Bleeding Neon

… I wanna change my clothes, my hair, my face!

Thanks, Bruce. But not really.

So I started typing up a long-ish post about goals I set out for 2008 and how many were or were not acheived, and why, and what needs to get done in 2009. And then I realized, after writing about 650 words, that the committal of words to screen isn’t what’s important — it’s the mere exercise of assessing one’s present in order to map out one’s future.

Or, you know, a reality check.

2008 went well. Hell of a lot better than ‘07. Got a sweet iMac. Paid off some credit cards. Got the band out of the bedroom and into the clubs. Drank less, ate better. Convinced a beautiful woman and her two silly-but-sweet dogs to live with me. Moved into a great old neighborhood and learned to love Las Vegas again. Didn’t pass out in a nightclub men’s room stall even once.

Obviously, 2009 is looming. In some parts of the world, it’s already here. What needs to happen? Well, things could maintain and I couldn’t complain (though, I would), but let’s see …  Sell this comic book series that I’ve actually finally found time to write. Polish up and send to my agent the TV series treatment. Revisit and rework Bleeding Neon book proposal for non-commercial publisher. Take the band out of town. Record a full album. Go to Wonder-Con. Pay off the rest of my credit cards. Buy a bicycle. Eat more fruit. Take more naps. No, more.

Tonight, I ring in 2009 from the Paris Las Vegas hotel & casino. I’ve lived in Sin City for half my life and have never spent New Year’s Eve on the Strip. First time for everything, I guess, huh?

We’ll leave 2008 behind with a totally random clip from when Saturday Night Live was still funny:

And Iran ... Iran so far away

See that sexy cad in the above photo? That’s Geoff Carter. He taught me everything I know about being a man.

OK, technically that is a lie, but it wouldn’t be a terrible reality were it true. Carter is — aside from being the most naturally gifted writer and photographer I have ever had the pleasure of knowing — well-versed in music, literature, pop culture and, most relevant to this post, alcohol consumption and the places in which to engage in said imbibing.

So it’s imperative that you direct your wandering cursor to the new blog (sorry, Geoff, “bl-g”) he’s recently launched with his fellow Seattle-ite Mark Shaffer, Gritty Shaker. It’s about bars. It’s about booze. And knowing Geoff, there’ll probably be roller derby references aplenty (oh, look, there’s one!). And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll subscribe to the RSS feed pronto.

Christmastime — or Hanukkah-time or whatever the hell quasi-religious reason you come up with to give and receive gifts as the northern hemisphere’s daylight wears down — is perhaps the greatest time of the year for the geek-minded. Especially in this, the seeming Age of Geek Cool (ushered in by our properly-elected leader, Barack “I read Spider-Man and Conan comics” Obama), the gift options are nearly endless, and if you have great friends and loved ones as I do, you may have found your Christmas morning/eighth night of Hanukkah/Kwanzaa dance of joy to be as memorable as the time you received the Jabba’s Palace playset from Return of the Jedi back in ‘83*.

I figured I’d share some highlights from this year’s take, as this was possibly the first year I celebrated a right proper Christmas, beginning with a lovely, intimate gathering of strays at our house on Christmas Eve — where we enjoyed home-cooked food, light cocktails and gingerbread cookie decorating (I kid you not) — and ending with a sitting-on-the-floor-by-the-tannenbaum, wrapping paper-tearing celebration of awesomeness.

I typically don’t like to receive gifts, much preferring to give — both on holidays and throughout the year to various charitable organizations (including redirecting my so-called “stimulus check” to six different charities). But as I was a good gift-giver this year, I felt less guilty receiving. So now, for real, without further adieu, share with me in the goodies Santa left under the tree:

500 Essential Graphics Novels: The Ultimate Guide (by Gene Kannenberg, Jr.) – It is what it says it is. A guide to (subjectively) the best sequential art books ever published, categorized by genres and including both standalone volumes and those that collect works previously published in serial form. Like another reference volume I recently bought myself, The Supervillain Book, this sort of thing makes for great reading while eating.

