The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Kevin Edzant

Prologue: I’m back home now. In the following days I will be posting recaps of the trips. I tried to update the blog shortly after each day, but that last entry (you know, the 1500 word one) took too long to finish and then I didn’t have any WiFi. But here we are now, enjoying a new post, so it’s all water under the Tower Bridge.

I don’t admit I’m wrong very often and when I do, I’m usually way out of line or have done something remarkably stupid. In the case of London I didn’t do either, which makes me admitting a mistake all the more impressive.

As you read in the last chronicle I didn’t care so much for this New Years Eve celebration. Partly because I was tired and partly because I didn’t care. The tired part is the most important. You see, before this trip began, Jenna told me that we are going to have to get up early. Every day. For the entire week. I have nothing wrong with that so long as a I get a good nights sleep. It’s hard to get a good nights sleep, however, on an air mattress the size of a thimble and the malleability of stone. So I went to bed early.

We woke up fairly early as well. Jenna usually takes the bus into London (I can’t blame her, who wants to walk back from the railway after walking through London) and she had read that the train left at 7:00AM. This should have been the first warning that things wouldn’t go as planned this day. We walk really fast to the bus stop and find…no buses.

Let me pause for just a moment and explain a characteristic of Jenna that I don’t think I’ve mentioned yet. She is always in a rush. Seriously, if she could sprint everywhere she would. I have no problem walking places. It’s a good way to learn the layout of the city and it helps me burn off breakfast, but I get shinsplints from walking on a treadmill. I can’t walk at 80mph and be happy at the end of the day. And, as I found out, my shoes are not made for walking. No matter how many times I tell myself that I am Nancy Sinatra it just won’t happen.

So at the bus stop we wait. And wait. And wait. Hey! Here comes an X90! To London Victoria! Jenna runs up and asks the guy when the next train leaves for London. He says something in unhelpful and Jenna leaves the bus, the only bus we’ve seen for 15 minutes, and returns to our bench. Why? Because she didn’t know how much it was. You could have asked!  We seriously should have gotten on that bus, we had no idea when the next bus was going to arrive because everything was on holiday hours, which conveniently aren’t posted anywhere.

We wait around for another 45 minutes. It’s now 8:00 and, as luck would have it, another X90 shows up. Well, we have to take this one, and as it turns out, the price would have been the same as the Oxford Tube we’d been waiting around for. Talk about an auspicious start.

About an hour and a half later we arrive in London. We walk around for a bit and find ourselves in the underground station, traveling toward London Tower. Honestly, I don’t find undergrounds or subways all that hard to navigate. And despite what Jenna may think, I’m not totally incompetent at navigation. I just let her do all the work because she was willing to. Earlier that day, jenna had decided to see the Tower first and then kind of work our way toward Covent Gardens.

Best laid plans.

Jenna and, by virtue of the fact that I did no planning, myself made one terrible mistake. We forgot to see if the tower would be open. It wasn’t. Oh well, Plan B. Plan B was walk. Jenna walks fast. I get shinsplints from walking fast. The shoes I’m wearing apparently aren’t good for walking.

This is not going to a be good day.

We across the Tower Bridge.

Meh. The Golden Gate is redder.

We walk past some strange looking turd of a building.

You can make a ton of jokes about this building.

We walk past the Globe Theater.

I did not see Kevin Spacey here.

We walk over the Millennium Bridge and into St. Paul’s.

I prefer Millenium Force.

I thought I felt God. Turns out it was just some hipster from Occupy who hadn’t showered in a month.

It probably wasn’t all that that long of a walk but damn, it sure felt long when your shins are ready to splinter into a billion different pieces. As I said earlier, Jenna is always in a rush to get places. I understand why, she wanted to make sure that I was able to see everything I wanted to see, but you need to learn to stop and smell the roses. During this walk down the Thames though, I did get to appreciate the style of the buildings in London. It’s not a town like Oxford that feels old. London is old, it dates back to the Roman times, but it doesn’t feel like that. It celebrates it’s history but doesn’t get bogged down it. I was impressed at how I could look at the skyline and see a medieval fortress and a glass egg in the same eye line.

