7.09.2008

Texted Movie Reviews: Wanted

Texted Movie Reviews™ is a regular feature wherein Rider posts SMS messages he received on his BlockBerry from friends or family members about current movies.

The following is Jeremy W.'s review of Wanted.

Message #1:

Wanted was awesome. No nudity.

Message #2:

Movie was awesome! GREAT kills

Click this link to read a translation of Angelina Jolie's tattoo

Day 35 on the road - Jebus help me. After leaving Target two days ago, now we're staying in an Arby's.


Chas, the 16-year-old store manager, lets us sleep in a booth because "the corporate douches haven't promoted me to district after five goddamn months. Besides, what are they gonna do--fire me? Feel free to use the laptop, even for porn. I've got shit bookmarked."

His assistant manager Gladys, a 43-year-old mother of six, brings us leftover Bacon Beef 'n Cheddars just before she leaves for the night. I have managed to keep them down, but just barely.

This morning the Mordor County Health Inspector walked in as I was bathing Boxter in the prep area sink. He watched quietly, then informed me that I "missed a spot." He gave the restaurant a pass in exchange for one of my Chuck Taylors. When I handed it over, he explained that he met Ellen Page at a Katy Perry concert and she autographed his right shoe. He keeps it on a shelf at home and needed a replacement.

Chas was pissed at me, though. "You shouln'ta done that, bro! Let 'im close us down! I needed a vacation!"

I replied that it could have turned into a permanent vacation.

"Dude-man, haven't you been listening? Nobody gets fired from Arby's! Joe-Ray the maintenance guy strangled the last store manager, and I just gave him a fi'ty-cent raise!"

I don't think I'll be staying here much longer.

Gotta go. Gladys just told me Boxter pooped in the walk-in.

7.08.2008

It's No Leg Lamp but It's Certainly a Major Award


Rider's Block has been recognized for excellence in bloggery--by an esteemed physician, no less!

Dr Zibbs over at That Blue Yak seems to think my wooden block head is a hoot. Sure, my physical malady caused me extreme suffering throughout childhood and the taunts of neighborhood bullies sent me running to my room in tears many times, but hey, what's more American than mocking the deformities of others? I guess that's how they roll in West Chester, PA. Why not punch a dwarf in his oversized, squishy noggin, Zibbs, you prick! Trip a cripple with leg braces and blog about how funny it was to watch his crutches flail about!

You think my having a cube-head was easy on my mom? Think again! She never really loved me. She never sang "Mockingbird" to me the way she used to when I was in utero and life still held such promise.

When I was seven my father told me, "Your goddamned head ruined everything! Just look at how your mother walks now!" Then he went back to mainlining Dewar's and smoking Salems to the filter, stubbing them out on my cranium. I didn't mind because it didn't hurt and he was giving me attention, but still...

...Er, where was I?

Zibbs has given me the virtual Arte Y Pico Award. I don't know what that means, I just know I've had a craving for salsa since I followed the link last night. He also tapped me for a meme, which I don't appreciate at all. I'm supposed to recognize five other blogs deserving of the Arte Y Pico.

Look at my blogroll, Zibbs. Does it look like I even know five other bloggers? You may be the blogging equivalent of the hot Dairy Queen babe in a hick town, but I don't sleep around with just any blogger who rolls past me in an El Camino with neon underlighting and three bucks for a Dilly Bar.

That said, here's my four, plus one:

1. A Crown of Thistles. MJenks may be the coolest chemist since Bryan Cranston on Breaking Bad--and he's probably in his underwear even more. He's written novels and almost had them published. Every other post has a Leelee Sobieski picture. Also, I contributed to his coolness by making him my Padawan learner on the finer points of mouseover text. He has graciously contributed to my sister blog Calling the Karma Police.

2. Valerie's Life 2.0. She's the Lucy van Pelt to my Charlie Brown. Valerie seems to hate me, always posting about how bad I smell or how I look like Sasquatch. She even drew herself kicking my ass once. What could I have done to inspire such venom? What does it mean when someone can't stop blogging about you? All I know is I'm too smart to run for any football she's holding, but she can't say the same. That girl is T-R-O-U-B-L-E(-D).

3. I, Splotchy. I'm not sure why I include him. He rarely posts.

4. josh pincus is crying. Why is J.P. crying? I can't speak for him but he makes me weep from looking at all his beautiful drawrings. His blog's got me reaching for more Kleenex than a teenaged boy watching The Girls Next Door. Plus you learn about the folks he sketches. Here, absorb a few factoids about Henry Rollins.

