Weekly Recap From: "So, You Wanna Be A Planet"

Well, the votes are in, folks, and what did I tell you?

Pluto got the boot.

I called it last week, but I don't think anyone wanted to listen to me. I mean, sure, he did extremely well in the hydrostatic equilibrium portion of the judging (kicked Saturn's semi-round butt!) but we all saw how he was having problems with the whole orbit thing. Remember the collective audience wince when he stepped all over Neptune's orbit? He really lost some points there. I thought Ronald was going to blow his stack in his final review of that little moment. He's been so much more catty this season, don't you think? Take a chill pill, Ron!

I was almost certain they'd go with the traditional "Pop Hits of the 80's" theme for last week, but when Cathy Cesarsky announced the "Gravitational Neighborhood Clearance" challenge, I knew Pluto just didn't have the chops to pull it off. (Oooo! While we're on the subject of Cathy, I'm really liking her look this season, but I've been a little thrown by the rumors she's got something going on with Mercury. Considering that whole scandal with her supposedly sleeping with Sirius on last season's "So You Wanna Be A Star", I really think she's playing it straight this year. I've got your back, girlfriend!)

Anyway, when they announced the challenge last week you could just see the terror settle in on both Pluto's and 2003 UB313's faces. Frankly, I was surprised at Ceres' composure at that moment. She doesn't exactly have a lot of pull in the gravitational department herself. But she was unphased. I think you've got to admire that kind of moxy.

Pluto actually had my sympathy until his exit interview. There were quite a lot of low blows aimed at you-know-who. C'mon Pluto, we all know who's going to be next one to get voted out, but the Uranus jokes are getting pretty old.

Becky, Look At Her BUG! It's SO Big!

Omigosh! So there are these bug guys, right? And they totally jump around and some stuff, okay? And they have, like, four arms and they live in the desert! Gross, right? 'Cause, hello? It's all hot and some junk? And sometimes, they live in, like, grassy places and stuff.

Anyway, these bug guys, they're, like, called Thri-Kreen or something, and did I mention they were all... buggy? They make these pointy sticks, and, like, use them and their bitey mouths to fight these big cow monsters all of the time. Seriously. Oh! And the cow monsters are called land-sharks, 'cause they totally swim around on the land, or, like in the land or whatever. And then they fight.

And they're, like, rilly cute. Here's a picture:

Jessica Stevenson's best friend Tammy Wilcox got bitten by one of the bug things last month- in the hallway after 5th period- and she almost got killed! Tory Bradshaw had to totally give her mouth to mouth right there in front of Mr. Plotnick's office! I know! Couldn't you just die?

A Tongue Held

One of the facets of being a member of an organized religion (for me) means my life has a certain social aspect that doesn't really reflect who I am. I mean, I don't actively dislike the people from my church. There are some folks whose company I even truly enjoy, but by and large, my slightly reclusive and selfish nature is often at war with an ingrained but entirely learned behavior that dictates I must interact with people whose... erm, personalities and interests... uh, are diametrically opposed to my own.

When engaged in conversation with my fellow parishioners, I make every effort to listen politely and try very hard not to allow my eyes to glaze over and/or fill with horror while they drone on at length about their footballing people and their... money things that can be... monied- invested- (whatever), and their "reality" based television series and what have you. I ask you, do I receive the same courtesy when I bring up the fascinating subjects of cryptoichthyology or, perhaps even Godzilla? I most certainly do not.

The fact that I don't have a lot in common with most of the members of my faith is never more obvious than when I have to get to attend social functions such as, oh, say, weddings. I've had two in the past month, and I can't speak for other theologies, but the LDS faith likes to see its kids good 'n' married as soon as possible. That's all well and good, but it just hasn't happened for me yet (the grousing at the beginning of this post probably being a good indicator as to why), and I think that makes folks nervous. My old bishop has shown up to both of the last two wedding receptions I attended, and he always has the same questions for me, the "old maid". "Hey", says he, while gripping my hand entirely too tightly, "Shouldn't you be next?"

I wonder. Does he think that's helping? That his pointing out my obvious lack of a love life is going to suddenly spur me into a marrying frenzy? It's not as though I haven't tried to find someone interested in sharing my life, but for heaven's sake, just looking at me should give you some idea that my efforts at dating are going to be a mixed bag at best. After you've actually had some sort of interaction with me? It should become crystal clear it's going to take me a little longer than your average Joe. It just seems mean.

