Tag: review
Out of "Office"
Dunno how many people saw this cuz Current.tv isn’t that mainstream a channel (yet?) but this mix of pop and mock has me grinnin’…
Palm Harbor, Yahoo'ed
I’m a regular user of Yahoo! Local as a tool… Pretty good for looking up local information and I find the interface a lot better than online Yellow Page listings in general.
That being said, there are still problems there…
Local businesses need to be reviewed and sometimes listings need to be removed. For instance, Jaguar Coffee has been gone from Palm Harbor for years upon years (how I miss Java Jungle — Jaguar Coffee’s predecessor) and yet their listing still exists. Same with the now-closed Palm Harbor Ale House as well as other businesses.
The Yahoo Local listings are very much an online social network of reviews and user driven content… But of course users have to be willing to get active on their own Yahoo Local area in order for the content to be accurate.
Walk like a Sabal
Jenna’s got something going for her and going against her at her apartment in central Clearwater. She happens to live in the Sabal Walk apartment complex which is near the corner of Highlands Avenue and Union street.
The complex is close to shopping, which is a plus. It’s not far from Clearwater Beach or the Intercostal Waterway which is also excellent. It’s at a central location close to her parents and her friends (such as this Artful Dodger) and it’s got a hell of a lot of floorspace for a one bedroom apartment. It’s also reasonably priced.
…but there’s a reason for that.
Jenna moved in when we were dating in February and before she moved in, she found a huge piece of sheetrock removed from the ceiling. The Office Manager said there had been a leak but it was fixed. It only took a couple of days in the apartment to find out it wasn’t however.
And Jenna waited, and complained, and waited for the roof to be repaired. The only means of repair that Sabal Walk employed was poking a hole in the sheet-rock so that water would flow out more easily… That and vacuuming up water that accumulated in the bedroom.
It took until just this past week to get the roof repaired — four months?! And yet there are other incidents around the complex where the apartments are leaking.
Of course, this is disregarded by the powers that be. I didn’t mention that the majority of the Sabal Walk populace is minority. Anywhere else and there’s a media sensation about slum-lording at Sabal Walk.
But down in central Clearwater, also known as Crackwater, it’s simply written off.
SO just for future reference — Sabal Walk happens to have pretty good prices if you’re willing to deal with poor maintenance. You also better not be some bigot or you might not enjoy your stay.
Light My Fire — no, put it out. Please.
It’s been a while since I decided to read any non-ficiton. Usually it’s biographical works on icons of the Entertainment industry (ie: Beatles or the Doors). Keeping with that trend, I decided to pick up Ray Manzarek’s Light My Fire, it’s a Doors autobiography I’ve been meanign to read for some time.
And yet, as I’m still in the early areas of the book, I’m trying to understand why I thought it was a must read? Probably because of all the positive reviews of the book when it originally was released. Can’t be bad at all then, can it?
From a writing standpoint, it can be all that bad. And worse. Though Manzarek has a unique perspective on his tail…. He’s not a writer.
The book comes off much like a personal journal would, I guess… Reporting the mundane as well as the gripping, life-altering events of Ray’s life… But Manzarek loses focus and direction on any given topic quite easily. At one moment he’s about to discuss finding a live performance of the Blues in the south side o fChicago, and the next moment he’s rambling about attire he wore to graduation from the 8th grade…. One moment he’s about to get into his first exposure to Beat poetry, the next he’s laying the smackdown on facism and intimidation of the California Highway Patrol. He goes off on the broadest tangents and does not focus on the event that inspires the tangent thought.
Another instance of Ray veering wildly is a recounting of Jim Morrison’s UCLA film school student film… While trying to detail Jim’s non-linear movie that Rya found “poetic”, he begins recounting Oliver Stone’s version of the student film that he made as part of his feature film on the Doors. Ray goes off on Oliver for makign an innocent film into something with anti-semitism and Nazi inneundo. He attacks Stone (as he has since the film came out in the early 1990’s) and lets the UCLA film school experience vanish from the story.
