Post Weekend Thread…

Updated on January 9, 2012 By Ken Begg 19 Comments

Open thread.

I did…pretty much not a single damn thing. Certainly should have attempted to move all the gigantic, endless mounds of crap stuff I have in my trailer to make some semblance of room for when my B-Fest guests come in. I’m trying to figure out if I can keep Galaxy Jane from even seeing my place. White Chad, meanwhile, well, he’s a guy, so I figure for him it’s just be a “there but for the grace of God go I” sort of deal.

Anyway, what did you guys do this weekend?

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  • The Rev.

    You cannot possibly have a messier place than the guy I lived with my last year of college.  I felt too embarrassed to let anyone come over, and frankly it was too overwhelming for me to try and clean up on my own (he obviously didn’t give a damn.)

    I didn’t do much of anything this weekend, either.  We recently got into “The Big Bang Theory,” so we caught a couple episodes of that.  Otherwise, the TV was pretty much off, and we didn’t have time for a movie.

    I did recently read “The Invisible Man” for the first time, and then watched the movie afterwards.  I liked both for different reasons.  I think I prefer the movie, though; the book suffers from “Frankenstein” syndrome, in that there’s a hunk in the middle full of expository back-story that slows things down.  He never gets to his promised rampage, either.  Plus, Claude Rains is pretty great in the movie; he has a wonderful mad laugh.

  • My highlight was watching the first part of the uncut TV version of the Millennium Trilogy. Kind of disappointing (especially the omission of Mikael’s daughter), and I’m expecting the David Fincher movie (to be released this Thursday in Australia) to be better, but not totally without merit. Looking forward to seeing Noomi Rapace in Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows and Michael Nyqvist in Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol.

    Also, an episode of Damages (season 2), a few Doctor Who episodes (Terror of the Vervoids; The Deadly Assassin; Day of the Daleks) and the latest episode of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.

  • Monoceros4

    Does playing lots of SW:TOR count as doing something over the weekend? Closest I came to watching anything was cuing up a few old MST3K episodes as background when doing some apartment clean-up on Saturday (“The Rebel Set”, “Attack of the Killer Shrews” and “The Giant Gila Monster”.)

    I was a real slob the first couple years living on my own and even now I tend to let things get cluttered. The tendency would undoubtedly be stronger if I were alone. I used to know and regularly visit a guy here in Seattle, though, who would’ve made a good candidate for one of those hoarding shows. The really bizarre thing was that he was quite fastidious and fussy in his personal habits. He seemed like the kind of guy who would give a damn, yet he lived in a walk-in dumpster. A friend of mine and I ended up having to empty a previous apartment of his out about a decade ago when the fellow got evicted. He himself couldn’t participate, thank heaven; he would have grieved and fussed over every little thing we were tossing out.

  • Anonymous

    I should note that I don’t a filth problem or anything like that (I don’t like bugs, so no food sitting around or anything.) Dust, yes. But mostly tons and tons of crap accumulated over the last fifty years and stacked on every friggin’ surface and tucked away wherever there’s a spot.

    I plan to send Rock another big box of VHS tapes, and then maybe I’ll start getting rid of all my movie magazines. But man, I have a lot of junk. Not quite Hoarders level, but way too much. It’s hard to just toss out books and such, though.

  • Anonymous

    Ken, I will see you a cluttered trailer and raise you the filthy single-wide, filled with waist deep trash and dirty laundry, complete with obscene grafitti on the bedroom walls, no working stove or heat, holes in the floor and two broken windows that I moved into upon graduating from High School.  Holy crap was that a nightmare, and such a huge project to tackle that I just gave up and lived in my own filth for 6 months before getting my first apartment. It lives on forever in the back of my mind as motivation to become turning a permanent clean freak, to the dismay of my husband and kids.  One day I will even finish overcoming my packrat tendencies, but that is a slow and ongoing process, I still accumulate clutter in random unused spaces, but mostly confine it to the second floor. The key is to keep everyone downstairs so they think I’m a great housekeeper.

    I had drill this weekend, so didn’t do much fun.  Did see the first 2 eps of Doc Martin on Saturday night, which I found amusing. Got home in time to see most of the second half of the Baltimore/Denver game, which turned out to be WAY more exciting than I think anyone expected. Then the Season premeire of Downton Abbey which I am really adoring.  Good old-fashioned costume soap with villains you can really boo and hiss at. And good guys you want to see happy, while knowing they never will be.

