The Longest Anything Ever

Just got back from the movie theater. I went to see this year's most promising entry for The Longest Movie Of The Year Oscar as well as The Longest Anything Ever Guiness World Record. I am talking about The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which is currently up for a title change to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: Told In Realtime.

It is a great joy to be writing this. This is one of those great opportunities life gives you to offend lots of people, as this movie is highly rated indeed. People take mortal offense when you attack their likes and dislikes; you say something nasty about a movie they like, and they will murder your family and put animal heads in your bed. But being an orphan, I feel relatively safe from retribution.

As I said, this movie's defining quality is length. You may consider reading the story instead, it will take you half an hour at most. I can't say that the movie is based on the story to any degree, but they do have one thing in common. They take a cool science-fictionish idea, and then proceed to do absolutely nothing interesting with it. The story, however, took me fifteen minutes to read, while the movie left me with gray hair.

The idea is simple but potentially interesting: a guy ages backwards. He's born an old man, and dies an infant. Now let's observe how one transforms this mini-gem into a bottle of sleeping pills.

Let's start with a synopsis, Book-A-Minute-Classics style

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: Told In Realtime

(Benjamin Button is born a hideous old man played by a crudely drawn CGI actor)

Everyone: he's hideous! Freak! Freak!

Black Woman With Heart Of Gold: gimme

(Black Woman With Heart of Gold raises the freak)

(Benjamin Button lives for forty years, and then suddenly realizes he's transformed from Gollum's ugly cousin to the apotheosis of magazine-cover male sex appeal: Brad Pitt)

Benjamin Button: holy crap! Did I just get younger? Holy crap! Is that a Cate Blanchett channeling Katherine Hepburn as Female Romantic Lead? Holy crap! Did she just have sex with me?

(Benjamin gets Female Romantic Lead pregnant)

Benjamin Button: well, my job here is done, see ya later.

(Benjamin abandons Female Romantic Lead to her newborn daughter and lame leg)

(Benjamin reverse-ages into a baby and dies)

The End

If it were only that simple. Unfortunately those key events are padded with hours and hours worth of Benjamin stalking around the planet Earth on foot, car and boat, occasionally opening his mouth to say something worthless in a creaky door voice with a Southern accent. Sometimes he goes to a bar and gets drunk. Sometimes he visits his mother. It's like watching a Reality Show, but one with actual reality, and no artificial drama injection.

Blah. I don't want to think about it anymore.


(Chatting with my friend in China)
Pei: k, I am going outside
Mark: i'll go outside too
Pei: k, see u there
Mark: k, i'll be by the tree
Pei: I know where outside is, dude

Don't do it or you'll have to do it again

Haven't written regularly in a while and haven't gotten any complaints. Time to try the opposite again.

Demonstrated ability in a domestic environment is a very dangerous thing. When I was younger, I took care never attempt to do something myself that had previously been done for me. Take for example peeling apples. My Mom and Dad can peel in an apple in 4.3 and and 4.1 seconds respectively without so much as shedding a pint of blood. It takes me a good 45 seconds to a minute to perform the same feat with the same safety margin, something I would never know if I hadn't strayed from the rulebook of my younger smarter self. But one time, long long ago, in this very same galaxy, Mom and Dad were too busy to peel an apple for on-the-brink-of-starvation Mark and offered him to try it himself with perhaps a "betcha can't do it!" for extra deceit points. And little Mark swallowed the poison pill, smashed the glass, took up the axe, and separated the peel (along with 90% of the apple) from the meat. And Mom and Dad said "Wow! Congratulations! Now you can do it yourself every time!"

Imagine what life would be like if from your very birth you held to the principle of not demonstrating ability. It would be cake with a tall glass of foaming Dr. Pepper, and someone would be spoon-feeding you both. You would still be wearing a diaper, you would weigh 800 pounds (that's 2000 pounds for you Jupiter dwellers!), and your parents would still treat you like your grandparents do - with utter disregard for responsibility and sole purpose to spoil. As it is, I have to peel my own apples, change my own diaper, and write my own blog entries.

Someone: they could get a restraining order.
Mark: restraining orders are probably expensive.
Mario: nah, at least buy one get one free.

Gene (telling a parable): There was this guy once, who had many many adventures. I'm not going to tell you about any of them, because I don't remember a single one.

(Gene is joking about some female spiritual leader)
Gene: She only holds you to five of Moses's Commandements
Boris: what about the other four?

How To Get In Trouble

Being that I love to argue almost as much as I like winning arguments, it helps to know what one's doing in an argument. There is of course good reading material in this area that I review every now and then, but mostly it's for humor purposes, and offers little real advice. Luckily, there's what I call the 'U, U and U,' the three keys to being a winner. Everything stems from the following revelation: No one can argue as well as the Uninformed, Unopinionated, and Uninvested.

