B-Movie Central Cheese Blog

A friend of mine who’s a fellow Rogue just lost his dog Dusty today to liver failure and other complications.  Anyone who’s had and loved a dog knows what an unbelivably horrible loss it is and how much pain, sadness and loss goes along with it.  My heart is with Tim in this time, and I can only tell him that someday the immediate sadness will pass, but the memories and loss will stay with you for a very long time.  Don’t lose those memories my friend.  Hold them to you and never forget your little friend.

And I leave you with this.  It’s a poem that Jimmy Stewart wrote for his dog Beau after he died.  He performed it on the Tonight Show and had everyone in the place crying.  I always thought it was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard, and I know it’ll touch you in a way that only someone who’s loved and lost a friend can know…

*****

“Beau”
by Jimmy Stewart

He never came to me when I would call
Unless I had a tennis ball,
Or he felt like it,
But mostly he didn’t come at all.

When he was young
He never learned to heel
Or sit or stay,
He did things his way.

Discipline was not his bag
But when you were with him things sure didn’t drag.
He’d dig up a rosebush just to spite me,
And when I’d grab him, he’d turn and bite me.

He bit lots of folks from day to day,
The delivery boy was his favorite prey.
The gas man wouldn’t read our meter,
He said we owned a real man-eater.

He set the house on fire
But the story’s long to tell.
Suffice it to say that he survived
And the house survived as well.

On the evening walks, and Gloria took him,
He was always first out the door.
The Old One and I brought up the rear
Because our bones were sore.

He would charge up the street with Mom hanging on,
What a beautiful pair they were!
And if it was still light and the tourists were out,
They created a bit of a stir.

But every once in a while, he would stop in his tracks
And with a frown on his face look around.
It was just to make sure that the Old One was there
And would follow him where he was bound.

We are early-to-bedders at our house–
I guess I’m the first to retire.
And as I’d leave the room he’d look at me
And get up from his place by the fire.

He knew where the tennis balls were upstairs,
And I’d give him one for a while.
He would push it under the bed with his nose
And I’d fish it out with a smile.

And before very long
He’d tire of the ball
And be asleep in his corner
In no time at all.

And there were nights when I’d feel him
Climb upon our bed
And lie between us,
And I’d pat his head.

And there were nights when I’d feel this stare
And I’d wake up and he’d be sitting there
And I reach out my hand and stroke his hair.
And sometimes I’d feel him sigh
and I think I know the reason why.

He would wake up at night
And he would have this fear
Of the dark, of life, of lots of things,
And he’d be glad to have me near.

And now he’s dead.
And there are nights when I think I feel him
Climb upon our bed and lie between us,
And I pat his head.

And there are nights when I think
I feel that stare
And I reach out my hand to stroke his hair,
But he’s not there.

Oh, how I wish that wasn’t so,
I’ll always love a dog named Beau.

We had to take our dog Rocky to the vet today. Rocky is an absolute sweetheart and just an awesome dog at home, but you take him into a vet’s office and he becomes a nervous wreck. He’s three years old now, and here’s a basic rundown year by year of our trips to the vet.

Year 1: He wasn’t used to being on a leash. He would get all meek and wouldn’t walk if you put a neck collar and a leash on him. If you pulled him along, he would hop like a friggin’ bunny instead of walking. As if that wasn’t embarrassing enough, after having him hop through the vet’s office and be a little bitch in there, we brought him back out and put him in the car. Once he was in the car, he climbed over the driver’s seat and basically mounted my head so I was wearing him like a hat. The worst part is, we were parked in front of the vet’s office and the nurses were sitting inside watching it all and laughing at us.

Year 2: This was the year of the crap fountain. By this point we discovered that he was cool if we put him in a body harness instead of a collar, so we had eliminated the hopping problem. Unfortunately, because of his anxiety and tendency to be aggressive when thrust into a strange environment with strange people, I had to put a muzzle on him. Well this made his anxiety even more intense and he started spewing runny crap all over the vet’s office. I even ended up stepping in it and they had to clean my shoe and everything. Probably one of the most embarrassing things I’ve ever been through. I was by myself with that one too. I didn’t even have Sharon there to help me.

