The ad for the new Gillette razor features a bunch of mooks bursting into men's rooms and giving the razor to half-naked men to try. One of the selling points is that it doesn't give you a lot of "tug and pull."
I say I like the tug and pull.
But then, I'm not talking about shaving.
The ad for the Hyundai Essence has got to be the fruitiest wish-fulfillment fantasy I've ever seen.
First of all, where do they get the names for these cars? Essence is kind of okay, but when I was in Korea I saw names like "Nubira" or "Terracan" or "Musso." Do they just throw a bunch of Scrabble tiles on the floor until they get something that looks like a word?
The ad for the Essence features a quartet of mooks who find a magic wand and conjure up the car. They change the colour, drive down the road, and the mook with the wand zaps himself into another car full of pretty girls.
If you're any kind of man at all, the Essence is not the kind of car you conjure up. Think of Steve McQueen in "Bullitt" or Gene Hackman in "The French Connection." Now those are the kinds of car, and that's how you drive it! At top speed through the city, dodging other cars and pedestrians, chasing down some killers to a shootout or a fiery demise!
Not meandering down the avenue, head bopping to some adman's idea of a jaunty tune.
That's for fags.
Brmmm-mmmm-mmmm-mmmm.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Old History, Repeating Itself
I used to work in a restaurant in the late seventies/early eighties. It was an interesting time. The guys who owned the restaurant, located in downtown Calgary, were an Englishman and a Catholic schoolteacher. The Englishman, who I'll call "W," was custom made for the business. He could talk, and talk interestingly (and incessantly), about anything. He was the perfect host, who could regale customers with stories, make them feel comfortable, and make them feel like they'd visited the homiest, most welcoming place on earth.
The schoolteacher was more laid back, and offered a quieter presence that tended to soften some of his partner's rougher edges.
But behind closed doors...
W could be a tyrant. His temper was quick to explode if anything was not done just right. If you've ever seen Gordon Ramsay in an episode of "Hell's Kitchen," you will know what I am talking about.
For the most part, he was a good boss, and I enjoyed working for him. The work was pretty easy to do, even when we were busy, because I had been trained well and knew what to do. But everybody makes mistakes, and even I got yelled at every once in a while.
One of the things that used to irritate me was changing the tape in the machine that piped music into the restaurant. Every single goddamned time I was walking toward it, W would come around the corner and ask, "Why's there no music playing?"
He was like Sybil telling Basil to put that picture up.
I worked there until 1982, when the city took all the land in the surrounding area and razed everything on it to the ground in order to build a shiny new City Hall. I was sorry to see it go, even though the area was not what you might call "Park Row."
Eastern downtown Calgary at the time was fairly down-at-heel. In the next block from our restaurant were two hotels, the Queen's Arms and the Monarch. They sat on two corners with an alley between them, and there was only a superficial difference between the two. They were home to the less advantaged of the city, and the bars were usually full of blue-collar types drinking their fill and then some. It wasn't a place I would go to alone, but it was okay if you had backup.
Yeah, they're gone now, too.
Down the other way was the St. Louis Hotel, a favourite haunt of then-reporter Ralph Klein. He used to come to our restaurant when he was running for mayor, and even after he won. I've seen him in his cups after hours a few times.
Further down was (and still is) the King Edward, the King Eddy, which now hosts a blues bar famous all over the city. Good music and thirst-quenching drinks.
W was full of plans for a new restaurant, of course, and it seemed like the natural thing when he asked me to come along and help to say yes.
I was going to Mount Royal College (now University), indifferently studying journalism, and I dropped out to work in the restaurant business full time. I thought I was getting in on the ground floor of something big. W said he was going to open pretty much the same place, only bigger and better. Yeah, he could talk, all right.
He decided before he could open this big glittering palace of an eatery, he needed to build up his bank account by opening a fast food joint. We looked around and then looked around some more for a place to set up shop and settled on an old, abandoned gas station. We rented the place from Shell Oil, whose place it was, and set about turning the service bays into a kitchen and the customer service area into a dining room.
We did quite a good job, and we did it all by ourselves; W, myself, and a kid who used to cook for us in the old place. And what a long, back-and-heart-breaking job it turned out to be. In the old place, there were a lot of targets for W's anger, but now there was only two, and boy did we get it.
It seemed like every day or every hour something would set him off, and we'd have to suffer through a tongue-lashing describing in intimate detail just how stupid we were, and how dense we had to be to make whatever mistake we had just made.
We were all under intense pressure to complete the job, and to drive ourselves as hard as we possibly could in order to finish, and get the restaurant up and running as soon as possible.
It makes me tired now just thinking about it.
Somewhere along the line, I burnt out, and lost all my enthusiasm for the resaurant business in general, and W in particular. We parted ways soon after the burger joint (called "Big Dick's," after Big Dick Turpin. No really) opened.
I've had other bosses with tempers like W's, and I was able to examine them more dispassionately, after my previous experience and a little time to think.
Remember the movie "Full Metal Jacket?" If you haven't seen it, you should. The drill instructor who lashes the recruits into fighting men is a perfect example of what I am talking about. He mercilessly berates the recruits until they are quite literally crying.
But he doesn't do it out of enjoyment. He's trying to break down their resistance to his instruction in the swiftest and most brutal way imaginable. He doesn't want to destroy them completely, merely remake them in the Marine Corps' image, and make them into trained, efficient killers.
He does a pretty good job at it until one of the recruits snaps and shoots him through the chest.
So I can see W's (and other bosses like him) point of view. And once you've seen behind the curtain, it's hard to ignore the little man working the controls of the Great and Powerful Oz. The giant head and the fire and the smoke are just special effects, used by an ordinary guy to fool you into doing what he wants the way he wants it.