What's the obsession with eggs?

From St. Paul’s Cathedral (I’ve got nothing to say about that place other than it’s very pretty) we went to Covent Gardens. If you talked to Jenna, she’d say that Covent Gardens was probably the best part of the my trip to London. Why’s that? Because of the Apple Store there. It’s a big one.

I can’t dwell too much on that store if only because I’m not allowed to talk about work on here…and I don’t have much to say about it other than that it’s bigger than Northridge.

Lets recap my poor decisions thus far. 1) We forgot to check times of busses and trains. 2) We forgot to check times of attractions. 3) I wore some terrible shoes. 4) I have 5 pounds of shit in my backpack.

Number 5 is the kicker. I forgot an umbrella and coat.

Don’t ask me why I didn’t bring a coat or an umbrella. I honestly have no idea. Perhaps it’s my hubris in thinking that “It’s my vacation. It can’t possibly rain while I’m on vacation.” Maybe it’s just that I’m dumb. In any event, it starts raining. Not hard or anything, but enough to make life miserable for someone who doesn’t have an umbrella or coat or jacket or good waterproof shoes. Someone like me.

So, we start walking around Covent Gardens for a few more minutes and the more I walk around, the more wet I get. I can handle the rain and coldness fairly well, so getting wet by itself didn’t make me miserable. What does make me miserable, however, is getting water in my shoes. That will put a damper on my day fairly quickly. Walking around with squelching shoes Sure enough, about 30 minutes into the rain storm I step in a puddle. I didn’t scream or yell or curse. It was more of a resigned depression that I was going to be miserable for the rest of the day and there was nothing I could do about it.

Jenna decided that she wanted to see the British Library. I followed along in suit because I had no idea where I was going. When we got off of the tube station it was raining even harder and even more miserably than before. Like I said, this would have been much better if my shoe wasn’t drenched in wetness. But, it could have been worse if my other foot was…dammit! Sure enough, my other shoe got wet. Then we find out that library is closed today.

In short, it’s just a miserable day. My feet are killing me because of the poor shoes and because of the wetness. Nothing that we wanted to see was open. I’m tired. I’m hungry and Jenna doesn’t like Taylor Walker pubs, which is all they have in London.

The rest of the day was spent walking about Vauxhall and Westminster. What’s in Vauxhall you ask?

This.

That is the SIS Building, or the British version of the Pentagon. A lot of secretive stuff goes on in those halls.

From there we travel quickly to the Tate Museum. It wasn’t on our list of things to do but it quickly made the list when we found out that it was 1) open, 2) indoors, and 3) free. Three of my favorite things in life.

The gallery itself was a bit underwhelming. I didn’t see any artists or works that I knew (not that I know much) and I didn’t really enjoy a lot of what I saw there. Jenna enjoyed some of the impressionists though. Apparently she has a thing for blotchy shapes and brush strokes. On the other hand, I liked the more modern side to the gallery. They had an exhibition about some modern artists who explored the medium of film and performance that I found fairly fascinating. Jenna left the exhibit fairly quickly when we came across the room dedicated to CUOM Transmissions, a performance art group that pushed the boundaries of art and pornography. Can something be pornographic if it is not erotic? Some of the stuff those guys did was seriously disturbing and a strong case could be made that they are not at all artists. I thought it was fascinating, though.

Somehow, and I’m still not sure how this happened, Jenna and I found ourselves in front of Westminster Abbey and Westminster Palace. Both of which, I’m sure, are fairly impressive looking. I didn’t get to see much because of how dark it was. I can tell you this though, Big Ben? Not all that big. I think his name is ironic. We didn’t go inside the Abbey because we didn’t want to spend the money to look at old graves. I have mixed feelings about this. Part of me wanted to see what was inside but the other part of me, the cold, wet, and miserable part just wanted to leave london and never come back.

