Tuesday, February 12, 2008

snow day

Is there anything that can match the disappointment of thinking you're going to get 4-6 inches of snow overnight and surely not have school the next morning, only to find out several hours later that you're only going to get one inch of snow?

Saturday, February 2, 2008

cloverfield

***Warning: I basically spell out exactly what happens in the movie Cloverfield below. If you don't want the movie ruined for you (anymore than actually watching it will ruin it for you) then don't read this post.***

I went to see Cloverfield: Electric Motion Sickness Boogaloo last weekend. Somehow I escaped without vomiting or getting a headache but I was pretty disappointed. I hear they're making a sequel to it already. I wish they would have just finished the first film so it wouldn't cost another $8 to have any sort of acceptable ending.

I'll go ahead and tell you about the whole movie right here, so if you haven't seen it yet and you're into that sort of thing, like wasting money on stupid crap, you should probably stop reading right here.

Ok so it starts out with 30 minutes of completely unrelated to the rest of the movie backstory about all of the characters in the film. Everyone's at a going away party for someone and there's a bunch of drama about some girl he likes but he was an idiot or something, and they're fighting. Some idiot is videotaping everything for posterity and he's semi-stalking some girl at the party.

Then they're out on the balcony and the one guy is crying because his girl is going out with someone else when there's an earthquake. Everyone decides it would be sweet to go up to the roof and check out the scene, so they do. And of course once they all get up there a bunch of shit comes raining down upon them in the form of fire balls so then they all run outside on the sidewalk to see what's up.

Here's where you get to see the Statue of Liberty's head flying through the air and landing. And all the idiots of New York City, who have learned nothing (NOTHING!) all stand around and take pictures and are completely unconcerned in any way about what might have caused the multiple tons of metal to fly miles and miles through the air.

So then some more stupid crap happens, and a building falls down evoking memories of 911 and there are still people standing around and once the building is down and the dust cloud is gone they all go out and stand in the street and take some more pictures and still no one is running away or even looking scared, like are they bad ASS New Yorkers or what??

Anyway, soon enough the big bad monster comes into sight and finally everyone's kinda like, "well maybe we should start moving away from this" and they all file in an orderly manner onto the Brooklyn Bridge. And somehow the thing comes back and a big ol' tentacle crashes into the bridge and meaningless character 1 dies.

Meaningless character 1's brother and girlfriend are quite distraught and they all turn around and go back to the city and eventually end up in the subway. Where absolutely not one other person is. In a city of millions of people, not one other person had the bright idea to go into the subway, which would presumably be quite a safe place as the monster can't get down there. Anyway, Mostly Main Character is going to go save his girlfriend so they ALL have to go, otherwise the home movie thing isn't going to work at all, so off they all go, down the tracks.

Someone had the forethought to turn off the electrified rails for them, which is quite considerate.

So they're walking along la dee da and the idiot with the camera is being an idiot, and then they see a whole bunch of rats come running at them. And since they have never watched a movie before and have no idea about anything, they don't take the hint that their asses should have been running in the same direction of the rats about 5 minutes ago, they decide to turn on the night vision on the camera.

Well I'm sure you can deduce that some of the monster's little friends are right behind them and as soon as they're noticed proceed to attack the people. They escape with some pretty serious looking injuries which don't bleed nearly as much as one would think they should be and they decide to get the hell out of the subway and go up on the street again.

They go through the still completely empty subway station up to some store where everyone is dead and some army dudes stop them and yell at them for a while and finally they go to the crisis center and they're told they will be evacuated on a helicopter. Mostly Main Character doesn't like the sound of that as his dearly beloved is still trapped in a building uptown. During this one of the other meaningless characters starts bleeding out of her eyes and is whisked away after a series of "A BITE A BITE A BITE" are screamed by all the army people. And she goes behind a curtain and is shot or explodes or something and another one bites the dust.

Now we're down to the mostly main character, meaningless character 1's girlfriend, and the idiot camera guy. They all manage to get to the girl's apartment, climb up like 40 flights of stairs, climb out onto the roof and over to the girl's place which is leaning up against the other building, find her apartment, rescue her. She has been lying for several hours on a metal spike impaled in her chest just above her heart but miraculously is able to get up and run around afterwards like nothing is wrong with her. They get back to the street and the building doesn't even collapse and all my hopes for this movie are dashed.

They all run around for a while, get to the evac site, and meaningless character 1's girlfriend boards a chopper which completely expectedly blows up and she dies after about 30 seconds in the air. The others get on a different chopper and take off and their chopper is hit by the monster who has nothing better to do because he is not getting bombs and missiles and machine guns in his face this whole time. Anyway, the copter crashes.

Soon the indestructible camera comes back on and all the people get out of the helicopter, except the two pilots and everyone who is not already established as a meaningless character. They all run around some more until the monster, who has been following them this whole time because, again, he has nothing more pressing to do, picks up the idiot with the camera and tosses him around a little bit, does not eat him, but instead tosses him onto the ground where you get a shot of his lifeless face on the ground. The others yell at him for a few minutes, have the presence of mind to pick up the camera, and run away.

Now we're left with the mostly main character and his girlfriend and they are huddled under a bridge in Central Park. They hear the sirens that signal the military is about to bomb to crap out of Manhattan, say their goodbyes, and then you see an explosion and the picture goes black.

I would like to know what kind of camera has a light, night vision, the ability to withstand a helicopter crash, and a massive fire bombing and can still be used and viewed afterwards.

So anyway, you don't have any clue what the monster is, where it came from, what happened to it, etc. when the movie ends. Everyone in the theater was like, "huh. well. yeah, I guess that IS the end?" as they were standing up. Some people stayed there like maybe they thought there was more.

In conclusion, I don't recommend that you see Cloverfield. It was like the redheaded stepchild of The Mist and the Blair Witch Project.

Friday, February 1, 2008

Preoccupied

I keep having dreams about my phone. In the first dream, I was talking on it and it was getting very hot, and all of a sudden the case was like melting and I took off the battery cover (even though there isn't one) and the battery exploded and the phone caught on fire. And all I could do was point to it with my mouth open.

And then last night I dreamed I was standing on a deck by a river and somehow I dropped the phone off the side of the deck and I basically threw myself after it and while it missed landing in the river, it landed on a bunch of gravel which all scratched and pocked the screen.

I wonder what will happen next?

Also, today I had a snow day and I slept until noon, and then I said I was definitely going to do something constructive today because I never get anything done anymore, and what have I spent the entire day doing? Sitting here on my ass in front of my computer, surfing the internet and playing spider solitaire. I did get up for a brief shower earlier this afternoon, and took several pop cans and water glasses out of the room and threw them away/recycled them. Does that count as constructive? I doubt it.

I have no energy or desire to do anything except sit here and do this!! What is wrong with me? I know I could be out doing something tonight but I've been sitting here thinking up reasons why I should just stay home (the biggest one being because I am a lazy sack of shit). The sad thing is, I'm perfectly content to sit here alone and later I will start drinking alone and I'll listen to my music alone and it will be exactly what I want to be doing.