[...about me #161] lyrics

July 19th, 2009 Graig

I have a horrendous time remembering lyrics to songs, even songs I’ve heard hundreds of times or made pains to learn the lyrics to I can’t remember. Then again I also have a hard time remembering how songs progress musically, making singing or humming tunes challenging. As much as I love music, my brain, I think, isn’t wired for it.

I do want to learn some songs to sing to LL though, so I’ll need to find a repertoire. I don’t think rapping “Bitties in the BK Lounge” is something she’ll want to hear when she’s 2 or 3 and trying to fall asleep.

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[...consumed all new #161] Hawkworld #1-20

June 13th, 2009 Graig

I received a full run of the series last year and have just started making my way through it in the past week. For some reason I’ve never read the originating Tim Truman HAWKWORLD mini-series that was a pretty hyped piece of work back in the late-80’s/early-90’s. But with the ongoing series, I’m quite amazed at how Truman and Ostrander managed to avoid tackling DCU Continuity head-on for much of the series, with only the occasional reference to the Golden Age Hawkman and Hawkgirl.

While I didn’t receive the first Annual in amongst the pile, I’ve been reading the reader response to it (jesus do I miss letter columns in DC Comics) and how upset the hawk-fans were with how it tried to explain the many continuity gaffs caused by Truman’s reboot.

Ostrander’s exploration of American social hierarchies, values, politics etc. was an unexpected element (if at times a little heavy handed), as was the Thanagarian political intrigue which the series routinely jumped back to. It’s got superhero, sci-fi and fantasy elements, which very few series pull off very well. It’s a pretty smart book. The biggest problem I found is Hawkman is pretty emo through it all. After a reading dozen issues of this I woke my wife up screaming “Hawkman does not keep a diary!” Even worse, every other issue Hawkwoman is crying. Shayera does not cry! But I get that the Katar Hol and Shayera Thal introduced in HAWKWORLD were blank slates and that their defining personas hadn’t yet developed. Hawkwoman wouldn’t truly be great until the Justice League cartoon, but you can see the foundation here. The only other major gripe is that you could make a drinking game out of every time someone yells “SEVEN HELLS” and never make it out of an issue with your sobriety intact…
Also, have to say that Graham Nolan’s art in the series is decent, but his covers are incredible.

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[...i ate #161] mini-wheats (original frosting)

June 11th, 2009 Graig

In the span of 2 years Mini-Wheats have become one of the most expensive cereals on the supermarket shelves, to the point that we can’t justify buying them on any regular basis. Of course, whenever they go on sale (such as they have this week, with a 475g box for $2.99) we wind up buying multiple boxes and eventually get rather tired of them, so taking a break and waiting for them to go back on sale isn’t really that bad of a thing.

I’ve tried the various flavours of mini-wheats - original frosting, brown sugar (my favourite), strawberry (kinda gross), vanilla (definitely gross), and maple (blech) but have avoided the cinnamon struesel as I’ve yet to find a decent cinnamon-flavored cereal. I’ll just stick with the classics.

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[...learned #161] jai alai

June 11th, 2009 Graig

My knowledge of jai alai comes solely from crossword puzzle clues, usually “jai ____” or “___ alai”. I didn’t know that the proper pronunciation was “hi ah-lye” and, to be honest I didn’t even know it was a sport. It wasn’t until the recent “Dos Equis” commercials, where a younger version of the Most Interesting Man in the World is playing it, that I came to even know what it was. It’s a team-player, court ballsport with some commonalities with Handball, Racquetball or Squash (tennis derivatives - in Basque, the variations are all “pelotas”), in that it’s played in a three-sided court, but instead of rackets they have a basketed glove that they use to hurl the ball at the wall (top speed was recorded at just over 300KM/hr, giving name to “the fastest sport in the world”). It’s a round-robin sport with 8 teams of two playing up to either 7 or 9 points, with the winning team of each point facing off against the next until the game is won. It’s popular in the Latin American countries, and Florida, and the Philippians, and heavily supported by gambling. The gloved, woven basket I’d previously seen on supervillain “Fastball” (in the Cadre) and similar designs were use in Tron.

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