Who IS Billy Jones: Building Buzz for an Audiobook

For those of you who have been following the blog and wondering about the Billy Jones stuff that always pops up to the left (and seriously, why haven't you clicked on it yet??), you might find the following interesting.

Who IS Billy Jones: Building Buzz for an Audiobook - Books - Blogcritics

Two Great Acts That Taste Great Together... or Something Like That

So a bit more of a "personal" blog today. Just letting everyone I know know (ha, I said "know know) about a pair of acts that are totally different, and equally great.

Act One: Cary Judd. His website is here.

Who is he? Well: check this out and you'll have your answer. And if you didn't see that, then at least here's a picture:



This guy is GOOD. Here's a list of his upcoming tour dates. CATCH HIM IF YOU CAN.

What makes him so good? Why bother seeing him live?

Well, because quite simply, chances are good you'll never see anything like it again. He's literally a one-man band. Not like the guys who walk around Disney movies with every possible instrument strapped to them. Rather, he creates "loops" for each of his songs live. So the first thing he'll do is lay down a drum line, recording it on the spot, right in front of your eyes. Then he'll bang on his guitar to create a bass drum sound. New loop. Then a rhythm guitar loop. And so on.

So in the space of about 30 seconds, you see someone put together all the background "fill" sounds he'll need for a full-bodied, full-band sound, which he controls and turns on and off, up or down, throughout the song, via a series of foot pedals and hand controls.

It's unreal, amazing, and absolutely worth traveling for.

Now, the second act I saw was a comedy troupe called The Society.



They are an improv group that I caught last night right after seeing Cary, and MAN did they impress. They took a word from the group: "Beachball" and then IMPROV'D AN ENTIRE BROADWAY SHOW around it, INCLUDING MUSIC AND LYRICS.

The ENTIRE GROUP was amazing, though for me the standouts were Kirby Heyborne as the love-struck professional beach ball inflater and Eric Artell as the crotchety rich old man who insists that his daughter only have beach balls for her 17th birthday beach party because (as he sung) "Yeah, you can enjoy lots of frisbees, and lawn darts, and surfboards and have lots of fun, but then what are you really? Just a big fat beach slob..." (message: focus, girl, you gots ta have FOCUS!)

And perhaps most amazing is that, unlike most comedy acts, when they hit a rough patch (as any improv group will... it's impossible for every joke to be a hit), they don't resort to crudity or "F-bombs" as a cheap impersonator of humor.

They're appearing at the IO West on Thursday at 11 pm. Entrance is free, but you better get there early, because it was standing room only when I was there.

And a bit of a warning: though The Society seems to be absolutely family friendly, the other group that I saw was NOT. So be aware. But then, IO West won't let you in unless you're 21 or older, so I guess chances of you packing up the kiddies for an 11 pm show in the middle of Hollywood is pretty slim.

Okay, so this was more of a straight "review," and I promise to return next time to more humorous (i.e., random and borderline incomprehensible) stuff.

But every once in a while you come across true talent, and I think that in that case, you gotta share it.

That's why you're all telling your friends about me.

Right?

Right?

[sound of crickets chirping...]

To Die For

Driving to work today (yes, I do have a day job), I heard something both wonderful and appalling. What was it? you ask. Well, I'll tell you.

There's a lady in a posh neighborhood who owes $1 million on her house (which is now probably worth only $42.50, thank you very much bad loan policies). And, surprise surprise, she doesn't have the wherewithal to make the payments.

So she decides to sell an item of value: her dead husband.

GAH! you say?

Okay, I'm exaggerating. She's not selling her dead husband. She's selling her dead husband's grave. On e-Bay. Meaning that if she sells it, she's going to have to move hubby somewhere else.

Well, I'm all for a little sacrifice in time of need (after all, as my wife so often points out, it WAS me who tried putting our son in a bowl and pouring milk all over him during the Great Froot Loops Draught of '08). But REALLY. And what does she think she's going to get for this marvelous piece of treasure.

Well, at last count on eBay: something like $4.5 MILLION dollars.