I became impatient with superiors who used the rant in an effort to cow me. I started to see them as petty and mean, without the imagination to see that I was an intelligent human being who could follow instructions and do the job without all the pyrotechnics. It was their failing, not mine.
I remember when I was working as a security guard at a large office building. For some reason, it was the night guards' job to stock the washrooms with paper, towels, soap, etc. The super would come in the morning and make a quick check before relieving you.
One day I got quite a dressing down for not refilling one of the soap dispensers. When I went to do that (and I couldn't leave until I did), I saw that it was over half full, but not completely full.
What the fuck?
When I got back from completing my arduous task, the super went on and on, and questioned my dedication to the job, and asked me just what I expected if I tried to get by with such ineptitude.
I quietly agreed with him and told him I would ask HQ to move me to another site.
I didn't see any point in arguing with the mook, who was in a postion of authority, and clinging to his little bit of power like a limpet. Pointing out that he was a fucking idiot might bring some personal satisfaction, but it would be professional suicide.
What was the point? What could I say to this person, who I had just lost all respect for, that would change his thinking that he was right and proper to treat me like shit?
I didn't think it would do any good at all to waste my breath. Over at "What The Kimchi?," Flint and I get comments from all kinds of fucktards. Arguing with them is like banging your head against a brick wall. You can't change their thinking, and all you get is a head covered with bumps and bruises.
My mother is a lot like those bosses. I love her because she's my mother, but I don't like the person she is. At this point in time, she is very disappointed in me, mostly because (like my father) I am a very quiet man. She doesn't like the quiet, and can be very cruel when she makes snide comments about it. I've taken to distancing myself from her, rather than arguing with her. And I try not to think of her as being too similar to those idiots I used to work for.
All of us in our family have had arguments and differences like this with her. My sisters have sometimes gone for months and years before they make up with her. I suppose my mom and I will make it up some day.
But until then, I'll have to stay away from "The Wizard Of Oz" and "Full Metal Jacket."
The schoolteacher was more laid back, and offered a quieter presence that tended to soften some of his partner's rougher edges.
But behind closed doors...
W could be a tyrant. His temper was quick to explode if anything was not done just right. If you've ever seen Gordon Ramsay in an episode of "Hell's Kitchen," you will know what I am talking about.
For the most part, he was a good boss, and I enjoyed working for him. The work was pretty easy to do, even when we were busy, because I had been trained well and knew what to do. But everybody makes mistakes, and even I got yelled at every once in a while.
One of the things that used to irritate me was changing the tape in the machine that piped music into the restaurant. Every single goddamned time I was walking toward it, W would come around the corner and ask, "Why's there no music playing?"
He was like Sybil telling Basil to put that picture up.
I worked there until 1982, when the city took all the land in the surrounding area and razed everything on it to the ground in order to build a shiny new City Hall. I was sorry to see it go, even though the area was not what you might call "Park Row."
Eastern downtown Calgary at the time was fairly down-at-heel. In the next block from our restaurant were two hotels, the Queen's Arms and the Monarch. They sat on two corners with an alley between them, and there was only a superficial difference between the two. They were home to the less advantaged of the city, and the bars were usually full of blue-collar types drinking their fill and then some. It wasn't a place I would go to alone, but it was okay if you had backup.
Yeah, they're gone now, too.
Down the other way was the St. Louis Hotel, a favourite haunt of then-reporter Ralph Klein. He used to come to our restaurant when he was running for mayor, and even after he won. I've seen him in his cups after hours a few times.
Further down was (and still is) the King Edward, the King Eddy, which now hosts a blues bar famous all over the city. Good music and thirst-quenching drinks.
W was full of plans for a new restaurant, of course, and it seemed like the natural thing when he asked me to come along and help to say yes.
I was going to Mount Royal College (now University), indifferently studying journalism, and I dropped out to work in the restaurant business full time. I thought I was getting in on the ground floor of something big. W said he was going to open pretty much the same place, only bigger and better. Yeah, he could talk, all right.
He decided before he could open this big glittering palace of an eatery, he needed to build up his bank account by opening a fast food joint. We looked around and then looked around some more for a place to set up shop and settled on an old, abandoned gas station. We rented the place from Shell Oil, whose place it was, and set about turning the service bays into a kitchen and the customer service area into a dining room.
We did quite a good job, and we did it all by ourselves; W, myself, and a kid who used to cook for us in the old place. And what a long, back-and-heart-breaking job it turned out to be. In the old place, there were a lot of targets for W's anger, but now there was only two, and boy did we get it.
It seemed like every day or every hour something would set him off, and we'd have to suffer through a tongue-lashing describing in intimate detail just how stupid we were, and how dense we had to be to make whatever mistake we had just made.
We were all under intense pressure to complete the job, and to drive ourselves as hard as we possibly could in order to finish, and get the restaurant up and running as soon as possible.
It makes me tired now just thinking about it.
Somewhere along the line, I burnt out, and lost all my enthusiasm for the resaurant business in general, and W in particular. We parted ways soon after the burger joint (called "Big Dick's," after Big Dick Turpin. No really) opened.
I've had other bosses with tempers like W's, and I was able to examine them more dispassionately, after my previous experience and a little time to think.
Remember the movie "Full Metal Jacket?" If you haven't seen it, you should. The drill instructor who lashes the recruits into fighting men is a perfect example of what I am talking about. He mercilessly berates the recruits until they are quite literally crying.
