Travels with Grumpus

Mickey (groaning): I shouldn’t have had that cheesecake.

Maya: (silence)

Mickey: Sweetie, you should help me.

Maya: I *told* you not to eat it.

Mickey: But you didn’t stop me.

Maya: How am I supposed to stop you? Physically hold you down?

Mickey: Yes! Restrain me! We’ve had this conversation before!

Maya: You should just learn to control yourself.

Mickey: You know I can’t do that. You know I can’t be held responsible for my actions when it comes to dessert and snacks.

Can’t get the embed function to work, so you’re just gonna have to click on this here link, cocksucka.

And in case you ain’t clued in to pure genius that is this show, here’s a little tiny bit of it. And here and here are some more.

When I was 12 going on 13, I spent a summer reading Spiderman, X-men, New Mutants, Alpha Flight and related Marvel offerings. My most fervent wish was for some mutant power to manifest itself once I hit puberty. Failing that, I wanted to get bitten by a radioactive spider. Failing that I figured I could become a ninja.

To my lasting disappointment, my latent superpowers never emerged. But I’m always thrilled when I hear of people like the Monkey Climber Girl (superpowers on display here) who developed her superhuman climbing skills in Africa, where she spent her childhood supposedly following her pet monkey up and down trees. Professional climbers say there’s nothing special about what she does - she’s just a very skilled climber - but to a confirmed couch potato like meself, that one-finger pull-up, mad rapid scampering up a wall and weird shaped fingers sure seem to indicate mutant powers.

And then there’s Echolocation Boy who, after going blind at age 3, developed a way to “see” with sound. He makes clicking noises with his tongue, and the echoes that bounce back off surfaces allow him to form an image of his surroundings. He gets around perfectly well, maybe even better than people with full use of their eyes. Very Matthew Murdock. Yes, there are doubters, but heck, kid’s pretty damn cool.

And you thought this post was gonna be about that reality show.

As the gossip pundits race to put the snark on this delicious piece of news, I will hold my tongue and lay it out for you to play it out.  Paramount is firing Tom Cruise.  Yehp.  And why, you might ask?  Well from the horse’s mouth:

In an unusually public rebuke, Viacom Inc. Chairman Sumner Redstone said that his company’s movie studio, Paramount Pictures, plans to end its 14-year relationship with the 44-year-old Mr. Cruise and his film-production company. In an interview, Mr. Redstone, who is 83, was clear about the reason: Mr. Cruise’s public antics and incessant stumping for personal causes, notably Scientology, have become intolerable and have been a drag on ticket sales for films like “Mission: Impossible III.”

Mr Cruise’s spin doctors are already hard at work.  We say Fired.  We know he’s nuts.

Save Katie!

Mickey: Hahaha! So did the kids like the Snakes on a Plane message? That was hilarious!

Maya: Yeah, and brilliant marketing. I’m sure that message is making its way across tons of cell phones and computers. So even if you hadn’t planned on seeing it, now you’re at least curious.

Mickey: Hearing Samuel L. Jackson’s voice on your phone *will* make you pay attention. See, that’s why I love the guy, nothing is beneath him. And he does it all with such gusto. Can you imagine Gwyneth Paltrow doing something like that? Or Sean Penn?

Maya: Well Sean Penn would only do it after an extensive script re-write.

Mickey: Yeah, put in some back story…

Maya: … about how he was set upon by snakes in childhood and it damaged him for life …

Mickey: … and it would ultimately be about redemption. Or no, Redemption, with a capital R…

Maya: … he’d have to be able to use it to angle for an Oscar nomination …

Mickey: … better yet, he’d play a retarded guy. Sam I am on a plane. Yeah, that would make it into the re-write.

Mickey: Here are the movies we have to see:

• Snakes on a Plane. Samuel L. Jackson. Snakes. A plane. High jinks ensue.
• Talladega Nights - The Ballad of Ricky Bobby. Will Ferrell. ‘Nuff said.
• Miami Vice. Directed by Michael Mann, one of my all-time favorite directors. He even made Tom Cruise likeable in Collateral.

Maya: Collateral was an awesome movie.

It’s that time of the month again, when inspiration runs dry and coherent thought flies out the window. Until the cloud in my brain disperses, my faithful readers, here are a few random bits of this and that to chew on.

