In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree.

It's almost 3am. I'm about to go to bed and put on Jon's copy of Citizen Kane to fall asleep to.

As far as reinventing myself goes, it went really well today. I really do feel much better. I went out to the Roadhouse to see Chris Brill play (he's playing piano at Zazzo's tomorrow night, and we're all going to be dressed to the 9's... whatever that means. If you're around, you should go.) I did some writing earlier today at the coffee shop above Video Hits, and it's coming along MUCH better. I still haven't found what I'm looking for, but it's coming much easier.

I can't describe how much lighter I feel. I'm much more optimistic, not just about my future plans, but just life in general. It's like a great weight has been lifted. I've just been given back a big dose of self confidence. I'm not exactly sure where it came from, but I feel great. I'm riding it. I think everything is about to turn around. If it isn't, I'll turn it around myself. I'm just about back to normal. It feels awesome.

Rosebud.

-j

...be kind to me or treat me mean, i'll make the most of it, i'm an extraordinary machine...

Fiona Apple's new CD "Extraordinary Machine" comes out next tuesday, October 4. That is very good news.

-j

e p i p h a n y

It's happened again. I think I hit that point where I'm taking charge again. I was just on the phone with Erin, and I felt it. I've been down a lot lately. A lot of it from being in Kalamazoo, a lot from feeling lonely, a lot from feeling like everything I knew in L.A. has come to a halt. I felt like this when I got to Lexington. Very insecure, very quiet, very timid, very afraid, and not at all in control. But somehow tonight, I had a moment of lucidity, the same as I did in 10th grade. In a moment, something I've always known became extremely clear and uncomplicated, and I saw how simple it is.

Over the next few weeks I'm going to change absolutely everything that I hate about myself.

It might take a while, it will probably take more than a few weeks, but what I can't change in a few weeks I'll have put myself on the right road to fix as soon as possible. But every problem that I have imposed upon myself, I am going to solve.

Starting now.

I'm not my father. I never will be. That I know. Today I stop comparing myself to him, because we are two different people with two different lives. I have been too hard on myself for being 25 without a wife, a steady job, a house, two cars, and three kids. I've been feeling like a failure since I was 19, because I wasn't good enough to be as good as him. That stops now. I love him. I am very proud of him. I am very lucky he is my dad. But I need to stop comparing myself to him. I need to stop getting down everytime I think of what he had accomplished by the time he was my age.

I am going to pick up the pace though. I'm going to become self dependant. I am 25, and even though I'm a very recent graduate in a very competitive and non-local field, I need to be able to get by on my own. Everyone needs help at some point in their life, and I've had my share. It's time to grow up.

I am going to find a job. I am going to accept that no matter what job I find around here, I'm more than likely going to hate it, but it will be temporary. I am going to accept that no matter what job I find around here, it will not define me. I am a writer, I am a director, I am a filmmaker first. I'll be a fry cook just to pay the bills. I will not let this get me down.

I am going to stop worrying about Kalamazoo. I have friends here. Sure the creative flow isn't as great here as it is in Los Angeles, but I wrote two feature screenplays here. The town isn't causing this writers block, and if I moved to Denver tomorrow, I'd still be in the same boat that I'm in now. Jobless and behind on my bills without a story in my head. I am going to take care of that before I move.

I am going to stop feeling like an outsider. In all aspects. Yes I am a private person, but sometimes I feel left out. I know I moved away, I know I rarely call, I know I don't keep in touch that well. That's going to stop. I know I'm usually busy, but I was always bummed when my family would go to Florida without me. I'm not good at golf, and that's cool. That's my brothers thing. But sometimes I feel a little out of touch. Not just with my family. With everyone.

