I admit it, I am a Star Wars fan! Although not a fanatic who dress up and go to conferences, but I have seen every Star Wars episode in the movie theater on the premier day and I watch the whole series, within a few days, about once a year. That said there are something that make me more or less cringe every time I see them, and here are a few comments about quirks and inconsistencies in Star Wars series I notice every time.
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
12:30 – Obi-Wan Kenobi says, from beyond normal life, to Luke Skywalker who is fallen exhausted in the ice after escaping an attack from the Yeti, that "he must go to the Dagoba system and get trained by Yoda like he did". However as seen clearly in episode 1, Obi-Wan Kenobi was trained by Qui-Gon Jinn, not Yoda!
25:00 – Similar to episode 1, here rebels spaceships are trying to flee a planet steering right into opponents when they have a choice of about one gazillion other paths out from the planet!?! Why do they absolutely have to steer right toward the enemy ships?
35:00 – When the announcement that “Imperial troops have entered the base” is heard, Princess Leia says “Give the evacuation code” even though evacuation has been going on since Imperial spaceships approached the planet.
41:00 – When landing on Dagoba he can’t see a thing and still he is not slowing down!?!
1:25:00 - Obi-Wan says to Yoda about Luke as he is leaving to save his friends “that boy is our last hope”, although Obi-Wan clearly is aware of Leia as he was present when she was born.
1:35:00 – In the room where Han Solo is about to be frozen in carbonite, Darth Vader does not seem to recognize C-3PO hanging on Chewbacca’s back, even though he constructed him as a boy.
Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi
54:50 – Travelling in a stolen imperial shuttle, our friends Luke, Leia, Han Solo, Chewbacca, R2-D2 and C-3PO are requested to transmit a pass code to bring down the force field surround the new Death star under creation, however as they are not going to the Death star but to the Forest Moon, their seem no need to fly so close to the Imperial cruisers and the Death star to get to the Forest moon.
1:18:00 – When Luke asks Leia if she knew her real mother, she replies “only images, she died when I was very young”. Actually we know for a fact Leia and Luke’s mother died at childbirth, so in fact she never knew her real mother.
1:32:00 – The Emperor tells Luke that “they are quite safe from his friends on the Century Moon”, even though we know it as Endor.
1:54:30 – The explosion on the shield generator on Endor is huge, but somehow Han Solo, Leia and friends all survive even though they only ran a short, perhaps 50-100ft., distance for safety.
1:55:00 – As the Emperor blasts Luke with his sorcerer lightning rays, Luke somehow manage to remain unscarred and undistorted unlike the Emperor as he changed appearance when he fought Mace Windu “Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace”.
1:57:00 – How come the Emperor is unable to prevent or stop his fall when Darth Vader throw him over the side? We have several times seen Jedi’s throughout the series, that they are able to prevent or stop falls and even jump extremely high by using their force to “jump” to a wall side and grab on.
1:59:00 – Why are the Super Star Destroyer falling nose first into the Death Star as it is hit by rebels, even though it is in zero gravity space?
2:07:30 – And here is what makes me cringe the most in the whole 6 part saga. It is when at the celebration on Endor with the Ewoks, Luke see’s the ghosts of Anakin Skywalker, Yoda and Obi-Wan Kenobi. Here George Lucas must have had a serious brain fart when he decided to change the ghostly image of Anakin Skywalker with the young, 20 year old or so, image for the DVD version instead of the older self image of him as his age was when he died, which are so for Yoda and Obi-Wan Kenobi. Why the hell George Lucas did you decide to show Anakin Skywalker as a young Anakin, keeping Yoda and Obi old?!? Stupid, stupid, stupid!!!
