This is from 1966.
Can you imagine CBS playing this today? A full minute of dialogue-free, hand-drawn, irony-free animation, with nothing to actually promote? This would probably be done in 3D computer graphics and squashed to the side to make room for a commercial for an upcoming show, while the whole thing has an animated "Dancing With The Stars" pop up on the bottom of the screen.

TICK...TICK...TICK...

It was a beautiful November afternoon, so I took the kids do a little nature walk / hiking path thing near our house. We walked and explored for an hour or so, met other people, saw fishermen, threw rocks into the lake. My son said it was beautiful and my daughter said it was "like a miracle." To sum up, we had fun.

Cut to 8 hours later. I'm in bed with my wife, watching LOST on DVD. There's literally one minute left in the episode and I unconciously brush my right arm with my left and feel a little scab, or dot of dried blood. I wipe it again and realize it's not a scab. EW! It's a freaking bug! I looked closer and saw that, yeah, it was a bug with its head in my arm. OH GOD! So we stop the DVD and I go to the bathroom while my bugphobic wife is doing her best to not explode.

She called the Nurse's hotline as I went online and we came to the realization that even thought it's been 8 hours, it's still well within the period of safety and I was not likely to have been exposed to any illnesses yet. This was especially true because the tick was not engorged. It was as if it had just settled in when I noticed it.

I got the tweezers and tried to grab it without...ew...removing its head. I pulled about 4 times and it wouldn't come out. Ew Ew Ew.... So I took my shirt off and got serious. That's when I saw the others.

There was another on my shoulder and another near my other shoulder. How my wife didn't pack up and leave right then I don't know. I brushed one of them and it took off. It hadn't dug in yet. We got it off and put it in a ziploc bag. I gently tugged at the other one on my shoulder it came right out. Into the bag. I went back to the one on my arm and went back to tugging. Pop! I got it out in one piece and put it into the bag.

Then we thought..."Oh crap...the kids." Both kids had had showers and were already asleep. How do we wake them up and say, "We need to see if there are bugs burrowing into you, like Daddy."? Luckily, they're solid sleepers and we just went in, rolled them over, pulled up their shirts and pants and rifled through their hair and found absolutely nothing. There were 3 total and I got all of them.

So I'll go to the doctor on Monday and see if he wants to give me any antibiotics or anything, but I'd say I'm out of the woods. Ha Ha. Get it?

I saw this poster in a bus stop that was in front of a Nathan's. I thought that was pretty funny.

*EDIT*
Apparently there was some confusion, so let me explain.
The movie looks terrible. The thing I thought was funny was the big sign advertising OLD DOGS in front of a hot dog restaurant.

WEEKEND OF INSANE MOVIES



This past weekend I saw three films that really excited me. When I say "excited", I mean I was invested, moved, shocked, and/or genuinely amused by all three.

The first was "Antichrist," an unrated thriller(?) with only two speaking parts. In essence, a couple loses their son to a tragic accident while they are making love. The wife is inconsolable with grief and guilt. Luckily(?) her husband is a therapist, so he takes her to the woods to an isolated cabin to work through it all. Unfortunately, a bunch of unpleasant things happen. The film starts off beautifully, with slow-motion black and white footage of the child's demise intercut with graphic, hardcore sex. The next 45 minutes or so are a totally logical, devastating, straight-forward story. The next 45 minutes is rife with symbolism and artsiness and every time I thought I knew what was happening, I was wrong. The film succeeded in shocking me and surprising me and making me wince. There is more genital mutilation in this film than I've seen in a movie, ever. But I guess that's not saying much. I was engrossed and grossed out throughout. I wouldn't recommend this film to anyone and I didn't enjoy the experience, but it was interesting nonetheless.

The second was "Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs." I've read the short book several times to my kids and I really enjoyed it. The movie trailer came out a few months ago and I was angry because of how different it was. It seemed like a totally different story with one element kept it; food falls from the sky. Well, I was right about that much, but after it got universally good reviews I took the family to see it in 3D. The 3D was negligible, but it enhanced the "falling from the sky" effect. The movie was really fun. There were more than a few moments that I found genuinely funny and clever. It was fast and crazy with a few token "learning moments" but I really enjoyed it, much to my own surprise. The last 20 minutes or so was so completely bugnuts bizarre, my wife looked over at one point and physically lowered my hand from my forehead. I couldn't believe the absolute weirdness they took the climax to. But overall, I wouldn't say it deserves any awards, but it was a really fun experience.

