Vacation Photos

Work-wise, it was a very weird week. Can't really go into it, but trust me - weird week.

Anyways, while I settle back into a working weekend, wanted to post this. I finally got around to uploading all my vacation photos from last summer onto Flickr. If you're interested, here're the links-

• London
  
• Belgium
  
• Paris
  
• Rome
  
• Berlin
  
• Denmark
  
• Sweden
  
• Norway
  
• Hven (Sweden)
  
• Ireland
  

Back to work...

Auction for Gene Colan

If you haven't heard, comic book artist Gene Colan is ill and his family is getting crushed by the medical bills. They're auctioning off items to help his family - you should check out the items up for bid at http://thecliffordmethod.blogspot.com/.

More on this in the next week or so.

May 2008 Music Diary

Here's what iTunes says I'm listening to-

Something Good 08 - Utah Saints
Paper Planes - M.I.A.
Unwritten - Natasha Bedingfield
Tomorrow - Ladytron
Chocolate - Snow Patrol
Warwick Avenue - Duffy
Sweet About Me - Gabriella Cilmi
Viva la Vida - Coldplay
Violet Hill - Coldplay
Heartbeat - Scouting For Girls
Cry for You - September
Two Times - The Blakes
Losing Me (Perdido en Ti) - Diego

Something Good. I loved the original - love the new remix - love love love the video.

M.I.A. is amazingly weird and cool. First caught the catchy tune during the trailer of Pineapple Express. Anyone who can make gunshots singable gets thumbs up from me.

Natasha Bedingfield has a new album out. Never listened to her first album's stuff, so I went back and found myself hooked on this tune.

My friend Eric introduced me to Ladytron - now I'm a fan.

For some reason, I noticed that I was missing a Snow Patrol track. Went and bought it on iTunes, and it got into regular rotation.

I love this new trend in British Pop towards throwback soul singers. First it was Amy Winehouse - now it's Duffy and Gabriella Cilmi. Warwick Avenue especially is one of those wonderfully sad songs that make you feel better.

Violins and Coldplay! Together! I pre-ordered my album. Viva la Vida may be their best song ever.

More great Brit Pop in Scouting for Girls. Wonder what it is about the Swedes like September that leads to such catchy dance music?

Here's where I rave about the free iTunes single of the weeks - the Blakes and Diego are great tracks.

It's Raining Men

For those keeping score at home.

It's Los Angeles in May, and last week it hit 100 degrees Farenheit, but today there was rain, hail, snow, thunder, lightning, flooding, mud slides, and even tornadoes.

I suppose it could be the Climate Change that all the kids are into these days. Global Warming causing severe weather fluctuations, with unreasonably hot temperatures and then snow. Though, if it's going up AND down, maybe the problem is that there isn't ENOUGH Global Warming? Just to be safe, I'm going to stop recycling and try to increase my carbon footprint.

If not Global Warming, then there's only one explanation - God is angry.

Not likely. I mean, it's LOS ANGELES. What could we have possibly done to annoy God?

Uh-oh.

Something Good 08 - "Like floatin' on air"

The Utah Saints are back. And they've brought the Running Man back with them.

All is good in the world.

Today's "Only in L.A." story

First off, my review of Prince Caspian. It's an okay film. As a kid, it was my least favorite of the Narnia books, thanks to its really dull story. But the art direction in the film is fantastic. I would happily pay my $12 to sit in a theatre and watch an army of talking dogs, cats, mice, bears, and centaurs in hand-to-hand combat with bad guys for two hours.

Prince Caspian isn't bad, but it's not great. But I'm eagerly waiting for the next film, Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which was an EXCELLENT book.

Anyways, before Prince Caspian started, there's a group of people in front of me. They're chattering away, then one turns to the other with an idea.

"We should pitch our television show to the AZN network!"

The others in the group buzz with excitement. "What a great idea!" "Why didn't we think of this before?" "It's a perfect fit for their network!" As the film starts, they're still very excited at the prospect of making phone calls, getting a meeting with the AZN network, and selling their show.

One little problem. The AZN network went out of business a few months ago.

I decided not to say anything. I didn't want to bring them down, since they looked so happy. But the only thing worse than some L.A. guys yammering on about their tv show? It's the know-it-all smart-alec sitting behind them who puts this stuff on his blog.

You just can't get this kind of fun with Netflix.

on procrastination

Still working. Skipping martial arts, television, NBA and NHL playoffs, shaving, and showers - but still working.

Though, I just have to say - it's amazing the stuff you can do when you're trying to avoid work. Today I went shopping for comic books, got my hockey skates sharpened, spent time online researching a new computer from the Apple Store, lost my umpteenth game of Facebook Scrabulous, found a hotel in Havana that sounds delightful for if/when the U.S. and Cuba hug it out.

That's not even including the time it's taking to write this blog post.

Sigh. And I'm still behind on watching Battlestar Galactica. Only by, like, 120 episodes, but I'm eventually going to catch up.

Oh, one quick note. I know a lot of this blog's readers are repped by the Gotham Group. Ellen was quoted in the L.A. Times last week. The quote is awesome, babe.

Speaking of repped by Gotham, gotta plug Dan Santat's gallery show this coming Tuesday.

Okay, no more procrastinating. Time to get back to work.




I'm hungry...

Happy now, Jon?!?!

Updating the blog, thanks to a friend who chided me for not doing a better job of entertaining him with it. Sorry for the lack of blogging. Believe it or not, I have NOT been playing GTA IV - I've been working on a couple projects.

In the meantime, since I've got nothing interesting to tell you about, how about some pictures?





You can check out the dozen pics I took in San Francisco on Flickr.

Daytripper

Writing this from San Francisco Airport - ducked up here for a one day getaway. Partly for fun, but mostly because I absolutely had to get on a plane.

See, a few months back, I had a claustrophobic anxiety attack while trying to get on a plane. And without being too wishy washy in describing it-

It sucked.

So since then, I did the recommended treatment - coping mechanisms, controlled breathing, and a small sedative. I felt more confident, but I wouldn't know for certain until I got onboard a plane.

Which brings us to today. After a lot of trepidation, I got on board a plane this morning. After determining that there was adequate aisle space in case I had to curl up in the fetal position, the flight went swimmingly.

Which is weird, because I've NEVER had any problem flying before. But for some reason, now I've got claustrophobic anxiety attacks to worry about. Thankfully, I made it - even though it was pretty touch-and-go there for a bit.

So that's why I'm here for a one day San Francisco daytrip. Walked around south beach, had sushi lunch with my buddy Eric, and took a few pictures of AT&T ballpark.

Anyways, the sedative's kicking in. Better get to my gate - hope these security guys give me back my shoes...

Lonely Planet Guide to Liberty City

If I ever write a travel book, it'll have to be about someplace I know very well. Like the fictional city in Grand Theft Auto 4.

So you may have noticed the lack of postings in the past week. You may have also noticed that it happened the exact moment that GTA 4 came out. Coincidence, I'm sure.

I've also had some family commitments, along with a couple of events hanging out with my writer friends.

Which reminds me. I used to name drop my writer friends on my blog. I stopped doing that, though, because I always end up forgetting to invite someone to these things. Then I feel bad when they read about how we had lunch in their living room, but forgot to invite them.

Anyways, I'm blogging this from my phone. More on that later.