Monthly Archive for November, 2008

The Day After The Civil War Victory

Posted November 30, 2008 at 10:35 pm // 0 Comments

There is nothing greater after last year’s debacle in Eugene, to see Oregon come on out and trample the rose petals all over the ground in Corvallis to the tune of 65 points.

I LOVE IT.

Highlights are up on YouTube and they say it all.

Jeremiah Johnson breaks an 83-yard run to give Oregon a 30-10 lead (on 3rd and 19):

Ed Dickson’s TD reception on a great scramble and throw from Jeremiah Masoli:

Spencer Paysinger’s pick, the nail in the coffin:

I also love how the Versus commentators, with their ever-so-sliiiiiiiiiight Oregon State bias, sounded so disappointed during the fourth quarter and after the game.

Sucks to be a Beaver fan, I guess.

Holy Cow, I’m In “Untraceable” After All (Photos!)

Posted November 29, 2008 at 3:42 am // 4 Comments

I was afraid I had died bleeding on the cutting room floor after being chosen as an extra in the movie Untraceable, which was filming in Portland last year when I lived there.

To make a long story short, when I was freelancing for KPTV I was one of many behind-the-scenes and on air personalities who were chosen as extras for the film (Fox 12 features prominently in the movie). I played the role of — what else? — a television photographer and Todd Mansfield played the reporter I was “shooting” at the time.

So naturally, when the movie was released I couldn’t wait to see it, if only for the reason I was in it — and my parents went with me. We were pumped.

Only thing was, the scene I was in was so quick they didn’t see me. Heck, I couldn’t see me either.

After being told by more friends they could not find me in the movie for the life of them, and after having an impromptu conversation about Untraceable with a few of the MSU Lady Bears after in between interviews at a practice session last week — THEN being told by Jason Wert that he couldn’t find me either, I got fed up and bought a copy of the movie to find out for myself if I was truly there or not.

With some good help from VLC Media Player’s slow-playback feature, I scanned the scene I was in very carefully, and with good reason. It taketh a keen eye to find me in the movie, but at long last I found myself and I have screenshots to prove my existence on the silver screen.

Did you see me? Let me back up a few frames, where it is clearer. For reference, I am the far left camera operator. Click the photo below to get a bigger view.

In the above photo, I am the left-most (is that even a word?) on the screen. It’s unmistakably me.

Let’s enhance that image a bit:

Pretty neat, huh? If you want to find me as well, skip to Chapter 8 on the Untraceable DVD, then pause it around the 27:58-28:01 mark (it depends on what DVD player you have and how it interprets it). Be quick about it, because the camera is following a cop car and then ends up focusing on an SUV in the driveway. I’m at the very beginning of that pan shot.

AWESOME.

Black Friday And The Banality Of Consumerism

Posted November 28, 2008 at 2:50 pm // 0 Comments

I just read a report online telling of a gentleman who worked inside a Wal-Mart in Long Island being trampled to death by customers who rushed the store right after it opened. Apparently they broke off the hinges of the doors in their mad attempt to get inside the store, and the helpless stock clerk who was trying to control the crowd was bum-rushed, stomped on and died right there.

The afore-mentioned incident is a tragic reminder that greed and consumerism still run rampant, no matter how “in the toilet” our economy may be. Black Friday is simply a reminder of our willingness as consumers to spend, spend, spend to get the best deal before the big Christmas holiday.

It’s also a reminder of the sad shape our economy is in. Retailers are hoping to the high heavens that consumers spend a ton this holiday season, to keep their institutions afloat for now. It would be a bailout in its own right.

I didn’t shop today. Instead, I headed out to get my car’s radiator fixed at the local Acura dealership, and at nearly every store I passed I encountered pushy drivers, mean-spirited pedestrians, and traffic snafus all over a town in which people already don’t know how to drive too well.

All in the name of buying Christmas gifts.

Now, isn’t Christmas supposed to be a time where we celebrate the birth of a man who lived to die for the world…the greatest sacrifice in the history of mankind? And some of us prepare for that holiday by letting our greed consume us?

God help us all.

