Friday, October 29, 2004

No Day But Today Sucked Harder


Wow, I survived? It's all a blur. Oh no, wait. I remember today all too clear and it SUCKED!

The day had potential. Because our company had a really good quarter, our big cheese gave the company a short 6 hour day. In order to take advantage of the shortened day, we went in to work really early. The first train that goes out to Los Angeles departs an hour earlier than our normal train. That means we had to get up at 4am.

So we went to the station and it was incredibly cold. I was freekink freeezing! And lo-and-behold, the train is late. When it finally arrived, we learned that the train had a "hot wheel" and they weren't sure if it'd make it any further down the line. It did, but we had to stop midway through to let the wheel cool down. Because of this, we were half and hour later than the time we originally planned to get in.

At work, I'm being put on a new project. It's a project that I really have no idea what I'm doing. It's all about programming and computers and when I'm given instructions, it mostly goes over my head. But I'm sure I'll pick it up pretty well.

We left work and I had to rush home to take a big fat dump that I had been holding since the previous night. Mother Routes and I had to pay off some bills at the mall and I had to buy the final component of my Halloween costume (a blue Hawaiian shirt with yellow leaves/flowers). Well, we paid the bills and looked all over for the right shirt. No luck. So we went to this Surf Outlet near my house to find that it had closed down long ago. No luck. We went to CostCo. No luck. We went to Marie Callendar because the pie sale is almost over, but there weren't any good pies left. No luck. Then we went to Target where I found the steering wheel feeling a bit wobbly. Some other motorist alerted us that the tire was flat. No FREAKIN' luck! So we had to call my dad to help us out and we found that my phone had just gone from one bar of battery left to ZERO. We tried to conserve battery as we tried to contact Father Routes, but he was nowhere to be found. Finally we got a hold of him and he swung to our rescue.

What I've found is that whenever I need my cell phone for whatever reason, the battery is always either nearly dead or I don't have it on me. Basically, I have my phone 98% of the time I don't need my phone. One time, Erico Suave and I were going to Disneyland to schedule interviews for jobs when he suddenly blew out a tire. We started swerving left and right and finally he reached the side of the freeway. None of us had our cell phones with us, so we hiked to a Carrow's and called on a payphone.

Another time, I left my headlights on all day while I was at class. The car was dead and I needed to get a hold of someone, but my battery was near dead. So I phoned an old high school friend who went to the same school and she rescued me.

I'm just glad this crappy day is over and I maintained a pretty good sense of humor about it. I never did find the shirt I need for my costume. Maybe I just won't dress up... AGAIN!



I say it sucka sucka sucka sucka sucka sucka sucka sucka sucka sucka sucka sucka suck, it suck to be me,

Unlucky
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Wednesday, October 27, 2004

Yahoooo! Graffiti!


Today at work, we had a little fair sponsored by the Rideshare program. We got lots of free stuff... blah blah. Long story short, they handed out some packs of trading cards that they give to kids to teach them how to behave when riding a Metro bus.

Here's my favorite one of the collection:




Teddy Tagger! I love it! ^+^ I know I shouldn't tag, but it looks so damn adorable doing it, doesn't it??? And I also love the bunny whore.

I'm running on last minute preparations for my Halloween costume this year. Erico Suave is throwing a costume party and I need to get ONE item (a shirt). I'd like to describe it more, but I'll keep ya'll in suspense. One thing's for sure, if my costume goes off without a hitch, I'll definitely have a picture of it on here after the weekend.

Nine Days!



Fading like a wilted flower,

Ricky
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Tuesday, October 26, 2004

10 Days Wait


Call me EcstaticBoy. I can't hardly wait till November 5th comes along fore The Incredibles will be seen by me! I've been good about spoilers, ya know. I bought the Art of book and it's still sitting on my shelf waiting for November 6th to be read. I also haven't been watching the trailers or reading any spoilerific reviews.

At The Incredibles website, you can go through "superhero training" and take a test and they will classify your super power and give you an alias. Here's mine:




Hyper Monkey isn't exactly a name that fits my personality well. I'm more of a skunk because my ass stinks. But agility is my forte. Yup, I'm up there with my pal Pikachu in quickness and speed and zoomniness!

As some of you may know, I have tickets to the midnight showing of The Incredibles at the El Capitan in Hollywood. Herein lies a problem. I just received word that I'll be working through November. The movie is just shy of two hours long. That means, I'll probably get home from the movie at 3am at the earliest! I usually get up for work at 5:30am!!! I am so screwed at work on November 5th!

