2013…Another Year of “Reboots”? I Certainly Hope Not…

Alright…I should consider this part III of “The Changing Tide of Movie Viewing”, but this is going to be short.  America is tiring of these “reboots” of classics…To touch some films in a remake is as  horrid as stepping on a grave.  Seriously!  When writers do not stick with original thoughts of the writers who penned the works, they bastardize the entire work.  I can already see what’s coming with this:

http://tv.yahoo.com/news/carrie-underwood-star-nbcs-sound-music-163400631.html

To me this would be like casting Ted Nugent in a “Jesus Christ Superstar” remake…Sorry but this is not a seasoned actress. This is a country singer. This is not going to fare well, but neither did the NBC remake of “The Munsters” or the “Dark Shadows” reboot that came out in theaters this year.  For those who wish to debate the latter–it did NOT do well in the US.  In this country, star power doesn’t always = movie ticket sales.

Some things are better left UN-made and this is going to be one of those projects…Do these studios get write-offs for the trash they put out or what?!  The only way this trend will stop is to quit giving the kids money to go to the theaters and either boycott sponsors, or simply refuse to watch…Maybe eventually they will get the message.  The only halfway decent shows on TV now are Hawaii 5-0 and Law and order SVU.  And let’s not forget PBS!

And that’s the truth!  *Gives the Edith Ann Raspberry Here!*

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJMKupYF14I

 

Nana Says, Pink Hit the Nail on the Head with this Song…WARNING: ***Vernacular in the 1st video***

This is the UNEDITED version of “F– Perfect” by Pink…For anyone who is totally misunderstood, this says it all. Thank God I didn’t have to go to the lengths this character did to find her way. I learned a long time ago that compromising one’s self is never the answer. Never did that and never will. It only leads to misery and that is why I cut a lot of people from my life this year and I certainly don’t regret that because new doors opened once I did! 2012 was a great year for me! A lot got put into perspective for me, that’s for sure. And for anyone feeling down on themselves this time of year, don’t.  Things ARE going to get better and you don’t have to let that which is temporary defeat you. However sometimes you have to pull yourself up by the bra straps or bootstraps…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocDlOD1Hw9k

HERE is the clean version for those who don’t like vernacular:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sRM39rHoB8

One of the most inspiring things about Pink is that she stands her ground and her voice rocks!

Nana’s #1 All-Time Favorite Cleaning Product (Helpful Hint #2)–Never mind the strong smell…

Look if you guys have a Family Dollar or a Dollar Tree Store–or even a Dollar General Store, you need to check this stuff out!

http://www.lastotallyawesome.com/

I’ve used this in lieu of stain sticks and stuff to get stains out of clothing and cleaning appliances…You can read about this stuff on the website link I put above, but there is no bleach, ammonia, etc… in this stuff.  It will clean almost ANYTHING! Seriously!  The best part of it is, it is usually only $1 for a spray bottle of it, or anywhere from $3-3.50 for the big refill bottle. I use it at full strength to do deep cleaning at the store I work in and I’ve never diluted it for the stove. I let it set for about a minute (two tops) and then wipe it off.  I don’t recommend it for really BADLY messed up ovens…NOT a good idea. Now if you need a stainless sink to be made silver again, this should do it after letting it set for a couple of minutes too.

Pick up a bottle and read what you can use it on! I’ve taken some pretty bad carpet stains out with it too, and it didn’t damage it! However it does have a strong smell to it!
Later!

I am not kidding around! This stuff works on some of the toughest cleaning jobs I’ve ever dealt with!

 

Nana’s Helpful Hint–and you MAY NOT NEED a PLUMBER!

Okay…Bathrooms are a pain in the ass to clean.  They are even more of a pain if you don’t live in an apartment complex with a maintenance person OR a halfway decent super…I’ve known too many people that had to wait a week for the super to show up or wait through a holiday weekend for a bloody plumber.  Before I go further, you need to know that if you use PVC piping on your plumbing neither lye nor things like Draino or Liquid Plumber are good for the lines.  DON’T USE ‘EM!  Over time, that can cause major problems especially if you live in an area like I do with hard water…Again, it’s a pain in the ass to fix! But if you’re too afraid to try what I am about to tell you, then call the plumber…It’s much safer–especially if you’re prone to making problem situations worse by trying to play Mr. or Ms. Fix It!

