Category: General Musings

For this podcast, The Dude on the Right wonders about team mascots, is still looking for a PG-13 movie with 2 “F” Bombs, hopes he doesn’t get old like a dude at the Post Office, and prays his sister doesn’t find a treasure chest of information that would ruin his life forever.

By:

The Dude on the Right
I hope you are having a nice 4th of July weekend here in the United States, or
at least just having a nice time if you aren’t from the United States.  I
give some breaking news about a mascot gone wild, and I wonder if there is
video.  I also saw that "Be
Cool" was on cable recently, and it gave me a line I have become obsessed
about, namely that if you utter the F-bomb more than once in a movie you get an
"R" rating.  I have yet to find an instance where this in not true, yet. 
I also find it sort of funny that those folks who can promote censorship can’t
take it when they think religion is involved, and blame getting a PG rating on
religious censorship (even though it’s not), at least when it comes to the movie
"Facing the
Giants."  I also had an incident at the Post Office which makes me hope
I don’t get like this when I get older.

But as I was cleaning the dude-pad I
found something that my sister, and probably my niece, would find as a treasure
chest (although not of a monetary value) of things to make fun of me for the
rest of my life.  I have to decide if burning this treasure or buying a
super-duper safe to protect it is more appropriate.  All I know right now
is that I need to find a better hiding place, and as I’m writing this, I know I
found it.  My new hiding place is not talked about in this podcast, but now
I’m almost tempted to invite my sister and niece to Chicago for a weekend just
to see if they can find this treasure.  My guess, they won’t, because,
well, it’s not gross (like waterproofed in a toilet), actually very clever, and that’s all I’ll write.

This
podcast summary has gotten too long, so I’ll just leave it like this…

Thanks for listening.

That’s it for this one!  I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
Sometimes I wonder how some people still have their jobs.  No, wait, I
suppose that’s really not it.  I suppose I wonder how, after years at being
on a job, they still seem like they are new on the job, and they also still have
their job yet their hygiene leaves a lot to be desired.  My case in point
is a dude who works at a local grocery store, manning the register in the liquor
department.

Every now and then I am want to purchase some liquor, and there
have been two, regular, check-out folks who have been working the register for
years.  One is this nice, older lady.  She doesn’t remember your name,
but she does remember your face, and is always there with a "Hello" and a "How
are your today?"  She is also able to run people through the line like
nobody’s business.  Scan, bag, scan, bag, scan, bag, scan, sticker, scan
frequent shopper card, punch the right buttons, and you’re out the door.

The
other is this middle-aged dude where if the line is just two people deep you
might as well hoof it to the normal check-out lines because your trip will
probably be quicker.

And somehow, after working for years in the checkout lane
and stocking shelves in the same liquor department, he still has a job, still
hasn’t seemed to figure out how it works, and well, taking pride in one’s
appearance doesn’t seem to apply.

Here’s what I’m talking about:

First off
the dude is way fat.  Don’t get me wrong, I need to lose some weight as
well, and even some of the most obese people can at least be one with their
obese selves and make it work for them.  Not this dude, he is pretty much,
for no better term, a fat slob.  He is also sort of surly, never greets you
with a smile, and doesn’t seem to know how to wash his clothes, or at least to
know when it’s finally been too many days wearing the same shirt.  He also
doesn’t seem to remember anyone who comes through the line, because as much as
I’ve seen him over the years, he still doesn’t seem to recognize me.  But I
can get past the initial gross-ness issue of the dude, what really blows my mind
is after all of these years the dude still doesn’t seem to be able to put
together how all of this technology works, even though he also helps stocks the
shelves in the liquor department.  In front of me is a wine person, with a
dozen bottles of wine.  For every bottle, even if they are multiples of the
same bottles of wine, check-out dude looks to find the bar-code before running
it over the scanner.  Yes, that’s right, after all of these years he still
hasn’t seemed to figure out the bar-code is on the back label of the bottle of
wine and you don’t really need to look for it.  And both you know and I
know that on those cases of beer, the bar-code is on the bottom.  Not him. 
He has to look on all four sides, then do the "head tilt" to look at the bottom
and realize that "Aha!  There it is, that pesky bar-code!"  Lighting
quick.  And still, after all of these years, you would have thought he
would have some technique to actually put the items in those plastic bags, but
no, not this check-out dude, because somehow he labors at still trying to figure
out how those bags actually work.

