Hehheheh. I followed a link that someone used to access my site, and discovered that it routed through a spanish translator. Interesting as it is to read my own words about the "X-Hombres", what really tickled my funny bone was the fact that I'm no longer Jet Wolf. Oh no.

I am ... Del Lobo Del Jet!

It probably shouldn't amuse me as much as it does, but ... well, it does.

Del Lobo Del Jet!

Tee-hee.

Despite the fact that most of it was spent on the couch, I think I actually slept better last night than I have in days. Makes a nice refreshing change.

As does the fact that, at 9:30am, it's only 69° outside. I hijacked a few fans from around the house, and I have a nice wind tunnel thing set up in the computer room, so for the moment I'm pleasantly cool. The sun is threatening to rip that away from me before too long, but I shall enjoy it while I can.

You know, I think I had a few poignant, thought-provoking things to say in today's entry, but I'll be damned if I can think of them now. Graah. It's on the tip of my brain and everything. Hmph. Well, stay tuned for, possibly, poignant thought-provoking things. Later. If I think of them.

Listening To:Who Are You? - The Who

Looking Forward To:A relaxing, non-sweaty day.

I hate to harp on about the bloody heat again, but it is so unbearably warm that I'm actually driven out of the computer room. I haven't been up here for hours, and judging by the fact that I'm already breaking a sweat and I've only been here for the minute or so it takes my computer to boot, I think I'll stay away for some time yet. I actually popped the side panel off of Callisto earlier today to give her better ventilation ... if only it were that easy with the rest of the apartment. I feel like I'm stuck inside Murphy's Happy Bake oven.

I like this place and all, but I cannot wait until we get our own house with air conditioning. Even if we only run it but a month out of the year, that's a month where I don't want to shoot myself out of overheated misery.

I think I'm sleeping on the couch tonight. At least the living room has that nice big balcony door that funnels cool air nicely. I think I need more fans for up here.

Bleah. I hate sweating.

As hot as it is today (97°, and we're still about an hour from the hottest part of the day), WeatherBug is promising me that tomorrow will be even hotter. "Record high possible Tuesday," it says, in that infuriatingly detached way that only computers can manage. How long until autumn again? Gods save us.

On the upside, I confirmed this afternoon that I now have all of Evolution in digital format, and burned off a DVD with all the episodes, including the four leftovers from Season 3 that haven't aired in the states yet. Now I just have to get the original animated series. My video tapes are really, really old.

After work tonight, we're off to get Mike a new pair of shoes. Excitement runneth over. Until then, I'm retreating back downstairs where it's probably about 5 degrees cooler. My quest continues for all character cards in FF8.

Listening To:My brain sizzle in my skull.

Looking Forward To:Coolness.

Er, this doesn't bode at all well for tomorrow, does it?

I really wish I wouldn't start tinkering with my web site when it starts to get late.

I've made some modifications to Flatscan, including a slightly revised review look, but that's still in the opinion-gathering phase, so it probably won't be up until tomorrow.

I'm so tired I've made at least 50 mistakes on this already. I usually only type this poorly when I'm drunk. I think that's a big hint to go to bed now.

Said by me tonight on ICQ, in regards to my precious broadband connection:

And lo, the modem thusly spake unto the Chosen One: thou shalt makest thy connections swift and true, and thy pipe shall be engorged with the bytes of thine peers, but knowest this -- thou shalt spill the blood of the thrice bless'd virgin upon the altar of thine Ethernet, lest thine packets become lost in the nethervoid of the net beyond, and thy pings shall be fruitless and thine traceroutes require many hops.

I got bored after that, but Amy thought it was funny and suggested I post it here, so ... here it is. Enjoy my 10:30pm wit.

Listening To:Joy to the World - Three Dog Night

Looking Forward To:Not sure. Stuff.

Well, my AOA-Rogue wallpaper may have been the shortest lived ever. The pin-up I mentioned a few days ago has been obsessing my every thought, so I simply had to make it mine.