But he doesn't do it out of enjoyment. He's trying to break down their resistance to his instruction in the swiftest and most brutal way imaginable. He doesn't want to destroy them completely, merely remake them in the Marine Corps' image, and make them into trained, efficient killers.
He does a pretty good job at it until one of the recruits snaps and shoots him through the chest.
So I can see W's (and other bosses like him) point of view. And once you've seen behind the curtain, it's hard to ignore the little man working the controls of the Great and Powerful Oz. The giant head and the fire and the smoke are just special effects, used by an ordinary guy to fool you into doing what he wants the way he wants it.
I became impatient with superiors who used the rant in an effort to cow me. I started to see them as petty and mean, without the imagination to see that I was an intelligent human being who could follow instructions and do the job without all the pyrotechnics. It was their failing, not mine.
I remember when I was working as a security guard at a large office building. For some reason, it was the night guards' job to stock the washrooms with paper, towels, soap, etc. The super would come in the morning and make a quick check before relieving you.
One day I got quite a dressing down for not refilling one of the soap dispensers. When I went to do that (and I couldn't leave until I did), I saw that it was over half full, but not completely full.
What the fuck?
When I got back from completing my arduous task, the super went on and on, and questioned my dedication to the job, and asked me just what I expected if I tried to get by with such ineptitude.
I quietly agreed with him and told him I would ask HQ to move me to another site.
I didn't see any point in arguing with the mook, who was in a postion of authority, and clinging to his little bit of power like a limpet. Pointing out that he was a fucking idiot might bring some personal satisfaction, but it would be professional suicide.
What was the point? What could I say to this person, who I had just lost all respect for, that would change his thinking that he was right and proper to treat me like shit?
I didn't think it would do any good at all to waste my breath. Over at "What The Kimchi?," Flint and I get comments from all kinds of fucktards. Arguing with them is like banging your head against a brick wall. You can't change their thinking, and all you get is a head covered with bumps and bruises.
My mother is a lot like those bosses. I love her because she's my mother, but I don't like the person she is. At this point in time, she is very disappointed in me, mostly because (like my father) I am a very quiet man. She doesn't like the quiet, and can be very cruel when she makes snide comments about it. I've taken to distancing myself from her, rather than arguing with her. And I try not to think of her as being too similar to those idiots I used to work for.
All of us in our family have had arguments and differences like this with her. My sisters have sometimes gone for months and years before they make up with her. I suppose my mom and I will make it up some day.
But until then, I'll have to stay away from "The Wizard Of Oz" and "Full Metal Jacket."
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Magic
Spoiler Alert! I will be discussing "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two."
I saw the latest (and last) "Harry Potter" movie recently, and I wanted to talk about the disposition of some of the magical objects in the film. I don't want to recount the entire plot, but some explanation of the action is necessary. Harry and his friends are hunting magical objects called horcruxes, in which the evil Lord Voldemort has hidden parts of his soul. Harry has to destroy these horcruxes as part of a plan to eventually kill Voldemort.
It turns out one of these horcruxes is part of a collection of objects known as the Deathly Hallows, ancient magic so old their origins are the stuff of legend. The three objects are the Elder Wand (so powerful it cannot be defeated), an invisibility cloak, and an Immortality Stone. The latter object was made into a ring, and passed down through Voldemort's ancestors until he made it into a horcrux. The piece of soul inside the ring was destroyed, but Stone's ability to grant immortality was not. Harry used the stone to recall the shades of his parents (just before Voldemort killed him), and then dropped it in the Enchanted Forest. He later said that he was not going to seek it out again or tell anyone where it was. He felt that leaving a powerful magical object lying in the middle of a forest would be insurance enough that no-one would ever find and use it again.
The Elder Wand had been used by Professor Dumbledore, and it was buried with him. Voldemort desecrated Dumbledore's grave to steal it. He felt the wand would ensure his victory over Harry in any magical duel, in vain as it turns out.
In the book, Harry uses the wand to repair his own badly damaged instrument, and then returns it to Dumbledore's grave. In the movie, Harry snaps it in two and throws th pieces away. I guess snapping the most powerful wand in two is as easy as breaking a dried up old twig.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of Harry Potter, the books and the movies. I started reading them in Korea, and they helped pass the time, especially when I was trapped in that Junkpile.
But getting rid of magical objects by snapping them in two or leaving them in an apparently deserted area is just not going to fly with me.
It reminds me of an episode of "Angel," where the vampire comes across a ring that allows him to walk in daylight. He eventually destroys it by smashing it with a rock.
Destroying magical rings is not that easy. Just ask Frodo.
I am a fan of "The Lord Of The Rings," too. That book is an epic tale of adventure, swords, and sorcery. The basic plot element is the destruction of an instrument of great magic (and great evil), the evil Lord Sauron's Ring of Power.
When the disposition of the Ring is debated at the Council of Elrond, some urge that it should be used against Sauron, but that plan is rejected because the ring is evil, and will turn any user to evil.
Some suggest that the Ring be thrown into the sea, but that is also rejected. The Ring and Sauron are connected. While one endures, so will the other. Sauron cannot be defeated even if the Ring were cast into the sea, and it would still be possible for him to find it eventually, and then he would be unstoppable.
Others say that it should be sent into the West, where powers greater than Sauron dwell. But they would not take it. For good or ill, it must remain in Middle Earth.
The only option open to them is to destroy it. Because of its great power, the Ring can only be unmade by casting it into the fire from which it came, in the volcano known as Mt. Doom, located in the midst of Sauron's realm of Mordor. So Frodo the hobbit undertakes the Quest, and succeeds after many perils and adventures along the way. Great stuff.