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Recipe: Quick Potato Chip/Vegetable Dip
Last night I had the munchies while watching a movie, Star Wars - A New Hope (Episode IV) for the 20th time. Fortunately my wife had just bought a bag of Ruffles ridge potato chips so I grabbed a bunch of those in a bowl and began munching. However even though they tasted good they needed something extra - a dip! We had no dip in the refrigerator, so I quickly made my own out of Buttermilk Ranch dressing, dried Parsley, Garlic Powder and Feta Cheese. Now I should say it was even easier than that for me, because we already keep part of our giant cheap $7 128FL OZ/1 gallon/3.79L Buttermilk Ranch container from Sam's, which keeps and takes us about 12 months to go through, in a separate squeeze bottle container mixed with dried Parsley and Garlic Powder.
Recipe - Quick Potato Chip/Vegetable Dip
Ingredients:
4 Parts Ranch dressing with Dried Parsley and Garlic Powder
1 Part Feta Cheese
Mix well in dipping container crumbling and squeezing feta cheeses thoroughly into ranch dressing.
Enjoy with potato chips, celery sticks, carrots or other snacks!
Recipe - Quick Potato Chip/Vegetable Dip
Ingredients:
4 Parts Ranch dressing with Dried Parsley and Garlic Powder
1 Part Feta Cheese
Mix well in dipping container crumbling and squeezing feta cheeses thoroughly into ranch dressing.
Enjoy with potato chips, celery sticks, carrots or other snacks!
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Review: Troy-Bilt 6.5 Amp Electric Tiller/Cultivator
In December 2008 my family (wife, son, step-daughter and me) bought a new house on a .55 acre property. This place needs a LOT of yard work. To keep this entry of getting too long and to focus on the Troy-Bilt tiller review, for now I'll only wrote about my current work in our front yard. The front yard from our driveway is 60-70ft (gets wider down our lot) over to the neighbor’s property line, and 54ft down our driveway to the house. About 12ft of the 54ft from our house is a flower/vegetable (nothing there yet) bed between the main entrance, and there is also a 4ft wide walkway. About 12 ft of the 60-70ft width next to the neighbor’s property line is tall trees and some bushes. The rest, about 50-60ft x 38ft is a pathetic looking lawn.
Second thing I did after getting the inside of the house organized after the move, was building a split-level fence up the driveway and over the one neighbor’s property line. First thing was building a chicken coop, which I’ll write about in another entry . For the split-level fence I bought treated 4x4’s as posts and two 2x4’s bars from post to post. On top of each post I put a solar light. Several neighbors have commented how nice the fence looks. The reasons for building the fence, was part containment of dog and two toddlers, plus eventually a bit of privacy as I thought about a hedge grown close to the fence. I eventually decided on an edible hedge, an orchard consisting of dwarf fruit trees at every post, except at two end posts, two corner posts, and one post at an existing small tree. In between the dwarf fruit trees I envisioned various berry bushes, three different varieties of seedless grape, one in between a post I could trellis on the bars plus two boysenberry between the two remaining posts up the driveway. From the driveway and street corner down close to the neighbors property line, I bought 5 dewberry, 3 raspberry, 2 blackberry and 4 blueberry bushes, for two bushes in between each two posts. Even with a manual post digger it took me about an hour to dig and put down each post, as it was all hard clay and rocks, some of them huge!
When the trees and bushes arrived, yes I ordered it via the Internet, I began digging the holes for them and quickly realized that this would take me a few months, as I only have about two hours to work in, after my day job is over, plus the weekends but only if the weather is cooperating. So after taking forever to put down a few grapes and cherry dwarf trees, I bought a Troy-Bilt 6.5 amp electric tiller/cultivator, and that sure is my new best garden power tool! Now I chose electric because I do not appreciate the noise, fumes and potential start problems of a gas powered tool. Actually I prefer manual tools over electric, as this gives me some needed exercise. Anyways I was worried, or rather was expecting the tines on the tiller would broke within an hour or two due to the hardness of the clay dirt, and the size of some of the rocks. But this amazing machine is truly a workhorse and I have yet to even press the overload reset button after about a total of 10-12 hours of use. All those hours by the way, have not only been for putting down more of my dwarf fruit trees and berry bushes, but mainly to level and till my pathetic looking lawn.
