Books N Movies Rants

Started as a blog of a father trying to create the perfect list of books and movies that his son should read and watch. Now it is that and some general rants. Scroll down for the lists. If you have a list of 10 books and 10 movies please send it to me.

September 27, 2005

Bush: One of the worst disasters to hit the US


Funny how much the meaning changes once you remove the quotation marks. A news station in Ireland "forgot" to put the quaotaion marks around a Bush quote.

The result - this great image.

If you think that is funny try going to www.google.com


Then type in "failure" , and then hit "i'm feeling lucky".

It takes you to Bush's White House bio. It iwas what is known as a googlebomb. Here is a link to some additional information:
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2005/09/googlebombing-failure.html

September 21, 2005

Updated Book & Movies Lists

I have received some more lists and so updated the master lists

Current Book List

  1. Lord of the Rings Trilogy - 5 votes
  2. Moby Dick - Melville - 5 votes
  3. Ulysses - James Joyce - 3 votes
  4. 100 years of solitude - Garcia Marquez - 2 votes
  5. A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens - 2 Votes
  6. Animal Farm - Orwell - 2 Votes
  7. Any book - Kurt Vonnegut - 2 votes
  8. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller - 2 votes
  9. Dune - 2 votes
  10. Geek Love - 2 votes
  11. Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - 2 Votes
  12. Illuminatus! - Robert Anton Wilson & Robert Shae - 2 votes - First book to receive multiple votes & first book put on the list
  13. Junkie - William S. Burroughs - 2 Votes
  14. Odyssey - 2 votes
  15. Silence of the Lambs- 2 Votes
  16. The Stand - S. King - 2 Votes
  17. The Stranger - Albert Camus - 2 votes
  18. The World According to Garp - 2 Votes
  19. Waiting For Godot - Samuel Beckett - 2 votes
  20. Watchmen - 2 votes
  21. Wuthering Heights - 2 votes
  22. 1984
  23. A Brief History of Time - Stephen Hawking
  24. A good biography on Abraham Lincoln
  25. Alone---Byrd
  26. American Psycho - Bret Easton Ellis
  27. An American Tragedy - Theodore Dreiser
  28. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding - John Locke
  29. Anna Karenina - Tolstoy
  30. Anything by Kipling
  31. Anything by Cussler
  32. As Told at the Explorers Club
  33. Athletic Shorts - Chris Crutcher or anything else by him
  34. Battle Cry Freedom
  35. Belladonna - Karen Moline
  36. Beowulf
  37. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
  38. Borstal Boy
  39. Catcher and the Rye - Salinger
  40. Civil War - Shelby Foote
  41. Cloudsplitter - Russell Banks
  42. Collected Star Man comics - James Robinson
  43. Collected Stories - Franz Kafka
  44. Collected Stories - Edgar Allan Poe
  45. Crackpot: The Obsessions of John Waters - John Waters
  46. Crime and Punishment - Fydor Dostoyevsky
  47. Don't smoke grass on my father's lawn (son of Charlie Chaplin),
  48. Einstein's Dreams - Alan Lightman
  49. Enders Game - Orson Scott Card
  50. Fahrenheir 451 - Ray Bradbury
  51. Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 72, - Hunter Thompson
  52. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - Hunter Thompson
  53. Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel - Groucho and Chico Marx
  54. Fountainhead
  55. Getting Things Done
  56. Girlfriend in a Coma - Douglas Coupland
  57. Gone with the Wind
  58. Good Earth
  59. Good Omens - Neil Gaimen and Terry Pratchet
  60. Great Gatsby
  61. Green Eggs and Ham - Dr. Seuss
  62. Gulliver's Travels
  63. It - S. King
  64. Rose Madder - S. King
  65. Portable Beat Reader - many writers (Ginsberg, Kerouac, Burroughs)
  66. Kane & Abel
  67. The Prince
  68. Still Life with Woodpecker - Robbins
  69. Lance Armstrong's first book
  70. Monkey, A Journey to the West
  71. Old Man and the Sea - Hemmingway
  72. Neuromancer - William Gibson
  73. The Wizard of Oz series - Frank L Baum
  74. The Tin Drum - Gunter Grass
  75. L.A. Confidential - James Elroy
  76. In Search of Schrödinger's Cat - John Gibbons (non fiction)
  77. The Pirate Lafayette,
  78. Siddhartha - Herman Hesse
  79. Iliad - Homer
  80. Maltese Falcon
  81. Tropic of Cancer - Henry Miller
  82. Snow Ghosts (also called The Snowstorm)
  83. The Trial - Kafka
  84. Middlemarch - George Eliot
  85. On the Road
  86. The Son Also Rises - Hemmingway
  87. Oxbow Incident
  88. Paradise Lost
  89. Three Musketeers
  90. White Noise
  91. Foucault's Pendulum
  92. Pharmakopia
  93. The Tipping Point
  94. Love in the time of Cholera
  95. Rule of the Bone - Russell Banks
  96. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
  97. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
  98. Madam Bovary
  99. The Rites of Spring - Madras Eckstein
  100. The Proud Tower
  101. Dreadnought - Robert Massie
  102. The Great War and Modern Memory
  103. The Big Sea - Langston Hughes
  104. Winter Soldier - Robert Ketchum
  105. The Cousins' War
  106. The Third Chimpanzee - Jared Diamond
  107. In Dubious Battle - Steinbeck
  108. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
  109. Gravity's Rainbow - Thomas Pynchon
  110. League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol 1
  111. Green Arrow, Archers Quest - Brad Meltzer, Phil Hester
  112. For Whom the Bell Tolls---Hemingway
  113. Tom Sawyer - Mark Tawain
  114. In the Heart of the sea---Plhilbrick
  115. The Firm---Grisham
  116. Shackleton
  117. Flyboys---Bradley
  118. Meditations on First Philosophy - Descartes
  119. The Power of Myth - Joseph Campbell
  120. Science and Human Values - Bronowski
  121. Confronting Silence - Toru Takemitsu
  122. Poetics of Music - Igor Stravinsky
  123. The Dilbert Principle or The Way of the Weasel - Scott Adams
  124. The Abs Diet - David Zinczenko
  125. The Illuminati Papers - Robert Anton Wilson
  126. The Big Book of Conspiracies - Robert Anton Wilson
  127. Dark Knight Returns - Frank Miller
  128. DareDevil - Frank Miller
  129. Tomb of Dracula - Marv Wolfman
  130. Swamp Thing - Alan Moore
  131. The Collected Calvin & Hobbes
  132. I know why the Caged Bird Sings - Maya Angelou
  133. How The Dead Live - Will Self
  134. The Hear is Deceitful Above All things - JT Leroy
  135. The Godfather - Mario Puzo
  136. Of Mice & Men - John Steinbeck
  137. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
  138. Walden - Thoreau
  139. Warriors of God
  140. Winnie the Pooh
  141. Where the Wild Things Are - Maurice Sendak
  142. Zen and art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Here is the current movies list:

