$100 million a day

The Wall Street Journal assures us that our financially beleaguered friends at Goldman-Sachs were still barely limping along in the second quarter of the year.

They're in such dire straits that they only had 46 days in the second quarter where they made $100 million or more. That's right, in about half of the days of the quarter, they only made ONE HUNDRED FREAKIN' MILLION DOLLARS A DAY.

I know. We're all worried about Goldman Sachs. But take heart, those numbers don't include the $20 billion we staked them with to cover their losses on AIG.

tagged: economy, bailout, Goldman-Sachs, Wall Street Journal, AIG

YouTube Tuesday: I figured it out

At least, Craig Ferguson has part of it figured out.



What he's missing is the complicity that our nation's parents have played and are playing in contributing to the cultural worship of youth and stupidity. As parents, it's up to us to make sure that our kids learn the hard lessons in life: That you don't always win, that bad things happen to good people, that there will be times when you don't feel good about yourself but what's important is not how you feel at the moment but how you react and what you decide to do about it, that when you treat others badly you're harming yourself and when you are good to others you enrich yourself.

I don't know if there's any hope for our culture. It's hard to find evidence that there is. But if there is hope, it must include us teaching our progeny to be self sufficient and emotionally mature.

tagged: YouTube, Tuesday, Craig Ferguson, youth, culture, parents

Movie Showdown: I Know Who Killed Me vs. Krull

A couple of weeks ago during a 2 a.m. feeding of our newborn I came to the realization that even though we have something like 500 television channels, there's nothing on at that time of day.

Well, obviously there's programing airing. What I mean is that there is very little that's actually worth watching. So I find myself exploring the upper reaches of the channel lineup -- you know, between Channel 216 (the Biography Network) to Channel 288 (the Independent Film Channel) .

Anyway, as I surfed these esoteric airwaves, I landed on two movies that were airing simultaneously: Krull and I Know Who Killed Me.

At first glance both movies seemed to be equally bad, and I kept flipping between them during commercial breaks and the (many) slow parts. But as my thumb became sore from mashing the "last channel" button on the remote, I thought that there must be some way to determine which movie is worse and just finish watching the least bad movie for the rest of the early morning.

So I looked at both movies according to four criteria to come up with an answer. Now look, these movies aren't worth watching, let along thinking about. So this isn't meant to be any kind of objective analysis.

Anyway, here's what I came up with:

Production value:
Obviously, I Know Who Killed Me (2007, staring Lindsey Lohan) is a more modern production than 1983's Krull (staring... well, nobody really. But a young Liam Neeson has a minor role with a pretty decent death scene).

Krull has all of the goofy animated "friggen' lasers" and stop motion "special" effects that were cutting edge in the early 1980's (when Members Only jackets were also considered cutting edge) but haven't really stood the test of time.

IKWKM is only better because they used modern camera equipment and the original film hasn't deteriorated through multiple late-night airings (yet). There are some very lame-ass dream sequence effects.

Winner (by default) I Know Who Killed Me. 1 Point

---

Acting:
Pretty much a dead heat here. Acting in both movies is so flat it makes Norville "Shaggy" Rogers look like an Oscar nominee. To steal a phrase from Nat X, I've seen better actin' in Tough Actin'® Tinactin®.

Lindsay Lohan lived down to her well-earned reputation as a stripper's actor in IKWKM. She played a psycho, overly sexed split personality potty-mouthed bad girl. I know what you're thinking, quite a stretch for her. And yet even with her copious experience with the material, she somehow found a way to make it seem strained and unbelievable.

But in Krull, the aforementioned Liam Neeson death scene was probably the second best acting job. All of the human actors were upstaged by the giant stop motion spider who guarded The Lady of the Web (seriously, who writes this stuff).

But the biggest disappointment was Neal McDonough, who played Lohan's father in IKWKM. I hoped for more from him since I've like his work in Band of Brothers and Boomtown.

So for Acting, I'll give the nod to Krull only because my expectations were higher for IKWKM.

Winner Krull. 1 Point

---

Writing:
At their cores, both story lines are pretty much the same, that being "let's see how lame of a story we can come up with and how long emawkc will watch before hitting the 'last channel' button or jamming the TV remote into his hear."

But on a more superficial level, Krull is your typical epic quest story, where the hero must acquire a special weapon then travel to the boss monster's lair to kill it. It's pretty much what happened in Lord of the Rings, Conan the Barbarian and Super Mario Bros. Because they didn't do any actual writing, producers were free to blow the money that they would have paid writers on building a bunch of the bladed frisbee Glaive weapons to give away at the wrap party.

IKWKM, on the other hand, is your standard split personality psycho killer horror flick. While the concept had some potential, the writing is so tediously contrived that I wanted to freeze off my own limbs with dry ice just to remind myself that I'm still alive. Since they didn't have to pay a writer, they were able to use the money they saved to provide pain relievers to the editors who had to work for hours on the footage.

Winner Krull. 1 Point

---

Highlights:
Using the term "highlights" to describe these movies is a little like using the term "sober" to describe KC's annual St. Patrick's Day parade. For IKWKM, I guess the highlight was Lohan's sexy pole dance scene. But given her escapades over the past few years and her level of overexposure (in more ways than one), I can't imagine that there was anything in that scene that most people haven't already seen on TMZ.

