhoun tries to seduce into giving in to and accepting his cannibalistic urges. Hmmmm. I have a wierd thing for cannibals. I'm really afraid to go exploring the Freudian explanations for that.

1) Spike (James Marsters Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

Undead heart of a chaotic punk, buried soul of a weenie romantic poet. Equal parts menace, hotness, and shameless wanker. I almost wish he'd stayed villainous or at least kept walking that edge he found when he fell in love with the slayer. I'm somewhat glad he found a second life on Angel even though I STILL CAN'T SEE IT!!!


You know, this was going to be a quickie list, but I ended up doing a lot of thinking for it. I really don't like evil bad guys. Not because they are evil, but because many times I don't know *why* they are evil. Antagonists should do what they do because they think they are right. Plenty of sick bastards exist who can be classified as evil (John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy, etc), and plenty of bad guys are portrayed as psychopathic in movies. "He's just off his rocker" is a reasonable explanation, but it doesn't leave much room for empathy.

I have racked my brain (doesn't that sound painful?) but I can't think of any villain I have ever been that attracted to (Spike doesn't count! By the time I wanted to have his child he was working for the good guys). Even the villains I list deserve punishment for what they did even if I have empathy for their actions. I have talked (via internet) with a lot of women who have things for certain villainous characters. The classic example I guess would be Count Dracula in his various incarnations. Nope, doesn't do a thing for me. I simply don't get why someone would fall in love with an evil man.

I'm guessing that what fires many women's fantasy ovens are characters that need the lovin of a good woman to mend their wicked ways.

So this list turned out pretty pedestrian in the sense that many of my favorite villains are everybody else's favorite villains. On the whole I wish for more villains like Catwoman. I mean people who are this close ->|| to redemption but can't quite make it. It gives them a tragic, romantic edge that I like.

We made it to the gym this morning: chest and triceps. I'm a bit miffed because I can tell I've lost a little even though I only took a week off.

All right: new plan. I'm going on a calorie-restrictive, targeted ketogenic diet; about 1200 calories a day. That means out of all my food, I'm going to eat about 60 grams of carbohydrates on work-out days and about 35-45 on non-workout days.

Starting the 16th of February, this will be my schedule:

Monday: 20 minute run, Stiff-legged deadlift, chin-ups, squats
Tuesday: 20 minute run, back and biceps
Wednesday:20 minute run, chest and triceps
Thursday: 30 minute run - no weight training
Friday: 20 minute run, shoulders and legs

Saturday and Sunday I won't exercise - but I'll mainly be at the drop zone which can be plenty exercise enough.

I'm starting Monday because Saturday we are having a chili cookoff at the drop zone - chili and beer, beer, and more beer. Then I'm getting serious. Really. This time will be different.

Meh.

I'm going to upgrade my Blog one of these days so I can publish pictures. Then I'll take a photograph of my butt and display exactly why I want to lose a certain amount of body fat.

Currently I am happy to report I weigh 133. Happy because I didn't gain that much since I went off my last diet.

So anyway - anything else to report on today? I watched not much of anything last night. A few episodes of Good Eats where I learned that you can make chocolate sieze up and sock puppets can fart. I love that show.

I'm a tad annoyed about all the ado about Janet Jackson's boob. So what? All the busybody politicians (there's a redundant phrase if I've ever heard one) are threatening a huge crackdown. Trust me - if the NFL received thousands of complaints, that will keep them from having MTV produce the half-time show ever again. No need for government intervention.

I'm enjoying Nancy's friend, Helly's blogs about stupidity. We have a sticker in our King Air that says "Notice: you can't fix stupid". A non-skydiver might smirk about a skydiver calling another stupid, but skydiving is one of those areas where stupidity can and does lead to extreme amounts of pain.

I was going to write a long discourse about the dumbass things I have seen some skydivers do, but then again I have done some idiotic things. I try to be conservative, but gravity can be unforgiving and it only takes once. The skydiving collarary to "Stupidity should be painful" is of course: "If you're going to be stupid, you'd better be tough".

Quickie top 10 list o the day:

Top 10 favorite songs:

10:Ring of Fire Johnny Cash

When I was young I was subjected to 8-Tracks of Johnny Cash and Neal Diamond. My loving of Cash and loathing of Diamond endures to this day. I'll sing along with Johnny, but if Neal comes on I'll bolt across the room to snap off the radio before the song gets stuck in my head. "Cracklin' Rosie you're a store-bought woman..." AAAAAIGH!

