“And then?”

Whoa, I really disappeared there for about a week. I can’t really explain what happened. Pure laziness really. Last year, I killed BEDA. No problems. The fact that I was unemployed at the time I think helped a lot. Blogging kind of became the one thing I HAD to do everyday, so it helped to have that one constant. Gave me a routine. Being employed can really sap your blogging energy. I thought about blogging a lot last week. Never did it. Not having Internet at my apartment doesn’t help either. The prospect of going back to the office just to blog isn’t that appealing. Enough excuses though. At least I’m making the effort now.

So, like millions of other people I was working on my taxes at the last minute yesterday. Got about $1,400 coming back to me, which I’m happy about. Journalism isn’t exactly a really lucrative career in case any readers out there didn’t know. I live comfortably pretty cheaply though, so I don’t want anyone to worry. Still, the $1,400 will provide a nice cushion in case of emergencies.

Went to the movies the other day to see “Source Code” and ended up seeing “Your Highness” instead. Get ready. Here comes that rant I was supposed to write on Day 10…

So, “Source Code” was playing at the small four-screen theater just down the street from where I live. It’s considered the cheap theater in town with $5 ticket prices. I get there, say, “One for ‘Source Code’ please” and am informed that I would be the only one in that showing. Apparently they won’t play the movie for just one person. Is there a different movie I would like to see? My choices are “Your Highness” and something else. In retrospect I should have said, “Nope. Only wanted to see ‘Source Code.’ Guess you’re going to lose my business. Peace out.” But I was already there, I was in the mood to see something, and decided to go with “Your Highness.” Pretty mediocre. Mildly amusing in a stupid way. More on that later. Later on I was thinking about it, and realized what bullshit it was that I couldn’t see “Source Code” the movie I actually wanted to go to. Why the f@ck couldn’t they show it for just one person? What kind of lame rule is that? Do the operational costs of showing the film to just one person not make it worth it? Is there something I’m missing here? I think the guy was being lazy and didn’t feel like getting the movie started for just me, so he thought he’d try to sell me on one of the films he already had the reel going for. I came in just a few minutes before the movies started. My theory is that if I had shown up 15 minutes sooner I would’ve been able to see “Source Code” since he wouldn’t have known who else was going to show up for it. I’m never going to let that theater jerk me around like that again. If this same scenario happens again, I’m walking out. They’re not going to take my money and force me into going to something I don’t want to see.

So, about that movie that was forced on me, “Your  Highness.” It’s stupid. There are a lot of dick jokes. And…that’s about it. There’s a movie review for you in two sentences. But it did make me laugh a few times. It got me thinking about other movies that are just plain stupid, but in that stupidity a little humor somehow surfaces. So, on that note, here is yesterday’s Day 18 topic, a Top Ten list (one of the themes I suggested to Becky). My Top Ten Stupid/Funny Movies (in no particular order and open to suggestions):

10. Dumb and Dumber. A classic. Just when I think you couldn’t possibly be any dumber, you go and do something like this…and totally redeem yourself!

9. Anchorman. Completely absurd. Doesn’t really make any sense at all. Somehow it works.

8. Billy Madison. Fifty years from now, if you wanted to show someone one movie that embodies the essence of Adam Sandler’s entire filmography, you’d perhaps go to this film.

7. Team America: World Police. There’s a hardcore sex scene. With puppets.

6. The Jerk. Steve Martin stars as the son of a poor black sharecropper. And that’s just the beginning of the ridiculousness.

5. The Austin Powers franchise. Other than some clever nods to classic James Bond films, these movies are the definition of stupid/funny.

4. Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. Twelve-year-old Blake loved this stuff.

3. Zoolander. Almost as stupid as the title character.

2. Super Troopers. That scene where they’re chugging bottles of syrup? They are actually chugging bottles of syrup.

The order of the nine films I just mentioned doesn’t really matter, and are interchangeable with movies I didn’t even list. The following movie though is truly my no. 1 stupid/funny movie of all time. It is pure, concentrated stupid, and yet it is funny to me in a way that defies all logic.

