LBR: Little Children

Little Children by Tom Perrotta. Tom Perrotta is a little like Nicholas Sparks (The Notebook, Message In a Bottle) in that he is able to write from a woman's point of view, but the simlarity stops there. In fact, Tom Perrotta is to Nicolas Sparks as Desperate Housewives is to The Miss America Pageant. As spicy cajun food is to cotton candy. As Rated R is to Rated G. etc.

Bottom Line: I loved it!

LMR: Robots

Where are all the religious right-wingers on this one? Are they too preoccupied with the Shiavo case to see what's going on here? Fender, a male character voiced by Robin Williams, spends more time in a skirt than pants, and nobody has a problem with this? Aren't the offensive-happy parents appalled by it? Where are the cries of fear for their children being flagrantly influenced by the glorification of transvestitism? They want to jump up and down about how a Spongebob Squarepants video is promoting tolerance of gay people, but have nothing to protest about a man impersonating Britney Spears with a rendition of "Hit Me Baby One More Time"?

Oh sure, you could argue that transvestites aren't a threat. It's not like any macho father is afraid of his kid turning into one, because they don't have enough influence in politics. It's not like they're trying to marry each other or anything. It's not like they're asking to be recognized as a viable political group of constituents.

Or did they just not see the controversial possibilities? Maybe if it were a slower news day. I'm just asking for some consistency, and I'm disappointed that those bozos haven't been paying attention.

Nevertheless, on a lighter side, the farting scene is worth the price of admission alone.

Lame Movie Review: Platoon

Does this mean that someday Charlie Sheen's kid will star in a Vietnam War movie too?

Lame Movie Review: The Wild Bunch

I guess I just don't like westerns. Some claim this to be the best one ever, and I still got a little bored. The Wild Bunch was like the Kill Bill of the Old West, lots of that fake 1969 fluorescent blood. It was a "Shoot 'em up" flick, a "Shoot 'em all up" flick, really.

No Respect for the Elderly

So I see this old lady on the bus today. Excuse me - Youth Challenged. I'm talkin' O-o-ooold. You know one of those dried apple faces, no teeth that I ever saw. I'm not being mean, I'm just trying to set the scene so you see what I saw. Anyway, she whips out her cell phone. Well - she didn't whip it out so much as she performed a long slow pull of it from her handbag. (Old ladies don't have purses, they have handbags) But this got me to thinking what an odd thing to see an old lady using a cell phone. And what was so odd about it? All kinds of things. First of all, you don't expect someone who moves like a glacier to be using such a device. Secondly, most old people don't take to new technology, so if she's using a cell phone, it should be some big old honkin' thing like the first ones they used to use in cars, not one of those hip small jobbies. Who does she think she is? I will say one thing though. The whole time I watched her, she just flipped it open and closed it and pushed buttons and put it to her ear, but never actually spoke on the thing. So maybe my old people/new stuff theory still stands and it wasn't even her phone. She probably mugged some Wall Street type off of Wilshire Blvd, took his money and lunch and got sorta stuck with the phone and was just playing with it. Yeah, she probably had no idea what she was doing with that thing.

Lame Movie Review: Serpico

How awesome is Al Pacino?

Lame Movie Review: Barfly

When I saw Mystic River I was annoyed with the way the characters spoke. Same thing with Rob Morrow in Quiz Show. Who was he trying to sound like? Act like you have a cold and that's an accent? I still don't know if he was trying to imitate some group of people from a particular part of this country. However, in Mystic River, apparently everybody had a Boston accent and nailed it. I guess I just don't know how Bostonians speak. So I see Mickey Rourke acting like a wierdo, and I'm thinking what led him to make such an annoying voice choice? No one talks like that. Then I watched the Special Features on the Barfly DVD and listened to the interviews of Charles Bukowski (the man on whom this auto-biographical story is based) and wouldn't you know... Mickey nailed it.

How To Piss off PETA

Not that PETA needs any more ammo. Pardon the pun. (What pun, you ask? Read on.)

It was only a matter of time, but red-necks can now hunt from the chair their fat lazy butt sits in. Live-Shot.com allows anybody with an internet connection to log on and shoot real guns in real time. They can even shoot real animals. And it's like a real guided hunting tour, you know where men with no business carrying a gun aimlessly shoots an animal enough to maim it without killing it, so the hired gun next to him has to do the actual killing so that Big Guy can have it stuffed and mounted for bragging (lying) rights - "Yup, I shot it myself. Oh he was a wily bastard, that one...".

So if you have a dial-up connection, do your bullets just sort of fall out of your gun onto the ground?

First the Maps, Now the Weather

If you're taking more than one click to get to the weather forecast, try Googling the weather. Go to google.com and enter "weather zipcode" or "weather cityname" and get a 4 day forcast at the top of the search results. Go Google.

Lame Movie Review: The Swimmer

So I bring this movie on the plane with me thinking, OK, it's a classic. It's got Burt Lancaster. It's perfectly safe to watch in front of other people. When I pop it in, I see it's in color, and it's made in 1968. Still it's Burt Lancaster, so it must still be very tame. I get a little self-conscious of my surroundings when Burt is traipsing everywhere in his swim trunks and another girl joins him in her bikini. I know it's called "The Swimmer", so what did I expect, right? But it's like other times, when it's OK to be in a bathing suit if you're at the beach, but if you're at the airport or on a plane in an aisle seat where several people are close by and could see what you're seeing, it's different somehow.

Then comes the scene where the older couple who are nudists are lounging in their backyard with strategically placed newspapers and chair arms. I'm worried one of these people is going to stand up at any moment. I lean forward to block the view of anybody who might be watching. I'm just waiting one of these days for someone to tell me they are offended by what I'm watching and there are children on this plane and what's wrong with you?

So Burt comes waltzing in, strips off his shorts and we are treated to his bare ass and virtual nudity for what seems like an excruciatingly long scene. I'm practically sweating. I can't even hear what these people are saying, I'm so worried what other people think. And I can't turn around to see if anybody is watching, because then they'll know what I'm thinking. Where's the fast forward button on this thing? Gosh, Burt sure looks good for his age, whatever it is. (I find out later he's 55! He looks incredibly fit for 55.)

Anyway, now that I have my wits about me, this film kind of reminded me of Ulysses.

They Like Me, They Really...etc.

An online litmag called Toasted Cheese has graciously accepted a short story of mine for publication. Go here and click on the story called Sandra and Charlie. It's actually an excerpt of my perenially unfinished novel.