Sean’s list of the fifty most beautiful women in the world:
(in no particular order)
This is an eclectic list, but these are the women who came to mind when I thought of “beautiful”. It’s not necessarily physical beauty in the traditional sense in all cases, but something about them makes them beautiful to me.
I put a Mrs. by those whom I know _and_ know to be married.
1. Catherine Zeta-Jones
2. Meg Ryan
3. Charlize Theron
4. Winona Ryder
5. Nicole Kidman
6. Mrs. Jane Meyer
7. Amy Nelson
8. Victoria Esher
9. Fairuza Balk
10. Darla Enlow
11. Melissa McCracken
12. Sinéad O’Connor
13. Mrs. Keri Aaver
14. Milla Jovovich
15. Michelle Pfeiffer
16. Laura Halling
17. Sheryl Crow
18. Melissa Etheridge
19. k.d. lang
20. Ashley Judd
21. Aimee Tubbs
22. Laurel Trautwein
23. Halle Berry
24. Michelle Rodriguez
25. Alycin Hummel
26. Lauren Hutton
27. Jessica Lange
28. Emma Thompson
29. Kathy Bates
30. Michelle Smietana
31. Maureen O’Hara
32. Carrie Fisher
33. Jodie Foster
34. Oprah Winfrey
35. Meryl Streep
36. Natalie Portman
37. Barbra Streisand
38. Holly Hunter
39. Mrs. Mickey Zucker Reichert
40. Stacy Peters
41. Mrs. Rachelle McCoy
42. Naomi Judd
43. Sarah McLachlan
44. Linda Hunt
45. Helen Hunt
46. Hilary Swank
47. Julie Andrews
48. Bonnie Raitt
49. Dolly Parton
50. Jane Fonda
Friday, 28 January 2005
Thursday, 27 January 2005
The Lord is amazing
Wow. I have hardly been up an hour, and the Lord's shown me today a glimmering of how amazing he is. This is through a ministry Kenneth Copeland has, an e-mail ministry wherein he'll send out a daily devotional along with a scripture reading. Today's reading was Psalm 107. As I read it, I was amazed at how wonderful the Lord is. I saw a few parallels between my life and the situations described in that chapter, and, well, I'm just amazed.
This is a great day, not just for me but for you, too.
Love and peace.
-Sean
This is a great day, not just for me but for you, too.
Love and peace.
-Sean
Wednesday, 26 January 2005
big business, stupid decisions, and the nose on your face
Corporations. Some do great stuff with sound reasons. Others do stupid stuff for moronic, short-sighted reasons. For example, a policy might have people submit paperwork on paper over long distances instead of just e-mailing it. Why? For security. For, perhaps, other reasons. Like some deal or contract they have with a carrier, a delivery service. E-mailing those documents or whatever would cut out money for the carrier. Another reason: somebody might hack in, there might be a computer virus, whatever.
Exactly. Whatever.
This is the complaint I hear so often from PC users. I try to tell them to switch to Macs and they won't have those sorts of problems _as much_, but they won't listen. They've been raised on PCs, they know them, they accept their position. They don't want to spend money on more software. So, instead, they spend that money on techies or repairs to fix the problems they could have avoided.
I gotta say it, and I'm not on Apple's payroll: Macs are safer. Operating System X (ten), is based on UNIX, which is about as secure as you can get. More to the point: Apple's not that big a target--there's little prestige in hacking into an Apple system, so hackers don't target them just because they're not that big. Also, and perhaps more importantly, Apple is a nice company. Competitive, yes, but nice about it. And they're cool, and don't poo-poo that factor. People don't attack what they think is cool. Why? Because they like it. Why attack something you like?
And their quality is great--not that their machines don't break down, but when they do, as long as you've got a service agreement, they're snappy about living up to their end of the bargain.
