Johnny Waddshisface

Whenever I'm in Bendigo (which has really only been three times so far) I stop to have morning tea at this little health food shop, where I enjoy a nice mango smoothie and a low-fat nut slice.

There's a guy who works there (who I presume is the owner), and I swear to God this is what he looks like;


Yes, 1970s porn star John Holmes. He even has the moustache and everything.

I think he'd be a bit of a crap boss to work for. I've seen him telling off two different employees on two seperate occassions in this really pissy manner. I think one of them might have even been his own daughter.

I guess the most unusual aspect of it is that you don't really expect a guy who looks like a dead porn star to be the owner of a country health food shop. You expect him to be selling drugs, or appearing at parties as a look-alike that the host hires to freak people out.

It also just occurred to me that maybe I should be worrying about what's in the mango smoothie.

...

...

... meh. It still tastes pretty damn good.

Costume Drama

Our Halloween party is this Friday night. Originally, I was planning on going as Donnie Darko. You know, from the movie Donnie Darko?


It's a costume I've been wanting to do literally for years, and finally I had my chance!

I thought it'd be a simple thing. They were selling adult skeleton costumes at Toys R Us, and I now have a plurality of hoodies. I was all set. My long-held ambitions of Darko-ness were finally coming to fruition.

Until I went to Toys R Us, and was told they'd sold out of all their Halloween costumes.

%$^# !!!

I went with Simone to the local costume shop, and while they had what she needed to complete her outfit, I was too much of a fussy baby to try on any of the grody looking skeleton costumes they had for rent. If it wasn't a pristine $15 dollar, never-before-worn Toys R Us skeleton costume, I wasn't interested. Yes, I'm that pouty and difficult.

So now I've improvised a costume that, while not as good, is still something fun and not a complete cop-out. It'll make for some interesting photos, at least. And in the meantime, I shall sleep and I shall hope, and I shall wait, until the day comes, where my Darko-est dreams come true.

*emo tear*

Going to Stay at this Place in Bendigo

It's not for a month yet, but am super-excited!

I Think I'd Spot More Celebrities if I Knew Something About Sports

I just got back from one of those low-impact occassional walks I mentioned before. While I was out there, marvelling at the local real estate, I ran into a giant. The guy was well over six foot tall, all muscles and Roger David t-shirt and what not, and had a face that could have been chiselled by DaVinci himself (if he wasn't too busy piecing together suitably enigmatic codes).

I started feeling a bit depressed about how a guy who was so stereotypically macho and good-looking could also have gotten to a place in his face where he could afford to own the incredible house he was walking out of. And then it occurred to me .... maybe he was a footballer! That would explain it all, and then I wouldn't have to feel bad about myself at all. No, those darn footballers get everything handed to them on a silver platter, they do!

But of course, knowing nothing about football, there was no way I was going to recognise him (unless he was Warne Carey, Warwick Capper or that one with 'Mayhem' written on his stomach).

That got me to thinking - being that I live in Melbourne, and my office is in Chapel street, I'm more than likely surrounded by famous sporting figures a good portion of the time, and am completely oblivious to it.

Of course, I knew who Grant Hackett was when I sold him some popcorn at the movies. But everyone knows the Aussie cricket team...

What Girl/Man Could Possibly Resist?

And in other Pree-related matters, there is an ever-growing circle of people who believe Pree looks like David Zayas of Oz and Dexter fame.



Yes?

Frank Miller Hates Weak Babies (or, "A Belated Critique of 300")

I had my monthly trip to Bendigo today, and as is always the case when I travel to Bendigo, I listened exclusively to my iRiver on the way there and back (well ... always the case when I have an operational iRiver).

I enjoy listening to the 300 soundtrack sometimes, as it's highly evocative music that helps to inspire the imagination (or, in Ben's case, the desire to run).

Usually when listening to it, I start daydreaming about stories, but today I started thinking about 300 itself and its many, many flaws.

Certainly it's racist. It's also gotten an edge of homophobia to it, which is really ridiculous when you consider how it's also quite homoerotic (a paradox seldom understand by the guys you see blasting their abs down the gym .... or would see, if one's exercise regime didn't consist of occassional low-impact walks and sporadic use of the Nintendo Wii at Simone's sister's place).

No, the thing I was thinking about was something that I don't recall ever having read in any of the reviews.

It justifies the Spartan's practice of killing newborn babies.

As is well-known, it was Spartan custom to leave babies found to be weak or "defective" on the slopes of a nearby mountain to die. This was dramaticised in the film with a brief scene showing a baby about to be thrown off a cliffside into a crevasse of infant skeletons below.