It almost comes off like a conversation — one that varies wildly as those who partake in the conversation ramble on into the night. Yet, having to read this conversation is painful… Especially with gramatical errors of repeated run-on sentences, short sentences that woudl be better combined, repetition of adjectives, etc….
Ray’s book, while from the heart, has nothing on John Densemore’s Riders on the Storm autobiography.,
Michael Crichton's "Prey"
When I was working in Target a few years ago, Michael Crichton’s first book in a while came out — titled Prey — and I found myself wanting to read it but also fearing disappointment because Timeline hadn’t been that great and Michael had seemingly gone off the deep end with comments he was making in the media.
That was 2002.
Last week I got bored and while my girlfriend scanned my mom’s bookshelf for paperbacks to borrow, she came across a copy of Prey and I immediately snatched it up, saying I’d like to take a look at what Michael has offered us here.
Now, when I started reading the novel I knew two things – that the action in the novel would be interesting and that I would likely learn something or be inundated with technical information that can or may entirely bore me. What i hadn’t banked on was the book being predictable and that it was.
The novel starts out with a synopsis of what was going on 7 days after the book starts. “Things rarely turn out how you plan them” seems to be a fitting line that leads you into chapter one because this synopsis does not hold true at the end. Yet the little piece that Crichton threw in before section #1 (Home) that my interest was immediately piqued.
Crichton also departs from his normal formula by writing this novel in the first person which I found helpful to his cause because he can go off for entire chapters in technical details and lose vision on the story… Having Jack Forman, the main character, tell the story allowed Michael to mix in the action of the story with the technical information that was going to be told to the reader through the story. Everything is paced rather well in that fashion and the book is a page turner…
But…
I felt like I was reading something I had read before — not just that but things were predictable with allusions that Mike left. Maybe they were intended but when you tell me a virus helps you make something and that something is now running amok all on it’s own, it seems rather obvious that the virus has something to do with it as well as everything you suspect that you don’t find out until later.
I have already spoiled the book enough with that last paragraph… I don’t want to go into predictable stuff any more nor do I want to continue to spoil it for those who haven’t read the book yet (and there is probably a handful of you if not a bunch of those who have missed the book’s release).
It’s a page turner and it’s captivating… it may be Mike Crichton’s best pacing of a book but at the same time – it’s not his best book.
When I open it, I close it
SO me and m’lady are in Ybor last night… First time (if you can believe it) I have ever been to Ybor City. No I didn’t get drunk into a stupor and I didn’t go clubbing either. I was walkign around and exploring with m’lady and….
Well, we needed cash so I went to an ATM and withdrew a few bucks… WIth a 3.75 service charge?! Suntrust ATM’s weren’t working for me and I was already upset I woudl get screwed with a service charge. When I take otu money from a bank besides my own, my bank chargees me 1.50 as was.
So I paid five bucks to take out money. Motherfuckers….
So I am determined to get work now… Just because I can’t survive financially this month and I have to pay back cash anyway to my credit card company (I hate debt), and this is the basis for the title fo this thread. I found a position I could do in an instant today and I applied for it, which was the case with Nielsen Media Research as was. Lo and behold, before they even review my resume – I am basically rejected:
Dear Web Designer Applicant,
We are extremely thankful for your inquiry about our web designer position.
Our ad in the St. Petersburg Times/CareerBuilders has produced over 70
applicants via email (with more coming in daily). Due to this continued
great response, we want to wait until the week of March 7th before we
contact applicants to set up interviews. We are also exhibiting in a
tradeshow in Vegas next week that consequently limits the time needed to
work on these matters. Rest assured, all applications will be viewed and
considered. I will reply again soon. I appreciate your patience with this
process and look forward to communicating with you further.
