This movie is raking it in though. It was released 10 days ago and its STILL selling out every showtime. I’m sure they’ll win a ton of awards, the effects crew does deserve it.

I guess go see it, I dunno. It was alright.

As I said, this movie just should not have been made. It was a forced re-creation of the first one. Not a continuation of the story really, just a cheap imitation of the original. They wrote in a Mexican sidekick who takes on the part of Rocco from the first movie. He is supposed to be funny and the butt of several unfunny jokes. The whole comedy angle in the movie was terrible. So many failed attempts at humor. The first one was funny at a couple moments but focused more on being bad ass. ALL SAINTS DAY tried really hard to make us laugh and it just did not work.

Even the fight scenes/executions were second rate. There isn’t as much killing in this one, but the few killing scenes there are just fail to impress. They completely ripped off the big hotel execution scene from the first movie. They replaced Willem Dafoe with a semi-hot southern belle FBI agent who takes on the same part as Dafoe’s character in helping the boys do God’s work. The original three Boston cops are back in action and have WAAAAAY too much dialogue. They’re terrible actors and shouldn’t have more than a few lines each, but take on somewhat major characters in this one.

There isn’t much else to say about this. Its a bobo version of the first movie with poor acting all around and even worse writing. Really stereotypical roles and bad taste. The worst part of all is that they left it open for a third movie. Lets just pray that some vigilante fans execute the makers of this fraud before they start filming a third installment.

the other night Jason and I went on a double feature with lovely escorts Emily Streit and Sarah Serrano. we saw Inglourious Basterds and District 9. first film up was Inglourious Basterds. Emma and I had seen this already but were more than willing to see it again. I don’t think I need to harp much on this movie. but I’ll say this, if you like Tarantino flicks, you like this one. it goes along with his style perfectly: chapters, lots of character development and back story, narrative dialogue, and some intense gore. I think its easy for people to bash on Brad Pitt for whatever reason, but this guy made the movie. Lt. Aldo Raine was perfectly written and perfectly performed. Pitt’s role coupled with SS Colonel Hans Landa made this easily the best movie of the year for me. so without wasting words on details, just go see this movie. most of you already have I’m sure.

now onto District 9… I can not say enough how much I HATED this movie. believe me, I get it. I just wasn’t into it. now I’m not in on movies like Transformers and GI Joe and that sort, so I guess I just don’t care that “this movie is everything that Transformers 2 and G.I. Joe tried - and failed - to be.” I assumed Transformers and GI Joe would be awful movies, and so was this one. District 9 is supposed to be a social commentary on immigration and racism. imagine the opening scene from Scarface, where all the Cuban immigrants are living under the overpass in a government camp, or like in the 1940’s when America rounded up all its Japanese citizens. it also happened in South Africa in 1966, 60,000 people where removed from their homes and the Sixth Municipal Discrict of Cape Town South Africa was deemed a “whites only” district. this is where the movie gets its title and inspiration from I’m sure. so South Africa has 1.8 million aliens living in camps and the locals are pissed. the aliens are becoming a financial and social burden so they try to relocate the aliens to a “camp” outside of the city and away from the masses. so without giving too much away, somehow in all the relocating hubbub shit gets raw and people/aliens/buildings get blown the fuck up. while I have several problems with this movie I did like that certain scenes and sets look really awesome, Peter Jackson made a cool looking movie. I thought it was funny that some of the aliens were slightly stereotyped and really unintelligent. I like that there’s no star power, there’s not one actor I’ve ever seen before in this one. that’s about where the love fest ends for me in this one. its shot in that faux documentary style where they think its a good idea to shake the camera around the entire movie so it makes me feel nauseous just looking at the screen. the trailer told me next to nothing about the movie, I’m not sure if I actually dislike that yet, I think its almost smart. because if I’d known the plot to this movie I definitely would not have wasted my time on it. the plot was just retarded. so many flaws. they find these aliens on a ship that’s just broken down. they look like they’re sick and starving so they bring em down to earth to save them. 20 years later they’re still stuck with em and they’ve become a giant pain in the ass…

