Christmas Movies

I have had serious connection problems lately and have not been able to post anything new. I wanted to post some Thanksgiving themed movies but since this is Thanksgiving eve I will mention a few and then give the Christmas list.
Scent of a Woman, great movie. It takes place over Thanksgiving if you have forgotten.

Planes, Trains and Automobiles, if you have kept up with me on face book you know this is my favorite Thanksgiving movie.

Driving Miss Daisy, I know this is a stretch but the last scene in the nursing home is on Thanksgiving Day. This ending along with the end of Field of dreams are the only two movies that still make me a little misty-eyed.

Okay Christmas, these are in no order, but you have a month so check them out.

The Family Stone, funny, I never in my life imagined I would be writing but Sara Jessica Parker is pretty good.

Just Friends, hysterically funny.

A Christmas Story, yes you get 24 hours of this on TBS or maybe TNT, but it is so much better without commercials. Check TCM's listings this month, they may play it. After Ralphie says the F--- word and the old man tells him to get in the car, notice the ever so slight grin on the father's face.

Fred Clause, Vince Vaughaun and Paul Giomatti, good combination. The scene where Fred is at therapy with other brothers of famous guys is classic.

Christmas Vacation, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer on the tuba as Eddie empties the "shitter" into the drain is priceless.

It's a Wonderful Life, the classic. I started watching this movie every Christmas Eve many years ago. Past jobs, which usually involve retail, had always kept me at work late on Christmas Eve. I would get home exhausted and the last thing I wanted to do is drive somewhere so I would always leave Christmas morning. This movie is old but there are many messages about life. The scene where is the run on the Building and Loan, during the depression, George(Jimmy Stewart) turn to look at a picture of his deceased father. There is an embroidery on the wall also. Through the magic of DVD and the zoom feature, I was able to read it years ago. "All you can take with you is what you have given away."

This one I discovered a few years ago and it is VERY funny, Love Actually, everybody is in this one, the aging rock star steals every scene he is in.

For those action fans, there are some options; Lethal Weapon, The first two Die Hard movies are good and well done, okay, Die Hard 2 is a little weak, it is hard to see James from Good Times play a bad guy.

I have noticed that TV Land plays all of its Christmas episodes at once and there are some good ones.
Now I know that I have left out a bunch but these are my favorites, so enjoy.

Oh yeah, on the subject of movies, the new Star Trek is awesome. If you are any way familiar with this show or the movies you will love it.

Okay, it has been a while, the holiday season approaches. I think it is safe to say that anyone that knows me will tell you that I am a fan of movies. So for the next three months I will suggest movies that go along with the current holiday season. Of course the first on is Halloween, I have never been a big fan of gory movies so there may be some movies that are not on the list. Movies that turn the stomach are not my bag, there will be no references to stuff like Hostel or any of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remakes. It seems like these "new" horror films only want you to vomit in your mouth, so this may not be your list.





These are in no particular order but if you like feeling on edge in the month of October I think you will enjoy these:





The first three Hannibal Lecture movies The Red Dragon, Silence of the Lambs, and Hannibal. Watch them in that order, yes Silence of the Lambs started it all but it is hard to beat them in order, they were done well, Hannibal being the worst of the three, Jodie Foster did not like the book, that is why she was not in the last.

Keeping with the serial killer theme, Seven, I have not talked to anyone that predicted how that one ended. Notice how they never identify what city it took place in and the credits roll backwards.

For the dark comic fans I suggest Underworld and Hellboy, great action and as far as Underworld, Kate Beckensail in a skin tight leather suit, enough said.





Bram Stokers Dracula, awesome and spooky. I know Kneau Reeves, but you get past him pretty fast, Gary Oldman steals the show.





Here is a sleeper, Exorcist 3. George C Scott is reason enough to watch this, but the nurse walking through the empty halls because she hears a noise, well you will jump. And the old woman crawling across the ceiling like a spider, damn.





Interview with a Vampire, great vampire tale.





Here's an oldie, John Carpenter's The Thing, remember this movie was very early 80's. Awesome special effects and a great story, dog lovers may not like this one, Wilford Brimley is not selling diabetes products either. Or oatmeal for that matter.





