The cheese is back, whoopee

Hey, The Cheese, where have you been?

I've been sick you little snot nosed brats, get off my back!

Anyway, apparently life continues on, even without any consideration for the plight of mr. and mrs. cheese. Well, if that's the case then the cheese says, SUCK IT LIFE!

Biggest news on the cheese front...school starts back up again on Monday. 9 units this time around (which is full time for the ol' graduate student for those of you keeping score at home), and probably near full time at work until the cheese can find something with better hours/better pay/better period.

The chronicles continue on and the light is definitely visible at the end of the tunnel. With Blaylock dropping 503 this semester the cheese now has until the fall to finish this biatch up before the next one begins, but the ideas have already begun to percolate....

Mrs. cheese is slowly and steadily gaining weight, and you know what, isn't that what pregnant girls are supposed to do? Well then maybe someone can explain that to mrs. cheese cause she don't want to hear from her husband.

Just finished rereading V for Vendetta, and they better not screw that thing up...but judging by League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, the cheese does not have high hopes.

Well, that's it for now kids. Remember to eat your cheese!

Wasted Day

Today, the cheese decided to forgo the usual Monday ritual of toiling at the bookmines in favor of staying in bed since he has come down with a severe head cold, and his sinuses feel as if they are being squeezed in a vice. Good times.

Where to begin...

Since most of you who read this, or more likely all of you, are all apprised on the situations currently affecting my life, I'm not going to repeat them here for reasons you can probably assume. But since we are only two weeks into the new year, I thought I might do something a little different up on the blog. On the one hand, I'm not entirely comfortable with trying to post some witty banter, and also I don't have much to be witty about. 2005 should have been one of the best years of my life. I started grad school, got married, and found out my wife was pregnant with my first child. But a different terrible event over shadowed every good one, and so I'm at a loss as to what to take from this last year. Really, it comes down to hoping that 2006 will be better, but the prospects, only 12 days in, are grim.

End of the semester...oh, and I guess Christmas is coming, or something

Let it never be said that procrastination is not a friend to the cheese. Even though he waited until the last possible minute to start, he still managed to finish both his papers on time. Yes, ol' "Eliot’s Journey from The Waste Land to Little Gidding" coming in at 15 pages, and "Dickinson and Plath: Approaches to a Writing Life" with a robust 17 and 1/2 pages were 90% completed in the five days prior to their respective due dates. The cheese is eagerly awaiting his forthcoming C-'s with great anticipation. On the up side, no class until January 31, on the down, now the cheese is forced to finish the Chronicles before January 31. Can he do it? Probably not...

And while the cheese probably won't be able to participate in this weekends bloodbath, he may be able to at some point in the near future.

As a parting gift to all citizens out there in cheese land exhibit A for the case against Bill O'Reilly, assbag.

Suck it ManU

Far be from the cheese to normally revel in the pain of others BUT.....this is just too good to let pass without comment!

Little sporting news

Well, the Dodgers finally, after parting ways with Jim Tracy and sacking ol' Paul Depodesta, named a new manager today...the thoroughly uninspiring Grady Little. This coming just days after the unexpected, yet oddly satisfying, pick up of SS Rafael Furcal. The outlook for the boys in blue next year still lingers around the bleak to shitstorm range, but at least Coletti seems to know what he wants. It's just a shame they couldn't get Brian Giles.

In football news, Liverpool played a rather exciting 0-0 draw at Stamford Bridge today, meaning the Reds secured top position in Group G, and will be one of 8 seeded teams in the draw for the round of sixteen in the Champion's League. It's still a bit premature, but with 9 successive unbeaten games, and all those without allowing a single goal, Rafa's lads are looking well poised to repeat as champions of Europe.

Damn you Suavo!!!

This coulda been US!!!!!!!!

Reason 227...

why the cheese will never move back to Corona.

No cheese love

What's up out there in cheeseland? Does no one care about the cheese' latest misdeeds? What must the cheese do to win back the love of his followers?

