"In The Parking Lots, In The Headlights Of Cars"

So I was at the Seven Eleven earlier this evening getting something to drink, and I saw one of the other cars in the parking lot with a license plate which read "MENSA IQ." "Oh, a genius," I thought to myself, walking towards the entrance to the convenience store. Then the people who were in the car got out, and I noticed the girl who'd been driving was wearing a College Republicans t-shirt. "Oh, she's obviously borrowing the car," I thought to myself, "or else the license plate is a lie."

Speaking of license plates, I get to go to the DMV tomorrow morning bright and early to get a new license, plates, and all that jazz. The average wait time (according to the website, which doesn't list the location I was planning on going to for some reason) is something like half an hour, statistically speaking. Of course, as the old saying goes, nine out of ten statistics are made up (including that one), so who knows. I'm planning to be there for the long haul, though: I'm taking a book (Bob Dylan's Chronicles, Volume 1, which I've been re-reading just for the hell of it), music (assorted, along with my archaic discman of doom), and maybe the Gameboy ('cause I still haven't beat Megaman Battle Network 5, which I was playing before I even moved here. God, I've been slow). I've got everything I think I need: title, license, proof of residence (I hope), proof of my registering with the county for tax purposes, insurance card, and money. It's an expensive proposition, though it doesn't look as expensive as I originally thought. That's good, at least.

On the topic of money (see how these paragraphs are all flowing into one another? I only wish we could teach the students in the English classes how to do this), I got paid today at Accotink and Huntington (which is good, since my Arvest bank account was down to about a dollar and a half before my Huntington check appeared in it...that's cutting it awful close, I have to admit). The Accotink paycheck was fantastic: even though it was only for three weeks of work, it was nearly two thousand dollars. A full paycheck is going to be great.

The Huntington paycheck...wasn't so great. Either I worked fewer hours than I'd thought, or they're really gyping me, 'cause it barely topped $800. It's enough to pay my share of rent and all, but it's still annoying.

I took my paycheck from Accotink this afternoon and started a local bank account at Sun Trust. I set up both checking and savings, deposited $800 in each, ordered checks, a debit/ATM card, and a credit card (1.7% introductory APR, up to 8.99% after the introductory period, which is still pretty good, and since I plan to pay it off in full at the end of each month, it shouldn't be much of an issue). I also withdrew some cash so I wouldn't have to worry about whether or not the DMV would take temporary checks tomorrow.

Wendy, Tim, and I went to see Corpse Bride this evening. It wasn't too bad; the flick has an amazing sense of style and setting, like a cross between Beetlejuice and The Nightmare Before Christmas (appropriately enough), and we loved the idea of having the living world in the drab, lifeless graytones and the underworld in brilliant and vibrant colors. It was a clever way to highlight the differences between the two settings. But what it had in style it totally lacked in character development and plot. The characters were all a little too one-dimensional, and the plot's twists were predictable and too few. Wendy and I had the plot twists figured out by about the second scene of the movie, which was rather disappointing. There was a lot of potential with the characters, and we wanted to see more of the actual relationship between Johnny Depp's character and either of the principle female characters. You never really got a feel for why he loved either girl, and since the whole story really hinged on his love for at least one of them at any given time, it really weakened the movie as a whole. It was basically your typical Tim Burton flick: long on style, falls short in the last quarter of the film. Burton seems more interested in world building than in the actual movie. We also thought the movie seemed...abrupt. There wasn't much buildup to things. The climax in particular could have used more build, more detail. It just sorta happened, and then...the movie was over. Boom, like that, to quote Mark Knopfler quoting Ray Kroc.

Tomorrow night, I think, I'll go see Serenity, since I couldn't convince Wen and Tim to go tonight. I needed other people around tonight, but I think I'll be up for a solo flick tomorrow. Besides, hey, it's Serenity, and they haven't actually seen Firefly, so they wouldn't be able to appreciate it as I could.

~chuck

Song of the Moment: The Band, "Makes No Difference (Live)"