Actually, this theme works better for the moment anyway. The colour scheme is much cooler. The last one had too many reds and oranges for the middle of summer. I'll go back to it once the novelty factor wears off on this one.

Though gods only know when that'll be.

Looks like we missed seeing The Hulk in the theater. Whoops. I guess there went that string of seeing all of Marvel's releases on the big screen. (Except for Blade. Blade don't count.) That's something of a load off, though, since now that means I don't have to feel guilty if I decide not to see Iron Man or Elektra or something.

The reason I was checking was that Mike and I were considering going to the movies tomorrow. Since Hulk is out of the question now, I'll have to decide on something else. We were also considering seeing T3, but I honestly can't psyche myself up enough to pay for it. It just doesn't look that great. Instead, I think we shall see Pirates of the Caribbean. I've heard only great things from everyone who's gone to see it, so I think it's the better choice of what's out right now.

Of course, we'll probably go see nothing at all, knowing us. But it's fun to pretend.

Listening To:All I Want - The Offspring

Looking Forward To:I dunno.

I just got back from taking my car to the DEQ for an inspection and registration renewal. I think that was the quickest, most unsatisfying $50 I've ever spent. I mean, it's wonderful that I only had to wait five minutes or so, but damn. I feel like my checkbook just got raped, and all I have to show for it is a little sticker and a piece of paper.

I feel so dirty.

Listening To:Planet Earth - Duran Duran

Looking Forward To:A good weekend. Hopefully.

I stumbled on someone's Live Journal avatar today. It's of Hunter. You know, it's really pretty cool to see something that you had a hand in creating taking steps into becoming iconic. It really makes me want to get back to work on some of my projects.

Not that I probably will, but the thought is there.

Listening To:What Would Brian Boitano Do? - South Park

Looking Forward To:Scanning in the latest delivery from Mum.

New stuff up on Flatscan, in record time. It's actually relatively cool today, so I don't doubt that helped.

Normally I wouldn't put something like this up in two places, but it's just so cute that it bears repeating. This was a pin-up from the most recent issue of X-Men Unlimited. Check it out:



Click on the image for a bigger picture. You'll want to see it bigger, trust me on this.

Listening To:Change of Heart - Cyndi Lauper

Looking Forward To:Dinner. I hunger.

It's been hooooot here. My brain's been roasting in my skull. Not very condusive to ... well, living. Most unpleasant, is what I'm trying to say.

I've been dowloading episodes of Dead Like Me lately. I haven't finished watching the pilot yet (I'm still trying to plow through the second season of 24. I'm sick to bloody death of having episodes from Febraury sitting on TiVo), but I did watch the first half and loved it. Shame I don't get Showtime, nor plan to pick it up at any point in the future, but thank the gods for peer-to-peer. <hugs cable modem>

New comics today. I think it's going to be a light week, so hopefully I'll get reviews done before Sunday this time.

Listening To:A Complicated Song - Weird Al

Looking Forward To:The temperature not exceeding 80 today ... right.

I've had an off-kilter week, but the reviews are finally up over at Flatscan.

I just finished watching the Teen Titans premier. It's very ... strange. Original. Yes. I'm honestly not sure if I like it or not. It's quite obviously not particularly serious. At least this episode isn't. It's a modernized adaptation that didn't quite manage to endear itself to me instantly like X-Men: Evolution did, but I'm intrigued and will allow TiVo to maintain its season pass for the moment. I'm still quite put out that Donna isn't there. (Speaking of, if anybody knows what the heck happened to Donna in the DC Universe, please e-mail me. The last issue of Titans that I had, Kori was running around with a tinfoil hat or something and Donna was, y'know, breathing an' stuff.) There's a noticable void in the line-up without her. My fingers are crossed that she'll show up later in the series, but I honestly don't know if she will or not.

On the up side, bits of it were quite amusing, if not necessarily Titans-esque. I'm itching to see Raven get really mad and call on Daddy, and anticipate the first non-shadowy appearance of Deathstroke. If they bring in Donna, and maybe Terra and Jericho (think of how much they could save in voice work!), I'd be in heaven. But I don't see it, sadly. Still, I console myself with Starfire, even if she currently sounds a little more airheaded than I'd like.

