Frustrating Ride

by on November 28, 2014 at 8:29 am
Posted In: Test

Well my morning biking regime has been going fairly well. For the most part I think I hit a plateau keeping it under 4o minutes but rarely going bellow my average of 38 minutes. To make matters worse there are the occasional extenuating circumstance like being slowed down by heavy wind or traffic or stopped by traffic lights most notably my personal nemesis 65th and Ravenna which is right next to the park and ride and has busy traffic as early as 6:15.

But today was especially frustrating. It was raining (which by itself was unpleasant) and I had no intention of trying to break any speed records on treacherous roads and while I was doing all right the need to watch where I was going and large puddles on the road were definitely slowing me down.

What was the most frustrating was what the rain was doing to my iPhone.  A wet screen is always a nuisance but the way it was effecting the Runkeeper app was especially annoying. It was telling me my progress about every minute (sometimes every thirty seconds) until it finally paused at the home stretch. I managed to get it going again in a way that wouldn’t screw up my time too much but that was only the beginning of things. When I finished the loop Runkeeper was congratulating me on my new record of 33 minutes. This I knew was nonsense as according to Runkeeper I’d been ridding 33 minutes for the last five minutes. Reluctantly I deleted the workout. Tempting as keeping it would be I have no desire for my progress to be regarded as irrelevant because Runkeeper was holding something impossible (or at least bloody difficult) over my head. It would be like when it said I burned 666 calories on Halloween.

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Wednesday Double Feature

by on November 26, 2014 at 9:18 am
Posted In: Test

For this week’s selection I went with the theme of hollow earth courtesy of Messer’s Edgar Rice Burroughs and Jules Verne.

at-the-earths-core-posterThe first, At the Earth’s Core, is extremely loosely based on the first of Burroughs’ Pellucidar novels of the same name. It is a cheesy piece of fluff that somehow remains entertainng. The plot can be boiled down to “hero and absent minded inventor take a rocket drill to an underground kingdom, get captured by psychic pterodons, rescue a beautiful princess who falls in love with the hero, escape, lead natives in rebellion against the psychic pterodons and go home.

Really. That’s it.

But somehow this all stays fun. The effects are completely fake, with split screen, hand puppets and monster suits but strangely while being completely unconvincing I found a lot of this in an aesthetically pleasing in a theatrical sort of way. (Though I seriously doubt this was done on purpose.}

On a side note, Peter Cushing is hilarious playing blatantly against type as the absent-minded inventor.

Journey_to_the_Center_of_the_Earth1959For the second film we the first of many adaptations of Journey to the Center of the Earth. I first remember being aware of the adaption (I was already aware of the book.) from watching the Filmation cartoon based on the film. (I knew it was based on the film and not the book because of the duck.)

For the most part, all it kept from the book was the general outline fleshing things out by adding a villain and a larger cast (and the Gertrude the Duck for comic relief)

I have a sneaking suspicion that this was mad to cash in on the success of Walt Disney’s 20,00 Leagues under the Sea, right down to the songs, but even so it was fun with some spectacular sets and matte painting. The main downside was some of the special effects. Near the climax the expedition is attacked by “dimetrodons” which consisted of Rock Iguanas (and I could have sworn I saw one Monitor Lizard) with fins strapped to their backs. I’ve been aware of this “technique” for years but I’m pretty sure this is the first time I ever actually seen it. And with this week’s marathon of cheesy effects I’m at a loss to decide which is more egregious, the costumes or the lizards.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WF8Bf1d_crk

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Wednesday Double Feature

by on November 19, 2014 at 9:25 am
Posted In: Test

Okay I confess… I kind of cheated this week. Instead of doing a proper double feature I did an Anime Marathon.

Durara is a show that I’d enjoyed in bits and pieces for some time and I finally decided to sit down and watch it. (technically I had access to it on Hulu but they only have the subtitled version and Durarara is one of those shows with enough little details I figured I needed to pick up the dub to properly take everything in.

I’m not sure just how to describe Durarara, It’s kind of present day magical realism with lots of action. It’s all about life in the  Tokyo district of Ikebukuro with all attractions, highschool students, internet gangs, berserker bartenders, headless motorcyclists, demonic swords that posses their victims… It’s that kind of show.

Beyond the eccentricities it’s the kind of show I like. It slowly and methodically takes it’s time adding in all the little details and then turns around and rewards you for paying attention. Some people may complain that this makes the first quarter of the show but I say that’s just letting one’s short attention span get the better of them.

There are so many little details I like. The bets thing is the way that background characters are colored gray as if we are not even noticing them. However once someone is “noticed” say in a flash mob triggered by… well this is what makes watching these things so much fun,  they suddenly light up into a normal palate.

 

Unfortunatly I find the second half of the series isn’t quite as riveting as the first and it feels like three separate stories. (consIdering it’s based on a series of  light novels it probably is) and it leaves several plot points hanging, with any luck these will be dealt with in the second season I am told is coming later this year. However despite all this  I think Durarara is well worth anyone’s time.

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My First Puff Pastry

by on November 14, 2014 at 9:01 am
Posted In: Test

Mushroompastrey2014-11-13-20.46

I’ve been trying to do more recipe’s lately mainly because even going to the cheapest restaurants add up quickly and to the other extreme while living on frozen chicken is technically a good diet it’s not what I’d call a great diet.

So I’ve been making a point of trying something interesting at least once a week as a way to improve my skills as well as I’ve found it’s easier to stock you refrigerator when your list is based around some sort of strategy as opposed to the usual impulse buys.

The challenge is to find something interesting while keeping things economical to spell that out one of my favorite shepherd’s pie recipe by Alton Brown calls for actual lamb, something I’ve yet to find for under eight dollars a pound in this town.

Anyway today I did Flaky Mushroom Pastries from the webpage Food Through The Pages a site that hypothesizes the recipes for food mentioned in all the books we love. I decided to try this one because first I really enjoyed the Gentleman Bastards series it came from and second because I love mushrooms.

I’d been putting it off because of the puff pastry but I happened to stumble over it while shopping at Trader Joe’s for a  good price and grabbed it. Puff Pastry is something I’ve been avoiding because it seems overly complex like working with explosives but ultimately fairly easy. Even when the instructions in the recipe are rather vague on the details. But once I got over the initial panic it turned out to be pretty idiot proof. All in all other than burning the bottom it turned out quite well.

 

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