Culinary Crime

I need to buy eggs, but I don’t want to look suspicious

You always look suspicious.  I don't trust you around my goldfish.

You have a goldfish?  

Of course.  I'm allergic to cats.

So anyway, today's Sametime Status is brought to you by my breakfast.  I made french toast recently because I wanted to make a nice breakfast, but only had one egg in the house.  Then there was that whole snowstorm thing you may have heard about which prevented me from going to the store.  Long story short, my house is entirely devoid of eggs, so there will be no french toast, omelets or Eggs Benedict until further notice.

You make Eggs Benedict?

Just because I haven't doesn't mean I can't.  

So here we are today, the roads are clear and most of the stores around are open again (Word is that the local WalMart was even closed when they lost power) and I should hit the grocery store.  I didn't lose power long enough to have all of my food spoil...I just need a couple things.  One of those things would be the aforementioned eggs.  Problem is, I live in a constant state of fear that cashiers at the grocery store (or any other store, for that mater) and today is Halloween.  I'm pretty sure that every grocery cashier who scans a carton of eggs today will just assume that those eggs are destined for somebody's front door.  I don't want them to assume I'm going to be vandalizing somebody's house when all I want is a scrambled egg.  

I'll just have to wait and buy groceries tomorrow. 

Wherein We Make Friends With Klingons

Training Day IV: The Undiscovered Country

Again with the movies?  Shouldn't you be learning something?

Well, at the moment, no.  We get occasional breaks from the deluge of information provided by the training course, so we're taking a pause at the moment.


So you decided to regale us with nerdiness?


It's what I do.  Today is the last day of training, which just happens to be Day 6.  Not many film series of note have gone to a 5th sequel, so even though I did Sci Fi yesterday, I felt obligated to go with Star Trek for Day 6.  I'm sure you all enjoy it.


Speaking of weird work schedules, Jeremy Is In The Office may or may not be in the office any given day next week.  The court system finally caught up with Jeremy.


Fortunately, I'm not the defendant...I drew jury duty.


So, next week...we'll see if Jeremy Is In The Office or not.  We'll also see how he feels about capital punishment.


It's just a small town court...I sincerely doubt I'll have a noteworthy trial.  And even if I did, I don't think I'm supposed to talk about it anyway, so anything you hear about a trial will be complete made-up bunk.  It's more fun that way!

Freezing Fury

Training Day, Episode 5: Mother Nature Strikes Back


Geeze, Jeremy.  Another day of training?  Once this is over, you're going to be a genius or something.


First of all, as evidenced on this Blag, I already am a genius. 

Second of all, there's only one more day of this stuff..so it's not so bad.

Thirdly, it would seem as if Mother Nature has won another round in the war of attrition between me and my heating bill.  I actually turned the heat on in my house yesterday, signaling the unofficially official end of summer.  Something about the forecast showing solid-form precipitation and low temperatures that start with a 2 meant that I should probably break down and start paying for warmth again. 

The concept of "sleeping weather" is an interesting one that I hear about.  Toward the end of summer, I start hearing people talk about how they had "good sleeping weather" the night before.  The idea being that when it's cold, it's not too hot in your house to be comfortable while sleeping, without the use of a fan or aid conditioner.  The problem with this is that you're unconscious, and unable to actually pay attention to, let alone enjoy, the weather.  The concept seems to only apply to temperature, but as far as I'm concerned, the only kind of "sleeping weather" I need to concern myself with is anything that's quiet.  So, hurricanes and tornadoes are out, regardless of the thermometer. 

However, when it's cold, we have good sleeping weather.  I'm okay with that...I just get out the big blanket, burrito myself in the bed, and wait for morning.  My problem has started to arise with me in the morning, where the room temperature has been dropping steadily since the summer months.  In the last couple weeks, that temperature has made its way into the lower 60s in the morning.  While this would still qualify as perfectly good "sleeping weather" it's not particularly good "getting out of the shower" weather. 

These Rarely Go Well

Training Day 4…not starring Denzel Washington

 Ooo...did they Darrenize Denzel's character for the sequel?

Thankfully, no.  Today's Sametime Status is simply pointing out that I'm back in that training class I had a couple weeks ago.

Jeremy failed miserably.

Actually, Jeremy passed with a 97.06%...only missed part of one multiple-answer question which was bunk anyway.  This particular course is divided into two parts, and now we're in Part II.  Therefore, it's Training Day...and the 4th one.  Pretty simple.  

Speaking of lousy sequels and reboots...I got a chance to see the new remake of "Footloose" not long ago.  Regrettably, I did not turn down that chance.  

Even with lousy movies, the director will often get something right, often by sheer happenstance.  In the case of Craig Brewer's remake of the 1984...well...I hesitate to use the word "classic" but whatever...the only thing he managed to get right was to use Kenny Loggins' original song as the opening theme.  This is pretty sad, since all he had to do was directly copy the movie he was copying, but he pulled it off admirably!  After that, it was pretty much downhill.  

Let's ignore the completely implausible and dated plot (dancing is outlawed by an over-reactively conservative city council until a reckless youth leads a spirited rebellion in order to free himself and nail the preacher's daughter), lousy script, and atrocious acting for the time being and focus on the car.  A car that's been sitting in a barn for an undetermined amount of time, but long enough to have a thick layer of dust won't simply start right up by putting in a battery.  Usually there's some kind of gas involved...maybe some oil...and it often helps if the car is less than 40 years old.  Even if we ignore that, the car stereo which barely has enough power to drive the speakers built into the car will apparently become an ear-shattering, disturbing-the-peace-ticket-inducing pinnacle of mobile audio simply by connecting it via a single wire to a carnival loudspeaker.  Remarkable!  

