Aw, Hell No!

Fair warning: this is going to be a post full of complaints.

1. In response to James's meditation on the remake of KK: I am totally with you. I have not blogged about this travesty for the very reason that I also have no intentions of seeing this. My issues, dear James, are slightly different from yours (although we do overlap on the red leather jacket). For one thing, why is the karate kid (oops! the Kung Fu Kid!) 12? I mean, the original film was a teen flick. Jaden Smith is not a teen. Ergo, this is not a teen flick. What's with that? If they had to have him, couldn't they have waited until he hit 16? It would have given Chan a few years to age too, and that couldn't hurt. I don't share your feelings about Jaden Smith though. I mean, he is the offspring of two of the most adorable people on Earth (even though I have a sneaking suspicion that Jada is not a very nice person). He is also adorable. But he's too young for this film. It is silly.

Also, I agree, Chan is no Miyagi. What is KK without Bonsai? Without catching flies with chopsticks? Without Southern California and a lot full of cars that may or may not run? Without a heart wrenching back story about a lost Japanese love? Without saki?

It's all crap. What's with Hollywood and remakes anyway? I know so many damn writers, some of them really talented, who could tell new stories, but we get this rehash. What's the point? It is so, so, so not interesting and not creative. Grrr.

2. The Pac 16? With Tejas and Oklahoma? Screw that. To quote my niece, "Are they even being serious right now?" Listen. I get the fact that it will bring better money, better television time, more prestige to the conference. I also get the fact that this could lay groundwork for several "superconferences" that could lead to some kind of actual playoff/national championship football situation. I also get that there would likely be two divisions that would return us to, for all intents and purposes, a Pac 8 situation. (Arizona and Arizona state would form the B division with Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas, A & M, Tech and, probably, Baylor.) Those are pluses. I can't deny it. But I cannot get behind anything that ties the Oregon schools to the Texas and Oklahoma schools. On principle. Is that narrow minded and regionalist of me? Hell, yes. But the truth is, I don't want Texas anywhere near my Pacific anything. (By the way, we are going to be screwed when the state of Texas secedes from the union. We'll end up the Pac-13. And that just doesn't make any sense.)

3. If Paul Allen is going to fire Kevin Pritchard, I wish he'd just do it. I'm tired of the speculation already. There's been too much upheaval in the Oregon sporting world already this year (by the way, thank the sports gods that Masoli was stupid enough to get busted for what was reported to be a tiny possession charge. He only would have proven a distraction this coming year.). Just get rid of K.P. (without the blessing of the majority of Blazer fans) and name his replacement so that we can all get on with our lives.

4. And I can't believe I am saying this, but PLEASE, PLEASE could we get some warmer and sunnier weather?! I mean, you all know that I love rain more than most, but I do recognize that Oregonians need a few good months of sun in the summer. And I am good with that. Besides, I can't get a damn thing done with sheets of rain coming down all the time. It has been a miserable couple of months, and even the heartiest of us are starting to get a little down.

That's about it. For today. Feel free to leave your personal bitchfest in my comments section. Lord knows I deserve to have to listen to them!

Losing It

Portland thinks she's Austin this week. It was in the upper 70s today, and will be tomorrow as well. I have my bedroom windows wide open in hopes that it will cool down enough so I can sleep, and the frogs are really active tonight, which means that I'll have to eventually close the window so that I can block out some of their amorous noises. I finally saw one, and it wasn't even 2 inches long, which makes the gigantic noise they make all the more strange.

This is an unseasonable reminder that summer is just a few months away, and as I listened to the sounds of people doing yard work, and kids playing outside today, it suddenly remembered the 4th of July. I don't mean that I had a memory of a particular 4th of July. I mean, I remembered that such a thing exists. I had completely forgotten all about it.

That's a weird thing to totally forget about.

Cabin Fever

Alright. So you might think that being almost totally home bound for the last 9 days would give me ample opportunity to catch up on some blogging. But I know how much Qwanty resents any blogs about the weather, and really, it is impossible for me to write about anything else. Since a week ago Sunday, we have had temperatures almost exclusively below freezing, and snow, freezing rain, and sleet. As you all know, I am sometimes given to hyperbole. In this case I am reporting fact. Currently, at the compound, we have about 10 inches of packed snow, a 1 inch ice layer, and then another 12-14 inches on top of that. Do the math, people. That is about 2 feet of snow. In Portland. For over a week.

For those of you who do live here/have lived here, you recognize how freaky this is. We are just not a people who are used to long-term arctic conditions. The last time Portland had a "snow event" of this magnitude was 40 years ago. So, I have never seen anything like it. The year that I lived in Boston was exceptionally mild, so I didn't even see it there. And if you think that I'm exaggerating, wait until you see the pictures (they are coming--).

