The Looming Spectre Approaches or How I Celebrated My 30th Birthday

[12 Jan 2009 | Monday] 

Category: Parties and Nightlife 40 Days. In 40 days, I'll be 30. The countdown's begun, and I'm not quite sure how I feel about it.A lot of me couldn't care less about the looming prospect of becomingyet another year older. Then there's that other side that looks on atthis "milestone" as something extraordinary and awesome, something thatshould be celebrated in a manner reserved for Great Ceaser. Quitefrankly, I'mjust not feeling that. I'm just a regular guy who likesregular things. I'm not going to rent out the Bellagio and party likeit's 1999. That's not me (not to mention quite a bit outside of mybudget). Major details: Birthday 2/22, Party will be on Saturday night 2/21 So here's the big ideas of the day:   Dinner with family, followed by...     1.) Party at The Little Cave as per usual. Problem there isI'm worried that if I were to hold it on Sat that there might be acrowd and not everyone would be guaranteed entrance (though this couldall be a moot point as the economy might have hurt business for them.Anyone been to the Cave lately?). Could be solved by seeing if theycould get together a guest list or something of that nature.     2.) Rent the second level of Barney's Beanery in Santa Monica.A whole floor to ourselves with pool tables and shuffle board, beer,and liquor. Sounds like fun, but it's in Santa Monica and the placemight be teaming with douchebags.     3.) Rent out or simply have the party at 6940, a Whittier barwith a great selection of beers, but no real liquor to offer. Love theplace, love the beers, but it's in Whittier. Seems a bit of a drive forjust about everyone but me.     4.) Rent out or simply have the party at Miss'T's Barcade.It's an awesome little bar with arcade cabinets of old school games.Problem is they have a very small list of beers and no real liquoraside for saki. Small place and smaller crowds might result in me beingable to rent the whole place on the cheap, but it's also pretty crampedand without a good assortment of drinks, the crowd might get restless.      5.) Convince a good friend to allow me to throw my party at his house (by the way, I had a great time ringing in the New Year with you guys!). It'd save on money and really put the whole personal touch on it, but then again it's a lot to ask, you know? Still, it might be nice not having to worry about too much beside clean up at the end of the night. Honestly though, I wish we could do everything at my house, too bad that's not a possibility quite yet. However, 31 will be an awesome party! I'd like to fit Mexico in there somewhere, probably not in thesame week. Hell, as long as we did it sometime this year before thesummer really set on, I'd be happy. So what are your suggestions?

The Kids These Days!

[25 Nov 2008 | Tuesday] 

It's no secret that you're parents probably hate the music you're into. Hell, your grandparents probably hated your parents music and so on and so forth. With that in mind, I remember wondering, as a youth, where the hell music had left to go. I mean, I grew up on metal, gangster rap, and grunge. Trent Reznor wanted to fuck me like an animal; Dr Dre never hesitated to put a nigga on his back; and King Diamond... well who knew what the fuck they were screaming about, but whatever it was, it was probably pretty evil. So where did music have left to go? Could it get more controversial than Me So Horny? Well, I got my answer today... I have accepted that I am now officially old, because if this video is indicative of the shit kids are listening to, then I have to say it, "The kids these days! That's not music, it's just plain noise!" Also, their noise sucks my balls in hell. I have never wanted to kill anyone group of persons more in my life.

Ten Bucks a Ticket: 007 Quantum of Solace

[19 Nov 2008 | Wednesday] 

