The Post with my weekend
I realize I didn't update my weekend- so you missed out on all the exciting things (not really)

Friday I went to the movies and saw a double shot of comedies that will be recapped at the end of the month. That was pretty much my night as I had nothign to do so I came home and watched some tv before heading to bed.

Also Friday I decided to go to Burger King for lunch and try that new Tender Bacon Crisp sandiwhc they make. It's really good but that's not the issue here. When did Burger King become so damn expensive? The value meal for this sandwich was 7.49 + tax. That's almost 8 dollars for lunch. That's crazy.- and really highly priced. Had I not wanted to try the sandwich so badly I would've skipped it.

Saturday then i got up and went to the gym for a while. After that I came home and did some yard work which included weeding and mulching. I'll be happy as all get out when this mulching bullshit is done.

After that I showered up and ran to get dinner and stop at Zern's to get some ring bologna. I came home and ate dinner then and got prepared for the fantasy football draft. I got some of my cousins together with my brother and I and we are doing a family league for bragging rights. Should be fun. With only 6 people the teams are pretty stacked so points should be scored like crazy.

I watched some TV after that and then headed into bed.


Sunday i got up and went for my jog/walk back to Redners.. I started using my mom's MP3 player and downloading podcasts from Dread Central (all horror movie stuff) which makes the time pass so much faster. I then finished up some yard work and then came in and did some things before calling it a night and watching the Phillies.

That is my terribly unexciting weekend- how did you ever survive without knowing that.
- posted by Brian @ 8/27/2008 01:59:00 PM

 
The Post with me reviewing Sounds Like
After the misstep of The V Word, Masters of Horror's second season tries to get back on track by turning the reins over to Brad Anderson (Session 9, The Machinist). Anderson wrote the script for his entry as well entitled Sounds Like.

Larry Pierce plays a quality control supervisor who spends his day monitoring conversations for a company. His whole life is built around listening to people. When we first meet him we can tell there is some sadness that is engulfing him overall. Through flashbacks we learn what the sadness is. Him and his wife had a young boy that had developed a heart condition that went undected for far too long. Larry notices his heartbeat when they are at the pond together playing with the boys sailboat. The parents take the kid to the doctor but they say there is nothing they can do to help other than ease his pain.

Following this things get tense between Larry and his wife. Also, Larry developes a heightened sense of sound. It's implied this is from holding in his grief but it's not specifically mentioned. This heightened sense of sound increases when Larry is getting more and more angry.

One night he catches his wife in their son's old room looking at wallpaper samples. Larry flips out and tells her to stay out of there. He goes insane and walks into the garage where he hears baby mice behind the wall feeding. He punches a hole into the wall and grabs a hammer to stop the sound.

Larry tries to befriend a co-worker but he gets carried away with the fatehrly advice and gets hit with a complaint from human resources. His grip on sanity further detoriates when his wife tells him she is pregnant with another kid.

Another night Larry has had a bad day and everything he passes is much louder than normal. Construction work, the radio, people talking a block away on their cell phone. Larry seeks shelter in the library but the sound of pages turning drives him mad. He rushes home and turns on the lights only to hear the sound of electricity coursing through the bulbs. He grabs a bat and smashes all the lights. He then rushes outside and smashes the meter on the house. He comes back inside and hears quiet for a moment or two but then he hears a gentle rustling. He treis to find where this is coming from as he heads upstairs. He realizes the rustlign he hears is the fetus inside his wife's womb. He grabs a pillow and tries to cover his ears to drown out the sound to no use. Failing that he smothers his wife with the pillow.

The next morning he wakes up and the sounds are normal levels again. When he goes to work though the sounds become elevated again and the conversations on the phone start replaying earlier conversations he has had. This is the final straw as he hurries home, wrecking a mailbox and inciting his neighbor to call the police.

Larry again hears rustling- this time coming from his son's old room. He walks in and starts searching for his son saying, "I hear you." Eventually Larry relaizes the sound he heard was a branch scratching the window. This snaps Larry who fashions a cleaver and chops both his ears off as the police burst in and find his wife upstairs still in the bed.

They storm outside as Larry is walking down the street in silence carrying his son's sailboat towards the water.