In the movie, before the 300 titular Spartans begin their defence against Xerxes' invading armies, a Spartan outcast comes to King Leonidas to volunteer his services. His name is Ephialtes, and the deformities he suffered from at birth meant he should have been cast off the mountain, but his parents smuggled him away and raised him in secret.


As Ephialtes is unable to raise his spear properly due to his handicap, Leonidas turns him away (to his credit, Leonidas does this politely and respectfully). In a rage, Ephialtes goes straight to Xerxes and offers to show him a secret path that would enable the Persian army to defeat the Spartans.

Now, Ephialtes is a genuine historical figure, legitimately believed to have betrayed the Spartans and told Xerxes of the secret mountain path. But here's the thing. He wasn't deformed. That was entirely an invention on the part of Frank Miller, the writer/artist of the graphic novel 300.


So the basic argument becomes that, had Ephialtes' parents done their "duty" and left their baby son to die, Leonidas and his men wouldn't have been undone by the betrayal of an outcast "freak".

This makes the scene where Leonidas turns Ephialtes away even more tragic - the King has more sympathy for this poor man than the story itself does (it also seems to suggest that Leonidas creates his own downfall by showing pity on Ephialtes, rather than killing him).

It's an irksome thing to think of, and it's just another in the laundry list of things that leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth in regards to 300.

All this from a random track that popped up on my iRiver. I bet I wouldn't get this if I had more Kylie on there.

At the Very Least, Steph Will Be Well-Pleased

The latest Marvel movie rumour? Marvel wants Christian Bale to play Dr Strange, and that a deal could be struck in the next couple of weeks.


Between this, his role as Batman and as John Connor in the new Terminator film, Bale would have essentially annointed himself King of the Geeks. But I seriously doubt this is anything more than pie-in-the-sky talk. It's also a bit unimaginative.

In other news, Daniel Craig has said that he was offered the role of Thor, but he turned it down (presumably because he felt one franchise character was enough - see what he did there, Christian?). Craig is a pretty good choice, really. A good actor, believably tough, and more than a little teutonic-lookin'.

I have no idea who else they could get for the role. If it was 1988 I might suggest Dolph Lundgren, but he's been both He-Man AND The Punisher. If he and Christian Bale ever acted in a movie together I think the universe might invert itself.

God Bless You, YouTube

Want to see Jason Alexander before being cast in Seinfeld, sporting a really bad wig, singing and dancing and, finally, shilling for McDonald's?

Well, that's a really specific request, but ....



... behold!!

Once Again ...

Say it with me now ...



"He's behind you!!!"

Frighteningly Prophetic Satire

Check out this article published by The Onion waaaaaaay back in 2001.

Spooky.

More Marvel Movie News Only I Care About

Some pretty surprising news too, with this guy ...

.... being replace by this guy ....

.... as this guy in Iron Man 2.

(He's actually saying "Clint", rather than the other word that it looks like ... Clint being the name of Hawkeye from the Avengers. But boy howdy, did the other reading amuse me to no end when I first read it!!).

Of course, I'm a big Don Cheadle fan, so it's quite a boon for the film. That said, as weirdly high-pitched as his voice is, I quite liked Terrence Howard as Rhodey and was looking forward to him eventually donning the War Machine armour.

In other Marvel movie news, this guy....

... has been unofficially confirmed as the director of The Mighty Thor movie.

This feels like a really good fit to me. With Kenneth Brannagh directing, this is sure to be a film to attract some decent talent. I just hope they base it more on Thor's appearances in the comics rather than as a straight adaptation of the classic Norse myths, otherwise what's the point of it being a Marvel comics movie? You might as well just make a Norse gods movie (which would actually be pretty cool itself if done right).

I think the real appeal of seeing a Thor film would be the blending of the mythological aspects of the character in the "real world" setting (in the comics, regular guy Dr Donald Blake finds himself the avatar of the thunder god Thor when he picks up the fabled hammer Mjolonir and is found "worthy", meaning that whenever danger rears its ugly head, Dr Blake taps his walking cane (he has a limp, like Hugh Laurie's House) and is transformed into the super powerful Thor Odinson.

A straightforward adaptation, set entirely in Asgard and covering the ground of the classic Norse myths - while interesting - would make Thor's inclusion in the much-discussed forthcoming Avengers film that much more difficult. I understand balancing the real world aspects alongside the mythological would be very tough, but why tackle a Mighty Thor film if you're not going to try to do the character the way he's done in the comics?