  1. Star Wars: Episode 4 A New Hope - First movie put on the list - 4 votes
  2. Lord Of the Rings Trilogy - 4 votes
  3. Casablanca - 3 votes
  4. A Wonderful Life - 2 Votes
  5. Blade Runner - 2 Votes
  6. Clerks - 2 Votes
  7. Star Wars 5 - Empire Strikes Back - 2 votes
  8. Exorcist - 2 Votes
  9. Ghost Dog 2 - votes
  10. Gone With the Wind - 2 votes
  11. Jaws - 2 votes
  12. Manchurian Candidate (original) - 2 votes
  13. One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest - 2 Votes
  14. Rashomon - 2 votes
  15. The 10 Commandments - Original with Charlton Heston - 2 votes
  16. The Godfather - 2 votes
  17. The Sound of Music - 2 votes
  18. Wizard of Oz - 2 Votes
  19. Abbot & Costello meet Frankenstein
  20. Animal House
  21. Aliens
  22. Apocalypse Now
  23. Barbarella
  24. Battle of the Bulge - Henry Fonda
  25. BeastMaster
  26. Bells of St. Mary's
  27. Bowling for Columbine
  28. Brain Candy
  29. Brazil
  30. Bridge of the River Kwai
  31. Bridges of Madison county
  32. Children of Paradise
  33. Citizen Kane
  34. Clash of the Titans
  35. Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
  36. Die Hard
  37. Dogma
  38. Dracula (Original with Bella Ligousi)
  39. Dune
  40. Fight Club
  41. For a Few Dollars More
  42. Forest Gump
  43. Goodfellas
  44. Hello Dolly
  45. Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back
  46. Kung Fu - David Carradine, Made for TV
  47. Manchurian Candidate (remake)
  48. Modern Times
  49. Moulin Rouge
  50. Nightmare Before Christmas
  51. North By Northwest
  52. Office Space
  53. Out of Africa
  54. Princes Bride
  55. Project A - Jackie Chan
  56. Psycho
  57. Re-animator
  58. Rear Window
  59. Robin Hood with Errol Flynn
  60. Royal Tenenbaums
  61. Schindler's List
  62. Silence of the Lambs
  63. Seven Samurai
  64. Singing in the Rain
  65. Star Wars 6 - Return of the Jedi
  66. The Big Lebowski
  67. The Cocoanuts with The Marx Brothers
  68. The Cook The Thief His Wife & Her Lover
  69. The Godfather 2
  70. The Greatest Story Ever Told
  71. The Incredibles
  72. The Passion of the Christ
  73. The Quiet Man
  74. The Seventh Seal
  75. The Shining
  76. The Thin Man
  77. The Thing (original)
  78. The way we were
  79. The Wolf Man
  80. The Zero Effect
  81. Texas Chainsaw Massacarre - (original)
  82. They were expendable
  83. West Side Story
  84. Young Frankenstein
  85. Zatoichi

