god bless american presidents

normally i'm only aware of secondary holidays like President's Day because places like Best Buy and car manufacturers decide to have sales. this year, however, i'm more than aware, as i got the day off. yay for presidents! yay for 3-day weekends!

that said, i'm writing this in the middle of working... so it's a working holiday. at least i didn't have to put in a full 8-hour day.

random things that have been going on in my life and/or stuff that i've been meaning to talk about for a while:

- the writer's strike is over! from everything i've read the writer's are pretty happy with the deal they got, but i think they had to give a few things up they were asking for. hope it was still a fair deal. anyway, half-hour comedies like The Office and 30 Rock and established, episodic dramas like House and Law & Order SVU will be coming back mid-April and air about 6 episodes a piece to try and salvage each of their respective seasons. newer shows like Chuck and Life and dramas that take longer to play out like Heroes and 24 will be returning next year. nowhere have i read how the strike is affecting summer shows like Burn Notice. i'm happy the strike is over, but hope the writer's got a good deal.

- finished reading the first trade paperback of Spider-Girl (DeFalco/Olliffe) this weekend. the editor of Marvel Comics told Spider-Man fans to buy books like Spider-Girl and Ultimate Spider-Man if they were unhappy with what's happening to mainstream Spider-Man lately - so that's what i did. Spider-Girl takes place in an alternate universe where Peter and Mary Jane got married and had a kid. this kid - May Parker - finds out she has the same powers as her now-retired father. she becomes Spider-Girl. it's a fun book that's total fan service. it's told in the 80s/90s style of writing where a lot happens in a single issue (as opposed to today's style where something may take 6 issues to develop), which i'm not a huge fan of, but it's still good. i'd still suggest reading Ultimate Spider-Man or Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane over this any day, but this is a nice alternative to mainstream Spider-Man right now.

- still watching Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. still not sure whether or not i like it. scratch that - i LIKE the show... i'm just not sure if i LOVE it. it's weird. the first episode was really great, and every episode after that has been a little worse. i'm just not sure if i like how much it's playing with established history. i wish it would just come up with all new characters not related to anyone in the movies, have the series stand on its own. oh, and it better not turn into a love story like Bionic Woman did. ugh. what's wrong with an powerful, independent woman that's single? anyway, there's enough here to like, but not to love. i can't help but feel that if the strike didn't happen and there were other things for me to watch, i probably would have dropped this.

- still making my way through Star Trek: The Next Generation. i'm about 1/2 of the way through season 3 already. each season gets a little better, but there are still episodes here and there that are pretty ho-hum. and again, i can't stress enough that this show would not be greenlit for television today. that said, i still like it.

- i'm buying figures (not toys dammit!) again. actually, i started late last year. haven't collected for a good 3 years now. it's something i really hate getting into because it can get expensive FAST. last time i spent probably $200-300 in just a couple of months before i quit. so far this time i've kept it to a minimum, only spending around $100 in 5 months, but i'm dangerously close to going all-out again. one thing stopping me? i don't have much more room! haha. anyway, i'll post about what i'm collecting right now later.

- finally, i started reading the novel World War Z (Max Brooks) this weekend. i'm only 60-some pages in and i can already say that it's one of my favorite books of all time. it is the fictional telling of the war with the zombies some ten years after it happened. it's told from a number of different perspectives (so far none of which have been revisited, so i think there will probably be over 100 one-shots when its all said and done) from around the globe and it's VERY grounded in reality. the manner in which the zombies come about and destroy the earth is just so well written. for instance, one of the outbreaks happens in China, but no one outside of China knows about it because they cover it up by threatening World War III and diverting attention. could happen. one of the reasons the zombies spread so far is because of the smugglers in Eastern Asia that smuggled infected out to Europe and America where they thought there was a cure. could happen. another reason it spread was infected black market organs that came from third world countries. could happen. one of the reasons it takes America by surprise is because we were sold a "wonder drug" that would vaccinate us against it (in truth, it was a placebo) and thus we weren't worried. could happen. IT COULD ALL ACTUALLY HAPPEN. in fact, sometimes i forget i'm reading a zombie book and am just thinking of the plague as a new virus that wipes us all out, a new AIDS or whatever. it's scary - not because there's zombies, but because the future described in it could be a very real one. not a future with zombies, but a future with death and destruction nonetheless.

now, back to work.

-k