Year 3 (Today): We picked up some tranquilizers for him the other day, in anticipation of another crap fountain event. We thought maybe if we drugged him up real good before we went in, that things would be better this time. Well I gave it to him about 45 minutes before we went in and by the time the vet actually came in and saw him it had been over an hour. He was pretty dopey at this point but we still put a muzzle on him just in case. Well everything went mostly ok and he got his shots. We should have left well enough alone. We asked her if she could clip his nails too as long as he was all doped up. She said she’d try and she wanted us to turn him around so he was facing the wall. Well we did, and as soon as we did he dropped a turd on the table and leaked some as well. So that was pretty much the end of that. We cleaned up the counter and got him out of there. So I take him out and put him back in the car and suddenly he’s fine, happy and smiling. But here’s the crappy part… The tranquilizers didn’t really take effect fully for about another hour or so after we came home. It’s after midnight now and he’s been doped up all night. I don’t know how long they’re supposed to last, but this seems pretty excessive. He even had a lower dose that what’s normally given, so I’m not sure why it’s lasting so long, but he should be fine by the morning.

So that’s our vet record with Rocky so far. I gotta tell you, he’s absolutely lovable and totally adorable but Jesus he turns into a little bitch when we have to take him to the vet. Thankfully, it was a 3 year rabies shot, so that’ll cut down the number of visits in the next three years.

Anyway, that was my adventure for the day. I was feeling a little better too depression wise until I had a really crappy discussion with Sharon tonight about things we didn’t even need to be discussing. I wish we could just live our lives without all the pressures and B.S.. We’d be so much happier.

As I’ve been prone to them in the past, I’m not surprised to find myself going through another one. I just wish there was even one person in this world who really understood me. Sometimes…actually, most of the time, I feel totally alone and isolated. I’ve never had anyone in my life who really understood me or my feelings, and unfortunately they continue to say and do things that only hurt me, even though they don’t intend it. I really do feel so totally alone sometimes. My wife is the closest person I have to someone who actually does understand me, and yet even she doesn’t. I wish she did, or that I could make her understand. To be honest, I’ve given up on trying. I know it all sounds overly melodramatic, but that’s how I’m feeling right now. I only hope that it’ll pass at some point soon so I can return to some level of happiness again.

I’ve reached a point in my existence when I no longer find any purpose or meaning to life. Nothing matters anymore, and whatever little bright spots I had have either become clouded over or no longer give me enough pleasure to warrant the continuance of my existence in this miserable, pathetic world. If I was given this life as some sort of a punishment, I’d hate to think what I did in a previous life to deserve this. If I chose this life somehow, I made a mistake. Now, I can only wait for it to end, and hopefully something better will await me. It’s the waiting that’s the worst part.

My wife Sharon and I were both so excited about seeing last night’s auditions in Seattle. Why? Because on Tuesday night’s auditions, they showed some previews of last night and it looked like a total freak show. Fortunately for us, and unfortunately for the Idol hopefuls in Seattle, we weren’t disappointed.

We watched as one crappy performance followed another, giving us a seemingly endless stream of entertainment that while funny, was also quite sad.

See, out of the 13,000 or so (I think it was,) people who showed up to try out, only about ten or twelve of them had enough talent to get through to the next round. One of them was this 6′ 4″ chick that I personally didn’t think had what it took, but apparently the judges did. My favorites were the half Indian brother and sister who both tried out and both made it. I’m going to really be pulling for them in this competition because they were both really talented.

But back to the freaks. Yes, there were actually people in the tryouts that would qualify as freaks, and Simon even said that one of them looked like a bush baby, which apparently is some kind of a monkey with big eyes. Then there was the guy that the bush baby made friends with out in the waiting area who looked like a weeble and talked like he’d been sucking on helium balloons. And then there was this bizarre chick who was totally dumpy with a bad wig (if it was a wig) and even worse teeth. The crazy part was, she had a mother who looked just like her. Probably the two most unattractive women I’ve ever seen, and the daughter, who was trying out, was completely and utterly talentless. Oh, and we can’t forget Red, the reddest guy ever. Red hair, red beard, red clothes, and REALLY scary eyes. His eyes weren’t the scariest part though. He said he would compare himself to Freddie Mercury and tried to sing Bohemian Rhapsody. Well not only did he mess up the words, but when he “sang” it he sounded like one of Freddie’s cats getting mauled by a pit bull.