Gwyneth is back! “And a great weight is lifted off our shoulders. Thanks, Gwynie!” says Mickey. How can you not love Ms. Paltrow? Having herself achieved perfection, (look for the “bad habits” quote), she spreads love and happiness with timely, welcome advice, loves her country, and knows how to soften a barb with a meaningful compliment:

I just hope the whole paparazzi thing continues in the way it’s been going, which is with less interest in people like me and more interest in people like Nicole Richie — who I think is an excellent dresser, by the way

And I’m sorry for the clumsy transition, but speaking of skinny, talented performing women, much congratulations to the beauteous Jeremie who has brought back many many gold medals from the 2006 World Championships of Performing Arts. Sigh. I can barely carry a tune, hold my tummy in or pull off a spangly ball gown with any conviction. And there’s Jer, zero body fat and the voice of an angel (a big black gospel-singer angel), pulling it all off with great aplomb.

Moving on to the topic of swank, here’s a luxury vacation experience that made my jaw drop. Yeah sure it’s a yacht. But it’s a yacht that comes with its own private island. And surfer slave girls.

Not quite up to spending nine thousand five hundred US dollars per couple per night? Well us poor folk can keep ourselves occupied with the answers to the 25 most important questions in the history universe. (Thanks to Mickey for the link. Slow day at the office.)
Ok that’s it for today. G’night kiddos. Peace out.

Conversation over dinner:

Maya: I also remember this one place when I was growing up that sold really really good pandesal for 10 centavos.

Mickey: Okay…

Maya: Yeah. It was sooo good when it was freshly baked and still really hot. It would come in a brown paper sleeve. All I wanted was when I grew up to live somewhere where I could eat that pandesal all day long.

Mickey: [pause]

Maya: What?

Mickey: Wow you really set your sights low. I wanted to be an astronaut.

You shall above all be glad and young

In remorse over last Saturday’s food orgy, Grumpus asked me to stick this admonishment on the refrigerator door.

Thanks for your concern over my dry bones. You are not to worry, nothing’s broke and there ain’t nothin’ wrong that cain’t get fixed.

That’s entertainment

Pirates 2 made $7.2 million in the US last weekend, bringing its domestic box office take to $392 million, and its worldwide take to $784.6 million.

Superfantastic upcoming song alert.

Grumpus says

Mickey engages in a debate on Ricky’s blog.

Again with the Chuck Norris stuff

A Chuck Norris bridge over the Danube? Me likey. Me likey very much.

Thoughts and considerations coming into Slither:

Okay, that looks promising. A funny horror movie. Maybe it’ll be like Shaun of the Dead. A romantic comedy. With zombies. But this time it’s snakes. Or some weird alien slug thing. Whatever. It looks funny. It’s got Elizabeth Banks, I like her. And it’s got Nathan Fillion. I liked him a lot in Firefly. Wow I miss Firefly. Too bad they had to cancel it. Well it looks like Nathan Fillion’s playing the same sort of character in this movie. Movie got good reviews too. So okay, I’ll see it.

The aftermath:

Hunh. Well that was okay, but it could have been better. Yeah it was funny and scary, but it sort of ended too abruptly. Didn’t get that nice emotional punch at the end. Started off right, hillbilly podunk redneck town, good set-up, and wow I think they cast the ugliest people in America for that bar scene. The gruesomeness was nicely over-the-top, which of course was funny. But I don’t know. Maybe the acting wasn’t hammy enough so there wasn’t that nice interplay between the slime, ick and gore and exaggerated this-is-the-end-so-I’ll-let-it-all-hang-out tearfulness… Hard to say. Maybe it was edited wrong. Could have been more compact, maybe some scenes could have been cut out in the beginning, give the climax a bit more time to play out.

Thoughts and considerations coming into Pirates of the Carribean:

Jeez. I can’t believe how much money this movie’s made. It’s a movie based on a freaking Disney ride. That’s not right. Didn’t like the first one much. And it’s got two actors I don’t much care for. Yeah but whatever. Mickey wants to see it. Guess there are worse ways to spend a Sunday afternoon. Maybe it’ll be funny. Johnny Depp’s pretty funny. So I’ll take that.

The aftermath:

*shrug*