And then comes the actual payment procedure.

So your items have all been scanned, he has scanned your frequent shopper card,
and it’s time to pay.  I would say 95% of the folks coming through this
line know how to scan their credit card through the scanner and punch the
buttons, or if they are paying with cash even better, but it’s not the
purchasers having the problem, it’s check-out dude.  From what I can tell
there are a couple of buttons to push depending on your method of purchase. 
To me it sort of seems like it would be redundant – If they pay with cash, hit
these buttons;  If it’s a debit card, these buttons;  Credit, it’s
these.  – and after years with the same cash register system (I know it’s
the same because when the grocery folks switched the cash register system a
bunch of years ago, the nice, older lady, took a little more time, explaining
they switched the system), you would actually get used to what buttons to push,
but not this check-out dude.  Nope, from day one, until day, well, it’s
have to have been over 500 on the job, check-out dude still works those buttons
like it was day one.

And so I just wanted to vent about this dude who still
has a job I think he should be much more familiar with because, thanks to my
fault, I didn’t listen to my normal rule today, and that is to head for the main
check-outs if two people are ahead of me when this dude is running the liquor
check-out.  There I stood, for about 15 minutes, waiting to pay for my
twelve pack of Heineken Light (my diet starts tomorrow), and not really
wondering how this dude still had a job, but how this lazy, fat, slob, still had
a job that after all of these years he still hasn’t figured out how to do it at
least somewhat efficiently.  Thank you for letting me vent.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

For this podcast, The Dude on the Right congratulates his sister, has some movie viewing dilemmas for “Superman Returns” and “The Devil Wears Prada,” and is psyched about “Spider-Man 3” even though it won’t be released for 11 months. He also isn’t worried about the asteroid coming near Earth over the 4th of July weekend, unless, well, those tracking it forgot to convert Metric to English, or vice versa. And then he just babbles for no apparent reason because he can never really figure out how to close out these podcasts sometimes.

By:

The Dude on the Right
Yes, I blew our "Stu & The Dude Weekend Wrap-Up" this week, but no worries, I’m
here for a podcast about a whole bunch of stuff.  I give props to my sister
who is a champion, I have a dilemma on how to see "Superman
Returns," and am actually looking forward to seeing "The
Devil Wears Prada."  But Superman and Prada aside, I am now totally
psyched for "Spider-Man
3" even thought the movie is 11 months away.  And as we look forward to
celebrating this 4th of July weekend, don’t worry, the asteroid that is a
half-mile wide won’t be that close, only as close as a lot of those space
modules in the

Apollo series.  I just worry if those watching this asteroid paid
attention to their English to Metric conversions, and vice-versa.  I hope
so, because it wasn’t such a success story for a

Mars Probe.  And although I comment about it, sometimes a fifteen year
old dudette, even if she is your niece, deserves getting "the finger."  I’m
claiming "Road Rage Syndrome."

Thanks for listening.

That’s it for this one!  I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
Okay, I’m a day or so behind.  I’m sorry, it won’t happen again, until the
next time.  Anyway, I made it back to my old country, and back to my
current country, actually forgot to get together with Stu to get a podcast done
today, but thought I would at least start things back up with some blog talk of
my trip home.