You, sir, are totally bad ass I want to start by saying a few things- 1.) I've never really seen a James Bond movie all the way through (aside from these latest entries into the series - also to note, don't be so shocked. I hadn't actually watched Star Wars ep 4-6 all the way through until 2 Summers ago.) 2.) I'm sorry, but I just don't get James Bond movies. 3.) Pierce Brosnan is a total fag! Okay, now. Calm down. I know, the hate is coming shortly. First off, I'm a critic who's never seen Sean Connery do his thing. that's one strike against me, and secondly I just called some lame ass a fag.On the first thing: sorry. Sean Connery might b0 a great actor. I've just never had the chance to appreciate him much more than his spot in Indiana Jones and Finding Forrester (a role which catapulted his career into the stratosphere with the soul-wrenching line, "You're the man now, dog!") Okay, no more of that, back to Bond. James Bond is just outside of my sphere. Sorry, but I'm not interested in watching some aloof douche bag alternate between lame tongue-in-cheek sexual innuendo, horrifically bad pun, and shooting a random guy. That whole mess right there just isn't my cup of tea. Sorry. Plus, Pierce Brosnan IS A TOTAL FAG. The guy's a tool. He's what lame guys the world over aspire to be. He's sad and nowhere near suave. The guy is  better suited to getting hit in the head with fruit than being an international ladies man- which by the way is another reason I detest the Bond films. Any man who can be titled an international ladies man should be shot. That shit is just plain lame. Look, I'm sure there are fuckers out there who are so slick that they can get pussy on every continent without fail, but I GURANTEE YOU that none of them would ever want someone to refer to them as an international ladies man... well, maybe that super douche Mystery from that show The Pick-up Artist. So with all of that crap aired, I have to say that I liked Casino Royale! I liked Quantum of Solance! -And to top it off, I like Daniel Craig! Here's the skinny, folks: I don't like douche bags; I don't like movies with douche bags; and I don't like stories written by douche bags. I'm as simple as that. The problem with most Bond flicks is that they were too douchey. It wasn't fun to cheer for the guy that never gave a shit and never showed a single emotion. It's not enjoyable to care for that sort of guy,a nd that's the kind of guy Bond is. He doesn't care and would rather make vague references to putting his penis in vagina than give the audience a reason to empathize with him. That's where Daniel Craig's Bond is different. fact is, I've got to hand it to the geniuses behind the series. They realized that Bond was getting boring, so there decided to reboot the franchise and start from the beginning. It helps get into the stories when you realize that Bond is just a regular guy. He can fall in love. He can feel betrayed. He can get angry and want revenge. All that shit is awesome and helps me, as a member of the audience, really get into the film. Now are both movies genuis themselves? Well no, not really. Casino Royale is pretty sharp, but it runs a bit long. The casino scenes are abysmal with more straight-flushes, royal flushes, and four of a kinds popping up than STDs at shore leave in Bangkok. Plus I'd seen the parkour stuff (urban gynastics) done before and with a higher level of skill in District B-13. All in all, though it was a fun movie and made me realize that the Bond movies weren't all bad. Quantum of Solace came next, and what can I say? I really liked it. Is it the best thing since grape soda? No, mostly because grape soda rocks the cazbah. -But it's still good. The action sequences are fun and unrelelnting. In fact, you'll spend less time listening to people talk, than watching Bond run after/be chased by/shooting the hell out of bad guys in this movie. It's action packed. So with that, I bid you a fond farewell. Thanks for listening to my crap. Overall Score: 7.0 Good, not great. Check it out.

Ten Bucks MetaReview: Reign over Me

[18 Nov 2008 | Tuesday] 

Just finished watching Reign Over Me, the Adam Sandler/Don Cheadle film about a guy essentially dealing the sever loss and the dark places he goes because of said loss. It was a powerful piece through and through, and usually about now I'd sit and get overly introspective about my own life. Movies have always affected me, maybe more so than other people. I can't say that for certain. Maybe everyone gets it, maybe everyone feels the same way I do. I just know what I go through after seeing something like this. It seems like a lifetime ago, but I remember the fallout after seeing Eternal Sunshine for the Spotless Mind. I broke someone's heart after seeing that movie. It was a fucked up thing for me to do, but I couldn't help but feel compelled to be honest with that person. She loved me dearly, was devoted to me and in those times I was a bastard to her. You know who you are. I am and will eternally be sorry to you for what I put you through during our time together. I was immature and very selfish. -And yes I know that we weren't meant for one another (as exhibited by both of our present happy states) but I can't let that excuse my behavior then. That's not really what I was wanting to say with this blog though- The movie was good. If you're in the mood, I suggest renting it and seeing it for yourself. That being said, I guess I feel something odd right now. You see, I don't have a need to get all introspective at the moment. You see, the most prominent part of the movie, the section that might have had the most impact for me, didn't affect me at all. In a moment of clarity, Don Cheadle's character calls his wife and apologizes to her for not letting her in, for shutting her out of his life. He confides in her that he is going to try to communicate more, because he "doesn't want to be that guy". It a powerful moment, but for me, I didn't feel it. At the end of the day, that's what came as my moment of clarity. I'm doing things the right way. No secrets. No holding back. This is the way I should have always been. I'm sorry for mistakes of the past, but I'm glad that on some level I've learned and grown from them. That is all.

