Category Archives: Social

Please Stop Remaking My Childhood…

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220px-fridaythe13th2009The release this week of Pet Sematary is just the latest example of the lack of creativity in Hollywood today. Admittedly, it’s been getting great reviews, and the original was an average movie at best, but I don’t think there were many people screaming for it to be revisited in the first place. Well, perhaps Stephen King was on board with it, but he’s certainly not averse to the odd retake anyway.

ghostbusters_2016_film_posterI guess, if we must see things a second time, the very least a filmmaker can do is polish up something that wasn’t very good in the first place. The object of the exercise should be to improve upon the source material. If it isn’t, why are you wasting everyone’s time?

Point-Break-2015-Poster-Advance-Style-buy-original-movie-posters-at-starstillsOf course, there are some examples where the revision is better than the first try (Scarface, The Thing, The Fly), but for every smile there’s a frown. Does anyone think Jude Law’s version of Alfie is superior to Michael Caine’s effort? Or that the Poltergeist from 2015 is greater than the classic 1982 movie it’s based on? Hell, I didn’t even know that was a thing until recently.

MV5BN2ZiMDMzYWItNDllZC00ZmRmLWI1YzktM2M5M2ZmZDg1OGNlXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNDQ2MTMzODA@._V1_So, with all the remakes, reboots and reimaginings that have done the rounds over the last few years, here are ten properties (not exhaustive, by any means) that I never want to see redone, because I do not believe it is possible for them to be bettered:

  • Airplane!
  • Back to the Future
  • Die Hard
  • Duel
  • Dirty Harry
  • First Blood
  • The Goonies
  • It’s a Wonderful Life
  • Jaws
  • Rocky

Let me be clear: these are not perfect movies. Some of them I wouldn’t even consider to be amongst my favourites. But every one of them is an example of how sometimes, the total package is greater than the sum of a production’s parts.

These movies are quite simply, lightning in a bottle – a confluence of facets and factors that cannot be repeated. They each have an intangible quality that is impossible to quantify, or to replicate a generation later, no matter how talented or dedicated the team working on it may be.

Flying High…

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There’s a fairly good chance that I’ll be taking my first overseas holiday later this year, since a wild stag weekend in 2013 took me to the south of Spain, and that was a whole different kind of thing entirely.

The Girlfriend© and I have narrowed the destination down to, well… most anywhere in mainland Europe really. Except for the cold places, of course. We both fancy Italy, but because we have both been there before and we would like to go somewhere fresh, Croatia is the new favourite. But we’re a long way from confirmed, and we’ll probably look at half a dozen other countries before we finally settle on somewhere.

I don’t want to spend a week lying on the beach, getting drunk. That is not, and has never been, my idea of a good holiday. I like to see new things and experience a different culture: I can drink alcohol anytime. Holidays for me are about getting up early and leaving the hotel behind, until I’m tired and end up back there for a sleep after my daily adventures. Thankfully, The Girlfriend© is of the same opinion, so I won’t have to leave her at home.

Of course, I fancy going back to Orlando, but then, that is always my first choice. Maybe next year!

Lost and Found…

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I’m less than two weeks into my steroid course and things have improved dramatically in the nasal department. I would say I’m sniffing at around 80%, which is a lot more than where I thought I’d be at this point. If it keeps up at this rate I should be able to avoid going under the knife (or tube, or pincers, or whatever the hell it is that they use for that kind of thing – I don’t want to know), even if it does mean going through this twice-daily routine every so many months.

I knew I had lost my sense of smell – probably a short time after it happened – but it never struck me that regaining it would be such a monumental shift, or indeed make that much of a difference. Of the five primary senses, if you had to get rid of one, smell seemed like the most disposable. While I still think that is the case, it’s loss over the last couple of years has certainly made me appreciate it more.

Onwards…

People Are All Kinds of Dumb #11…

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Sometimes having an impromptu blonde moment actually works in your favour, as it did for this Australian guy last week, who forgot he had already bought a lottery ticket, and then bought a second one, using the same numbers.

It turned out that they were the lucky digits that week, and there were three winning tickets for the seventy million dollar jackpot. So instead of receiving just one third of the prizemoney, he walked away with over $46 million instead.

He had been playing the same numbers for over thirty years, and then – like the proverbial bus – two came along at once.

Dumb luck indeed.

Getting Back to My Senses…

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Diesel has quite a strong smell, but yesterday was the first time I was able to pick up the odour for a long time. I was at the garage and spilled some on my hand, and was probably more elated to recognise the toxic stink of escaped fuel than any person really should be.

It was the first of several such memories I had yesterday. I noticed the coffee at work (and suddenly realised why most people think it’s shit); the Cajun tuna sandwich I had for lunch (yes, that’s a thing); and then the air freshener in my car on the way home.

