Movie Thoughts: Planet Terror

If you're old enough (like me) you'll remember the drive-ins. No, not drive throughs (sheesh, kids) but drive-ins. These were outdoor movie theaters where you'd pull up in your car, grab a tinny sounding staticy speaker from a post and hang it on your partially rolled up car window. Then look around (to make sure the manager couldn't see you) and pop open the trunk, letting out the three or four friends who managed to fit in there.

The movies at the drive-in weren't all that good. In reality, I don't know that people really went to the drive-in to watch the movie. Mostly it was to do other things. Make out, drink, cause general havoc and mayhem for the other patrons. The movies were mostly those "B" type monster films. Evil Dead, Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead. Corning writing, corny characters and completely predictable. Mostly they were older movies too, and not not such good shape. Scratches and dust marks all over the film, the sound would warble at times. But like I said, you really didn't go to the drive-in to actually view the film.

All this comes back to me now because I recently watched Robert Rodriquez's "Planet Terror". I don't know why I rented it. Probably because on the cover, Rose McGowan was sporting a MACHINE GUN FOR A LEG!!! How crazy is that? Rodriquez was one of the directors behind one of my favorite films of recent years, "Sin City", so that, along with the chick having a machine gun for a leg, made up my mind for me. The movie was a bit more than I expected. I kind of expected that whole "B" movie experience, but really, it is more like a "A" movie, masquerading as a "B" movie - complete with the dust marks and scratches and warbley audio and everything. At one point, the film melts - just like the old days. I can't remember the last time I was in a theater and the film melted. It was awesome.

The movie is utterly and completely over the top in everything it does. It starts out with a faux "Coming Attractions" trailer for a movie called "Machete" during which the announcer declares "If you hire Machete to kill the bad guy, you better make sure the bad guy isn't you." Basic storyline is thus: Bad chemical escapes, people are being turned into zombies, a rag-tag group of people are immune, end up banding together to fight their way to safety.

This isn't a movie where you are going to be surprised, just thoroughly entertained (if you like that over-the-top campy kind of stuff).

Did I mention the lady with the machine gun for a leg?

8th Grade Education

Remember when grandparents and great-grandparents stated that they only had an 8th grade education? Well, check this out. Could any of us have passed the 8th grade in 1895?
This is the eighth-grade final exam from 1895 in Salina , Kansas , USA . It was taken from the original document on file at the Smokey Valley Genealogical Society and Library in Salina , and reprinted by the Salina Journal.

8th Grade Final Exam: Salina , KS - 1895

Grammar (Time, one hour)

1. Give nine rules for the use of capital letters.
2. Name the parts of speech and define those that have no modifications.
3. Define verse, stanza and paragraph
4. What are the principal parts of a verb? Give principal parts of 'lie,''play,' and 'run.'
5. Define case; illustrate each case.
6 What is punctuation? Give rules for principal marks of punctuation.
7 - 10. Write a composition of about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical use of the rules of grammar.

Arithmetic (Time,1 hour 15 minutes)

1. Name and define the Fundamental Rules of Arithmetic.
2. A wagon box is 2 ft. Deep, 10 feet long, and 3 ft. Wide. How many bushels of wheat will it hold?
3. If a load of wheat weighs 3,942 lbs., what is it worth at 50cts/bushel, deducting 1,050 lbs. For tare?
4. District No 33 has a valuation of $35,000. What is the necessary levy to carry on a school seven months at $50 per month, and have $104 for incidentals?
5. Find the cost of 6,720 lbs. Coal at $6.00 per ton.
6. Find the interest of $512.60 for 8 months and 18 days at 7 percent.

