The Lost Saturday Grab Bag

Sorry for not posting this on Saturday, but it was a fairly busy day. My brother-in-law and his girlfriend came over to visit for most of the afternoon (and thus most of the morning was sacrificed to cleaning up the house). We had a great visit, notwithstanding the heartbreak of watching the Michigan Wolverines come back, only to blow the game in overtime. (4-1 still ain’t bad, though.) Our visitors came bearing gifts for my birthday, too, which was nice. I now have added copies of Fargo Rock City by Chuck Klosterman and the hardback collection of Stephen Colbert’s Tek Jansen comic book to my reading pile. Fargo had been on my wish list for a while but the Tek Jansen collection, despite being right up my alley in all ways, was something I wasn’t even aware had been released. I am humbled by that blindspot, and hella-impressed that my brother-in-law managed that rare feat of a gift that totally surprised me and was totally rad.


Then last night I went to an upscale sports bar with some of my college frat buddies as a belated birthday excursion. Yes, apparently there is such a thing as an “upscale sports bar”, which apparently means lots of hardwood décor, black leather booths, and individual flatscreens with DirectTV. The original plan was to watch the Yankees, but it was really a no-stakes game (which the Yanks lost anyway) and so we watched Detroit-Chicago. The Tigers couldn’t get out of the hole they dug themselves and are now tied with Minnesota for the AL Central lead. Since they’re not playing each other today, the Twins and Tigers could finish the season tied, which would necessitate a one-game playoff before the ALDS – when the winner will face the Yankees. I’m of course obnoxiously excited about the possibility of the Yanks facing a worn-out opponent in that series, so I’m hoping that scenario does in fact play out and that the Tigers ultimately prevail, because I think they’re the easier opponent. We shall see!

Oh, so, despite making great fun of the very concept of an upscale sports bar, we had a good time (you are herewith advised never to bet against me having a good time whenever beer and wings are involved) – possibly too good, as I’m pretty sure some of the stupid crap we were yelling about was fairly offensive to the older couples sitting at the next booth over, but ah well.

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RottenTomatoes.com has done a list of the 100 Worst Films of the 21st century, and there was some kind of mini-meme going around for a nanosecond involving admitting how many of those movies you had seen. Normally I’d be all over that. I’m no cultural snob and I know I’ve paid good money for some craptastic cinema experiences, some of which I enjoyed (like Spice World) and some of which I loathed/fell asleep during (like Ang Lee’s Hulk and Blue Crush, respectively). I’m also very susceptible to getting sucked into a movie that someone else is watching on cable or DVD. But amazingly enough, I’ve only seen one (and a half) of the Worst 100 – none of the three movies I refer to above, or lots of other bombs I’ve sat through, made the Rotten Tomatoes list. I read through the whole countdown, and a lot of them were obscure enough that I’d never heard of them, and the rest were movies I had consciously avoided. (Every movie Larry the Cable Guy ever made is in the Worst 100? YOU DON’T SAY.) My one exception was the remake of Rollerball (#28 on the list), which I watched on a DVD rented by someone else, primarily because I really dug the original James Caan version. (I’ve kind of blocked out the remake. It deserves to be on the Worst 100.) The only other one I’d even come close to seeing was In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (#49 on the list) which I stumbled across on cable a couple of months ago and watched for about half an hour before deciding it was unwatchable. And for me to find something unwatchable when I’m bored on a weekend afternoon is saying something.

So, I have low taste in movies, but not the absolute lowest? That’s … oddly comforting, I guess.

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As we plow through Month Two of PA here, I’m not sure how much longer I’m going to keep the new-pseudonyms-for-my-wife-and-my-son-every-post policy going. It’s fun to put my brain to the task, but it can also be time consuming and sometimes outright derailing to my thought process. It’s still in place for now, but I’m contemplating coming up with permanent aliases for them at some point just to simplify things. Suggestions and/or past favorites are welcome!