Yvette's Inner Geek Blog

Ben has amassed a fair collection of model trains since he was a kid, and he’s been (finally) talking more seriously about building a layout for them. We have the space set aside in our house, so now it’s idea time.

We jointly decided this morning, accompanied by our good friend COFFEE, that one section of the layout should be zombie-fied. Little bloody/guts-showing miniature figures set up on one part of town where a derailed train has been burned (or is on fire) and a few non-zombie miniature figures huddled in small groups with cricket bats and beer. The zombies will be headed toward the part of town that remains (for the time) unscathed.

And in that unscathed part of town, there will (at the very least) be a MirthMobile parked outside Stan Mikita’s donut shop.

I would also like to see a secondary layout that reflects the late 1800s, with steam engines and top hats. And a TARDIS.

Gods bless Sundays with strong coffee and Doctor Who on DVD. So say we all.

I was nodding off in front of my laptop last night while writing this, and then today (Thursday) has been a bit of a whirlwind without internet access. So just imagine that you were reading this Wednesday night.

My final masterpieces have been turned in for my Drawing I class and I took the final exam this morning. I’ll share those soon. I went home to pack, then Ben drove me to the airport (with only 1.7 trillion Utah Driver incidents along the way) where the security line was long and I didn’t have a seat assignment. When I checked at the gate, the agent printed out a little receipt with seat number 20C that turned out to be in the very last, and very windowless, row of the small plane.

However.

I sat next to a very friendly Brit named Phil, who turned out to be the manager of singer/songwriter Bobby Long. Bobby had been sitting on the other side of the aisle, but he moved up when two girls asked him to switch so they could sit together. Phil said he’s pretty shy, so if I’d been sitting next to him we might not have spoken at all.

Given the tight quarters and the fact that there was no freaking window for the poor passengers forced to sit in the very back row, insert pity party here, Phil and I fell into small talk pretty easily. When he revealed that he was three weeks in to a one-slash-two-year world tour with Bobby Long, I smiled and said, “oh!” but clearly had no idea who Bobby Long was.

Turns out he co-wrote the main song for the Twilight movie (which I have not seen, and have no real desire to see) and that thrust him head-on into famous… though according to Phil he’s “the real thing” when it comes to folk singing and songwriting. Which of course he’s going to say as his manager, but he struck me as being more sincere than the stereotypical manager/agent. Or maybe it was his sexy British accent.

Regardless, we chatted for nearly the whole ride, which is something I rarely do. Granted it was under two hours. We agreed that the back row of the plane has a special “gang” dynamic since we’re all stuck in the back.  Shaunette, the Memphis-based flight attendant who enthralled Phil with her accent and beautiful dark skin, was part of our gang when she sat in a pull-out seat in the aisle next to me during take-off and landing of the really bumpy flight. Good thing I’m not claustrophobic or overly sensitive to turbulence, because hoo boy.

Overall, my conversation with Phil was pretty normal. We talked about our families, the challenges of air travel, Ernest Hemingway, Neil Gaiman, Moxy Fruvous*, and, you know, the rigors of traveling the world playing sold-out gigs and becoming more and more of a recognizable public figure. I’m not one to get fangirlish over someone just because they’re famous, and Phil expressed appreciation for that. He referenced people whom he calls Shakers—those who instead of using actual words when they meet him and/or Bobby, they just shake or nod their heads a lot and make grunting half-words. Star-dazed, I’d say. I think I’ve seen enough celebrities, and had the opportunity to talk to a few**, to understand that they’re all humans and most likely overwhelmed by overbearing fans and I do not want to be THAT GUY.

Bobby had a gig in Denver that night, and since I’d told Phil that I was flying to Denver for my sister’s PhD defense, he invited me (with a plus-one) to come by the sold-out 350-person venue. As in, he would put my name on the list. Now that, in general, was enough to make me all giggly inside. I’ve never had my name on the list for a concert or anything like that.*** Schweeeeeet.

I wish it would have worked out, but ultimately it didn’t. Monique was pretty stressed while preparing for her defense on Thursday, so I decided that being with her was more important than attending a concert. Even if Bobby Long is some superstar 22-year-old folk sensation. Phil said that he’s planning a concert in (Colleen, are you listening?) Boise in November, so maybe Ben and I can drive in for that. Shaunette and I both had very good things to say about Boise, between screams from the two girls sitting across the aisle as we surfed the rough tide of the atmosphere in our pea-sized plane.