 

7. What is the cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 ft. Long at $20 per metre?
8. Find bank discount on $300 for 90 days (no grace) at 10 percent.
9. What is the cost of a square farm at $15 per acre, t he distance of which is 640 rods?
10. Write a Bank Check, a Promissory Note, and a Receipt

U.S. History (Time, 45 minutes)

1. Give the epochs into which U.S. History is divided
2. Give an account of the discovery of America by Columbus
3. Relate the causes and results of the Revolutionary War.
4. Show the territorial growth of the United States
5. Tell what you can of the history of Kansas .
6. Describe three of the most prominent b attles of the Rebellion.
7. Who were the following: Morse, Whitney, Fulton , Bell , Lincoln , Penn, and Howe?
8. Name event s connected with the following dates: 1607, 1620, 1800, 1849, 1865.

 

Orthography (Time, one hour)
[Do we even know what this is??]

1. What is meant by the following: alphabet, phonetic, orthography, etymology, syllabication
2. What are elementary sounds? How classified?
3. What are the following, and give examples of each: trigraph, subvocals, diphthong, cognate letters, linguals
4. Give four substitutes for caret 'u.' (HUH?)
5. Give two rules for spelling words with final 'e.' Name two exceptions under each rule.
6. Give two uses of silent letters in spelling. Illustrate each.
7. Define the following prefixes and use in connection with a word: bi, dis-mis, pre, semi, post, non, inter, mono, sup.
8. Mark diacritically and divide into syllables the following, and name the sign that indicates the sound: card, ball, mercy, sir, odd, cell, rise, blood, fare, last.
9. Use the following correctly in sentences: cite, site, sight, fane, fain, feign, vane , vain, vein, raze, raise, rays.
10. Write 10 words frequently mispronounced and indicate pronunciation by use of diacritical marks and by syllabication.

Geography (Time, one hour)

1 What is climate? Upon what does climate depend?
2. How do you account for the extremes of climate in Kansas ?
3. Of what use are rivers? Of what use is the ocean?
4. Describe the mountains of North America
5. Name and describe the following: Monrovia , Odessa , Denver , Manitoba , Hecla , Yukon , St. Helena , Juan Fernandez, Aspinwall and Orinoc ..
6. Name and locate the principal trade centers of the U.S.
7. Name all the republics of Europe and give the capital of each.
8. Why is the Atlantic Coast colder than the Pacific in the same latitude?
9. Describe the process by which the water of the ocean returns to the sources of rivers.
10. Describe the movements of the earth. Give the incl ination of the earth.

Notice that the exam took FIVE HOURS to complete.
Gives the saying 'he only had an 8th grade education' a whole new meaning, doesn't it?!

SNOWFALL

"They can put a man on the moon, but they can't keep this white crap from falling from they sky?" - Alex P. Keaton

Actually, I love the snow. It is my firm belief that cold weather is a complete and utter waste of time without snow. And we got the snow. Truth be told, we got more snow before Christmas this year than we normally get all year long. It hasn't snowed this much here in Fly-Over Country since I was a kid. I love it. My kids are lovin' it. The 5/8 is hating it.

When I got out of bed this morning, I looked out the window to the dark, snow-covered street below, it was calm and serene looking. A neighbor had his truck running, headlights casting shadows up the street as I heard the distinctive scrape, scrape, scrape sound that can only come from a shovel, shoveling snow off concrete. It didn't look that bad. I figured the kids were going to be in school, and the 5/8 would hate it even more for having to drive in it. But, being the dutiful and generous and loving husband I am, I sneaked downstairs and fired up the web browser and hit the local news station website.

WIBW Channel 13. That is the news station that everyone turns to for closings and cancellations. Oh, the other stations have the list, and run the ticker along the bottom and read the list on air. But if you were to ask any state employee, city employee, school teacher, pastor or just about anyone else, WIBW has the de-facto official list. Sister Corita would tell us it doesn't matter what is said anywhere except Channel 13. If Channel 13 doesn't say school is closed, then school isn't closed. And for those of you who know her, you know there is no arguing with Sister Corita - ever.

I took another look out the front door window as I worked my way to my cramped little den and turned on the monitor and logged in. Still, it didn't look that bad. Opening the school closings page, I was shocked to see that the schools were closed. 'Maybe it's because it rained all day yesterday, and the streets are really slick' I though to myself 'Oh well'.