That being said, I am going to give you something to try FIRST.  Do NOT pick up that phone until you do unless you want to spend a minimum of $200.00 that you might not be able to afford.  There are only TWO things you need for this concoction…You need 1-30 oz. bottle of CLOROX bleach.  DO NOT USE STORE brands. The concentration of chlorine varies and this works best.  Then you need about 32-40 oz. of COKE CLASSIC. AGAIN, do not use store brands and such. If they don’t have COKE CLASSIC, Use ORIGINAL PEPSI. This is for the acid content and either one is pretty strong by itself.

CAUTION: Above all make sure the area is WELL VENTILATED.  The smell of this shit can knock the hide off of a buffalo AND/OR cause the meanest billy-goat to humble himself very quickly!
If it is a sink, try to plunge it to get rid of excess water first. If you can’t just do the best you can.  If it’s the toilet, same thing.  After you do that, pour in the soda first.  It looks freaky at first but when you add the bottle of bleach it will clear up. Wait a few minutes and it will start bubbling like mad…Once the bubbling slows down and/or stops (about 45 minutes) try putting hot water down the sink.  If it’s the toilet, flush it.  If it works, then great! I just saved you a fortune and you can thank me later.  If it only speeds up the draining (or flushing a little) then repeat it one more time.   Either way it’s worth a shot before calling the plumber. I know because I used this on my toilet tonight. BOOYAH! Have a great Sunday!

 

 

Nana’s Favorite Blog Post–Still the Best One I’ve Read!

I love reading Lauren Vasil’s blog…I go into the archives to find stuff on occasion to refresh my memory when necessary.  However the Holidays is the perfect time to share this post again…This time of year I think of my Grannie Ainsworth a lot. My sister made a chocolate cream pie today that reminded me of her–and I’ll get my porcupine meatballs tomorrow! Brian, my son, will be lucky if I share! LOL!

I find myself thinking of other family members I lost also…And of one particular Christmas where my older brother told EVERYONE what their gifts under the tree were and my dad nailed him to the wall for it! The next year–Dad duct taped the boxes and the Christmas wrap in which he carefully wrapped them!

However I also find myself remembering my Granny O’Neill…My father’s mother.  Not much has been written about her, but she was a good woman, and very kind also.  I was fortunate because my grandparents lived across the street from each other, so on Sundays we made our rounds!  We would have early lunch at one and then go to the other’s house and eat again!

Some days I could go over there and find her playing her electric organ.  The song “Long, Long Ago” comes to mind. I had interest in music at an early age and would play that thing also, and then go play the big one Grannie Ainsworth had in her house!  I couldn’t remember how to do that now, but my son, Brian,  has a new keyboard upon which I intend to learn to hash out a few things again!

She’d pay me a quarter to sweep her floor and I’d go raid the ice cream at Mann’s Grocery or buy myself a soda. Then we’d come back, usually on a Saturday afternoon and music shows would be playing on TV.  My Grannie Ainsworth was playing shows that featured “The Happy Goodmans”, the “Grand ‘Ol Opry”, “Hee Haw” or something!  On Friday’s my brother and I would sneak up at our house and watch “The Midnight Special”, “Don Kirschner’s Rock Concert”, “Friday Night Videos”, etc…Needless to say music was, and IS a huge part of  my life. I started singing again. I’m writing music and stories as well as a book.

Now back to what I was saying.  Food is what a lot of things centered around regardless of whose house we were in and it was not just on the holidays! When it wasn’t a holiday, I loved Granny O’Neill’s roast beef and home-made mashed potatoes w/gravy etc!  I remember one time when my father looked at my in a funny way, and said, “You are the weirdest kid I’ve got!” laughing because I was mixing the meat, potatoes and gravy together!  Granny O’Neill told him, “Oh leave her be. It all goes to the same place anyway.” and was grinning from ear to ear.

