Hate Life, Will Travel

Yesterday I spent ~15 hours working on my house’s plumbing, and as you’d expect I’m now covered in small cuts, scrapes, bruises, and one burn. The worst of these, functionally-speaking, is the side of my right thumb, which is exactly where I hit the spacebar while typing.

So writing this is a battle between mindfullness, negative reinforcement, and almost a lifetime of touch typing. It’s going badly.

Also, we still don’t have water. There are four outlets (two to sinks, two to toilets) that use compression fittings and last night I managed to get one of them to go from “spraying water everywhere” to “works” at the end of my long shift. I hate compression fittings.

Now that I think about it, the only thing I like about plumbing at all is running pipe, soldering, and doing the planning, because they’re binary: they either work or you screwed something up. This compression fitting type stuff, where I fix it, it leaks, I fix it, it leaks… oh, how I hate it.

Came across this while searching Google for a paper:

I noticed today that one of my favorite movies is available on Netflix’s “Watch Instantly” (which is a DRM-ridden horror show, but anyway), and I wanted to recommend it if you’re on Netflix (and have Internet Explorer and can use Watch Instantly) or are willing to go out and rent it.

It’s a 1974 crime flick about hijacking a subway car, based on a book. It’s really sweet: it’s tightly plotted, it’s funny, it’s got tension and plot twists (which are not dumb or overly cute), and it has Walter Matthau as a worn police lieutenant and includes what I’d argue is one of the single best lines in any crime drama.

The interesting thing the movie reminds me of is something Pauline Kael used to write about: the value of workmanship. She repeatedly wrote in favor of movies being made simply, without needless directorial embellishment, and Pelham One Two Three is a great example of how it can work. Joseph Sargent’s work up to that point was undistinguished: if you look him up on IMDB, he’s got a ton of credits but there’s nothing that hints his next film will be a four-star masterpiece.

But here, it works: he lets the script and the actors do the lifting, and the story plays out simply. Sometimes, it pays to tell a story with a maximum of economy, which is what I try to remind myself of when I’m writing fiction.

Of course, the movie is being remade by Tony Scott with a cast of stars, due out in 2009. I wonder, though — if you released both versions at the same time, putting out the 1974 version as a period piece, or an “homage to 70s cop movies” or something, I wonder if the older one could compete.

Anyway, Derek says “check it out” if you haven’t already.

Look up something popular, say… iPods. Go the actual category for MP3 Players > iPod. Even pick a particular model.

I did this with the nano, as I was considering replacing my venerable one. Searched for items with the “buy it now” option, sorted by price+shipping, lowest. 1,349 items.

The first two pages are all miscategorized items. And of course, ebay makes it hard for you to report those. You might get to some broken ones if you’re lucky. It’s all skins, batteries, adapters — everything that shouldn’t be there. But they can’t be bothered to police even the top-tier categories they spend money advertising on Google with. It’s crazy. Lord forbid people be forced to put their ipod cases in “Consumer Electronics > MP3 Accessories > Cases > Apple iPod” where I might go to shop for those.

It’s like if I went to Target and went to the housewares section, to the toaster aisle, and instead of toasters, there were 900 people trying to sell me bread, extension cords, power adapters, non-conductive forks for sticking into the toaster…. faaaaaaaaaaaaahk, man, it’s just ridiculous.

And now I can’t shop on Amazon, because I’m mad about the whole print-on-demand issue… drives me nuts. Is it really that much easier and cheaper to run a maddening cesspool that drives people like me away that it makes it worthwhile?

After over a week of pretty much coughing continuously, I have to say my abs haven’t looked this good in years. I’m two into my six pack, and I’m betting a couple more days and I’ll be showing another two. I should write some kind of best-selling fitness book. “The Sickness Solution: Your Shortcut to Losing Weight and Looking Great”.

Sure, I might have pneumonia, but isn’t that worth it?