Now while this was entertaining and really very funny, it was also sad, and I found myself feeling really bad for these people. Many of them were little more than genetic leftovers who had deluded themselves into thinking they had some sort of talent and basically open themselves to ridicule just by the simple fact that they exist on this planet. Thus, the dilemma that faces me when I see people like that. I feel bad for them because I know what kind of a horrendous life they must have had, full of ridicule and heartbreak. People are cruel to those who are different, and for those on the receiving end of it, it can really destroy you on so many levels that it’s difficult to even comprehend. I myself was on the receiving end of it in school because I was the fat kid. People just suck.

The dilemma kicks in when I see people like this though who have to know that physically they don’t measure up to what’s expected by society of an Idol, and yet put themselves out there on television to be judged by not only Simon, Paula and Randy, but also by the millions upon millions of people who watch the show. Now simply being unattractive doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t be an Idol, but unfortunately those who are unattractive have to have extra levels of talent to overcome their physical shortcomings, basically enthralling people so deeply with their talent that they forget about their appearance and focus more on their ability to perform. It’s not fair, but it is the way of things. The thing with these people though, is that not only were they bizarre physically and wholly unattractive, but they had no talent at all. I want to feel sorry for them because I know that most of the people at home thought of them as little more than the main attractions in a freak show, but I really have a hard time with it because they knew what they looked like and they knew they didn’t measure up talent wise, and yet they put themselves out there in a situation where they basically opened themselves up to the scrutiny.

So am I bad to think they were funny, both physically and because of their complete lack of talent? In a way, I do feel bad. If I had met any of these people in a casual situation or were just introduced to them randomly, I would be very nice to them, and while I may have been put off by their physical appearance or mannerisms, I would never show it openly and would show them the utmost courtesy, treating them as I would any other person. That’s just how I am. I understand human dignity and I treat people with respect no matter what they look like. But these people on the show actually put themselves out there and embarrassed themselves, even though they probably don’t even realize it. I guess that makes them legitimate sources of mirth and I shouldn’t feel bad about laughing at them. Still, somehow I do, but I just can’t seem to help myself.

Aside from the freaks and geeks, there are those who are actually more attractive who, for whatever reason, seem to think they have talent. I don’t know who’s telling them they do, but they’re obviously being lied to. What gets me are the ones who actually get pissed off when the judges flat out tell them they have no talent and should forget about a singing career. The judges are doing them a favor by stopping them from deluding themselves, but so many of these people, their dreams suddenly shattered, actually verbally attack the judges saying that they don’t know what talent is and that they know nothing about singing or whatever. It’s really amazing how deep some people’s delusions run, and yet somehow I think many of them, despite their verbal attacks on the judges, know deep down that the judges were right, and the real reason they’re lashing out is because they just had their dreams shattered. Then again, some of them are just jerks and idiots who did deserve whatever verbal bitch slapping the judges gave them.

In the end, the only two that they showed that were actually any good at all were the two half Indian kids. Everyone else they showed that made it, what few there were, were mediocre at best. I really hope those two kids do well in the competition. I’d love to see them in the top 10 at least. They deserve it.

Next week the auditions are in Memphis, so there’ll probably be a lot of annoying country songs and even more annoying accents. I guarantee though that there’s no way any episode of the show will ever match up to what I saw last night for pure humor and entertainment value.

So I’m sitting here watching one of the newer Outer Limits episodes on the Sci-Fi Channel. Why? Because there’s nothing else on right now. I gotta tell you though; every time I watch this show, it pisses me off with its stupid moral messages that it tries to beat you over the head with. It’s not just this show though. There are many shows out there that do the same thing, but to a far lesser degree. The original show, though I don’t remember it all that much, was probably the same way and so was Twilight Zone off and on, though no where near as much.

