Ha ha ha ha, where’s the beef. Hi-larious.

I’ve been a bit too into Little House on the Prairie lately because of the Hallmark channel. It’s a good show if you’ve never seen it. Start from the original made-for-TV pilot if you do get into it. I’ve never read the books (which start at Little House in the Big Woods), but I have a feeling that after the pilot episode, the show and the books had very little to do with each other. But that’s okay.

I may be looking at this through kid glasses, but it seems like everything made before the year 2000 was just plain better. In the 70′s, we had many good television shows and films that defined their genres. Most people saw Star Wars, for example, for the first time when they were children or teenagers. I had the privilege of waiting until I had already acquired a taste for films of decent quality in my lower to mid 20′s. There isn’t a large number of movies I like, and I’m certainly not the type to absorb everything of a particular genre. But when I watched the trilogy for the very first time, I was extremely impressed. The quality of the effects were almost all up to par with a more modern film.

Then came the 80′s. The quality of filming became about as good as it would ever get with 1985′s Back to the Future. While the special effects and future history were a bit lacking in my opinion, the quality of the visual and audio were very near peak, and no better actors have come out of Hollywood since then. You could tell the difference between the visual attractiveness of this film compared to 1982′s Terminator which seemed much less appealing.

But then came 1991′s Terminator 2. Again we’re brought to a new level of special effects that the industry has hardly seen before. We also see CGI leaping onto the scene with the one thing it’s perfect at making — a liquid metal robot (and very little else that I could see.) Couple this film with Jurassic Park, and this was a time when as much as possible was done with the use of miniatures, real sets and animatronics while using CGI only when absolutely necessary.

1999 saw a great new SF film, The Matrix. You could say it was east meets west with an anime-style kung fu story in a high-tech virtual world. While the sequels didn’t live up to the novelty of the original, it did seem like one of the last great special effects films.

Maybe I’m old, but nowadays it seems like everything has been replaced with CGI. Films that use things like miniatures, real sets, animatronics, traditional animation, claymation, stuntmen and the like are few and far between. They still exist, mind you, but are outnumbered greatly by the use of computers. I really felt like The Hulk and its sequal were a very poor use of CGI. Others have claimed to me that CGI looks absolutely real, but to me, I can see its irregular cartoon-like movement in the real-world setting and the whole thing just feels like I’m watching Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

Of course, then we come full circle to Lucas again and the new Star Wars movies. I saw Episode 1 through kid eyes and liked the character of Jar Jar when I was younger. As I got older and more crotchety, the CGI really annoyed me, how his character looked like a cartoon shoved into a real world. It’s the same for Gollum of The Lord of the Rings and other characters in other films. There’s a good chance they could have been portrayed more realistically using animatronics, or, heck, even puppets.

But I’m probably just crotchety.

So, I hope you guys are having a good holiday season. I hope the same for my international readers, but I’m sorry I don’t know much about holidays outside the US of America!

I think the Thanksgiving story is pretty common knowledge to most English-speaking westerners due to the wide spread of American media, and for as long as I can remember, there’s always been debates over who did what, what food was served, whether it really was on good terms or even if it really happened. I think when it comes to Christmas, it’s obvious the traditions are almost not related to the reason for celebration at all, and that’s okay.

Putting aside religion, tradition or anything else that holds you to celebrating these days, just remember the theme of the November/December holidays, and that’s togetherness. We get together with people we love (I hope you love ‘em!) and have food. One major reason the current creatures on the planet exist is that when they eat, the pleasure portion of their brain is excited, and they are suddenly just a little happier. They get addicted to this notion, actively seek out food, and are healthy enough to pass on this addiction gene. Fast forward to today when you celebrate, it’s often over a nice meal. Not many people celebrate with food alone. (If you do, you’re me, and don’t be me!) We’re usually celebrating by shoveling food into our gullets with someone we love. It is perhaps the eating of the food with this person that makes us love them just a little more.

If I had a point to all this, it is long since dissolved and now I’m bored with the whole thing.

So, what are you guys eating this Thanksgiving? Does anyone really like that jellied, can-shaped cranberry sauce? I ate it for over 20 years out of tradition then realized “Wait… I hate this.” Also, I’m so bored with turkey. It’s good, but I think a chicken or even a pheasant is a bit more flavorful. As for uniquely southern foods, I’m not sure what’s unique to us, but I have a few favorites. For starters, my mom makes great home-made stuffing (but who wastes stuffing by shoving it in a bird’s butt?). It’s nothing like that stuff you get in a box (which I like, but not nearly as much as dear Mom’s.) and is like a really high-quality deviled crab without the crab. Oh, my. My mouth waters thinking about it.

