Monthly Archives: February 2004

Surviving the Blizzard

“Your taun-taun will freeze before you reach the outer marker!”

 

“Then I’ll see you in Hell!”

It’s been snowing most of the day today and as of the current moment — roughly 1.30 in the morning — there is a good five inches piled up on the back deck. If I had any sense at all, I’d have stayed in tonight with a nice bottle of brandy and watched Blade Runner. But since I’m basically a dumbass who thinks it’s a good idea to be sociable with friends on a Saturday night, I took Anne up to Bountiful to visit with Jack and his lovely Mrs. We had a pleasant evening, discussed many interesting things, bowled our usual pathetic games while ogling the teenage beauty-school dropouts playing in the next lane over (well, Jack and I did the ogling; Anne and Nat made fun of us for being dirty old men), and generally had a good time. Then it was time to go home…

spacer

Fun Stuff from Lileks

For those who care — and there probably aren’t too many of you — the post about my All-Time Favorite Movies is still forthcoming. To keep you amused in the meantime, however, let me direct your attention to Stagworld, the latest irreverent (or is that irrelevant?) section of James Lileks’ very funny Institute of Official Cheer web site.

A little background information: James Lileks is a collector of ephemera,which consists of old paper items like postcards, matchbooks, magazines and cookbooks. On the Institute site, he shares with us the more dated and bizarre stuff in his collection, supplemented with his own amusing commentary and captions. This exercise sounds kind of pointless, and I suppose it is — making fun of stuff produced by the naive America of fifty years ago is sometimes like shooting fish in the cliche’d barrel — but James has a sharp wit and these pages always make me laugh out loud. Sometimes they’re even educational, giving us a glimpse of a long forgotten pop culture that existed before the rise of Cable TV.

If you go exploring around James’ site, be warned that his blog can sometimes get a little shrill, depending on your politics. Hope you enjoy yourselves.

spacer

Movie Review: The Cooler

The sharp-eyed reader of Simple Tricks will no doubt notice that today’s entry isn’t what I promised was coming. What can I say? I’m easily distracted…

Have no fear. That discussion of my all-time favorite films is still on the way, hopefully by the end of the week. For today, however, I’d like to offer up my thoughts on The Cooler, an independent film currently running at Salt Lake’s Broadway Theater.

spacer

Congratulations Again

It’s a busy season for the OB/GYNs out there. Only a few days after Jack’s big news, another round of kudos is in order for my friend Mike “Cheno” Chenoweth and his lovely wife Kim. They welcomed their second child into the arena this afternoon. It’s a boy this time. Good job, guys.

“And you never even call me Godfather…”

spacer

Please Allow Me to Introduce Myself

I’ve been thinking that since this site does not have an “About Me” page, I probably ought to offer up a some kind of profile of myself. Although I’m 98% certain that the only folks who are reading this blog already know me, I am out there on that InterWeb-thingie now, so you never can tell. Besides, my friends (and you know who you are) might not know some of this stuff. So, without further ado, I offer up the following list of autobiographical tidbits:

spacer

Congratulations

A quick pat on the back to my Webmaster, friend, occasional bowling partner and fellow Kurosawa fan Jack Hattaway, who has just announced his impending fatherhood. For details and fuzzy black-and-white images purported to be the tyke-to-be, check out Jack’s own site.

spacer

Going Public

Hello, everyone, and welcome to my personal corner of the World Wide Web! There isn’t much to my little fiefdom at the moment, only this blog and a photo gallery which can be found here. (FYI, there is a permanent link to the photos at the bottom of this page, as well as links to some other sites that I frequent.) In the future, I hope to add many more photos, my resume’, and some samples of my writing work. For now, however, the emphasis will be on the blog.

So, you may be asking, what is this blog going to be about? Well, my plans for this space are still a little vague, but generally speaking, Simple Tricks is going to be an extension of my off-line journal.

spacer