Out of Order

Eight years (or so) ago, there was a show about couples, marriage, and relationships and how they deal with addiction, depression and infidelity called Out of Order. (View the trailer.) It was a wonderful program, and it did feature a wonderfully hot scene with a nude Justine Bateman. Totally worth it.

I do not know what made me think of the show today, but I felt compelled to watch it.

So, I went looking for it.  First stop, Amazon.com.

I found the listing (here) and realized that is was just the pilot.  Not all six episodes.  Irritating, to say the least.

There are some episodes on YouTube but they are cut into nine minute pieces and are fairly crappy quality.

So, does anyone have any ideas on where I could find the full series, preferably on DVD?

The final scene of the show...

Arrested Development News

Movie Trailers - Movies Blog

I love Arrested Development, and it will never get old. This non news news is still good.

Via Vulture.

Odd Dreams Again

I had fleas. Fleas.

How odd and off putting is that?

I was trying to escape from a desert, and I was covered in fleas.

Why was I in the desert? I was there because I was told to be there. Someone had made a threat against me, and offered me a painful death or a trip into the desert. I chose the desert and wandered. I cannot remember if I had the fleas before I went in or they were a function of the wasteland.

The racism of everyday.

I had to go to a hardware store this morning and saw these...




For a second look, I blew up the image...




How is that appropriate?

Is this casually racist or deliberately so?

Tastes Like #Winning!

Charlie Sheen's Winning Recipes from Charlie Sheen

Yes, yes...I know that Charlie Sheen's moment is over and there is anti-Charlie backlash, but this is funny. Really funny. Beer out of the nose funny.

So, forgive me for this. Thanks, Sean, and a H/T!

What is the essential nature of a creature?

I had a dream last night where I was berated by Fish about the difference between alligators and crocodiles.

When I woke up, I thought not of the dream but about one of my favorite fables, the Monkey and the Crocodile though in the version I have heard so often, the crocodile eats the monkey because that is his true nature. This may be a variation of The Scorpion and the Frog with the roles reversed.

Anyway, in honor of that, I made a playlist that reflects the version of The Monkey and the Crocodile that I remember.

The Monkey & The Crocodile:
Modern Man - Arcade Fire
Paper And Glue - Emma Pollock
Is It Wicked Not To Care? - Belle And Sebastian
Tighten Up - The Black Keys
Freckle - Copper
Down By The Water - The Decemberists
This Is Why We Fight - The Decemberists
Love Like We Do - Edie Brickell & New Bohemians
Maybe I'm Amazed - Jem
Crosses - Jose González
Remember My Name - Keri Noble
Mr. Brightside - The Killers
Suedehead - Morrissey
See America Right - The Mountain Goats
Lotus Flower - Radiohead
Empty - Ray LaMontagne
Jump In the River - Sinéad O'Connor
Call The Doctor - Sleater Kinney
Walking With a Ghost - Tegan and Sara
Throw It All Away - Feat. Sia - Zero 7
Bulletproof Weeks - Matt Nathanson



Only after that, did I remember being berated in the dream.

For the Sake of Art

Remember last year when I went bowling to benefit the UAG?

It looked something like this.

(I know that I look pissed off. It is probably because I hate bowling. But I am doing it anyway.)

Yes, FPR is the Team Leader again of the Primitives.

The UAG does a lot of very good things, and has always organized many 1st Friday events in Albany. I know a lot of you reading this have attended those. Have you ever thrown any money in the donation bucket? If you haven't (for whatever reason), here is your chance to rectify that oversight.

You can donate here.

Or ever better, if you want to be a bowler, you can register here.

Apropos of nothing

"Do you need transportation? Tools? Stuff?"
"Our opponent is an alien starship packed with atomic bombs," I said. "We have a protractor."
"Okay, I will go home and see if I can scrounge up a ruler and a piece of string."