1. Dude, Where’s My Car? The premise is completely absurd. Two stoners can’t recall their activities from the night before, and begin retracing their steps to locate their missing car. Along the way they encounter aliens and have to find the Continuum Transfunctioner in order to save the planet. What? Much of the humor is derived from ridiculous exchanges like this:

Jesse: Dude! You got a tattoo!
Chester: So do you, dude! Dude, what does my tattoo say?
Jesse: "Sweet!" What about mine?
Chester: "Dude!" What does mine say?
Jesse: "Sweet!" What about mine?
Chester: "Dude!" What does mine say?
Jesse: "Sweet!" What about mine?
Chester: "Dude!" What does mine say?
Jesse: "Sweet!" What about mine?
Chester: "Dude!" But what does mine say?
Jesse: "Sweet!" What about mine?
Chester: "Dude!" What does mine say?

“Tell you where I’d go. Zihuatanejo.”

A tornado touched down about 45 minutes south of Rhinelander last night. Today a photographer and I headed down there to cover the aftermath. Nobody died and only three people sustained injuries that required them to be helicoptered to the hospital, but the damage was pretty significant. This house was nothing but foundation and chimney post tornado.

The family who lived there was at church during the storm. They came home to find their house literally gone. Can you imagine? One day you’re just living your life. Waking up, eating breakfast, going to school/work, socializing, etc. Then something happens and all of that stuff becomes inconsequential. A tornado wipes out your house, and suddenly your life becomes salvaging what you can, finding a temporary place to live, and beginning the process of rebuilding your home. A whole new set of worries you didn’t want or need.

Of course in this situation it’s just stuff. Stuff that can be cleaned up, and rebuilt like nothing ever happened. It doesn’t compare to loss of life and something like the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Maybe that’s why the people I talked to today were upbeat for the most part. They realized how lucky they were that Mother Nature only destroyed property and not human lives. They were just going about their business, helping each other out by breaking down fallen trees and moving personal belongings out of destroyed homes. In between they took breaks to throw back a few beers. Sure they have the hassle of repairing or, in some cases, rebuilding their homes. But there was an “oh well” attitude to it all, which is admirable. It happened. Now let’s move on and do what we have to do. Still, the sudden, life-changing power Mother Nature has is always surprising. It took 30 seconds for this tornado to rip through and cause damage that will take the area’s residents months to fix. 30 seconds.

One minute something is a certain way, and the next it is not…

I’ve been a bad BEDAer

I missed Friday and Saturday. How did that happen?

I partially blame the fact that I don’t have Internet in my apartment. I’m a five minute walk away from my office, but I guess writing the daily BEDA post wasn’t a big enough incentive for me to go back to the office once I got home on Friday.

And Saturday just got away from me. The sports editor for the paper was out of town this weekend and asked me to shoot a couple of sporting events for him on Saturday. The second of those was a high school girls’ soccer game in the Wausau area, which is about an hour south of Rhinelander. I have a friend who lives in Wausau, so after I was done shooting the soccer game I ended up staying down there for the night and didn’t drive back home until earlier this afternoon.

So, I guess I’ll catch up with the daily themes quickly:

Follow Friday, suggest a blog you follow….I don’t really read any blogs. I do have a friend though who currently writes for the Kansas City Star, and before that wrote for the Lawrence Journal World in Lawrence, Kan. He covered University of Kansas sports while he was there, and occasionally wrote blog posts that usually  had nothing to do with his beat. They were pretty funny. An example.

Saturday was supposed to be the photo essay. I had big plans for that post. I was going to put something really special together. Oh well. Maybe I can do that later. For now, here’s one of the sports photos I took yesterday:

And then today’s topic, “Off Your Chest–Get something off your chest: your pet peeves, opinions, rants…”

Oh boy, do I have some opinions. This one topic could easily last me for the rest of BEDA. In fact, an old blog of mine from years ago (a Xanga site I believe), had a name that was based loosely on Pierre Bernard’s Recliner of Rage, a bit that Conan O’Brien had on his old Late Show on NBC. It’s getting late though and I have to get to bed. Rain check?

“Why aren’t you wearing your pants, Joe?”