The third and final film of the weekend was "Synechdoche, NY." There was nothing fun about this film. It was depressing as all hell, and I was enthralled by it. Like Antichrist, I didn't know exactly what was going on, but the emotional aspect of it came through really strongly. I would have to say it's about a man's struggle to understand life and come to grips with his own eventual death. It is completely unrealistic by design, but I found it to walk JUST outside the line of making sense. I kept watching it going, "that was symbolic of something...not sure exactly what, but I understand the basic gist." For example, one character's house is always on fire, but nobody seems to care and it's never explained. David Lynch is a director who uses surreal touches to heighten a mood, usually nothing else. This film felt totally sure of its structure and I felt like I missed a good deal of the director's intent. With all that said, I was thoroughly engaged and emotionally moved by it. By contrast, Francis Ford Coppola's recent film, "Youth Without Youth" was another surreal, artsy story about life, but I felt completely bored by it. Synechdoche, NY is a film I would highly recommend to those with daring cinematic tastes.

This video is exactly the kind of thing I would have loved in High/Middle School. It's a simple fable with cute animation and some truly bizarre and imaginative character design.
It also reminds me a bit of the film "Everybody Rides the Carousel," which I saw in High School psychology class. That film was also animated and explained the eight ages of human life and used different animals to symbolize fear, independence, love, etc. I admit part of the reason I liked it was the simplistic symbolism made me feel smart. But I asked my teacher for a copy of the tape after class and I still have it.
This is a lot less subtle, and I doubt it's meant for children, although children were treated with a lot more respect and less coddling back then, so who knows? Plus, it's blatantly anti-war, and I can't imagine that would be promoted in schools.

A GLORIOUS DAWN

This is beautiful and wonderful.
"If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe."

MANIC MOMMIES

My darling wife is a web superstar!
She is a big fan of the Manic Mommies podcast and called to tell them so. They played the call on the most recent episode which can be heard here. She appears about 40 seconds in. This is the first time she's appeared on a radio-like show since 1988 when she called in a radio show and won Bon Jovi tickets!

THE LAKE GEORGE ODYSSEY
part three: Wednesday

Another fitful night; the raccoons were chewing up the garbage cans right outside our room. But we got up and went to the mechanic to see if they actually got our van and left us with a loaner. The lot was full of cars and trucks, but there was a Subaru Outback right out in front and were very happy. It looked nice and big and in great condition. We went in to talk to the guy and he told us the Outback was his. Oh. Our car was around the corner. It was a 1989 Pontaic 6000. It's a four-door with a trunk and an engine that seems to work, so I shouldn't complain, but we are. It's a crummy little car, it's filthy and it smells. It's got A/C and a radio, so that's good. It's just that we feel so screwed over that we deserve a decent car. We were told three times that the transmission was done and totally fine and then we break down up in the mountains with no cell service and have to load our family into a stranger's car to get to any civilization. The least they can do is give us a station wagon from the 90's.

THE LAKE GEORGE ODYSSEY
part two: Tuesday

We slept poorly and woke early. We got the kids out to camp and borrowed a car to drive out to the mechanic’s place. We told him who we were and what was up. He explained that he was booked until next Tuesday and he doesn’t deal with transmissions anyway. We asked him what we should do. He said the folks who worked on our transmission have to come and get it and supply us with a rental car. Unfortunately, it is racing season and he did not know if we would be able to rent a car at all. So we drove 20 miles to Ticonderoga, the nearest place with reliable cell phone service, and all the rental places we called up here require the car to be returned up here, which does us no good. Then we called the mechanic back home and told them what happened. They apologized up and down and said they’d arrange for a tow truck to drive up to Lake George from Long Island, with a loaner car on the back. We got a message that the truck was on its way and would be up at the mechanic’s sometime tonight. They’d drop off the loaner and bring the van back home and have it fixed by the beginning of next week. The amazing mechanic up here is so nice; he is not charging us any storage fees and has agreed to let the tow truck guy call him at home when he arrives this evening and he will go meet the truck at his shop to arrange the trade. He even offered us a ride into town with his wife if we needed it. This all, of course, took place over multiple hours, through multiple messages and return calls, which were made with Kat’s head leaning against a flagpole, in the blazing hot sun, in the only place on campus where Verizon cell phone service works.

