it keeps getting better or worse (depending on your orientation)
Current mood: scared
Category: Blogging

So, first it was Bernie Mac and now Issac Hayes is dead.

I'm getting worried. I'm almost out of black celebrities that I have bothered to learn the names of.

We need police cars circling Malcolm Jamal Warner's house, stat! We also need half a police car for Eartha Kitt's duplex.

If we lose them I'll look like a racist.

~shane

Currently listening : Miss Kitt to You By Eartha Kitt Release date: 1992-07-14

11:10 PM - 3 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

It’s Funny Cause It’s Funny
Current mood: awake

A dirty gypsy once cured me of my racism with a tablespoon of spit.

Currently listening : Sing-A-Long With Madeline By Various Artists Release date: 2002-06-25

10:13 PM - 3 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Disaster Movie: This Movie Makes Parts of my Brain Eat the Other Parts
Current mood: infuriated
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

Scary Movies 1-4, Date Movie, Epic Movie, Meet the Spartans, Superhero Movie, and now Disaster Movie..

Quick question: who the fuck watches these things?

Someone has to be watching them. I mean, they cost money-- people spent money on bagels and duct tape (the primary components of the film industry). Men with cigars put their hedge funds to work and financed it to the tune of several million dollars a piece, and yet I still wonder "why" and "for whom."

Scary Movie wasn't all that bad. It wasn't a good film, but it maintained it's focused and somehow was able to span an hour and a half of parody without ever pointing out anything new to the audience about the genre.  That's kind of impressive. You would think there would have been at least one rogue idea that challenged or critiqued the films it relied so heavily on. This was a genre of films that deserved a level of scrutiny for it's pervasive motifs of structural racism and misogyny, yet a set of largely black writers found nothing important to say. At least it was moderately funny and had a couple penises.

The decline in the films to follow was beyond tragic as the thin sham of a plot that held the first film together was continually sacrificed to fit in more half assed attempts at humor unbefitting the margins of a forth grader's composition book.  By date movie they weren't even trying to have a through-line anymore and the film was just one continual reel of awkwardly unfunny "sketches" and parodies that beg the question "did the writers even see the movie they are making fun of?" Teaser trailers are being treated like the Cliff Notes for an advanced class in disappointing your audience.

I accept this as a fact. I don't like it, but I accept it. (Like much of America is going to have to get with the notion of a black president)  However, in the latest installment they have gone beyond the act of a disjointed narrative. The following is a list of subjects prominently spoofed in "Disaster Movie":  Enchanted, The Dark Night, Hannah Montana, Hellboy, High School Musical, Indiana Jones, Alvin and the Chipmunks, Iron Man, Kung Fu Panda, Sex and the City, Speed Racer, Hancock, There Will Be Blood, The Incredible Hulk, Juno, as well as the perennial celebrity fodder of Dr. Phil and Amy Winehouse. Please note that not a single one of these properties belong to the "disaster film" genre. NOT A FUCKING ONE!!!

Was there nothing funny to be said about Armageddon, Twister, Independence Day, Earthquake, The Day after Tomorrow, Volcano, The Towering Inferno, Vertical Limit, Descent, Deep Core, End Day, Dante's Peak, Meteor, Flood, Even Almighty, The Perfect Storm, Waterworld, The Inconvenient Truth, The 11^th Hour, Backdraft, Latter 49, The Andromeda Strain, Children of Men, I am Legend, Outbreak, Deep Impact, 9/11, Alive, or Maximum Overdrive.

The only thing I really took away from my years in film school was the realization that the power of film lies primarily in the eternal nature of its imagery.  There is nothing ephemeral about it and I would sleep a lot better at night if I new millions of dollars weren't spent in making bloated episodes of Best Week Ever (with all the funny taken out).  These DVDs will last for a thousand years and look at the legacy that we leave behind: a series of jokes so short lived that they will never "start to feel dated."  They will be just as painfully short sighted then as they are now.

I hope everyone who was a part of this film dies in an erection related accident.

Currently listening : Sinatra At the Movies By Frank Sinatra Release date: 2008-04-15

2:03 AM - 3 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

I’ve Got a Bat for YOUR Belfry
Current mood: distractable
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

I was checking IMDB today and apparently THE DARK KNIGHT has an IMDB rating of 9.5… nine point fucking five.

It beats out The Godfather's 9.1 to make it the highest rated movie in history (as far as the internets is concerned).  Now, granted, these numbers are sure to adjust over time, but at 47,000 votes that is still pretty fucking good.

A comic book film is better than Shawshank Redemption now. Take that angry third grader with back acne that used to pee at me! 

I'll take my apology now.