Now, before all of you go looking for one of your less-liked relatives to dig up and sell off their "final" resting place, you should know that this woman's husband's grave had something a bit unusual about it.

No, it wasn't full of solid gold iguanas.

Rather, it was right next to Marilyn Monroe's grave. In fact, it was part of a two-fer set that MM got with her (then) husband Joe DiMaggio. When they divorced, Joe got rid of "his side of the bed," as it were.

NOW the $4.5 million bid starts to make sense.

Or does it?

I mean, $4.5 million to lay next to this for eternity?

Okay, I can see that appealing to some people.

But the fact is, it's been a while. So $4.5 million to lay next to this?

Less so.

We have all gone crazy. People are trying to push a new health care system that hasn't even been read by most of the people pushing it. People are buying big screen TVs to go in the houses they can't afford. People are pouring milk over their children when they're out of Froot Loops (see, no one is blameless).

And in this time where everyone is hurting (or at least complaining that they're hurting), we still have people who can manage to find $4.5 million to spend in order to be buried next to The Mummy.

Darwin was clearly wrong on some points. Because anyone with any sense at all would put their $4.5 million into something with a little bit better return on investment. Like butter futures or something.

Then again, whenever anyone asks me (as they so often do), "How did we ever get into this mess," I will no longer look at them blankly and go "Wha?"

I will merely say, "Marilyn Monroe's Mummy."

And my conversation partner will nod and leave. For no more, at that point, will need to be said.

Thinking About Ignorance

This one is in a bit more serious of a vein than usual. My apologies, but even the best of us gets serious sometimes.

See, I can't even be serious without making a joke about it. Sad, really.

Anywho, I recently went to the Self Realization Center in Malibu (that's the picture). For those of you who don't know what this place is, it's a really lovely place with a lake, full of koi, ducks, and swans. The surrounding areas are plush, smelling richly of the flowers that veritably coat every square inch of the surrounding hills.

The place also has religious significance. There is a shrine to Mahatma Ghandi, which even contains some of his ashes, and some other religious features which I will get to in a moment.

I made the trip a bit of an outing with my children. They thoroughly enjoyed it, as did I. We did a circuit of the lake, stopping at the "feeding area" where you can feed the fish in the lake. I told them they were called Makoto fish and told them a legend of the fish's transformation to a mighty dragon if it could swim to the top of a certain waterfall - particularly cool to them because there was a large waterfall directly across the lake from us.

They were also very impressed when I told them a bit about Ghandi, and how he taught people that you don't always have to fight to win a battle. Conveying his message to a three- and five-year old was a bit trying, but if you ever want a lesson in clarity, try to distill important things down to that level: you really get to the essence and strip away everything that doesn't matter.

We also stopped by the meditation area, and I talked to the kids about the differences between thinking, pondering, meditating, and praying.

Finally, we ended up at an area that was designated to highlight each of the world's five major religions. This was (for me) the most interesting part of our small self-tour. As before, I tried to teach my kids, so I took my children to the symbol that represented each of the religions, and tried to talk to them a bit about what each religion believed, and some of the things that made each different from our own religion.

I emphasized that just because they believe differently does not make them bad, and that if someone is wrong about something, the best way to teach them is not by arguing or yelling, but by being so good they cannot help but admire you and want to emulate you.

The humbling part came when I realized I could only speak in depth about three of the five major religions. I will have to do some more studying, not because I wish to become an acolyte, and certainly not because I wish to remove myself from my own treasured beliefs in any way, but because it is impossible to understand someone when you don't understand their language.

And religion is one of the things that most fundamentally makes up a person's language, coloring his (or her) attitudes, beliefs (obviously), and actions. But more than that it colors their REactions and their INTERactions. And so understanding a person's religion - at least in a broad, basic way - can make the difference between thinking someone is an enemy, and KNOWING that someone is a friend.

World Peace Through Higher Gasoline Consumption

I just heard on the radio and read on the net that Chevy is coming out with a new vehicle that will get a whopping 230 miles per gallon. And that's city-mileage, baby, so who knows what it can do on the freeway?