Then we’d go to Grannie Ainsworth’s house in the evening for supper too much the time…Now my uncles were pure cut-ups at the table.  They loved pitching beans at each other or farting at the table. If they did the latter they loved to blame my older sister just to embarrass her!  She’d be crying,”I didn’t do it!”  every time and my Grannie Ainsworth would get onto them for acting up like that.  And just so everyone knows, my Grannie Ainsworth and my  mom made the best hamburgers on the planet.  You will not catch me at Wendy’s, McDonald’s or any other fast food place getting a burger because if it’s not hot enough to melt the cheese (REAL CHEESE), then it’s not any good in my opinion.

In Midland there is a place on Rankin Highway called “Dixie Burger”.  THEY know how to make old-fashioned hamburgers.  I like Fuddrucker’s once in a while too.

This year I became a grandmother myself.  If it kills me, my grandson is going to have a lot of good memories to laugh at–as soon as his dad realizes he can’t push the poor kid into the NFL before he’s even out of diapers–and he’ll KNOW what real food is!  Why? His dad will never admit it, but he got a knack for cooking from my Grannie Ainsworth and he is excellent at it!  So is his girlfriend Daphne! I am so thankful for so many things and for all the laughter and memories that Lauren’s post continues to bring up even after a year of its original posting.  It is because of that that I am calling it one of the best posts I’ve ever read, and am sharing it here again.

This will lift your spirits, that’s for sure! Enjoy and don’t forget to leave a comment on her blog! Thanks!

http://www.fizgiggery.com/2011/real-life/nanny

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I certainly have and I do have much to be thankful for!

Nana Learned a Lesson on Thanksgiving…

Sometimes misunderstandings can lead to a lot of grief this time of year. I totally misunderstood something one of my boys said–well actually, I misinterpreted what he said, but let me start at the beginning.  I got off work and got home late on 11/21…Spent 2.5 hours cleaning up the kitchen that one of the boys messed up…No one EVER confesses to such messiness but I did clean it up.  About 30 minutes later one of the boys comes in and puts some food in the refrigerator which I felt was food for Thanksgiving Day.  So much for that.

I then heard one say they were spending Thanksgiving with the ex…Knowing my boys, that translates into they are cooking T-Day dinner at MY HOUSE.  I had to be at work at 2 p.m. and nothing was done by 11. In fact, nothing was cooked.  Nobody wanted to get up to go to our local truck stop, which had turkey dinner and all the trimmings either…I went alone.  I worked my fanny off thinking my ex was in my house enjoying the day, with me not getting anything.

I came into the house and found out that the ex never showed up and nothing was ever cooked.  The boys decided to can the idea. The part I misunderstood was the part about the ex eating with them in MY HOUSE.  THAT complicates things since the man tends to go through all the food in the house if I am not there–OR he leaves some of  his stuff there which irritates the hell out of  me and I’ve told him NOT to do that.

Anyway, while I was feeling sorry for myself at work, a man who had come to my defense once thinking someone was disrespecting me as a lady entered the store. I wasn’t being disrespected, so that was cleared up quickly.  He didn’t understand what Thanksgiving was about and hadn’t eaten in a day.  He said, “America sucks!”  I knew something was up so I followed him outside and asked him what was going on.  He didn’t know how to get to the Salvation Army so that he could eat a hot meal, and I didn’t know how to get there from where I was, but I remembered how he tried to “stand up for me” when he thought I was being yelled at.

I knew he wasn’t acting normally because he is usually very friendly.  I asked him what happened and he told me.  To make a long story short, this man is from Australia and he’s writing a book–traveling on foot across the U.S.  I explained to him what Thanksgiving means to various cultures  and that those who judge one another in an  unkind way have not learned that many people in this country have not learned that we all bleed red yet.  He felt a little better after that and my co-worker and I bought him something to eat.  It was the least that we could do.  Isn’t this what Thanksgiving is about? Sharing?

He smiled before leaving and was telling another man, “Now I know what Thanksgiving is!,” then he turned to us and said, “Thank you for giving me something to be Thankful for!”

Then it made the pain of the misunderstanding go away, and that got resolved later.

The moral of this is that things are never as they seem and someone ALWAYS has it worse off than you do…It is my fervent hope that the injustices to the homeless in the area gets taken care of soon.   As I said in an earlier post, winter is coming.  Too many people in Midland, TX have lost their homes (even though they make a decent salary)  due to the price-gouging on the rent and the hotel fees there.  Somewhere along the way some of these people who run the hotels, apartments and rent houses have lost sight of the fact that the boom will one day bust  They had better hope that Midland has a  kinder spirit toward them should they ever fall upon hard times.