House = Ours

[11 Nov 2008 | Tuesday] 

Caption Choices Below: This is what "win" looks like. Half a million dollars never looked so good/pathetic/miniscule/silver. Key here? I hardly know her! Hey-oh! We are the proud new owners of 30 YEARS worth of debt! Yaaayy!!

Ten Bucks a Ticket: Role Models

[10 Nov 2008 | Monday] 

Current mood:  ecstatic Don't be so down, movie was good! If you're like me then you were probably cringing whenever you saw trailers for the newest Paul Rudd movie, Role Models. It starred that guy from American Pie, that kid from Super Bad, and looked like it was trying to cash in on 40 Year old Virgin cred. The whole production appeared to be nothing more than huge rip-off of everything before it, much the same way that every fucking comedy in the early 00's was trying to be Old School. Why is it that every time a successful comedy comes out, we have to spend the next 9 months to a year reliving it in increasingly painful, poorly conceived remakes? It's like seeing REM in concert only to be forced to sit through not one but twenty lesser talented Vegas Lounge acts covering their music with decreasing success. -But before you go running from this review thinking, "Alex hated it. At least that's one less thing to worry about", slow your roll a bit and listen to this... Ken Marino and David Wain are contributing writers (with Wain pulling double duty as the film's director). Beyond that, the film stars David Wain, Ken Marino, Kerri Kenney, and Joe Lo Truglio. Do yourself a favor and run those names through Google or IMDB and you'll find a couple of other things they have in common... MTV's The State and Wet Hot American Summer!Yes kids, the same people behind Role Models are our very dear friends who brought us such classic characters as Louie, Doug, Barry & Levon, and Blueberry Johnson. So it sort of goes without saying that Role Models is FUCKING awesome! Cast - A Absolutely everyone in Role Models is utter joy to watch! Sean William Scott shows that with the right script he is capable of playing someone other than Stifler (though the whole walking boner stigma seems to follow him where ever he goes). Paul Rudd brings his A game to the show and delivers some of the funniest limes you'ver ever heard. Christopher Mintz-Plasse and Bobb'e Thompson, who might have been throw-away characters in any other movie (the nerdy LARP kid and cussing black kid) are suprisingly human and get the proper attention they deserve. Jane Lynch is phenomenal, stealing every scene she's in with some of best left field lines in the history of left field lines. Add that to the rest of the ensemble cast and you've got yourself a winning formula! Story - B- There's really nothing new here. Rudd and Scott are two guys working for an energy drink company that panders to high school kids. When Rudd's long time girl friend dumps him, he goes a little off kilter and gets he and his friend arrested. What follows is a plea bargain which places them as Big Brothers to problem children (though why a judge would give convicted felons access to kids is beyond me). There are the usual twists and turns that you'd come to expect from a buddy flick including the buddies breaking up just to reunite when it counts. Seriously, the story is this movie's weak point, but you wouldn't notice it between all the laughs. Not great, but hardly noticeable. Buddy Factor - A+ Rudd and Scott are just plain fun to watch together. The details in their performances are what makes the movie. Expertly written and lovingly directed, Role Models becomes more than your standard buddy flick, probably because the people behind it are genuinely buddies. Overall Score - A See this fucking movie! See it and then buy it when it comes out on DVD!

10 Bucks a Ticket Movie Review: Quarantine

[28 Oct 2008 | Tuesday] 

