Resident Appreciation Trip and More!

It's been busy this past week or so. Last weekend was our annual "Resident Retreat" - which has been renamed to a "Resident Appreciation Trip" (codename: the RAT) this past year for semantic and administrative reasons. Readers may recall my previous post about last year's "retreat". Essentially its a 36 hour "steam let off" for over-worked, over-stressed residents. My first two years, we went up to Crystal Mountain. We'd get there on Saturday afternoon, taking a bus, start guzzling booze, then be up all night and have a complete drunk fest. The next day, those who survived their hangovers would trudge up the slopes and do some skiing and/or boarding.

Well this year we changed our gig a bit and decided to do some white water rafting. We drove down on a Saturday to the White Salmon River, roughly 3 hours away on the Oregon/Washington border. White Water rafting is a blast, but I'd never been in 39 degree water before, and was mildly apprehensive - it was about 50 degrees out and raining otherwise.

But we donned our wetsuits (complete with gloves and booties), broke up into 4 separate rafts, and hit the water. It was a blast. We hit about 4 or 5 class IV rapids which were sweet. Our guide intentionally flipped our boat on 1 of them, just for kicks. It was a pretty cool experience, going overboard and plunging into freezing water - I have vivid sequential memories of the whole thing.

I was in the front on the right side, which became the bottom side of the raft flip. The raft started to go up over. I looked up and saw the guy sitting opposite me start to come down - toward me. I put my hands up and then he collided down on me and we hit the water.

It was cold. I came up under the boat, the life vest more impedance than anything else as I tried to skirt out under the raft and get my head completely out of the water. I didn't have a good breath when we hit the water and I ran out of air quickly. I didn't panic, but I was a little hurried. Then coming up, I found it hard to breathe because of the freezing temperature, and ended up hyperventilating when I needed a big deep breath. I quickly calmed, and all resumed to normal. The adrenaline rush was pretty cool. The whole sequence replays in my head in slow motion when I think about it - full on movie style. Pretty fun.

Anyway, after the rafting, we hit up our campsite along the Columbia. The "camp site" was actually an RV site, and within view was a small town and even a gas station. Some people camped, but it was raining and so Gwen and I (and several other less intent campers) walked about a half mile away and got a hotel room. Back at the camp site, we started getting pretty toasted in classic fashion. Beer pong and the shot-ski were in full effect and it wasn't long before we were all ripped. Then we decided to descend on some poor townie bar hosting a karoake night. We took that place over and went nuts while the astounded townies looked on semi-speechless. Some had awkward smiles. All in all it was a good time. The next day we got up and drove home. I was pumped because I managed to moderate my alcohol intake pretty well and ended up only being tired and with barely a hangover the next day. (I'm learing!). Some pics below.



George (in ridiculous hat), Pete, and Me --- the big three


Preparing for the SHOT-SKI! (That's me, my chief resident, another resident (with sweet military eye wear), and George on the end)


Pete playing pool and me, uh, helping him... (guess who's drunk?)


Gwendolyn and I as the night winds down (note my sweet hat head)

Sonics Playoff

Last Tuesday, Pete, George, Cristin, and I went to the Sonics playoff game. It was game 2 against the Sacromento Kings. It was a fun time and the Sonics had a decisive win which was cool. The coolest thing however, was the Sonics Mascot, Squatch. He is by far the most entertaining mascot I've ever experienced. He's like a cross between Chewbacca, some generic Yetti, and Teenwolf. (How can that not be the sweetest? Answer: it can't) Anyway, Squatch was all pumped up, dancing around, dunking off trampolines at time outs, and basically going nuts. He also repelled in from the roof right before the introduction of the sonics line-up. That's right - a big yetti repelled in pumping his fists to start the game. The maneuver endeared me to him forever.

Before the 4th quarter, old Squatch rigged up some ridiculous stunt - a set up that would make Wile E. Coyote proud. He put himself in a massive slingshot under one basket, while wearing rollerblades, and then launched himself - he shot out across the court and finally off a ramp at about the top of the key on the other side. Then he threw the ball off the backboard dunk, flipped, and dunked it. Absolutely ridiculous. The crowd was going completely wild - led mostly by me. Check out his home page here.

I also have some pics from the game. Squatch is pretty much the coolest. Iwan - I'm looking in your direction on this.