I will recommend the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre, I write this only because the movie theater in Kinston showed this one night in high school and I was the only guy out of all my sister's hot female friends. The girls were spooked and I was like John Wayne to this bunch so I was protecting them. During the chase scene an employee of the theater ran down the aisle with an actual chainsaw, I screamed like a girl and stepped on all of their feet as I scrambled to the wall. No chance of getting laid that night.





Okay, I guess these are in order, the original Halloween 1 & 2, watch these on the same night. This series started it all, these movies would have been 10 minutes long a piece if Micheal Myers would just have ran instead of walking, but this is why they are so good.





So turn the lights off and enjoy.

Be careful

This is more of a cautionary tale, I have been selling stuff on E Bay for the past five years. I think it is a great way to get rid of the stuff you no longer need or use and a good way to make a little money. I from time to time sell stuff for my friends, I take a small percentage, usually just enough to cover my costs. I was recently sent an offer to join the E Bay Seller's Lounge. Sounded pretty groovy, I envisioned a smoke filled bar with jazz in the back ground, hanging out with a bunch of cool cats talking about E Bay. Now I do not know how affiliated this entity is with E Bay, I e-mailed a complaint about this organization and it is the only time they have never responded to me. Anyway, the membership comes with a disc, I quickly realized that I did not need this "mess" and cancelled the membership. Problem solved, right?? WRONG!!
Somehow my information was passed along to the Product Resource Network, if you go to their web-site you will see E Bay logos all over the place. They send an e mail saying that you have to cancel your membership or your credit card will be charged. You have to call a number, which I did. One of the first things they ask for is account information, I thought it was a scam and hung up. A few weeks pass and I notice a charge, a little over thirty bucks on my account. I call my bank and got a number, which I called and cancelled the account. "Your refund will be posted in 5-10 days," I was told. WRONG!
Now I consider myself to be pretty on line savy, I do a lot of business on line and it is very safe but Product Resource Network is a scam and it looks like they have managed to drag E Bay into the mud with them, buyer beware.

Has it been that long??

I was recently reminded by a good friend that I do have a blog post, it has been well over a month since I have posted anything. The truth is I have been writing, just not here. Oh, before anyone gets distraught, I thought I heard a resounding gasp out there, I do not have any other blogs out there. So to the tens of people reading this around the world, calm down.



OK, funny and true story. I recently visited my grandparents the other day and it reminded me of a story about my grandfather. For three and a half years I worked in Raleigh, from '04-'07. I would frequently visit my grandparents and spend a lot of time on their farm. When the season was in I would hunt when the season was out I would work or just mess around. This day I was "messing" around with a .22 rifle and saw a carpenter bee hovering about 10 yards away. I raised my rifle and waited for the bee to hover into my cross-hairs and fired....spilt the bee in half. I half to admit I was feeling pretty good.
Thinking it may be a fluke I returned a few weeks later and missed every bee I shot at. While this was going on my grandfather was bush hogging around the farm. (that is cutting grass with a really big mower, for those of you north of the Granville Co. line)
He finished and slowly walked over with this "what the hell are you doing?" look on his face. I explained the earlier kill of the bee and my desire to prove that I could do it again. "Oh." was his reply. He then noticed a bee hovering beside his head. With the speed of a ninja, this 85 year old man jerked his hat from his head, slapped the bee to the ground, and stepped on it. He then placed the hat back on his head and said, "And my way is quieter."
I put the gun in its case and never fired another shot. We then sat under the old stick barn and talked for the better part of the afternoon. A good day.
That one is for you Barb.

How stupid are we?

I am sure we all have asked ourselves that question at one time or another. Usually right we have said or done something that was pretty dumb. Okay for those of you asking, this is where I am going with this.

I received the mangled mess of glossy advertisements today in the mail. They arrive every Wednesday just like clock work. Pizza coupons, Arby,s(I sometimes use those), the usual. I happened to notice the advertisement for Family Dollar. With the holiday approaching, Independence Day, (see previous post) I saw that they were advertising a charcoal grill for twelve dollars. It looked like, well, a twelve dollar grill. The picture showed the grill with three burgers and four hot dogs. At the bottom of the picture in fine print it read, "food not included."

