Mr. Midwestern Shoe Explorer

Happy Halloween.

Once more, Ramble City. You Have Been So Advised.

The primary driver for these things lately is just getting my cartoons out there, so if it seems I don’t have much to say, how observant you are.

Paul and I went shopping last night. Our primary motivation for calling the cab and going to Wal-mart was to secure a pumpkin to be jack o’lanterned for tonight’s non-festivities, because Paul and I both enjoy celebrating holidays that have emotional significance to us. However, we were too late; all Wal-mart’s pumpkins had gone where the woodbine twineth, or, rather, presumably, were sitting on other people’s front porches with fearsome visages hacked into their normally quite bland and expressionless gourd-like facades.

This made us sad. But we were there, so we bought groceries, and now (very temporarily) have a full fridge again, and that makes us less sad.

We bought, among other things, cold cuts and a loaf of French bread and incomparable Claussen’s pickles, so I, as I type this, am intermittently stopping (but you can’t tell, can you?) to nibble on a sandwich made from the crusty heel of said loaf, split down the middle, with turkey and a slice of American cheese inside it (I don’t use condiments or, as I refer to them, ‘goo’, so there is no mayo, no mustard, no nastiness at all, just the bread, the meat and the cheese, thank you VERY much) with a couple of Claussen pickle slices I cut myself (we bought the halves, of course, because you get 6 more ounces for about 30 cents less than if you buy the quarters, and I kind of enjoy cutting the pickle halves myself anyway) sitting beside them on the plate, which I must confess, at this point, are very nearly perished, because I really like Claussen pickles.

We also got two frozen pizzas, one of which I’ll utterly consume during this Sunday’s Bucs game, milk and special Halloween Cocoa Puffs (which look like normal Cocoa Puffs but they were cheap) and a rotissary chicken (Word is just going to keep ‘rotissary’ underlined no matter how I spell it, so fuck it) (although I guess I could just call it ‘roasted’ and be done with it), a small jar of chicken gravy (because I wanted chicken and biscuits, dammit), some Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups for trick or treaters Paul swears won’t come (but then we’ll eat them ourselves, natch), and, I don’t know, some other stuff we’ll eat really quickly because I can eat quite a lot and Paul is literally a horde of locusts on long skinny Legolas legs, especially when he’s toked up, which is pretty much all the time he’s not at work or asleep. (And last night he scored some really expensive hydro shit, so he’s seriously stoned lately.)

And I did make chicken and biscuits last night (it was easy… we buy these pre-shaped frozen biscuits which just go in the oven at 400 degrees for twenty minutes, and I carved chunks off the whole roasted chicken and poured in some gravy from the jar and stirred it all up and when the biscuits came out I split two each of them for us, poured the gravy and chicken bits over them, and voila, chicken and biscuits).

It’s odd, because I don’t like chicken and biscuits so much I’ll make them more than three or four times a year, but when I want them, I want them. And it’s not that the food is all that delicious when I make it, although it’s not bad. It’s just that for some reason this is comfort food, and eating it is, well, very comforting.

Oh, Paul has rotten teeth and surlily refuses to see a dentist, so when they flare up on him he has a bad couple of days before the nerves subside again, so he wanted some warm gooie stuff to eat in case that happened again, so he got a box of little packets of different kinds of oatmeal mix, and we got a lot of soup. I'll mix up a can of tomato soup (if we have milk; tomato soup with water is nasty) and drink it right from a cup, so it’s good to have that, plus, if I feel more industrious I’ll make toasted cheese sandwiches to go with it, which is another comfort food thing that, unlike the chicken and biscuits, is really horribly bad for you and probably has nearly no nutritive value whatsoever.

We also have chicken noodle soup, which is still another comfort food thing for me, and vegetable beef, which is all for Paul because I think it’s gross.

Let me stress here once again that Paul and I are both sad we don’t have a pumpkin to carve into a jack o’lantern. Paul just got home from work and said he’d taken the long way home to check various places for pumpkins and couldn’t find nary a one. That will teach us.