If we’re lucky, we’ll wake up tomorrow, drive to the mechanic and pick up our shiny new rental car to use for the rest of the trip. And since things always go our way, I have full confidence.

THE LAKE GEORGE ODYSSEY
part one: Monday

Our Honda Odyssey has a rich and colorful history, of which I have previously blogged. Recently, the transmission died and basically had to be replaced. It cost a lot and our van has 120,000 miles on it. Ever optimistic, we got the work done. A few days after we got the car back, it started showing signs of transmission problems. We brought it back to the shop and it was repaired again, whatever that means. A few weeks after THAT, we brought the van in for an oil change. While the car was in the shop, we mentioned that there was still something wrong with the transmission. It was making weird noises and shifting very hard. The shop assured us that new transmissions sometimes do that and not to worry. We told them we were about to embark on a trip upstate, somewhere in the neighborhood of 250 miles each way. He assured us again not to worry. (See where this is going yet?)

Monday morning, we loaded up the van with food, luggage and family and headed north. We were still a little cautious with the transmission and tried to be nice to it by keeping the RPMs down and ignoring all the weird whining noises and hard shifts. That plan worked perfectly until about six hours into the trip, 4:30pm. We had just gotten off the Northway when we decided to switch drivers. I pulled over and the car stalled out. It restarted right away but it got us very nervous. There is NO cell phone service up where we were, nor where we were headed. There’s not much of anything, really. We continued driving. About five minutes later the gas pedal refused to do anything but rev the engine. It was like the car was in neutral when it wasn’t. Freaking out, we pulled over and shut the car off. We started it up again and immediately the engine light came on. The accelerator continued to refuse to live up to its name. I looked up the engine light in the manual and it mentioned several times in different fonts and sizes that continuing to drive the car when the light was on could cause serious damage. So we pulled over and looked at each other. “What do we do now?” we each said to the other. Then we each said it again. We were on the side of the road on 9N, about to drive up the twisty, turny road up the mountain, through the dense forest. As I mentioned, there is no cell phone service up there. Luckily the car was jammed with food, just in case we had to camp out there. But we had family waiting for us with no way to let them know what was happening, and we had no way to call a tow truck or AAA or anyone.

We decided to flag down a car and try to get a ride up to the cottage where we were to stay for the week and where our family was waiting. We waved down a wonderful man named Paul who offered to take us all up to our destination. We piled in and he drove us the 8 miles to the cottage, wished us luck and went off to visit his brother in Ticonderoga to drop off the fishing lures his brother had ordered and which came in early, apparently to Paul’s house, not Paul’s brother’s house, and would he be surprised! Because Paul hadn’t told his brother he was coming, Hopefully they’d be able to get some fishing in that day!

Anyway, we drove to a neighbor’s house one town over, who had a land line. It was 5:30pm. I called AAA and was told a tow truck would be there in 30 minutes; 6:00pm. My father in law and I drove down to the van to wait. 6:00 came and went. At 6:30pm, we decided one of us should go back and call AAA again. As we were about to do this, the neighbor who had let us use the phone drove up and said AAA called and it’s gonna be awhile. We had no idea how long a while was, so my father in law loaded up his car with all our food, clothing and games and whatnot and brought them back to the cottage. He came back a little while later and we continued to wait. Every time we heard a car coming around the corner, we'd crane our necks and sink back down when a car drove past us. Every once in a while we'd hear a low rumble and become convinced it was the truck, only to find a motorcycle gang. This happened over and over again in between stretches of silence. It is really, really quiet up in the mountains. Sometimes I just sat in the sun, listening to the noisy silence of the bugs buzzing around. Sometimes I pawed through the CDs in the car to find something to read. Finally I remembered the car has a radio and found a station to listen to. Around 7:30pm, a flat bed tow truck came screaming around the bend, passed me, and slammed on the brakes. He backed up until we were face-to-face.
“Just passin’ through, or are you the guy I called for?” I asked.
“Just passing through. What’s the problem?”
I told him the whole story and he said, “Well, as long as you called somebody already…” and drove away.

