Monday, November 24, 2008

Zack and Miri and Grandmas Make A Porno

This past weekend I had the pleasure of viewing "Zack and Miri Make A Porno." And don't worry I didn't pull a Pee-Wee Herman at the theater. I already did that for "High School Musical 3." What? You obviously did not see the Zack Efron shower scene. Anyways, I waddle into the theater with my big bucket of popcorn and beverage. I don't know about you, but I am cursed at movie theaters. No matter where I sit, what time of day, or how long the movie has been out, I always have some idiot sit by me and ruin the movie. I wish I could be one of those people who can tune it out. But I can't. I also wish I could be one of those people who say something out loud to the idiots. But I can't. Instead I give some sort of mean looking stare, thinking that my intimidating facial expression is going to get the idiots to shut the hell up. When in reality, I look as harmless as a little puppy in the fetal position. Not sure why I used that reference, but let's just go with it.

So whenever I walk into the theater I try to think the opposite of what a normal person would do. And in general most people are lazy. So if I have a choice to enter through the left side or the right side, I will go into the side that is the least convenient. I know it might sound crazy, but for some reason it works. Now this is something I still don't get and maybe some of you can help me out with this... What is the fascination with sitting in the middle? It makes no difference for the movie experience. Don't you realize that? So not only do you have to squeeze by people in the aisle, but you have to surround yourself with people you have no desire to sit by. I can't even tell you the last time I've sat in the middle. My strategy is always to sit in an aisle seat, away from the idiots. I don't know what it is, but I have this psychic ability to tell whose is going to be annoying and disruptive. Just by looking at somebody for one second, I can sense if they are going to be a loud-mouth jackass. Some people find cures, I find the idiots.

So we sit in our seats. An aisle seat towards the back of course. There's a group of middle-aged women down the row, to the right. Now, I knew they were going to be annoying right away. But it wasn't the talking type of annoying. It was the laughing type. You know the type of people who laugh at every single stupid ass thing. Like the people who even laugh at the commercials and the most obvious jokes. For example, when somebody falls down or gets hit the face. These women were rolling on the ground laughing. Man, where were those women when I bombed at doing stand-up? I don't like it, but the laughing idiots are the people I can somewhat tolerate. The non-stop commentary and I'm-so-popular-I-have-a-cellphone idiots, are a whole other story.

There is one other type of movie-goer nobody likes to sit by. And that's the elderly demographic. Don't get me wrong, I love my sweet elderly people. Heck, I practically am one. But if there are two places we rather avoid the elderly - at restaurants and movies. I don't know what it is about them, but they don't know how to shut the hell up when the lights go down. Maybe they don't care anymore or they don't realize it, but whatever the case is they're annoying. So the movie is about to start, I'm sitting in my aisle seat, stuffing my face with popcorn like how a person would eat in a pie eating contest. My laughing buffoons are sitting to my right. Not the best situation, but I can deal with it. Then out of nowhere come these three elderly ladies. And I can hear them talking miles away. I don't know if God was trying to punk me here, but I was devastated. I felt like a fat kid dropping his ice cream cone. They walk up slowly and of course sit in the row behind me. Not directly behind me, but a few seats down. I turned to my GF, with a look of devastation. I could not believe it. When you go see a movie called "Zack and Miri Make A PORNO" you doubt that you would have to worry about the older demographic. I don't know what these three older ladies were thinking. Maybe they were the founding sisters of Pornography or they thought they were seeing "Cocoon 3." I don't know and I was pissed off!

They sit in their seats, the movie begins, and there is non-stop chitter chatter. If you are not aware, this movie is probably the most foul-mouthed film that I've seen in a long time. I think I counted a total of 100 instances they used the words "Cock" and "Pussy" in the first five minutes. I tried my best to block out the laughing buffoons and the elderly mumblings, but it was way too much for my ADD to handle. Finally about a half hour into the movie and the one thousand mention of the word "anal" the elderly trio got up and walked out. Thank the Jewish Lord for that one! Whew! Now all I had to do was put up with the laughing buffoons. The movie was fair, it got a little too slow for me. But I would recommend maybe seeing it when it comes out on DVD, because some of the dialogue is pretty good. Seth Rogen pulls off his same old shtick and Craig Robinson from "The Office" has some good lines. But what's the deal with Elizabeth Banks? Not only is she in the movie I was watching, but also two previews as well. I mean is she taking over Hollywood or something? Producers and casting directors.... Give it a rest with the Elizabeth Bank overkill. I beg you!

