Author Archives: Rob MacD

Hey, I think I just made up a new word:

Commentuncating, or commentucation

That’s where your relationship with someone is based pretty much solely on communication through the comments you leave each other on your blogs, internet sites, forums, etc.

Commentucating

Technorati Tags: commentucating

Last night’s 30 Rock was great.  Alec Baldwin is wonderful.  The whole cast is fun.  My biggest laugh came when Rachel Dratch, this episode a trampy prostitute, screamed “Happy Valentimes!!”  I appreciated that the line wasn’t commented upon by any of the characters.  It was just allowed to live on its own merits.

Anyway, I just saw a photo, and then read a story about a couple who recently got married.  I’d recommend you read the story first.  Then look at the photo.  Because if you do it vice versa, like I did, you’ll likely feel sad, until after you read the story.

Here’s the link to the story.

Here’s the link to the photo.  It won first prize at this year’s World Press Photo.

I hope it makes you feel good.  I hope any cynicism you have can be ignored for the duration of your involvement in the story and picture.

Happy Valentimes.  Next week.

Last night’s 30 Rock was great.  Alec Baldwin is wonderful.  The whole cast is fun.  My biggest laugh came when Rachel Dratch, this episode a trampy prostitute, screamed “Happy Valentimes!!”  I appreciated that the line wasn’t commented upon by any of the characters.  It was just allowed to live on its own merits.

Anyway, I just saw a photo, and then read a story about a couple who recently got married.  I’d recommend you read the story first.  Then look at the photo.  Because if you do it vice versa, like I did, you’ll likely feel sad, until after you read the story.

Here’s the link to the story.

Here’s the link to the photo.  It won first prize at this year’s World Press Photo.

I hope it makes you feel good.  I hope any cynicism you have can be ignored for the duration of your involvement in the story and picture.

Happy Valentimes.  Next week.

I’ve had my music player on my computer and iPod synced up with Last.FM for a while.  Here, then are the top 50 artists who’ve been played.  Even though I have my players set up to play random tracks, I think this is a pretty good representation of what I’d consider my favourite music.  A couple of anomalies are the Theme Songs showing up at Number 8, and Emmanuel College Chapel Choir showing up at all (don’t understand that one??).  Elvis Presley is surprisingly high, too.  And, really, Emmylou Harris probably shouldn’t be on that list (I’d replace her with Iris Dement).

Top Artists

…One giant leak for Womankind.

I don’t follow stories like this one about the astronaut woman who drove from someplace to someplace to allegedly kill someone, mostly because news channels like CNN glom onto them and make them much, much bigger than they deserve to be.  Kind of like a Slow News Week “being called up to the big leagues” sort of deal.

But even I’ll admit that 1) female astronaut, 2) driving a long distance while wearing a diaper, 3) attempted murder charges, 4) love and intrigue, and 5) look-like-a-nutjob photo makes it hard for ratings-craving news agencies to ignore this one.  Still, though, a brief skim of the headline and first couple of paragraphs of an internet story about it will be enough for me.

Hey, anyone in the GCA (Greater Charlottetown Area) have any positive experiences with auto body shops?  This morning, a non-observant driver did us the favour of making us require the services of a fair and honest auto body shop by becoming rather too familiar with the back end of our vehicle.

Where has my loyal reader gone and was rewarded with honest and fair auto body service?

Anyone?  Anyone?  Bueller? 
(and the award for pulling out an age-old reference goes to… Rob MacDonald!… “I’d just like to say, I’m surprised and shocked that I won this award.  I mean, the competition was pretty crazy this year.  There’s that guy who was blogging about his dog, and wrote “Who let the dogs out?”.  And of course, that lesbian-written blog post entitled “Where’s the beef?!”.  Worthy competitors, all.  [orchestral music starts to surge]  Anyways, I just want to thank everyone who voted for the Bueller reference, and also thank God and the marvelous Mr. Ruddy, my grade nine Industrial Arts teacher.  He’s gay… wait, that’s common knowledge, right?  That he’s gay.  I mean, I’m not telling secrets out of school, am I?  Revealing that Mr. Ruddy is gay, right here in this award speech for age-old references?  Anyway, looks like my time is up.  I’m just so happy that you love me!  That you really, really love me!”)

Yeah, so about those honest and fair auto body shops?  Anyone got one?  Anyone?  Anyone?