But Phil revealed his real motivation for the Boise show: he wants to visit Ketchum, Idaho. Boise will get to see Bobby Long because Phil is a HUGE fan of Ernest Hemingway. I found this very amusing, especially since I’m a huge Neil Gaiman fan, who is a (sort of ex-pat) British author. We each had a book out from our favorite authors. Except he hadn’t heard of Neil Gaiman. My jaw dropped and I cried a little, but then I figured “one less fan I have to beat down in line to meet him.”

In any case, staying with the fam turned out to be the right decision for the evening. Monique practiced her thesis presentation in front of the three of us on Wednesday afternoon, and it was pretty polished and pretty damn impressive. I wasn’t nearly as concerned as she was about her committee not passing her. Then we went out for dinner and afterward, while Monique pounded a few more molecules of information into her brain, I fell asleep while writing this blog entry.

*Moxy Fruvous is my favorite Canadian modern folk rock bands, but they’re no longer together. I swooned big time for hottie band member Jian Ghomeshi. At one point during today’s conversation, Paul mentioned meeting Billy Bob Thornton while swimming at a hotel pool in L.A., and I had to tell him about the time Billy Bob was a dick to my guy Jian on a radio talk interview this year.

**Writing that kind of slaps a pompous sticker on my face, but it’s not like I hang out with Brad Pitt when he’s in town or anything. (ZOMG pinch me now if that were true.) It’s just that I’ve been to a few geek conventions and I volunteer for Sundance, so I’m acclimating to being in the presence of celebrity-types. Uh, nevermind that maybe I wanted to lick Alia Shawkat’s face in June.

**I only imagine that if my name ever gets on a list or I get backstage passes, I will behave exactly as Wayne Campbell and Garth Algar did when they met Alice Cooper. Especially if local history is divulged.

It’s almost August, and it devastates me to realize that I haven’t blogged because I NEEDED to blog about my trip to Idaho in… (squeak!) May. Ben and I took more than 300 photos between our two cameras, so sorting them and uploading them to Flickr was frankly daunting. BUT IT HAS BEEN DONE. And I’m finally going to tell you, with what I’m sure will be anticlimactic fanfare, about my exciting weekend in May.

I’ve lived in Utah for almost four years now and had never driven into Idaho (which, for the record, I keep typing as “Idago” because really, who puts an H after the letter A?!?! srsly, WTF). I didn’t really have a reason to visit the land of Famous Potatoes until my Idahoan friend C. invited me to her housewarming party in Boise. I befriended C. through this very blog when she was SpudLostInUtah… we finally met in person last year and then a miracle occurred and she was able to escape crazyass Utah, and her blog name changed to FoundInIdaho.

Anyway. We left on Saturday a little before noon, and were pleasantly surprised by the drive through Northern Utah, where the rocky, industrialized mountain area gave way to green and sparsely populated landscape, perhaps similar to what Utah Valley looked like before it was inundated with tightly-spaced condos, churches, and McDonald’s.

The drive through Southwestern Idaho was much greener and hillier than we expected. Heavily-irrigated fields were filled with cows galore. (Ben and I played fiercely competitive rounds of Cows I Win, which is a game I learned in college. The first person to see a herd of cows and call out “Cows I Win” wins. Negative points if the herd turns out to be horses or sheep.) Silvery-green scrub brush dotted non-irrigated areas in interesting patterns. Hawks, eagles, and ravens, and possibly a falcon flew in and out of our view. I’ve turned into a little bit of a bird nerd, and really wished that I’d brought binoculars and field guide with me. At least Ben was driving so we didn’t have to worry about me swerving into oncoming traffic while pointing at them.

However, Major Fail: Ben failed to alert me, and I did not notice, that the Idago (what the hell, I’m just renaming the state) border was looming, so I did not take a photo of the “Welcome to Idaho” sign. I’m pretty sure we did actually leave Utah, though, since the drivers started behaving like actual drivers instead of rude, idiot asshole f*cktards. (I’ve experienced Masshole drivers, and they’ve got nothin’ on half-brained Utah drivers in F-350s with trailers of ATVs. Ahem. /rant. Sorry.)

