Cleaning One's Room

Ever tried to clean your own room and thought to yourself, "WHERE THE HELL DO I START???" Yeah, that was me for about an hour today. I basically went in a counter clockwise motion around my room to pick up and throw out stuff I didn't need. After about an hour or so, my room still looks like crap.

The Producers

Since a lot of posts on here are about movies, I'll try my part. I haven't seen a movie in a theater (or theatre for you Anglophones out there) since coming to China. But a couple weeks ago, I did manage to buy thirty DVDs for about twenty-five bucks. Not bad. I haven't gone through all of them yet, but the few I've watched are perfect. The only gripe I have is that you cannot turn off the subtitles (or sous-titres for you Francophones out there) on most of them. Tonight, I plan on killing time by watching Gandhi. A few of the films are foreign films, so those might be a disaster if I can't find the English subtitles.

Anyway, regarding The Producers. They made the original film, not a musical, in 1968. Then they made a Broadway musical out of it a few years ago. And now they've made a film musical out of the Broadway musical. Does this count as a remake? But my real question is this: Why not do this with all films? Turn all great non-musical films into musicals. Gone With The Wind. Citizen Kane. Casablanca. And then maybe make classic musicals into non-musical films. West Side Story. The Wizard Of Oz. The Sound Of Music. They might have to change the title of that one. How about The Sound Of Nazi-Occupied Austria?

Wait, what? You think that's the dumbest idea ever? Why? Isn't that what they're doing with The Producers? Pretty much. But it's Hollywood. Trends. The only reason movies like Rent and The Producers are being made is because of the success of Chicago. And vice versa. A musical version of The Lord Of The Rings? Thanks, Lion King.

I don't know what this ramble is about. It's pretty much bemoaning a lack of creativity in the industries that are supposed to entertain the masses. This means the masses are stupid. Read a goddamn book, you stupid masses. Meanwhile, I'll be waiting for the musical, film or Broadway, version of Schindler's List.

King Kong

The movie had the hype. All the critics loved it. A critic on NPR said even though the movie is 3 hours and 7 minutes long, every minute is worth it.

I went to see it with Bach, Bryan, Robert, Tammy, and Tony, and the movie lived up to the hype. It's definitely one of the the best movies of the year, as Ebert said. You don't even see Kong until 70 minutes into the movie, but it was great in building up suspense. You know what's there, but you're still on the edge of your seat.

The action on the island is basically everything Jurassic Park 2 wanted to be except it's 100 times better. Peter Jackson figured everything out with using CG special effects. Usually, when you watch CG action, there's no sense of danger. It's just there. In Kong, Jackson develops Kong as a multidimensional character. All the emotions you can think of, Kong expresses them without thinking to yourself, "This is stupid." So when Kong fights with prehistoric enemies, you feel moved and not bored.

So I highly recommend the movie. Second best movie of the year. Right behind Batman Begins.

ESPN Page 2 Bill Simmons

Bill Simmons is the best writer I have ever come across (take THAT, Bertrand Russell.. on second thought, Russell's still better. still, take THAT, Nietzsche). He comes across so personable and funny and witty and relates it all to sports.

I remember a couple years ago I was driving with Kumar and we were going through the UCI In-n-Out drive thru and the topic of ESPN Page 2 came up and he brought up Bill Simmons and the Spelling Bee article. Easily the funniest article I have ever read. I would link it to you guys, but ESPN is charging for an INsider account to view Bill Simmons' past articles. Now I wouldn't pay ESPN to get INsider information on vague draft pick potentials or obscure college football data, but I seriously considered plopping down a bit of cash to read that article again. Now they're charging for the Bill Simmons Anchorman article too! grr..

Point in case: Bill Simmons' most recent article about the suckage of NFL teams *link*.

Quote: The eventual outcome of perpetual parity IS perpetual putridity. For example, after the magical run of alternative and hip-hop music from 1991-1995, everyone was so worn out from quality music that we allowed one-word crappy bands like Creed and Live to become famous, as well as untalented rappers like Diddy and Ja Rule, eventually leading to the inexplicable boom in hacky pop music, boy bands and that metal rock miasma. Just watch the SNL reruns from the bulk of the Will Ferrell era -- it's a musical apocalypse.

