OMG, I totally forgot about Flickr!

At least until the very sweet and shy Todd reminded me of it. I started looking at the site again and got all inspired to post some more pics...including (finally) some of the 35mm work I've scanned into my computer. Sadly my last entries before that were from January, I think...LOL...

Anyway, if y'all are curious to see my stuff (the photos, you perv) then you ought to be able to pull it up with this.

In the meantime here's a little preview...

Lazy lazy Saturday...

Well, it's officially my Saturday. And yes, I realize it's Monday for pretty much everybody else, but when you've got Monday and Tuesday as your weekend you tend to measure the week a little differently.

My original plan for today, when I was looking at it from the perspective of my Monday (which was Wednesday), was to finally find my way back into the gym after my self imposed hiatus. But, as Moby alluded to on his blog the other day, I developed a not-so-friendly stomach bug a couple days ago that has yet to leave me entirely. Going to the gym seems like a less than ideal plan when your stomach sounds like it has a herd of angry, confused veloceraptors squealing in it.

So I think this will be my super-mega-lazy Saturday. I headed up to Sprouts for some foodage earlier, just finished a big bowl of oatmeal with strawberries and bananas on it, and am now being a total bump on a log in front of the computer. Which will likely be what most of my day will consist of.

Gym Embargo: Day 7

Well, as much as I hate taking time off from the gym, it's been a week now since I tossed around the ol' iron. The surprising part is that I don't feel the kind of irritation and grumpiness that usually comes with not getting to the gym. I'm actually feeling alot less tired and worn down. I've also comforted myself with the knowledge that this will make my workouts better in the long run...and will prevent me from doing damage to my body.

I have experienced some odd things, however. Such as feeling sore from a workout I'd done 5 days earlier, and my appetite actually increasing over the last week. But I guess that's what happens when you finally give your body the chance to rest like it should.

And the winner is...

First off, I wanted to thank you guys for your unprecedented response to the "Fur-Off". I think that's the most comments I've ever gotten for a post on here! LOL...It probably helps that Homer promoted my little contest on his blog. Thanks, Homer!

So, without further ado, Here are the respective styles from least to most popular...

The "Dwayne Johnson" is 4th, with one vote.

The "Juan Pablo" is third, with two votes.

The "Goldberg" is second, with five votes. (Yes, I can count...I pestered Moby until he told me which one was his fave, and he voted for this one)

And The "Fuzzycub" is first, with nine votes. (Which pretty much confirms my suspicions...I've always liked it best too)

Since this winner requires no altering of my current facial hair arrangment, I'll go ahead and just post another example of the Fuzzy to show the winner....



Thanks again to everyone who voted, especially the ones who gave me flattering comments while doing so! :o)

Hairy Otter and the Ever Evolving Facial Fur

I had someone tell me a while back that my facial hair seemed to always be in a state of change...shifting and moving toward something else. I thought about that, and I have to admit to getting easily bored with any one style of beard-ness. I always find it fun to try something new out to make my face look a little more or less follicle-y populated. It's a heck of alot cheaper than a hair cut.

But it got me got thinking, I know I have my faves of what I've tried, and John has told me his...and, surprise, our views on that matter don't always jive. But he is one of the people I know can always count on to be completely honest about an opinion. So I thought it'd be fun to post a few different types to see what you guys think is the better.

Vote for your fave in the comments section, and those who pick winner get a free mustache ride! Oh alright, so those who pick the winner will get to influence my shaving A.D.D. for a while. I promise to shave to whatever style you choose, and keep it that way (for a few weeks).

My current: The "Fuzzycub"

The "Juan Pablo"

The "Goldberg" (no, not as in '& Osborne")

The "Dwayne Johnson" (Yes someone actually told John I looked like him in this pic...they were on hallucinogenics at the time, I'm sure)

There have, of course been other styles I've attempted, but most have been too disastrous to inflict upon your eyes.

Overtraining? There is such a thing?

Some of you who've read my sporadically updated little blog on a regular basis may remember a post from a while back bitching about losing weight unexpectedly, despite eating more than I ever have. That, joined with being generally tired and developing a slight case of tendon-itis, led me to talk to a few friends with a pretty good knowledge of weightlifting and all that testosterone-y stuff.

They essentially both said "Duh, you're overtraining". Given that I, on a given day: wake up, go to the gym and totally kick my ass tossing about heavy things for an hour and a half, shower, head to work, totally kick my ass tossing about heavy things for about 8 hours, then go home and catch a little sleep before starting it all again...I guess I can see their point.

"So what should I do?" I asked my buddy Perry (who's not only one of the in-better-shape people I know, but has also won a bodybuilding competition).

