Man versus Woman

This is long overdue.  I was assigned this review about a month ago, did the grunt work right away, and then procrastinated due to reading, a cruise, and the Red Sox.  In any case, I'm doing it now and that's what counts.

The following scenario is true 99% of the time:  Ask a man if he likes the movie The Big Lebowski and he will emphatically say yes.  Ask a woman if she likes it and she will emphatically say no.

I first saw this movie maybe 6 months after it came out and I remember not liking it, in true female fashion. But I kept wondering why there's such a gender chasm in its followers and I decided to watch it again to see if I'm still on the girl side of things.  Theresa gave me the assignment of reporting back on my findings.  Here they are.

I am a man.  Wait, let me rephrase.  I'm a woman who sometimes dresses up like a man.  I can confidently say that I liked the movie.  I can also confidently say that I did not love it.  Obviously I liked the colorfulness (it's a word) of the characters. But then, the Coen brothers are known for their original, eccentric characters, so there's no surprise there.  I think I would have been even more bored than I already was with the plot if the bits of humor mixed in and the characters' nuances didn't add to the scenes.

Things that were good:  any scene with John Turturo, the concept of the white russians, the dream sequence (mainly due to the costumes and the music), the soundtrack, John Goodman (!), Philip Seymour Hoffman

Things that were bad:  Tara Reid (this can be said for any movie she's in), not using Steve Buscemi to his potential, the scenes with the "cowboy" talking to the camera at the bowling alley bar, the plotline around Julianne Moore

I guess this movie is a typical Coen brothers movie which means I should have known that I would think it's good artistically but not good entertainingalingly (not a word).  In other words, I can see why people would like it.  But I still can't see why it's split between men and women.  Is it the bowling?  The swearing?  Tara Reid?  And are those the same reasons why women don't like it?

I think I'll stick with watching movies and not reviewing them.  I'm better at the former....

Important amendment

This just in....

Theresa has alerted me to the fact that there is no way she looked up at me while eating her pizza. "I inhaled that," is how she put it.

That is all. Thank you.

Don't say Haman.

Is it a full moon?  It's got to be.  Because people are friggin' crazy today.  Last week at work I obsessively flipped between People.com and Lifehacker.com to pass away the time.  I was just bored to tears.  And all of a sudden it's like I have no time to breathe.  People in Edinburgh are yelling at me in emails, people in Luxembourg are laughing so hard on conference calls that they are snorting, and people in Boston are so stressed they're reclining in their chairs and splaying their limbs everywhere.  It's all very distracting.

Chris Wyman is convinced that when Patrick Swayze dies, they will play a marathon of his movies.  ALL his movies....not just the one good one.  Which means that I will have to suffer through Point Break.  Again.  I, on the other hand, am pretty sure that TNT will only play Dirty Dancing.  There's no denying it; it was a strange conversation to have.

Yesterday I went over to Theresa's house around 2:30 and left around 10:30.  It's weird, but I think we paid the most attention to each other in the car to and from her house.  When we went grocery shopping, we were concerned with why Stop & Shop doesn't carry Peter Pan peanut butter and whether or not to buy fat free mozzarella cheese or 2%.  Then, when we got to her apartment, I was concerned with uploading my video to youtube (not successful) and she was preoccupied with taking a shower.  And then we watched some tv while both playing on our own computers.  So, not really paying attention to the tv or each other then either.  We kinda glanced up as we ate our pizza, but not really.  It's amazing how 8 hours can feel like only 2 when you're not paying attention to anything.  This is why I feel like my weekend hasn't started yet.  I want a do-over.

Now it's 8:08.  I should be out listening to the Megillah and twirling my noisemaker while eating hamantashen.  But I'm pretty sure sitting here drinking decaf coffee while checking blogs counts the same.  Right?  Right, God?  

Where am I even going with this thing?

I've only written about 6 entries since I got back from London. Apparently I was bored enough in London to write an amusing couple of paragraphs each day. And now that I'm back in Boston, I've been distracted with things like pissing cats, fixing my surround sound home theater, creating excel spreadsheets to adequately track overtime, joining a gym and figuring out how to make my arms look more toned without injuring myself, stealing the Wall Street Journal every day, buying awesome new Merrell shoes, remembering that Nip/Tuck is on at 10 pm every Tuesday night, and making trips to the bathroom at work with Theresa when I only have to go 50% of the time.

I miss writing. I don't miss stressing out that it's 11:30 pm and I haven't written my daily entry yet and oh my God I'm totally gonna let everyone down. But I do want to start writing again on a more consistent basis. I think it makes me a better person since, if I weren't writing, I'd just be watching another episode of the Food Network Challenge. And I swear...whoever does the program scheduling at the Food Network should be shot. Because the 7 pm timeslot is like, so amazingly precious, and they are fucking it up by putting a shitty show like that in there. Sure, I watch it. But not because I like it; I watch it because I need something to entertain me while I make my Kraft macaroni and cheese and the people on Wheel of Fortune are dolts.

Sometimes I make a deal with God in my head. I tell him that I will give him $1,000 if he can make my body instantly look like that Biggest Loser trainer, Jillian's, body. But then I realize that once I have that body, I would probably lose all its definition in about a week ('cause of, you know, candy). So I call off the deal.

Ted posed an interesting question at the Celtics game the other day. He asked if I would pay $1,000 to take a free throw shot. If I make it, I win $1,000,000. I can't remember if I said yes or no. My current answer would be 80% yes, 20% no. Which isn't really an answer at all.