The sun started to go down and it began to get cold. I began to worry. Just then the real tow guy came along. It was close to 8:00pm. He loaded up the van and took it to a little place just a few miles north of where we were staying. I left a note and we went back to the cottage just in time to pick at the scraps from the dinner we had missed. I shouldn’t say that. There was plenty of food and it was all very good. Tomorrow we find out what we can do and how we're getting home.

SHATNER vs. PALIN

This is priceless!

MOUSE(?) IN THE HOUSE


This little guy suddenly appeared in a laundry pile this evening. He freaked the living guts out of my wife and son, but my daughter and I were curious as hell. Plus we thought he was really freakin cute! He was relatively easy to catch, but once I did catch it, I couldn't figure out what it was! It looks like a teeny gerbil. I thought it was a mouse, but it's way too short to be a regular mouse. We've had a mouse in the house before and it was much longer. This guy was round. I looked online but I can't figure out what it is for sure. I gave it a little plastic CD container to use as a shelter, since it's raining out right now, and I put it outside. Really weird.

CD BUBBLE
When you buy a stack of recordable DVDs or CDs, there's always one clear disc on the top to protect the top disc. Apparently, if you take that clear plastic disc and melt it just the right way, you can blow on it and make a kind of bubble. I experimented with it today at "work" with my summer assistant. On the disc you can see 3 other attempts that failed. We also tried on two other discs so this was something like the 12th try. We were very happy.

CAR TROUBLES

We have two cars: a minivan and a sedan.
Recently, our minivan started making an odd noise. Sounded like a transmission problem, so we brought into the shop. They said that it was, indeed, a transmission problem and they'd have to practically replace it. It was going to cost $4000. So we have this 6-year-old minivan with 120,000 miles on it. Is it worth replacing or fixing it? We hemmed and hawed for almost a full day and decided to go ahead and fix it. Now, keep in mind, this minivan has been in 5 major accidents in six years. It's hit ambulances, telephone poles, other cars, you name it. It's been rebuilt so many times it's ridiculous.
Several days later, the van's done. We're down $4000, but the van's fixed.

About a week later, my wife woke up sick. I decided to take the day off work and take the kids to school. While the kids were at school, I decided to go into work for an hour or so, just to catch up on some stuff. I took the minivan because I needed to take some equipment home and I needed the room. At about a third of the way to work I felt a bump. I figured I ran over something so I looked in the rearview mirror. There I saw a tan sedan fishtailing all over the highway, swerving from lane to lane. I tried my best to get away from the car, but it slammed into my rear side panel and pushed me into a tailspin across all three lanes of highway traffic. I bounced off the concrete divider and came to rest facing the wrong way on the highway. Luckily, I was now on the shoulder and nobody else hit me. My car had a damaged rear bumper, a huge dent on the side, and the side sliding door couldn't open because of the deformation. One tire was flat and the other one sat on a broken axle. The other car was front-first into the divider, totally smushed. The driver was unharmed as was I. According to a witness and police report, the driver had been driving erratically for several miles. She kept dozing off and she eventually drifted into my lane and tapped me. This woke her up and she freaked out and swerved the car and lost control. So my sick wife had to come get me. Of course, we were now tying up traffic so it took her forever to get there. But she did and we followed the tow truck to the repair shop and then went and picked up a rental car. This all happened on a Friday, so we had to wait over the weekend to find out if the appriaser from the insurance company was going to total the van or not. We spent the weekend shopping for cars, just in case.
Eventually we got the word that the van was not going to be totalled and it would cost $5000 to fix, $500 out of our pocket. My wife had become convinced that the car was cursed. It had now been one major accident every year of its life and it would not die.

We kept calling to check on the van and when it would be done. Things were going slowly at the repair shop because the suppliers kept sending the wrong parts. Then they sent a pair of tires and during the wheel alignment they realized one of the pair was not the correct kind of tire, so they had to remove it and order another one. It was finally done almost a week after they said it would be done. The repair guy told my wife something to the effect of, "I had to say this, but your car is weird. I've never had so many problems with one car before. It's like it's cursed or something." Great.

