Things That Make Me Snarf - Army of Darkness

With the holiday coming up, I wanted to show a clip of one of my favorite Halloween movies. And there's no beating Army of Darkness.



Personally, I think Klaatu Burata Necktie has a nice ring to it.

I'm all about the campy horror flicks. I have no desire to see any of the Saw movies or anything in which the idiot sorority girl runs around in her undies and has to fend of the insane psycho killer with a pair of safety scissors, but give me the rollerskating vampires from Fright Night or Billy Zane doing the demonic cowboy dance in Tales From the Crypt: Demon Night, and I'm a happy girl. I like the vampire cheerleaders in Dusk Til Dawn and the singing zombies of Shaun of the Dead. Anybody else have some good recommendations for me?

I'm adding "make the campiest horror film ever" to my list of things to do. Because really, I'm all about camp, unless you're talking about church camp in which case I am less than pleased because my best friend slept with my boyfriend the last time I was there. I mean, really, you'd expect lightning bolts from heaven for that kind of thing, but apparently Ramrod was busy.

I'm thinking that there should be a lot of eyebrow shots in the movie. And maybe it should be a musical. Rollerskating Zombies in Love. Mmmm... I think I'll have to work on it a little more.

RIP Frumious Bandersnatch - Almost

The Frumious Bandersnatch died on Saturday.

For those of you who need a refresher course in Carriespeak, I'm referring to my computer. All of my computers have been named The Frumious Bandersnatch. I know, how creative of me. Anyway, the third in a long (if three is long) and distinguished line of Frumious Bandersnatches totally croaked. I sound very calm about this now, but at the time I had an intense urge to kick the CPU up and down the street whilst repeatedly screaming: "Eff you, you effing effer!"

We had a neighbor who used to stand outside his apartment and scream this very sentence, or the nonsanitized version thereof, to the construction guys who worked outside one summer. We called him Mullet Man. Because, well, he had a mullet. And he was obviously a superhero in disguise whose mission was to save the world from early morning construction. I particularly loved when he would scream his motto while I was on conference calls for work.

So I took the Frum III to Best Buy, hoping against hope that they wouldn't have to send him away for new parts, because then I'd have to call him the Frumious Frankensnatch, and that sounds vaguely pervy to me. I'm not sure I could say it without giggling. And the Geek Squad guy hooked him up. Turned him on.

And he worked just fine.

He very carefully did not laugh in my face, although clearly he wanted to. And of course I felt like a complete idiot. I wanted to say, "You know, I used to teach a college level computer class when I was a grad student, and yeah it was software instead of hardware, but I'm not a complete idiot. I tried everything I was supposed to. I unplugged it, and let it cool down, and tried safe mode and everything. I even sacrificed some bread to Ramrod. So quit not laughing at me like I'm an idiot."

But I didn't say that. I took the Frum home and hooked him back up. He's fine now, the bastard. If he wanted to go for a ride, he should have just said so.

All of this makes me think about this guy I once saw who gave a speech about quality control. And he opened up by saying that there was one industry that has a really poor history of quality control and reliability of products, and if other industries followed their lead, five people would be buried alive in the US each year, three planes would suddenly stop working and fall from the sky, and so on. (I'm making up the numbers since I can't remember them exactly, but the gist is still the same.) I tried to find him, but for some reason searching Google for "hilarious speaker who talks about computer quality control and people being buried alive" got me pages about Obama and t-shirts about hookers. Those would be separate pages, BTW.

So Many Ideas, So Little Time

I'm in serious trouble. See, my friend Skilli went to Japan and brought me back a gift. Is it a doggie bag of leftover yellowfin maki? A complete collection of El Hazard cartoons? Some of those funny tabi shoes that make you look like your feet were stolen by aliens in the night and replaced with turtle feet? Nope. None of those things. He got me a book called "Yokai Attack! The Japanese Monster Survival Guide."

To me this means a couple of things. First, Skilli really gets me. He understands my weaknesses. Second, I've got a serious problem, because now I've got another book idea. To many people, this would be a good thing, because apparently some people actually sit down at the computer and ask themselves what in sam hell they want to write. This never happens to me. When I sit down at the computer to work on something new, it goes something like this:

"I've always wanted to write a book where a bunch of Japanese monsters start rampaging through the world and stomping on cities... oh, cities! If I've got cities, then I could work in some urban werewolves with lots of scruff, and I'll call one Oargarn, which is a thinly veiled anagram of Aragorn... oh, and then I'll need to have Gaslole, the Legolas wannabe vampire... and then I should put in some girls with weapons hidden in their high heels, because I like shoes... and then the world could be saved by a tribe of urban Smurfs, only that's probably copywritten, so I'll have to call them Snorks... er... Smorfs. Yeah. Oh, and I like popcorn. Bow down before my scary eyebrows!"