Key Arena - Game on!


Ray Allen looking to drive


Squatch (blurry like those big foot photos) pumps up the crowd!


Squatch pulls on an official Teen Wolf move - fans are so pumped its madness (look at em!)




Finally, I'm typing this as I'm on the way to pick up one E. Roston for the weekend. His flight's been nice and delayed and he's coming in at midnight. Then we tear this town a new one. Late!

Bust A Move

Heh - I found this picture in my archive. I normally pass over it because its all blurred and hazy. But on closer inspection - it rocks! It's a pic of Papa Stup and Mama Stup getting Biz-nizzy on the dance floor my cousin's wedding. With a little imagination, I see it as an "edgy" advertisement for a middle aged dance club. (PS - My mom has lost some serious weight since this photo thanks to her sweet new exercise regimen (prescribed by me). Nice work Mama Stup!)

"Uhh, Michael - Do you see how I get freak-nasty on the dance floor with your mother?"

Enjoy.

Episode 2 - Electric Boogaloo

(First off, I almost never miss a chance to throw out the old "Electric Boogaloo" after a number 2 of anything, movie or otherwise. Second off, "Star Wars Episode 2 - Electric Boogaloo" actually deserves that sub-title more than any film (other than the original Breakin' 2 - Electric Boogaloo, that is). I'll explain why a little further below. Third off, there is more to this post than Episode 2 complaining. So, if you're not into that, its probably best to skip down to the bottom.)

But first the necessary pain. Sigh. I think I'm most disappointed because I thought that after lasting through Episode 1, Episode 2 would be a breeze. Unfortunately, that wasn't really the case. As it turns out, Episode 2 qualifies as "wincingly bad" in many parts as well. In fact, I would say that overall it seemed that for every Jar Jar uppercut and Jake Lloyd body blow that Episode 1 could muster, it was countered masterfully by a Hayden-tries-to-act sucker-punch and an evolving-love-story groin kick. And once again, it was I, Bitter Mick, caught in the middle, absorbing the damage like an early-round Rocky against a furious Ivan Drago.

To be a little more objective, I would classify Episode 2 as superior to Episode 1 in that it (and this is a compliment, I guess), didn't leave me feeling quite as hollow as the first. Everything seemed a little more serious, and the darkening tone was nice. Unfortunately and obviously, however, the humongous draw back to Episode 2 was the god-awful love story and horrific portrayal of Anakin Skywalker.

Hayden Christiansen is a terrible actor. I'll say that again because I think its important. Hayden Christiansen is a TERRIBLE actor. I felt like in many scenes that *I* could have literally gone out there and done a better job. Granted, the poor kid isn't helped a lick by any of the George Lucas Mc-dialogue (which is again absolutely atrocious - even Ewan McGregor stumbles over a few scenes in this one - saying some of the lines with a half-grimace indicating he's almost in pain to have to be reciting a specific line. But hey, that's what Lucas dialogue does - it causes pain.) So you take Christiansen and Lucas dialogue and you now have two bad things that go worse together. The problem becomes synergistic.

I can't believe how terrible Anakin's speaking scenes are. From top to bottom, they are all ridiculous. I was either shaking my head or laughing out loud (not a good thing) in at least 75% of his scenes. I think I have the problem of expectations creeping in here. When I saw the movie in the theater, I remember being ready for 2 straight hours of Jar Jar plays Anakin, and I remember being pleasantly surprised when that wasn't the case. This time, I went in thinking, "Ah, old Annakin isn't THAT bad." And that's why my spirits are now crushed. He is THAT bad. He's actually worse. I dare anyone to find a scene illustrating otherwise. That kid is terrible. He rattles off his lines like a broken speak-and-spell. And whereas Jar Jar is a stain on the first movie, Hayden Christiansen threatens to bring down an entire franchise. We can forget Jar Jar (as long as he doesn't rear his ugly head in Episode 3), but we're sort of depending on Christiansen. He is the cancer in the Star Wars locker room just when we need him for the big game. This is a very scary proposition.