For Krull, the highlight is probably be the art direction for the Glaive, a weapon which resembles a starfish that grew steel talons. Still, it's impossible to see how an up-and-coming prince could yield this weapon without losing a few fingers.

So again, this one is a tough decision. But since I'm not a misogynist who likes to see pole-dancing strippers mutilated with dry ice, I'll give the nod to Krull in this category.

Winner Krull. 1 Point

---

And the winner is...

So there you have it. By a score of three points to one, Krull beats out IKWKM in this late-night movie showdown. Now, you shouldn't take this as any kind of endorsement of either movie. They're both about as entertaining as an open head wound. But at least the next time producers decide to do a nostalgic 30th Anniversary re-release of Krull, they can use the slogan "Hey, at least it wasn't as bad as I Know Who Killed Me."

tagged: movie, review, Krull, I Know Who Killed Me, glaive, pop culture

Friday Blogthing: Mad world

This nasty little viral marketing campaign has been super successful for AMC and the producers of Mad Men.

It's not that original, but anytime you appeal to a person's vanity and ask them to "Madmen Yourself" (or Elf yourself, or South Park yourself), chances are you'll get a good response.

It doesn't hurt that Mad Men it probably one of the five best shows currently airing on any network. New season begins at 9 p.m. Central on Sunday, Aug. 16.

That's me on the left, giving fashion advice to Don Draper.

Click here to MadMen yourself.

tagged: Friday Blogthing, Mad Men, Don Draper, pop culture, meme, viral marketing

Iron man

The ironic thing is that as I was trying to iron my pants this morning for work, I would iron one side but at the same time I was accidentally ironing new wrinkles into the other side.

I know. Ironic.

tagged: irony, iron, pants

YouTube Tuesday: War is hell

Believe it or not something very similar to this happened at a company I used to work for... shortly before it went out of business.


tagged: YouTube, Tuesday, video, battle, war, office, nerf

Police state cometh

There's a lot of hoo-hah and bluster going on right now about how stupidly the cops in Cambridge, Mass. acted for arresting a guy who was breaking and entering his own house.

Every one is all verklempt by the outrageous actions of the police, or the outrageous actions of Professor Gates, or the outrageous comments of the president. In short, everyone is outraged.

Me? Meh. I can't say I'm surprised by the incident. And frankly, as a society we probably deserve it.

For year's we've been told by politicians that we're in huge trouble. We're on the brink of disaster from terrorists, or economic calamity, or illegal aliens, or unfettered gun ownership, or swine flu. Pick your poison, we're dying from pretty much everything these days.

The result, of course, it that we willingly vote for people who say they can protect us. Sure it will cost us about half our annual income in taxes each year. But isn't that a small price to pay for security and the promise of long life?

Well except for those times where our protective golem turns against us. The Gates/Crowley incident is only one recent example.

In Western Australia recently, police used "non-lethal" weapon to subdue a crazy gasoline fume sniffer. Unfortunately, this made the perp a little hot under the collar.

Mitchell's sister told The Australian newspaper that her brother had been sniffing petrol.

"He must have put petrol on his face, then the policeman shot him with the Taser, that's when the flames happened," she said.

Police Commissioner Karl O'Callaghan said Mr Mitchell was a known violent offender, and defended the police officers' deployment of the Taser.

I'm not saying the Taser wasn't justified. Probably it was. Still...

Then there's the case of Boise, Idaho cops who when crazy with their Tasers:

The February incident was captured by an audio recording made by one of the police officers at the unidentified man's home.

"If you move again, I'm going to stick this Taser up your (expletive) and pull the trigger," one of the officers said. "Now, do you feel this in your (expletive)? - I'm going to Tase your (expletive) if you move again."

Police violated the department's use-of-force policy when the officers Tasered the man once in the back before he was handcuffed, and then in the buttocks after he was handcuffed...

Look, I'm not down on cops. I like the police in general.

What I'm sayin' is that we have ourselves to blame. In general we're tending to put too much faith in "the authorities" to look out for us, instead of looking out for each other, keeping each other safe, making sure our neighbors and families aren't starving, or sick (physically or mentally).

If we make the government collectively responsible for everything, then the governed aren't individually responsible for anything.

tagged: police, Gates, Crowley, taser, government

Friday Blogthing: All revved up with no place to go

Okay, I admit it. I had to do this quiz a couple of times before my result came up with a Ferrari rather than a lame-ass Mercedes.

I'm a Ferrari 360 Modena!

You've got it all. Power, passion, precision, and style. You're sensuous, exotic, and temperamental. Sure, you're expensive and high-maintenance, but you're worth it.

"Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

tagged: Friday, Blogthing, Ferrari Modena, quiz, personality, car, Mercedes

The Legend of Dexter, Part I

Let me introduce you to Dexter the Wonder Dog.

No, he wasn't named after Dexter the serial killer of criminals. He's been around much longer than that. He was actually named after Dexter, the boy genius.

