Category: Manhattan

Turkey Day Ramblings

James AsherLeave a comment

First off, happy Turkey Day to all!

And what a nice little Turkey Day it was. I got over to my dad’s house ’round noon or so. My brother and my dad were playing Scrabble, as per usual. After the game, Rory and I went to Dillon’s to get some movies to watch during the day – this is an Asher custom (movies during the holidays, that is). We rented Super Size Me, Walking Tall, and The Punisher (also watched in that order).

Super Size Me was a good movie. One sentence synopsis: In order to find out if fast food is actually bad for you – as opposed to what people just assume – Morgan (documenter / director) eats McDonald’s for a month. This was a really good movie, I’d say. The 7.8 rating on IMDB also agrees. If you haven’t yet seen this documentary, I highly recommend it. I won’t say much more than that, just go watch it.

Walking Tall absolutely sucked. One sentence synopsis: The Rock gets back from his tour in the military and comes back home, only to find his town being controlled by a drug-peddling, casino-running, former schoolmate. AND THE ROCK GOES TO TOWN. Please. <rant>The problems I had with this PG-13 movie just piled up it seemed. In the first 20 minutes of the movie, there is a scene of a guy driving off in his car after a friendly football game with a beer in his hand. Later in the movie The Rock becomes the sheriff of the town. At no point does the guy ever do any police-type actions. Except when he pulls a guy over and then bashes in his tail light with a ceder 4×4. Later, he’s got a guy in lock-up and he’s sent his deputy to go guard his parents house because he thinks the bad guys are gonna go after them. So what happens? The ex-high school sweetheart comes to the station and they do it. Greeeeat. It was just a bad movie.</rant>

The Punisher was alright. One sentence synopsis: It’s the punisher, duh. The movie just didn’t capture the comic book genre enough for me. I mean the acting and everything was alright I guess. It had John Travolta, he’s aiight. Had Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, and she’s wicked hot – oh and a total slut in this movie (gives a thumbs up). The main character – Frank Castle – The Punisher – is not Hugh Jackman, but in fact is Thomas Jane. Just now found that out. 🙂 But it was just, eh.

SNOW!

James Asher3 Comments

It started snowing lastnight. I couldn’t be happier. I love snow. This is ironic considering that I tend to get in car wrecks during the winter. In my eyes, if it’s going to be cold, then it should be snowing. It’s the only way the cold is bearable. Case in point: we’re at the bars lastnight and we started attacking strangers with snowballs. 🙂

The Gideon Invasion

James Asher2 Comments

Update: I added the picture that I mentioned below.

Today, as per usual for this time of year, the Gideon Invasion began.

The Gideons, with their perfect octogenarian strategery, amass themselves in force on important intersections across from the University. As is their custom, they give out these little green bibles to passersby free of charge. ‘Tis a gift. Now that I think about it, they were orange once, but it matters not.

I hate being a wasteful person, I really do. Giving me a Gideon bible is wasteful. I will not read it. I’m sorry, I just won’t. I’m not religious, I don’t feel as though I need religion. I believe in God, although not as most people do – most people believe in an omnibenevolent God, whereas I do not, but that’s neither here nor there. Consequently, I avoided the Gideon’s today. I went out of my way to do so, even. This act, in and of itself, is not typically me, but I figured it was better for both the Gideons and myself.

In a possibly related bit of entertainment, though I’m not sure if it actually was or not:

Flash forward to 11:30 a.m. I’m walking from my technical writing class to my physical anthropology lecture. I have to cross the quad – no big deal. As I’m making my short journey, I notice a girl yelling at people and waiving a large flag. Needless to say this piqued my interest. This fanatic very devout girl was screaming explaining in a loud tone that I, and every passerby, was going to hell. Talk about some bad news on a Wednesday morning. If you know me at all, then you know that I was laughing my ass off chuckling to myself. I then proceeded to continue to class.

It just made me think, though. Is that sort of fanaticism and condemnation of every living soul passing you going to convert someone? I mean, seriously, someone explain their logic to me, I’d love to hear it.

I took a picture of the girl with my cell phone camera, though I’m not sure if there is a free way to get it off and onto the internet. I know there is a service I can pay for, though I’m not so sure it’s worth it. I’ll look into it, worry not.

Here’s that girl:

Religious Fanatic

I was explaining this whole spectacle to classmates in my anthro class when one of them mentioned that it was gay-pride week or national come-out-of-the-closet week [or something to that effect]. That also made me wonder if the Gideons, and associated (or un-associated) crazy-ass people with flags, timed their Invasion to coincide. Perhaps so, perhaps not. Damn those Gideons and their impecable strategery.

Ah Football Season

James AsherLeave a comment

I just love the beginning of the college football season, I really do. Prior to coming to college I really wasn’t into it that much, but now, I love it. There really is nothing like getting up at 7am, getting ready, and then have a nice, cold beer. You have a legitimate claim that you are not an alcoholic – you’re just a football fan. At least that’s what I claim.

As per usual, we spend our pre-game time at the Cox Bros. / Coco Bolo’s tailgate. The meal was barbequed turkey legs, which I’ve dubbed Viking Legs due to the Hagar the Horrible-esque way that you eat them, as well as jumbo-sized hot dogs, mmm. There was also the beer, nice, ice-cold, non-judgemental ;-) beer. Kara’s dad also joined us, which was nice. After the feasting, we watched the supposedly strong K-State Wildcats team not-so-soundly beat the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers. K-State won 27 to 13. The score really doesn’t do the game justice, as Western Kentucky, considering their talent, played a decent game.

On a related note, I joined Barrett’s college pick ’em game. More notes and comments can be found on the board (log-in required). To quickly sum up, though, week one I was 10/10, Barrett was 9/10, Colin was 8/10, and Ben 0/10 due to late entry. Let’s see what next week brings. 🙂

Torrential Storms

James Asher5 Comments

As a Manhattan native for 20+ years, I obviously am not afraid of storms. I think it just goes with the territory of living here. If you live here and the sirens go off, you do one of two things. 1) Ignore them. 2) Go outside and look at the storm. One thing you don’t do is take cover. That’s for quitters.

It’s been said that Manhattan has a unique location relative to the local landscape and as such is immune to tornados in the normal sense. This, of course, is completely unfounded, but seems to hold water because the city itself hasn’t been struck by any type of major damage in a very long time, before my time at least. I can count the number of times there have been serious storms in and around Manhattan on my two hands. Only two times that I can recall has there even been a tornado (read tornadic winds, i.e. rotating wind) within city limits. And even when they were within city limits there wasn’t any significant damage. Once there was some roof damage to the old Wal-Mart, but that was it. I guess there was another tornado that went just south of town, just south of the Holiday Inn and it did some damage to a farm, but still.

Last night Ben, Kara, Becky, and myself were at the rec when the tornado sirens in Manhattan went off. As usual my, and Ben, who is likewise a Manhattan native, response was “Meh.” However, that was not the response of the rec workers. They, on the other hand, felt the need to tell everyone to go downstairs into the basement. Regulations, phssh. So we sat and sat and sat some more. I refused to go downstairs with all the other drones. When glass starts breaking and the walls come a’ tumblin’ down, then I might go down, but until then, no, I’m sitting in this cushioned chair, damn it. I stole Kara’s portable radio and listened to K-Rock, attempting to figure out when I could go back to lifting, as our so-called Tornado Warning was to last for about 20-25 minutes. As per usual, it wasn’t near Manhattan at all. It was miles south, near I-70, moving east. Manhattan is north of I-70, bastards. Anywho, I felt like venting about how it was all pointless. Not only that, but they closed the rec after the warning was up. Waste of my damn time.