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Yay! The ozone layer is recovering! I think in general we don’t know enough to know the cycles of global patterns like temperature and weather and how things interact, but in this case it’s pretty clear our production of CFCs was the main cause. Now if we can just cut oil use and stop over-fishing the oceans.

Nicole and I were in need of a comedy and Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby was there with the right starting time. We got a lot of laughs out of it so mission accomplished there. It’s rediculous and silly but always stays on target. I see is compared to Anchorman a lot since it has the same writer and director but that was him trying to figure out how to make a movie and not knowing what to throw away. With Talladega Nights I think he’s figured out what to do. Of course we won’t really know until next year when his direction of “Land of the Lost” is presented to us.

The last of the biggies from the big-band era passed away yesterday from kidney & liver failure resulting from an abdominal infection. His last and final album that he just finished recording will be coming out this fall. I was hoping to see him again next year when his tour hit Salinas.
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The first single off of Weird Al’s upcoming album, Straight Outta Lynwood, is now available for download (for free). It’s titled “Don’t Download This Song” and can be found on his myspace page. Also from there you can get a link to the animated video on yahoo.

Also while you’re there you can get a copy of “You’re Pitiful” which won’t be released on an album.

I wanted to see Snakes on a Plane on Friday during the work day but last week was a hellish work week and I wasn’t able to get away. Then over the weekend I didn’t get a chance. Monday I was very happy when Gerald & Terry asked if I wanted to see the 5:10 show with them and I gladly accepted. There was more set than I was anticipating but it was just the right amount to get you going. The movie wastes no time getting to the action and once i gets there it’s just fun! A lot of the snake attacks are funny, a few snake shots are gross, and one or two are surprising. I think most everyone who already wanted to see it has already seen it. For the rest of you, if you aren’t afraid of snakes and think the idea of a movie calling itself Snakes on a Plane is funny then you’ll probably enjoy this movie.

While hiking in Big Basin with Tammy this weekend I told her about some news bloopers I found on youtube. We discussed how hard it can be to find things on youtube so I thought I would include them here:

First up is a reporter covering a drug burn…

Next is a newscaster totally embarrassing herself and the subject of the report…

And finally a music video from Gym Class Heroes because it’s a lot of fun!

A few weekends ago I accompanied Nicole to Bay Meadows for a day at the races. I’m not big into horses or horse racing but it was fun. The notable events during the races were one horse I picked to win dumped the jockey at the gate and ran the other way about halfway around the track at top speed before slowing down. It took another 10 minutes for everyone to get him off the track and back under control.

The other event was in the last race, the only female jockey of the afternoon was racing on a horce that was like 22 to 1. We bet on that horse to come in first and it was behind the entire race until the final stretch when it passed all the other horses like they were standing still! But it was too late and there wasn’t enough time to catch the first place horse. Still an impressive run.

Last Saturday we went to the Monterey County Fair. Right when we entered there were two tents, one for Hercules the Giant Horse, and one for White Mountain the Giant Steer. We first went to see Hercules and while it was a large horse, I’d seen other large horses. It was a Belgian Draft Horse which tend to get close to that size. After that we were a little reluctant to spend another buck on a cow that might not be that out of the ordinary, but we did anyway. Damn, that is one huge-ass cow! If you look here you can see the top of its back over the partition. Yeah it’s on a pile of hay, but that only raises it about a foot. It’s 6.5 feet at the shoulder and weighs over 3400 lbs. For comparison, the average steer weighs around 1000 lbs.

The rest of the fair was fun. I had a good cinnamon roll and there were some great pictures in the exhibit hall. The giant cow is what keeps coming to mind though.

I’ve now finished Dune Messiah, the shortest of the Dune books. (If you don’t want to read more Dune rambling, stop now)
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Stephanie was in town touring for people she hasn’t seen in years and for Santa Cruz she decided a hike in Big Basin was the thing. Making the trek were Stephanie, Tammy, Brick, Brick’s friend Mike, Nicole, and myself. Mike led the way for about the first third and I’m not sure we ever were on the trail we set out for. After awhile and a number of discussions at crossroads we ended up at a “You are here” map, only the part that indicated your location was rubbed off, making it useless. Later at another of these maps the location indicator was also rubbed off. For about $10 in plexiglass that could have been avoided.

From there Brick took over the navigation and it wasn’t long before we had looped back to the first big decision point which allowed us to take the only remaining option that led up. Quite a hill it was too. I think we were climbing that hill for 10 minutes. When we got to the top there was some more climbing, and then a decision point led us to a decision to climb the last 0.7 miles to the summit.

Once we got up there and Tammy located some shade at the actual summit, we sat down and ate and the views were definitely worth it. You were able to hear an occasional airplane in the distance but aside from that the only sound was birds and the moan of wind rushing through the trees.

After lunch and the photo-ops, we headed back down along a much more direct path to the park headquarters. I didn’t need an inhaler (yay!) and today the only major muscle soreness is from lateral stabilizing muscles in my hips. Not bad.

I’m glad I got to spend even the short time with Stephanie and others I haven’t seen in awhile and I hope it isn’t as long before it happens again.

I’m re-reading the original Dune series because another is soon to come. (This post is long and rambling… don’t read it)
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Saturday was the day for visiting mo and Jeff. When we got to the hostipal we visited Jeff first since mo was asleep and seeing Jeff was amazing! After just one day he already had a healthy color in his face and he was happy and animated. I never expected such dramatic results.

After Jeff consumed his 4oz of broth he started getting sleepy so we left and went to the cafeteria for some dinner and then called on mo. Mo was asleep but she woke up enough to say hi and then woke up enough for fun conversation. Mo was looking good too after a major surgery and having a major lack of sleep. Shortly after her parents arrived we decided it was time to take off and get back to the dogs.

Here’s to a speedy recovery to both of them!