How to Eat Your Words

How to Eat Your Words

Subtitle: I tried to get the kids to watch MY era cartoons.

And my friend wanted me to mock them.

Damn you Jeff 

A critical review of the pilot of Thundercats...

I love you Lion-o

Ok, so I started to do steps with my notes but it got confusing so yeah, stream of conscious is what you get...

Observation 1: From the get go I had to note that these Thundercats of Thundera were naked. Completely naked. Well, ok, except for boots and belts. I mean, I'm trying to determine exactly what type of fashion statement that we're trying to make with just boots and belts. But wait?? Head dude Jaga has clothes....

And the chicks have no nipples...

Not that we needed to see that in a kid's show, but cubs gotta eat. Or kittens?? What IS the appropriate term here? 

Observation 2: Ok, so it seems that the different cats = different races. Should I be offended that the cat CLEARLY representing the black dude is Panthro, which is a black cat normally, and he is a "bald" cat. Probably. But he's kinda hot. Like Morris Chesnut hot......

Stop cheating on Shanks, now, stop. 
I LOVE YOU MR. CANADIAN HOT PANTS 

Who dat?? HAHAHAHAHA!

Observation 3: Oh, hey, that Jaga dude is now addressing the clothing. Wow, we are only like a few minutes in and you have addressed my first question. Damn, I'm impressed, some shows NEVER address anything ever (like, uh, Fringe, why in the HELL some random Swiss scientist would just believe Walter and Michael UNLESS that scientist was a thawed Belly but NO you couldn't just give us a 30 second scene to explain that huh??) Oh, ok, the reason, right, not my ranting. It's protective, but that still doesn't explain the boots or the belts, ESPECIALLY the belts! 

Observation 4: The little cats are nobles. Huh, never knew that. That explains why in the hell they're on the lead ship. It's like Battlestar Galactica. With cats. 

Observation 5: I now have a new reason asserting my belief that I need to resurrect Dante so he can create a separate layer of hell just for George Lucas. I can honestly say that every line Anakin Skywalker had in "The Phantom Menace" was said by Lion-o first in THIS episode. WORD FOR WORD. I would include specific examples but I'm just too lazy. 

Observation 6: Mutants!! Wait, THOSE are mutants. And they are not led by a bald man in a wheel chair (did anyone else notice that I have mentioned bald men MORE than Michael Shanks in this post, well now I haven't but still, kinda weird. Been that kind of week). But for real, no one throwing playing cards or having metal claws shooting out of their hands, what kind of mutants are they? OHHHH...they are COPIES, Mum-ra's copies. That makes sense. 

Observation 7: Ok, I know that we are only at number seven but I have to honestly say that this cartoon makes actual sense, MUCH better than most Sci-Fi shows and it's got me super paranoid about Surprise Package (not sure what that is? CLICK HERE) but each and every thing that I started to make fun of is explained:

1. Why are there not two by two of the animals like Noah's ark if your planet blew up? Just you guys on a ship. Oh wait there's a caravan. And they got blew up. And you explained WHY the main ship didn't get blown up, and how they boarded the ship. 

2. How did Lion-o age and the other's didn't. They DID, he was just like 11 or 12.  IF they aged about 6 years he WOULD look like that but the other adults would not be THAT different. Bravo. 

3. How the Thundercats woke up! Lion-o activated them when the Mutants could not get them out of the pod. Eye of Thundera. 

Need I say more?? Honestly, I was shocked. Seriously, this was hands down an awesome. Well done, explained and had moral lessons. Want to get your kids off the Disney Channel? Show them THIS. Serious quality. 

And get yourself a glass of wine. You won't need it, but wine always enhances the experience. 

Thundercats Pilot Exodus

How to Create Shenanigans

How to Create Shenanigans

Subtitle: I was using this word WAY before Mr. Canadian Hot Pants said it last week which makes him all the more creepy.

Subsubtitle: Ok, so this is kinda of a movie review, but I think straight reviews are boring. 

Step 1: Check Twitter. Go home from a nice dinner, get comfy, put on your PJ's, decide to absorb yourself into something stupid on Netflix and see on Twitter that people are going to see 'Mama' which is supposedly SO scary that people are LEAVING the theatre. 

Oh my Athena!

It's been way too long since you saw GOOD horror, not canned crap for stupid people. People are leaving?? 

Excellent! 

