well, I've finished one whole week at my new job, and I've gotta say, I'm loving it. It's amazing how quickly the day passes sitting in front of a computer doing something you enjoy. the most difficult thing has been trying to join a project in progress while figuring out how they do things. the biggest plus has been that I've already gotten a paycheck, after only having worked there one week (lucked out on the pay cycle), and that I got my first paycheck from my new job the same day I got my last paycheck from my old one, oh, and that my paycheck for one week at the new job was almost as much as my paycheck for two weeks at the old job. 'course, rent is due, and the landlords are charging us an extra hundred dollars since brian moved in, so rent alone almost took the sum total of both paychecks. once again, I'll be struggling the next two weeks to buy food, gas, and cigarettes.

so, my life looks to be shaping up somewhat, finally getting to the point I've wanted to reach for a long time now. but things are never perfect are they?

now that I've got a great job, that it looks like I'll actually enjoy, and that pays well–now that I don't have to worry about what I'm "doing with my life," and seem to actually be in a position to achieve happiness, at least on a professional level, I can now devote myself to other unsatisfactory aspects of my life. only once in my life have I glimpsed perfection, there was a time, over a year ago, when I had a great job, was making decent money, had a wonderful live-in girlfriend, and was very very happy. things obviously didn't work out, through a combination of internal and external influences, I pretty much lost it all. with this new job I'm starting to build that back. now I can get depressed over the failure of past relationships again. 'bout time.

I've finally started my new job at Corvus, been there for three days now actually, and I'm liking it so far. damn well ought to be, I've been trying to land a "real" job for, oh, almost six years now…

funny thing is that the new job is almost like the two months I spent off work–sitting around on the computer, making web pages. surprisingly low pressure so far, but they're probably taking it easy on me…

can't think of anything else to talk about…

not much to report the past couple days, been workin', my sixth and final week at Kinko's. on monday I start my new real job at Corvus. I'm going to be struggling the next few days to readjust my schedule from third shift to first shift… why can't life ever just be easy? why can't we just sleep when the hell we feel like it, wake up when we can't sleep another minute, do the things we need or want to do, and just be happy? if someone could tell me the secret to this, I'd be indebted to them for the rest of my peaceful, happy life.

to retouch on something from my last post, I have finally read a couple reviews of the x-men movie, and so far it's fifty-fifty (I've only read two–one good, one bad.) The reviewer for Entertainment Weakly–that snot rag of an entertainment magazine, which, ironically enough, put X-Men on their cover–spewed a mouthful of bullshit all over one of their pages. I often wonder if these movie reviewers even go watch the movies they're reviewing, but since he actually pointed out a few scenes that weren't in the trailers, he must have, or at least he talked to someone who had. It amazes me that this dumbfuck actually saw the same movie I did, but then I think about how reality is all perception based anyway, so in truth, he didn't see the same movie I did, he saw the movie his brain made him think he saw, and damn where the hell am I going with this?
      anyway, the guy has no clue.

now, the guy who reviewed the movie for the LEO (Louisville's Eccentric Observer, for you out of towners) obviously didn't have his head up his ass when he walked into the theater. at least he got it. he understood the message, the theme, the really great thing the movie was, as well as the little, but ultimately forgivable, problems. all in all, he gave it a fair, honest, thoughtful review.

EW guy, on the other hand, apparently walked in expecting some totally fanciful kids movie that he was going to hate, and was pissed off when the real-world issues made him think too hard.
      not to throw myself into too-heavily geek infested waters, but this is the same bullshit Star Trek gets on occasion, when people dis it because it actually tries to deal with important social issues. Admittedly, some of the acting on Star Trek isn't the greatest, and there have been some horrible episodes (of all the series), but Star Trek isn't about the actors, the characters, or the ships, it's about theme, emotion, hope, and all that other good shit that makes good literature good.
      which conversely, is what the X-Men movie is all about too. It isn't about the characters, the costumes, the funky powers; it's about the struggle of the outcast members of our human society trying to fit in and live normal lives, and not being able to do so because of prejudice, fear, and an unwillingness or inability to learn, understand, accept, and welcome differences.

and all this is very real, very now. perhaps EW guy looked into Magneto or the Senator's face and saw himself, prejudiced, afraid, ignorant, and got pissed because the movie called him out. or maybe he just didn't get it.

ok.

