If I could choose to have lunch with any three people, I think John Kenneth Galbraith might be one of them.

Oh, and…gobble gobble.

Another road game, another original six matchup, another win for the Canadiens. First 3-0 start to a season since 78-79. Not bad.

All in all I’m digging the new rule changes. There are practically no icings anymore, nor are there many pucks shot over the glass by the players; under the old rules you saw plenty of both, and it just killed the pace of the game.

We’ve started looking at plans for both xmas and our Rockies trip next year. Neither will be cheap. But both will be fun (hopefully). I think we’re going to take one more stab at Da Maurizio; if nature or circumstance denies us this time, we’ll know it’s fate that we never eat there again.

The Ring Two (imdb | rotten tomatoes) sucked in the worst way. Such a letdown after the atmosphere of the first. Ptoo!

What an amazing film Vera Drake (imdb | rotten tomatoes) was. It felt like I’d been invited to spend time with a family in 1950 London, to see their existence, as if it weren’t a dramatization so much as a faithful recreation of something that never happened. The detail around the characters’ lives, the lingering effects of the war, the faithfulness to the period…all just made it such a real experience. I usually stay very detached from movies, very aware that it’s all just effects and scripts…but I got completely sucked into this story.

The most amazing part, of course, was Imelda Staunton. She went from such energy and cheer in the early scenes to such complete dispair and shame in the end, such transformation on multiple levels, it’s little wonder she received an Oscar nomination (and Mike Leigh for writing/directing). Amazing performance by the other cast members too. Can’t recommend it enough.

I’m fickle.

Girlfriend du jour.

!!! (in other news, pigs to fly; dogs and cats to begin mating)

We’ve had a busy morning…we were out early in the chilly air (7 degrees!) for a walk down to St. Lawrence Market where we got some fixins for tomorrow (including a pumpkin pie), then a stop at the Dominion, then home, then to the nearby grocery store for the rest of the groceries, then home, then to the Summerhill market for some meat & tasty baked goodness & wine, then home. Barely noon and it was already a busy day.

Now I have to catch up on my reading & posting before the game starts tonight. ‘Hockey Night In Canada”…say it softly and it sounds like a prayer.

[geekery]

As some of you know, reading websites sucks and RSS is the way to go. Still, judging by my stats, not enough of you know that. Anyhoo…

I’ve been an avid user of Nick Bradbury’s FeedDemon reader since it was a gleaming beta in Nick’s eye, and prefer it over all others I’ve tried (Newsgator for both Outlook and web, Sage, Thunderbird, BlogBot, Bloglines, several others that I don’t even remember now). His new 1.6 beta is even better than 1.5, but, well…

Tday Google released theirs and it’s pretty sweet. The reason I like it? They designed it to work like newsreader software (specifically FeedDemon), not Outlook (like Bloglines or Newsgator). And the UI is sick.

I’m not sure it’s feature-rich enough to make me switch, but you know Google will be pumping fixes and features into this thing almost weekly. As fast as Nick is with updates, he’s not that fast, so at some point it’s reasonable to think that the Google reader will have better funtionality. We’ll see.

In short, getcherself a newsreader and forget about reading websites (for the most part; some of them still aren’t on board. Cough cough pitchfork cough.).

[/geekery]

I’m tired. And hungry. Want to go home and relax.

This is nuts. We’re so far behind on our movie watching that we may never catch up. Check it: The Aristocrats, Broken Flowers, Everything Is Illuminated, The Exorcism Of Emily Rose, Flightplan, Grizzly Man, In Her Shoes, Lord Of War, Nine Songs, Pretty Persuasion, Proof, Thumbsucker, An Unfinished Life And Where The Truth Lies.

We also have four movies — The Ring Two, Jules et Jim, Vera Drake and The Dreamers — at home waiting to be watched. I’ve been watching the Dreamers here and there over lunch but I still haven’t finished it.

We also have Wednesday’s Daily Show and last night’s L Word to watch and, though it’s already kind of irrelevant, I’d like to watch the TSN NHL preview.

If someone’s figured out a way to watch movies in your sleep, can they please email me? Merci.

“Imaginary Friends” by Nada Surf and “More” by Tugboat Annie.

Les Habitants are 2-0 after Michael Ryder’s second game winner in as many nights. All the kids are stepping up for Montreal.

I usually look forward to Fridays at work — relaxed, quiet, few meetings — but today I have a four hour meeting…9:30 to 1:30. Which means I’ll be bored stiff and I’ll have to play catchup when I get out. Ptoo.

And finally, happy birthday to Jen and Jenn. One I haven’t seen in 11 years and barely hear from anymore, the other I see nearly every day but is moving to the far end of the country in a few months. Still, it’s their birthday and I’m thinking of them both. Have a good one, kids.