So we left, and like we did nine hours before, got onto the X90 and left for Oxford. Only instead of being chipper and exited for the new year, we were exhausted and wet. What a difference a day makes.

In oxford we met up with one of Jenna’s friends from University named Janosz. Nicest guy you’ll ever meet. A little too nice, if you ask me. But we found some interesting things to talk about. He’s a Maths and Physics major, both subjects I am fairly interested in. Jenna may have been bored with our discussion of Bosons and relativity but who cares.

Join us next time when it’s London, Part 2!

Jenna gets imprisoned in the Tower of London. Kevin realizes that the French aren’t all that bad when a French girl hates mayonnaise. Janosz walks a lot. The three of us almost get locked in and arrested!

Warwick Castle: How I learned to stop worrying and love the locals

Day two of the trip began with a long walk. Jenna lives about 30 minutes away from the nearest train station and she lives to walk there. Now /I’m all about exercise\ but at 7 in the morning I don’t really feel like along anywhere. Oh well, Jenna wants to walk and she knows the way better than I do.

Remember this, it becomes important later.

My trip to England was predicated on a single principle, find out what you want to do and then cram it in to a few days. In doing do we might do a single town in half a day and another a few hours. This would not be a problem if not for the transportation. I can’t just get in a car and drive, instead we have to take the public transit systems, buses and trains.

Remember this, it becomes important again.

Saturdays destinations were Stratford-upon-Avon and Warwick, named for Warwick Davis, who play Wicket and Professor Flitwick. He also stars in the Ricky Gervais comedy “Life’s too Short.” it’s funny because he’s a midget.

They should name a whole country after Warwick Davis.

We arrive in Stratford around 9:00 and we immediately get to walking. I’m not as rigid with plans or times as Jenna is and I’m fine meandering down weird streets and such. This was the perfect town in which to do that. It’s fairly small and compact, as to oppose to being small and spread out. Stratford-upon-Avon is primarily known for being the birthplace of Shakespeare and hiss final resting place. As such, the entire town is built around trying to extract the most amount of money possible for the least amount of tourist attractions.

I’m not going to say that it reeks of commercialism, it doesn’t. But it does have an air of being manipulative and inauthentic. I think I said it best when I compared it Solvang. A clear example of this is the town buildings. Jenna tells me that traditional Tudor architecture is a lot like what we think of British towns. Thatched roofs, white panels and black borders. Stratford was no exception, it was rife with buildings of those types. Well, Jenna also tells me that a fire raged through the town in 1694 and destroyed most of the buildings, only a few of that style are left remaining, a pub, a school, Shakespeare’s house, and another pub. Everything else that is painted that way was in the 1900′s when everyone got all excited about the past and how much better it was.

Well, we walk around the town and find our way to the little church where Shakespeare is buried. Cozy kitten little place. Not much to say about it other than Shakespeare is forever entombed there. Okay, that’s not truest all. There is some guy from Tudor era England that has a chapel devoted to him here. Not that I can tell you his name or anything.

Say what you want about God or religion or superstition, people have built some of the most beautiful buildings to him. Imagine what they could have done if they used that money to fund science instead of fraud.

Remember that, it becomes very important later. Much later. Like when you die.

Jenna and I decided not to enter Shakespeare’s birthplace. It was £16, a little too pricy. Besides, we were going to spend some money at the castle. That being said, it was fairly cool to see. As someone who has read his works in the past I definitely have a different appreciation of the house than someone who has no idea who he is.

Like say, Chinese tourists.

We had a few extra minutes to kind of just walk around the town before our bus left for Warwick, so we decided to find our bus. Well, we couldn’t find it. We walked well out of our way and then backtracked just to find that had we found the bust stop sooner we wouldn’t have had to wait. fortunately stratford is not all that large a city so this didn’t really affect us all that much.

Remember that, it becomes important later.