The day after we got the van back, I was off to work in my car, the sedan. I decided to take the Ocean Parkway. For those who don't know, the Ocean Parkway runs along the bottom of Long Island for something like 20 miles straight with no major exits. It's right by the shore and there's rarely much traffic. As soon as I got on the Parkway, I heard an odd noise and another driver waved to me to pull over. I had a flat tire. No big deal. I can change a flat. I jacked it up, pulled off nut #1, nut #2, nut #3...
And the fourth one was stuck. I kept at and it finally loosened. I was able to turn it easily. But it juts kept turning, never getting closer to coming out. Finally I had to call AAA to come get me. The guy got there, tried the same things I did, and went, "huh, that's weird." Yeah, thanks. Apparently the stud came loose from its moorings and was just spinning, not letting the tire come off. So the repair guy went to his truck, pulled out a 3-foot sledge hammer and commences to whacking on the stud. It finally broke in half and the flat was able to come off. But the other half of the stud was now rattling around inside the brake system. After about another 15 minutes of fiddling with fingers and screwdrivers, he finally got it out and was able to put on the spare tire...which began to hiss. Except then it stopped hissing, and when the repair guy filled it up again, it didn't hiss anymore. Nothing's worse than intermittent problems. But he put the spare on and sent me on my way. I was able to drive to work and drop the car off at the tire place. The tire place called about 4 hours later: "Man, we put this car up and the lift and we're opening up a can of worms on this thing." So the wheel needed to be replaced, the brakes fixed, the stud replaced and I also had a bubble in my brake fluid hose, like an anurysm. So luckily we caught that one before I lost my brakes, huh? What I had originally imagined being an $80 tire replacement turned into an $800 major project and left me car-less for another 48 hours. Luckily I was able to borrow cars from the parents and in-laws. Thanks, guys.

It's now been almost a week and no experts have had to look at either of our cars. I keep calling the insurance company to find out when the other driver's insurance is going to pay for the $500 deductable. They haven't claimed responsibility yet and my insurance company can't get in touch with the other driver. So it looks like they're playing hard to get.

My Dad's one-month-old, new car just broke down a coupla days ago. It's starting to get a little too "The Day the Earth Stood Still" for me, to be honest.

UP
I just saw the latest Pixar masterpiece UP. I was totally ready for it to be mediocre. That is, Pixar Mediocre, which is ten times better than everything else. No, this was a good one and there's nothing like Pixar Good. I can't say it was absolutely perfect, but it was as close as anyone can expect. The 3D was superfluous, but it added a little intensity to the whole height thing.

Without giving anything away, I'll say it was worthy of its PG rating. It was pretty adult, both in action/violence and emotional intensity. I'm not ashamed to say I cried three times.

So go see Up. Take your parents. Take your kids if you think they can handle it. But do yourself a favor and see it. Afer I saw Coraline, I was convinced that it would win best animated feature next Oscar season. Now, I don't believe it will. Coraline was a hugely impressive feat because of its stop-motion technique. It was also a great film. But if you ask me right now, I'll say Up was better.

SPAGHETTIDOGS

My brother sent me a link to some weird Russian site that featured the unholy merging of frankfurters and spaghetti. That link is HERE.

I decided to delve into the world of "spaghettidogs" (my phrase, but feel free to use it). See the results HERE.

NATURE vs MAN X 2

Tonight I discovered, by accident, two amazing new series:

STREET MONKEYS
and
LIFE WITHOUT PEOPLE

Street Monkeys is a reality show on Smithsonian Channel, following two tribes of monkeys, whose habitat is being destroyed and who must learn to live amongst the world of humans. It's so simple and so amazing. Did you know monkeys are really similar to people? Me too, but it's still fascinating.



Life Without People is a TV series version, on the History Channel, of the almost-great book, The World Without Us. Basically it explores what what would happen to all aspects of the world if humans were to simply vanish.


Both great shows so check em out.

WORDS and PICTURES


There are a few simple do's and don'ts when it come's to apostrophe's. If you can't keep them straight, just DON'T USE THEM!!!!! I'd much rather see a missing apostrophe than too many. Just like spiders, we need them around, but we don't need to see them everywhere we look!

