Tikkabik

James is in the family room playing with his Rescue Heroes toys when I hear him say this.

"Mummy, at the end of the world we're all gonna die."

This is the same kid who, a couple of months ago, reminded us that we're all made of meat.

For the life of me, I have *no* idea where he's picking this stuff up, and it's not like he's particularly depressed when he makes the observations either. It's just sort of a matter-of-fact comment along the lines of "I want some more fruit snacks" or "Can we go to the museum today?"

Posted by flargh at 10:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Like or lump Dick Clarke, he said one thing in his interview with 60 Minutes last week that really caught my ear:

"Osama bin Laden had been saying for years, 'America wants to invade an Arab country and occupy it, an oil-rich Arab country. He had been saying this. This is part of his propaganda," adds Clarke.

"So what did we do after 9/11? We invade an oil-rich and occupy an oil-rich Arab country which was doing nothing to threaten us. In other words, we stepped right into bin Laden's propaganda. And the result of that is that al Qaeda and organizations like it, offshoots of it, second-generation al Qaeda have been greatly strengthened

Regardless of how you feel about the guy's book or his veracity, it's hard to argue with his logic: That the Bush administration has demonstrated a catastrophically bad foreign policy with regards to the Middle East, and a pig-ignorant understanding of how to handle muslim extremism worldwide.

It's just reason #3,482 while I'll be voting for Kerry this fall.

Posted by flargh at 02:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Working from home, I have a very skewed sense of the passage of time. Clocks and calendars abound on the walls of my house, and it's clear to see what time of day it is, but I don't work a "normal" work schedule -- I'm usually at it starting at around 7 AM and usually don't finish until well after the kids go to bed. I It's not a statement against how busy I am -- I'm grateful to be working in the field I'm in and I love my job. But I've recently begun thinking about how this schedule has affected my lifestyle.

Five years ago, when I still worked in an office, my days were bracketed by the work week. It was a given that Monday through Friday, from about 8:30 to about 5 or 6, I'd be in a specific physical location doing specific tasks, away from Bonnie and kids. It's amazing how regemented your life gets when that's the case. Everything from getting groceries to filling up the gas tank relies on a schedule that occupies a major chunk of your life.

Working from home, it's a really different case. I'm not exactly my own boss -- I'm still beholden to the schedule and requirements of my employer, and their guidelines for how I'm supposed to do my job, but there's a lot more flexibility involved.

I'm also lucky enough that my boss doesn't begrudge it if I have to split for an hour to, say, go pick up some milk and bread and fill up the tank. Or if I want to go to a special event at my kids' schools.

But the downside of all this is that that regimentation is gone, and for someone with less-than-stellar organizational skills, this creates problems.

The other day, I had absolutely no idea what day of the week it was. It was either Tuesday or Wednesday, I couldn't remember for the life of me, and ended up having to ask Bonnie to figure it out. That's such a bizarre, disorienting feeling -- not knowing what day of the week it was, simply because I didn't have a set schedule to adhere to.

Posted by flargh at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

So over the weekend I tried Hershey's new Hershey's Swoops, a new chocolate candy that looks disturbingly like a tiny potato chip but is, in fact, all chocolate.

Swoops are flavored like other popular Hershey's-owned products like York Peppermint Patties, Almond Joy, Reese's Peanut Butter cups and regular olde fashioned Hershey's Milk Chocolate. But they're shaped like Pringle's potato chips, stacked six to a pack in hermetically sealed snack packages, three to a box. There is a squiggle or a pattern on the top of the Swoop to let you know how it's flavored, but that's all it is -- flavored. There's no thin layer of peanut butter or mint, it's just chocolate.

Apparently this is a hipper, more trendy way of eating candy on the go than stodgy, old fashioned candy bars, as the Web site assaults visitors with a "Swoop, there it is" loop and the advice that "SWOOPS are best served with a personal signature move. Pop open a canister and start Swooping away," complete with the image of a woman entranced in rapture while exercising her "personal signature move," which resembles a cat with a bad case of diarrhea trying to wipe its ass on the couch.

In fact, much of the Web site is dedicated to showing off these "personal signature moves." Apparently motion is vitally important while eating Swoops, otherwise the Swoop experience will somehow be lessened. There are "group Swoops," involving more than one person, "Bust a Swoops," which calls to the hip hop fans out there, and "Hippie Hippie Swoops," which I guess are supposed to appeal to potheads with a case of the munchies.

My "personal signature move" was to sit my ass down on the couch. Maybe that's why I thought Swoops were lame. Bottom line is if I want peanut butter cups or peppermint patties I'll go for the real thing.

Have fun Swooping.

Posted by flargh at 11:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

"Dr. Seuss' The Cat In the Hat." Rented it over the weekend. Thanks for asking. Total disappointment. Insultingly bad, even.

Posted by flargh at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Yeah, it was only a matter of time before I found something to bitch about with our new van -- the one I bought last fall from my sister-in-law.

Recap: It's a mid-90's GMC conversion van; a G10 conversion that's been hopped-up with a fiberglas hi-top roof, luxury interior, VCR and TV, etc. A real nice ride. The thing has been and remains a great ride for us, but that doesn't mean I haven't got any problems with it. Over the weekend I tore up a piece of body moulding and can't get it replaced, because the company that did the conversions is long out of business.

We got some late winter snow that had piled up on either side of the driveway and had gotten hard and crunchy with a few days of warming and cooling. I pulled out of the driveway at a bit too shallow of an angle as we were driving the kids to James' birthday party at the children's museum on Saturday when I nailed the pile of snow at the end of the driveway.

The whole interior of the van echoed with this loud, solid CRUNCH that let us know that the icy snow on the side of the driveway had impacted with the van's body like the iceberg that hit the Titanic. The ice had scraped along the leading edge of the driver's side rear wheel well, which is covered from end to end with a piece of plastic moulding.

The van's got 180K+ miles on it, so that moulding has worn and chipped over the years. As it was, that piece of moulding was only hanging on by a thread. The ice impact was all it needed to tear free.

As I drove down the road, I moved the mirror down so I could see the damage. The moulding was waving at me back and forth.

My driveway is apparently cursed by a demonic spirit that eats car body parts, because shortly after we moved in my mother slammed into a tree on the side of the driveway and lost about two feet of moulding off of one side of her car. And ever since we moved here, the original Frickin' Van's body rot has increased by an exponential factor.

When we got to where we needed to go, I managed to tuck the moulding and and under where it should have been to pin it in place for now. I'm going to go out this weekend and see about getting some repair material to see if I can patch it.

And if anyone knows where I can find replacement moulding for a 96 Chevy Gladiator conversion van by Glaval, let me know...

Posted by flargh at 04:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Amazing. Doctors in the U.S. usually have to do something like cash a paycheck during surgery or show up for work drunk before they get their privileges revoked. In the U.K., they're suspended for taking extra croutons for their soup without paying.

Posted by flargh at 03:55 PM | Permalink

Max is our cat. He's been with us now for more than a month; regular readers will recall that we adopted him from a shelter. He's a maine coon, our favorite breed, and he's a very sweet cat, though he's starting to exhibit some very peculiar behavior.

Last Wednesday night I went down to my office in the basement, as I always do, to do my guest host spot on Your Mac Life. Since the iSight came out I've kept my camera on while I'm doing the show so people can look at my face while I'm talking. Somehow, Max got into my office while I was doing the show. That's when the fun started.

Max is a big cat -- better than 14 pounds now -- and he's not very dainty or graceful. I have about thirty feet of countertop built into the walls of my office for my computer equipment, and it's stacked with boxes, papers and computer peripherals. As I'm chatting with Brian Greenstone from Pangea Software about Nanosaur 2: Hatchling, I hear Max exploring my office.

It sounds like this:

*shudder* *shuffle* MROW *bump* *SLAM* MROOW *thud* *shuffle* MROW *scamper* *bang* MROWWW

I'm desperately trying not to show any distraction as Max is jumping up and down off the counters, knocking off boxes, peripherals, documentation and manuals, jumping back down to the floor and going up to rub a veritable Leaning Tower of Pisa recreated by abandoned FedEx and UPS container boxes that lies in one corner of my office, knocking them all to the floor in a heap.

Then Max decides he's had enough of this hell-hole and walks to the door. The door is a crack open -- if he'd just pushed it with his huge head, he could have easily opened it enough to walk through. But this isn't enough -- he wants me to do it. In fact, he wants me to come up stairs.

So for the remainder of the Webcast -- about seven minutes -- I'm hearing Max in the back of my office, yelling MROW MROW MROW in a continuous wail like a kitty car alarm.

Posted by flargh at 09:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

If you...

1. ...owned a restaurant, what kind of food would you serve?

Bacon. Duh.

2. ...owned a small store, what kind of merchandise would you sell?

Cleverly designed sex toys and obscure cooking implements.

3. ...wrote a book, what genre would it be?

Historical fiction/fantasy with a strong vein of animal husbandry.

4. ...ran a school, what would you teach?

Stunt car driving.

5. ...recorded an album, what kind of music would be on it?

Lullabies for orc children.

Posted by flargh at 07:38 PM | Permalink

It must be Irony Week on Tikkabik.

"If you're going to make an accusation in the course of a presidential campaign, you've got to back it up with facts," says President Bush.

