A big middle finger to CBC for choosing to show the bloody Leafs-Senators game last night over the Winter Classic. Thanks to NBC for actually bothering to show a game that only happens once a year, and was between two good teams rather than two bottom feeders.

A few this year.

1. The common - go to the gym more and lose weight. Currently about 10lbs above my target goal. It's more of a getting into a routine again that seems to be preventing those last 10 pounds from being shed.
2. Give up porn. Seems like an odd one, but I really don't need it in my life anymore I think, and if anything, I'm starting to get concerned it may be impacting my stamina in bed (as infrequently that I've gotten the opportunity lately anyways).
3. Either one of the following:
- a. Regain love of my current career so that I can once again enjoy life here.
- b. Pick up everything, put it in storage or with parents, and travel the world until my money runs out.

Haha, what a great play/run by Manning!

I'm surprised to see such a strong range of opinions on this one.  I guess I can understand if you don't like the main actor (or actively hate him) you're not likely to enjoy the movie, as it would be with nearly any movie, but I had such a fun time that it is surprising to see the negativity.

I agree. I mean, this is my #2 movie of the year (behind Inception). It's interesting to see how it's such a love/hate movie apparently.

These are my feelings exactly. #2 movie of the year (and Inception is one of my all time faves now), so that's no disrespect to SPvTH at all. I just watched it at home to once again experience it's awesomeness. Great movie.

Not as revealing as the other one, but this one definitely got a good laugh out of me. Love the sheep!

Since I had avoided spoilers, I was pretty surprised when the Titanic sunk.

Last night's Britney Spears tribute episode was the BEST SHOW EVER.

"It feels like a Jewish cloud."   

I honestly thought it was terrible. Almost no story progression, the musical numbers were almost all pretty much recreation of music videos and shoehorned in via a silly mechanism, and the entire thing felt entirely wasted.

I will say that Brittany, finally getting solos, was indeed fantastic (and a stellar dancer).

Can I watch all the Leaf games? 

I'm confused, I thought you wanted to watch hockey?

 

Sorry Canuck, I don't use the service myself so I can't provide any help. Hope someone here has experience with it though. Going without hockey would be a terrible thing for a Canadian!

 

6 billion people in a country

I hadn't realized that the Chinese population had started multiplying like rabbits.

The B.O.'s up to about $143.5 million in 10 days now.  Not that it reflects quality, but that's more than Insomnia and The Prestige made, combined, in their total theater runs. Me thinks it's important that shows WB he's more than a Batman one-trick pony at the box office, and good for his long-term career health and freedom to do things the way he wants to do them (certainly not a freedom every director enjoys).

It certainly seems that Nolan was given a lot of freedom with Inception (not to mention a good sized budget), and I'm *really* glad it seems to be paying off so far. I thought the movie was outstanding.

Other than being annoyed with the 3D conversion, that looks absolutely awesome. I've enjoyed both the books and the movies.

I loved my 2 weeks of training in Austin. I was up in the Arboretum area as well and thought nothing but great things about the city. Lots of good food (but unfortunately I can't recall much beyond the already mentioned Rudy's), friendly people, well laid out highway system...I wish I was going back to Austin in August rather than Houston *shudder*.

After FF6, FF9 is my favourite JRPG of all time. It's simply sublime. I'll be tempted to buy it again once it hits NA shores.

This movie was one of my favourite surprises last year. I thought it had some absolutely hilarious moments and was really well put together.

The 6-3 opener against Pittsburgh wasn't much different - Lots of goals by the Penguins, lots of penalties for the Habs (of which both Philly and Pittsburgh capitalized on), and Halak getting pulled after sub-par play. Oddly, both games Montreal actually outshot their opponent (something that seems to be a bad omen, the Habs are 0-4 when they outshoot their opponent).

And Montreal won Game 1 against Washington.

That looks awesome. I'll be seeing this one shortly after it comes out, guaranteed.

Kings-Canucks game has the added entertainment of every few minutes the game takes a quick break for a mini-game of 'dogpile the goalie' (both sides).

2-1 Canucks so far, hopefully they can keep it up in the 2nd. And stop taking GD penalties, since they obviously can't kill them off.

wtf!?  nothing in Michigan?  screw em  I hope they cancel tour.

Sarnia is right on the Michigan border, 1 hour north of Detroit.

And I'll be there for the show.

I don't get the scheduling. US and Canada games are in the middle of the day when no one can watch them, and the 2 games with all European games are during a time when their countries are sleeping. Wouldn't have made more sense to switch those?

