Is Summer officially here? It’s hard to tell amidst the random balls of weekday lighting and unbearably hot weekends. It’s all a bit confusing, but so is walking down the street for some people. If the change of a season can bring anything…its enlightenment!
So I am going to selfishly share with you some things that have occurred to me as we dust off the t-shirts and become self conscious about pale skin and body types.
NAT GEO Channel
Great channel, perfect couch potato television because you can convince yourself you are actually ‘learning something’ while doing nothing. There are programs on NAT GEO that remind us how beautiful the world can be, but they are now grossly outnumbered by shows about the end of the world. Not only are they filled with impending doom, but they are littered with crappy CGI to illustrate their morbid sensibilities. Is a gamma ray really going to start shooting out of the Milky Way, vaporizing the East Coast? According to NAT GEO it is, so hold onto your fucking hats!
Just look at this list of uplifting titles:
The Whale That Exploded (I wish I made this one up)
How to Kill a Planet
Exploding Las Vegas
Dino Death Trap
Seconds from Disaster: Crash of the Comet
Osmosis Jones
Who Really Killed Jesus?
Hitler and the Occult
Deadliest Planets
I am not going to stop watching, but could we up the happy a bit? I need more shows about the importance of prehensile thumbs or a 9-foot-tall Lithuanian who prefers to shun the spotlight of the circus. NAT GEO, I love you, please stop talking about the end of days. We know the world is crumbling around us, just find a way to make it more exciting.
Suggestions for new NAT GEO shows:
How to Avoid Hipsters: The Definition of a Meaningless Subculture
The Plus Side of Pirates and Pirating
Monkeys, Dinosaurs, Meerkats and other Totally Awesome Things
Pandas: Falling and Staying In Love
Search for The Elusive Narwhal
Chimps Who Don't Attack Humans
More Enlightenment:
ENCORE MOVIE CHANNELS
I don’t have any fancy movie channels at my tree house, but I do have about 17 Encore channels. There is such a wide range of films from all genres. I am so hooked I have just about abandoned my DVD collection. Here are some films I have discovered while enjoying the ENCORE catalogue:
Ladyhawke (1985):
Rutger Hauer and Michelle Pfeiffer are medieval lovers who have been cursed by an evil priest. Rutger turns into a Wolf at night and Michelle turns into a Hawk by day. This curse must be lifted so they call on a petty thief, Matthew Broderick, who goes by the name: Mouse.
The score is amazing as well as some beautiful scenery. The only problem is the ridiculous amount of crying Broderick does throughout the movie. It’s simply odd and distracting.
Little Murders (1971):
A girl brings home her latest boyfriend, Elliot Gould, to meet her parents. This is done against the background of random shootings that had just begun in NYC.
Elliot Gould plays a pretentious artist so full of himself and oblivious to others that you have to imagine his character birthed Eli Cash of The Royal Tennenbaums. It was also directed by the amazing, Alan Arkin.
Rumble Fish (1983):
Wow…this movie is absolutely stunning. It can be watched without sound it looks so gorgeous. I don’t know how this was received by critics when released, but I am guessing they considered it an ‘experimental’ film by Coppola. Matt Dillon does lonliness so well, but Mickey Rourke crushes it from the moment he rolls up on his motorcycle. PLEASE check this one out.
Don't go see Christian Bale scream and yell at Terminators all summer long...just watch ENCORE.
Rourke In Rumble Fish
So I am going to selfishly share with you some things that have occurred to me as we dust off the t-shirts and become self conscious about pale skin and body types.
NAT GEO Channel
Great channel, perfect couch potato television because you can convince yourself you are actually ‘learning something’ while doing nothing. There are programs on NAT GEO that remind us how beautiful the world can be, but they are now grossly outnumbered by shows about the end of the world. Not only are they filled with impending doom, but they are littered with crappy CGI to illustrate their morbid sensibilities. Is a gamma ray really going to start shooting out of the Milky Way, vaporizing the East Coast? According to NAT GEO it is, so hold onto your fucking hats!
Just look at this list of uplifting titles:
The Whale That Exploded (I wish I made this one up)
How to Kill a Planet
Exploding Las Vegas
Dino Death Trap
Seconds from Disaster: Crash of the Comet
Osmosis Jones
Who Really Killed Jesus?
Hitler and the Occult
Deadliest Planets
I am not going to stop watching, but could we up the happy a bit? I need more shows about the importance of prehensile thumbs or a 9-foot-tall Lithuanian who prefers to shun the spotlight of the circus. NAT GEO, I love you, please stop talking about the end of days. We know the world is crumbling around us, just find a way to make it more exciting.
Suggestions for new NAT GEO shows:
How to Avoid Hipsters: The Definition of a Meaningless Subculture
The Plus Side of Pirates and Pirating
Monkeys, Dinosaurs, Meerkats and other Totally Awesome Things
Pandas: Falling and Staying In Love
Search for The Elusive Narwhal
Chimps Who Don't Attack Humans
More Enlightenment:
ENCORE MOVIE CHANNELS
I don’t have any fancy movie channels at my tree house, but I do have about 17 Encore channels. There is such a wide range of films from all genres. I am so hooked I have just about abandoned my DVD collection. Here are some films I have discovered while enjoying the ENCORE catalogue:
Ladyhawke (1985):
Rutger Hauer and Michelle Pfeiffer are medieval lovers who have been cursed by an evil priest. Rutger turns into a Wolf at night and Michelle turns into a Hawk by day. This curse must be lifted so they call on a petty thief, Matthew Broderick, who goes by the name: Mouse.
The score is amazing as well as some beautiful scenery. The only problem is the ridiculous amount of crying Broderick does throughout the movie. It’s simply odd and distracting.
Little Murders (1971):
A girl brings home her latest boyfriend, Elliot Gould, to meet her parents. This is done against the background of random shootings that had just begun in NYC.
Elliot Gould plays a pretentious artist so full of himself and oblivious to others that you have to imagine his character birthed Eli Cash of The Royal Tennenbaums. It was also directed by the amazing, Alan Arkin.
Rumble Fish (1983):
Wow…this movie is absolutely stunning. It can be watched without sound it looks so gorgeous. I don’t know how this was received by critics when released, but I am guessing they considered it an ‘experimental’ film by Coppola. Matt Dillon does lonliness so well, but Mickey Rourke crushes it from the moment he rolls up on his motorcycle. PLEASE check this one out.
Don't go see Christian Bale scream and yell at Terminators all summer long...just watch ENCORE.
Rourke In Rumble Fish
Gould in Little Murders
Rutger In Ladyhawke