All right. What else. Well, I watched Tru Calling last night. It’s not a very good show, unfortunately… it’s actually quite formulaic, within the truly weird series concept. Eliza is delightful, and as a long time comics fan I was intrigued by how close to a classic superhero origin they gave her both in terms of her odd powers and her motivation for using them to help others. However, the conveniently dysfunctional family they assigned her, with the coked out older sister and the gambling addict younger brother, whom she will obviously be trying to bail out in each episode as she gets to flash back and attempt to prevent the untimely death of whoever it is she’s trying to do that with that week, simply struck me as rather too much.

Now, Eliza was going to have trouble going from Buffy to nearly anything else, since it wasn’t very likely that whatever she jumped into next was going to remotely be as good as Buffy. And I have to admit, this vehicle isn’t bad, and Eliza does a good job with the character and the adequate-but-far-from-scintillating dialogue. And I’ll keep making an effort to watch it (which means taping it out in the front room, since Survivor has been far too interesting to give up this time around, and just got amazingly more so last night). However, unless FOX shifts it to another time slot quickly, I don’t think this has much staying power. I hope otherwise because it is a genuinely different show and because I wish Eliza nothing but the best, and would enjoy being able to look at her on a regular basis. But I fear. I fear.

Oh, yeah, Paul got a couple of boxes of Little Debbie Christmas Cake things, but I’m trying to stay away from both sugar and that hydrolized fat stuff, which is supposed to be just LETHAL. It won’t last (I just had a glass of Mountain Dew, in fact, being utterly sick of plain water) but for now, I’m avoiding those sludge coated Christmas Tree shaped artery clogging heart exploding Death Pastries entirely.

As I mentioned, Survivor has been fascinating this season and last night it only got to be more so. I’m honestly wondering if we don’t have a chance to see a genuinely pleasant person (the near-heroic Rupert) win the game this time around. In fact, I find myself liking a couple of the people still in the game (Andrew, the guy leading the beleaguered Morgan tribe, also seems quite sympathetic to me).

Last night’s twist, in which the six people voted off the game so far returned to compete in an unexpected immunity challenge as a tribe of their own (the Outcasts) seeking vengeance and vindication, really enthralled me. The social dynamics of Survivor have always been intriguing (if mean spirited, conniving, and generally odious) but now, with at least two people previously voted off coming back into the game next week as renewed members of either established tribe, this is going to get really freaky.

I’m curious as to what will happen with the Outcasts. Since they won the challenge, they get to vote two of their members back INTO the game… which is interesting enough in terms of how that will shake up the Morgans and Drakes, when a previously rejected loser shows up once again.

However, I’m curious as to whether the Outcasts will continue beyond this as part of the game, perhaps augmented in the future by other rejectees. I realize they can’t keep this up for long because you have to eliminate players in order to get down to your final winner, but in the past, rejectees have all gone into a jury that picks the winner from the final two. Keeping them in an actively competing spoiler tribe would be a very interesting twist.

Anyway, unless one of the two people voted off tonight goes into the Outcasts, they will be down to four members next week, and the other two tribes will be at 5… an untenable dynamic. Now, the host stated explicitly whoever got voted off in last night’s show was going home (and Osten won no points with anyone by becoming the first player ever to openly volunteer to be sent home), but, well, they’ll lie. I doubt Osten will choose to stay, but the other fellow who got kicked out (annoying sales executive guy, whose name I can’t recall) would doubtless jump at the chance to get some payback.

What I find equally fascinating is the idea of how it’s going to work when the Outcast tribe votes to send two of its members back into the competition. Obviously ALL of them want to be picked, and that’s a very different thing from trying hard NOT to be selected to get booted. If everyone votes for themselves… but no, that’s probably not allowed. So basically, if you have to vote for someone else, then… hmmmm. Interesting.

The possibility for deals is dizzying… someone could say ‘well, vote me back into the game, and then vote for me when you’re on the jury, and if I win, I’ll split my prize with you’, or something like that. (I’ve often wondered if the attractive women contestants don’t make deals with some of the men offering sexual favors in exchange for their support -- not on the island, obviously, but afterward, once the game is over. A guy would have to be pretty trusting to go for that, but, well, I’m a guy and I’m stupid like that… I’d at least strongly consider any such offer that came my way from some of the hotties that have been on that show.)