Things I Love Thursday:

Tracy Morgan on “Conan.” That man is out of control. I like the name Morgan. For a girl’s name mostly. There are of course a lot of male Morgans. Like Morgan Freeman. My go-to Morgan Freeman movie would probably be…I don’t know. So many good ones. Definitely not “Outbreak.” Not unwatchable, but not really very good either. It’s weird to think how many big names are in that movie. Kevin Spacey, Donald Sutherland. Cuba Gooding Jr. not too long before he won his Oscar. Man, Cuba Gooding Jr. How has he been in so many bad movies since “Jerry Maguire”? Oh yeah, Dustin Hoffman was in “Outbreak” too. Probably my favorite actor of that generation. I recently watched “Midnight Cowboy” again. Those last five minutes…heartbreaking. Hoffman and Jon Voight are so good in it. I once saw Jon Voight chilling in a sidewalk cafe in Sarasota, Fla. He was in town for the annual film festival. Man, if I was still living in Florida right now I would already be complaining about how hot it is. But now I live in the northwoods of Wisconsin and April means beautiful, moderate temperatures, not sickening heat. I love spring. Means I can bust out the flip flops. I love flip flops. That’s all I would wear 24/7, 365 if it was socially acceptable. I even run barefoot. Shoes just screw our feet up. Who was the guy who invented shoes? I hate that guy. Oh wait, this is supposed to be about things I love. So, yeah, I love spring, and flip flops, and…baseball. Had some beers and watched the Brewers game after work yesterday with a buddy. I love that Brewers’ reliever Kameron Loe has a pet boa constrictor called Angel. Thing I don’t love? That the Brewers – unlike Loe’s previous teams – apparently don’t allow him to keep it in the clubhouse. Lame Brewers. Lame. Look at all the names of Wisconsin’s professional sports franchises. Brewers, Packers, Bucks. If you had a form a vision of the typical Wisconsinite on that alone, you’d probably come up with some hairy, burly, meatpacking, beer guzzling hunter. That doesn’t describe me at all. Not hairy or burly. I do enjoy a good micro brew, but I’m not the beer guzzling type. I am the milk guzzling type however. I suppose that’s where I can fit into some sort of Wisconsin stereotype. I love my milk. Chocolate milk. Milk and cookies. Specifically milk and Oreos…

Okay. Hold up. Going to  have to end this post right there. Got to get some Oreos and milk now.

——————————

Movie quote contest update:

Manda- 1

Autumn- 1

Laura Grace- 1

Becky- 1

Nicola- 1 (She knew that yesterday’s quote was from “Almost Famous.”)

Everyone else- 0

“I’m always home. I’m uncool.”

Best live entertainment experience. I can’t pick just one.

There was the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles concert when I was a young lad.

There was the Billy Joel/Elton John concert in St. Louis my freshman year of college.

There was the Green Day concert in St. Louis a few years after that.

Can sporting events be included under this topic? If so, there’s every single Packer game I’ve ever been to. Each one is special, but particularly memorable are a Tampa Bay game in 1994 in which Packer RB Edgar Bennett Lambeau leaped right into my arms and a playoff game during the 2003-04 season. That was the one where that cocky douche Matt Hasselbeck said, “We want the ball. We’re going to score.” Then he proceeded to stare down his receiver running an out route to the sideline, and Al Harris jumped it and returned it for a pick six and the win. Everyone in the stadium could tell what was about to happen except for Hasselbeck. I was already out of my seat and going crazy before Hasselbeck even released the ball. I could see where his eyes were going and that Harris immediately recognized it. Man, so sweet.

Let’s see. What else?

There was the Styx concert in Sarasota, Fla. a few months after I first moved there. My friend wore this ridiculous multi-colored windbreaker from the 1980s that he found at a Goodwill. We got good and hammered and grooved out to epic classics like “Lady” and “Come Sail Away.”

There was the four days I spent in Manchester, Tenn. at the Bonnaroo music festival during the summer of 2008. Unbelievable. As close as our generation can get to experiencing some semblance of what Woodstock might have been like.

There was the time in college I saw Dave Coulier (a.k.a. Uncle Joey from “Full House”) do stand-up. His material is in the PG-13 range and pretty quality.

And then there’s every day I wake up. What better live entertainment than the world?

———————————

Movie quote contest update:

Manda- 1

Autumn-1

Laura Grace-1

Becky-1

Everyone else-0

“I’m the dude playing the dude disguised as another dude. You’re the dude who don’t know what dude he is!”