Well, that depends on where you're at, I guess. If you live in Idaho, you'll probably get higher mileage - like infinity miles per gallon (I'm rounding); if you live in Los Angeles, where I operate, you might get lower mpg... like 4. Which is still an improvement.

At any rate, hearing that information absolutely floored me. And it led to an obvious question and an obvious danger in my mind: if all cars start getting that kind of fuel efficiency, what are we going to do with all our extra gas?! I mean, we can't just let it sit there in its crude form in the ground, just doing nothing. We're not wasteful like that. "Find a use for it and use it": that's the American Way (the American Way used to be "Work real hard and buy a house for financial security," but we all know how that turned out).

So what to do, what to do?

The obvious answers are always an option: use the extra gas to feed hungry children, or to cure cancer, or to end the worldwide polio epidemic.

What? They already took care of that one? Coolio. So now we're down to even fewer options.

And then, driving to work, it hit me: we can use our extra gas to end global warming! "What?" you say. "End global warming with gas? How is it possible?"

Here's how it works. We all know that the sea levels are rising as a result of the ice caps melting. Or at any rate, we all know that who say we all know that. Some people say we haven't actually proved that, and we respect their opinions, but for now we'll just ignore them and call them "the crazy people."

So all of us (not "the crazy people") get all our gas out of our old cars - which we will immediately throw away* when this new Chevy Volt comes out because we will immediately want to get this fuel-efficient gift from the heavens (or from Olympus - we don't discriminate in this blog). We then take that gas and pour it on the beaches on the major coastlines of the world.

Then we light it all on fire.

I anticipate the heat generated will boil the beach water. This will cause steam to rise, and kick-start the rain-cycle which should drop more water over our polar areas, thus adding to our polar ice caps. Not only that, but the water that is boiled away means an automatic, instantaneous drop in the world's sea level. You can thank me later, Netherlands.

AND when all the gas is burned off, I bet there will be plenty of boiled fish washing up on the shores. We just have UPS standing by for shipment to underdeveloped nations, and WHAMMO! we've also just solved world hunger.

So is this sounding great, or what? I know, I know, there are a few obvious kinks in the process, like: what if people in areas of world hunger don't like fish? But these things iron themselves out, I assure you.

So let's all get ready. 2010 is when the Chevy Volt is scheduled to arrive. The year we all turn fuel economic on the freeway and use the earth's remaining gasoline and oil to solve global warming, world hunger, and I wouldn't be surprised if it accidentally also cures cancer.

* Where will we throw away our old cars? I dunno. You can't expect me to think of everything. But probably just in some big hole somewhere. That way, they won't hurt anything.

G.I. Jonesing – or – Why I Want to Bear Snake Eyes’ Children

I’ve already made it pretty clear that I don’t think every movie has to be smart to be brilliant. The last movie I talked about in that vein was Transformers 2, a movie produced by Hasbro, and one that I found loud, silly, almost plotless… and totally awesome.

Well, folks, Hasbro is two for two this summer. I saw G.I. Joe last night, and when I went in I just wanted it to do one thing: I wanted it to make me remember why, when I was around 10 or 12 years old, I had to get home in time to watch G.I. Joe. No. Matter. What.

I get detention? I skip it to get home.

Car not working? I run.

Pass a burning bus full of nuns on the way? Sorry, sisters, you gots ta burn.

Because I know that G.I. Joe is coming on. And knowing is half the battle. The other half is watching the show.

Point being, I wanted that feeling, that “YO, JOE!” feeling that I used to get.

And I got it. For six specific reasons:

1) Cool gadgets.

2) Hearing catchphrases like “knowing is half the battle” and “we got a lotta Joes out there.”

3) Snake Eyes.

4) Snake Eyes.

5) Snake Eyes.

6) Snake Eyes.

Sure, there were a couple things that didn’t work for me. The little kid from Third Rock From the Sun as Cobra Commander didn’t work for me. Wayans as the stereotypical black funny guy who has his moment to shine after essentially serving as the village idiot for 95% of the movie… meh.

