Testing one two...

Today I took a day off from work to drive down to San Diego for a clinical trial evaluation and intake meeting. The folks at UCSD are very nice and make it a point to make you feel comfortable. The drive took a little over two hours and hit some moderate traffic on the way so I made good time. I’m taking part in a clinical trial to see if HIV meds affect memory and possibly motor functions. The great thing is the results go to me and to my doctor as well. So we can see if there is anything we need to adjust to correct the difficulty I’ve been having with my memory. Needless to say I forgot to bring the address part of the map-quest printout. I also forgot to bring the phone number of the place. I also forgot the woman’s name I was to meet. I also drove past the exit and that caused about 45minutes of backtracking to find the right street. I’m not a bad driver nor am I bad with directions it was just a mess of one way streets and huge stretches of street with nowhere to turn around. I called a close friend and asked him to get into my e-mail and get the address and phone number and then finding the place was easy. The interview consisted of some motor skill tests and some nasty memory tests. It lasted for about an hour and a half. I go back this Monday for a full day that will consist of more psyc eval and an MRI, blood work, a drug screen and of all damn things a lumbar puncture.

This is a recent problem.
I used to chalk it up to stress but I have been relatively stress free and the problem seems to be getting worse. Age? Stroke? Toxoplasmosis? Past drug use? TUMOR? It seems to have gotten worse since I started back on the meds. I’m thinking that’s the problem and just my luck these folks are doing a study to prove or disprove that theory. They were also keen to make me comfortable because I was referred to them by the senior physician. I guess that’s something that is rare for them? Now for all you med students (JIM) Do you see any problem with getting an L.P. and having a blood patch done with a person who is HIV positive. Is there any danger of the blood patch compromising my system? Virus getting directly into my spinal cord seems like something I want to avoid. Or is it already there? They say the blood patch is no problem but I want to ask everyone just in case. It’s the one thing I’m worried about.

IMDB PRODUCERS

A list of random PRODUCERS and their words of wisdom from THE INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE (IMDB)

In alphabetical order:


Robert Altman
"When I see an American flag flying, it's a joke" - to the London Times, 1/22/02

Josef Goebbels
"Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play."

Graham Greene
"For an actor, success is simply delayed failure."

Mick Jagger
I'd rather be dead than singing "Satisfaction" when I'm forty-five.

Akira Kurosawa
"Human beings are unable to be honest with themselves about themselves. They cannot talk about themselves without embellishing."

Fritz Lang
"I do not like producers."

Sergio Leone
"Get the costume! We need the costume!" Upon hearing that actor Al Mulock was wearing wardrobe when he made his fatal leap from a hotel window.

Russ Meyer
"I'd rather play cards if I can't have a lady with big tits."

Brian Patrick
“Is eye blood red or clear?”

Gregory Peck
"It just seems silly to me that something so right and simple has to be fought for at all." (On gay rights)

Cry wolf

You know I never post things like this but I just have to go on record to say:
He's full of crap.
2 days after this guy is detained in Thailand his story changes. Come on! This guy may be a pedifile and a child murderer but he did not kill JonBenet Ramsey. I'm just waiting for the announcement to the AP the this John Mark Karr is just some sick ass wannabe who needs attention. If John Douglas didn't figure it was this guy then ... He didn't do it. I'm curious to see is what sense he "was there" when this poor girl got killed. In the same sense we were all there for years in front of the TV as picture after picture of this horrible crime was flashed before us? He must be guilty of something becuase its must be almost impossible to be picked up for a sexcrime in Thailand.
Sit back and relax, the show is about to start. This is one of those things that seems too good to be true.
I'm going out further on a limb here so ... stay with me at least while I get this thought out. Could this be just another orchestrated smokescreen to distract us from real crime?
Let me get the priorities straight here...
War in iraq.
War in lebanon.
Prisoners held and abused in cuba
Castro dead/alive?
Homeland security still not doing anything because we still go on alert.
Wart on my foot.
Some kid still dead after 10 years. Killer MAY be found.


Here is a picture of the ASSOCIATED PRESS' distraction of the week.

Monkees fling poop. That what they are known for.

I know its the Monkees but this is a Harry Nilsson song!


Ok this is the crapfest sugar pushing idiots I remember!

And you thought they were just the bad show that was between the good commercials! Nope.
They were the commercial.

Star Wars had Battlestar Galactica and The Beatles had these idiots. (or was it The Partridge Family?)

Here is the demo version of the opening of the HIGH-LARIOUS show. zzzzzz.


I'm sorry... how the hell did Johnny Cash get mixed up with these yahoos?

The Day The Wookiee Cried.

