Forty-Two: Explained

For all those who were disappointed that I didn't include the most important number in the universe in its proper film context for my "100 Movies" clipshow, there are three reasons: (1) I hadn't seen the new Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy yet, (2) I was wanting to get the project done sooner rather than later and (3) I had heard unfortunate things about the film.

I was pleasantly surprised when I finally sat down to watch it last night. I enjoyed it so much that I almost feel compelled to write up a massive defense of the film after reading The Flick Filosopher's scathing review which she titled "Vogon Poetry". Ouch. No, it is not a faithful adaptation to the book, but the spirit is there, which I would think is the ultimate goal. But Maryann Johanson is apparently quite the uber-fan of the original book and it's hard to argue with a passion like that.

All I know is that late in the movie when Vogon troopers (dressed disturbingly like the Gimp in Pulp Fiction) advance on our heroes, Mos Def goes after them while flailing his towel about. "Oh no! A Towel!" they wail in their British accents as they waddle a quick retreat. It was such a supremely silly moment in a movie packed with them that I laughed out loud. Monty Python would be proud, and I believe Adams would have been proud, too.

Which Lolcat am I?

Your Score: Sad Cookie Cat

55% Affectionate, 46% Excitable, 68% Hungry

You are the classic Shakespearian tragedy of the lolcat universe. The sad story of a baking a cookie, succumbing to gluttony, and in turn consuming the very cookie that was to be offered. Bad grammar ensues.

To see all possible results, checka dis.

Link: The Which Lolcat Are You? Test written by GumOtaku on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

Reading "The Blue"

I don't do message boards or any of that, and I don't make a habit of reading them (except for the occasional Lost discussion at Film Fodder), but I just had to share some of these Metafilter comments to this video. The video, of course, is entertaining all on it's own, but the comments are hysterical:

A celebrity cooking?! Is this worthy of the Blue?
posted by dov3 at 11:42 AM on July 29


He got his greasy yella chicken hands all over that salt spoon.
posted by brain cloud at 12:01 PM on July 29


He got his greasy yella chicken hands all over that salt spoon.

In a contest between Walken and salmonella, I know which will win.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:04 PM on July 29 [1 favorite]


A celebrity cooking?! Is this worthy of the Blue?

If this were, say, Jennifer Lopez... no.

But it's Christopher Walken. Christopher Walken could do an instructional video on loading the dishwasher, and it would be worthy, imho.
posted by katillathehun at 12:07 PM on July 29 [2 favorites]


I love this man. All my heart. All my goddam heart.
posted by cortex at 12:41 PM on July 29


Christopher Walken may cook, but would you eat it?
posted by tommasz at 12:45 PM on July 29


This was worth it, just to hear Christopher Walken utter the single phrase "it's just like a little cookie."

I want a text-reading program with the voice of Walken that I can use when I read cute overload now.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 12:52 PM on July 29 [1 favorite]


And then what ... he fed it to his cat???? I love you Christopher Walken.
posted by WolfDaddy at 1:00 PM on July 29


I watched the whole thing. No cowbell.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 1:03 PM on July 29


A celebrity cooking?! Is this worthy of the Blue?

When Chris Walken farts its worthy of the blue.
posted by Ironmouth at 1:26 PM on July 29 [1 favorite]


Interesting video, but the problem with that recipe? A chicken that big roasted for one hour is still pretty raw. I hope he wasn't having guests over.
posted by bardic at 2:53 PM on July 29


A celebrity cooking?! Is this worthy of the Blue?

Yep. What'ya waitin' fer? Lindsay Lohan on how to toast Pop Tarts® ?
posted by ericb at 3:08 PM on July 29


Lindsay Lohan is a toasted Pop Tart.
posted by Wolfdog at 3:32 PM on July 29 [2 favorites]


Christopher Walken may cook, but would you eat it?

Who would dare refuse to?
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 4:01 PM on July 29

Salon makes me happy

Reading stories like this almost (almost) makes up for the depression I felt back in November of 2004:

It was all so much less complicated when there was an heir apparent. But this time around, it's not even clear what such an heir would inherit. The elephant in the room, the one the candidates prefer to ignore, is the failed presidency of George W. Bush. His legacy will be a burden to whichever Republican stumbles to the finish line. Yet in the same poll where nearly 60 percent of the Republicans expressed dissatisfaction with the presidential field, 39 percent of the respondents wanted a nominee who would continue Bush's policies, and another 39 percent want a nominee more conservative than Bush. That puts the GOP base a little at odds with the general electorate, given that Bush's approval is in the mid-20s nationally, falling into the teens in some states. The stubborn yet dissatisfied base of the party presents a dilemma for candidates who hold any hope of winning the general election. How can a potential nominee win the favor of a Bush-loving GOP base without poisoning his prospects in November 2008?

