YOU'RE NOT REALLY THAT SPECIAL

Truer words were never spoken.

I could have written this. I wish I had written this.

Heh, Duran Duran novels. Fan Fiction of the 80s. I'll admit to having written more than a couple.

See, fan fiction's always been around. And back then, we didn't even bother Mary Sue-ing ourselves. We were the story, BAY-BEE!

IT'S SUCH A SHAME

So here's my final verdict:

Red Carpet Massacre is two totally different albums smashed together into a pile of fail. The Timbaland stuff should have been an EP, and everything else is old skool Duran and should have been another EP. Plus, I have Timabland's Shock Value...some of the songs on RCM have harmonies and beats that sound like they were lifted whole cloth from Shock Value. If I had any true intratubes skillz, I would post some examples for you. Timbaland needs to put a sock in it and disappear for a while.

It's disappointing because every single song on Astronaut was great. I get what they were trying to do, but it's the musical equivalent of Batman Returns: there are hints of the amazing album that could have been, but there are way too many characters screwing everything up.

A SERENDIPITOUS DISCOVERY

So today in class we has a kick ass discussion about "pop music."

"We HAS?" WTF?



Anyway, we HAD a kick ass discussion about pop music. It was primarily about this article here, Adorno's On Popular Music, in case you want to follow along.

Anyway, imagine my surprise when I returned to my cubicle at work and found that my PRE-ORDERED DURAN DURAN ALBUM HAD ARRIVED IN THE MAIL!!!!



I have not listened to it yet. Too many distraction here at work. I need my full attention to give it the appreciation it deserves.

i.e. I'm going to wait to listen to it in the car, where I can blast that fucker and annoy The Husband and everyone else on the road.

AWESOME!

YOU DID THIS ON PURPOSE, YOU FUCKERS

Sources are reporting that the newly green-lit X-Files movie will hit theaters next July 25th.

Someone at Fox must have read my entry.

THANKS CHRIS CARTER!

GOODBYE YELLOW BRICK ROAD

So, it is done.

All my X-Files magazines are off to the recyclers.

You probably could have provided me great wealth on the eBays, dear magazines, but alas I am too lazy.

God damn, we have a lot of shit.

HOW DUMB ARE YOU

I just paid $41.90 to pre-order the new Duran Duran album. It comes with a DVD and a booklet, so it may possibly be worth all the money.

Aw, who the fuck am I kidding?

POP GOES THE WEASEL

My new class is the greatest thing ever. Possibly greater than even Duran Duran.

Last week, while in a Starbucks, throwing back a Café Mocha and pre-reading, I had a rare moment of unbridled clarity that is usually, supposedly, reserved only for those moments when you're high on the Mary Jane. I've had only incredibly unpleasant experiences with The Demon Weed, so I can't really speak from experience. Anyway, my moment evolved thusly:

The homeless man, sitting in the chair across from the front door, hit on me as I came in. I chose to sit far away from him, in a hypo-allergenic, a-little-cleaner-than-the-cloth-chairs leather couch. I was feeling a little bit of nervous anticipation at the thought of my new class. Since it was still a couple of hours before I needed to make my way there, I started in on one of my books. Then came my moment. I read this passage in the introduction, which is about the theory of how people--you and I--interact with things we make and buy

...we make culture and we are made by culture; there is agency and there is structure. It is not enough to celebrate agency; nor is it enough to detail the structure(s) of power; we must always keep in mind the dialectical play between agency and structure, between production and consumption. A consumer, situated in a specific social context, always confronts a "text" in its material existence as a result of particular conditions of production. But in the same way, a "text" is confronted by a consumer, situated in a specific social context, who appropriates a culture, and "produces in use" the range of possible meanings the "text" can be made to bear...

A thing is made, and we recognize it for what it is and we use it. Through our use, we alter what the thing is and the intent of meaning of the creator.

My heart stopped. I'd been kicked in the chest. I read it, and I understood it. And I got teary-eyed in the process.

I understood this! I could reiterate it in my mind into simpler terms! And it all made PERFECT SENSE!!!

I had a second moment when I finally sat down in class. It quickly began to fill with younger Mes. Fat chicks with glasses and ponytails and ironic hipster T-shirts.

My God, I thought, these were Me, back in college. Hell, these were Me NOW. Thirty-five. With my glasses and ponytail and hipster Target T-shirt.

I haven't changed at all. Is this good? Did I discover my true, authentic self (® Oprah) long ago? Or am I stuck in a time warp, living some idealized version of a past Me? Will I always be like this, or will I try to wrest myself from Myself when I reach middle age? Will I ever grow up?

Is this bad? Should I even be doing this?

Does it help or hurt that my face is covered in bug bites that makes me look like I've got really bad acne?

And best of all, the frat boy across the room kept looking at my wedding ring.

The professor said something during that class that made me feel a little better. He said, "You don't need to be ashamed of being a pop culture geek here."

With me, he may come to regret those words.

____ _____ _____ _____ _____


Today's class, though, was the greatest thing ever, and yet at the same time confirmed the worst fears I had about the class.

There's a considerable generational gap. Supposing there's around fifteen years between me and any random classmate, at times it seemed like fifteen million. The poor kids. Talking about Michael Jackson like they knew who the hell he was. To them (at least according to their comments in class), Michael Jackson is a pedophilic freak who spontaneously appeared from the ether around the time they were born. He had that one song everybody liked, Billie Jean.

In my mind, I could hear them adding, You know, that guy my parents liked.

Here's the example given to illustrate the cyclical nature of trends, why people like things a lot for a while and then tend to get bored and abandon them: Like, people really liked Michael Jackson when he started making all that really awesome music and the music companies really pushed him on the radio and stuff, like for Billie Jean, and then they stopped liking him.

HUH? I wanted so badly to say, umm, Jackson Five? Off The Wall? Wait, what?

So, so far it's slow going. There's the girl who inadvertently (or probably not) outed herself as a writer of Harry Potter/Snape slash fan fiction when she tried to describe online fandoms. But I've written X-Files fanfic, so I have no right to call that particular kettle black. There's the lanky kid who randomly yells out things at inappropriate times. There's the frat boy who's apparently trying to get through the quarter without buying or reading the books.

Some things never change.

But I've learned all about how saloons started in 19th century America. And how Shakespeare was instrumental in developing frontier identity in the early American West.

And how Habermas is completely incomprehensible, even in English. He reads like a single, run-on sentence. He's probably like that in the original German.

This weekend, I'll be learning about the culture around romance novels. AWESOME.

But so far, one thing is certain, above all else:

Trying to keep up with a college class AND the new television season was much, MUCH easier back when I didn't also have a full-time job.

Homework sucks.

ITCHY AND SCRATCHY

So I'm having a problem. A REALLY BAD PROBLEM.

Last weekend, I woke up one morning with bug bites all over my face and neck. They were mostly on my jaw and neck, but there was a nice big cluster of them on my right temple. They itched like a motherfucker, and nothing--NOTHING--made the itching any better. I tried all manner of cremes and sprays and soaps and nothing worked. I've pretty much been riding it out for the last week, barely hanging on to my sanity.

Okay, that may be a bit of an exaggeration. BUT IT STILL FUCKING SUCKS!!!

I look like I've had an explosion of acne all over my neck. It's nasty.

The worst is that periodically, my face would go all red and hot and rashy. It would go away after a while, but there's nothing like feeling like you're having a hot flash or something.

So, today, or actually Sunday, it felt like it was finally going away. My face didn't itch at all, my neck wasn't nearly as bad...finally, a respite.

Until this morning. About 1:30am I awoke, and I could swear I felt like I was getting bit on the cheek. And sure enough, I go downstairs to the bathroom, and there's an enormous welt growing on the side of my face. It feels like it's on fire.

Great.

So I run back upstairs, turn on the light, and turn my pillow over. I check the sheets. Nothing. We just CHANGED the sheets, earlier today, BECAUSE OF THIS SORT OF THING. And I'm still getting bit.

Was it a spider? Fleas? BEDBUGS!?!?!? Whatever it is, it's not attacking The Husband. Or if it is, he's not having nearly as bad a reaction to it as I am.

