Belgium
How's that for controversy? Using the dirtiest word in the Universe as a title? Sure beats a silly half-time show, now don't it?

Ok, fine, so only those that have read Douglas Adams know what I'm talking about, but it's better than using something like "Do de do" or "Peanuty" as a conversation/monologue starter, isn't it? I thought so too. So after browsing the internet, I managed to find a live album of the Jimmy Swift Band (it's going to take a little while for me to stop talking about them...) on the net, and it's a little shy on volume and recording quality, but it better captures their music than the studio stuff, I think. I'm still going to look for those too, but this'll tide me over until then. Let me know if you're interested, and I can facilitate the sharing happiness. Or you could go to jamhub.ca and get it yourself.

I'm weak.
I went to check out the ice sculptures over in Confederation Park this afternoon, and if I can, I'll try and get some pictures of the final sculptures when they're done. Everything was still looking kind of rough since what I saw was only about halfway done, but I'm looking forward to the finished results. On the way home, I stopped into HMV and immediately bought about 3 more DVDs. I couldn't help it. They had Waking Life and Titan A.E. (two pretty decent animated flicks) for only 11 bucks each, and then to further make things worse, Amelie was on sale for only 13! That's like 3 rather beefy discs for the same price as a newly-released movie! The crazy movie part of my brain immediately sucker-punched the money-keepy-tracky part of my brain, and I ended up walking out with all three. I'm going to have to start deliberately avoiding that store, or I just may end up slightly broke.

Also of note, I added a few links on the right there. I've now got a section of some of the best bands in my opinion down near the bottom. The last link, to AllMusic.com is basically a huge database of about a hojillion different bands, all hyperlinked and organized, so you can just kind of browse through various (read: every) musical style there is, for bands from all over the world. If I'm looking into checking out a new band, I usually start here. I also added my DVD movie collection, just like Berry did. Since just about all my movies are at home, there's probably a few missing, but for the most part they're all there. All the ones that I actually own, at least. Didn't bother with anything I've downloaded, since that pretty much defeats the whole "collection" thing (it's no fun if you can just take everything).

Mail call!
I have been receiving a little bit of mail recently, and it's peculiar since most of it isn't for me. A couple of days after I moved in I got my neighbour's AMEX bill by mistake, which wasn't a big deal, but about a week later I got a package for the previous resident of my flat. No biggie I thought, I'll just "return to sender" it and it'll be done with. And it was, until I got the next few pieces. Seems he's forgotten to tell his University's financial aid folks that he moved, and as such will probably not be getting some rather important money-related posts. Now I myself am guilty of not letting people know that I moved, but for the most part they were just bills and Columbia House spam. Nothing by which I might get money, and certainly nothing that might just go back to the sender (since my parents are still in the house). If there were some chance that I might miss getting something critical like a paycheque or a loan cheque, you can bet your last bubblegum card that I would be letting them know if I were, oh, leaving the province.

Last, but not least
Booya! Like a little ray of sunshine, there is a sequel to Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time coming. For those that don't know or may have missed it, PoP was one of the best games released last year, and was sorely underappreciated. I guess the sales numbers weren't as high as they could have been, and that's really too bad. I think Penny Arcade put it best when they gave it the #1 rank in the We're Rights, by simply saying "Best Absolutely Everything". I wholeheartedly agree. There's a reason why this is the only game I have ever like so much that one play-through was not enough, and that I started over the day after finishing it the first time. I still haven't gotten rid of it.

Interesting little article here. You might have heard that Wal-mart took out life insurance on all their employees. Maybe it was so they could keep them locked in a room and work them to death, and then collect on the insurance. I'm not saying this was their plan all along, since they're such a nice company and have such a pleasant, happy mascot, but it certainly isn't the greatest press one could get. Perhaps Wal-mart thought "Oh, they're only immigrants. What are they going to do to us? We're American! And we can afford lawyers!"

Ever hear the one about the dummy in the funhouse that's actually a corpse and no one knew? Guess what? I'm really don't have much to add to this one. It really speaks for itself.

Before I go do something else, I just wanted to point out that if anyone is confused about the Boohbah link I put up a while back, it's ok. Apparantly it's a new tv show in Britain from the creators of Teletubbies, and is starting to gather just as much evil hype around it as the last show. Something about lying about the target audience and trying to implant commercialism in today's children. This woman doesn't really have a good track record, does she?  ¶ 1:19 p.m.