Thank you, Imminent Ned. I made the above image the other morning after seeing something similar on r/NewOrleans.

Yes, Mardi Gras approaches (Holy Crap, Krewe du Vieux is Saturday!), and I’ve been immersing myself in Game of Thrones and work. And mead.

I’ve almost finished book five of GoT, and I’ll never finish the mead – there’s just not enough in the world for me.

That’s all for now. Back soon, I promise.

This week, I “manned up” and made things square. I was tired of not knowing when I’d finally get tracked down and the book thrown at me, so I decided to square things up.

I paid my $1 fine from 1999 to the New Orleans Public Library.

Man, that feels good to get off my chest. And it was for Stephen King’s The Waste Lands, of all books.

Now, I have Stieg Larsson’s The Girl Who Played With Fire on loan from the NOPL. I hope I’ve earned their trust back.

In honor of that, twitter had a “yo mama” style contest, and here are the honorable mentions in all their wizardly glory:

JanetVarney: Yo momma so fat the Sorting Hat put her in all four houses
chris8675309: Your momma so fat, she looked in the mirror of Erised and saw a ham
PeterVRules: Your momma’s so old she gave Nicholas Flamel his first handjob
chris8675309: Yo mamma so nasty, the order of the phoenix was “stay away from that bitch”
chris8675309: Yo mamma so stupid, she thinks Sirius Black is the soul station on satellite radio
sarazafar: Yo mama so fat she tried to eat Cornelius Fudge
dino_rider: Yo mama’s so ugly the Dementor’s Kiss was swapped out for a hearty handshake and a promise to give her a call sometime.
reppocs: Yo momma so black, she’d probably get sorted in to Ravenclaw and would be a minor character at best
bradheintz: Yo mama so nasty, Dobby wouldn’t take her sock
Burnaway: Yo momma so skanky, even her patronus got knocked up
chompychomp: Yo mama so stupid, she drowned in a pensieve
Dick_M: yo momma so dumb she thought that she could talk to snakes if she put parsley on her tongue
dtejano: Yo mama’s so masculine, she makes Dumbledore go, “DAAAYYYUMM!”
habcous: yo mamma so nasty, every pair of her panties has the Dark Mark
HakSolo: your mom is so fat if she confronted a boggart it would morph into a treadmill
finnigan37: Your mama’s so nasty she got naked and turned @The_Real_Shaq into @The_Shrieking_Shack
dantelfer: Yo mamma so fat, she has to enchant her panties into a portkey to get out of a chair
dantelfer: Yo mamma’s cooch is so nasty it has its own house elf
dirk_funk: Yo mama so fat it takes two boggarts to shape-shift into her
Kingdaddy1773: Your family is so poor you have to bus in from Narnia every morning
MarioEGarcia: yo mama so poor she went to Honeydukes and put a chocolate frog on layaway
melgotserved: Yo momma’s so fat she got stuck in the Floo Network
melgotserved: Yo momma’s so fat her wand is a Slim Jim
MikeDrucker: Yo’ Momma so fat she joined the Death Eaters ’cause she was hungry
MikeDrucker: After she’s done being skanky, yo’ momma hides her tramp stamp by saying “Mischief Managed”
MsJG: Yo Momma’s so fugly that even Voldemort won’t speak her name
nicofopolous: Yo Momma’s so muggles she gave my hog warts
nthornton: Your momma’s ass is so saggy, she’s being sued for copyright infringement by Neville Longbottom
paulscheer: Yo Mamma is so fat that even the Dementors can’t suck out her soul in one sitting
phirm: Mama so nasty, everybody call her “She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Naked”
phirm: Yo mama so fat you couldn’t find her pu**y with the Room of Requirement
PinheadX: Yo mamma coochie so hairy it look like she ridin’ a Nimbus 2000 backwards
TheonetrueCams: your mum’s P#$$y is like the Slytherin common room, it smells foul and its always full of snakes
TheonetrueCams: Yo Mum is just like a Dementor, always looking for some “Serious” Black
Taborifica: Yo momma so fat even her Quidditch robes have stretch marks
randbot: yo mama so fat, when your parents have sex yo daddy gotta cast “accio vagina”

Holy Simultaneously Grim and Necro, Batman.

That aside, a certain shot caught my eye:

 
That’s actual Katrina footage, dirtied up a bit to fit the über-post-apocalyptic setting of The Road. You can see the New Orleans skyline in the background, and that clump of boats behind the two larger ones are boats my company insures. I’m not exactly sure just where in Plaquemines Parish that picture was taken, but it’s definitely here. I’m inclined to think it’s the south side of the Gen DeGaulle bridge, but I’m not sure.