So I'm going back upstairs to wash my face again. I'm going to put some more calamine lotion on. And I'm probably going to stick in The Poseidon Adventure, because I sure as hell ain't getting to sleep now.

Fucking fuck fuck.

BOOKS!!!

So the textbooks for my class are now (supposedly, according to the bookstore website) in and available for purchase!!

Weird, I don't have any of them already. You'd think I'd have been able to READ THE PROFESSOR'S MIND about what books he'd be using for the course. LAME.

But still, in a few hours I will be thismuchcloser to my class!!!



Also, after blowing $75 bucks on books and an extra $2 on a Frappaccino, I will be seeing a sneak preview of Rob Zombie's "re-imagining" of HALLOWEEN. I will most definitely blog about it.


PS BORED!!!

review--WAR

SPOILERS!!!

So if you will recall, a little while ago I posted the trailer to the new Jet Li/Jason Statham movie WAR, which looked like it would totally kick my ass three ways to Sunday and then pee all over my head with its awesomeness.

The Husband and I saw it last night, and there was not much ass-kicking to be had. It was very sad. *frown*

It was one of those days...the work day was ssssssssooooooooo fucking llllllllllllllloooooooonnnnnnnnngggggggg, I swear I thought I'd never get out of there, and then the damn computer kept crashing, and because it crashed, the program I needed was locked and I couldn't get a hold of support, and I got a headache, and it sucked ass. So The Husband suggested a movie, and I suggested a drink (which I never do), but boy did that piña colada hit the spot.

And yes, I like piña coladas, AND getting caught in the rain, especially if it's a thunder storm. But I've not yet ever had the opportunity to make love at midnight in the dunes of a cape, so I will have to get back to you on that.

I had a thought walking to the theater: I've been thinking about booze a lot, lately. Namely, that I want to drink more. I don't drink at all, really. That piña colada was the first alcoholic beverage I'd had in ages. But I think I need to be drunk more. Drinking to excess is sad and pathetic when you're in your twenties, because it's like you're stuck in a college, frat-party-obsessed rut. You drink to excess because it recaptures the glory days of college, when you were drunk all the time and having sex you won't remember in the morning with people you normally wouldn't give the time of day to. Being drunk in your thirties is all about despair and hopelessness. That seems like a much better reason to me.

Also, The Friend Naladahc has always wanted to be a heroin addict. We could totally be the "Midwest's Fat, Ugly Paris and Nicole." It'd be AWESOME.

Anyway, usually, we procure our tickets BEFORE dinner, so we can take our time and not have to worry about the lines and whatnot, but this time we didn't bother, and unfortunately it wasn't like we needed to fret about it. There was barely anyone there, even at seven on a Friday night. It wasn't like they missed much.

See, WAR is about this guy, Crawford (Jason Statham), who's on Asian gang watch for the FBI. At the beginning of the movie, he's nearly killed by this shadowy contract killer, Rogue, but his partner "kills" Rogue, and everyone lives happily ever after. Except Tom really didn't kill Rogue--he just gave him a flesh wound, apparently--and Rogue comes back and slaughters Tom and his family.

The movie picks up three years later, and Crawford's not doing so well. He's lost his family to his obsessive need to avenge Tom. Luckily for him, Rogue's back, and he's kicking ass and taking names. Actually, Rogue (Jet Li) is working for the Yakuza, killing off Triads. Except when he's working for the Triads, killing off Yakuza. Most of the movie is about Rogue's delicate juggling act involving the flaming bowling pins of Japanese and Chinese gangs, all the while hula-hooping Crawford around his outstretched ankle.

And here's the FAIL: all this double-crossing makes NO SENSE, none, until the very end of the movie. Literally ten minutes before the credits roll, Rogue reveals that he is, in fact, Tom, who miraculously survived the real Rogue's attack, killing him and taking his shadowy identity. The whole film has been about Tom exacting revenge against the mob boss who ordered his death. The mob boss then reveals that his information as to Tom's whereabouts came from Crawford, who was working for him the whole time.

And THEN, with five minutes to go, we FINALLY get the Jet Li/Jason Statham ass-kicking, which lasts two minutes, and you can't really see any of it because it's dark and the camera's flailing around like the guy holding it's having a seizure, and then Tom kills Crawford and he drives off into the sunset and THE END.

Holy crap. What a piece of shit. What a total letdown.

First of all, it's never established that a mob boss ordered Tom to be killed. Ever. I assumed (and I believe the total lack of evidence otherwise supports this contention) that Rogue killed Tom and his family because Tom shot him in the face and that pissed him the hell off.

So now Crawford's three years of anger is because Crawford wasn't there to stop Tom's death, and the guilt that he wasn't there and didn't check harder to make sure Rogue was really dead. And the whole film, Gangland's going to total hell and Crawford doesn't give a rat's ass, because he's far more concerned with getting Rogue and killing the son-of-a-bitch. But, of course, he doesn't REALLY not care, because he's good enough at his job to actually DO his job while also engaging in a vendetta. So he's out for revenge, but only sort of.

And Tom (as Rogue) isn't REALLY a cold-blooded killer, even though he's spent the whole movie chopping people's heads off, because he spares the lives of the wife and child of the big mob boss (SEE, UNLIKE HOW HIS FAMILY'S KILLED, GET IT, HUH, HUH?), although since at that point you don't know he's really Tom, you totally think (as I did) that he spared their lives because there was going to be this big reveal at the end about how Rogue has cancer and is dying and is killing all the people who wronged him but he can't kill people who haven't done anything to him because it's all a last-ditch effort to redeem himself before he goes out in a blazing gun battle with the Feds.

That would have been awesome, but I didn't write this movie.

If this blog was actually read by more people than just my mother, I would probably get a lot of comments about how YOU JUST DIDN'T GET THE MOVIE AT ALL AND NOW YR ANGRY BECAUSE YR SO STOOPID THAT U DIDN'T GET IT JET LI YAY. But seriously, it's not about that at all. I enjoy movies with twists, and I don't mind it if I NEVER SAW IT COMING. Sometimes I don't mind if I saw it coming a mile away.

HOWEVER, the problem with this movie isn't the twist itself. The problem is that this movie COULD HAVE BEEN THE GREATEST MOVIE EVER MADE

HAD THE TWIST COME AT THE BEGINNING OF THE MOVIE.

Let me explain.

The Husband and I discussed this after the movie. The problem with movies today (one of myriad problems) is that filmmakers seem to think that it's impossible to tell a story to the audience without the characters finding out about it. But see, Filmmakers, characters AREN'T REAL. They are IMAGINARY. The actors playing them are REAL PEOPLE, but the characters ARE NOT. So for example, if you show Jet Li getting a face transplant in Mexico to the people in the audience, Jason Statham will only know about it because he's read the script. His character's not going to know unless you want him to. He's not in a theater watching the movie, and then he's going to jump into the screen with his newfound magical knowledge and screw up the plot for you. And Jet Li's not actually getting a face transplant. Although in real life I guess he could if he really wanted to.

The point is, you can SHOW ME Tom fighting Rogue at the beginning of the film. You can SHOW ME Crawford telling his mob boss where Tom lives. And guess what? NEITHER OF THE CHARACTERS ARE GOING TO BE THE WISER. They can still go through the entire movie ignorant of the other's true identity. But now what I know this information, it adds another layer of depth to the characters and their motivations and interactions that wasn't there before. And it makes for a more interesting and engaging movie. And I don't have to sit in a theater with the ushers cleaning up popcorn, wondering what the hell just happened in the last two seconds of your movie, because all I know was that when there should have been two guys getting the shit beaten out of them, they instead talk and share feelings and then all of a sudden one of them's shot to death, THE END.

Or how about this: you can also show me Crawford being eaten up by the fact that he thinks his best friend's going to get the shit kicked out him by the mob boss's henchment, which then segues into his horrified realization that he's responsible for his friend's death. NOW we understand his obsession with killing Rogue, and the true reason for the disintegration of his marriage (Hell, what if his wife knew about all this? THAT'D be something to see!). Instead, it's all a couple of throwaway lines at the end of the movie!