The love story is a mess. Highly flawed scenes which must be mentioned but defy explanation or further comment include: The first time they meet again, the playing and tickling in the field, the first kiss where the music stops, the absurd sand is coarse but your skin is smooth speech, the stupid dinner where Anakin uses the force to help Padme eat fruit, the falling in love with Anakin because he just told me he slaughtered a whole village including women and children scene, and of course the "i truly, deeply, love you" scene before the arena battle. All of those scenes were completely terrible and/or utterly laughable. And now I'm moving on from that part of the story, before I start foaming at the mouth.

Anakin's descent. This is a good idea, and obviously essential, but it really falls short because of the bad acting. This kid just can't pull it off. So I'm left just sort of accepting that its happening, even though I can't really see it happening in any coherent way that isn't unintenionally comical. Would have been nice, but hey. That scene where he shakes in bed during his nightmare still gets me every time. And why, oh why, does Lucas cut away from the Sand People slaughter scene? That raw anger and power would have been great to help develop the Vader in Anakin. Ugh.

Other thoughts:

-Jango Fett - A cool character. Though I really would of preferred it if Lucas had let Boba Fett be Boba Fett and have some other cool charachter be the "other enemy" in this one. The Lucas obsession with making EVERYTHING come full circle for all six movies has gotten a little ridiculous, and this is the perfect example. I like both adult Fetts, but I'm not really a fan of watching "Lil' Boba" fire up the tail guns (isn't that cute how he helps out his old man in a fight?!?!) or giggle childishly while dad is "pulling out surprises" during space combat. And the whole death scene, with Lil' Boba holding his dad's head in his hands, is unnecessary. Come on. The motivation for Boba Fett has always been that he's a cold, hardened bounty hunter doing a job for hard cash, not some ridiculous revenge against jedis and their friends because they killed my dad sub-plot.

-Jango fights Obi Wan. Good scene. Love the rain.

-The clone world. Very well done. Cool Aliens. Cool escalation of music as the army is revealed. Good acting by McGregor as he goes through the place. This is the part of the movie where the Star Wars feel increases and my interest begins to emerge in the story.

-The Emperor. Again, nice work by this guy. No complaints.

-The arena scene. Another complaint of mine. Not a great scene. First, we're introduced to the scene with part of that heinous love story, which is bad enough. Then, the bad jokes come flying with lives on the line (though this is somewhat tolerable given its prevalence in earlier films). The ripped shirt was TOO gratutitous. These creatures were another Lucas showcase rather than anything all that interesting. (Compare this to the rancor scene in Jedi, which is hands down way cooler and more tense). And the jedi attack. I once called this "Jedis on Ice, the musical", and I still stand by that. Lots of generic jedis, whirling and fighting and twirling and prancing! (this is what I meant by the "electric boogaloo" scene, referred to earlier). The whole thing is too busy on the eye and not even all that engrossing. Its as if Lucas said "OK, for this scene, everybody who is a jedi should be spinning a lot and blocking fake lasers a lot with no real rhyme or reason - and pay no real attention to any direction or potential focus of battle - that's totally unimportant for you guys - my computers will do ALL that for us. OK, ready? Action!" Which leads to another of my gripes. When Luke Skywalker blocked lasers with his saber, it was cool, AND it actually took some effort. In these films, any ho-hum jedi can whirl about and block 20 lasers at a time with one hand all the while patting out a deep yawn with the other. But hey, as long as the digital overlay shots look sweet, who cares, right?

-Droid Factory. Um, video game. Next.

-Count Dooku. A solid character. Christopher Lee, of course, rocks. Terrible name - just ridiculous and unnecessary. Overall well done, though. (Although for fun watch even Lee trip up over the shit dialogue in that scene where he firsts encounters Obi Wan in all chained up. As you'll recall, he didn't have this problem in LOTR.)

-Yoda fight. I'm a big fan of this. Here is where Lucas hits paydirt. He has the wonderful universe filled with characters people are really into. He has the potential to do so much with them. And with yoda, here, he actually lives up to the potential dream. Total chills scene as Yoda comes hobbling into that hangar right after Dooku schools Anakin and Obi Wan. A little bit of the old Star Wars euphoria always creeps back in with this one. Worth the price of admission. I espeicially enjoy how Yoda simply tosses away everything Lee throws at him. Its the ultimate vehicle for the delivery of the "inner calm and peace overcomes all" message that Lucas tries to convey.