Anyway, I had the opportunity to go to the viewing of a wonderful man who passed away last week. Jan Denbutter was deservedly well loved and a lot of people from my old ward were there to pay their respects to him. My old bishop was there again as well, and I have to tell you, it took every ounce of self restraint to keep from walking up to him, taking his hand in that same too firm fashion and asking, "Hey, shouldn't you be next?"

My Sneakers, They No Sneak So Good No More.

I'm wandering around at work today and there's this... this just really annoying sound following me around. Urmk, urmk, urmk, urmk. Of course, it's my shoe.

Sigh.

I usually go through about a pair a year, but these bad boys have lasted me nearly a year and a half. This speaks volumes to the careful crafting of the NewBalance brand, as I tend to put shoes through, and please pardon my Français here, heck.

But the noise is there now, the urmk that is the death knell of shoes from generations untold on down, and it saddens me. Even Renee and Dawn, those drive time impostors whose shenanigans always put a smile on my wretched old face, have yet to lift my spirits. So, I'm getting out the duct tape and scissors, all the while knowing (in that dark and hollow place where such things are known) that one can stave off the inevitable for only so long.

But really, when shoes go bad, isn't it our wallets who suffer the most, in the end?

Looking For Love In All The Wrong Spaceships

So, I'm not exactly sure what's going on with my spam filter at hotmail, but I've been getting a lot of weird mail lately. The majority of it seems to be coming from a series of folks who are starting to ask some rather odd questions: "To be frankly, are you hot?", or "I thank your gorgus, do you want to be with hot girl?" (I don't even know what my gorgus is*, but apparently, it's doing nice things)

Now, I know what you're thinking. "Sure, Goshzilla," you say, "there's a lot of bad spelling peoples out there on the intarweb. What makes you think these folks are all connected in some way?" Well, I'll tell you. Thus far, at least twenty different people (all absolute strangers to me) have emailed me, wanting me to contact them via MSN messenger. They gave me names like emilydizzy, emilytriton, emilymelon, emilyflush, emilyhotplums and emilyexpress as contacts. Huh. Starting to see a pattern here?

That's right! They all have the first name EMILY! I know! Freaky, huh?

I've given it some mulling over, and I think I know what's behind it all now. The poor spelling? The shared first names? That's right, kids. Female Red Lectroids, straight from Planet 10 by way of the 8th dimension. I don't know why they're so concerned with the temperature (But, duh, it's summer! Of course I'm hot), but knowing who I'm dealing with is half the battle, I think. I'm just worried I've tipped my hand with this post. They might know I'm on to them.

Further posts as events warrant.

Oh, and the picture is of Mecdrox's character, Somtan.

*I googled Gorgus, and apparently he was a king on "The Legends of Hercules". He's not my king, though. Another piece of the puzzle falls into place.

Rumpled Stiltskins

So, for the moment, I don't have any real access to a lot of my pictures, due to a convoluted and silly series of events, which really don't bear going in to. Suffice to say I'm a bit of a dummy, and leave it at that. I did, however, find this guy (above) lurking about on my work computer. He's an older picture, and not exactly stunning to say the least, but he's mine. A shape shifting monster from the Unseely Courts for a game I was playing with my D&D group (stop it), his obvious deformities of the cranium in his "human" form are deliberate, and not just because I'm a poor artist.

Also, I have a bridge to sell you. It's nice. You'll like it.

I know You're Out There, I can Hear You Blogging

My friend sent me an email the other day, linking to a mutual friend of ours who had disappeared a few years ago- wandered off into the pacific west with his new bride, an old car and a handful of my Miyazaki films, never to be seen again. He's an incredibly talented artist (and a fantastic flamenco dancer), and I was pretty excited to try to contact him again.

Turns out that I kinda had to register with Blogger to leave a comment on his blog, so I did.

Tah-dah!

I don't know if he'll be happy to hear from me, but I was very pleased to see he was still drawing and writing and just generally being Cholki. What a crazy-head.

Um... Maybe I'll try and post some of my pictures here, too, some time. If I can find ones that I like. That might be nice.

Okay. That's it for now.

I'm done.