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X Files

I’ve been in the mood to watch X Files lately. I found some moldy tapes in the video closet and watched both Tooms episodes (season 1) a couple of weeks ago (still creepy). This week I rented an Episode 3 disc from netflix because I wanted to see “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose,” the one with Peter Boyle, which was just as good as I remembered. The whole disc was classic. Remember the first three seasons when XFiles was unbeatable TV?

The first two episodes on the disc were season openers which completed a 3 episode story that had aliens in train cars and Indians and stolen files and Krycek. I convinced Bob to watch the fourth episode, D.P.O., last night. Giovanni Ribisi and Jack Black are in it — GR plays this nutty guy who fries people with lightning while loud rock music blasts. JB gets fried in a shower of quarters. Awesome.

From the San Francisco Chronicle — finally, someone’s said it: Too Much Positive Reinforcement

“… Like everyone from Paris Hilton, whose attorneys confidently announced in the middle of her sex-tape fiasco that “Hilton is a model and actress (and) is at the beginning of what she had hoped would be a long and prosperous career,” to President Bush, who wears his below-average credentials like a badge of honor, Rea was suffering from what one might call Too Much Positive Reinforcement: the belief, against all available evidence, that one is meant for special things.

“TMPR has now reached epidemic proportions. How else to explain the legions of the talent-free who wait in line for days for a chance to show their stuff [on American Idol] — then are stunned to be told they don’t make the grade? After decades of upper-middle-class parenting designed to shield Junior from all possible failure, and from any honest judgment of his talents, it’s no wonder we need television shows like “American Idol” and its fellow showcase for TMPR victims, “The Apprentice.” These shows are delivering the spanking — sorry, the time-out — that our culture of bloated self- evaluation is subconsciously craving. Their success signals that we may be reaching the end of a long national delusion. There is simply not room enough at the top these days for everyone raised to believe they belong there — and, deep down, we all know it. …”

Here’s another computer thing. Now that I’m ancient and have no idea what the kids are up to these days, I didn’t know what song was OutKast Hey Ya! Didn’t it win song of the year or something? So I went to cdnow to listen to a clip but cdnow is now amazon (grrr) but I wasn’t buying, just listening to a clip and then I get there but I don’t have RealPlayer so I go to download it and do I understand correctly that there is no free Realplayer for OS X? So I said screw that, I’m not paying for software just to hear a clip. Bob told me that I could get the windoze media player for OS X which makes zero sense but I checked it out and it was true so I downloaded that and then I went back and found the clip and then I played it. What a hassle. I’m vaguely familiar with the song but it sounds like a commercial for gum or a car and not like something that I would put on the stereo on purpose.

Something unexpected happened which is: I’ve become a browser slut. I’ve pretty much always used Netscape although I sometimes used Exploder on the iMac for reasons I can’t remember. But the eMac booted up this thing called safari which I fell in love with after about 3 minutes. It’s superfast and easy to use and pretty much my only problem with it is that all my bookmarks are floating around somewhere other than in the bookmarks area. I need to find a URL manager. Meanwhile, liking safari made me start thinking about browsers and I found this article about browsers and later I heard about Firefox on a weblog and downloaded that at the office and then downloaded Camino back at home. So now sometimes I have 2 or 3 browsers going at once and bookmarks all over the place. I like safari a lot but this sidebar bookmark thing in Camino is brilliant.

I’m back in the writing project again and did some research yesterday. I can’t believe the sort of stuff I find when I’m not looking like Heartless Bitches International. They even have merchandise.

We had a successful eating weekend. We created fish soup from several recipes choosing what sounded good and what we had on hand. We put a bag of seafood medley from Trader Joes plus another pound of whitefish and a dozen leftover shrimp. Tasty treat. I also made chicken soup from the roast chicken. Now we have too much food.

Still trying to get this new system organized. Efficiency eludes me. I have a complaint about OS X which is it has that annoying windoze quality of making me confirm every stupid thing I want to do. I hit a keyboard command to bookmark a webpage and then I have to click again that yes, I do want to add as a bookmark. It asks me if I’m sure I want to shut down. All the double whammy not necessary.

Also CBS apologized for the OutKast Indian number. Quote: “CBS television on Friday apologized for any offense taken at the American Indian-motif Grammy Awards performance by the hip-hop group OutKast that some Native Americans have condemned as racist.” … ” ‘We are very sorry if anyone was offended,’ CBS spokeswoman Nancy Carr said when asked about the NACC boycott. She declined to comment further.” How perfunctory is that?

I made a fun dinner for Valentines: Cook’s Illustrated Rosemary-Garlic Roast Chicken with roasted vegetables. The recipe said potatoes but I also threw carrots and onion in plus a turnip and a few pieces of daikon radish — just to see what it would do. It was all yummy. I made an Expresso Brownie cake from Sunset for dessert. (Both websites want you to be a member or sign in or something.) We invited Priscilla over and had some cheesy pink champagne — we had a great time and I have a sugar hangover this morning.

Here’s a map of all the states I’ve visited. Only 15. It was kind of hard to remember where I’ve actually been and places I’ve wanted to go. Also I didn’t count airport layovers otherwise I could have added Utah, Texas, Minnesota, Illinois, Michigan, Georgia and Maine.

create your own visited states map

or write about it on the open travel guide