Well, so much for BEDA. I guess now my quest is  BEDAAETD (Blog Every Day in April Except for Two Days). Doesn’t really roll off the tongue, huh?

I kind of  have a good excuse for missing out on Days Three and Four. There was a special section my newspaper was putting out, and I had to use the weekend to catch up on stuff I was writing for it. It was near impossible to do it during the week when I was doing day-to-day stuff for the following day’s regular edition of the paper. I explained this to Becky. She understood. So, I feel like I have an excused BEDA absence. I was planning on posting last night, but I kind of crashed early. That national championship game put me to sleep. Dear UConn and Butler, if I wanted to watch a 53-41 basketball game with teams shooting under 40 percent I’d go to a girls’ high school basketball game. Geez.

So, like a good BEDAite, BEDAer, BEDAian, whatever, I’ll at least catch up on the topics of the last couple of days.

Day 3: Crushes

Celebrity – Zooey Deschanel. Just something about her. That’s why Joseph Gordon-Levitt couldn’t help but fall in love with her in “(500) Days of Summer” even though she told him she didn’t believe in love.

Literary – Chuck Palahniuk, author of “Fight Club,” “Choke,” “Diary,” etc. He’s a twisted f#ck and I love it.

Musician – Billie Joe Armstrong, front man of Green Day. I believe Nate mentioned him as well. Saw Green Day in concert a few  years back when they were on their American Idiot tour, and man, does Billie Joe know how to put on a show.

Inexplicable- Oprah. It’s inexplicable. I don’t have to explain.

Day 4: Advice

Not the best advice, but the most memorable I’ve ever received: Never pay for your girlfriend’s boob job. I think I might have mentioned this in a previous blog post from last year, and in that post I provided the complete backstory to this piece of advice. For fun though, I’m not giving any context this time.

And that brings us to today’s topic: If I won the lottery…

Are you kidding me? Who came up with this topic? I would NEVER want to win the lottery. Do I need to explain?

If I won the lottery, this is what my intentions would be: Make some investments in order to sustain the winnings. Pay off some debt. Look into some charitable contributions. Get a new car. Nothing extravagant. Something reasonable and reliable. Quit my job and do some serious traveling/soul searching for a solid year before settling back into a normal life.

This is what would ACTUALLY happen to me: Enjoy the attention and the freedoms money allows for a while (several months, a year, a couple of years, who knows). Become overwhelmed by that attention. Fall into a bad crowd of people who I think are my friends, but really are just interested in my money. Realize I can’t trust anyone. Become a recluse. Give whatever I have left to charities. Move to northern Mexico and live in the Copper Canyons among the Tarahumara.

Actually, that doesn’t sound bad. I like the end result there. Maybe I do want to win the lottery?

Click here to learn about my obsession with the Tarahumara. I’ve previously written about it.

————————————

Movie quote contest update:

Manda: 1

Autumn: 1

Laura Grace: 1

Everyone else: 0

I’ve decided to award points to the first two who guess the quote each day. I’m going to have to stick with the honor system here obviously. I’m not going to be able to know for sure if someone actually knew the quote or just copied whoever was first to comment. I feel like all you fellow BEDAers are good, honest folk though. We’ll see how this goes. I might even expand it to the first three later. I just want to award more people who might know the quote even if they weren’t the first to comment.

“You talkin’ to me?”

There is your movie quote for

the day. Easy one.

 

Did you see what I just did above? You talkin’ to me? (Five syllables). There is your movie quote for (Seven syllables). the day. Easy one (Five syllables). As all you fellow BEDA participants know, today’s topic is writing about our days in haiku form. So, I thought I’d start off with a haiku as well. Now don’t be blown away at how smoothly I incorporated today’s post title and my promise of a movie quote every day into a haiku. You see, I’m a professional haiku writer. Becky is probably the only one reading who already knows this. Remember how I mentioned her large influence yesterday? She’s actually the one who got me into haiku writing. AND she was the one that gave me the opportunity to get my haiku out to a wider audience.

