A Load of It

First off, anybody seen the new Starbucks Expresso Shot commercial where some guy named Hank is followed around by a crowd of people singing along to Rock and Roll Pt 2? HANK! Great commercial. Not as good as the "Glen" commercial with the band Survivor. Worst commercials? Old Navy commercials that take old songs from the 80s and 70s and change the words to fit some crappy item they're selling [ie "Super Skirt" to the tune of Rick James' "Super Freak"]. Horrible stuff.

My Top 10 songs, from a rotation standpoint:
1. "B.Y.O.B." by System of a Down
2. "Feel Good Inc." by Gorillaz
3. "Holiday" by Green Day
4. "Revenga" by System of a Down
5. "Orpheus" by Ash
6. "Banquet" by Bloc Party
7. "Southern Belles in London Sing" by The Faint
8. "Wishbone" by Architecture in Helsinki
9. "It'5!" by Architecture in Helsinki
10. "The Hand That Feeds" by Nine Inch Nails

A decidedly rock list. I'm not on a rap fix right now, that's for sure. The new System of a Down album is pretty damned good. The first 5 songs are ridiculously hot. The new Gorillaz album is good, the video even better. "Holiday" is the best Green Day song in years (and by far and away the best one on the overrated American Idiot album). "Orpheus" is possibly the greatest driving song ever, 2nd only to "All I Want" by the Offspring. Both songs were used in racing video games that I loved the hell out of ["Orpheus" is in Burnout 3: Takedown and "All I Want" was in Crazy Taxi 1]. The tracks by AiH are carefree and fun. "Banquet" sounds like a more sophisticated Franz Ferdinand. "Southern Belles" and "Hand that Feeds" just rock. They make me want to get up and move.

I still haven't seen Star Wars Episode III, and yes, I am a huge dork. But not that big of a dork. I can't stand the crowds. After Episode II, I wasn't too thrilled to get out there and see it either (now Lord of the Rings was a different story).

The vibrate motor on my phone just stopped working the other day. That's really annoying.

Ubuntu's running well on all the machines still. The problems are minor, but some take some nasty work arounds. I wish I had my Xbox Media Center functional again so I could catch up on all the shows I've downloaded.

Lost season finale is tonight. I really like that show.

The iPod Shuffle is working great still. It's odd that I use the 1GB Shuffle far more now than my 40GB Nomad. Speaking of, I really, really need to update the Nomad.

I do miss iTunes in Linux. I'm using Beep Media Player [essentially a Winamp clone] but I miss the artwork/browser panes in iTunes. Rhythmbox is close, but still missing a lot. I also want a MusicBrainz client.

I finally cashed in all my iTunes Pepsi caps that I got from my coworkers (around 100 or so in total from January-April) and bought a few albums: all the Ben Folds/Iron and Wine/Postal Service rarities, The Stars' "Set Myself on Fire", Of Montreal's "The Sunlandic Twins", and The Go-Betweens' "Oceans Apart" - haven't listened to them all yet, but I immediately converted them all to DRM-free mp3 [and not DRM-encrusted Apple AAC] so that I can use them wherever I want.

I am saddened by Subway ending their Sub Club promotion. No more stamps given out, and they'll just give you $0.40/stamp for the stamps you've got. Sad thing? I've got 9 little booklets done [I used to work across the street from a Subway in Detroit]. So I guess I need to cash those little bastards in.

School's going great so far. No tests yet [Bio on Tuesday, Chem2 on Wednesday] but I've pretty much destroyed all the quizzes, homeworks, and labs. Shouldn't be a problem.

Oh, and I had a Tendercrisp Bacon Cheddar Ranch again today. BK needs to make that a permanent item on the menu. Oh, and the Darth Vader / Burger King stare-down commercial is comedy gold. As is the Darth Vader "I'm your....uncle" one.

I watched Big Lebowski again last night and I still love the shit out of that movie. Quite possibly the most quotable movie that I know. "YOU'RE OUT OF YOUR ELEMENT, DONNY."

I finally got a subscription to the greatest magazine in the world, 2600, after years of wanting it. The first issue arrived the other day, and it was an absolute joy to read. I love the hacker mindset, that constantly inquisitive drive that hackers have to fight for personal freedoms and to always find out how things work. Barnes and Noble has copies, I suggest you pick one up one day.

And I should be finishing Metroid Prime 2 sometime soon. What a great game.

Oh, and women still continue to just baffle the heck out of me. The ones I like the most are either not available or nowhere near me or just not interested. In the words of Homer Simpson: "Aww! The waiting game sucks! Let's play Hungry Hungry Hippos!"