The uninformed:

Nothing is more deleterious to your arguing capacity than a trunk full of actual facts. This is one of those uncommon common wisdoms. Knowledge is like a rug that you stand on, a rug with multiple handles on all sides for people to yank. So all knowledge is excess knowledge, when it comes to an argument.

Knowledge hurts you in several ways. First of all, it makes you cocky. Little feels better than proving your opponent an ignoramus, and this makes it hard to resist throwing a little quote or worse - parable, or (don't ever do this) actual news or scientific findings. Unfortunately, that 'little' contains among other things, the satisfaction of being that ignoramus, and knocking your four-eyed, egg-headed and degree-laden opponent on his figurative ass.

And second, knowledge is highly correlated with verbal incontinence. When you know something that could further your case, stifling it is like stifling salivation when faced with an eighteen course Thanksgiving meal. Pavlov laughs in your face.

On the other hand, being uninformed gives one wings of freedom. Not knowing anything, you can make up whatever you want and be equally convincingly convinced of it.

So, the best option is to be uninformed. Alzheimer's is a cromulent path to take, but I hear the side-effects are a bitch. For us mortals, refusing to learn to read is a good alternative. Parents, this is your chance to ensure your child's happiness. And don't worry about school, no one's ever learned anything there anyway.

The unopinionated:

This one's more obvious than a monster truck sitting on your face. If you have an opinion, you hazard agreeing with a potential opponent. While agreeing with him/her does release a certain amount of endorphins, it pales in comparison with ridiculing them.

The uninvested:

Having a stake in an argument is almost as bad as having an opinion. It's not quite as bad, because opinions are usually rock solid, and stakes are made of paper or plastic money. (However, "paper covers rock," so it's mildly debatable).

Now you're ready grasshopper, go and make people lose their cool and hurt you.

(Mario's walks past me wearing a thin see-through white shirt. Meanwhile I can barely see anything, I'm so wrapped up in clothes to keep warm)
Mark: aren't you cold?
Mario (with a look of dawning realization): oh my God! I'm freezing! Where's my sweatshirt!?

Home

Today, I flew back to NJ. Mario dropped me off at Houston Hobby Airport, and after we soaked each other's well-muscled shoulders with veritable cataracts of tears, we parted ways. I went to find my plane and Mario went to go buy some tissues.

Hobby Airport is like a trailer compared to the grandiose mansion airports I'm used to. It only has one employee - Carl Fratratchet, a middle-aged clone of a middle-aged black man. When I came in, Carl ushered me to the ticket window. After he maxed out my credit card on account of my bags having one too many dimensions (AirTran charges you an extra $500 for each dimension past 2D), he took me through security, where he patted me down and took a urine sample. Luckily I haven't done any hard drugs since I was in my mother's womb, so I passed with flying colors.

After the carry-on flammability test which relieved me of both carry-ons, Carl took me over to the terminal, made sure I knew where to find my plane should I wish to follow through with my ticket purchase, and then walked me over to the duty-free shop and sold me some Starburst. When I'm on a plane and it changes altitude, my ears tend to complain with blood and brain tissue discharge. Starburst keeps my saliva running, so I can equalize pressure at a greater pace.

Finally Carl walked me to the plane - a Boeing 707 two-seater discontinued in 1956, got in the pilot's seat and flew me home. Now that's what I call a valuable employee.

Mark: I took your stuff out of the dryer.
Mario: because you were washing?
Mark: no, drying. But good guess.

(at Starbucks, last day in Houston)
Mark: does the Pumpkin Spice Latte sound good?
Mario: to me? No. But to you it sounds good. Dang! Really good!

(talking about someone at Mario's work)
Mark: is she hot?
Mario: she's 80 years old, at least.
Mark: answer the question!

Yesterday we found out that Mario thinks 'Jew' is a racial slur.

Marathon?

Today was the marathon attempt. I'm cracking up even calling it an attempt. Nevertheless, something happened, it was more or less 7 miles long, so let's just call it that - an attempt.

There were several revelations that came during the during and remembered themselves to me during the after (obviously none of them concerned grammar). Here they are in no particular order:

1. A marathon is about 26 miles long...er than you think.
2. Optimism only gets you through about 1 mile.
3. Vomit burns. Both times. And in between.
4. I have the lungs of a chain-smoker.
5. Mario's lungs are actually made up of stacks of Camel Golds.
6. Those stacks of Camel Golds are made of real camel essence. Because that boy sure has endurance.
7. Sitting at the computer for four months is probably only the second best way to prepare for an attempt.
8. Typing speed and running speed are uncorrelated.
9. Running is not the best time to work out personal problems. The only thing I could think about was the personal problem of having decided to run a marathon.
10. Doing is highly highly overrated. I'm going to stick to 'planning to do' and 'lying about doing' from now on instead.
11. Not only can Mario not run a marathon, he can't even run a marathon while carrying me on his back.