And that's about it. I could nitpick other stuff all day but even I get tired of that. Overall, I would say episode 2 starts to get on track and move in the right direction despite the utter failure of some critical story elements (read; Anakin's entire development). It finally starts to feel a little like Star Wars, which is hard to say for Episode 1, at least for me.

So in summation, Episode 2 is not very good, but it sucks less than Episode 1, which is a step in the right direction. And despite it all, I'm still pumped (but reserved) for Episode 3. And hey, that's positive, right?


Other Stuff

A couple of quick hits.

-This blog will be getting a new look soon. I've been debating, for some time now, about "going public" with this thing, and opening up it to more groups of peeps that I keep in contact with. It sort of coincides with my moving to Germany thing, but I've been thinking about it for a while. Regardless of what I decide, this whole thing will probably get a new format - and I have plans to set up the old discostup.com (for pictures, etc) a bit more to coincide with this idea. More later.

-My resident retreat is this weekend. White water rafting in south western Washington. It's gonna be fun. And cold. So very cold....

-This Onion Article is priceless. Check it out.

-Finally - Pics. Here are two pics from Whistler. One features me and my boy Pete (both drunk!) in a bar at Whistler. His taint is not visible in the photo. The other is from a "jaunty walking guy" street sign from Canada. Check out his Canadain strut, which gets me in stitches every time I see it. Canada is such a gold mine for instant comedy - I can't believe it. Iwan that's on you! Enjoy!

Episode 1 – I Weep for Lucas

In preparation for the forthcoming episode 3, which I do find myself actually somewhat excited for, I’ve decided to rip open some old wounds by sitting down and enduring Episode 1 and 2 again.

Today, mildly hungover and sort of tired, I re-watched “The Phantom Menace”. As I remembered, this film is pretty much depressingly bad. And of course, legend has it that nothing gets the good old fashioned BitterMick in his trademark lather more than this limp piece of over-digitized Lucas tripe.

But in watching today, I wasn’t left feeling bitter so much as just defeated and accepting. This movie is bad. Its not the “worst movie ever”, or even close, but it has so many fatal flaws that it makes me sigh when I see the good name of “Star Wars” attached to it. Some thoughts, good and bad: (but mostly bad)

-Jake Lloyd is terrible. I mean horrible. Combined with pretty-boy Hayden Christiansen, this tandem highlights the biggest problem with these new films – namely that the most important and central character is acted out so poorly that it threatens to pull the rug out from underneath the entire endeavor. And it doesn’t help that Lucas continually sabotages his own agenda by supplying his characters with perhaps the worst movie dialogue ever. EVER. Combining bad actors with bad dialogue makes for (as Papa Stup would no doubt point out) a bad movie.

“Are you an Angel?”

“Yiipppeee!”


-Those “Asian Aliens” (“They were speaking another language…”) are absolutely ridiculous.

-Natalie Portman is hideous as the queen/Padme/lame plot device. And she’s a good actress. Another testatment to Lucas’s inability to write even reasonable dialogue. And what’s up with that on again/off again crappy accent?

-Jar Jar. (Shudders). This fucken thing is so wincingly bad that I’m left simply shaking my head (and hoping the DVD has some “deleted” scene where Jar Jar gets viciously slaughtered). I mean, is there a more annoying and lame character in the history of cinema? I’m serious about this question.

-One of my other big contentions with episode 1 is that, aside from jedi dealings, it is utterly boring. Nearly half the movie revolves around trade talks, taxation laws and blockades, senate bureaucrat bickering, gungan laws/tribals. Completely uninteresting stuff. Of the “exciting” scenes, I find that the pod race falls way short – it essentially feels like it was conceived to launch a video game. The droid war against the gungans is just terrible. I’ve never seen any conflict lack tension to this degree.

-Writing and thinking about how bad Episode 1 is bums me out. I could go on and on (and have in the past). One last thing, on the plus side:

-The only worthwhile things in Episode 1 are the following:
-Obi Wan (nails)
-Liam Neeson (nails)
-The relationship between the two, highlighting sort of how jedis functioned in the old republic. I actually enjoyed their subtle dynamic more than anything else in the film.
-Darth Maul was pretty cool, but atrociously underused.
-Palpatine is pretty sweet, too, only he is the victim of much of that boring bureaucracy mentioned earlier.
-I say the jedi council is ‘meh’. Samuel Jackson has the worst lines (aside from jar jar) and his delivery is terrible.
-Lightsaber fight.


