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The Ottawa Rabbit Hole |
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My old blog, featuring my 2006 European Vacation and other wacky adventures : Extras :
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June 2006 : Credits :
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Friday, July 28, 2006The Big Bookcase DebateFor a few months now I have wanted to buy a bookcase to accentuate my living room. My main requirment is that I want it to be relatively tall to hold a maximum number of books, but I also don't want something that looks terrible. This is where my first conflict comes in. The cheapest/tallest bookcase around is the IKEA Billy, which everybody I know seems to own. This one fits the height requirement perfectly, the price is more or less right, however it is also godawfully plain and ugly. Next up, I found a Sauder bookcase available at Canadian Tire which isn't quite as tall as the Billy (only 5 shelves instead of 6), but the price of $50 was right. I went to check it out last night and it too is a lot uglier than I initially thought it might be. The third potential bookcase is at Costco, it meets the height requirement, looks nicer than all the others but this also comes with a $130 price tag. The additional problem with this one is that I don't currently have a Costco membership and would have to mooch off a friend to buy it and it's a lot bigger package than the other two and might be difficult to get home. So my big debate now is do I go for cheap, too short and not too ugly (Sauder); decent price, good height and ugly (Billy); or most expensive, good height and good looking (Costco). The obvious choice seems Costco, but then that seems like a long term investment. I am just decorating my little one bedrom rented condo so maybe the $50 Sauder would do the trick for now and then I can drop money on a nice bookcase whenever I get my own place in the future. Who knows, maybe I won't even have room for a bookcase in that joint. I can't make up my mind, so I will, like most problems in my life, do nothing and let future Wes worry about it.  
Thursday, July 27, 2006Red Light DistrictOver the past week or so it seems like I have hit the red light at every single intersection I have come upon and it is starting to get to me. You may wonder what the hell it is that I have to do that is so god damn important that I can't afford to spend an extra minute or so at every intersection. Well the truth is I have nothing important to get to at all, but I want to get there as fast as possible. Here are some of the things which I have been a few minutes late for: Saturday: Watched Swingers with Purdy and then headed out to the Market. At first we tried our local drinking establishment 'Absinthe' which has been advertising hard over the last few months. Well I guess it doesn't work since there were a total of two people there. See ya later! After checking out the scene at my favourite spot, Bar 56, we eventually ended up at establishment X where Purdy knows the bartender. I have called it such in order to protect this person's job, as he was slipping his boy free drinks under the table all night, turning it into a runaway train of a night. I got a few perks from this relationship, but thankfully not as many so I kept myself in check. Purdy tried to give out his digits to a waitress, but I am pretty sure they went in the trash with all of the old receipts. Sunday: Played beach volleyball in the late afternoon. An friend from the old days has been setting this up all summer, but I just got wind of it. Well there were exactly 12 people there so it worked out well and we had 6 on 6. After that I had a healthy dinner and then went to see Clerks II with some folk. This movie was hilarious, and Kevin Smith has done it again. It is a very fitting ending to his View Askew New Jersey universe. I recommend this flick to all Smith fans and everybody who appreciates terribly offensive potty humour. Monday: Skipped my chitty volleyball and just hung around all night. Oh I also got groceries. Tuesday: Ordered chicken and sat around all night. Wednesday: Played volleyball with my fun team. We had two ringers sparing for us, and we dominated the other team. At first I felt guilty about our domination, but quickly realized they were just a terrible team and couldn't return any of our serves, which weren't particularly tough. I don't think they had very much fun since we ended up beating them by about 15 or more the last two games. Afterwards, most of us went out to eat at Temptation Tea Shop which is a great vietnamese place on Bank. Thursday: Ran around Nepean for a while, doing some chores and looking at bookcases. I will detail my bookcase search in a later blog. One of my stops was Costco, where I decided to have a classic hot dog for supper. At the end of my travels, I had spent $20 on comic books, $2 on a hot dog and $5 on yogurt pretzels at Bulk Barn. After this blog entry I will overdose on reality television and go to sleep. My total loss of patience has lead me to the conclusion that everybody in this world is an idiot (friends and family excluded). Here are some of the people who have made it to the top of my shit list: 1) The lady serving working cash at the Costco canteen. She was one of the unfriendliest people I have ever seen. Standing in line for about 5 minutes I really got to see her attitude and it was not good. After I paid and walked away, I turned back to ask for my drink cup, forgetting that I had tucked one under my arm already when paying. She gave me a look that I would only imagine myself seeing if I had told somebody I had just purposely burned down their house. I wanted to let her know that her unbridled sunshine brings a smile to the world, but I decided to let tact win and walked away. If you are so unhappy with your job, please quit and stop bringing the rest of the world down. 2) The lady who decided to bring her 1 year (or so) old to volleyball on Wednesday. It seems plain to me that a place where fast moving uncontrolled projectiles are flying around is not the safest place to allow your toddler to wander around aimlessly. I would not let this person take care of a fish tank, let alone a little human being. 3) The guy I saw walking down the street with the biggest pair of headphones on I have ever seen. Maybe you haven't noticed buddy, but in our modern society we have tried to streamline this type of technology through MP3 players and little bud earphones. I can only assume he was blasting his Air Supply cassette tape at full volume in his Walkman to take full advantage of those bad boys. That is all. Please enjoy your day!!