Electronic Drum Kit Shirt (from ThinkGeek) – For anyone who hasn’t caught on yet, I play drums in a rock band. It’s not my first instrument (I guess that would be guitar, followed by keyboards), but it’s my favorite. And possibly my most comfortable, as I seem to always be drumming on whatever is within arm’s reach — steering wheel, table, lap, whatever. So it makes perfect sense that someone gave me this, a T-shirt rigged up with a fully playable picture of a drum set. When you tap on any of the seven active drum parts, a speaker unit hidden in an internal pocket blasts the respective drum sound. I am totally wearing this under all my clothes now. Here’s an awesome video demonstration:

Flip Mino Camcorder – Bleeding Neon pal and CineVegas web guru Roger Tinch turned me on to this overly simplified digital video camera (as he bought it for himself as an early Xmas present). It’s streamlined and sleek: Powers up in three seconds, runs for four hours per charge, shoots up to 60 minutes of video and plugs directly into either a computer (via USB) or a TV (via RCA connectors). Expect to see some terrible homemade videos captured with the Mino here soon. You poor suckers.

Lego Mindstorms NXT kit – Anyone who knows me should know I love robots. I have robot art all over my house, including a robot planter. I have a robot tattooed on my left arm. And now, thanks to my girlfriend who tirelessly supports my geek obsessions, I have the building blocks for intelligent robot design, courtesy of those crafty folks at Lego. To go one step further, she also grabbed for me Creating Cool Mindstorms NXT Robots, a book authored by a 24-year-old bastardgenius.

Now, Mindstorms claims to be made for ages 11 and up, but I’m telling you, this is some intimidating stuff, even right out of the box. I mean, I haven’t opened it yet, but it sure looks scary. However, I did flip through the accompanying book, which is even more frightening, apparently authored in some sort of alien techno-language or perhaps by a math professor. But I’m up to the challenge and expect to be creating peanut butter-serving, dog belly-rubbing, world-overthrowing robots any day now.

There were other goodies, of course, including a gift cardtoken to my local comic shop, 3-D notebook paper and random gift cards, but the aforementioned items are the pearls of the geek oyster. And as we know, I totally need more distractions from actually, you know, writing.

*Yes, I totally did get that Jabba set for either Christmas or a birthday back in ‘83. It came with Jabba on his throne, which slid back to reveal the opening to the dungeon or whatever, as well as that annoying sidekick bird looking thing. Sadly, Slave Leia was sold separately.

Is it 50 percent less douchey?

Hey, even douchebags have to sleep, right? I mean, at the end of a long day spent reading Maxim, waxing your chest and driving your Mustang down to Town Square for happy hour at Blue Martini, you have to put your gelled, frosted head of hair down to rest somewhere, right?

Better hurry up and get down to Dillard’s at the Fashion Show mall, where this slammin’ Ed Hardy bedding set is now 50 percent off! That’s right — you can have the ultimate in douchey bedroom accessories and save some dough for that new scent of Axe Body Spray that just came out!

During a trip to the surprisingly devoid-of-books West Charleston Library last week, the girlfriend and I decided to pick up a DVD, and for whatever reason, we grabbed Prozac Nation, the 2001 film adaptation of Elizabeth Wurtzel’s best-selling memoir. I didn’t really have any expectations of the movie, as I’ve never read Wurtzel’s book and really didn’t know much about the story, but it starred Christina Ricci, so how bad could it really be?

Um, pretty bad.

I realize this story is based on Wurtzel’s real life, so I hope the author forgives me for saying so, but her character as represented on film is so unsympathetic, I didn’t really care if she lived or died. And I’m not sure who to blame for that: the screenwriters? The director? Or Ricci, who seems to have made a career in adulthood of playing emotionally disturbed young women?

Nearly everyone’s acting in this flick was off-kilter — either wooden or over-the-top. Nothing seemed natural. The transitions between scenes were forced; the interactions between characters felt dry and disconnected. Even two-time Academy Award-winner Jessica Lange gave a performance that should revoke at least one of those Oscars.

Given the amount of quality on-screen talent in this mess, though, I’m going to have to lay the blame at the feet of Norwegian director Erik Skjoldbjærg, who not surprisingly, has never made another U.S. wide-release film since. Maybe he was trying to convey the protagonist’s own disjointed consciousness through the trick cinematography and stilted performances. But if so … sorry, it didn’t work.

On the other hand, we watched Definitely, Maybe, a Ryan Reynolds chick-flick vehicle from earlier this year. I expected it to be fluffy, predictable and boring, but it was actually engrossing and touching. I mean, sure, the Adam Brooks-directed film totally and obviously plays with your heartstrings, but it has something that a film such as Prozac Nation lacks: characters about which you give a damn, and actors acting, well, naturally. It was well-paced, cleverly framed and features Nirvana in the soundtrack, so really, you could find far worse ways to spend a few hours on a lazy afternoon than watching Definitely, Maybe.