9:I fall to Pieces Patsy Cline

This woman's voice *rules*.

8:Won't Get Fooled Again the Who

Not only a kickass rock anthem, the lyrics aren't insipid ballads to some woman's hooters. "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss" indeed.

7:Bizarre Love Triangle New Order

The only dance song I can think of that you can sing a capella and it still sounds good. Try it!
Every time I see you fall I get down on my knees and pray
Waiting for that final moment you say the words I can't say
Not that I can sing.

6:Birds of Paradise The Pretenders

I blame an old boyfriend for this song. I get all choked up and nostalgic when I hear this one. I could say the same for the Ramones' "Blitzkreig Bop" though.

5:Wish You Were Here Pink Floyd

More melancholy. Hey, it's an INTP thing.

4:I Apologize Husker Du

Everything they did was at breakneck speed.

all these crazy mixed up lies floating all around
making these assumptions brings me down
and you get tight-lipped, how do i know what you think?
is it something i said when i lost my mind?
temper too quick, makes me blind i apologize.

3:Some Days are Better Than Others U2

Bono is an ex-listee and I still love his voice - especially the way it floats over Edge's chiming guitar chords in this song. Another pop tune whose melody lends itself to a capella renditions.

2:Ain't that Pretty At All Warren Zevon

Everyone should have a favorite Zevon song.

I'd like to go back to Paris someday and visit the Louvre Museum
Get a good running start and hurl myself at the wall
Going to hurl myself against the wall
'Cause I'd rather feel bad than feel nothing at all

1:When the World is Running Down the Police

You make the best of what's still around - dunno completely why this is my favorite; the breezy melancholy gets to me every time I hear it. The Police remain one of my favorite bands.

No gym today: Jon promised me we'll go Thursday and Friday. Hope so.

Nancy reminded me of a woman character I love:

8: Diana Guzman (Michelle Rodriguez, Girlfight )

This movie is about a Puerto Rican girl who lives with a lot of rage and finally finds a good outlet for it by learning how to box. I really liked this character, even though I almost didn't add her because while I admire her strength and will, she really is close to following her father's abusive footsteps. The best thing about this movie is she finds another father; she pays a reluctant boxing coach to train her and he slowly realizes he has a highly talented athlete in his hands. I had a huge lump in my throat when she wins a bout and her coach tells her how proud he is.

An editorial note: I've toyed with the idea of learning how to box; not to learn how to dish it out, but to learn how to take it. I think it would be highly useful to be still able to function while under pain and duress. Boxing is brutal and I really enjoy watching it when I can. I know a lot of people are repulsed by boxers and especially women boxers (don't watch it then, ya mooks). I wish I understood why women get a lot of shit for being physical - I think it's because it reminds people too much of men (sweat, muscles, and blood). What makes me laugh is the stereotypical woman athlete - a ballerina, ice skater, or gymnast, for instance - knows what sweat, muscle, and blood is, too.

For the record since I have started weight training I have had nothing but good experiences and feedback from the men who weightlift in the gym I attend. Remember I live in a really small Southern town.

Last weekend was so awash in mediocrity, I forgot to mention a movie I genuinely enjoyed: the 1961 version of Zatoichi. I was expecting a Japanese Western - you know, lone gunman comes to town and cleans up the place. Zatoichi is different. He is a blind master swordsman. He taught himself the sword precisely because he's blind - he can't stand having people feel sorry or contempt for him.

He comes to this small town at the request of a gang boss; the boss has seen him fight and thinks having Zatoichi on his side would be useful. Zatoichi has no real desire to do any fighting for the boss but he does use his hospitality to freeload some.

Anyway, the boss of a smaller, rival gang has in his employ a samurai from Edo (a ronin, one would presume). Zatoichi and the samurai meet while both are fishing by a small lake and soon become good friends. You can see how it's going - both men were hired because of gang tensions. Zatoichi does not want to fight his friend but the samurai left Edo because he is dying from consumption. He would rather die in a fight with a legendary swordsman than by a lowly gangster or his own desintigrating body.