Imagine what this movie COULD have been! Early in the film, Crawford discovers Tom's alive. Not only that, but that Tom is the man he's been actively hunting down for THREE YEARS! The internal conflict! I should be thrilled Tom's alive! But now he's a cold-blooded killer! And he's probably now after ME! But I'm not the same man I was three years ago! I've been wracked with guilt! How do I tell him?!

And Tom discovers that Crawford's the one who was the mole who ruined their cases and sent a man to kill his family. But he was my best friend! How could he do that?! What if he was coerced?! How could the bastard do it?! Now look at the man I've become! Because of him!

And then much ass-kicking can STILL COMMENCE!! You don't have to sacrifice any violence. In fact, you're guaranteed to TRIPLE the Li/Statham ass-kicking quota!! And at the same time, BOTH CHARACTERS spend the ENTIRE MOVIE undergoing CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT, CONFLICT, and perhaps even REDEMPTION over the course of the movie, again--ALL WITHOUT SACRIFICING THE ASS-KICKING.

The WORST part of all this, in the end, is that in the last five minutes of the movie, Jet Li actually got to act. And believe it or not, the man actually CAN act. His movie UNLEASHED is a perfect example of serious acting with character development and growth, with tons of bloodshed and shit getting kicked. And Jet Li was WONDERFUL in it: innocent and child-like and alive with wonder, and ferocious when necessary. And Statham's really good in what he does, but here all he got to do was scream at people (because he's angry, see?).

I know, I expected too much. The trailer was SO GOOD. So much stuff blowing up. So many heads caved in. And swords. And cars.

The cars were awesome.

As were the swords.

It makes me think of porn. Yeah, it's just a movie with people fucking, but if it had a plot and good dialogue, think of how much BETTER it'd be!!!

I wish for too much.

I'll settle for a Frappuccino with booze in it right about now.

HAROLD AND KUMAR GO TO AMSTERDAM

So many moons ago, I wrote a review of HAROLD AND KUMAR GO TO WHITE CASTLE, which is still, in my mind, one of the greatest movies ever made. At the time, I wrote that Harold and Kumar could be one of the great comedy pairings, making a series of films in a similar vein as those great Hope/Crosby "Road" movies of ages past.

Well, the teaser for the new Harold and Kumar movie has made an appearance on the web. What little there is looks awesome. NEIL PATRICK HARRIS, YAY!!!

Enjoy!!

YOU THINK THAT'S HIGH? THAT'S NOTHIN'

So the letter came from the doctor's office. Almost two months I've been waiting.

240

My cholesterol is 240. That's WAY HIGHER than the people in the commercials. Not as high as The Mother's 300-something, but still.

This sort of sucks, because I've NEVER had a problem with my cholesterol. NEVER. I could eat fries with impunity and every test would come back low.

So now what? Face-first into a gigantic cardboard box of White Castle onion chips, screaming, "COME GET ME, CORONARY HEART DISEASE?"

The Husband's going to probably want me to start working out in earnest now.

*pout*

HOT DAMN

There's an episode of the old Twilight Zone called "Midnight Sun." In it, a painter and her landlord await Death together as the Earth hurtles toward the Sun. The painter watches as her landlord dies, as the oils of her paintings melt and drip and pool in the heat.

The twist at the end is that the painter is in the grips of a fever dream, that the Earth is actually hurtling away from the Sun, and everyone will soon freeze to death.

That episode popped into my head as I exited the library just now, on my way back here to work.

It's wicked fucking hot out.

Definitely not as hot as it gets in other places, but I have a delicate constitution.

FAHRENHEIT 451--A BOOK I HAVEN'T READ

“They stuff you with so much useless information, you feel full.” -- Ray Bradbury

L.A.’s august Pulitzer honoree says it was never about censorship

WHAT HAVE I GOTTEN MYSELF INTO?

So I think I mentioned in an entry a while back that I was going to be taking an Introduction to Popular Culture class this fall. This has been my dream--studying popular culture on an upper-academic level--since I was a wee youngin' at The Kollege On The Hill. But at the time I graduated, Graduate School seemed way far out of reach: I was seriously fucked in the head, I didn't have any money, and I was terrified of moving to a completely new city all by myself with no money or job or apartment. And I didn't want to have to teach anybody anything in order to earn money, which is usually how those pesky Graduate School programs seem to work. Plus I'd have to take the GRE, and I test VERY POORLY.

You know that Urban Legend where you supposedly automatically get 200 points on your SAT if you get your name right? That was for me.

So anyway, Life happened. I got a job that's not particularly challenging, but I enjoy the people and my work and during lunch it lets me blog about my troubles. I got married, bought a house, became the slave of some cats. Ironically, I got a Masters in a tangentially related field that didn't require an entrance exam from me, or any teaching, or any big financial commitment.

But burning in my heart was always this dully glowing ember of hope that one day, The Gigantic University of Soul-Sucking Sports Craziness would offer something that would, in a round-about way, appear to sort of resemble in a not-too-obvious way some classes that kind of were obtusely about popular culture. And maybe it'd grow into a graduate program, like a Diet Pepsi Clear version of my dream program: not-at-all resembling the soda that I love, but I'm damn fucking thirsty so hand the can over, it's good enough for right now.

Lo and behold, The University suddenly decided, after much soul searching, to offer some classes in popular culture studies. And as soon as the ink was dry on the outline of the proposal, I had signed my fat ass up.

I can't even begin to tell you how psyched I am. All I can think about is buying my books. Every time I'm on campus I drive by the various bookstores dotting the streets and I WANNA GO GET MY BOOKS SO BAD. But I don't even know what my books are yet.

So with that in mind, I went trekking online for some pop culture craziness. This led to my Imaginary Pop Culture Cool Uncle Robert Thompson, which led to the Popular Culture Association, which led to their publications, which led me to where I am I right now, which is thinking I'm probably not cut out for the Important Work my heart has led me to.

Here's the problem, in a nutshell: I, in my quest for knowledge of all things "Popular Culture," have completely forgotten all things "Everything Else Out There To Know." For example, let me provide you with a synopsis of an article that appeared in the Spring '96 issue of the Journal Of Popular Culture: "Singing and Dancing in the Baser Manner: A Plea for the Democratization of Taste," by G. Albert Ruesga (like how that's in APA style? THANKS, MASTERS DEGREE!)

This essay tackles the aesthetic presumptions against popular taste for the art of popular culture. For moral theorists, the principles which govern moral valuation are often turn to the intuitions of the man on the street. To proceed in this way is to assume that an adequate moral theory should underwrite or account for common moral judgments. When aestheticians attempt to determine the principles which govern aesthetic valuation, the common man's aesthetic judgments are devaluated. The structure of his preferences, the principles which govern common taste, appear to be of relatively little significance to aesthetic theory. Plato, for example, discusses a very peculiar kind of Homo aestheticus in the book 2 of Laws. He speaks of the person who professes the value the noblest and best in art, but who nevertheless takes a peculiar delight in the lower forms of artistic expression. In the book An Aesthetics of Junk Fiction, written by Thomas Robert, the mystery of how sophisticated readers can enjoy and value literary works of dubious artistic merit are tackled. The response of a person to a good artwork is necessarily complex, rich and sophisticated. It is the structure of popular culture that may ultimately provide the most promising field of aesthetic inquiry. The dichotomy lies between good art and bad art in the context of popular culture.

First of all, what the fuck? Is that even English? Second, I don't think I've ever even read any Plato. Did he invent plates?

I'm kidding, of course; I've heard of Plato. He's the dude with the cave.

Seriously, though...reading this made me realize that I have no idea what the hell is going on. I feel like my life has been spent faking at being smart. That I can correctly answer all the questions on Jeopardy, but if pressed I couldn't for the life of me explain with any clarity of thought the grander implications or contexts of any of the historical persons or events. I know the date of the Normandy invasion but nothing of what lead up to it. I know what the Platonic Ideal is, but I couldn't give you an example of it, or connect it to anything.

My brain is like a Guinness Book of World Records, but without the pretty foil cover and the twelve-inch fingernails.

The whole point of going in on the ground level with this was because I've been out of school for so long. My Masters was really just a vocational degree. I've forgotten how to think and talk and write like a pretentious academic fuck. I've forgotten how to bullshit and make up words that have no meaning and present them in such a way that together they sound important and cutting-edge.

