Stuff I Left Out

I have to say that I'm pretty proud of our politicians, overall, because they are following through with their promises. For months and months and months all we heard about was how America needs a nude erection, and lo and behold ever since November all we've heard about is the President's stimulus package. See? Who says there isn't accountability in government?

But btw Mr Prez the car wasn't invented in the USA. A fellow named Benz did that. Just fyi. We're the guys who figured out a way to mass produce it and make it affordable. And ever since we stopped doing those two things stuff has changed. You'll notice.

Residue from the Oscars. Newsflash; Angelina Jolie still looks like a vacuous goggle-eyed snapping turtle. Seriously folks, just as Julia Roberts reminds me of a horse I bet on in 1987, once you strip away the trappings and the makeup and the aura methinks Angelina is basically pretty ugly. And even worse so when she puts on that pouty ice-princess bitch face. Dude.

I can't be the only guy on Earth who understands that the "current economic crisis" will be solved when we go out and buy stuff. Can I? I mean... I can't possibly be the only person on Earth who gets that right? I said RIGHT??

I've discovered that whenever you hear a politician complain that government spending is ruining our grand children's future you will also find that the same politician has voted to support the spending of $720,000,000 a day in Iraq for the last six years based on weapons of mass destruction that weren't there. So who you crappin?

I don't want Senator Roland Burris to resign. I want him to stay in the Senate so we can watch him self-destruct before our eyes through a long and torturous process of crashing and burning while he hides behind the color of his skin and brutally embarrasses himself like a naked fat man balancing on a telephone pole, do nothing for Illinois and then be completely destroyed as a human being and left for the drek of the world when he runs for the office on his own in two years. It isn't that I have anything against him, it's just that that sounds better than Top Chef right now.

Newsflash. Governor Bobby Jindahl of Louisiana is running for President in 2012. I also can't be the only person on Earth who found his sing-songy and condescending campaign launching that was poorly disguised as a "Republican Rebuttal" difficult to listen to last night. I've heard fingernails on chalkboards more symphonic that the sad crap he tried to pull. Jesus dude, we already knew who you were. You are on record saying you want the Patriot Act to become permanent so you know what...? Go fuck yourself.

Now let's get back to this nude erection idea....

Under-Appreciated Because of the Packaging

For a lot of people this song would be fantastic if it wasn't the packaging behind it. Love the song, hate the singer. But I don't feel so negative myself, and that helps - I think - take this song as a little more than what it seems like to a lot of people.

Forget the singer, if that's your problem. Note I didn't run the YouTube version - just fer youse.

Close your eyes and try it again...

And once again, welcome to my iPod.

Eyes without a face - Billy Idol

"Readin' murder books, tryin' to stay hip" is writing a lot of writers would kill to be able to produce. Just sayin...

Prepping The Majestic

In honor of Oscar Night I'm adding a movie theatre to the town (which hasn't been named yet).

But since this is 1919 the movie posters and "what's playing" have to be accurate. You will see a lot of attention to whatever accuracy is possible throughout the project.

I found a resource online that displays movie posters year by year and downloaded a bunch. Then I kept shrinking them down until I found the right scale. To give you an idea of the scale we're talking about... here's a bunch of display boards with shrunken posters already attached. That's a nickel...



So I decide what's playing is a movie by Charlie Chaplin and one by Tom Mix - both released and viewed during the year 1919. The other posters are used... they're just inside the theatre. Once I get it lit, you'll be able to see the lobby. Until then, let's get some popcorn!

First Tries

A midwestern town in 1919. Three days before Christmas.

Striking Back

It's February and I am preparing for Christmas.

When I was a boy I would fly away on the magic of that season. There would be no end to the fantasy. It went on and on in full technicolor when I closed my eyes. The season seemed to last a hundred years, and every last thing was enchanted. Snow, no snow, cold, warm, strung lights or darkness. It didn't matter.

Every little boy's flight away from reality - I had it. Every little boy's anxious list, furtive looks up into the sky on Christmas Eve, checks on one's Ps and Qs. I engaged in it, and mastered it. I was at the Alamo. I was with Napoleon. I was with Ben Franklin. Davy Crockett was a personal friend of mine. My Christmases were so thick, so rich, so packed, real, so unforgettable - and all of it in my spinning little boy's head - it was a wonder I could function the rest of the year.

But I could function the rest of the year because the dead of winter snowball fights and snowmen were legendary. The start of baseball's spring training sent me to my baseball glove to start treating it with oil for the coming season. The Fourth of July. Thanksgiving, a hint of Christmas, and there it was again. That's how I survived, come to think of it.

And then I grew up.

And Christmases when my daughters were small were just as full, and just as magic, and fed the same fantasies, only in behalf of the girls I would put to bed with "A Night Before Christmas" - and fully aware how they squirmed in the same deep anticipation I had when I was them.

But something happened. It happened just in the last few years. The last two Christmases have been miserable in all kinds of ways. And I found myself - in early January - saying to myself "God I hope there's never another Christmas at all. Ever."