I am going to stop being afraid of people. I'm so worried about people's opinions of me, people who I'll only see once in my life. That's so unlike me, really. I'm always the quiet one at the bar, at parties, at gatherings. I'm the guy who sits back and watches everyone else have fun. I used to be the guy who ran down the hill with orange triamenic stains on my shirt. I used to be the guy who took a camera on campus and asked people if they'd sponsor a cafe with shaved monkey waiters. I used to be the guy who claimed he saw a penguin on the side of Clever Lane. I used to be the guy who got up and sang Meatloaf's "I'd Do Anything For Love" in the LeFevre cafe at 7am. One time in Los Angeles I stood up in the middle of a crowded restaurant at CityWalk and sang "Let's Get It On" because it was playing quietly over the speakers. I'm going to be that guy again. That guy isn't so chicken-shit to talk to new people. So much so that he hasn't had a date in years.

Most of all though, I think I'm just going to smile more, and have some faith that all the luck and blessings I've received in my life, all the good fortune, all the friends and family, all the support, all the fun, and all the gifts I've been given had to have been given to me for a reason. I'm going to accept that this is a trying time, and it's something I deserve, because nobody should be as lucky as me, and be able to glide through some things like I did. This is a test. Nothing in my profession will come as easily as it has in the past, and I need to be ready for adversity and be able to work my way out of it. That's why this is happening. I'm going to relax. I'm going to breathe. I'm going to organize and compose myself. I'm going to focus and I'm going to persevere.

For the first time in a while I feel great. I feel like I'm walking the long road instead of crawling. I feel much higher, much more prepared, less intimidated. Less willing to make excuses and feel sorry for myself for not being what I wanted to be, and more willing to just become what I want to be.

My dad once wrote me a note, a note that I still have, that says "Only you can change your stars." It really is as simple as that.

Andy, you're a star in nobody's eyes

I just watched tonight's all new episode of Lost, which promised that the fate of all the survivors would be revealed. ABC promised. ABC lied.

During the show there was a commercial for Serenity. Now if you live in my house with my roommates, you know what Serenity is. I live with two big Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans. Buffy was written (as was the original Luke Perry movie as I have just found out) by a guy named Joss Whedon. Joss has written a few episodes of Roseanne, was one of four screenwriters for the original Toy Story (which was written mainly by John Lasseter and Peter Docter), he wrote the unfortunate Alien Ressurection, he did the spinoff show Angel, and has written and directed the soon to be released Serenity. Serenity is a movie version of a Joss Whedon TV show called Firefly that was on FOX for a few episodes before it failed and was cancelled.

The movie comes out on friday. I think it's doomed.

On IMDb, Serenity is listed as an 8.4, which is an amazingly high number. Higher than The Godfather III, The Maltese Falcon, last years best picture Million Dollar Baby, Aliens, A Clockwork Orange, LA Confidential, The Wizard of Oz, Jaws, 2001, Gone With The Wind, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Exorcist, and Return of the Jedi.

Pretty awesome, considering the movie doesn't come out until FRIDAY.

The movie has had prescreenings for a while now, and people left the theater and rated it on IMDb. As of this moment, it has 2,660 out of 3,334 people voting it as a perfect 10. Did you go to one of these fan screenings? Neither did I.

I think there may be some bias in these rankings.

At any rate, back to the Serenity ad. It starts out showing the same joke Serenity trailers always have (which is ALWAYS a bad sign) about the captain asking the other guy if he wants to run the ship, and the guy says yes, to which the captain, obviously thrown off his guard by this response replies, "Well... you can't." But then it goes into the typical of good movies voice over that starts out "New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, USA Today and the LA Times..." but then it takes a very interesting twist, "...have all written about the buzz surrounding Serenity."

Now of course there's a buzz surrounding Serenity. Joss Whedon has an entire legion of fanboys, and they're all over the internet. If you were to go on IMDb, and put forth the opinion that the movie doesn't look good, they will retort with such violent and gruesome imagery that it even makes ME blush. It'd be like going to a Star Trek convention and saying that Gene Roddenberry is kind of lame. They would all set phasers to kill. I'm not sure, but I think they wrote about the buzz because it's frightening.

The other thing you notice though. They started the ad out like they were saying critics really liked it. But they never said that. I've not seen an ad out yet that said anyone really liked this movie. Nobody except 2,660 Whedon fans who already saw it. See, they made it SOUND like they were going to say that, but they didn't. Another sign that it's not that good.