FEMA sends ice for Katrina victims to Maine - for no apparent reason

There are times when people do or say things that are so monumentally stupid it just makes my brain hurt. It feels like my brain is smashing itself against the inside of my skull, like it is trying to get out so it can smack someone.

It you are in the mood for some stupidity, or more stupidity, on the part of FEMA click here
http://ksdk.com/news/us_world_article.aspx?storyid=85020

In a recent issue of Mother Jones I can across the best description on what went wrong with the Republicans.


"It's a classic tale of intending to do good - and doing very
well, ... The pledge of all these Reagan revolutionaries was to overturn
the iron triangle of Congress, the special interests, and the lobbyists.
Instead, they've found themselves comfortable with big government, as long as it
cashes in for their clients. I remember all these people as insurgents,
revolutionaries to overthrow the establishment. They became the
establishment in such a short time in an orgy of moneymaking. They ran the
Republican revolution off the rails."
- Marshall Wittmann, a former Christian conservative in the
article The Fall of a True Believer by Barry Yeoman, in Mother Jones
September/October 2005

September 20, 2005

A Little Girl Needs Your Help

My wife and I know these people. This is not a scam.

It is a tragedy. Not only because this little girl, Ruby, suffered brain damage at birth, but also that medical insurance and the government will not cover or even help cover the costs of therapy that will help her learn to do things like sitting up and chewing. It's the early intervention of these therapies that will help her throughout her life.

If you can please make a contribution.

If you have a blog please post about her including the web address.

Thank you and Go Ruby Go!

http://www.gorubygo.com/index.html

September 16, 2005

Why the Bard was quite right when he penned "First we kill all the lawyers".

In case you ever ge the warm and fuzzy about lawyers, especially Boston Lawyers, read this.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/
articles/2005/09/16/injustice_for_almost_all/

I am not advocating violence, but I would probably laught like hell if someone kicked their asses.

Dear Red States...

A friend send me the following. Do not know who wrote it, but it is funny.

Dear Red States...

We've decided we're leaving.

We intend to form ourown country, and we're taking the other Blue States with us. In case you aren't aware, that includes Hawaii,Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and allthe Northeast.

We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation,and especially to the people of the new country of New California.

To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma and allthe slave states. We get stem cell research and the bestbeaches.

We get Elliot Spitzer. You get Ken Lay.

We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood.

We get Intel and Microsoft. You get WorldCom.

We get Harvard. You get Ole' Miss.

We get 85 percent of America's venture capital andentrepreneurs. You get Alabama.

We get two-thirds of the tax revenue, you get to makethe red states pay their fair share.

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lowerthan the Christian Coalition's, we get a bunch of happyfamilies. You get a bunch of single moms.

Please be aware that Nueva California will bepro-choice and anti-war, and we're going to want all our citizensback from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask yourevangelicals. They have kids they're apparently willing to send to theirdeaths for no purpose, and they don't care if you don't showpictures of their children's caskets coming home. We do wish you successin Iraq, and hope that the WMDs turn up, but we're not willing to spend our resources in Bush's Quagmire.

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firmcontrol of 80 percent of the country's fresh water, more than 90 percent ofthe pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation's fresh fruit,95 percent of America's quality wines (you can serve French winesat state dinners) 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high techindustry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods,sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools, plusStanford, Berkeley, Cal Tech and MIT.

With the Red States, on the other hand, you will haveto cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans (and their projectedhealth care costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percentof all Southern Baptists, virtually 100 percent of alltelevangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University ofGeorgia.

We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

Additionally, 38 percent of those in the Red statesbelieve Jonah was actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent believelife is sacred unless we're discussing the death penalty or gunlaws, 44 percent say that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent thatSaddam was involved in 9/11 and 61 percent of you crazy b*****ds believeyou are people with higher morals then we lefties.

By the way, we're taking the good pot, too. You canhave that dirt weed they grow in Mexico.

Peace out,Blue States

September 15, 2005

First hand account of New Orleans

This is a link to a scary first hand account of trying to get out of New Orleans. Further affirming my belief that there are more people that are evil SOBs then there are decent people willing to stick their necks out for a stranger.

But those decent people save lives. We should all thank them.

http://www.nypress.com/18/37/news&columns/bobbybellew.cfm

September 14, 2005

Colonoscopy 3

Between my last solid bowel movement and my next solid bowel movement - 55 hours.

On the subject of Pancakes

Pancakes

They seem like they should be simple enough to make. Flour, water, baking soda, etc. But no they are one of the most difficult thing for a restaurant to make Good. Most place can make a decent pancake. But there are few truly Good pancakes.

There is (or was) a place outside Jersey City called Grandma's where you have the choice between pancakes of toast with your eggs. These are the best pancakes I have EVER had. We used to come all the way from Manhattan for them. Any people from Manhattan never go to Jersey.

Except to Ikea.

There used to be a place outside of Woodstock called The Black Bear that made good pancakes. But they closed. Turns out the landlord said they made too much traffic - with the people coming to the restaurant and all. Yea it makes my head hurt too. Closed because they were successful.

Well now that the Black Bear is closed my wife, son and I went to the local bakery for breakfast. This place make amazing bagels and great crunchy bread. Same basic ingredients as a pancake. They must be great? Right?

WRONG!

These were the worst things I have ever tasted and I had recently taken phosfo soda to clean my colon and that tasted better than these things. They were so bad we had to keep eating them to try and figure out what was wrong with them.

So if you are ever in Kingston having breakfast in a bakery - skip the pancakes. The eggs and bacon were great.

Colonoscopy 2

Ok, so it is over. I just have really bad hemorrhoids. I do not remember a point in my childhood where I thought the statement "I just have really bad hemorrhoids" would be a good thing.

So it starts with me having to stop eating solid foods by 1PM the day before. Just clear fluids after that. When I got home that evening I took two ducolax and then another two right before bed. Well at 2:30 AM I woke up. I could feel something going on inside me. Something not good. Sort of like what John Hurt would have felt if Alien had shot out his ass instead of his chest. Just making it into the bathroom in time for a bowel movement so impressive I considered taking pictures of it. It just would not stop coming out. Remember that scene in Austin Powers when he was pissing after coming out of suspended animation. Picture that with poop and lots of graphic-bordering-on-Monty-Python-like sound effects.

I think I discovered Number 3.

Well after a good 45 minutes of pooping back to bed. 7AM up to take phosfo soda - three doses a half hour apart. If you ever wondered how these things clear out your bowels, well it is simple actually. The active ingredients in them cause your bowels to retain water. So basically you end up pissing out of your ass.

A lot.

Often.

And I mean a lot very often.

So after 3 hours of pissing out of my ass time to leave for the hospital. I went to Benedictine Hospital in Kingston. Really nice place. I was pre-registered. Walked in. Showed them my card then someone escorted me and my family up to the endoscopy area. Very civilized.

Gave my wife and son a hug and sent them on my way. Could not help but think about the ramifications of what the worst case senaireo would be. Met a woman on the bus the other day. She has started commuting everyday into NYC. Her husband died a few years ago and she just lost her job. The only job she could find that paid enough was in NYC. So she drops her two children off with family at 5:30AM every day. Her youngest, who does not remember her dad, just started school.

But I digress.