The ones that really irritated me though were the cartoons. He Man, The Transformers, GI Joe, Thundercats, and most famously Fat Albert all beat you over with moral messages and then drive the point home with a monologue at the end. Of all of these, Fat Albert was the only one that actually gave some good life lessons and didn’t come across as overly preachy and annoying. When you watched Fat Albert, you knew there was a message and there were actually good, common sense messages that it tried to get across. The rest, and this goes for the Outer Limits and other shows like that, all come across as trying to indoctrinate people with liberal, “thought provoking” messages that are intended to turn people into a bunch of hand-wringing wussies.

Well you know what, life is the best teacher, not television shows. (With the exception of Fat Albert. Bill Cosby is a good dude and his messages in Fat Albert were good messages for kids to learn at an early age.) I don’t know why the idiots who write and produce these shows feel like they need to preach their morals to everyone in the guise of “entertainment”, but whatever the reason, it’s my turn to send them a message. Keep your damn moralistic rubbish to yourself.  I decide my own morals, as everyone should, and I don’t need them preached to me by you or some self righteous religious turd or anyone else.  My morals are mine and it not your or anyone else’s business to try to tell me whether they’re right or wrong. Jerks.

As you may or may not know, I do the website for the It Came From Lake Michigan film festival. I did it last year as a straight html site and this year I switched it over to a Wordpress blog format, using the same blog and theme I use here, only I modified the theme somewhat. I thought it would make my life easier, but oh my friggin’ god it’s been a pain in the ass. Why? Because the rich editor in the blog, which is actually an incorporated version of TinyMCE screws up the html so bad that I can’t even use it for most of the stuff I’m doing there. Between that and problems with the theme that took some modifications, I spent about eight or nine hours in the last two days doing stuff that should have taken me maybe an hour and a half tops. Well it’s been a massive pain, but in the end it’s worth it and I’ve worked out most of the problems. Now I just have to wait for some new problems to arise.

Then there’s these moronic ass Truth anti-smoking commercials. I don’t just hate these snotty ass bastards, I despise them. I would personally love to kick their snotty butts up and down the street until they go runnin’ home crying to their mamas. Why have they caused an upswing in my wrath tonight? Because I’m sick of seeing their damn commercials, and most especially the one with the two idiot cowboys where one has a hole in his throat and sings through one of those things that Ned uses to talk in South Park. So let me get this straight… We’re all supposed to listen to life lessons from some idiot who was so weak willed and moronic that he smoked himself to a hole in his throat? Why the hell would anyone want to take lessons from someone like that? Every intelligent person out there knows what cigarette smoking can do to you, and whether or not they make a conscious decision to do it is up to them. The only people who don’t know apparently are the people who are as stupid as the idiot with the hole in his throat, and they’re obviously not going to pay attention to it because they were stupid to start with. So you morons out there making those dumb ass Truth commercials, just stop already before I have to come out there and lay down some restaurant quality whoop ass on you.

Then there’s American Idol. The new season started tonight, and I really regret that I never got into the show before last season. I love it, and the first few shows are the funniest because they show all the auditions and the wacky people who show up to take part in them. Well tonight was just awesome. There were some freaks and some geeks and one girl who sang like a wookie. No kiddin’ she actually sang like a wookie. It was hilarious. But it’s nothing compared to what’s coming up in the next episode when they show the auditions in Seattle. They showed some clips from it tonight and it very literally looked like a carnival freak show. I’m so stoked about that I can’t even tell you! It’s gonna be a total blast. I better not drink anything during the show because I know I’ll only get about two sips into it before it’s coming out of my nose.

That’s all I really have to talk about this time. I’m sure I’ll have more soon. Just gonna sit here and drink my iced coffee and spend time with the wifey now.

I love you Sharon.

