DRUM ROLL...............

IRON MAN IS..............................

Robert Downey Jr.

You heard it here first Mr. Lee!!! CNN.com reports that Robert Downey Jr. has been cast as Tony Stark/Iron Man in Marvel Entertainment's upcoming feature film slated to begin production in February 2007. Jon Favreau is directing.

You can read the entire article here:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/Movies/09/29/film.ironman.reut/index.html

In other superhero news...

Did anyone watch the season premiere of Smallville last night? Wow, what an amazing episode. I think Al Gough and Miles Millar really have created a masterpiece on the whole Superman mythology. I remember when the show premiered, they both said that it wouldn't be a "Superboy" series. No cape, no costume, and specifically: "no flight, no tights". This season however, their attitude has somewhat changed in the whole "no flying" aspect. I personally think that they never expected the series to go as long as it has. Watching a young Clark Kent develop a lot of his superpowers and learn to control them, then learn to master their use is just amazing. The stories keep getting better and this season will really highlight the rift that forms between Clark and Lex Luthor. As well, they have introduced Jimmy Olson, and will introduce Oliver Queen, a.k.a. The Green Arrow. He comes to Smallville and eventually meets Clark and tries to convince Clark to form a Justice League of sorts with Kid Flash, Cyborg, and Aquaman. Pretty cool season I must say!!!

Well, to Iron Man I say thank GOD it wasn't Tom Cruise. Kind of wishing Oded Fehr was cast, but Robert Downey Jr., despite his past problems, is a great actor and I definitely think he can do it.

I'm just waiting until Green Lantern and Flash. I've heard that Flash will be played by Ryan Reynolds (only if it is Wally West though. He is too comedic for Barry Allen or Bart Allen). Green Lantern is still rumoured to be played by Jack Black. All I can say is that would be a tragedy. While I do enjoy Jack Black's comedic talents, he doesn't fit any Green Lantern, whether it be Hal Jordan, Kyle Rayner, John Stewart or even Guy Gardner (who I doubt they'd build an entire franchise out of). I would suspect that Hal Jordan would be the GL, but I can't see Jack Black playing him. Perhaps George Clooney if they had to go with someone famous... we'll have to wait and see!!!

Credit Cards...

So last night on Olson on Your Side on CTV news, they had a story about the latest fad of putting "Please see ID" on the back of your credit card instead of your signature. The article can be found here:

After reading the article, I realize that in Canada, we are a very trusting lot and most places don't actually look at the back to match up the signatures. In the US though, they specifically ask for ID to confirm you are the person using the card. Even without having "Please see ID" on the back. I know some people who have taken to doing this on their credit cards instead of their signature. The only thing I would recommend, is to sign the back AND put "Please see ID" beside it. However, I wouldn't take my recommendation as fact, and the best is to call your credit-card company and find out if that is still acceptable.

Diet Pepsi/Coke & Mentos

Check out this YouTube video I found. Hilarious!!!!

Oh, by the way, for all you science geeks out there, Mentos does the same with regular coke/pepsi as well as diet.

If you're not down with that, I got just 2 words for ya!!!

My young Jedi apprentice has completed her training. She has officially succumbed to the Dark Side of the Force.

So I've officially hooked Tanya onto WWE Wrestling and Justice League. It was a slow and sometimes arduous process (more for WWE than JL) but she is now officially hooked into watching Monday Night RAW. Neither of us like Smackdown very much. She is a huge John Cena and Trish Stratus fan and a big DX fan. She is a typical mark for wrestling as she hated Triple H when he was bad but likes him a lot now that he has reformed DX with Shawn Michaels. Shame that Trish decided to retire, but she sure ended her career on a high note!! If you have no clue as to what I'm saying here, go and send an email to "Lauri" asking her to ask her boyfriend to explain it to you. Confusing? Probably. But saves me some trouble...

Anyways, I've been slowly teaching her the ways of being a "smart" wrestling fan. Knowing how to see what is going to happen even before it does and knowing how everything happens for a reason. Except for RAW last night when the power went out.

The process of hooking her onto wrestling took many moons and only really occurred this past summer even after a year of living together. Of course my wonderful wife doesn't watch wrestling like a typical guy would, but I do find her insights into how ugly Edge and Kane and Umaga and Viscera are to be very humorous. Her deduction that Lita is a slut is also quite funny since everyone watching the events live says the same thing. =)

Justice League is the best cartoon made since The Transformers. You can't help but love to watch Superman, Batman, Flash, Green Lantern (John Stewart), Wonder Woman, Hawk Girl, and J'onn J'onzz kick ass every episode with animation that makes the original "Super Friends" look like caveman paintings. Tanya's favourite character is Wonder Woman. I can't really blame her as she is very amazing and also has a big chip on her shoulder. I've even got Tanya into reading Wonder Woman comics!!

My personal favourite is of course Superman. A close 2nd is Batman. We recently purchsed all three seasons of Superman the Animated Series. Then to further our collection, we recently purchased Season 1 of Justice League. We've currently watched 3 of 4 Discs. Great storylines (some better than the others) really make this show worth watching. We just finished watching "Legends" a two parter that pays homage to the entire DC Infinite Earths storyline. I won't go into great detail, but if you want a synopsis, check out this website. http://www.worldsfinestonline.com/WF/jl/episodes/legends/

Something that I think sets DC characters apart greatly from even those of Marvel is the whole Greek Tragedy aspect of each character's life. Whether they be hero or villian, some traumatic event in their life has shaped them into who they are or who they will be destined to be. Among the 7 main characters on JL, J'onn J'onzz seems to have had the most lost in his life. He was witness to his entire civilization being destroyed and he must live with the fact that he is the only martian left in the universe. The parallel of Superman is similar, but remember, Superman was a baby when he escaped a dying Krypton and so he never really knew his parents or had the opportunity to grow up and start a family that J'onn did. Regardless, the DC universe is very much alive with personal tragedy which is something I never truly discovered as much watching these episodes for the first time on my own. It took Tanya to really point out how meaningful alot of the episodes are.

