Instead of doing anything I was supposed to tonight, I watched movies. After this week, I deserved a night off.

( The Producers, 2005 version )

( The Bourne Identity )

I have seen WALL-E and now I am going to bed. Since wiki can tell me what I skipped last year, I can start putting DVDs on hold at the library first thing tomorrow.

I saw the new ST reboot! I went with both roommates and one of M's girl-friends and WSFA!S. (She needs a cooler nickname for the purposes of internet chatter.) Because we were poorly organized, we got to the theater ten minutes before the movie started. We found three seats together in the front, and WSFA!S and I made about half of a row shuffle their legs so that we could sit dead center, and it was awesome, because we could giggle together like giddy fools. Roommate M. thinks Kirk (as played by Chris Pine) is totally and unironically hot, her friend says and H. said she liked Spock, and I looked at them like they were from another planet, because I have a type: smart, and self-aware, or at least funnily un-aware of how they present themselves. ST buried its self-aware in sets, costumes, and loving recreation of '60s schmaltz with '00s movie aesthetics, and didn't put any of it into the characters, except maybe for Leonard Nimoy's Spock.

It's worth noting that I think I last went to the movies sometime last summer, which should tell you how I value Hollywood movies. If it doesn't have epic huge explosions (which can be seen at matinee prices), I'm waiting for Redbox to get the DVD. But watching ST while hyped up on Raisinettes? Priceless.

( That's about all I can say without spoilers. )

WSFA!S and I stayed to watch the credits, lost our other three, and eventually summoned them back through the powers of the cell phone. We eventually lost S to the hour, got dessert and sat around for another hour, and I got home after midnight, hyped on sugar, and wrote two-thirds of this until two in the morning.

Oh - trailers! Sometimes the best part of the moviegoing experience. I leaned over to S and we giggled our way through Transformers 2, G. I. Joe, and 9 spots. (I could not figure out what franchise the G. I. Joe movie was from until the reveal rolled.) These are mostly not movies I will be rushing to see. But the new ST movie totally gets my vote for Popcorn Summer Flick 2009.

The obvious answer to rain and roommates and eight to five Fridays with curve balls at three is dinner and The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. At some point, I may even work up the willpower to do laundry.

I've been pretty happy with CDex in the past, but it's the 21st century and you never know when your favorite freeware program will go away. I recently tried Exact Audio Copy because it's the 21st century and I should branch out, and the five or six classical CDs I ripped with it sound skin-crawlingly lossy. (Also, it absolutely refused to work on the laptop, so major, major thumbs-down.) So I'm installing CDex on the desktop, beating the ports with a permission stick, re-ripping those CDs, and telling everyone: don't mess with success.

This message brought to you by me messing with two PCs and the library copy of 2001: A Space Odyssey. I have been alternately underwhelmed and baffled by the first 20 minutes, so I'm wondering if what I'm seeing on the screen is what Kubrick meant to put there. At all. Fortunately, I read the book first, so I know the plot. Which is moving at a glacial pace. (Not melting ones.)

...oh, for a side of datedness: the "jet liner of THE FUTURE" has one person taking the Earth-to-LEO flight. Remember, kids: 1968 predated the first oil/fuel crisis.

ETA Also, remember: no matter how awesome your effects budget us, in 30 years false-color Earthscapes will be super-passe.

ETA #2 Oh Em Gee GIANT STARBABY OF DUBIOUS INTENTIONS. That is a sight I could've done without.

Conclusion: Kubrick, whatever you were trying, I'm parsing this through the filter of having read the book first.

Last week was trying and unsettled without breaking into a crisis at any point, so I am glad my weekend's greatest irritants were a misread movie schedule and my wholly elective act of watching Into the Wild on DVD. Today was wacky bus shenanigans day, which was a timely reminder to be infinitely grateful for friends and roommates with cars. I am also very glad I keep an umbrella at work.

( Notes toward an understanding of Into the Wild. )

Other weekend highlights: hitting the tiny Bethesda farmer's market and Montgomery Market Farm Woman's Co-Op on Saturday; hitting the Bethesda library on the same trip; inheriting two gigs of memory for Moya from ashcomp's dead desktop (double the RAM, double the fun!); seeing Prince Caspian with LS from WSFA on Sunday. Nailed one of the closing songs as a Regina Spektor number and nearly combusted from shocking spontaneous pop culture recognition. Asking LS to haul me to Micro Center and geeking out over the tons of computer parts; getting a cheap bluetooth adapter (instead of the wireless adapter or bluetooth headset I should have been shopping for). Installing said bluetooth and making my computer talk to my phone, oohhh. Geekout! Also now I can get 1.3 mpix pictures off my incredibly lame cell phone camera. Next up: linux fun and games, European semi-finals, GRE studying, and life in general.

BTW, I will be in Boston from July 3rd to the 6th. If people want to do something while I'm there, drop a line. If people have suggestions for things I should do, hit me: all I've got are three guide books I haven't even peeked at since pulling them off the library shelves and a freewheeling schedule.

Am contemplating skipping WSFA because I am not doing the Beltway at night, and I am really not doing an hour of overland routes, not when I'm this wiped out. Anyone up for a metro pickup?

Have rediscovered Redbox. Will probably spend this weekend watching $1 DVDs on the baby laptop while unpacking. I've only got pretty much the entire Hollywood backlog to catch up on. I Am Legend was okay; the ending irritated me, but Will Smith can be the last man in NYC any time for me. Juno was cute, but the main character was a little too level-headed. Definitely more of a deliberate fiction for charm than fiction aping life for truth.

How is it almost midnight? Dear body, if you don't start letting me get more sleep I will go crazy. Crazier.

Here is what I've learned about boxes:

Grocery stores have them sometimes.
Liquor stores are slightly more likely to.
Asking the people who deal with work deliveries to save their boxes: priceless.

I put boxes in the back seat, in the front seat, and in a burst of inspiration, in the trunk of the car yesterday. Tomorrow they all go home with me to be filled up. After those get filled up, I'm making more box runs.

Tonight I saw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, which was exactly the right mindless, retro action movie for the end of my week.

Converter: highlight text and right-click to convert units.
Leechblock: blocks your favorite time-wasting websites for time periods of your choice.
Nuke Anything Enhanced: save your ink - stop printing ads!
Research Word: highlight an unfamiliar term and right-click to query Wikipedia or other sites.
Zotero: magic research bookmarking / collation tool. Still trying to figure out how this one works.

Bonus: IE Tab: switch the tab of your choice from Firefox to Internet Explorer. Perfect for those backwards sites only compliant with IE.

I want to say somethng about when private or intended semi-private throughts become public speech (see also Jo Walton does not respond to a review and mamadeb misses the start of Yuletide signups*) but it comes down to me gossiping about which authors' public faces I like more.

*Nota Bene I am not inviting people to re-open associated political or/and religious discussions. I am commenting on the phenomenon of semiprivate LJs going semipublic, or being invaded by the masses. Anyone who wishes to discuss fascism, Jewish holidays and American culture, or topics related is welcome to do so in their LJ.

Final thought: if you put cop buddy flicks, horror movies, and action films into a blender, then set the blender on "comedy", Hot Fuzz is what you'd get out.