Every day after work I try to put in a few hours and every time it spits up a large rock or shreds a hidden branch it amazes me the tines it holding up to that use (abuse). Note that this Troy-Bilt tiller does not till or cultivate very deep, about 6-8 inches, so for the tree and bush planting holes I have to till, remove dirt and repeat once or twice. But once I have the hole or actually trench, I put down heavily with leaves, course sand, peat moss, wood shavings plus some of the original clay dirt, and run through the hole or trench with the Troy-Bilt electric tiller to mulch the leaves, and mix the components thoroughly together. For my pathetic looking existing lawn, or rather lawn area I found that sticking a spade as deep as I could at an angle in the ground and lifting slightly every 8-10” to loosen the brick hard clay in some areas, and then run it over with the Troy-Bilt tiller helps tremendously, especially in time, as without using the spade in these area and just the Troy-Bilt tiller alone would take me a long time as it could only shave off/till a tiny bit of clay dirt at a time.
Any negatives about this electric Troy-Bilt tiller/cultivator? Not really but sometimes the long electric cords I carry around in the yard, can be a bit of a drag or a slight annoyance, but I just have to work a smaller area at a time to keep the extra cord short and out of my way and sometimes it helps routing the cord over one shoulder. Anyways it certainly does not discourage the use of this wonderful machine, and I have recommended (praised) this electric version Troy-Bilt tiller to two coworkers plus one neighbor how are strongly considering buying it.
You can get the Troy-Bilt electric tiller/cultivator for a very resonable price including free shipping on Amazon
.
Second thing I did after getting the inside of the house organized after the move, was building a split-level fence up the driveway and over the one neighbor’s property line. First thing was building a chicken coop, which I’ll write about in another entry . For the split-level fence I bought treated 4x4’s as posts and two 2x4’s bars from post to post. On top of each post I put a solar light. Several neighbors have commented how nice the fence looks. The reasons for building the fence, was part containment of dog and two toddlers, plus eventually a bit of privacy as I thought about a hedge grown close to the fence. I eventually decided on an edible hedge, an orchard consisting of dwarf fruit trees at every post, except at two end posts, two corner posts, and one post at an existing small tree. In between the dwarf fruit trees I envisioned various berry bushes, three different varieties of seedless grape, one in between a post I could trellis on the bars plus two boysenberry between the two remaining posts up the driveway. From the driveway and street corner down close to the neighbors property line, I bought 5 dewberry, 3 raspberry, 2 blackberry and 4 blueberry bushes, for two bushes in between each two posts. Even with a manual post digger it took me about an hour to dig and put down each post, as it was all hard clay and rocks, some of them huge!
When the trees and bushes arrived, yes I ordered it via the Internet, I began digging the holes for them and quickly realized that this would take me a few months, as I only have about two hours to work in, after my day job is over, plus the weekends but only if the weather is cooperating. So after taking forever to put down a few grapes and cherry dwarf trees, I bought a Troy-Bilt 6.5 amp electric tiller/cultivator, and that sure is my new best garden power tool! Now I chose electric because I do not appreciate the noise, fumes and potential start problems of a gas powered tool. Actually I prefer manual tools over electric, as this gives me some needed exercise. Anyways I was worried, or rather was expecting the tines on the tiller would broke within an hour or two due to the hardness of the clay dirt, and the size of some of the rocks. But this amazing machine is truly a workhorse and I have yet to even press the overload reset button after about a total of 10-12 hours of use. All those hours by the way, have not only been for putting down more of my dwarf fruit trees and berry bushes, but mainly to level and till my pathetic looking lawn.
Every day after work I try to put in a few hours and every time it spits up a large rock or shreds a hidden branch it amazes me the tines it holding up to that use (abuse). Note that this Troy-Bilt tiller does not till or cultivate very deep, about 6-8 inches, so for the tree and bush planting holes I have to till, remove dirt and repeat once or twice. But once I have the hole or actually trench, I put down heavily with leaves, course sand, peat moss, wood shavings plus some of the original clay dirt, and run through the hole or trench with the Troy-Bilt electric tiller to mulch the leaves, and mix the components thoroughly together. For my pathetic looking existing lawn, or rather lawn area I found that sticking a spade as deep as I could at an angle in the ground and lifting slightly every 8-10” to loosen the brick hard clay in some areas, and then run it over with the Troy-Bilt tiller helps tremendously, especially in time, as without using the spade in these area and just the Troy-Bilt tiller alone would take me a long time as it could only shave off/till a tiny bit of clay dirt at a time.