I've not updated in a couple days, and have seen the new X-Men movie three times since then. and I say I'm not a fanboy…

I'm pretty sure that those of you who care have already read at least 25 or 30 different reports/reviews/commentaries on the movie, so I'll spare the long-winded shit. overall, I thought the movie was great (obviously, since I've seen it three times), probably the best comic adaptation ever done. The opening scene sets the mood and theme in a very powerful, recognizable way, and the movie doesn't stray from that feeling too far at any point. From a philosophical standpoint, this movie definitely has something to say. I really hope people are taking it seriously. (I've not read any reviews of it at this point, mainly because every time I've read reviews in the past, the reviewers inevitably are either out-of-touch morons who don't get the point, or potentially intelligent people who went in with strong preconceptions that colored their experience).
      from a comic geek standpoint, I'd have to say they pretty much hit the nail on the head. I'm not that up on the X-Men and their history, but Paul and brian could probably tell you the name of Iceman's first girlfriend, what issue she appeared in, and who the creative team was that worked on that particular issue–and they said that pretty much everything was pretty close, with a few acceptable (considering the circumstances) shortcuts or omissions here or there.
      I thought the various "powers" were done well, with the exception of some of the flying/floating/jumping stuff (which I understand is difficult to fake with wires & harnesses). and I loved Magneto's "I don't think I can stop them all, Charles." (though why the guy didn't just get out of the way of the bullet when it was stopped, I don't know.)
      my two biggest gripes about the movie are 1) the bodies flying straight back when hit (Wolvie didn't do this when smacked with the tree, which was good), and 2) screws in Wolvie's claws (on the train…)
      the weakest characters were Storm and Sabretooth, the weakest acting by those two actors and the guy that played Cyclops. Jackman was perfect as Wolverine, probably the best performance of the whole cast, including the always brilliant Patrick Stewart.

to make a long story short, if you haven't seen the movie yet, what the fuck are you waiting for? quit reading and get your ass to the theater!

well, today's x-men day. I must say, though I myself never read any of the x-men books, I'm pretty excited about the new movie. perhaps it's an illness I've caught from brian (jerk boy, over there yesterday with Paul who'd weaseled his way into a preview pass somehow, and invited brian rather than me because he actually reads x-men or something. man, the nerve of some people).

anyway, it's gotten some decent reviews, and it'll hopefully bring comic movies back up to the level of the first Keaton Batman movie. also, there's hope that if this movie is a success, someone will actually get around to finishing that damned Spider-Man movie they've been promising for almost more than 5 years now.

oh yeah, and Rebecca Romijn-Stamos is… pretty much… naked. why the hell would I not watch this movie?

a follow-up to yesterday's "vanity insanity"

damned interesting. after waking up last night and checking my e-mail, I was very surprised to see, in the latest glassdog MEMO, a brief entry discussing the same subject as my own post earlier that morning.
    the entry was about egosurf.com, a site that makes vain pursuits such as mine much easier, and which even includes an option for e-mail updates from a continuous search. ** update 12/17/2004** egosurf.com is no more. just use google. for the "e-mail update" feature, just use google alerts.

what a relief, now I don't have to waste two hours wading through links that end up not having anything to do with me.

I am a really really sad individual. sad in a "what a pathetic loser" sort of way, rather than a "woe is me" kind of way.