ok, but they’ve got 1.8 million aliens living in third world/concentration camp type conditions. these aliens are making some next level weapons the whole movie, and they just get their weapons confiscated the whole time? bullshit. there’s 1.8 million of these mother fuckers. and they’re making weapons that are leveling entire buildings and melting people to pools of blood and shit… 1.8 million of em. you think some South African military group is gonna be able to contain that? really? no. these dudes would just take over the whole world if they wanted to. I think the biggest problem i have with the movie is that it’s made me question the company that I keep. my friends are idiots. every person that I’ve talked to about this movie, and given my very enthusiastic thumbs down, has been extremely surprised with the bad review. apparently everyone who is anyone is raving about this movie. literally everyone that I’ve told that I hated District 9 has either argued that it was amazing or replied with something like “Really?!? I’ve heard soooo many awesome things.” or “Man, I was really looking forward to that movie.” or “Damn, Jerry said it was great.”. well by all means, don’t take my word for it. I’m just one viewer. it seems like the general consensus is that this movie was very good. I hated it.

tonight i had dinner reservations for 10 at Volcano Sushi & Grill. it was nice. i was vegetarian for maybe 7 years until this year, i started eating fish. id never had sushi before and to be quite honest i was terrified and disgusted by the idea of it. but due to peer pressure i gave in and had my first experience tonight. it was good.

on the advice of my personal sushi mediators, Brittney, John and Lauren, i kept my order simple, yet daring for a sushi novice such as myself. i ordered a “dinner box?” which included a soup, salad, and 3 choices of sushi type things off this huge list. i chose spicy tuna rolls, volcano rolls, and shrimp tempura rolls. it was a lot more food than i expected really. $20 got me a soft drink, a soup, a salad and this:id taken a couple bites by the time the picture was taken. i liked it all. the tuna rolls were my least favorite. i really liked the tempura and volcano rolls though. i had to force it all down, it was surprisingly filling. MSG? and i don’t throw away food so… I’m stuffed. i guess since we were there with such a large party, and the economy sucks they gave us some free appetizers to butter up hopeful return customers. it worked, the appetizer was awesome. i don’t remember exactly what it was called. happy face, or happy feet or something. it was really good though, actually, that was the best thing i ate. all in all i enjoyed it and will eat more sushi in the future. it was pretty good. not TOO expensive really. backed.

I’m told by certain food critics that Volcano is not the place to break greens if you’re a sushi noob. but i thought it was good, so hopefully it only gets better as you graduate onto better sushi joints.

so I’ve been told several times by numerous people that it was haircut time for ol’ dobson here, so i gave in to peer pressure and got an edge up. i only get haircuts like 3 or 4 times a year, and i wear a hat everyday, so these things have never been a big deal to me… until now.

I’m in love with my hair “stylist”. she’s cut my hair once before, and i wrote this about her on a local message board that i frequent when i was asking other gentlemen where they get their hair did…

“Ok, I had some time to kill and was in Hilltop so I went into Dimensions Hair Studio. It was very good. A cute girl named Kelly did my hair. She washed it and gave me a DANK head massage(I’m not gonna lie, I was slightly aroused) and did a pretty good job on my hair. I detected some quality flirtyness, but that’s their job I guess kinda. Fuck it, she was into me. It was $20 though, I’m used to a $12 haircut. But she did a good job, I will return for the happy ending and her phone number in 2-3 months.

Oh, side note… while doing my hair she gave her standard small talk “what’re you doing tonight?” and I said going to eat and see some bands play. And she asked what bands, what type of band or some crap. And I said “oh, I doubt you’d heard of them, just some loud rock bands” and she says she’s into loud music and that’s the stuff she listens to and that I shouldn’t judge her by her barbie doll hair stylist facade because she just has to look/act that way for work and she told me to check out some band but their name went in one ear and out the other…  but I think she was just trying to get me to ask her to come to dinner/show. Thinking about it, she was def into me. She called me Johnny Cash when my hair was slicked back and she almost landed me for that one.”- july 14, 2008

