Wow what a week(end) this has been!  I took in some good movies, found a new bowling technique at the Rock ‘N’ Bowl, went to Morganton, NC and visited the renovated Frankie’s Fun Park!

Monday after work I went to Blockbuster to trade in a couple of my online flicks and picked up Passengers on DVD and Taken on Blu-ray.  I started with Passengers with Anne Hathaway which wasn’t nearly as suspenseful as the trailer leads you to believe.  The film is really slow paced with a decent payoff, but not enough to justify being dragged through most of the movie.  However, the ending did help make up for the rest of the film though it was an ending that was fairly predictable.

Passengers  \m/  \m/  \m/

Later in the week I watched Taken with Liam Neeson as a former spy whose daughter is kidnapped in Paris by an underground prostitution ring.  The film was quite impressive with Neeson’s character showing some even more impressive skills in the hunt for his daughter and her abductors.

Taken  \m/  \m/  \m/  \m/

Friday night was the night of my personal favorite event in Test Fest, our annual celebration of manhood, the Rock ‘N’ Bowl.  When Rebecca and I got there, we were placed in the first two lanes which we had to ourselves so we took advantage of it and bowled to our hearts’ content!  We started playing off of some of the P1’s in the neighboring lanes and P1 Boss T and I started randomly coming up with ridiculous bowling techniques including the reverse Granny or as I call it the ‘Goose egg’ because you look like you’re laying an egg and you tend to come out with no pins taken down.  Then, as a joke, I grabbed a bowling bowl with both hands, held it up in front of my face just below eye level so I could aim the ball then thrust the ball forward with rather satisfying results.  Needless to say, I began using this technique since it seemed to be working for me and ended up setting a new personal record for myself with a score of 116 and later tied it!  I grabbed a video camera and had Rebecca film me using this grand technique so hopefully I’ll have it posted here soon!

I had to pack in right after bowling because I had to be in Morganton, NC by 11 the next morning for a remote at Carolina West Wireless.  Being we don’t get to Morganton very often, I had Sarah Berger throw in some extra Planet shirts because I knew the eager NC P1’s would be out in force - and they were!  It was great meeting some P1’s I normally wouldn’t get to run into around town so I was thankful for the trip!

When I got home, I ran to Best Buy and bought seasons 6 and 7 of Tales From the Crypt since they were on sale for $17.99 each!  Now I’m only missing season 5!  I went home and chilled in front of the tv since I needed the rest and didn’t sleep well the night before.  Which is odd, because if I didn’t have to get up early, I would have been out like a light!  Weird!  I also watched Underworld: Rise of the Lycans since I had picked that one up at Blockbuster when I returned the others.  This film serves as the prequel to the Underworld series with some of the original cast reprising their roles to tell the backstory of their characters.  Personally, I wasn’t blown away by the other Underworld films but I really liked this one.  Makes me want to go back and revisit the rest of the series with a renewed perspective!

Underworld: Rise of the Lycans  \m/  \m/  \m/  \n

Sunday I slept in getting some much needed rest and then went to Frankie’s Fun Park with Rebecca for the first time since they renovated the place.  We played various video games before going out for a round of miniature golf and laser tag.  I kicked her ass at miniature golf but got my ass handed to me in laser tag!  I’ve ALWAYS sucked at that!

Memorial Day I took in a double feature down at Hollywood 20 and saw Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian and Angels & Demons.  The sequel to Night at the Museum was true to the first film, but seemed to lack the charm and wonder of the first installment.  Don’t get me wrong, it was still a fun and immensely enjoyable film.

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian  \m/  \m/  \m/  \n

There was only about a twenty to thirty minute lay over before Angels & Demons started so I went and got some popcorn while waiting.  The sequel, which was actually written BEFORE The DaVinci Code and serves as a prequel in the novels, was many times a better film than The DaVinci Code.  The film seemed more sinister with the threat of a very old vengeful secret society known as the “Illuminati” attacking the Roman Catholic Church.  Plus the battle of religion vs. science actually showed much more reverence for the Catholic church than the other film thus stirring less controversy.

Angels & Demons  \m/  \m/  \m/  \m/

Okay, Super Bowl XLIII was a big disappointment, but I’ll get to that in a minute.  Friday night, Rebecca and I kicked off the weekend by going out to our first movie in 2009 as we went to go see My Bloody Valentine 3-D, a remake of the 80s slasher film - a genre that’s a guilty pleasure of mine since most of my queue on my Blockbuster online account are various horror flicks from the 80s!  The updated version was just what I was expecting: a lot of gore and a great sex scene that turns into a murder scene with the killer chasing a hot chick who’s completely naked for like ten minutes!  That’s right kids, no reason to press the ‘pause’ button when this one hits video stores!  And maybe they’ll be able to translate the 3-D effect on Blu-ray and DVD as an added bonus!