I gingerly worked my way back up the stairs. Trying to make as little noise as possible on those creaky old stairs. Told the 5/8 that school was canceled and turned her alarm off. Watching the news as I was preparing for work, they were saying we received 7 inches of snow overnight. Looking out the window, it still didn't look that deep to me. They had some young lady out in their parking lot, making snow angels and sticking a ruler in the snow. Poor kid, she was probably and intern, they get the worst assignments. She measured 9 inches with the ruler. I don't know how scientific that measurement is.

Heading out the back door towards the garage I was stunned to see how much deeper the snow looked up close and personal. Oddly, it seems our street had been plowed. We live on a wide street that I would have thought would be a priority for plowing. Back in the day, the trolley used to run down our street. Even with cars parked along both sides, two fire trucks could drive down our street side-by-side, that is how wide our street is. But until today, I don't believe our street had ever been plowed. Today it was, and that was a pleasant surprise.

I was prepared (I thought) for the drive into work. I knew that other people, even people who lived in Kansas way back when it used to snow like this all the time, didn't really exhibit the skills required for snow driving. Having lived in Alaska for around four years really taught me a lot about driving in the snow. Add to that about three years of driving my Jeep through the mountains of Colorado, I learned how to keep a vehicle moving forward with minimum traction.

The key is using the front tires to constantly seek new traction. Let's say you're at a stop sign, and you have little-to-no traction starting out; one thing that has never failed me (yet) is to turn the wheels left to right continuously. I'm not certain exactly what this does, but I do know it works. I drive that little POS Honda Insight (which is great for highway commuting, but pretty much worthless other than that) and I didn't have any problems with traction or getting stuck. The folks at work were amazed I could get in to the office in that little thing. I told them I have skills - with a z.

The worst I had to deal with was somebody driving up Huntoon St. They were scared I'm certain, being very cautions, driving about eight miles per hour. I don't have a problem with people driving slow in the snow. If they are comfortable, and I'm certain that the slower you drive, and the more confident you are behind the wheel, the safer it is for everyone. But this guy was on a four lane road, and driving down the middle of it. Taking up two lanes, going eight miles per hour. I don't know why they didn't pick a stinking lane. I know my vehicle, and I know what I can handle. I know how fast I can drive in what conditions. And I knew that I would be comfortable and safe at around 20-25 miles per hour. But this guy would not relinquish the middle of the road so that I, nor anyone stacked up behind me, could get around them.

But other than that, it was a fairly easy drive in.

Fly-over news

It turned out to be a pretty good week in the on-again-off-again-frozen-then-thawed-then-frozen area of Northeast Kansas. Mid-week we had the exciting basketball game between rivals Kansas State University Wildcats and Kansas University Jayhawks. The favored were the Jayhawks. The 'Hawks are always favored over the 'Cats. It is a much bigger school, with more funding and more national recognition, especially in basketball.

I have always felt more at ease around the KSU crowd than the KU crowd. KSU started out as a agriculture and mechanical school. And it still pretty much is. Which is probably why I like the people there better. They are less pretentious than the folks over at KU. I'm glad that KSU won that game. It seemed...I don't know...just - somehow.

That was followed by the news that No. 1 Son was promoted to Lance Corporal in his MJROTC unit, along with making the high school's Honor Roll. His grandmother took him to the Japanese restaurant to celebrate. He was excited about it all, and the food was good.

So things were going pretty well. The the Super Bowl comes around. I was rooting for the Giants because, like KU, I thought it was time for the Patriots to lose. I was getting tired of always seeing them win the Super Bowl. Call me the champion of the underdog or whatever.

No. 1 Son was rooting for the Pats. Poor kid, he was also rooting for the 'Hawks. I kept asking him, as the seconds ticked away at the end of the game what it felt like to back two losers in the same week. He did a horrible job of trying to deflect my taunting. I know he felt bad because I'm pretty certain he chose those teams specifically because I hadn't chosen them.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again; the Internet is such a wonderful creation. The best friend I have in the world I met while working in Alaska. He is now in North Dakota, while I'm stuck here in Kansas. But that didn't keep us for watching the Super Bowl together (if even virtually). We fired up the computers and IMed the hell out of each other, commenting on commercials and plays. It was almost-but-not-quite exactly like sitting right next to him - except, him being in North Dakota, and me being in Kansas, he couldn't drink all my beer!