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Are we as a society that stupid, do we need to be told that? I know that all of you are thinking of a similar situation that you have seen or heard. And as a person that once owned a business and had to do some advertising, I bet I know why they put that disclaimer on the ad. Somewhere a person walked in and purchased an item, not necessarily a grill, but the ad showed food in the picture, and they asked where was the food.
Like someone walked into Walmart and bought a frying pan and got home and was mad because the two over easy eggs, that were pictured in the pan on the outside of the box, were not in the pan! It happened, I bet it did.
So that being the case I guess society is that stupid, wow. I would love to have been the guy in the store that day when it happened. We have all had those moments when we get that incredibly stupid question lobbed to us.
Jonathan Brooks and my self were cooking pigs one time for a fraternity function. As the time approached to flip the hogs we opened the lid and got some help. One of the helpers stared at the pig lying skin side down spread out on the cooker, and then it happened. "Brooks is that a whole pig or a half a pig?" The look on his face was priceless, I gave him the look of, yes he just said that. Jonathan took a moment, "No (the person will remain nameless), a whole pig has eight legs."
Caption under that story *brains not included

Happy ID

As the holiday weekend approaches it make me wonder about "Independence Day". You always hear people ask "What are you doing for the fourth?"
One of the most important days in the history of this country has just turned into a number. You never hear someone say "Merry 25th" or "what are your plans for the 25th?" And have no doubt July 4th is one of the most important days in the history of the United States.

Some others come to mind; July 20th(moon landing), June 6th(D Day), September 11th 2001(terrorist attacks for those who may have forgot), April 9th 1865(Lee surrenders), January 14th 1972(first episode of Sanford and Son) just to name a few.
You have to give Independence Day its props. This always reminds me of one July 4, I mean one Independence Day many years ago when a friend of mine showed up to help me get ready for the first of many Independence Day parties. It was late in the morning and he walked in my front door laughing. as he was holding a Hardee's cup he told me of his drive thru experience. This was the old Hardee's on the corner of Charles and 10th. After ordering he proceeded to the window where he wished the young girl a happy Independence Day. She said thank you. He then asked her what did Independence Day mean to her. Her reply, "Ya know Geor Washenton an shit."
I erupted in laughter, still do to this day.
So keep the meaning for this important day in mind, pass on what it really means, not what the hippie teacher said in the movie Dazed and Confused. ".....that a bunch of rich, slave owning, white men didn't want to pay their taxes."

Happy Independence Day.

Who loves you baby?

In the past few days I have been talking to my friend Watson about a rafting trip that we took over twenty years ago. We have discussed the possibility of a reunion trip. I do not know if this will happen, probably not but it has sure stirred up some memories. Our week in the mountains was beyond fun but there were a few moments where I realized that God loves me and looked out for me and my friends.

The line up was Watson Sutton, Brad Pollock, Darryl Tyndall, Mike Stainback, Warren Dubose, and myself. Warren's grandmother was kind enough to let us stay in her families' cabin just outside Franklin NC. All of us had hung out a lot that summer and we were all going off to college. I know Mike was already in college but someone had to buy the beer.

Now I had never been rafting before or sense, for a reason. And I think none of the rest of the group had any rafting experience either. The smartest thing we did was to get our feet wet(insert rim shot here) on the Nantahala River. That was more like an angry creek. I could write forever how beautiful it was but that is not why I am writing.
We stopped at a store to get breakfast and found out through a conversation with the owner that he also rented rafts, first problem solved. So we tied it on the back of Brad's Toyota and off we went. Technically it was a roomy four man raft that we managed to fit six people in and two coolers of beer.
We had a ball and the only "rapid" we encountered was at the end of the trip. There was a footbridge right after the spot where you were supposed to pull off to the side. We missed that spot. Warren, Mike, and Darryl bailed out. Still laughing at the sight of Warren trying to hold a raft that was full of three guys and rain water, oh yeah, it had started raining.
Hanging from the bridge and from ropes across the river were these sticks. Well not knowing what they were for Watson, Brad and myself kept laughing. I then noticed the look of horror on the faces of the people eating at the restaurant on the river bank. I then noticed a man scaling down the river bank carrying a rope gun. Then I heard people yelling for us to grab the sticks.
I stood and grabbed the last stick, no joke. We spun around and Watson hopped out and was in knee deep water. Crisis averted.
Drying off by the restaurant, rope gun man walked up and began to cuss us out, we were still laughing. "Ride down that road about a hundred yards and see if you think it's still funny." He said. So we got in the car and drove a bit and got out. Many years ago the Army Corps of Engineers had dynamited the river and it dropped like over fifty feet, maybe farther, and there were jagged rocks at the bottom.
We stood there for a few minutes, silent. Then with the swagger that all of us had at eighteen, hell I was still seventeen at the time, someone said, "We could have made it."
Erupting in laughter we turned to go home. That was the beginning of the week.