Warwick is known for Warwick castle. It was built by William, Duke Of Normandy, who had quite the impression on English history. Its located right on the river Avon and was the site of some battles and sieges throughout its history. Most importantly, however, This was the first caste I had ever been to. These buggers are quite impressive, both from an historical perspective and also from a size perspective.

Right now the tower is in the hands of Madam Toussads and it’s more than a little touristy. The experience was disappointing only from an expectation perspective. I loved the castle tower walk that Jenna and I took. We explored the different towers, parapets, hills, and weapons of the castle. It is, as with Oxford, and eerie experience. Climbing up the steep stairs has been climbed by archers more than 600 years ago, only instead of sightseeing, they are about to defend the castle. I had a hard enough time climbing the stairs with my backpack, I couldn’t possibly do it in a full set of armor. I’d probably be killed just walking than in actual combat.

Jenna is an expert on Tudor history, but it kind of ends there. With anything related to war, she usually defers to me. She called a ballista a “ba-LEE-sta” and then later a “BA-lis-ta.” for those of you who don’t know, it’s pronounced “who give a shit.” The point is, it was funny. We saw a trebuchet (she pronounced that one correctly) that usually launched flaming stones down the river bank. Today it was closed. I was angry.

A "who gives a shit" siege weapon. It acts as a giant crossbow.

Once we left the castle we headed to the church of Saint Mary’s. Jenna once again kind of freaked out when she heard that Robert Dudley was buried there. I was more interested in this guy Beauchamp who told his son to build him a massive memorial. And he did. He seemed to be a pretty arrogant guy, someone I would have gotten on well with.

But know the fun part of the day. Jenna likes to walk places. She also fancies herself good at directions. We need to find the train station to leave Warwick and get back to Oxford. The problem is, we cant find the station. There are no signs for it and no one and their mother has any idea what we are talking about. Finally we into some pharmacy and a guy there tells us the most confusing directions ever. “Continue on this street until you get to a mini-round about. Follow it left until you get to another major round about. Continue straight left on it until you reach a road. Turn left, make the first left/right and then double back for a quickie. You’ll know you’ve reached the railway when you head airplanes taking off.” What?

As we are walking out of the pharmacy we spot a bus that takes us…to the railway!

“Jenna, do you want to take the bus there?”

“No, lets walk there. Take in the sights.”

“Jenna, we should take the bus.”

“Let’s walk.”

Resigned sigh.

“Fine.”

30 minutes later we have no idea where we are going. It’s getting darker by the hour. Getting colder by the minute. Getting hungrier by the second. We finally ask for directions, and for the second time in Jenna’s life, and the first in mine, a stranger drives us to the railway.

“Now, Kevin,” you ask. “Why would you get into a car, in a foreign country, with a stranger when it’s dark outside?” Good question. Well, the stranger was a woman. There are no well known women who murder hitchhikers. And two, she was older and putting on nail polish on her feet. I’ve never met a woman who put nail polish on her feet, outside in the cold, to be untrustworthy. It’s a basic fact of life. Turns out she’s from Jamaica, visiting her mother during the holidays and was just a very nice person. As Abraham Lincoln said, “I always rely upon the kindness of strangers.”

The rest of the night was uneventful. We get back into Oxford and have a bite to eat at a gourmet pizza place. I have a few beers. Jenna is barely able to finish her drink without feeling buzzed. We get back to Jenna’s room and sleep right through New Years. We know we have a busy day the next day and frankly, we didn’t give a shit about 2012.

Next Time on Arrested Development: It rains bitches and ho’s in London. Kevin realizes he’s made a huge mistake. Jenna learns to never trust anything on the internet. And there is such a thing as “too nice.”

Boredom at 30,000 feet

Plane rides don’t seem to bother me all that much. I usually have no problem sitting in the same seat for 10 hours watching movies, tv shows and listening to music. My only complaint is how exhausted I feel after the plane ride is over. I have a hard time sleeping in those tin boxes and the longer the flight the more pronounced the effect.