Derek Elley from Variety writes: "Nobody seems to have told Whedon that many U.S. sci-fiers were already Westerns in futuristic dress, and that cross-cultural Eastern-Westerns were invented 40 years ago. What may have seemed fresh on network TV doesn't look quite so fresh on the bigscreen. Still, what makes "Serenity" refreshing is its avoidance of CGI, which gives the pic a much more human dimension; the evident chemistry between the cast; and a humor that doesn't rely simply on flip one-liners. None of these smarts, however, may be enough to satisfy mass auds.... Sets look considerably airier than in the TV series, though Whedon directs his interior sequences in a visually constricted way that shows his small-screen origins. Colors have a mostly dark, unappetizing look that becomes a tad wearisome over two hours, and David Newman's score does the business but never elevates the material."

And Variety was the only reputable and seemingly unbiased critique I could find. Others came from sources like "Moviegeekz" and "Ain't it cool news." I'm never one to buy into critics opinions, frankly, as they say, everyone's a critic. But it makes you a little skeptical when critics have avoided it. You'll find no critics opinions on the cover of Gigli either.

Basically what it comes down to is this. This may be the highest budgeted, best quality, made for TV or straight to DVD movie ever.

Why spend this much time writing about it? I don't know. I got carried away. I may have been too harsh. I know both of my roommates are probably chomping at the bit for friday. Or at least the one with the Serenity sticker on her door is. I sympathize. But relatively unknown cult status material is not something that is going to be accepted by a wide audience. The reason I sympathize is because I was there too.

I'm a MSTie.

I belong to another cultish inside group of nerds who could quote every line from a show, started a tape collection, and generally annoyed the hell out of everyone around me who didn't know what I was talking about. My poison though was Mystery Science Theater 3000.

MST3K was a little underground, it wasn't exactly a pop culture MUST. Same with Firefly. (Although Firefly lasted 11 episodes and MST3K finished 10 seasons and 197 episodes) Similar as well is the fact that MST3K also came out with a movie that played in theaters. Don't remember that? Maybe you were sick that day.

It bombed. And bombed like hardcore. If you have a film that 10,000 people are going to go see opening day because they're such huge fans of the TV show, and no one else has even heard of it... it's going to crash and burn.

There's more fans than that in both groups. You get my point though.

Like I said, I sympathize. But even being a big fan of MST3K, I knew at the time, the movie was a bad idea. Serenity is also a bad idea.

6.1M opening weekend. That's my guess. If I'm wrong, I'll admit it on monday.

-j

Arrrr.

Just a quick note, I had a dream a few nights ago that I was a pirate. In all honesty, it was probably the coolest dream ever. I had a cool pirate costume, and I was on a giant pirate ship. That's all I really remember.

-j

Hello?

Hey everyone. Thanks to my most beautiful, charming, sweet, wonderful and best friend Erin, my phone works again. Thanks for your help Schmoo. So if you need to get in touch with me, the smoke signals are no longer necessary.

-j

It's over.

Only in Dreams

Last night, I dreamt I was at the Atkinson's house, only it was the 1970's and all my friends were characters from "That 70's Show." We were going down to some local community center or something because David Bowie was there signing autographs. So I tell Kelso about it first, and he gets excited, and goes outside. Then I tell everyone else and we sneak past Red and go outside to get my car, but Kelso had taken it. But then he comes back because it was apparently all a joke. My car is my 2001 Monte Carlo, so it's totally awesome to have in the 1970's.

So Donna drives the car and instead of taking the road, she goes over the road and drives through the fields, then up a hill and at about 80mph cuts right into an expressway. We survived. We make it to this place where Bowie is, and it turns out we just missed him. So then suddenly, in the other room there's a crowd cheering. I walk in and there's an indoor (like in a big gymnasium) football game going on. So I join the football game, and as it turns out, it's a combination football/hockey/handball game. Like every quarter we play a different game. So anyway there's this guy on our team who only has one leg and one arm, and a really weird haircut named Stevie.