Got my Sunday plans...

Anybody else up for it....

Update

Saturday: the cheese and mrs. cheese drive out to Corona (1 1/2 hours thanks to traffic) to see mrs. cheese friend's newborn child. Friend, of course, is not home, and so drive done in vain. The cheeses go to movies instead and see Shopgirl.

Sunday: 8 AM football game for the cheese sees his team of mismatched Indians/Pakistanis (not sure which) and Vietnamese mobsters lose by a whopping 9-0. Cheese twists knee during pointless 90 minutes. The cheese, with wife in tow, then heads up to the bay area for three days.

Monday: time spent in City = 12 hours. Number of eateries visited = 3.

Tuesday: Umotherfuckin'2 BITCHES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wednesday: drive home bearable thanks to audio book version of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Jim Dale rocks out with his cock out)

Thursday: mrs. cheese birthday, though the cheeses will be celebrating on the morrow

Retail [shudder]

Today at the bookmines the cheese found himself shelving a number of science related tomes, but the scientifical shelves were all packed so tight that a crowbar was required to take a book down. In light of this, and the large amount of newly arrived books the cheese had to put on said shelves, the cheese decided a little "discretionary pull" action was in order. Thusly, the cheese began ripping down a number of old and worn Astronomy titles and "placing" (read: tossing haphazardly) said books on the ground. After a number of books had found their way to the ground an elderly woman thought it might be a good idea to ask the cheese "Do you work here or are you just making a mess?"

The cheese just loves the kindness and respect shown to him and his fellow mine workers by the book buying public. And with that in mind the cheese would like to take this opportunity to say to all ungrateful book mine patrons out there:

Go screw yourselves!

Another day another loss

Well yesterday saw SoCal SC (that's the cheese' current Soccer Club) go down 4-1 against...whoever the hell that team was. Bringing SoCal's current record to 1-4. It is a bit hard to compete in games, though, when you start with only 8 men on the field. This game seemed to be more even tempered, but still saw 4 yellow cards handed out, and one of those was to the opposing goalie. There was a tense moment when it seemed there might be a fist fight on the field, but luckily no crow bars appeared this time.

In non-recreational, 25 and over sports news (read: professional) the Dodgers fired 33 year old GM Paul Depodesta. Which leaves the boys in blue sans Manager and General Manager.

Dear Mr. McCourt,

Please hire the cheese as the next Dodgers GM. He promises to attend all home games (unlike former GM Depodesta) and if he doesn't improve on the 91 losses of last season then he'll forfeit the remainder of his contract. Which, the cheese thinks you'll agree, is much better than firing someone and paying him the remaining three years on his contract. Also, I promise not to sign horribly injury prone players, or trade away high level prospects for players who get into fights with fans.

Yours,
the cheese

If you're a WOT fanatic like the cheese...

then you'll love the Encyclopedia WOT. It's even downloadable so that you can have a local copy on your non-internet equipped laptop like the cheese.

Asian Invasion

So the cheese is once again plying his skills on the pitch (for you football [or soccer as dumbass American's would say] uninitiated). Having found a team via Craigslist the cheese was happy to back kicking the ball around. An overheard snippet at this week's game, however, has made the cheese question his choice of teammates. It seems that in last week's match (which the cheese missed) one of the cheese' teammates nearly got into some fisticuffs with an opposing player. After the match said teammate then absconded to his automobile to fetch a crowbar to finish the tussle.

Over half of the team consists of Vietnamese guys who all show up roughly two minutes after the game is supposed to start, and barely speak of word of English during the game. This, of course, makes it hard to play as a "team." But the Asian faction does not seem to care. The fact that they are Vietnamese does not bother the cheese as he has played with people from the Czech Republic, Ireland, Brazil, various Latin countries, and he even played on a team with an Asian guy named Jaime (the Spanish pronunciation) and a black guy named Yoshi who grew up in Japan. The thing that bothers the cheese is the very real possibility that over half of his team in somehow connected to the Vietnamese Mafia.