I've forgotten how to fake sounding like I know more than I do.

Do you know, I've read Boswell's Life of Johnson cover to cover. I think I actually enjoyed it. But I don't remember any of it. I can probably recite for you most of the dialogue from The Simpsons Movie, though. I know the names of all the characters in Moby Dick, but I've never read it. However, I can tell you exactly what's happening on Lost even though I never watch it.

Have I completely screwed up? Is the damage irreversible? Has it been so long--too long--that I've lost what little ability I had to understand and translate the "academiese?"

And in the end, does it really matter, if there's no graduate program to get into? And technically, it's The Husband's turn to go to school.

ARGH!!!! Fuck it, I'm going to watch some So You Think You Can Dance on YouTube. Fuck thinking. Thinking is hard and overrated.

BTW, there needs to be a book called, "SO YOU'RE THINKING YOU WANT TO BE SMART," and it's a list of every book you need to read to be smart. Something concise. All in one place.

Just to prove a point, I close this rant with a quote from The Simpsons, but not from the movie, because Spider-Pig, no matter how awesome, is not relevant.

"I am so smart. S-M-R-T."

UPDATING TEH SUCK

So you'll be pleased to know that the bleach solution worked for the air conditioner. Turns out it was sludge and algae in the pipes after all, and no $10,000 system was needed.

It's been running all day...no water AT ALL ANYWHERE, and the air is toasty cold and smells like a freshly cleaned bathroom!

YAY!!!

The Husband's new name is Mr. Fixthings. Although he attributes his success to my lightning-quick googling, which of course is thanks to my library education.

THANKS MASTERS DEGREE!!!

THE DEFINITION OF SUCK

So this past week, The Husband and I have been on vacation.

We've been playing lots of Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Your character turns into a wolf and howls. IT'S AWESOME.

What's not awesome is that all week the basement's been flooding. The Cats are pissed: they come downstairs expecting to poop with impunity, and instead they can't get to the litter boxes because of the standing water. Tess screams about it constantly.

The funny thing to see is when the water's flowing into the office side of the basement, at the bottom of the stairs, and Jack comes down and sticks a paw in and OHMYGODITSWATER and he shakes his paw, and then you can almost literally see his brain reboot and then he sticks his paw back in and OHMYGODITSWATER and then he shakes his paw and then his brain reboots again and the process starts anew until you yell at him to stop.

Normally, he's the smart one.

So almost all week we headed downstairs--either right after we woke up or before we went to bed--to play catch-up with the accumulated water. All the towels in the house have been washed over and over. They smell like summer camp, all mildewy and outdoorsy. At first, we assumed the water was from all the rain we'd been getting: if the ground's saturated and it's raining non-stop or really hard for a short period of time, water will seep up through the basement floor. We think there are a couple of long cracks that are the culprits, although the whole floor could use a new coat of sealant. So as we mopped (well, as The Husband mopped and I looked at lolcats on the internet), we shook our fists at the sky and cursed the weather and figured we'd spend a weekend moving shit around and fixing the floor.

Then the Big Suck occurred.

I don't remember exactly how it happened, but The Husband was looking around the furnace, which was where most of the water was accumulating. We figured the floor underneath had never been sealed, hence the proliferation of water. I saw an insulated pipe that looked wet. The Husband looked at more pipes. I looked at more lolcats. Then, the EUREKA moment.

The Husband discovered that the air conditioner condenser thingie-mabobbie is leaking.

He jerry-rigged this awesome Man Contraption together, which was basically a trash bag duct-taped around part of the pipe, shaped into a funnel that drains into a bucket.

Which we have to empty every couple of hours the air conditioner's running.

This is the definition of suck. We don't have the money to get a new system, which is what most of the web sites suggest: buy a whole new fucking air conditioner/furnace setup. Which we should probably do anyway, because ours are both from the mid-80s. And most places have financing, which we could totally swing, but it would cut into our newly acquired Wii game buying expense.

Plus, I'm enrolled in my dream Intro to Popular Culture class this fall, which makes me orgasm every time I think about it. And I still have to pay the tuition for that.

But a little googling has alerted us to the fact that it may just be a clogged pipe, something a little hot water and bleach may take care of. So we're going to try that and see what happens.

Owning a house sucks ass.

You know what we should do? Move the computers upstairs to one of the bedrooms, and teach The Cats to swim. It's not like they couldn't do with a bath, the little stinkers.

ALERT!!!

I don't know if you know this, but Coldplay sucks ass.

SERIOUSLY....YOU'RE GOING TO BE JEALOUS OF ME

I thought that after all these years of blogging, it was time that I outed some of the Important Real Life Characters that have appeared in my entries. This way, you can feel you know me a little better than you already do. What with me telling you about how I smell my own underwear and whatnot.

So without further ado, I give you a picture of The Husband in all his Afternoon at an Outdoor Cafe glory.





What, you didn't know I was married to Val Kilmer?

That comes as a shock? Didn't think my big fat ass could attract the likes of The Iceman?

Well, now you know.

YOU AND I ARE GONNA FINISH THIS

You know what's a HUNDRED BILLION GAJILLION TIMES BETTER than giant robots kicking the shit out of each other?

Jet Li and Jason Statham kicking the shit out of each other.

Just thinking that this movie exists and I'M GONNA WATCH IT makes me pee my pants a little.

SEPARATING THE WHITES FROM THE DARKS

No, this isn't an entry on race relations.

This is an entry about me shoving my nose into the crotch of my own panties.

The Husband and I have been together seven years, many of those years spent occupying the same living space. You'd think that by now we'd have some sort of system down for doing the laundry. Alas, our strategy seems revolve around the laundry lying around the house like warrens of rabbits left to breed unchecked, to the point where one or both of us becomes annoyed into action, or we run out of clothes to wear.

It's usually The Husband annoyed and unclothed fifteen minutes before we have to leave for work that a plan of action takes shape.

Last night was one of those moments. Not only were we desperately in need of clean clothes, but a few nights earlier Tess the One-Eyed Pirate Cat had awoken me from my beauty sleep by hawking up a few hair balls on the comforter. The dirty bedclothes had been hastily cleaned and then unceremoniously dumped on the floor at the foot of the bed. The Husband was pretty pissed about having to walk around the mess on the way to and from his side of the bed, so a decision was made: the laundry was getting done.

First, before he and I are able to actually physically engage in the act of washing the laundry, we have to put away the old clean laundry that we did the last time we did laundry.

See, this is another hurtle we face in our quest for unsoiled apparel. Rarely--if ever--do we wash the clothes and then put away the clothes.

My thinking is it's sort of like Newton's Third Law: if you don't do laundry and it multiplies, then if you do do laundry, then the clean laundry will also multiply.

Or maybe if you don't do laundry it will do itself. Equal and opposite, equal and opposite.

Please bear in mind, I was an English major. I got a C both times I took Calculus.

So here's the crux of the problem: whenever we finally decide to do laundry, all the baskets in which we would transport the dirty laundry to the laundry room, or conversely remove the clean laundry from the laundry room, are either filled with dirty laundry waiting to go downstairs or clean laundry waiting to go upstairs.

And often we go so long between frenzied laundry-doing that we forget what's clean and what's dirty.

And here we come full circle to the beginning of my story: me, home from work following a trip to the grocery, with my nose buried in the crotch of my panties trying to figure out if they were cleaned last night or brought downstairs this morning.

And you know what? Damned if I could tell.

I threw them on the floor, put the stuff in the dryer in the basket, put the stuff in the wash in the dryer, and washed those goddamned panties again.

They'd better come out smelling like fucking roses.

On second thought, maybe they should just come out smelling like Tide and be done with it.

I'm off to clean the litter boxes.

And no, don't get me started on the litter boxes.

I'm sure as hell not putting my nose in there.

IF IT WASN'T FOR MY HORSE, I WOULDN'T HAVE SPENT THAT YEAR IN COLLEGE

Lewis Black has this really awesome routine about the "dumbest thing he's ever heard in his life":

"If it wasn't for my horse, I wouldn't have spent that year in college."

