Christmas Done, Birthday's a Comin'

Got pictures down below the post!!

Having three Christmases can be a little draining, but they were a lot of fun. At Karissa's mom's place, there was only 5 1/2 of us, which made things a little simpler, quieter. Her mom got me a Mr. Beer Kit, which I didn't mention last post because at the time April was still looking for one for Kevin. At our place, it was just the three of us, an intimate little holiday for just mom, dad, and daughter. At my dad's place there were at least 10 of us running around the place, shaking things up. We were there the weekend after Christmas. If we had been there on Christmas, our little trio would have made 25 total at my sister's place.
I got a lot of cool stuff, like a reverb pedal (which I've been wanting for a while), bowling shirts, a Tom Waits CD, and the movie Six String Samurai plus soundtrack from Jas. Karissa got her breadmaker and a new toaster oven (trust me, these things are awesome to her).

Last Saturday night, we hit 11th Frame with Tab, Derek, April, Kevin, and Blake, with a visit from April's sis Alicia. We didn't have the opportunity to get started on Derek's cardboard bass, but that'll come soon. We had a lot of fun, and learned what Derek considers a 'prude'. G'head, ask him about it.

This weekend marks the beginning of my last 4-page comic. I like this one much, MUCH more than Red Riding Hood. I have an 8-page comic coming soon, but the good news is that all 8 pages will be posted at once so you can read the whole story right away. That sounds nice.

Holiday news: My birthday is coming soon, and I want you all to think about your schedules. It's January 27, sunday, but I'll be celebrating it the weekend before, probably Saturday, in Devils Lake, probably at 11th Frame. I haven't written anything in stone yet, though, so stay tuned for any possible updates. I'll forgive you if you can't make it, but you'll owe me a spanking.

What am I watching?
Six String Samurai- Come on people! This is an awesome fucking movie! I saw it over a year ago and fell in love with the music of the Red Elvises. Jas bought it for me for Christmas, along with the soundtrack, so we watched it that Sunday before the Vikings sucked all the fun out of that Sunday. He thought it was alright (just alright?), but dad and everyone else who decided to start watching it hafway through missed the backstory and started making comments about stuff they didn't get. My mom must have the memory of a baby when she watches movies, because when a scene with a 4-person metal band only showed 3 members, she became confused and asked where the 4th went. She's not senile or anything yet, she's just used to Mel Gibson movies.
Anyway, the backstory: in the '50's, Russians bombed us, taking out our entire country-except Vegas. Elvis expanded his kingship from rock n roll to government. Zoom to present day (1998): Elvis has died and left no hier to the throne. This news reaches the outlands and causes numerous pretenders to begin their trek to Vegas. The main character, Buddy, is one such pretender, armed only with a 1957 semi-hollowbody gibson and a tattered sword. Death and his heavy metal band are also on the make for Vegas and see Buddy for his awesome skills, so they want him gone. That's really all I'm gonna tell you at this point. It's one of my favorite movies, and the soundtrack is equally fuckin awesome. The Red Elvises rule.
Paradise Now- Two childhood friends are recruited for a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv. They're given one night to be with their families (the families have no idea). The border crossing goes awry, and one of the guys goes missing. This movie gets into the mind of these two guys and shows all the conflicts going through their heads from before they're notified of the order, to a pretty wicked ending. It was hard to follow because it's not in english, but it turned out to be a cool movie.
Grand Theft Auto- Not ANYTHING like the game 20 years its junior. This one has Ron Howard! Derek warned me about this one, but I didn't listen. I've been pleasantly surprised by TCM underground before, right? Well, this wasn't very good. A rich girl wants to marry a 'wrong side of the tracks' type boy (Ron Howard), her parents refuse to consent, she steals daddy's car and the two go on a roadtrip to vegas to get hitched. Her dad blows a gasket, contacts his "people", gets them on her trail. The girls real fiance (an arranged thing) gets all whiny and crashes a bunch of cars trying to chase after them and a radio dj follows them in a helicopter and bugs them like a paparrazzo and they all end up in a big derby and everybody dies. No, nobody dies, I just wich they did. Ron howard marries the girl, her dad sees the former fiance for the whiny little momma's boy he is, everyone lives happily ever after, including the dj, who crashes through a trailer into a pool. Yeah, he really does that.
The Goebbels Experiment- I didn't realize at first that this was a documentary. It was still cool, though, because Kenneth Branagh narrated (good German accent), and because since Goebbels wrote EVERYTHING down, there is a lot narrated directly from his diaries. One thing is for sure. Goebbels is a drama queen. He suffered from depression, he was a womanizer, and he was paranoid. He wrote it all down, and apparently thought he was a classical poet.
Doorway to Hell- I accidentally caught this on TCM one night. It turned out to be a cool movie with an awesome ending. Made in 1930, it was James Cagney's second movie (he's in a supporting role). The movie is a bout a gangster trying to get out of the business by rallying all the bosses together and making them play nice, kind of like what Charles Luciano did. Some bosses don't like the "truce", and try to kinap his little brother, accidentally killing him. He gets his own revenge, but soon realizes how futile the whole game is. For 1930, it's an excellently written movie.