Saturday, July 22, 2006Boring Blog UpdateI don't have much to report, but it's been a week since my last update so figured I better give it a go. I haven't done much noteworthy, so here's a quick recap. Saturday: Went to a housewarming party of a friend. She bought a house out in Embrun with her fiancee. For those that don't know, Embrun is officially in the middle of nowhere. Sunday: Can't remember. I think I just lazed around all day, went to Blah Blah's with Purdy and then watched Deadwood at Mullins'. Monday: Played volleyball with my pick up team. Once again I kept telling myself this would be the last match and I would quit after, but once again I felt guilty about it. I have 4 more games to play with them, so I keep thinking I'll just tough it out. I will see if I do it or not this Monday. Tuesday: I forget...oh now I remember. I played tennis with Purdy and it was boring. His serves were on so I couldn't return them, and my serves were off so I kept double faulting. I think we had 1 rally. Wednesday: Played volleyball with my fun team of friends, but we sucked ass this week. Went to the Works after our match, and after I got home I ended up going out to Whisper's with my Mechanicsville boys. Thursday: Did some chores in Nepean with Purdy. This included picking up my comic books, looking for shows, buying some stuff at Farm Boy and Bulk Barn. Oh we also went to Zellers. Friday: Went to Boris' to watch the two episodes of So You Think You Can Dance from this week with a couple others. We ordered pizza and I drank a Pepsi. Amidst that I have also been digging into The Wire - Season 1 DVDs hardcore. This is one of the best shows on HBO and I'm ashamed for America it isn't more popular. I want to rip through the first two seasons as season 3 comes out on DVD in a few weeks and season 4 starts on HBO in September. I also finished reading In Cold Blood. Overall it was a great read, but the last 100 pages or so was a bit of a let down. The big 'reveal' of the book was when they finally described how the murders were done, but this is done with about 100 pages left. I guess there is supposed to be anticipation to see if the murderers get off or not, but since I have seen Capote I knew they did the hangman's dance so there was no suspense. Still enjoyed it though and read the last 100 pages in one sitting on my balcony last Sunday afternoon.
Saturday, July 15, 2006Metric ConcertLast night I headed out to my one and only Ottawa Bluesfest show to see Metric. I was supposed to go with my boy Boris, but he had to bail due to health reasons so I headed down by my lonesome. The show was scheduled for 9, but I went down around 7 to check out some of the other talent. I planned to go see the opening acts for Metric, but I got distracted by Danny Michel who was playing on the 'Blues Til Dusk' stage. He was putting on a solid rock & roll performance with a good mix of country and blues thrown in. The band did a great cover of No Doubt's 'Running'. However you want to describe it, I was entertained and actually missed the beginning of the Metric concert to see the end of this guy's show. I listened to a bit of his music on his website this morning, and it doesn't really convey the spirit and energy he put into his live show unfortunately, but then again that's pretty common for most bands who put on a good live show. When I see a concert, I look for a number of things to define whether or not I enjoy it. 1) They must actually sing on stage 2) They must put a lot of heart into their performance. Metric delivered on both of these requirements and then some. The lead singer, Emily Haines, on whom I focused for much of the night, was a sweaty mess after giving it her all for over an hour on stage. I had heard tales of her energetic performances, and at first was surprised that she was relatively calm on stage, but as the show went on and the energy of the crowd picked up she did too and really got into the performance. Not to take away from the rest of the band though, who also gave it their all, most notably the lead guitarist Jimmy Shaw. Metric's one of my current favourite bands and I highly recommend checking out their live show if you ever get the chance. The big headliner for the night was Rihanna, so on my way out I walked past her stage out of curiosity. 'Luckily', I managed to catch her encore performance of her big hit S.O.S. After about 1 minute of that popcorn lipsynced performance I bailed out of there to catch a bus home before the crowds. On my way out I ran into Freddy Bricks (pictured below*), an old acquantance and the world's #1 Rihanna fan apparently. I said my hellos and got the hell out of there.  * Not a photo from last night.