We play for a while, I'm a linebacker. I make a couple good blocks I guess, and then suddenly during one play, Stevie somehow ends up in the bleachers. He tries to get down by himself, and people want to help him, but he won't let them. Then he falls, and falls like really hard. He gets up, and grabs a microphone, and says to the crowd, "Say goodbye, because Stevie is going to go kill his life." (Yeah, I know, it doesn't make a lot of sense, but it was a dream, none of this really makes sense.) So Stevie hops out of the room, and our team captain goes after him. I was worried to go help, because I didn't know Stevie, plus I somehow knew he was going to try to kill himself with a big knife, and I didn't want him to stab me instead. So our captain eventually talked him out of it, and when he came back into the room, everyone cheered.

That's all I remember. God bless you Stevie. I'm glad you didn't kill your life.

-j

Greetings from off the face of the Earth

To everyone trying to get in touch with me to no avail, I apologize. My cell phone is off, but should hopefully be back on this weekend.

It's been a helluva week. There's been a lot to deal with. Ask me about it sometime, I might even tell you what I'm talking about.

I turn 25 on monday. I purposefully haven't been telling people about my birthday because I don't want a lot of hoopla, and I don't want to celebrate, and I know that is somewhat unacceptable in society. So if anyone wants to get me a killer birthday present, give me that. I'm not exactly where I wanted to be by 25, and I'd really not like a lot of reminders of that.

The only reason I mention it at all, is because it's on my mind, and this is where I go to drop off most of the stuff that is on my mind. Funny enough though, the biggest stuff on my mind is the stuff that doesn't make it on here, because it's pretty personal, and even though this has been an online journal and look into my brain for all to see for almost five years now, there are still thngs that I'm not comfortable just publishing and sharing with the world.

For those of you new to this blog though (boo), I tend to still get it on here in somewhat more cryptic and vague ways. Like song lyrics, or perhaps writing out the entire last scene of the greatest American love story. This is so that people who know what is going on or are directly involved know what I'm talking about, or so that in five more years, when I have that day where I come back and look at the evolution of my character, I can see it and remember what this week was all about.

Not that it's much of a mystery anymore.

I was caller number nine and won a DVD box set of the first season of Lost from WGRD... ahem.... So maybe tomorrow I'll go up to Grand Rapids and pick it up.

Life is going on as usual here in Kalamazoo. I've been in Fiji all week.

There's a bluegrass band that practices at the house next door. They call themselves the Mossy Mountain Band. I've never been a bluegrass fan, but I gotta say, I love it when they practice and I can hear them through my window. I met one of the guys in the band today. He was born right across the river from me in Sarnia. Small world.

There's a story brewing inside of me. I don't know what it is yet. But it's there.

I finally got past -32 on notpr0n. I'm at -34 now. If anyone wants to try it it's a lot of fun, and once you start figuring it out, you'll feel like a freakin' genius. The point is to just figure out how to get to the next screen. From level 1 to level 82, then from level 0 to level -44, then from level Alpha to level Lambda. So there's a total of 138 levels. The link above takes you to level 1. Good luck.

It's 3am. I must be lonely.

I've got two rolls of film I need to get developed soon. I hope the film is still good in them. Chances are they aren't. I brought both cameras back home from Los Angeles when I flew here, and they went through the X-Ray machine. I think that butchers your film.

I had a great weekend, Erin. I look forward to calling you "Schmoo." Thank you for everything. Everything ever.

Congratulations to Tera Breinich who is getting married sometime soon.

24 was a good year though. Los Angeles was the best time ever. Maybe this year will be even better.

Who knows.

Goodnight Elisabeth.
-j

RICK
Last night we said a great many things. You said I was to do the thinking for both of us. Well, I've done a lot of it since then, and it all adds up to one thing: you're getting on that plane with Victor where you belong.


ILSA
But, Richard, no, I... I...


RICK
Now, you've got to listen to me! You have any idea what you'd have to look forward to if you stayed here? Nine chances out of ten, we'd both wind up in a concentration camp. Isn't that true, Louie?


