You might think that a day spent running around as much as today was would yield some remotely interesting news to post. And yet. So here are some random bits of my day:

Vic bought me lunch today to celebrate his first paycheque on his new contract.

I have signed up for something called Blogshares. I have no idea how this works, but for some reason they already had my site on record and worth a whopping $26.14. Again, no idea what this means at all.

I am indeed sore from hockey yesterday, and I am willing to bet tomorrow will be worse. I am reconsidering my “it’s a good kind of hurt” declaration.

I would like to say that we’re making a concerted effort at band practices to identify the weak spots in our performances and tightening up the whole kit and kaboodle into a finely tuned rock machine. I would like to.

Pete has invited me to the Neil Young / Lucinda Williams show in June. I am leaning towards yes – $50 tickets (probably closer to $65 after Ticketbastard) isn’t horrible.

517 wants to cover the song from this week’s Strong Bad email. I have to say, I can’t argue – it’s a really strong tune. I bet I will be relegated to handclaps.

We are having a bitch of a time getting the www.lakeholiday.net URL pointed at my webspace. The DNS seems to have propogated for *some* ISPs, but not all. For example – at home, I can view it fine and pings go to the same server as chromewaves (which is where it’s supposed to) but at work? File not found, domain not found, etc etc. My webhosting also does not see the name as pointed at them, nor do any WHOIS queries. This is fucked up.

How can it be April already?

np – Jeff Tweedy / Chelsea Walls

It’s snowing. Why the hell is it snowing? I did not consent to this.

Someone will pay.

np – Baxter Drury / Len Parrot’s Memorial Lift

Went and played hockey today with SUDEEP, who complains that I never mention him in my blog. This was the most exercise I’ve gotten in a dog’s age, and I felt it. First shift was fine. Four or five shifts in, I was dizzy. I am so lame. I even turned my ankle, and it hurts. But on the positive side, these guys play every Sunday and anyone can show up. I may have found a new regular activity. On the negative side, I am sooo going to be feeling this tomorrow. But it’s a good kind of hurt… except the ankle. That’s a bad kind of hurt.

Also went and caught 25th Hour at The Royal. It was not what I’d thought it would be. It’s a smaller film than I expected, the story of one man’s last day before he goes to prison for seven years. I had figured it’d be more along the lines of a caper, maybe Edward Norton would come up with some masterful plan to escape his certain fate by playing his enemies off of one another. Instead, it’s primarily a character study of one man dealing with the impending consequences of the choices he’s made, and how he and the people around him spend the last day of his life. The film also functions as a sort of allegory for New York pre and post September 11th – the aftermath of that day hangs over the whole film like a shadow. I couldn’t appreciate the full depth of what Lee was trying to convey, but the imagery of Ground Zero and the towers of light, for example, were pretty stirring in and of themselves.

So yeah – while it wasn’t the thriller I’d maybe signed up for, it was definitely a more thought-provoking movie and all in all, a better movie. Good performances all around. Philip Seymour Hoffman was particularly impressive, playing against type as an awkward, nebbish, sweaty mouth-breather. Ha.

np – The Posies / Dream All Day – The Best Of The Posies

So I defy you to find me a more contentious mainstream film in the last few years than Bowling For Columbine. Everyone either loves it or hates it, and based on which side of that particular fence a person falls on, you can probably get a good idea of how they voted in the last few elections. Me, I enjoyed it as how I reside on the same general ideological turf as Michael Moore. While watching it, I laughed at the points I was supposed to laugh, felt disgust towards the villains of the piece, empathy for the victims. I walked out of it, however, with a definite sense of having been manipulated. There’s not much doubt in my mind that Moore plays fast and loose with the facts to make his point, or that his grandstanding stunts are designed to draw as much attention to him as the causes he champions. What I hadn’t done before was taken the time to actually investigate the veracity of his claims. Thanks to an article in today’s Star, I was led to this page that rebutts and debunks some of Moore’s claims and supporting evidence. I’m well aware that the author probably has as much of a personal agenda as Moore, but I found a reasonably well-researched dissenting POV an interesting read. I would encourage fervent Moore supporters to at least have a look through some of the points presented. Don’t get me wrong – I still like Moore and I still like the fact that someone with his ideology has such a high profile in America these days when I think they need it – but I also think it’s important to remember that in all things, there’s what we believe, what they believe, and the truth, and far too often never the Twain shall meet.

Through the magic of archiving, you can see my initial impressions on Bowling For Columbine here.

np – The Cars / The Cars

This is neat – Will Sergeant from Echo & The Bunnymen is auctioning off a bunch of stuff – music and guitars – on ebay. But starting bids on some of those CDs at five pounds? Come on Will, that’s a little steep.