April 2001 Archives

Mark was down this weekend and it was nice to kick back, take in some Shaft with Samuel L. Jackson, have an extremely overpriced lunch at Y Arriba Y Arriba at Downtown Disney ($80 for four people consisting of 4 Tapas and 5 side dishes plus two drinks) and generally have a good time.


Another one of my favorite commercials is for Washington Mutual. Guy walks into a bank up to the teller. She asks him for his accunt info and then staple-guns a barcode to the top of his head. She then directs him to the other line. After Washington Mutual flashes to their bank full of nice warm colors and friendly people, we see him in line. He asks the person in front of him "What's taking so long". They say "I have no idea". Flash to the front of the line where the teller is holding someone's head and running it back and forth across the scanner similar to a supermarket. The teller looks into the monitor and says "I hate it when these things don't scan". Priceless.


If there was a vote for coolest person, Mandel would get my vote.

I came dangerously close to buying a new Dell Refurbished system online today. But then someone took it out of the inventory. It's a pretty good deal - $800 for a Pentium 3 1.0Ghz with 256MB Ram and a DVD player. I'll keep looking, but I'm sure I'll wanna buy something soon. The old computer is beginning to wear thin. I'd go shopping in person somewhere, but I can't fathom buying a Compaq or HP.

Timothy is 15 today - yikes!


Having DSL return really points out the weakest link in my home access - the computer. As much as I really want a high powered 1Ghz+ system, I think at this point a 700-800 system won't be so bad. My computer keeps crashing and the floppy drive doesn't work. But what really hurts - only 3GB of hard drive space. I'm hoping I'll be able to swing something in May. Keep your fingers crossed.

My DSL has returned. Now of course I need a new computer and a wireless network, but that's another story.


With my return to broadband, last night I finally synched the entire site. Club Josh is now 50MB and growing. A year ago when I switched to clubjosh.com, I did so because my site reached 20MB and I ran out of space on my old JPS account. Good thing my new account allows me 500MB. Just think of all the Gorn photos.


Speaking of JPS - people are still getting here by accessing those old pages. I removed the redirects and posted the date they will be going away (June 17). Hopefully people will get the point.

I did some quick housecleaning on the site today. Despite the high traffic volumes, no one seemed to notice that some of the links on the Trip Diaries didn't work. Oh well, they are fixed now. I also added a link to the respective Gorn galleries for the chapters.


This past weekend I was at Disneyland and DCA - not once, but twice. It is amazing how nice DCA is compared to Disneyland late at night. Sure, there are no fireworks (but if you know the tune like I do, you can watch DL's fireworks and hum along), but the lack of crowds makes the park more enjoyable. You can saunter with your flavor-tipped soft-serve ice cream across Paradise Pier and walk on everything from Screamin' to Mulholland Madness. Sunday, we were at the Rancho del Zocalo in Frontierland. I was wearing my DCA sweatshirt and the cast member at the register asked me if I liked the new park. I told her yes and she seemed surprised. She told me hardly anyone says yes - most people hate it. I told her its because most people go into the park with the expectation that it is the second coming of Disneyland. Folks, it's not. It is an entirely different ball of wax. One that I happen to enjoy immensely - despite all the buzz from the internet sites. Of course, when other people figure this out and the crowds finally show up - it will be awfully packed and probably not-so-nice, but I can always yearn for those cold, rainy winter days at Disneyland when Roger and I have the park practically to ourselves.

This weekend I finally got around to doing some housecleaning. You see, I have this one closet that has nothing but mementos and other misc. stuff from over the years. With a critical eye, I set out to thin out the boxes by 6, leaving enough room in the closet for a new file cabinet to get better organized. Well Saturday, I accomplished the thinning part - I eliminated 7 boxes of stuff. Sunday I bought a new file cabinet, but lo and behold it was 2.5 inches too big for the closet. So with some moving around, it is now next to my desk. no easy task considering my room has a curved wall. But I look forward to being able to organize and put away some bills and other misc. stuff that has been floating around my apartment.


Still no DSL. Well sorta. We have DSL to the house, but I can't login because someone at Earthlink forgot to add the line of code that authenticates me on the network. Total time on the phone this weekend with them: 3 hours. Latest estimate: Tuesday.

Today at Club Josh, I launched the expanded AvantGo channel page. Now you can choose all or part of the PDA site to synch. I have had these URLs sitting around for weeks, but I finally posted them. See all that's available. I will probably organize it better when I get some free time or think about it more.


The next site up for revamp is either the Charo home page or my Jarre collection. I am leaning towards Jarre since Charo is doing just fine in the traffic area.