I need an iPod Photo.



Consequence and Frozone catch a glow, uh oh, no, no, don't go,

Ricky
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Thursday, October 21, 2004

From Dawn to Dusk


I just witnessed the saddest Mcsaddiest thing I've ever sad.

It sucks when you leave for work and get on the train when it's dark and then you come back from work and it looks exactly the same at the train station (dark). It's depressing.

Today, since we missed work yesterday, we had to stay late today. Needless to say, there was a lot of work piled up. There's really no story to tell here. I just wanted to bitch about returning late at night (if 6:30pm is considered late).

Okay, you know what? Nevermind everything said above. I never complained about it.

Speaking of complaining, I've got a little something to get off my chestular region. In order to visit my cousins' house, we have to get through a security gate. The guard at the gate checks for visitors' names listed in their computer database.

Well, for some reason they're always Mexican men. Now, Father Routes's real name is "Hubert" and for whatever goddamn reason, old Mexican guys can't say his name!!! He'll approach the gate and he'll say his name as clear as day, "Hubert," and then they'll say it back to him, "Gilbert." GILBERT??? FREAKIN' GILBERT??? WHERE THE HELL DID THE GA GA GA SOUND COME FROM???

Yesterday was flippin' ridiculous. The guard kept us there for around seven minutes claiming that my dad's name wasn't in the database. Well of course, when the retard is looking for GA GA GILBERT!!! I swear, it wastes so much time off my short life!

Let's conduct an experiment. Are you Mexican? If yes, then say the word "Hubert." Did you say "Gilbert?" Then I hate you.



Spouting nonsense,

Ricky
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Wednesday, October 20, 2004

Train in Rain


Take a look at the day and time of this blog entry. That's right! I'm not at work!

I feel really bad about not getting into work today, but honestly it was too problematic to get to the office. We were on time getting to the train station this morning, but because of flooding by the storm, all scheduled trains to Los Angeles were cancelled!

Then we inquired about Foothill Transit lines into Los Angeles. It was only $1.75 for the ride, but it would have been a FOUR hour drive (because the buses were avoiding the freeways like the flu this year. People it's just the damn flu).

So after standing in the rain for about an hour, pants soaked, shivering cold, and unable to decide how to get to Los Angeles, we just packed it up and went home.

Turns out that Mother Routes wasn't feeling well anyway. She couldn't get to sleep last night and woke up pretty miserable. So perhaps it all worked out after all.

Hopefully the rain will lighten up and they remedy the flood situation so that getting to work tomorrow will go off without a hitch.



Got a job and it don't pay,

Ricky
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Sunday, October 17, 2004

On the Company Dime


A bunch of us went to Universal Studios yesterday for my company's annual family event.

We were treated to an all-you-can-eat-and-cram-down-your-pants buffet. The hot dogs were the good kind with the foot long weiners. They were scrum-diddlyicious. I didn't eat the burgers because they were pink, but I stole a helluva lot of cookies!

Then we only had around five hours to experience the park. We went on the Mummy coaster which was fun.




From left to right and front to back: Co-worker Mike, Ricky Routes, Mother Routes, Timotei, Mojo Maggie, Lee Leman, Mexican Guy 1, Mexican Guy 2, Oh Suzanna, Agent J, and Tall Man Sam.

We also went on the Jurassic Park River Adventure because there was no line. And even though it was pretty chilly out, it was no problem going on because you barely get wet on that ride anymore. You used to get soaked.

Today, we celebrated Granny K's birthday at the Ansel household. It was pretty fun. We used to have family get togethers all the time in the past, but we're all growing up now and so we're all doing our own things. We now have to find different games to play to keep the party banging (such as Murder in the Dark, Mafia, and Chaos. This party's big hit was Text Twist at Yahoo! Games. Can't wait till all of us (even Em) are over 21 so we can have open bars and strippers!



Entering my final two weeks of work,

Drunkard
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Saturday, October 16, 2004

ANThology Part Three: Ant Bully


Because of the constant ant-related stories, I've decided to group them all into my ANThology series. Pretty clever, huh?

Don't judge me!

Anyway, this is of course part three of the series. Part one, if you remember, was entitled "Ant Rant" and part two was called "Ants in my Pants; Sans the Boogie Dance."