Step 2: Gather your crew. Always start with Hot Roommate (or YOUR other, not mine) because he's fun.  After all, if you didn't marry somebody fun you made a huge mistake. However it is only an offer because once you start explaining the film Hot Roommate will ask you to no longer explain, that he's not going. Call your close friend (Pseudo Brother) that watches the same kinda scary mess as you. The conversation will go like this:

Me: Hey, wanna go see Mama?

PB: When?

Me: At ten. 

PB: It's nine fifteen. How are you gonna get here? You live in the boonies.

Me: Whatever. Be at your place in 20 minutes. Get dressed. 

PB: I'm not responsible for any tickets. 

Hey hey, I got my first speeding ticket only a few weeks ago. I've learned my lesson, I'm much more careful now. 

I realized that cop cars are smaller than you think and you need to slow down near signs. 

P.S. Kidnap your sister. She's even more fun now that she's almost a college student. 

Step 3: ...

"How do I get to your place?"

"How long have you guys been friends and you can't get to his place?"

"He moves a lot." 

"I do NOT. Like twice in twelve years. She just has no memory." 

"Sister you're a bad friend." 

"Just tell me how to get there." 

"Where are you?"

"Passing the elementary school."

"That's the OTHER WAY."

"What!?! I'm lost."

"No you're not, you're just hopeless. Keep straight to the next light." 

"Uh, we're gonna be late."

"This is why I never drive." 

"I hate being late to a movie."

"So do I." 

"Does anyone care that I am lost?" 

"You are not lost. Just, never mind. Right at the light." 

See ^... shenanigans

Step 4: Notice the details. Here are some of the more exciting details I noticed in the first fifteen minutes of 'Mama'

a. It stars Jamie Lannister (a.k.a. Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) - YUMMY  (Seriously HBO have you not recognized that Michael Shanks would also be a HAWT choice for your programming. I can't abide this sensitive shit you Canadian programmers keep putting him in.)

b. It takes places in RICHMOND & VIRGINIA!!! #RVA REPRESENT!!! 

c. DEL TORO. As a Spanish teacher and fan of Pan's Labyrinth words cannot express how excited I was too see that name. 

d. Oh wait...there are a lot of names of Spanish language origin...*peeks at compadres*...maybe I should warn them....

Step 5: Holy shit that monster is scary! Wait, we are less than 20 minutes in and there it is!! And it breaks necks none of this stupid gore for the sake of that really makes no damn sense shit....AWESOME. 

But I have to ask...cherries? Is there some symbolism?? *takes out phone, sees usher with flashlight, hides phones*

(Looked it up later, symbol of good deeds which considering how this story played out is FANTASTIC irony. Well done Del Toro, well done). 

Step 6: Wait, what!?!? Did Jamie Lannister (I have stopped calling him Lucas, his character's name b/c I cannot focus on anything other than the new season of Game of Thrones) just DIE right now?? This is NOT a Michael Shanks movie people, the main character does not just die. 

Ok, he lived. 

Wait, how the fuck did he live?

Seriously, I would like a fake doctor with a fake chart to explain this to me. 

Now. 

And feed Jessica Chastain a cheeseburger. 

She looks like Evil Lynn. 

This is Evil Lynn. Note the cheekbones make her look skeletal because she works for Skeletor.

If we are trying to emulate He-Man characters she SHOULD look like this:

This is Teela. Note that while she is thin and sexy that she does not have a sunken in starved face.

Step 7: I can't concentrate. Every single time they say "Richmond" I'm squeeing like an idiot. I just cannot get over the use of Richmond, VA in TV and movies lately, it's just so exciting that I'm actually screaming at this ghost thing jumping out at me (I DON'T get scared by stuff like this, all of this Richmond is distracting me) and my sister is practically in my lap and my amigo to my right yelling out "Oh dear god." 

To be honest, I'm WWAAAYYY more creeped out by the younger sister. 

THAT is gonna give me nightmares...

By the way, that's not chocolate on her face. It's MOTH. Ass-nasty. 

Step 8: I forgot to warn you, didn't I? Remember the whole Spanish name thing...yeah...now that Jamie Lannister is awake, not ONE damn thing broken WTH, Evil Lynn is STILL with the kids and he's having a awake dream that he cannot distinguish from reality from his twin brother who is contorting unnaturally under a bridge that my friend beside me swears he has driven under and is summarily creeped out. This my friends is Magic Realism. If you are not familiar with it, please visit HERE: What is Magic Realism? Basic synopsis = Magic Realism blurs the lines between reality and fantasy in a story only to come to the conclusion that no lines really exist at all.