My dinner tasted much better than expected as well. I know smell and taste are connected – and one is always better with the other – but I did not think there would be such a marked difference.

The doctor told me it’s a slow process, but hopefully this is only the beginning of my recovery. My steroid course takes me into May, and with a little luck I’ll be back to full capacity by then.

Choppy Choppy Pee Pee…

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The first thing that The Girlfriend© texts me during the working week is usually, Good morning, honey or some derivation thereof. That said, it was a little disturbing to read the following, first thing this morning:

“25 years since Lorena Bobbitt cut off her husband’s penis.”

All right. Thanks.

For those of you who are either too young to know the reference, or are simply not aware of it, Lorena Bobbitt became somewhat of a celebrity for chopping off John Wayne’s penis (her husband, not the actor with the cowboy hat) on June 23, 1993, and then infamously threw it out of her car, into a field. So as not to make it seem like this was an unprovoked attack, she did claim he had raped her earlier that night, so there’s plenty of wrongdoing to go around.

John Wayne Bobbitt became quite popular in the pop culture of the nineties and went on to have a moderately successful career in porn after the incident, so every cloud and all that.

Still, there are a thousand and one ways to get famous in this world… and let me be crystal, I choose any other one!

People Are All Kinds of Dumb #10…

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I’m actually going to go ahead and give this one to me, because if you can’t have a laugh at your own expense you shouldn’t be laughing at anyone else.

For many years I had trouble sleeping. I eventually did get to sleep every night, but it was usually a struggle to get there. I would often lie there, thinking about what I had done that day, or about what I was meant to be doing tomorrow. I’d think about my stories, and about what I had eaten for dinner. And yeah, sometimes – like the guy here – I’d be counting farmyard animals until even they had gone to sleep.

Silly as it may sound, I never actually knew how to get to sleep. Perhaps I did when I was a child, but somewhere along the line I forgot. When I was in my thirties I discussed this with my wife at the time. I explained to her that I would just lie there in bed, staring into the darkness, waiting for sleep to take me. I didn’t find it particularly funny, but she really laughed hard that night.

Apparently I was doing it wrong all along. She told me to try closing my eyes. That seemed like an odd concept to a fully-grown adult. That act felt like more of an effort in the search for sleep than simply letting my eyes fall shut naturally… but I tried it, and I haven’t looked back since.

So, you’re never too old to learn something new.

Booze, the Devil’s Juice…

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Yesterday I was at a leaving night for The Girlfriend©, who is moving on to new employment pastures. Same job title: new environment… and, more importantly, a step up in all the areas that matter.

There was a meal, followed by a pub quiz, and in amongst all that, there was alcohol. Now, I’m not opposed to alcohol at all – I can certainly enjoy it from time to time – but I know my limits and I stick to them. I do abhor the way alcohol affects some people, and, by extension, how the behaviour of those people affects me and my enjoyment of the night.

I am very competitive when I’m playing games – whether that’s a pub quiz or sat at home on my PlayStation. It’s just how I am. Should I have been a little more forgiving of those around me who cared more about finding the bottom of their glass of red wine than about hearing the next question? Probably. But I think alcohol should be used as a method of relaxation – to put a cap on the end of a long week; or, as in this case, to celebrate a valued colleague who is taking her talents elsewhere.

Last night, some used it as an excuse to be an asshole.

A long-winded way to say I didn’t win? Well, yeah. That too.

Doctor Nose Best…

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I lost my sense of smell over a year ago. I don’t know exactly when, but it was around the time I started seeing The Girlfriend©… so perhaps it was precautionary. This was coupled with the sensation that I was suffering from a cold that just wouldn’t quit. Runny nose one day; blocked nose the next. It hasn’t been pleasant to say the least.

I saw my doctor about it last year because I was getting fed up, and after a few months of nasal sprays with only limited success, I was referred to the hospital for further evaluation. That appointment was this morning, where the consultant advised me that I have polyps blocking my airways.

He has put me on a course of steroids, and given me some nasal capsules which he is confident will work. However, if those things are unsuccessful I’m going to need surgery to take care of it, which is something I’d like to avoid if at all possible.

Then again, maybe I could get a free nose job into the bargain.

People Are All Kinds of Dumb #9…

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This one goes to one of my young work colleagues… one who should probably remain nameless after this little inquiry. So let’s just call him Kieran.

“Don’t you think Dwayne Johnson and The Rock look like the same person?”, he asked.

Yes. They do.

I asked Kieran if he was serious, at which point he questioned whether or not he was thinking of the right… people.

Now, in his defence it would appear that he is not the only one who doesn’t know that The Rock and Dwayne Johnson do indeed share a passport, but I figured that someone in their early twenties would have their finger a little more directly on the pop culture pulse than he apparently does.

I wonder if he knows that J Lo is really just Jennifer Lopez.