Anyway, you may recognize him as a Jack Russell Terrier. Not sure how much you know about dog breeds, but this particular strain of terrier was originally bred back in the days of yore by the Parson Jack Russell, hence the name (this isn't getting too complicated for you, is it?).

It turns out that foxes were a huge problem in England back in Master Russell's day, and he needed a dog that would chase foxes, weasels and the like into their burrows and bring them back out or hold them there until they could be dug out. So the dogs had to be fierce, brave and smart, not to mention very athletic with lots of stamina (If you've ever chased a weasel into a hole, you know what I mean).

Our boy Dexter is all of these things. In fact, it is his superior intelligence and athleticism that allows him to do such things as Sit...

... Sit Up ...
... Lay Down ...... Roll Over...... Play Dead ...
... Stand ...... Dance ...... Take a Bow ...
... And even jump through hoops ...
Dog is smart, is what I'm sayin'. And while he's generally good tempered (he especially likes people (unless you're wearing a US Postal Service Uniform, then God help you...)), he has neither love nor patience for rodents roaming around his backyard.

Rabbits are summarily chase out without exception. And normally ubiquitous squirrels in our neighborhood caused him no end of agita as they taunted him from the treetops.

That is until a few weeks ago.

It was a pleasant mid-summer's day. Dexter was on his regular daily patrol in the back yard when he noticed one of the evil gray squirrels sharpening its teeth on our daughter's swing set.

He immediately gave chase, barking like Christian Bale on crystal meth. In a few seconds he had the quarry treed in one of the river birches we have in the yard.

Dexter barked and chased the squirrel from tree to tree for the next couple of hours. Yes, hours. That's why we sometimes call him The Tenacious D. He doesn't give up easily.

Eventually the squirrel made its way back to the wood-frame swing set. Typically, a squirrel will run back and forth across the top ridge of the swing set, working to get Dexter out of position so that it can make a running jump to the chain link fence and escape to the safety of the neighbor's yard.

But not this day. On this day, Dexter was on his game. He had put too much time and effort into chasing this furry offender, and he wasn't about to let him go.

When the squirrel made the leap, Dexter was ready. The rodent hit the ground and Dexter was on him in a flash. Powerful canine jaws immediately clenched on fragile rodent throat.

A few violent shakes of the head and the snap of a spine and it was all over.

The story was relayed to me by my backyard neighbor, who works from home and saw the whole thing (no doubt highly annoyed by the incessant barking, but entertained nonetheless by the exciting ending). He said he saw Dexter carry the carcass and leave it along the south fence line. I looked but couldn't find the remains of the squirrel.

I assumed that Dexter had devoured his hard-earned bounty. But a few days later I found the dead squirrel as I was mowing. It was undefiled by Dexter, aside from a bit of gnawing on its tail. Yes, it was smelly and maggot-infested, but Dexter hadn't eaten so much as an ear.

It was all sport for him. A killing driven by a deep instinctual need to fulfill that for which he was bred.

I should mention also that I haven't seen a squirrel in our back yard since this incident.

tagged: dog, pets, Dexter, Jack Russell Terrier, hunt, squirrel, wildlife

In my head

This post probably falls into that "random thoughts" category that you see so much of when people are feeling particularly uninspired.

Except, this is probably a step lower than that, since these random strains of non-contemporaneous stream of conscientiousness aren't really meant to be cohesive thoughts as such, just a snapshot of the words that happen to have bounced around my gray matter at various moments in the past couple of weeks.

Anyway, submitted for your ennui:

• Damn, it must be time to get out a new razor blade. It feels like I'm shaving with a rusty Ginsu knife! Shit! I just cut my upper-lip mole. That's going to bleed like crazy.
  
  
• Oh c'mon lady! Who writes out a check these days! We're living in the future now! Fer cryin' gyahhhh!
  
  
• Where the heck is everyone, it's only 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Did I miss the "take the day off early" memo?
  
  
• Ooookay, by the looks of these urinals I guess housekeeping took the day off.
  
  
• It was nice to sleep in. But wait a minute. If you get up at 3:30 in the morning then go back to sleep at 5, then get back up at 6 then go to sleep at 7 and sleep until 9:30... is that really sleeping in? or does it count as an early morning nap?
  
  
• That Peter Sarsgaard is really coming off like a pretentious douche (I was watching him on Conan at the time -- Edit.). "Oh, I live in England and I got married in Puglia and had my honey moon on the Amalfi Coast and I'm soooo much better than everyone." Just take it easy man. We're both from the same side of the tracks here. Orphan is just another lame horror flick. It's not the second coming of Citizen Kane.
  
  
• What the...?! Who the...?! What are you talking about?!
  
  
• I wonder who decided that an ellipsis is three dots and not, say, two or four.
  
  
• Peter Sarsgaard's name is fun to say in a pirate accent. "SAAARSGAAAAHHHHHRRRD!!!"
  


• I need to stop intentionally mispronouncing the word nuclear just for laughs. It's getting a little too easy.

tagged: blog, random, stream of conscientiousness, Peter Sarsgaard, nuclear, ellipsis, ennui