Best Regards,
Mark Hastings
In the land of opportunity, it hurts to look into an opportunity and then see the door shut on your face before you even peek into that opportunity.
The Year in Review — Yuccaneers indeed
“Four and Twelve seems like a real possibility.”
You know, I got a bit of bashing for having this bleak outlook at the Bucs this season. I saw things going in a direction that was counter-productive to what fans wanted and what the NFL trend was and you know what? The Bucs got just what they deserved, those who thought I was full of shit and expected another playoff-run got what they deserved and I get to deal out humble-pie for a change.
God, you do not know how much of a dick I feel like righ tnow and how bad I feel about it. I wanted to be wrong about hte Bucs this season. Hell, I needed to be wrong about the Bucs this season in order to be proved wrong about the state of the franchise post-Gruden acquisition. Yet I was proven right and there is this impending sense of dread with the coming offseason that the Bucs will try to jump right into contention again by spending on past-there-prime players and we’ll end up completely fucked because of it.
Jon Gruden, the man who can do no wrong in certain fans eyes because he brought the Bucs to the promised land, needs a swift kick in his ass and his yes-man office assistant, Bruce Allen, should be fired post-haste before they further fuck things up by doing what Jon wants to do without regarding the wellfare fo the team. There is indeed a way to get the Bucs back to contention and it isn’t by signing players for more than they are worth, going after names and reputations instead of talent, etc…
This off-season, the Bucs need to cut the bullshit with the free agent spending. It’s rebuilding time and instead of going after everyone on the market (and former Raider players) they need to go after young talent that needs a chance to shine in starting roles instead of on special teams or what not. They need to say goodbye to Michael Pittman and Charlie Garner, Mario Edwards and others that were brought in during the 2004 off-season and start a youth movement.
That also means keeping around Derrick Brooks, Simeon Rice and some of the rest of the veterans on the squad. Not because the Bucs need to keep some aspect of contention but they need to keep some aspect of leadership and direction. Brooks gives them that and Rice give them taht on defense (along with Ronde Barber). Mike Alstott gives them that on offense along with Cosey Coleman, Joe Jervacius, etc.
They need to let Brian Griese walk isntead of further being cluster-fucked with the Salary Cap by agreeing to his 8 million dollar option. They should bring in journeymen QB’s and le tthem contend for the starting psoition against Chris Simms. You can make chicken salad out of chicken shit at the QB position — look at Jake Delholme. He was nothing until he got a chance to start with Carolina and the rest is history.
Gruden, with a roster of youth and hungry players, needs to run one fo the tightest ships he has ever run…. Along with one of the most intensive training camps that he has ever run. He’s been stradled with superstars since taking over head coaching duties for the Riaders a few years ago… Without having a huge cast of big-name hired guns, he might just get the clue that he’s going to have to have patience and actually coach and not just shout orders. He’ll have to lead and teach instead of just expect results from players that were brought along under someone else’s system.
2005 would turn into a painful experience for some – a hopeless endeavour… But then again, it would right the ship long-term by foricng the Bucs back into the building mode instead of Gruden’s ill-planned “retoolings” of the roster.
I expect retooling instead of building this offseason again, however :-(. I expect Brooks and Alstott to be cut instead of the true fat on the roster – the dead weight. All because Jon Gruden’s ego is so much bigger than his talent. He’s an overglorified Offensive Coordinator who’s gotten carte blanche of the Tampa Bay Buccaneer franchise and will run it into the dirt before he will concede that he’s fucked things up with his acquisitions and his preferences.
Mirimax History
I don’t give Ain’t It Cool news that much credit even though I happen to visit the site on a semi-regular basis because I am a movie fan… I find some of the fanboy-ness reviewing some movies to be an utter joke and the porrous HTML something that makes me sick.
But they do have their pluses.