What else can I say about Macs? This: if people would switch over, they'd be safer. So spend the money once and get a great product, and you won't have to worry as much about stuff going wrong. Oh, and Macs will run anything Windows puts out, as far as I know, with a program called Virtual PC. As I understand it, get that program, and you can delay getting Mac programs for your new Mac computer. Virtually anything else you want to do, you can do on a Mac better than on a PC--folks say there isn't the software--yes, there is. You have to look, but it's there. As to games, Windows has the upper hand there, but the games that are really good will eventually migrate to Mac anyway. Besides, it's better to have a PlayStation2 for games and use the computer for, um, work and stuff.
Oh, but viruses come over the internet all the time. Here's a solution: you know that telephone line or RJ-45 cable from your cable modem? Unplug it when you're not using it. It takes two seconds, and that way, you control more of what's coming into your computer. Here's another tip: take the effort to get to know the preferences on your browser, specifically what cookies are coming in and set up restrictions. Here on Safari, for example, I choose the option to only accept cookies from sites to which I navigate. If I wasn't willing to accept a cookie from site XYZ, maybe I shouldn't go to site XYZ. And choose the option to block pop-up ads. I don't know if Internet Explorer has this option, but Safari does and so does Netscape, which are in my opinion better browsers anyway. I know, most people use Explorer. Why? Because it's what came with their computer and they didn't question it.
Question it. Find the better product. Do your homework. Don't be lazy, or you're just asking for trouble where the internet's concerned.
And, while I'm spewing about computers, sometimes your computer will slow down because of too much junk on it, and that junk is usually in the cache of your browser. Clean out the cache. It's a simple press of a button, and a few minutes later, your browser should be running better. And while you're cleaning, take a look at your hard drive as well. Do you really have to have nineteen photos of your cat's left ear? If you do, fine, put that on a CD and file it away with the rest of the junk, but know that hard drives access stuff slower when there's more stuff on them because there's more stuff for the computer to have to root through in order to find what you want. And get more RAM. RAM is memory and when you have more space to remember things, you can remember more things, and faster; otherwise things get kind of crammed in and hard to access.
Okay, my tirade is done but for one more bit: Try a Mac or quit whining about how bad your PC is performing. This is a page that will address any other concerns about switching from PC to Mac: http://www.apple.com/switch/
'Nuff said.
Exactly. Whatever.
This is the complaint I hear so often from PC users. I try to tell them to switch to Macs and they won't have those sorts of problems _as much_, but they won't listen. They've been raised on PCs, they know them, they accept their position. They don't want to spend money on more software. So, instead, they spend that money on techies or repairs to fix the problems they could have avoided.
I gotta say it, and I'm not on Apple's payroll: Macs are safer. Operating System X (ten), is based on UNIX, which is about as secure as you can get. More to the point: Apple's not that big a target--there's little prestige in hacking into an Apple system, so hackers don't target them just because they're not that big. Also, and perhaps more importantly, Apple is a nice company. Competitive, yes, but nice about it. And they're cool, and don't poo-poo that factor. People don't attack what they think is cool. Why? Because they like it. Why attack something you like?
And their quality is great--not that their machines don't break down, but when they do, as long as you've got a service agreement, they're snappy about living up to their end of the bargain.
What else can I say about Macs? This: if people would switch over, they'd be safer. So spend the money once and get a great product, and you won't have to worry as much about stuff going wrong. Oh, and Macs will run anything Windows puts out, as far as I know, with a program called Virtual PC. As I understand it, get that program, and you can delay getting Mac programs for your new Mac computer. Virtually anything else you want to do, you can do on a Mac better than on a PC--folks say there isn't the software--yes, there is. You have to look, but it's there. As to games, Windows has the upper hand there, but the games that are really good will eventually migrate to Mac anyway. Besides, it's better to have a PlayStation2 for games and use the computer for, um, work and stuff.