Jon Favreu, the director of Iron Man, has said in regards to the Avengers film that he has trouble envisioning Thor existing in Iron Man's world. Certainly, it's not a scenario that springs immediately and strongly into the mind's eye, but I definitely think it's possible, especially if Favreu himself finds ways to work in Iron Man's own cinematically unwieldly concepts, such as the Mandarin and Fin Fang Foom.

Finally, in regards to the film adaptation of The Avengers ...

... there's talk of of utilizing the Hulk as the villain. This would actually be true to the comics, as the Avengers first formed to oppose the Hulk, and only after fighting him did they realise that they were all actually being manipulated by Thor's half-brother Loki. They then joined forces with the Hulk to take Loki down.

Edward Norton doesn't seem all that keen in appearing in any future Marvel films after the troubles he had behind the scenes of The Incredible Hulk. Having the Hulk show up in the Avengers film as a villain (albeit a misunderstood one) could allow for the character to appear without the jarring aspect of once again re-casting Bruce Banner, as I imagine they could quite easily get around having any transformation sequences and just have the Hulk be the Hulk throughout the whole film.

It would also be a way of incoporating Thor a little more easily, should Loki be revealed as the mastermind behind the situation (and, extrapolating from that, perhaps working in league with Iron Man's own nemesis, the Mandarin).

Mostly, I think it's cool because it allows for the possibility of seeing sequences such as this one in full, cinematic glory;

The knock-down, drag-out superpowered fistfight is the one major thing that superhero movies have going for them that isn't really possible to see happen in any other kind of action movie, and for the most part we haven't had the chance to see them. Sure, there was the Hulk vs. the Abomination and Iron Man vs. the Iron Monger, and there are other various examples, but until one of them matches and surpasses the grandeur of the final battle between Neo and Agent Smith in The Matrix Revolutions, I'm going to feel that the cinematic superhero fight is still yet to live up to its true potential.

Phew! So much geekery in such a small amount of space! I think I'll end it there. I'm sure I've lost enough of your respect for one post.

Cutest. Squirrel. Ever.

Life on the Open Road, Part II

So ... I'm in Albury again.

I wasn't able to book a room in the hotel I saw last time, so I tried out another one which looked nice enough on the website.

I'm not entirely positive I've traded up.

First, the positives;

- Spacious.

- Nice view.

- Smells good.

Now for the negatives;

- No cable TV (the other hotel had this, and I'm positive I remember the website saying this place had it .... but no such luck).

- Depressing decor.

- Non-operational room service (I've just ordered a pizza for dinner).

- No temperature control (it's freezing in here!).

- No mini-bar. It's not like I NEED the $3 chocolate bar, but I wanted the OPTION of having it!

The rating for this place is meant to be 3 1/2 stars. Of course, I'm convinced that there hasn't been anyone through to rate it since about 1987 ... which would be around about the time they last decorated.

After I arrived, I thought it'd be a good idea to go for a walk. The road outside my room is a crossroads, on the corner of which is a hunting and fishing store by the name of "Elk's". I felt like I was Dr. Joel and I'd just stepped into the middle of Northern Exposure.


I walked to the supermarket and got some health snacks and a bottle of ice tea. Even if I can't have a mini-bar, I'm still going to snack, dammit!

So that's strike two for places to stay in Albury. Hopefully next time I'll be able to get a room in the nice-looking place I keep passing (although the rooms on its website don't look as nice as the exterior does).

Seperated at Birth?

Shane from The L Word ...


... and Edward Furlong from The Crow: Wicked Prayer;

I'm Probably the Only One Interested In This, But ...

A columnist for the New York Times got West Wing creator / showrunner / head writer Aaron Sorkin to pen a conversation between Barack Obama and West Wing President Jed Barlet. Now that's what I call some worthwhile fanfiction!

BARACK OBAMA knocks on the front door of a 300-year-old New Hampshire farmhouse while his Secret Service detail waits in the driveway. The door opens and OBAMA is standing face to face with former President JED BARTLET.

BARTLET Senator.

OBAMA Mr. President.

BARTLET You seem startled.

OBAMA I didn’t expect you to answer the door yourself.

BARTLET I didn’t expect you to be getting beat by John McCain and a Lancôme rep who thinks “The Flintstones” was based on a true story, so let’s call it even.

OBAMA Yes, sir.

BARTLET Come on in.

BARTLET leads OBAMA into his study.

BARTLET That was a hell of a convention.

OBAMA Thank you, I was proud of it.