Fortunately I had a secret weapon this time around: my Christmas present. The Sennheiser 450PxDMZFBI noise cancelling ear cupping headphones. They kept me sane on this last flight; I couldn’t hear a damn thing except for Radiohead and Louis CK. I’ll take it.

When we landed we were greeted with typical (I’m told, I’ve never been here before) gloomy weather. It looks as though the heavens are about to burst at any money moment. A sense of impending doom. I love that type of weather; it’s one of the reasons I can’t wait to move out of Southern California.

After a bus trip to Oxford, where Jenna goes to school, we took a tour of the city. Jenna knows the place fairly intimately and showed me around her college, St. Edmunds. I’m a sucker for anything older than me, it explains my obsession for the blues and Helen Mirrren (seriously, she is still quite the looker!). What I’m struck most by is the history of these building. I’ve done some traveling in the US and seen some of the historical documents and buildings that are important to our history. Gettysburg was unforgettable, but it only happened 140 years ago.

Oxford? Oxford happened 900 years ago. That’s a lot more history. As I walked down a path in Oxford I was just overcome with the feeling that I am part of history. Men and women have been waking down this exact road, seeing the same exact sighs that I am now, for 900 years. It’s a really remarkable feeling.

It was raining most of the time when we were walking around the town. The heavens finally broken and they decided to shower us with a fine light rain. I may have been alone in thinking this, but I thought oxford was even more beautiful with rain glistening everywhere. That being said, by the time we got back to Jenna’s room I was freezing cold and ready to sleep.

I’m writing this post two days after these events took place, but it doesn’t feel that long ago. Vacation time works on a completely different scale than does normal time. Days seem faster, food taste better (except at castles, more on that later), and memories sharper. Perhaps it’s because you also take pictures to help you with the memories, but the sights and sounds of the city are still vivid in my mind.

Next week on Arrested Development: Kevin visits Shakespeare’s home town and takes photos. While visiting Warwick Castle Kevin, Kevin comes to the realization that he could never have been a soldier. Jenna gets us lost, gets us lost again, and a nice Jamaican woman returns a favor. href=”http://edzant.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/20120101-051238.jpg”>

Succinctness

Let me cut to the chase.

I haven’t been on here in a while. I’m not sorry. Life happens. It moves on.  No one cares. I don’t.

Let me catch you up on what happened since last April.

I turned 21. I went to Vegas. Played poker. Won money. Huzzah!

I graduated school with a bachelor of arts in screenwriting. I haven’t written anything in a year. Waste of time.

I still work at Apple. I tried to get transferred. I didn’t. I got promoted. Got trained. Got drunk. I made a spreadsheet.

I’ve come to terms with my beliefs. I’m out as an atheist. See you in hell. Oh.

I’ve made new friends. They are cool. I’ve kept the old ones too. They are also cool.

I’m still single. No surprises there. Somethings never change.

I’ve become obsessed with Arrested Development. Steve Holt! I’ve become obsessed with Archer. Danger Zone! I’ve become obsessed with community. Pop pop!

Jenna is studying at oxford. brag. I’m flying back with her to England in 13 hours. I’m excited. I’ve never been outside the continent.

Yeah. That’s it.

 

 

Ich bin zurück!

Or am I?

No, I think I am. I am going to do this, I am going to start blogging (on my site) again, not my other site. My other site is, of course, devoted to Woody Allen. Not something many people are interested in. Although, fun fact, if you google “woody allen phillip roth bonnie and clyde coen brothers” guess whose blog is number 2! That’s right! Mine! A proud accomplishment or what?

On a more serious note, the last time I posted was last october, in the middle of the semester. It wasn’t even a real blog post, it was a more a response to something my aunt may have implied but didn’t actually say. I do apologize, it wasn’t a fair way to end our relationship with each other, blog. I hope you can take me back.

I’m going to give you a quick update on the life of Kevin at the moment.

