Posted in politics/government at 12:20 am by Josh Peters
Newsweek is reporting about China’s dollar stockpile and the potential effects it has on the global economy.
I guess having too much money suddenly becomes a bad thing when the number of zeroes gets past 11.
Seriously though, we really need to export more to that damn country and stop importing so much! The scales are tipped to the point of falling over, and it’s only making us poorer and poorer (well, that and a slew of other things including our country’s somewhat misguided notions of driving the value of the dollar down so that we can take advantage of our ability to acquire so much credit throughout the world). A balanced budget amendment looks more and more appealing to me every year now.
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Posted in health at 12:47 am by Josh Peters
Well, it’s now S+19 and here’s a little update. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted in movies, reviews at 12:29 am by Josh Peters
Little Miss Sunshine
IMDB
Year: 2006
Writer: Michael Arndt
Director: Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris
Category: Comedy
Media: Film
Distributor: Fox Searchlight
Rating from Motion Picture Association of America: R
Today I watched the movie Little Miss Sunshine, a road-trip movie about a dysfunctional family who travels to California to enter its 7-year-old daughter into a beauty pageant. It’s got a great cast and some excellent moments and is a wonderful little movie.
The characters all have their foibles and nuances (with the exception of the mother–she didn’t really get much backstory nor development) and the movie essentially is the mixing of these odd little people in their mission to get young Olive to the beauty pageant.
The story begins with Steve Carrell’s character’s post-suicide-attempt homecoming. His sister adopts him into her broken home and invites him to stay with her (in her son’s room). He gets reacquainted with his family over chicken dinner, which agitates the grandfather (hysterically played by Alan Arkin). Arkin is a cocaine-snorting old fart who just doesn’t care what people think. During dinner the family reviews a phone message alerting young Olive (who is such a cutie-pie) that she actually won the beauty pageant she formerly runnered-upped in (how’s that for creative vocabulary) due to the previous winner taking diet pills (did I mention she was only seven years old?) and is thereby invited to participate in the “Little Miss Sunshine” pageant in California.
The young lass is ecstatic in her new victory and the family is relegated to drive the 800+ miles to California to take her to the pageant. They all cram into a Volkswagen microbus and head out (they all go as Carrell’s character cannot be left alone, as well as the 15-year-old, Air-Force-Academy-hopeful, vow-of-silence-taking, Nietzsche-acolyte Dwayne apparently).
Along the way hilarity (and a little heart warming) ensues. One of the best devices used in the picture was the fact that the clutch breaks in the microbus, so there is a lot of push-starts that happen during the movie (and then the horn gets stuck to much dismay).
All in all, the movie is quite fun, though some of the characters’ stories could have been a little better utilized (Carrell’s character didn’t quite have much closure to it, and the mom didn’t have much identity of her own) but the main theme was reconciliation of the family. I won’t spoil things too much, but our family grows up a bit during this film and learns to pull together somewhat.
The movie is almost worth watching just to see the Superfreak dance scene, and if my friend Katie Rosen possibly reads this review, please know that I thought of you during that scene. It just seemed up your alley.
One thing I couldn’t help but notice was the price of gas during the movie was $2.45/gallon, which just kills off my sense of suspended disbelief 
Tags: movies, comedy, indie
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Posted in health at 4:34 pm by Josh Peters
I had my follow-up appointment today with the surgeon’s office. Good news all around! I’m cleared to drive, scheduled to go back to work on the 5th of September, and I’m gonna come back to Bloomington/Normal tomorrow sometime!
I’ve also got a temporary handicap pass, so I don’t have to traverse the parking lots so often 
Woo!
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Posted in health at 10:22 pm by Josh Peters
Well, by popular request, here’s an update of my condition.
The short of it: I continue to improve at inhuman rates.
The good:
- My right leg is back to normal, all of the tendon issues I had have been resolved.
- After some trouble, the excretory system seems to be fully operational once again.
- My parents continue to receive the NFL network on their Dish Network Satellite Television.
The bad:
- My left leg continues to give me tendon trouble, I’m hoping it’ll clear up in a few days.
- I’m really wanting to be back in Normal, but am pretty sure it would be bad for my recuperation; I’m a bit lonely and really pretty bored.
The ugly:
- It could seriously be two more weeks before I get to come back to Normal
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Posted in anecdotes, friends/family/loved ones at 4:04 pm by Josh Peters
As most of you know, I’m an uncle to two beautiful nieces. Kenna (who turns 3 on Friday) and Rheyse were over at my parents’ house yesterday and I was laying on my bed playing Game Boy Zelda when little Kenna comes into my room.
She’s scribbling on pieces of paper and talking with me and occasionally she hops up on the bed to sneak a peek of the Game Boy. I retreated to my room earlier as I had a headache which continued to grow (looking back, being in a dark room playing video games probably isn’t a good perscription). Eventually I got up and went to the kitchen to check on my dad, who was working on the walls of the kitchen. Rheyse came in and tattled on her sister, saying “Kenna was witing on her leg!” (Rheyse doesn’t pronounce the letter “r” very well)
I and my mom go into my room to find Kenna laying on my bed scribbling all over her leg. Immediately I realize that it’s partially my fault, as Kenna is trying to emulate her favorite uncle’s new tattoo.
Suffice it to say, she’s getting fake tattoos for her birthday
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Posted in health at 11:05 am by Josh Peters
Hey everybody! Just wanted to let you know how my recovery is proceeding.