A new reporter for AIn’t It Cool happened to be at a happening at the Museum of Modern Art in New York where the Weinsteins and Quentin Tarantino got together to give the audience a little taste of the story behind Mirimax pictures. Being big on Tarantino and admiring Mirmax and what the Weinsteins have done with it, I just had to read this thing and I’m glad I did.
If you’re a die-hard for movies and like to know the behind the scenes stuff, check it out.
The NFL Season is upon us
Well, the NFL Season launched last night and suffice it to say I am still ask skeptical as ever with Los Buccaneeros de Tampa Bay.
TSN.CA issued some power rankings for the NFL and the Bucs were ranked so high that i had to email a complaint about the rankings. When a team with a jumble on offense, a shattered defense and non-existent special teams makes the top 10 of a preseason review – you gotta bitch a little bit about it.
This is the first season I have been this skeptical of in a while. I have had minor skepticisms in the past (especially 1996 when I thought Tony Dungy was just an also-ran brought in to manage the Bucs) but this is the first major one that i have had in a long time. Maybe my actual first one for the Bucs. I was skeptical in the past when they were the Yuccaneers but you always hoped that team would surprise a few people. Now? It’s such an utter mess with such a set of corrupted individuals in charge (Gruden and his sycophant, Bruce Allen) that it reminds me of the days of Sam Wyche or Ray Perkins…
Alas, I’ve already talked about my skepticism. Now it’s the time for the Bucs to prove me wrong or right.
The "Lot" Beckons
The casting alone makes em want to catch the remake of Stephen King’s 2nd novel-come-movie, ‘Salems Lot
Rob Lowe playing Ben Meares — I can live with that. Donald Sutherland as Richard Straker? Exact casting that I imagined reading the book. Rutger Hauer as Barlow? Another dead-on casting! James Cromwell as Father Donald Callahan?! Another dead on casting! It’s incredible…
Of course, casting alone won’t make this a great movie – if Mikael Saloman can’t work with the images and provoke fear inside the viewer much like King can do with words and images — this will turn into another King-book-come-movie dud to follow dozens of King books that were turned into movies and fell flat.
Reviews on Google have been mixed while reviews on IMDB sound hopeful. We’ll see just how this turns out tomorrow night on TNT.
"Song of" The Gunslinger…
Song of Susannah kicked ass.
In my review of the sixth part of the great sage and imminent wordslinger’s (Stephen King) magnum opus – The Dark Tower — I have to say that for the most part Song of Susannah made up for any and all problems that I had with his last entry to the series (Wolves of the Calla) and was probably the most constant and tension filled book in the series for me — probably a bit more than The Drawing of the Three and The Waste Lands . Compared to Wolves which I fought at times to finish up, or Wizard and Glass which lost my interest because of how far off course the story ventured, this was an absolute pleasure to read.
“Dude, stop with the praise and give me an idea what happens already!”
OK, I don’t want to play the spoiler but of course in all reviews of anything (movies, books, TV shows) you get an idea of what is going to happen in a review…. In Song, the first gasp of the novel establishes the need for the ka-tet to be repaired… Beamquake. It gives a new idea of the sense of urgency of the mission to the Dark Tower (but of course gives no idea on what they need to do there). Eddie is in shambles because Susannah has gone through the Unfounded door, Father Callahan is going insane because he’s found out he is a character in a book, Jake Chambers is still pissed off at losing his best friend because of “Frank…..Fucking….Tarvery” and of course Roland is…. Roland. A bit rational even when there is pressure afoot.
Only taking place for a short time in the borderlands between Mid-World and Thunderclap, the story spends a good deal of time in New York City of 1999 and Maine of 1977. It puts some explanation of story flaws in past Dark Tower novels and it doesn’t exactly sink with the Stephen King side plot. That was my biggest beef with Wolves of the Calla — King writing himself into the books… But you know what? It works now. You see how it works. King had written in the past about what would happen if he met Roland in person and basically you get to see that for real in this story.