Well, my trip home reinforced
my continuing belief that those who aren’t used to driving on a three-lane
highway have absolutely no clue on how to drive on a three lane highway, how my
old country town is letting its resident’s learn what it might be like to drive
on the moon, how
sleeping in a basement has some benefits in a house of older parents, and how my
sister, and I hate to proclaim this, but my sister is a champion.  I will
not really elaborate at what my sister is a champion of, but in all of my life,
no one, and I have been around the best of them, has ever accomplished an
accomplishment such as hers.  I might talk to Stu about it when we actually
get together to do a podcast,
and let him know he used to be a contender, but he has now fallen so far below
the bar, well, there is no getting back in contention.  I will just say
these things right now:  I think my sister’s husband would be proud (at
least that’s what my sister said), my nephew should be glad he wasn’t in Ohio
(nor in any adjoining states) at
the time, and my niece is still in awe that I survived.  My sister’s
championship aside, I have finally been able to combat my fear and sleep in my
old, country home, basement, alone.  I’m thinking The Boogeyman that lives
in the laundry room was caught off-guard with my coming home, and especially my camping out in the basement by myself.  Had he have known I was coming
home, and sleeping alone in the basement, he probably would have wrestled up a
bunch of his friends to spook me, but by the time I left it was too late for him, and I
actually got an extra hour of sleep!  I suppose I should explain these last
couple of sentences a bit.

When I was a youngin’ there was one room in our
house that creeped me out because I thought The Boogeyman lived there. 
That room was our laundry room in the basement.  I don’t know why, I’m sure
there is some repressed memory that made it that way, but for whatever reason,
whenever I had to go downstairs, I had to turn on all of the lights so I
wouldn’t be afraid of what might jump out of the laundry room.  Even as I
got older, and more rational that there wasn’t actually a boogeyman living in
the laundry room, every time I would walk down the stairs to the basement, and
even today, I couldn’t help but remember how the laundry room spooked me out. 
But this past weekend I won!  While at home I slept in the basement, in the
dark, and no boogeyman attacked me, even in a completely dark basement, and I am
confident that the next time I go home, and down those basement stairs, I am
sure I will still wonder if The Boogeyman still lives in the laundry room, and
that he has now just grown into a slacker in his boogeyman ways.

The Boogeyman
aside, and being at home in the old country, I
didn’t take pictures again because, well, sometimes I’m a slacker, and for this
weekend I was a slacker.  I wanted to do a blog or two but didn’t, was
going to do a podcast but am using the excuse that since neither my sister nor
my niece wanted to do one, well, I didn’t, and in some simple honesty, it was
nice to just get away and watch some baseball, and I don’t think those podcasts
would have proved that productive because I would have just made fun of my
sister or flipped-off my niece again.  I’m such a bizarre brother and
Uncle.  I was also going to try to do a movie review about "Click," but
didn’t.  I saw the movie and give it 1 1/2 stars out of 5, but that review
will wait.

And my drive back to my country was actually uneventful for a change.  Getting
out of Ohio still showed that those folks don’t know how to drive on a
three-lane highway with a speed limit of 65, I am liking Indiana with their
speed limit of 70 (those people seem to know how to drive it, even with two
lanes), and in Ohio, near Toledo, this spot (the picture to the right) always, and on every trip back
and forth, somehow brings my spirit up.  For the last bunch of trips I have
kept trying to get a picture of this shed with my cell phone, and this time I
finally got one, and for the life of me, I’m really surprised I got it.  It
came up quick, I said to myself "Shit, here comes the ‘Smiley Face’ shed!" 
I pulled my camera phone out of my pocket, set it up, and luckily snapped this
picture, which I haven’t been able to do before.  The rest of the pictures
I tried to take on my way back to my dude-pad came out lousy, but for some
reason the "Smiley" picture worked.  Weird how things happen like this
sometimes.

So, I officially made it back to my Chicagoland pad.  The 4th
of July Weekend is coming up for all of us, in whatever way for you, and me. 
Me, I’ve got to deal with Ozzie Guillen and White Sox, Dusty Baker and his
issues with Cubs, and keep betting with my Mom and the Indians.  I would
like to get together with Stu to do a podcast, but if not, one should be coming
tomorrow night.  My Dixie Chicks CD review is almost done, I am psyched
about "Superman Returns" (but torn on where to see it first), and if I do write
a review of "Click," spoilers will abound because the movie just pissed me off.

