1. The ESPN.com widget on my Google homepage has displayed the same "Favre signs with Vikings" headline ever since Favre signed - over a month ago.  I see this as further evidence that ESPN is lame and does not get it.
    
2. Windows 7 might actually be worth paying for.  Not worth the price Microsoft is asking, mind you, but worth buying.
    
3. We got a new german shepherd dog two months ago, and I should so be writing about her.  As I type this, she's in her crate, laying on her back, sleeping.  Don't get all PETA on me about the crate - it's god's gift to puppy owners who don't like their shit wrecked.  Besides, she likes it and goes in it on her own.
    
4. I just upgraded the software I use to maintain this site.  It has tagging support, so you can see at a glance what I used to write about back when I actually paid attention to this site.
    
5. I finally saw Little Shop of Horrors.  A musical featuring a bunch of upcoming actors who can kinda sing and a plant that eats people.  Yeah, it's just as weird as it sounds.

Because there are two small children in the house, our movie options get a bit limited, so we have to hit the back catalog of movies that appear safe for children.  For that reason, we chose to get the 2005 remake of Yours, Mine and Ours.

The good news is, it's only 87 minutes long.  The bad news is, they manage to cram enough wooden acting, absurd storylines, improbable situations, lame humor, predictability and obvious plot-holes into those 87 minutes that it feels like an eternity.  It might be passable cinema if you're six years old.  Or severely drunk.  Or unconscious.  But it's safe for children.  Unless, of course, you worry about offending their common sense.

 Inspired by the Oscars and...whatever the hell is wrong with me.

Gran Torino fucking rules.  Sorry Mom, I had to swear there, because it totally fucking rules.  Oh shit, I swore again.  Shit.  Oh well, go see it.  Clint Eastwood will totally tear your face off with his unforgiving shittiness.  Seriously.  He's such a prick, but you'll like him, and when the end comes...well, you'll just cry like a pussycake.  Sorry, mom, but...well, maybe you wouldn't like it.  There's a lot of cussing.  But if you're reading this and you're not my Mom, go see Gran Torino.  Seriously.  It's Oscar material.

What if you added a little punctuation (ala "Eats, Shoots & Leaves") to a movie title? 

Last weekend, I watched Footloose for the first time ever.  I'm not much of a dancer, but happy-crappy 80's movies are generally okay - and I ended up enjoying it more than I thought I would.  Afterward, my Lady Friend and I were talking about that crappy 80's movie staple, the montage.  You know, that 3 minute bit where they play some happy-crappy music and protagonist A teaches protagonist B some essential skill - Kevin Bacon, Chris Penn, and dancing, in the case of Footloose.  LF lamented the fact that you never see a montage where someone learns how to spay a cat.

~ ~ ~

At 6pm, I usually head out the door of our 11th floor office and take the stairs down to the seventh floor of the parking garage where I normally park.  I save myself the extra time of elevatoring down to the lobby, then back up again to the seventh floor of our somewhat oddly designed building.  Plus, I con myself into thinking those extra steps are good exercise for someone who drives a desk.

This time, I stopped short, my hand on the doorknob.  On the other side, I could hear footsteps, and didn't want to throw the door open.  At best, I'd scare the shit out of them - at worst, it would hit the person.  Then I noticed the faint but unmistakable sound of a woman's voice - singing to herself.

In a second, I realized that even if I waited a couple seconds for her to pass the door, I might not scare her, but she'd likely still notice me and stop singing.  I listened a moment longer, then turned and walked to the elevator.

Wow!

Isn't it strange when an actor plays more than one iconic role? 

The other day at work we decided that Andre the Giant, before his unfortunate death in 1993, spent too much time as a wrestler and not enough time as an actor.  His turn in 1987's The Princess Bride provided real comedy gold.  I declared that it would have been fun to see him in a romantic comedy with Meg Ryan.  Hell, it couldn't have been any worse than every other movie she made.

At long last, everyone's favorite archaeologist comes back this spring with the fourth installment of the Indiana Jones trilogy.  (Sorry, but quadrilogy sounds totally lame.)  I can't help but get fired up when I hear the first four notes of that classic John Williams theme.  It makes me want to chase Nazis, cuss at snakes, and crack a whip (a fairly typical Memorial Day at my house).

I'd been salivating over the trailer for the new movie for a few weeks when my Lady Friend, Poe and Poodle surprised me last week with the original trilogy on DVD.  Friday being movie night at our place, Raiders of the Lost Ark immediately lost its virginity in our trusty Sanyo.

The kids loved it.  There was much eye-covering, what with groping mummies, chopped-up german soldiers and faces melting off, but Poe's favorite scene was when Indiana was confronted with the intimidating swordsman and casually dispatched him with one shot from a pistol.  Classic stuff.

Near the end of the movie he suddenly asked, "Is this movie old?".  We informed him that it was set during the 1930's, so it seemed old, but it wasn't really that old - until we stopped to think about it and realized it had been released twenty-seven years ago.

27 years. That's five years older than Indy IV co-star Shia LaBeouf.

For additional perspective, look at it this way - if you saw Raiders in the theater as a child, consider how you might have felt watching Hitchcock's Rear Window back then, because that movie was 27 years old in 1981.  Woah.  I think I need to go curl up in a corner with my whip.