My Bloody Valentine 3-D  \m/  \m/  \m/

My main complaint about the experience wasn’t the movie itself, but rather the steep price to view it in 3-D!  Normally a movie ticket runs $9.50, but a ticket for this film is $12!  I didn’t realize this until after the movie because Rebecca and I were nearly late and the line was fairly long so I gave her my debit and Regal Crown Club cards to buy the tickets while I went in and got in line for concessions.  An extra $2.50 a pop for a 3-D movie?!  Damn!

Saturday after we both took care of a few work-related activities and looked at a few houses for Becca, we went to Blockbuster to trade in yet another one of my online movies.  We decided upon the latest Coen brothers’ flick Burn After Reading starring George Clooney, Brad Pitt and John Malkovich.  It was another film of train wreck situations that unnecessarily turn tragic in an absurd and unbelievable manner.  If you enjoy the Coen brothers’ films, you won’t be disappointed!

Burn After Reading  \m/  \m/  \m/  \n

After we finished that film, we watched one of Becca’s Netflix movies, Death Race starring Jason Statham which is a remake of the 1975 film Death Race 2000 which starred David Carradine and Sylvester Stallone.  I enjoyed the film despite the fact I am not a big fan of Statham - I mean THREE Transporter films and now they’re releasing a sequel to Crank?!  WTF!!!  But the movie was a fun yarn of carnage and destruction as such a film should be!

Death Race  \m/  \m/  \m/

Last night Becca and I went over to my mom’s new place where she lives with her boyfriend Mark to watch Super Bowl XLIII since neither one of us have cable at the moment - her’s is down and the cable guy won’t show up until Wednesday!  I brought my box of crackers and roll of summer sausage and then we picked up some cheese, con queso dip and tortilla chips.  Mom was fixing barbeque chicken, broccoli and rice and baked beans with brownies for dessert!  Yeah, I ate good!

As usual, the big game was littered with the best advertising companies have to offer during the commercial breaks.  The highlights for me were the theatrical trailers for G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,  Star Trek and Up as well as a few clever bits from Catrol, E-Trade and a handful of others.  The 3-D portion after the 2nd quarter was alright with the trailer for Monsters vs. Aliens, the SoBe commercial and the clip from tonight’s episode of Chuck which Becca and I will be watching on the big ass TV in the downstairs conference room - no cable, remember?!

The game itself was total crap with the Cardinals getting penalized every other play.  I’m not a Cards fan, but I tend to pull for the underdog when I have no interest in either team playing.  I just thought they played awful for the most part aside from a handful of really brilliant plays.  And the fact that they came back to lead from a 13 point deficit in the 4th quarter only to allow the Steelers to turn right around and score another touchdown just made me nauseous!  The game was a nailbiter and overall, was actually a good game, but I’m just jaded because Pittsburgh has already won two Super Bowls this decade!

When I went to pick Becca up to go to the store before going to my mom’s, I saw a new dog in her yard.  Yep, she had rescued yet another mutt!  This one’s name is Cassie and she is a Boston terrier/feist mix which means she is a scrawny dog with a Boston terrier face that looks more like the face of a chihuahua.  Seeing as she was better behaved than my Boston terrier mix Molly, I decided to take Cassie home and give her a try.  Maybe she will be more of an apartment dog than Molly although I don’t want to give her up.  However, Molly is happy staying with Becca for now with her other dogs to play with.  Hopefully I will go home and not have damaged goods and no pee or poo on my bed!  LOL!

Well we now have our new 44th president of the United States, Barack Obama.  I enjoyed the inauguration with my highlights being the piece of music composed by John Williams (I was half expecting them to break out the Star Wars theme in the middle of it!), Obama’s speech which was more like a State of the Union address which I found appropriate considering the state of the Union and, of course, the reverend’s speech which was ‘colorful’ in its hopes for racial unity (”…when yellow will be mellow…” - CLASSIC!).

And don’t forget the NFL Conference Championship games took place last weekend with Arizona taking down Philly for the NFC Championship and Pittsburgh defeating Baltimore to take the AFC Championship.  So now the two will face-off at Super Bowl XLIII on February 1st and I know a few Steelers fans who couldn’t be happier!

Last Friday Rebecca and I went out to Ground Zero to support a few of our homegrown bands.  First OF GOOD AND EVIL took the stage with a guest vocalist helping out here and there since their vocalist was having problems with his voice - it is the season for that!  WHISKEY MOUNTAIN MACHINE was next with their brand of Southern flavored metal followed by PANACEA.  Becca and I had to leave early during their set because she had some rather early appointments the next morning which I regretted because PANACEA was unbelievably tight with a rather large full sound from a band with only one guitarist.