Here’s some personal perspective. Yesterday, my mom shared with me that gifts are not a priority this Christmas. Dad has a great job, but economic times are rough and they plan to manage their finances wisely.

I can’t blame them one bit. “If you don’t want to get gifts for us, you don’t have to either,” Mom said.

I’ll probably end up buying them all a gift that will prove itself useful for their lives, but otherwise I don’t plan on spending anything. Conversely, I don’t really mind if the family doesn’t have a tree or any gifts under it with my name.

As a kid I couldn’t wait to see what was under the tree for Christmas, and the gifts were always a treat year in and year out. As time passed, the holiday became more of a desire to spend time with loved ones than to put a box of material possessions under a brightly lit and decorated tree.

That rings true especially today. At age 24, and as a young professional, keeping my job will be Christmas gift enough for me. My brother coming home after a medical discharge from the Army would be a great addition. And for Dad’s company to win a new project bid next year would be awesome too. Those would be gifts that you can’t put under any tree, and it would make my Christmas the best one ever.

What a contrast from my child and teenage years. I guess what the Apostle Paul said rings true, for some of us at least.

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.

Days like today make me wish we could all do the same thing.

Written Snapshots From A Good Thanksgiving

Posted November 28, 2008 at 12:47 am // 3 Comments

There is much to be thankful for today. Primarily I am thankful for the Lord keeping my body, mind and soul safe from harm — and I am blessed in many other aspects as well. I still have a job, a good roof over my head, I have never gone hungry, and I am very grateful for that. Plus I am thankful for my friends here in Springfield and beyond, and for those who make life for one who still misses home after a year and three months a bit more fun around here.

A nice shout-out goes to everyone who showed up to Turkey Bowl Un-Spectacular 2008 today. We had six people, and while the outcome of the game did not favor my team — the White Meat were roasted and became dead meat to the tune of 25-12 — it was still fun to get together with Jerome, Emily, Ian, Jason, Dale, and Billy and play some good football. Great running today by Dale as well, I might add. For a kid who can count his age on two hands, he is a fast little booger. Ripped off two 50-yarders today.

After the game and a quick shower I headed to the parents’ place in Republic. Dad is home for the weekend and we all enjoyed some turkey, football, conversation, play time with Cocoa, and a mean game of Scrabble. We even took Cocoa for a walk and I was able to shoot this snapshot of my parents, Jerry and Sybil:

I also tried my hand at some more experimental photography to mess with the shutter speed a little bit.

That was about it, and aside from some major car troubles due to a busted thermostat, the day went pretty well.

Come To The Turkey Bowl TOMORROW, 9 AM!!!

Posted November 26, 2008 at 2:20 pm // 0 Comments

If you’re in Springfield and you’d like to play in a Thanksgiving football game tomorrow morning, SOFA (our Sunday football alliance) is holding Turkey Bowl I tomorrow morning at 9 AM at the field across from Gillenwaters Tennis Complex. Most of our people, understandably, are out of town or have family in town, but we will still have enough to play football and I am extending an open invitation to anyone else who would like to join us.

Comment in this blog thread, or email me at chris -at- chris-brewer -dot- com for more info. We’d love to have some new folks out tomorrow morning.

The games will end at 11 AM so everyone can go home and be with their families, of course. It’s flag football too, so no one should have to worry about getting hurt, we hope….

The 54321: Burning The Midnight Oil

Posted November 26, 2008 at 2:00 am // 0 Comments

Here’s a good sampling of what I’m listening to as I burn the midnight oil tonight, cleaning my apartment.

I just can’t sleep. Some of these tracks might help to do the trick.

Thanks For Bearing With Me…

Posted November 25, 2008 at 7:31 pm // 2 Comments

Over the past 24 hours, I have switched hosting services from Bluehost to HostGator and the difference is notable. Basically what that means in layman’s terms, is that I took my website off one remote computer and paid to put it on another…after I did so, I cancelled my old service.

BLUEHOST SUCKS. NEVER GO WITH THEM.