But it just goes to show you that magical objects cannot be disposed of so easily. Any writer in the field of fantasy must take this into consideration, or risk seeing their story founder on an unbelievable or inconceivable plot point.
I saw the latest (and last) "Harry Potter" movie recently, and I wanted to talk about the disposition of some of the magical objects in the film. I don't want to recount the entire plot, but some explanation of the action is necessary. Harry and his friends are hunting magical objects called horcruxes, in which the evil Lord Voldemort has hidden parts of his soul. Harry has to destroy these horcruxes as part of a plan to eventually kill Voldemort.
It turns out one of these horcruxes is part of a collection of objects known as the Deathly Hallows, ancient magic so old their origins are the stuff of legend. The three objects are the Elder Wand (so powerful it cannot be defeated), an invisibility cloak, and an Immortality Stone. The latter object was made into a ring, and passed down through Voldemort's ancestors until he made it into a horcrux. The piece of soul inside the ring was destroyed, but Stone's ability to grant immortality was not. Harry used the stone to recall the shades of his parents (just before Voldemort killed him), and then dropped it in the Enchanted Forest. He later said that he was not going to seek it out again or tell anyone where it was. He felt that leaving a powerful magical object lying in the middle of a forest would be insurance enough that no-one would ever find and use it again.
The Elder Wand had been used by Professor Dumbledore, and it was buried with him. Voldemort desecrated Dumbledore's grave to steal it. He felt the wand would ensure his victory over Harry in any magical duel, in vain as it turns out.
In the book, Harry uses the wand to repair his own badly damaged instrument, and then returns it to Dumbledore's grave. In the movie, Harry snaps it in two and throws th pieces away. I guess snapping the most powerful wand in two is as easy as breaking a dried up old twig.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of Harry Potter, the books and the movies. I started reading them in Korea, and they helped pass the time, especially when I was trapped in that Junkpile.
But getting rid of magical objects by snapping them in two or leaving them in an apparently deserted area is just not going to fly with me.
It reminds me of an episode of "Angel," where the vampire comes across a ring that allows him to walk in daylight. He eventually destroys it by smashing it with a rock.
Destroying magical rings is not that easy. Just ask Frodo.
I am a fan of "The Lord Of The Rings," too. That book is an epic tale of adventure, swords, and sorcery. The basic plot element is the destruction of an instrument of great magic (and great evil), the evil Lord Sauron's Ring of Power.
When the disposition of the Ring is debated at the Council of Elrond, some urge that it should be used against Sauron, but that plan is rejected because the ring is evil, and will turn any user to evil.
Some suggest that the Ring be thrown into the sea, but that is also rejected. The Ring and Sauron are connected. While one endures, so will the other. Sauron cannot be defeated even if the Ring were cast into the sea, and it would still be possible for him to find it eventually, and then he would be unstoppable.
Others say that it should be sent into the West, where powers greater than Sauron dwell. But they would not take it. For good or ill, it must remain in Middle Earth.
The only option open to them is to destroy it. Because of its great power, the Ring can only be unmade by casting it into the fire from which it came, in the volcano known as Mt. Doom, located in the midst of Sauron's realm of Mordor. So Frodo the hobbit undertakes the Quest, and succeeds after many perils and adventures along the way. Great stuff.
But it just goes to show you that magical objects cannot be disposed of so easily. Any writer in the field of fantasy must take this into consideration, or risk seeing their story founder on an unbelievable or inconceivable plot point.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Saturday Night Live's Seventh Season
I just finished watching Saturday Night Live's seventh season, which I downloaded from Demonoid. The video quality isn't that great. It was recorded on a VCR, and then made into a torrent, so the picture has downgraded a bit. There're even parts where the tracking isn't done properly.
But overall it's watchable, and the seventh season is probably my favourite. This was the season where the show came back from the dead. Some may argue whether that's a good thing, but that's not what I want to talk about.
The sixth season of SNL had been very bad. There was a new cast, new writers, and a new producer that managed to run the show into the ground in only eleven episodes. Dick Ebersol was brought in to produce one final show and then shut it down until the next season.
The only survivors from that series were Eddie Murphy and Joe Piscopo. Ebersol wanted to hire John Candy and Catherine O'Hara away from SCTV, but Candy turned him down and O'Hara backed out after meeting Michael O'Donoghue.
O'Donoghue, a writer from the first five seasons, basically returned to kill the show. He wanted to give it a Viking funeral, and tried to instil "danger" back into the writing process. His volatile personality guaranteed that his tenure would be short-lived.
The fourth show was the nadir. Donald Pleasence was the host, and he featured in a sketch that highlights an amputation and gallons of spurting blood.
The musical guest was a punk rock band called "Fear." Their performance reminded me of the episode of SCTV's "Mel's Rockpile," where he had a punk band perform. Mel, the lamest host ever, announced that there would be a "slam dance." All the dancers slammed into each other with great ferocity, and Joe Flaherty screamed, "Have you no consideration for the women!"
That was funny, but "Fear's" performance was not. They were booked on the show at the insistence of John Belushi, who also made a surprise cameo that night. It would be his last appearance on the show before his death the following spring.
There were, however, a lot of great musical performances that season from The Kinks, Rick James, The Go-Go's, Meatloaf, the Allman Brothers, Lindsey Buckingham, and John Mellencamp. Elton John sang his John Lennon tribute, "Empty Garden," and the Charlie Daniels Band did "The Devil Went Down To Georgia." Johnny Cash did a selection of his greatest hits.
On the Christmas show, Bill Murray hosted, and made a midshow announcement about the Polish government's crackdown on "Solidarity." An interesting bit of social commentary thrown into a comedy show. But then, SNL always prided itself on its satire of America's fools and their foibles.
