Slapinions

Definitely, Maybe

Fri, 25 Jul 2008 04:25:02 GMT

Definitely, Maybe is a standard issue but very enjoyable warm romantic comedy set in (gasp! Could it be?) New York City.

Ryan Reynolds is a separated thirty-something dad whose daughter, played by Abagail Breslin, wants to hear the story of how her parents got together. Reynolds obliges her, but not before changing the names of the women involved and daring her to guess which one is her mother.

What follows is a charming and romantic story that involves you to the point that you'll start rooting for the woman of your choice.

Now there are two flaws in the logic of the film, one of them alarming, but to give credit where it is due they didn't occur to me until well after the film ended.

First, of the three women one is a professional writer, and one is a transplanted Wisconsinite. These and other details should be enough to identify her mother right off the bat, given that she seems quite close to both her parents. But, maybe the kid isn't half as nosy as my own and she never asked. Eh, could be.

Second and more importantly, depending on who the mother turns out to be the daughter now knows that her Mom was unfaithful, bi-sexual, promiscuous, a Democrat and/or all of the above. I realize what we see may not represent the (hopefully) edited version he tells his daughter, but yikes. For what seems like a good father in the midst of an amicable divorce, that's a heck of an impression to leave on a kid.

But again, during the movie itself Suspension of Disbelief takes over and all is well.

So which one was the Mom? Watch and find out if it was your favorite. I think you'll be surprised.

3.25 out of 4, 80 out of 100

Tags: definitely, maybe

A Fly Went By

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 02:15:09 GMT

I thought it might be interesting to occasionally revisit some of the books I loved as a boy.

'A Fly Went By' is a great rhyming book by Mike McClintock, who's real claim to fame lies in introducing his friend Dr. Suess to the world while McClintock worked as an editor.

The book tells the story of a series of panicked animals that run by a boy, each afraid of the animal behind them and each in turn misinterpreting the fears of their 'pursuer' as a threat to themselves.

The fly ran away
In fear of the frog,
Who ran from the cat,
Who ran from the dog.
The dog ran away
In fear of the pig,
Who ran from the cow.
She was so big!
The cow ran away
From the fox, who ran
As fast as he could
In fear of the man.
That man heard a thump,
And away he ran!"

A good way to ruin any book is to jump on Amazon and read the amateur psychology offered in the customer reviews. The book, written decades ago, has reviews that actually 'warns' parents that the text includes the word 'kill' and that man in the poem is a hunter with a rifle. Oh, the scarring this will cause a child!

[Aside #1:nevermind that I have no memory of the gun in the text and have never, as I've mentioned before, fired one in my life.]

[Aside #2: I'm afraid America has become a nation of mollycoddlin' parents nowadays. Prosperity certainly has its downside. It's a damn wonder we haven't been conquered by some country that doesn't demand bike helmets, doesn't forbid swing sets as our school's insurance does, can handle a reference to killing in nature and doesn't object to kids being kids.]

[Aside #3: BTW - I saw two kids wearing bike helmets yesterday . . . while they rode their big wheels. C'mon!]

I'm sorry. Back to the book.

I don't think it takes a degree to see that the Cold War era book tries to highlight the idea that miscommunication is at the center of most disagreements. Beneath that I think it also teaches a simpler ideal. Namely that anxiety and fear are often exaggerated in your own mind, and that most of the time Everything's Gonna Be All Right. I like that bit.

A very fun and sweet book, and still in print. Pick it up for the kids in your life.

Smiley, Spaghetti, # 2 and the Lu (that's a pun - you'll see)

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 03:26:31 GMT

It happens to everyone, and I'm sure I'm treading no new ground by rehashing how I spent my day on Sunday. Still . .

Sometime near midnight I noticed the toilet was clogged. I had contributed to our city's grand fertilizer stock moments before but, judging soley by size and shape, didn't view it as a threat to our plumbing.

Plunging didn't solve the problem. Although the water went down it still flushed weakly and oh so slowly.

So I went online, read up on a few tricks, and tried 'em. Nuttin'. I finally gave up and went to bed, making sure to tell my wife that the commode was out of order. (we have an extra bathroom in the basement)

The next day, after work, my Dad came over with his toilet auger. It was an inopportune time as I was watching all four kids,YaYa had the neighbor's daughter over and I had just served them all spaghetti, but what can you do?

We stick the auger in. We go through the motions. We hit paydirt. And we begin withdrawing said auger.

I saw air bubbles coming up and a brown cloud forming and thought 'oh God, this is going to be bad', but my Dad, being more in tune with man's natural processes, kept right on going until a fine mist of brown sludge burst from the bowl and the auger was out.

Attached to the end, pierced by the end actually, was an empty bottle of the kid's bubbles.

'Smiley!' I roared. He trotted in before backing up from the odor. "Did you do this?!"

