Yesterday I watched Boogie Nights, which I picked up at HMV the other day. I'm officially addicted to purchasing movies. My new rationale is: if I wanted to see this movie again I'd have to pay a few bucks anyway, so why not just buy it for ten and have it at my disposal for the rest of my life? Surely DVD will still be the standard accepted format fifty years from now.

Andrea came over and we watched a bit of A Hard Day's Night before crashing. Today I'm meeting Matt downtown and we're going MIDI keyboard shopping.

Yesterday I finally fulfilled my own prophecy and tried a Fudge Brownie Temptation at Dairy Queen - aka that sundae they serve in the waffle bowl. It was damned tasty if a little pricey (five bucks). I also tried on a shirt at Old Navy for the first time in my life. It was too bright. Shopping at that store makes me nervous for some reason, as if I don't think I'm DOING it right. And I look at the posters of the male models and think that the clothes are way too prep for me. I stare at the piles of shirts and think that if I bought one I'd inevitably run into some dude with the same shirt. At least thrifting removes the likelihood of that possibility. I should really have people to buy my clothes for me. One step at a time.

Andrea and I went to see The Counterfeiters at the Bytowne yesterday afternoon, an Austrian WWII concentration camp film about Jews who were forced to recreate millions in pounds and dollars. It was an effective portrayal with gritty cinematography. There was a great scene in which a prisoner weeps when he sees that the Germans have a printing press in the camp, and one of the men says that it reminds him of their humanity.

I searched for reviews of the film online. Not to go off on a tangent here, but I will. Roger Ebert is my favorite film columnist. He's just a great writer who always brings out aspects to movies I hadn't considered. I admire the man's ability to watch a film in a way I can't, and I respect his opinion even when I don't agree with him. Ebert has been ill lately and his online review output has been supplemented by site creator Jim Emerson, who, well, sucks. Here's an example pulled from his review of The Counterfeiters, which he gave, in Ebert-terms, thumbs down: The trouble is that the storytelling and filmmaking are routine (surely faux-documentary handheld camerawork is the most overused cliche in modern movies), even when the human drama is not.

Surely it is. SURELY. When Ebert reviews a movie, he doesn't make these grand, sweeping condemnations about technique - he might state that the technique is overused, but he'll always present an argument for why a technique benefits the story being told, or why it doesn't. Emerson just leaves it at the statement, and that's why he sucks, and that's why I hope Ebert lives forever and keeps his reviews going in place of this idiot. Rant done.

I'm finished work for the week. TGIF and all that. Despite the hours I don't mind the job at all and feel as though I'm picking up new knowledge everyday about both the proofreading process and the government. Some scandalous shit goes down in politics. The Senate has lately been talking about the Bernier/Couillard issue, which is basically this: former Minister of Foreign Affairs Maxime Bernier resigned his position after it was discovered that he left confidential papers at the home of his girlfriend Julie Couillard - who used to date members of Quebec-chapter Hells Angels. I had no idea Canadian politics could be so juicy.

I found out that technically I'm scheduled to work Wednesday-Friday, not Tuesday-Thursday, which means I'm working tomorrow morning. I think I'll still go to the In/Words open mic tonight for a bit since it's been so long. Not that I have much of anything to read.

I have my own work email and phone number (if anyone is up at 2-6 AM and needs to reach me). Last night I was told to not surf for porn at work because they can tell. Good tip. It makes me wonder what else they're looking at. I should ask my friends with government jobs what they can get away with on their computers.

I'm seeing a movie with Andrea today at the Bytowne. Next week I'm going to start seriously looking for an apartment in the Centretown area.

I installed Reason onto my iMac yesterday evening and tooled around with it for a bit. I tried getting a couple of hours shut-eye before work, but I was too excited, as though Santa Claus were coming instead of 25 pages of political speak. I will say it's kind of terrific to have Late Night with Conan O'Brien as your morning show.

The job: I sit at a desk and read. Occasionally I get high and mighty about what I'm reading and demand commas, colons, semi-colons, quotation marks, apostrophes, and capitalization. The lady to whom I hand off the corrections has pink hair. My work has to be done by 5:30 AM-ish to meet the publication deadline. When I leave the office, the sun is coming out, hardly anyone is wandering the streets, and it's very pretty.

I arrived home at around 6:30 and slept until noon, proving once again that my internal clock is outfitted with a 12:00 PM alarm. I just got back from grocery shopping. Reese Puffs were on sale for $1.50 a box. This could be the greatest day of my life.

Yesterday I sent off advance requests to three U of T profs for letters of reference and have so far received two positive replies. It does the heart good.

Last night Andrea and I had dinner with Mike and Emily at Temptation Tea Shop followed by beers at Atomic Rooster on Bank Street. It started pouring rain but the weather cleared relatively by the time we headed home. I crashed at Andrea's and the two of us went to see a matinee of the new Indiana Jones movie this afternoon. I liked the flick for the most part and blame the apparent onset of George Lucas' senility for the parts I didn't like.

My copy of Reason has finished downloading, so I'll be playing around with it tonight before I take a nap in advance of my first shift with Senate Publications. First I need to pick up a package at the drug store. I hope it's not another religious text from my father (bless his heart).

I woke up on Steve's couch yesterday morning. The couch was made of that material that appears lighter or darker depending on which way the fabric is pushed, so I played with it for awhile until Steve got up. The three of us had lunch at Local Heroes and talked (mostly about music) before Steve drove me back into town.

Matt gave me a quick overview of the Reason program and his MIDI keyboard while we were hanging around in Steve's basement. I'm downloading a copy of the software right now. He was able to toss together something halfway cool in minutes that Steve played over on guitar and it's exactly the type of thing I want to mess around with. I'm really excited about it. He also showed me some video of different hardware that bands use to create sounds. I know so little about electronic music but it's interested me for a few years now and I'd really like to turn it into a hobby.

I went out to the Rideau Centre and picked up the new Green Day record (under the name Foxtrot Hot Tubs) as well as a few DVD's. When I got back I spent the evening in watching Wayne's World and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. I was able to get a little writing in before bed.

Last night's jam with Matt and Steve went to show how out of shape I am as a musician. My callouses are coming back and my right forearm is chafed from playing. We played for about 4 and a half hours before I crashed on Steve's couch. We recorded a bit, just some jam material and takes of a couple of songs including an old one called "Helen" from the Black Hill archives. I took lead vocals on it and shot my throat to pieces. The stuff doesn't sound that great off the floor but there might be some stuff in there worth fooling around with. All in all it was just nice to play again.

I watched too much TV yesterday. I'm not used to watching hours of it at a time and I get headaches around the 8th straight episode of Seinfeld. Hopefully I'll be able to keep myself busy with other things in the weeks to come, if for no other cause then for the benefit of my brain.