Wednesday, December 27, 2017
Tuesday, December 19, 2017
P&S - The Warrant Hotline
No, the Warrant Hotline is not the number you call after watching America's Most Wanted, it's one of those 900 numbers from the 80s or 90s!
Yeah, it's a ripoff scam but it's a lot of other things too!
Yeah, it's a ripoff scam but it's a lot of other things too!
Labels:
Podcasts,
Preston and Steve Show,
Radio,
Warrant hotline
Saturday, December 16, 2017
Up on the Housetop
I was listening to some Christmas music today and in true Festivus fashion, I have a problem and now you're all gonna hear about it.
One of the staples of this season is the song "Up on the Housetop", an old timey song of which the most famous version is still Gene Autry from 1953.
The chorus goes like this:
Ho, ho, ho! Who wouldn’t go.
Ho, ho, ho! Who wouldn’t go,
Up on the housetop, click, click, click;
Down through the chimney with old Saint Nick.
Now it's possible that I was asleep during Santa class, but from what I remember, there is no option of joining Santa as he goes down the chimney. There was never a raffle where 2 lucky people get to ride with him in his sleigh nor any myth that Santa would let people go down the chimney with him. This is never presented as an option, so why even ask? Every second you spend thinking up an answer to the question posed by these lyrics is a second wasted.
And a direct question would be bad enough. This song has the audacity to take it further. Rather than "would you go..." it's "who wouldn't go..." Suddenly, I'm taking a census. Ok, what percentage of the population would go up on the roof with Santa and what percentage wouldn't do the thing that never happens anyway and is pointless to ask? Gee, I don't know how to divide the demographics on this.
All that being said, I'm ready to answer the question for myself. I would NOT go up with Santa and through the chimney. First off, I don't like the heights, I don't like roofs and I'm not practiced in walking on them. Secondly, we're told that the way Santa gets through the chimney is by some magic. But is that magic even transferable to others? I don't know, I don't fancy finding out. Nor do I want to find out if the magic protects me from inhaling chimney soot or getting it all over my clothes. Is it up to me to climb slowly down - I don't like the idea of a two story free-fall into either a roaring fire or some cinder blocks.
No. Definitely not. I pass on this whole fake proposition that's never going to happen and doesn't exist as a thing. Sounds like a nightmare. Gene Autry and whoever can do whatever they want on the housetop but as for me, I'd rather be up on the roof with James Taylor.
Merry Christmas, everybody.
Labels:
Christmas,
Christmas Songs,
Gene Autry,
James Taylor,
Up on the Housetop
Thursday, December 14, 2017
Conan - Santa's Netflix Special
Santa's back and he's EDGY.
I can't see real good, is that Kenny Rogers over there?
I can't see real good, is that Kenny Rogers over there?
Labels:
Christmas,
Conan,
Conan O'Brien,
Netflix,
Santa
Wednesday, December 13, 2017
The Room - A Theory from the Internet
The key to "The Room's" staying power is that it's so dreamlike and hard to understand. People have described it as what would happen if aliens, trying to understand human life, tried to make a movie about it. The vast consensus for why it is the way it is, is that its creator Tommy Wiseau is simply inept. And when he claims he had a "vision" for the movie, he's simply dismissed. Especially since he's never explained what that vision was.
In trying to understand what "The Room" might mean, I wonder if there's a clue to the some of the answers in the title itself. After all, does anything in the movie suggest the title "The Room"? Why name it that? It's clearly about the relationships (man-woman and man-man) of the characters themselves. But the title - the simplest summary of the movie's meaning is "The Room".
What if the "room" (the apartment) was an active participant in the events of the movie. Let's suppose it was possible that some sort of inter-dimensional nexus could exist on Earth that it had the power to affect people's thoughts slowly over time? And suppose that Johnny and Lisa's apartment happens to be that nexus. Then what we perceive as bad writing and awful acting is really a manifestation of the negative psychological effects of long-term exposure to The Room. They're acting and speaking strangely because they're no longer in their right minds and haven't been for a long time. If this is the case, Johnny, who's presumably spent the most time in The Room, seems to exhibit no normal human behavior whatsoever.
Lisa and her mother would be second to Johnny in their exposure to The Room's effects which explains why they still have traces of humanity but yet show that a cancer diagnosis isn't a worthwhile conversation topic, etc. This is particularly hinted at by Lisa herself on the roof, "I'm changing... people are changing all the time".
If the Room is causing gradual madness over time, it naturally follows then that that the most ancillary characters like Michelle and Steven would seem to most resemble real people and act as the "voice of reason" to our "crazy" main characters. And this is exactly the case.
People often wonder why Mike suddenly falls down in the alley. Watch again and see that this moment comes right after he's told a story about being in the apartment. He's suffering brain trauma.
The effects of being in The Room? |
I think Tommy Wiseau may have very well had a vision for "The Room" and he's not telling anyone in the same way that all the great filmmakers never reveal the meanings of their works. "The Room" may be a science-fiction piece. It's a movie that observes a group of (previously) normal people whose minds have been warped and distorted by a force outside their control. And being unaware that this force exists, unaware that they're sick, they must continue to argue, fight and cheat each other, following what their sick minds are telling them to do. Without the possibility of thinking "outside the Room", the events of the movie flow inevitably and the very last scene is a bleak determinism.
In short, "The Room" may be a companion piece to "Upstream Color".
Labels:
Bad Movies,
Explanation,
Film Interpretation,
Movies,
The Room,
Theory,
Tommy Wiseau
Tuesday, December 12, 2017
Tonight Show - Peanuts
I'm just taking it by faith that this is funny...
The Tonight Show does a mashup of Riverdale with Peanuts. Now, I've never seen Riverdale and probably never will so I can only assume this is worth sharing. It's certainly carefully made.
The Tonight Show does a mashup of Riverdale with Peanuts. Now, I've never seen Riverdale and probably never will so I can only assume this is worth sharing. It's certainly carefully made.
Labels:
jimmy fallon,
Peanuts,
Questlove,
Riverdale,
Snoopy,
The Tonight Show
Friday, December 8, 2017
Tonight Show - James Franco
What has the world come to when I'm posting a James Franco interview? EVERYBODY BETRAYED ME, I FED UP WITH THIS WORLD!
James Franco talks about his new movie where he plays Tommy Wiseau.
James Franco talks about his new movie where he plays Tommy Wiseau.
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