As much as it was good to be back home in the old country, and I sort of felt
bad for flipping off my niece, but I’m claiming "Road Rage Syndrome," it is good
to be back in my normal country.  I’m thinking one more night in the
basement and The Boogeyman would have figured out I was down there.  I can
think of nothing worse than a 39 year old screaming up the basement stairs that
"The Boogeyman" is coming to get me.  Oh wait, I can think of something
worse, and that is why my sister is a champion.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
I ended yesterday’s blog, Part 1 of my "A
Haircut Gone Wrong" episode with the simple line, "I miss seeing Vita." 
If you wonder why, read yesterday’s blog first, otherwise, here is Part 2 of the
installment, the actual haircut experience, gone wrong.

… As I was heading
home to the dude-pad, it was finally time to get that almost desperately needed
haircut.  It’s probably been about two months since my last haircut, which
is sometimes long in haircut time, but I’ve gone longer, I think around four
months has been my record.  Vita had a field day making fun of me when I
came in for that haircut.  But Vita was not in this equation, I headed back
to the same place that left me with two decent heads of hair with two different
stylists.  I walk in and there she is, "Piercing Girl," and this time I had
my contact lenses in so I wouldn’t be blind during my haircut.  I tell the
dudette at the desk that I’m looking for a haircut and a blow-dry, but I wasn’t
paying close enough attention because Piercing Girl was just finishing up with
her client, so I didn’t say I would wait for her, and all of a sudden I was with
"I’ve Got Better Tools Girl."  I should have sensed there was a problem
when, as she was washing my hair, she commented how she prefers to get her hair
cut with whomever cuts her hair because it is in the haircutter’s basement and
she doesn’t have to "wait in line" to get a haircut.  I guess what she was
telling me was that coming here was a mistake.  This time she was right.

With my hair all washed, and me seated in her cutting chair, it occurred to me
that she was a little too short.  Now I’m not a tall dude, but the haircut
chair wouldn’t go low enough so I had to crouch down a tad for her to be at a
comfortable height.  And here is where I really knew things would be going
wrong.  I have a simple haircut, at least so I think.  It’s parted on
the side a bit, and generally when I get a haircut I’m looking for it cut to the
top of my ears, with no sideburns, with a square cut in back, slightly above the
collar.  She went to cut the hair on the sides, first trying to line up the
scissors for a straight line getting rid of my "sideburn" hair, but somehow
couldn’t just cut the hair in one nice clip.  Nope, she tried to do a
series of clips, leading to a jagged look for the side hair.  At this point
I could tell she was really pretty new to this haircutting thing, and I was her
latest guinea pig, but at least she had the cool clippers.

So she quickly
abandons the side of my head and heads to the top of my head where she grabs a
lock of hair and asks "Is this short enough?"  I tell her just a little
more, which for her ends up being about a finger and a half worth of hair, to
which I say, "A little less."  With my patience in full patience mode, I
knew I was in for the full ride, and a ride it was.  I’ve seen Vita cut my
hair a lot of times, and even the other girls at this place had the "grab first
batch of hair here and cut to appropriate length, grab another batch of hair off
the newly cut hair a bit and match the length, but adjust for the shape of the
head and haircut" maneuver.  This girl, though, couldn’t.  She would
miss her mark where she made the first cut, thereby grabbing a handful of hair
with no reference where to cut next, and continued.  With the top of my
head not that bad, she now moved to the back of my head, and I could still see
her struggling.  The right side wasn’t too bad, she would try to flip up
some hair with the comb, and oh, did I mention that she already dumped two combs
onto the floor by this time?, and then clip some of it.  She didn’t really
seem to have a game-plan, just trying to make it shorter, and around the ear,
but not really having the ability to just make a decision and cut.

But it was
the left side of my head that, for some reason, just gave this girl trouble.