The next day I slept in but ended up running around town with Rebecca the better part of the day so we spent Saturday night in relaxing and catching a few DVDs.  Between Saturday, Sunday and Monday we took in several decent flicks.  First off, we watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall a couple of weeks back so I figured I’d start with that one.  This is one I will definitely buy once it goes on sale for like ten bucks (or fifteen since Blu-rays are still a bit pricey) because it was hilarious once you get past the full frontal exposure of the main character - and I don’t mean Sarah Marshall who is played by the smokin’ hot Kristen Bell!

Forgetting Sarah Marshall  \m/  \m/  \m/  \m/

On Monday, I traded in a few of my Blockbuster Total Access flicks for some in-store new releases and I bought Wanted on Blu-ray.  One of the movies I picked up was Hellboy II: The Golden Army since Rebecca had just seen the first one on TV.  The second film was somewhat better than the first but I wasn’t a big fan of the first film although I think Hellboy is a great character with his sarcasm and insubordinate nature.

Hellboy II: The Golden Army  \m/  \m/  \m/  \

And I can’t say enough good things about Wanted!  When it was in the theaters I had little interest in seeing it because I am not big on assassin action flicks.  However everybody kept telling me how great the film was so I eventually caved and went and saw it in the theater.  I was FLOORED!  I had been waiting to see if I’d get a Blu-ray player before buying it on DVD, so now that I have a PS3, I picked it up on Blu-ray.  Simply amazing!  If you don’t like it then YOU SUCK!!!  LOL!!!

Wanted  \m/  \m/  \m/  \m/  \m

I also rented Pineapple Express on DVD but haven’t had time to watch it yet but be looking out for a review of that one too!

After getting off the air Friday, Rebecca and I headed down to Columbia to celebrate her best friend Suzanne’s 26th birthday.  We stopped at a seafood joint in Clinton which was probably a bad idea for reasons I will leave to your imagination!  We got to Suzanne and her husband Jay’s apartment somewhere between 9:30 and 10 (we had to pack a little before leaving) and we went to a place called the Martini Bar which, as it sounds, is not my kind of place, but I met some interesting people and enjoyed watching the girls get plastered.

We got home late and had to get up a bit early but Becca and I managed to squeeze in about five hours of sleep and got up and got ready to go to the Carolina/Arkansas game at Williams-Bryce Stadium (and, yes, I washed the straightener out of my hair!).  Our seats were great as was the game as the Cocks defeated the Hogs 34-21!

As we were leaving the game, I called my old friend and former bandmate Moon and met him and his girlfriend Renee at the Columbiana Mall for a few minutes.  It was great to see him again except for the fact that he was looking as slim and fit as he was when I met him 10 years ago and I was looking all pudgy and soggy in the middle!  Damn I need to get my chunky butt in the gym!

Rebecca and I then went out to dinner with Suzanne and Jay and a bunch of their friends and coworkers at a nice Japanese restaurant to have a group celebration for Suzanne’s birthday.  Afterwards, Becca and I headed home as we both had things to do on Sunday.

Earlier in the week, Rebecca had bought me a nice new queen-sized mattress and box springs to replace my worn-out full-sized mattress and box springs since she stays at my apartment most weekends although I’m still reimbursing her for at least half of it.  She was also donating me her old bed frame to replace my older, rickety and squeaky ass bed frame.  As we left Columbia, we stopped by Wal-Mart and picked up a new ‘bed-in-a-bag’ so we wouldn’t have to stop by her house in the middle of the night to get both the bed frame and her old sheets.  We got to my apartment and dismantled my old bed and just threw down the mattress and box springs, quickly dressed the mattress and crashed.

We slept in, grabbed some lunch at Monterrey’s and went our separate ways to take care of what we needed to.  I met her at her house later that evening, loaded the bed frame in my car and took it back to my apartment.  She brought my dog Molly back with her as we had left her at her house with her brother and their six dogs.  After putting the bed together, I had to give Molly a bath since Rebecca’s dogs love to dig up her yard and Molly was a mudball of fine South Carolina red clay!  And flea-ridden to boot!

We then chilled on the couch as I made us my specialty of fried egg sandwiches and baked us some cookies using the triple chocolate cookie dough I bought off our webmistress Tracy.  Becca passed out rather early on and I had to wake her around midnight and made sure she was conscious enough to drive home and not fall asleep at the wheel!  I went to bed and enjoyed hogging my huge new bed!