Monday, February 11, 2008

Things I've learned since my last post

- Inhaling helium from balloons at a party is still funny when you're in your thirties.

- It is unfair for the karaoke to end just as you realise this.

- Steak is still tasty when served on a stick.

- The quality of a movie can not be predicted by its opening shot.

(No Country for Old Men and Alien vs. Predator 2 both begin with a shot of a hunter looking at a deer through a rifle sight. One of these two films goes on to be good good movie; the other turns into a bad bad movie*. Guess which is which).

- People will laugh at you when you try to tell them that using wooden pencils is more environmentally friendly than using plastic pens.

(C'mon! Renewable resource, biodegradable / compostable shavings, no toxic ink, minimal end-of-life garbage consisting only of wood, rubber and metal... and yet they still laugh. Maybe it's because I always carry 3 pencils with me in order to avoid sharpening them mid-meeting).

*Movie classifications, adapted from something I read somewhere a long time ago:

1) Good good movie: something that's worthy, hyped up, wins or is nominated for lots of awards, and is actually good, e.g. Last King of Scotland, Sideways.
2) Bad good movie: something that's worthy, hyped up, wins or is nominated for lots of awards, but is actually a bunch of pretentious tosh, e.g. The Piano.
3) Good bad movie: terrible movie with ridiculous story and 2-dimensional characters that's still immensely enjoyable, e.g. Jurassic Park, Evolution (extra bonus point for containing the often-underrated comic talents of David Duchovny).
4) Bad bad movie: terrible movie with ridiculous story and 2-dimensional characters that's just awful, e.g. Star Wars episodes 1 and 2. (The other 4 are good bad movies).

Many arguments occur over whether a given "good" movie should be in category 1 or 2. See The English Patient episode of Seinfeld for illustration.

4 comments:

  1. Hmmm, I'm sensing a story from a wrap-up party on the weekend?

    Mermaid

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  2. Mmmm, yes indeedy! I didn't start the whole helium balloon thing, that would be my lovely husband! It was that kind of party...

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  3. so, but about those pencils...how many trees go into a wooden pencil? And what if you use one plastic pencil for a life time? Hmmmm....

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  4. That's an excellent point, but the problem is that I would never be able to use the same plastic pencil for more than a couple of months. The reason is that I always manage to break the clip, or the eraser holder, or just lose the damn thing somewhere. And then I have to buy another. And the replacement leads come in plastic packaging. Wood is a renewable resource (or at least it can be, maybe I'll need to source some pencils that come from local managed forests) and the pencils I buy come in a cardboard box that I then recycle. As with many things, it's a trade-off...

    ReplyDelete

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