Now since I hadn’t gotten my hair cut in a while, and as it got longer I skipped
the mousse portion of my morning regimen, so my hair on the sides sort of
trained to "flip" out a little bit.  And she had the hardest time with
this, especially on the left side.  She would flip up some hair with her
comb, try to cut it, but because it was already dry it would fall before the
scissors got there, then she would try again, and each time catching just a
little tuft of hair.

My guess is that for this haircut chain, they will give
you the basics, some combs, scissors, but for the most part, if you want cool
stuff, you are on your own.  This girl had the cordless trimmer thing,
which one of her colleagues borrowed earlier, and it is a cool thing if you can
use it right, but I’m thinking she had it just because whomever cuts her hair
has one, because she couldn’t use it right, especially for the side of the head
hair.  There is sort of an art to using the cordless trimmer to sculpt the
hair.  You use the comb to line up the hair, and this only works if the
hair is sort of damp (mine wasn’t), then you nicely trim the hair along the
teeth of the comb.  You move the comb a little (keeping some of the other
cut hair for some reference) and do it again.  She kept trying, especially
on the left side of my head, but forgot the hair needs some wetness to keep it
pointing out of the teeth of the comb.

My hair is finally a little shorter,
and in the meantime, the two other dudettes cutting hair have already gone
through their next batch of clients.  At this point my dudette actually
told me she couldn’t figure out how to get the hair on the left side of my head
to go how she wanted, and by this point, I knew I was just better off getting
out of there without hurting her feelings, and without her cutting any more of
my hair.  As I was looking in the mirror it didn’t look like the back of my
hair was that straight, I could see that the right side wasn’t too bad, and that
the left side had some slight gouging which I figured I could cover up with some
mousse and a blow dryer.  And as I fibbed to her that "Everything looks
fine," I still couldn’t help but wonder how you can’t at least get the first
cut, leveling out the hairline with the top of the ear, to be level.

And so
ends this episode of "A Haircut Gone Wrong."  Look, I realize the dudette
was probably kind of new at this haircut thing, and that’s sort of why I didn’t
want to wail into her while I was there, or even show her how to use her crazy
clipper thing.  Maybe I should have inquired how long she has been cutting
hair, and if it’s been over a year, maybe it might be time for her to look for
new work.  But I didn’t, and now I sit with a haircut I have to try to work
with in the morning to make sure it doesn’t look like a haircut the previous
girl who cut my hair would make fun of.  Me, I’ve got a couple of months
before I need another haircut, as messed up as this one is, and then the dilemma
comes up:  Do I risk it and try to get "Piercing Girl" to cut my hair
again, or do I just try to plan a trip into Chicago and call Vita?  As much
as "Piercing Girl" is nice on the eyes, I’m thinking it might be nice to talk
with Vita again, who’s also nice on the eyes, and give her my family update, and
see how hers is doing as well.  With getting a haircut from Vita I’ve got
to plan a little bit better in getting said haircut in a little bit better
fashion, but I know what I’ll get – A decent haircut, and comfortable
conversation, and isn’t that what we are always looking for?  But then
again I might just be to lazy and pray I get Piercing Girl the next time around.

Sometimes I’m such an idiot.  Happy Haircutting!

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
I was going to let

yesterday’s blog wrap things up here until I got back to the old country,
but an incident today, as part of planning for my trip to visit the P’s, went as
I feared it might one of these times.  This blog is simply about my haircut
today, and you can probably relate in one way or another.  Or you can just
quit reading and go on with your daily life, and check in for my next Blog. 
But isn’t there something nice about a getting a decent haircut?  Today, it
didn’t happen.