An Open Letter to Terry Prachett

Dear Mr. Prachett,

Let me start by saying I'm sorry. Or rather, let me start by saying I'm sorry to myself. I was one of some 150 people at a speaking/signing you held on Saturday September 24th, in the year of "our" Lord 2005. It is doubtful you remember me. The afternoon started with you addressing the crowd and taking questions (everything from "How do you pronounce Angua?" to "What does a Hippo sound and like?" and even "What, exactly, is a figgin'?"). I, of course, did not ask any questions because something like "What is your exact philosophy on the nature of time and multiple dimensions in relation to "Nightwatch" and "thief of Time" seemed a little inappropriate for the occasion.

After the interactive portion of the event was over all those in attendance lined up so that we could secure your precious autograph on our coveted copies of your various works. Being under the assumption you would only be signing your newest book I did not, in fact, bring any of the number of other things I would have given my left index finger to have you sign (but since I still have said finger, perhaps that was for the best). As was already mentioned, roughly 150 were there to wait in line and I was lucky number 128.

It was not until around 5:00 (three hours after you were first introduced to us) that I (with my supportive wife in tow) finally made our way up to you. It was at just about this point that my tongue stopped functioning. Or possibly it was momentarily transported to some dark dungeon dimension because I don't even remember feeling it waggling around inside my mouth. I am fairly certain I was able to mumble a "hello" or some odd equivalent. And while I don't remember speaking my name, I certainly must have because the correct name is indeed inside the two books you signed for me.

And so, roughly 15 seconds later my brush with greatness was at an end. My wife wondered why in the world I didn't actually speak to you, as you obviously had no problem conversing with others who sought your signature. All I can say is that the experience was so surreal that even now, two days later, I have a problem remembering the specifics.

And in all honesty, how do you tell someone whom you've idolized for a number of years that he is the reason you wanted to become a writer? Sure, it sounds nice to think it, or even write it down, but too actually say it sounds a bit...well...stupid.

Anyway, I just wanted to let you know, Mr. Pratchett, that I wasn't being rude. And if I ever get the chance again I will certainly try to ask a squeaky voiced question or two. Or at least, I'll try to try.

Thanks for everything,
the cheese

p.s. Seeing as how I will be at a similar event this Saturday for Neil Gaiman, I have decided to write out some questions/witty banter ahead of time...

Self torture

After one week, the cheese' resolve finally broke and today he purchased Thud!. Of course, today also marked the release of Anansi Boys so time will tell how long before the cheese buys that. Normally, none of this would matter, except that the cheese has to read Sister Carrie by next Monday, and still has three critical essays to read before tonight, not to mention the fact that he must finish Dracula by next week (though, since he has already read this once, he will likely skim it as, if memory serves, it's a slow ass book).

Damn grad. school is certainly getting in the way of the cheese' normal reading habits!

Grad school MADNESS!!!!!!

Having to devote his entire weekend to catching up on the correspondence between Vicomte de Valmont and Marquise de Merteuil the cheese, unfortunately, missed the dungeon crawling goodness of WHQ that ensued this past Saturday.

And so the question is...how fared the witchhunter?

Infrequent updates

As much as the cheese complained about his last job (wasting away in front of a computer for a large multi-national corporation), it did afford him ample opportunity to post blogs/use company time doing non-company related things on the internet. Being back at the bookmines affords no such luxury.

So, a brief recap of the last two or so months...

Move-check
Married-check
Death in wife's family-sadly check
Started Grad school-excellent

Of course, with the last point, the homework and massive amounts of reading have also begun. If only the cheese had been a good student at some in his life he wouldn't get a panic attack when thoughts of the upcoming semester drift across his mind.

Sad but true

The cheese is sitting naked on a metal folding chair in the heart of the OC where the current temperature is roughly 900 Fahrenheit...and it occurs to the cheese that sweaty bare flesh has a tendency to stick to metal.