Sorry, AP/IB teacher nerd moment.
I want Daniel Jackson as my person slave.
There, back to normal.

Step 9: I need to have my blog How to Survive a Horror Movie sent to all major movie studios. The awesomeness of the magic realism touches in this film or not (I mean this is getting pretty mixed with the realities and while some people are still screaming in the theatre others are no longer amused...) you need to recognize that breaking the rules I have mentioned above will get you killed. Period.

Oh and telling someone "I love you" is the kiss of death.
Like having sex.
That's what I meant when I shouted that out in the theatre you perverts.

Step 10: I need gas but the station is closed so I can't get wine too. Probably best, they only sell Moscato anyway. Time to head back to the boonies.

I've probably got some Spanish in the cabinet.
But hand to Dionysus if I moth comes out of that drawer I'm gonna shit myself. 

How to Figure it all out...

How to figure it all out...

Subtitle: I know this is supposed to be a comedy post but this year has been interesting...

I just needed to get this out. 

Dearest Readers, 

So many of you are new and fast friends and I appreciate each of you coming with me on this journey.  I want to take a little time this afternoon to tell you some more about me. Do not judge, it's life, and I am not looking for sympathy or trying to bash others. I just feel that people need to know. 

My dad wanted a boy and I knew that from the moment I could understand. My mom on the other hand was the most amazing person ever, making sure that despite the way my dad made me feel my entire life, worthless, that I never did with her. He eventually got bored with parenting and left, leaving me, my mom and my brother destitute. 

I'm gonna stop the life story there because I don't want to write it. It was a Lifetime movie, literally, maybe that's why I hate them, and if you ever really want to know I will tell you, but that's all I want to say now. But I had my mom, my amazing amazing mom and my brother and that was all I needed. 

I met Jack in college and the people I met there changed my life. College changed my life. Randolph-Macon changed my life. It wasn't the fun college experience though, I had to work many more hours than my peers and I tried to have the experience and I did, but I missed some things. I missed some things but I still met amazing people and I got Jack. That was the best thing, I got Jack. 

So we got married. I never lived on my own, never did that single thing, but that's ok. I don't regret it. I got what many people long for, look for and never find. We had kids very soon after we got married and that was good too, except for the post partum depression. I have had depression my entire life and have been able to control it with exercise, etc. but this I just couldn't bear. I lost myself in sadness and lost everything, everything I had worked so hard for. See, I don't want to be that person that announces "Oh boo hoo, my life was so hard, look at me overcoming it" I don't, I just want to explain, probably more for self-cathartic reasons than anything. Many of you know the the story from this point, the REAL reason I drove to Chicago, the real reason I even give two shits that the man exists. Others can fight and feud like children over who he gives attention to but my reality is that I just want him to understand that for some strange fucked up reason THAT brought me from the brink and I owe him forever. 

2012 was my year. Sure, it all started in late 2010, but in 2012 I got myself back, the person I had worked so hard on in school and had lost in the blink of an eye. It was such an amazing and fantastic year that I cried most of New Year's Eve for fear that it was ending, fear of what 2013 would bring, as my fever spiked again to 104 degrees. And I'm not gonna lie, 2013 has SUCKED so far: We had some good news fall through, some issues at work that no one can fix, problems in our community (not with us, but it is tearing my community apart) and other random instances of back luck, so much so that I felt myself slipping away, back to that place of despair I had fled. 

But this week it hit me. Life's not easy, I mean I knew that, but it's really not. It's hard as hell, shit's gonna fall into your lap, people are going to be nasty to you just to make themselves feel better, things that seem so perfect can fall apart in an instant. 2012 might have been the year that I got Bri back, that wild, hardworking go getter that wants to save the world but 2013 is about what I DO with her. It's one thing to reclaim yourself, but it is quite another to set them out into the world. Sure, January has kinda sucked, with challenges I could have never expected, but what's going to prove my mettle is whether or not I can rise to the challenge. 

I can. I've got this. Life, experience, dreaming, being a part of the world and not a complacent observer has prepared me. 

I've got this. 

And if you need me my friend, I've got you. 

Bring it on 2013. In the past I might have crumbled, but 2012 prepared me for you. It prepared me for what is REALLY important in life. 

On that note, I need to get back to that. You know, life and all. 

Thanks for listening.