A Family Back Together

After what has seemed like an eternity, my cousin has come back from Iraq and I went back to Houston this past weekend specifically for his "surprise" homecoming party. It was definitely worth the 6 hour round-trip drive. On the left you can see him at age 8 and on the right you can see what he looks like today. I put these up because it's so crazy to know this guy who has known me since I was born has done his country proud by serving it out there on the frontline and even representing Indian Americans well (supposedly, he was the only Indian there). It was surreal for us to all see him again and it makes you realize how important some people can be to us. You just don't realize it until they're not readily at hand anymore to see or speak with. I'm sorry, it's cliche, but it is really important. At every family event we have had there's been a huge hole where he would usually be, and I could feel the energy in the air of having a family back together in one piece again; it was quite a cool experience. I decided that the only way I was going to have fun and not be stressed was through booze, and it worked quite well though I had four different drinks and was on the brink of throwing up quite a few times (I had a full dinner, as well). I hadn't danced like that in a good long way (we hired some dude named DJ Rocky to handle the music), and it made me realize that I should be doing a whole lot more of that in Austin. If any of you catch me not having fun when I party (i.e. keeping to a group rather than dancing) then just smack me around a bit, will ya? I ended the weekend with an ACM potluck tonight, and I'm still stuffed!

It doesn't help that I spent a paragraph on personal stuff when there's so much other stuff going on, but there's not much in movies anyway so you'll have to just bear with it. When Napster went legit I think some companies were hoping that it would come back just as it was before: a P2P service, but with payment. That may just may come true with Shawn Fanning's newest offering, Snocap. It blocks copyrighted downloads either for payment or because it cannot be traded. There are concerns over whether this is a feasible competitor with normal P2P, but if iTunes has survived this one may be able to, too. Google has been buying up dark fiber like crazy recently, but why? Robert Cringley seems to believe that they're trying to create densely populated data centers connected through the fiber optics cables, which means that they'd be able to process Internet data much faster and spit out results more easily, and hence stuff like Internet TV. This is all still top secret though, so in what capacity are Cringley's reasonable presumptions correct? Blizzard is being sued by the parents of a 13 year-old boy who jumped from a high location to his death, supposedly because of a scene in World of Warcraft. If you die in the game, you're a ghost and have to be resurrected, but if your son believes that then maybe you're a pretty crappy parent. Just maybe. Lastly, Jack Thompson's book is getting totally owned by gamers and liberals alike on Amazon.com and he is pissed. He's threatening legal action on Amazon.com for not regulating the page enough, but I'm not sure what he's planning on nailing them for. In case you skip the article, here's my favorite part:

"Out of Harm's Way has likewise been plagued with a slew of negative tags on Amazon, as well as linkage with books on gay erotica, presumably caused by mischievous back-and-forth clicking between Thompson's book and various sex manuals offered for sale by Amazon."

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire managed to snag over $101 million over the 3-day weekend, which surpasses all its predecessors, and it surprised many pundits who felt that its PG-13 rating would hold it back. I knew it would do well because of all the excitement, and I'm impressed that Walk the Line managed to follow right behind it at $22.4 million. I wish I could say that the box office is back, but it's only a temporary boost because of a few really good movies being released and they'll probably maintain their strength next weekend against new movies that are either lame or not well-known. If you Harry Potter fans don't know what to do with yourselves you can check out IGN's good list of their top 25 fantasy films and then head to your local video store. Since there's no other movie news to speak of I might as well point you guys in the direction of a few geek babe calendars, which I just find funny because no one wants to date geeks and all of a sudden they're hot now? Well the ladies of Geek Gorgeous and Girls of Geekdom really are hot, but if they were really geeks they'd be interested in guys like me. My head is totally going to explode here.

And now the time has come for some Unconscious Mutterings:

I say ... and you think ... ?

1. Heads up::7up (remember that game from elementary school?)
   
2. Kicker::Punt
   
3. Aggressive::Mean
   
4. Getting ugly::Wild
   
5. To be continued::Suspense
   
6. Twist::Lime
   
7. Form::Woman
   
8. On the road::Me today!
   
9. Import::Car magazines with more chicks than cars
   
10. Flowers::Pretty