RENAULT
I'm afraid Major Strasser would insist.


ILSA
You're saying this only to make me go.


RICK
I'm saying it because it's true. Inside of us, we both know you belong with Victor. You're part of his work, the thing that keeps him going. If that plane leaves the ground and you're not with him, you'll regret it. Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life.


ILSA
But what about us?


RICK
We'll always have Paris. We didn't have, we, we lost it until you came to Casablanca. We got it back last night.


ILSA
When I said I would never leave you.


RICK
And you never will. But I've got a job to do, too. Where I'm going, you can't follow. What I've got to do, you can't be any part of. Ilsa, I'm no good at being noble, but it doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Someday you'll understand that....

Now, now...

...here's looking at you kid.

Sports Night

Now don't get me wrong, I'm a Lions fan. But after hearing over and over that this is the Detroit Lions breakout year, that this is Joey Harrington's year, that they'll make the playoffs, and that (ahem) they could be the first team in history to host the Superbowl (right...), and after todays 38-6 loss to the Bears with a record FIVE interceptions thrown by Joey Harrington, I love to say that I told you so, and I told you so.

-j

Ugh with a side of ugh.

I don't normally do these online quiz things telling me which New Kid or Buffy the Vampire Slayer character I am, but being that I'm almost 25, I thought I'd take the "How Old Are You" quiz.

My results?

You Are 33 Years Old

it's been a long december and there's reason to believe maybe this year will be better than the last. i can't remember all the times i tried to tell myself to hold on to these moments as they pass. it's one more day up in the canyons and it's one more night in hollywood. it's been so long since i've seen the ocean. i guess i should.

Easy like Sunday Morning.

Today I'm not going to stress out. I'm not going to think about all the money/job/bills/bank/ issues I have because it's sunday and there's not much I can do about it today. I've been losing my mind all week, I haven't been able to sleep, today I'm just going to relax, eat pizza, and watch the Lions.

I'll flip out again tomorrow.

-j

Curse you National City

Seriously, in my previous experience, and my current experience, this is a shady shady bank. Can anyone explain to me how you can be charged a $35 overdraft fee in an account with no minimum balance, and even after the fee is assessed there's still money in the account?

Now I've got to go straighten this all out. Just one more thing on my list.

-j

Take that!

I got word verification now bitches! Spam comment me now!

Make Mine Marvel... or not.

To piggyback on Jon's site (which I'd link to, but is currently down), he brings up the Marvel movies, and the fact that there's about to be, I think by current listings, another 19,000 of them coming out in the next few years.

I agree, it's getting excessive. Nic Cage is staring in the soon to come out Ghost Rider movie. According to a site probably as reputable as "Ain't it Cool News" (around 35% Accurate) coming soon we'll see Ant-Man, Black Panther, Black Widow, Blade 4, Captain America, Daredevil 2, Deadpool, Deathlok, Dr. Strange, Hulk 2, Iron Fist, Iron Man, Longshot, Luke Cage, Man-Thing, Morbius, Namor: The Submariner, Power Pack, Prime, The Punisher 2, She-Hulk, Spiderman 3, Venom, and X-Men 3.

Now this whole craze began anew with the X-Men movie, which did significantly well. The reason of course is that people have heard of X-Men. Then Spiderman did well for the same reason. On the DC end, Batman had consistantly done well (undeservingly so under Schumacher, however Nolan's interpretation was actually really good), and I'm willing to bet that when Superman comes out, it'll do well.

Who the hell has ever heard of Ant-Man? Who is Ant-Man's adversary? (I gotta think it would be Spiderman.) The Incredible Hulk is well known, and that movie blew. The Fantastic Four people have probably heard of, and that movie blew. Spiderman 1 and 2 were good, X-Men 1 and 2 were good. Batman Begins was good. (On another note Sin City was awesome, but that is neither here nor there.) So there you have it. Five decent movies. Daredevil, the Hulk, The Punisher, Blade 1-3, Elektra, Catwoman... suck suck suck suck suck.