My theory for this: Everyone was so distracted by the unexpected Internet boon, as well as the copious amounts of suddenly free porn, that four or five years passed before we realized that the music industry was headed straight to hell. And it kept getting worse and worse and worse -- culminating in Andrew K's selling out NBA-sized arenas and everyone unwittingly allowing the complete bastardization of the music industry -- before the Strokes, Eminem and the White Stripes burst onto the scene and everyone remembered, "Hey, music can be popular and good! Wow!" And now we're knee-deep into another iPod-fueled renaissance.

Not that I agree with all his statements, but it's funny. If you can talk about free porn, bash Creed, Live, Diddy, and Ja Rule, and mention SNL - Will Ferrell in your NFL article, you get my thumbs up. To make this post even longer, I quote from the free snippet of the Anchorman article:

Remember my mailbag rant about rewatchable movies last month, when I complained about the five-year drought (and counting) for entertaining movies that could be watched on cable again and again?

Back East a few weeks ago, I ended up on-Demanding (is that even a verb?) "Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy" at my mom's house one night. Even though the movie (about a chauvinistic '70s anchorman in San Diego, played by Will Ferrell) received mixed reviews last year, since Ferrell was involved, I gave it a belated shot ... and loved it. Two days later, I watched it again. When I returned to California, I bought the DVD and watched the movie and every extra. Much like the "Austin Powers" movies, it's silly and inspired, and you notice four or five new wrinkles every time you watch it. Now, if I'm flicking channels and it's just starting, I can't help myself. It's like being at a wedding where they serve those bacon-wrapped scallop appetizers: Sure, I guess I'll have one more, but that's it. And you end up having 10. Now that, my friends, is the very definition of a rewatchable movie.

Now I just wanna watch Anchorman again. Because 60% of the time, it works every time.

Office Depot Brand Stinks

I'm working on graduate school applications this month. So I went to Office Depot to get some mailing envelopes. I'm standing there in front of 10 brands of regular envelopes. Hmm, what's a good brand? Heck, Office Depot brand envelopes has to be good. I mean, Office Depot specializes in office supplies. If it sucked, the whole Office Depot name would be tainted. So I got the box of Office Depot envelopes.

I get home and take a handful out of the box as I'm preparing to send letters of recommendation materials to people. You know, the back of the envelope has a bunch of seals to keep the envelope together. I noticed one envelope had a loose seal near the corner. I pulled at it gently and the whole thing fell apart. Shoddy gluing. Then I took another envelope and it had the same thing. About 6 of them were the same until I found a few good ones.

Great...now I'm worried that my mail is going to fall apart in the post office machines. Thanks, Office Depot!!!

ESPN = Sports, not movies

ESPN is showing their widely hyped movie, "Codebreakers". It's about some West Point scandal where football players cheated on tests because they were failing, and it's supposed to represent atheletes everywhere that cheat to pass their classes, because they're too dumb to pass or because they're practicing 8-10 hours a day (you know Who knows that I don't study 8 hours a day).

Anyways, I haven't watched this movie, and I won't. Why ESPN? It's 12:50am, and I want to see sports highlights, and maybe a fun sports game. Sportscenter is my CNN. If I wanted to watch a movie, I'd watch HBO.

The actual CNN is too depressing, and the same old things are always going on. Some bill passes, some bill doesn't. Liberals vs. Conservatives. Religious vs. Athiest/Agnostics. Some new science breakthrough. Some train derailed in Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Burma, or Rochester, and x number people died, and 58*x people were injured. And the world goes on.

If something's important enough, they'll be talking about it for at least a week, and chances are I'll catch it on Google news or that random time I turn the channel to see some hot Asian lady on Headline News. (or those times Tammy watches Anderson Cooper)

Finals week!

Man. Finals week. I'm so pathetic right now, I just washed some clothes in the sink because I haven't had time to actually do laundry. The good news is, two more finals and I'm done! Free! I envy you, Pham and everybody else who's already graduated. Someone tell me a joke or something, I need a break.

WTF is it about eyebrows?

When most girls are asked what they notice first when looking at the male species...most say, eyes, smile, arms, chest, or the total bullshit answer "I never notice physical appearance, thats not what matters."

I say...eyebrows.

Is that wierd? Where did my fetish for dark bushy eyebrows begin? Sure, I like nice muscular arms or great hair just as much as the next girl. But none of that compares to black, caterpillar-esque eyebrows.

My advice to you boys...unless you have a total UNIbrow...leave the tweezers to the ladies. :)