Current mood:  bored Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities I was screaming too, though mostly for the movie to end. Quarantine is essentially another in a long line of "Don't call them zombies!" movies with a plot that revolves around a fluff piece for the local news gone wrong. Jennifer Carpenter, Debra Morgan on Showtime's Dexter, plays a reporter on a ride along with a group of firemen who come upon an apartment building that's hiding a big surprise, Zom- - uh I mean The Infect- - uh I mean, Rabies... Give it a second to sink in... yes.... I said rabies. The movie's "monsters" are people with rabies. If it's any consolation, they're people with super rabies (think Old Yeller times 50!). Rabies Zombies, in case you were concerned, loosely means that the movie's filled with 28 Days Later zombies, except with less style and more shaky cam. While I'm on the subject, when did shaky cam become cool? Because I think it's pretty lame and always feels like a cheap way of adding emotion where there was none beofre. I imagine board room meetings where someone chimes in, "This whole 'filming a movie with cameras' thing is derivative and boring. How about instead of telling a compelling story through the use of good filmmaking and cinematography, we just put the viewer in the movie by having everything unfold in first person! It's brilliant, just like one of those video games the kids love so much!" "-but Bob, isn't that also annoying as hell? Plus, in all those movies the camera's so shaky that it doesn't allow the audience to ever get comfortable." "Right! That's because our movie has tons of tension!They're tense which is why they can't get comfortable." "Bob, tension is a product of good storytelling. What you're doing is just cheap and amateurish." "Shut up, you're stupid!" And so on and so forth- So let's get to the nitty-gritty: what exactly is wrong with Quarantine? To be honest, not a whole lot- the problem is that there isn't a whole lot that's right about the film either. It's just a lame duck that doesn't provide much of anything in the way of entertainment. It just sort of exists. The acting isn't especially bad... or good for that matter. The story is simple but not really clever. Nothing is especially good or bad about it, which at the end of the day just translates into meaning that it's a complete waste of time. Cast - C B & C level actors and actresses make this whole production feel like Lost, the movie but without all of that quality stuff. There's the guy from "That Thing You Do", a guy from "Hostel", a girl from "Heroes, a guy from a lot of other things you've probably seen, and several other people who are just as forgettable. All in all, you'll keep thinking, "I know that person from somewhere" and forget them a second later. Story - D Getting from point A to point B never felt so nausea inducing. Formulaic and forgettable at best. Nothing to see here, move along. Cinematography and Special Effects - D Nothing new, just another zombie flick trying to cash in with a pitch that must have sounded like, "think 28 Days Later meets Cloverfield!" I'm bored just telling you about it. Overall Score: 5.0 Skip It. Utterly forgettable.

Our Prospective Home

[05 Oct 2008 | Sunday] 

Current mood:  hopeful Category: Life So how's everyone doing? I miss all of you greatly.Seems like I barely get to see any of you anymore, which is mostly my fault. I'm doing my best right now to better my position. So when I'm not at work, I'm at school. Back and forth in infinitum until the end of Summer next year. Then hopefully things will cool down a bit and I'll be able to finally enjoy life some. So onto more pressing news. As many of you are aware, Chana and I and currently in the process of securing our very first home. It's unbelievable. I go from feeling insanely happy one minute to paralyzed by tense fear the next. Ah the joys of home ownership. So for those of you who might not be familiar with the home buying process, I'll explain a little bit about where we are at this second. We've been looking for the better part of 4 months. Saw a lot of shit and some good and okay stuff. Just the usual. Found this place in Mt Washington and fell in love. We put in our offers and after some haggling accepted an offer from the seller. So we're currently in Escrow, which basically means, that we're waiting for everyone to get their ducks in a row before we can finally do this. There's a ton of paperwork and lots to do. We just finished our Home Inspection today, and I'm finally starting to feel a bit relieved now that some of the work is behind us. At the moment, we're just waiting for the loan to finally be approved and then it's on to business. Here is a link to the Photo Album of our Inspection. It has all the details of our possible place. http://picasaweb.google.com/LXMadrid/HomeSearch

Moving On

[06 Jan 2008 | Sunday] 