These boats, the Sea Wolf and the Sea Falcon, are part of the Menhaden fleet and I found a number of pictures of them on the NOAA’s National Weather Service (NWS) Collection Catalog of Images. Here’s a shot of them, from a slightly different angle:

 
Small world.

It had been recommended to me, but with the caveat that it was quite dark, and could very well leave one depressed. Knowing my tastes and penchant for post-apocalyptic fiction (can we go ahead and just call it speculative fiction? ;) ), they felt that it was nonetheless a solid suggestion. I have to say, they were partially right.

The basic gist of the story is that a man and his son are survivors of what we can assume is something akin to a nuclear winter. It is indeed dark and dreary, and I will freely admit that I enjoyed going outside and enjoying the warmth of the sun on my face. Later, I talked to Jeremy and gave him my thoughts on the unfortunately short (~250 pg) book. I see where he might have been depressed, but I think I extracted a wholly different sentiment. For me, while the scenario and ordeals were horrible, it was the absolute and unending dedication of the man to his son’s well-being that affected me the most. It is the man’s sheer unwillingness to accept defeat in order to protect another and “keep the light” that I find uplifting.

This book is at times sad, harsh, and utterly bleak, and it is in these situations that the absolute best and worst of man is brought to light. The resounding message for me is that there are those that when faced with it, will keep putting one foot in front of the other because it’s just what has to be done.

I think in 2009, I’ll work on something else: exercise (i.e. doing more), and drinking less (i.e. far less shots). We got the Fit for the Wii, and I really do enjoy it – I’ve just fallen off the wagon. Monday will see me up 30 minutes earlier to hop back on. On the general fitness front, I’m doing so-so. I ran probably 4 miles last night at the VooDoo Hash, so chalk one up for the exercise. Afterward, I added two shots of whiskey to the copious amounts of beer, so take a point away.

On the upside of the whiskey addition, I was apparently quite amusing when I got home. There was dog walking, bed hogging, passing out on the floor with the dog, and eventual vomiting. Go me.

*Alternate title: </2008><2009>

Too bad, so sad.

me: i walked into a fire hydrant yesterday. it hurt. bad.
harley: hahaha
harley: dunbass
harley: er, nevermind
me: way to spell.
me: heh
me: almost had me.
harley: so close!!

Well, here’s some pics of my new bookshelf and the current state of my home office. Click on the images for flickr-y extras.

Where do I start? Howsabout a rough outline of some major-ish events since my last post (that should be individual posts themselves):

• Reffed the first Jackson MS / Biloxi MS derby bout
• Retired from rollerderby refereedom. Am now known as Don’t Panic or perhaps Mr. sKiddo.
• (Over) Enjoyed two office parties, back-to-back.
• Rode the spillway with Bea. She did the teeter-totter on her bike.
• Went to 5 Christmas Parties ( my family, her family, friends )
• Spent 5 relaxing days in Waynesville, NC with Bea.

And now that I have freed up a substantial amount of time that was previously occupied by derby, I present unto you my 2008 Resolution:

Read 26 books in 2008.

This works out to an average of one book every other week. I’m going to count re-reads in this one, not just new reads. I am also going to count two books I read over vacation towards this list: Joe Hill’s Heart Shaped Box and Richard Bachman (Stephen King)’s Blaze – two shorter-length novels that I quite enjoyed. (Liz, you should at least read Heart Shaped Box). I’ve even bought a much-needed new bookshelf for the occasion. While I attribute the idea to Liz, my motivation may be different. For me, it’s a forced downtime. I do really enjoy reading, and miss sitting down with a good novel. I’m using it to just sit down, relax, and escape (instead of perhaps going to the bar). Little mini vacations.

And a quick sidenote: while I love old New Orleans houses, I loathe their drafts. It’s goddamn cold in here.

2007 was a pretty good year for me (despite the physical injuries), and I greatly look forward to 2008. And I can’t believe that Mardi Gras is a mere month away. This year, the Ramblers roll from my house.

P.S. – We rule the street. The rest of y’all are Monkey Meat.

1) I have a press pass to Phoenix Rising: a conference devoted to all things Harry Potter, will fuse the intensity of academic debate with the improvisation of exploratory dialogue, the rhythms of New Orleans with the colors and pageantry of art. The conference will examine the novels, the movies, and the extraordinary fan phenomenon during the day; then, attendees will revel with the beat of the Crescent City — herself rising from ash and flame — when evening advances.

2) The new Harry Potter game on the Wii uses the Wii’s “wand” to control your character’s wand ingame. Review and screenshots from IGN.

3) More awesomeness from the Penny Arcade: