This blog has moved

This blog is now located at http://fasttwitchmind.blogspot.com/.
You will be automatically redirected in 30 seconds, or you may click here.

For feed subscribers, please update your feed subscriptions to
http://fasttwitchmind.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default.

Why is it(continued?), Movie Review(ugh!!)

Why is it (continued)? _When two dogs, one small and one large, chase me while I am riding the bicycle, why is it the little dog bites me and the large dog just barks? Is this where the saying, “his bark is much bigger than his bite” came from? _Why is it when I ride the bicycle the wind is always in my face? Could this be why they call it a “head wind?” _Why is it when I turn my left signal light on while driving and then I turn right, people look at me strange? Could it be they just don’t get creative people and it confuses them? _ Why is it that when I was driving on the highway today and the Texas state trooper was on the other side of the four lane Interstate I felt secure, even though I was speeding. Could it be he couldn’t make a U turn or did he have his radar turned off or maybe he was taking a nap or maybe he just didn’t care at that point or possibly his radar was out of order or maybe he wears glasses and didn’t have them on?_ Why is it that it seems as though everyone is dying, every time I open the arbitrary page of the newspaper it has nothing but death notices in it?_Why is it everyone wants to go to heaven but no one wants to die to get there? Could it be they might be afraid of going straight to hell, not passing go and not collecting $200.00?_Why is it we don’t have to lick stamps anymore? Could it be that the glue was actually toxic and all the people in the arbitrary pages use to lick more than their share of stamps, and just died?_Why is it when I go to a restaurant and order water to drink they still ask me what I want to drink? Seems clear to me, I am drinking water for my drink. Then I find that to get a refill of water, when water is my drink, it is much harder than if say I was drinking a margarita. The way they pounce on you to order another one you would think the world is running out of tequila._Why is it when I am riding my big black Hog with all kinds of noise and poise, men stare at me? Is it possibly a gay thing and I don’t realize it, or is it just outright unadulterated jealousy? It really doesn’t matter to me but I hate for them to waste time looking at me when they could be scoping the good looking women!

Movie Review: “Repo Men”, 0 no star here, This is one of the most gross movies I have even seen. Such a waste of good acting talent in Jude Law and Forest Whitaker. It is way into the future, year not given, and people can buy artificial hearts, pancreas, and livers; however, the cost is over $600,000.00 and they can finance them. The big kicker is that if they get 90 days behind in their payments the repo men will come cut the parts out of the body and leave them to die. It is the bloodiest movie I have seen in some time, maybe even the bloodiest of all. It is a very depressing stupid movie and the producers tried to redeem themselves with a reasonably happy ending, I think. Go at your own risk and do not pay full fare. Rated PG-13 for strong bloody violence, grisly images, language and some sexuality/nudity.
greerman

Why Is It? Book Review, Movie Reviews

Why is it: 1. when I walk up to a place of business and they have two entrance doors, one is always locked and I pick that one to enter the store? Why not just leave both unlocked? 2. When I walk up to these two doors and there is a sign pointing to the unlocked door and I always pull or push on the locked door? 3. When I walk up to the same set of doors and it says, “pull” I always “push?” or When I walk up to the same set of doors and it says, “push” I always, “pull?” 4. When I have to pee real badly I hit all of the red lights in town? 5. When I have to pee real badly and I go to a public rest room there is someone in the rest room taking what seems like 30 minutes to get out of there? 5. When I am in a hurry to get somewhere I pick the roads that are being worked on? 6. When I am on these same roads the traffic is worse than ever and the turn lanes are to the left and I need to go right. 7. When I fill up the Explorer with gasoline and sit in inside to get in out of the cold the automatic release doesn’t work and gasoline fills the streets? 8. When I order jalapeno peppers at Col Sanders they are out? 9. When I go into the post office to send a package there is a big line in addition there are people sending at least 100 packages each. 10. When I go into the post office to get my passport done they are out of forms? 11. When I go into to have buy license plates for my automobiles I forget the insurance form? 12. When I go to the grocery store I can’t find what I am looking for and then the person I ask can’t find it either? 13. When I get caught speeding I never have an emergency excuse when the officer asks me, “do you have an emergency?” 14. When I get ready to mow the yard, someone has stolen my lawn mower? 15. When I get ready to edge the grass after buying a new lawnmower someone has stolen my edger? 16. When I work a trade show people always ask if I am having fun? 17. When I work a trade show my feet always hurt so badly I feel like I have been standing on concrete all day, which I have? 18. When Christmas approaches everyone ask, “Are you going to have a big Christmas?” 19. When Christmas is over everyone asks, “Did you have a big Christmas?” 20. When it rains the cattle feed lots smell worse than other times plus the odor blows in my direction no matter which way I am going? Enough for today, now back to my George Carlin book. He is my hero of sarcasm, too bad he decided to die.

Book Review: “Getting Naked”, ****, No this is not a porno book and is really a straight forward business fable. Written by Patrick Lencioni, it is a true story about shedding the three fears that sabotage client loyalty in the consulting business world. Has great application in any business atmosphere and really has to do with, “being yourself!” Nothing wrong with that and it is a great story about being honest with yourself and other people. One noted person, the author of The One Minute Manager said: “Put your feet up, check your ego at the door, and read Getting Naked. It’s such an enjoyable read, you may finish the book in one sitting, but you will remember its message forever.”

Movie Reviews: “Alice In Wonderland,” ***, Johnny Depp plays the part of the mad hatter while Mia Wasikowski portrays the 19-year-old Alice, who returns to the whimsical world she first encountered as a young girl. Well done movie with great color and imagination in the supporting characters. One for the kids for sure. Rated PG for fantasy action/violence involving scary images and situations, and for a smoking caterpillar (WOW, I don’t remember all that violence, but do remember the smoking caterpillar).

“The Bounty Hunter,” ** overall rating, but ***** for having to watch Jennifer Aniston in nearly every scene. This is basically a very boring movie and really wastes some good actors. Gerald Butler, current gruffly looking heart throb, plays a disgraced policeman turned bounty hunter. His next bail-jumping client is his ex-wife, Aniston, and the story goes from there to the bitter end, which is very predictable. Don’t spend prime time fare on this one. Rated PG for sexual content including suggestive comments, language and some violence (you mean when he locks poor Jennifer up in the trunk of the car?)

“She’s Out of My League,” *** overall rating, but ***** for having to watch Alice Eve as Molly, (WOW, you talk about easy to look at, even brings out some lust thoughts!!). Jay Baruchel stars as an average, everyday guy who cannot believe his good luck. While stuck in a seemingly dead end job as an airport security agent (TSA), he meets Molly, a successful and outrageously gorgeous woman—and she falls for him. He is stunned. So are his friends (funny conversations between his group in weird airport scenes make the movie worthwhile), his family (very dysfunctional bunch, but puts some good rough edge comedy in the movie), and even his ex-girlfriend. Rated R for language and sexual contact.

greerman

Vultures, Movie Review

Someone once said, possibly God, that everything has its reason and place for being on or in this world. But for the life of me I don’t know why the gross looking vulture /buzzard has a place or right to be anywhere. While traveling to the first triathlon of the season some 300 miles from home I noticed some vultures in the middle of the road feasting on recent road kill. While it looked like an innocent deer I am not too sure what it was. But what I did notice, and I have watched them closer while on the bicycle, as I sped by at 70 mph these so-called birds were extremely ugly and worthless looking. But what should I expect from a bird that is called “vulture” to look any different. After all they live off of the dead and would have to be considered the extremely homeless of the animal world. They wait till some innocent animal is struck dead by something and then they come into to feast off of them. As you look at them real close you will find they are really butt ugly, are sparsely covered with feathers, usually look like dirt/mud warmed over and have a shiftless look on their face. One thing they can do is fly fast enough to get out of the way of the moving vehicle and very seldom fly into your windshield so you got to give them credit for that. Then I know if we did a breath check on them they would have real bad breath. Can you imagine, they eat at least day old real dead stuff all day long and never brush, that I know of. As I continue to search for their usefulness and worthiness I conclude that there should be a national monument built for them simply because I know of no one else who would remove the road kill like they do. The theme could be, “thank God for the vultures/buzzards of this world, because without them our roadways would be covered with road kill.”

Movie Review: “The Green Zone”, could be **** for presentation, but also ** for boring, but also * for reminding us of the lies the Bush administration used to enter Iraq in the first place, or no rating because the Weapons of Mass Destruction never existed. This movie is presented like a documentary but actually is not one. It is reality-based chaos, and stars matt Damon as a credible chief warrant officer who, during the USA invasion of Baghdad in 2003 is ordered to round up Saddam Hussein’s hidden weapons of mass destruction—yes, the same WMDs that an American president hung over the heads of the Congress and the American people. When none can be found, Damon questions “bad Intel?” It only gets worse and then he questions those in authority, a non reality thing since Warrant Officers just don’t do that, but in Hollywood they do. Brendan Gleeson plays a CIA person, and Greg Kinnear plays a typical all too-powerful, arrogant U.S. intelligence people listening to the wrong advice. Rated R for violence and language.

greerman

Travel, Movie Reviews

To some people traveling is a glamorous thing, to others it is just part of their professional life and then to others it is just habit forming and becomes a combination of both. To some it just plain sucks!! Since my traveling life really started back in my high school and college days as a member of the collegiate football and track team that would total over 56 years and still going. The early travel was of course by automobile, train, and buses. Airplanes were invented at the time but air travel was for the very rich and just didn't make any sense for my kind of travel. My parents were not into doing much travel so I didn't catch my bad case of having to travel from them, it just came naturally. After graduating from college and then entering the US Army I found my travel became even greater and I knew then that packing and unpacking a bag would become part of my lifestyle. Since that time I have traveled to most of the USA states(48 to be exact) and 20 countries. Most of this was done while competing in some kind of athletics or in my profession, but very little for just outright vacation fun. It seems as though I try to make my business travel into some kind of fun travel and just forget about vacations. This past weekend I traveled to Florida for no business purpose and my sole reason for going was to see two of my old time friends and even see one of them re-marry, so I guess that was a pleasure weekend. When I started by sales career way back in 1966 I was given a new automobile to travel in and since cell phones didn't exist and long distance calls were very expensive we were expected to drive anywhere in our territory to see customers rather than call them on the phone. Gasoline ranged from 15-25 cents so it was pound the pavement and no worry on fuel cost. Now after all these years everyone has a cell phone stuck in one ear or the other, gasoline is $2.65 per gallon, computers keep us informed and business travel has a whole new angle. Back in the days of travel when my kids were young I traveled every week and when arriving home one week from a sales trip my youngest daughter, about 5 at the time, looked at her mother and ask, "is he going to stay here tonight?" Traveling can also make you a little disoriented, one week when I had stayed in 3 different hotels and finally got home at the end of the week I found myself getting up in the middle of the night to go take a leak I went to the approximate same area where the rest room had been the night before. Turns out in our house this was the same area that our laundry room was in, so I reached down to pull the camode seat up and it turned out to big the clothes dryer. Luckily I woke up enough to realize I was fixing to go to take a leak in the dryer, and then worked my way back to the real rest room. Most of the time when people age they kind of taper things off and especially do not travel as much; however, my travel has increased and just during the month of February and March I will be gone 6 of the possible 8 weekends. For March I am making a 3 weekend run, and then possibly in the last weekend will remain in Ransom Canyon. Now I am in Dallas for the Rock N Roll half marathon, actually running in it and monitoring the Athletes Honey Milk booth. Then next weekend I will be competing in the first triathlon of the season in Alpine, Texas, the gateway to the Big Bend Country of Texas. My point for all this useless gibberish is that I have been behind in my blogging because of all the travel and not being able to use my lap top computer to post on. Now I have that fixed and will be blogging like crazy again. There are all kinds of new news(that is why it is called news) coming to past, i.e. Tiger will go back to playing golf and limit his playing around to his wife, there is no football on TV, former Texas Tech coach Mike Leech(sp on purpose) will get his settlement from Tech and probably receive much more than he deserves, Athletes Honey Milk will become the most popular drink on the planet, and I will be traveling to many more points of interest in the next 9 months of 2010.

Movie Reviews: "Cop Out", **, Bruce Willis should be ashamed of himself for this boring, stupid movie. He is just passing the time of day and collecting his big bucks in the poorly done movie. He and Tracy Morgan play veteran New York(always New York cops, never do they do a show about cops from Lubbock) cops on the trail of a stolen, rare, mint condition baseball card, and wind up facing a merciless, memorabilia-obsessed gangster. Actually Willis owns the card and is going to use it to pay for his daughters wedding($48,000.00), so this story is so stupid it stinks to high heaven. Rated R for pervasive language including sexual references, violence and brief sexuality.

"Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief", **, The gods of Mount Olympus and assorted monsters walk off the pages of high school student Percy Jackson's Greek mythology textbook and into his life. And they are not happy campers. Zeus' lightning bolt has been stolen and Percy is the prime suspect. Percy adapts to demi-God status: his father is Poseidon. Lots of action to find the lightning thief and I can't believe I watched the whole thing. Rated PG for action violence and peril, some scary images and suggestive material, and mild language.

Academy Awards: Last week while in Florida I actually watched the Academy Awards ceremony that seems to last for hours and hours, well actually it does do that. This year there were no real surprises and I was real pleased with the results and thought they were right on. Crazy Heart was a big favorite of mine and Jeff Bridges won the best actor for his performance. Avatar won the best picture and that was probably a good pick. Even though I didn't mention them on this blog site I agreed with most of them, even though there was a couple of movies I didn't get to see since they didn't come to Lubbock. The Hurt Locker was a big winner and if it came to Lubbock, it came and went while I was traveling, so I must find it some where since it was a big winner.

greerman

Christians???? Movie Review

Christian congregations always amaze me in the way they profess to love one another, love God and Jesus even, but then go contrary to what the good book teaches in their relations with each other. To illustrate my point there are a couple of things that come to mind. In the 6,000 population town that I was raised in the Church of Christ congregations got mad at each other every few years and then split and formed a new church. The last count I had they had created 7 Church of Christ congregations in this small town. Seemed strange to me since I was raised in the Presbyterian Church and we never split, guess we must have taken the teaching in the Bible a little more serious. But I always wondered what the deal was here and why they just can’t get along. But from a business stand point I also noted that this created jobs for 6 more ministers, choir directors, business managers, and required building another building, furnishing it, and buying all the hymnals for the choir and congregation Guess that is not all bad!! Yesterday I came in from my bicycle ride and as I entered the main entrance to Ransom Canyon I noticed that the new chapel was being completed for another Christian congregation for Ransom Canyon (population 1,000), Now I know the full story on why it was created so I know it is not because of growth in the original chapel but simply because they got mad at each other and it basically divided in half and they had to have a place to meet, so they built a new chapel. It is also built on a location that it is the first or second thing you notice when turning in to the main road. That had to be done to spite the original chapel since it is located within the population of the town. I also noticed where the building is built like a gasoline service station and I wondered if they were going to sell Chevron or Shell gasoline in the drive up over hang. Then I noticed that they had added a cross to the front of the build so this must sanctify the building into some kind of official worship service. It really seems so stupid to me since they are Christians, and the Bible is the bible and it doesn’t call for anything like this. I am sure that God sits up there somewhere and really enjoys watching all of this ridiculous hypocrisy. When they first divided I went to one of their meetings and walked away shaking my heads wondering how grown adults could call themselves Christians with all of the name calling and negative conversation that was going on. Instead of joining either of the dividing factions I chose to stay home on Sunday morning and enjoy a good run, or even do a blog article on the subject. While I realize we must have things to disagree over and even fight over it seems to me that this is not what God intended. But who really knows until we meet the maker in a more formal atmosphere, i.e. we all hope in that place called heaven.

Movie Review: “Shutter Island”, *, this movie had great acting in it but it was probably one of the most mind twisting, depressing movies I have even seen. I gave it a one star for the acting and Leonardo DiCaprio will probably be nominated for his acting. The setting for the story was in an institute for the extremely hard core criminally insane, the worst of the worst type of criminal. The story was hard to follow and was as gruesome as you can imagine. It all revolved around the search and investigation of one of the inmates who had brutally killed her three children, but as the story unfolds you will find that this is not really the story at all. It twists around like a pretzel and finally has a conclusion nearly 2 hours later. Supporting roles by Ben Kingsley, and Mark Ruffalo are excellent but still not worth the mental misery we are subjected to. We also had to sit on the 3rd row and I think it hit harder that close in. Bottom line, if you go after reading all of this you are one sick puppy! Rated R for disturbing violent content (understatement), language and some nudity (I missed that)!!