This is a huge improvment over the previous entry in the series. The story, acting, and directing are all much better. The onyl drawback is this. Brad Anderson's films are great but they aren't something that inspires multiple viewings. Not becasue they are bad, but rather because they are uncomfortable, and the feeling they leave you with borders on depression. This is really no exception but for different reasons. Imagine you lived where every sound you heard was amplified 1,000 times. That is the hell Larry lives in. A dripping water faucet can be heard from across the house. The mice scurrying behind the wall was heard at a normal conversation volume. Imagine how that makes a normal conversation volume sound. Whoever did the soudn effects on this did an excellent job. Even the sound of dry sking being scratched is enough to give you the chills in this.

Anderson deserves a bunch of kudos as this is one of the better episodes of the entire two season run and I could see someone arguing it as their favorite. Really top notch episode.

That leaves the season 2 rankings like this:

Sounds Like
The Damned Thing
Family
The V Word
- posted by Brian @ 8/25/2008 07:51:00 AM

 
The Post with me seeing THE BOSS live
When I was little I was a huge Bruce Springsteen fan. I was babysat by my grandmom for a few years and my Aunt Beth, who still lived at home, was a fan and had his "Born in the U.S.A. album. It took some time but eventually I got my own "Born in the U.S.A." album as a gift.

So I used to carry my Fisher Price tape player into the backyard, pop in the tape, and then sing songs at the top of my lungs for the whole neighborhood to hear. (This has been confirmed by our old neighbors)

I rewound and played the tape so much that eventually it gave out and no longer plays. I've tried to no avail.

As I grew up I became more interested in his entire catalogue of songs and got a better appreciation for who Springsteen was as an artist. Unfortunatley due to bad timing, high prices, and no one to go with I never once got to see him live. Last night though all those pieces fell away and finally gave me my chance to see him.

We got to Hershey late- due to some hellacious traffic, but that's a different story. Luckily they didn't actually take the stage until 8:30. By the time the night had ended Springsteen & the E Street Band had performed 29 songs, and played for 3 hours and 7 minutes pretty much non-stop.

The best part about the set was this, and it highlights my Buffett argument. Springsteen has an extensive catalogue of music, and has a rabid fanbase that turns album cuts into immensely popular songs. That means there is a huge collection of songs he can choose from night to night. Not play 8 songs every night like Buffett- with the one that people would freak over if they didn't hear. So Bruce didn't play "Born in the U.S.A." or "Glory Days" and some were disappointed, but in the end it doesn't really matter because he played so many rare songs for concerts and debuted a few songs on the tour. Of course I can say that since he played my 3 favorite songs

I would write more about it but I only got about 3 and a half hours of sleep last night and my mind is backfiring right now- again different story. So I'll turn it over to Backstreets.com who write up set lists and reviews every night for Bruce's concerts

August 19 / Hershey, PA / Hersheypark Stadium

Notes: Once again, it's E Street Band al fresco. And it's not like they had really scaled back performance-wise in the arenas, but tonight at Hersheypark Stadium it was decidedly a stadium-sized show. Three hours and 29 songs, with a powerhouse eight-song encore, and an emphasis on confections like "Darlington County," "Sunny Day," and "Working on the Highway," which Bruce performed out at the end of the center stage thrust. Those who expected locale-specific treats may have been disappointed -- not even "Candy's Room," let alone "Give the Girl a Kiss," "I Want Candy," "Sugar Sugar" or "Candy Man." Springsteen pulled a sign for "Give the Girl a Kiss" as part of the nightly collection, but otherwise, no apparent sense of the occasion for the Boss.

Instead, the Hershey show was a cover-fest: cover songs opened and closed (as in Charleston), with a total of four in the set -- two of them tour premieres. First up was "Summertime Blues" to open. The next one was a tour premiere from the sign collection -- "Oh my god.... we've created a monster!" said Bruce, faced with literally hundreds of signs, and he gave Little Steven first choice. "Pick one, Steve! We're going with obscurity... start with obscurity..." and Steven opted for John Lee Hooker's "Boom Boom." ("Appears hastily assembled," Bruce said of the sign, written on a box lid -- with the even more longshot "London Calling" on the reverse.) Steve also picked "Darlington," which followed -- what, no signs for "Held Up Without a Gun"?