Something really bit at me though and it was something I don’t know if it’s real or not. It’s excerpts from King’s “Diary” between 1977 and 1999… I don’t know how much is fake and how much is real — but if there is reality to his wife telling him not to walk a certain route and the fact he predicted 6/19/1999 (O, Discordia!)… It’s just chilling to the bone. There’s no other way to put it.
Susannah gets a lot of pages in this book — and to some degree things did get boring with her dealings with Mia (the other inhabiting her body) and that might be the weakest part of the story… That or a rehash of the ending of The Waste Lands (and no, it ain’t Blaine the Mono) might piss some people off. But it’s not going to be years until we see the conclusion of the Dark Tower saga. Episode 7 — The Dark Tower — is due out later this year.
Long Days and Pleasant Nights to ya, I beg. Life for your crop and thankee-sai… Song of Susannah is a pleasure to read.
Things
The last month has been one of change for me. Physical change, emotional (?) change, personal change and some changes around me. They’ve been more accomplishments than setback and my mood hasn’t always been the best but there is progress in my life and that makes me feel better than I’ve felt in a long, long time.
Last year around this time I was falling into an abyss as I was losing ability with my legs. Go back for yourselves and take a look at June and July 2003 and you can find my personal writings that talk about my legs giving out from under me. Now? Now I’m again at a point where there is a great deal of light in front of me but I am not entirely ready to emerge from the tunnel of darkness.
Jack Ryan needed a year to regain the ability to walk, that was what was said in The Hunt For Red October and I won’t be surprised if it lingers that long for me.
Anyway, I’ve traded my walker (which I only use rarely) for a red cane and am mixed using that and trying to walk on my own. Comes and goes with how well I can do that but it’s close enough for government work.
I started not posting onto this journal last month because I’ve had my room torn up and lost in discordia (we’ll get to the discordia reference in a minute kiddies :wink ) as I’ve finally had my ugly mica furniture removed as well as had a real floor put in… It’s a big change from what I have had. Brighter. More positive for that matter. Good for the soul, say thank ya.
And of course things really got better the last week with me getting out and seeing I could do again – that’s with help, however. I have to still put up a post about what went on with my friend Keith but that’s for another post. Maybe tomorrow.
As for now, I go back to Stephen King’s latest – Song of Susannah which I’m enjoying as I near the finish of the book. Big step up from his last Dark Tower novel. I will give you a better review of the book when I am done…
Positives are around… Quite a change of pace for the Artful Dodger, but positives are around again — thank God.
Transition Game
While I am a bit distracted with things going on in my life, though it’s not like I don’t have time to blog. I’m still trying to figure out just where and what I am going to take the Stonegauge to with regards to blogging…
Keep ranting about personal stuff? Take it more pop culture with entertainment things that I can’t always speak for when it’s current? (My Adaptation review was an old post, I comment on old songs, previously released movies, published books, etc) Political rants which are done better on other blogs and are the norm on the blogshere, and certain people I’ve met with Boltsmag talk about local issues pretty well….
Then we have the fact I do talk about sports here and there — Boltsmag is a success just because I really timed this shit well :smile. There’s writing stories I could give but those are about failure. Medical stories I could tell but those seem irrelevant…
This is the personal homepage of John Fontana but then again? I want the Stonegauge to be a place to stop by and have something worth looking into, commenting on or discussing. Not the garbage I’ve had lately. My April entry spurt was brought on by a certain someone who does a real good job of showing up when she needs a crutch, but avoids really well when things don’t fit her current schedule, which includes friendship..
I want to give “a better ‘Gauge on things” but damnit – I want it to be relevant in some way shape or form. It isn’t at this rate.
Was I right about Van Helsing?
Maybe it’ll be a popcorn flick that you can’t possibly believe but find entertaining none the less, sorta like The Mummy Returns…
But as it stands right now, I’m starting to feel I was right about Van Helsing with the thought it is going to tank. Or at least the reviews are starting to come in and no one is caring for it much besides Harry Knowles and the fan-boy Ain’t It Cool News crowd.