Any negatives about this electric Troy-Bilt tiller/cultivator? Not really but sometimes the long electric cords I carry around in the yard, can be a bit of a drag or a slight annoyance, but I just have to work a smaller area at a time to keep the extra cord short and out of my way and sometimes it helps routing the cord over one shoulder. Anyways it certainly does not discourage the use of this wonderful machine, and I have recommended (praised) this electric version Troy-Bilt tiller to two coworkers plus one neighbor how are strongly considering buying it.
You can get the Troy-Bilt electric tiller/cultivator for a very resonable price including free shipping on Amazon
.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Rant: Parking Citation at William B. Umstead Park
Welcome to my blog! For a few years I have wanted to start a blog about interesting things going on in my life and a place to vent my occasional rant.
Now I did not plan to start my blog with a rant, but I need to get this one out of my system.
Yesterday I got very upset when in my opinion an over-zealous State Park Ranger Bob Davis wrote me a $146 citation for parking about 25 minutes to the side off a dirt road in William B. Umstead Park in Raleigh, North Carolina. I say over-zealous because it should have been a warning, not a $146 citation.
Let me explain why I parked off the side of a dirt road, instead of in a “designated parking area”. My wife and our two year old son had driven from our home near I-40 Harrison Ave. exit with the park brochure in hand, and planned to eat lunch near the Glenwood Avenue entrance because we wanted, after our lunch, to have the least walking distance from a parking area to the “Point of Interest” and that is a JOKE “Airport Overlook”on Reed Creek Trail to show the Airport and especially planes for our son.
So after our lunch we enter the park, drive slowly down the narrow roads past the visitor center, then left, and then right on a dirt and gravel road down to the “Big Lake” where according to the map in the park brochure there should be parking, but no only two handicap spots. This means we have three choices, we can drive home and disappoint our son, or we can drive back to a parking area that also allows non-handicapped stickered cars to park and then have to walk even longer with him as we did not bring a stroller as we planned the distance from the map showing parking spaces closer, but did NOT specify it was handicap spots only, or we can try to drive a bit further to try and find an area closer to the “Point of Interest”, again a joke, “Airport Overlook” area where we can park off the road and walk as short a distance as possible with our two year old son.
When we came as close as possible to the anti-climax “Point of Interest”, I’ll explain in a bit, we parked off the side of a dirt road, right before a “Official Traffic Only” sign and walked about a mile to the according to the map “Point of Interest – Airport Overlook”, well actually we walked past it and had to ask a few joggers where it was, and it was behind us! Then we walked back to the clearing we previously passed and was greatly disappointed that this was called a “Point of Interest” named “Airport Overlook”, sure overlook if you have binoculars because it’s 3 miles away, and then it’s only for small propeller planes. So my son literally could see nothing of interest, nor could we, so we walked the mile back to our car. As we came down Reed Creek Trail to the dirt road we parked on, closed by a metal gate I saw a park ranger turning around and back towards where we parked, and surely enough when we got close to my car I saw the pink slip in my windshield, and when I reached it I read it was a $146 parking citation, a $146 price to pay for about 25 minutes of parking off the side, at the end a dirt, not obstructing traffic and in nobody’s way. Actually we were forced to park at this location since the ADVERTISED parking spots in the park brochure allowed only handicapped sticker cars, and since we could not walk with our two-year old son 10 or so miles. On top of this false map parking advertising, calling the “Airport Overlook” a “Point of Interest” is a joke as there is literally nothing to see! Because of false advertsing of parking area and the deception of point of interest, I think a $146 parking citation is completely unfair and I plan to fight this citation vigorously. This morning I emailed Scott Letchwort at the park, complaining by pretty much writing him as I written here. If that won't result in my citation being cancelled (reversed) I'll figth it in court, and I am seriously considering sueing the state park seeking class-action lawsuit, as I am sure other unfortunate, frustrated and disappointed people have been forced to make tough decisions as whether to cancel going to a point of interest, park far off in the distance or park “illegal”.