Anyway, Survivor this season has me locked in. I’m really not daring to hope that Rupert will win (and if Jon wins, I will, once more, long to kill someone) but hey, Rupe seems like a strong contender at this point. Wouldn’t that be cool?

Okay. I watched this truly appalling film called Equilibrium yesterday. Scott burned it off cable, or something, I don’t know… he brought me a DVD of it, anyway. He and Paul watched it and loved it and raved about it, so I checked it out, and well, this is one of the most colossally stupid films you can possibly imagine. At some point in the future, a psycho-religious tyranny has been established in which it is forbidden to feel strong emotion, so everyone is required by law to take something called an ‘interval’, which is basically a very strong tranquilizer. If you’re caught skipping your meds or showing any sort of sentimentality or emotion at all you will be summarily executed. There are these priest guys called clerics who act as the upper level enforcers for the ruling church, which is called the Tetragrammaton, and which is headed by some mysterious figure known only as Father.

Our Hero is a cleric whose name I can’t even remember. He dressed a lot like Keaneau Reeves in THE MATRIX which is no surprise, since the fight scenes are taken directly from that movie, and this film is pretty much all about the fight scenes.

I admit, the first fight sequence, where Our Hero battles (well, slaughters) a strike team of Tetragrammaton troopers who have caught him cuddling a puppy (I’m quite serious) is visually compelling… this guy makes gunfighting look like a precision martial art as he jumps into the midst of six troopers with an automatic in either hand and goes through these elaborately stylized katas there you can see him whirling around, blasts of gunfire intermittently spearing out of each muzzle of his pistol as he points them in turn at each trooper… it’s really quite dazzling. But once you’ve seen it you don’t need to see it again, and you do, over and over again.

The only point in which Our Hero isn’t completely invincible is when he’s not supposed to be; there’s one sequence where he’s trying to free some members of the rebellion from a raid and they get captured and are about to be gunned down, and since there are like thirty troopers there, he has to just stand there and watch while these guys are slaughtered. Now, based on what we see throughout the film, thirty church troopers wouldn’t be a problem for this guy any other time, but just this once, he simply stands there looking grim and anguished because the script requires it.

Aside from the fact that Our Hero is never remotely challenged in any way at any time during the film… he never looks even remotely human or seems even vaguely vulnerable so there isn’t the slightest suspense as to whether he will, inevitably, be triumphant… and also leaving aside the utterly moronic simplicity of the philosophical premise (feelings good, coercive drugging/thought control bad), and not even touching on just how many times the writer/director must have jerked off over a worn out, rather shabby and beat to shit paperback copy of 1984 before he set out to make this movie, what I found truly annoying about the film was the fact that at no point does anyone, heroic or otherwise, make anything that remotely resembles an effort to think coherently.

The movie is all about the joy of emotions and how horrible it would be to live without them, and fine, I’m there, really I am, but Our Hero does not triumph because he outwits an overwhelmingly powerful authoritative hierarchy, nor does he ever do anything that remotely demonstrates the slightest shred of intelligence or wit on his part. He wins because he’s a better killing machine (and, frankly, the level of his prowess is simply ridiculous; this guy is superhuman, in a world that has no superhumans).

With no real characterization, an outcome that is never in doubt, a plot utterly devoid of interesting moral or philosophical issues, and nothing that could even remotely count as memorable dialogue, all you have left in this thing is the near-pornographic levels of stylized, bloodless, comic book type gun and sword driven violence, which includes, near the film’s climax, yet another rip off of the special effect from Blade where someone gets part of their head sliced clean through in a sword fight and after a few seconds, that part just slides right off due to gravity, before the poor partially decapitated fellow collapses to the ground dead.

Oh, yeah, and our Our Hero’s chief nemesis sure smiles and laughs and preens and gloats a lot, for a guy who isn’t supposed to feel anything.

It’s an appallingly stupid film, a completely immoral work of art, and, in general, a really shitty movie, although I have no doubt once its released it will acquire a devoted and deeply disturbed cult following, mostly simply on its admittedly glossy, dark, and ultraviolently appealing aesthetics.