We took a little longer than expected to arrive in Boise because we stopped at some of the scenic overlooks. This photo was taken just before we drove across the Perrine Bridge into Twin Falls, where there was reportedly a Visitor Information Center. That’s the Snake River and a taste of America the Beautiful. Oh, and a golf course on the right side.

We passed the Visitor Info building twice before getting there. Which might be hard for you to believe, given how large the letters are on this tiny building, but trust me. It’s hiding behind an Outback Steakhouse and faces the canyon and a small park instead of the road. Must have been some visiting Utah civil engineers who thought that up. But the short detour off the freeway to find it was absolutely worth it; the Snake River canyon was amazing and the guy inside the Visitor Center was incredibly friendly and helpful. Like, to the point where I wondered if there was going to be an ultimate reason for explaining all of that information as there was at the end of the movie Wayne’s World, which validated Chris Farley’s cameo-filled-with-seemingly-unnecessary-information. (See, Mom? There’s another example of how watching that movie a million times had a purpose after all!)

And here we have a non-sponsored appearance of Burt’s Bees Lemon Butter Cuticle Cream. Seriously, If I don’t use this stuff regularly, I pick/bite my nails/cuticles until they bleed. I had it out and got all artsy with the Perrine Bridge in the background. I like that the curve of the little tin is echoed in the curve of the bridge.

Not included in any photos that I took: base jumpers. But they were there. Also, a little chameleon of some sort.  At first we thought it was just a cute lizard doing push-ups on a rock to impress/scare us, but then it moved behind a bush and turned green. You BET I started singing karma-karma-karma-karma-karma chamel-e-on! According to Teh Internet, this little guy is not a chameleon after all. But you know what he was for sure? A diva. He kept moving closer until we got a good photo and said how cute he was. Then he grew bored of us and scurried away.

In other exciting news, I did not realize that the Oregon Trail was real. I thought it was just an educational computer game that I never played well enough to beat.

And this is for my mom. Horses have teeth, too! But I wondered briefly if that’s where horses went to learn about dentistry for their species? Because maybe they’ve advanced beyond the “paw once for yes, twice for no” intelligence? And now they’re capable of performing root canals—at least in this obscure Idaho town that had a two-pump gas station in front of a “COUNTRY STORE” that was the hoppingest place in town and probably the only liquor store for miles and even had a Shasta machine out front that ate my 50¢ and then, after a generous honor-refund from the cashier inside, was out of Diet Shasta and shot out cream soda instead of root beer which was too sweet for me and Ben had to drink though he didn’t really mind after all.

Boise eventually appeared over the horizon in the early evening, seemingly out of nowhere. We counted down the mile markers and were like, “um, does Boise actually exist? Because there’s no sign of life and it’s almost our exit…” and then BAM! A city in a tree-filled valley in the middle of what is otherwise nowhere. Sorry I didn’t take a photo of the BAM! moment.

We checked into our hotel—the Hampton Inn in downtown Boise. We had a great view over the newly gentrified neighborhood and movie theater below, and the room was nice and clean, but the walls were paper thin. It was easy to hear, um, bathroom sounds… from next door. Yay. Otherwise a nice place. We walked to meet C., her husband and son at the TableRock microbrewery for dinner, where I had a reuben that had never heard of New York but was otherwise good, and we tried some of the local beer on tap but unfortunately I can’t remember exactly what we had. I probably had the amber ale, and I do remember liking it.

Wow, so now I remember what blogging is like again. It takes time and energy! I’m going to do Idaho Day 2 tomorrow. If I don’t, you have my permission to slug me in my I.P. address. But I will blog, so you don’t have to plan how you would actually do that. You can get a sneak preview by looking at my photos from Idaho on my flickr photostream.

The nail is in the coffin for HD-DVD, and the people at Sony are surely ecstatic to finally have a Booyah! in their pocket after the 1980s embarrassment of Betamax. And there’s no doubt that Blu-Ray will rock my world and wreak havoc on my finances in the next couple of years.

I’m very much looking forward to it, though I think I have the majority of the movies and TV shows I need on plain old DVD, most of which look great on my bigass HDTV with my under $100 upconverting player. 