Tonight's episode follows the misadventures of Mother Routes and her plan to kill all the ants in the neighborhood. She noticed that ants keep invading the stove area of our kitchen and fan out across the counters gethering what crumbs are left behind. Instead of killing them on the spot, she's decided to lure as many ants from the nest as possible with some bait and then when the count reaches 300,000,000... WHAMMO!!! Massive pesticide!




It's a disgustingly terrible, cruel, inhumane, and deliciously ingenius plan! I know it's not going to work as well as she thinks, but it's still nice to see a vast amount of hopeful (belly full) ants DEAD. Take that suckers!

And the ants love my toilet for some reason. I went into the bathroom one day and found, to my surprise, a group of ants huddled around the top layer of toilet water sipping to their hearts' content. I found it pretty annoying and disgusting, but utterly enjoyable to piss on them. They never knew what hit 'em!

I think I might need some psychological help. I'm having too much fun with this whole ant thing.



Pissed off, but at least not pissed on (har har har),

Ricky
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Wednesday, October 13, 2004

Wading Patiently


Good news, everyone!

I made a purchase on Amazon.com! Thank you all for your support. I couldn't have done it without you.

Actually, I've had some paranoid fears about making online purchases. I just found it a little iffy giving my credit card number over the net. You never know who it's really going to. I'm not going to go crazy or anything with my credit card number. I still don't want my number spread over a ton of websites.

I bought two things. Firstly, I bought The Art of The Incredibles hardcover book. I've been looking forward to this book for about 8 months. Seriously. But the thing is, I don't want anything spoiled for me before the movie, so I'm probably not going to look through it till November 5th. The second book I bought was Abarat: Days of Magic, Nights of War. I wasn't exactly that thrilled with the first book (Abarat). It had an awesome intro, but fell apart near the end. The book never really went anywhere; not much payoff. But I'm keeping with the series because I do see good potential in the characters.

The reason I made the decision to buy these books online is because of the price. It's cheaper. The Incredibles book is $40 in bookstores. But at Amazon, it's only $28. The second Abarat book is $25 at Borders and only $15 online. Plus, free shipping! I'm just waiting patiently for the packages to come.

I'm also reading another book though! MacArthur and Erico Suave let me borrow Lemony Snicket's Series of Unfortunate Events. The first book is really short (only a little more than 100 small pages), which makes for a perfect train read. Lemony Snicket packs quite a story into so few pages. It's cleverly narrated and very interesting. I highly recommend it. There are 11 books in the series right now with 2 on the way. I'm going to go ahead and buy the whole series to add to my collection.

Some quick thoughts. There was a bomb threat on the Union Pacific yesterday that delayed our train-ride home. Lost was absolutely great tonight! Awesome awesome storytelling. Desperate Housewives is such a freakin' hoot to watch. I had the mother of all stomach aches yesterday night that nearly killed me. Mother Routes made this weird soupy/saliva-y concoction which made it go away! Work is fine. Can't wait for The Incredibles! Need a Halloween costume. Bush is a liar. TGUK ROCK!



Building walls around the words around the world,

Ricky
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Sunday, October 10, 2004

"They've Got You By Their Strings Again Tonight...


...so quick to find that dollar in the sky." - Rufio




Team America was a disappointment. The trailers looked great, it had potential for a ton of humor, it's by the South Park guys! How could it be just ho-hum?

They rushed this thing to theaters.

First of all, the marionette work is just awesome. It's amazing how it's done. And when the film pokes fun at the limitations of the puppets (i.e. a puppet's "regular" face from its "serious" face [no distinction]; trying to get two puppets to look like their kissing when all they're doing is butting faces), it's downright hilarious. And I'll just say it. That stuff is funnier than the plot jokes itself.

But the movie has nowhere near the amount of sheer laughs as the 1999 film South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut. In fact, the jokes here are way too far and in between. It's one of those films where you can pick out the 5 or 6 times you truly laughed and the other times you just kinda smiled because you knew it was supposed to be funny, but it wasn't.

One of my favorite gags was at the beginning. They do a sweeping shot of Times Square and land on a billboard for the Broadway show Lease: The Musical. Then we see the show's final number in which all the characters sing about how everyone has AIDS. So hilarious.

But there are not enough bust-your-gut jokes. And there are at least two recurring jokes that beg the question "Why go for this laugh again???"

There are also a lot of emotional parts in the film, which is kinda funny seeing it come from puppets. But it makes it uncomfortable since you don't know whether you should laugh or not.