Perhaps, then, it is a small blessing to the current crop of candidates that none of them is Bush's chosen successor. The field is, at least, wide open. But without an obvious heir apparent, the Reagan rule -- the tradition during primary season of "doing no harm" to fellow Republicans -- no longer applies. Thus the war of attrition starts, and the second-tier candidates begin searching for ways to separate themselves from the other long shots and gain on the vulnerable front-runners. Lately, while Romney aims his attacks at possible Democratic opponents, posturing as the nominee-in-waiting, he finds himself a target of fellow Republicans. Sam Brownback, the Kansas senator and self-styled "true conservative" in the field, has found a particularly inflammatory way to crack the top tier. He has decided to gay-bash Romney, challenging his position on gay rights, specifically the former governor's past statements about homosexual leaders serving in Boy Scout troops. The Brownback campaign issued a statement which, in part, read: "Romney's openness to gay scout leaders conflicts with the Scout Oath, which requires Scouts to be 'morally straight.'" David Brody, senior national correspondent at the Brownback-friendly Christian Broadcast Network, writes that "once the Brownback campaign brought [these issues] up, it's fair game."

The remainder of the Republican primary season promises to be a soul-searching experience for the party that has long treated the White House as an entitlement. More comfortable taunting Democrats for lacking core principles than questioning their own, the GOP's presidential aspirants seem a bit unsure of themselves, of their president, and of their party's moral authority and political standing. One of these candidates will emerge as the GOP standard bearer for 2008, of course. But in a party with no natural heirs, it's the value of the inheritance that's in doubt. Although 15 months still remain until the election, the Republican nomination looks less and less like a golden ticket to the Oval Office than an invitation to become their party's Walter Mondale or Michael Dukakis -- a punch-line proxy for an era when the GOP lost its moorings.

Popping my TW cherry

As part of my next YouTube project, I've been watching new films in order to see if they have the scenes I need. As it happens, two of those were my first exposure to Tennessee Williams: A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat On A Hot Tin Roof. Both were quite good, though I enjoyed Cat much more than Streetcar. Cat just seemed meatier and richer in it's material and characters.

Also, I have to say, the fact that Newman and Taylor didn't couple in real life means the world lost some gorgeous children.

Only drawback: No more waking up late

My brain is very burned out in terms of original blog content, so I guess I'll just comment on some random entertainment news:

Drew Carey picked to come on down as new 'Price is Right' host

I've always had an affection for Drew. Though I was indifferent to his stand up and his sitcom, he did two things that earned my respect.

First, he was able to get an American version of the hit British show Who's Line is it Anyway up and running. He even got some of the same comedians from the original show to come over and be regular guests (the American members, appropriately enough). No, it wasn't as good as the original, but it was a damn fine effort that had it's moments.

Second, the guy is smart. I remember seeing him on the celebrity version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire and kicking ass. Not only was he knowledgeable, but he was confident about his answers. You didn't see a lot on vacillating from him. Just pick an answer and go. It ended up winning him 500,000 dollars. The best thing about all this? He donated his winnings to the Ohio Library Foundation. Now that's a man after my own heart.

With this new gig, there have been some discussing what kind of a career move this is for Carey. This comment was posted by XQUZYPHYR over on Metafilter and pretty much sums up my take on the whole thing:

"Carey's job- for which he will be paid, likely a lot- will be to be pretty much adored by millions of people for hanging around beautiful women and handing people lots of money. My god, if that's a decline what hole can I crawl into for a chance at that?"

Have a nice, steady career, Drew. You've earned it.

Skippy of the Day: Mitt Romney (and friend)

This picture is getting a lot of attention in the blogs:






I'm going to guess that this will become a larger problem than you might think, if for no other reason than the Romney campaign seems to be scrambling for an answer to it (everything short of an actual apology, of course). As for his latest comment that we should "lighten up" about his supporters lumping democrats with a mass murderer, I'm just wondering how he would react if we did some similar alliteration if his last name were, say, "Rigger" or "Fetback".

Greatly Exaggerated ... Twice

I'd just like to use today as an opportunity to print some retractions. Recently, I bemoaned the demise of Brickshelf and also, back in April, delivered a eulogy for the Tuesday Night Movie Club website, as well.

Turns out neither of them are dead. Brickshelf has found a way to stay alive and TNMC is ... well ... it's still there, but updates remain very thin on the ground. Congrats to both for hanging in there.

Now if I could only get back to updating DPN more than once a month.