I definitely recommend watching Justice League if you already haven't. As for me and Tanya, we'll continue to enjoy the crotch chopping DX and look for Season Two of Justice League at stores everywhere!!

Personal Update Interlude

While I will for sure soon get to Part III of T&T's wedding, I thought it would be good to update other personal things...


Work has been going quite well. Was involved with a creek realignment project for most of August and part of September. I'm in the office now completing reports for other projects and will shortly be heading back out into the field in October. Busy time of the year for our office as we have a lot of small annual projects on the go soon.


I won't delve into many details and Seakrait made brief mention about a loss that we had recently. Tanya's grandmother had been sick for a while but the fighting spirit of this amazing woman kept her going for quite a while but unfortunately, she passed away about 2 weeks ago. She was 90 and was a very lively and happy woman who was surrounded by many loved ones and will for sure be missed by her family. I always think though that if a person is fortunate enough to have lived a good and happy life and is surrounded by people who love them, then we can only celebrate the life they led and cherish the happy memories they gave us.


On another note, a position with our Vancouver office came up a couple weeks ago that I decided to apply to. It was a tough decision as I do really like it in Nanaimo and the projects I am involved in are really cool and interesting, but Tanya and I realized that we want to eventually move back to Vancouver for her master's and for when we have a family and so I would kick myself if I didn't at least try for the position. My office manager was very accomodating about the whole thing and went so far as to say that the company would do whatever it could to help me transfer as I am a valuable member of the company and they would hate to see me go elsewhere. I was truly flattered and humbled by his comments and those of my other co-workers and project managers that know because it means I am doing something right!! =)

I'll update this when I know what the results of my application are so keep your fingers crossed!!


Finally, September marks 10 years since Tanya and I and all our high school friends started Grade 12. That means that in 10 short months, it'll be our 10 year reunion. How amazing is that?!?!!! We've already gotten in touch with some of our classmates and we are starting to plan a reunion. If you graduated C.E. London Secondary in 1997 and are reading this right now and you aren't Tanya, Jeremy, Gloria, Doreen, Devon, Tim, Wai Chi, Selene, Tanya, Ada, Bonnie, or anyone else I regularly keep in contact with, drop me a line so we can add you to our list of grads. Meanwhile to get regular or semi-regular updates on the reunion, check out http://london1997.spaces.live.com/

TTFN!!!

The Wedding Part II

Wow, 3 months since I've last updated my blog. Crazy!!! Time has flown by so fast. I remember last year, the summer kind of dragged on waiting for the all important fall TV season to start. Yet, this year, Tanya and I were just commenting on how quickly the fall TV season has approached us as we were watching the Season premiere of Gray's Anatomy and CSI.

Well, back to the stuff I have been meaning to finish writing on... our wedding and honeymoon!!

So I left off at us being just married and husband and wife. After our nuptials, we went off to take wedding photos with family, friends, and just us. All the while, our friends were conspiring to decorate my car with "Just Married" all over it as that was the car we took on our honeymoon. We were very honoured and overjoyed at seeing such an awesome decorating job, but then realized that two of our friends who were supposed to be preparing things for the wedding reception shirked their duties and decided to play artistes!!!! I blame Goma.

Our reception was amazing. Meeting so many people for the first time and seeing friends and that we don't often see because they abandoned us to places like Redmond, Boston, New York, London, or Toronto. I know in particular that my family was really happy to be there because it was a sort of impromptu family reunion as lately the only times we see everyone is at funerals. It was great to have everyone be together for such a happy and festive occasion. The food was amazing so we were told. Unfortunately with all the photos, dancing and greeting, we didn't get much of a chance to eat. Tanya herself wasn't hungry and I was starved but the food was nearly gone when we were just sitting down to eat and then it was speech time.

Both our fathers and my brother (best man) gave a speech followed by myself and then Tanya. Her speech was amazing and mine was pretty good so I've been told. Our friends then gave speeches and finally my 11 year old neice (who is almost taller than someone we all know) gave a short speech to the effect that she has a mom named Tanya and now an aunty named Tanya. =)

After speeches it was time for cake cutting and more dancing. Our friends all danced to Grease of which we have some awesome blackmailing photos!! It was an amazing time for Tanya and myself and we were quite disappointed to see it end so quickly in fact, but we were so happy to have spent our most special day with all those that we love and care about.

Our wedding night was spent at the Granville Island Hotel. My company gets a discount there so we decided to take them up on it and were treated quite well to the penthouse suite with mini-bar, living room, bedroom with hottub and a view of the east end of False Creek (Science World). We spent the night opening our gifts and then sleeping in and waking to a beautiful sunny day on Granville Island.

Our honeymoon started with a stop-over at Tanya's parents place to drop off our gifts and then our official trip started as we made our way down to Portland Oregon for the first night. We got in late in the evening thanks to traffic through Seattle/Tacoma and construction entering Vancouver Washington. We grabbed a couple slices of pizza at a New York style Pizzeria and then headed to our hotel for a night of relaxation, thinking of all the wine we would soon be drinking in Napa and Sonoma Valleys!!

Part III to come soon!!! I promise!!