The joke, which can be heard below, if basically, WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN, and OH, THE PAIN AS I WILL NEVER KNOW WHAT THE FUCK THAT IS SUPPOSED TO MEAN.



The thing is, tonight The Husband and I had a very similar experience.

We were driving home from an evening of playing board games with The Husband's Boyfriend and The Husband's Boyfriend's Girlfriend. It was pretty late, 12:30 am or thereabouts. We were passing by the Waffle House. Parked in front of the Waffle House, in the street, were two cop cars, lights flashing. The cops were standing on the sidewalk/berm, in the grass, hands on hips, just sort of exasperated or something. And running away from them (actually, it was more of a cross between a slow jog and a quick saunter) was a Hispanic man, no shirt, those horrible long men's jeans shorts, and he's holding a cat. An orange tabby. It looked sort of like our own beloved Commodore Oliver J. "Buster" Poopsalot of the British Royal Navy, arch-enemy of Tess the One-Eyed Pirate Cat and her salty First Mate, Black Jack Pickett.

The Husband did a first-rate job of driving forward and looking backward for an extended period of time, without hitting anybody. But damned if we could figure out why a half-naked Hispanic man would not be trying very hard to escape with his cat from cops who were not chasing him. Unless it wasn't his cat.

Had he been trying to have sex with it in the bathroom of the Waffle House? Did he rescue it from an evening in the pokey, after the cat had perpetrated some crime against Society that required the intervention of the police? And why weren't the cops running after him? Were they full of waffles and unable to run without developing stitches in their sides? Had they already filled their month quota of arrests of half-naked Hispanic men with cats?

All I know is, as I sit here having to pee real bad and needing to go to bed because now it's 2 am, is WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN, and OH, THE PAIN AS I WILL NEVER KNOW WHAT THE FUCK THAT IS SUPPOSED TO MEAN.

Please, PLEASE, for the love of god be on the news in the morning.

Please.

I CAN HAS CHALKLAT SHAVINGS?

So I went to the library on my lunch break to pick up an audio book I had on hold. I also picked up an assortment of books that will litter the living room coffee table/floor until I get the email telling me to renew them (running across PARASITE EVE randomly on a shelf FTW!).

As occurs every time I go to this particular library, I stopped by the coffee place on my way back to work. I feel I've earned a big ass cup of coffee, after having walked my fat ass all the way to the library and back, carrying the enormous load of my ass and some books I'm never going to read.

The barista, whom I believe has served me before, was particularly chipper today and called me "ma'am" and "honey." I'm at least 10 years older than her. What did I want, honey?

"A large iced mocha, please," I said, trying my best to be pleasant. After all, I'd found just enough change in my lint and fruit fly filled pockets of poorness that I could treat myself to a drink.

"You want whipped cream, ma'am?" she asked.

"OH NO," I said. I'm counting calories, don't you know.

And then I saw it. The signal that death would surely rain down upon Earth from the heavens. The End was NIGH. My world crumbled beneath my feet. Fireworks clouded my vision as though I'd been rubbing my eyes real hard for hours. It couldn't be...it just COULDN'T.

PLEASE...NO...

The coffee place has started taking credit cards.

My one saving financial grace has been that the coffee place never took plastic. When I went to the library, I'd always have to have cash on me, or else I had to do without. I'm addicted to froufrou coffee drinks: the Starbucks near my gyno, when they see me pull in for my Pap smear, rub their hands in glee at the thought of all the money I'll be spending on beverages when I'm done with my appointment. But I can't get these drinks all the time: Starbucks is too far out of the way. That Panera on the way to work every morning? Their drinks are shit. They couldn't make a good cup of coffee if there was a gun at their heads. The other Starbucks near work? No parking, and my ass isn't addicted enough to walk that far.

Although I have made the trip. But I was particularly desperate. And the stop near the library wasn't open yet. And I was REALLY DESPERATE.

But the point is, I usually HAD TO HAVE CASH. And I don't really have the money to be wasting on froufrou coffee drinks. At least according to The Husband. Who thinks I should just MAKE MY OWN, like you can just get up one morning and put boiling water in a cup and add some grounds and poof, you have a cup of coffee. IT'S NOT THE SAME!!!

Seriously, sometimes I think I'm so lazy I'd stop wiping my own ass if I could get away with it.

But back to the coffee. The shop accepting credit cards means that I'm going to be tempted to blow a wad of money every time I go there. I MUST HAVE SUPREME POWERS OF RESISTING. As I sit here now, I can hear the faint siren call.

ICED MOCHA....*sssshhhhhwwwwoooooooooooooo*

That's the approximate sound of someone whistling and beckoning or the wind or something.

Boy, I've got to pee real bad. And my heart's beating so fast it feels like I'm having a heart attack.

Large froufrou coffee drinks are so awesome. And now that I don't have to pay cash, they're even awesomer.

MUST RESIST!!!

Thank God my lazy ass has already made that trip once today, or I'd be in BIG TROUBLE.

THE INTERNET'S NOT FUN ANYMORE

I need to give up on the internet.

It used to be awesome. You'd go to a website, find a bunch of people who all shared your interests and sense of humor, and then you'd have a rollicking good time. But lately it seems like the internet's raison d'etre is to be a place there one goes to

* make fun of people who disagree with you by calling them "fat"
* make fun of people who disagree with you by calling them "douche"
* become hyper-critical of things that in the past wouldn't bother you in the least
* become hyper-critical of things that you've always been critical of, but now you end your critiques with the words "you douche"

It's just so vitriolic. Take for example the forums at Television Without Pity. Yeah, I know, but I used to be a regular back in the early days of HOUSE, when there'd be lots of fun made in between the insightful cultural and scholarly critiques. I admit, I haven't visited them in ages, because I haven't been watching anything I wanted to discuss online with anybody. But then I became addicted to SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE. I've been reading spoilers for the show here where someone who attended a taping mentioned that a particularly hated contestant admitted to having an "Asian alter ego."

The boards EXPLODED with rage. How could the producers of the show allow such racist content? How dare she stereotype all Asians as sexy! How ignorant that she doesn't understand that "Asian" doesn't apply to just East Asians! What could she be thinking? Never mind that all the dancers who adopt a "ghetto" "blackalicious" hip hop style are celebrated for being able to adapt their styles with such ease. Because this one contestant sucks ass as a dancer (in their opinion) and has caused other, more deserving dancers to be booted on the show while she is receiving obvious preferential treatment from the show. Which is a whole 'nother discussion (argument) altogether.

And it goes on and on and on. The more you disagree, the wronger you are. I want so badly to go in there and say, I love all things "Asian." I'm especially fond of anything Japanese. All I know about Japan I learned from watching AKIRA, but I love Japanese food. Japanese women are so hot. Japanese guys are so hot. They're all so cool, in their city from the future, with its tentacle sex and ghosts made of long black hair and gigantic neon billboards and its vending machines that dispense whatever your heart desires. I love the ethereal mountains in a haze of fog, hiding houses made with delicate paper walls. I WANT SO BAD TO LIVE IN TOKYO.

And according to the boards on TWoP, that makes me a racist.

So I keep reading, my eyes bleeding; my brain begs me to stop, but it's a train wreck of pomposity and rancor and I can't stop looking. Surely, I think, it's not really as bad as it seems, and yet it goes on for page after page. There's no civility: you may couch it in the long, flowery words of aristocrats, but you're still being an ass.

Or a douche.

It's exactly like Ghostbusters 2: the one where the pink slime oozes under the city, feeding off of the inhabitants' ill will. This shit breeds more shit. They're not even talking about me or to me and it raises my hackles.

AND IT'S LIKE THIS EVERYWHERE. Go to any board, anywhere. You can't comment that the sky is particularity blue today without someone telling you YOU'RE A FUCKING IDIOT YOU FAT FUCKER YOU PROBABLY SUCK MICHAEL MOORE'S COCK PLUS YOU WOULDN'T KNOW WHAT A PROPER PASO DOBLE LOOKED LIKE IF IT RAMMED YOU IN THE ASS. YOU DOUCHE.

Why is everyone so on edge, and angry, and mean? I hate to sound cliché, but why can't we all just get along? What the hell has happened to us? That suddenly, no matter how ignorant we are of something, we're obviously right and everybody else is wrong?

