A Rock God......Well, Sorta...

The weekend is mere hours away, as the team and I are putting the finishing touches on another issue of The Outlook. I feel its a good read this week. I felt like a chicken running around with my head cut off yesterday. I went from the courthouse, to the Keg Agro building in Broderick, to the new jewellery shop in Sears, to the RCMP detachment. But it was fulfilling when all was said and done. And yes, loyal readers, The Court Report is featured inside. I found something rather amusing yesterday afternoon, as I talked with Constable Bob Anderson at the cop shop. Unbeknownst to me, there was a court date on March 27 that I didn't attend. I wasn't aware that there WAS one to begin with. So when the paper comes out on Monday and there's no Court Report, the RCMP are getting phone calls left and right from people asking where the report went! Hehehe, I guess I never really took into consideration the sheer volume of people who look forward to it every couple weeks. That's human nature at its best, though. People eat that stuff up. Being given access to information like that is sure to be construed as gossip, and this I'm fully aware, but I get stopped all the time and commended by people in stores and on the street who think The Court Report is not only good reading material, but also helpful in making people aware of certain individuals. I never really thought of it that way. I'm just a Joe Blow doing his job, even if I have fun doing it much of the time. :)

Not entirely sure what I'm gonna do with this weekend. I do have a lot of DVD watching to accomplish, though I've never been known to get it all done in one sitting or even a whole weekend. There's a couple movies I'd actually like to rent, as opposed to watching from my own collection. I hope to rent "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" and "Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story". That'll probably be tomorrow night, because I'm currently planning on cruising up to Saskatoon tonight for a movie or two at the Galaxy. The main reason for that is because my mother is hosting a jewellery party tonight. Some friends and neighbours are coming over to the house and the focus of the evening is a presentation on selling jewellery and signing up new clients. Mom's looking forward to it. The men of the home are evacuating the premises so I guess its "ladies only". Not entirely sure what I plan to see at the Galaxy, though I'm thinking "21" and "Street Kings".

As for the rest of the weekend, its just more movies to watch. That, and honing my skills on Guitar Hero 3: Legends Of Rock. Last Saturday I went up to the city with my mom and decided to reward myself for a job well done in the last year here at The Outlook. I was able to do so with the fat income tax refund I got, and bought myself a Playstation 3 system. I also got a deal on it, as the London Drugs clerk knocked off 10%. Later at Blockbuster, I rented two games. It took a while to get the whole thing set up. I thought I'd ran into a problem when I tried ejecting the disc tray to put my game in and it didn't open up. But, as I had yet to learn, the PS3 doesn't use a disc tray system. You just slide the game in like a CD changer in a vehicle. Needless to say, I felt like an ass. However, I was soon very impressed with the system when I got Guitar Hero going. I like the aspect of wireless controllers, because there's nothing I used to hate more than getting my controller cords tangled up. The graphics and audio are also very well-done. Everything looks smooth and sounds crisp and clear.

As for my mad skills on Guitar Hero 3, they're second to none, lol. Its really fun and I recommend it to anyone. It also doesn't hurt that a lot of classic rock songs are featured, including "Slow Ride", "Barracuda", "Paranoid" and "Welcome To The Jungle". Tons of fun, and I still have a huge number of songs to unlock as I keep playing along. One odd thing about it, though, is that Pearl Jam's "Even Flow" is featured in the European Invasion bracket? What the Hell? They're from Seattle! But I digress. Everyone young and old would love the game. Its even, dare I say it, educational? Teaches good hand and eye coordination and makes you stay focused on the task at hand.

Was also in Saskatoon on Tuesday. I picked up "Blue Collar Comedy Tour Rides Again", "The Sopranos: Season Six, Part 2" and "There Will Be Blood". I'm very happy I have the final Sopranos episodes, and finally have a chance to watch Daniel Day-Lewis' Oscar-winning performance in "Blood". I'm in for some gooooood watchin'.

This, my friends, is my weekend. And on top of everything else, I'm gonna be doing more research on vehicles. When in the city last Saturday, I took a look at some cars at Jubilee Ford. Originally, I just wanted to go off on my own and browse around, but a helpful salesman named Evan showed me around and asked questions. At first I didn't want the pressure of having a salesman grill me, but he was only doing his job, and I was actually very glad he showed me around and talked things out with me about different vehicles. He understood where I was coming from finance-wise, and knew that I needed something very fuel-efficient because I'm a reporter. So he showed me a few Ford cars, notably the Ford Fusion. I gotta say, I've never been a car guy before but I was very impressed with the Fusion. It was roomy, comfortable, gets 42 MPG and has a trunk the size of a walk-in closet. It was also near my price range, but I wasn't exactly ready to commit just yet. The Fusion is heavy on my mind, but I'm still gonna shop around and see what else I can come up with. The Ford Taurus looks impressive to me, too, so we'll see what happens with that. I may just wait until the end of the month to see where I stand.

Anyway, that's what the next 48 hours looks like for me. Hope everyone has a good weekend, and remember, spring IS here, even if it doesn't exactly look (and feel) like it!

Keep 'em laughin',
- Derek