The city council here in Topeka is still in somewhat hot water regarding their actions (hey, there's a surprise, someone finally catches on that the council is full of a bunch of corrupt pinheads). A couple of years ago, the citizens of this city, fed up with the crap the council and mayor were heaping upon us, voted to change the city charter to convert the government to a city manager form. We still have the council and we still have the mayor, but the city is pretty much run by the manager (and not very well, I might add) with the big decisions (the ones that affect our pocketbooks) being made by the council.

The council voted to approve several things, a new over-priced, under performing computer system, a raise in court fees, a (second) new helicopter for the police department, which the mayor vetoed (and rightly so). These were expenditures which were unnecessary, and generously unpopular with the citizens. Greater than 80% of citizens that weighed in on the matters didn't want these things that the council approved anyway. After the mayor vetoed the bills, the council voted and overturned the vetoes.

While all that seems normal on the surface, the problem lies in that the new city charter does not specify that the council has any authority to override a mayoral veto. This is a bad thing. The mayor, in essence, has the ability to squash any legislation the council comes up with, and there is nothing the council can do about it. The good part of it is that the city may be forced to back out of all of these stupid deals that were made, thus saving the average Joe taxpayers millions of dollars.

Love the Zune

I love music. All kinds of music. I seriously cannot think of a time or situation, where music would be unwelcome. Sure, certain types of music are better for certain situations, but on the whole, music is always welcome where ever I happen to be. Its a tough question when someone asks me  "What kind of music do you like." My usual reply is "All kinds." From Hank Williams (Sr) to Dire Straits, to Led Zeppelin, to Thelonius Monk to Count Basi, to Christina Aquilera, to Glen Miller to Mozart and Beethoven and their crowd and on and on.

I will admit that usually the radio station in the car is tuned to country music. But not exclusively. Many times I switch on over to the rock station, or the soul station. The problem with radios is, you only get one genre of music at a time. Then you have to go in search of something else if you don't want that particular genre any longer. Albums err, I mean CDs are the same way. They are not only one genre, but mostly one artist. That is what I love about having a media player. I hadn't thought about it before. If I had, I probably would have gotten one a long, long time ago. One great thing about having the media player is I have the ability to quickly and easily load pretty much whatever I want to hear at any particular time. Most decent ones (1GB and up) will hold hours and hours of music. Music that you have ready access too. Sometimes, I like to simply turn on the 'shuffle' mode, and start it to play everything in my collection (that's a ton of songs people). I do get sometimes a bit annoyed at some song I happen to have that isn't one I wanted to listen to at the time, but mostly, I get surprised by songs I may have not listened to for a long time.

And heck, I haven't even really gotten into the whole "podcast" thing yet. But I'm certain I will before too long. It just seems too easy not to do it.

LOST again

Today the new season of LOST begins. I can't wait. Especially after last season's finale.

A small trip down memory lane for those who don't quite remember what happened.
1) Charlie died. He drowned in the under water pod after shutting down the whatever system it was he was supposed to shut down. It is presumed it was the system that keeps the island cloaked.
2) The ever-present flashbacks regarding the characters' lives before they arrived on the island were replaced with "flash-forwards" (for want of a better term). In these we see that Jack and Kate for certain make it off the island. Jack is a drunkard, and stops by a funeral home for a viewing. The casket is short, and we never see who is in it, and the funeral home is empty. The funeral director tells Jack that no one has come to pay their respects. The short casket, and the fact that no one attended tells me the person on the coffin is the bug-eyed Ben - leader of 'The Others'.
3) Jack has been traveling the world-over. He tells Kate he wants to go back to the island. During this conversation Kate speaks of 'him' and we are all led to believe (or at least I imagined I was led to believe) that 'him' is Sawyer, but that is truly never revealed and I know from experience with this show, you can't assume anything and have it stick.