I'm also not sure how many people out there who take out their frustrations with the world by dancing around an abandoned factory, swinging on rusty chains and breaking windows before falling on the ground laughing,  but apparently, this is a perfectly viable means of escape.  And if you find you're having trouble agreeing with somebody, by all means, settle your differences by driving old school buses around a figure-8 demolition derby.  That will show everyone who's boss.  Just don't ask where you're supposed to procure a fleet of customized used school buses. 

Oh yeah...I would be completely and thoroughly remiss if I failed to mention the horrifyingly awful cover of Bonnie Tyler's "Holding Out For A Hero" that was spewed upon the world by Ella Mae Bowen.  Sweet merciful crap, that was terrible.  

Before we went to see this shameless, lousy, money-grab masquerading as a movie, we were alerted to a critical review that suggested the film would be a better experience if you were intoxicated upon entering the theatre (I Am Not Making This Up).  Unfortunately for that author, all I can offer is that it doesn't help enough.  Footloose (2011) is pure junk. 

This has been another edition of Jeremy Is In The Theatre

Either Way, His Name is Jonathan

Three straight shutouts apparently isn’t good enough to make the next start

Yep...it's hockey season.  Jeremy's going to be busy for a while now.

Well, it seemed that way.  Today started off with me wanting to amuse everyone with the tale of LA Kings goaltender Jonathan Quick, who set a franchise record in his last game, recording a third consecutive shutout and now hasn't been scored upon in his last 188+ minutes of play.  All that said, he won't be starting tonight's game against New Jersey because...uhm...well...because.  

What ended up happening today though was too much fun to pass up.  I set a new record for futility at work today.  We get new computers every so often because they become obsolete and start having trouble, and all the usual reasons.  Well, today was my day to get a new computer...which for me is usually very exciting.  I get to play with new electronics and configure a new desktop and see what capabilities my new machine has.  It's great fun.  Of course, to get to that point, I have to go through the standard configuration wizard which includes the installation of all the required programs for network access and passwords and security and whatnot.  My new laptop choked on this wizard no fewer than three ways.  

A hard drive security program didn't install properly, the network access program won't run at all, and the software installation program won't update.  It was a whole new type of pathetic that I had my computer for 45 minutes before I found myself on the phone with the help desk.  That has GOT to be a new low.  Who's got a better story?

So Did Both Fans

Based on the commentary, I expected the Coyotes to win by 5 or 6 goals

 Sports Commentary sucks.

Oh boy!  It's time for another horrifyingly misguided Rant from Jeremy!  Dust off your soapboxes, everybody!  We're about to get sued!

As hard as it may be to believe, on occasion, I will watch a hockey game on TV.  Shocking, I know...but it's true.  One important aspect of watching sports on TV is the play-by-play and color commentary provided by the game's announcers.  Once you become accustomed to a certain announcing team, be they Doc and Chico, Bob and Jim, Dan and "Moose," it actually gets a little uncomfortable to watch a game announced by a different crew.  Not long ago, I was treated to a Los Angeles vs Phoenix game, with commentary provided by Dave Strader and Tyson Nash.  Since one of the teams involved was LA, I expected to hear Bob Miller and Jim Fox, but it was the Phoenix broadcast, so it was a little unusual.  What followed was a travesty of announcing.  

Dave and Tyson are what are referred to in the industry as "Homers."  That is, they firmly believe that the team that employs them (in this case, the woeful Coyotes) can do no wrong.  If you weren't actually paying attention to the game, you would come away firmly convinced that the Coyotes were playing the better game.  They were skating faster, fore-checking better, winning more individual battles, getting the better scoring chances, deserving of more power plays, getting the better of the 4th line play, fighting better, checking harder, and goaltending better than LA.  It seemed from the audio of the broadcast that the Coyotes were running absolutely roughshod over the Kings.  

Strange, then that the game ended 2-0 in favor of Los Angeles. 

Comedy Returns Tomorrow, Hopefully

If Wall Street wanted to occupy my wallet with 1% of their money, I’d be okay with that

What would you do with all that money?

What are the people who have it doing with it?

Fair point.

So today's Sametime Status is in reference to the Occupy Wall Street protests that are still going on in New York and various other places around the world...and nobody really knows why.  I get that there is a lot of unhappiness among them, but I just don't understand what they expect to happen out of the whole thing.  

The corporate world is built around growth of profit in order to increase stock prices.  There is no corporation in the world that will willingly sacrifice a couple years' worth of profits and risk the wrath of the stockholders, mainly because the heads of the companies will be replaced by people who will go back to the singular focus of increasing the stock price.  The issue right now is that corporations have forgotten how to make money.  Most sales aren't growing by the desired pace (mostly because nobody has any money left) and all that's left is to increase profits by lowering costs...which amounts to little more than taking money away from the people who already don't have it.  Ostensibly, it seems like a pretty self-destructive spiral that's been going on for the last 30 years or so and shows no signs of stopping before it crashes.  I don't know what the answer is, and neither do the protesters, or the 1% of the people they're protesting against.