That Smurfette was a killer, you know. She was all smurfy this and smufy that, but she had to be kickass to keep all those guys in line.

But I think you begin to see my problem. Too many ideas many of which make no sense whatsoever. Anyone want to start ghostwriting for me? Just so long as you leave the Smorfs to me, because that's a killer idea.

Anyway, thanks Skilli for putting another idea into my head. Not like it wasn't full enough already!

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention: PJ Hoover is celebrating the release of her MG book The Emerald Tablet! If you haven't heard about it yet, neiner neiner neiner. I'm taunting you. Of course, you could go to her website and remedy the situation, and then you could join me in taunting the rest of the plebes who aren't kewl like we are...

Channeling Jon Lovitz

It's my policy not to put people I know into my books. Some days, I regret this policy. For example, my best friend married this great guy who is SCREAMING to be in a comedy book. He's tall, bald, and can channel the spirit of Jon Lovitz, which is even more impressive when you consider that Lovitz is still alive.

That's a really cool idea for a book: an impressionist who actually channels spirits. One minute, you're a famous Hollywood actor, sitting at the dinner table and eating bean sprouts off five million dollar plates because that's the only way you're going to make bean sprouts remotely palatable, and the next minute, you're looking out of the eyes of Mr. Bald and your voice is coming out of his mouth.

Of course, that's kind of like Being John Malkovich, isn't it? Which is sheer genius if you haven't seen it.

Anyway, Mr. Bald recently told me a story about how his mother called to tell him that her horse died and he felt really bad because he couldn't stop giggling. Which sounds really callous of him, except that the horse was standing in the middle of the woods, and it got struck by lightning. Not the trees. The horse.

Which goes to show you: if you're stuck in a thunderstorm, don't hide under a horse.

Now how can I resist putting that into a book? But then I'd want to take the character based on Mr. Bald (let's call him Mr. Hairy), and I'd want to turn him into a zombie parrot or drop him into a tank full of mutant bilingual piranha. I think he might take the piranha personally.

Which makes me think of the guys I went to college with, who paid off their student loans with piranha betting. They put beer in the piranha tank and then took bets on which drunk piranha would actually manage to catch one of the feeder fish. At the time, I found this funny. And again, it's screaming to be put into a book. But the good news is that I don't know those guys any more, so if I feed their characters to to a tank of mutant bilingual piranha, they won't know that they ought to be offended.

Addendum: BTW, I forgot to mention that I have been the victim of a Blogger curse the past couple of days, and my comments have only been working sporadically. I sacrificed two piece of white bread to Ramrod this morning and hopefully all is well again. Sorry. (Not like I think commenting on my blog is the highlight of your day or something.)

Things That Make Me Snarf - Exorcists

This week's Thing That Makes Me Snarf is courtesy of Whose Line Is It Anyway? One of the best shows ever on television if you ask me, which you didn't because you were shirking your duties. I mean, really, do you expect me to keep up both sides of the conversation?

Fair warning that this clip starts out slow, but stick with it. It gets progressively snarfier.



I happen to know an exorcist or two, and I'm convinced that I've figured out the way to make my millions: Inspired by this video, I shall form a musical group. Know how that one guy is the guru of the boy bands? I shall be the guru of the exorcist bands. We could start the exorcist rap group: Exorcists Fo' Shizzle. The exorcist metal band: Motley Exorcist Riot. The exorcist 50's throwback band: Johnny and the Exorcists. The exorcist alternative rock group: Exorcist 11.

I know there are people out there who need to be exposed to the Latin version of "Pour Some Holy Water On Me," sung to the tune of "Pour Some Sugar On Me." Because really, that song is like mono. Once you're exposed to it, you can't get rid of it. When I was managing the research lab, I got that song stuck in my head for about four weeks and couldn't dislodge it. I'd be checking in brains (seriously. not kidding.) while singing that song, which is kind of twisted now that I think about it.

But then again, I kinda like twisted. Except that Dee Snyder gives me the creeps.

Religious Reflections

I can prove that god exists.