Also in animated superhero news, this was the second week of MTV's new Spider-Man series. It's really growing on me. The CGI, while almost a slap in the face when I first saw it, actually works. And I love, love, love the way they've animated Spider-Man's movements. He looks like a human spider, exactly how he should look. I hadn't realized how wrong every other rendition of it had until I saw this one. The show has really good voice work as well, and snappy dialogue, which is doubtless helped by the mighty pen of Bendis. It's good stuff, I recommend it, despite the fact that it's on MTV. Oh, and if you miss it on Fridays, don't worry. They'll replay the episode something like 20 times that week. I'm only barely exaggerating, TiVo was going nuts.

Wow. New Evolution on the horizon, Rogue coming back in about six weeks, I managed to find a high quality VCD screener version of X2 so now I can show it to Mum when she visits, Titans and Spider-Man, and Morrison leaving New X-Men. Things are good in comic book land.

Listening To:All That Jazz - Chicago soundtrack (Broadway, not movie)

Looking Forward To:Someone wanting to kick my ass for the Morrison comment.

Today, I am learning something new. Today, I am learning about BitTorrent. Me likey.

I was able to download the final episode of Evolution from the third season. The haven't aired in the US yet, I think these came from Canada. But I don't care -- they were excellent. I'm biting my nails waiting for Season 4 to start now, after that ending. What a cliff-hanger. Good stuff.

On the way home from lunch I saw something extremely disturbing, but interesting. It was a stretch pick-up truck. Yes, that's correct -- a pick-up truck approximately three times its normal length, done up with the typical limousine trim on the outside. I find it impossible to come up with a pratical reason for this vehicle. Even an impractical one seems difficult to fathom, since it didn't even have an open bed with which to cart, say, an exorbitant amount of lumber in style.

People are very peculiar creatures.

Listening To:Time - Pink Floyd

Looking Forward To:The Matrix: Reloaded soundtrack. Hey, the movie sucked for the most part, but it had some good music.

I just got invited to lunch by my guy. It's really weird that this has somehow made me happy. JW, you are a strange girl.

Apparently the "4Paws" reference has confused some people who know way more about me than they should. :P It's the name of our home Network, different from my "video studio" except in name. I don't have the videos online right now, unfortunately, due to bandwidth constraints. But as Matt reminded me yesterday, ICQ has file transfer capabilities, so I think that will be a primary mode of distribution for me.

So, those interested in downloading videos, just e-mail me and we'll set up an ICQ time. Be much easier than the Bear Share thing, methinks.

Listening To:Machete - Moby

Looking Forward To:New comic Wednesday!

Today's been a bit turbulent in the broadband department. We hit a SNAFU earlier today, but a quick call to tech support and the problem was sorted out (there was a data entry error in creating my account, and they had to build me another one. Would've been nice if they called and told me, but it's sorted out, so that's all I really care about). So both computers were up and running with the Internet, but apparently Callisto and Sylvie weren't talking to each other. I finally gave up on what I was working on, hit Best Buy where I bought an actual broadband router and two new Ethernet cards (all for just under $50 with rebate) and sent the evening up to my elbows in computer parts. A relatively short time and a scraped knuckle later, 4Paws is back online and everyone is talking happily, now with increased firewall protection.

Now maybe tomorrow, we'll actually get to play with it instead of spending most of the time fiddling.

Listening To:Bell Bottom Blues - Eric Clapton

Looking Forward To:This guy posting more of the as-yet-unaired Evolution episodes.

I'm currently downloading a soundtrack for Mike almost faster than I can keep up with it.

HOT DAMN, this is so sweet. How I have missed thee, high speed Internet.

Listening To:Angels sing their praises on high.

Looking Forward To:Abusing the hell out of this.

Friends and neighbors, today is truly a joyous day. All tremble before me, as I have ... BROADBAND!!!

Yup, they dropped a flyer off on the door telling me to call, so I did. The guy took my name, my address, and said that someone would be over within thirty minutes.