Yet I am sticking to my guns… More marketing than movie making. More play-toy designs than plot. More potential spin-offs than story. Marketing and the big studios is what kills film. You want a good monster movie? Go watch 28 Days Later which doesn’t use too much CGI to instill fear. If you want a good action/Sci Fi movie? Go watch Equilibrium which hasn’t gotten enough attention. Yes, both of those movies re-touch on subjects explored in other movies… But at least they aren’t films devoted to the almighty dollar and marketing before film-making and telling a story.
White Chicks
I started looking at my Summer Movie Preview edition of Entertainment Weekly (at newsstands everywhere starting today) and came across a picture I just couldn’t believe… I mean it REALLY had floored me…
On page 52 there is a preview for White Chicks and it’s Shawn “SW1” Waynes and Marlon Waynes done up as white girls… and the thing is — before I saw the trailer, I honestly couldn’t tell these were people in make up… let alone African-American…. Let alone the Waynes Brothers who I have known from various entertainment endeavors for close to 15 years now.
This isn’t the picture in the magazine (which takes place in a dance club) but it gives you a ghist of the two guys in drag… Quite a transformation, no? Not just gender but color too…
The Death of a DVD Player
I’ve alluded before on Der Stonegauge that I was an early adopter of the DVD format. In 1998 I had the money to blow so I went out and got a player before the format even took a firm hold on society. Over the years, my Panasonic DVD-A105 has shown hundreds of hours of DVD video in high quality without a ton of bells and whistles like some of the new models that come out. It isn’t a progressive scan DVD player, it doesn’t have digital zoom, or a hard drive or whatever… it’s just a solid machine that has gone the distance time and again.
I bought Star Wars original trilogy (pirates :p) on DVD when the problems really started with my player. I attempted to play each movie and I had “digital breakdowns”, so to speak. I had been noticing the machine acting funny lately besides that (even though I clean it regularly) and just giving a few more problems than normal…
Well, Star Wars seemingly did a number on the machine. I tried playing Gladiator last night and what happened was… well, I couldn’t get past certain chapters due to digital breakdown on a clean DVD along with several messages telling me I had no disc in the machine while I did.
I bought condensed air to clean my machine, I ran my DVD laser cleaner, I tried running those DVDs again and the same problems came up. The machine would lock up while having the tough time reading the discs and end up ejecting the DVD from the machine or just plain turning off.
Sadly, I knew that my 5+ year old Panasonic is on it’s last legs…
I started looking at new players today seriously with regards to replacing my machine… And as I was sitting down to write this entry, my brother dumped a new Toshiba. Personally I would have preferred to find my own system but… Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, ya know?
Rented Movie Reviews
So on this post bitter-singles day, I have for you a pair of films I have seen in the past 24 hours:
The Sum Of All Fears: Ben Affleck takes over the role of Jack Ryan from Harrison Ford with this prequel/sequel to the Jack Ryan movies. Personally I never cared for Ford in the role of Ryan, and The Hunt for Red October happens to be my favorite Clancy film (even with it’s cheesey special effects and it’s terrible mock ups of submarines). At any rate, this film moves a young version of Jack Ryan — CIA analyst — into the 21st century which sorta makes things weird. The Hunt for Red October was supposed to have happened around 1985… The other films in the series (Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger – two titles, by the way, that George W. Bush has no comprehension of the meanings) I have no clue when they were supposed to have happened but they starred the elder Harrison Ford after Alec Baldwin launched the Jack Ryan series with Hunt
ok, enough of the explaining… what did I think of the film?