"Take two weeks off the gym, eat alot, sleep alot...reset your body's overtraining clock"

I, being not only gym-obsessed, but also stubborn as hell. Scoffed at the idea, and headed directly into the gym the next morning and did legs. As if to tell me that I was being an idiot, my body found the "tired" and "pain" buttons and pressed them as hard as possible that day. Walking felt like trying to animate a zombie from the inside...and yes, that IS the best description I can give. Or maybe it's because Shaun of the Dead was on TV in the breakroom that night.

So here I am in day two of my weightlifting embargo. And oddly enough, I don't feel nearly as bad about it yet as I thought I would. But that could be because I just got home from tossing about heavy things for 8 hours at work...just maybe.

Computer killed the video star

Every now and then John and I get to feeling really lazy, and decide that instead of doing anything the least bit productive we'll have ourselves a movie day. Which, roughly translated, means that we go to a matinée movie (which are priced at $7 here...WTF?!?) and then theater hop to see at least one more movie. I know...bad bears...how dare we cheat the local multi-plex of that extra $3.50 that they'll easily make up on a single 12 ounce soda? But I digress...

So on Sunday we did just that, and headed in to see Transformers and then Ratatouille. The first showing of Transformers was at 12:30, and we were there at 12. The theater we went to is housed in a mall, so we (unwisely) bought our tickets and wandered out to browse a few stores we'd normally never set foot in to kill some time until the movie started.

I say unwisely, because when we finally wandered back into the theater, it was so packed that we had no choice but to sit in the you-can-see-every-one-of-those-pores-that-the-lead-actors'-makup-guy-worked-so-hard-to-cover-up seats. The only good thing was that we were sitting next to this rather hot military looking guy who had some nice tattoos on his rather beefy arms. But even that wasn't enough to keep us in seats that required us to move our heads from side to side just to make sure we were catching everything on screen.

So we left that theater, and waited in line for the next showing of the movie right next door. I have to admit that despite going in knowing it was a Micheal Bay film (and thus lowering my expectations enormously) I was quite pleasantly surprised at certain aspects of the film. The CGI effects were really great, and allowed for some really kick-ass action sequences. They were only ruined when the robots started (shudder) talking. Especially when one of them sounded like he was the whitest kid in the world trying out to be the next VJ on BET. But overall, the CGI effects and sequences out-classed anything the live actors could bring to the screen. I mean, how can an actor compare with a big-rig truck that changes into a 50 foot high robot while skidding down a major freeway, locked in battle with another 50 foot high former vehicle robot thingy?

Which was a funny revelation to have as we headed into Ratatouille...an entirely CGI movie. The only thing that actors were really good for in that movie was the voice-overs. Which, don't get me wrong, were very well done. But it got me to wondering, when one can create such a wonderful and visually rich world inside a computer, how far are we from the majority of movies having come from pixel rendering? The amount of detail and visual beauty that Pixar continues to put into their movies never ceases to amaze me.

After all, a pretty good percentage of the Transformers movie was CGI. And when the time comes when it's cheaper to create an entirely CGI movie than deal with sets, props, and overpriced primadonna actors required for most blockbuster movies...how hard of decision will it be to just go with the computer?

Or maybe all these thoughts were the result of achieving dangerously low blood sugar levels while attempting to sit through nearly 5 hours worth of movies on protein bars alone...

I left on the Bart to San Francisco...

I know that I've gone on and on about the great benefits of working for an airline before here, but I'm still in the flying-for-free-is-a-novelty stage right now. Which means I still think it's really cool that John and I can decide last minute to fly somewhere, and not only do I not pay extra for it, but I still pay nothing for it! So the other day when, upon trying to decide what to do with my three days off that were quickly approaching, John suggested we head up to San Francisco for pride and to visit our friend Moby, I was all about it!

Of course, like most things that one is really looking forward to doing, the trip up there wasn't without complication. We arrived at the airport way early (5:30) for our way early flight (6:40) and found out that the 2nd portion of the trip (from Las Vegas to Oakland) was pretty full.

So I singed up for flying 4th, which means that I basically act as one of the flight crew, sitting in the jump seat, helping pass out peanuts, and maybe even making snarky announcements over the PA. This meant that if the flight were to fill up, I would free up one seat for John. It also meant that I had to pre-board so I could meet the flight crew that I might be working with. Which also meant that I found out before anyone else would that that particular plane had a mechanical issue that would delay it quite a while.

So, in another shining example of how great my job can be, I hopped off the plane, walked up to the customer service desk, and managed to charm the girl there into getting us onto the next flight into LA. The catch was that we got into LA about 7 minutes before the flight to Oakland was due to depart. I was able to convince the gate agent to let us pre-board and luckily enough, that flight was only 2 gates away, so we booked it right out of our plane and onto the other one just in time.