Yes, that's right -- thirty minutes.

So now I have 60 channels of cable goodness (which I unfortunately have to pay for, but we can't have everything, can we?), including Food Network for Iron Chef and WB for first-run Evolution episodes. But more than that, I HAVE BROADBAND.

I downloaded an 80+ meg file in about 19 minutes. Are you feelin' the power? I sure as hell am.

Today turned out to be a pretty freaking spiffy day.

Listening To:My heart sing with joy!

Looking Forward To:Downloading the entire bloody Internet.

Judging from the sounds of digging and shouting outside of my window, I think that Comcast is finally here and getting on with the installation business. I cannot wait for cable modem. I do sincerely hope that my being in cable-limbo won't interrupt the premier of Teen Titans on the 19th, though. I've only been waiting for the show for two months or so now.

Which means, of course, that I'll probably miss it completely.

Mike's birthday went well. He loves his GBA. We went to breakfast at IHOP, then saw The League of Extraordinary Gentleman -- did I mention that already? Well, if I did, I'm metioning it again. Not that the movie was good enough to deserve a double dose of attention put to it, but I'll get into that when I do my review. Whenever the hell that is.

Someone e-mailed me earlier today and requested that I take a couple of quizzes, so here we are. The woman one is great -- I didn't even try. I'm not sure if I can totally agree with the quiz maker, though. Anyone who calls Dazzler "confident" clearly never read ... well, her entire run with the X-Men. But they're neat anyway.


You are Rogue!
Flamboyant, agressive, and outspoken, you are always willing to
throw out a witty one-liner or take a crack at an acquaintance.
Yet this playing at the extrovert only serves to mask your own
insecurities and fear of lonliness. Jubilee will make you
feel right at home by assisting in your antics, yet the confident
and self-aware Dazzler will only serve to exacerbate your insecurities.

Which X-Woman Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla



You are Beast!
You have a love for learning about the world -- to better apply it
in social situations, of course! Considerate and sympathetic,
your friends can always come to you for credible advice.
Rictor suits you, as you will be able to sooth his temper, but you will
find trouble with Havok, who just can't come to believe your "genuine" ways.

Which X-Man Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla



You are Spiral!
Face it: you're evil. Sure, you might not want to kill people outright,
but your evil urges know few boundaries. You like your enemies to suffer.
Sociopathic and mysterious, you prefer to toy with others' minds, causing
them to destroy themselves, rather than have yourself do the dirty work.
Your evil companion? Mystique -- her style and manipulative ways will make you
two quite destructive. Pyro and Magneto will only slow you down with their
respective arrogance, and desire for ubiquitous control.

Which X-Men Villain Best Suits Your Evil Nature?
brought to you by Quizilla

Listening To:Tomorrow, Wendy - Concrete Blonde

Looking Forward To:Getting back on Aard. I think it's down.

It took me much longer than it should have, but Flatscan is updated. I hope to maybe possibly someday perhaps write up that Finding Nemo review (I forgot I hadn't done it) and add the latest movie, The League of Extraordinary Gentleman. Maybe.

Listening To:My stomach growl.

Looking Forward To:More FF8. (I'm on disc two!)

Today's my hubby's birthday, so everyone drop Mike an e-mail so he'll feel loved.

(And no, these one or two sentence posts aren't the new trend. Promise.)

Just finished. Very good. Eyes hurt. Go sleep.

On last third of Order of the Phoenix ... must not stop reading ... must find out what happens ...

My latest comic package from Mum arrived today, full of all the Age of Apocalypse I can eat. Ahh, Age of Apocalypse, the single best thing to come out of the entire stinkin' 90s. I haven't read these things since they were released back in 1995 (and Mike never read them, poor thing) so I'm looking forward to settling down in my wonky chair and enjoying myself immensely.

After I review this week's books, scan the covers and complete the AOA section for Flatscan, of course.

Listening To:My head pound. Damned headaches.

Looking Forward To:Evil 'Poccy goodness.