Zatoichi is so upset at the end of the movie he asks that his sword be buried with the remains of his Samurai friend. However, there's like 10 more movies in the Zatoichi series so I sincerely doubt he has completely hung up his sword-slingin' ways.

There's a whole lot more to this movie - some decently fleshed-out characters and surprisingly little swordplay. When there is, of course Zatoichi kicks major butt in his trademark underhand swordfighting style.

I'll have to watch more in the series. I'd also like to see the recent remake but Miramax is dragging it's collective butt in releasing it here in the states.

Jon and I watched Rounders, a movie about poker players. It features cute as a button Matt Damon and just as cute Ed Norton. Norton impresses me more with every movie I see him in. Here he plays the just out of jail scumbag (aptly nicknamed 'Worm) who cheats at cards to Damon's reformed gambler, Mike.

What interested me about this movie was yes it was about poker, and the difference between being a sharp and a cheat, but the main plot was Mike's flaw wasn't his ability to play poker with the best, but his weakness for a no-good man, Worm. Mike lives with a woman (and she is the reason he has promised to stop gambling) but she is fairly irrelevant. I bet an already interesting movie could have been made more interesting if she hadn't existed altogether simply because Mike's relationship with Worm is so destructive. An undercurrent of homosexual love (or more of one, rather), would have gone a long way into explaining why he puts up with it.

The movie, besides having some cool poker sequences, deals with the theme of 'you are what you is'. Mike is happy playing poker, which he insists is not gambling. He utilizes his skills of keeping track of cards and odds, and reading other players to win. He is a law student, but when Worm gets back into town Mike starts playing again and he realizes what he has missed. Worm is what he is, too. He is a bad man, and it takes them both getting worked over by some angry cops before Mike finally realizes this and cuts that no-good loser loose.

Really, they do make a cute couple.

Here: ANOTHER top 10 list: My Top 10 favorite movies at this point in time:

10: Office Space

I tried hard to think of a comedy to add to this list. Office Space won out because it's the comedy I have most recently worn out. At an earlier age, this slot could easily been taken by Airplane!, Top Secret, Animal House, the Blues Brothers; all movies I have worn out and can still enjoy.

Why Office Space then? Because I work in a cubicle. This movie is dead-on about the life-sucking experience of working in such an environment. Ron Livingston (someone once described him as looking like Charlie Sheen without the scumbag factor, and that's pretty accurate) plays a cubicle denizen who is at wit's end because he hates his job so much. Gary Cole's coffee sipping boss from hell is worth the price of rental alone.

9: Toy Story

One Pixar movie had to make it on the list and this is it because it was the first. I was *blown away* by the animation values. Plus it had a great story, it's wickedly funny, and filled with wonderful characters.

8: The Right Stuff

This movie about the Mercury astronauts did not get the box office it deserved. Scott Glenn, Dennis Quaid, Ed Harris, Fred Ward, Sam Shepherd and Lance Henriksen - the cast is a who's who of character actors from the 80's. Favorite line: "Our Germans are better than their Germans." This movie should be seen on a double bill with Apollo 13.

7: Goodfellas

My favorite gangster movie. Robert DeNiro, Joe Pesci, Ray Liotta, and Lorraine Bracco give us the flip side of mobster life. The Godfather showed us vicious but somewhat noble gangsters; the characters in this movie are vicious thugs who wear bad clothes and like to cook a lot.

6: Spartacus

This is one of the few historical epics that successfully touches on the human elements. Kirk Douglas is a god. And Tony Curtis was *hot* when he was young! No wonder Laurence Olivier wanted to get under his skirt. Uh, see the restored version to understand what I'm talking about. Character of note: Charles Laughton's Gracchus, a corrupt but surprisingly sympathetic Senator.

5: The Year of Living Dangerously

Mel Gibson at his finest (mmmmmmmmmmmmmm). This movie is beautiful to look at. If one can classify this as a chick movie, then this is by far my favorite chick movie. A good bookend movie is Peter Weir's Witness - which had Harrison Ford at his finest. Both movies are hypnotic with great chemistry between the leads (something that wrecks more often than not most chick movies).

4: Hard Boiled

My Hong Kong actioner entry. John Woo directed this and it features Chow Yun-Fat as a hard-boiled cop. Look, it has a 45-minute shootout in a hospital at the very end; what more do you want? It just is a kick ass movie.