Two more covers came in the encore: "Seven Nights to Rock" had its first U.S. airing on the tour, with Garry singing along into Steve's mic, and the tour premiere of Them's "Gloria" was a major highlight to close the show. "Let's take it back to where it all started!" Bruce hollered, bringing up Joe and Johnny Grushecky to jam along.

Another tour premiere was "Part Man, Part Monkey" by request, joining "Boom Boom" to recall the Tunnel of Love Express Tour. And did I say there was local flavor? Well, not of the chocolate variety -- but just down the road from the home of the "Scopes 2" trial, Bruce sent this one out to "the Dover parents, and good science education." "We don't know this one," he said (though 20 years ago, they were playing it practically every night), "See if the band can get it." They got it, just as they've gotten every other curveball Bruce and the signs have thrown their way. Like taking candy from a baby.

Setlist:
Summertime Blues
Radio Nowhere
Out in the Street
Spirit in the Night
The Promised Land
Boom Boom
Darlington County
Waitin' on a Sunny Day
Reason to Believe
Prove It All Night
No Surrender
Because the Night
She's the One
Livin' in the Future
Mary's Place
Working on the Highway
Part Man Part Monkey
The Rising
Last to Die
Long Walk
Home
Badlands

*******

Thunder Road
Jungleland
Seven Nights to Rock
Born to Run
Rosalita
Tenth Avenue Freeze-out
American Land
Gloria (with Joe and Johnny Grushecky)


- posted by Brian @ 8/20/2008 12:48:00 PM

 
The Post with my weekend until now
Friday I had the bullshit shift at work working 11-8. It was ok in that I could watch women's scocer play in the morning but by 6 pm it sucked something fierce. I spent my last two hours watching episodes of random TV shows on Hulu.com. I watched a few episodes of Stacked which starred Pamela Anderson. It was ok while it was on.

Friday night then I went back to the PC Pub with Joel. The band was pretty good, and I actually enjoyed their mix of music more than Lima Bean Riot the other week. Overall though the scene was worse than before. There was one scene that made me laugh at the foolishness of it all. However, it is closer to a dating type story so it will end up on the relationship blog later this week. Maybe on Friday.

Another positive to the night was I had 3 beers and it cost the bar .25 . See their is a 7 dollar cover charge when you go in but they give you a coupon for a free domestic draft. Joel doesn't drink beer so I had his and mine. After those two I decided to drink a Corona and handed the bartender a 10. He handed me back 10.25 in change. My guess is the Coronas are 3.75 bottle and someone dropped a 5 dollar bill into the 1 drawer. Their loss, not mine.

Saturday I went to the gym in the morning and then in the afternoon headed up to my cousin's for his pig roast to party "country style." That consisted mainly of people driving their vehicles through the huge mud bog there. They also had people trying to wrangle a goat which was amusing becasue the goat was too fast for people. (No I did not try to chase the goat.) We also played volleyball. The old guy that plays kept trying to cheat which makes me laugh. At that age just play fair for goodness sake. I also drank a hodgepodge of Pabst and Coors Light. Got to go with the flow of kegs getting kicked.

Got home around 11:30 and then watched the Phillies lose in a bad game.

Sunday morning I finally woke up around 10 and went on my jog, which sucked becasue I had virtually nothing in the tank. That had less to do with the drinking and more with the 22 miles I biked the previous day at the gym. After that though I felt completely exhausted and ended up doing pretty much nothign all night but drifting in and out of naps.

Yesterday work was awful. At nighit I got my cousins all lined up for a family fantasy football draft which should be fun.

Today I'm killing time until I get to Hershey Park Stadium tonight to see BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN & THE E STREET BAND!!!!!!!

Super super excited.
- posted by Brian @ 8/19/2008 11:51:00 AM

 
The Post with me reviewing The V Word
Episode 3 of season 2 is written by Mick Garris, who created the entire series and has written a few horror/sci-fi pieces. It was directed by Ernest Dickerson who directed the Demon Knight movie along with the better than it should have been Bones.

Two high school friends are at the one kids house playing video games late at night. The one gets the idea that they should go to the funeral home where his cousin is working so they can see a dead body. It is outlined that these kids are way into horror films.

They head over to the local mortuary and begin to look around. What they find are coffins open with dead bodies inside and some creepy organ music being played from somewhere in the house. They decide to leave when they can't find the cousin anywhere but the door is locked. They then return through the foyer and now the bodies are missing with huge blood stains where they used to be.