He shook his head no but gave me a Danny look: a quick hunch of the shoulders, eyes a-shimmering, a sneaky grin and a quick but but silent 'hee-hee'.

[two years ago he flushed a triangle from his shape sorter at our rental, causing our landlord to have to replace the entire toilet. A week ago he flushed a toilet paper roll at my Mom's house backing up their bathroom. Maker of Trouble and Mayhem indeed.]

Now the problem was getting the bottle off, because as I said the auger had pierced the thing. I tried, oh how I tried to get it off daintily, with plastic bags between me and the thick brown sludge in and around the bottle, but it could not be done.

And so I grabbed it bare-handed and began to slowly unscrew it down the line.

Meanwhile I hear plates being overturned, slaps and crying from the living room, and cries of blame echoing from more than one child's mouth.

I couldn't get the bottle off that last bit of the auger.

"Cut it," my Dad said. "It's the only way."

And so I took a kitchen knife and in its last moments of its useful life began cutting the bottle off, choking down my dinner.

At this point LuLu comes into view, apparently oblivious to the wretched smell.. "Daddy, I want to go swimming with Stacey," she said.

"No," I said.

"Daddy, yes! I want to go swimming!"

"Damnit Lu, get out of here!"

"No!," she said, stomping her feet. "I want to go swimming now!"

"Lu," I said, still working on the bottle, sludge now all over my arms. "If you haven't noticed I'm elbow deep in poop right now - "

At which point I vomited spaghetti all over the floor. Lu didn't even pause.

"I don't care. I want to go swimming, and I'm going."

"Leave her be," my Dad said, looking at my vomit with scorn. "Give me the knife."

I handed it over and he did the deed. Once I cleaned it all up, dry heaved once or twice, and carried the garbage out, it was done.

While I was occupied the kids had flat-out destroyed the house and waged war upon one another. All in full view of of YaYa's friend.

Did I mention the house smelled like a waste treatment plant?

&**$#$ Smiley.

Vince Vaughn's Wild West Comedy Show

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 05:09:31 GMT

Vince Vaughn's Wild West Comedy Show is a documentary of a '30 towns-in-30 nights' tour Vaughn organized around four relatively unknown young comedians. Vaughn says the purpose of the 2005 tour was to give people in the heartland and small town America a glimpse of a premier comedy show that they ordinarily wouldn't get a chance to see.

[I fail to see how X # of stops in California and Vegas achieve that goal, but allrighty.]

Notice that I said it's a documentary, not a concert film. This is more like the 'making of' portion of the tour, with snippets of monologues tossed in left and right but no complete set, nor even half of one.

Vince Vaughn comes off as surprisingly articulate and intelligent and I get the impression many of his 'characters' are no more than variants of the man himself. Vaughn is interesting when he's on the screen, and some of the comedy clips are great.

And for some . . well, maybe you had to be there.

At a few points the crew pushes the self-indulgent idea that stand up comedy is an art form that expresses, analyzes, and aids the inner turmoil that is the 'artist' . Eh, it probably does, but even so it ain't Beethoven man. It's jokes about roller skating and BJ's. Keep it in perspective buddy.

However, I did think there was one big problem with the film.

Namely, the comics were not that funny.

Ahmed Ahmed was a bore. While I applaud him for turning the post-9/11 backlash against Muslims (including one apparently bogus arrest in an airport) into a career, I imagine it would kill me if, as an artist, I was confined to one narrow subject matter ad nauseam. How exhausting.

Bret Ernst was hit or miss but batted a thousand past the midpoint of the film. Sebastian Maniscalco was still employed as a waiter when picked for the tour, and I can see why he needed a day job.

However, John Caparulo rocked and was funny as hell. I was suitably impressed when he cleaned up his potty mouth act for the all ages show after Hurricane Katrina - a mark of a true professional.

Overall a topsy-turvy, uneven film that could've used a few minutes less runtime.

2.5 out of 4, 60 out of 100.

Tags: Vince Vaughn, John Caparulo, Wild West Comedy Show, slapinions

Happy Birthday Jonah!

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 03:36:36 GMT

Before the day ends let me send a Happy 14th Birthday to my nephew/Godson Jonah, featured here on his graduation earlier this summer.

Lump's 1st birthday is right around the corner, and so I am reminded that I am often embarrassed when I see video of Jonah's 1st. birthday party. I was quite enamored by the boy and addressed him in a constant, distrubingly high baby-voice, often referring to him by a series of goofy nicknames.

In hindsight, given that (in theory) his great-grandchildren will see it someday, it's not the ideal way to be recorded for posterity.

But one good thing (among dozens) about having a baby around back then: it was good schoolin' for having one of my own. Oh, don't get me wrong. Being a Dad is much more hellish than being an Uncle ever was, even when I lived with the lad. But it was a nice appetizer to the meal, and a good way to practice.