Operation Downfall

I am guessing that most of you have never heard of this. I was aware of what it was but never knew the name. After watching some of the D Day commemoration activities this weekend and then a documentary on Pearl Harbor Saturday night......Okay, yes I watched a documentary on a Saturday night! This put me in mind of a few things.
Some of you may not know about Operation Overlord, it was the name of the invasion of France, D Day. Operation Downfall was the name of the invasion of the islands of Japan. Just to give it some prospective, the number of troops and support personnel for D-Day was around 300,000. The number called for to take Japan was around 4.5 million.
US casualties were estimated as high a a million, Japanese casualties would have been much, much more. Japan was training its civilians, including children to fight to the death, encouraging them to commit suicide rather than surrender.
The documentary, giving all sides, suggested that the United States decision to drop the A bomb was retaliation for Pearl Harbor. That decision, in my opinion served two purposes, the first and most important was to save American lives. For example, preparations were being made for this invasion. One of these preparations was the minting of Purple Heart medals. So many were minted that we are still using those medals today. And unless there is another wide scale conventional ground war we may never run out.
Second, because we knew that the Japanese would not surrender from our countless battles like Iwo Jima and Guadacanal, we were going to have to break this army's spirit, take them out of that frame of mind. How do you truly defeat an enemy that will not surrender? An enemy that thinks it is divine to kill themselves while killing their enemy. You, unfortunately, have to convince that enemy that you have the means and the will to completely erase their existence from the face of the earth.
Before anyone launches themselves from their seats remember the one thing that has bothered me since I was old enough to understand history; we had to drop that bomb twice. Japan decided not to surrender after the first one.
The use of those bombs were indeed a tragedy but necessary. In comparison, the Japanese civilians that died during those bombings and afterwards is nothing compared to those who would have died had we invaded.
The only alternative I could think of was to detonate the bomb on a remote island in front of Japanese generals, but because they did not surrender after the first bomb it would not have worked.

Ask a veteran who was in or on their way to the Pacific during 1945 if they think we should have used it, veterans like my grandfather. They were the ones who would have paid the price. Ask them quickly though, their numbers get smaller every day, D Day was 65 years ago. I don't know about you but I am glad there is only one invasion ceremony.

Still Bangin'

I will go completely off the reservation this time and tell you about a documentary I watched last night. It was about Iron Maiden, Flight 666, I think was the title. I have never been anything but a casual fan, ever since I was a little freaked out at Jeff Becker's house in high school, their mascot Eddie, always gave me the creeps. You can find their music sprinkled on my I Pod but that is about it. After watching this very good documentary, wow, is what I am left with.
I think it is good for Americans to see things outside the box of this country. This documentary crew follows the band, who were big when I was in high school by the way, on their world tour that started in India and ended in Toronto. 45 days, like 23 shows and over 50,000 miles traveled. The two coolest aspects of pulling this off, Iron Maiden has their own plane, a 757 named "Ed Force One", and the lead singer, Bruce Dickinson, is the pilot. And it is not like he is in the cockpit wearing a sleeveless t shirt and spandex, he is wearing a captain's uniform, shoulder boards and a tie.
When you see a band and it's influence it has around the world that is when you see something you are familiar with from the eyes of others in other countries. Massive crowds that seemed to get bigger the farther south they traveled in South America. The crowd was so big in Bogota it was a little scary.
Then there is the fact that these guys are not that much younger than my parents and the crowds seem to be very young. And it is not because their music has ever changed. Now I do remember them catching a little flack for the Somewhere in Time album, but these guys go just as hard as they did 30 years ago, good for them. If you have even the slightest knowledge of this band, check out this movie, I think the dvd is out on Tuesday the 9th.