Well, not being someone who has read the book, I enjoyed Sum even though the plot was confusing at times. The film is basically a nuclear standoff between the US and Russia as Neo-Nazi terrorists attempt to start war between the two nations. I actually liked Ben Affleck playing Jack Ryan – a mix of every-man instead of super-hero from what Harrison Ford brought to the role. When one watched the original Jack Ryan film, Red October, you saw Jack didn’t want to be there when sent to do something because he was expendable (“Next time, Jack, just write a god damned memo.” ) An all star cast of James Cromwell, Morgan Freeman, Liev Schreiber and Bridget Moynahan — meow! — round out this film. Worth a viewing – even if it drags at points.
Intolerable Cruelty: You know, i didn’t have my hearing device on when I watched this film and I have a strange thing happen every time I watch a George Clooney film — I think of him as speaking in a southern drawl, much like he di din his role in O, Brother, Where art thou? . I guess it’s just his mannerisms — I just can’t believe he would straight talk through this role of Miles Massey when Miles Massey seems totally obsessed with his teeth and white smile.
The film premise is simple — it’s about divorce and Miles Massey is the best divorce lawyer around. Cathrine Zeta-Jones (meow!) is a man eater, looking to get hitched, get divorced and make a ton of money off it. Of course, these two collide and that’s the basis for the entire film. Sure we get lessons on love and such, with a few laughs in between… but I can’t help wondering how gay Miles Massey’s assistant, Wrigley, happens to be?
You have to wonder if someone writing a review, bringing that question up, actually enjoyed the movie? I did, I honestly did… but there was a little comfortableness about the movie. I usually get this with Coen Brother movies but it doesn’t mean there is anything bad with the film. This is worth a viewing and I won’t spoil it with any more talk. :grin
Anyway, I hope to publish my list of movies rented in the past year an a general thumbs up/thumbs down next to each movie. We’ll see what happens…
Wolves of the Calla review
I’m done with Wolves of the Calla for over a month, making reference to it before I went into the hospital and finalizing it the day I got out of the hospital… but I haven’t made mention of that once in this journal.
There, I just did… Once.. :tongue
The Dark Tower V starts with a section of the story that was already published online – an introduction to Calla Bryne Sturgis and their dillema with the Wolves… A band of rough-riders/brigands/harriers who steal children from the Calla once every genereation or so. We then have our hero’s — Roland of Gilead (whom the Dark Tower saga revolves around) and his band of Gunslingers — Eddie Dean, Susannah Dean, Jake Chambers and Oy…
And what commences is what seems to be author Stephen King’s literary version of a bridge that gets him back to writing the Dark Tower saga after years off.
What I am saying doesn’t exactly shed new light on the story. I could go into detail with each section of the story and give a general synopsis of what happens, but I won’t. I will say that though we are re-introduced to Father Callahan (who is a character in King’s vampire horror novel, ‘Salem’s Lot), I found some of Wolves of the Calla to be a let down… Specifically the end when not only does the climax come off anti-climatic (build up throughout the story and then — fizzle!), and some points that lead us on to the next chapter of The Dark Tower saga (episode VI, Song of Susannah, due out soon) don’t just put a damper on the story, but a damper on the entire Dark Tower saga.
Does that mean Wolves isn’t worth reading? Oh hell, it’s worth reading. Anyone who has gotten immersed into the Dark Tower saga knows that Wolves is a must read for the sake of one’s sanity… The problem is that Stephen King knows how big the Dark Tower is to himself and his fans, and seems to play up that fact and — as an end result – falls a bit flat with regards to telling the tale and furthering the tale.
The wheel of Ka will continue to revolve for me and drive me to finish the saga when the last two novels are published, but for all the build up, for all the intense wait, for all the long stories and tension that drives Wolves Of The Calla, I still feel let down by the end result of the tale.
Reloaded Ramblings
Well, I’ve been feeling :puke since late last night. Honestly, I was up until 6 AM because my stomach was doing knots and I couldn’t have slumber sweep me away. It didn’t help that I had stayed in bed until noon the day before….:sleepy I gotta get back to normal hours.