    That’s ’bout it really.

  • Anonymous

    I know what you mean, my place isn’t really dirty but I have books, magazines, and stuff piled everywhere.

    I didn’t do much either. My favorite SF author is Poul Anderson and I love his Technic series with Nicholas van Rijn, David Falkayn, and Dominic Flandry. I’ve read most of the stories but recently Baen issued all the novels and short stories in 6-7 paperbacks so this weekend I’ve been reading them. First time for me to read them actually in chronological order plus a few short stories I haven’t been able to find before. Great stuff and even better when you read them in order!

    Not much else, got bored yesterday evening and pulled both versions of ‘The Thing’ and watched them back to back.

    While off subject just wondering if anyone is thinking of going to see ‘Redtails’? Thinking about it but Lucas and Speilberg haven’t had the best of track records recently. Still sitting on the fence.

  • Prof. Chris

    Rev,

    I haven’t had cable or local TV for almost 10 years. Saves time, money and makes hotel stays during all the travel I do to dumpy places more fun because, no matter how sketchy the joint, I always have the novelty of the “magic box.”

    At any rate, when I stopped being a full-time lawyer at my firm last year, the legal secretaries on my floor all took me out for drinks the evening of my last day. We got pounded. I discovered they had codenames for all the attorneys. Most were pretty self-explanatory: “Loudmouth,” “Perv,” “Doormat,” “The Tyrant,” etc.

    Turns out mine was “Sheldon.” They thought it was hilarious. I had no idea what it meant until I got home and youtubed it.

    Ouch. Juuuust a little humiliating.  

  • Flangepart

    Wow. Thou art more exciting than I.
    Went shopping sunday, took a friend with no car to Krogers, ate, slept, went to a friends house to eat, plays a comdey CD ( Comedy Police: Mike Armstrong)and help her sort through her late husbands effects.
    Yeah…

  • I celebrated my birthday weekend. Got some nice stuff like new running shoes and MST3K volume 22. Also watched ‘Time Bandits’, one of my favorite movies from my childhood.

  • Rock Baker

    Movie magazines? I think Pop would be interested in those if you don’t yet know where to dump them…..

  • Rock Baker

    I busted my tail getting the first few pages drawn for an upcoming issue of The Saint for Moonstone. (Less than half-way into it.) This one has me more nervous than most assignments, since the pages actually have to be approved by the license holder for the Saint characters BEFORE the pages go to inking! (Also adding to the challenge is the distinct lack of cheesecake on this one, so I’m somewhat out of my element!)

    To give me some background noise, I listened to the commentary tracks on the recently viewed THE MONSTER SQUAD disk that my brother picked up. Somewhere between Pretty Cool and Total Waste of My Time, you’ll find THE MONSTER SQUAD. So much ALMOST worked, only to be stymied by the rest of the movie. What a tragic misfire.

    On Sunday, I stole a little time to enjoy my new copy of THE TIME TRAVELERS via the good folks at AC Comics. The widescreen transfer came from a simply beautiful source print, and I’ve always loved the film itself. It’s not great or anything, and the middle sort of bogs down with a bunch of on-camera magic show tricks, but for the most part the film is a fairly slick, colorful, and very fun adventure story in much the same vein as FLIGHT TO MARS or WORLD WITHOUT END. Weirdly, the film would be re-made only three or four years later as JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF TIME! The later film isn’t quite as good, but it serves up enough changes to be entertaining -not great, but entertaining (plus it has a cast which includes Anthony Eisley, Gigi Perreu, Scott Brady, and a young Lyle Waggoner -as a Martian, no less!).

    Mostly, though, I crammed on that Saint project, and I’m back on the clock today.

