Films I’ll watch over and over:

All That Heaven Allows--My favorite

Hannah & Her Sisters--Woody Allen at his best, before he turned perv. Michael Caine is lovely

East of Eden--Julie Harris is almost as fun to watch as James Dean

Maltese Falcon--Bogie. 'nuff said.

Young Frankenstein--it's Fraankenstein

Waiting for Guffman--Makes me smile just thinking about it

Best in Show--Ditto. I like the way Christopher Guest looks like his bloodhound

The Ghost & Mrs Muir--Escapism

Hud--Paul Newman shirtless. Oh my

12 Angry Men--Just great

Double Indemnity--Barbara Stanwyck is such a ballsy dame

Amelie--Audrey Tatou is just adorable

Broadcast News--Albert Brooks' flop sweat

To Sir With Love--Sidney Portier personifies elegance

The King of Comedy--Only Jerry Lewis film I'll watch. Rupert Pupkin's basement talk shows are genius

Murphy’s Romance--I really really like Sally Field in this one, and who wouldn't fall in love with James Garner?

Lost in America--Albert Brooks again.

Local Hero--This is such a wonderful fantasy film. Love the locations.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid--"The fall alone will kill you!"

Defending Your Life--Another Albert Brooks, this time with the wonderful Meryl Streep

Pillow Talk--Rock and Doris, but Tony Randall steals the show

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner--I like Katharine and Spencer together onscreen.

Autumn Leaves--It's so bad that's it's good. Joan Crawford in a swimsuit and it still looks like she is wearing shoulder pads

Mildred Pierce--Joan Crawford again

White Christmas--I love Rosemary Clooney and Vera Ellen together. I'm always amazed by Vera Ellen's waist size. It's got to be less than 12 inches!

Moonstruck--I love Cher. I love Nicolas Cage, but watch it for Olympia Dukakis

North By Northwest--Cary Grant being in danger but still debonair. What actor today is debonair? Name one!

On the Town--Love the songs.

Disney’s Beauty and the Beast--One of my top two all time favorite animated movies, plus Angela Lansbury plays a teapot!

Pixar’s Toy Story--The other of my favorite top two all time favorite animated movies.

Funny Girl--It's all about Barbra. Swoon.

Annie Hall--It made me love Diane Keaton, and I still do.

A Place in the Sun--Everyone is beautiful in Black and White--even Shelley Winters

Giant--Rock. James Dean. Elizabeth Taylor.

The Quiet Man--Schmaltzy but fun.

The Player--My favorite Robert Altman film, and Tim Robbins is just so good.

The Sound of Music--Christopher Plummer is wonderful in this, plus I love the opening shot1

Electric Horseman--Jane Fonda and Robert Redford,throw in some Willie Nelson and go.

Coming Home--Is this the only war film I love? Yeah.

To Kill a Mockingbird--Peck as Atticus Finch. That's all.

The African Queen--Bogie with leeches, looking dirty and druck. What's not to love?

A Star is Born--Babs and the yummy looking Kris Kristofferson. "The black black widow is sitting in the middle of the web it's the fly she seeks..'

The Way We Were--"Hubble? Hubble Gardener?" It's the final scene that does it for me...the way Babs smoothes Redford's hair. I like second banana actor Herb Edelman in this too.

Films I’ve never seen, and don’t want to:

Titanic

Fried Green Tomatoes

Any James Bond movie with Roger Moore

Beaches

Schlindler’s List

Any slasher movie with teenaged victims

Fight Club

Das Boot

A Clockwork Orange

Million Dollar Baby

Crash

Trainspotting

Dead Man Walking

The Last Temptation of Christ

Any Oliver Stone film

Saving Private Ryan

Taxi Driver

Boys Don’t Cry

Full Metal Jacket

Tomorrow: Films I'll watch over and over

Christmas season is officially here!

I bought a big bag of Christmas peppermint chewy nougats! Yum-O!

Blowhard Cop

I actually rooted against someone on Deal or No Deal tonight. The contestant was a blowhard cop who called the models "honey," and kept saying over and over, "That's what I'm talking about." He was trying to gain audience sympathy by saying he was shot at, that he wanted to win money for his family in case something should happen to him. Very manipulative. He was offered over a quarter of a million dollars and turned it down saying "I'm greedy." He ended up with $100,000, not too shabby but he could have left with more. That's what I'm talking about.

I saw Michael Chiarello make this the other day--maybe this is what I'll take to my sister's on Thanksgiving. It looked really good.

Autumn Panzanella

-----

Also, good luck to Spidey and Big Joe today. I'll be thinking about you.