The Star Wars Holiday Special was an event every kid in the U.S. and of A could not miss. Almost 1 year to the day after the films release the most popular film of all time was to have a thanksgiving Holiday special. C.B.S. was convinced that they had a sure fire holiday tradition that will endure for generations. Just like The Wizard of Oz aired each Christmas season to the delight of children and adults this too would sink into an annual spot and children make it a ritual to celebrate the fictional wookiee holiday called LIFE DAY. How could anything go wrong with a holiday special centered around a second tier supporting character of the most popular film of all time? It had to be a hit.
I know I couldn’t wait. I recall carefully cutting out the full page ad in T.V. Guide before the show aired, and placing it into my Star Wars scrapbook. Years later I was relieved to find out I was not the only kid who did that. I have met two others who care to remember this night in Star Wars history by preserving the FIRST ad of what was to become a holiday classic. A new hope for TV.

The night of November 17th 1978 came and kids everywhere were glued to the TV for their first glimpse at a NEW Star Wars adventure. That night children across America grew up. November 17th 1978 was the night we all were had.

It starts great with pre credits sequence of Han And Chewie in the cockpit of everyone’s favorite ship escaping the empire’s evil clutches. But something is wrong it looks like a soap opera. VIDEO. EWWWW this is video not film. Han is shot with what must be a stocking over the lens. A trick reserved for ugly over the hill women now being used on Harrison Ford? Whaa… The cockpit of the Falcon looks less detailed and very cardboardy.

It was clear by the end of the credits children all over America were duped.
The feeling of watching the thing you love fall apart before your very eyes is...horrible.
This was the first and only time this crapfest was ever aired. Even George Lucas has said publicly that he wishes ""that if he had the time and a hammer, he would track down every bootlegged copy of that program and smash it.".

But lets explore how such a promising concept could become such a hated travesty.

First off how did they decide on the cast? Well, Mark Hamil, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford, Anthony Daniels and Peter Mayhew from the original cast are a given James Earl Jones can say a few new lines and we can say he’s the voice of Darth Vader. That little funny robit R2D2 can be there too. That itself is worthy of viewing. The cast reunited. Everyone is a sucker for that.
Then there are the guest stars. Bea Arthur. Well Bea had a very popular show on CBS at the time called Maude so she is a STAR. That works well with Star Wars. Star. STAR wars… ok.
What was also popular on CBS at the time? The Carol Burnett Show and who is that shows whore for hire? Harvey Korman that who. Along with Tim Conway he was half of a funny duo. Half a funny is better than no funny so Harvey is thrown into the mix. Since specials are nothing with out VARIETY there has to be a musical group. WAR was too ethnic for CBS but what about Jefferson Airplane? After all they just changed their name to Jefferson STARship. SOLD! Hmm who else in Hollywood isn’t working? Art Carney available. He used to act next to that fat guy who’d say “to the MOON, Alice”, what was that show? Ah yes, The HoneyMOONers. Lets add Diahann Carroll to the mix. After all she likes to add extra letters to her name just like the way Lucas names his space characters.

Now who could write a riveting script involving all these people? George Lucas? NO no no he’s a hack let him give us an outline and we’ll give it to Bruce Vilanch. Bruce knows T.V. (little did they know that “T.V.” in Bruces’ world of personal ads was something he has a fondness for) Bruce would write a show that (aside from the credits and the precredit sequence that last less than 2 minutes) for the first 12 minutes not one word of any intelligible language is spoken. Its all Wookiee moaning, cooing and snarfing.
Clever Bruce, and very arty for T.V. Next up for Bruce was the SMURFS in Esperanto.
Oh and lets not forget the part where Chewies aged father gets strapped into the masterbation chair and finds his ideal woman. (yep thats really part of the show but its not Bruces fault I think that was in Georges' original outline) With a total of 3 musical numbers and one dance number its 2 hours of pain. Let not forget that one of those musical numbers is sung by Bea Arthur as if she is in some Kurt Wiel extravaganza. Carrie Fisher herself ends the show with a little ditty. As her perscription kicks in she hits a note so sour your ears bleed.

Here is the climax of the special with Carries' otherworldly warbling




Ok , so crap aside how could it fail with the original cast?

1. Not one of them can act.
2. There is no 2.

Our dear hero Luke Skywalker looks like a woman with all that T.V. makeup. (musta hired that friend of Bruces’ to do the make-up) Hamil mugs like a child in a Welches grape juice ad.
Carrie Fisher is so high that her eyes are segmented. Upon hearing her first words of dialog it was clear she was acting from the Patty Duke handbook.
Harrison Ford is trying so hard to act but alas the lack of a director leaves him on his own to “Go for IT”
Anthony Daniels seems to be the only one doing what he does best act like a robot intentionally the others seem to just follow his cue.

It’s a wonder that this thing broadcast in the firstplace.

While Lucas wants to forget this… THING, many wish never to forget. Lucky for us back in 1978 a rich kid back in Boston recorded this show on Betamax. That one Betamax copy has circled the globe via the internet and comic-cons. It will never be forgotten. We know you sold out George. We knew back then. We have been watching your apologies ever since.

The root of all evil.

Tanis is highly unstable and very deadly.

Marc Almond - Paint it Black

I love this guy!

EYE ON EAGLE ROCK