I use the lower case deliberately, because The Wonder That Is My Blog does not discriminate based on religion. Whether you worship God, the Great Mystery, or Ramrod the Holy Toaster, you are welcome here. So I'm going to use the lower case, and feel free to insert whatever deity-licious name you'd like.

Anyway. There are two episodes in my past that are useful in the whole proof-of-god's-existence thing. The first is the birth of my twins. See, the whole pregnancy with son thing was pretty much an exercise in excrutiating discomfort punctuated with short periods of sleep. I was on bed rest for about two months in my inlaws' living room. And I love my inlaws. They love me. But I think that by the end, they were as happy to have my whale-sized arse off their couch as I was.

Actually, I was bigger than whale-sized. I had this red sweater, and I was so big that you could have seen me from space. If there are any astronauts reading my blog, I was the little red blob on North America. It wasn't a hot air balloon.

So one day I said to myself, "Self, I'd like to have more kids. I hate being pregnant, but they're worth it. Although I wish I could just skip the pregnancy thing and just have the kids. Oh, and I think I'll name my toaster Ramrod, because it seems strangely fitting."

And less than a month later, I was pregnant with twins. I can just see god sitting up there, giggling at my expense. "Well, if she wants babies but doesn't like to be pregnant, I'll send her TWO AT ONCE! She'll have to learn to hold a book with her feet while she feeds them, and that will be funny. Oh, and the toast is done."

The other proof that I have that god exists and really needs to come to one of my dinner parties because he has a great sense of humor comes from when Slayer and I got engaged. Because we did the whole "will you marry me?" "hell yes!" thing, and then we got out the bubbly and toasted each other with glasses that Slayer had purchased especially for this purpose. Unfortunately, I was so giddy that I knocked my glass over and completely obliterated it.

Later, Slayer was washing our one remaining champagne glass, and he looked at me and said, "Well, at least we have ONE glass left," because we really haven't matured past the Pigtail Pulling Syndrome in kindergarten: you know, where you pull the pigtails of the girl you like? So he starts ribbing me about being a klutz when the bottom just fell off his glass, PLINK. In midair.

That Ramrod. He's such a kidder.

P.S. If you are one of those people who have come here after searching for a "freaky mom," I think you may be in the wrong place. I'm not THAT kind of freaky. I'm the kind of freaky that thinks Ramrod the Holy Toaster is freaking hilarious.

Halloween Mix and Match

I'm not really cool with the whole purchasing a Halloween costume thing. I get tired of seeing the same five costumes all night. I remember one year where it was all superheroes and princesses, and I vowed that I would give my entire bowl of candy to the first kid that I saw dressed like Mini Me from Austen Powers. That poor kid didn't know what hit him; I leapt up from the front step, screaming and doing the patented Carrie Happy Dance (tm), dumped all of the candy into his pillowcase, and went inside.

I'm sure he's in therapy now.

But son is determined that he wants to be a superhero every year, and he doesn't want a lame homemade costume any more. No, he wants to go out and buy one. Which is a blessing in disguise, because after Halloween last year, he said he wanted to be Ghost Rider, and I wasn't sure how I was going to make that happen short of immolating him. Which would probably be bad.

My solution to this is to combine store-bought costumes in new and interesting ways. Like the Yoda Gangsta. Start with a Yoda costume, accessorize with a bling bling necklace, gold teeth, and roll up one pant leg. Say things like "Bust a cap in your ass I will."

Now THAT's original.

Or be the Batgeek. Start with a Batman costume (because you knew I was going to bring up Batman, or you should have), and attach a pocket protector to one of the Batnipples. Put thick-rimmed glasses on over the mask and maybe add a bow tie, because hey, it's a holiday.

Again, original. You will attract attention and make friends. Of course, they're probably all weirdos, but at least you will be popular. Because I've got a keen perspective on what's important.

Or try Captain Jack Cheerleader. Be Zombie Potter. (Quiiiiidich!) Princess Wolverine from X-Men: The Crossdresser Musical. I could go on and on, but I'm pretty sure you already think I'm nuts so my work is done here.

As for me? I've decided that I'm going to put together a bunch of pieces from our closet and will be the Queen of the Ninja Cheerleaders.

Oh, and if you peruse the sidebar, you will notice that Google happily recognizes my expertise in two new subjects: "snarf snarf indeed" and "freaky jumbled up words thing." Which actually makes me feel proud-ish. I think I need to get out more.