Once we finally got to Oakland, we had to catch the AirBart shuttle that goes from the terminal to the Bart station by the Coliseum. Three dollars later, we were packed into the rear doorway of the bus stuck between a couple with a sick puppy who smelled as though he'd been eating out of Taco Bell dumpsters and two extremely loud and obnoxious New Jersey-ites who complained about everything from the number of people that they let onto the bus to how fast the driver was going to how long it was taking to get there.

Once at the station, we hopped the wrong train...hopped back off...hopped on the right one, and headed toward downtown. We needed to get off at the stop near where the trolley cars depart thinking that we'd hop one to get to our hotel in Nob Hill. I knew that it was Pride weekend, and that there was going to be a parade on Market, but it was scheduled to start a good hour before we got there. And, were said parade to have been in Tucson, it would have been over 45 minutes ago. We emerged from the station to the all chaos and frivolity inherent to a big-city pride parade.

The first thing we saw was a group of church crazies screaming about hell, repentance, and condemnation over a PA to a group of rather exuberant homosexuals that had gathered around them and were chanting things back while jumping about like they were at a circuit party. All of which was only angering the gentleman on the PA even more, making him re-double his efforts...which only made the gays that much more excited. You can't buy that kind of entertainment.

We watched the parade for a while, and then grabbed a bite to eat at this Korean BBQ place that somehow managed to overcharge my card by the simple mis-placement of a decimal point...making my food $181.60 instead of $18.16. I'm sure somewhere one of my former math teachers is smiling, knowing that I finally understand the power of that little decimal point and its position in a number.

All this time I'd been texting Moby, trying to figure out where and when we'd end up meeting him. He had told me that he was sort of headed our way, even though I hadn't even told him exactly where we were. After eating, and resisting the temptation to throttle the girl behind the counter, we wandered back outside. I told John I was going to call Moby so that we could better figure out our meeting place. As the phone was ringing, I looked around the pandemonium surrounding us and saw...who else?...a grinning Moby standing right on the other side of a rail that created an entry way into the restaurant we'd been eating in. I still don't know how he found us so easily, but I was certainly glad!

That's Moby...and no, that's NOT a halo behind him.

After hugs and kisses, he helped us find our way to our hotel so that we could ditch the bags we'd been dragging through the crowded streets...tripping more than a few bitter queens along the way. Check in time at the hotel wasn't until 3, and it was barely 11am, so we checked our bags and wandered back out to the street festivities.

All of the non-parade activities ended near the Civic Center (no, not a place they sell Hondas) where the expected assortment of booths and port-a-potties lined the streets. Moby showed us around some of the more interesting spots, and we met a few interesting people including Andy and Bill (the men to whom so many BigMuscle members owe heaps of thanks for making it way easier for them to get laid). They were both really nice and great guys in person.

Does this group hug make me look gay?

We also met Matt, Moby's adorable friend from Oklahoma who wound up hanging out with us. Between Moby (southern) John (also southern) and Matt (you guessed it, southern) I was the odd man out. I heard more "y'all"s, "might oughta"s and "usta could"s than a trip to Dollywood would yield. It certainly made the day more fun for me!

Come 3 o'clock, we checked into the hotel and got showered up. We then headed over to the Castro to visit some more with Moby and Matt, and had some great sushi...and cookies. Later we headed back to our hotel via the Muni train and then bus (neither of which we wound up having to pay for for some odd reason). We had reserved a room with two double beds, but discovered earlier in the day that they forgot the 2 part. I slept pretty well despite doing so on the floor.

Apparently, sushi makes everyone giddy.

The next day we met up with Moby and hung out for a bit...had lunch with Matt, Moby and a friend of John's from BMB and his two friends. Matt was nice enough to volunteer to drive us around, as his car had just gotten out of the shop, so John and I and M & M headed to the Haight Ashbury district at my request. You see, I was born there (well, I was born in a hospital, but my folks lived there when I was born) and had yet to visit despite having taken several trips to SF before. It was a fun neighborhood...the four of us hung out in a thrift store there for nearly an hour making fun of clothes, and making each other try on ridiculous articles. Afterward it was on to Ben & Jerry's for some creamy goodness!

Despite appearances, we weren't in a bath-house.

We later made our way back to the Castro for dinner, and then went back to Moby's to watch "Serial Mom". That night Moby went above and beyond his normally sweet and considerate nature and let John and I crash in his bed while he slept on the couch. We promised to keep the stains to a minimum, and slept pretty well.

I'm not sure if it was Matt or John that was doing the pontificating in this picture, but someone's gonna break an ankle stepping off that soap-box.

The next day the three of us headed out to the Oakland airport together, (Moby was going home to east Texas via Houston, and we were headed home). We got to visit a bit more, and subject Moby to some of our music tastes on the train...then we said bye at the airport, and headed home.