I apologize for the Elizabeth Banks rant. It was something I needed to get off my chest. In conclusion, I realize there is no way to stop idiots, laughing buffoons, hey look at me cell phone guy, or the elderly commentators. But one thing we can stop, is for people to be informed about the movie before they decide to go see it. All it takes is a simple phone call to your grandmother/grandfather, or informing a random elderly person walking down the street and letting them know that "Zack and Miri Make A Porno" is not a good movie for them to see. Little by little, with every body's help, we can make a difference. We can change.

I'm Out!

Friday, November 14, 2008

The 5K, Cosby Kid, Fire Hydrant Race

This past weekend I had the pleasure of participating in my first ever 5K race. I know some of you may say, "What's the big deal about a 5K?" "Try doing a 10K or a half marathon, then write a friggin blog." You would be surprised to find out that the 5K race is a huge milestone for me. I would love to lie to you and tell you I'm this miraculous individual who made an unthinkable recovery after breaking both legs and was told by doctors that I would never be able to walk again. My situation was something of far more importance. I was a fat kid my friends.

I remember in gym class when we had to do the atrocious annual mile run. It was the day we all dreaded on the calendar, the day we tried to call in sick, or the day we wanted to drop out of school. But for some reason it always seemed impossible to avoid it. No matter what we did to run away from it, the mile run would catch us. Given my physical limitations, the run was never an easy feat for me. It involved a lot of Fatty McGee wheezing, walking, panting, and a facial expression that I had eaten too many prunes. Nevertheless, I knew one day I would be able to conquer the mile run with great ease.

Cut to today, I've been running consistently since my Junior year of college. My jogging consists of nothing too intense, two miles 3-4 times a week. I never felt the need to add any more kilometers to the work-out. In the last month or so, I've been stretching my runs to about 3 miles, with the aide of my lovely, vivacious, marathon runner GF. So it was now time to test my training and endurance. My GF and I, were going to be in Cleveland for a wedding and conveniently there was a 5K race the same weekend. So we signed up, along with her popz and her bro. The race started at 9am. I wasn't necessarily nervous by any means, but I was curious as to how I was going to perform.

I don't mean to make any of you nauseous, so I apologize beforehand. (I seem to write this in all my entries.) But I did not have my routine bathroom experience that morning, if you catch my drift. In other words, I did not drop the Cosby kids off at the pool. And I'm used to dropping Vanessa, Denise, Theo, and sometimes even Rudy during my morning routine. We get to the facility where the run was starting at. And suddenly I felt some small eruptions in the stomach area. I didn't know if it was nerves, or if I really had to use the restroom. We checked in and the eruptions were not getting any better. I thought about just waiting till after the run, but at the same time I didn't want to have to stop during the middle of the race and not be able to finish it. The other problem was that the race was going to start in the next few minutes. So I couldn't risk the race starting and then here I am bursting out of the bathroom with my pants around my ankles, yelling "Wait! Wait for me!", and tripping over myself. I quickly made the executive decision to just use the restroom now and try and be as quick as possible. Mission accomplished! The Cosby Kids were dropped off at the pool, Theo did a cannonball, and we were ready to roll!

It's time for the race to start. I line up with the other runners, who are mostly middle-aged men and women. A handful of younger people and some elderly people. The gun goes off and here we go! My GF and have nice pace going. We're not going too fast, but not too slow. Her popz takes off and gets way ahead of us. (Apparently he runs races often and fast) A few minutes into the race, her bro has a little trouble keeping us with us. I know the nice thing to do is to stay with him, but this was not a war. It was a race, where you could leave men behind. I look about 100 feet ahead of us and see these two short, stocky, fire hydrant shaped women in front of us. They look like they are running pretty slow, but they are a pretty big distance in front of us. I turned to my GF and said to her, "We gotta pass them." We did not do it right away, our plan was to pace ourselves. I wasn't worried about not being able to finish the race or something like that, but at the same time I didn't want to burn myself out too early. We hit the 1st mile checkpoint and the two fire hydrants are still in front of us chugging along. They appear to be experienced and they knew how to pace themselves. But I still wasn't going to let them beat me.

We hit the 2nd mile and they're still ahead of us. I turned to my GF and gave a look like, "Let's Do It." We turned on the accelerators and headed toward the two female fire hydrants. They didn't even see it coming. They also probably didn't give a crap about us at the same time. Regardless, we passed them and it felt good. If the Cosby kids were still with me, I don't think I would've been able to pass them. We hit the 3rd mile check-point, I'm a little winded, but I know this is the time to turn it on even more. So I run the fastest that I could at that moment to the finish line. Even though I felt like I was running fast, I'm sure in reality I was going as fast as an elderly person on an electric scooter. Waiting at the finish line was my GF's popz, who had finished the race at very impressive 27 minute time. I finished at 30:30, with GF a few steps behind. The female fire hydrants finished a few minutes later. Mission accomplished.