greerman

To Ramble, Movie Reviews

Since it has been nearly a month without posting on this site I am going to blame it on just being real busy; however, I could just say that I didn’t have anything to say or maybe had some writer block. Nothing could be further from the truth since I always have something to say. But the kicker is I want to say something that is close to being worthwhile so maybe I was just hanging in there for that light bulb of worthy subjects to happen. The fact is I have been traveling a lot and the computer I took with me just didn’t do the job for me. Now I am back from a very successful business trip to Colorado and now I am ready to write. My meetings in Colorado Springs included the USA Triathlon annual race director’s conference and it was very good. I was voted the oldest race director at the conference and probably the world since people my age have a different life than what I do. They spend time with their grand kids, work in the garden, play checkers or go to the senior clubs to compare the latest surgeries, etc. While I am not criticizing this activity at all it is just not what I want to do in life. So it is fun to go into a meeting at least 20 years older than most, but the cool thing is that there is always something to talk about, yep, my age. Since I have no intention of “retiring” or “quitting” I guess my unique topic of discuss will continue to be my age. From what I have gathered most people will retire and these people that are now 20 years younger than me will be retiring right before my eyes and then I will be dealing with people who are 40 years younger than me. Now I am having to work my way through this technological society who sit around and twitter their face book till their fingers are numb then they consult their e-mails and do that irritating texting and then lo and behold they might actually carry on a conversation at some point. In another 40 years I suppose we will just walk in a room to talk and we will have some kind of computer on our chest that you just touch for communication, so then we will not have to make any effort. Since I just completed my annual physical and my doctor declared me a freak of nature (the only surgery I have ever had was my tonsils out at age 8) and he would gladly trade the blood tests results for his. Excuse me doc but I am not in the trading mood, especially for my blood test results. He declared me very fit and said my ekg showed that my heart was doing the same thing it did last year during the test; it was beating at a reasonable rate and was healthy. Glad to hear that since I swim, bike, run, ride my motorcycle, and bowl. Please take your annual physical as soon as possible. The good news if you have nothing wrong, you will know it and feel good about it, but if you have something wrong you can catch it early and then do something about it. My simple solutions for staying healthy are not just exercising, since you must also exercise the brain and eat the right kind of food, no matter what. One of the things that I did a lot of during this nearly one month of not writing is go to the most current movies, so now I must get to the movie reviews. A record number, of seven will be reviewed.

Movie Reviews: “Tooth Fairy”, ***, actually a cute movie but really for those aged kids that still believe in the tooth fairy. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson has the title role, introduced as a minor league hockey player who discourages a youngster and is sentenced to one week’s hard labor as the real Tooth Fairy. Kind of stupid really but again the kids will really enjoy it. It is still playing in Lubbock so that means people are going to see it. Rated PG for mild language, some rude humor and sports action.

“Crazy Heart”, *****, This is a real good one starring Jeff Bridges as richly comic, semi-tragic, romantic anti-hero country and western singer Bad Blake. He has had way too many marriages, far too many years on the road and one too many drinks too many times. He finally reaches for salvation after a near disaster with the help from Jean played by Maggie Gyllenhall, a journalist who discovers the man behind the musician. Bridges has been nominated for best actor; he deserves to win in my opinion. Rated R for language and brief sexuality.

“The Lovely Bones”, **, For once I agree with the local critic on this one. Kind of a weird story where a teen age girl is murdered and then looks down on her family from heaven. Some of the scenes are repetitive, long and boring. Not even good acting makes this worth the high priced ticket. Good popcorn didn’t save it either. Rated PG-13 for mature thematic material involving disturbing violent content and images, and some language.

“The Edge of Darkness”, ****, This is a very good movie with lots of brutality and stars Mel Gibson as a veteran Boston police detective, whose adult daughter dies from a shotgun blast on his front porch. Convinced that he was not the target, Gibson delivers a character fueled by his own grief to find out the real story and why this happened. He is perfect for the part and does a great job of acting. The ending is worth waiting for since it is a 2 hours long. Rated R for strong bloody violence, language (to say the least).

“From Paris With Love”, ***, This movie is okay but I wouldn’t spend prime time bucks on it. It is a story of a low-ranking intelligence officer, working in the office of the U.S. ambassador in France. To spice the movie up he is assigned with a partner that is a wisecracking, rule breaking, fast-shooting, high-ranking American agent played by John Travolta. Sometimes the movie script is overwhelmed by the Travolta dominance of the scenes. Go see on bargain ticket. Rated R for strong bloody violence throughout, drug content, pervasive language and brief sexuality.

“When In Rome”, ***, Kristen Bell stars as an ambitious New Yorker who, disillusioned with romance, takes a whirlwind trip to Rome, where she defiantly plucks magic coins from a foolish fountain of love. She inexplicably ignites the passion of an odd group of suitors: a sausage magnate, a street magician, an adoring painter, and a self-admiring model. Makes for a cute story and Kristen is very easy on the eyes. Go see during prime time just to see her!! Rated PG-13 for some suggestive content.

“The Wolfman”, ***, Funny how there are movies galore about vampires, then it goes to werewolves. The acting is beyond reproach with Benicio Del Toro, Gwen Conlifffe, and Anthony Hopkins. Of course the story is about the monster that is killing everyone in grand bloody style, and then passing on the bad blood that makes this killing a requirement to wear the hairy armor of a werewolf. A remake of the original classic and very well done. Rated R for bloody horror, violence and gore.

greerman