I'm sitting here, $130 poorer after Jett's visit to the vet this morning, eating a bowl of fake, Fred Meyer brand Lucky Charms.

Is it possible for life to get better?

Listening To:Crocodile Rock - Elton John (in my head)

Looking Forward To:Playing some more FF8 when I get home from class today.

Yay! Turns out that they didn't go up on our rent this year after all, they'd simply merged the rent for Jett in with the basic rent. So not only will it not cost us any more, but we get August's rent free (extra $900 in our pocket -- there's the fall tuition), plus garbage and the car port free in September. All that, and my car insurance has gone down by $10 a month cuz I'm hot like that.

Money is good. More money is better.

Regarding the 4th of July rant, it would really be more about patriotism in general, particularly in this day and age, which is something that I've done before in several different incarnations. However, I'll see if inspiration takes me over the next few days, and if so then I'll write it up.

No word about the events from last night, which I take to be a good sign, at least in a general societal sense. If someone's apartment had been broken into and the occupants attacked, I'm fairly confident that I would've heard something about it by now, even if it was just the police talking to everyone. But nothing from the complex, nothing from the cops ... I'm guessing it was indeed domestic in nature. Which I suppose is a good thing, although I guess that's relative, isn't it?

I'm so excited, I should be able to actually reboot Callisto in about an hour and a half. Mike discovered a Mame newsgroup, and has been on a mad downloading spree. But of course, this is dialup. So Callisto's been up for about three and a half days now, working her little black heart out. Frankly, I'm impressed that my Internet connection hasn't dropped more frequently. But it'll be nice to not have Xnews running for a change.

Listening To:Angels Dancing in the Thrill - Bubblegum Crisis

Looking Forward To:A day when half of my inbox isn't freakin' spam.

Have you ever heard someone scream bloody murder? I mean a serious, bone-chilling cry for help? Until about 10 minutes ago, I know that I never had.

I was ripped from sleep just a few moments ago by a woman's voice screaming "HELP ME!! OH GOD, HELP ME!!" It took a good few seconds to realize that the voice wasn't actually in my dreams, but was coming from outside in the apartment complex. Mike jolted awake and ran outside while I tried to remember in my half-asleep haze where the cell phone was. To my surprise (although I probably shouldn't have been surprised, but I was) there was already several people in the parking lot, and the crowd was quickly growing.

Mike returned after a few minutes, saying that some people were already calling the police and that he wasn't sure what had happened, except that it seemed to involve a woman with a baby and stemmed from our building. He said he wasn't sure if she'd been attacked or what, but the woman was crying and being led away by a another tennant.

Now there's comforting news. "Something happened to make this woman scream loud enough to wake up the entire complex. Whatever it was happened downstairs from you. No idea what. Have a nice night!"

I think it's the woman on the ground floor, first apartment, and I wouldn't be particularly surprised to find that it was a domestic issue. I've heard some pretty heated rows coming from that apartment personally, usually revolving around her boyfriend/husband coming home exceedingly late. I know that he's also a (wannabe?) rock musician and so, being unashamedly stereotypical here, it doesn't take much to stretch this into the beginnings of a VH-1 Behind the Music.

At midnight, I'm sure as heck going to tell myself this was just a domestic issue. And then recheck the front door lock.

Two things come out of this, though. Well, apart from the story itself.

1) It will be a long, long time before I forget that scream. It was filled with raw terror and emotion, the scream of someone who honestly felt that they may be facing the end of their life. Nothing in the movies compares to the real thing. Brrr.

2) As already mentioned, I found myself pleasantly surprised to see just how many people were out there trying to find out what was going on. Now I know that human curiousity is a hungry beast that gorges itself on the most inappropriate food sometimes, but given that they heard what I heard, nobody could've had any idea what was out there, and many were running to where they thought someone was in dire trouble. In a world where you hear about people getting raped and murdered in broad daylight, it's good to know that not everyone would simply close the window, roll over and go back to sleep.