My customer experience with them was downright horrible. The site was only up for 80% of the time and they kept on claiming it was my website running “an inefficient script.” I asked them how this could be because WordPress wasn’t causing much of a load on the server, and all my photos are hosted on Flickr now, so I just link there. Instead of helping me get the problem fixed by troubleshooting the system that hosted my files, they kept telling me it was me and my site, and everything always seemed to conveniently work okay for them on their end.

Enough of Bluehost BS, I don’t recommend them, and like I said the customer service was terrible. I was cut off on the phone at least twice in the past week and one of my two support tickets I entered never got answered. Morons.

At any rate, HostGator is much faster for the time being and we will see how they treat me. Thanks for bearing with me through this change!

(change we need)

Flag Football + Chipotle + A Movie = Good Day

Posted November 24, 2008 at 12:42 am // 5 Comments

Today was pretty cool. Judging by the photo to my left, you’d think it was actually cooler than cool — ICE COLD. Thanks to Emily for snapping the photo of (clockwise from top left) Matt, me, Pete, Jerome and Ian. I am a true weather warrior…it was 48 freaking degrees outside. MAN UP PEOPLE!!!

We only had six people at flag football today — Matt, Ian, Jerome, Emily, Pete and myself — but we made some good three-on-three football games happen. Matt, Ian and Pete made up one team, and the West Coast connection of Jerome, Emily and myself opposed them. We split both games, and the only really eventful thing that happened was my knee popping while I ran to catch a pass. It hurt like the dickens and I’m still a bit in pain from it now.

After the game was over, we all — except for Matt, who’s a hardcore Colts fan and wanted to do laundry before the Sunday night game — went to Chipotle where we shared stories of relationships, jobs and 419 scammers. It was the best.

Then Jerome and Emily (gotta singular-ize the happy couple), Ian, and myself (notice there is a comma between Ian and myself, NOT singular) went to go see Bolt at the local Wehrenberg Theatres outfit. It was there that Ian pointed out to me that the Wehrenberg logo looks awfully similar to that of a white supremacist group called the Creativity Movement (aka World Church of the Creator). See for yourself below.

I could not stop laughing for about 20 minutes after he pointed that out. I don’t know why it was so funny, but it was.

Bolt was a great movie too, by the way.

Happy Sunday, kids!

Flag Football Tomorrow; Turkey Bowl on Thursday!

Posted November 22, 2008 at 2:11 pm // 0 Comments

This is your weekly friendly reminder that we will be holding our weekly game of Flag Fooball tomorrow at the Kickapoo High School practice field…we gather at 1:30, stretch and all that fun stuff, and we start at 2.

We’ll need some folks tomorrow, so bring friends who wanna play football!

Also on Thanksgiving, we will be holding Turkey Bowl II and are needing some players for that. Details forthcoming!

Darth Vader Resurrects; Spotted At Blazers Game

Posted November 22, 2008 at 2:25 am // 2 Comments

For those of you who thought Darth Vader died in the final Star Wars movie, you’re wrong…that’s the jumbotron at the Rose Garden in Portland, Oregon showing you Episode 7. Apparently the Dark One has been hanging out at the Rose Garden during Portland Trail Blazers games and has apparently been helping the home team with whatever twisted uses of the force he can find. I heard he even choked Kobe Bryant — and Kobe was playing on the East Coast.

Whoa.

Actually, the man in the Darth suit is none other than my good man Michael Perozzo, who took it upon himself to order a customized Darth Vader helmet painted red and with the Blazers logo emblazoned on the sides a few months ago. He then scored tickets to the Blazers home opener on Halloween night and decided to debut his costume.

As fate would have it, he was interviewed by KATU’s Meghan Kalkstein and it was a dandy.

That video helped launch what could become a Portland phenomenon. He’s started his own MySpace, and in the two weeks it’s been up he’s added over 300 friends. He’s been on the Jumbotron regularly and is developing a mini-cult following. How awesome.

Add him to your Myspace over at www.darthblazer.com. You’ll enjoy every second of looking at his photos…especially the security guy.

When I head back to the NW in March, I have to dress up as a Storm Trooper or something, I dunno.