Graham the Conquerer 142-125 (53.2%) 159 pts
Jim Simmonds 131-136 (49.1%) 126 pts
spragger2002 122-122 (50.0%) 122 pts
reverseflash 128-139 (47.9%) 117 pts
RFTT1985 127-140 (47.6%) 114 pts
annekenstein 123-144 (46.1%) 102 pts

Here are the final results for The Annekenstein Monster’s The Weekly NFL Picks Page pick’em pool.  Graham the Conquerer smashes the competition with a startling 53.2% picking accuracy.  Yours truly performed atrociously, embarassingly so.  Never before have I picked so poorly.

Congratulations Graham!!
Thanks for playing, folks.  Most likely, it’ll be back next August, when I’ll vow to kick ass, and make it my personal goal to finish each week on the plus side of 50%.  Of course, I’ll also be high on the speculation that the Miami Dolphins will be able to make it to the playoffs (where anything can happen) this coming year.  I predict great things for the new coach, Cam Cameron.  Ricky Williams will be back, will remain drug-free for the entire season, and will be a legitimate backup to Ronnie Brown, who will have a banner year.  Culpepper will rebound from a terrible (injury-crippled) season and make a star out of Chris Chambers.

By the way, with Peyton Manning winning the championship, Dan Marino once again retains his mantle as the unquestionably best quarterback ever to never win a SuperBowl.  I’d say when Peyton didn’t have one, he’d have given Dan a bit of a run for that title.

DaveM, DaveS, J-Ro and I went to see Pan’s Labyrinth Saturday night and then went out afterwards for drinks.  We stopped at a few places and had a good time.
After DaveM left us, we went to the Gahan House.  There, DaveS requested we each name the first male and first female actor we each think of.  I said Meryl Streep and Greg Kinnear.  Jay said Sharon Stone and Billy Baldwin.  Dave said Demi Moore and Tim Robbins.  These people, it turned out, were to be the stars of the purposefully bad movie we were about to plot out there at the Gahan.  Here is the awful movie we came up with:

Meryl Streep plays an author on a book-signing tour.  She is hawking a book about love, a book whose message she doesn’t really believe.  She is also a person who only speaks in her own language.  Why she speaks this language, or where she learned it, is a mystery to all.  Only she and her interpretor (who spent years studying Streep and her language) can understand her.
Her interpretor is Sharon Stone.  Maybe we need a little scene here to see how dependent Streep is on Stone.  Without her, she couldn’t survive in the world alone.
For some reason, they need to hire a private plane to fly to over the Atlantic Ocean to their next book-signing date.  Sharon reluctantly suggests they could hire the pilot she used to date (and still is not quite “over”?), Billy Baldwin.
On the flight, Baldwin and Streep hit it off.  A real connection. Lots of flirting. Maybe Baldwin is playing it up a bit to make Stone jealous?  Whether the Baldwin/Streep connection is real or not, it affects Stone, who begins to purposefully mis-interpret the flirty things Streep is saying to Baldwin and vice-versa.  One phrase she does not mis-interpret, though, is the utterance that Streep screams upon looking out the plane’s side window. “Ack, ugh, glub, bluggah!” says Streep.  “Look out for the seagulls?” puzzles Stone.  Then Stone looks out here window, sees the flock of birds and screams herself, “Look out for the seagulls!”  A great scene!  Baldwin’s over-attention to Streep caused him to fly into a flock of seagulls.
The plane crashes into the ocean.  Baldwin perishes, but Stone and Streep manage to make it to a small deserted island.  Things on the island go from bad to worse as the Stone/Streep relationship deteriorates quickly, due to Stone’s jealousy about Streep/Baldwin.  Some great chances for overwrought emotions between the two.  While on the island, they discover some sort of strange-looking golden amulet, or golden bowl, or something likewise golden that they note as being odd.
I am admittedly fuzzy on the sequence of events that we discussed beyond this point, so if DaveS or Jason want to correct me on the following, please do.  (as I’ve written the following, I made some small changes to the plot as I went, as I thought they would improve the story we talked about)

Just as things are about to come to a murderous head between Stone & Streep, Greg Kinnear, a likable fisherman, arrives on his boat.  “Didn’t know this island existed,” says Kinnear. “Not on any charts!”  As they get to know each other, the girls tell Kinnear about the golden thing they found.  He raises an eyebrow (as only Kinnear can do).  “Rescue us,” says Stone.  For some reason (maybe the boat is full of fish?  Or maybe he has ulterior motives?) he can only take one of them back with him to civilization, and he won’t be back to get the other (not sure why this is).  He chooses Streep, leaving Stone to likely die.  This, combined with her jealousy over Baldwin, puts Stone over the edge and, as the boat is leaving with Kinnear and Streep, Stone is a wild, screaming, vindictive crazy nutjob on the beach.  Another great scene.