3: Dawn of the Dead

This movie is gory. I'm talking heads exploding, guts being ripped out, chunks of flesh being pulled off limbs gory. They just don't make movies like this any more! The thing this movie had going for it (and its sister movies, Night of the Living Dead and Day of the Dead) were characters you could care about so it is far more than a special effects extraveganza. I've been criticized for liking movies like this. I don't get it. Yes, it looks awful real, but those actors washed off the moulage and went and had beers after the director yelled 'cut'. It's not real, folks!

2: Jaws

Spielberg at his finest hour. More than a movie about a shark terrorizing a tourist town, this movie shines because of the dynamics between Richard Dryfuss, Robert Shaw, and Roy Scheider on board a little boat in a big ocean.

1: Aliens

I have declared this to be my favorite movie a bazillion times. Obviously I love action, war-oriented movies. In this movie even the women were sweaty, square-jawed, and heroic. This movie rises above the mindless action movies because each character is given enough time to not be just a faceless casualty. I love them all: Vasquez, the supercool tough hispanic chick; Hudson, the excitable wiseass; Hicks, the supercompetent, quiet NCO who finds himself in charge; Bishop, the android who turns out to be quite human; and Newt, the not annoying spunky little kid. And I can't forget the sleazebag company man Burke. And of course there's Ripley. She faces her fears and finds a second chance when lone survivor Newt is discovered on the now-colonized planet where the infected spaceship from Alien originally crashed.

I promise I'll eventually talk about other things. But in the meantime I have plenty of mindless entertainment saved on TiVo to watch and bore you with. Speaking of, The Forsyte Sage part II started last Sunday on PBS. I haven't had a chance to watch much of it (Jon is not into Masterpiece Theater, plus he found out how much I pant over Damian Lewis {happy birthday, you hot redhead, you} and is a little jealous).

I did see enough to know Soames hasn't changed that much; he treats his second wife badly but he dotes on his daughter. I do feel bad for the uber-uptight, repressed Soames. I swear when he sits down to take a crap he shits rebar. I can't wait to see how he reacts when he finds out his daughter falls for Irene and Jolyon's son. For that matter I can't wait to see how Irene and Jolyon react.

Oh, god, I'm caught up in a soap opera. Sheesh!

Yay! Went to the gym this morning. I was feeling somewhat on the flabby side, even after only one week off.

This last weekend I did 2 skydives this weekend; one a fun jump and one AFF level 3 dive. This 2 dives a weekend is pretty pathetic; I want to hit the 1,000 jump mark by my birthday so let's see: I need 68 jumps and there's 13 weekends between here and then. I should be doing about 5 jumps a weekend. I just wish it would hurry up and get warmer.

So what did I do with the rest of my weekend? I watched a few movies. They all had one thing in common: mediocrity.

I finished Battle of Britain. For an English movie it reminded me heavily of american war movies like Midway or even Titanic: Take a historical moment for a backdrop and create some fictional characters to help 'personalize' the story. In this case I wasn't really interested in the characters - too bad, because the cast included Christopher Plummer, Amanda York, Michael Caine, Robert Shaw, and Edward Fox. (Seeing Shaw and Fox together reminded me of Force 10 from Navarone, a movie I haven't thought of in years, for the second time in a few weeks. I know it ain't great but I had to put it on my Netflix queue). Anyway: spiffy flight sequences featuring mainly Spitfires and Stukkas.

Then my day got even more mediocre - Raid on Rommel. Can a British commando train a rag tag group of P.O.W's mainly consisting of hospital personnel to blow up some guns in Tobruk? I guess if they are led by Richard Burton.

A quick aside: someone once complained about Laurence Olivier that the trouble with his acting is that you can tell he knows he's acting. Or to put it in another way, he reminds me of Jon Lovitz's character, Master Thespian. Not so exaggerated, but really: watch Olivier any time he acts. His acting is self-conciously stylized. I mention Olivier because he was in Battle of Britain. And I mention his acting style to bring up Richard Burton - he's another Master Thespian.

Anyway back to Raid on Rommel. Actually, no - I have nothing further to add. It was boring.