Oh, but viruses come over the internet all the time. Here's a solution: you know that telephone line or RJ-45 cable from your cable modem? Unplug it when you're not using it. It takes two seconds, and that way, you control more of what's coming into your computer. Here's another tip: take the effort to get to know the preferences on your browser, specifically what cookies are coming in and set up restrictions. Here on Safari, for example, I choose the option to only accept cookies from sites to which I navigate. If I wasn't willing to accept a cookie from site XYZ, maybe I shouldn't go to site XYZ. And choose the option to block pop-up ads. I don't know if Internet Explorer has this option, but Safari does and so does Netscape, which are in my opinion better browsers anyway. I know, most people use Explorer. Why? Because it's what came with their computer and they didn't question it.
Question it. Find the better product. Do your homework. Don't be lazy, or you're just asking for trouble where the internet's concerned.
And, while I'm spewing about computers, sometimes your computer will slow down because of too much junk on it, and that junk is usually in the cache of your browser. Clean out the cache. It's a simple press of a button, and a few minutes later, your browser should be running better. And while you're cleaning, take a look at your hard drive as well. Do you really have to have nineteen photos of your cat's left ear? If you do, fine, put that on a CD and file it away with the rest of the junk, but know that hard drives access stuff slower when there's more stuff on them because there's more stuff for the computer to have to root through in order to find what you want. And get more RAM. RAM is memory and when you have more space to remember things, you can remember more things, and faster; otherwise things get kind of crammed in and hard to access.
Okay, my tirade is done but for one more bit: Try a Mac or quit whining about how bad your PC is performing. This is a page that will address any other concerns about switching from PC to Mac: http://www.apple.com/switch/
'Nuff said.
Wednesday, 19 January 2005
here again we go
Well, I'm at work on another story. Will I never quit writing? Um...no.
I've been reading Ayn Rand's _Atlas Shrugged_. I don't know if I've mentioned it before. Anyway, compelling idea and an incredible book so far by the best writer on Earth whom I've come across. I told somebody that if I got to be a quarter to half as good a writer as Ayn Rand, I'll be one of the best around. She just has a way of saying something so precisely, with such clarity, that the reader gets a very exact image. And the suspense, the readablility, wow. Rand's writing won't suffer fools, but it's not opaque, either. It takes a brain to get what she's saying, but one needn't be the direct lineage of Stephen Hawking and possess an IQ of 204 and have nineteen doctorates in various facets of English, philosophy and sociology to understand it. Therein lies Rand's talent: taking huge ideas, huge subjects, and making a compelling story with compelling characters. And, get this, though I'm only a third of the way through _Atlas Shrugged_, I've yet to find an extraneous word. She uses however many words it takes to get the point across, no more. Excellent, excellent stuff.
What else? Bills are coming due, but I will be fine in paying them. I got some overtime at work, and hopefully there's more of that on the way. Nevertheless, the bills aren't so much I can't meet them, or at least make a dent in them.
I'm probably going to join the YMCA this week, get back into weightlifting. I understand they're doing a promotion now where you don't need to pay the initiation fee, which is a plus to me. I can always think of something else to do with thirty bucks rather than pay a third of an initiation fee. Personally, I wonder what the initiation fee's for, other than to put more money into peoples' pockets.Still, that's better than one other gym I looked at. There, you could pay an initiation fee of ninety-nine dollars, with a contract of one year, but that fee had to be paid within three days of whenever you first visited the gm. Otherwise, it went up to $199 or $299. When did all this happen? Contracts? Initiation fees? When I was working out, you paid about thirty bucks a month and just went month to month. You might pay a little more than somebody who went for six months at a time, like four bucks more, but so what? Makes a fella just want to buy a weight set of his own and train at home. Pay a bit and get it all over with. I'm still tempted to do that, but the cost of setting up a proper weight set in this apartment would be a bit too much.
I remember at least one thing from when I lifted: the hardest part about working out is getting there.