There were a couple of lines that made my eyes roll so far back I was looking at the person in the seat behind mine (sometimes my brain and skull go transparent, allowing me to do that – a neat but creepy party trick).

I also was a little weirded out by the ethno-cultural changes. It used to be “G.I. Joe… A real American Hero” (and if you can’t actually hear the song being sung when you read that, you’re the wrong demographic for this article, dude).

This was not the case in the movie. In the movie it would have been more like “G.I. Joe… A real cross-cultural mixed-ethnicity inter-national U.N.-sanctioned P.C. hero…” Which I have no problem with as a moral choice or anything, and I get that the folks in charge want to appeal to as many different countries as possible. It was just jarring is all.

But there were a few things – more than a few things – that did work for me.

Scarlett had a frickin’ rad crossbow.

And yes, I did just actually say “frickin’ rad.” And I say frickin’ rad because frickin’ rad was what we said when the Joes were around as cartoons.

But anyway, her crossbow was like something Buffy the Vampire Slayer might have if she had Darth Vader’s tech/weapons guy working for her. It could shoot around corners and hit you in the eye and if that didn’t make you go “Frickin’ rad!” then the fact that it glowed red at the edges and had some sort of LCD video screen would definitely make you go “Frickin’ rad!”

And there were also submarines that looked like amphibious X-wing fighters, helicopters that made Airwolf look like one of those airplanes you wind up with a rubber band, and a whole slew of “wicked kewl” other stuff.

And the catchphrases. Hearing Dennis Quaid say “And knowing is half the battle” was wonderful, if not quite as good as hearing Peter Cullen say “Autobots, roll out.”

And last but not least (times four)… Snake Eyes.

I remember that Snake Eyes was the coolest one when I was a kid. He didn’t say anything, he had a pet wolf, and you had the feeling that he could be the most popular kid at school if he wanted to, but he didn’t: he just wanted to kick the crap out of bad guys and save the day.

And they nailed it in the movie. No wolf, but they got the rest bang-on. I mean totally perfect. So here I am, a happily married man with two kids, and this guy is so frickin’ rad (again, see above re frickin’ rad) that I’m having my heterosexuality challenged. He’s got swords, a gun, and a facemask that is like Geordi LaForge’s on steroids. How cool is he? Again, I’m having trouble maintaining my straightness here.

And why is Snake Eyes so cool (aside from the above-mentioned reasons, as if those weren’t enough)? Well, I think a big part of it is that he is – oddly enough – the most human of the characters. The one who you get the feeling that if you were serious enough and tried hard enough and took a vow of silence, you could end up with the skills Snake Eyes has. Get yourself a black suit and the aforementioned cool facemask, and you are him. You don’t have to be pretty, like Scarlet, or prettier like Channing Tatum as Duke (seriously, I thought the girls in the audience – both of them – were going to die of apoplexy whenever he opened his pretty little mouth). You don’t have to be a big dude, like so many of the other (multi-ethnic) Joes in the movie are.

You just gotta want it. You just gotta work for it. You just gotta be the one who is already moving to do something while everyone else is still scratching their heads and saying, “I don’t know, what do you think we should do about the nuclear warhead speeding towards Washington?”

And no, that’s not a spoiler. There is no nuclear warhead in this movie. I will provide a short spoiler, though.

SPOILER ALERT

The Joes win. No major bad guys are actually seen dying. There is a Colliseum-sized opening for a sequel.

END SPOILER

So did I like G.I. Joe?

Yeah. It was frickin’ rad.

And Tat's all There is to it

Heard an interesting piece on the news today about how tattoo removal is projected to become a multi-billion-a-year business in the US alone.

I don’t see how that’s possible. I mean, all you have to do is wait for a while and the tattoo just wears off, right? In fact, usually when I get a tattoo, I forget to hold the cold washcloth on it long enough and then when I peel the paper back my “Superman” tattoo ends up looking like a cross between a dead fish and a llama with dysentery.