Back in civilization (somewhere in Florida?), Greg’s friend, Tim Robbins, who is a treasure-hunter, greets Kinnear and Streep.  Kinnear immediately tells Robbins about the golden thingy.  Turns out Robbins has spent his entire adult life searching for this island and this golden thingy (and the fabled tribal community that created the golden thingy).  They make preparations to go back.  We can see Robbins as the self-interested, treasure-mad money-grub his character is, but we don’t know, yet, whether Kinnear is a good guy or a bad guy.  Since his navigational GPS system broke down during a storm on the way back to civlization, Kinnear doesn’t know if he can find the island again.  In another great scene where Robbins and Kinnear try to understand her, Streep indicates that she could find the island.  Off the three go.

Back on the island, Stone is delerious with rage.  That’s when Baldwin comes out of the sea and walks, zombie-like, up the beach towards her.  As he walks, he eats whatever is washed up on the beach.  (We get Baldwin to really eat these awful things.  He’d do it.)
Despite (or maybe because of) the fact that Stone is crazy and Baldwin is some kind of voodoo-influenced almost dead guy, the Stone/Baldwin romance rekindles.  And that’s when Demi Moore, as the daughter of a tribal witch doctor (played in voice-over by Morgan Freeman, who is the movie’s narrator), appears on the scene.  Moore speaks in a made-up language similiar to, but different than, Streep’s language.  Yet it’s similar enough that Stone can understand Moore.  Moore and Stone immediately hit it off, with a real sexual chemistry that excites Baldwin too.  There’s a great scene where Stone has to try and safe-crack the tribal chastity belt that Moore wears.  it’s a very tender, very provocative, very sensual scene.
Moore and Stone continue to sizzle with sexual energy.  Baldwin’s involved too, but we, the audience, can see that it’s really the two women who have the hots for each other.  Maybe it’s hinted at that for now, they’ll allow Baldwin to participate but once they tire of him, he’ll become expendable?

Boat arrives with Kinnear, Robbins and Streep.  Robbins is an ass as he tries to take control of the group.  Maybe Kinnear starts to see Robbins as the ass he is and begins to question what’s important to him?

(this is where our plot kind of fizzled out, but we’d like all the above to maybe be about two-thirds of the entire movie)  We do know that in the end Streep is able to write a world-wide bestseller on Love, based on her third-act experiences on the island.  I kind of forget what happens to the rest of the players.

If anybody has any ideas on how to improve this story (that is, make it worse), let’s hear them.  We really need a good ending third.

DaveM, DaveS, J-Ro and I went to see Pan’s Labyrinth Saturday night and then went out afterwards for drinks.  We stopped at a few places and had a good time.
After DaveM left us, we went to the Gahan House.  There, DaveS requested we each name the first male and first female actor we each think of.  I said Meryl Streep and Greg Kinnear.  Jay said Sharon Stone and Billy Baldwin.  Dave said Demi Moore and Tim Robbins.  These people, it turned out, were to be the stars of the purposefully bad movie we were about to plot out there at the Gahan.  Here is the awful movie we came up with:

