“Ah lub yooo!”

Okay, why is Kurt Russell having lunch with the Stanley Cup? And why does it have arms?! He’s feeding it with his fork! I mean, seriously–what the fuck?!?!

My first installment as film columnist for This Magazine is on newsstands now and online for the electronically inclined (which will no doubt be most of you). If you were wondering how I felt about the portrayal of Vikings in the upcoming movie Pathfinder, well, this is your chance to find out all the gory details.

This shouldn’t be nearly as funny as it is…

(via Nick from Blanketfort)

1) Trying to set-up webpages and deal with the finickiness of configuring them properly makes me want to stab myself in the junk with a fondue fork. That’s why I’m going to leave the procedure to professionals in future.
2) Tenacious D - The Pick of Destiny is a much funnier movie than it probably should be.

A couple from column A and one or two from columns B and C. Take your pick.

Personal:
- I went to the dentist the other day for the first time in fifteen-or-so years. Coincidentally, I also have dental coverage for the first time in fifteen-or-so years. It wasn’t particularly taxing (aside from riding public transit to Richmond) but the bad news was two cavities (which apparently can be fixed in a 1/2 hour) and all four of my wisdom teeth (which will require general anaesthetic and more than a 1/2 hour). Bah. I’m more upset about the wisdom teeth than anything else, mostly because they’re not (and haven’t been) bothering me. Yes yes, better that they take them out before they do start causing me grief, but still. The one awesome part about the clinic, though, are the TVs. Ceiling-mounted TVs to which they give you headphones and a remote while they dig around in your mouth. Hell, I got to watch nearly an entire episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation while I was getting cleaned, but since they finished quickly I don’t know how it ends. Will Picard and Dr. Crusher die in the strange alien arms-dealer cave? I’ll never knownow. *sigh*
- Anxious to rekindle and old friendship, a week or so ago I emailed my friend Sue (to whom I haven’t spoken in several years now–stupid time flying by) and she emailed me back today from a prolonged vacation somewhere next to a river in Thailand saying how glad she is to hear from me. I love global communications. That is all so incredibly awesome.

Oscars:
- I’m glad Marty finally won one. I know it’s all politics and they just chose The Departed because of the very real possibility he could kick off before they slid him a Best Director nod, but honestly–it’s about fuckin’ time.
- Also, I’ve been saying Helen Mirren is hot for over a decade now. Is everyone else just catching on?

Shopping:
- Let’s face it–having something electronic wake you up sucks. It doesn’t matter what exactly the alarm is or what it says or does, the fact is it’s jarring you awake against your will. The only product I’ve seen that mitigates this torment with something rather soothing and refreshing is this new alarm clock that wakes you up with eleoquently announced Stephen Fry compliments, in the tradition of his role as Jeeves on Jeeves & Wooster. Perversely, this clock is so cool I could see myself setting the alarm on my days off just to hear it. I could also see myself fully ignoring it, but that’s prerogative of the master of the house.

Art:
- Black metal photographs. I tried to figure out something clever to say, but words fail. Totally brutal.

Hard Candy, The Devil Wears Prada and Why We Fight.

You may start assembling your psychological profile now.

Wow, it’s been a hell of a week. Not in a bad way, mind you, just in the way that everything decides it has to happen at once. Here’s the pertinent bits in point form.

Personal:
- Mrs. C has left for two weeks on business and I’m left holding down the fort. This means that I can get more writing done, but it also means that my best friend isn’t around for half a month, and that pretty much sucks. And it also means that I have to get groceries alone in the snow and that the cat is even more crazy because she misses her mom. Foo.
- But as I mentioned before, more time for writing, which is awesome.

Writing:
- And speaking of writing, I’m the new film columnist for This Magazine, so be sure to pick up a copy of the next issue when it hits the newsstands–it’s sure to be a keeper.

Tech:
- Everyone else on the planet has developed an acute case of logorrhea regarding the iPhone, so I won’t bother to go off about it, but I will say that while I don’t usually care for convergent technology (why do you want a 3MP camera in your cell phone? why?), this is pretty p0rny. Yes, I want one.