I'm willing to bet Ghost Rider sucks too.

'Nuff Said.

-j

An open letter to anyone born after 1990.

To: 90's Babies
From: An MTV Generation Kid
RE: MTV

Dear Next Gen'ers,

For you too young to remember it, MTV was cool in the 1980's. Cable television had just begun, and the idea of a 24 hour music channel was extremely experimental. Back then they used to show what were called "music videos" which was in effect a short film usually featuring some rock band or artist, while a song by that artist played in the background. Sometimes they would just be the band on stage singing along to the song, sometimes they would have a story that went to the music. (Ask your parents about "Thriller." Before he was a white woman on trial for child molestation, Michael Jackson was a black man and a pretty famous pop singer). Now a days, you can still see a hint of this idea on a show called TRL, where to kind of honor that era, they pretend the five or ten seconds of a video they show you is important enough for you to pay 99 cents to call in and vote on.

At any rate, back in the 1980's, or in ancient times as you know it, back in the days before ring tones, bling, reality television, back when cell phones were extremely expensive, largely uncommon, and weighed about thirty pounds, back when Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen were not hot, nor bulemic, and were known collectively as "Michelle," back before the PS2, before the XBox, back when we had no email, no AIM, lol meant absolutely nothing, before Windows 95 (!) when we had a thing called MS-Dos, before DVD, before Gatorade, before Eminem, before even Dr. Dre, MTV was cutting edge. It was the edgy programming that OUR parents, your grandma and grandpa wasn't sure we should be watching. We watched videos by Poison, Alice Cooper, Metallica, Michael Jackson, Debbie Gibson, Prince, Blondie, The Police, The Buggles, Black Sabbath, (which had that guy from The Osbournes... the mumbly guy), Duran Duran, Queensryche, INXS, etc, etc. This now out of date material can probably be found in your local library. The library is of course a now out of date building somewhere downtown that has a lot of books in it. This is where we'd go when we had to do reports on things we didn't know about, as the internet was not yet in existence. Tragic, isn't it?

Towards the beginning of the 90's, there was this movement called "grunge" which originated in Seattle WA. With this "alternative" music came bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Blind Melon, Soul Asylum, and of course more music videos. This, in case you don't know, is back when musical acts still featured members who could play some form of instrument, there was usually a drummer, a bass guitarist, and one or more guitarists playing lead or rhythm. (A guitar is a six or sometimes twelve stringed instrument that can be plucked while holding the strings on the neck to play notes or sometimes chords. They have big replica ones in front of the Hard Rock Cafe. Again, ask your parents.) This is when MTV started to change, and seemingly for the better. They started to evolve and stop playing videos 24/7 and decided instead to play more edgy programming. There was still a lot of videos, but now late at night, there was Sifl and Olly, Liquid Television, Beavis and Butthead, Aeon Flux, The Real World, Remote Control, The Maxx, and towards the end of the "MTV is cool" era Celebrity Deathmatch.

I know what you're thinking. The Real World. You recognize that one. This is true, it is the same show, however it's vastly different now than it was in our day. The first Real World was in New York City, and featured seven strangers, picked to live in a small apartment in SoHo, to see what happens when people stop being polite and start getting real. They didn't have a hot tub or a swimming pool, no beach front two million dollar home, no jet skis, they weren't all extremely attractive like models in GAP ads, they weren't named Irulan, Nehemiah, Jacquese, Aneesa, Malik or Coral, they had names like Eric, Heather, Becky, and Julie. It was a lot more like... well, the real world. Then two seasons later, we had Pedro and Puck. Again, ask your parents.

Sadly, as all good things do, it eventually all came to an end. MTV became a joke when it was violently impregnated by Backstreet Boys, N Sync, and Britney Spears, and gave birth to TRL and the hellspawned Carson Daly. Suddenly it had nothing to do with music television (which in case you don't know, is what MTV actually stands for) and more about Pimp My Ride, Punk'd, The Osbournes, Room Raiders, Undressed, etc. They became the channel that 10 year olds watched so they could feel cool.

But, sadly, it's gotten worse.