Playing to the East Coast audience - The US game is at 3pm EST, and the Canada game is 730pm EST. Prime hockey time!

BTW: The really big game is tomorrow - Team Canada women Vs Team USA women in the semi-final!

You mean the finals, right?

They play for Gold Thursday. I'm looking forward to it.

But the Canada/Russia game tonight should be a good one. I'm hoping to squeak by the Russians, I think it will be very close tonight.

I visited Honolulu and the USS Arizona memorial back in Sept 2008. It is truly a staggering place to stand over and take everything in.

iPad it is!

I am sort of torn because I always wanted to see Brett get his Superbowl win.  I won't be too torn up if we beat them though! 

Superbowl XXXI doesn't count?

Other than the AZ/GB game, the playoff games have been duds/lopsided affairs so far. I'm really hoping Sunday will actually see some real competition.

Reminder...third season of Chuck premiers tonight, 9E/8C.

Wonder how they're going to get Yvonne into her underwear tonight???

Okay, does 8 minutes until a bikini shot count? 

They easily topped that in the second episode. 

I'm keen on hearing what it eventually turns out to be, but if they really think a $800-$1,000 tablet price point is going to work in the current economic environment, I want whatever Jobs is smoking.  

While it wasn't the same economic environment (but was on the way there) when the iPhone was announced, I remember a lot of people making similar statements about the iPhone and it's initial price point. If I recall, that little thing seemed to sell pretty well? Especially when they got their production cheaper and lowered the MSRP.

I think Apple will be just fine here.

2009 was a mediocre to poor year for me.

- Changed jobs, and while the new one has been better, it's still not really enjoyable to me. Might need to find a new field.
- Considerably less travel than 2008. 2008 I went on numerous trips. 2009 I went on one (it was a good one, but I wanted to do much more travelling).
- Several starts and stops with relationships. Nothing lasted longer than 2 months. All were enjoyable while they lasted, and one was really disappointing in not being able to last longer (damn longer distances!). The city I live in is a complete wasteland for dating, so I'm now dating in neighboring cities (ie 1hr drives).
- One of my closest friends and coworkers up and moved 3 hours away in the final weeks of the year.
- Got a good raise and lots of overtime opportunity, as well as pretty good recognition of the work done. Can't complain there.
- Bought a new car. Love it!

I'm hoping 2010 will be a better year, but I think for that to happen I'll probably have to move. Something I'd prefer not to do, and I might just do the 'travel until your money runs out' thing instead. And that could probably last a full year or two depending on how well I budget...

Jets win
Eagles win
NE win
GB win

You other directors with your quick cuts, blurred action sequences and shaky cams can learn a lot from James Cameron! I'm looking right at you Michael Bay!

At no time did I feel lost in the action sequences, I could follow the shot-by-shot action, and therefore felt more invested in each of the different Naa'vi and mercenary deaths. I feel as though I would have been able to identify each of the different marines that died if they lined them up at the beginning of the movie and said their names. I would not feel the same way at all about IDing the different transformers that died in Transformers 2.

If nothing else I hope this movie schools the other action movie directors into taking more time with their shots and giving us action sequences we can follow so that we feel invested in the action rather than confused by it.

Very true, and that was something I mentioned to my friends once we left the theatre. Cameron actually knows how to film and showcase action scenes, unlike the moron directors that use continuous quick cuts and shaky cameras for EVERY SINGLE SCENE.

I saw it in both Imax and normal 3D. The Imax had better sound and seats (and naturally a much larger picture), but I thought the 3D was actually better in the normal theatre. The Imax as still a slightly better overall 'experience' though. Worth the effort if you want to see the film a second time!

I'm not in an arguing mood, but I don't think Olympic hockey sucks now. Not by a long shot.

It's by far the most entertaining form of hockey available today.  Love it.

gellar

+1.

Might be even better this year on an NHL sized rink, too.

Actually the NHL sized rink makes me a little sad this year. I loved the larger olympic sized rink, more room for skating and speed.

Still, very much looking forward to the games.

If they pulled Manning with a 29-10 lead, I could understand. But it was 15-10. Pulling Manning meant they expected to score nothing else during the game (and indeed they didn't). While I acknowledge that the Colts are protecting their starters, by doing so that early in the game with the score close, they are pretty much throwing the game away.

