Journal of No. 118

So it looks like the Rams are coming back to LA (and thence to Inglewood).

A neuron popped, and before it dies forever, I'm spilling out its contents.

Former Ram running back Tommy Mason lived in the same development I did in Brea back in the early 1980s. He had two sons that were younger than me, but they had a sweet videogame setup, so I spent a few lazy hours there every once in a while. Mr. Mason was a nice guy, but kinda sad... no doubt partially due to the recent break-up of his marriage to Cathy Rigby, who I met a couple times as the kids were shuttled back and forth. Yes, all the kids in the neighborhood made maxipad jokes (not in their hearing).

Looks like Mason passed away about a year ago.

I was joking at hagdirt and [Unknown site tag]'s awesome Superbowl party that I had seen people wigging out about Illuminati machinations at the Superbowl. And that the blackout would make them spooooooge with joy. Here's a highlight (so far) in the aftermath...

Lights out at the 13:22 mark. 13 of course a favorite number and 22 a double 11. First commercial during lights out break: Air Force One going down. 13 people falling out of plane without parachutes. Iron Man can only save 4.

The message, America is going down, in this, the year 2013. Many will not have a parachute - ie. be prepared.

Interesting how exactly 1/2 of stadium went out. During Halftime show there were 2 Egyptian looking faces with Eye's of Horus facing each other. Symmetry of faces, symmetry of lights out. I think Janus is the 2 faced god? Have to look into that. Reminds me also of 2 face from Batman.

About the #86 and it's meaning. Was the marine killed the Sacrifice who they Eighty Sixed?
First Looong commercial after Halftime was a sappy Pro Troops Coming Home tribute that was really a Jeep commercial. I hate fake patriotism.

109 yard record kick return took 11 seconds. We have a 9-11 there.

Yes, yes. They won the big game. I had fun shouting at the TV alongside friends at Smaugslair. Ate way too many wasabi peas and pumpkin seeds. Drank just enough beer, mezcal, and Agwa [though I still long for that trip to Peru and the chance for mate de coca].

In a strange confluence, Netflix brought the last disk of Boondocks & the documentary Trouble the Water, which describes the story of a carless couple in New Orleans during Katrina, much of it being amateur footage shot by Kim during the storm. One could wish she were a better cinematographer, but it's pretty as real as it gets. She and her husband and brother basically fend for themselves, save neighbors and strangers, and get the fuck out using their own initiative, ultimately driving a panel truck with 30 people in it out of the city. After the worst of the storm, they hook up with professional documentarians and cover the rest of the aftermath. By no means a perfect documentary, but still fascinating, especially to see the changes in their lives. Not to beat around the bush, but the husband is a high school dropout drug dealer. She's a wannabe rapper, ex-drug dealer. They become heroes. More than that, you get the sense that this catastrophe has made them better people.
I may have mentioned that the Goth Gardener has instituted a rule whereby she gets to punch me in the shoulder when sad things happen in a film I've made her watch. There are certainly a number of sad things about Katrina, but these heroes spared me from a severe beating, by heroically saving their cat. I was never happier to see a cat onscreen.
Oh, and I mention Boondocks in connection with Trouble the Water because at one point, she picks up her brother from prison (the prison system seems to have failed spectacularly). She asks him what the authorities did to prepare them for Katrina. He says they didn't tell them anything about the hurricane; he had no idea it was coming. "Didn't you see it on TV?" "Naw, we only watched BET." I fell off the couch, dying from an attack of black comedy. Wait, not black comedy, but black comedy. Wait, maybe it's both.

I've played a little more multiplayer Uncharted 2. It has it's pluses and minuses. There are 'boosts' that add bonuses to your character, but they are only available once you've reached a certain level of multiplayer play. So while I have the boost that allows me to carry more ammo, someone else may have the boost that lets you see enemies through walls. Arg. But on the positive side, you can only have 2 boosts enabled at a time, so that hopefully limits the unfairness to some extent.

On the definite plus side, the multiplayer is still really fun. There is a 'plunder' game-mode in which the two teams try to pick up golden idols and return them to their home base. But when you're carrying a treasure, you're really slow and the other team is blasting away at you.

And the other bizarrely addictive thing about multiplayer mode is that the game stores the games as 'video' files, so you can rewatch your exploits. But it's not just a movie of what you saw in the game; you can detach the camera from your character and just roam around watching the action from wherever you like. If you're of an artistic bent, you can add fog and lighting effects, go sepia-toned and tilt the camera a few degrees for that artsy look. About the only thing I'd tweak on it is that, although the movie highlights your teammates with a username halo over their head, the enemy players don't have them and more infuriating... your own character doesn't have one. So if you wander off with the camera and want to find yourself again, it's not easy.

( Okay, now books: The Hunger & Losing My Religion )

Quarterly Scores Ending in...

Steelers	Cardinals
1	0
0	4
9 or 7	6 or 3
2	9 or 6
4	1 or 5

The bolded set seems to offer some particularly good numerical combinations.

Damn! Usually in the snowy games, it's low scores, mostly running plays. Not today. It's 28-17 Packers at halftime at Lambeau. Favre's underhanded toss after the almost sack was legendary.