Four for Three

CNN has the scoop on the next season of House. Out with the old ...


... and in with the new:




The four new faces are, in order, Olivia Wilde, Kal Penn, Peter Jacobson and Anne Dudek. The only details given about specific characters is that Wilde will play a character called (ahem) "Thirteen". What, was Jeri Ryan unavailable to play this character?

As for the others, Kal Penn gets points for being in my wife's favorite movie last year (Superman Returns), and he recently got some notice for his dramatic chops in The Namesake. Hopefully the House role will help him further shed the "Kumar" image ( though his doing the sequel isn't helping that cause any).

Peter Jacobson is the oldest of this quartet and the most recognizable for a ton of television work. I'm guessing that he's playing another doctor in the hospital not under House since he's a little old to be playing an intern.

And the final girl I know nothing about, other than that picture makes her look spookily like Diane Neal off of Law & Order: SVU.

Good Luck To The New Meat! (snicker)

LOT'S of little flaming wheelchairs

I recently joined the Bookcrossing.com website. For those of you unfamiliar it, you register specific copies of books on it, mark the number on the inside cover, and then leave them out anywhere for others to pick up. Whomever gets them next can then update on the site what their thoughts on the book are and where they then drop it off at. And so on. The end result is that the books are handed from person to person and, in some cases, state to state and country to country.

This sounded like a cool thing to be a part of, so I submitted a paperback copy of one of my favorites, Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates by Tom Robbins, and then dropped it off at a Panera earlier this evening.

Later on, I checked on the copy by doing a title search only to find that 125 copies of that title are already registered and floating around the world right now in places like Portugal, Turkey and Taiwan. Oh well, my submission isn't that original, but I'll be happy enough if it gets across the state line.

Joined the bleedin' choir invisibile!

Well, shoot. I guess I'm going to have to change the blog's sidebar again.

Clicking on Brickshelf brings up a page saying "Brickshelf has discontinued operation. We apologize for any inconvenience." and that's it.

Well, at least I still have the pictures on previous posts I found there, and there were three that I uploaded recently but had not posted yet. So here they are without links to their authors. Enjoy ... for one last time.

"Falling Gnomes"

I just got back from vacation and am not in shape to talk at length about much of anything, but I thought I'd share this video I came across. This Boing Boing link explains what it's all about:



If nothing else, this proves that the one positive thing to come from Benny Hill was that damn chase music.

I'm on vacation...

...but I had to come online to share two things with you:

1 - By some strange bit of luck, the one-screen movie theater where we are vacationing recieved Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on Wednesday, so Mrs. Mosley and I got to see it two days before most everyone else. Very cool.

2 - "Skippies of the Week" is awarded to Operation Save America.

For the first time in history, a Hindu today delivered the Senate’s morning invocation. But three protesters belonging to the Christian Right anti-abortion group Operation Save America loudly interrupted the invocation, stating, “Lord Jesus, forgive us father for allowing a prayer of the wicked, which is an abomination in your sight.”

Will these people please, please get a different friggin hobby?!?!

I'M IT! (along with seven other folks)

I neglected to mark a milestone last week when Acrentropy turned three years old, so let this be my belated commemoration. Today, I have another milestone: After three years of blogging, I have finally been tagged!

People who have been tagged are required to reveal eight facts about themselves and to post and obey the following rules:

Rules:

1. We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
2. Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged write their own blog post about their eight things and include these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged and that they should read your blog.

Eight Facts About Me:

1. Five years ago yesterday, I was visiting my then-girlfriend's hometown of Greenville, Mississippi. While we were driving through a quiet residential area, I entered a T-intersection for a left turn and was hit by a police cruiser that was speeding with neither his siren nor his lights on. She received some major bruises on her leg and I was taken to the emergency room with a ruptured spleen, which was soon taken out. Though it was only supposed to be a weekend trip, we spent the next two weeks in Greenville recovering. Both cars were totalled and the insurance companies declared it equal fault. As for legal action, I decided against it because (a) it would have meant doing it remotely from 800 miles away and (b) it would have been his word against ours since there were no witnesses. Such is life.

2. One year after the accident, I was married to the girlfriend and we began an annual tradition of vacationing with her mother's side of the family in Brevard, North Carolina every July. In fact, we leave for this year's trip tomorrow. Since we started, I've found Brevard and the surrounding region to be, to quote John Wayne in The Quiet Man, "another word for heaven to me". It's something that I very much look forward to every year.

3. I currently have a Tom Waits fixation. I bought my fourth CD of his, "Heart of a Saturday Night" and have been listening to it over and over. All this will eventually translate to a new YouTube video clip show I plan on doing later on this year to one of his songs.