First, some back-story…

For the longest time I’ve been
getting my hair cut by a nice and nice looking dudette named Vita.  I was
introduced to Vita, and her then hair salon partner, Angela, by a college
friend, Laughing Boy, back in, well, college.  Laughing Boy knew Angela,
but it was Vita’s place, and really, I didn’t care which one cut my hair, on the
looks side they both measured up, but in the end I just wanted a decent hair
cut, actually a decent cut of all of the hairs on my head, and eventually, this
was the place I always went.  They weren’t the cheapest, but the both of
them gave a consistently decent haircut.  As the years went on, after
college, except maybe a couple of times during my stint as a Radio Shack Manager
in downstate Illinois, I still visited Vita’s place and got a decent haircut. 
As my job careers would have it, my locations still stayed neared my old college
stomping grounds, and thus, near Vita’s place.  Vita, she eventually closed
up her shop and Angela went away, but Vita kept doing her hair thing in her
basement in her nearby neighborhood, and I kept getting my haircuts there. 
Over the years, and it has probably been almost 19 years since either Angela,
but for the most part, Vita, have been cutting my hair, Vita’s gotten to know me
and my family whom she has never met, and I know a little bit about her family
as well.  She knows when I am going to visit my parents, because, well, I
need a haircut, and we joked a lot because I always took too long to get a
haircut.  She saw me starting to go "gray" and asked if I wanted to have my
hair colored, to which I replied "What’s the point?" and she related a story
about a dude whose hair she colored who one day couldn’t understand why he was
spending so much money to "not go gray."  Conversation aside, and she has a
super-friendly dog, I could always count on a decent haircut, even when I got a
little goofy with a spiky look.

But then something changed.

One of the
companies I do computer consulting for, that was keeping me near to Vita’s
haircuts, moved.  The new location wasn’t close to their previous location,
nope, it was out into suburban-land, which traveling-wise is actually better for
me, but it was nowhere near Vita’s house, so now I had a problem:  I had to
find a new place to get a haircut.

My quick solution – one of the national
chains.  And it wasn’t that bad for the first two haircuts.  For the
first haircut I got a cutie with nice assets and some cool tattoos, a piercing
through her lower, umm, below her lip, and I was just a little sad that I didn’t
have my contacts in because, well, once taking my glasses off I was pretty much
blind and couldn’t focus on her assets, I mean my haircut.  The easy joking
back and forth was that I couldn’t see what she was really doing to my hair, and
she laughed.  She asked me to take a look, I put my glasses back on, and
she did a pretty good job with the haircut.  I was pleased, just wishing I
had my contacts in, but I left feeling okay about my haircut and not feeling
that bad about not seeing Vita again.

A couple of months go by (I’m not that
quick to get a haircut), and I’m heading home again to see the parents, so I
know I need another haircut, but sadly, piercing girl wasn’t there, and I got
"when I’m out with my husband I always point out to him people who got a bad
haircut" girl.  Again I had no eye contacts, so the joking was back and
forth about my not being able to see the haircut.  "Perfect Haircut" girl
professes during the entire process, from the washing of the hair to the final
removing of the haircut cape, that she is the best haircutter, and I just
humored her during the entire process.  She didn’t do that bad of a
haircut, but piercing girl did better, and now it was time for haircut number
three, without Vita.

And this time, things went wrong.

And this time it will
wait for my next blog to explain everything that went wrong because this blog
has gone on too long as it is, and I’m trying to watch two baseball games and
"America’s Got Talent" at the same time so I can’t focus on my bad hair anymore.

I’ve just got to say this…

I miss seeing Vita.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
If you didn’t listen to our "Stu
& The Dudes’s Weekend Wrap-Up," I’ve got to thank our staff member Stu Gotz
for solving part of my new movie-going dilemma that I talked about in my

last blog.  His suggestion was since the old movie theater had the
better viewing experience, when it comes to blockbluster-type movies, pay the
extra buck and a half and head to my tried and true theater, but for the most
part, I should save the cash and head to the new theater for the rest of the
movies.   Thanks Stu!

On another topic, one of the blogs I read on a
regular basis is from a dude named
Brad Feld.  Subscribe to it if you will.  I don’t always agree
with him, but he found a great piece by a
dude
from Ohio State about the word "fuck."  Thankfully he read the entire
thing and gave some great thoughts, appropriate for his blog title, so I was
able to skim over the entire "fuck" piece.  I just found Brad’s thoughts
entertaining and thought I would share the links.