Now for something completely different, I saw Metroland, with Christain Bale and Emily Watson. This movie had considerable Bale nudity (including a brief flash of frontal naughty bits), mostly from sex scenes. So what - this movie was mediocre, too. Far more interesting than Raid on Rommell but still I was unaffected.

Bale plays a man in his 30's who lives with his wife and baby daughter in the suburbs of late 70's London (nicknamed 'Metroland'). An old friend of his who is still living la vida loca comes by for a visit and tries to entice him into leaving his middle-class existence. A lot of the movie is Bale's flashbacks to when he was a young man living in Paris and the love affair he had with a french woman and how he met his English wife (Watson). I adore Bale, Watson is a terrific actress, but I still just can't recommend this movie. Maybe it was because suburbia is just plain boring, maybe it was the copious 70's hair. Eh.

And to cap off a mediocre weekend, last night Jon and I sat down to eat and I searched TiVo for something to watch. I was delighted to see that it had recorded The Taking of Pelham 123, a crime movie with Robert Shaw and Walter Matthau from the mid-70's. It is about a gang of robbers who take a New York subway train hostage. I bet I haven't seen that movie since it was in the theaters, but I remember I really enjoyed it.

Well dammit I hit play and something looks wrong. WTF - Vincent D'onofrio is in it. Excuse me, was he even alive in 1974? (I checked - he was 15.) Then Donnie Wahlberg sporting an amusing blond 'do shows up! (As Mr. Gray. Damn that was funny in an obscure way). Even though TiVo listed the original movie date and actor roster, I was watching a frickin made-for-TV remake!

D'onofrio had the unfortunate task of playing Robert Shaw's character, Mr. Blue. He just ain't Robert Shaw. Well, nobody can fill Shaw's shoes; boy do I miss him. Nobody could play overbearing, aggressive, and loud like he could. Shaw was his own definition of machismo. Vincent D'onofrio - well, he plays wierdos real well. And he does a wicked Orson Welles impersonation.

Walter Matthau's character was played by Edward James Olmos and Lorraine Braccho. I have *no* idea why they felt the need to cast his character as 2 separate people but they did.If I have strong memories of a movie I saw as an 11 year old kid, it must have had something going for it. This remake was just eh. Blah. I was not happy. So I have slipped the original on my Netflix queue to see if my memories have merit.

This is a long entry - here's my top 7 favorite woman characters. I couldn't think of 10! I'm trying to decide if it is because there just aren't that many movies with women I like (I compared my list of favorite men to favorite women- they tend to share the same qualities I admire) or if there just aren't many movies with interesting women in them period. It is true, however, that the movies I like simply don't have many women in them.


7) Lindsey Brigman (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, The Abyss

Yes, I find it interesting that two characters from James Cameron movies made it to this list. I would have included Sarah Connor but I decided two was enough. For a while there Cameron was The God of Action movies.

Lindsey Brigman was remarkably different from Sarah Connor and Ellen Ripley because she was not instantly likeable. She refers to herself as a 'cast-iron bitch' and indeed that a fairly accurate description. But the biggest bitchy quality seems to be vindictiveness. She is merely abrasive. She is an engineer, dammit, and she dislikes anything getting in the way of her projects. She and Bud (ex-listee Ed Harris) are on the verge of divorce, and the wonder is why did he get married to her in the first place?

In one sequence they are trapped in a submersible with only one usable scuba unit. They are a good distance away from safety (at a depth of 2000 ft+) and their submersible is filling with water. In desperation, Bud asks her to think of a way to get them both back safely. She suggests to let her drown and he can haul her back to the rig and revive her. Of course he protests vehemently, but she convinces him it's the only rational choice. You see then one of his biggest attractions to her: her intelligence. It's also the scene that made me like her. I find this movie severely flawed but I really like both of these characters.

6) Hildy Johnson (Rosalind Russell, His Girl Friday)

This movie was made when Romantic Comedies were romantic AND funny. His Girl Friday was directed by Howard Hawks, a filmmaker whose work always strikes me as hardheaded and practical. That's what I loved about Hildy Johnson - she is a hardheaded, practical journalist in a very male-dominated business. Russell's and Cary Grant's smart dialog in this movie is rightly regarded as classic.