My back pain is pretty minimal. On Day 5 I decided to try out not using my pain medication in lieu of just Tylenol and I was pretty surprised how easy the day was.
My biggest issue has been my legs. On Day 5 I decided to walk farther than I had since my surgery, all the way to my grandma Jean’s house, maybe a mile and a half from mine. My mom went with me, and things were going pretty well. However, at the end of the walk, my legs cramped pretty bad.
Ever since the surgery actually happened my legs have been in a weird place. The surgeon said it was likely due to the position I was laying during the actual surgery, but my legs continue to ache and seem unable to relax in any position: the knee seems to feel best when not bent, but my hip seems to hurt unless I’m in some sort of bending position.
The pain varies between annoying (like a funny-bone hit on my hip) and fair amount of hurt.
Otherwise, I’m pretty good.
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Posted in health at 3:31 pm by Josh Peters
L4-5 Fusion
Begins: Wed, 09 Aug 2006 at 7:30 AM
Ends: Wed, 09 Aug 2006 at 10:00 AM
Location:
Carle Foundation Hospital
Urbana, IL 61801
This post is a combination of two things. One: it’s an update on my surgery and the recovery process. Two: it’s a test of structured blogging for an unusual event (from structured blogging’s point of view).
Anyhoo, here goes.
I awoke at 4:00 am on the day in question and drove the lonely 45+ miles to Urbana. I arrived 10 minutes early for the surgery and was a little disappointed to see no people working the information desk, as I was expecting someone to be around to direct me. I found the surgery waiting room and apparently 3 other people were scheduled to have surgery at 7:30 am too.
I was admitted into surgery and provided a gown to wear and waited for my IV to be administered. One wish I had was that the pre-surgery waiting room would provide some reading materials as I was really bored for about 20 minutes. Not wanting to think about the surgeon cutting me or the horrors a sudden sneeze would incur (both pre and post surgery) I soon found myself reading and re-reading a Carle Foundation Hospital mission statement/state of the hospital/internal propaganda document.
My parents arrived about 5 minutes before I was hauled away and I was most happy to see them. I really didn’t expect them to arrive until after surgery.
Surgery came and went, and apparently it went quite well. My surgeon made the incision such that the two large muscles near my #4 and 5 lumbar vertebre could be avoided (I’m sure my friend Evan could provide the appropriate name of these muscles).
I awoke in my room with my parents, sister, nieces, and mother’s mother waiting for me to wake up. I was introduced to my “pain button” which actually does the opposite of what it sounds like it would do. Pressing it caused morphine to be injected into me, which also caused vomit to be expelled out of me (off-topic, but why is “into” a cromulent word, but “outof” not?). Turns out that I don’t play well with morphine. I did have fun making my older sister turn green as I would threaten to vomit in her presence. I guess she can stomach it a lot easier when it’s her own kids but not her younger brother.
After some convincing the nurse switched me onto (there it is again! “onto” is okay, but no “offof”…what about “offto”?) something else which really helped a lot.
I’ll post again soon describing my recovery process, and the drama which incurred there.
Thanks for your support.
Tags: surgery, health
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Posted in friends/family/loved ones, health at 9:59 pm by Josh Peters
Tomorrow morning (at 7:30am) I’ll be having my spinal fusion surgery. I’m pretty nervous right now and don’t really want to be around anyone.
Today I had 5 pre-operation appointments that left me feeling pretty uncertain as to whether or not this will be worthwhile. (Not that anyone actually said this wouldn’t be worthwhile; the afternoon was just somber enough to make me start second-guessing and rationalizing living with what seems to be constant (albeit minor) pain.) (Double parentheses: I must really be in the zone!) This surgery has an 80% chance of totally eliminating my lower back pain, and a 95% chance of partially eliminating it, so in the end I think it’s the best option for me.
So I have to be at Carle Foundation Hospital at 5:45 am tomorrow morning (so I’ll be asleep soon with the help of Tylenol PM) which really sucks. I didn’t want to burden any of my friends with getting up and leaving town at 4:30 am so I’m goin’ alone. My hope is that with my parents staying overnight plus friends visiting tomorrow I can find a good-hearted soul (who is a capable driver) who wouldn’t mind taking my wagon home for me.
Getting home will then be something I’ll have to figure out later, but I’m not too concerned with it.
What stinks is that my recovery time will be a few weeks longer than I anticipated, which really upsets me. I’ll go coo-coo bananas at home with nothing to do but trip out on whatever painkiller they give me. At the same time I don’t wanna screw this up by pushing things too far ahead. In the end I think I’ll request one of my good, generous friends to fetch me a TV tray (though not one from Wal-Mart, cuz they suck the life out of America). Said tray will be my faux-lap so my laptop can be of use to me, as I imagine I’ll attempt to work from home by next Tuesday.
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Posted in PSA, web at 12:34 am by Josh Peters
Yes! I’ve got another reason to love the (sadly) Mac-only web browser OmniWeb: they implemented a suggestion of mine!
In what I’ll call a clear case of Lazy web, OmniWeb now displays URL paths in their most human-readable form. In other words, josh-peters.name/folder with spaces in name/ display just like it is, versus the URL encoded form of josh-peters.name/folder%20with%20spaces%20in%20name/.
I’ve mentioned this desire to the Internet Explorer team and the Mozilla folks (why not Opera? I forgot!) but it took the great people at the Omni Group to try an implementation.
Hooray beer Omni Group.
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