Stir of Baby

When my Wife was laid off, we immediately made some cost saving decisions. We gave up our fancy Arrowhead bottled water with the nice cooler/heater combo water dispenser and we also gave up cable along with going out for dinner and other things. Where we drew the line though was with our Netflix subscription. Those happy red envelopes have done a lot to keep our spirits up and I love watch social documentaries using there "instant watch" feature. 

Watching movies is a bit of a juggling act though since the Baby rarely finds the movies that we rent to be the sort of thing he would like. The distinct lack of talking anthropomorphic trains and animals in the Wristcutters: A Love Story, for instance, meant that he was be bored to tears. And by tears I mean running around in front of the television finding out what new and interesting sounds he's capable of producing. This usually leads us to let him Cars or Thomas the Train with a bowl of Cheerios and a sippy cup full of milk. This diversion lasts for about thirty minutes and he'll come out of the room carrying three or four books which he'll demand to be read. Usually I'm pleased at his academic dilligence but having the oversized Thomas the Train book thrust into your face whilst watching Angelina Jolie curve a bullet around a room to assassinate a room full of assassins is somewhat distracting and the Wife will point out that watching Angelina Jolie curve a bullet around a room to assassinate a room full of assassins is of dubious value in the proper care and feeding of a two year old. So either one of us gives up on the movie to go be a parent or we both admit defeat and go and play with the Baby. 

But when it comes to watching movies, I'm a trooper. If I have to stay up till midnight so I can watch my movie in peace, then that is what I'll do. I'll wait till the Wife and Baby are asleep, lower the volume pop in my movie and enjoy two hours of Baby free entertainment. Such was the case the other night when I was watching Stir of Echos. If you haven't seen it, it's about Kevin Bacon being able to hear dead people. Yes, like in that other movie, but not as good. 

So there I was, the room darkened, only the glow of the TV while creepy images slowly seeped their way into my brain when I sneezed. I sneezed and from the blackness I hear, "Bless you...", at this point I'm not ashamed to admit I was a little scared. I'm completely startled by this quiet disembodied voice and then I hear it, "... honey."

"Aidan?" I cautiously call out into the dark hallway.

"Yeah." Comes the reply, the voice quiet and small.

By now I've put the movie on pause and I'm walking over to his bedroom, 

"You awake little guy?"

I see him in the doorway, the door opened ever so slightly his face still in shadow, a pinpoint of reflected light glinting off his dark brown eyes the only betrayal of his presence as my eyes struggle to adapt to the darkness.

"Yeah... I'm awake already" He responds and then after a short pause, he sighs and opens the door fully, his little arms outstretched, demanding a hug.

Romantic Tragedies

Valentines Day was never a big thing for the Wife and me, even when we were dating. A small gift and a nice dinner was our usual routine. It's not that we were trying to be anti-consumption or anything so noble, it's just that she's hard to shop for and she appreciates small sincere gestures over large ones... which is lucky for me because I'm horrible at the later. Having to plan and orchestrate a night out fills me with so much dread that I shutdown. By shutdown I mean I sit in my pajamas and watch TV. And by TV, I mean anime. Yes, Valentines Day sends me running to my geek safety blanket.

Since the Wife is currently between jobs and we're trying to save money, I decided this year I would rent her favorite romantic movies and spend the evening snuggling while the Baby sat in his room watching Thomas the Train and Cars. So I rented for her "The Notebook" and dug out our copy of "Serendipity" and we settled on the couch and started watching.

"The Notebook" is a favorite of hers and it's a real tear jerker. We finished it, had a small cry and I made her promise that if I ended up suffering from senile dementia that she wouldn't let me die in some home. After cheering ourselves up with some chocolate cake we moved on to "Serendipity". It was about half way through when it dawned on me... it dawned on me that these "other" in these movies are going through tragedies, the worst moments in their lives. While we're laughing and crying with the romantic leads, their "other" is watching the person they love most in the world plotting to cheat on them, leave them, at the altar, in front of their friends, their families, God. 

Sure, it's easy to cheer on the leads when their "other" is someone evil or manipulative. Or is it? Is it right to sit there and wish pain, loneliness, humiliation on someone, just because we don't like them? Because they have an annoying laugh? Or do we not even notice? In "Serendipity" we don't even see what happens to the other. The dumping takes place off screen and we laugh with Sarah as she finds out the good news. The good news that somewhere another woman just had her heart ripped out and that she's out being consoled by her family and friends. While her ex-fiance is doing what... feeling guilty over his callous betrayal? No, walking around in park, wistfully dreaming about that certain someone. 

So to all those "others" out there. The ones who did nothing wrong while the ones you loved most plotted and cheated on you and then cruelly stabbed you in the back, leaving alone at the altar all in the name of true love, I hope you too find yours. 

Predator Reboot in the Works!

Supposedly the Predator movie franchise is gonna get a reboot. I thought I'd toss my hat into the ring:

What if, instead of grizzled old veterans, they were all young, fresh out of the academy. And all male is boring, have at least one squad member be a hot female lead (it will help if it's obvious that she's never seen a gun before, much less fired one). And the commander is in love with her but is unsure about all the killing. He would like to retire to mexico and fix cars or something. And one of them is a scientist, not even a commando and he hates war too so he's always trying to get them to not kill the predator. 

And the predator isn't an alien, it's an angry indigenous person trying to save the rainforest from evil american imperialism. Because the commandos are going to blow up his home village to make way for an oil pipeline and he needs to race home to cure his sick wife with a special flower that grows in the amazon and the wife also just gave birth. And they're trapped in a pit and it's raining. Raining poisonous frogs. genetically engineered poisonous frogs.

And the climax is fought in a big cave, where the Predator (it's his title given to him by the wise and blind village elder) smears mud on himself to disguise himself from the commando's night vision technology (technology bad, traditional good) and he uses the venom from giant spiders (that he fought and killed in act II) to defeat the commandos. But at the end, the commandos are actually winning, when commander and hot commando have a crisis of faith and turn on their comrades (evil) and save the predator. 

The film can end with the predator saving his sick wife and new born baby, (with the wife being hawt now) she holds the baby while he holds her and she looks up and smiles and they both look up into the blue sky and then we pan down from the blue sky to a beach house in mexico, a trendy CW band playing on a radio, commander is now AWOL and fixing cars (yes, on the beach) then some beautiful legs appear in front of the camera walking towards commander, shot of beautiful swaying ass, oh look, it's the hot commando she ran away with him! 

the end.