They head upstairs and find the cousin laying dead on a table with his throat ripped open. All of a sudden a sheet sits up behind them and then the sheet gets ripped off revealing a vampire who stalks them through the house.

The one friend gets thrown down the stairs and breaks his leg. Before they can open the door he then gets his throat ripped open. The other friend dives through the window and runs home. He tries to call the cops and his dad but to no avail as noone believes him.

The next morning his friend is at the door and he lets him in only to watch him die. His friend then comes back to life and bites him in the neck.

The next scene the second friend is awoken by his mom and sister but he is scared off by the sunlight, and the garlic on the pizza his mom brought home for dinner.

Later on the full vampire friend tells him he must kill someone and drink their blood by sunrise or he will die. He is then taken to the man who originally attacked them and he repeats the same thing but throws in some nonsense about spirits and whatnot.

They then kidnap the kid's sister and tell him he must kill her to live. He refuses and kills the original vampire and then tells his friend to get as far away from town as possible. He then straps himself onto the table at the funeral home and as the sun rises he bursts into flames burning down the place.

The first 25-30 minutes of this is excellent. The kids are actually pretty effective leads and Michael Ironside as the vampire is really good and creepy. Also everything at the funeral home is really scary and the tension is really high throughout that whole portion. After that though there is still a half hour to go and it veers off the rails very quickly.

The last half hour is so slow I was tempted to turn it off at least once throughout the time period. It feels like nothing is happening and the speeches get really cheesy. Also it loses that tension that worked so well for the first half.

Of the three so far this is my least favorite- and it's not really even close.

So in order:

The Damned Thing
Family
The V Word

Coming up next in the series is Sounds Like.
- posted by Brian @ 8/13/2008 09:51:00 AM

 
The Post Discussing the Olympics
I actually have watched more of the Olympics in the past few days than I probably did in all of 2004. Shocking to me.

I watched good portions of both men's soccer games. That tie with the Netherlands was horrible. They were this close to guaranteeing themselves a spot in the medal round but they blew it 3 minutes into stoppage timne and are without Bradley and Adu for the next game.

I watched some of the men's basketball game. Water polo was on for about 2 minutes Sunday before I declared that the most boring sport to watch ever.

Baseball is on tomorrow morning so I'll probbaly catch some of that before coming to work.

However, the sport I watch the most of always is the sport I've caught the most of so far- Volleyball, both of the beach and indoor variety. Here's the secret. I'm pretty good at volleyball, always was. I watch it a lot when it is on during the year. I actually read up on a lot of the teams as well.

Beach Volleyball is easily the most fun to watch. There is something about a two on two constantly moving sport that is just entertaining to watch. Of course I really enjoy watching the women's volleyball especially Misty May and Kerri Walsh. And really it's not for the reason you would think (although if pressed I would say they are both attractive- May moreso than Walsh IMO). MOre becasue they are just dominant.

Baseball in the late 90's, early 00's had the Yankees. Basketball in the early to mid 90's had the Bulls. Every sport needs their team that is just impossible to beat. May-Treanor/Walsh is that team. They are fun to watch because they are the perfect team. Walsh is huge and knocks down 70% of the spikes at the net. The ones she can't get to she has the best defensive player in the game behind her and she digs like crazy. They are perfect compliments and it's incredibly entertaining to watch. They won Saturday night, and they won again last night. NOt only do they not lose but they don't lose sets. I think they play at 9 pm eastern on Wednesday if you're interested.

While I'm discussing volleyball I have to mention I hate the rule change they enacted a little while ago about scoring. Usually you needed to be on serve to score points. If you won a point off-serve it was declared a side out and then you got serve back. Now they changed it to when side outs are now points. It's a lot easier to score points when you are off-serve than when you are on-serve. Kind of makes the whole process silly.

I do like the let serve rule they have added. Usually if a serve hits the net it's dead. Now if a serve hits the net and comes to your side it counts. I like that change as it adds a different element to the game.
- posted by Brian @ 8/12/2008 12:48:00 PM

 
The Post with some small politics talk
It's getting to the point of time where I start paying attention more and more to the political candidates. We know who is running for President but we need to figure out where they stand.

I like to take some time to ge the brass tacks of what they are proposing that way when the debates come up it helps me follow along some. Besides- being an uninformed voter is bad.