Ironic words from the leader of an administration that made accusations about another country's "weapons of mass destruction," ultimately unable to back that assertion up with facts.

Posted by flargh at 04:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I dunno if these ads are just regional or nationwide, but Lincoln/Mercury is featuring a new TV ad for some promotion to get people to buy cars. The soundtrack is "Big Time," by Peter Gabriel.

Anyone else think it's ironic that Ford Motor Co.'s upscale brand is using a song that's basically a condemnation of conspicuous consumerism to hawk its vehicles?

I can't figure out if the ad company who put this together is sublimely clever or incredibly stupid.

Posted by flargh at 08:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Friday Five:

1. What was the last song you heard?

Some crazy-ass classic guitar song on the radio last night, while driving home from the grocery store.

2. What were the last two movies you saw?

The Passion of the Christ and Return of the King.

3. What were the last three things you purchased?

Groceries. See (1.)

4. What four things do you need to do this weekend?

a) Get a cake and a present for my mother, whose birthday is today. (Happy birthday, Mom!)
b) Write, write, write. Some freelance work due Monday.
c) Get the van's oil changed. (This one is optional, but I'd *really* like to do it.)
d) Bring the trash to the dump.

5. Who are the last five people you talked to?

My older son.
My wife.
The cashier at the grocery store.
My mother, who was watching the kids for a time last night.
A person in our ADHD Parents' support group.

Posted by flargh at 07:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Krispy Kreme Plans Low-Sugar Alternative.

Posted by flargh at 07:48 AM | Permalink

The only thing stupider than lawyers suing fast-food chains because people get fat is Republicans in Congress trying to keep them from doing it.

I suspect this is just yet another example of Republicans in the legislature trying their best to cuddle up to big business. Seems that Mass. rep James McGovern agrees: "It protects an industry that doesn't need to be protected at this particular point and we're dealing with a problem that doesn't exist."

Posted by flargh at 08:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

James and Emme are playing in Emme's room. They're playing with Emme's endless procession of dolls when Bonnie and I hear Emme say, "They're having a gay wedding."

"*Who's* having a gay wedding?" asks Bonnie.

"Um..." Emme starts. "Well, we're just playing with girl dolls. There aren't any boy dolls. So the girl dolls are having a gay wedding, and one girl has four kids, and the other girl has none."

Well, thank goodness. Emme's dolls are *lesbians*. For a second, I was getting worried.

Posted by flargh at 05:28 PM | Permalink

A note printed on a half-sheet of yellow paper came home with one of my kids recently. It was printed using a basic word processor or page layout program, complete with a little logo on the top showing fresh fruits and vegetables. Here's how it read:

Attention Quashnet School Third Grade Parents and Students

On Friday's Salad Bar will now be available...

Do I need to continue?

I'm not saying the school's English department should be fired or anything, but didn't anyone in the office even bother to proof this thing?

I can't be the only parent that winced when he saw this...

Posted by flargh at 08:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I'm the principal cook in our house. Left to her own devices, Bonnie can cook and often does a good job, but she really doesn't like to do it, and she's not very comfortable cooking without a recipe. She's also easily distracted which can sometimes lead to disasters of the smoking, burnt kind. So for the most part, I'm in charge of dinners and I often make lunches on the weekends as well.

I've been cooking for a very long time. One of my first experiences was at 5 or 6 when I decided to make a cake using an instant cake kit that included everything, even the pan, without my mom's help. She was surprised, thrilled and more than a bit shocked that I turned on the oven myself and did this, without her supervision. But I was raised an only child by a single parent, so I've always figured that this was a defensive skill -- one must eat to survive, after all.

So I've often cooked throughout my life, and given Bonnie's general discomfort around the kitchen, it's always been more or less my domain unless she's baking something.

My repertoire is fairly varied. Over the course of a week I'll try to cook some pasta dishes, a stew or soup, some beef and chicken as well. Bonnie shies away from pork and seafood and the kids are all very finicky with a couple of them sensitive to certain spices and seasonings, so a lot of variety I'd prefer to work with is out, but within the scope of what we all like to eat I think I do a decent job. Broiled chicken in lemon pepper marinade one night; pan-fried steak smothered in mushroom sauce on a bed of rice the next; the occasional hearty beef stew or vegetable soup.

I don't know if it's just me, but I've noticed something over the years: My food never tastes as good as other people's. The kids and Bonnie don't complain, and I'll get compliments from them and from other friends and family who eat with us, so I don't think it's my cooking that's the problem, just my attitude. I'm one of those cooks who just doesn't like to eat his own dog food.

Posted by flargh at 09:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Friday Five time.

What was...

1. ...your first grade teacher's name?

I can't remember my daughter's first-grade teacher's name. You expect me to remember mine?