I just finished Goblet of Fire, so I can now turn my attention to the latest book. I'm amused by the fact that I go to all the trouble of preordering the book back in April, and yet I don't start it until two weeks after its release. I'm glad I took the time to reread the 4th one, though, I'd actually forgotten who the non-Voldemort bad guy was.

I'm looking forward to Order of the Phoenix. Not only for the book itself, but so I don't have to worry that I'll be spoiled every time I go online. Potential spoilers keep popping up in the most unusual of places.

Happy 4th, I suppose.

I've been asked many times what, if anything, I'm doing to celebrate the holiday. The answer of "I ain't doin' SQUAT" is probably unsurprising. I'm half inclined to go into a rant about the myriad of reasons why I'd like to tell this country to shove a firework up its arse, but I could be devoting that time to working on another review or something and have a great deal more fun in the process.

No, instead I'm going to spend tonight trying to keep my dog from having a heart attack. Fun times.

Listening To:I Wish it Would Rain Down - Phil Collins

Looking Forward To:Enjoying the day as much as possible.

Hitting the sack early tonight, since I didn't sleep well the previous night and I ate way too much at Olive Garden this evening, but I did manage to get this week's reviews done over at Flatscan. Anybody considering picking up UXM#427, make sure to read before you buy. Don't say I didn't warn you.

The pain has not lessened today, unfortunately. If anything, my right arm is actually stiffening up more, to the point where it hurts to raise it past a certain height, and reaching behind me is highly unpleasant. However, this injury has shown me the real reason people get married.

So they have someone to scrub their back.

Listening To:Who Am I Now? - X-Men Evolution

Looking Forward To:Doing well on my first Math test tomorrow.

Oh, in such pain this morning. Yesterday afternoon, after class, I decided to take Jett to PetsMart for a bath and nail trim. When I got home she was, as usual, thoroughly excited. Rather than have her be almost uncontrollably hyper for the groomers, I decided to take her for a walk to burn off some energy.

Now most of you have no idea the volume of energy that walking Jett entails. I've been working with her to understand that pulling me along at a break-neck pace is NOT okay, but our progress is slow, almost non-existant some days. Like yesterday.

So we're walking (pulling/dragging) along, when we come to a section of the apartment grounds where the concrete has been fashioned into steps. I'm not altogether sure why, since the steps don't really go anywhere, but they have been. I'm wrestling with Jett's leash, Jett's anxious to smell absolutely every possibly scent ... And over I go. Right into the concrete steps. Hard.

As you can probably guess, this took a great deal of fun out of the walk, and it was ended shortly thereafter. I immediately packed Jett into Kiyone and drove to PetsMart. I wasn't sure exactly how beaten up I was, but I did get to reflect on the drive how interestingly painful my palms felt -- burning with cold. Very strange feeling. (I haven't fallen that hard since I was, like, eight years old and learning to ride a bike.) We finally get there and make our way to the grooming section, only to find out that they're all booked today. That's a first, I've never gone in on a weekday and not been able to get her right in. Typical. So I schedule an appointment for the next day, lament my injuries were for naught, and head home to clean myself up.

Total damage: Two skinned palms, one knee missing as many layers of skin as is possible without bleeding, one elbow with a new bloody gash, one slightly sprained ankle, one more sprained wrist and, as of this morning, one entire side of my body dully aching like it's got a hangover.

And the good news is, I get to try and burn off some more of that energy in about 15 minutes. Hooray!

Listening To:TATU - Nas Ne Dogoniat

Looking Forward To:New comics

So I'm sitting here at my desk at just past midnight, catching up on some online stuff before heading to bed for another half an hour or so of Goblet of Fire when I hear this peculiar sound. Like one part banshee wail, one part drunk football fan, and one part dying cow. I tentatively peeked out of the window, but can see nothing, which sort of adds to the strangeness of it all.

And now I can hear what sounds like a metal baseball bat hitting a ball, but given the baseball diamond is pitch black, it sort of makes one wonder exactly what's going on over there.

Not enough to go find out, mind you, but enough to make me write a Blog entry.

Listening To:That stuff mentioned above.

Looking Forward To:Sleeping well. Hopefully.