And of course this won't fly. It will never do. I have a grand daughter and she's in the Yuletide tornado now. And though the last two Christmases were spent in absolute familial misery, she went on with her fantasies. But I didn't hook into them. I lost two rounds of her excitement. Gone. Out the bloody window - thanks to people around me (people I love) acting like losers and madmen and drunken morons to the point where I hated Christmas. There were some days right after New Year's where I would have told you - quite frankly - to stick Christmas up your ass.

But I can't.

Coursing through the winter there has been one over-riding desire in the back of my head. To reclaim my Christmas from the drunken, crazy, angry, silly blue meanies in my extended family. And late last month I hit on the idea.

I am going to build a Christmastime toy train fantasy to beat them all and grab my energy, my fantasy, and the deep richness of it all. I am going to hold onto it and work it and discharge the finished product the day after Thanksgiving.

The work has begun. I shall report as it progresses. Wait until you see this...

I Just Lived A Fantasy

I finally did it.

I called back one of those unGodly unknown numbers you get that call you even though you're on the Do Not Call List and when they answered I said "what did you call me for?"

And then I got this song and dance (first it was 866-808-0880 which comes up a Veterans' Benefit thing when you check the number online, then it was 205-561-2780 with a read-out of Tuscaloosa Alabama) about making a donation to disabled veterans. It was the Alabama number I called back.

Let me clarify for you how this works...

If you are a worker at one of these phone banks every day you come in your name changes. That is to say when you walk in you look up at the board and see what name they've assigned you for the day. If anybody says "what is your name" you tell them the phony one. That way whatever happens you are covered. Tomorrow you'll have a different name, and believe me by next week you'll have forgotten what your name was and if an angry person calls back and asks for that name, you're "I don't know him" will be very convincing.

Anyway I called back this number from Tuscaloosa and got a very smarmy guy. I said "I got a call from this number?" And he went into his act.

Folks... I've done this. I know how it works. I let loose a stream of pretty bloody invective, explaining that I'm on the Do-Not-Call List and don't want these calls any more - which meant nothing to him. I told him to commit a sexual act upon his mother. I said he could do things with his "parts" that would raise the eyebrows of Larry Flynt. Then I asked to speak to his supervisor so I could "sue your ass if you call me back again."

He was p-O'd at me! WOOO! But who cares? He's a lowlife scumbag who never worked a day in his life and preys on the good intentions of honest people in a down economy. He is everything that is wrong with capitalism and cynicism all rolled into one. I know this because I was him once.

So his sweet-voiced (aka alarming to angry people) "supervisor" picks up the line. Now if I was a novice at this I would have been taken aback by her very first question, which went like this...

"Jason?"

"Jason? My name isn't Jason."

(Here's what she wants to know, because if you say your name you're less likely to be rude... try it) "So what is you name?"

To which I answered.... "What's YOUR name?"

And she goes "Fatima."

Uh..... sure it is. I just laughed (remember the name board they check when they come in).

So here is this lady - a sweet little angel with a southern accent. I asked for her address. She gave me a location in Indiana. I said - why are you giving me an address in Indiana when this call came from Tuscaloosa, Alabama? Well... you know... this is a national company. Sir (you can tell they are getting agitated when they start calling you "sir").

So I asked, well tell me - since this is a national company - how much of my dollar goes to the veterans? And check this - THEY HAVE TO ANSWER EXPLICITLY OR IT IS FRAUD - she says "12% goes to the veterans...." and she tried to go on with her explanation but I interrupted her.

Wait a minute. Do you mean to tell me that for every dollar I send you, 88 cents of it will go to your company? Yes sir - we're a fund-raising company, we have telephone bills and electricity and wages, and...

I stopped her (because I recognized the argument. I was trained at it once, you see). I asked her why I should give her a dollar when if I just walked up to a homeless vet and gave him a buck he'd get 100% of it!

Her answer - "because you wouldn't". At which time I replied that she could go fornicate herself, because I have. Not only have I - but she has no way of knowing if I have or haven't.

I let her understand that I'm on to the game. That no legitimate fund raiser works like this. That they send what they can to "Veterans" to keep the Feds away from the scam. That they ARE subject - despite what she told me - to the Do Not Call List. That in a week I'd be surprised if this Tuscaloosa number was operational any more. And that she could reach on over across the state line and kiss my lily-scented ass.

I gave her my standard good-bye... "I'll be seein' ya." And she said bye-bye.

I have always wanted to do that. I feel really really good.

For This House

between what is broken
and what is sold
is the place
where there is empty space
to fill with dirt or gold

Old School

They used to tell us, when I was in high school and getting cast in every play they had, that we had the most wonderful collection of talent for such a level that anyone could remember. We had people who had nothing to do with our school coming to see our theatre productions because we had a reputation. Folks were simply amazed at us.

