Rockin' Rodeo!

I won a karaoke contest! I'm so happy. It's a weekly contest, $100 to the top singer, split if there's a tie in the points. I sang Superstar by the Carpenters and Don't Know Why by Norah Jones. I had almost given up hope that I could win a contest with my voice. I don't have a typical I'm gonna kick your butt voice like say, Christina Aguilera's, I sound much more like Norah Jones, who, while popular, probably also won't be winning any karaoke contests.

Anyway, it was fantastic, and it was lovely to finally win before I finally leave Eugene and never come back.

Geek attack

I love the function on the profile screen where you can click on one of your interests and see other profiles with the same interest listed. I put down Star Trek: TNG as one of my interests (that is the best show ever, bar none, although the first few seasons had some incredibly stupid plot lines. It got better though...) and it was really interesting to see what else people who listed Star Trek: TNG were interested in. One person was a self titled Bible thumper. Another was interested in blood. Another was interested in cemeteries, death, and so on. Another was into all the various incarnations of Star Trek in addition to various RPG games. Good stuff - it's always nice to know that a show of such import is loved by such a broad spectrum of people in our society.

By the way, if you take online geek tests (I was stuck in a La Quinta for two days straight - I was bored!), liking Star Trek is apparently a big part of being a geek, as is being in marching band, being able to describe to someone else what e=mc2 means, and being able to name more than ten elements on the periodic table. I was 60% geek, or something like that, whatever that means. I still haven't been able to figure out the difference between nerd and geek - anyone care to enlighten me?

Only good things about shows after TNG - well, not much that I can think of. A female captain was cool. Scott Bakula is arguably the best looking captain, but I don't know if that counts as 'good' since he was in a better show before Enterprise. 7 of 9 is a plus if you're a guy, but I never did get the appeal, same basic reason Jolene Blaylock is on Enterprise.

Maybe it takes actually learning Klingon to reach into the realm of being a truly and completely hopeless geek. Personally, if I were going to learn a fake language, I would go with something from Lord of the Rings - Tolkien was totally brilliant.

Wyoming sucks - so does I-84

I just drove from Eugene up to Port Orchard, WA then to St. Louis, Missouri in a 48 hour period. Not fun. Not fun at all. But, I'm now prepared to go to bed at this nice La Quinta hotel with free wireless internet access. I have essentially nothing to do tomorrow except work on the Latin transcription I'm working on for my advisor. It should be a smashingly good time. :)

Wyoming sucks. A lot. We stopped in Rock Springs because David couldn't keep his eyes open anymore and attempted to get a place to stay for the night. The first three places just told us they were booked full. The fourth front desk person said that probably every hotel along highway 80 in the entire state of Wyoming was booked. That was a fun thought, considering we were a good four miles driving time from the border and it was already 2am. We persevered, and three more no vacancies nearly made us accept the possibility of sleeping in the terribly uncomfortable front seat of my brother's Toyota Tacoma. Then we stopped at the Economy Guest Village. As you might imagine from the name, it was not a promising place to stay for the night. We were told it was full as well, then the woman at the desk said that she did have one room left but the sofa bed was busted. When told that there was a queen size bed in the "suite" I said it didn't matter and we booked it for the night.

It was a trash-hole. To put it kindly. The maintenance man claimed it was only four years since renovation, but the oven had to be early 80's at the newest. The sofa bed was indeed busted, so I got the lumpy couch and my brother got the lumpy queen size bed. We were told not to worry about the noise around 3am because that's when all the strippers came back from work, and because the owner of the strip club was also the owner of the hotels, all the girls rented out rooms in the same building we now occupied. When I woke up, I found that I had acquired a number of bug bites. I don't even want to know how.

Now I'm in this nice La Quinta, happily typing away at my laptop using free wireless (for which I paid less than my brother paid for the sad little place in Nowhere, Wyoming), and I must say that I will be extremely surprised if I find any more bug bites tomorrow morning. Which is as it should be.

'Tis such sweet sorrow, In the parting of our ways

It is very odd living in a somewhat empty apartment. All of my furniture - except for two chairs - is gone, so all that's left are books I didn't pack, recycling, CDs, and so on. Caesar's enjoying having the extra space to knock his lime green bouncy ball around.

I'm going to miss singing with the praise team at St. Mary's. Because we're such a small group, I get to do a lot of the solos, and they're just so much fun! I enjoy singing in church because there's so little pressure. I get to sing, which I love, without having the pressure of trying to "make" something of my voice. My old voice teacher said that I should have pursued singing, but then that would take the joy out of it. Then it would be a job.

About Snakes on a Plane, or SoaP as it is called on the "blogosphere" apparently: it was actually quite funny! I was expecting a stupid, but entertaining action flick and that's precisely what I got. Samuel L. Jackson was appropriately cool and kickbutt, and there was a good supporting cast. I was not pleased with how many icky snakes there were, but after all, I was warned by the most obvious title ever. I still don't get why there was an anaconda if the point was to wreak as much havoc as possible with poisonous snakes, but then I guess I was supposed to suspend disbelief. Anyway, it's a good popcorn movie, and the snakes are probably much better on the big screen than on a little one. Much scarier when they jump at you then. :)

But seriously - if you go see it, it's funny, but very, very stupid. As long as you expect that, then it's a great weekend movie.

Sushi and ice cream at Nina and Austin's

So tonight I tried out my ice cream maker for the second time since I got it. Things tasted alright, I think, but then add whip cream, milk, strawberries, sugar and a little vanilla together, freeze and I think it's going to taste fantastic no matter what you do. Nina and Austin provided absolutely fantabulous sushi, and I actually had some of the raw stuff. It wasn't so bad, but I dunno about eating it again. I preferred the yummy shrimp, the kappa maki and the inari. mmm... inari.

I don't really have much going on right now, and I'm too lazy to go scare up something fun or amusing, so I think all I'm going to say is this:

Go see Snakes on a Plane! Not only is that the stupidest title ever, it's probably the stupidest idea ever, and Samuel L. Jackson is starring! What better way to waste $8? definitely a better bet than a parking ticket, say.

Life in Eugene during the time of no work

Well, I don't actually have roommates anymore. Their lease didn't allow for pets, so I'm back to trolling classified ads and other sites for possibilities. I'm almost to the point of paying a real estate agent to find a place for me because it's so difficult to find a place of my own in Vienna. Very narrow housing market. Back to the grindstone...

I am up way too late again, as usual. I keep getting headaches about halfway through my day (around 6-9pm) and then I end up staying up until 3 and sleeping until eleven or later. It is a testament to my inability to go to sleep as early as I ought to that I am actually watching Jay Leno. I very much dislike his show, but he's got a pretty funny guest on tonight.

I took up a beading project tonight. I bought the materials more than a year ago intending to get started right away, similar to many projects I undertake in life. Anyway, I got started tonight, and finished four rows, which I am quite proud of. Of course, I don't think I'm actually following the pattern correctly, but I'm close enough that I think it will look alright. I do know one thing - no more beading projects. I am very bad at beading. And Caesar enjoys playing with beads a little too much.