Current mood:  discontent For anyone who's kept up, or since lost track, this is my first blog in rougly a year though I'm probably seriously overexaggerating. Forgive me if I have a dozen or so misspelled words as I am typing on a new keyboard and this thing is giving me some serious problems. Don't know how many times I'll be going back to fix this or that before just raising my hands to the gods and moving on with my thoughts. So here goes, (hopefully spell check does its job) I went through a pretty decent rainbow of emotions today. It's funny now that I think about it yet somehow startlingly serious. I want to just push all of my thoughts aside and chalk this whole day's worth of thought to over-thinking, which I am prone to do. The thing about it is that I really can't help but feel that something is on the horizon, maybe a changing of the guard... Here's the thing, this morning as I was running through my errands I found myself going through about 5 christmas pressents that never got delivered. They were all for friends who hadn't come to my christmas party, which sent me down that path. I got good and set in that mire of thought. What the fuck? These were some of my closest friends, people who I know got my invitations, people who should have had the common courtesy to simply drop me a line and say, "Hey, sorry. Can't make it." Yet I didn't even get that. Now I know we are all busy. Hell, we're working adults. That's funny to say, but it's the truth, and often times friendships and relationships take a back seat to making sure we keep our heads above water. That being said, how long does it take to make a fucking call? I can't express in words how much my blood boiled over that one. I started thinking further along that path and got angrier. Why is it that I'm always the one who seems to have to extend himself to them? When's the last time they visited me for chrissakes? Shit like that digs its own holes. Trouble with all those questions is, for the most part, I was right.... right and justified until I read a recent blog. I fell on myself when I saw that, wanted to slap myself for thinking bullshit like that. Here I was being selfish when something traumatic happened, something with a bit more weight that a silly party. Don't get me wrong, I still would have liked a phone call, an email, anything... but I wasn't going to sweat it as much and I had been over the course of the day... Which actually brings me to the next step in that train of thought. As I read along, moving from anger to shock to understanding, I found myself in another place. I saw friends moving in with one another. I saw friends consoling one another. I saw friends relying on one another. At the end of that day, that is what friends do. So why did I feel like such an outsider? Basically, I was watching people moving on with their lives, traveling down their specific paths while I along mine went the other way. I honestly feel removed from some of my closest friends. It's funny how life happens like that. I thought I would have some of these people in my life for the rest of my life and now I wonder if there's any tomorrow. Now look, I'm not trying to be overly dramamtic. I know that if I got together with my friends tomorrow, it's be like old times. I'm just making very general observations here about the finite length that most people have in our lives, even those we consider family. Now I may be wrong. Shit might change entirely once I move closer to them. Turns out my girlfriend and I are planning on buying a house sometime within the next 2 years and our goal location is somewhere in the Eagle Rock, Highland Park, Glassell Park, Pasadena region. Hopefully all of these negative thoughts will be gone soon because I honestly love my tight circle of friends. Whether I see them today, tomorrow, or next month they are my blood through and through, which is why it hurts so much when I feel slighted by them. I guess at the end of the day no one can truly control where their lives take them, and as a result we move closer or further away from those people surrounding us. I just wish it was easier dealing with some of this stuff. Alex, signing off-

Waxing Romantic

[31 Mar 2007 | Saturday] 