On a last topic, I wanted to
post something tonight since I’m not sure when our next post will be, at least
in the next few days.  That’s because I’m heading back to the old country
for a weekend of rest and relaxation.  Okay, it’s not the old country, it’s
just Ohio, and it’s not a weekend of rest and relaxation, it’s just a weekend of
getting together.  But unlike the last time I went home, when I forgot to
charge the battery in my little digital camera, said camera is on charge so I’m
hoping to give a fun-filled blog with pictures from my homestead.  I’m also
taking the "Mobile Podcast Studio" with me so I’m planning on wrestling up my
niece, one of my siblings, or one of my parents to do a podcast over the
weekend.  My guess – they’ll all chicken out and I’ll just have to find
something entertaining and topical to talk about, much like I always do.

In
the meantime I’ve got to make sure my laptop is set to update the website from
afar, get some laundry done so I have clean clothes, get my garbage out in time,
and get a haircut.  The other thing is that even though I have my
Sirius Satellite Radio, as
my driving day is Friday,
Howard Stern is off this Friday.  As much as I like "The Friday Show,"
I’m thinking about listening to a bunch of new music on my iPod and finally, and
I mean finally, getting some music reviews posted.  I’ve been really liking
the new Dixie Chicks
CD, have become a little iffy with
Blue October, and
need a couple of more spins with
Augustana. 
But then I’ve broken promises before.  I guess we’ll just have to see how
the trip goes.  Let’s just leave this blog at…

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
I have two dilemmas I am dealing with right now, both of which I hope to
remember to discuss with
Stu
Gotz during our "Weekend Wrap-Up" podcast tomorrow.  Well, one I will
definitely discuss with him, and that simply has to do with having a podcast
that really isn’t for the kids.  No, we aren’t going to have any strippers
or porn stars in the studio discussing perverted sex acts or how they were
molested as children, although Stu would probably welcome that.  Nope, I’ll
leave that to the kings of those who do that.  In any case I heard a new
song on the radio this weekend.  Nope, it wasn’t on an FM nor an AM
station, it was on satellite radio,
Sirius as a matter of fact,
and it’s a pretty blunt song about Connecticut.  The thing is I laughed my
ass off during the song, and I’d like to play some clips for Stu, as well as
some clips from some of the band’s other songs.  I’m not sure if I want to
go there, namely risqué songs, but I think Stu will appreciate the songs, for
the campy feel they are worth.

My other dilemma has to do with movie theater
loyalty.  I don’t think Stu has this issue, but for the past many years I
have been a steady patron of our
AMC theater sort of
near my dude-pad.  It was a little further away than some of my other local
theaters, but it was the only one with stadium seating, had a huge variety of
times movies would be playing, had great online ticketing that didn’t charge you
anything if you were a
MovieWatcher member, and even gave you free stuff (popcorn, sody-pop, and
movies) and other bonuses if you were also a said member of said MovieWatcher
program.  But another movie theater has opened, much closer to me, and at
slightly cheaper prices.  The problem I have is they don’t have free online
ticketing, the movie screen isn’t as enveloping, and as far as I know, no free
stuff for patronizing them.  The benefit is that the seats are a little
more comfortable and bouncy, and they stock

Raisinets.  I suppose I might have to do a statistical analysis of the
pros and cons of both theaters, but man, the five minute travel time versus the
20 minute travel time is a huge issue, although without that travel time, I
wouldn’t have heard said song I eluded to in my first paragraph of this plight
had I gone to the closer theater on Saturday.  Who knew going to the movies
could be so complicated?

On the simpler of things, I did catch "Nacho
Libre" and "The
Lake House" this weekend.  I’ll talk to Stu about them as well, but
feel free to read the reviews in the meantime.  There’s a few more movie
previews posted, with a few more to come in the next couple of days, and then
finally I should be all caught up in getting my movie previews done.  My
next step is to get back to some concert reviewing, some CD reviewing I’ve been
promising for awhile, and even some DVD’s.  My summer is looking very busy,
and hopefully very fun.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!