After the laundry and other assorted housework I was too tired to go to a movie. LP stayed the night with Jordan, he’s supposed to be home soon but I doubt he’ll want to go see Stranger than Fiction with me. BP’s out in California until the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. I gave him Bert and Verbie’s addresses, so expect him for dinner you two. Ha.

The week after Christmas I think my oldest sister, her husband, and BP and I are going to French Lick for a few days. Here’s the link: French Lick. They have revitalized this small quaint town (hometown of basketball great Larry Bird) and renovated the mineral spas and added a casino. It will be a fun two days.

Saturday

It was raining and thundering and lightning last night with more rain on the way today, so that shoots my “Work Outside” Day today. I think I may see a movie today—either Borat or Stranger Than Fiction. I saw Dustin Hoffman the other night on The Daily Show (he’s in STF). What a funny man he is. He has five kids and the youngest left the house last year and so he said it was his Martin Luther King Day—“Free at last free at last thank God Almighty I’m free at last.” lol. Jon axed him which was worse: Having his teeth drilled on by a Nazi (in Marathon Man) or being groped by Charles Durning (in Tootsie). He picked the groped one.

We’re going to my youngest sister’s family house for Thanksgiving and she wants me to bring a “fun green salad.” OK. BORING. I’ll wing it.

LP’s 16th birthday is a week from today! I think Jilly mentioned in Tree’s blog that Maryland has raised the age limit on driving to 18. They’re thinking about doing that here, and I’ve told LP. I’ve pestered him three times to give me his choice about driver’s education (he can pick 2 weeks after school, or Sunday afternoons for ten weeks,) and he hasn’t decided. I’m not asking again. If he wants to drive then he’ll have to take some responsibility and decide some things.

Mostly for Tree

For Your Consideration


watch the trailer

Besides the wonderful election results there’s not too much new in Hoosierland.

In televisionland there’s:


Emmitt vs Mario. I’m rooting for an Emmitt upset.

Lost is so freaky boring. At this point I don’t care if Sawyer lives or if Jack lets Ben die. Yawn. Tree, your Ben Crush was looking really spooky in a few of the scenes last night—especially that one close up shot of him in those funky wire rim glasses. “Lift up your eyes and look north” indeed.

Those promos for Daybreak with Taye Diggs are only slightly less annoying than the dearly departed negative political ads. Argh. Within the Lost episode last night alone, there were about 20 commercials for that show. With ABC pushing it so much it’s got to be horrible. I’m not going to watch it. It’s Bill Murray’s Groundhog Day with murder. Blech.

The Davinci Code comes out on DVD on Tuesday.

Like corpses in a Chicagoland cemetery, vote early and often

One Breath

One more day until Election Day, Republicans

Yesterday LP and I went over to my Lexus sister’s to help her out. She had foot surgery four weeks ago and is still in a cast. She said it was hard to keep a positive attitude because she’s never had to depend on others for help. I told her that she’s always doing for people and she should just shut up and enjoy being waited on hand and foot, so to speak.

I did her laundry (as you know, I’m a pro at laundry), went to Marsh grocery shopping, and straighten up around her house, and gathered up her trash. Then we loaded her up into the car (wheelchair and all) and took her to lunch and to do a little shopping. LP scored big with clothes. He still loves The Foot Locker and Man Alive (when will he outgrow that “I was born a poor black child” sense of style—I don’t want him to be another PapaZao KFed). Lexus’ credit card was smoking.

Then she wanted to go to a bookstore so we went. We had tea and cinnamon scones. She bought some magazines and books and told us to get some stuff. She bought me that Alan Alda book I mentioned when it first came out in hardcover, so now Never Have Your Dog Stuffed is out in paperback so I got that. Plus she had read John Grisham’s The Innocent Man and wanted me to read it. She really liked it. I also got this intriguing book by Ted Bishop called Riding with Rilke. “A motorcycle odyssey that combines the sensory seduction of the road with the intellectual rewards of archival research.” Hmm. One of my all time favorite books is Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and this Bishop book sounds reminiscent of it. I think I’ll read this one first.

Also magazines: the Rolling Stone magazine with Jon Stewart & Stephen Colbert on the cover;National Geographic Traveler highlighting New York City on foot, the Caribbean, Ireland and passages thru India; and two Paula Deen cooking magazines: December issue and a special on holiday cooking. LP selected two hip hop magazines and a James Cagney boxed DVD set. Lexus kept thanking us over and over for helping her out yesterday, but LP and I walked away with some good stuff.

