Midnight Musings

Some Whine and Cheese

Mon, 12 Feb 2007 06:58:59 GMT

It's all James Taylors' fault. Not the singer, though I could blame him for a few things, like how listening to his music over the years can bring my spirits down, because his music is just so sad sounding to me. I would have to concede that it is good music though, since I rate music on how much I 'feel' while listening to it, and his songs always illicit strong emotions, just not the ones I want to 'feel' all the time. Then there is Dan Fogelberg, he had some doozies of feel-good songs. But his 'Same Old Lang Syne', and 'Leader of the Band', evoke such sad feelings in me, I just want to curl up on the couch with some melodrama on the tube and veg out on feeling blue. Not my favorite way to spend the afternoon, but you know, that's what happens when I listen to him.

Anyway I'm really talking about James Taylor the Las Vegas Fan who is at fault right now. He's an easy-going guy, so he can be an convenient target for blame and he'll probably just shrug it off, or ply me with some wine and song (he introduced me to Tom Smith's Debasement Tapes CD, who can't get in a good mood singing along to 'Five years' or 'Seven Drunken Nights in Space'?). But actually, he didn't do anything to me directly, he just wrote about his driving experience during a recent road trip to Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, and hearing about his driving adventure set me off reminiscing about the differences in driving quality here in Las Vegas compared to the years I lived in Indiana.

I think everyone who knows James will have to admire him, he certainly has chutzpah, he knew the road was under construction, and he would be driving at night (he has trouble with night vision), but still he drove out there anyways.

As much as I like driving, I intensely dislike navigating through work zones, or any long stretches of road that are receiving (or require) a lot of repair, and therefore my attention. I have been known to go the long way 'round Las Vegas just to avoid sitting in traffic, and I guess part of my affinity to the long way 'round is that I have a lead foot, and the more I sit in traffic, the itchier my foot becomes. I ache for an hour of uninterrupted highway driving so that I can cruise at top speed with the radio blaring rock-n-roll at it's best. An hour of driving without a huge, jacked up, gas guzzling, Dodge Ram Dually pickup truck, two feet from my rear bumper trying to intimidate me by it's sheer size and proximity to drive more than 10 MPH over the posted speed limit of 65. Or, an hour of driving on a highway that doesn't seem like a race track. Oh! I long for the quiet lonely open roads of Indiana at times. It's easy to forget the fact that my daily trek to work took me an hour uphill (both ways!), and that I was always impatient to arrive. I spent a lot of time in those days driving along, wondering what it would be like to live within minutes of work or shopping. I now know: it's frustrating, waiting behind other cars at stop lights, maneuvering my car around other drivers who don't actually follow the rules of the road or have common sense, or courtesy.

Maybe it is the different pace of life back in Indiana that accounts for the difference in driving manners. For instance: at a four way stop a combine was always expected to go first, whether it stopped first or not, everyone knew that it's size dictated that it went first. Was it's size the real reason? Or did everyone just let the farmer get on with his work knowing his travel route would take him longer than theirs? Or maybe it was because, if you came up on the back of a tractor, combine, or any other farm equipment running up Highway 52, they would pull over at the first available area to let you pass, or just wave you on by.

I have always like to drive, well before it was legal for me to do so, and I also had a father who didn't exactly feel he had any personal obligation to follow the law (unless it was his own), so his children were all driving before the legal age limit. Dad had a large construction company, the kind that built whole public housing projects, which meant he had a lot of large vehicles like tractors and trucks to move around, and he didn't mind using his kids to do the labor. My oldest brother initially taught me to drive a stick shift on an old VW Beetle that my Dad had provided him years earlier for his driving education, and he then taught all of his other siblings how to drive.

When my Dad was setting up a new job site it was always exciting, he would pack all us kids up in a van and head over to the site for us to assist him in preparing it. We would all walk the site as he gave verbal directions and set up construction cones as markers to indicate where he wanted certain pieces of heavy equipment positioned. As far as I can tell he never had any sort of reasoning behind which equipment each of us would drive, sometimes he would just say run, and if you were the first one to that piece of equipment, that's the one you drove. He would walk you around the vehicle, do a safety check, and go over the mechanics of driving it with you (again), then send you on your way. He would then busy himself with blueprints, surveying, spray painting lines and directions on the ground, which sometimes took him hours and allowed us to move a piece of equipment back and forth, repositioning them until they were just right, and increasing our proficiency driving the vehicles.

I know that at this point you are probably thinking what a cool guy my Dad was, but since he was setting up new construction sites on a regular basis, sometimes once a week, his motivation was really to set up a new site without incurring the cost of staff to maneuver the equipment. He also knew how to use our interest in driving these machines to his advantage in other ways, like the time when I was 12 and he bought a new Gradall machine.

I wanted to drive that huge earth mover so badly. So, he said if I washed it down every day when he brought it home he would eventually let me drive it. Well, after about 6 weeks (it was probably less, but I was 12, so everything seems longer), my day to drive the Gradall finally arrived. I remember it so vividly (that and the time I stole candy, but for different reasons)! After doing our walk around safety check I climbed up in the cab with my Dad at my side, and he spent at least 30 minutes going over the system, and having me drive forward and braking, until he was satisfied I could actually stop the Gradall on a dime. Then I drove the Gradall (to my elder brothers irritation since he wanted to be the only one to drive it) all the way around our block. This may sound dangerous in a city situation, but at this time we lived in the center of 8 city blocks that had been pretty much flattened to build public housing, so there wasn't much traffic ever.

Even now, 30 years later, if I pull up alongside a huge truck or construction equipment I drool a little and make Tim Allen “Grrr” noises. Michael finds this exceedingly entertaining and often will point out a vehicle just to hear me growl.

My fixation with car's, or just about anything with an internal combustion engine, was cemented the year I turned 12, besides becoming Dad's 'fourth best driver' that year (I'm the fifth child), we were also spending most of that summer's Saturday nights at the Riverside Raceway. My Dad loved car races, and loved to bet on them. Also, having no qualms about teaching his children how to drive, he had no compunctions over teaching them to gamble. He would give us our very own race programs and advise us to pick the cars that we thought would win the race, or that would be the last car moving under it's own power for the demolition races. He bet each of us varying amounts of our allowances for the month. Just so you don't get the wrong idea, my Dad was not trying to get out of paying us our allowances, he was very generous with money concerning his children. Even though my allowance was $2.00 a week, I could end up with a $20.00 for doing a good job at some task he set me on. Once I received $20.00 by keeping my mouth shut (which was really hard work for a chatterbox like me) and not telling my step mother that we had stopped at McDonald's and Dad ate 3 Big Macs for lunch, because he knew full well we were having something for dinner that he didn't like. He did this often to avoid eating things he didn't like for dinner. So, he would arrive home, inform my stepmother he had been at work for a long hard day and was too worn out to eat. Since my stepmother always seemed to have eyes in the back of her head, and always seemed to know exactly what all seven of us kids were doing at any given time, I have to think she knew exactly what my Dad was up to, but she let him get away with it. In fact, on the nights he wouldn't sit down to eat dinner at 5pm with the family she would then cook a second dinner for him at about 8pm, consisting of his favorite foods for 'working so hard' and then she would entice him to eat. Wow, did he have a good thing going!

Returning to school after a summer of fun and falling in love with driving, my sixth grade homeroom teacher assigned us to write about 'What I did for my summer vacation' or 'What I expected my life to be like in the year 2000'. As an adult I can see this was just a ploy on her part to keep us quiet for the first 30 minutes of the new school year so that Miss Belonging (yes, her real name) could consume her coffee, and get over the shock of dealing with 35 excited 12-year-olds crammed into a room together. I can't say I remember many details about assignments from the sixth grade, at 12 my mind was in constant motion, but I do remember that everything that year evolved around cars, going really fast, and the next big Saturday I could help my Dad at a construction site. I was quite a tomboy at that time, I wanted to grow up to be just like my eldest brother Al. However, I do remember that I wrote about what I thought driving would be like in the year 2000: Cars that looked and drove just like space ships, on freeways like the Jetsons, between Earth and other planets. How I would have a 'Rosie' of my own to do the dishes, clean my room, and of course I wouldn't have to work, I would be independently wealthy.

I never imagined that several years after the year 2000 we would still be living solely on planet Earth, extensively polluting our environment with internal combustion engines, and wasting money on asphalt and road maintenance. But since I am not a dreamy twelve year old unfamiliar with physics and the political mechanisms of our country, I am now well aware that we won't be 'flying' our cars around any time soon, and until it benefits corporate energy interests we will not be seeing very many technologies widely utilized that provide inexpensive, clean fuels. Though, as I am writing to you, I am reminded of my 12 year old self, full of ideas I had read and learned about but not really understood, talking at the dinner table with my family about my certainty that in the future we would be driving vehicles propelled by perpetual motion. My young mind could only barely wrap itself around the possibilities, to heck with this 'law of thermogoddamics' my older brother insisted on telling me about, and which he adamantly insisted proved my future predictions impossibly impractical. Well, it turns out he was right, but who knows what the future might hold in technological advances? Certainly not me.

Anyways, thinking about actual flying cars is worrisome, can you imagine what 'car' accidents would be like if we were all driving the speed of light (“It's not just a good idea, it's the Law!”)? And who wins the superduperhighway race when you each reach the wormhole on-ramp at the same time? Are we just both sucked in? Do we come out the other side in any recognizable form? It hurts my brain just thinking about that one.

Movie Meme, I have seen 147 of the 336

Thu, 02 Jun 2005 04:12:40 GMT

These are the official rules:

1. Take this list and post it into your own LJ, and mark the movies you've seen (in bold).

2. Add five more movies to the end of the list.

3. Count how many you have seen. If you've seen more than 70 movies, you are a Movie Whore. Post the score of how many movies you've seen in the subject line.

4. Use a LJ-cut since you've got at least one LJ-friend who doesn't really want to see an ungodly number of movies snaking its way down the computer monitor (now at 336).

5. (optional) Question your friend's taste in movies.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I have seen WAY to many movies and looking at the list, there are plenty that I wish I hadn't watched. I probably saw 40 of these while dating and for the most part I remember the movie better than the dates.

I am such a copy cat, I also did not bold the movies I have seen but listed them separately.

Here is my list:

004. White Oleander
005. Anger Management
006. 50 First Dates
014. American Pie
017. Harry Potter
018. Harry Potter 2
019. Harry Potter 3
022. The Wedding Singer
023. Little Black Book
027. Finding Nemo
028. Finding Neverland
031. The Grinch
034. Butterfly Effect
035. 13 going on 30
036. I Robot
037. Dodge Ball
041. Deep impact
043. Never Been Kissed
044. Meet The Parents
047. A Cinderella Story
059. Practical Magic
060. Chicago
066. The Whole Nine Yards
067. The Whole Ten Yards
068. The Day After Tomorrow
072. Just Married
073. Gothika
075. Sixteen Candles
076. Bad Boys
079. Seven (SE7EN)
080. Oceans Eleven
081. Oceans Twelve
087. Independence Day
088. Cujo
092. E.T.
095. Maid in Manhattan
098. How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days
099. She's All That
100. Calendar Girls
101. Sideways
104. Ever After
105. Forrest Gump
106. Big Trouble in Little China
107. X-Men 1
108. X-Men 2
111. Catch Me If You Can
113. Freaky Friday
115. Cruel Intentions
121. The Notebook
123. Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
124. Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
125. Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
126. A Walk to Remember
130. South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut
131. The Fifth Element
132. Star wars episode I
133. Star wars episode II
134. Star wars episode IV
135. Star wars episode V
136. Star wars episode VI
141. Blue Velvet
142. Sound of Music
143. Parent Trap
144. The Burbs
146. Meet Joe Black
150. Spider-Man
151. Spider-Man 2
153. Mean Girls
154. Shrek
155. Shrek 2
156. The Incredibles
162. The Sixth Sense
163. Artificial Intelligence
164. Love Actually
166. Ella Enchanted
167. Princess diaries 1
168. Princess diaries 2
173. Vanilla Sky
175. Boogie Nights
176. Braveheart
183. 13th Warrior
190. Apollo 13
192. The Net
193. Jaws
194. Speed
195. Speed 2: Cruise Control
201. The Terminator
202. Terminator 2: Judgement Day
206. The Craft
212. Elizabeth
213. Man in the Iron Mask
214. Labyrinth
215. The Dark Crystal
217. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
218. Bambi
221. Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back
222. Beauty and the Beast
229. Blazing Saddles
230. American Beauty
232. Princess Bride
234. The Wizard of Oz
235. The 10th Kingdom
236. The Green Mile
237. Dirty Dancing
240. John Q
241. Girl with a Pearl Earring
244. 28 Days
245. Breakfast Club
247. The Rules of Attraction
249. West Side Story
250. The Color Purple
252. Last of the Mohicans
253. Pirates of the Caribbean
255. Chasing Amy
256. The Hunt For Red October
257. Buffy: The Vampire Slayer
258. Titan A.E.
261. Fiddler on the Roof
262. Mary Poppins
263. What Dreams May Come
265. What's Eating Gilbert Grape
266. Silence of the Lambs
269. Monsters Inc.
275. Titanic
277. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
282. Grease
286. The Way We Were
289. Circle of Friends
290. Dead Poets Society
292. Arsenic and Old Lace
297. Dogma
299. The Matrix
303. Animal House
304. Close Encounters of the Third Kind
306. Secretary
307. Casablanca
313. Singin' In the Rain
314. A Beautiful Mind
323. The Sting
324. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
325. Gosford Park
329. Green Card
330. Witness