Poker: Been sometime since I’ve played seriously. Ever since I took that pretty big hit to my roll in November I haven’t played much online. For a couple of reasons: 1) Too stressful. 2) Too time consuming. 3) Too much money (I’d rather spend it on porn…kidding). 4) Too annoying (like when you tell that you play online “omg! isn’t that. like. illegal?’). 5) school. Although, I did play in the poker league again at the beginning of the year. I had to take two months off because the finals interfered with my school schedule. But in November, I came in first for points and first in the finals for that month. I am the only player to do that. Ever. Oh yeah, I won a shoe autographed by Kobe Bryant and won a seat into a world series satellite. In December I came close to becoming the first player to take two championship titles, but I was knocked out in 3rd and won a pretty  nice digital camera.

School: I am definitely going to finish out my college career (and hopefully my public education career) as a screenwriting major. I have decided that, although my passions still lie with editing, writing gives me the opportunity that editing doesn’t afford me: it gives a reason to cry at night. No seriously, I enjoy writing screenplays. It’s one of the few things I enjoy doing in school. Just like editing, its a puzzle. Its about how to make the pieces fit together, and besides, I have a lot of great ideas floating around inside my head and writing, not editing, is the first step in getting them on film.

Work: It’s gotten a lot better. I can’t comment too much on it (there are still those people who are out to get me) but since september, I feel that I have gotten back into the Kevin day’s of old, you know, before the “Great Heartbreak of 11/08.” By the way, if you still read this, I really don’t harbor any hard feelings toward you, its just fun to pretend I do. Tomorrow is the iPad launch and I am really excited about it. i can’t comment on whether I like it or not. Thats irrelevant (and ground for termination) but just being apart of something so massive is an experience that few people in retail really get to experience, and this is going to be my fourth product launch. Wow.

Personal Life: Old friends creep into your life sometimes. Someone I was friends in high school with just popped back into my life last fall in new and unexpected ways. Its been fun sharing our mutual respect and love for “The Dub” and going to see the second (sorry, I think that 30 Rock is above and beyond the greatest comedy on air) on TV – Big Bang Theory. Glad I had someone so into that show to go with. Thanks.

German: Ein junges Kind spricht besser Deutsch als ich, aber ich lerne. Letztes Jahr haben meine Eltern mir Rosetta Stone gegeben. It’s been pretty cool…interesting. I just typed those two sentences in German, and now my computer is saying that I am misspelling all the English words. This is awesome, i had no idea my computer was that smart. Anywho, Its been pretty cool learning a different language. I like German a lot better than I did Spanish, and I think that it is easier to learn. Ich brauche schlafen, weil heute morgen ich muss arbeiten

I honestly should be going to get right now, I have a long three days ahead of me, with very little opportunity to sleep. I have to be awake at 5:45 this morning for the iPad launch. I have my sister’s birthday party thing tomorrow night. My sister’s actual birthday is on Sunday and we are going to disneyland. And then on Monday my dad and I going up to Chumash to play cards. Long days ahead.

Gute Nacht. Bis später.

I’m Back…maybe

I have been drawn out of hiding to address a very serious issue: cyberstalking.

Ever google a friends name hoping to find dirt on them? Ever google a friends name just becuase you can? Ever start looking on your friends facebook page trying to find that cute girl who sits next to you in German?

Well, thats called cyberstalking, and it needs to stop. Its creepy.

Kevin

Another Semester, Another Blog Entry

Well, its the start of the new fall semester on tuesday, and as usual, I always like to look ahead and see where my life will be 4 months from now. I’m going to ponder that though for a couple of lines.

I can’t see any difference.

But I can say this, every semester since college began has had a different soundtrack. My first semester is was alll about the long winded jams. Cream, Allman Brothers, Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service, that kind of stuff.

My second semester was all about getting back to the roots of rock. Rolling Stones, the Kinks, The Who (well, the who remained constant and always will) and Neil Young and Crazy Horse.