I just hope I don't get overly helpful people, when I'm new at the Y, coming over to help me when I'm trying to get the lay of the land. Other people like to work out with a partner, talk to people, whatever. I don't. Never really have. Just give me my walkman, or an iPod, and leave me alone. I think I don't like working out with a partner because of the loss of control--i can't just do whatever I want, switch things around according to whatever I feel like doing. For example, on back and bis day, I might decide I want to do seated rows rather than dumbbell rows and the partner doesn't like doing the former. Without a partner, there's nobody else to consider, so it's simpler.
Of course, the problem there is it's hard to really gain, fast, without a partner, because it's hard to truly go one hundred percent when you've got nobody to help you when you fail. In most exercises, it doesn't matter. In dangerous ones, like squats or bench presses, you need a spot--in cases like that, I usually recruit somebody or handle a weight I know I can handle. Again, the problem is, if you only handle a weight you can handle, you won't develop the strength to handle more. I should be a personal trainer. When I slim down, that is. Best if your personal trainer looks like he/she trains once in a while and has some idea of the efficacy of choosing granola over a piece of taffy--both are delicious, both have...differing strong points.
Time to get some friggin' sleep. Take care, all.
-Sean
I've been reading Ayn Rand's _Atlas Shrugged_. I don't know if I've mentioned it before. Anyway, compelling idea and an incredible book so far by the best writer on Earth whom I've come across. I told somebody that if I got to be a quarter to half as good a writer as Ayn Rand, I'll be one of the best around. She just has a way of saying something so precisely, with such clarity, that the reader gets a very exact image. And the suspense, the readablility, wow. Rand's writing won't suffer fools, but it's not opaque, either. It takes a brain to get what she's saying, but one needn't be the direct lineage of Stephen Hawking and possess an IQ of 204 and have nineteen doctorates in various facets of English, philosophy and sociology to understand it. Therein lies Rand's talent: taking huge ideas, huge subjects, and making a compelling story with compelling characters. And, get this, though I'm only a third of the way through _Atlas Shrugged_, I've yet to find an extraneous word. She uses however many words it takes to get the point across, no more. Excellent, excellent stuff.
What else? Bills are coming due, but I will be fine in paying them. I got some overtime at work, and hopefully there's more of that on the way. Nevertheless, the bills aren't so much I can't meet them, or at least make a dent in them.
I'm probably going to join the YMCA this week, get back into weightlifting. I understand they're doing a promotion now where you don't need to pay the initiation fee, which is a plus to me. I can always think of something else to do with thirty bucks rather than pay a third of an initiation fee. Personally, I wonder what the initiation fee's for, other than to put more money into peoples' pockets.Still, that's better than one other gym I looked at. There, you could pay an initiation fee of ninety-nine dollars, with a contract of one year, but that fee had to be paid within three days of whenever you first visited the gm. Otherwise, it went up to $199 or $299. When did all this happen? Contracts? Initiation fees? When I was working out, you paid about thirty bucks a month and just went month to month. You might pay a little more than somebody who went for six months at a time, like four bucks more, but so what? Makes a fella just want to buy a weight set of his own and train at home. Pay a bit and get it all over with. I'm still tempted to do that, but the cost of setting up a proper weight set in this apartment would be a bit too much.
I remember at least one thing from when I lifted: the hardest part about working out is getting there.
I just hope I don't get overly helpful people, when I'm new at the Y, coming over to help me when I'm trying to get the lay of the land. Other people like to work out with a partner, talk to people, whatever. I don't. Never really have. Just give me my walkman, or an iPod, and leave me alone. I think I don't like working out with a partner because of the loss of control--i can't just do whatever I want, switch things around according to whatever I feel like doing. For example, on back and bis day, I might decide I want to do seated rows rather than dumbbell rows and the partner doesn't like doing the former. Without a partner, there's nobody else to consider, so it's simpler.