5) Eowyn (Miranda Otto, The Lord of the Rings)

One of the few female characters in this famous trilogy. When the movies were being made I remember my
one real hope was that they would give this character justice. For the most part they did; the scene where Eowyn and Merry put a hurting on the Nazgul is truly a joy to watch. I was sorry they gave her (and Faramir) such short shrift at the end of the series, but the movie was long enough as it was. Here's hoping some of that is restored in the DVD edition.

4) Marge Gunderson (Frances McDormand, Fargo)

Marge is the super-competent and seven-months pregnant Chief of police for Brainerd, Minnesota. She (and her relationship with her husband) is the warm center of this super-cold and super-funny movie about a kidnapping gone horribly awry. And holy cow, what an appetite.

3) Wing Chun (Michelle Yeoh, Wing Chun)

If I recall the legend correctly, Wing Chun developed the classic Wing Chun style of kung fu to get out of an arranged marriage with a horrible man. None of that is shown in this movie; this must happen after those events where she takes on some bandits that are threatening her village. This movie is light-hearted and many asses are kicked.

2) Dana Scully ( Gillian Anderson The X-Files)

Yeah, it's a TV character but a movie did make it to the big screen so I get to claim her. Ultra-smart, level headed, the calm foil and anchor to Mulder's manic-depressive wild speculations.

1) Ellen Ripley ( Sigourney Weaver, Aliens)

The Ripley character has been in 4 movies, but the only one where she mattered to me was this one. Alienwas good but the characters, all of them, were distant. She got to live because it was pro forma for one woman to live in a 'pick them off one by one' horror movie. That's right, Alien is the stylized cousin to Friday the 13th and Halloween.

In Aliens, however, Ripley is humanized. I'd like to recommend tracking down the extended edition which has two scenes that add to the character. In one scene we learn that Ripley had a young daughter who grew up and died of old age while she was in hibernation drifting along in outer space. This makes her bonding to Newt, the sole surviving colonist more understandable. The second scene is just before she leaves the ship to go rescue Newt. She checks on the one surviving Marine if he's okay, calling him by his last name, Hicks. He tells her his name is Dwayne. She replies "Ellen". A nice humanizing touch before she proceeds to kick alien ass.

That's pathetic. If anyone out there has some recommendations to add to this list, I'm all ears.

Cold's over. I guess that means I'll have to go to the gym this week.

Maybe I'm just too much of a wallflower/nerd/stick-in-the-mud/geek whatever, but what in the Hell is the attraction of 'clubbing'? I understand a good deal of people who go are looking for someone to sleep with; but surely there's an easier way of picking up a partner than going to a loud, smoky, smelly place full of drunk people and crappy music?

I was dragged along to this club this last Saturday night. It had the wonderful name of - I shit you not - "Spank Daddy's". The only thing good I can say about it is the cover band was competent and did not play so loud that my ears bled. I guess if you are into people watching it's fun.

If I ever get a divorce, it will be because I hate dancing and my husband loves it. He's always trying to get me out on the dance floor and tells me there's nothing to be self-concious about. Well I'm a terrible dancer, and I have to concentrate so hard to keep any kind of rhythym I find the whole thing embarrasing. He keeps telling me that nobody's looking at me, but if that's so then why do he and his friends spend a great deal of time at the club pointing out how ugly people are/ what terrible dancers they are?

Okay, enough about my marital troubles. I will get to my top 10 women characters in movies in a bit; I'm still doing some research. In the meantime:

Sometimes movies at the bottom of the cinematic bell curve can be just as enjoyable as those near the top. I have some favorites - all of them marked by the fact that I have seen each of them more than twice (much to my embarrassment).

Top 10 favorite bad movies:

10)Shocker

What bugs me about this movie is that it starts out pretty good. A young Peter Berg realizes he has a psychic connection with a mass murderer who likes to kill whole families. One of his targets ends up being Berg's adopted family. He and his father are the only ones who survive. There are some questions about whether or not young Pete is the killer. Up to this point I found it compelling in a schlocky, teen-age way (like I found the Faculty). But then they catch the killer and things get really, really stupid. Still, I have a soft spot in my brain for this movie. And I was three seasons into the X-Files before I realized the bad guy was played by Mitch Pileggi.

9)Resident Evil

A movie based on a video game. Very much vaguely a poor Aliens clone substituting slow moving shuffling zombies for aliens. No plot to speak of and it's not even gory by flesh-eating zombie movie standards. Yet,... I like it. So sue me. Jason Isaacs' blue, blue eyes make a cameo appearance.