Yeah it got here today instead of yesterday. It’s pretty sweet. Prints fast and it’s nice and clean. Inkjet printers are ok at printing photos and what not, but they’re not the best for text, which is the majority of what we print. Plus it’s WAY cheaper to print with this thing than it was with an inkjet. So we’ll save money in the long run just on the inkjet cartridges we won’t have to buy anymore. Well, we still will, but rarely since we won’t be using the inkjet for anything but photos now, and like I said, that’s extremely rare.

Anyway, Sharon’s out right now. She went to see a play her friend’s daughter was in tonight. Me and the puppies miss her, but she’ll be home soon enough and then we’re going to have coffee and donuts and watch the movie Little Man together. We got it in from Netflix today, so we wanna get it watched so we can send it back out tomorrow since there isn’t any mail on Monday.

Now something that needs to be said…

All these moronic, traitorous democrats bitching, hand wringing and whining about the war in Iraq and want to cut funding and pull back the troops before the job is done and what not…well doesn’t anyone realize that they’re the problem, and that they’ve been the problem all along?

Here’s why. They’re bitching because the war isn’t going well. Why isn’t it going well? I’ll tell you why. Because the military wasn’t allowed to finish the job before the politicians stepped in and screwed everything up. Here’s the most important statement about war that has probably ever been said, and I’m not being immodest when I say that. Here it is…

When you fight a war, the military must be allowed to act in whatever ways are necessary to completely and utterly defeat the enemy and beat them into submission. Only then should the politicians be allowed to step in to formulate a politically based peace settlement.

Think about the wars we’ve been in since the Korean War. Viet Nam was a disaster. Why? Because the military was not allowed to win because the politicians would not allow them to. Gulf War I…same thing. We should have gone into Iraq at that point and eradicated Saddam and his regime. We were on a roll and had them on the run, but for political reasons, we didn’t. Again, the politicians screwed over the military and didn’t let them finish the job. Now we have Gulf War II. Again, the political hand wringers are bitching and moaning about how there is no military solution in Iraq and they’re criticizing the White House for not coming up with a political solution. Now how can you have a political solution when the enemy still wants to fight? They’re not ready for a political solution because they’ve been brainwashed from birth with their religion and are thoroughly ignorant and controlled by mob mentality and their imams. You don’t negotiate with people like that, you don’t sit down over tea and work out your problems with them…you crush, defeat and demoralize them to the point where their will to fight disappears and they’re ready to just put an end to it.

Politicians don’t understand this simple fact, and as long as we have disingenuous, hypocritical politicians who are more interested in grandstanding and opposing whatever the other party supports rather than doing what’s right for this country, then we’ll never have a successful war ever again.

What pisses me off the most about this is that it’s the military and their families that are suffering because of their incompetence. I really feel for them all because they’re stuck in a situation they can’t control. They know what they need to do and are perfectly capable of doing it, but aren’t allowed to. That has to be supremely frustrating, and it’s just not right. They could have been back home ages ago if they hadn’t had their hands tied by political b.s..

This country really needs to wake up when the next election comes around. Stop voting parties and start voting for people who actually care about the country and have some shred of integrity. Every single incumbent should be voted out in the next election and parties like the libertarian, independent and constitution parties should be voted in so we can actually get back to what this country was intended to be by its founders.

I’m pissed off, and you all should be too.

That’s all for now. Sharon’s home so it’s time to go have some fun and cool off.

Ok first off, who the hell got together and decided that Napoleon Dynamite was a good movie?  No one invited me to that vote.  Jesus Christ, watching that movie is like watching paint dry.  If the Napoleon character was even remotely likable, that would have improved it somewhat, but he was just plain ol’ annoying.  The only likable person in the movie was Pedro.  The girl was kinda too, but she was boring.  God, how the hell did that movie ever get the cult status that it did?

I feel like I’m in a cartoon.  There’s a mouse in here.  Right here in this room.  We’ve been trying to catch this thing for weeks and we just can’t seem to catch it.  Well he’s running around in here somewhere but he’s so small he can fit in pretty much anywhere and now I can’t find him because there’s so much crap in this room.  I have the underside of the door blocked with books and I tried to block off the underside of the closet as best I could, but I still don’t know where the little bastard is.  Yes I could put out poison, but I don’t have the heart to kill them.  Oh well, I’m sure I’ll catch him eventually.  Just gotta keep at it.