What's the difference

Well good old MSNBC is at it again, in my nightly flipping, I was caught by hearing the phrase "domestic terrorism." So against my better judgement I watched a few minutes and learned what they were talking about. The were referring to the guy who killed the abortion doctor this weekend. Now as I have stated before I think abortion is wrong but so is what this guy did. And I have no problem with anyone referring to this guy and the ultra right wing groups that support this behavior as terrorists. My first question after hearing relentless dribble from this network and others is why do they refer to the prisoners at Gitmo as "detainees"???? Also the same day they reported the story about the guy that was arrested for killing a soldier and wounding another at a recruiting office. He was never referred to as a terrorist, in fact the only time the word terrorist was used was when they said he was being charged with committing a terrorist act.
Every movement has its fringe elements and the pro lifers did themselves harm by not aggressively denouncing this doctor's murder. But for this kooky network to aggressively label this guy as a terrorist and not do the same to others that are more worthy of the name only adds to my belief that MSNBC is a joke.
Thank goodness I am one of the tens of people watching.

Ugly Business

A recent response to my first few posts suggested that I scrap the serious stuff and stick with the funny stuff, so I will try to be more funny about serious topics.
After watching the news in the past few weeks I am left with a question. When did everyone get so upset about torturing terrorists? It is like we just discovered what was going on, are you kidding me? We have known since September the 12th 2001 that we were strong-arming these guys for information. Now the opinion seems to be, thanks to no small part by the liberal media, that torture is wrong. Do you expect me to believe that any normal person would not pull out the bucket of water if they thought that they could save lives by preventing attacks. Of course you would, you would make Jack Bauer look like a Sunday school teacher. And water boarding?? This is like torture-lite, did anyone see what they did to Leonardo Dicaprio at the end of Body of Lies, or Mel Gibson in Payback, now that is torture. We all saw the picture of the guy that looked like Ron Jeremy. It looks like they started on him by pushing his body through the neck hole of his shirt. And the look on his face, he knew what was coming and so did we, no one spoke up then.
But now that the old administration is out let the piling on begin, but there is one thing we can count on just as sure as the sun rising in the morning, let a politician talk long enough and they will tell you that feet are an acquired taste. Nancy Pelosi can tell you that, the CIA lied to her, why just her? She expects us to believe this? Don't get me wrong, the CIA does lie and I hope they are good at it, but only to the bad guys. Tie someone to a chair and listen to her talk, they will be begging to be water boarded. Oh and by the way, how about the unknown numbers that were sent to other countries to be interrogated, like Egypt, where there are no rules. I don't hear anyone crying for them and I'm sure more than a few of that bunch redefined suffering.
The bottom line is that this is all a dirty business, it was possible that our leaders know more than we did, and that is fine with me, I have enough stuff to worry about. And after the past few days it seems like someone else now knows what some may not have. These are extreme people that are devoted to their beliefs, some of those beliefs include killing all of those who do not think, feel, or pray the same way they do. Maybe that is the reason that the President decided not to release the pictures, maybe this is the reason that the camp at Gitmo will stay open a little longer.
Call me crazy but I expect my government to protect me and the did for seven years after 9/11, so be it if had to do some bad things to some bad people keep this country safe.
This is an ugly business, unfortunately we can not stop until they do. Just remember one thing, they started it.

The Question

God looks down on humanity, humanity looks back, just staring up at a light in the sky. Oh, by the way it is Judgement Day. What do you think his question will be? Will it be just one?
What will be the straw that breaks the camel's back? I have often thought of this scenario, sometimes out loud with friends, mostly to myself after reading some story or seeing something on television. It sends me back to a conversation I had with my grandfather after September 11th, you remember that day don't you. If you watch the news these days you may wonder if it ever happened. (Getting off on a tangent alert)

We talked about the fear that everyone felt the day of the attack, mostly because no one knew what was going on and if we still need to be worried. My grandfather said, and he is a man of very few words, "We need to be worried about when God is gonna put a stop to it."

Now before I go any farther, I believe in God. I believe in heaven therefore I believe in hell, one cannot exist without the other. After taking some EMT classes I have learned how the human body works. I'm not just talking about the "this bone is connected to this bone" song or the "pump" song that Potsy sang about on Happy Days. (I think that was post Jump the Shark) I am talking about how the human body functions down to the cellular level. I'm sorry folks but there has to be something divine in that.

So I guess this is the round about way of asking the question that bothers me the most when I think of our society, Why haven't we taken care of our children?



I think about this when I read the story of the toddler that had to have her leg amputated because the person watching her tied a rope around her leg to keep her from moving around. Or when a mother puts her kids in a car and rolls it into a lake because she is afraid her new boyfriend might break up with her. I could go on forever and I am sure that some of you can think of worse. The countless kidnappings and rapes and murders of what I think is our most valuable natural resource. Look at it like this, children are the only assurance that our species will survive, what have we done to protect it?
I also think that you absolutely can not have this conversation without addressing the white elephant in the room, abortion. My view on abortion was a solid pro choice for a long time. After the Lacey Peterson case my thoughts changed. Here was a guy charged for two murders, that child's life was terminated early, what was the difference? I could not come up with one. When did children become so disposable?