Meryl Streep plays an author on a book-signing tour.  She is hawking a book about love, a book whose message she doesn’t really believe.  She is also a person who only speaks in her own language.  Why she speaks this language, or where she learned it, is a mystery to all.  Only she and her interpretor (who spent years studying Streep and her language) can understand her.
Her interpretor is Sharon Stone.  Maybe we need a little scene here to see how dependent Streep is on Stone.  Without her, she couldn’t survive in the world alone.
For some reason, they need to hire a private plane to fly to over the Atlantic Ocean to their next book-signing date.  Sharon reluctantly suggests they could hire the pilot she used to date (and still is not quite “over”?), Billy Baldwin.
On the flight, Baldwin and Streep hit it off.  A real connection. Lots of flirting. Maybe Baldwin is playing it up a bit to make Stone jealous?  Whether the Baldwin/Streep connection is real or not, it affects Stone, who begins to purposefully mis-interpret the flirty things Streep is saying to Baldwin and vice-versa.  One phrase she does not mis-interpret, though, is the utterance that Streep screams upon looking out the plane’s side window. “Ack, ugh, glub, bluggah!” says Streep.  “Look out for the seagulls?” puzzles Stone.  Then Stone looks out here window, sees the flock of birds and screams herself, “Look out for the seagulls!”  A great scene!  Baldwin’s over-attention to Streep caused him to fly into a flock of seagulls.
The plane crashes into the ocean.  Baldwin perishes, but Stone and Streep manage to make it to a small deserted island.  Things on the island go from bad to worse as the Stone/Streep relationship deteriorates quickly, due to Stone’s jealousy about Streep/Baldwin.  Some great chances for overwrought emotions between the two.  While on the island, they discover some sort of strange-looking golden amulet, or golden bowl, or something likewise golden that they note as being odd.
I am admittedly fuzzy on the sequence of events that we discussed beyond this point, so if DaveS or Jason want to correct me on the following, please do.  (as I’ve written the following, I made some small changes to the plot as I went, as I thought they would improve the story we talked about)

Just as things are about to come to a murderous head between Stone & Streep, Greg Kinnear, a likable fisherman, arrives on his boat.  “Didn’t know this island existed,” says Kinnear. “Not on any charts!”  As they get to know each other, the girls tell Kinnear about the golden thing they found.  He raises an eyebrow (as only Kinnear can do).  “Rescue us,” says Stone.  For some reason (maybe the boat is full of fish?  Or maybe he has ulterior motives?) he can only take one of them back with him to civilization, and he won’t be back to get the other (not sure why this is).  He chooses Streep, leaving Stone to likely die.  This, combined with her jealousy over Baldwin, puts Stone over the edge and, as the boat is leaving with Kinnear and Streep, Stone is a wild, screaming, vindictive crazy nutjob on the beach.  Another great scene.

Back in civilization (somewhere in Florida?), Greg’s friend, Tim Robbins, who is a treasure-hunter, greets Kinnear and Streep.  Kinnear immediately tells Robbins about the golden thingy.  Turns out Robbins has spent his entire adult life searching for this island and this golden thingy (and the fabled tribal community that created the golden thingy).  They make preparations to go back.  We can see Robbins as the self-interested, treasure-mad money-grub his character is, but we don’t know, yet, whether Kinnear is a good guy or a bad guy.  Since his navigational GPS system broke down during a storm on the way back to civlization, Kinnear doesn’t know if he can find the island again.  In another great scene where Robbins and Kinnear try to understand her, Streep indicates that she could find the island.  Off the three go.

Back on the island, Stone is delerious with rage.  That’s when Baldwin comes out of the sea and walks, zombie-like, up the beach towards her.  As he walks, he eats whatever is washed up on the beach.  (We get Baldwin to really eat these awful things.  He’d do it.)
Despite (or maybe because of) the fact that Stone is crazy and Baldwin is some kind of voodoo-influenced almost dead guy, the Stone/Baldwin romance rekindles.  And that’s when Demi Moore, as the daughter of a tribal witch doctor (played in voice-over by Morgan Freeman, who is the movie’s narrator), appears on the scene.  Moore speaks in a made-up language similiar to, but different than, Streep’s language.  Yet it’s similar enough that Stone can understand Moore.  Moore and Stone immediately hit it off, with a real sexual chemistry that excites Baldwin too.  There’s a great scene where Stone has to try and safe-crack the tribal chastity belt that Moore wears.  it’s a very tender, very provocative, very sensual scene.
Moore and Stone continue to sizzle with sexual energy.  Baldwin’s involved too, but we, the audience, can see that it’s really the two women who have the hots for each other.  Maybe it’s hinted at that for now, they’ll allow Baldwin to participate but once they tire of him, he’ll become expendable?

Boat arrives with Kinnear, Robbins and Streep.  Robbins is an ass as he tries to take control of the group.  Maybe Kinnear starts to see Robbins as the ass he is and begins to question what’s important to him?

(this is where our plot kind of fizzled out, but we’d like all the above to maybe be about two-thirds of the entire movie)  We do know that in the end Streep is able to write a world-wide bestseller on Love, based on her third-act experiences on the island.  I kind of forget what happens to the rest of the players.

If anybody has any ideas on how to improve this story (that is, make it worse), let’s hear them.  We really need a good ending third.