My guess is that Locke will not leave the island, no matter what. He was crippled and confined to a wheelchair after his father threw him out a third or fourth story window. But on the island he has full use of his extremities. He can walk, and run and jump and all those things that people who are not confined to a wheelchair are able to do. I believe Locked would rather die than go back to being in the wheelchair.

No sign of Jack's current main squeeze, the hot doctor lady from 'The Others' in the flash-forward. And since he is flying all over the place, it would appear they are not together any longer. Perhaps she stayed on the island, perhaps she died. Perhaps she just couldn't put up with his constant drinking and flying off all over the world using the 'Golden Ticket' the survivors received from Oceana Airlines.

Whatever happens, it is certain to be a heck of a roller coaster ride. I'm guessing at the most there are two seasons left in this show. I read a year or so ago that the producers have created the end for the show, but didn't way how long down the road that end would come. They didn't want it to end up like the X-Files, which lasted about three years past when it should have. I don't look for all of the questions to be answered. In fact, I am kind of looking for most of the questions to remain questions. There are some things that are just unexplainable. The smoke monster for one, what is it? Who created it? Who is this enigmatic "Dharma" group that got Ben there in the first place? And who were the other people that were already on the island? We know they are not part of Dharma. Are they survivors of the Black Rock shipwreck?

One thing I would like to know is what happened to Michael and his kid, Walt?

Usually before the new season they would do a kind of "catch up" show, which discusses the major happenings, refreshes everyone's memories, and brings everyone up to date. It is mostly a discussion show with some clips. They did that differently last night. I didn't watch it (we DVRed it), because I was busy watching the Wildcats make the Jayhawks run around like chickens with their heads cut off (go 'Cats!). At any rate, I did get to see a few minutes, and what they did was show last season's finale, but with pop-up info texts explaining what was happening and giving some background. It was a neat way to get everyone caught up. Or, it would have been if we hadn't been in some stupid winter weather warning so that the bottom left half of the screen wasn't taken up with the little map and text 'splainin what the map meant.

Nigerian scammer's comeuppance

We've all received them. Those emails. Written with poor spelling and a more poor command of the English language. The person is the son/daughter/nephew of some deposed dictator or high government official in Nigeria. Or perhaps it is just from some corrupt bank official in same said country.

The premise is always the same. There are several millions of US dollars in some account that the originator of the email can't get to by themselves, but with your generous help, they can. And for your troubles, they will reward you with great sums of dollars. Sometimes several millions of dollars. All you have to do is be willing to say you are somehow entitled to the money.

Of course it's a scam. Usually there is some sort of processing fee involved, probably several thousand dollars, or possibly tens of thousands of dollars. But really, what is the four or five or twelve thousand dollars when you stand to gain $1.5 million? Peanuts. So you go through all of this, fork over your money, only to find out there isn't any money. Never was, never will be. It is all a scam.

These scams, come to be known as Nigerian email scams, are also known as 419 scams. The 419 is the section of the Nigerian penal code which deals with these types of scams. That's kind of a laugh though. I guess just because a law is on the books, doesn't mean that the law is ever enforced. But I'm starting to ramble. What I wanted to talk about here is the saga of Nicholas Okorie.

Nicholas Okorie is one of those adorable Nigerian scammers. His problem is that he contacted the wrong person. No, he didn't get in trouble with the law (at least, as far as I know) but he did receive some justice.

You can read Okorie's story here, at 419eater.com It's really quite an amusing story. Suffice it to say, he was talked into getting a tattoo to prove his 'worthiness' of the finances he was trying to scam from a church. Here's the picture he sent to the church proving his tattoo. You have to read the whole story though, it is quite imaginative. Makes me wish I had the time and knowledge to mess with people like this. The tat is the 'church' logo. Here is a better picture of the tat.