Cartoons:
- I know that Adventure Time was just produced as a one-off “Random Cartoon”, but can it please become a regular series? PLEASE. Because it’s truly awesomazing and Jake the Dog is my new hero.

Movies:
- Available online for free now: Darkon. If a documentary about weekend warriors (and by that I mean fantasy LARPers who do it mostly on the weekend) is at all intriguing to you, load up your browser with this. Laughs and sympathetic embarrassment abound.
- I just managed to find a copy of the hideously out of print, shot-in-Vancouver-when-not-everyone-and-their-dog-did-it classic film Ladies and Gentlemen… The Fabulous Stains, so I’m blissing out. Punk rock raditude.

Music:
- Dear Friends, you know I love metal, so why didn’t you tell me about Mastodon earlier? Like last year. Or before. Everyone else has been rockin’ and I’ve been missing out on the best metal in ages. You suck. Yours, Chris.
- Ghostface Killah’s last two albums are fucking dope.

Obits:
- Iwao Takamoto: the artist and designer behind such notable Hanna Barbera series as Scooby-Doo, Speed Buggy and Atom Ant.
- Momofuku Ando: the creator of the Cup Noodle (whose story is told in this surprisingly gripping manga).
Between cartoons and Cup Noodles these men forged my adolescence. RIP, gentlemen; you will be missed.

1) 300
2) Get Lamp
3) Spider-Man 3
4) Harry Potter and the Order of The Phoenix
5) Nerdcore

I finally got to see the latest Ramones documentary End of the Century the other night. I say finally because anyone who knows me knows exactly how much influence the Ramones had on my adolescence, post-adolescence and, well, most of my life, really. I airbanded “Judy is a Punk” in front of my Grade Seven class (looking back on it, I still have no idea what any of my classmates might have thought of a gangly nerd mouthing the lyrics to a punk song in front of them) and over the years my fashion choices generally seem to have come from the wardrobes of one of the band (leather jacket, jeans, shaggy hair). So it’s a little surprising that I didn’t run down to the video store in a spastic fit as soon as it was released, but I didn’t and it somehow passed me by until now.

In any case, it was worth the wait. It’s a remarkably frank and unromantic movie (which is probably as it should be, considering the relationships of the band members), but it’s the most honest and upfront version of their story that you’re likely to hear (especially considering that three of the members are now dead). In fact, according to the quote on the front of the box, it was so accurate it left Johnny “disturbed.” And I suppose that’s fair, because for most of their two decades as a band they semed to generally hate one another. Joey and Johnny in particular shared a special kind of animosity (the kind that can only be achieved from stealing your bandmate’s girlfriend) that went on until Joey died. They went into the studio; they wrote music; they recorded music; they hit the road—year after year, all the while barely being able to stand being in the same room as one another. And that’s astounding. And it’s all on film.

It’s a sad story, but it is important—especially if you’re an armchair historian of punk culture or someone just interested in one of the most influential American rock bands. Gabba gabba hey.

Anyway, in honour of watching this, I thought I’d post some lyrics I think are appropriate. In my hometown, I was known (to a lesser degree) for my Joey Ramone impression. Indeed, a few of my friends (T.T. and LeeLee) and I (Chrissy) have talked for about the last decade or so about forming a Ramones tribute band (called Vindaloo Commando—a reference to both “I Just Want to Have Something to Do” and “Commando”). This hasn’t yet come to pass (although I still think it would be fuckin’ funny), but I still feel the need to share the joy, so—for the first time—here are the lyrics to Vindaloo’s Canadian history lesson “The FLQ Took My Baby Away”.

“The FLQ Took My Baby Away”

She went away for the holidays
Said she was going to Gaspé
But she never got there
She never got there
She never got there they say, yeah
(Repeat)

The FLQ took my baby away
They took her away, away from me
The FLQ took my baby away
They took her away, away from me

I don’t know where my baby can be
They took her from me, they took her from me
I don’t know where my baby can be
They took her from me, they took her from me

Ring me, ring me, ring me up Parliament
Find out where my baby went
Ring me, ring me, ring me up that Trudeau guy
And find out if my baby’s alive

Yeah yeah yeah
Oh oh oh oh oh

(Repeat lyrics as necessary)