Well, I guess I was just expecting a lot more laughs and fun out of this movie. The movie does boast a lot of fun action sequences and a good analogy on war, but it just wasn't as entertaining as it should have been.



Giving the movie 2 1/2 stars,

Ricky Roeper
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Friday, October 08, 2004

Fluffy Bunnies and Their White Fluffy Scruffy Tails Poopsy Whoopsy


Hi kids! So I ran over a gray bunny today. Actually, I didn't. But I was thinking about how bunny tails are kinda poofy and look ready to pop! Well, I was just sorta wondering if when a car runs over a bunny head, is the pressure from the flattening so great that it rolls into the butt and pops the tail off? Still don't get what I'm saying? See the artist rendering below:




Well anyway, that's all. I was just wondering if that's what really happens is all.

Good news ev'ryone! All this week I've been complaining about how my body fails to let go of its poopoo platter. Well today, I had the best crap-dango of my flippin' life! It was all good. I'm not sure what caused that little obstruction of justice, but one thing's for damn sure... I won't ever eat Uncrustables again! Those things are still hurtin' me seven weeks later. Damn you Smuckers!

And lastly, the second Presidential debate was on earlier today and after three or so minutes, when I realized they were just gonna repeat everything said in the past debate, I tuned out basically. It was pretty dull. But in the Los Angeles Times today, there was an article/editorial from an anti-Bush writer who wrote, for a change, the pros of having President Bush re-elected. I found it really fascinating and it actually made me feel better about the idea of four more years of Bush.

Read the article here.

Don't get me wrong. I'm still pushing for Kerry/Edwards, but the article helps us realize that if Bush gets his second term, he'll take the fall for his own actions. In other words, Kerry won't become the scapegoat for Bush's presidency.

Bunny got flattened.



Fighting off PETA,

Ricky
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Wednesday, October 06, 2004

(Worst) Hiccup of Life


I HATE this! By the way, this blog contains profanity, so if you're younger than, say, however old Agent K is, stop reading here. In fact, just ignore this entry and scroll back up to my next update entitled "Fluffy Bunnies and Their White Fluffy Scruffy Tails Poopsy Whoopsy."

Okay, back to my frustration to the ninth degree! For the past few days I've had to poop. And then every time I go to the toileta, I experience what I like to call "Shit Tease." You know what I mean? I know I have to crap, it hurts like I have to crap, the crap is knocking at my door, and BAM! NO CRAP!!! It pisses me off! (Heh... pisses)

Well, it's always a bad start in the morning and, well, today... it only got worse.

Work went slooooooooooooow for some reason (this past week has been pretty dreadful). We went to the Turkey Basket for lunch (it's a neat little café located next to that tallest building in Downtown Los Angeles). Anyway, after lunch, I coughed wrong and some saliva or something went into the wrong valve and I had the worst hiccups I have ever had in my life. It was so bad, it hurt and burn and stung ever 6 seconds or so. I had to cope with it for the bus ride to work till I could get my hands on a cup of water. The trick to getting rid of hiccups, I learned in the Boy Scouts, was to drink a glass of water upside down. It totally worked... until I choked on my water and it started up the hiccups again. But it hurt. I wanted to kill myself, it hurt so bad.

And then something creepy. While we were waiting for the bus to get back to work, a seemingly homeless black man was mumbling something under his breath, standing near us. We tried our best to ignore him and not make eye contact. I was busy with the hiccup sitation, so I figured he wouldn't bother me, since I was already bothered. But for about 2 minutes and up until we sped away on the bus, the homeless man mumbled and stared at me. Like he was freakin' cursing me or something. That freaked me out completely, but I've since forgotten about it. See? What was I talking about? I dunno. Certainly not some freaky ass black guy stalker voodoo psycho.

But on a brighter note... I have tickets for a midnight showing of The Incredibles on November 4th! God! I can't wait! The special screening is at the El Capitan and includes a costume contest, coffee, pastries, popcorn, drink, reserved seats, and a commemorative dated certificate! Yee-haw!



Olay! Olay! Olay!

Ricky Martin
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Tuesday, October 05, 2004

Whimper While You Work


Got a little some'n some'n for ya'll.

I thought it'd be neat to show you some'n you don't get to see everyday, but I do... I do...

It's my work station! My cubicle! My little crying corner!




