The Big DumpTruck

As I may have mentioned here before (it's getting hard to differentiate between Facebook and Twitter updates and the blog itself, although anyone who reads the blog sees my Twitter updates over there on the right) Junior and I went to see the movie Paul Blart, Mall Cop because it was filmed at one of our local malls, the Burlington Mall in Burlington MA.

We FINALLY went back to the mall last weekend, after literally not going for months. We had intended to go right after watching the movie, but never got around to it (plus didn't have the money to go into the den of temptation).

So this will only be meaningful to folks who have seen the movie, but the rest of you can feel free to continue reading. One of the key things on our list was to figure out where Amy's cart was. We knew you could see a Zales in the background. That was easy to find. And while we were there we spotted a real Burlington Mall security guard on a Segway. You couldn't pay me ENOUGH to do that after the movie came out.

We were upstairs, and I said I wanted to go buy some ink for my fountain pen. Now there are technically 3 stores in the mall that I think could cover being the store that the dickhead guy worked at, but only one of them is a true "pen store" and that is Paradise Pens. I love love love that store, and it made me laugh that they made dickhead work there. As a family, we've spent hundreds of dollars in that shop, so I'm pretty familiar with it.

While buying my ink, I couldn't help but ask the clerk if the pen store was indeed supposed to be his, and he said the producers of the movie spent a lot of time in the store, and even bought a pen. It was likely the one that the dickhead gave to Amy to sign her check in the bank. There is a suspicion that the character might have been modeled after one of the employees, but I would never go so far to claim that, and I would deny saying so. But we have our suspicions that a teeny bit of this guy's personality made it into the movie. Heh.

All in all, a successful Paul Blart mission!

Labels: movies, shopping

I tried to be patient, but it's just not worth it. They got massively hacked last fall, it took six months for them to rebuild their site, and then they launched it, sort of. Kind of. Not all functionality works. If you don't pay twenty bucks, whenever one of your readers clicks a link, it puts an ad at the top of the page you go to. Screw that, why should THEY get money because my readers clicked on a link I recommended? Bad bad bad bad business model.

The final straw is that I cannot log in. See, once upon a time when it was a decent service, you could pay for gold level service. Part of that was being able to have a username instead of using your email address. Now with the changes, they don't seem to recognize my username. There is no way to get support. I cannot log in to make changes to my blogrolls. Which really don't seem to be updating the way they are supposed to.

So I'm going to try to figure something out. I mean, I'd love to be able to use their product, but they have blown it big time. So I will no longer be displaying blogrolling links over on the right menu. I'm sure you're all very sad about the page loading just that much faster, eh?

Buh-bye.

Labels: websites

When I dropped Junior off at his "before school" care program, a little kid, maybe in the first grade, ran up to him.

"How come you aren't wearing a hat like mine?" The hat in question was a green plastic leprechaun hat covered with green glitter. It was truly a thing of beauty, probably the nicest green plastic leprechaun hat you can buy at a party store. My son just stared at the boy.

"Where is your hat? And where is your shirt like mine?" Junior was wearing a green shirt, but it did not say "Kiss me I'm Irish" with a fuzzy shamrock in the middle.

"Ya, where is your hat?" I asked my son in an accusatory tone, in support of the short child in front of us.

Junior just looked at me.

"You should be wearing a hat." The small boy smiled at me.

"I don't have a hat like that," Junior explained to him.

"You should totally get one." I told him as the small boy and I nodded conspiratorially. "It's a really awesome hat."

Labels: holidays, odd

People are afraid to buy things these days because so often they become obsolete within days or weeks. Usually the problem is that you buy something that in two months will cost less for all kinds of extra bells and whistles. It's pretty heartbreaking when that happens, I can honestly say.

I'm in kind of an interesting reverse spot right now. I have had, on my list of things to obtain at some point in the future, an iPod shuffle. I know I have an iPhone, which is most awesome, don't get me wrong. However, it's just really heavy and not optimal for going walking (or jogging, or working out, or whatever it is that you do). I figured that I would get one for the spring or summer, when it was nice enough to start walking at work again.

I kind of had this thought out of my head, as there are other things I really should invest $50 in, you know? But Apple announced the new Shuffle, and after reading about it, I can say that I do not want this new version. I do NOT want a unit with the controls on the headphone cord. I want to be able to use 3rd party headphones more suited for walking. Lord knows the regular headphones fall out if I am just sitting still. Walking is right out.

So now I have to try to figure out how long I'll have to buy one of the "old" (read: current) Shuffles before you can't find them any more. Thanks Apple!

Labels: shopping

The Boy came home from school sick yesterday. Sore throat, headache. My yesterday evening, I felt like I had been run over by a truck. Or a bus. Or a truck carrying new busses. Something like that.
So we're both home sick today, because a)I have a horrid earache now, and b)he's sick and someone has to stay home with him. Isn't this fun? Oh it's fun, all right. Things are WAY too busy at work for me to be sick.
Maybe I'll watch some RiffTrax today. That would make me feel better!

Labels: health

I detest DST right now. Tonight, when the last small flickers of daylight are lingering at 7pm I may feel differently. But right now? No. Especially because the neighbor's dog was not kind enough to sleep in.
I need to spend some time outside enjoying the sun. Tommorow the high will be 25 degrees colder than today.

I am on the computer bright and early to look at my checking account balance, which will determine what I can and cannot do this weekend. Except my Mac doesn't seem to want to open the budget spreadsheet. That's so cute, it doesn't want me to get all upset!

Labels: mac, money

It's sleep over night at Chez Dump. The regular cast of characters are present, including the gerbils and the dog. We're watching an MST3K movie. Good Lord, if I ever stumbled upon this on my own (the chances of which are slim to freaking none, given how horrible the damned thing is) I would only watch 3 minutes of it.
But as I'm sitting here, hoping for the best, and it occurs to me that if someone was able to convince someone else to put up the money to create this, someone could give me money to make a movie. It couldn't be any worse.
The movie in question is the Raul Julia classic "Overdrawn at the Memory Bank." A 1983 classic.

Labels: movies

And THIS is why the sandals are still in the closet. Stupid weather. The shedding of February for March was a total ripoff. Listen, March, you only get one chance to make a first impression.

Labels: weather