Month: January 2008

The McBournie Minute: Heath Ledger’s death is not important

Last Tuesday, actor Heath Ledger died an untimely death. That night, I saw my friends’ reactions expressed in their away messages on AIM. Most had some kind of message expressing his or her sadness at hearing of Ledger’s passing. I took the time to leave my own away message expressing my thoughts on the day’s news.

I don’t care.

It’s not that I am glad he passed or anything, I just don’t have feelings one way or the other about it. This came as a shock to a few people. They said I was insensitive to say such a thing. After all, the man had died only a matter of hours earlier, his body was scarcely cold and I refused to show humanity. But still, I don’t care about Heath Ledger’s death. Why should I? His life had little effect on me.

Continue reading The McBournie Minute: Heath Ledger’s death is not important

MasterChugs Theater: ‘Rounders’

Rounders is a movie in which the central character is not nearly as fascinating as the fringe players that surround him. Now, just hold up a moment. This isn’t a knock on Matt Damon who, as the central character, plays a reformed gambler who turned his attention to law school after overconfidence led to a $30,000 loss at an underground poker game of high rollers. At his age today, nobody holds a better career hand (ha-ha, poker joke) than Matt Damon. Following the box-office and Oscar success of Good Will Hunting (an acting nomination and a win for the script he wrote with co-star, friend and fellow South Boston townie Ben Affleck), Damon, 27, scored the title role in Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan; nabbed the lead in The Talented Mr. Ripley, directed by Anthony Minghella (The English Patient); re-teamed with Affleck in Dogma for Kevin Smith (Chasing Amy); and signed for the film of Cormac McCarthy’s best seller All the Pretty Horses when Leo DiCaprio turned it down. Might I also point out the magnificent Ocean’s [Insert Number Here] and Jason Bourne trilogies? But here’s the pull: Rounders (a term for a skilled player who earns a living at poker) is about Damon’s guilt-by-association re-entry into the gambling scene and his resulting struggle to maintain a front as the scrupulous, upright Joe he’s trying to become.

Continue reading MasterChugs Theater: ‘Rounders’

Big Brother is watching and he doesn’t want you to stop … yet.

The District of Columbia seems to have a bit of a porn problem, since nine city employees have been fired and 32 others suspended for surfing the seedier side of the INTARWUBS during work hours. Of course, “bit” may actually be understating the case, as the nine that were KO’d were under the circumstances of visiting an “egregious” amount of porn websites. As defined by Dictionary.com, “egregious” means “extraordinary in some bad way; glaring; flagrant.” That’s a whole lot of furries, most definitely more than what’s recommended.

Then again, if it’s that easy to look at porn while you’re at work, well, maybe the onus should be spread around.

Repeal the unjust drinking law!

Right now, at this very moment, over 7 million people in this country are horribly oppressed. These are legal U.S. citizens, of all races, religions and political affiliations. They are single, married, divorced. They are young and they are old. The one thing they truly have in common is that they have the misfortune of living in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

“Commonwealth” is a pretentious name for “state” used by Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Virginia.

In any case, Virginians are being oppressed by their own state government. The worst part is the vast majority of them don’t even know it. What is it? It’s a law that says it is illegal to make sangria within the state borders.

Sangria, the famous Spanish drink, is not allowed to be made in its true form, because the law says you cannot mix wine or beer with distilled spirits. If you make the drink, you could get locked up for a year. To this blog, that punishment is much stiffer than the drink itself.

Yes Virgina, there is sangria. It could be coming your way soon because the state general assembly is going to look at the law and hopefully change it. The Guys are sending Bryan Schools, the closest member to Richmond to protest outside the Virginia General Assembly all week long.

How To: Survive a monster attack

History teaches us all something very important: monsters are out there and they will kill you. Wait, wasn’t it history that said there were dragons flying around and sea monsters at the ends of the Earth?

Maybe it’s Hollywood. Yes, Hollywood teaches us that monsters are out there and they will kill you. Take Cloverfield for example, something attacks New York and you get to see it firsthand through a herky-jerky hand held camera. This is not just entertainment, this is a cautionary tale. You can trust Hollywood, when have they ever lied to you? All they have ever done is make you laugh, cry and become infatuated with organized crime. That’s not wrong, is it?

Because the threat of monsters is ever-present, The Guys bring you this survival guide in case the worst should happen, and by the worst, we mean something large, green and ugly stumbles into town asking about you.

Continue reading How To: Survive a monster attack

‘Waiting for Godot’ vindicated by science

Image: “The Bar Scene” by Jonathan Harriot

Thanks to a study by three mathematicians, we now know that it is better to wait for the bus than to walk to another stop.

How does this revelation apply to this blog? Modern Drunkard Magazine coined the term “drinking with Godot”:

drinking with Godot adj. drinking while waiting for friends who may or may not arrive; from the Beckett play Waiting For Godot, wherein the title character never appears.

In other words, you’re not an alcoholic for drinking alone in the meantime–you’re waiting efficiently.

All’s well that ends damp

It’s safe to say that everyone loves happy endings, which is why The Guys are very glad to hear that the artist who had made a nude self-portrait out of a rug, only to have it stolen, has since found her precious carpet, relatively undamaged. And yes, the TV station, KATU, blurred out whole scale rug nudity. You wouldn’t want a bad example for the little kitchen tiles to be set, right? They’re oh so impressionable, after all. Especially little linoleum.

Don’t do the PDA if you can’t do the time

In China, public display of affection (PDA) is punishable by death. Not really, but apparently the Chinese find if funny as hell. Who can blame them? It’s not like they are allowed to see much else on the Internet, after all.

A couple in China is going to sue after a surveillance video in a subway showing the two kissing was released on YouTube and other Web sites recently. The video has become huge there, and the couple says they were embarrassed by the video’s release, even though they were making out in public for several minutes and were not embarrassed by that in the least.

It’s good to see China is finally adopting a style of justice closer to our own, frivolous system.