Thursday, July 13, 2006Entertainment Round Up #1I get tired of blogging about my day to day, so I have decided that rather than give detail about every little thing I do in my life, which bores even me, I will give little updates like this every once in a while to talk about TV shows, DVDs, books, etc that I am currently involved in. I will continue to do posts with the day to day from time to time when something interesting happens. So without further adieu, I'll step up on my soapbox with some stuff you probably don't want to read about... I am trying to fight my way through the 'Earth 2' DVDs I got from Zip back in January. This show had so much potential and I remembered really liking it back in the early 90's when it was on, but now after production qualities on TV have improved so much I find it painful to watch. It has an interesting premise with people trying to survive after crashing on another planet (very LOSTish), but the execution is just brutal. Even my boy Clancy Brown as a regular and guest appearances by Tim Curry and Terry O'Quinn couldn't make this pile of dog shit worthwhile. Since I like to see things through to the end I will watch the remaining two episodes I have left, not both with the special features and file it away on the shit list never to be watched again. My other DVD pick at the moment, which I am racing through, is 'Gargoyles' Season 2 (Volume 1). This Disney cartoon was also on in the 90's, but it was one of the best executed animated series ever. It was a kid's show, but it was very mature and I'd be hard pressed to find your average pokemon obsessed child being able to follow something like this these days. The basic plot is a clan of gargoyles from the 10th century awaken in 20th century New York and have to deal with this strange new world. May sound kind of mundane, but the creator (Greg Weisman) did an incredible job of intertwining medival legends with classic literature (characters from various Shakespearean plays feature prominently...most notably Macbeth and Puck). After a 52 episode second season (I'm really hoping the second half makes it to DVD soon), Disney shit canned Weisman and produced a third season for Saturday mornings without him called 'The Goliath Chronicles' which was just a shit sandwich. On a message board he posted about 20 different ideas he had brewing in his head for future stories and various spin off series. Now, almost 10 years later, he has finally managed to start bringing these to life with a new comic book series he is writing himself which picks up where season two ended (he thankfully does not include season three in continuity). I look forward to reading the continuing adventures of these crazy Gargoyles. Last week I finished reading the 'Da Vinci Code' after less than a week. I can understand why it became so popular. It is a pretty interesting fast paced story that kept me wanting more. At this point I more or less knew all the 'plot twists' which were coming up but I still enjoyed it. I might have liked it more since I have visited a number of the places referenced or visited in the book. Getting the big picture copy from the library helped too since I could actually see the various paintings and whatever he's talking about in the book. It's basically the equivalent of a summer popcorn blockbuster movie, so if you're into that give it a whirl. I am now knee deep in 'In Cold Blood', just over half way done with one week left before it needs to be returned. I plan to take a big bite out of it this weekend since I have no plans for Sunday and can lobsterize on my balcony and read. It is obviously a better written book than that other one I just read (I don't feel like typing the title again) and is equally as engrosing despite its dark subject matter. I'm glad 'Capote' was such a big hit that this book was brought back to the forefront of pop culture. I think I'll go back and rerent the film after finishing the novel since I'll have a greater undrestanding of it and really enjoyed it the first time. Plus it will let me work on my Truman Capote impression for when I play tennis. A surprise entry in this round up, is the film 'The Matador'. I had a big evening of watching 'Big Brother' and 'So You Think You Can Dance' lined up when my boy Mullins MSN'd me that he had just watched this film if I wanted to borrow it. He paid $2 for the rental at the Food Sanction so by doubling up the viewings he has practically cut that cost in half! I just have to return it in time, or the $2 late fee will ruin the entire scam. As for the movie itself, I was thoroughly entertained and recommend it to my loyal audience. What can I say, Greg Kinnear and Pierce Brosnan have outdone themselves!!