Category: Writing and Poetry I really went back and forth about sending this email directly to you. In fact, at this very moment, I'm still debating it. The fact is, you already know I'm a romantic and my restating that fact won't make you swoon that much more and all it does is put me at risk of beating the proverbial dead horse. So here are my two options: I either a.) blog this whole thing and talk about the three movies I've just watched, the latter of two which had the most impact or b.) I write you and let you into my world a little more. That seems to be the dilemma at hand. So there you have it folks, and I realize that as I write this, I am looking more and more neurotic by the second, so that blogging option is starting to look insanely attractive. So I'm stuck at home with nothing to do, the setup for any terrible night. I decide to take a look back in my DVD library and pull out a shiner I haven't seen in a dog's age, Before Sunrise and its sequel (which I confess, I've never seen) Before Sunset. Yeah, I know they're romantic drivel, but this is my time OK? I guess I just wanted to see if Sunrise was anything like I remembered it. It was so long ago. I remembered being this young kid, watching it and being full of youth and vigor. My heart swelled at the thought of finding a love as pure as the one Ethan Hawke found in Judy Delpy, and yet like any great Hollywood story theirs was a fleeting love. I don't think I understood, then, how important that fact would be to the overall emotional development between them or how it would force certain issues more so than others. I guess I just watched and believed that it could be that way, that two people could meet, share an intelligent discourse, find that their souls complimented one another's, and simply fall in love. It made logical sense and yet defied everything logical and reached into the emotional... into the magical. It was beautiful and romantic, everything love should be. Watching it just took me back to that place. Took me back to those impressionable, wishfully painful days when I didn't worry so much and when my heart was at ready. I wanted for love so badly that I would risk my neck for anybody. In the end that would be my downfall. I would grow cold and calloused. I would turn into one of those pricks that I detested so, and why? -Because I was scared of being hurt again? Shit, if I look back on those early days, the girls I was risking my neck for were fucked up to begin with. They were confused and fixated on shitty boyfriends who treated them like garbage to begin with. How else did I expect them to perceive me? There I was, saying I thought the world of them when they obviously knew better from years of self-esteem asphyxiation. The guys who treated them like dirt knew them, not me, hence that's who they gravitated toward. Sadly, it's stupid high school bullshit like that which helps to kill so many nice guy tendencies. Seriously, how many times do you have to see that the asshole wins before you want to become an asshole yourself? It's a horrible cycle: stick with who you truly are and be hurt for it, unappreciated, and likely overlooked, or change and get noticed, dates, and plenty of tail but nothing meaningful. -And to think, this all came out of a fucking movie. Two people meet. They connect. They fall for one another. The shortness of the hour hits. They realize how little time they have with one another and make the most of it. By the end, you're left wondering if they actually did fall madly in love with one another or if their little tryst was just the product of panic and youthful hormonal lust? Then came the second film, one I wasn't so sure I'd be able to connect with. Our characters are nine years older, roughly 32 now, and both in relationships that seem well thought out and amiable on all fronts. He's married with a child and she's seeing a photojournalist. Both of them, by all accounts, should be happy. After a second meeting, they pickup almost exactly where they left off. They go on and on about foreign wars and politics in general. He is the cynic, yet somehow the idealist at heart. She remains brilliantly coy, passionate, and full of vigor. Time passes between them, and somehow they are placed in the same situation, wondering if or when they'll ever see each other again. Without trying they confess to being in loveless lives, to giving up on romantic love right after they saw each other last. They confess to making due, to trying their best to make the circumstances and people around them fit, to trying to be the best people they could be. They confess to hiding their hearts and pretending to be happy. They confess to being on the breaking point, but not really knowing it until they saw one another. It's funny how things work sometimes. I guess Before Sunrise perfectly embodies everything I wanted in a romantic, passionate connection, while Before Sunset embodies everyone of my worst fears. No one wants to settle. No one looks into the mirror and proclaims that they'd be OK taking second place. Everyone wants love, which doesn't necessarily mean that you're with the perfect person to everyone else's standards, just your own. There was this part and I just started laughing my ass off when I heard... so Judy Delpy and Ethan Hawke are in this cafe faking telephone calls home to explain the odd set of circumstances that landed them in Vienna with a complete stranger. Hawke, while talking to one of his best friends, confesses that he feels like such an oaf whenever he speaks to Delpy, whom he perceives as hyper intelligent and completely out of his range. I'm telling you, dude, I was right there. I feel the same way about you sometimes. Trust me, I know there are some serious Neanderthals out there. I understand that I'm not an idiot, but I still feel at least a little intimidated by you every now and again. The thing is, I know where it comes from. You see, with most people I can usually get by with bullshitting my way through this or that. I have a relatively firm grasp of the English language. You, on the other hand, have that shit on lock down and there's really no bullshitting you. I almost feel like I have to have a permanent Answers.com window open up to make sure that I'm not using the wrong words in the wrong places. Again it's nothing crazy, it's just that I'm not used to girls that can hold their own or who know when to call bullshit when I've fucked up. It's something I've been begging for for a very long time, and now that I've got it I just don't know what to do with it. Do you catch my drift? (-I could actually relate it to a story my grandma told me earlier today, but I'll save that for later. Suffice it to say, it took a huge weight off my shoulders and had me rolling in the aisles.) As it turns out, I guess I just needed to say something. I wanted to talk. Taking that trip down memory lane really resurrected more than a few untapped feelings. The problem now I'm now faced with is: do I let you in? You know how it is. This amount of brutal honesty, one shot after the other, has the potential to scare a person away. I mean there's nothing wrong with what I'm saying here. They're just thoughts. You're being allowed to see the way I think. Still... ...Maybe I'll save it for another time. I guess I'll see you when I see you. I'll leave you with the words from a street poet in Before Sunrise. It's something I've held onto for a while. Hope you like it. Daydream delusion, limousine eyelash Oh baby with your pretty face Drop a tear in my wineglass Look at those big eyes See what you mean to me Sweet-cakes and milkshakes I'm a delusion angel I'm a fantasy parade I want you to know what I think Don't want you to guess anymore You have no idea where I came from We have no idea where we're going Lodged in life Like branches in a river Flowing downstream Caught in the current I carry you You'll carry me That's how it could be Don't you know me? Don't you know me by now? -Alex