4. Back when I was first in college, I had a friend who loved Mystery Science Theater 3000. He tried to get me to watch it, but I dismissed it as too goofy (and in all fairness, this guy's tastes were mostly acquired ones). It was only during the Sci-Fi Channel years that I got hooked and regretted never watching it earlier. To this day, I only have two types of DVD's on standing order: Pixar films and MST3K.

5. My wife got me hooked on Jane Austen. Specifically, she hooked me on the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice. It's become the ultimate comfort viewing for me, and it's led me to watch five (!?!?!) other versions of the novel, just to see what they do different.

6. The first (and only) time I have ever gotten seriously drunk was at the ripe old age of 26. However, I was fortunate enough to have done this in Edinburgh, Scotland, so at least I got drunk somewhere interesting.

7. Post-Apocalyptic fiction has occupied a lot of my reading. I've read "World War Z" and "Earth Abides" within the past year and am currently reading "Dies the Fire". If this meme brings by any visitors who have further reading suggestions for this genre, by all means post them in the comments.

8. My wife is six years younger than me. This usually doesn't pose that many problems except on the rare occasion where I have to, for example, explain who Herve Villechaize is.

OK. That was easy. Now here comes the tricky bit: I don't know eight bloggers!

So the list below is made up of two bloggers I've had communications with and the rest are bloggers that had nice things to say about my "100 Movies 100 Quotes 100 Numbers" video. You see? This is what you get for being nice to someone (I hope you've learned your lesson).

Tagged

Chuck at The Chutry Experiment
Jamie at Turn Down Your Lights
Joe at Cup of Joe Powell
Maki at More Junk From Maki
Michael at Zigzigger
Peevish at Barlyru
Walhydra at Walhydra's Porch
William at BillyBlog

(Postscript: I completely forgot to mention the guy who tagged me. Thanks to Robert Turnbull of Eternal Sunshine of the Logical Mind for the honor.)

As you were.

Here's some more Slate goodness, this time concerning the recent foiled London bombings:

Had the bombs actually gone off in the early morning hours, as planned, there could have been hundreds of casualties. One was parked near a packed nightclub; the other was nearby, in the center of the theater district. But this is a city that survived the IRA's terrorist campaign of the 1990s. It is also a city full of people who have to get to work in the morning, people who care quite a lot about traffic. I'm not going to lapse here into a string of cliches about British stoicism, but it really was a relief to encounter no hysteria whatsoever.

One of Mrs. Mosley's favorite historical subjects is the British homefront during WWII (this is one of the main reasons she's a big fan of Foyle's War). And this little paragraph does say a lot about the British character. It also brings to mind a T-Shirt showcased on Boing Boing last month:

Yeah, and Gene Kelly was in Xanadu. We all have our crosses to bear.

It's only 7:45 in the morning, but I think this (from a story by Slate) is going to be the best Picture/Caption combination I'm going to see all day:




Of course, it helps that I knew what the hell they were talking about without even having to look at the article. I am a child of the eighties.

"Go to bed, old man!"

So Mrs. Mosley and I are heading home tonight on JTB Boulevard and come up behind a car that is stopped at a green light. The traffic in the left lane is breezing by, so we crane our necks around to see in front of the stopped car. There is no backup in front of him, so Mrs. Mosley honks the horn a couple of times. This has no effect, so she maneuvers into the left lane, only to see that the light has finally turned yellow and then red.

So we are stopped now (for legitimate reasons) at the intersection and the idiot car is to our right. We both look over and see an older black man in the driver's seat seeming almost serene. He has a printout of some MapQuest directions held in his hand and is studying them under the cabin light, which he has turned on. We sit there looking at him dumbfounded, and he never once looks over to us. The light turns green and this time he puts his directions down and he proceeds through the intersection at a speed past us.

So, yeah, I had pretty much the same reaction as any of you would have had to this situation: WHO THE HELL USES MAPQUEST FOR DIRECTIONS ANYMORE?!?!?!?!

Delroy Lindo Quote of the Month: July 2007

Ah, another month, another mean-yet-humorous hood played by Delroy. Well, you go with your strengths.

And what better place to play a mean-yet-humorous hood than in a film based on an Elmore Leonard novel. Get Shorty is considered one of the best adaptations of Leonard's works, and it does hum along quite nicely. Delroy plays Bo Catlett, the thugish owner of a limo service who is owed money by B-movie producer Harry Zimm (played by Gene Hackman). Bo doesn't pull any punches when voicing his opinion of Harry.

Bo Catlett: "You think we watch any of your movies, Harry? I've seen better film on teeth."