Anyway’s, I’m beating a dead horse here. Episode 1 pretty much sucks. Thanks to Jar Jar and that effing kid – it’s nearly unwatchable at parts. On to episode 2 this week, I guess.

What's this Here? A Post!

Oh, blog.

How I’ve longed, of late, to be with you and to input sweet words onto your template…
I’ve been away a few weeks – but you were always in my thoughts. Let’s make tonight… special.

OK – I’ve been away awhile. And work is to blame. Evil work, which has kept me ridiculously busy (to near intern levels again) over the past 8 weeks. 8 straight weeks of heavy call. 8 straight weeks without a weekend off. 8 straight weeks without 2 days off in a row. 8 straight weeks. (It’s kind of like the movie “9 and a half weeks” – only sub me in for Mickey Rourke and replace the constant soft porn with frequent call.)

The problem with this blog is that once I stay away for a bit – that is - once I take too much time between posts, I tend to feel like I can only make it right by churning out the sweetest post ever. Its like I need to sit down, in my chair, back straight, focused hard, and write a mother-lovin’ showstopper of a don’t-call-it-a-comeback-I’ve-been-here-for-YEARS type of post. I’m talking about a post that is long and deep; with insight and wit! A tight and easily readable post, but filled with UTTERLY clever subtext – a post that will knock you off your feet, make you laugh, make you cry, make you so happy to be alive that you want to run outside and spread your arms as you look skyward, even while its pouring rain….

And therein lies the problem. That kind of post is tough to write. Damn tough, in fact. But at least I’m posting something. It’s a start.

I’ve been reading a lot of sports guy lately. And I’ve really come to enjoy his columns. There are far better writers in the world, but I’ve rarely seen someone so gifted at bringing readers into his own little highly-nuanced world, setting up some unique ground rules, and then delivering the goods over and over in that specific framework. Despite all his pro-Boston crap – he’s a damn fine read. The whole thing reminds me of conversations I had with Iwan back in college about all kinds of sports and pop culture connection references. I’m enjoying his intern selection contest. Read up, if you get the chance. (In particular, his “More Cowbell” has been awesome as of late. And since I actually caught the last two hours of the Master’s on Sunday, I was rolling at all his Jim Nantz references. Gold!)

Other than work, there hasn’t been too much to speak of as late. Last night was my final night of call in residency that would require me to walk down to the ER and admit somebody. That is, I have a full ICU month left, complete with annoying every fourth night (in medical speak known as “Q-four”) call, but being in the ICU doesn’t require me to admit anybody. They simply get sent to me and then I take care of ‘em. I never have to leave the unit.

As a reward for my last night of “ER-based” call, and because Gwendolyn is out of town in Miami at a conference this week, I took myself out to a fine sushi dinner tonight at good old Shiro’s and had a feast. What a meal. As I walked in, got seated, and started to look at the menu, one of the head chefs behind the counter (named Agi) asked me to put the menu down.

“I take care of you tonight,” he said with a smile and a bow, indicating that he would decide and prepare everything I would eat based on the freshest fish, his preferences, and all that.

Fine with me. What followed was one of the best sushi meals I’ve ever had. An unbelievable array of all kinds of fish, some of which I’ve never had before. There was a special flounder fin (from the Atlantic), a fried shrimp head (not for the faint of heart), seared salmon, and of course his famous Uni. (And Agi’s uni is the best). Couple the fish with a huge Kirin and I was having myself a good old time. Great dinner. Cost was 58 bucks (plus a 20 dollar tip), but I would easily have payed 100 bucks for such a meal. (Um, why am I in massive credit debt again?)

I’m going to miss sushi over in Europe. I hear that over there it’s hard to find, of lesser quality, and super expensive. On the upside, I’m really looking forward to expanding my schnitzel and wurst palate.

Speaking of Germany, I’ve been running the old “Learn German in your Car!” CD’s occasionally on the way to work. That language rocks. And whenever I have trouble pronouncing a word the right way, I pretend I’m one of the villains from Indiana Jones and start yelling it. What a blast! Only it’s going to be real hard in simple social settings for me to say simply “Nein”, rather than constantly screaming it with fascist zeal.

And with that thought, I officially dub this blog “back in action.”

You may all run out into the rain now…