We just saw Shrek 2 the other day and at one point there's a sign on the newly married ogres' property that says "CAUTION: OGRE'S." Now, it's hand-painted so maybe the director's thought was that they're just ogres and made the sign themselves and they'd probably misspell it. I can dig it. Well, not really. It bugs the hell out of me.



Also, why do AOL and YAHOO and every other website feel the need to have a "do's and don'ts" headline every other month? You know, like "Spring fashion do's and don'ts." THERE SHOULD NOT BE AN APOSTROPHE IN "DO'S"!!!!! AND YET, EVERY SINGLE PERSON DOES IT! This makes me absolutely mental! I mean, there you are, using an apostrophe to indicate plurality in ONE HALF of the phrase....AND NOT THE OTHER! Why would you not say "Do's and Don't's?" I mean, at least be consistent!

"Well, Rob, you see, the apostrophe is there to indicate that the word is pronounced "dooz" and not "doss", like the old computer operating system. Well to that I say, "screw you." Some words don't look like they sound. Get used to it. Use context and figure it out. The correct spelling is "Dos and Don'ts." And why the hell are you using this god-awful phrase anyway? It's like "Spring has Sprung" or "Me three!" I don't think most people understand those are jokes anymore. Man!
Please see this wonderful blog. It's painful and wonderful all at the same time.


OK, enough hatin'. Here's something I love. It's the new ad for an HBO vampire series called True Blood. I like the show a lot but even if I didn't, I'd groove heavily on this ad:


When I saw it in a magazine this week I saw a blood spatter on a black background. I looked and looked, knowing there was a hidden image in there somewhere, but I couldn't make it out. Finally I saw it and now I can't NOT see it. Very well done in my opinion.

GRAMMATICALLY CORRECT, THROUGH AND THROUGH

It's no secret that I'm a bit of a snob when it comes to the English language. I get really annoyed when people use "good" instead of "well." The word "good" is an adjective, while "well" is an adverb. One does something well. "Well" describes the doing, a verb. A dinner can be good. "Good" describes the dinner, a noun. Although a dinner can be prepared well, the dinner itself is good, unless it is "well-done." A steak may be cooked through or "well-done" and prepared well, but the steak and the dinner themselves may be described as "good." Simple enough, right?

When people misuse words or punctuation in common speaking or casual letter-writing, my ire is minimal. It's when professionals mangle the language (or "manglage") that I get mad enough to tell you people.

Last year we ordered my son a cute bedsheet/pillowcase set from COMPANY KIDS which is owned by THE COMPANY STORE. The sheet's design is a pattern of generic superheroes and comic book sound effects. The package arrived. We unpacked it, washed it and put it in his bed. Only then did we see the problem:
(click to see bigger images)


In two instances they misused the word "threw" instead of the word "through."
I pondered it for a while. We couldn't return it since it was already washed, but even if we did return it, my son had already seen it and enjoyed it. I decided to give it a shot, and tell the company about their defective product. Maybe they'd reimburse me. At the very least I wanted them to pull the item.

So I went on their website and used their online form to send them a question. I told them about the error and asked what could be done about it. I didn't give my name, my order number...nothing. I got a response the next day saying that because my 90 days were up, I couldn't return it.

HUH? It WASN'T 90 days and how would they even know if it was? I didn't give my name or order information. Now I was determined to get some results, now that they'd dismissed me out of hand. I wrote back, giving all my information this time. The next response I got from the company was this:

"Thank you for your inquiry. They are spelled that way because it is a cartoon character and that is the way they are.”

ARE YOU KIDDING ME? First they blew me off and now they're giving me attitude, like I'M the one in the wrong? We Googled the company to find their head office contact information. We wrote up a letter to their CEO. An excerpt of that letter is below:

This is a product for children. You are a company that caters to children. To say that an obvious misuse of a word is fine because it’s a cartoon character is unacceptable. This is not a playful misspelling or a pun; this is a mistake. The wrong word is used. This isn’t “Sooperman” or “Kid’z Korner.” This is a blatant error.