~ The Dark Shane

Currently listening : Batman Forever: Music From The Motion Picture Release date: 1995-06-06

8:00 PM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

shane made a personal ad for me.
Current mood: romantic
Category: Romance and Relationships

I realized today that it was silly of me to put effort into getting my friends laid on the internets when there was someone else, even more deserving of having had been laid, still going wanton... I'm talking about me.  I decided to post a craigslist message for myself

-=-

I'm looking for a completely non-unique sort of girl.  I don't need her to be "funny" or "intelligent."  I'm also getting rather tired of this constant barrage of "cute" every time I turn around.  I just want her to sort of blend into the background of my life, occasionally telling me how awesome I am, but only through the mesh screen of a full ghilly suit.

Now don't get me wrong, that doesn't mean I want someone who isn't damaged goods. I like 'em scarred and charred, baby. And while it's a little unrealistic to ask that every girl I meet should be physically abused (no one's perfect) I do require some one to have kicked the stuffing out of you, if only emotionally speaking.  This guarantees the sort of frightful sheepishness that will let me get away with all kinds of wacky schemes and philandery.

I don't want any readers, film buffs, romantics, or "girls next door."  Just a good old fashion sex servant / civil war reenactivist with a keen eye for verbal irony.

Holla at ya boi!

-=-

And so you don't think i'm making this up. http://austin.craigslist.org/m4w/746358298.html

Currently listening : Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus By Hannah Montana Release date: 2007-12-07

1:56 AM - 3 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

Marco Bastion - Word Warrior
Current mood: Logorrhetic
Category: Logorrhetic Writing and Poetry

I think the following are funny, but I seldom have the opportunity/audacity to use them in public:

Comeuppance, sassafras, dongle, ninny, oscilloscope, rotunda, episcopal, hirsute, mollycoddle, nipperkin, hoosegow, sirocco, pogonotrophy, meatus, cocksure, flibbertigibbet, scofflaw, perambulator, caddywampus, gruntled, mustachioed, callipygian, syllepsis, tintinnabulation, funicular, fruticose, torpor, quaquaversal, floccinaucinihilipilification.

I think the following are not funny:

Nick Cannon.

Currently listening : Here Come the ABCs [CD/DVD Combo] By They Might Be Giants Release date: 2005-10-25

11:50 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Found Art
Current mood: Wistful
Category: Wistful Romance and Relationships

"With one brave, historical, act,
I will win your love,
now, and for all eternity."

John Hinckley, Jr. to Jodie Foster

(It would almost be romantic if he weren't about to try to kill the president.)

Currently listening : Contact: Music From The Motion Picture Release date: 1997-08-19

8:43 PM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Surprise! Surprise!
Current mood: confused

I am seldom surprised anymore. Maybe it's because I've grown jaded and indifferent over the past "my entire life" or maybe I'm merely a genius whose powers of intuition are nearing clairvoyance. (The world will never know) But lately the surprises keep rolling in as I have been called out by three people in as many days for being "cocky."

We are obviously seeing two very different people.

When I look at myself I see a one-eared hobble horse being held together by messily applied patches of bond-o and a strong sense of irony.  I'm one robust preschooler away from being reduced to my simplest form—nothing more than a twitchy pile of splinters and brass fixtures that've gone all green with neglect. Perhaps I should've taken better care of myself in my youth, but it's hard to get a child excited about lacquer and lemon oil resins.  Not when there are shows like "Clarissa Explains it All" to be had.

I forgot where I was going with that meta-nalogy… oh yes! Truth be told I'm a barely functional individual, only occasionally man-like, with a barren godless wasteland where most people keep their social graces and precepts for acceptable dinner table conversation.  Before I go out to perform I have to staple a happy mask to the front of my skull and pray five times towards Mecca in the hopes that nobody realizes I don't belong up there.

How can that be viewed as "cocky?"  When things are going well I'll have a brief flash of "confidence" but wasn't that supposed to be the goal? Aren't we supposed to be sure of ourselves and proud of our abilities? I'm barely even that.

La di da, America. La di da.

THE Shane Hebert

Currently listening : Mermaid Avenue By Billy Bragg & Wilco Release date: 1998-06-23

2:36 PM - 4 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

Forget it
Current mood: irritated

well, i was going to post a bulletin to see who wanted to go and watch Eddie Izzard with me when he comes down to Austin in June, but it seems that tickets start around $275 for balcony, so I guess I'll be watching his new show on DVD like usual.

Damn.

I hear he takes his balls out on stage this time around.

~shane

Currently listening : Definite Article By Eddie Izzard Release date: 09 November, 2004

2:06 PM - 8 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

A Night of Firsts
Current mood: quixotic

Well, tonight was a pretty great night. A lot of firsts.

I danced on a stage tonight for the amusement of a largely receptive audience. (And not like the last time either.)

I finally got to know what it felt like to blow people off. Oh yeah, it was awesomes.

And to top it all off, now my car smells like partially digested insalata Caprese with a side 'o bad decisions.

I think we've all learned something tonight.

Currently listening : All the Young Dudes By Mott the Hoople Release date: 21 February, 2006

2:04 AM - 4 Comments - 3 Kudos - Add Comment