8)Wild Rebels

I saw this movie through the old Comedy Central show, Mystery Science Theater 3000, a show built around godawful movies. This movie is about a race car driver who is recruited by the police to infiltrate a gang of bank robbers. Sample dialog: "I'm in it for the kicks, baby!"

7)Godzilla Vs. the Smog Monster

Japanese hippies. *Heh!*

6)Commando

This is the nadir of Arnold Schwarzenneger's career (if you exclude 'Hercules goes Bananas'). Yet, it is the epitome of 80's mindless action movies. Bad dialog, ridiculous action, horrible continuity just add to the fun. Try and keep a bad guy death count for even more amusement.

5)Universal Soldier

This big-budgeted movie has the heart of a low-budget, direct-to-video, really stupid action movie. Starring two wooden planks, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren. They play re-animated Vietnam war vets. Really. I don't know why it has any appeal to me but it does. Oh, sure, Van Damme is fun to look at, but there needs to be something more. See 'Commando' for other excuses.

4)Armageddon

Oh, God this movie sucks! Mindless, bombastic, and riddled with egregious scientific errors. Featuring a phoned-in performance by Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck's teeth, which he got capped specifically for this role. But hey, it also has Steve Buschemi, Owen Wilson, and the underappreciated William Fichtner. And Jason Isaacs.I highly recommend buying the Criterion Edition of this movie because of the commentary tracks: a) The directors track, just to hear Michael Bay speak. He is a self-important prick. b) The actor's track, especially Ben Affleck. His comments are hilarious and he has no illusions about what type of movie he's in.

3)Dreamcatcher

A blonde and a redhead are trapped in a cabin in the forest battling space aliens. How can I resist if said hotties are Thomas Jane and Damien Lewis? And throw in brunette Jason Lee, though he's taken out too early. This movie is loopy and you'd think Lawrence Kasdan would know better. Still, if you have ever been possessed by the urge to hear Thomas Jane belt out the Mighty Mouse theme here's your chance.

2)Pieces

This is a Spanish horror movie that came out in the 70's. It was Christopher George's last film and I can only suspect he died of shame. Psycho killer stalks nubile young college girls. Entertainment level is elevated by such scenes as: one proto-victim runs into an elevator somewhere in said college (she is clad only in a bikini). Psycho killer stops door from closing and gets in. The killer is wearing an overcoat, a scarf, and a hat pulled low and has a chainsaw hidden behind his back. The victim's response? "Oh. It's you." Rent it, if you can find it, to see the best damn non-sequitur ending ever committed to celluloid.

1)The Swarm

I was raised on 70's disaster films. I have soft spots in my brains for all of them: Earthquake, the Towering Inferno, all the Airport movies, and this one. Bees! Bees! Millions of Bees!! For ultra-pain, find the extended version.

Everyone involved in this classic was on heavy drugs, even Micheal Caine. Sharing in the shame are Henry Fonda, Richard Chamberlain, Miguel Ferrer, Patty Duke, Fred MacMurray(!), Olivia De Havilland (!!) and Slim Pickens (!!!).

Okay; my lungs are better but now I have a nice sinus headache.

Hey, I'm famous! Uh, scroll down a bit. I posted yesterday's link to his site before I knew about this. I have a small handful of sites that I support financially; his is one of them.

Did I mention our new house has a pool? I have been bitching about it - I didn't want one - but I guess that sounds conceited. "Oh, I hate the new pool!"

Well, I do. They are vast money-sucking pits. I knew owning one would be a maintenence headache.

It rained hard yesterday; at about 9 in the evening my husband got worried about the pool overflowing. He bitched, whined, and went to Wal-Mart and bought a Shop-Vac - only to discover he couldn't use it to suck up water without buying another piece for it.

So he was set to head back to Wal-Mart and I pointed out to him that the Shop-Vac was pretty useless for his intended purpose; you might as well grab a couple of buckets and start bailing. I won't go into detail but the argument got a little heated.

So I stomped outside and stood there in the dark and the cold, wet rain; I contemplated the pool and I asked myself the magic question: "What would MacGyver do?"

