Where are my comments people????

What the heck! I finally start blogging on a somewhat regular basis and no comments. Sheesh. You're a tough crowd!

Here's a fun article on smokers. My favorite line? "Clearly brain damage isn't a treatment option for people struggling to kick the habit." hahaha

This article is called: "Never give an inguana Viagra" Not all that interesting of an article, but I thought the title was fun.

Obama and Clinton are battling for Hollywood support. Gee - why not care more about what thinking, rational voters support rather than a bunch of fruits in La-la land. Oh wait, that would make sense. Can't have that. And as it turns out, Liz Taylor supports Hillary. Well good. Now I have reason 112,123,984,263,266,266,664,198 why I won't vote for her.

Windows is finally coming out with a new operating system. I'll try it out in a year or so when they have 23% of the bugs identified and 1% patched.

My older son is part of the baggy pants brigade. He's not as bad as some - they don't hang halfway down his legs - but I find it really annoying. I tried to reason with him about this, but then realized I'd have better luck explaining non-cooperative game theory to my cat. Maybe I should have him (my son, not the cat) read this article.

Doom & Debbie

Bunch of doom n' gloom news - just 'cause it's Monday!

The moon is going to disintegrate!!! (But not for a while.)

One of the few veggies I actually like and is good for me - now it's all covered in cocaine. I can't win. I bet nobody would do this with something yucky like alfalfa sprouts.

From the "Wow sometimes men really ARE pigs" files we have this story.
Actually it should be the "wow some woman are spineless idiots who will do anything for some dumb lug" files - but oh well.


And on a more serious note, Debbie Schlussel has a really interesting piece on the fact that both of the Super Bowl teams this year have black coaches. Best lines:

"Reaching parity is not something race merchants can recognize or handle. Like the Palestinians and their phony "refugee" issue, they don't ever want this to be solved. It would take away an issue that they wish to self-perpetuate, that they don't want taken off the table . . . ever."

Read the whole story here.

A Great Big Long Rant

Nothing much in the news over the past couple of days.

I did watch the most interesting documentary today. It's called "This Film Is Not Yet Rated" and it's an expose of the MPAA film rating process. If you like movies and can find this at your local video store (it comes out on Tuesday) I highly recommend it.

So the MPAA is the group that decides what rating a film gets - G, PG, PG-13, R, or NC-17. The whole process is completely secret and no one even knows who the raters are. This group is not a government entity - they are part of the film industry. They would argue that they do not "censor" movies because a filmmaker does not have to accept or use a rating on their film. That's all well and good, but if a filmmaker doesn't accept a rating, or doesn't fight an NC-17 their film will get little distribution, advertising, etc. So no rating or a "bad" rating is effective censorship, if not actual.

The raters are supposed to represent the "average, ordinary parent." Only one of the nine raters has children under the age of 18. There is some evidence that the raters favor studio pictures over independent films. It is very difficult for an independent filmmaker to get any feedback on why their film received a certain rating. A filmmaker can appeal a ruling, and this process is even more shadowy. Rarely is a ruling overturned and there are always two members of the clergy involved in the appeal process.

The raters tend to give harsher ratings to movies with either explicit sex, "aberrant" sex, or even a lot of talk about sex. They do not seem to have much of a problem with gratuitous violence. This is almost the exact opposite of the film rating system in Europe.

The documentary eventually exposes the members of the MPAA who do the ratings as well as the members of the appeals board. Probably the ultimate irony is that the documentary itself received an NC-17 rating. The MPAA says it's because of the clips of other films used in the documentary. The director rejected the rating and his film is literally not rated.

I am a HUGE fan of movies and found this documentary utterly fascinating. I've often found myself puzzled by the ratings that certain films receive and why. One example off the top of my head is "The Day After Tomorrow." This is a silly film about weather - nevermind, it's not even worth going into. But anyway, it's PG-13 for "situations of extreme peril." What the heck is a situation of extreme peril? It seems to me that the little lion cub in the "Lion King" spent a lot of his time in situations of extreme peril - why isn't that one PG-13? Oh but wait - filmmakers who appeal a decision by the MPAA aren't allowed to bring up the ratings that other films get. If they try, they will be cut off by the MPAA lawyer present at the appeal hearing.

So what's the solution? No ratings, government ratings, the same system, a modified system, what? I vote for no ratings. I don't need other people to tell me what's ok for my kids to watch. What may offend one person might be perfectly acceptable to me and vice versa. It is my responsibility as a parent to keep track of what my kids are doing. I know the next argument is - "well what about all those parents that don't keep track of stuff like that for their kids????" Well for one, too bad - I can only worry about my crew. But furthermore, if there is some child out there who has such disinterested parents that that child is watching porn all day long, the kid has FAR bigger problems to face than the effect of a couple of movies.

I know I've gone on about this for way too long. But I'm just so opposed to any kind of intrusion into the decisions private citizens make for themselves or their children. I don't want ANY organization telling me or my kids what movies we can see, books we can read, groups we can associate with, etc. But if there must be a system in place, it doesn't seem to me that the MPAA is going about matters in any kind of fair or reasonable fashion.

Here are some links if you're interested.

This Film Is Not Yet Rated
MPAA
A review of the documentary can be found here.

Monkey see, monkey do....

I think they should have just hired her!! Check it out. I want one.

Late. Tired. More this weekend.

Woohoo American Idol!