And I am so bored I can hardly stand it. My little car is buried. So I'm stuck here for awhile. Yesterday I actually played 2 rounds of that racist domino game (I'll not name it, in respect to J-Bro) with my parents and my grandmother. Have any of you ever played a game with me? That's right. You haven't. Because I don't play games. I don't play games because I am the world's worst sport. It is very unpleasant to play games with me. But I played that damn game for 4 hours yesterday because THERE IS NOTHING ELSE TO DO.

There are, of course, a couple of silver linings in this series of storms. Here are the highlights:

1. Watching Ella snowboard in the backyard at 10 o'clock at night. That was pretty cute.

2. Going to "McCool's" with my dad for lunch Saturday (the last day we were able to get out), and seeing a room full of people drinking coffee nudges (the $5 cocktail special) in the middle of the day.

3. Local news. They are preempting almost everything to continuously tell us that it is still snowing (awesome!). But after the first 48 hours they began to get really bored and punchy and they have had to work harder and harder to find things to talk about. That has led to some funny on-air antics. The best thing that I've seen so far--one news team was talking to their field correspondent in Troutdale, which is a pretty important location since it is the end of the line for truckers who are wanting to travel east--I 84 has been closed for about 3 days. Anyway--the correspondent had his camera man pan over to the diner at the off-ramp to show a 10 foot drift, and as the camera panned back to the correspondent, a man walked out of the gas station and fell. I'm not someone who usually laughs at other people getting hurt or embarrassed--I don't tend to think that sort of thing is funny. BUT. One of the anchors back at the station actually said, "Aww. Look at that! I sure hope that guy isn't one of ours!" Which is a completely jackass comment to make on the air. It was a nice break in the facade that these guys try to create to make us feel like they care.

4. Hands down the best thing I've seen: I was at Kinko's on Saturday (long story--) and it was snowing like crazy. A woman walked outside and her windshield had iced/snowed up while she'd been self-serving at the copy machine. She took her copy of (I SWEAR!) The Prophet and used it to clear the windshield. This could only happen in Portland. It made me simultaneously proud and disgusted to be an Oregonian.

Thanks, by the way, to Stobie. Your Remington Steele tip came just in time.

Real Time Report

I am currently sitting at a coffee shop staring at a man who is a dead ringer for a fitter version of Brando at 60. He doesn't talk like him though, which is good, because I'm tripped out enough already by the physical similarities.

Also, a weather report for those of you not in Portland right now. It's raining like crazy, and it is gray and cold. I think it is only about 66 degrees out right now. It looks like it could be anytime between late October and April. But not August.

But I'm not complaining. Just reporting.

Today Is Your Birthday

I have just finished making the annual birthday mix for Dr. Awesome, the awesome doctor. He turned 33 today (yesterday, technically) and I had to miss his soiree at the home of the Moody Blues Bros. due to packing. That is sad. But my guess is that they had a great time, even without me.

I'm not totally happy with this mix. In spite of the fact that Dr. A and Mikey J. were just making fun of me for including a Frank Black song on every mix I've ever made (and this is not strictly true--those of you who got a copy of the 2007 mix know that I didn't include any Frank Black), there is, in fact, a song from Show Me Your Tears on this mix. There are also three covers. That wasn't on purpose either. But one of them is particularly good--the Future Bible Heroes covering "Don't You Want Me." But I'm sure that I'm losing my touch and that is sad.

Anyway, happy birthday to my favorite partner in crime. I'm glad that we got to spend some time together before I have to return to Austin (yuck) and you get swallowed up by Long Island.

And yes, I did say packing. Tomorrow (today, really) I leave the sunny, breezy 80 degree perfection of the PDX summer for Austin, where the weather is less than desirable.

Once I'm there, I'll write a little about what comes next. And I'll finally post Rose Festival pictures. I know you want to see some Rose Festival pictures!

Feels Like Vacation

I'm having a slightly hard time with the transition from Austin to Portland. It's hard to go from 95 and sunny to 62 and rainy (even if you LOVE the rain, as I do). I went to pick up Mikey for drinks tonight (on Foster--THAT is awesome) and he made fun of the fact that I was wearing flip flops.

The truth is, I didn't even get out of bed for most of the day because every time I tried, I nearly froze. It turns out that the air conditioning was on in the house. On accident. It was seriously cold, but it was also a good excuse for watching back-to-back episodes of Nanny 911 while curled up in a quilt, eating toast with strawberry jam.

Tomorrow I'm heading to Eugene--my dad's there to see a track meet this weekend--and then my parents and I are going to the chalet, and Ryan, Joy and the kids will meet up with us there later in the weekend. Good times.

I brought my niece, the lovely Lady E, two pairs of hello kitty socks (I like to have something in my carry-on to bring her when I get into town). She was really excited about them, and told me that she, "loves hello kitty" and has a new hello kitty toothbrush.

I am so proud.

That's about all the news. If you can even call it that.

Gross

It is so humid outside that you can see the air.

Is it any wonder that I'm counting down the days until I get to go to PDX?