(read more)
THE WHOLE LIST
001. Napoleon Dynamite
002. Saw
003. White Noise
004. White Oleander
005. Anger Management
006. 50 First Dates
007. Jason X
008. Scream
009. Scream 2
010. Scream 3
011. Scary Movie
012. Scary Movie 2
013. Scary Movie 3
014. American Pie
015. American Pie 2
016. American Wedding
017. Harry Potter
018. Harry Potter 2
019. Harry Potter 3
020. Residential Evil 1
021. Residential Evil 2
022. The Wedding Singer
023. Little Black Book
024. The Village
025. Donnie Darko
026. Lilo & Stitch
027. Finding Nemo
028. Finding Neverland
029. 13 Ghosts
030. Signs
031. The Grinch
032. Texas Chainsaw Massacre
033. White Chicks
034. Butterfly Effect
035. 13 going on 30
036. I Robot
037. Dodge Ball
038. Universal Soldier
039. A Series Of Unfortunate Events
040. Along Came A Spider
041. Deep impact
042. KingPin
043. Never Been Kissed
044. Meet The Parents
045. Meet The Fockers
046. Eight Crazy Nights
047. A Cinderella Story
048. The Terminal
049. The Lizzie McGuire Movie
050. Passport to Paris
051. Dumb & Dumber
052. Dumb & Dumberer
053. Final Destination
054. Final Destination 2
055. Halloween
056. The Ring
057. The Ring 2
058. Harold & Kumar
059. Practical Magic
060. Chicago
061. Ghost Ship
062. From Hell
063. Hellboy
064. Secret Window
065. I Am Sam
066. The Whole Nine Yards
067. The Whole Ten Yards
068. The Day After Tomorrow
069. Child's Play
070. Bride of Chucky
071. Ten Things I Hate About You
072. Just Married
073. Gothika
074. A Nightmare on Elm Street
075. Sixteen Candles
076. Bad Boys
077. Bad Boys 2
078. Joy Ride
079. Seven (SE7EN)
080. Oceans Eleven
081. Oceans Twelve
082. Identity
083. Lone Star
084. Bedazzled
085. Predator I
086. Predator II
087. Independence Day
088. Cujo
089. A Bronx Tale
090. Darkness Falls
091. Christine
092. E.T.
093. Children of the Corn
094. My Boss' Daughter
095. Maid in Manhattan
096. Frailty
097. Best Bet
098. How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days
099. She's All That
100. Calendar Girls
101. Sideways
102. Mars Attacks
103. Event Horizon
104. Ever After
105. Forrest Gump
106. Big Trouble in Little China
107. X-Men 1
108. X-Men 2
109. Jeepers Creepers
110. Jeepers Creepers 2
111. Catch Me If You Can
112. The Others
113. Freaky Friday
114. Reign of Fire
115. Cruel Intentions
116. Hot Chicks
117. Swimfan
118. Miracle
119. Old School
120. Ray
121. The Notebook
122. K-Pax
123. Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
124. Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
125. Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
126. A Walk to Remember
127. Boogeyman
128. Hitch
129. Back Door Sluts 9
130. South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut
131. The Fifth Element
132. Star wars episode I
133. Star wars episode II
134. Star wars episode IV
135. Star wars episode V
136. Star wars episode VI
137. Troop Beverly Hills
138. Swimming with Sharks
139. Trainspotting
140. People under the stairs
141. Blue Velvet
142. Sound of Music
143. Parent Trap
144. The Burbs
145. SLC Punk
146. Meet Joe Black
147. Wild Girls
148. A Clockwork Orange
149. The Order
150. Spider-Man
151. Spider-Man 2
152. Amelie
153. Mean Girls
154. Shrek
155. Shrek 2
156. The Incredibles
157. Collateral
158. The Fast & The Furious
159. 2 Fast 2 Furious
160. Sky Captain & The World of Tomorrow
161. Closer
162. The Sixth Sense
163. Artificial Intelligence
164. Love Actually
165. Shutter
166. Ella Enchanted
167. Princess diaries 1
168. Princess diaries 2
169. Constantine
170. Million Dollar Baby
171. Life Of David Gale
172. 25th hour
173. Vanilla Sky
174. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
175. Boogie Nights
176. Braveheart
177. The Anarchist Cook Book
178. How To Deal
179. Mallrats
180. City of the Lost Children
181. Run Lola Run
182. Dazed and Confused
183. 13th Warrior
184. Super Size Me
185. Dark City