Stick with me, there were over one million abortions in the US last year, there were over 20,000 adopted foreign children brought back to the US last year. See where I'm going. The issue of abortion has not changed and will not for some time, I don't care which side is trying to scare the hell out of you. If we turned all that energy and money towards bringing these numbers together, would that not be a solution to a problem. Now there will have to be people a lot smarter than me to figure it out but I DO know that it a shame that so many United States citizens have to go overseas to find a baby. Is it me or does it seem easier to get an abortion than to adopt a child? Shouldn't it be the other way around? I think we need to attack this from a different direction. I am kind of flying in the dark here, but are there incentives for women that decide to give their baby up for adoption? If not then there should be.
I know I have opened a can of worms here but after you talk to someone who has been through this and they say, "you have to jump through more hoops to adopt a dog than you do to have an abortion," then something is just a little more than askew. There just seems to me that there is a solution that could satisfy everyone, maybe it is time to try. I am certainly not judging anyone here, that happens later.
My only experience with children is from being the "cool uncle", but all of has a chance to be a positive influence on everyone, especially the ones that need it the most, the children. They are just looking for some guidance and in the lack of positive guidance they will take whatever is in front of them.
I don't know, will that be the question, will we even get a question? I believe in getting credit for trying, I guess I'm saying that from a distance it doesn't look like we are.

Great movies you may have never seen

I watch a lot of movies, those of you who know me are rolling your eyes right about now or just got through saying no s#@t. I watch movies for one reason only, to be entertained. I do not watch movies to get a history lesson, if I am watching a movie like Pearl Harbor, I already know the story, I am not watching it to learn. I hope I am not letting the cat out of the bag here but sometimes movies are not historically accurate. Movie makers use this thing called artistic license to make a point or spice up the story. Chances are if they are making a movie about it there is a book somewhere that may do a better job of telling the truth. Oops my soapbox alarm just went off so I will stop.



I have put together a list of some good movies that you may have never seen or may have forgotten about, they are in no particular order and this may only benefit those of you that have Netflix, Blockbuster is a weird place these days. They have the most confusing rules, late fees etc. I will soon be on Netflix.

Oh yeah these are not in any kind of order:



1) The Package- Gene Hackman Tommy Lee Jones, Great suspense thriller, mid 80's.



2) Hoffa -Jack Nicholson, Danny DeVito, I have never seen this movie on TV or at the movie store, finally found the DVD at some random place last year. Jack is so much like the real Hoffa it is scary, the DVD has some footage from the actual Senate hearings, see for yourself.



3) Waiting- Ryan Reynolds and that kid from the Apple commercials, if you have ever worked in a restaurant you will, let me see if I can do this right for the texters out there LYFAO. (that is Laugh Your F@#$*@$g Ass off for those of us over 30.)



4)The Lucky Ones-Tim Robbins Rachel McAdams, this one just came out last month. I don't know why I picked it, I saw a movie about soldiers coming home from the war in Iraq with Tim Robbins and my first impression was to throw it across the room. It was mildly political, and when it was I did not seem to mind. I'm glad I watched, it was very entertaining.



5) Fail Safe - Henry Fonda and everybody, probably 60's great Cold War flick



6) Twelve Angry Men- Another black and white with Fonda, great cast. You will find your self saying, "That is the guy that was in...." and you forget that it was filmed in one room. This is back when a story had to be really good, could not rely on special effects.



7)Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang-Robert Downey Jr., Val Kilmer. Funny, funny, laugh, laugh. Val Kilmer playing a gay private detective, his name is Perry by the way. I will let you guess what his nickname is in the movie.



8) Every body's All American- Dennis Quaid, Jessica Lang, John Goodman. One of the best sports movies ever made. I include this because I have never seen this in a Blockbuster anywhere. I have never seen this movie for sale. Those of us who know will see a kind of "cameo" by a band that is supposed to be Doug Clark and the Hot Nuts.



9) Nanking- kind of a documentary about the 1937 Nanking massacre. Actors play the actual people who were there, the story is taken from their letters and personal accounts.