Got a new laser printer coming today.  Used to be that they cost four or five hundred bucks and on up from there.  We got this one for $99 from Newegg.  It’s an HP and it prints like 2000 pages per toner cartridge.  The replacement cartridges are only like $58 bucks from Newegg too.  Now to show you what a crappy company they’ve become, Best Buy is selling the same printer for $129 bucks and the toner cartridges are $73 bucks.  Circuit city is the same.  Plus with Newegg I didn’t have to pay tax and I got free shipping.  Makes me wonder why anyone actually buys from these stores anymore.  The only benefit they really offer is ease of returns in the case of a defective product, and even then that’s not always guaranteed.

Hmmm, what else…

I miss my wife.  She’s at work and it’s so boring here all day without her.  I really love her and I love being with her and when we’re apart everything just feels so empty.  I can’t even really talk to her in text messages today because we have T-Mobile and they pretty much suck.  I can barely talk to her when she’s in her building.  We can usually send text messages without much trouble, but when the weather’s bad sometimes they just won’t go back and forth.  Anyway, I can’t wait till she comes home every day, and today is no different.

Anyway, that’s enough for now.  Until next time…

I’ve had a lot of stuff that’s been bugging me the last few days.  Be damned if I can remember what the hell they were though, so I don’t have anything all that interesting to post.  I’ll just ramble a little and see what comes out.

Hmmm, so what to ramble about?  Well…um…I just drank some iced coffee and I’m sure I’ll be pissing all night.  I spend more time in the damn bathroom lately.  Jeez, I think I drink too much.  Feels like there’s a straight shot through sometimes.

Had nachos for dinner.  Didn’t really enjoy it.  Not that they were bad, but I really wasn’t in the mood for them.  You know how it is.

What else…

Christ, my life is boring as hell.  Funny how you never really realize that until you actually try to sit down and think of something interesting to write about your day.  How sad is it when all I really have to say about my day is that I took a nap and made a whole bunch of trips to the bathroom?

Our dog Rocky is behind me.  He keeps setting this slobber covered, knotted up rope on Sharon’s chair and then he’ll stand there and stare at her and look back and forth between her and the rope until she throws it for him.  It’s insane how much patience he has.  He’ll stand there literally until he either gets tired of waiting and takes it back off the chair or you get tired of being stared at and throw the nasty, slobbery thing for him.  He’s an awesome dog but he can be a total pain with his endless persistence.

Oh, we watched the first episode of I Love New York on VH1 tonight.  I think it would have been ok with just her and the guys, but they brought her mom in to help her out, and she has this FLAMING gay little Spanish guy as her personal assistant and stylist.  Those two will definitely make the show worth watching.  Hell, they should just have a show where her mom walks around making guys’ sacks shrivel up.  I’d watch that.  She’s funny as hell.

Oh, there was a stink in New York today.  Isn’t there a stink in New York every day?  Damn, that must have been one powerful stink to overpower the regular stink.  Maybe someone in one of the buildings took a huge, nasty explosive dump and then overflowed the toilet.  Or not…

Oh, there’s a new movie out, or that’s coming out called Stomp the Yard.  Whoever wrote that movie should be taken out in the street and beaten mercilessly.  I can’t even really blame him though.  The idiots to blame for this endless stream of ridiculous crap coming out at the movies are the idiot studios who actually back this crap and put it out.  Maybe if people would stop going to see this inane garbage, they’d stop wasting good theater time with it.  People are gonna look back on lame ass movies like this in about ten or fifteen years and think how ridiculous it looks.  Kinda like looking back at rap videos from the mid 80′s.

God I’m tired.  I really want to go to bed and put my arm over my wife and pass out.  It’s a bitch trying to get her to go to bed with me though.  It used to be the other way around but lately I’ve been getting tired earlier than her and she’s not ready to go to bed yet…and I’m too tired to give her a reason to come to bed.

Oh well.  I guess I’ll wrap this up because I really am about to pass out.  I’ll ramble at you all some more next time.