I guess maybe they’re talking about more washcloths being needed to scrub the ugly llamas off?

What? You mean they’re talking about THE OTHER KIND of tattoos? And it turns out that it’s even more expensive to get one off than to put it on?

Does this all seem kind of weird to anyone but me? First of all, I have had sharp pointy things poked into me by people who were not my friends. They did it mostly for free. So as a rule I must admit I have no wish to pay a stranger to stick sharp pointy things into me, and leave behind permanent proof that he did it. But that’s just me.

Nonetheless, it does kill me the number of people that are getting “tats” all over at the age of 16 or 18, or even 20 or 22. At some point it stops being about a cool tat and starts being a social statement.

And what’s the statement? Probably something like “I want to be poor.”

See, a rock star can get away with tattoos. He’s rich, and in a field that promotes that kind of activity.

But the majority of us are going to end up wanting to be teachers or architects or doctors or things like that.

And believe me, nothing says “Hire me” to HR at a major law firm like a teardrop tat and “Born to Burn” emblazoned across the back of your head.

Having said all that, then, I guess it isn’t such a surprise that tattoo removal is getting ready for big numbers. At some point, most people realize they have to grow up (my wife is still waiting on me). That means paying the bills. And that usually goes hand in glove with LOOKING like someone who pays the bills.

Which, in turn, implies that tattoos may not be the “wicked cool” thing they’re generally perceived as by the people getting them. Rather, they are more likely “wicked cool today, wicked dumb tomorrow.”

And don’t even get me started on the people who look like they’re trying to turn their earlobes into basketball hoops.

I’d say more (like about the tattoos all the girls are getting on their backs – you know, the ones right above their tooshes – which I suspect are going to look rather odd as they age and the things stretch out to resemble silly putty faces), but I gotta go. I hear University of Phoenix has an online course in tattoo removal, and I want a piece of THAT pie.

I Don't Know Anything About This, but I Know I Have Strong Feelings About it

I was just listening to talk radio (endless fodder there for blog topics), and the commentator started ranting about the California budget process, which as near as I can tell involves a bunch of people cloistered in a room with some accountants, a stapler, lots of paper, and a Magic 8 Ball.

The commentator's rant got my blood pressure up. "Hey," thought I (when I think, I always do it in olde vernacular like "thought I"), "methinks I agree... the budget process in California HAS TO CHANGE!"

Then I realized that I have NO idea how the process works.

Okay, I have SOME idea, but not much. And still I know - I KNOW - that things must change. And if you stuck a gun to my head and made me come up with some, I bet I could even contribute concrete suggestions as to HOW the process should change.

And I could come up with these suggestions even though (as I've already stated) I don't know how the process works in the first place. And how ridiculous is that? It's like me hanging out a sign on my door that says "Michaelbrent - Heart Surgeon" and when asked about my qualifications replying that I eat those Necco hearts each Valentine's Day that say "Be Mine" and "Hot Stuff" and things like that.

Even worse, I think this problem may not be confined just to me. I have a sneaking suspicion that an awful lot of my friends, coworkers, peers, etc., have very strident opinions about important matters that they have not bothered to educate themselves about.

Example:

GUY ON THE STREET: We need to get the troops out of Afghanistan.
ME: Why?
GUY ON THE STREET: Because they're not doing anything good over there!
ME: What do you mean by that?
GUY: Just what I said.
ME: Well, you didn't really communicate much. Do you think they could be better utilized elsewhere? Or that the methods they're using are unConstitutional? Or just that fighting in general is immoral?
GUY: [swiftly punches me in the groin then runs]
ME: [gurgle]

See what I mean? I'm not saying anything here about whether or not we should have troops in Afghanistan, or whether or not Prop 8 was a good thing, or if the Cash for Clunkers program is a good one or not (though I have opinions about at least one of them). What I'm saying is that we have all these issues flying around these days, and so many of us care so much about them that we're willing to argue and scream and yell to make our point... but we don't care quite enough to actually research the underlying facts that (in a perfect world) would actually make up our opinions.