My son likes the design of this item, and we have explained about the misspellings. However, I feel that this product is defective and I would like a refund, or a credit towards a future purchase. We have always been happy with your products in the past. If I cannot get my money back for this item, I understand. My greater concern is other children getting this set and growing up using the wrong word because they sleep next to a grammatical error that nobody cares enough to fix. I am an educator and I know first-hand that our children are exposed to enough misspellings and bad punctuation by people who don’t know any better, without having The Company Store telling children that it cares so little about them that it would knowingly sell written materials with multiple errors. This item needs to be pulled until you have fixed the problem.

Additionally, in researching your company in an effort to find out to whom to write, I examined your website at http://www.hanoverdirect.com/. Please be aware that on the front page you have a title listing “Our Brand’s”. This, too, is incorrect. Your “brands” are plural, and do not need an apostrophe. You are, however, clearly in need of an editor.



A few weeks after that letter went out we received a phone call from Company Kids thanking us for pointing out the error and apologizing for it. A few weeks after that we received a credit for the sheets. So in the end we got to keep the sheets AND got our money back. If you go to the Company Kids' website the design is still there, however. Apparently you can view the pattern in detail. If you know what to look for, you can see the misspellings are still on the sheets they are selling. So we won the battle but not the war. Not yet, anyway.

I did some more watercolor/ink thingies this month. They're HERE.
Last time I used a Sharpie. This time I used india ink.

I was playing with Garageband this weekend and came up with two songs:
Tennessee Nights (a country melody in search of a song)
and
Glamboy (a 70's-style hard rock song in search of lyrics)

Enjoy!

NEIL YOUNG

Q: How awesome is Neil Young?
A: Really awesome!

This is a man who will not burn out or fade away. He's been making music for 40 years and constantly challenging himself and his audience. He put out a rockabilly album, an album of feedback, an instrumental album, a rock opera, he's directed movies, written books, started Farm Aid, is working on a prototype electric car, has an autistic kid and began a charity for that affliction, and continues to make music at an alarming rate while digging through his archives and releasing old material as well as new.

He just released a new single and video called FORK IN THE ROAD and it's great. Find it HERE

I started diddling around with some ink and watercolors a month ago or so. Here's what I came up with:

IMAGINARY PORTRAITS VOLUME ONE

It's also under the Question Mark on my site's home page.

THE OSCARS

When I was younger I watched all the big awards shows (except the Tonys). Now that I'm older, I've lost touch with the music scene and the "MTV generation" is unrecognizable to me. I also watch a lot less TV than I used to, so the Emmys hold no interest for me. That leave me with the Oscars. I still love movies.

Here are my thoughts for this year:

ACTOR
Richard Jenkins. THE VISITOR was a small little film with basically only four roles. It was good, but not great. Richard Jenkins was very good and subtle in the film but I merely thought he did his job well. I don't think he went above and beyond, nor did the film really give him an opportunity to.

Frank Langella. FROST/NIXON, again, was good but not great. The reverse of THE VISITOR, FROST/NIXON gave Frank Langella a meaty role to tackle. He lumbered and hurumphed throughout the whole thing and I felt it was a bit forced and cartoonish.

Sean Penn. Harvey Milk may have been an over-the-top gay Jew from New York in real life, but seeing Sean Penn be that way for over two hours was a bit grating. He threw himself into the part, but I always felt he was acting.

Brad Pitt. I think Brad Pitt is an underrated actor. Just see 12 Monkeys or Fight Clubfor an example of how good he can be. This wasn't one of his most impressive acting jobs. Like Jenkins, it was fine.

Mickey Rourke. Looking at all the other actors, you'd think nothing could impress me. THE WRESTLER impressed me in a number of ways, most of all Mickey Rourke's performance. If he doesn't win, it'll be a tragedy. This was a small movie like THE VISITOR, but there was nothing showy or boring about the lead role. Rourke was subtle and heartfelt and I believed every word he spoke and every movement he made. A truly award-worthy performance



SUPPORTING ACTOR
Josh Brolin. Nothing noteworthy about his performance in MILK. If anything, his drunk scene was scorn-worthy. He wasn't actually BAD, and I've seen him do great things in other movies, but this just wasn't his best work by a long shot.