Now there's My Super Sweet 16, Laguna Beach, The Newlyweds, Cribs, The Ashlee Simpson Show, I Want A Famous Face, MADE, Making the Band... MTV has become the "Admire those who have much more than you while they bitch about not having enough" channel.

It is at this point where I admit I'd love to add five years to my life to upgrade to the much cooler Generation X, instead of shamefully being known as the MTV Generation. There's got to be a better name for us. Hell I'd even opt for the VH1 Generation (which used to show music videos and stuff too, before it became the "What do D-List Celebrities think about everything?" channel.) How about the more broad Cable TV generation? Maybe Generation Y, as we're after X?

If you want to see what MTV sort of resembled in our day, check out MTV2. Oh! Maybe we can be the MTV2 Generation!

It does leave me with a perplexing question though. What do we call you? Something that has to do with the internet probably. Like Generation.com or maybe like eGeneration. Or like teh 1337 G3n3r4710n. OMG! r0xx0rz!

At any rate, if any of you want to be the next American Idol, please, please, pick up a guitar. Pay homage to that time when it took more than blonde hair and a schoolgirl outfit to become a musical genius.

I want MY MTV.
-j

I've got a little black book with my poems in.
Got a bag with a toothbrush and a comb in.
When I'm a good dog they sometimes throw me a bone in.

I got elastic bands keeping my shoes on.
Got those swollen hand blues.
I've got thirteen channels of shit on the T.V. to choose from.

I've got electric light.
And I've got second sight.
I've got amazing powers of observation.

And that is how I know
When I try to get through
On the telephone to you
There will be nobody home.

I've got the obligatory Hendrix perm.
And the inevitable pinhole burns
All down the front of my favorite satin shirt.

I've got nicotine stains on my fingers.
I've got a silver spoon on a chain.
I've got a grand piano to prop up my mortal remains.

I've got wild staring eyes.
And I've got a strong urge to fly.
But I've got nowhere to fly to.

Ooooh, Babe when I pick up the phone
There's still nobody home.

I've got a pair of Gohills boots
And I've got fading roots.

Ninja in the Killing Fields

If you know me, you know I love really bad movies. I was a big fan of Mystery Science Theater 3000 when I was a kid, and it was tradition at 1530K to go out to the Olde Peninsula on thursday night, then head over to Video Hits Plus, find the most terrible looking Sci-Fi, Kung Fu, Horror, or otherwise bad film we could, bring it home, and put it in, and Marcy, John, Adam and I would proceed to enjoy it while adding our own little clever remarks. (That was a run on sentence.) This became so fun, that christmas was filled with terrible gifts on DVD. One of which that was either given to me, or was purchased for said bad movie night, was a pile called "Ninja in the Killing Fields."

As I tried to fall asleep last night (unsuccessfully until nearly 9am), I thought maybe if I put on a movie, I'd crash out. I wanted something I didn't really need to pay attention to, and figured NITKF would do just fine.

It didn't work. I got really into it. In a very comedic way. (That was a sentence fragment.)

I had to turn it off, as it wasn't helping, but I decided to finish watching it today. This film has one of the greatest most inexplicable endings that would make even Stanley Kubrick confused. The basic story leading up to it is that there's these evil drug dealing ninjas headed by this caucasian ninja who looks a lot like Graham Chapman of Monty Python fame, who for some reason dresses all in bright red ninja attire, which as red is the easiest color for the eye to see, seems to defeat the purpose. The japanese enlist the help of a "streetsmart American cop" named Richard Jones and he is also a ninja, but he wears all bright yellow. There's fighter jets, and traitor ninjas, and a really dorky looking ninja informant, and a japanese cop who looks like Tony Clifton, and tanks, and a gas station robbery. All this is unimportant. What is pure awesome is the ending.

Richard and the red ninja square off at the end. Apparently these nijas can bury themselves quickly and attack from underground, because that's how red ninja starts the battle. Then they fight a bit, and Richard chops off red ninja's hand which lands on the ground and then inexplicably flies off the ground and explodes once it hits a tree. Then Red ninja throws something at Richard, who dodges cleanly, and shoots ninja darts or something out of a wrist gun. Red ninja explodes. Richard waves his hand around, his yellow costume explodes, and his street clothes are on him.