Oh, Also I’m making LP into a Bob Dylan fan. I was listening to one of his CDs when the song “Hurricane” (I love the violins on the song) came on. LP asked me about it, and I told him it was the story of black boxer Rubin “Hurricane” Carter who was falsely tried and found guilty of a triple murder. Corrupt cops, an all-white jury, etc. I think it appealed to LP’s sense of being a black child trapped in a white boy’s body. : )

I told him that it was really ‘shocking” at the time--to use the words “shit” “nigger” “sonofabitch” and the like in a 1975 song.


Hurricane, by Bob Dylan and Jacques Levy

Pistol shots ring out in the barroom night
Enter Patty Valentine from the upper hall.
She sees the bartender in a pool of blood,
Cries out, "My God, they killed them all!"
Here comes the story of the Hurricane,
The man the authorities came to blame
For somethin' that he never done.
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

Three bodies lyin' there does Patty see
And another man named Bello, movin' around mysteriously.
"I didn't do it," he says, and he throws up his hands
"I was only robbin' the register, I hope you understand.
I saw them leavin'," he says, and he stops
"One of us had better call up the cops."
And so Patty calls the cops
And they arrive on the scene with their red lights flashin'
In the hot New Jersey night.

Meanwhile, far away in another part of town
Rubin Carter and a couple of friends are drivin' around.
Number one contender for the middleweight crown
Had no idea what kinda shit was about to go down
When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road
Just like the time before and the time before that.
In Paterson that's just the way things go.
If you're black you might as well not show up on the street
'Less you wanna draw the heat.

Alfred Bello had a partner and he had a rap for the cops.
Him and Arthur Dexter Bradley were just out prowlin' around
He said, "I saw two men runnin' out, they looked like middleweights
They jumped into a white car with out-of-state plates."
And Miss Patty Valentine just nodded her head.
Cop said, "Wait a minute, boys, this one's not dead"
So they took him to the infirmary
And though this man could hardly see
They told him that he could identify the guilty men.

Four in the mornin' and they haul Rubin in,
Take him to the hospital and they bring him upstairs.
The wounded man looks up through his one dyin' eye
Says, "Wha'd you bring him in here for? He ain't the guy!"
Yes, here's the story of the Hurricane,
The man the authorities came to blame
For somethin' that he never done.
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

Four months later, the ghettos are in flame,
Rubin's in South America, fightin' for his name
While Arthur Dexter Bradley's still in the robbery game
And the cops are puttin' the screws to him, lookin' for somebody to blame.
"Remember that murder that happened in a bar?"
"Remember you said you saw the getaway car?"
"You think you'd like to play ball with the law?"
"Think it might-a been that fighter that you saw runnin' that night?"
"Don't forget that you are white."

Arthur Dexter Bradley said, "I'm really not sure."
Cops said, "A poor boy like you could use a break
We got you for the motel job and we're talkin' to your friend Bello
Now you don't wanta have to go back to jail, be a nice fellow.
You'll be doin' society a favor.
That sonofabitch is brave and gettin' braver.
We want to put his ass in stir
We want to pin this triple murder on him
He ain't no Gentleman Jim."

Rubin could take a man out with just one punch
But he never did like to talk about it all that much.
It's my work, he'd say, and I do it for pay
And when it's over I'd just as soon go on my way
Up to some paradise
Where the trout streams flow and the air is nice
And ride a horse along a trail.
But then they took him to the jailhouse
Where they try to turn a man into a mouse.

All of Rubin's cards were marked in advance
The trial was a pig-circus, he never had a chance.
The judge made Rubin's witnesses drunkards from the slums
To the white folks who watched he was a revolutionary bum
And to the black folks he was just a crazy nigger.
No one doubted that he pulled the trigger.
And though they could not produce the gun,
The D.A. said he was the one who did the deed
And the all-white jury agreed.

Rubin Carter was falsely tried.
The crime was murder "one," guess who testified?
Bello and Bradley and they both baldly lied
And the newspapers, they all went along for the ride.
How can the life of such a man
Be in the palm of some fool's hand?
To see him obviously framed
Couldn't help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land
Where justice is a game.

Now all the criminals in their coats and their ties
Are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise
While Rubin sits like Buddha in a ten-foot cell
An innocent man in a living hell.
That's the story of the Hurricane,
But it won't be over till they clear his name
And give him back the time he's done.
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.


Here's the Wikipedia dope on Carter

Blue in a Red

Last night I sent an email to this dude who is running for my State representative. Last time he ran I gave money to his campaign and supported him. Some upstart dude beat him because he (Upstart Dude) ran a very vicious negative campaign.