On Jan. 3, I received an email from Becky with this subject: Want to help me write some haikus?? Becky was preparing some material for a library research class she was teaching. She decided she was going to have a bunch of haiku about various Mississippi River Basin related subjects then let the students match the haiku to the appropriate topic. She had a bunch of suggested subjects, then put the call out to me and others to help with the haiku writing. I thought, hey, sure, I’ll write one for kicks. But then I got the fever, and the only prescription was more haiku.

In the end, I contributed five haiku, four of which made the top 15 that Becky used in her presentation. My haiku started and anchored her presentation, and were well received by the students. That’s when I knew I had “the gift” and I decided to turn professional. My most recent haiku activity involved an epic email exchange with Becky between March 3 and March 21 in which we corresponded only in haiku form. I have to admit, I got a little burnt out after that. Just went too hard, too fast. I feel refreshed now though. In fact, I was the one who suggested today’s topic to Becky.

So, here you go. Readers, you’re in for a real treat. Here is my day in haiku….from a professional haiku writer:

Wake up. Golden Grahams.

To the office for some work.

On Saturday? Yuck.

————————–

I hope everyone enjoyed that. Now before I sign off for the day, I’ll do an update on the month-long movie quote contest. Two people correctly guessed yesterday’s quote, “Allow myself to introduce…myself.” It is from the 1997 classic “Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery.”

Manda was the first to guess correctly, but I’m also awarding a point to Autumn, who says she didn’t look at the other comments before posting her guess. I believe her.

So, the current standings:

Manda: 1

Autumn: 1

Everyone else: 0

“Allow myself to introduce…myself.”

Alright, first day of BEDA. Well, for me it’s more like BOIA (Blog only in April). At least that’s what happened with me last year as I dominated BEDA, then let my blog quickly die in May. I’m going to try not to let that happen this time around, but as I told Becky, no promises. Perhaps by taking the pressure off myself and not making those promises to blog more frequently, I will actually blog more frequently. We’ll see.

I like what Becky did with her intro post, so I’m going to do something similar I think. Anyone reading this should first of all know that Becky Canovan has a huge influence on me. For example, the title of my blog: Reptiles of the Mind. Becky came up with that the other day. Since I hadn’t posted on this blog since last May, I wanted a fresh start for BEDA 2011 and thus, a new name. Rather than come up with something myself, I wrote “TBD by Becky” on my BEDA form. I know Becky works very hard at her job, but I can only assume she did nothing this past Tuesday but brainstorm blog titles for me based on the number of emails I received from her. My name, Blake Winters, served as her main inspiration. That led her to go on a William Blake frenzy. “Reptiles of the Mind” came from a Blake quote. Here’s the full quote:

“The man who never alters his opinion is like standing water, and breeds reptiles of the mind.”

So, on that note, here’s what you need to know about me by the numbers…

2: The number of names I have. There’s Blake Winters, and then my actual birth name. Blake Winters is a pen name I developed for myself back in high school. So long ago in fact, that I can’t even really remember why I decided to come up with a pen name in the first place. I do remember why I settled on Blake Winters though. I thought Blake was a cool first name and what better to accompany a cool first name than the coldest season of the year.

0: The number of people who passed my movie quote quiz that I did as one of my BEDA posts last year. It wasn’t a difficult quiz — I thought — but people failed miserably. I mention that in order to segue into this fact about myself: I love movies and reference them a lot. And as you can see, the title of this BEDA intro post is what else, a movie quote. First BEDA participant who correctly guesses what movie the quote is from gets a point. Every post this month will have a different movie quote. The overall winner at the end of BEDA gets a prize. Seriously.

308,745,538: The U.S. population according to the 2010 Census. I worked for the Census Bureau last spring and summer during the count. I was personally responsible for counting around 1,000 of that 300+ million and some of those people did not make things easy. That’s right, I’m talking about you Denis Turner!

27: My age. Also the age of Bart Starr, Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers when they won their first NFL championship. When I discovered this fact, I became incredibly confident about the Packers’ chances in the Super Bowl in February. In fact, I had no doubt at all. Weird trends like that matter to the universe.

3: Number of states I’ve lived in. Quick recap: Born and raised in Janesville, WI. College at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Mo. Three years living in Sarasota, FL after college. Currently living in Rhinelander, WI where I write for a newspaper called The Northwoods River News.