Last but not least, lovely lass Vanessa continues to single handedly generate new material on this page for all you other folks out there who like to read it, by being the only person in the past few days who has bothered to post a comment. Vanessa’s own blog is pretty much indescribable and others may not like it as much as I do, but I enjoy it when I encounter people who are smarter and wittier than I am. V occasionally works a bit too hard at seeming cool, but, hey, don’t we all? You could do worse than check out her stuff. And may be by checking out mine.

Meanwhile, David Fiore has this utterly insane thing regarding one of the (admittedly) lesser issues of Englehart’s Avengers run over on his blog, and as he gave me explicit permission to simply shake my head, say “fuckin’ Fiore”, and hit the BACK button when I read something truly egregiously wrong headed of his there, well, I did that.

Okay, it’s not that Dave’s comments are so insane, he just… doesn’t… get it. And I mean, comprehensively. He doesn’t get the Collector, he doesn’t get what Englehart was mostly trying to do with this admittedly poorly plotted issue (which is all about the characterization and has little to do with the Collector’s typically addled scheme), and for all that he says he’s all about fun and sentimental holiday celebrations, he apparently never read Englehart’s previous Rutland, VT story (in AMAZING ADVENTURES, featuring The Beast) or he’d realize that this is just a follow up tribute to some real world people Englehart genuinely liked.

But, never mind that, it’s not like anyone who reads this page other than Dave cares about Silver Age comics, and Dave just gets them comprehensively wrong, so… “fuckin’ Fiore”.

I hate to leave it on that note, but looking elsewhere around my limited slice of the blogosphere I find no one else talking about anything I care about at all, so…

Oh, yeah, Marie Braden seems to have gotten rid of her blogroll, including me, so she’s gone from mine. Heh. Pretty soon my blogroll will be nonexistent; it’s certainly not GROWING…

Oh. Yes. All you people relax. After Uppity-Negro, after TampaTantrum, and especially after recent experiences with Neo’s main squeeze, I am not investing. Trust me, I am not. It’s nice while it lasts, but if, as seems inevitable, I alienate yet another fellow blogger, well, I shall move on with equanimity. Now, I admit, hope always springs eternal that I will, eventually, encounter someone out there who is as cool as they seem initially (by the only real definition of ‘cool’ that means anything to any individual, namely, ‘they continue to be willing to provide me with positive attention and support in exchange for similar emotional services from me’). But if it doesn’t happen, it doesn’t happen. I am not building any self esteem on any foundation having to do with the regard of anyone else I’ve just met, really, I’m not. So quit it. I’m okay.

Oh, right… Paul wasn’t wild about Dawn of the Dead. Yeah. ::heavy sigh:: What are you going to do? Well, he’s my baby brother; I used to carry him on my shoulders on walks in the woods and up the road to my step-grandparents’ farm when he was 2 and 3 years old, so despite the fact that he has grown up to be this often maddening over six foot tall dissipated-Legolas looking creature with no taste in movies at all, I still love him. He’s actually a likable guy too, most of the time, even if the only way he seems to regard me as a role model these days is in the manner in which he finds validation from my wasting my life for him wasting his, which I find truly irritating.

But, honest to God, what has he done with that adorable little blonde three year old who used to ride on my shoulders, giggling when I called him silly names and saying ‘I’M not Paul Bob, I’m just Paul’, chubby baby hands locked in a death grip on the hood of my winter jacket or my forehead? I want him back.

Someday I may return to tightly disciplined blog entries where every separate topic has its own little comments thread, but probably not until more people start posting comments indicating they care. Otherwise, this is easier and more fun.

RULES OF THE ROAD

In one of his many invaluable essays on life in Hollywood, Mark Evanier described his first meeting with legendary TV comic and icon Milton Berle. Upon being introduced to Uncle Miltie and shaking hands with him, Mark, who is a pretty witty guy, blurted out without even thinking about it, “Wow, I didn’t recognize you in men’s clothing”. According to Mark, this soured Uncle Miltie on him from that point forward, because Mark had broken Rule Number One When Hanging With Milton Berle, namely, Never Be Funnier Than Milton Berle.