She also makes an astounding banana pudding, essentially from scratch. Sugar, milk, eggs, flour, bananas, “Nilla” wafers I think are the major ingredients. No boxed vanilla pudding. This stuff is so good, you won’t realize you ate so much of it until your stomach hurts from distention.

My favorite dish, however, has been a favorite for most of my life. You probably call it macaroni casserole, but it’s much simpler and thicker than most northern or western casseroles. We call it macaroni pie. It’s essentially flour, cheese, (egg? I don’t think so. Maybe.) and of course macaroni. The sauce is cooked in a saucepan then mixed with the boiled macaroni, then baked. Of course, this is when most people would eat it. I’ll have a small bite, sure, but I’m saving my biggest portion for when it’s cold. The cheese and flour have solidified, and now you cut the casserole with a knife. If it’s made right, it is soft, but doesn’t fall apart, even when eating it by hand without a plate. It’s so rich in the cheesy flavor, and is substantially satisfying. It’s truly my favorite dish.

So have a great holiday season, guys. Don’t worry about your waste-line this month. Just have all those good foods, and resume healthy eating habits to drop any stubborn pounds the next year around. Life’s short, so enjoy it.

So, I’ve always been a frugal guy. I explained this in my Wacom post. I’ve also always had cats. They’re amazing animals with incredible, individual personalities and if they seem to just sleep all the time and avoid you, you’re probably giving off an “I don’t like you” vibe to start with. But that’s enough about cats.

What I want to talk about is kitty litter. If you’re a cat owner, you know it, and you hate it — that is, if you buy the cheap stuff. For the longest time I’d buy the cheapest litter. Something like a 20 pound bag for $3. This might last a month, but with four cats, it was more like 2 to 3 weeks. It always stunk, so we’d occasionally get the good-smelling stuff to sprinkle over the top of it to help absorb the odor. Since it didn’t clump like the ‘expensive’ stuff, you could only pick up the dookies with the scooper, and the pee just left the litter a darker grey, so after a few days, you had to just dump out the entire box. And this was a horrible hassle. Every time I cleaned the box, it filled a plastic grocery bag, and was extremely heavy. Sometimes it would tear from the weight, and it was just terrible terrible. And did I mention the stink? Good god, the litter box is in my bathroom and it was a punch in the face every time. No air freshener could cover it, and I don’t like to use air freshener around small animals anyway.

So one day, there was a sale on kitty litter. US$9 for a 28LB box of “Fresh Step Multiple Cats Scoopable” kitty litter with carbon. Usually $12, but as I’ll explain, still worth that price. I said what the heck, and removed the old clay litter for the last time. I added this stuff to the box and the bathroom smelled better instantly. It was like night and day. I never realized before how hesitant I had been to even enter my bathroom until I got rid of that old litter. A couple days later, it was time to clean the box. I was still apprehensive, as I figured there’s no way anything can clump as good as it does in the commercials. So I went through my routine, I squatted down (not comfortable for a fat guy) and began scooping. I pushed my scoop deep around the first clump. The fine, still-clean litter around it feel down through the holes of the scoop without so much as a shake. It was like the waters falling away from an island that had risen from the ocean after millennia of submergence.  (Dangit Worpress, don’t tell me “millennia” is spelled wrong. I know it’s right.) But even though it was a big perfect chunk, it was also surprisingly light. After I had finished cleaning the box, the bag I placed it in was barely full at all. I had gotten only the dirty litter, and the box still looks glistening clean, as if I’d just poured it. I added a bit more litter to the litter box (with no choking dust, mind you,) and I was done after only a minute of light scooping. With the old crappy litter, it was several minutes of feverish searching for semi-clumped stuff, pulling up clean and dirty litter alike, before getting frustrated and emptying the litter box altogether.

That was on September 13th that I started using this new litter. It’s now Oct 21st, and I still have at least half of a box of kitty litter left. I figure that if this box lasts 2-3 months and the old stuff only lasted a few weeks or a month at best, on cash spent alone, you’re already coming close to breaking even. And in sanity, my god is it worth every penny. Go to Taco Bell once fewer every couple of months and buy this litter instead. Your bathroom will smell like roses and meadows instead of pee and crap.

You will thank me, and your cats will, too.

- Rumpy and Needles when they were a few weeks old.