What a train wreck. Don't people realize that they can't sing. I can sing "Happy Birthday" or a simple Christmas carol. But I KNOW I do not have the voice to be a singing star. I'm OK with that. I have other talents. I would NEVER try out for a show like American Idol - I'd never make the cut. How can people honestly not know that they're horrible. Or even if they don't know, don't they have friends to be honest with them???? Sad. But fun. Embarrassing. But still fun.

By the way, if you can find a clip of Hugh Laurie accepting the Best Actor Golden Globe for TV drama go watch it. That guy is hilarious. Ok, here's the link.

Here's a strange story. German obedience - sure ok. But what ever happened to good old German engineering???? Remind me never to buy a Volkswagon. Sheesh.

And just as a huge brag, here's my handsome son all dressed up for his first formal - couldn't talk him into a haircut, but I think he looks amazing anyway.

....and even more news!

Here we go with things that caught my eye.

This story is just amazing. Back when I lived in St. Louis, an 11 year old boy disappeared. It was such a sad story and I was really struck by it because my son was 11 at the time. I assumed the boy was gone forever, but it appears that he has been found today. He is alive and appears physically unharmed. His family must be over the moon. All the best to them.

Are you an American Idol fan? (I am...shhhh) Well now a group wants to do a similar contest for writers. Looks kind of interesting (and way less embarrassing to admit!).

The Doomsday Clock has been moved again. I'm way ahead of that bunch - I moved mine when Pelosi was elected Speaker.

I was all prepared to start ranting about boycotting Southern Methodist University. The headline of this article reads, "SMU Faculty Members Oppose Bush Library." But if you actually read the article, you'll see that most of the people associated with SMU are in favor of the library. So instead of ranting against the university, I'll rant against the editors who OBNOXIOUSLY chose the headline they did, instead of a more truthful one which would have looked something like "SMU Happy About Bush Library." It's so pitiful and transparent how the MSM acts.

Here's a story about procrastination. The funniest thing about it is that the procrastination study that was supposed to take five years actually took ten!!! That's hilarious!

Finally, it wouldn't be Friday without a fun photo. Here's Noah after reviewing movies with my mom! ;)

Hmmmmmm

I tried to reply to the posts that Kat and Mom left earlier and it didn't work. Pretty sad when you can't work the features on your own blog. I'll try again later. Well here's a couple of equally stupid news clips, a scary one, and a hopeful one:

I can't decide if this is really cool or abysmally dumb. But mostly I wonder how the fish feel about it!!

I think that if you poke a hole in your Picasso, you don't freakin' deserve a payoff. What an idiot.

Don't give cough medicine to babies. Wish I would have known that when my boys WERE BABIES. Jeez.

Sen. Johnson improving. Wishing him all the best. (At least until he votes for something I don't like, and then I will wish him ill - but only like a cold - and no cough medicine for him either. Is this too bitchy? Is it bad to cuss on your blog? How did I get off on these topics?)

Return of the mutant deer!

A couple of posts back, I challened Kat to think up a name for a herd of mutant deer. My contribution was a "freak of mutated deer." I think her responses are way better and way funnier:

Basic: a quirk of mutant deer
Culturally dated: The monstrosities formerly known as deer
Generic: a fold of refabricated fauna
Foretelling of doom: a harbinger of hinds
Overly dramatic: a horde of hair-raising harts
Strictly alliterative: a drove of deviant deer
Gross: dinner

I've not seen any amazing news stories in the last couple of days. I did see an amazing new movie out on DVD. It's called "The Illusionist" and stars Edward Norton, Paul Giamatti, Rufus Sewell, and Jessica Biel. Absolutely wonderful romance/mystery. Even if you wind up not being wild about the plot, the acting is superb and the cinematography is just breathtaking. You feel as if you're watching a very old movie in terms of the lighting and mood. Next time I get near Wal-Mart (which is WAY too often), I'm going to buy this one. Four stars.

Speaking of four stars. I need some sort of rating system. Stars are boring. And no, Mom, I'm not going to do the cigarette test. (My mom rates a movie she sees in the theater by how many times she leaves to go smoke - e.g. One smoke is a pretty good movie, four smokes she might as well stayed home). Maybe I'll have my hubby graphic design something up for me.

So Sorry Saturday

Well since all of my readers how now officially registered complaints, I'd better dang well post something new!! But first, let me offer some (lame) explanations:

1) It was the holiday season - how much work did YOU get done?
2) I ended my old job and started a new job - busy busy!
3) My modem freaked out and died and we had to get a new one.
4) Other than people dying (Brown, Ford, Hussein) not a heck of a lot caught my eye.
5) I'm just terrible at this - which I believe I explained a few posts back
6) All of the above.

One really interesting news article did actually catch my eye a couple of days ago. Since one of my readers (MOM) complained about links with no explanation, here's a brief summary. These parents had their severely handicapped daughter's growth stunted to keep her physically small in order to make it easier for them to care for her at home. You'll have to go read this and tell me what you all think. I find myself siding with the parents. It's a difficult question, but I'd love other opinions.

This story about infant car seats really hacked me off. We have spent so much money on these things and they probably weren't any good anyway.

Here's a way to get free instruction from MIT. I can't do basic algebra, but this might be fun for someone. The article raises some interesting thoughts about the future of education.

I love my cats, but this just seems COMPLETELY INSANE!!!! (and slightly unsanitary)

Finally, here's a late picture that I should have posted on Friday.



Oh, by the way - I went to a movie today called "The Holiday." I really liked it. Good, light romantic comedy.