And it did pay dividends. A couple of years later I headed up north with Lisa to visit some of her relatives prior to our wedding. I wound up holding a nine or ten month old boy, and to the amazement of the crowded room I easily navigated a coat on and off the kid. I mean that in the true, unadulterated sense of the word 'amazement'. You'd have thought I negotiated peace in Dafur or cleaned up Jesse Jackson's mouth.

Major props for me for with their family, so kudos to Jonah for that.

Anyhow, I'm rambling. Happy Birthday and many many more.

A warning, courtesy of Alphawoman

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 18:29:40 GMT

I read a post on Alphawoman's Blog this morning that got me worried. I'd noticed in recent days that the 'sitemeter' graphic was no longer displaying on my sidebar, but I wrote it off to a typical glitch. Not so.

According to her post AOL has removed this great site - provider of DEPENDABLE, free stat counters for journals - from its list of 'acceptable' sites.

You can check out her write-up here and she posted additional info in the comments on my last post.

The issue here is the ol' slippery slope. If Sitemeter is disallowed today, maybe Photobucket (and all the pictures I've posted here via the site) will be gone tomorrow.

Two other complaints I have about AOL Journals:

1. Magic Smoke lists a handful of journals in its 'other journals' sidebar. This isn't about them (they are fine sites and worth visiting) but what is the rationale to single those out above all others?

2. Still waiting for the print/save option after most of a year.

LOL. Man, AOL is great at ticking off their clientele, eh?

Night Parking in Milwaukee

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 01:08:33 GMT

In this great city of mine you have to pay for the privilege of parking on the street in front of your own house, high property taxes be damned. I'm sure it's worse elsewhere - most things seem to be - but I think it's a crock.

Anyway, neither here nor there.

Since we picked up the Freestar our old van has been parked in one of the two spots behind my house, waiting for a friend of ours to get off her behind and get together the money to buy it from us (no pressure, no pressure). This leaves us with the task of temporarily rotating one of our two working vehicles to the street each night.

I have so far refused, on philisophical grounds, to reward the city's policy by spending $12 for a permit. In return the city has slapped me with a single parking ticket for $15. Eh, close enough to count as a draw.

But I didn't feel like another ticket last night so I went online to apply for night parking permission . I entered the address where it was parked and the plate number and was rewarded with a message that said (closely paraphrased)

Night parking permission refused. Permission is restricted to three (3) nights in a thirty day period.

If you have reached the three night limit but still require night parking permission, please call 555-5555 for assistance.

Fair enough. I called the number and gave the same information I'd typed in online.

"Oh, I'm sorry sir. You've reached the three night maximum."

"Yes, I know. That's why I called."

"I see. Well, there's nothing I can do for you."

"Excuse me?"

"You've reached the limit. I can't do anything for you."

"Then why bother with this number?"

"You've received permission three times in thirty days sir. That is the limit."

"Yeah, but I know I haven't called in for permission in July. At worst I'm a few days away from the 30 day mark."

"26 days actually. It's been 26 days since you last received permission."

What a p**k.

"Ok, so I'm four days away. Can you please waive the limit tonight?"

"Hmm. Yeah, no sir. The rules are firm."

I was nearly laughing. "Why have your website direct people to call you at all if you there's no chance of getting permission? Is it just for giggles? I mean I don't care, it's not going to break my wallet, but doesn't that strike you as a little bit strange?"

"The law is the law sir."

I felt like yelling "My taxes pay your salary!", but then again his taxes pay his salary too (which is kind of lousy, no?), so f* it.

I doubt I'll continue my one man stand much longer. The last time I did that, by refusing to pay a ticket issued at the airport (for parking in an employee lot while I was an employee with the proper ID in the window) my $20 ticket went up to triple digits and my plates were suspended. If nothing else my wife will demand I get the permit.

But I'm hoping our friend will take the van off our hands and solve the problem before it comes to that.

A Scam at Home Depot??

Sat, 19 Jul 2008 03:26:51 GMT

Sweet niblets could my computer get any slower tonight? While waiting for this page to load I read Bradbury's Night Call, Collect (from his story collection I Sing the Body Electric) start to finish. Dangnabbit.

And for what? A lousy email joke. Still, here it is, with thanks to acompany employee.

* * * * *

SCAM @ HOME DEPOT

Be Careful - A 'heads up' for those men who
may be regular Home Depot customers.

Over the last month I became a victim of a clever scam
while out shopping.
Simply going out to get supplies has turned out to be
quite traumatic.