There was a lot of fun made of Ronald Reagan, depicted as the clueless idiot he was in real life. His administration was shown to be the "Bizarro World" from Superman comics. This was the beginning of the end of the cold war, but the times were still pretty tense. They even did a Dr. Strangelove sketch.
The comedy could be very sharp at times, sometimes too sharp for comfort. Towards the end of the season, they conducted a phone-in poll to decide the fate of a lobster dubbed "Larry." Callers voted whether to spare the lobster or boil and eat him. At first, it looked like he was for the pot, but the final tally spared his life.
Then, on the next week's show, Eddie Murphy read a letter from a woman in Oklahoma who doubted that Larry had survived the show, especially the way Murphy was "waving him around." She also commented, "I thought those people didn't like seafood."
Murphy's response to her racist comment was to reveal Larry's boiled body, announced that his stay of execution had been revoked, and ate him.
The last show of the season was my favourite. Olivia Newton-John was the host, and she sang some hits from her "Physical" album. I was hot for Olivia at the time, I'll tell you.
But the best part was when Graham Chapman interrupted a sketch as the Colonel, telling them it was "too silly," and obviously ripped off from Monty Python.
Chapman was on the show to promote the film "The Secret Policeman's Other Ball." An NBC station had recently refused to air the trailer for the film, saying it was "too objectionable, even for [SNL}."
They then played the trailer, and invited Chapman to comment. Chapman read NBC's objection, which said that the American flag displayed in the ad was "rumpled" and "defaced in one corner." While the flag was a bit wrinkled, it wasn't defaced. There was a birdcage in front of it, and the censors might not have gotten a good enough look to see it.
I think what really cheesed them off was the poking of fun at the Moral Majority and the fact that Chapman was wearing a tutu, nylon stockings, and a garter belt.
Chapman made an eloquent apology, saying he never meant to offend anyone, or do anything to break the strong bonds between Britain and America by defaming the flag.
He then stood up to reveal he was wearing a star-spangled g-string.
It was an hysterical moment, typical of the humour of that season, which marks it in my memory as one of SNL's best.
At the end of the show, when everyone was waving goodbye, Piscopo announced that Eddie was going off to San Francisco that summer to make a film with Nick Nolte. This film was, of course, "48 Hrs," and it made Murphy a big star.
In fact, the shows in this torrent were re-presented on Comedy Central with the subtitle "The Eddie Murphy Experience," and include a few taped reminisces from him about his time on the show.
Well, it wasn't the first time that a cast member grew larger than the show, and it wouldn't be the last. Murphy's success overshadowed that of Piscopo and fellow cast members Tim Kazurinsky, Mary Gross, Christine Ebersole and SCTV alumni Robin Duke and Tony Rosato. It's too bad, as they all helped make the seventh season one to remember.
But overall it's watchable, and the seventh season is probably my favourite. This was the season where the show came back from the dead. Some may argue whether that's a good thing, but that's not what I want to talk about.
The sixth season of SNL had been very bad. There was a new cast, new writers, and a new producer that managed to run the show into the ground in only eleven episodes. Dick Ebersol was brought in to produce one final show and then shut it down until the next season.
The only survivors from that series were Eddie Murphy and Joe Piscopo. Ebersol wanted to hire John Candy and Catherine O'Hara away from SCTV, but Candy turned him down and O'Hara backed out after meeting Michael O'Donoghue.
O'Donoghue, a writer from the first five seasons, basically returned to kill the show. He wanted to give it a Viking funeral, and tried to instil "danger" back into the writing process. His volatile personality guaranteed that his tenure would be short-lived.
The fourth show was the nadir. Donald Pleasence was the host, and he featured in a sketch that highlights an amputation and gallons of spurting blood.
The musical guest was a punk rock band called "Fear." Their performance reminded me of the episode of SCTV's "Mel's Rockpile," where he had a punk band perform. Mel, the lamest host ever, announced that there would be a "slam dance." All the dancers slammed into each other with great ferocity, and Joe Flaherty screamed, "Have you no consideration for the women!"
That was funny, but "Fear's" performance was not. They were booked on the show at the insistence of John Belushi, who also made a surprise cameo that night. It would be his last appearance on the show before his death the following spring.
There were, however, a lot of great musical performances that season from The Kinks, Rick James, The Go-Go's, Meatloaf, the Allman Brothers, Lindsey Buckingham, and John Mellencamp. Elton John sang his John Lennon tribute, "Empty Garden," and the Charlie Daniels Band did "The Devil Went Down To Georgia." Johnny Cash did a selection of his greatest hits.
On the Christmas show, Bill Murray hosted, and made a midshow announcement about the Polish government's crackdown on "Solidarity." An interesting bit of social commentary thrown into a comedy show. But then, SNL always prided itself on its satire of America's fools and their foibles.
There was a lot of fun made of Ronald Reagan, depicted as the clueless idiot he was in real life. His administration was shown to be the "Bizarro World" from Superman comics. This was the beginning of the end of the cold war, but the times were still pretty tense. They even did a Dr. Strangelove sketch.
The comedy could be very sharp at times, sometimes too sharp for comfort. Towards the end of the season, they conducted a phone-in poll to decide the fate of a lobster dubbed "Larry." Callers voted whether to spare the lobster or boil and eat him. At first, it looked like he was for the pot, but the final tally spared his life.
Then, on the next week's show, Eddie Murphy read a letter from a woman in Oklahoma who doubted that Larry had survived the show, especially the way Murphy was "waving him around." She also commented, "I thought those people didn't like seafood."
Murphy's response to her racist comment was to reveal Larry's boiled body, announced that his stay of execution had been revoked, and ate him.