The DSL was supposed to be turned on last night after 5pm and still hasn't showed up. Maybe when I get home? I can only dream. For those of you keeping track, it has been 6 weeks since we were given the boot by Pac Bell.

I am quite fond of Marie Calender's cornbread. I think it is my mother's fault since she used to make it when I was in my formitive years. Now why is it that all of the Marie Calenders in my area all get the B rating? I pretty much try and avoid B places, but sometimes....sometimes I get a hankerin' for the cornbread and gotta go. I guess if I was really motivated, I'd actually make my own. Riiiight.

Today is the 95th anniversary of the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake. There are not too many survivors left to tell the harrowing tale of the massive 7.5-8.3M quake (no one really knows the actual size and theories vary). It lasted for 60 seconds and ruptured 430km of the San Andreas fault. In some places, fences were offset 20 feet.


Quirky note from SFGate:

In May 1906, Sunset magazine -- then a publicity organ of Southern Pacific Railroad, published an "emergency edition" praising the city's recovery and imminent rebuilding after the April earthquake and fire. Articles in the issue hewed to the advice that an SP executive had circulated to chambers of commerce throughout the state, emphasizing the fire and downplaying the quake in the belief that fire -- a more familiar threat -- would be less likely to scare off visitors and future residents.


Lion King last night was great. It took a bit to get used to some of the character's stunning costumes, but by the end you didn't even notice. The producers did a great job expanding the material for the musical. The new bits blended well with the original movie material, and I think only those who have seen it many times really would know the extra bits. Some of the set pieces were equally stunning. My favorite was the wildebeest stampede sequence - truly a show-stopper. Go see it if you are going to be in LA.


Josh's theater tip: Whenever you see a musical or play in a tiered theater, get the second row in the first balcony (sometimes called mezzanine). You get the best view of the entire stage without being overpowered by the orchestra.

I am convinced that the person who decided on the new colors for my apartment building is on crack. We used to have a nice simple building where all the doors were sorta foam green and the exterior walls were a nice yellowish-cream colored. Over the last month or so they have been painting a new scheme: Interior doors to apartments are still foam green, fire doors are still white, but their frame is now dark green; exterior doors are dark green, patio planters that used to match the building are now also dark green; exterior of the building remains yellow-creme; and the best of all - the gate goes from foam green to purple (to match the awning out front).


Tonight's entertainment is Disney's The Lion King at the Pantages Theater. Should be a good show - I've heard lots of good things about it. Is is better than Mamma Mia? (see March 28) I'll let ya know.

Back from one of the greatest natural wonders in the world. The last time I was in Yosemite was in 1989 or so with my friend Kris. We drove out one day and went for a quick hike up to Vernal and Nevada falls. Upon returning, one thing I noticed was how smaller things looked. Maybe it is one of those perspective things, and the fact that prior to the visit with Kris, I was 12 the last time I was there might have something to do with it.


Roger and I did have a great time. We stayed at the 4-diamond Tenaya Lodge just outside of the south entrance. I recommend it as a place to stay - reasonably priced and good food (Roger enjoyed the Crab cakes, salad, and Cr�me Brule). If the sight of kids running around makes you queasy you might want to try somewhere else. Due to the Easter holiday, most of the people were families with lots and lots of kids. Quote of the day from Roger: "The plumbing is definitely NOT 4-diamond."


Enjoy the Gorn pics from Yosemite - I posted a couple non-Gorn but still scenic pics as well.

It is amazing, but when you stay up until 3am at work and then have to go back to work the next morning, the feeling is eerily similar to a hangover.


This morning I was pleasantly surprised to see my Club Josh T-Shirt in the mail. It came out great so order up! I have been looking into combining stores into one page so I will be able to sell different shirts (one for Charo, one for the Gorn, some old Party shirts etc.). I added a link to the store on the left side nav bar on the homepage. Once I get more shirts or my own storepage I will put a link to it in the global ssi.


The Gorn is off to Yosemite National Park this weekend and he asked me along. Look for some new Gorn pictures next week!

In addition to the self-inflicted chin scrape suffered earlier this week, this morning I added some scraped knuckles on my left hand. I am a creature of habit. When I shower I usually have a pattern I follow. This minimizes how awake I need to be in the morning while getting ready for work. (I have a separate "don't care how long I take" routine for the weekends) The downside of all of this is that every now and then you do something stupid. Like this morning. I was towelling off in the shower and raised my hand up to dry my back and bam! I hit my hand on a sharp-ish edge of the top of the shower door causing chunk-size gouges to be taken out of my knuckles (the ones where the finger meets the hand). Not a good week for coordination.