BARTLET I meant the Republicans. The Us versus Them-a-thon. As a Democrat I was surprised to learn that I don’t like small towns, God, people with jobs or America. I’ve been a little out of touch but is there a mandate that the vice president be skilled at field dressing a moose —

OBAMA Look —

BARTLET — and selling Air Force Two on eBay?

OBAMA Joke all you want, Mr. President, but it worked.

BARTLET Imagine my surprise. What can I do for you, kid?

OBAMA I’m interested in your advice.

BARTLET I can’t give it to you.

OBAMA Why not?

BARTLET I’m supporting McCain.

OBAMA Why?

BARTLET He’s promised to eradicate evil and that was always on my “to do” list.

OBAMA O.K. —

BARTLET And he’s surrounded himself, I think, with the best possible team to get us out of an economic crisis. Why, Sarah Palin just said Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had “gotten too big and too expensive to the taxpayers.” Can you spot the error in that statement?

OBAMA Yes, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac aren’t funded by taxpayers.

BARTLET Well, at least they are now. Kind of reminds you of the time Bush said that Social Security wasn’t a government program. He was only off by a little — Social Security is the largest government program.

OBAMA I appreciate your sense of humor, sir, but I really could use your advice.

BARTLET Well, it seems to me your problem is a lot like the problem I had twice.

OBAMA Which was?

BARTLET A huge number of Americans thought I thought I was superior to them.

OBAMA And?

BARTLET I was.

OBAMA I mean, how did you overcome that?

BARTLET I won’t lie to you, being fictional was a big advantage.

OBAMA What do you mean?

BARTLET I’m a fictional president. You’re dreaming right now, Senator.

OBAMA I’m asleep?

BARTLET Yes, and you’re losing a ton of white women.

OBAMA Yes, sir.

BARTLET I mean tons.

OBAMA I understand.

BARTLET I didn’t even think there were that many white women.

OBAMA I see the numbers, sir. What do they want from me?

BARTLET I’ve been married to a white woman for 40 years and I still don’t know what she wants from me.

OBAMA How did you do it?

BARTLET Well, I say I’m sorry a lot.

OBAMA I don’t mean your marriage, sir. I mean how did you get America on your side?

BARTLET There again, I didn’t have to be president of America, I just had to be president of the people who watched “The West Wing.”

OBAMA That would make it easier.

BARTLET You’d do very well on NBC. Thursday nights in the old “ER” time slot with “30 Rock” as your lead-in, you’d get seven, seven-five in the demo with a 20, 22 share — you’d be selling $450,000 minutes.

OBAMA What the hell does that mean?

BARTLET TV talk. I thought you’d be interested.

OBAMA I’m not. They pivoted off the argument that I was inexperienced to the criticism that I’m — wait for it — the Messiah, who, by the way, was a community organizer. When I speak I try to lead with inspiration and aptitude. How is that a liability?

BARTLET Because the idea of American exceptionalism doesn’t extend to Americans being exceptional. If you excelled academically and are able to casually use 690 SAT words then you might as well have the press shoot video of you giving the finger to the Statue of Liberty while the Dixie Chicks sing the University of the Taliban fight song. The people who want English to be the official language of the United States are uncomfortable with their leaders being fluent in it.

OBAMA You’re saying race doesn’t have anything to do with it?

BARTLET I wouldn’t go that far. Brains made me look arrogant but they make you look uppity. Plus, if you had a black daughter —

OBAMA I have two.

BARTLET — who was 17 and pregnant and unmarried and the father was a teenager hoping to launch a rap career with “Thug Life” inked across his chest, you’d come in fifth behind Bob Barr, Ralph Nader and a ficus.

OBAMA You’re not cheering me up.

BARTLET Is that what you came here for?

OBAMA No, but it wouldn’t kill you.

BARTLET Have you tried doing a two-hour special or a really good Christmas show?

OBAMA Sir —

BARTLET Hang on. Home run. Right here. Is there any chance you could get Michelle pregnant before the fall sweeps?

OBAMA The problem is we can’t appear angry. Bush called us the angry left. Did you see anyone in Denver who was angry?

BARTLET Well ... let me think. ...We went to war against the wrong country, Osama bin Laden just celebrated his seventh anniversary of not being caught either dead or alive, my family’s less safe than it was eight years ago, we’ve lost trillions of dollars, millions of jobs, thousands of lives and we lost an entire city due to bad weather. So, you know ... I’m a little angry.

OBAMA What would you do?