Of course, the problem there is it's hard to really gain, fast, without a partner, because it's hard to truly go one hundred percent when you've got nobody to help you when you fail. In most exercises, it doesn't matter. In dangerous ones, like squats or bench presses, you need a spot--in cases like that, I usually recruit somebody or handle a weight I know I can handle. Again, the problem is, if you only handle a weight you can handle, you won't develop the strength to handle more. I should be a personal trainer. When I slim down, that is. Best if your personal trainer looks like he/she trains once in a while and has some idea of the efficacy of choosing granola over a piece of taffy--both are delicious, both have...differing strong points.
Time to get some friggin' sleep. Take care, all.
-Sean
Thursday, 13 January 2005
God is good
Wow. It’s Thursday already.
I gotta say it: God’s been good this week. He’s good all the time, though, so it’d be more accurate to say I’m more cognizant of his goodness this week. The paycheck debacle has been solved to the point where I got paid early this time around.
Also, I was crabbing myself out at work today for giving up on the Hollywood thing, but what I’ve mostly been concerned about is how other people think of me for quitting. I have the impression that some people pinned their hopes on me, wanted to see me make it, maybe so they could say the knew me when. Thing is, I haven’t given up on it. I’m doing an end-run around it, going in by the back door. In other words, I’m doing movies, Hollywood or no Hollywood. Yes, I wanted to be Hollywood star. I still want to, just in a different way. I will, one day, see my name up there in the cast credits of a nationwide release. I’ll be able to sit in the Cinemark Tulsa here and watch my name go by, perhaps more prominently than I expect, if the voice in my head is right. So I haven’t quit; I realized acting wasn’t my passion, so I’m doing what is my passion, and getting some good stuff done while I’m trying to arrange to start shooting on my movie.
On that, I’ve got an actress who wants to read for the role. The role’s really hers to lose, in my opinion. For my part, I need to get equipment and use of a diner for two nights. Both can be challenging, but I think the actress might be able to help with the equipment. Really, I just need a mini-DV camera and some sound equipment, a few lighting rigs and that’s about it, and I think I can rent a lot of that. I do want the mini-DV camera to be my own, though, because I plan to do more with it.
Once it’s done, I’ll make some copies of it on DVD and send it out to a few festivals this year, and we’ll see what happens from there. Meantime, I continue writing.
I gotta say it: God’s been good this week. He’s good all the time, though, so it’d be more accurate to say I’m more cognizant of his goodness this week. The paycheck debacle has been solved to the point where I got paid early this time around.
Also, I was crabbing myself out at work today for giving up on the Hollywood thing, but what I’ve mostly been concerned about is how other people think of me for quitting. I have the impression that some people pinned their hopes on me, wanted to see me make it, maybe so they could say the knew me when. Thing is, I haven’t given up on it. I’m doing an end-run around it, going in by the back door. In other words, I’m doing movies, Hollywood or no Hollywood. Yes, I wanted to be Hollywood star. I still want to, just in a different way. I will, one day, see my name up there in the cast credits of a nationwide release. I’ll be able to sit in the Cinemark Tulsa here and watch my name go by, perhaps more prominently than I expect, if the voice in my head is right. So I haven’t quit; I realized acting wasn’t my passion, so I’m doing what is my passion, and getting some good stuff done while I’m trying to arrange to start shooting on my movie.
On that, I’ve got an actress who wants to read for the role. The role’s really hers to lose, in my opinion. For my part, I need to get equipment and use of a diner for two nights. Both can be challenging, but I think the actress might be able to help with the equipment. Really, I just need a mini-DV camera and some sound equipment, a few lighting rigs and that’s about it, and I think I can rent a lot of that. I do want the mini-DV camera to be my own, though, because I plan to do more with it.
Once it’s done, I’ll make some copies of it on DVD and send it out to a few festivals this year, and we’ll see what happens from there. Meantime, I continue writing.