7: The hours since I took a 5-hour energy shot, and I’m still riding it. Man, that stuff works. Especially for someone like me who doesn’t really consume caffeine with any regularity. The label on the 5-hour energy says it’s the equivalent of a cup of premium coffee. I needed a little jolt at lunch today. My paper’s putting out a special section next week and it was a little hectic finishing everything for that this week while still doing the day-to-day stuff for the next day’s paper.

13: The number of years Becky says she’s known me according to her blog post today. I think it’s closer to 12 though.

6-5: The score yesterday’s Brewers’ game would have been if I had pitched the ninth inning instead of John Axford. For those who don’t follow baseball, the Brewers lost to the Reds on opening day yesterday 7-6. They were up 6-3 going into the ninth inning, but Brewers closer John Axford gave up four runs including a three-run homer with two outs to lose the game. Now don’t roll your eyes. Hear me out. The Reds hitters wouldn’t have known what to do with my 50 mph junk. I likely would have allowed some hits and a couple of runs, but I don’t think one inning would have been long enough for the Reds to fully adjust to such a slow speed after seeing true major league pitching all game. They would have been in front of my pitches, probably producing some catchable fly balls. Bottom line, I would’ve held on for the win.

Countless: The number of ridiculous, outlandish things I say on a daily basis. For example, the above paragraph.

I think that’s enough for Day 1. I look forward to the next month everyone!

I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti

Everyone is familiar with this quote said by Hannibal Lecter in “The Silence of the Lambs.” Even if one had never even seen the movie, I would imagine he or she would still recognize the quote. It’s one of those things that’s ingrained into pop culture. What I have written in the title though is only part of the famous quote. Eating liver. Fava beans. Nice chianti. These are the memorable parts of the quote. Most people probably don’t remember what precedes it. You don’t think about it because it’s not the meat of the quote. It’s not what strikes you. It’s not what stays with you. The full quote is as follows:

“A census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.”

Census taker. The liver that Hannibal Lecter eats with some fava beans and a nice chianti belonged to a census taker. It’s a part of the quote that I had forgotten as well until I became a census taker. Now I think about the quote occasionally. Why did it have to be a census taker? Why not an overly aggressive door-to-door salesman? Someone there to gather simple biographical information certainly didn’t deserve to become dinner.

This doesn’t make me fearful of my present temporary employment. All of the addresses I’m responsible for are around where I live. I’m familiar with the area. I’m not trekking into the middle of nowhere and potentially stumbling upon meth labs like this poor census taker might have. It’s just interesting how suddenly the entirety of the famous Hannibal Lecter quote came back to me once I became a census taker. I guess it’ll make me more aware. I’ll be sure to be careful when I’m talking to someone who is looking  me up and down while licking his lips.

P.S. I did some more reading and it turns out that census taker’s death I linked to above was actually ruled a suicide. Apparently he staged his death so that his son could collect on $600,000 of life insurance. That never works. Didn’t he watch movies?

The Easiest Job in the World

That would be working as an enumerator for the U.S. Census Bureau.

This is by far the easiest job I have ever had in my life, and let me tell you, I’ve had some pretty easy ones. In college, I worked as a projectionist for a student film organization that showed $1 movies on the weekends. That job involved putting a DVD into a DVD player and pressing “play.” That job was more difficult than my current Census job. Sometimes the equipment was a bit temperamental, which can be stressful when there’s an auditorium full of people ready to watch a movie.

I also once worked as a job coach for a job development agency for handicapped people. That job involved WATCHING people work. That was literally what I did. Of course that job could be challenging because I had to know my clients’ jobs well enough to teach them how to perform better and more efficiently.

There is nothing remotely difficult about this Census job. The only difficult thing so far was surviving that mind numbing week of training. Maybe it’s my journalism experience that makes this easy for me. I’m good at tracking down people and interviewing them.

Now that I’m acting all cocky, I’ll probably encounter a challenging situation. I can’t imagine what though. Even if there’s an address that you’re having a hard time getting information for, all the Census Bureau expects is for you to make the required six attempts of contacting that household. After that, they just give the address to a different enumerator.

When I worked at Papa John’s for a couple of summers, it was more challenging. And there I made half of what the Census Bureau is currently paying me.