It just seems strange to me that we will get into fist- or word-fights over things that are direly important to us, but when asked to explain our opinions in factual, non-argumentative tones, so few of us can.

But maybe that's human nature. After all, I hear that there's a bill pending in Congress that intends to ban use of paisley in clothing. I'm for it. And I'll DIE to defend my beliefs.

Just don't ask me why. It's what I believe. That should be enough, shouldn't it?

WIIIIIIII.... isn't that the sound you make right before you want to get off the merry-go-round?

This one is inspired by a Facebook comment I made in response to a buddy of mine.

I won't go into the back and forth, but as a result of it I looked up the Wii.com website, to see what kind of stuff they offer.

Did you know you can play Wii tennis? Wii yoga? Were you aware (or should I say, aWiire) that you can Wii jog, Wii ski, and even (or should I say, Wiiven) Wii bow-and-arrow?

[Sidenote: Wii bow-and-arrow is a bit lengthy, but what's a blogger to do?]

I'm not sure whether to be thrilled or appalled. On the one hand, there's a bunch of fat little kids (or adults) out there who might be enticed into actually doing something that resembles physical activity based on the idea that they're not REALLY exercising; that it's just a game.

On the other hand, I have a vision of the future, where 30 years from now everyone looks like vampires because no one goes outdoors any more. Why bother, when Wiibeach lets you have all the fun, without the sunburn? And of course, though everyone has insanely developed forearms muscles (even the women look like Popeye in this Wii-topia), no one Wii-ly knows how to ride a bicycle anymore.

Can't you see it?

MOM: Oh, no, little Johnny's cut his arm badly!
DAD: And the car won't start!
MOM: What about the bicycle?
DAD: I don't think the Wii-bike will really carry us anywhere, honey. It's all virtual.
MOM: WHAT?
JOHNNY: Glug (death-rattle).

Of course, by then there'll probably be Wii-surgeon, so Johnny might turn out all right after all.

But on that line of thinking, why don't they just save us all some time. I'm waiting for it. The Big One. Sort of the Unifying Theory of all Things Wii.

That's right, I want them to come up with Wii Life. The one where you never have to actually DO anything ever again; all interactions are carried out through an avatar-life interface proprietary to Nintendo. All you need are a Wii, a bed, an IV with enough fluids to keep you alive, and a catheter.

Watch out world, here Wii come!

Who the heck IS Billy Jones?

Curious???

HOLY COMPUTER GENERATED GUACAMOLE!!!

Shorter than most of my blogs, but I just had to share. I just saw the new trailer for TRON: Legacy.

For those of you who don't know, TRON was a Disney movie that came out about 20 years ago, and was a huge flop... largely because audiences didn't like seeing a bunch of computer-generated images instead of "real" stuff on the screen.

Oh, how we have changed.

But in spite of not doing so well at the box office, it spawned a bunch of highly successful video games and garnered a tremendous cult following.

Oh, and did I mention it has one of the best actors ever in it: Jeff Bridges?

Well, the trailer looks AWESOME. Check it out. I'll be here opening night.

This isn't earth-shattering news. Just me-shattering.

What do YOU think?

HARRY POTTER vs. CUJO vs... HAMLET??? (only on Pay Per View!)

Just kidding. It's not only on PPV. It's right here, on My Little Thoughts, free of charge!

So who would win?

And what the heck do I mean by that title (not that my titles necessarily mean anything other than that I have suffered a massive overdose of Skittles and Dr. Pepper - a mean combo).

What I mean is, I wonder who will be regarded as THE great English-speaking literary master of our age 500 years from now. English teachers and professors all over the US and England would probably respond that it will be James Joyce, or F. Scott Fitzgerald, Maya Angelou, or William Faulkner, or a host of other folks along those lines.

Me, I think J.K. Rowling and Stephen King are running neck and neck in the race for the crowning title of our era's "Shakespeare."

That sound you hear right now is about a thousand heart attacks all over the US as the "really smart" people out there gurgle and mutter "blasphemy" under their breath and look around for a rock to huck at me.