so today i went back for round two… of course i had an appointment to ensure that i would be seen by kelly again. let me be more descriptive about her looks since this is a full on audit of this place. shes short, “thick” dare i say a little “chunky” without meaning it negatively? has some meat or baby fat on her bones, she reminds me of nicole kidman if she were a foot shorter and were really into Wawa subs or something. ok, you get it. so i sit down, she asks what we’re doing with my hair, bla bla bla. while she’s going to town on my head, she asks if I’m a hockey fan, i answered that i was a very casual fan and barely follow at all, but can get into the sport. she starts telling me how awesome the flyers/caps game last night was, which leads to other sports talk. she says she’s a fan of all the Philadelphia teams, loves the eagles, could watch football all day, every day, and doesn’t get into basketball really because “the Sixers suck”. all of this is said while i am not with a Phils hat, or any philly paraphernalia. she asks what teams i back, and i have to tell her of my unhealthy obsession with the Philadelphia Phillies, so we talk baseball a bit, then she goes back to football, saying “she cant stand Andy Reid”… so legit. i disagree with her, but I’m really into how SPORTS! she is. eventually the haircut comes to an end and i must go. pretty much end of the story until 3 or 4 months of hair growth call me back into her chair, where i can talk sports like I’m hanging out with dudes on a sunday afternoon, get my head massaged like I’m in a fucking spa, and get hit on by an attractive young lady.

so the long/short of it is this, Dimensions pretty much is the Hooters of haircuts. all the stylists are pretty attractive, and you can go in there, talk hockey and get hit on. mike lawson seal of approval.

before i get into this record let me say that i do like both of these bands… you wouldnt think so after you read what i have to say about this record.

i’ll start with End of a Year. for those who may not know them, they play a rare form of punk that isnt played/appreciated enough nowadays in todays punk rock scene. its a “revolution summer” vibe that gets compared to Rites of Spring and Embrace a lot, its a fair comparison. now the record…they only did one song. lame. it does ring in at over 5 minutes, but i dont want that from this band. i dont want it from any band really. the only good song thats over 5 minutes long is Boston- Foreplay/Long time. i just dont like this song. boring. long. same riff over and over. poor recording quality for them, but that may have even been intentional. while the vocals for this band have always seemed whiney to me ive never had a problem with them until hearing this song. it just got annoying. the song lacks energy and i dont think it is well written enough to just be the laid back chiller of a song that i think they were going for.

no onto Shook Ones… this band dubbed themselves a Kid Dynamite/Lifetime worship band and its exactly what they are. this record is no different. short, fast, melodic punk songs, full of “whoooaaooooo”s and sing a longs. they bring 4 songs ringing in at barely over 4 minutes total. once again im disappointed. these songs just seem thrown together for the sake of making a record. all of them, with the exception of “Asterisk”, just dont seem finished. i think they just tossed together 4 “fast” riffs and a couple melodic parts and went to the studio. it just seems like a really poor effort on both bands parts. i know theyre friends and they just wanted to do a record with their buddy bands but still, shouldnt you put some thought into the songs and make them good still? maybe i’ll be alone in this one, but i think these are the worst songs either band has done.

ok, so i bashed this record enough. i feel like i should say how i feel about both bands, excluding these bad songs, so it doesnt seem like im killing them. i really like both of these bands. end of a year play a style that you dont hear very much right now, and they play it well. ive seen them live a couple of times and their singer always has great things to say between songs whether its explaining lyrics or just talking about whatevers on his mind. it never sounds rehearsed or like some bullshit speech and i love that. theyre energetic and fun to watch play, and most of their songs are really well written and unique from what every other punk band is doing now. shook ones are no different, they are really fun guys. ive seen them play HUGE shows at fests and ive seen them play the smallest show and they act the same on stage no matter how many people are watching them. they just come to play. they were supposed to play norfolk last year on halloween and the show was shut down before they played, and outside jamie seagraves was joking with me about how they should just come play in our practice space and one of the band members overheard us and they all got really excited and wanted to do it. so they drove to chesapeake and played a storage shed to 15 people. thats awesome. most bands wouldve packed up with their nose in the air and said “fuck this town”, but they just wanted to play.

so in closing both of these bands are really good, but this record is terrible.

now i leave you with this…

Went to the State Fair last month for bunnies, cowboy boots and fried foods. This stuff – baby livestock, giant pumpkins, fried anything, shami cloth demonstrations, lionhead rabbits, potato art contests… is what separates the State Fair from the shitty carnivals that show up at Mt Trashmore. The “kill you” rides, paying to view a midget on a couch, and amazing dayglow outfits are also worth mentioning.