I have just spent an inordinate amount of time on raging.com–a new search engine by the AltaVista crew, which really isn't any different or better than all the other search engines out there except that it doesn't have a bunch of extraneous "My" kinda crap and ad banners all over the place on it–and if you've never done this, i really don't recommend it. the ultimate pursuit of vanity.

i plugged my own name into the search engine. to my partial surprise, it found over 1,000 pages that "matched" my query. i immediately tried to get more specific by using "+" signs, trying, somewhat unsuccessfully to get it to do a boolean-and type search. my lack of success, I suppose, bespeaks my ignorance and the fact that I've only briefly read those search "help pages." who the fuck knows how those damn search engines work… i plug in rabbits and I get hot steamy asian anal rampage.

anyway, there actually were a few pages with my name on them, but strangely enough, none of them had anything to do with any aspect of my life over the past three or four years. and, of course, none of my own pages come up… weird. 'course I suppose it would help if I submitted the damn things to the search engines.

i did find a few genealogy pages, with listings of people who might have been my ancestors, and obituary pages, which was a little off-putting and I didn't really delve into out of some paranoid fear of actually seeing my own name.

thats it. i'm out.

just a quick update concerning my recent happy news.

Jim from Corvus Digital called me yesterday, finally, and at a time when I was awake and home to receive his call. after brief chit-chat, he informed me that he was calling to "offer me a job." glory be and hallelujiah, after weeks of nailbiting and despair at my inability to succeed in the world, I have been redeemed! I am finally a "professional" web developer (well, will be in two weeks anyway), I have landed my first salaried position, and my first official position making more than $9.00/hr. maybe now I'll be able to start paying my bills on time.

in other news, i've pretty much decided to go in a completely different direction with my coffeemonk.com redesign idea. the two people who've responded with useful and detailed constructive criticism don't quite agree on the things I've attempted thus far, and I've come to realize that the old adage clearly is true–"you can't please all of the people all of the time"–and really, you can't please some of the people most of the time. (–this last is not an attack on my friends, whose time, help, and honesty I truly do appreciate–)

also, I've taken some time surfing around in that randomly connected chain that is the web, and have been inspired by some of the really great graphics design people out there, whom I could never hope to equal. my jumping off point for this little sight-seeing trip was saturn.org which is a great example of the type of web design I enjoy, and wish I could create.

I'll be doing more surfing for inspiration, and perhaps will have some new inspiration in the next few weeks (I already have half an idea tickling at the back of my head, but haven't quite got the whole picture yet).

ok, after my little mental drainage the other day, I'm feeling at least a tiny bit better. perhaps it has something to do with the fact that brian and paul have threatened to beat me until either all my depression is swallowed by the intense pain of breathing, or I'm simply overtaken by the euphoric feelings of near-death.

I don't enjoy my job. I perform my job, but I gain absolutely no satisfaction whatsoever from it. Is this the way life is supposed to be? my parents always told me that when I was older I'd be able to find a job that suited my interests, a job that would help me feel fulfilled. have I done something wrong? am I not trying hard enough? can I not spout enough bullshit to weasel my way into a job I'd love to do, but perhaps don't quite have the required level of experience? what is the deal with the only positions that are open are either a) total shit that no one wants or b) nice, but require exhorbitant amounts of hands-on or book knowledge. how do these hiring managers think people get experience for these jobs in the first place? someone, somewhere has to hire someone just a little less than experienced, or am I just missing out on something?

as a side note, and kind of just so I can work in an interesting/funny link I've found, let me just say this.

I like Kegels.

I really like Kegels.

The KegelMaster is possibly the greatest invention of the modern age.

work sucks
life sucks
love sucks
humidity sucks
rising price of gas sucks
being totally broke sucks
starving sucks
waking up sucks
having to sleep sucks
being bored sucks
writer's block sucks
my web design skills suck
math sucks
having to excrete sucks
losing all hope sucks
pretending you're happy sucks
webloggers who don't update their weblogs often enough suck
i suck

(there's a nice happy one for ya.)