Don't be naove enough to think it couldn't happen to
you or your f! riends. Here's how the scam works:

Two very hot 20-21 year-old girls come over to your
car as you are packing your stuff into the trunk. They
both start wiping your windshield with a rag and
Windex, with their breasts almost falling out of their
skimpy T-shirts. It is impossible not to look. When
you thank them and offer them a tip, they say 'No' and
instead they ask you for a ride to Lowes. You agree
and they get in the backseat. On the way, they start
undressing. Then one of them climbs over into the
front seat and starts crawling all over you, while
the other one steals your wallet.

I had my wallet stolen March 4th, 9th, 10th, twice on
the 15th, 17th, 20th, 24th & 29th. Also April 1st,
4th, twice on the 8th, 16th, 23rd, 26th, 30th,
three times last Saturday and very likely again this
upcoming weekend.

So tell your friends to be careful.

P.S. Walmart has wallets on sale, $2.99 each.

Lightning Bug Lane

Sat, 19 Jul 2008 05:07:27 GMT

Sure, everyone's concerned about a new name for Lump. But in the meantime we've come up with a new title to refer to our street: Lightning Bug Lane.

I have never seen so many fireflies in such a small area. If you go out at twilight you'd swear a small patch of the night sky has fallen to the earth. There's soft twinkling lights everywhere you look.

This past week I took the kids out - one kid at a time, one kid a day - to capture some fireflies. First up was YaYa, intrepid bug hunter and collector for years now. She and I caught perhaps a dozen and a half without even trying, and one of our neighbors even joined in, proclaiming with delight that it was the first time in her 50-odd years she'd ever captured one!

Next up was Lu, accompanied by her cousin. Not quite as experienced or aggressive a bug gal, Lu still caputred a good dozen or so for herself.

On the third day came Smiley, who joined the hunt after a day of fun with Grandma.

Smiley has a well known aversion to insects, stemming from the time a colony of ants swarmed him at a picnic a year or two ago (it's mentioned here on the site somewhere). Therefore I wasn't expecting a very long hunt, but boy was I mistaken! He seemed to have discovered his calling and caught them with an ease that was remarkable.

(his hunt was earlier in the evening then the girls and so the pictures turned out better)

That's a lighting bug clenched between his fingers in both (above and below) shots.

Unlike the girls, who were fond of releasing the bugs, Smiley fought it tooth and nail. But in the end he gave in and they were set free.

A very fun way to spend a few minutes each night, and it was great that each kid got their alone time with me.

In closing, here's a shot of my niece wearing the 'suit of armor' I bought Smiley.

and one of our now empty bird's nest in the shed. I guess/hope the birds grew up and flew off on their own.

'Salem's Lot

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 05:22:39 GMT

World Traveler, who has sadly moved on from our company, once looked at a Stephen King book I was reading and proclaimed it my 'guilty pleasure'.

I don't take offense to that statement but I do think it's a bunch of malarkey.

I don't know what books will be remembered two or three hundred years down the road. Perhaps To Kill a Mockingbird will fall out of favor as race ceases to be an issue or the world will wise up and dismiss Catcher in the Rye. Hey, for all I know a Danielle Steel novel will reign as the next Oliver Twist in 2187.

But I do think some of Stephen King's work has a chance of being remembered. He's created some great novels (and some clunkers) and I'm not in the least embarrassed by calling myself a fan of his work.

Even if he is a [redacted] Red Sox fan.

'Salem's Lot was his second published novel, put out just after the success of Carrie. The idea behind the plot is simple. Ben Mears returns to his hometown after many years only to find himself on the front lines of a vampire invasion.

It's a great novel with a strong plot and a large cast of characters. At times King's prose genuinely sings in Lot. His descriptions of the town itself as it wakes, darting from one character to another and showing us the very human heart of its people, jumped out at me and stayed with me long after the book was done.

3.75 starts out of 4 for me personally, 90 out of 100. Your take on horror may influence your vote.

The 1979 miniseries based on the book stars David Seoul as prodigal son Ben Mears. It's considered a horror classic and is lauded left and right on every site I've been to, but you know what? I thought it was boring. Slow and boring. The only good part was watching a young Bonnie Bedelia on screen. 2.0 out of 4, 50 out of 100.

On the other hand the recent Rob Lowe version is skewered just as often by fans. I agree liberties were taken with the characters. I just don't see how that alone makes it a 'bad' movie. A bad adaptation of a book perhaps, but not a bad movie.

I happen to think most of the changes moved the story along at a cinematic pace. Certainly the rewriting of Ben Mears strengthened his motives for returning to the town and bolstered the emotional impact of his emergence as a hero.

It's not King's book, but it's a fine movie. 3.0 stars out of 4, 70 out of 100.

Spoiler:

I'd have given it a mathematically proper 75 out of 100, save for the fact that I thought the portrayal of the priest was disgusting. To not only willingly join the forces of evil but question the existence of God when face to face with an agent of the devil was sacrilegious and ludicrous.