Some friends of ours recently made a short film (they're officially in IMDb) that got into the Sarasota Film Festival, so Kelly and I had to check it out. It screened with eight other short family-friendly films on a Saturday morning, and there was good turnout for the two locally-made titles in the set. I enjoyed our friends' comedy and laughed along with everyone else, and I was impressed by several of the other movies too. Short films don't get much respect, but there's often so much more originality and experimentation in them. We ran into some other old friends in the audience and shared a long lunch afterwards catching up about old times and mutual friends. What a great start to the weekend. I need to get out to this annual film festival more often.


Logical Operator

The creator of Funeratic, Scott Hardie, blogs about running this site, losing weight, and other passions including his wife Kelly, his friends, movies, gaming, and Florida. Read more »

Can't Live With Her, Can't Live Without Her

This is the truncated version of a much longer and more ambitious post about my relationships and why I don't blog about them. Let's just leave the reason at "duh." Denise and I tried being friends again after breaking up, but it was based on each of us not saying what we really thought of the other, which is always unwise. Go »

Pico de Greedo

On Friday, my company threw a part Mexican, part Star Wars party in celebration of Cinco de Mayo and Star Wars Day ("May the 4th be with you"). It was a weird combination but it worked, with games like a lightsaber piñata bash. Kelly made "lightsabers" (pretzel rods frosted with blue and red frosting), but she really got interested when I mentioned that the salsa contest offered three prizes and only had three teams on the signup sheet. Go »

Things You Realize at the Top of a 40-Story Ferris Wheel

Kelly and I just got back from a two-day getaway to Orlando to celebrate our anniversary. No theme parks; we've been to them many times and they're jammed with people right now anyway. We tried small local attractions instead. Go »

Thorough Performance Reviews

I'm not around much this week because it's time for the annual performance reviews at work. I'm staying up till the wee hours each night writing the reviews so that the two-day marathon of face-to-face chats at the end of the week will go well. It's a win-win: For the employees doing a great job, it's my chance to offer serious praise without it sounding phony or arbitrary. Go »

Spiders on Drugs

Thanks, Aaron. (link) Go »

A Pet Peeve That's Actually About My Pet

How come I can't get through the grocery checkout lane without the clerk or the bagger commenting about how many cans of cat food I buy, which inevitably leads to questions about how many cats I own, how much I feed them, and why I need so many cans? Has nobody in this state heard of stocking up? For their information, I have one cat who eats two 3-oz cans of food a day, which is more than a typical cat but not unheard-of. Go »