We were a high school drama group, but we had local newspapers and all that coming by. The audience sizes were something to remark about. We were STARS.

Taking that as the natural course of the world, and that what that all meant was that I would just naturally take the acting world by storm and have sixteen Oscars in no time, I set out on my wondrous career convinced I would be the greatest thing to happen to acting since Oedipus Rex. Gods gift to the floorboards. The fantastic fury of film.

I managed a few odd roles and even had a part waiting for me in a thing being done by Malkovich. I got beat out by someone you know for Second City (he was in a movie called Groundhog Day, btw) and I watched John Mahoney audition for shit before anybody knew who he was.

And I walked away from it.

Part of me had already come to the conclusion that this wasn't what I wanted. I didn't like the actor's life. I craved a normal life. "Being somebody" never - ever - was important to me. You ask the folks that knew me back in school and they would tell you how hard it was to find me. The bohemian way of going was not my deal.

But there was something else too. I came from an environment where everyone told you you were a star. The greatest thing since... you know... Oedipus. Oh you kids are so great. Wonderful. Nothing like you anywhere. And you take that ethic and walk into the world thinking you're going to conquer it all.

And then you sit at an audition where REAL actors have assembled, and you notice right off the bat that THESE guys on stage don't look ANYTHING like the guy who was just sitting next to you a second ago, and there's been no make-up or rehearsal. One minute they are sitting next to you raising their eyebrows about this or that and the next minute their name is called and they go onstage and you don't even recognize them. And it dawns on you there is a level of acting prowess you never even considered as possible that SOME people have been part and parcel of from the start. And for all your collected kudos they were light years - eons - ahead of your game before you even knew words existed.

They weren't the guy in the next seat anymore. They were somebody else. Immediately. They didn't even look like themselves, and it was a natural transition. Natural. Un-noticed.

That's what makes an actor. You stop seeing him, as he is, and can't get this new being out of your mind. It's why I wish Sean Penn would just act and shut the hell up otherwise, because if you ignore his politics he's the greatest actor in America right now - bar none.

Well anyway...

Word comes to me today that James Whitmore has died. He's not been in any sci-fi stuff I know of and most of the blogging generation probably doesn't even know him. More's the pity.

We used to say - back when acting counted for something besides receipts - that you could tell a great actor by the fact that no one role reminded you of any other he did. That each one was fresh and new, and he couldn't be "typed" because there was a huge range that he did and did well. That's kind of why I'm so disappointed in De Niro and Jack Nicholson - who now just play different versions of themselves from one thing to the next. But above all, the real test is when you didn't ever notice the "acting."

You forget it is acting. That's the only true test.

LINK

It's because you don't notice the "acting" that makes him so great. That's the entire secret. I will miss James Whitmore TERRIBLY.

God bless you sir. God bless you forever.

We Sure Are Stupid

The banks got a gift from the US taxpayers just a short while ago in an effort - we were told - to "loosen up the credit markets." Well the company I work for has been looking for a line of credit loan since December with no luck. Every time they come back from a meeting with the bankers it's always "wow, it's tough to get a loan." This, of course, was all precipitated by the fact that the existing loan - though being perfectly serviced by us - was canceled as of Jan 3.

But it isn't just us. Nobody can get a loan. However you will note that there were tons of bonuses paid out to people who run banks, just after they got the influx of money from the government.

I find it not strange at all that the move to pass the approval for giving that money to the banks flew through the house and senate with just a momentary ripple; but in the end there was great bipartisan support to get that money into the hands of the bankers because, by jingo we really need to loosen up the credit markets. Republicans and Democrats alike marched in pretty much good order, with only a handful of people from both parties trying to say "wait a min..." before they were trampled over, to get this done because "it's an emergency."

If it was such an emergency how come it's as hard to get a loan now as it was right before the government handed out the money?

And why - when we had a Republican in the White House - we got lectures about how government spending can stimulate the economy from places like the National Review, but now all of a sudden government spending is bad again?

And if government spending is just generically bad, what about the $720,000,000 A DAY we spend in Iraq? Are the people who defended the second worst President in US history and label any critic of his failed policies as "a hater" (and by the way, fuck you for saying that you bunch of whining shits) saying it's better to spend $720,000,000 a day in Iraq better than turning that over to our states and cities? Why the hell should I be more concerned about democracy and infrastructure in Iraq than democracy and infrastructure right here in America?

I know the stimulus package is not the same as the money given away to the banks late last year, but how come welfare for banks who failed is basically alright, but welfare to people trying to get by out in the real world suddenly generates such heavy static?

And will somebody please stick a hot dog in Barney Frank's face to get him to shut up? And while you're at it tell me again why Rush Limbaugh's opinion is something I need to care about?

And is one of the requirements for getting into President Obama's cabinet that you be at least a little conveniently stupid about your taxes and tax law and actually owe the government some money?

Exactly how stupid are we, again... I mean since the folks in Washington on both sides of the aisle think we're not noticing this stuff?