First semester of Sophomore year was nothing but Brit-pop and British indie rock. Bands like the Smiths, The Stone Roses, Blur, Oasis, The Libertines.

And last semester was characterized by The White Stripes, The Strokes, Modest Mouse, Arctic Monkey and the Black Keys. Not really sure what they all have in common except that I like their music a lot.

So, my question to myself is this, what is going to be my new musical muse? So far an early front runner seems to be my rediscovery of Soul Music. When I used to listen to KRTH and oldies, Motown and Soul Music used to be my favorite kind of music, then I discovered rock that kind of went on the back burner but through a series of well times PBS specials and infomercials I have my interest rekindled.

But it’s a bit too early to say what my new obsession might be. Who knows, it might be Gangster Rap. Or maybe “Wierd” Al.

It’s Business Time

I need to get a couple of things out of the way tonight.

Lets start with poker – ugh. Thats all I can say about the month of August so far. I started playing more and more Sit and Goes and I was doing well, I had grinded my way up about $100 in about 4 days and then a couple of days ago I didn’t cash in 15 straight and lost it all back. talk about frustrating.

Second, I came up with a concept for a story on the way home from work tonight, its not a full fledged idea or narrative but just an idea. Let me preface it by saying that I seem to obsessed with choices and causality, its just a fascinating concept to me. Okay, on  with the idea.

Most humans live in a world in which they have no control over their lives. They are forced (literally) into situations in which they cannot escape or avoid. Any decision they need to make is already made for them; they cannot escape their predetermined path. But who created this destiny and this choice-less world? They do. Every ten years the are given a series of choices that will shape the next 10 years of their lives. They can see every possible consequence to their choices and every possible path. And once they chose how they are going to live the next ten years they can’t change it. Each person is seemingly given different choices and can’t accept input from any other person. But are the few choices they make really choices at all? Or are the choices they make predetermined as well?

I know, it sounds like something out of a George Orwell novel or The Giver (which I read in middle school) but I like the idea and think it can explore choices in a way which I haven’t though of before.

Which leads me to  my third topic of interest, choosing my favorite TV shows, past, present, and future.

Past – Any show that is no longer airing  new programming. Shows on DVD or in syndication count as long as no new episodes are being produced.

Twin Peaks – The OG OMFG show. A detective is called to the town of Twin Peaks after the brutal murder of Laura Palmer. Surrounded by a supernatural forest where “the owls are not what they seem” Twin Peaks, especially in the second season, defies explanation. When I first saw this show in my Film Aesthetics class two years ago I didn’t know what to think, and then I saw the rest of the shows and I was hooked. The mythology of the town was incredible, and the characters were fascinating. Its easy to understand why it’s such an influence on TV and the serialized drama. A show later on in my list is influenced by this program.

Keen Eddie – A New York cop is transferred to Scotland Yard in an energetic and stylistic fish-out-of-water/buddy cop show. Featuring that one guy who is literally in every single TV show and Sienna Miller this show first got me hooked on the absurd type of humor that I have grown to love. It really is a shame that this show is no longer because I really think that this show was brilliant.

Present Shows

Lost – A plane crashes on a deserted island where people go into Lord of the Flies mode, deception and chaos are rampant. Only problem is the island they are on? Well, its plagued by a mysterious monster that eats people, and mysterious distress calls in French. Oh, and they are not alone. Others live on the island, and they aren’t happy about intruders. Introduce a mythology to rival Middle Earth and some really freaky time traveling and you have the most brilliant show on TV. This clip will sum up why I love this show.

Mad Men – If Twin Peaks began the Television as Art movement Mad Men has perfected it. Every episode of this show is so expertly crafted its impossible not to be amazed at the art of the film making. The writing is superb and the characters are all at once likable and detestable. I am still blown away by how intricate the story lines are yet how simple they appear. The story telling ability is rivaled only by show above.

Future – I have hope for a show called Glee.

