Past-Blasting!

A verbatim excerpt from a piece of paper I just found in my underwear drawer... which I obviously need to clean out more:

9/29/00 - St. Francis Bingo Night

Tonight I joined first clique. 8th grader in it! Talked about "stuff"! Going to a pool party. I feel really mature now. Cool!!!

The Man with a 30 Second Memory

Thought provoking, to say the least:



The whole time all I could think about was how I might try and explain this situation to someone who hadn't watched the video, and I concluded the impact just wouldn't be the same. I love how his wife is sticking with him - you best believe if I were her, I'd have ran for the hills, like, four years ago. Still, it's the perfect romantic touch to keep this story from complete and utter bummer-dom.

Fun Site

I just copy-and-pasted the first four paragraphs of "Smith Experience" into this website, and apparently they're good at telling who you might be trying your hardest to imitate...

I write like
David Foster Wallace

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Every July 11th for the Rest of my Life...

...will henceforth commemorate the rascally shenanigans of the Barefoot Bandit, the Pacific Northwest's very own - and possibly last all-time great - classic, movie-worthy American criminal.


The ethical dilemma this Colton character presents will surely be the stuff of 100-level Ethics discussion groups for years to come, though my answer will never waver: this kid rocks! Okay, breaking into a store is bad, and everyone knows it, and I'd be the first person to throw the metaphorical stone at such a person in such a situation. But to break into a store... after escaping juvi... and then stealing a series of planes... and crash landing them... and branding both a moniker and a calling card (you heard of the barefoot chalk outlines, yeah?)... and then fleeing to the Bahamas... before one final, high-speed, gun-laden boat chase... now that's the stuff every 14-year-old boy's dreams are made of. I don't care how into "just reading" you are.


Unfortunately, I predict Colton is quickly approaching what will someday equate to the final twenty minutes of his Steven Spielberg-produced biopic, which, as everyone who watches such biopics knows, always drag. Here's hoping the actor who plays him (but - oh, man! - I just realized it's gonna have to be some annoying-as-hell kid actor) opts out of the scraggly prison beard look. It's overdone.

As for me? I'm spending every July 11th, in addition to the line for the midnight showing of Catch That Bandit!, barefoot.

It's Hot as Balls Out

I woke up this morning at 5:33 (or something like that... exact times are just always more dramatic, so I allow some creative leeway if I can't remember it to the minute) unable to breathe. It was just. so. hot. out. I'd already stripped completely naked and removed all the covers from my bed, so there really wasn't anything more I could do in that department. Plus, it was 5:33 (or something), and who the hell would choose actually getting up to try and solve a problem at so early an hour? Now, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "you're the kind of person who would do that, AJ. Why would you even ask such a question when it's so obvious you'd respond exactly how you're now suggesting no one ever would." And you aren't incorrect. I hate situations that could easily be fixed but aren't, and yet I still don't usually do anything about them... unless it's 5:33 (or something) and my bedroom is already 80 degrees fahrenheit and I can hardly breath and a fine sheen of sweat has me stuck to my near-bare mattress. That's when I get up and move the fan from its perch beside the window to about two inches from my face.


Summer in Eugene has been miserable and hot and full of busy work that I don't appreciate at all. But I've also had the time to watch some movies!

The Informant: Hilarious. Loved the soundtrack and the funky visuals. Matt Damon's voiceovers are also incredible. Plus, he looks like SUCH a dork with a mustache.

Pee-Wee's Big Adventure: Yeah, that's right, I'd never seen this one before. In retrospect, I actually now count this omission in my favor, because I don't think as a child I would ever have appreciated Tim Burton's early knack for mise-en-scene, nor Pee-Wee's gleeful performance, nor the infectiously juvenile jokes that grow and grow and grow on you throughout the film's running time until it's all just really damn funny. Honestly, Pee-Wee still kind of bothers me, but its an irk that I feel is similar to many other people's dislike of Jerri Blank in that they both run on strange facial tics and an obnoxious laugh, so I'm willing to suppress my reservations in an effort to demonstrate the tolerance we should all practice with Jerri. But I digress.


Hot Tub Time Machine: If I ever talk with you and you start telling me how much you like this movie, we probably won't stay friends. Simple as that. What's happened to mainstream humor in America? Is this really what it takes for a film to go blockbuster on our asses in the twenty-first century? It's inept. I think the main point of contention for me is that people have to be kind of smart to write a movie, so when something this stupid comes along, I just don't understand how an individual can possess enough of a brain to pen a script while ALSO being the kind of person who values this brand of humor. The two just don't go together. Skip!

And that's about it. Tomorrow = Oregon Country Fair. I'm not sure whether to be excited or just plain depressed about spending a day surrounded by 100% Organic hippies.