And why douche? You know how partial I am to fucktard.

The Evils of YouTube: or, Don't Click On That Link, No Matter How Enticing

So I watched this "Colossus" clip (never saw the movie, although now I'm going to have to hunt it down) and it totally reminded me of "Demon Seed", which scared the living beejeezus out of me when I was younger.



So just for shiats and giggles I go poking around and find the "Demon Seed" trailer on YouTube. Huh, whaddya know? Still scares the beejeezus out of me. Over in the "related" section there's a link to "'Xtro' belly expansion"...never saw that movie, either; sounds like another potentially funny/creepy 70s horror movie so I click on the link and

HOLY CRAP.

Now I know why I never saw that movie.

What is it with horror movies about women giving birth to mutant alien werewolf creature mutants? Huh? Childbirth's traumatizing enough as it is without having people putting into my mind the idea that my husband's actually a satanic mutant alien and my unborn fetus could literally be a parasite and also a mutant demon spawn that could after a ten minute incubation potentially claw its way from my womb and then wreck havoc amongst the plain and simple townfolk of my city.

Thanks for the nightmares, YouTube! I'm off to call my therapist.

Things popping out of people!!!

DUST FROM A DISTANT SUN

It means a trip to The State Up North, but The Husband can pretend it's a fact-finding mission or something. The tickets have been purchased after an hour-long fight with the presale site. I could've had row H, right up front, but for some reason they wouldn't load in the cart, and even adding an account under The Husband's login couldn't resurrect them from the ether. Instead I got the front row of the balcony. No one in front of us, and we can sit through the whole thing if we choose to.

Hey, we're fat and I'm lazy. Sue me.

So, yeah, Crowded House. Broke up, drummer killed himself, no hope in the world, then they get back together.

Desperate for money, or a tickling whisper in the ear from God? After all, the losing streak I was on--Toad the Wet Sprocket, Crowded House...there are others that escape me at the moment, and no, Duran Duran doesn't count because they've always been putting out albums--every band I've ever loved broke up. And now they're all getting back together!!!

Since I'm an atheist, I'll go with Door #1.

Just in case you're wondering, my Second All-Time Favoriteist Band In All The World After Duran Duran is probably best know for the following:




However, I'm totally obsessed with the song below at the moment. It's the live version so you can pretend you're at the show with us.

When I'm in the shower imagining what I would sing during the Final Two show of American Idol I'm performing on (being the favorite to win, of course), this is the song I pick as my free choice, because it's awesome and bombastic in all the right places and could (if arranged correctly) involve an orchestral accompaniment and possibly a choir. I would SO WIN.



Paul Hester, RIP

I'M CRAZY, BUT YOU KNEW THAT

I have a problem. It's pretty serious.

See, I have a tendency to anthropomorphize things and become attached to them in an unhealthy way. The Husband teases me about it occasionally.

I have become attached to KelmeisterMobile 2.0. Even though the car is a total piece of shit; even though we spent almost $2000 at the beginning of the year trying to make it drivable and it's only worth $1200.

After I left the bank and got my CD and my fries, I drove back to work. My parking space was still free, which was a miracle of Biblical proportions. But as I gathered my stuff and locked the car, I realized this would be the last time I drove 2.0 to work. The last time I'd park it in the lot.

It made me sad.

Even though 2.0 is a piece of shit, it got The Husband and me to New York and back without any problems. We did alright to Nashville, although it did break down as we were preparing to head home. It never left us stranded. It always seemed to perk up when we got it an oil change or got it washed.

And what do we do in return? We give up on it. We would never have enough money to totally fix it to the point that'd it run like a top, and getting a new car was inevitable because of that. But I still feel guilty.

And that's fucking stupid, because it's a goddamned car.

It's unhealthy to become attached to things. This is how you end up with four hundred cats, or two boxes of X-FILES magazines in the basement.

I'll get over it. Especially after The Husband and I get to work cleaning the damned thing out tonight. God, what a pit. NO FOOD OR DRINK IN THE NEW CAR. AND EVERYONE MUST TAKE OFF THEIR SHOES WHEN THEY ENTER.

By the way, YEAR ZERO is all sorts of awesome.

See, I feel better already.

Nope, wait, there's a tear.

LAME!!!

CONGRATULATIONS, IT'S A CAR!!

The KelmeisterMobile 3.0, our new baby, is ready. Fresh from the beautiful island of Japan.



I'm off to sign the paperwork and we can pick it up tomorrow morning.

On my way back to work, I'm getting some Micky D's and I'm stopping to get Nine Inch Nails' YEAR ZERO on CD to christen the car.

Nothing like an album about the totalitarian-led downfall of society to brighten the glow of buying an insanely overpriced consumer product, I always say!!

Watch this and imagine you're driving with me.

BOY, AM I LAME

Did I ever tell you about the time I saw JURASSIC PARK for the first time in a movie theater? It was the weekend it came out. I just happened to be in DC with The San Francisco Friend visiting her brother. We went to see it for shits and giggles.

I cried through the whole thing.

Fuck, it was DINOSAURS!!! FOR REALS!!! Up on the screen, interacting with Jeff Goldblum! DINOSAURS WERE REAL!!! And I totally wanted one, because they were wicked cute and looked like they'd make great pets.

It's been a while since I was so amazed by something going from being in my imagination to up on the movie screen and appearing like it was real. Like it could walk by my house while I was sitting at home with The Husband, listening to him complain about my unholy and unnatural fixation with JUDGE JUDY.

So it may come as no surprise to you that as I watched the new exclusive Yahoo trailer for TRANSFORMERS that I actually cried. Okay, cried is probably overstating it a bit, but I shed a few tears. Because HOLY SHIT CARS CAN FUCKING TURN INTO ROBOTS, and when they do the FUCKING KICK THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF ONE ANOTHER.

And TEENAGERS DISCOVER THE TRUE MEANING OF LOVE (AND IT MEANS WAITING TO HAVE SEX UNTIL AFTER MARRIAGE) and GOVERNMENTS DISCOVER THAT WAR IS NOT ALWAYS THE ANSWER (UNLESS YOUR POPULATIONS ARE HAVING THEIR ASSES HANDED TO THEM BY OUTER SPACE ROBOTS) and SONS AND FATHERS LEARN THEY'RE A LOT MORE ALIKE THAN THEY PROBABLY REALIZED (AND THAT INCLUDES A LOVE OF PORN AND CARS).

So TRANSFORMERS looks to be the feel-good sleeper hit of the summer. All it needs is Jane Fonda turning into a giant robot and kicking the crap out of Lindsay Lohan and then telling her to use condoms and stop drinking so much. That'd be awesome.


ETA: I just watched it again, because as previously stated, I am lame. And sure enough, when Optimus gets into his Keanu-Reeves-MATRIX-fighting-stance, the tears started spilling.

What the fuck is wrong with me? Is it because I got my period today?

OH, THE VAPORS!

Variety (via Dark Horizons) is reporting that Hugh Laurie is joining the cast of the new James Ellroy flick, already set to star Keanu Reeves.

Holy shit, my loins are sure to explode!!!

HAVE YOU EVER FIRED GUNS WHILST JUMPING THROUGH THE AIR AND YELLING "AHHH?"

HOLY SHIT.

HOT FUZZ is literally, seriously, like the greatest movie ever made. And it features what is literally, seriously, like the greatest on-screen death ever filmed.

Simon Pegg is my new imaginary boyfriend, like you didn't already guess that was coming.



Looks kinda like The Husband here, hahahaha.

When I'm reincarnated, I'm totally coming back as Simon Pegg, because he's a total badass in ways I cannot be.

Also, we saw the preview for BALLS OF FURY. This movie, the brain child of Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon from RENO 911, gave me a hard-on. First it caused me to spontaneously grow a penis from my vagina, and then my new penis became engorged with hot throbbing passionate love for this movie. Literally, seriously, like that's how good this trailer is.



Okay, not literally. But I think you know what I mean.

NOW YOU'RE A MAN, A MANNY MAN MWHAN

Rickey.org linked to this site, which is the GENDER GENIE, an algorithm that supposedly can detect the gender of a writer based on frequently recurring words.