David L. "Squiggy" Lander joins the list of celebrities spotted at McDonald's. He joins Brad Pitt and Ron Perlman as members of this exclusive club.


I received an e-mail from someone asking about Charo. After some digging, I found that she is performing at John Ascuaga's Nugget on July 12-14, 2001. So get your tickets now by calling (800) 648-1177.

My favorite commercial on television is again for Pacific Bell DSL. A mother comforts her deaf child as he clutches his dog. She tells him she's sure that the neighbors are friendly. An elderly woman next door peers out the window and determined to be friendly, logs onto her modem connection to view some sign language video. Of course its choppy and slow, but she does her best. She then walks up to the child with a freshly baked pie. She tells the child "I've baked this pie for you" but as she signs it, it comes out "I've baked your dog for you". The poor child drops the pie and runs away mortified. Of course this wouldn't have happened if you had DSL.


KFWB is now giving "power tips" along with your hourly "power update". Today's tip: Try buying lighter colored lamp shades - that way you don't need to turn on as many lights. I'm not making this stuff up folks.

In my wanderings around the Internet, I have found a couple of relic theme parks that have websites. It is interesting to think that there is not much separating these pages from my Doingworld pages. I guess I should work on an attractions list and then no one will know the difference.


Check out:

Freedomland USA

Pleasure Island

I'm back from my nice three-day weekend. This weekend also marked the fifth consecutive weekend at the Disneyland Resort. I really have no idea why we have been there so often, but I think it is more "nothing better to do" than "Disney-obsessive who needs a life".


Sunday Roger and I went to Ontario Mills. Those of you unfamiliar with the Mills concept - take a bunch of outlet stores and mix in some brand name non-outlet stores (but look like outlets). Expand to a huge size and fill with thousands of people. Then line the outside with fancy restaurants. The best part was that dinner was good at Black Angus. We decided to drive home via Historic Route 66 and avoid the freeway jam. It was a fun drive, but only really good when you have lots of free time.


I played around with Photoshop this weekend and created some t-shirt graphics. I set up the store at Cafe Press and ordered a sample shirt to see how it looks. I might need to tweak the graphics a bit to get a better shirt.


Club Josh Apparel Store - buyer's beware! Wait until I get my shirt next week. But hey, if you want one really bad, go ahead and order one.

The last couple of days have really been a roller coaster ride. Tuesday night I was up until 2am approving pages at work. Yesterday we all sat around QA'ing and waiting. The result? At 5am this morning, two years of hard work finally paid off.


It is all somewhat anti-climatic. The waiting, the frantic coding and recoding, and the general lack of a social life all take their toll while building up a sense of expectation. Then it all happens and despite a few bumps here and there, it works well. You are left with a sense of what's next. Fear not, I am taking tomorrow off to unwind and return to a somewhat normal life.


In the meantime, enjoy the fruits of labor of a bunch of really great people.


Completely unrelated, but really amusing: KFWB a local all-news radio station I listen to during the commute has added hourly power updates. What is this world coming to? "At the top of the hour here is the latest power update - No Power Alerts issued as yet - stay tuned".

Cafe Press allows people to upload graphics and sell t-shirts, mugs, and mousepads. They claim to have more coming. Dan ordered one for his website and it looks pretty good. Better than printing on thermal transfers and doing the ironing yourself. Look for Club Josh logo items for sale soon...


Over the weekend I updated the Cyber Surfin' Safari. It is really amazing the number of sites that have gone under or have remained stagnant in the last 6 months. I know I was guilty of that awhile back, but am glad I am updating again on a regular basis.

StarWars.com had a really good April Fool's joke up on their site. They converted it to April 1, 1979 - complete with reports from the set of Episode V, why George Lucas hadn't released Episode IV on Betamax, and the screen was nice a monochrome green like the good old days.


Baseball season is upon us. This season, the Brewers and the Pirates open new stadiums. I remember a time a little more than 10 years ago when Toronto opened the first new stadium in 10 years and everyone else's stadium looked long in the tooth. I do remember being excitied as the Giants built their new stadium and hope to someday get to see a game there. Here are the stadiums that I have been to:


Dodger Stadium

Candlestick Park

Oakland Coliseum

Bank One Ballpark

Coors Field

Astrodome

Anaheim Stadium



Here are the ones I have been by, but not inside during a game:

The Ballpark at Arlington

Pac Bell Park

Wrigley Field

Comisky Park


I don't think I'd ever spend the moolah to go on one of those escorted MLB staduim tours, but I wouldn't mind visiting as many as I could on my own.