BARTLET GET ANGRIER! Call them liars, because that’s what they are. Sarah Palin didn’t say “thanks but no thanks” to the Bridge to Nowhere. She just said “Thanks.” You were raised by a single mother on food stamps — where does a guy with eight houses who was legacied into Annapolis get off calling you an elitist?

And by the way, if you do nothing else, take that word back. Elite is a good word, it means well above average. I’d ask them what their problem is with excellence. While you’re at it, I want the word “patriot” back. McCain can say that the transcendent issue of our time is the spread of Islamic fanaticism or he can choose a running mate who doesn’t know the Bush doctrine from the Monroe Doctrine, but he can’t do both at the same time and call it patriotic.

They have to lie — the truth isn’t their friend right now. Get angry. Mock them mercilessly; they’ve earned it. McCain decried agents of intolerance, then chose a running mate who had to ask if she was allowed to ban books from a public library.

It’s not bad enough she thinks the planet Earth was created in six days 6,000 years ago complete with a man, a woman and a talking snake, she wants schools to teach the rest of our kids to deny geology, anthropology, archaeology and common sense too?

It’s not bad enough she’s forcing her own daughter into a loveless marriage to a teenage hood, she wants the rest of us to guide our daughters in that direction too?

It’s not enough that a woman shouldn’t have the right to choose, it should be the law of the land that she has to carry and deliver her rapist’s baby too? I don’t know whether or not Governor Palin has the tenacity of a pit bull, but I know for sure she’s got the qualifications of one. And you’re worried about seeming angry?

You could eat their lunch, make them cry and tell their mamas about it and God himself would call it restrained. There are times when you are simply required to be impolite. There are times when condescension is called for!

OBAMA Good to get that off your chest?

BARTLET Am I keeping you from something?

OBAMA Well, it’s not as if I didn’t know all of that and it took you like 20 minutes to say.

BARTLET I know, I have a problem, but admitting it is the first step.

OBAMA What’s the second step?

BARTLET I don’t care.

OBAMA So what about hope? Chuck it for outrage and put-downs?

BARTLET No. You’re elite, you can do both. Four weeks ago you had the best week of your campaign, followed — granted, inexplicably — by the worst week of your campaign. And you’re still in a statistical dead heat. You’re a 47-year-old black man with a foreign-sounding name who went to Harvard and thinks devotion to your country and lapel pins aren’t the same thing and you’re in a statistical tie with a war hero and a Cinemax heroine. To these aged eyes, Senator, that’s what progress looks like. You guys got four debates. Get out of my house and go back to work.

OBAMA Wait, what is it you always used to say? When you hit a bump on the show and your people were down and frustrated? You’d give them a pep talk and then you’d always end it with something. What was it ...?

BARTLET “Break’s over.”

Have You Guys Seen This?

It's both smarmily condescending and quite funny ... especially the Jonah Hill and Sara Silverman parts.

"I'm going to take off my bra under my shirt!" Amusing.

Of course, I've never been patronised and vaguely insulted by so many celebrities in such a short amount of time. Not that it applies to any of us given that we're not American.

But still ....

A List of Things I've Broken in the Last Week

... aka Requiem for an iRiver.

1. Ben and Carol's George Foreman brand vegetable steamer. They use this thing all the time, and I messed it up when I tried washing it and got water in the wrong place. Thankfully, it looks like it's gotten better. Thank God!

2. The fairylights in my bedroom. Yes, I know how incredibly manly that is.

3. My iRiver. Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh. This one breaks my heart, and it happened just this morning. I was on my way to the car when I dropped my beloved iRiver on the ground. It didn't shatter, it didn't crack. It was a bit scratched but it seemed fine. I unlocked the car, got in, tried to start the player and ... nothing.

I almost cried. It felt like losing a friend.

It hurt extra bad because I'd just loaded new music onto it last night that I was looking forward to playing on my way to Ballarat today. Instead I had to listen to the ... *shudder* .... radio.

I'm currently the highest bidder on eBay for a replacement iRiver, but while my previous one was a 20 gig model, the one I'm bidding on is only 6 gig - the compromises you make when you're desperate for mobile music.

And then, almost as if to top off the day ...

4. My house key.

This one happened in the lock of the front door, otherwise known as the only door into the house. It snapped right off in the lock, with absolutely no way of wiggling it out. I immediately headed for the real estate agent, who gave me the number of their locksmith and told as I was the one who'd broken the key, it was up to me to pay for it.

$90 later, I was let back into the house.

None of this is counting how my work car keeps breaking down because motor heat seems to scramble the engine immobiliser, so I have to let it cool before it will recognise the key's electronic signature.

Fuckin' technology age.