This past week has been spent with Barack Obama and John McCain giving their speeches on their energy policies.

McCain's speech is the usual rhetoric from him. We can lower oil by fighting the war on terror. See terrorists know we are vulnerable and one attack on an oil field could jump prices to 150 dollars a barrel.

Obama's speech included many ideas, but the best one was a simplistic one. He said individually we can do things. Make sure your tires are properly inflated, and get regular tune-ups on your car. He said this would do more to save money than drilling for new oil. The McCain camp responded to this by making ads mocking Obama for saying such a ludicrous thing.

Turns out Obama is correct accoring to Politifact.

The lesson here is even the simplest advice can be ridiculed by people who should know better.
- posted by Brian @ 8/08/2008 10:10:00 AM

 
The Post with me highlighting a new website
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1829725,00.html

For those that thought we weren't litigious enough as a society- you now have that website. For those that might not have the time to read it here's the gist.

A Florida attorney has set up a website called, "Who Can I Sue." Basically you go on there and you punch in all the facotrs of your case and determine if you have one.

Then it gives you a list of attorneys you can choose from and has their fees listed on the site.

Now granted I think there are some positives to a service like this, but the crazy people will overrun the positives creating a major farce.

Oh well, I'm off to see if I can sue some people
- posted by Brian @ 8/07/2008 01:27:00 PM

 
The Post with more problems
So after the whole Visa fraud prevention thing (which seems to be cleared up- just awaiting the new card) I come home from work on Monday and receive a letter from The Willis Company.

They run the company that used to help us with our benefits through Arrow. The letter read like this:

"I am writing on behalf of Willis, which provides employee benefits services for your employer or former emplyer, to inform you that computer back-up tapes containing your personal information were lost on June 9, 2008 while in transit to storage. The tapes included your name and Social Security number."

They did offer us a free ID Freeze service for 2 years which basically helps possibly prevent any identify theft or fraud. What irks me though is- why did it take them 2 months to let us know about this. Anything could've happened in those two months. A person's credit could already be shot to hell. It's everyone who worked at Arrow prior to October 2nd of last year.

Were they searching for two months? Did it not occur to them to send this out sooner or were they hoping they would find them?

Also, for anyone who might be trying to steal my identity I should warn you- I'm not a terribly interesting guy. There's nothing that exciting about my life, and I'm far from a millionaire.

Most people say when it rains it pours. For me when it rains, there's a monsoon coming. So pissed right now


The Man's Guide to Dating is updated
- posted by Brian @ 8/06/2008 01:55:00 PM

 
The Post with me reviewing Family
First off a small note: The Official Douchebag Uniform post is up at The Man's Guide to Dating.

Now onto this post which involves Episode 2 of the Masters of Horror series.

"Family" is directed by John Landis (An American Werewolf in London) and written for the screen by Brett Hanley.

Harold (played by George Wendt) lives in what appears to be a normal little house in a normal little cul-de-sac. At the beginning we meet new neighbors Celia and David who are moving in across the street. They seem to be relieved to be starting life anew and starting a family.

Later they go out drinking and when they return they run over Harold's mailbox destroying it. They leave a note. The next morning the mailbox is all fixed so they knock on Harold's door to se if they can pay him. Harold declines payment and invites them in for coffee.

Again Harold seems extremely nice to the customer although he keeps hearing Celia tell him she wants to fuck him.

Harold has a wicked case of split personalities. Harold harbors a secret where he kills people and turns them into skeltons. He then dresses them up in clothes and treats them like his family. He even has full on disucssions and arguments with them. It makes it a little odd becasue Landis decides to use real people at times to get across what Harold sees and hears versus what the reality is.

Celia and David invite Harold over for dinner and they discuss their jobs (David is a doctor, Celia an investigative reporter) Celia also mentions that they used to have a daughter. They also find out they are both from the same area of the country. Harold again hears Celia telling him vivid sexual fantasies she has about him.

Later that night Harold spies on them having an argument and slinks away into the darkness. The next morning the cops are at Celia and David's and Celia is there by herself saying that David has gone missing.

That is about where I'll stop because the fun with this episode is seeing where everything leads to. (If you'd prefer I just go all out with plot details in the future speak up in the comments and I'll do so from now on.)