Wow. Wow wow WOW. Saw Avatar in a midnight screening in 3D (not IMAX). Simply incredible. It took my eyes a little to adjust to the 3D, but after the first 20 minutes or so it was pure bliss. There are some scenes that are just staggering in what is presented. And with the 3D, I found the slow moving scenes to often be just as visually striking as the faster action scenes.

I had no issues whatsoever with the story or characters. I enjoyed them for what they were, they kept things moving well. This is a spectacle movie in EVERY sense of the word, and just HAS to be experienced in a huge theatre, in 3D. The CGI was uniformally stellar. The action was extravagent and easy to follow (no shakey cam/quick cuts nonsense that I recall, with the exception of possibly one scene early on). If you are on the fence about seeing the movie - GO. I really don't think this film would have near the impact in 2D on a TV, and I wonder how well it will hold up there. Still, last night is a movie experience I will never forget. People talked that Avatar might be a revolution in the movie viewing experience - I can believe it now. 2 thumbs way up.

I liked GI Joe, was much more fun than Transformers 2.  The story, ridiculous as it was, at least made sense. Transformers 2 had bus sized plot holes and barely deserved to be called Transformers, it introduced so many new, stupid elements.  Human transformers?  (who have nothing better to do than attend college?)  "The fallen"?  Transformer heaven?  Robot testicles?  The racially sterotyped twins?  Michael Bay was giving the finger to and mocking Transformers fans, and most of them didn't even realize it.

GI Joe had the more intelligent script (by which I mean followable by a human being), superior cgi, and was more fun too.  At least you could see what was happening on the screen, rather than just a bunch of giant machines crunching into each other and BAYSPLOSIONS!!!!  And Scarlett in GI Joe > Megan Fox in T2.  Hell, Jar Jar Binks was preferable to the twins.

I agree with a lot of what you said. However, I thought the CGI in Transformers was pretty darn outstanding, while GI Joe was decidedly meh. I enjoyed the action more in Transformers, but everything else was better in GI Joe (story, characters, humor, not having the twins, etc). And I thought the Baroness was the hottest of the three women (followed by Scarlett).

"Around here our ambition throws a non-perishable item in the donation bin at christmas, and then pats itself on the fucking back because it thinks it's done something decent." -- Matthew Good.

I get to see Matt Good live next Saturday! Exciting times.

Some days, I'm really glad to be an engineer. Dress code? Hah! I think some on this floor are lucky if their socks match, let alone thinking to dress in anything more than a tshirt and ratty jeans.

Holy god...

Red Wings 9, Blue Jackets 1

Didn't I say a few weeks ago that the Wings offense has woken up. Now Ozzie seems back to form. It'll be interesting to see how the Canucks fair against them tonight. I'm betting that H Sedin and his countrymen on defence continue to play like a bunch of retarded bitches.

I'm heading to the game shortly. I certainly hope the outcome isn't similar to Detroit's showing last night and Vancouver's the night before..

And it is WAY more contagious. In a matter of days it has infected my sister, my dad, my father-in-law, my mother-in-law, and now me. My wife is still infection-free, but the clock is ticking....

Ya, this thing likes to hop really easily amongst people. I had the flu last week, but I think I managed to stay away from friends enough that they didn't get it.

Add me to the pile that found the flu more mild than normal. Highly contagious? Yuppers. Dangerous? No (unless you have other health issues, then be concerned, just like any other flu).

The media has been disgusting to me with this. Toronto especially. This is a rough sequence of events, for those that haven't gotten to see it:

- A young boy dies suddenly (Evan). This makes front page national news. It is believed he had H1N1 (now believed to be from meningitis)
- A few days later, the first vaccination clinics are about to open. All the news stories state they are about to open. And right at the end, they mention non-challantly that the clinics are for high priority cases only. I saw this done multiple times (FLU CLINICS OPENING TOMORRROW!!! (High priority only)
- Once clinics open, the lines are MASSIVE, demand is overwhelming. Many people state they are there because of Evan's sudden death, and how it frightened them. Many people are not high-priority. Health officials claim they are caught off-guard by demand.
- News is reporting on the massive lineups, the confusion over who can get the vaccine, the constant dangers of the flu, etc. They are now highlighting what makes you 'high-priority'.
- Now there are reports of shortages of the vaccine, clinics closing early, etc. The media are just having a field day.

Just disgusting. I do appreciate that CBC has run (on their website at least) an article admonishing the media and health officials: Link

I'd actually like to see this movie.

I want to see this movie as well. Looked better than most things released in theatres.

I liked it, and will keep watching it.

I also enjoyed the Oceanic airlines advertisement in the background in one scene.