I pasted a few of my blog entries into the machine, and guess what?

I'M A MAN, BAY-BEE!!!

It's the generous sprinkling of "fuck," I just know it.

HOLY CRAP, YOU SCARED THE PEE OUT OF ME, TRENT REZNOR

I don't know if you've heard about this, but the new Nine Inch Nails album is this big ass Magnum Opus concept album that they've been promoting online for a while now, with a crazy ass Alternate Reality Game involving websites and coded t-shirts and flash drives left in dirty European bathrooms. The album is called Year Zero, and the story is something like this:

Year Zero is 2022. The world has become a zombified, dystopian wasteland. The US government in the year 2007 introducted a drug into the water supply called Parepin, a broad-spectrum antibiotic/antiviral as a preventative measure against terrorist biological attack. Some folks don't like this idea: people who stop using the drug find their minds clearing, and set up resistance against the government and use of the drug. The government claims this clarity is nothing but paranoia.

However, it seems the paranoia is suffered by those drinking the water: there are mass reports of a phenomenon the public begins to refer to as "The Presence," a gigantic hand-like specter that is repeatedly seen reaching down from the sky. Is it literally the hand of God? Churches spring up to worship The Presence. Corps of military enlisted dedicate themselves to the Evangelical mission. Does this all precede the ultimate showdown between Good and Evil? Or is this all nothing more than a fever dream in the collective subconsicous of a bunch of addicts?

It all started with a t-shirt: highlighted letters amongst the tour dates on the back led to I Am Trying To Believe. And it all ends

here.

JUST DOING THIS SO EVERYONE WILL KNOW I WAS FIRST

Saw BLADES OF GLORY last night. It was okay: hilariously funny in parts that were few and far between, with some ha-ha moments in between. Definitely dollar movie material. I was glad we saw a free preview. ANYWAY, that is not the point of this.

This is: the final move Farrell and Heder do in their routine at the end of the movie is a Pamchenko Twist from the movie THE CUTTING EDGE, but with the thrower doing a butterfly (or death drop, they differ in the take-off) while the throwee is in the air.

Just so you know.

CAN I KEEP IT, HUH? CAN I, PLEASE?

I want a Stephen Fry. I would take good care of him, I swear. I would walk him twice a day, and feed him the best food. I would fix him up a little room in the basement with his own bed and lots of toys. I would play with him all the time and take good care of him. And we would have tea at four p.m. every day and I would listen to him talk about stuff but he'd be super smart and I wouldn't understand any of it, but it would be awesome.

So can I have my own Stephen Fry? Please? If you get me a Stephen Fry, I would love you forever.

A NEW EXTREME IN HORROR

So Sunday, The Husband and I go over to The Husband's Boyfriend's house for a little cooking out action. After everyone was done eating, we popped in a movie: HOSTEL, which The Husband has wanted to see for a while. I have to admit, after all the gore I've seen in films in the last few years, I still didn't want to watch it because I thought it'd be way over the top. Like pins in eyes for 90 minutes. It actually wasn't nearly as bad as I was expecting. It was far more vile with its constant parade of boobies.

Anyway, HOSTEL was pretty good. So we go home, and we're downstairs in the home office fucking around (I'm on Fark.com and The Husband's trying to put the new hard drive in my computer). After about a half hour, a stench worse than the breath of Satan wafting from the depths of Hell permeates the air. My eyes begin to water.

"Holy fuck," I say, "Did Tess just shit?" referring to our eldest cat--she who is prone to nasty bouts of smelly diahrrea.

The Husband stalks to the area of the basement where the litter boxes are housed. "Nope," he replies, "It's Buster." Our newest addition, he is also prone to nasty bouts of diahrrea, but he at least tries to mitigate the damage by dragging random plastic bags and pieces of paper from around the basement to cover his poop. He's a trooper, he is.

The quiet sifting of litter comes from behind me. Then, a scream.

"AAAAAHHHHH!," The Husband cries. I jump from the chair (about as well as you can "jump" when you're a big ol' fattie) and poke my head around the door frame.

"Buster's got worms!" he cries, shoving a litter scoop at me, sawdust covered piece of poop right in the center.

And sticking up from the center of that sawdust covered piece of poop is about an eighth of an inch segment of glistening white worm, twirling its head in circles, looking for another ass to crawl into.

Heroically swallowing my bile, I get a baggie in which to put the poop for the inevitable next day trip to the vet. Then Buster went into the back bedroom to be quarantined. Then showers were had, the bed was stripped and redressed, and the other two cats were banished to any area of the house which was as far away from me as possible.

The vet said Buster had a tapeworm.

I swear to you, I do too. I imagine it is like Cthulhu, waiting to spawn from my ass and take over the world. I have been methodically checking my own poop.

The tapeworms, they are everywhere.

The vet swore people cannot get tapeworms from their pets: it is a six-month long process involving ingestion of infected fleas.

It matters not. I saw the horrid creature, reaching up for daylight from a steaming pile of feces.

Holy fuck, that's nasty.

Cats suck. Don't ever get a cat, unless it's one that doesn't have an ass for a tapeworm to come out of.

I NEED TO STOP READING SALON.COM

It's so shitty: it's nothing but a collection of opinion pieces written by people who screech and complain so much you can totally imagine them tearing their hair out as they write. The letters to the editor (except for mine, of course) are consistantly written by shrill uberfeminists with their panties all in a bunch. All I have to say is, thank god I had enough sense not to renew my subsciption. Now all I have to do is try to steer my mouse toward TMZ.com whenever I get the urge to go to Salon. My blood pressure and my sanity will be the better for it.

ARMCHAIR QUARTERBACKING

After all conversation about American Idol had been exhausted, my co-worker tells me she and her husband got all caught up in one of those news shows, Dateline or Primetime or whatever the fuck. It was the ultimate tale of survival, and it got me to thinking.

See, the story goes something like this, and since I didn't see it myself I have no idea what actually happened so I'm going to make some shit up that sounds like it's flowing in a logical order:

There's this guy who's a diver, and the ultimate place to go diving is this place in Africa. It's like one of those big ass cave systems like in The Descent or something. So while he's down there, he discovers an enormous cave. He hooks up with a team of African divers to explore it, and they discover a huge lake and a cavern large enough to house the Eiffel Tower.

Unfortunately, the dude dies during one of the dives. His father's all like, that sucks, but he died doing what he loved. His mother's like, fuck that shit, I want his body so I can give him a proper burial. This is no easy task, because dude didn't die in an easily accessible section of the cave.

So they hire another dive team to retrieve the body. Someone somehwere has to be thinking this is a pretty shitty idea, but no, down they go; and because of the way the cave system is constructed, they need to go down single file.

The guy at the very bottom of the pile is for some goddamn reason wearing a camera on his helmet instead of a flashlight. He's holding his flashlight in his hand. He finds the body and has to put it in a sack to have it hauled up. Something goes horrifically wrong (as it always does in situations such as this): he has to let go of the flashlight to bag the body and doesn't see all the lines and tubes and cables getting tangled up, and the bottom guy ends up dying. This is, of course, all caught on tape thanks to the camera on his helmet. The next guy up the line almost doesn't make it himself; it's so touch-and-go that they tell his wife to prepare for the worst. The thing is, because of how far down the cavern is, it takes them an hour or so to get down to it, but it takes almost twelve hours for them to surface because of decompression. But as he's coming up he tells the next guy in line that the guy below him found the kid's body and had it in the bag, and they actually aren't that far down.

So they end up hiring a second dive team to go down, and they are able to retrieve the bodies.

Now here are my evil, evil thoughts: first of all, how fucked up is it that you'd risk other people's lives to retrieve a dead body? Second, this sort of shit happens ALL THE TIME. You hear about it on the news, someone gets trapped on a mountain while they're climbing, the rescue team gets stuck or lost and a second team comes in to get them. Here's my thought:

Why do they never hire the second team first? I mean, if they are SO GOOD at what they do that they're able to rescue stranded people AND the teams send to find them, wouldn't THEY be the go-to guys?

Also, about the phrase, "They died doing what they loved." I had this thought following the Atlanta bus tragedy a few weeks ago, when the baseball players and bus driver died when their bus crashed over an overpass. Many people said the baseball players, en route to a game, died doing what they loved.

