personal

Wow, where the hell have I been?! It’s two days shy of a month since I last posted, which is an eternity online. As is probably obvious, I’ve been really busy with work and all the other interesting things that life can throw at you.

If you can see this post, that means that your ISP has updated its DNS cache and you are now viewing the Ministry of Intrigue at its new home! Everything should work for you now, but in the off chance you left me a non-spammy comment inbetween the previous post and now there is a chance that it didn’t quite survive the move.

Just so you all know, it is extremely difficult to eat a cinnamon roll and look professional at the same time. You either pick it apart and end up with frosting all over your fingers, or you attempt to bite the roll whole leaving you looking like some sort of manchild with a face smeared with sugary paste.

I apologize for the delay between posts, but I’ve been a little busy the last couple days. However, I do have a few things in the works and hopefully I’ll be able to post quite a bit tomorrow, including my review of V for Vendetta.

I haven’t posted in a few days, in part because I’ve been pretty busy, and partly because I’ve been overhauling my system with a brand new Linux distribution. I’m now running Gentoo and I absolutely love it.

Last night I was monkeying around on my computer while enjoying the David Cross comedy album Shut Up, You Fucking Baby!, and I noticed a dark shape out of the corner of my eye.

Many years ago, back when I was in high school, my three closest friends and I were called in to wage war against an opponent roughly 0.5% our size. You see, Quentin’s family had a bat that had snuck into their guest room and was trying to set up a life for itself in the shadows above the canopy bed.

Okay, you’ve heard me telling the Courtesy story, which admitedly was pitch-shifted. If you want to hear me being relatively serious (well, with a few exceptions) you can check out my guest appearance via Skype on the most recent release of the Creepy Sleepy Show Podcast (show 38).

To my ten readers (I may have counted a few of you twice to make myself feel cooler :) ) : Sorry about the general lack of posting lately. I have been super busy getting CreepySleepy.

So my friend Dan of the Creepy Sleepy Show Podcast took a moment over the Christmas holiday to record me telling the Courtesy story along with Greg (who was involved) and Zach, who hid in the break room during the incident.

The Dresden Dolls are going to be doing a show in Madison!!!! It looks like the Dolls will be here Oct. 17th at the Barrymore Theatre, which promises to rock my socks off.

Wow, I’ve been slacking with this blog the last few days, but with good reason. I had a very busy weekend and now I am ill. This weekend I had my normal crazy work schedule, although the multiple viewings of Serenity did mess up my sleep schedule a bit.

For those of you sci-fi fans who may have been living in a cave, the movie Serenity comes out this Friday. As I am sure you know, this film is based off of the wonderful, if short-lived television series Firefly.

I hate the telephone with an unreasoning yet unstoppable passion. It’s something my father and I share, so I probably learned it from him. The sound of a phone ringing, even if it is a cutesy cell phone ringtone, is like fingernails on chalkboard to my ears.

Well, I went to the 6:00am class of Aikido yesterday. I wanted to make sure I got that practice session in otherwise I would have to wait three days to get back on the mat, although in retrospect it may not have been so wise to go when I was still so sore from the day before.

I was leaving a parking garage late last night, and as I waited for the cashier to get me my change he surprised me by asking if I was interested in selling my car.

I finally went back to Aikido today. I went and joined the local dojo and attended my first class there, and I am so glad I did. While my body has forgotten a lot of what it once knew, I felt a joy in the practice and exertion.

I am amused. The Isthmus Daily Page, which is the digital version of one of Madison’s free weekly newpapers cited my entry where I wrote about my short trip to the Taste of Madison.

Okay, I have an embarrassing confession to make. I actually own a copy of The Craft. Yes, that teen movie about the four witches. You must understand that it has sentimental value because my friend Dan and I saw that movie (in the theater no less) quite a few times in high school when we were going through our “dark” period.

Once, many years ago I made potato gnocchi, because I desired their deliciousness. And they were yummy, but I swore to myself that I would never make them again. Why? Because unless you plan to spread your meal preparation over two days, it takes several hours to produce the meal, and it is really a lot of work during the entire process.