Monday, July 10, 2006Cottage WeekendThis past weekend I went on a little trip with my boys Mullins and Purdy to Ontario cottage country to visit the cottage of one of Erin G.'s friends. A lot of chit happened, most of it hilarious, but trying to remember it all now and writing it all out would be a tiring task so I'll just try and hit the highlights. If anybody has any more hilarious stories to add, please put them in the comments section. Thursday after work we got the hell out of Ottawa ASAP and made a beeline to Belleville where we were spending the night. As we neared the city, we listened to the most annoying 14 year old girl ever on the radio. She whined for about 15 minutes straight about how she liked trampolining, Mars bars and popcorn before finally requesting a song. Our first plan of the weekend went up in smoke as we found out the butcher where we planned to by supper was closed. Instead we ate some A&W burgers with frosty root beers. After that we picked up some great party supplies, including temporary tattoos and Hawaiian laze, at a dollar store and headed to the Mullins Estate. We hung around chatting, watched some UFC with special guest star Large Farva. Friday morning we all got up and did some chores around Belleville in preparation. For breakfast we ordered up some sausage and egg mcMuffins but they ran out of eggs so I had mine with a folded egg. It was as terrible as it sounds. This McDonald's should stock enough eggs in the future so they don't run out at 10:30 in the morning again. We also bought groceries for the weekend: 6 hot dogs and buns for the fellas. We finally got the hell out of Belleville around 11 and hit the road. The trip there seemed to take about twice as long as we hoped, but we saw some incredible sights along the way, chief among them a plane which was sinking out of the sky right in front of our eyes!! We looked for black smoke after but couldn't see anything. It might have been a mirage. We also talked about meatloaf for about half an hour. Once we got to the cottage we did the usual cottage stuff like hanging out, having a couple drinks and lobsterizing. Other people swam, but due to my lack of knowledge in this area I chose to sit on the dock instead. We also covered ourselves in temporary tattoos and looked like complete idiots (myself especially). I can't remember much else too exciting from this day except there was a Hawaiian party theme at night and Purdy talked about typewriters for about an hour around the old campfire.  Saturday morning we piled in the Sunfire with Erin G. and two of her friends from Toronto and headed into Minden for breakfast. We found a place called the Brown Owl where we managed to have a passable breakfast at a decent price.  We picked up some more supplies at the grocery shop and goosed it back to the cottage since we were missing valuable lobsterizing time. It was a pretty eventful day, including doing crosswords on the dock, playing card games, kicking around the soccer ball and passing around the old volleyball. When we got back from breakfast I met a guy named Matt who had shown up while we were MIA. He didn't make much of an impression at first until he reappeared as 'The Wiggler' in the evening. He came in like a firestorm and made people notice him, by doing things such as accusing the host of throwing a cork at his head and nearly breaking his tailbone by jumping off of an 8 foot deck. After these feats, he wisely decided to take about a 4 hour nap. When he was woken from that he was really on his game, providing tons of laughs and being a great guy to pal around with. You really haven't had fun until you've partied with the Wiggler. Not only is he fun, but he is also a great guy who cleaned up a huge part of the mess after everybody else had gone to sleep. I guess he wasn't tired after his nap. The Wiggler  Me and the Wiggler during his nap  Sunday morning after getting up we got the hell out of there as soon as possible after talking to the Wiggler for a little while down on the dock and soaking up the last bit of sun. The ride back to Ottawa was estimated at 3 hours but it must have taken about 4, and they were the longest 4 hours ever. Some portions passed lightning quick though, such as when the three of us tried to name as many three letter words as we could, or when we talked about the term 'Goose It' for an hour. We finally got back to Ottawa in late afternoon, and were greated by a nice layer of smog over the city. You can see a lot more photos from the trip at http://eurowesley.shutterfly.com As a parting bit of fun, please try to answer the following quiz: Light Entertainment F_ _ _ _ _ _ K S