Then, as he walks away, he hears a frog. He looks shocked, and approaches the frog. Then he says, "Huh? A frog!" and tries to grab it. It disappears, and turns into two frogs. He grabs at one of those, and it disappears, and suddenly there are four frogs. He stands up, visually upset, and says "Shit, who needs you!?" He turns, and as the victory music plays (which sounds like it came from a cheap casio keyboard) he pulls out his walkie talkie and says (verbatum), "I'm Richard. Our enemy Marshall Sears is eliminated. I here announce the case is over." Cut to red, and in big words: The End.

Totally awesome.

Also, there's a sweet line where a guy is talking to a girl ninja, and their romantic dialogue makes George Lucas look like Shakespeare.

Girl: Love making shouldn't be by force, why not just say the word?
They start kissing.
Boy: Didn't know a woman with your fighting skills was such a good kisser!
Girl: You're not bad yourself. I never expected that one such as you... from the underworld... could be so gentile.
Boy: Did your ninja training camps also teach you love-making?

Now that's what I call smooth....

-j

My Super Sweet 16.

I don't have a whole lot of cable options here. I do however get MTV. As I'm flipping through today, I come across "My Super Sweet 16." The episode I watched featured a young girl who wanted a Moulin Rouge themed party, complete with preparty, 100 invitations for "1000 people who really want to go," a fully choreographed can-can dance entrance, a Hummer limo, a $10,000 personal stylist, and a "beautiful" dress. Her mom served her breakfast in bed, she then called her mom on her cell phone to come get the tray when she was done, made her mom take her to Dunkin Donuts, her grandmother bought her a brand new Audi, and as she sat in the back of her mom's car on the way to Dunkin Donuts, she claimed that today the world revolved around her. I can't count how many times she told her mom to shut up, or called her a bitch, or treated her like she was trash. Then when she was handing out invitations, she totally flipped out and dressed down this girl who was holding an invitation, but was not given one. She kept telling her "friends" that it was such a power trip handing out invitations, because EVERYONE wanted to go to her party.

Sadly this story does not have a happy ending. The party actually went off really well. I kept hoping that no one showed up, or that the building caught fire, or that someone dumped pigs blood on her like on Carrie. Okay, maybe that's a little too far.

Her closing thought. "I get whatever I want."

I remember when I turned 16. I got a 88 Grand Am, and considered myself very very lucky. But really, I wanted a Moulin Rouge party.

I can't wait until her sweet 18 party... when she gets booted out of the million dollar mansion, and lives in a one bedroom apartment and has no friends.

That probably won't happen, but hey, we can dream can't we?

Now, I wonder what wonderful spam comments will I recieve? Time will tell.

-j

I've got a theory.

My theory is that as soon as I write a new post, some bot picks up that a new post has been created and leaves an ad in my comments section. Shall we test this theory?

-j

I wished for so long...
I cannot stay
All the precious moments...
Cannot stay
It's not like wings have fallen...
I cannot say
Still something is missing...
I cannot say

Holding hands of daughters and sons
And their faiths are falling down
Down, down, down

I have wished for so long...
How I wish for you today

Will I walk the long road?
I cannot stay
There's no need to say goodbye

Oh, the friends and family...
All the memories going round
Round, round round...

I have wished for so long...
How I wished for you today

And the wind keeps roaring
And the sky keeps turning grey
And the sun is setting
The sun will rise another day

I have wished for so long...
How I wish for you today

I have wished for so long...
How I wish for you today
Will I walk the long road?
We all walk the long road

"Long Road" - lyrics by Eddie Vedder.

September

It is September.

Today I went up to WMU at about 8pm, and just watched people go by until around 10.

I need to get a life, I guess.

This blog has taken a very drastic and depressing turn as of late, hasn't it? Sorry about that. I'm just really down lately it seems.