I'm like, what, riding on a bus?

No use yelling at me for being a mean bitch, I'm already well aware that I'm going to hell, thank you.

Also, Crank is the bestest movie ever, and Jason Statham is my new imaginary boyfriend.

BACK AWAY FROM THE INTRAWEBZ

I don't think I mentioned it here, but I'm going to see Taylor Hicks, American Idol Season Five winner, next month with The Husband. I quite like Taylor Hicks. I bought his album (through iTunes, which was a huge mistake because the damn thing won't burn right). I may or may not have a wallpaper of him downloaded to my computer. But my days of obsessive Duran Duran stalking-type behavior is long over and done with. No more magazines saved in boxes in the basement. No more jackets. No more buttons. Maybe a sticker and t-shirt here and there, but only ironically.

So today with a lack of desire to do work, I went to a fan site that's since morphed into his official fan blog complete with podcasts and whatnot. Occasionally they have free downloads, and if I'm anything, I'm cheap. So I'm really bored today, and start poking around on their tour boards. Just to see what's going on: are there special happenings at the venue, pictures, audio?

It's a nightmare about a room full of horny, crazy, fat ladies.

The women going to the show I'm attending are apparently all coming in from out-of-town. They want to have dinner together, but every single one of them is on a special diet, and have long, drawn out hard luck stories about the horror of eating out because of their special diets. They have purchased strings of beads for themselves to wear to the show, supposedly to show solidarity but much more likely to hopefully draw enough attention to themselves that Taylor will want to sleep with them. If that doesn't work, they're all wearing homemade name tags which may feature the slogan, "Taylor Hicks opened a window on soul" or "to my soul" or some crazy shit. HOLY FUCKING CRAP. I didn't think up shit like this when I was twelve.

The best is they're keeping track of where everyone is sitting, I guess to better position the gigantically huge homemade sign they're taking that says, "TAYLOR PLEEZ FUK US." But it won't be vulgur because it will have glitter hearts and pictures of kittens on it. They shelled out shitloads of money the day the tour was announced to get seats, and they're all like, "I'M RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE, BUT THERE'S SOME BITCH WHO'S RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME, SHE'S A BITCH DOES SHE THINK SHE KNOWS TAYLOR OR SOMETHING SHE'S NOT ALL THAT."

I was cheap and got general admission tickets, and it turns out GENERAL ADMISSION IS IN FRONT OF THE SEATED SECTIONS.

I'm in front of them, HA-ha.

GOD I HATE PEOPLE SO MUCH.

Maybe I need beads.

Or Prozac. Probably Prozac.

Taylor Hicks probably won't want to sex me up if he reads this and sees how big of a bitch I am, will he?

THE GREATEST THING TO AIR ON TELEVISION, EVER

"I'm gonna fuck you like a bitch, Dingle."

I GOT ANOTHER EDITOR PICK LETTER ON SALON.COM

Tonight The Husband and I are going to see 300. Hopefully I will get a review up, although I doubt it. I've actually been to the movies quite a bit in the last few months, though you wouldn't know it to see the site, because I haven't reviewed any of them. I think I have half of something stored on here somewhere for THE MESSENGERS. Maybe one day it will see the light of day.

Anyway, the review on Salon.com can basically be summed up thusly:

300 is not historically accurate, it's incredibly gay while very homophobic at the same time, and it's not campy enough but doesn't take itself seriously, either.

WTF?

Not to mention that the reviewer didn't even bother to mention whether she liked the movie or not.

Crazily enough, the top story on the site the day before was an article about how the intellectual elites were ruining reading with their demands that everything be overanalyzed: author's intent, cultural relevancy, etc. I could get into it in more detail since I was an English major in college, but I think I've mostly forgotten a lot of it. Mostly.

Hegemonic master narrative.

So in response to the review, I wrote the following comment, which was starred as "Editor's Choice." Because I ROCK OUT.

Editor's Choice

Brass tacks

Ironically, yesterday's cover story was about how we're analyzing the joy out of books.

Can't I just watch some hot guys beat the crap out of each other in peace?

-- I mean, seriously

There you have it. Aren't I awesome?

I WAS RAISED ON THE DAIRY, BITCH

I have a friend who's dating a guy who loves JACKASS. She wants to share in the experience with him, but she hateshateshates JACKASS. Did I know of anything similar that wouldn't gross her out so much?

Well, no, but the question did bring to mind this: the funniest thing I have ever seen on TV, something that to this day still makes me cry when I watch it because I'm laughing so hard. And yes, having watched this video right before posting it here, I cried yet again.

I present KENNY ROGERS'S JACKASS, from MADtv

JOSH GROBAN IS MY NEW IMAGINARY BOYFRIEND

And this is my new all-time favoritest song.

THIS IS MY ALL-TIME FAVORITE SONG EVER

A BIT OF COMIC RELIEF

This is why Bohemian Rhapsody is the Grestest.Song.Ever.

Check out the dude losing his toup late in the video.

I caught my first tube today... Sir.

This is easilly the greatest thing ever



Ernio Hernandez Playbill.com
Thu Jan 25, 6:18 PM ET

Audience members will answer the call to star in the Keanu Reeves role for Point Break LIVE!, a stage adaptation of the 1991 film.

James Hook directs the new non-Equity Manhattan run of the work - previously seen in Seattle, Minneapolis and Brooklyn - starting Jan. 25 at the La Tea Theater. The limited engagement plays through Feb. 24.

Point Break LIVE! follows the story in the Hollywood film that "revolves around Johnny Utah, former college football star turned FBI Agent who must go undercover to infiltrate a gang of bankrobbing surfers."

What is unique about the stage take is that the role of Utah (played by Reeves in the film) is played by an audience member (selected at random each night) who is thrust upon the stage (guided by a PA - who also serves as stunt double) and given his/her lines on cue-cards. "Keanu Reeves roles demand a special kind of acting," explains director Hook, on the show's conceit. "Essentially, in every scene, you have to look like you've just been dropped into a room and you have no idea what's going on."

The cast features Topher Mikels (as Bodhi), Thomas Blake (Roach), George Spielvogel (Angelo Pappas), Ben Robertson (Ben Harp), Izzy Abeyta (Tyler Ann Endicott), Scout Durwood (Kathryn Bigelow), Amber Hubert (PA), Mike Kash (Cameraman), Jonathan Evan Stern, Adam Morris and Conor Tansy.

According to production notes, the play "features copious amounts of fake blood, extended fight choreography, and an indoor monsoon." The work premiered at Seattle's Little Theatre and subsequently toured throughout the Pacific Northwest before playing runs in Minneapolis and Brooklyn.

Tickets to Point Break LIVE! at the La Tea Theatre, in the Clemente Soto Velez Cultural Center at 107 Suffolk Street (between Delancey and Rivington St.) are available by calling (212) 352-3101.



God, do I wish I could go. I would make an AWESOME Keanu.

WOE IS ME

So I'm having a problem.

I'm beginning to physically resemble Rosie O'Donnell.

And don't think I'm exaggerating here, because I confronted The Husband with my observation, and he was all like, Yeah, you kinda do.

I go to the gym and workout. My weight stays the same but my clothes don't fit. Am I retaining water? Am I gaining muscle? Am I sneaking Frappuccinos in my sleep? It's starting to piss me off!!!

I'm off to get a Cafe Mocha at Tim Hortons! Maybe that will calm me down.

BILL MOYERS--THE SECRET GOVERNMENT

On the eve of the State Of The Union...

Here's an old PBS special by Bill Moyers centered on the Iran-Contra scandal. It outlines the history behind the mindset and policies that created the "Above The Law" mentality we've all come to know and love.

(Give it a chance to load--it's 90 minutes long)

FOR NOW, I'M GIVING UP

I went back to the Movable Type default. Cascading style sheets make my brain hurt. But I kept my masthead!!

NEW YEAR, NEW LOOK

So here it is, my new layout that I stole from somebody's website. Hope you like it. I will obviously be tweaking it, beause right now it's kind of crappy. But ENJOY the pretty pictures of po-tay-toes. Because we all need mucho various potato products in our lives.