10)Pool Hall Junkies- great movie, a lot of random guys, like the guy who plays Lex Luthor on Smallville, he has hair, and Christopher Walken. It is like the Rounders for pool players. You can learn some pretty slick scams as well.



Well I guess I should stop at ten, if you have any to share please do.

To MSNBC or not to MSNBC

I have taken advantage of my chance to watch a lot of news lately, especially since the election. I have seen some strange transformations on some channels. Now let me get this out of the way, I do not like watching the non stop 24 hour news networks. I consider myself fair and if you ask anyone who knows me they will tell you that I give it to you exactly how I want to hear it, straight down the middle. If the truth is going to hurt then don't ask me.


From what I have seen the major networks are pretty much the same, they lean as hard to the left as they can get away with, no big surprise. Fox News is pretty much the same, Sean Hannity was better with Alan Combs, Bill Oreily's show has gotten better. I used to hate his show, it annoys me when someone asks a question and will not let the guest answer the question. You would think that someone who was on the radio three hours a day would be tired of talking so much. He has gotten better at that so I watch it a little more now.
CNN, well, it's CNN. We all have seen the footage of the reporter arguing with the man at the Tea Party. I have to admit, even for CNN this is a new low. Ask yourself, what would have been the reaction if a reporter acted like that to a person at the million man march? Still no suprise, CNN crossed the line a long time ago.


The network that has left the reservation is without a doubt MSNBC, what an embarrassment, there morning show is one of the worst ever, I used to enjoy Pat Buchanan when he was on the McLaughlin Group. (better show than any mentioned in this post by the way) He is obviously just collecting a paycheck, that and I think he really does not like Eleanor Clift. He always challenged her on that show but now on MSNBC he looks like a heel hound, no fight left, maybe running for president 20 times has taken its toll.


MSNBC only seems to exist because of Fox News, I have never heard another network mention the competition so much. I watched the other night and they mentioned Fox News so many times, if I were a casual viewer I would have wanted to turn it to Fox.


The two prime time shows are the same, Keith Olberman, the sixties are over dude. You were great on ESPN, but leave the agenda at home. No one is watching anyway, I guess for the same reason that no one listens to Air America. Then after his show you are treated to the same show except this one has the lady that looks like the catcher on the softball team. Her rhetoric is the same, it is like they have the same outline for both shows, bash Bush, say "tea bag" and giggle, take a shot at Palin, and so on and so on.



They seem to just want to talk about everyone they don't like and what they think they are doing wrong, but as I wrote earlier, no one is watching anyway. These networks always mention or have a guest from moveon.org, who needs to move on here? The fact is MSNBC is more entertaining when they spoof it on Saturday Night Live.

They remind me of the little dog chasing the car, they wouldn't know what to do if they ever catch one.

Old School

I attended the funeral of coach Paul Jones the other week and it reminded me of a funny story that I am sure a lot of us have about him or growing up in Kinston. After an on-line chat last night with Kevin King he suggested that I share a story from back in the day. So I guess I take requests, keep in mind that this happened over 20 years ago but I think I have the key players in this story correct.

I played JV basketball my tenth grade year as well as baseball. I was in Coach Jones's 7th period PE class, along with all the current varsity and other potential basketball players. After basketball season I would sneak out with the baseball players and get in some extra cuts in the batting cage during tryouts. Coach Jones saw me walking out of the gym one day wearing my cleats and carrying my Easton green label bat. He stopped me and said, "I guess you have played your last basketball game at this school." I just nodded, I had no illusions that my mediocre basketball career was over, besides all I wanted to do was play baseball.

This did not discourage me from supporting my friends that played varsity basketball, in fact, myself and some of my friends started a dubious tradition that may or may not still exist today. We were some of the most obnoxious fans in the conference, I mean down right nasty. And it was not just in Kinston either, we were chased all the way to Dover one night after a game in New Bern. Southern Wayne fans chased us all the way to LaGrange on an empty tank of gas.

Visiting cheerleaders were treated to a very loud version of "Old McDonald had a Farm" at every home game, for that I am really ashamed. What an a hole!

Okay the story; we were playing a conference school who had a player that was being recruited by UNC and other schools. However it was made public that this young man was having trouble with his SAT scores. We reminded him of this every time he went to the free throw line. Well needless to say this did not make the AD at this school very happy, the next day he Fed Exed a letter stating his displeasure.