  • Marsden

    I rented Cars 2 an Xmen First Class.  I liked them both, I thought the Xmen movie was really good.  It’s really cool that they were able to actually restart the series with out disregarding what already happened as I can see the situation evolving into what happened in the 2 good Xmen movies.  (That last Xmen sucked, and I understand I’m the only one but I liked the Wolverine movie)  I hope they can follow it up with the same actors and find Cyclops and Storm.  I thought they showed Storm quick in the scene where Prof X first used Cerebro.  Kevin Bacon was really good as Shaw.  I didn’t have a problem with any of the characters, but that dragonfly girl was not my favorite, but I don’t think she was meant to be.  And I liked Darwin, too bad he was killed but it seemed like the right thing to do, they didn’t kill him gratuitously just to say, oh we killed someone.  And Shaw could come back, having a coin through your brain would probably hurt but might not be automatically fatal, especially for a mutant like Shaw.

    Cars 2 was really good, too.  It was focused on Mater, but he did a good job and I thought they handled it really well.  It was actually a bit more violent than I thought, I know they were cars, but they were actually killing some of them.  

    Also, took all day Sunday taking down my Christmas tree and packing it up for next time.

  • Rock Baker

    In X-MEN: FIRST CLASS, I instantly fell in love with the platinum blonde who passes behind Col. Hendry as “Palisades Park” really kicks in. SIGHHHHHHHHHHH.

    Also fun to see Michael ironside pop up toward the climax! 

  • Rock Baker

    Belated Happy Birthday!

  • The Rev.

    I realize I only hang with you a couple hours a year, but I really don’t get a Sheldon vibe off of you.

    So, screw those drunks bitches!  HELL YEAH BRO!!  *fist pump, chest bump*

    (The previous sentence brought to you by testosterone.)

  • Fisheyenomiko

    I watched the “Hounds of the Baskervilles” episode of Sherlock, their updating of… I think you can guess. (-:

    I really loved it; funny, scary, and with plenty of surprises even for those familiar with the original story.  Plus, one of the things I like about the show is how… odd Sherlock is, and he was definitely in fine form last night.  And Martin Freeman, who plays John Watson (that’s CAPTAIN John Watson to you, Corporal!) is always good, but he really brought his A-game in this one.

    Plus there was the nice little in-joke of Russell Tovey as Henry Knight (the updated Henry Baskerville), a young man terrorized by memories of the Hound.  The joke?  Tovey plays a werewolf on another show, Being Human.

    And yeah, I know I sound like a bloody press release, but I REALLY liked this episode.  And, actually, even if you’re not a regular viewer, you could probably watch the episode anyway.  It’s pretty self-contained (the very end will confuse you a bit), and being 90 minutes (all the eps are that long), it’s essentially a movie in and of itself.

  • I saw the second of the recent Sherlock Holmes movie.  I don’t think they come close to being as successful without Downey Jr. and the crazy way he plays the part. 

    I can’t tell how well they work as mysteries, but I’m glad they at least try it.  The trailers make them look like dumb action movies, but I don’t recall a moment that *I* thought was really dumb.  (They even make the fighting OK by using them to show Holmes thinking of the fastest way to take his opponent down.)

    SPOILERS:  For example, the climax of the second film is just Holmes and Moriarty just playing chess and talking about each other’s plan.   Other characters are doing things, but the main character and his arch-nemesis are just flexing their cerebral muscles.  They even avoid a fist fight, which I think was a good decision.

    I loved the car they drove early in the movie.

  • Anonymous

    Saturday was pretty activity-heavy with the kids up until football started (bowling, basketball, cub scouts…)- so I told them that movie night would have to be Friday. They chose a fave MST3K ep- Godzilla vs Megalon, which we enjoyed thoroughly. That’s just a great one through and through- skits and everything about it are classic. My 9 year-old even decided that he would adopt the moniker Goreblatt (or maybe Rex Dart) when we allow him an email account. Then again, that could change next week.

    I did also get some time in to do some reading. Catching up on the Merlin BBC series has inspired me to go back to the source, so I got Malory out of the library. It’s interesting in a stylistic way- not too much heavy description or beating around the bush; he gets straight to telling what would seem to a modern reader to be just the bones of the story. In that sense it is a really thick book that reads fast, real fast.

    After football Sunday (Go Giants!!!) I started on the Game of Thrones discs that my brother sent me – what a great way to finish the weekend. Hopefully I’ll get to the books one of these days, and this seems a good introduction.

  • Anonymous

    So for the the first time,  I watch Hausu on TCM Friday night and and I just watch Magnificent Obsession on Encore  (Hi Jabootu).  

    I am ready for anything.