I know what he would do: he would gather up some household chemicals and blow the damn thing out of existence. Me, I grabbed a serrated knife, pulled the garden hose off its rack, and measured a length of it from the pool to a nearby drainage ditch. I cut a length of hose off, applied suction, and voila, instant siphon.

Jon stared at me for a second, and did 2 things right. 1: he apologized for getting angry, and 2: refrained on making an oral sex joke. Had he done the latter I would have killed him - or maybe just pushed him into the wet, dirty pool.

I realize I haven't talked about diet, exercise, or skydiving for a while. That's because I haven't done any of those things for a week. I did get 2 skydives last weekend - both AFF dives; a level 1 and a level 2. I haven't done any instruction for the last 2 months and it felt good to knock some rust off. She was a good student, too. Thank goodness when they have a brain and take it with them on the dive.

So more movie stuff:

We finally got the living room organized; with some careful pre-planning we managed to get the digital cable box, TiVo, VCR, DVD, and the Laserdisc player all working in conjunction with each other. The living room is almost devoid of boxes. I settled down to watch The Battle of Britain but haven't finished it because I got interrupted by an overflowing pool.

So here's a top 10 list:

Top 10 favorite male characters from movies and why I like them:

10) Peter Parker (Tobey McGuire, Spider-Man)

Loser nerd-boy develops superpowers. What elevated McGuire's nerd-boy to something special in my eyes was his growing understanding of the law of unintended consequences. I don't find McGuire attractive, but I do find Parker so. Like his uncle Ben pontificated on - the spider bite not only gave him super powers, but it also began his transformation into a man. And despite my anti-chick movie stance the angst between him and MJ is delightfully painful.

9) Spartacus (Kirk Douglas, Spartacus)

What most people don't realize is that Spartacus, as Kirk Douglas portrayed him, is nothing like Russell Crowe's Maximus. Spartacus is not the baddest badass (he loses the one gladiatoral fight he participates in) - he is a clever, intelligent, compassionate leader of men.

8) Peter Washington (Ken Foree, Dawn of the Dead)

Okay, if you woke up tomorrow and the world was overrun by flesh-eating zombies, wouldn't you want a calm, collected, intelligent, badass ex-SWAT team man taking care of you and your unborn child? Enough said.

7) Han Solo (Harrison Ford, Star Wars)

Duh. What preteen girl in the late 70's didn't have an estrogen spike when he showed up in the cantina? Solo is the apotheosis of the scoundrel with a heart of gold. While his character is nothing new to movies, like someone said: "It's not who does it first, it's who does it best".

6) Severen (Bill Paxton, Near Dark)

I'm not particularly fond of bad guys, and I'm not particularly fond of vampires. But Severen is evil incarnate in this movie, and his animal ferocity, his sheer joy at being aliv-er, undead, is infectious. Evil Bad Guy Goodness.

5) Hoot Gibson (Eric Bana, Black Hawk Down)

Gibson is a Delta Force soldier - he comes across in the movie as a bit of a lone wolf, a professional warrior. Badass, super-competent. Intelligent. And hot. He's not completely aloof - he offers advice to Josh Hartnett's young Ranger sargeant several times, trying to make him understand there's only so much responsibility you can shoulder in war.

4) Quincy (Jason Isaacs,Armageddon)

The smartest man on the planet. And, as Fox Mulder once pointed out, Smart *is* sexy. He's the guy who came up with the plan to save the world (remember the ketchup bottle speech?). He got so dissed; no one gave him a parade!

3) Samwise Gamgee (Sean Astin, The Lord of the Rings)

The epitome of loyalty. We all know he's the real hero of the trilogy. Pudgy, thick, ordinary Sam saves the world because his friends needed him to.

2) John Preston (Christian Bale, Equilibrium).

Ruthless, cold-blooded, unquestioning (hot), until he manages to break the hold of the drug that makes him so. Betrays everything he thought was right in the name of emotion. Speaking of estrogen spikes: "I pay it gladly". Yow!

1) Richard Winters (Damian Lewis, Band of Brothers)

Yeah, you knew this was coming. Thoughtful, quiet, intelligent, lion-hearted leader of men. Kills without question when his country needed it, put it all away for a life of peace when it was all over. Based on a real man - do they make them like that any more?

I'll post my top 10 women characters later on.