I found myself standing in our AD's office along with my friends Mitchel Howard and John Harvey, not the dozens and dozens of people saying a lot worse stuff than we were. He read the letter and then singled us out as the "ringleaders" and after a few minutes of heated and uncomfortable conversation he informed us that we were banned from any more home games. Now if memory serves me correct, the conference tournament was starting the next week.

As we were leaving we walked by Coach Jones's office, "How did it go Rick Dean?" he asked.

After explaining the situation and a few jokes from Mitchel, Coach told us to be at the next game, "I'll take care of him." Was all he said.

Now I don't remember the outcome of that game or that season, I do remember maintaining a relationship with the Coach after he caught me ducking his class to go to the batting cage. I sprained my ankle pretty bad one year and coach Jones taped my ankle nearly every afternoon before baseball practice, he was a nice guy.

He always supported his players and I guess he supported those who supported them.



And for those of you who do not believe in karma, I ran into one of those cheerleaders at a party in college, she found out I went to Kinston High School and properly deposited her drink on my head, I deserved that.

Imagination

Well this is the first if these, blogs, I am not sure how they came up with that one. I am sure someone will let me know. I've had a couple of friends suggest that I do this. They both said that I was funny and they would read my blog if I started one, so my readership has increased by a factor of two! I am not sure how funny this will be, I will try to throw some funny anecdotes in here but my humor is more reactionary. I hope some of this stuff will make you think, there does not seem to be a whole lot of that going around these days, which, hey, leads nicely into the title of this .....post. (I hate the word blog.)

I first noticed this a while back in the presence of my, then, four year old nephew. He would often go into my old room at my parents house and play with a few of my old toys. I say a few because one day he picked up an old die cast tractor, about the size of a Tonka toy, that my grandparents had given me a long time ago, it was one of my favorites. It reminded me of my grandfather's 1950's model Ford tractor that still runs today. Anyway, he picked it up and flipped it over, looking for the on/off switch or the place to put the batteries. Once he realized that it would not move or make sounds on its own he set it down and walked away. All I could think of was how much fun I had with that tractor, moving it and making all the noises myself. Like most people my age, most of our toys did not talk or move on their own, you needed some imagination.

I have no children but most of my friends do and it does not seem to get any better, DVD players in cars?? I remember having to play I spy or punch bug. And when you were told, usually by my father, to be quiet, and you did, not because Sponge Bob was on the screen but because that is what you were told to do. Don't get me wrong, I had an Atari 2600, it was either that or a Coleco. But on a nice day you were outside playing, riding bikes, football, baseball, basketball, war. (that's right, we played war.) I know times have changed, and I will be the first to write that I would be hesitant about letting my children play unsupervised outside. But anything would be better than letting them sit in front of a TV playing video games and eating fruit roll ups. Do they still make those? But the most disturbing thing in that scenario is not the fact that they are sedentary and eating junk food, but they are sitting there letting a machine do the thinking for them, which goes back to imagination.

Now this isn't all bad, the popularity of comic book movies that have come out in the past ten years are a direct result of this. Back when I was a kid all we had was the comic book, we had to use our imagination between each panel, there were a few attempts at live action comics. You could see Spider Man on the Electric Company, he also had a prime time TV show. But it was always a let down when he would capture the bad guys and they looked like Spidey threw a hammock on top of them. Now that CGI is so good, people my age can see what we were imagining so long ago. I would like to see a break down of the demographics of the people buying tickets to these movies.

That leads to another point, have you noticed all the remakes and the endless sequels that have been released or are on the way. Look at this summer; Wolverine, Star Trek, Terminator, Transformers 2. Now these movies will probably do very well, I'm guessing Star Trek will be the sleeper of that bunch but Damnit Jim, a Star Trek with no Shatner??

Some I just have to scratch my head, Land of the Lost(can anyone under 35 tell me what a Sleestak is?)

Halloween 2, okay a sequel to a remake of a remake, I'm confused. I hope Donald Pleasance is rolling over in his grave if he's dead.

Okay, I'm guessing that this is way too long and most have stopped reading, the point is that I hope that the young peoples' imaginations are challenged from time to time, especially when there is so much around them discouraging this. These are our future leaders. And as most of us already know, when it comes to growing up and thinking for yourself: Batteries not Included.

And there is not a reset button.