I'm fully aware that my time was not that great. But to be a stocky kid growing up, struggling with the gym class mile run, participating in my first race, passing the fire hydrant runners... I was pleased with the performance. To make it even better, they had munchkin donuts and some water after the race. Which made the race even that more of importance to me. What can I say? I'm a simple man, with simple desires.

I'm Out!

Wednesday, November 05, 2008

The Tricky Electronic Voting Machine

On Tuesday, November 4th, 2008, along with many millions of American citizens, I voted. Because I have moved cross country twice in the last year or so, I voted at a library in the southwest suburbs. Given the major celebrity that I am, I unfortunately cannot give you the address of my location. But if you are a curious young boy of about 7, maybe we can work something out. Big Brother settle down, I'm only kidding.

So I waddle over to the line and it's a decent turn-out. There were probably about 8 or 9 people waiting in front of me. The majority of the people were in the 50-70 age range. Which I fit perfectly in, given that I feel like a 70-year-old man trapped in a 27-year-old body. There were about 5 judges sitting down behind a table, with a box of dunkin donuts on top of it. Because I did not have any breakfast my fat kid instincts were kicking in like no other. Then out of nowhere, some man in a trench coat, almost God-like, drops off a box of variety donut holes from some local bakery. Some of the donut holes evcn had rainbow sprinkles on it! If you know anything about me, it's that I get hard on for rainbow sprinkles. Right at that moment, I thought," I must be a judge in 20012!"

I'm finally second in line and almost ready to vote. There is a gentleman, I suspect in his later 50's in front of me. One of the judges, all of the sudden makes it known, that there is a machine available to use. She says, "It's an electronic machine. It takes a little longer, but its easy to use." The gentleman does not answer, presumably because he wanted to fill out his ballot the traditional way. Bastard! So did I! I don't blame him, but he didn't have to leave me hanging out to dry. So now all eyes on me. Given that, I was representing the youth of America at this voting destination and for the sake of the long line, I loudly proclaimed, "I'll do it." I know people were thinking in their heads, "Wow look at how brave and courage this young man is." Or others may have of thought, "Why does he keep staring at those rainbow sprinkled donut holes?"

I then sat down face to face with my electronic machine. I correctly fed my ballot into machine. So far so good. The ballot was now electronically displayed on the screen and all I had to do was touch screen my votes. Seem easy right? One would think so. I accurately place my finger on the circle next to Obama/Biden (I would've voted for Alf, but his name was not on the ballot). And for some reason this electronic machine, filled in the circle next to McCain/Palin. I mean don't get me wrong, my dad is a Maverick and my mother is a Hockey Mom, and I once dated a Plumber named Joe... Regardless, that's not who I wanted to vote for! I touched the Obama/Biden circle again and it worked. Whew! Now came for the next 20 selections. The touch screen got progressively worse. I would touch the circle of who I wanted to vote for and nothing would happen. I would touch it five, six times and would get nothing. It was almost like the ATM machines, when you are trying withdrawal money. And you want to withdraw $40 and the somehow the machine thinks you hit $20. That error was occurring non-stop! It got to the point with some of the judges, where if the machine selected a different one than I had selected, I just moved on and didn't fix the error. I just wanted to get the heck away from this machine! I turn around and noticed an old lady in a wheel chair behind me. She was waiting to use the same demonic machine, because it was the only voting booth that had a chair. I tried to give her this look, like "Go away from here. Stay away! Far away! Kind of like how you see in those horror movies, where the killer is around, but the other person can't say out loud that it's around. But the little old booger wouldn't budge. I thought our elderly brainwaves would mesh and she would be able to decipher what I was thinking. But there was no luck. She was determined to sit in that chair and vote.

I finally finished up the voting, frustrated and pissed off as hell. What was suppose to be a liberating, fun voting experience turned out to be quite the opposite. All because of this stinkin', demented, voting machine! I thought about grabbing one of the scrumptious donut holes as an FU to the judges for making me use the machine. Fortunately my conscious got the best of me and told me otherwise.

Mysterious old lady in the wheelchair, hopefully you are reading this on your 1994 IBM computer with the AOL dial-up connection. And you accept my sincere apology for not making you aware of the malfunctions of the machine. God knows, you are probably still at the voting station, touching that screen with no luck. Hopefully our paths will cross again in 2012 and we will protest the end of the electronic voting machine.

I'm Out!