Showdown

Those of you who know me know that I'm not some crazed sports nut. Sure, I like the Chiefs, and I like to watch the Royals play when I can. But if I miss the game, its no big deal. I've never been much into sports. Probably because growing up I was simply too fat and too slow to play sports to any degree of anything.

We played neighborhood pick up baseball games, and they were always fun, and I cherish those memories. But I was never part of a real team. My older brother was exceptional at baseball. He was in the summer leagues up through junior high (yes, that's right, back then we didn't have middle schools, we had junior highs). And he was good. Real good. I believe to this day he could have played, at least in the minors, with success. I also believe the reason he quit was because the Ol' Man was just too pushy and overbearing about it all. So much so that my brother would choose to walk away from a game he loved, rather than put up with the Ol' Man.

I can't remember the last basketball game I watched clean through (other than at college when it really wasn't about watching the game so much as socializing). But tomorrow I'll have my eyes on the tube watching the KU/KSU game. I really don't know anything about these two teams. Other than what has been in the headlines. KU is currently undefeated. KSU is 14-4, undefeated in conference play. Both teams are in the AP Top 25 (KU at 2 and KSU at 22). KU is once again getting, in my opinion, the raw deal. They are 20-0 and the AP #1 team is 19-0. But that is the curse of being in Kansas. You get no respect. I remember the World Series between the Kansas City Royals and the St. Louis Cardinals. It was the first series I ever remember where the Goodyear blimp wasn't present. But who cared? It was only Missouri right? This kind of thing is all to familiar to those of us in fly-over country.

Against common sense (not to mention everyone in my family) I'm rooting for the 'Cats. Yes, that's right, I'm hoping that KSU beats the 'Hawks. Why? Living only 30 minutes from Jayhawk HQ (Lawrence) and about 70 minutes for Wildcat HQ (Manhattan), and having spent a couple of years attending KU, it would seem natural for me to be rooting for the 'Hawks.

But I'm an underdog kind of guy. I don't have any love for either brand, but KSU is certainly due. It's been something like 24 years since KSU has beaten KU at basketball at KSU. With a record like that, the law of averages has to, just has to catch up at some point. Plus, KU has to lose a game sometime (yeah, that's probably what people said about the football team), and I'd like that loss to be handed to them by KSU. If KSU were to pull off a win, it would certainly be one of those David and Goliath style upsets (and I don't mean that kid and his dog).

Either way, it is sure to be an exciting game, and I'm looking forward to watching it.

WHY MEN ARE NEVER DEPRESSED

This came in the email today (well, okay, it came yesterday, but I didn't read it until today). And I thought it was just to true not to share.

Your last name stays put.

The garage is all yours.

Wedding plans take care of themselves.

Chocolate is just another snack.

You can be President.

You can never be pregnant.

You can wear a white T-shirt to a water park.

You can wear NO shirt to a water park.

Car mechanics tell you the truth.

The world is your urinal.

You never have to drive to another gas station restroom because this one is just too icky.

You don't have to stop and think of which way to turn a nut on a bolt.

Same work, more pay.

Wrinkles add character.

A wedding dress is $5,000 but a Tux rents for $100.

People never stare at your chest when you're talking to them.

The occasional well-rendered belch is practically expected.

New shoes don't cut, blister, or mangle your feet.

One mood all the time.

Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.

You know stuff about tanks.

A five-day vacation requires one suitcase.

You can open all your own jars You get extra credit for the slightest act of thoughtfulness.

If someone forgets to invite you, he or she can still be your friend.
Your underwear is $8.95 for a three-pack.

Three pairs of shoes are more than enough.

You almost never have strap problems in public.

You are unable to see wrinkles in your clothes.

Everything on your face stays its original color.

The same hairstyle lasts for years, maybe decades!

You only have to shave your face and neck.
You can play with toys all your life.

Your belly usually hides your big hips.

One wallet and one pair of shoes, one color for all seasons.

You can wear shorts no matter how your legs look.

You can "do" your nails with a pocket knife.

You have freedom of choice concerning growing a mustache.

You can do Christmas shopping for 25 relatives on December 24 in 25 minutes.