The last show of the season was my favourite. Olivia Newton-John was the host, and she sang some hits from her "Physical" album. I was hot for Olivia at the time, I'll tell you.
But the best part was when Graham Chapman interrupted a sketch as the Colonel, telling them it was "too silly," and obviously ripped off from Monty Python.
Chapman was on the show to promote the film "The Secret Policeman's Other Ball." An NBC station had recently refused to air the trailer for the film, saying it was "too objectionable, even for [SNL}."
They then played the trailer, and invited Chapman to comment. Chapman read NBC's objection, which said that the American flag displayed in the ad was "rumpled" and "defaced in one corner." While the flag was a bit wrinkled, it wasn't defaced. There was a birdcage in front of it, and the censors might not have gotten a good enough look to see it.
I think what really cheesed them off was the poking of fun at the Moral Majority and the fact that Chapman was wearing a tutu, nylon stockings, and a garter belt.
Chapman made an eloquent apology, saying he never meant to offend anyone, or do anything to break the strong bonds between Britain and America by defaming the flag.
He then stood up to reveal he was wearing a star-spangled g-string.
It was an hysterical moment, typical of the humour of that season, which marks it in my memory as one of SNL's best.
At the end of the show, when everyone was waving goodbye, Piscopo announced that Eddie was going off to San Francisco that summer to make a film with Nick Nolte. This film was, of course, "48 Hrs," and it made Murphy a big star.
In fact, the shows in this torrent were re-presented on Comedy Central with the subtitle "The Eddie Murphy Experience," and include a few taped reminisces from him about his time on the show.
Well, it wasn't the first time that a cast member grew larger than the show, and it wouldn't be the last. Murphy's success overshadowed that of Piscopo and fellow cast members Tim Kazurinsky, Mary Gross, Christine Ebersole and SCTV alumni Robin Duke and Tony Rosato. It's too bad, as they all helped make the seventh season one to remember.
Monday, July 25, 2011
Family Weekend
Our family assembled at the hospital in Red Deer at 9:00 a.m. for a meeting with the various therapists helping rehabilitate my mom, to hear their assessments of where we are and where we're going from here.
In order to get there for the meeting, I got myself up, shat, showered, and shaved, and then fixed breakfast for my dad and brother. I guess we were kind of late, because dad was shoving us out the door before we could even clean up from breakfast. I didn't even have time to put makeup on my infected areas.
We met my sister there in my mom's room and went round to the conference room. There was a supervisor, a physical therapist, an occupational therapist, and a different kind of occupational therapist.
The physio guy said mom was making good progress, but would like to work with her for another month (at least). The occupational gal talked about her mental progress, and mentioned a previous test done just when she'd been moved out of ICU. It had a fairly low score. We think it was because she was still fairly disoriented and full of drugs. This o.g. said mom still wasn't 100% and wanted to get her doing tasks like cooking and so on to make sure that she could operate at home okay. There was some talk of how my mom tries to do too much, which I can see. She's always on the go, always thinking about what needs to be done, what needs to be done next, and what needs to be done after that.
My dad said later that he didn't like this woman or her assessment. He thought she was too negative. I was willing to defer to her judgement, and didn't find too much wrong with what she had to say.
The third therapist just talked about getting mom involved in the various activities they did on the ward as a way to help facilitate her re-entry to the world outside.
So, as far as the hospital goes, mom is about a month away from coming home for good.
She did come home that day, just for the weekend. She wasn't up to doing a lot, as she was just too physically handicapped. She could wheel herself around in a wheel chair. She could walk with a walker. She could climb stairs but slowly.
She wasn't feeling too good the whole weekend, and slept a lot of the time, or laid down on the couch and watched TV. We tried to get her to maybe come outside onto the deck or maybe take a walk, but couldn't entice her.
My sister went to pick up our oldest sister that night, and they came back on Saturday. Friday, I barbecued steaks, and my older sister made a curry on Sat and then a pork roast for Sunday dinner. We all ate well.
Mom and dad slept in their room, I continued to sleep in my room, and my brother has been sleeping in the Batman-cave. My sisters slept in a cabin at the golf course which a friend of my dad's leant us. My sisters said it was a real nice place.
There was a lot of laughter, tomfoolery, and reminiscing about old times.
But now it's over. My sister's went to visit mom in the hospital (she returned there Sunday night), and from there, they'll be heading home (one to Vancouver, and the other to Lloydminister).
I've been cleaning up and doing laundry this afternoon, while my brother gets ready to sell some barn wood and my dad does yard work.
It was all right, as family weekends go. They don't happen very frequently these days, so we try to enjoy them as much as families who know where everyone's buttons are can.
In order to get there for the meeting, I got myself up, shat, showered, and shaved, and then fixed breakfast for my dad and brother. I guess we were kind of late, because dad was shoving us out the door before we could even clean up from breakfast. I didn't even have time to put makeup on my infected areas.
We met my sister there in my mom's room and went round to the conference room. There was a supervisor, a physical therapist, an occupational therapist, and a different kind of occupational therapist.
The physio guy said mom was making good progress, but would like to work with her for another month (at least). The occupational gal talked about her mental progress, and mentioned a previous test done just when she'd been moved out of ICU. It had a fairly low score. We think it was because she was still fairly disoriented and full of drugs. This o.g. said mom still wasn't 100% and wanted to get her doing tasks like cooking and so on to make sure that she could operate at home okay. There was some talk of how my mom tries to do too much, which I can see. She's always on the go, always thinking about what needs to be done, what needs to be done next, and what needs to be done after that.