But hear me out. What is it that creates a classic? It is a literary work or a body of literature that speak through the ages, that are passed from hand to hand, heart to heart, and withstand the test of time.

There's a word for that: popular.

Popular is a dirty word for the literate elite. Not for all of them, but I certainly know more than a few English teachers who think that a piece of writing isn't "valuable literature" unless you need the assistance of a cryptographer to decipher what it "really means."

It's kind of like the priesthood of the Middle Ages, when the common folk were forbidden from reading bibles in a lot of places, because that ensured that the priests would always be important. Our modern version: you don't understand the "important" works of literature? That doesn't mean you're stupid. It means that some English teacher has job security.

So I don't think Joyce has a chance. I only know three people that read him for "fun," and I'm pretty sure two of them did it because they thought it gave them a shot at getting a date with the third. Faulkner? Better, but not someone who has endured as much on his own merit (which I actually think is pretty good) as because we have included him in English text books. And Fitzgerald? Forget it. The Great Gatsby was, for me, The Highly Forgettable Gatsby, and would have been The Never Cared Gatsby if it hadn't been forced upon me by my English teachers.

And now, before you go getting opinions about me, let me tell you something: I had read the complete works of William Shakespeare before I was thirteen... and loved them. Ditto Mary Shelley's classic Frankenstein, and Bram Stoker's Dracula, and Little Women, Little Men (anyting Alcott, in fact), and most of Jane Austen. I'm not someone who just reads things that you can find next to the magazines in the supermarket.

I'm just also someone who thinks that, occasionally, those books next to the magazines are pretty dang good.

So, to return to my thesis (smart word alert!), I think that Rowling and King are probably our two top contenders. They have both managed to create worlds (numerous in King's case) that have become, not merely appreciated, not merely loved, but iconized and internalized in our society. Say Harry Potter to ANYONE, and they know what you're talking about. Say Cujo to a 14-year-old, and he knows you're referring to a crazed rabid dog.

The books written by these authors have actually already passed EVERY test required for a book to be a "classic" except for one... the test of time. Great Expectations is still a great book because it still says things that matter today, to the readers of this era. Les Miserables still teaches - beautifully - lessons that every society must grapple with as it tries to balance justice and mercy. Even Dumas, much more of an "action writer" than many of the others on this list (he's the guy who wrote The Three Musketteers and a bunch of others like that), still put into his writing themes that are relatable and important today.

So, in 500 years will the battle between Voldemort and Harry Potter still matter? I think so. Themes of family, of love, of strife, of bigotry and hatred and those who would fight against it... these will all still be relatable and relevant.

Ditto the questions raised in many of King's books. The Stand, and its themes of what makes good worth following (even though as a rule it tends to be a bit less organized than evil), and what it takes to conquer evil (give you a hint... the scene where the bad guys are blown up isn't when the good guys win... it's the scene when one of the good guys is threatened by Satan... and laughs). Or how about The Shining, and its motifs of love vs. abuse, of substance abuse, of isolation and creativity and a thousand other things that will still matter to people in the year 2510.

I DO have an opinion as to which of the two will be judged as the greater writer of our age, but I'm keeping it to myself, for now. But I believe it WILL be one of them.

What do YOU think?

FOR THOSE WHO SAY CHILDREN ARE OUR FUTURE LIKE IT'S A GOOD THING

There are those who say children are the future. If so, I think it's because they're going to knock us off and TAKE the future. I have proof...

If you're still not convinced, I know a guy who knows a guy who knows some child assassins (or "chassassins" as the pros call them) who will be happy to pay you a... visit...

I Hate Movies, Especially Harry Potter

This is why movies are ruining our lives…

I like movies. I really do. In fact, given my ‘druthers, I’d be out there writing, watching, or doing SOMETHING movie-related as often as possible.

Of course, given my ‘druthers, I’d also be covered in solid gold iguanas (see earlier post if you don't get this... it actually means something). So see what that gets me.