Tuesday, July 04, 2006One Day, Three MoviesI havee't been to the theatre since April, so I decided to overcompensate on Sunday and see three movies. First up on the docket: Superman Returns - After a long visit to the lost remains of the planet Krypton, the Man of Steel returns to earth to become the peoples savior once again and reclaim the love of Lois Lane.  I'm a comic book reader, but I have never been a big Superman fan. How can you cheer for a guy who has every power under the sun at his disposal? Plus it means there's no conceivable villain for him to fight, so it's always rescuing people from accidents and natural disasters. This movie more or less delivered on this same theme, but it doesn't mean it's a bad film. I actually enjoyed it a fair bit, although I did find it a bit slow and dull at times (much like Superman himself). The fact is, Clark Kent is a much more interesting character and it's unfortunate he gets shortchanged on the screen time in this film. It's also unfortunate that the kid who played the main guy will forever be compared to Christopher Reeve who it's impossible to top. He did do a solid job though and even got some Reeve style acting in (particularly with Kent's bumbling). The rest of the supporting cast were enjoyable and did a solid job, particularly Kevin Spacey's Luthor which was outstanding. I don't want to say that Lois Lane was miscast, because I'm not really sure what else could be brought to what is basically just a boring role in all Superman stories. Overall though, it's a summer popcorn flick and you definetly get what you pay for: a decent story with killer special effects. 3.5 carrots out of 5 Brick - A teenage loner pushes his way into the underworld of a high school crime ring to investigate the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend.  I've wanted to see this for a while, so I finally committed to my first Kentertainment movie night and went out to the Mayfair. I really didn't know much about this movie going in other than it was well reviewed and involved some kind of mystery in a high school. Turns out it's way more than that. A lot of reviews relate it to a film noire mystery, and they are dead on. This entire plot including the dialogue, with a few exceptions, could be redone in an adult setting and reproduce a 20's style detective mystery perfectly. The main performance by Joseph Gordon-Levitt (that's right, the kid from Third Rock From the Sun) is great and really brings you into the movie. The storyline itself is pretty complex and provides a lot to absorb. I managed to keep up with it during my watching, but if anybody asked me to reproduce the entire plot right now I'd be hard pressed to do it. I highly recommend everybody check this film out. 4.5 carrots out of 5 Hard Candy - A mature 14-year old girl meets a charming 32-year old photographer on the Internet. Suspecting that he is a pedophile, she goes to his home in an attempt to expose him.  I planned to leave after Brick, but I wasn't that tired so decided to stay for the second half of the double feature. I knew absolutely nothing about this movie going in and maybe that's why I had the reaction I did. This was one of the most disturbing movies I've seen in a while. As the description says, it starts out with a 14 year old girl meeting a 32 year old creep she met over the internet and going back to his place. I was waiting for him to crank up the creepometer for the first 20 minutes or so, then all of a sudden the tables turn and she's in control and wants to punish this guy for being such a creep. The rest of the movie consists of her torturing this guy, but the trick it is mostly mentally with a little physical vilance thrown in for good measure. This film had an 18A rating, and it was all due to disturbing subject matter since there was no real gory violence. This movie was well done, and the two main actors did a stellar job. In fact, pretty much the entire 2 hours is them on screen with little minute long appearances by a handful of other characters. This film is dark and disturbing, but incredibly well done. I recommend it for quality, but be sure you can handle the subject matter. You are not in for a laugh riot when you sit down for this one. 4 carrots out of 5
Monday, July 03, 2006Be Careful What You Wish ForI know I posted twice already this morning, but I had to share this. Ever since I created this blog I have been checking google to see if I register in their index but to this point I haven't. Well luckily my Statcounter below tracks who visits and where they linked from. I finally saw my first hit from Google. Follow this link to see what keywords they used to find my page. That's right. I am number one on Google India if you search for 'tortorus photographs'. I guess whoever did that search is as bad a speller as I am. Now that I have typed that phrase in this entry I may remain number one for a while. I hope the sick bastard in Calcutta who did that search enjoyed what he found on my blog. The only torturous photograph present in that entry was a close up of Purdy's grill.