 

Happy Thanksgiving to All!

And I hope you all have a wonderful time with family, friends, and/or loved ones. I’ll be at work and will go to Mom’s after or early in the a.m.

Here’s a laugh for ya!

Oh Come on! You knew this was coming! LOL Have a great one!

The Changing World of Movie Viewing Part II

In the first post on this I discussed how actors/actresses are judged by an audience and how a film critic’s views no longer represent the public as much as they do the marketing execs.  They don’t represent the academy, that’s for sure. I will not rehash that here.  I want to discuss another aspect that Hollywood seems to trip  itself over.

Many marketing execs claim that they make films to appeal to teens and ‘tweens because they think that the older audience tends to “stay home”.  The logic is nothing more than a smokescreen to justify how they tend to make a lot of crappy films now.  Why? Because they are marketing the same type of crap to home viewers.  With the exception of a few shows, like “Hardcore Pawn” people are getting really sick of “reality TV“.  The fact of the matter is that many of these shows highlight what is wrong with society rather than what is enjoyable about it.  Some even tend to glamorize behavior that society should never tolerate from anyone for that matter–especially the authorities…For example, take the latest case:  Honey Boo Boo…What parent in their right mind would jeopardize the health of their own child by pumping him/her full of energy drinks and let them gain so much weight just so they can act the way this kid does?  The fact of the matter there is that they feel sorry for the kid and want to kick the parents’ asses, and I think many watch just to see if CPS will knock on their door…

Now back to the point of this post.  IF these execs knew what they were doing, they would market real movies with logical plots and believable story lines AT LEAST to the home viewers since they tell the public that the older audience tends to “stay home”…The bottom line is: They want the kids because they think most have only a two second attention span. Not only is that an insult the entire audience as a whole, but they insulted the entire Academy of Motion pictures with that line of thinking.  Do they really think when deciding for the Oscars that that is the logic of the members of the academy?  Seriously? If so, they should all be fired and replaced.

It seems to me that it is the performers and a handful of  directors and producers who have the real audience and fans in mind.  Both the Academy and the audience want original ideas, innovation, characters that COULD exist, believable story lines and even a little old-fashioned romance from time to time–and even HUMOR–REAL HUMOR–not this crap that always goes back to sexual innuendo either.  The innuendo and such has its place but it should not be on Prime-Time TV. THAT should be reserved for when the kids are in bed.  There is nothing illogical or “archaic” about that.  It is those execs who promote the bull shit that have limited their own potential by buying into their own crappy perception of the world they live in.  IF that were not the case, they wouldn’t be advising stock holders and producers to put money into pictures and TV shows that are not worth a damn.

When shows like “Harry’s Law” and “Memphis Beat” get cancelled, something is definitely wrong.  A network with a wiser CEO should work to get those shows on it.  I’ve got $10 that says with the RIGHT marketing and the RIGHT time slot, those two shows would be runaway hits for investors.

It is also time to stop with the sequels, prequels and remakes (or as some now call them “reboots”) that tend to deviate from original classic shows. NOT one of these has succeeded on TV this year or at the box office.  The only movie doing well in that category this year is “The Expendables 2” because it is a continuation of an ORIGINAL IDEA!   Thank God for Sly Stallone and Dolph Lundgren.  At least those guys have some idea of what an audience really wants…The only other fairly recent film which did well was “Star Trek” (2009).  J. J. Abrams did that one right–regardless of what some think.  He captured the essence of the original characters using new actors and did not deviate from their traits in the least.  That is more than I can say for the  “Dark Shadows” movie that was released this year.  Every reason that movie flopped is in a book written by Tom Laughlin  which you can find here:

http://www.billyjack.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=BK9S&Category_Code=BOOKS&Store_Code=BERSERK

And I still say that had the Dark Shadows Revival series went beyond 12 episodes, it would have lasted.  That was one remake that did stick to Dan Curtis’s vision of what he thought his own creation should be.  He always knew what his fans wanted, that’s for sure.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday, everyone! Until next time…