Lenten Obligation

I was raised Roman Catholic, in a particularly Irish Catholic way. Guilt and praise were handed out in equal measures and I was taught to reflect upon things. This aspect of my family life has probably had the most profound effect upon me.

Yesterday was Mardi Gras, and today is Ash Wednesday, the start of the Lenten season.

When I was growing up, my mother, and my teachers encouraged us not just to give something up, but to promise to do something active as well for the forty days.

While I am no longer a Roman Catholic, or even a person of faith, I can respect the tradition of sacrifice, doing good, and reflection that this season implies.

I have made my choice about what I am giving up and I am trying to figure out what good I am going to do on a daily basis as part of this period. Anything that I can think of seems trite and that is not really the point. So, my burden is to think of a goodness to do before then end of the day, and one that I can repeat on a daily basis.

And yes, I did go get my ashes.

On Portland and the Decemberists

(I love the Decemberists and the PNW.)

Conversation with my brother:

Dan: Who is this?
Me: The Decemberists.
("This is why we fight" was on MusicChoice.)
Dan: What are people from Portland fighting?
Me: Mediocrity.
Dan: (Laughter) That was quick.

Now back to your regularly scheduled evening.

Oh, Boy! Tiki's coming back.

Tiki wants to unretire.

Don't get me wrong, I loved Tiki as a running back for the New York Football Giants and I love the Giants, but...Tiki shouldn't be back, and he should not be coming back for these reasons.

From the article:

Barber's personal and professional life have been in shambles recently. In April 2010, Barber reportedly left his wife of 11 years, Ginny, for 23-year-old Traci Johnson, a former NBC intern. Ginny was eight months pregnant at the time. Soon after, NBC cited its morals clause and terminated Barber's contract, which reportedly paid him more than $300,000 per year.
In June 2010, the New York Post reported Barber was broke and couldn't pay his divorce settlement with his ex-wife.


But...what about your books, Tiki?

Edit:

No, I am not expecting Tiki to come back to the Giants nor was I implying that. Do the Giants really need another running back who is my age?

Warriors, come out to playehhh!

Speaking of 70s movies, Lux just sent me this link about the classic film "The Warriors".

I love this movie, though I disagree with A.O. Scott that this is a dystopian world, this is just New York before it was "cleaned up" by Rudy.

It is a wonderful film for those rainy afternoons.

An Admission

I really do not like the Godfather films. (Well, with the exception of Mary's death scene in Godfather 3. That's brilliant.)

It isn't that I don't like long film series full of minutiae, because I do, (With the exception of the Star Wars films and the Lord of the Rings trilogy obviously.) and I enjoy immersing myself in a fabricated universe.

But...

The Godfather films do not do it for me. There was something tawdry about them, wrapping in elegance what were despicable people doing despicable things. At least the Sopranos, which was brilliant for the time that it ran but has not aged well based on recent viewing, acknowledged the flaws inherent in a system based on crime and evil. Yes, evil.

So, why is this relevant today?

Apparently, Francis Ford Coppola had the same issues with the film that I did and only did it for the money. (Citation)

This gives me a feeling of justification and validation. For the record, I really liked THX 1138.

Five Artistic Geniuses Who Only Became Great After Selling Out

This Wins The Internet (Today) #Winning

Kim Jong-Il looking at glass.

Kim Jong-Il Looking At Things

H/T to Paige

Three Songs from Shuffle

I give iTunes and the iPod line of products more credit than they are due.

They are not intelligent and I am assuming that the shuffle function did not do this "on purpose".

(Why, yes, I am providing intent in behavior to software.)

This is a supreme example of "One of these things is not like the other."


Keri Noble - Remember My Name


Danzig - Mother


Emma Pollock - Paper & Glue

So, see folks? Ascribing intent, consciousness or sentience to iTunes is a bad idea, as it is obviously not ready to make a mix. My only real question is how the algorithm that selects the songs for shuffling put these three together.

Seriously Odd Dreams

The iPhone:
I was at a family function and I was considerably young, as were my relatives, and I had let one of my aunts play with my iPhone which was all well and good until she wanted to see how durable it was.