So my acquisition strategy will be different for these new-fangled discs (once I have a player, or a PS3 if Ben has his way). I’ll probably lean more heavily on Netflix, which fits better into my long-term strategy of being less materialistic without giving up my entertainment budget.

I’m not saying that I won’t buy any Blu-Ray DVDs, because that would be complete insanity. I claim only partial insanity. There are select movies and shows that I am already looking forward to… remember that little TV show called Heroes? Please allow me to quote a covetous Wayne Campbell:

It will be mine. Oh yes, it will be mine.  

All future Pixar films will also come into my home in delicious Blu-Ray HD glory, plus a smattering of other fantastic new titles as the average prices (hopefully) decline.

Amazingly enough, it was less than a year ago when I first posted about this format war. And at that point I was considering one of the dual-format players… I’m glad I waited. The thanks should really go to Ben, who convinced me to be patient until a clear winner was revealed.

Now everyone can move forward and Think Blue in ’08! (Aren’t thinly-veiled political statements okay in election years?) 

My darling Ben set his alarm clock this morning for 7:30 so that he could check the Sunday ads and race out to Target if they advertised the Wii console. He woke me up to tell me that it wasn’t in the ad, but he was going to go shopping anyway to at least take advantage of the 4th of July pop sales that are going on right now. Sigh, another week until potential Wii ownership (we’re too stubborn to pre-order the bundles on ebgames.com).

I woke up later and Ben still wasn’t home, so I made some coffee and started reading the paper. He came home with armfuls of 12-packs that will surely get us through until Christmas 2009. We chatted a little about that fact and other mundane stuff, and then I went to the front room to retrieve the paper…

Lo and behold, there was a Target bag sitting on the couch with a brand new Wii console inside!!!  Note to self: must clean up that pile of bricks I left behind.

Yes, Ben is a smart man. He went to Target first because, you know, just in case. And they had pop on sale. So he walked over to the electronics area first and looked in the Wii case, not expecting to find anything. Yet he saw a handful of boxes too big to be games or accessories…

Yes, some Targets do actually put out the consoles on a Sunday in which they don’t run the ad, contrary to what I had been told. They only had about 7, not the 30 or 40 that they get when they run the ad in the paper. So it’s a good thing that Ben went early…

Did I mention how cool it was and how grateful I am that I could sleep in while my husband ventured into scary commerce and valiantly conquered the dragons of bad fortune? Ben, you R0xx0R!

So instead of working on anything website-related, I spent many glorious hours in front of our insanely big TV with an insanely awesome game system that didn’t take long to win me over completely. I started with the game it comes with, Wii Sports, and played tennis, baseball and bowling like never before. The Wiimote is quite intuitive, and I’m impressed. I also spent some time creating a few Mii characters… though that function has yet to be fully explored because we don’t have the LAN adapter.

What else did Ben buy at Target? The one game that I REALLY wanted: Super Paper Mario. O.M.G.

I’m an old school Nintendo gamer, and had a hard time getting used to the more complicated controllers of recent years as well as the games. I don’t have enough testosterone in me to love all those shooters (as much as Ben wants me to play Halo 2 so that I’ll want us to get a 360 so that he can play Halo 3). Games in general just haven’t been as exciting and intriguing for me since the original NES. And for some reason, I never owned a Gamecube. Things might have been different if I had, but I only played it at friends’ houses where they whooped my ass because they were used to playing and I wasn’t. Everyone knows that’s always a bummer.

It’s late and I’m geeking out over Super Paper Mario. The gameplay is incredible, with just enough old school Mario Bros. thrown in to make me giddy. The whole flipping between 2-D and 3-D I thought was going to be a nightmare for me, since my G.Q. (Gaming Quotient) is pretty low and the idea of 3-D Mario was intimidating. But the new tricks came easily and I played for hours (sorry, Ben). Awesome. Just awesome.

It’s going to take me a little while to get through the game, as I’m only on chapter 2-2. But I’m looking forward to it (even the times when I repeatedly die trying to figure something out).

No wonder it’s been so freaking hard to find a Wii in stock. Nintendo did an amazing job. In the words of Wayne Campbell and Garth Algar: We’re not worthy! We’re not worthy!

Maybe not worthy, but very, very happy!

</ gwiik out >