-Hiring Sam Raimi to direct a “Warcraft” movie should be awarded with a Nobel Prize. It’s so rare to hear movie news so good, so exciting, that you literally want to jump up and down. “Warcraft” helmed by Raimi? Yes, please. I picture a campier, wilder “Lord of the Rings,” a fantasy action picture with roots in B-cinema. Now there’s a fresh take I could get excited about.
-Kissing bandmates during a concert is lame. At a recent U2 concert, Bono and the bassist (Adam Clayton, is it?) got a little mouth-friendly. Jane’s Addiction also used to do this (big shock), as well as the whole Madonna/Britney Spears thing, etc. Does anyone else feel that this is in incredibly poor taste? Even when Springsteen makes out with his wife in front of everybody, I dislike it. You’re on a freaking stage! There are thousands of people watching! As a rule, any sexual activity you engage in is now disgusting and weird. Blegh.
-Conan O’Brien is sucking wind. His numbers are terrible, and I am absolutely flabbergasted. The poor guy, he’s getting beaten by Letterman. Letterman. I have never met a single individual who likes this man. I know they exist, and indeed there may be millions of them, but I think it’s significant that I have completely unintentionally remained totally free of them my entire life. The only other groups of people this applies to are satanists and Scientologists, so it doesn’t bode well.
What the hell is going on, people? The prince and lord of Late Night Television steps up to his birthright, and we give him the cold shoulder? I demand we all start watching, and then calling Nielsen to tell them so. Immediately. If he gets knocked out, or even remembered poorly in the long run, I will never forgive all of you. NEVER.
-Microsoft Excel could stand to take it easy. I’m not denying that “Excel” is a quality program, but sometimes its nature is so punishing to the self-teaching user that it borders on intolerable. The problem is, there are occasionally changes you make with a single keystroke that the software forbids you to take back. If I arrange a list alphabetically, there is no readily apparent apparatus to return the items to the order in which they were entered. Like, ever. And don’t even get me started on the format shenanigans of the cells; one errant dash, and “Excel” decides you’re entering dates and begins right-justifying everything, or inserting “July” on every “7,” and so forth. Yes, I can remove this in the “Format” tab, but it still irritates me. I wish the program wasn’t so damned keen on being a step ahead of me.
Of course, the “Excel” wizards can make the thing do jumping jacks, and I confess I’m not one of them. But can’t I just be left to my simple ways, without the higher echelons of functionality coming down off of Olympus and changing my crap around? I know my grasp is clumsy, but why won’t the software work out a truce with me, like “Word” and “Powerpoint” do? When I’m ready, I will call on you to auto-format everything I do, but for now I’d just like to get in and get out unharmed. As it is, using “Excel” is more or less like diffusing a bomb: one wrong move, irrevocable consequences.
-Cats cannot be trusted. Mark my words, Dear Reader: when the chips are down, their whole species is going to rise up against us. I don’t buy their act for one minute. They saw dogs living the sweet life, they decided to play along, but when I look in their little cat eyes I know that we are nothing more than a means to an end. Most cat owners I know have to beg their pet just to touch them, have been randomly clawed for no reason, and won’t even see the thing for days on end.
The best part is, these people always tell me their relationship is more “complex” than one you could have with a dog, that cats earn “respect.” I get a giggle out of this. What on earth are you talking about? It’s a cat. It poops in a box you set on the floor, then dopes up on name-brand opium you buy it at “Petsmart.” If this is a complex relationship, then your personal life is in strange order.
I am also told that dogs are “annoying.” I suppose if I owned a cat, pure and selfless love would become foreign to me as well. And the idea that they “slobber” or “hump your leg” is grossly overstated: some breeds do that, plenty are incredibly laconic and do not. There is every imaginable size and temperament of dog available. What almost every dog will do is bark at intruders and throw their own bodies in front of yours if they sense danger. You’re not going to get that treatment from a feline. They don’t call them “cat burglars” for nothing.
Of course, I’m just messing around, millions of people are happy with their cats, and why should that bother me? But in the spirit of playful rivalry: cats are lame.
Except for you, Penny. You’re all right.
-Obama rocked the business at the NAACP talk. You can’t deny it. Or yeah, some of you probably can, but I don’t care. The dude suddenly remembered that he is the first President in our history who is invulnerable to charges of racism, and then he got up in front of the NAACP and called it like he saw it. A lot of people bristled like porcupines, but it did not matter, because no one gets to call him ignorant. And it’s not that I enjoy anyone being critical of the black community, but with hell-hounds like the ACLU waiting to sue you blind for the slightest comment, it’s incredibly rare to see someone speak their mind.
A white President could not, and maybe should not, say those things. But God bless America, we finally have a black man in office. Without trivializing the accomplishments of JFK and LBJ, I don’t think a white commander in chief could ever command the kind of credibility that this country needs to improve race relations. I’m sure many of them have wanted to, but in some ways it’s just not their place. Maybe that’s unfair, but again, it’s reality.
Of course, simply being a black President is far from enough, but it does put you in a position unique from your predecessors. The question is: what do you do with it? So far, it seems like Obama intends to stir things up, and I’m okay with that.
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