At any rate, Mike gave me The Matrix Reloaded as requested as a late birthday present (speaking of late birthday’s – my silence towards other’s birthday’s is only because of other’s silence twoards mine). I had seen the movie back in June so it wasn’t like I was unaware what happened…
But come on, folks… you should know me. Well, maybe you don’t. I happen to be deaf and use a device to help me hear — but most conversations are tough on me. So I depend on captions with TV and the like.
What does this have to do with Re-Woah-ded? It’s time for my delayed review on the film now that i understand just WTF was going on (not to say I didn’t through watching the movie with just the images on screen).
I look at this movie and I watch it and after dropping all the rehetoric — “It’s about choice”, “Cause and effect”, “It’s understanding that choice and why you made it” and all the other stuff — I find the film’s aim to be about Faith. Undying faith.
How did I jump to this conclusion? Neo being ridiculed by the Architect for having hope. The fact that Morpheus is at a cross roads (“I have lived a dream and now that dream is gone from me.”), and how much the people of Zion and even the machines must believe in Neo — or believe in themselves for that matter — in order to survive the coming onslaught from the Machines.
There’s the love story that you see in this film which is faith in a bond between two people (sidenote – the scene with the cave and Neo making it with Trinity could have been edited out and re-shot with just the two of them in bed in the warm afterglow. That might have moved the movie along faster).
I don’t know, maybe I am missing something here — maybe I just enjoy the movie enough to not care to see the contradictions that the critics are talking about… I see this as a film of faith. As will Revolutions end up being.
Keanu Reeves has said the movies are about “Birth, Life and Death” which scares me a bit because I don’t want to see Neo get killed off to save everyone else. I want to see everyone else saved somehow with Neo leading the way…..
Oh well, so much as for that.
I got my writing assignment back from Herr Fisher and need to work on that sometime soon. I don’t know when I will however. Sorta discouraged and sort of just blah right now with writing — though this entry came off my mind/fingers pretty well. We’ll see what happens.
Downed
T minus a day and a matter of hours.
I ranted to a few people today about how I am right now and I really came to the clear realization I don’t like focusing on myself. I mean, I’ve been called selfish when I’m being a pain in the ass but I’m high strung with certain things — picky-choosy. That’s not being selfish. Being selfish is doling out one’s life over and over again and making yourself the subject of items. I don’t like to do that when I have bad news to share, I’d rather share the positives and we all know things aren’t exactly positive for me right now. Then again, i can share my negatives when I know I’m truly SHARING with someone and it isn’t just a casual relationship.
I also need something to prop me up, I guess, emotionally. Fluff my ego and all that. Friends have wanted to help me out if they can but there’s not much one can do to help. Some have said “I wish I could take away your problems” — that’s likewise. Others can just agree that things suck right now and get brash on the fact I’m down… While others ignore it, maybe it’ll go away?
A venerable cornucopia of reactions to a NF2 patient who’s about to have an operation on his spine.
In other news, I forgot to tell you all that Lou got back to me with lesson four and….
Loved it!
Oh, yeah, I still need to work on things. For all of my reviewing of the story (previously published on this site, “Thank god for Arthur” and my editing down of the story, it still had a few flaws, but it really came out good. I need to be more clear with italics (I tried a technique some authors use with italicizing personal thoughts, which was a no no),and get more comfortable with dialogue (I’m actually comfortable with it, it’s grammar around dialogue and quotes that I need to work on) but all in all…
“Mavelous, dahling!”
Any requests to see the finished product?
Looking in all the wrong places
Someone from HS pops up on the web and you can’t get their email… unless you pay
Actually you can if you search hard enough. I guess I haven’t because I just can’t find the damn thing wherever I look….
In other news, you can review the comments on the test I gave if you want to know results or just want to comment on the damn thing….
Not much else to report- unproductive week and my legs aren’t doing well at all. I really need to stop pussyfooting around with things and get my ass in gear with something or other to mend my situation.