Sunday, 9 January 2005
time
It's been a while since the last post. A lot has gone on, screwed up, gotten fixed (thank God), and the end result is I'm writing this from my first real apartment of my own--read, not a room in a house and no roommates, for better or worse.
Last night was pretty spartan. I got a bean-bag chair and watched a couple of movies on my 13" TV. A good TV, yes, but I want something bigger. But there are other obligations to meet first. There are things for the place to buy, etc.
My sister gave me a good deal on a bed, saving me just under half of what I would have paid at, say, Sam's Club, for a mattress and box spring and nothing else. My other sister's loaning me a coffee pot. The place is starting to come together.
One interesting thing is that, since this is my place, I want it to be nice. I'm out of the stage where I'm putting up posters. NOw I want framed...posters. Great movies, replicas of good art, that sort of thing. Nice, old wooden furniture that I can pick up for cheap, like at Salvation Army. I mean, I know I'm not going to get, right away, the really nice stuff, but I want as good of stuff as I can afford...and yet I'm having trouble spending the money for a single plate. I can be a real miser, but being cheap like that is one of the most expensive ways to live. Better to spend a chunk of change all at once than nickel and dime yourself to death.
This evening, I'm finally going to see a legendary movie, _The Thin Man_, with William Powell and Myrna Loy. Should be pretty good stuff. Tomorrow, I have to make a list of food I want and suck it up, go buy it. Get it over with for now. Then use that food for lunches at work, instead of eating out of the vending machine. Another grand waste of money.
I don't know why I'm so concerned about money. Probably Satan trying to scare me again, like he has been with my fear of losing my job, especially now I've got my name on a lease and am obligated to these people at the apartment complex for almost a year. What happens is I get fearful of something, so much so I paralyze myself, which is usually how whatever I feared comes to pass. Sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy; if I'm convinced I'm going to lose my job, I'll probably find a way to make it happen. Thing is, it works the other way, too. If I'm convinced I'm not going to lose my job, then with God's help I'll probably find a way to make that happen, too. See, it's all a matter of perspective. I choose, now, to not lose that job.
Last night was pretty spartan. I got a bean-bag chair and watched a couple of movies on my 13" TV. A good TV, yes, but I want something bigger. But there are other obligations to meet first. There are things for the place to buy, etc.
My sister gave me a good deal on a bed, saving me just under half of what I would have paid at, say, Sam's Club, for a mattress and box spring and nothing else. My other sister's loaning me a coffee pot. The place is starting to come together.
One interesting thing is that, since this is my place, I want it to be nice. I'm out of the stage where I'm putting up posters. NOw I want framed...posters. Great movies, replicas of good art, that sort of thing. Nice, old wooden furniture that I can pick up for cheap, like at Salvation Army. I mean, I know I'm not going to get, right away, the really nice stuff, but I want as good of stuff as I can afford...and yet I'm having trouble spending the money for a single plate. I can be a real miser, but being cheap like that is one of the most expensive ways to live. Better to spend a chunk of change all at once than nickel and dime yourself to death.
This evening, I'm finally going to see a legendary movie, _The Thin Man_, with William Powell and Myrna Loy. Should be pretty good stuff. Tomorrow, I have to make a list of food I want and suck it up, go buy it. Get it over with for now. Then use that food for lunches at work, instead of eating out of the vending machine. Another grand waste of money.
I don't know why I'm so concerned about money. Probably Satan trying to scare me again, like he has been with my fear of losing my job, especially now I've got my name on a lease and am obligated to these people at the apartment complex for almost a year. What happens is I get fearful of something, so much so I paralyze myself, which is usually how whatever I feared comes to pass. Sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy; if I'm convinced I'm going to lose my job, I'll probably find a way to make it happen. Thing is, it works the other way, too. If I'm convinced I'm not going to lose my job, then with God's help I'll probably find a way to make that happen, too. See, it's all a matter of perspective. I choose, now, to not lose that job.
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