Wendt plays his charcter perfectly. He comes off as a normal guy next door but even in those areas there is an unsettling subtext to him. I think he benefits as well based on his past roles. The whole time he is there you see Norm from Cheers so it's even more startling to see the bar buddy essentially skinning people.

Both young leads as the couple play their roles really well and they pull off the full spectrum of where the script takes them.

Landis isn't a classic horror director in that he prefers a "wink-wink" horror comedy style more than anything. However, this one is creepier and scarier than his first season offering whihc focused a little too much on the comedy side of things.

It has a few spots where it feels like they are padding the story to get to an hour but overall it's an enjoyable time and isn't a let down. I'd say it's below That Damned Thing but not by a whole lot as it flies closer to my personal tastes.
- posted by Brian @ 8/05/2008 01:25:00 PM

 
The Post with my Visa Fraud Prevention story
First off the big news. The relationship blog is as promised up and running. So please go visit when you have a chance The Man's Guide to Dating

On Thursday night there was a message on the machine at home from Visa Fraud Prevention asking me to give them a call about some charges on my account. Friday afternoon I gave them a call and this is the chain of events.

The lady at Visa Fraud Prevention tells me there were 500.00 worth of charges to a men's and women's clothing store named Hollister. There were also some other minor charges (.10, 3.00) to various online sites. In total there were 535.20 worth of suspicious charges. The best part was most of the charges were made between 3 and 3:30 am on July 31st. Also the clothing charges were in two seperate amounts. One for 300.00 at 5:15 pm, and then another 200.00 at 3:13 am. I told the lady, "I need to be up for work at 6:30 and I'm not a night owl so I ain't up at that time." She laughed and said, "You and me both."

So I got everything I could straightened out there. She also gave me the phone numbers for Hollister and the other company where my debit card was used. I explained to the guy at Hollister what happened and he assured me they never actually took money from my account and the orders never finalized. The person at the other place told me it was marked as fradulent right away and they stopped it.

After this I had to call National Penn to get a new card issued. While I was on hold I checked out the Hollister website. 60.00 for a pair of jeans. I can buy a whole week's worth of Wranglers at Target for 60 dollars. The lady from National Penn then came on and we went over everything from their end. I said to her:

"They racked up like 500.00 worth of stuff with a clothing company."
"Which one?"
"Hollister"
"Oh they're expensive."
"No kidding. To be honest, I'd bet my whole wardrobe doesn't cost 500 dollars."

She laughed. Eventually she said they were going to be sending me a new card and I would not have access to my account until it went through. I can write checks and go into the bank to withdrawal money but can't go to an ATM or anything.

So thanks asshole who tried to steal my card numbers to order a bunch of fucking clothing.
- posted by Brian @ 8/04/2008 01:02:00 PM

 
The Post with another commercial that bothers me
I'm sure you've all seen those Nutri-System commercials. They get some retired athlete or some third rate celebrity to come on and say how they once were fat and now they've lost a bunch of weight thanks to this diet plan. No problem with that. Tony Orlando probably needs the payday.

The one that bothers me is the one starring Jillian Barberie. For those that may not know her she is an absolutely gorgeous woman who used to host Good Day Live on FOX, and is the weather lady on FOX NFL Sunday. She's like 41 and looks amazing for her age. She has for a long time.

She is in a commerical now where she shows a picture of herself at her old weight and then what she looks like now in a bikini. (This is not to complain about the bikini look. She looks great per usual).

The problem I have is this. She was pregnant. That's why she put on weight. Now granted- I'm not an expert on a female's metabolism. Alos I imagine it's not easy to lose weight once you have a kid but I'm fairly certian the whole amount of weight you put on doesn't stay on. Even for the mere fact you aren't eating near as much. Can nutri-System really take credit for this? Maybe some of it but Jillian says, "I lost 40 pounds." Really? That first 10-15 wasn't just from dropping the kid?

Say a dude smokes his whole life and then decides- I'm going to quit. He wears a nicotine patch for two days and then breaks his jaw leaving it wired shut for 4 weeks. He gets done with that and doesn't want to smoke. Is it the nicotine patch's credit? Or is the fact that he couldn't open his mouth to puff on a cigarette? I'm think the latter has more to do with it.

Nutri-System is just hogging all the glory in this instance.
- posted by Brian @ 8/01/2008 01:48:00 PM