My dad said later that he didn't like this woman or her assessment. He thought she was too negative. I was willing to defer to her judgement, and didn't find too much wrong with what she had to say.
The third therapist just talked about getting mom involved in the various activities they did on the ward as a way to help facilitate her re-entry to the world outside.
So, as far as the hospital goes, mom is about a month away from coming home for good.
She did come home that day, just for the weekend. She wasn't up to doing a lot, as she was just too physically handicapped. She could wheel herself around in a wheel chair. She could walk with a walker. She could climb stairs but slowly.
She wasn't feeling too good the whole weekend, and slept a lot of the time, or laid down on the couch and watched TV. We tried to get her to maybe come outside onto the deck or maybe take a walk, but couldn't entice her.
My sister went to pick up our oldest sister that night, and they came back on Saturday. Friday, I barbecued steaks, and my older sister made a curry on Sat and then a pork roast for Sunday dinner. We all ate well.
Mom and dad slept in their room, I continued to sleep in my room, and my brother has been sleeping in the Batman-cave. My sisters slept in a cabin at the golf course which a friend of my dad's leant us. My sisters said it was a real nice place.
There was a lot of laughter, tomfoolery, and reminiscing about old times.
But now it's over. My sister's went to visit mom in the hospital (she returned there Sunday night), and from there, they'll be heading home (one to Vancouver, and the other to Lloydminister).
I've been cleaning up and doing laundry this afternoon, while my brother gets ready to sell some barn wood and my dad does yard work.
It was all right, as family weekends go. They don't happen very frequently these days, so we try to enjoy them as much as families who know where everyone's buttons are can.
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Thursday, July 21st
It's been an interesting week here. On Monday, my brother arrived from Texas. He drove from there to here in four days. He is a driving machine. He travelled from San Marcos to Salina, Kansas (about 800 miles) his first night of driving. I say night, because it was too damn hot to drive during the day, so he would wait until mid-afternoon, and drive until 3:00 the next morning.
I remember driving down to Texas with him a few years back. We took a little more time, because I wanted to make some stops along the way. We visited the Little Bighorn Battlefield site, Mount Rushmore, the Crazy Horse Memorial, and Dealey Plaza (my second visit). One night, he drove about 500 miles in one shot.
He is up here to do a little business. he takes down old barns and sells the wood for people to make rustic decor. My brother also uses some of the wood to carve artworks or make boxes. He took up carving about eight years ago, and has gotten quite good at it. Right now, he's in a mermaid phase, but he also does rattlers, buffalo, and these kind of fishhook type necklaces.
This year, I'm helping him market his stuff by offering it for sale on Kajiji and maybe Craig's List.
On Tuesday, my mom came home for the first time since her accident. Her glasses were broken in the crash, and she's been seeing double, so she came in to see an optometrist. She then spent the night before going back to the Red Deer hospital the next day.
She's been slowly improving. She was even able to climb the stairs into her house. She has to walk with a walker, of course, and spends most of her time in a wheelchair, but she is definitely improving.
Mom has expressed a lot of frustration at the slow rate of her recovery. When we try and tell her just how far she has come, sometimes she sits still for it, but she can get pretty low at times. It's a job to keep her spirits up.
Today I mailed the last bit of paperwork I needed to turn in for my application to university. I just need a letter of reference and a description of my work in the classroom from a colleague in Korea. He's taking his time about getting it in, so I may have to prod him a bit.
I may be foolish trying to get my Education degree since Alberta has been firing teacher's left and right, but I guess we will see once I have it, eh? Maybe European employers will find me more attractive. I sure hope so.
I watched a movie called "Ironclad" this evening. It was recommended by a friend in Korea. It's set in England just after King John signs the Magna Carta. Pissed at having to kowtow to the barons, John (played by Paul Giamatti)raises a mercenary army and begins slaughtering anyone who signed the charter.
One of the barons, played by Brian Cox, hires some mercenaries of his own, including a Templar played by James Purefoy, and holds a strategic castle until the French arrive to drive John and his mercenaries off.
In reality, the castle fell to John, and the struggle raged across England for another year before John died of dysentery while fleeing the French. It wasn't until much later that John's son Henry finally succeeded in driving the French out and claiming the throne for himself.
But the movie was fairly entertaining, not the least for it's gory battle scenes, in which limbs are chopped off, blood sprays everywhere, and one man is nearly split in two by a broadsword. The movie's depiction of the savagery of battle, the mud and the blood prevalent during those times, and the struggle between people fighting for freedom against a tyrant was well done.
Tomorrow, our family is meeting with the doctors to discuss our mother's future. The whole family will be together for the first time in four years.
I remember driving down to Texas with him a few years back. We took a little more time, because I wanted to make some stops along the way. We visited the Little Bighorn Battlefield site, Mount Rushmore, the Crazy Horse Memorial, and Dealey Plaza (my second visit). One night, he drove about 500 miles in one shot.
He is up here to do a little business. he takes down old barns and sells the wood for people to make rustic decor. My brother also uses some of the wood to carve artworks or make boxes. He took up carving about eight years ago, and has gotten quite good at it. Right now, he's in a mermaid phase, but he also does rattlers, buffalo, and these kind of fishhook type necklaces.
This year, I'm helping him market his stuff by offering it for sale on Kajiji and maybe Craig's List.
On Tuesday, my mom came home for the first time since her accident. Her glasses were broken in the crash, and she's been seeing double, so she came in to see an optometrist. She then spent the night before going back to the Red Deer hospital the next day.
She's been slowly improving. She was even able to climb the stairs into her house. She has to walk with a walker, of course, and spends most of her time in a wheelchair, but she is definitely improving.