I just added two new lists to the right hand column, so now everybody can track in even more detail what I'm doing with my life. They are pretty self explanatory. 'DVD Series I'm Watching' is a list of what TV series I am currently in the middle of watching on DVD. I'm only really actively watching a couple (Earth 2 and Gargoyles), but there are a few that I started and got bored half way through. I will keep these on the list so I don't forget to go back and finish watching them. 'TV Shows I'm Watching' is a list of what shows that are currently on the air that I follow. Watch for this list to balloon when the fall TV season starts.
My weekend is shaping up more or less like I wanted. Maybe a little bit more excitement than I had planned on. Around 5 on Saturday I walked down to my friend Jenn's place (about 30 minutes walk) where there were some people collected on the patio hanging out. We ordered some Gabriel's Pizza for dinner. It was raining a bit later in the evening, but we still walked down to the river to watch the fireworks. We weren't so stupid that we went to Parliament Hill, but instead we went to Lebreton Flats where you get a better angle. I'm not sure why thousands of people crain their necks staring at the flashing lights from the hill when you can't see half of them anyway. The fireworks were alright I guess. I'm still not sure what advancements in firework technology can be made to keep me interested. After the fireworks I walked home. At one point I took a header when the path dropped off about 6 inches since I was motoring to get home in the rain. Luckily I got my hands out and survived the fall without cutting up my grill. Yesterday I went to play tennis with Purdy where he once again whipped me like a mule. This time it was 6-1, 6-0, 6-1 so at least I got a few licks in. It was insanely windy yesterday, so maybe those are my optimal playing conditions. After that we stupidly decided to walk to Westboro to find something to eat. This was good for about the first 30 minutes, after which time my little peglegs and hinges started barking at me. After walking all the way to the other end of Westboro without finding a place that was open and offered prepared, healthy, delicious and cheap food we trucked back to Blah Blah's and bought something at their food stand. The walk home from there was painful and I really wish we had driven. In the evening we both went out to a BBQ at a mutual friend's house. Well I don't know him that well so it was really nice of him to give me an invitation. He provided all the food which was incredible of him and it was all delicious (there was souvlaki, sausage, hamburgers and all kinds of appetizers). I got home around 2:30, and rather than go to bed like a smart person I decided to start up a webcam conversation with my friend in Winnipeg. I am paying for that now after getting only about 5 hours sleep. Today I will see at least one but maybe two movies. I will keep you in suspense as to what they are.
Saturday, July 01, 2006Happy Canada Day! So far my low key weekend has shaped up to being just that. Last night after work I ripped up the exercise bike and read a bit. After eating a healthy baked pizza, me and my boy Purdy headed to Nepean for a couple shopping stops. First I picked up my funny books at the Comic Book Shoppe and then headed to Best Buy where I bought a $5 Eazy-E CD and Gargoyles Season Two - Volume One DVD. I saw this DVD at Walmart at Christmas time for $45 in Abbotsford and didn't buy it and have never seen it at a Walmart since. I was going to buy it at Chapters using my birthday gift card, but last night I stumbled upon it by accident and it was only $43.99. Who's the big winner? I am! When I got home, rather than watching my newly purchases DVD I instead watched Serenity which I have been sitting on since Christmas. At that time I had just seen it in theatres a few months before and had no urge to rewatch it. I had forgotten how fanastic it was and once again am dismayed over FOX's cancellation of Firefly. This morning Purdy and Uhrbach and I headed out to Westboro for breakfast. Unfortunatley, my favourite breakfast joint John's was closed for the day so we had to slum it at Newport Pizza. The breakfast was a bit cheaper but I didn't enjoy the food as much. It was still better than the pile of garbage I got at the Alfa Diner a couple months ago. After that we watched the brutal defeat of England by Portugal in the World Cup in penalty kicks. At one point Beckham was crying on the sides since he knew he will never be back to another World Cup since he is quickly fossilizing. After the match I cleaned up a bit and have been on my balcony reading the Da Vinci Code. It is a pretty interesting storyline that moves quickly and compels you to keep on reading. I am now half way through it and hope to finish it up before the end of the week. In a bit I am leaving to head over to a friend's house for the evening with a few other people. We have no real plans so I guess we will just sit around all day. They live downtown so maybe we will wander over to watch the fireworks. I am not always impressed by pretty lights in the sky though so I don't care too much one way or the other.
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