This state fair I had my first experience with fried soda – nasty. I thought for some reason I’d be able to drink it (how do you fry a beverage??), but it’s actually soda syrup inside batter, then fried. I think. Like a dirty sugar nugget. It was edible, but nothing I’d ever want again.

After eating every fried vegetable I could find, I tried to go to the bathroom. This lady’s stall door was wide open and I saw her vagina so I held my pee until we got home.

Today I audit the Painted Lady Tea Room’s GIFT SHOP. Fruitiest audit on record.

I’ve liked hot tea for a while, but recently been wanting to step it up and brew loose tea, and possibly even display tea (like in Marie Antoinette). Saturday Mike (not Lawson) took me on a hunt for loose tea. After a few failed attempts we ended up at the Painted Lady on the advice of his friend. Apparently it was Special Hat Day, and I was so relieved that we only had to go to the gift shop upstairs. Fancy hat people are intimidating! I couldn’t take any pictures inside because it was all hot and balmy and small and full of teddy bears dressed in clothes. The gift shop was occupied by ladies fanning themselves as well as a woman I mistook for a mannequin. I loved it! I want to go back for lunch, or afternoon tea even! We bought two kinds of tea, Apricot and Darjeeling Gold Tipped black tea (i think that’s what it was called). The apricot smelled good, but they both tasted pretty much the same. I probably don’t have a sophisticated palette, YET.

so ive had this idea for a long time now, to audit justin timberlake. just him as a person. i think hes cool as crap. in the ensuing audit i will challenge all haters, and for the lovers just give you a general appreciation entry and some funny things to look at.

1. hes a great musician. emily has this CD of his, “justified”, and she knows every word to every song. i gathered a few choice lyrics that i will share with you now to back up this claim.

“dont need no Mabeline, cause youre my beauty queen. dont need no L’ Oreal, cause bitch youre bad as hell.”

“lets hit the floor and cause a scene, get real wet if you know what I mean.”

now that ive typed that out, and read it out of context, its not that cool. but seriously, listen to the CD, its good, hes smooth, its hot. hes just a feel good, smooth mothafucka. its like if Prince, R. Kelly, and that slutty blond chick from desperate housewives all hooked up in some alley somewhere and he was the strange offspring. all that sexuality and good taste had to come out somewhere, and it just busted its nut right onto your ipod.

also on the music front. justin timberlake and andy samberg won an Emmy Award, for best comedic song. with this instant classic “dick in a box”. seriously, it won an emmy.

2. hes funny as balls. hes hosted SNL a bunch, been in a few movies. hosted the ESPYS, was on one of very few enjoyable episodes of the MTV series PuNkeD, and seems to just be a generally humorous guy. the following are a few pictures and youtube clips to back up this claim. i really suggest watching these videos from the ESPYS especially if youre a sports fan. but even if youre not, watch. sorry, i couldnt find any SNL clips on youtube.

and as if 2 very strong points werent enough i give you three…

3. the ladies. justin timberlake has plowed through the finest of hollywood cooze. from britney to camron diez to finally end up at this(for now).

jessica biel.

he must be pretty cool right?

i only played with this thing for about 30 minutes, but i think its really cool and convenient. my only beef was youre only allowed to skip 6 songs per hour for each “station” and its really hard to not just skip when you get to a song because youre really curious of what song is gonna be next. you dont really need to load up your phone with music to be able to jam out which is cool as crap, and i wouldnt think apple would be cool with that since with this program you dont really need to spend as much money in the itunes store. i support this program to the fullest.