Here I am sitting in front of the computer. This is what I do all day folks. Forty hours of my life per week in front of this old dingy monitor. Notice I spruced up the place a bit. A sharp eye reveals a newspaper clipping of Lost on my cabinet thing. To the very left is an ad for Urinetown. Then I have a bunch of little Post-It sticky art that I just garbled up on the wall. Then there's a cool Fox Racing Catalog spread showing a kick-butt sunset (and a wakeboarder). Then I have a bunch of notes and email reminders posted up on my bulletin boards.




And in this picture, I have left the office for an extended potty run. Notice the spaciness of my workspace and my beautiful printer (dot-matrix of course).

So there's my work. I know what you're thinking and I agree. If I had to sit in that chair for eight hours a day too, I'd probably eat a fart pellet.

In other news, Erico Suave and I went to see Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow today! This was his second time seeing it, and now I know why he didn't mind seeing it again! It was great! It was action packed and eye-popping! It was funny! I'm definitely getting the DVD for this movie, if not only for the last minute of the film. Heh heh heh...



Putting my thang down, flippin' it, and reversing it,

Ricky Elliott
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Sunday, October 03, 2004

Weakend


This weekend pretty much blew. Well, it blew in the sense that I didn't do anything. Another wasted break from work. The thing about weekends is that if you do something, the weekend goes by too fast. Yet, if you don't do anything, it goes by slower and you can savor the time off, but it feels wasted. This weekend, however, went by fast and I did nothing. That's the suckiest of the suck suck.

Well anyway, I've been on the computer trying to update things on the ol' website. I finally finished that Proactiv report, as if anyone cared anymore. I'm cleaning up the front page of The Routes by removing the "From the horse's mouth" and "Highlights" sections. I've added some new song quotes to that page too (nothing big). One day, after I learn Macromedia Dreamweaver, I hope to upgrade my site to a Flash based site. But that's in the way way distant future.

Regarding my Walt Disney World report, I had a plan written down, but I can't find that paper, so it'll probably be more of a while, as if anyone cared.

But, I do have something for ya'll. It's a picture of Erico Suave's cute ass puppy dawg.

Behold!




Her name is Nikita Vernita Brown and she doesn't usually wear shirts like that. She's all about slutty thongs.



Crying over the thought of another work week,

Ricky
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Friday, October 01, 2004

Lost & Round


I've been doing nothing.

Oh hi! Pardon my inactivity. I know I said I would have those Walt Disney World photos up "soon." Hopefully I can work on that this weekend. It's just that, I'm just about completely getting over last week's cold episode (I'm still shootin' snot from my nose).

I've been saying all week that I'm going to go to the gym, but I only ended up going once (just to use the elliptical trainer). So, I'm getting a little handley around the love; basically I'm getting rounder. Well, I'm gonna totally work out hard till I'm skinnier than Kate Moss. Remember her? Is she dead now?

Sidetracked. Anyway, a few updates. I still haven't seen Sky Captain, but I have been deliberately waiting for it to get off the Special Engagement category so that I can use a free movie ticket on it.

I bought Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Here was a movie that I had read about at least two years ago. When I first heard the premise (Man's ex-girlfriend has a procedure done to erase him from her memory, so he does the same, only to have a change of heart and then attempt to hide memories of her in other memories), it tickled me happy. I thought it sounded ingenius and I knew I wanted to see it right when it came out. I counted down the days till it opened and when it opened, I wasn't able to find someone to see it with. Time passed and it left theaters, so I picked it up on DVD. Anyway, it was really good; shorter than I thought it would be. It's really sweet and thought-provoking. It's a real, as an old friend would put it, mind f***.

I watched the first Presidential Debate yesterday and was so incredibly pleased by John Kerry's performance. He did very well. And all Bush could do was take the lashing and studder his usual "uh... uh... uh..." Vote Kerry! Bush is too stubborn to admit his mistakes, so he'll just keep trying to justify his actions. Meanwhile, foreign countries will continue to hate America because of Bush, therefore we have to get Bush out of office so that America's reputation can begin healing. We can't win the war on terror alone.

My favorite new show of the season is probably Lost. The look of the show is very eye-popping and the characters are all interesting (for the most part). I'm really looking forward to seeing how the secrets of the characters unravel throughout the episodes.

One quick thing about my seemingly abandoned website. I'm going to be stopping the "Highlights" section since I can just post pictures in the blogs now.

Anyway, I'll stop blabbering.



That's my $0.02 and I'm sticking to it,

Ricky
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