Robert Downey Jr. Once again, a great actor taking on a challenging role in TROPIC THUNDER. But after all, it's a silly comedy and Downey's character is a one-joke role. He pretends he's black. OK, fine, no problem. But a better job than all the other supporting actors in every other movie this year? Please.

Philip Seymour Hoffman. DOUBT was a jewel of a film and Hoffman was the best thing in it. He ran through every emotion with ease and believability. I think he's a great actor and he took this role with both hands and made it his own.

Heath Ledger. Jeez. Talk about over-rated. THE DARK KNIGHT was presented to me as the greatest superhero film ever. It wasn't. It was laughably bad in spots. It was too long. Character motivation was non-existent. And it played like it was trying to be realistic within the context of superheros, but then it went off the deep end with Dent's injuries at the end. It just didn't gel for me. Now, Heath Ledger was good in that he totally immersed himself into the Joker character and really made it something new. But it was just a crazy, over-the-top character. OK, he was fearless in his lunacy. But there was no realism to it. I never thought of him as anything but a comic book character. The big question is, "will the Academy give him the Oscar because he died and showed promise as an actor?" I hope not. No offense. He just doesn't deserve it this year.

Michael Shannon. I didn't see REVOLUTIONARY ROAD, so I can't say.


ACTRESS
Alright, this is lame, but the only movie I saw that has a lead actress nominated is DOUBT. Meryl Streep was awesome as always, but without seeing the others, I make no predictions.


SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Amy Adams. She was good in DOUBT, but the story was good, the direction was good, the lead actors were great...I feel like she just got carried along for the Oscar ride.

Penelope Cruz. Didn't see VICKY CRISTINA BARCELONA, so I can't say.

Viola Davis. She had one scene in DOUBT where she had to be upset. She cried amiably, but I wasn't blown away at all.

Taraji P. Henson. I enjoyed BENJAMIN BUTTON a lot, but the more I read about it and think about it afterwards, the more I feel manipulated by it. I'll have to see it again to judge. In any case, Taraji's performance was not awards-worthy in my book.

Marisa Tomei. Next to Mickey Rourke, Tomei's performance paled. That said, she was very believable and engaging. As someone who knows her best from MY COUSIN VINNY, this was a huge departure from that and an impressive performance. Out of all the nominees, I think Tomei gave the most of herself to her performance.


ANIMATED FEATURE
It's WALL-E, who you kidding? I'm frankly surprised it wasn't nominated for best picture.


Let's fast forward to best picture because I don't have anything intelligent to say about art direction, score, sound editing, documentary short, etc.

THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON
Again, I loved it when I saw it, but now I have my doubts about its worthiness. I think it was good, but not an award winner.

FROST/NIXON
Another good movie, but it didn't WOW me. All it really did was make me want to see the original interviews.

MILK
MILK was a biopic and I am not a fan of biopics. People's lives can be fascinating, but they just don't have the same story arc as a fictional story. I always find these movies to be a list of things that happened, as opposed to a "story." Ray, Man in the Moon, Walk The Line... They were all done well, but felt very unsatisfying to me. MILK was no exception.

THE READER
Didn't see it, sorry.

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE.
Wow, did I want to see this one. I heard about it first from NPR and then from all around everywhere. The buzz was hot! The movie was not. Sorry, but I just didn't feel the love. It was a simple, dopey love story after all. I must say I liked the structure of the whole thing, with the questions and how he knew the answers, although some of them really really stretched plausibility. The brother's character arc was totally unconvincing. And how did he get on the show to begin with if he only knew those 12 things? My father-in-law is an intelligent, educated man who has tried half a dozen times to get on and couldn't. Then you have to get past the fastest-finger thing to actually get on the show. It was a silly fable that left me feeling nothing. I've heard that you "should" see this movie, as if it were an important film that had deep social significance. I just didn't feel it.


So my picks for Sunday night are:
MICKEY ROURKE, PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN, MERYL STREEP, MARISA TOMEI, WALL-E, oh and WALTZ WITH BASHIR for Foreign Language film, only because it's the only one I've heard of and I've heard great things about it. I have no pick for best picture. I think DOUBT and THE WRESTLER were better overall films that the ones nominated this year.