Well they give me a bag and tell me to put on a robe. I sat in my robe and read some of The Road To Mars by Eric Idle. After a very long wait a nurse comes to get me. Turns out they forgot I was back there. Great.

So she takes me into a room and I hop up in bed. While one nurse sticks me with the IV, monitor patches, pressure cuff and the such the other is asking me all sorts of medical questions. Since most of the time I had not idea what she was talking about I just said "no".

Now I am laying there on a bed, in a robe with no drawers on. With my feet towards the door if you know what I mean. I've got IV's, cuffs, oxygen, electrodes my chest, some thing on my finger, and more. I was wondering is this what my last days are going to be like (hopefully) 40-50 years from now. Kind of scared and feeling rather alone and remembering my grandfather in the hospital. Not the way a person should go. Not like that. Not alone.

But I digress again.

The doctors with the good medicine shows up. The guy that knocks you out. Can not remember how to spell it and the spell check aint helping. He starts making jokes about whether I am a good tipper or not. Nothing like being strapped to a table with some stranger standing over you with a BIG MOFO NEEDLE making jokes. Well he sticks the thing in the IV and I was out. Boom I was out.

vaguely remember my doctor shaking me. Vaguely.

I ended up sleeping for almost an extra hour. They could not wake me up. They would give me a shake. Talk to me. The minute they stopped talking I would go right back out.

Big freaking surprise considering that I get like 5 hours sleep a night.

Finally get me up and tell me I am ok. I started laughing really hard. Not at anything in particular.

Just laughing.

It was good.

Then I think I confessed to all sort of things I did when I was younger involving drugs, but I figure the statute of limitations has run out on those.

National Media Attention . . .

for a friends Blog. Here is his email:

Nationally syndicated radio talk show host Rollye James has linked to my
"Go Fish" ( http://tinyurl.com/d65xe ) post. Not bad for a blog I
started a week ago. Her site is http://www.rollye.net/ and the link is
in the second paragraph of the post in her site's blog dated TUESDAY
SEPTEMBER 13, 2005 9:00 PM (ET).
I have called into her show in the past and we had fun talking on the
air. I find her radio show to often be insightful. Like myself, she
finds both sides of the political aisle a sham.

September 08, 2005

Colonoscopy

Ok, so tomorrow is my colonoscopy. I will not go into details as to why they are going to taking a film crew up my Hershey highway. It is not your business and if you were the sort of person who was into that sort of thing, well, damn it I'm married.

Everyone that knows about the test seems to think I am worried about the colonoscopy itself. Which I am not. Let's see someone is going to shoot me up and then some other guy is going to shove something up my ass. That is called Thursday night for 80% of the West Village.

No, I am more concerned with why they are doing it. Because I know blood coming out of your ass aint a good thing. I tend to doubt my doctor and his buddies were sitting around trying to figure out what to do tomorrow and shoving something up my ass was the best option they could come up with. Screw that and go play golf, go to a strip joint, hell watch All in the Family reruns. Damn it.

It is probably more like my doctor got a call from his wife to tell him that her parents were coming over for the day. And he was all "Well, that is a shame as I have a new patient who needs a procedure right away. Yes he needs, um, a. . . colonoscopy. Yes he needs a colonoscopy. So I will not be able to see your lovely Mother that day."

I went into his office last week and they stuck a hose up me bum to inflate it, so he could get a better look around. As he was inflating my rectum, and we all know the distinctive sound a compressor makes, with my but high in the air he says "Nice shoes". I am thinking "Pay fucking attention to what you are doing", but it came out "Thanks".


By the way does anybody read this?

September 07, 2005

A Buddy's Blogg

My best friend, and Best Man at my wedding, has finally started a blogg. Besides being an great guy, he is probably my favorite writer. I have saved just about every email he has sent me and they still make me laugh and think.

I suggest you keep and eye one it for both good laughs and strange connections.

It is called A Spectators Account and here is the link:

http://spectatorsaccount.blogspot.com/


Here is a quote from an email he sent me years ago when I was depressed about some money issues:

Lament, shmament. Money comes, money goes. You got your health, your wife, and enough to buy a horse. You can always grow a mustache (or buy one at the theatre shop). Next you'll start whistling when you piss. Cash out, burn the money. See you in Dallas, at the plaza.
KLF JAM

Remember, in a thousand years what the hell is the difference.



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