Mom has expressed a lot of frustration at the slow rate of her recovery. When we try and tell her just how far she has come, sometimes she sits still for it, but she can get pretty low at times. It's a job to keep her spirits up.
Today I mailed the last bit of paperwork I needed to turn in for my application to university. I just need a letter of reference and a description of my work in the classroom from a colleague in Korea. He's taking his time about getting it in, so I may have to prod him a bit.
I may be foolish trying to get my Education degree since Alberta has been firing teacher's left and right, but I guess we will see once I have it, eh? Maybe European employers will find me more attractive. I sure hope so.
I watched a movie called "Ironclad" this evening. It was recommended by a friend in Korea. It's set in England just after King John signs the Magna Carta. Pissed at having to kowtow to the barons, John (played by Paul Giamatti)raises a mercenary army and begins slaughtering anyone who signed the charter.
One of the barons, played by Brian Cox, hires some mercenaries of his own, including a Templar played by James Purefoy, and holds a strategic castle until the French arrive to drive John and his mercenaries off.
In reality, the castle fell to John, and the struggle raged across England for another year before John died of dysentery while fleeing the French. It wasn't until much later that John's son Henry finally succeeded in driving the French out and claiming the throne for himself.
But the movie was fairly entertaining, not the least for it's gory battle scenes, in which limbs are chopped off, blood sprays everywhere, and one man is nearly split in two by a broadsword. The movie's depiction of the savagery of battle, the mud and the blood prevalent during those times, and the struggle between people fighting for freedom against a tyrant was well done.
Tomorrow, our family is meeting with the doctors to discuss our mother's future. The whole family will be together for the first time in four years.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Planking, Again
We all know what planking is. Mooks take a picture of themselves lying prone on top of something, and then post the picture somewhere. It was just something stupid for mooks to keep themselves occupied with until an Australian man fell to his death from a seventh story balcony.
You would think that death would put the kibosh on a fad, but planking has resurfaced in the form of some players on the Winnipeg Blue Balls of the Canadian Football League doing it while celebrating a touchdown.
The TSN comooktaters were nonplussed. They had no idea what the celebration meant. It wasn't until later that they explained what had happened to us viewers.
Duh, hello! My name is Stig!
I guess some research gnome, or someone who was awake and aware and alive on this planet, told the comooktaters what it was all about.
The teeth and hair who do news, sports, opinion, etc. are not really reporters in the original sense of the word. Reporters used to do research on a topic for a story, and usually knew what they were talking/writing about.
My parents watch the news on Global Calgary morning, noon, and night. When I question the need to see the same goddamn story over and over again, my mom tells me she's waiting to hear the weather report.
Weather reporters are even more unreliable than the ones who do the news. To be wrong that percentage of the time while doing your job... well, I should be so lucky.
I tell my mom that I could do their job just by looking out the window.
But I digress.
One Global newsreader was commenting on a Youtube video. They play one as a regular part of their newscast. Yes, Youtube videos (especially ones about kitties) are news.
The newsreader made an off the cuff comment about the video, and then said that what he said might be true, he didn't know.
I thought, you're a reporter, and you don't know? And then I remembered, ah, teeth and hair. He doesn't report the news, he just reads it off a teleprompter. It's too bad his ad-lib showed his ignorance.
So the Blue Balls players and the TSN comooktaters were probably not aware of the death that had taken place when they decided to go ahead and air their ignorance.
I thought what the players were doing was not really planking, as they were laying on the ground. If they really wanted to plank, why didn't they climb up onto the goal posts?
Planking has even shown up in the comic strip "Betty." Her son discovered it and tried it out for himself.
I guess his research into the topic didn't extend to the dying part, either.
Well, it was a lot of fun, and we all had a jolly good laugh.
Until the next death.
You would think that death would put the kibosh on a fad, but planking has resurfaced in the form of some players on the Winnipeg Blue Balls of the Canadian Football League doing it while celebrating a touchdown.
The TSN comooktaters were nonplussed. They had no idea what the celebration meant. It wasn't until later that they explained what had happened to us viewers.
Duh, hello! My name is Stig!
I guess some research gnome, or someone who was awake and aware and alive on this planet, told the comooktaters what it was all about.
The teeth and hair who do news, sports, opinion, etc. are not really reporters in the original sense of the word. Reporters used to do research on a topic for a story, and usually knew what they were talking/writing about.
My parents watch the news on Global Calgary morning, noon, and night. When I question the need to see the same goddamn story over and over again, my mom tells me she's waiting to hear the weather report.
Weather reporters are even more unreliable than the ones who do the news. To be wrong that percentage of the time while doing your job... well, I should be so lucky.
I tell my mom that I could do their job just by looking out the window.
But I digress.
One Global newsreader was commenting on a Youtube video. They play one as a regular part of their newscast. Yes, Youtube videos (especially ones about kitties) are news.
The newsreader made an off the cuff comment about the video, and then said that what he said might be true, he didn't know.
I thought, you're a reporter, and you don't know? And then I remembered, ah, teeth and hair. He doesn't report the news, he just reads it off a teleprompter. It's too bad his ad-lib showed his ignorance.
So the Blue Balls players and the TSN comooktaters were probably not aware of the death that had taken place when they decided to go ahead and air their ignorance.
I thought what the players were doing was not really planking, as they were laying on the ground. If they really wanted to plank, why didn't they climb up onto the goal posts?
Planking has even shown up in the comic strip "Betty." Her son discovered it and tried it out for himself.
I guess his research into the topic didn't extend to the dying part, either.
Well, it was a lot of fun, and we all had a jolly good laugh.
Until the next death.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)