I was all set to vote for My Guy this Tuesday, until I heard his new radio commercial. In it he tells about his background and qualifications which was good but then at the end he spouts off about being “Pro Life” and that he shares “Hoosier Values.” Excuse me? He doesn’t bother to add that although he’s pro life he’ll vote, if necessary, Pro Choice so a woman can keep her reproductive rights. So if he didn’t add that I must assume he won’t. That’s what I emailed him about.

That’s a deal breaker for me. I won’t vote for Upstart Dude, but I’m not voting for My Guy cause he isn’t my guy no ‘mo. It’s hard being Blue in a Red State.

Mambo

Karina & Mario Lopez

DwtS Week 7: Emmitt & Cheryl Mambo

If this doesn't get your blood going--you're dead

Emmitt's Hips

It's November 2nd.

Mr. Eko died. Killed by a cloud of black smoke.
Who's the Eye Patch Guy? Another character we neither want nor need.

I watched Dancing with the Stars on Tuesday and I must admit kinda liked it. I now have a semi crush on Emmitt Smith. I don't know two shits about his football career, but his hip action when dancing is awesome. He seems to enjoy the dance floor. Joey Lawrence, of the Blossom "Whoa" fame is now bald and a lip-licker, but he does an excellent job. His partner, that Polish chick, is beautiful. She seems to be that unusual mix of niceness and beauty. Like me, I guess. (har) And Mario Lopez has dimples deep enough to take a spit bath in, he'll probably win. I loved his samba (now there's a sentence I never thought I'd type "I loved his samba.") and he's a crowd favorite.


I have a headache.

Happy Hallow Weenie

I hate the fact that so many schools and communities have distorted the true meaning of Halloween and negated its existence with "Fall Celebrations." Sheesh.

Some begging of free candy . . . witches, vampires, goblins and black cats and people go all Christian-y on you.

Give a vampire kiss to someone you love. Remember Carou Vamp? Didn't she make bats in the Book Shelf?

The good thing about having a teenager is that he’s more independent; he’s spreading his wings, stays out with his friends and tries to find his own way in life. The bad thing about having a teenager is that he’s more independent; he’s spreading his wings, stays out with his friends and tries to find his own way in life. On the weekends he’s rarely home except to sleep and shower and occasionally eat. I miss him.

Do Not Buy His Book

The Evil Bill O’Reilly was on Oprah yesterday trying to sell his new book. Don’t buy this book. He divides up people into Social Progressives (evil) and Traditional Warriors (good)

SPs want everything to be allowed: rap music, hiphop, abortion, “disgusting” movies, pornography, drugs, gay marriage, and, the Biggie, LIBERALISM. :::shudder::::
“DO YOU WANT AMERICA TO BE DENMARK OR HOLLAND???????”

Traditional Warriors want everything good for America: pro life, winning the war on terror, the “bad” guys in prison, torture’s ok if “it saves American lives”, motherhood, apple pie, and CONSERVATISM. According to Billy Boy, Martin Luther King was a T WARRIOR. JFK? T-Warrior! RFK? T-WARRIOR! As was FDR. ALL T WARRIORS! (lol)

Tree, can you just imagine Stephen Colbert coming up with the phrase “T Warrior”? Colbert would do it tongue-in-cheek. O’Reilly is dead serious.

“THERE IS NO MIDDLE GROUND!! PICK A SIDE!! THERE’S A WAR GOING ON! DEMOCRACY MUST PREVAIL!”

An audience woman called him on being divisive, and polarizing the nation. “You’re here talking calmly with Oprah, but on your show you do nothing but yell and say everyone but you is wrong. You make a lot of money polarizing this country.” She went on to say, “I work with gay youth, and . . .”

“SIT DOWN MADAM. YOU ARE AN SP! SP SP SP!”

And, of course, all the media (except him and FoxNews) is liberal. They’re bottom feeders. “Did you know my book is on the New York Times bestseller list and YET THE NEW YORK TIMES WON’T REVIEW IT?????????????”

When O’Reilly wails against BIG BUSINESS, and a man in the audience points out that FoxNews is a part of one of the biggest corporations, O’Reilly dismisses him as a “FOX HATER. YOU, SIR, ARE A FOX HATER!!”

To everyone who disagrees with him he yells, “DO YOU HATE AMERICA? DO YOU WANT TO LIVE IN HOLLAND?” wtf??

What a fucking loon.

Oprah wimped out. She didn’t call him on nary a thing.

Letterman's Important Message About February for George Bush

haha!