Sdtrk: ‘Prelude and dawn’ by Basil Kirchin

*shivers with excitement*

November 22nd is the exact street date for Aeon Flux – The Complete Animated Collection. This is a 3-disc affair which fans will enjoy a lot more than the hard-to find original 4-episode DVD released in the disc format’s first year, 1997.

Not only will this release consist of the complete series, but it will have some great extras on it as well. Planned bonus material (subject to change) includes:

• Commentary tracks
• Interviews with Peter Chung, production crew, and the cast
• “History of Aeon Flux” featurette
• …and much more!

(from TVShowsOnDVD.com)

My favourite rangy pseudo-anime, PVC-wearing, assassin-slash-foot-fetish-model is back on DVD, and All Is Right With The World. I can finally get rid of my dodgy VHS copy! Hurrah!
Just as a point of interest, 14 November is my birthday, hint hint

Sdtrk: ‘Be’ by the Hospitals

After eight months, nearly the gestation period for a human being, I’m back to being ‘gainfully’ employed, circa this Friday. I’m workin’ for The Man now! Well, a man. Well, a couple of men. And there’s women, too, in the corporate offices. They don’t discriminate.
Anyway! So I arrived at the warehouse at 9am, and went through a brief walkthrough with Herb, one of the drivers who reminds me of Warren Oates’ character from ‘Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia‘. He even kinda sounded like him, too. He showed me how to go over the various points on the pre-drive checklist, using a Crossfire as an example. I’ll tell you, one of the few American-made cars I dig is the Crossfire, cos it looks like an SD version of a Jaguar ‘E’-type, and I naturally thought I was going to drive this bad boy. Nope! It needed to be dropped off at one of our clients, so I had to follow Herb in a chase vehicle so he could get back to the office after the drop-off. However, my chase vehicle was a Stratus. Although my first two cars were stickshifts, I hadn’t driven one in a couple of years, but thankfully, it all came back to me in only a couple of minutes’ time. Not too shabby!

Later, I got to drive the Stratus a second time, being a chase vehicle again for a gigantic pickup truck, and my last assignment for the day had me riding along with Herb and another driver, in order to pick up a Magnum from a client downtown. I don’t know what to make of that car. It’s like a station wagon-sport ute-car, or something. Rather nice acceleration, however. I didn’t get to drive that, which was just as well, as I was starting to get sleepy on the journey to get the Magnum. You have to understand that, after I was ejected from my last job my sleep schedule changed, and consequently, I’d be up at noon, and up until 4am, so much to my chagrin, I have to get used to being a Daywalker again. *points to timestamp on post* Heh, good luck with that.

So my first day wasn’t too bad, although it only lasted six hours. Considering the fact that I was sleepy as all get out, it worked out for the best. Since this is a part-time job, our hours are based on the number of assignments that the dispatcher has available, and I’ve been largely told that an average week is usually about 20 – 30 hours, but as I’d said, it’s better than being utterly skint.. It’s a shame I have to take my earrings out while on duty, though. Ugh, how pedestrian. Ha, a pun!

I’d say Friday’s instalment of Cat and Girl is a close approximation of how I’m feeling about the New Orleans situation.

Give this a look as well, won’t you?

Sdtrk: ‘We build a golem for London’ by Mount Vernon astral temple

Okay, with this instalment, we’re back to the sort of architecture that genuinely makes me a wee bit sad to look at, cos I know I’ll probably never get a chance to live there, but at the same time, it makes me entirely giddy to know that a place such as this is still standing. This time, our focus turns to Habitat 67, designed by Moshe Safdie for the 1967 Expo in Montréal.

At the ground level, a service road system connects all service areas and parking facilities. One level above the service roads is a pedestrian plaza, and above that plastic-sheltered streets which connect all parts of the project through walk-ways and bridges. At no time is it necessary for a pedestrian to cross the service roads. To reach the homes on the upper levels there are three vertical cores, where the elevators serve the horizontal pedestrian streets.

Unlike most Expo exhibits, Habitat 67 remained after the exposition’s close, and remains fully occupied today. Mr Safdie was one of those architects that sought to change the way people lived in a social context, so he built a series of apartments that had the open space that most urban apartments were lacking. This place offered 158 units varying from one- to four-bedroom units, with open walkways that were sheltered from the weather by plexiglass walls. There’s a link at the bottom of the page I’d provided above, that recounts the experiences of a couple that moved to Habitat 67, that’s pretty interesting to read.

What initially hit me about Habitat 67 is that the whole place looks like it’s in motion (‘Nude Descending a Staircase’, anyone?), what with its cube-units going in and out at all sorts of angles and distances. The other appealing thing is due to its structural layout, everyone has their own back patio/mini-garden, which would be perfect for someone like myself, who doesn’t mind the outdoors and nature, just not in great amounts. Some amount of greenery, yet no yard to maintain? You’re speaking my language!

Habitat 67 is a Machine for Living, but with a personal touch. Once again proving that Expo sites feature some of the best buildings and structures

Sdtrk: ‘Just can’t get enough’ by Nouvelle vague

If you’re not seeing the proper black circuit board background, as well as the Guest Gravatars, or the various images and graphics in general that are normally associated with ‘Shouting etc etc’, don’t panic, as Photopeg appears to be spasming right now.

I would strike it sharply with the side of my fist, in the manner of Fonzie correcting an errant jukebox, but the Photopeg servers are nowhere nearby. Actually, I’ve no idea where they physically are.
Hopefully nowhere near a hurricane, is all I can say

Sdtrk: ‘Velada’ by Fursaxa

Look at what I found!

yes, that’s my Sidore-chan. 🙂

Remember, Elena Dorfman’s ‘Still lovers’ comes out next month, and it’ll be available on Amazon.com, as well as Barnes & Noble and a couple of other vendors.
And if you can read Français, why not also buy a copy of ‘Des poupées et des hommes: Enquête sur l’amour artificiel (Dolls and men: Investigaton into artificial love)’, written by Elisabeth Alexandre, with photos by Elena Dorfman? Why not? Hmm?

They’ll be the best literary purchases you’ll make all year. (Despite the fact that one is mostly photographs, and you might not even be able to read the other one.) I guarantee it

Sdtrk: ‘Michael’ by Franz Ferdinand

Now it can be told, as I have positive confirmation: for the first time since January, I now have a job. I’ll be working for ESI as a driver person, where my duties will include delivering various makes and models of vehicles from our warehouse to people, in order for them to review them, eat them, what have you, as well as driving vehicles round to put mileage on them. I’ll be starting this in early September, and I’ve really no idea what the pay will be, but the job seems like something I can get into — there’s no cube farm, there’s very little forced interaction with coworkers, and it’s quite frankly better than being on the dole. O wait — my dole cheques ran out two weeks ago! So obviously, the timing is perfect.
Plus, not only do I already know someone there — Dave, Derek & Steph’s roommate — but Steph was the one who got me the job in the first place. Steph, when the hell’s your birthday?

Woo and yay!