The people at the park seriously need to revise their park brochure and make it clear which parking areas that are only for vehicles with a handicapped sticker, and they should also made avaialable of their abundant space for parking areas closer to points of interest, whether those points are actually interesting or not!
Now I did not plan to start my blog with a rant, but I need to get this one out of my system.
Yesterday I got very upset when in my opinion an over-zealous State Park Ranger Bob Davis wrote me a $146 citation for parking about 25 minutes to the side off a dirt road in William B. Umstead Park in Raleigh, North Carolina. I say over-zealous because it should have been a warning, not a $146 citation.
Let me explain why I parked off the side of a dirt road, instead of in a “designated parking area”. My wife and our two year old son had driven from our home near I-40 Harrison Ave. exit with the park brochure in hand, and planned to eat lunch near the Glenwood Avenue entrance because we wanted, after our lunch, to have the least walking distance from a parking area to the “Point of Interest” and that is a JOKE “Airport Overlook”on Reed Creek Trail to show the Airport and especially planes for our son.
So after our lunch we enter the park, drive slowly down the narrow roads past the visitor center, then left, and then right on a dirt and gravel road down to the “Big Lake” where according to the map in the park brochure there should be parking, but no only two handicap spots. This means we have three choices, we can drive home and disappoint our son, or we can drive back to a parking area that also allows non-handicapped stickered cars to park and then have to walk even longer with him as we did not bring a stroller as we planned the distance from the map showing parking spaces closer, but did NOT specify it was handicap spots only, or we can try to drive a bit further to try and find an area closer to the “Point of Interest”, again a joke, “Airport Overlook” area where we can park off the road and walk as short a distance as possible with our two year old son.
When we came as close as possible to the anti-climax “Point of Interest”, I’ll explain in a bit, we parked off the side of a dirt road, right before a “Official Traffic Only” sign and walked about a mile to the according to the map “Point of Interest – Airport Overlook”, well actually we walked past it and had to ask a few joggers where it was, and it was behind us! Then we walked back to the clearing we previously passed and was greatly disappointed that this was called a “Point of Interest” named “Airport Overlook”, sure overlook if you have binoculars because it’s 3 miles away, and then it’s only for small propeller planes. So my son literally could see nothing of interest, nor could we, so we walked the mile back to our car. As we came down Reed Creek Trail to the dirt road we parked on, closed by a metal gate I saw a park ranger turning around and back towards where we parked, and surely enough when we got close to my car I saw the pink slip in my windshield, and when I reached it I read it was a $146 parking citation, a $146 price to pay for about 25 minutes of parking off the side, at the end a dirt, not obstructing traffic and in nobody’s way. Actually we were forced to park at this location since the ADVERTISED parking spots in the park brochure allowed only handicapped sticker cars, and since we could not walk with our two-year old son 10 or so miles. On top of this false map parking advertising, calling the “Airport Overlook” a “Point of Interest” is a joke as there is literally nothing to see! Because of false advertsing of parking area and the deception of point of interest, I think a $146 parking citation is completely unfair and I plan to fight this citation vigorously. This morning I emailed Scott Letchwort at the park, complaining by pretty much writing him as I written here. If that won't result in my citation being cancelled (reversed) I'll figth it in court, and I am seriously considering sueing the state park seeking class-action lawsuit, as I am sure other unfortunate, frustrated and disappointed people have been forced to make tough decisions as whether to cancel going to a point of interest, park far off in the distance or park “illegal”.
The people at the park seriously need to revise their park brochure and make it clear which parking areas that are only for vehicles with a handicapped sticker, and they should also made avaialable of their abundant space for parking areas closer to points of interest, whether those points are actually interesting or not!
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