But anywho, to return to movies: I like them, but I think they’re killing us. We go to movies as the last great social event available to us: in the old days, people went to the theater; in the old-old days, they went to the Greek Chorus; in the old-old-old days they went to the funeral of the oldest man in the tribe (16 years old) and wept for his 12 year old wife and their six kids. So in that sense, they still serve an important function, binding us together as communities. After all, who out there went and saw Harry Potter?

Who wore a cloak, a weird hat, or drew a lightning bolt somewhere on their body?

But here’s where they’re killing us. Most movies have a set structure with specific parts. Movie experts like to call these things a “beginning,” “middle,” and “end.”

Don’t worry, all those crazy-sounding lingo words are in the dictionary, so you can look them up for pronunciation.

At any rate, the thing about a beginning, middle, and end, is that when you see them happen enough in a two hour period, you start to think just about anything should be resolvable in a similar time frame.

I remember when my son was born. It was EXHAUSTING. I mean, I’m sure my wife was a little tired, too, but I was so pooped I could barely stand it. And then, at last, after all my work and toil, the little kid came out.

“Woohoo!” I thought. “I did it!”

Then the nurses immediately handed the baby (still covered in some kind of substance that I can only assume was a sort of internally prepared tapioca) to my wife. Having seen many a nature show, I naturally assumed that this was so my wife could lick the baby clean.

But no, instead they said, “Feed the baby.”

“What?” my brain shrieked. “We just HAD the silly thing. Isn’t there, like, a grace period, or a hiatus, or… an INTERMISSION or something?”

Because, see, in the movies, after the baby is born, you cut to either a) older baby, b) family in the hall, or c) credits.

NEVER do you move on to “Now feed it.”

Of course my wife did feed the baby, even though it was very tough on me to be working hard like that right after the birth.

I fear that, as a culture, we have become ever more focused on and desirous of quick fixes. We don’t “patch things up” any more, we just throw them out and get a new one. Patches are not cool, after all (unless on jeans with pre-ripped and –patched seems added ahead of time, only $99 on clearance, buy yours today!). Patches are not cool, and taking time is just right out of the question.

I mean, come on, what won the Presidential election? Was it lengthy dissertations of issues? Or was it five-second sound-bites?

Why is divorce on the rise? Is it because people give it their all and it doesn’t work out? Or is it more often because it’s just easier to jump ship?

Why are Bratz dolls becoming more popular than Barbie? (Okay, this last has nothing to do with the topic; I just think it’s a sign of the Apocalypse and we should all be aware of it.)

The movies: beginning, middle, end. Want, work for, get. All in two hours. TV is even worse, because after cutting out commercial time, you have the whole process happen in 22 minutes or 40 minutes.

I’ve been married for seven years now. No beginning, middle, and end. I mean, I know there was a beginning, but I’m not sure if I’m at the middle, or still at the beginning, or what.

I think that’s what’s tough about so many things in life: you don’t see when it will be over. The challenges and tribulations that we face don’t come with expiration dates. There is no point at which we can be assured the credits will roll and we will finally be able to go to the bathroom (I always drink too much soda pop during movies and life).

But we’re not in a movie. We’re in life. It has no end credits (at least, not any we get to stick around and read, being as we’re in some kind of dark box at that point). It has an awful lot of scenes that shouldn’t make the “final cut” – too boring, too mundane, too… lifelike.

But on the upside, there are no four corners that prevent you from jumping right into the action. You can be a part of it. We can all write it as we go along. And if Act Two seems like it’s lagging, that doesn’t mean it’s time to fire the cast and try to find a new leading man or lady, it just means that more time needs to be spent polishing our own lines so that we can become the hero (or heroine) we’ve always dreamt of being.

And, besides, life doesn’t have that sticky floor feeling, either. So bonus.

PS I don't hate Harry Potter. But I bet that title got you curious!

Character, shmaracter

It has been said that the true test of a man's character is what he does when he thinks no one is watching.

Well, that may be true.

It is also true, then, that the true test of a WOMAN's character is what she does after watching her man do what he does when he thinks no one is watching.

Just a thought.