Let me show you a clip

Stars Aligning

Every once and a while when I sit down and play poker it feels like I can’t do anything wrong. The moments are few and far in between. I can literally count them on one hand. The first time was at Storms house and I called his all-in bet with a King high and caught him bluffing. The second time was my fourth time at Chumash, and even though I lost, I still played excellent. One time at the poker league a couple of months ago. And tonight.

Let me tell you about tonight. For the first two hours of the tournament the table was short handed. Obviously playing online has taught me a great deal about short handed action. Sit and Goes are all about short handed play as well as he 6-max cash games. So I would say that I have a lot of experience playing short handed and heads-up. In fact, heads up NL Holdem is probably my best variation of NL Holdem.

But we are six handed for most of the night and I completely ran the table over. It wasn’t that I was getting cards, because I wasn’t, but I was playing really well. I was sitting at a table with a couple of people I’ve never played with before and only one person who knew my game. The person who knew my name (correctly) assumed that I was a tight and aggressive player and that a raise from me would mean that I have a big hand. The other players had no idea what to expect.

My strategy is, as always, to amass a pretty decent sized chip stack before the break. I’m not into gambling away large amounts of chips so I prefer to go it the old fashioned way, nickel and diming my way up, taking down the large pot when I have an edge. I decided to vary my strategy tonight – instead of playing my typical TAG style and taking down a small number of small pots and small number of large pots, I decided to take down a large number of small pots.

Guess, what, it worked like a charm. If the pot was folded around to me I would open with any two cards. If it was limped to me, I would raise with pretty much any ace, pair, suited gapper, suited connector and just about any suited king or queen. In short, I was playing like a maniac. It worked out. The player who knew how I played thought I had a hand each time since he knew how I played and those who didn’t know how I played thought I was a maniac online player. Against the known player, lets call him Scott, I was seated on his left. He would raise my blind, I would raise him, he would call my blind, I would raise him. I was relentless with the pressure.

Against the other players, I had a pretty good feel for how they played. For the most part, they were all pretty tight and pretty passive and weak. Easily pushed off hands. I wouldn’t just fire one continuation bet, i would fire two bullets. I would just check, I would check raise. With my strategy of opening with ATC if it was folded to me, they could never put me on a hand. If I flopped trip ducks after raising with J2 I would get paid off every time.

Of course, once the table was 9 handed again the fun stopped and I reverted back to my TAG ways. But the damage was done. the other players thought I would raise with anything and paid off a couple of big hands.

I finally went broke on a standard all-in shove and call spot and wound up coming in 8th place tonight, but as long as i’m happy with the way I played, thats all that matters. And tonight, not only was it good poker I was playing, but it was some of the greatest poker I was playing, because I was playing the table, and not my cards.

Hey, Jo

Jo,

I think you might be reading my blog. If you are, thats cool, Just know that it’s a bit creepy to google my name and see what pops up. However, I guess if you are going to cyber stalk me this is probably the best way. I won’t be friends with you on facebook, I know you will just tell my mom everything that I say and do on there.

Enjoy Your Trip to New York,

Kevin

Enough ranting.

The month of June and the first part of july were kind of torturous for me. I was working at my dads ofice scanning in literally tens of tousands of documents into a computer. Imagine 8 hours of sitting in front of an office desk doing nothing but scanning in documents. Its not fun. It just makes me more and more certain that I do not want to spend my entire adult life in an office. Its just so boring and tiresome. I had to resort to watching poker online, not playing, that would be really really bad. But even that could amke things unboring. So, fortunately thats been over and done wiht. Now starts the second part of my summer – the rest of it.

What should i do? The whole spending “8 hours a day at the office” thing really tired me out so that I had no desire and no focus other than doing mindless activities such as watching TV.

I have about a month before school starts up again, so I could start working on my penmanship again. Or I could just veg and occasionally work (20 hours a week) or I could actually do something with my time…

I choose the former…My writing is really really bad.