She asked, "Will it bounce?" and threw it to the floor.

"No, it will break."

When I looked down, it was in pieces. The screen was intact but the innards were all over the place. There was one black piece that I identified as the internal speaker which would not mount properly within the casing.

My aunt was apologetic, telling me that she would replace it. I refused and there was a two day (subjective) search for a replacement phone, which took me to the "Cell Phone Store" to have it replaced. The sales person kept trying to get me to buy another phone and there may have been violence.

In the end, I gave up on finding a new phone.

The Party:
TEA and I were in formal wear while walking through the woods, and Donald Rumsfeld walked by and pointed to a castle/mansion that was being built across the valley (quickly too, we could see the dome being built in a matter of minutes). He told us that there was a party going on and we were invited.

Once TEA and I arrived at the castle, we were shown the dining room, and then taken to another room where we were to stay during the course of the party. TEA and I were upset, with TEA asking "Why would they treat us this way?"

"I don't know, buddy."

As more fake guests arrived, we tried to figure out a way to escape the room so we could go to the party. Yes, dream logic works this way. We all still wanted to go to the party, not escape this magic house of horrors that Donald Rumsfeld was building.

There was a harrowing escape, and I was able to protect TEA, even though I ended up getting shot in the arm.

In contrast to the very pleasant dreams that I had enjoy on Saturday and Sunday mornings, these were a little bit of a letdown.

Interesting or not

Meeting someone new is always interesting...

Whether it is a random occurrence or a friend saying that you should meet "X" because you two would get along really well.

I met X today and she was everything that was promised. She was also a little too young.

Not that I am an old, but I am set in my ways, and maybe that is my problem.

Anyway, that is not the point of this...

The point of this is, we had a conversation where we asked a series of get to know you questions and she asked one of the best ones I have ever heard. (In her defense, I started the series of questions with something about "Desert Island Music" and she went from there.)

"You have two minutes to live and you have the means to make a phone call. Who do you call?"

The follow-up to that is "What do you say?" but thankfully, that was unasked.

I know my answer, and I did not have to think about it, though it did cause reflection, but it struck me as interesting.

Who would I want the last person that I ever spoke to to be...

And what would I say?

Would my dying words be a burden or something they would treasure?

It made me think of a number of things. I always tell TEA, my mother, and my father that I love them when I get off the phone with them or when I am leaving because I want them to know that if anything happens, that was the last thing that I said.

It seems trite, but is helps me sleep at night.

So...what would you want the last thing you said to someone to be? Something bitter, something loving or something innocuous?

Rebuilding Cities and Dead Girls

You have horror films and then you have horror films. There are some films that are scary and terrifying for their gore and realism and then there are other that are terrifying not because what they are presenting is believable but more for what they are presenting in terms of ideas. Deadgirl (Official Site) is one of the latter films.

From Deadgirl (Wikipedia):

They discover a mute, naked woman in the basement, chained to a table. While J.T. is interested in raping her, Rickie refuses and leaves. J.T. confronts Rickie the next day, and the two return to the basement where J.T. reveals that the woman is undead, which he discovered after fruitlessly attempting to kill her three times.

Yes, that is what I find horrifying. Find a chained up woman, and...well..."let's rape her"!

This movie has stuck with me, and I find it a disturbing. You can see more about it at Deadgirl (IMDB).

If you are interested in seeing it, it was going to have a television premiere next week on Chiller. I believe it is Saturday night at 8 pm. I will be paying attention to hockey.




In other zombie news, I was talking to Fish about something (maybe about what movie to watch) and she mentioned that she had found a giant time suck of a flash game that had zombies. Yep, she shared the link with me. Yes, I was sucked in for playing for hours. Yes, I may hate her a little bit because of it. (No, I don't, well maybe a little.) Anyway, the game is Rebuild and it is fun and slightly addictive. Thanks, Fish!