I’m reminded of that anecdote now.

Recent experiences at Electrolite being pretty much entirely similar if not completely identical to my previous experiences at Uppity-Negro.com and TampaTantrum.com, I thought I’d take the time to extrapolate whatever wisdom there is to find in the whole mess. Here’s The Deal, as far as I can see:

If you want to make friends and influence people when you head out onto the blogging trail, at least, as regards your posting comments on other people’s blogs, you MUST NOT:

Rule E comes mostly out of my experiences with Aaron Hawkin’s Uppity-Negro blog. He gets a lot of female posters and like any of us male geeks would be in that admirable position, he is thoroughly whipped by them. If a new reader comes along and does anything whatsoever to offend the babes on Aaron’s blog, that new reader can expect a cold shoulder from Aaron roughly the size of the Greenland glacier. I don’t really blame Aaron for this; for a male geek, positive female attention is a jewel beyond price, and if I ever had any women posting to my blog who weren’t related to me by marriage, I’d most likely dance and sing like a puppet on a string when they cracked the lash, too.

I should add to this that I’ve learned, from Electrolite, that one Must Not Be Whimsical, Oblique, or Overly Geeky When Posting To A Big Important Political Marketplace of Ideas Type Blog, because those guys just have no time for Theodore Marley Brooks or Cornelus van Lunt references, regardless of how amusing or entertaining you and some others may find them.

Now, I am posting this to point out that while these may be the universal Rules of the Road on other blogs (and as far as I can see, they are, indeed, pretty much universal) you can ignore them here. I don’t care if you:

Oh, and I like geeky references and would just adore whimsical, cleverly elliptical posts to my comment threads, although I suspect I’d get annoyed if someone started posting a whole lot of Harry Potter-speak here, just for one example.

If there is a universal rule on this blog, it is quite simply, Do Not Be A Bigger Asshole Than The Blogger. In fact, if you can avoid it (and most of my small number of regular posters avoid it with style and panache) Don’t Be An Asshole At All. I am quite a big enough asshole myself to supply all the assholiness necessary for any blog, and I will continue to keep this blog well furnished with stupid remarks, doltish mistakes, whiney rationalizations, and defensive recriminations by the ton lot, there can be no doubt. You need bring none of your own asshole nature with you, I have plenty and am always willing to share.

THE INEVITABLE DISCLAIMER

By generally accepted social standards, I'm not a likable guy. I'm not saying that to get cheap reassurances. It's simply the truth. I regard many social conventions in radically different ways than most people do, I have many many controversial opinions, and I tend to state them pretty forthrightly. This is not a formula for popularity in any social continuum I've ever experienced.

In my prior blogs, I took the fairly standard attitude: if you don't like my opinions or my blog, don't read the fucking thing.

Having given that some more thought, though, I'm not going to say that this time around, because I've realized that what this is basically saying is, 'if you don't like what I have to say, tough, I don't want to hear it, don't even bother to tell me, just go away'.

And that's actually a pretty worthless attitude. It's basically saying, 'I don't want to hear anything except unconditional agreement and approval'. And that's nonsense. This is still a free country... for a little while longer, anyway... and if you really feel you just gotta send me a flame, or post one on my comment threads (assuming they actually work, which I cannot in any way guarantee) then by all means, knock yourself out.

Unless your flame is exceptionally cogent, witty, or stylish, though, I will most likely ignore it. You do have a right to say anything you want (although I'm not sure that's a right when you're doing it in my comment threads, but hey, you can certainly send all the emails you want). However, I have an equal right not to read anything I don't feel like reading... and I'm really quick with the delete key... as various angry folks have found in the past, when they decided they just had to do their absolute level best to make me as miserable as possible.

So, if you don't like my opinions, feel free to say so. However, if I find absolutely nothing worthwhile in your commentary, I will almost certainly not respond to it in any way.

Stupidity, ignorance, intolerance... these things are only worth my time and attention if they're entertaining. So unless you can be stupid, ignorant, and/or intolerant with enough wit, style, and/or panache to amuse me... try to be smart, informed, and broad minded when you write me.