The attempt started auspiciously. After half a mile, Mario was celebrating the 2% mark. "Dude, we already ran 2%! Just fifty of those, and we're done. Cake. Wait, it's only forty-nine more! How can we not finish?"

The first mile was indeed cake, and no, we weren't in a car. Unfortunately there was a second, which didn't go over so well with my head and stomach. At around two miles, they suddenly teamed up and betrayed me, with a pain-in-the-ass thing called pain. And the next five miles after that were pretty much a bloody haze of running and walking, though I'm reasonably sure it wasn't my blood. I may have strangled Mario a bit, and perchance some worthless passerbys.

Anyway, it's all over. Now I get to sit back and enjoy the perks of having attempted to run a marathon. These include not being able to walk, lots and lots of complaining about not being able to walk, having to take frequent sips of water between complaints because of a burning throat, and of course blushing and running out of the room when the word marathon clears the air.

Slitting Wrists and Other Hobbies

After yesterday's viewing of Run Fatboy Run, Mario and I were inspired. This morning we headed over (drove) to his aunt's house and ate about sixteen pounds of food a piece. After that motivation session, we feel ready to run a marathon. We have all the requisite characteristics - we're weak, out of shape, and now we're fat. Armed with these superpowers, we will run not one, but two marathons! One for Mario and one for me. The date is Friday, and we've told everyone we know that we're doing it to ensure the most happiness in the event of failure.

Like every year around this time, the world is beset with nagging but unanswerable questions, most of them having to do with Kwanza, such as:

What in the world IS Kwanza?
Is it spelled with a K or a Q? Or perhaps both? Qkwanza? Kqwanza?
What group of people is responsible for K(Q)wanza's existence and what does the event commemorate?
How many candles should there be on the eighth night of Kwanza?

Ok, I will answer some of these, though I guarantee no amount of truth.

First of all, you uncultured ignoramuses (this is the 'you' that no longer includes 'me'), Kwanza is actually spelled Kwanzaa, or so is the humble opinion of Wikipedia. It's a week long, so if we take length as a measure of importance, it's somewhere between Christmas and Hanukkah but closer to the latter. It's celebrated by lighting a candle, which explains why Kwanzaa subscribers are impossible to recognize in the sea of minorahs and Christmas lights.

Umm...ok that's enough for this year. Next year, we'll learn who celebrates Kwanzaa and what they're actually celebrating.

Speaking of depression, Leaving Las Vegas. Do NOT see this movie. It might put your life in perspective, and that's the last thing anyone wants.

The Brits Are Slowly Unclenching Those Well-Dressed Buttocks

Just watched Run Fatboy Run, the relatively recent movie with Simon Pegg's crew (Shaun of the Dead). It was hilarious, but let's give credit where it's due. It's at least half due to the fact that British people have done a great job of representing themselves in movies as reserved, rational, and gentlemanly. In other words, as utter tightasses. The American view of the British film character is one inevitably played by Michael Caine, who is articulate, natural, believable, and also the most quick-acting over-the-counter soporific on the market. It is because of Michael's skill that we have our current view of the Brits.

Enter Simon Pegg and crew. Suddenly we see British people doing all sorts of strange things: grimacing, wearing booty shorts, being fat, walking around naked from the waist down, and doing all sorts of physical comedy that require stuntmen and stunt genitalia. And here you can't help but laugh. The stereotype is so strong that when you break it open, there are hysterical giggles inside. I laughed so hard I needed three separate ribcage replacements.

Now that I've explained the reason this movie's so funny, you should by no means ever watch it. Being conscious of the contrast effect I described will undoubtedly break the spell, and you'll just be seeing another Hollywood slapstick with a cliched plot and stupid jokes.

So, to summarize (just saying those words makes me feel like I'm trying to meet a word count), this movie's pretty lame. It put me to sleep just fine even without Mr. Caine's professional help.

(Franco put up some Christmas and Hanukkah decorations including some uncircumsized reindeer, Mario comes back from work)
Mario: a menorah? I don't think God would approve of that. The God I worship I mean, not your heathen God.
Mark: then we shall have a battle of the Gods.
Mario: or we could sit there and stare at each other until one of our Gods kills one of us.
Mark: or lets one of us starve to death.