“Oooh, free Wi-Fi access at all campsites.”

“You’d want that?”

I started clapping. “I could be all ‘Hey, I’m blogging from our campground right now!'”

“That defeats the entire purpose of camping!”

“What do you know about camping?”

“Nothing.”

The final unit in our building sold recently, with the closing coming in three weeks or so. From a practical standpoint, that means we finally get a washer and dryer that don’t eat quarters, and that a bunch of mechanical issues around the building are finally getting fixed. On the downside, Lisa and I will have to start paying association fees soon, but at least the holiday from that was nice as it lasted.

I can’t wait to get that stupid for-sale sign off the front lawn. Not only is it exceedingly ugly, every time I walk by it I feel like I have to turn around and yell “hey, we’re a bunch of freakin’ yuppies driving normal people out to the suburbs!” It’s hard to complain about gentrification when you’re part of the problem, but that doesn’t mean I should have to feel guilty about it every time I come home.

~~~

A week from now we’ll be in New England. Hopefully it will have dried out by then.

Kind of a low-test weekend. The plans for Northfield were scuttled due to questionable weather, so instead we caught a couple of movies, ate at Latte, and took care of some errands. I did some overdue work on the pig cage, and Lisa planted some flowers out in the boxes around the front porch. Beyond that, not much.

~~~

Eight days to Boston. There’s still a lot of prep work to do before we head east.

Shopgirl: Interesting story, good acting, great cinematography, and thankfully not as similar to Garden State or Lost in Translation as its trailer would suggest. It’s a fairly melancholy movie (especially when pondering Steve Martin’s character), but in a good way. 7/10.

First rule of action movies: Thou shall not be boring. By that rule alone, Poseidon is a massive failure. Sure, the special effects are nifty, but, with two very tenuous exceptions, the characters aren’t interesting, and despite it not being a carbon copy of the original, the storyline is exceedingly predictable. (I probably had a 95% prediction rate for what would happen next.) Short ride, zero thrill.

Josh Lucas’ and Richard Dreyfuss’ characters were almost worth watching, but for everyone else, it was like, please die so we can go home. I was prepared because of bad reviews, but it was still disappointing. 3/10.

It’s been kind of a weird week so far, one that went from a full plate of spaghetti and meatballs getting dumped on dry-clean-only slacks on Tuesday to a business idea big enough to be signed and dated on Wednesday. It also brought the purchase of my first new suit in years, one who’s necessity regrettably cannot be mentioned at this particular time.

Tomorrow morning brings a 7:30 meeting in which this self-described curmudgeon and pessimist will likely be told that devil’s advocates are counter-productive. This weekend should bring final preparations for the impending road trip, an overturned boat, and, if time allows, a day trip to Northfield.

I’m actually getting stuff done this week. It’s a pleasant change from the ordinary.

• Tool’s ‘10,000 Days’ Recalls the Good Old Days of CD’s – I’m by no means a fan of Tool, but this review pretty much sums up my feelings on the shuffle-culture overtaking popular music. While I’m very dependent on my mp3 player, I rarely shuffle my music, instead opting for the traditional order of tracks as laid down on their respective CDs.

Mission: Impossible III is a fantastically bad movie, but, unfortunately, not in the so-bad-it’s-actually-good way. No, it’s just really, really bad, the worst movie I’ve seen in a very long time. Bad plot, worse acting (except for Philip Seymour Hoffman, who’s on screen for, what, 10 minutes?), and the most EXCRUCIATINGLY PAINFUL use of the line “I love you” ever committed to film. Topping it all off, Tom Cruise comes across as batshit insane in his performance as he often does in real life.

Avoid this movie. Even if you’re curious, it’s simply not worth it. 2/10.

I should have a lot to report about the weekend, but I don’t, really. MinneBar on Saturday was cool, although I probably would’ve made better use of it if I hadn’t been under the weather and gotten more sleep the night before. Sunday brought hiking at Fort Snelling State Park, which was kind of underwhelming after hiking at Interstate Park a few weeks ago, but still fun anyway.

Beyond that, not much to report. More later.

Not too much to report for this week. Lisa’s up at a conference, so I’ve taken some of the quiet time around the house to catch up on stuff and eat junk food I’d usually be lectured for having around. The weekend should be a bit more busy: Friday and Saturday brings MinneBar, and Sunday will likely include a movie outing of some sort. (Lisa has put us on a very specific movie program for the next three weeks. Following MI3 this weekend, we’ll be seeing Poseidon and The Da Vinci Code.) I’d like to get some hiking in, but there probably won’t be any time for that.

There’s than three weeks to our big road trip out east. I suppose I should take care of those remaining campground reservations…