186. Jurassic Park
187. The Lost World: Jurassic Park
188. Jurassic Park 3
189. Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie
190. Apollo 13
191. It Came From The Sky
192. The Net
193. Jaws
194. Speed
195. Speed 2: Cruise Control
196. The Land Before Time
197. Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron
198. Any Given Sunday
199. Friday Night Lights
200. Net Games
201. The Terminator
202. Terminator 2: Judgement Day
203. Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines
204. "O"
205. Thirteen
206. The Craft
207. Poltergeist
208. Poltergeist 2
209. Poltergeist 3
210. Twister
211. Boondock Saints
212. Elizabeth
213. Man in the Iron Mask
214. Labyrinth
215. The Dark Crystal
216. MST3K: The Movie
217. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
218. Bambi
219. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
220. Perfect Blue
221. Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back
222. Beauty and the Beast
223. Sleepy Hollow
224. Spirited away
225. Fahrenheit 911
226. The Producers
227. The Ladies Man
228. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
229. Blazing Saddles
230. American Beauty
231. Radio
232. Princess Bride
233. Clue
234. The Wizard of Oz
235. The 10th Kingdom
236. The Green Mile
237. Dirty Dancing
238. The Last Unicorn
239. Fern Gully
240. John Q
241. Girl with a Pearl Earring
242. Last Life in the Universe
243. 28 Days Later
244. 28 Days
245. Breakfast Club
246. Radio Flyer
247. The Rules of Attraction
248. Hackers
249. West Side Story
250. The Color Purple
251. Princess and the Warrior
252. Last of the Mohicans
253. Pirates of the Caribbean
254. Fight Club
255. Chasing Amy
256. The Hunt For Red October
257. Buffy: The Vampire Slayer
258. Titan A.E.
259. Zulu
260. Wings of the Apache
261. Fiddler on the Roof
262. Mary Poppins
263. What Dreams May Come
264. Annie
265. What's Eating Gilbert Grape
266. Silence of the Lambs
267. Hannibal
268. Red Dragon
269. Monsters Inc.
270. The Passion of the Christ
271. Gallipoli
272. Peter Pan (not Disney)
273. Remember The Titans
274. Pearl Harbor
275. Titanic
276. Last Temptation of Christ
277. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
278. Life of Brian
279. Dead Alive
280. Dream A Little Dream
281. Blade Runner
282. Grease
283. Grease 2
284. Gladiator
285. Dream for an Insomniac
286. The Way We Were
287. Waiting for Guffman
288. Center Stage
289. Circle of Friends
290. Dead Poets Society
291. Real Genius
292. Arsenic and Old Lace
293. The Maltese Falcon
294. The Birds
295. The Talented Mr. Ripley
296. Princess Mononoke
297. Dogma
298. Snatch
299. The Matrix
300. Blast from the Past
301. Romeo must Die
302. Shot In The Dark
303. Animal House
304. Close Encounters of the Third Kind
305. Continental Divide
306. Secretary
307. Casablanca
308. Casino Royale
309. 84 Charing Cross Road
310. Amadeus
311. Freebie and the Bean
312. Schindler's List
313. Singin' In the Rain
314. A Beautiful Mind
315. Cabaret
316. Citizen Kane
317. Lost in Translation
318. Ghost in the Shell
319. This is Spinal Tap
320. Grosse Pointe Blank
321. Heathers
322. Siesta
323. The Sting
324. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
325. Gosford Park
326. Persona
327. Picnic at Hanging Rock
328. The Last Wave
329. Green Card
330. Witness
331. Fearless
332. With Six you get eggroll
333. Overboard
334. Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love
335. Neverending Story
336. Hildago

I love to hear my own keyboard clicking away!

Tue, 02 Nov 2004 21:51:38 GMT

I am off and writing! Or for you pedantic souls, I am off and typing. I have joined thousands of other wannabe writers and commited myself to writing 50,000 words in one month, yes it is possible and if you are interested in hearing more or joining me, check out the details of National Novel Writing Month at http://www.nanowrimo.org/.