And here's my anti-award:

5. Distant Authority Figure. This is a dude (improbably) named Hal Haroldson. He's a funny enough guy, granted, but I must've done something to piss him off. He's always ragging on me whenever Valerie posts about how she can't get enough of me (which is always). Here's something he wrote about Amelia Earhart and Hitler, and how folks in hospitals would feel better after seeing fake news. For the record, I will punch his lights out if I ever meet him.

I apologize in advance to the above "winners," but I'm obligated to turn this beautiful awards ceremony into a meme.

Should you choose to accept this award, here's the fine print:

1) Pick 5 blogs that you think deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and also for contributing to the blogging community, no matter what language.
2) Each award has to have the name of the author and also a link to his or her blog to be visited by everyone.
3) Each award winner has to show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given her or him the award itself.
4) Award-winner and the one who has given the prize have to show the link of “Arte y Pico” blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award which is here: Arte y Pico.


Thanks you for the award, Dr Zibbs. It weighs nothing at all. Like my mother's seething hatred of my sharp-edged head, I won't forget this.
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Sent from Gmail for mobile | mobile.google.com

7.07.2008

Moon Knight of Blogosphere...?

I woke up in Target this morning (for the last time, it turns out) and I found the following message saved as a draft on my BlockBerry:

oh hi
oh you are in hell
you are
marc spector
jake lockley
steven grant
moon knight
of blogosphere
enough is enough
hell is waiting
welcome him back
german swine
will bear witness
go to hell

I don't remember typing it myself, but the handset was right next to me where I always leave it (see this picture and subtract the still-MIA hoodie). I don't recall any dreams, although one image in particular (left) is stuck in my mind.

To quote Pee-wee Herman, "What does it mean?"

I'm a little freaked, as you can imagine. First my hoodie goes missing, now mysterious messages are turning up on my phone.

I'm taking Boxter and we're leaving this town. I'm in the local Apple Store composing this message on a MacBook Air. (They're sweet machines, by the way.)

First I'm going to finish this post, then I'll check out McGone's blog and leave it open for others to enjoy 'cuz I'm a pal like that, and then we'll hit the road again. I'm going in whichever direction the wind takes me. As long as it's away from here, that's cool.

It was time to leave Target anyway. The workers had come back during the day to make their July 27 grand opening. Also, even though the sign looked OK back on June 11, now it's shedding its skin. And that's just weird.


How am I the "Moon Knight of the blogosphere"...?

7.02.2008

A Peek Inside My (Block) Head: Newsweek

I am trying to hold it together following yesterday's tragic occurrence. In the meantime, I'll share with you my first thought upon seeing the current cover of Newsweek.

How did I drudge up the back cover of a 1976 Marvel/DC crossover? Am I that pathetic...or that unabashedly awesome?
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Sent from Gmail for mobile | mobile.google.com

7.01.2008

My Blogger Hoodie

I started using Blogger in March 2002. I upgraded my account one year later, shelling out my hard-earned lucre to add photos to posts (which sounds really stupid these days).

A few months later Google acquired Pyra Labs--the company that founded this service--and I received an email from its founder saying:
"Google has lots of computers and bandwidth. And Google believes blogs are important and good for the web."

Everyone reading Rider's Block knows how wrong Google was and how little it amounted to, right? I mean, how good can a blog be if anyone can have one?

Anywho, the email also informed me that since I had paid for Blogger Pro, Pyra was in a position to "give back." I was hoping book deal but...

I received my hoodie weeks later.

For the past five years, as far as you know, I have worn it while composing every post on each of the 99 blogs I've created (101 in total, if you count the Wilder Valderrama and Conchata Ferrell fan fiction sites).

It is the prize jewel of my wardrobe. I hand-wash it with soapy, distilled water mixed with baby's dreams and rose petals, and I blow dry it by mouth.

It is an essential component of my identity and it makes me who I am and drives my purpose for being...

but when I woke up this morning at this Target in central Mordor and looked around for my Blogger hoodie it wasn't there and I searched the whole store with Boxter's help but it was nowhere to be found and I'm sorta panicking right now because who could've taken it and when did they take it and I don't have a clue since there's not supposed to be anybody here except us and I'm already hungry from being banned from entering any Panera in the continental U.S. and now this happens and how can things get any worse and I really only have one question and that's

who took my Blogger hoodie and why?

A BLOGGER COLLAPSES: Rider reacts to the loss of his beloved hoodie
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Sent from Gmail for mobile | mobile.google.com