2. ...your favorite Saturday morning cartoon?

Easily the Warner Bros. cartoons -- Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Road Runner, etc.

3. ...the name of your very first best friend?

I'd probably say Christian, this kid who lived down the street from me when Mom and I lived in Seattle. We did the whole sleepover thing and stuff.

4. ...your favorite breakfast cereal?

I'd run the gamut from Count Chocula to Alpen, which was this variation on museli, depending on my mood. Nowadays I'm lactose intolerant so I avoid cereal unless I'm looking for digestive problems later in the day.

5. ...your favorite thing to do after school?

Depended on the weather. During the winter months I'd just as soon play in my room or over the houses of my friends, but once it was warm we'd ride bikes or play at the local parks and so on.

Posted by flargh at 07:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Flash-based USB thumb drives are a dime a dozen -- everyone and their cousin makes one these days, and they're very handy. They've more or less usurped Zip drives for sneakernetting large files back and forth between computers. This little guy is definitely the most unique Flash drive I've seen. And there's just something exquisitely, perversely funny about jacking your rubber ducky's ass into your computer to transfer files. Especially given that his eyes light up when data transfers.

Posted by flargh at 01:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

So my iPod return to Apple went better than I had expected -- the company sent a box via Airborne on Wednesday, a day earlier than the AppleCare guy expected it to get here, and it was returned yesterday. So a week from start to finish, basically.

Unfortunately, Apple didn't actually *do* anything to iPod. A letter enclosed with the iPod said that my original iPod was being returned to me since it was working within what Apple considered to be normal operating parameters. They'd blanked it out and restored the system image on it, so maybe they had better success than I did.

I charged the thing up last night and am going to dry to drain it try today to see how long the charge lasts. If it's where it was before -- about four hours or so -- I'm going to let the drained iPod rest for 24 hours then charge it back up, leaving it connected to the Mac for 24 hours. It's something Apple recommends for ornery iPods that don't seem to maintain a decent charge, and it's worth trying.

If that fails, I'll go back to Apple hat-in-hand again...

Posted by flargh at 10:33 AM | Permalink

I love what I do for a living, and not many people can say that, so I know how lucky I am. Although it isn't the sole thing I do, part of my job is to review games for Macworld magazine. Each month I review, on average, around four to six games for the magazine. Usually I'll squeeze in a couple of "big" titles -- A-list releases from major publishers -- along with a few second-tier releases and a kid's game or a shareware title. Each game I review has to be accompanied by screenshots showing the game in action.

I hate taking screenshots. If I reviewed general productivity applications or specialty apps like music or video editing utilities, taking screenshots would be a lot less obnoxious than it is. You can stage those shots pretty easily -- get a palette of tools ready, load up some sample imagery, make everything look busy, then, *snap.*

Games are a different story.

The Mac's built-in command-shift-3 Vulcan nerve-pinch usually takes screenshots, but it doesn't always work in games. And sometimes, when it does, the brightness is so off that the picture is very muddy and dark.

Sometimes you can work around it by using a third-party utility like Ambrosia Software's indispensible Snapz Pro. But that sometimes introduces its own set of problems. Although it plays much better with others than it used to, Snapz Pro can occasionally cause games to freeze or lock up, especially if they don't offer support for windowed (as opposed to full-screen) gameplay. This problem isn't unique to Snapz Pro, either. Sometimes screens captured with either method appear scrambled, jumbled or incomplete.

More often than not, I'll depend on the game's built-in ability to take screenshots. Sometimes, albeit rarely, it's as plain as day: F13 will grab a screen, or F9, or what-have-you. More often than not, these methods are poorly documented or totally undocumented. This requires me to scour the Web looking for hints and tips from the developers or from PC game sites, or bother the Mac game developer. This sometimes requires modification to the game's initialization or configuration files in order to work.

I could be lazy about it and go to the publisher and ask them for screens, and in a couple of pinches I have done exactly that. I don't want the stuff that shows up in Macworld to be the same screens that you seen in a MacAddict or GamePro review, though, so in the rare circumstances that my hand has been forced this way, I'll plead with the publisher to send me exclusive screens that haven't been used elsewhere.

The actual mechanics of taking an in-game screenshot are only one problem, however. The more significant problem is properly staging the shot. This requires some directorial skill worthy of a movie or TV show. I want to show the game off in a good way, if it's a decent game. I want my screenshot to be colorful and bright. I want a sense of action and drama -- characters with arms and legs akimbo, explosions, projectiles -- whatever.

Also, I'm in the middle of the game when this happens. Things are trying their best to kill me, usually. So as frazzled as I am already by trying to stage the shot and take the picture, I have the added distraction of making sure I dodge enough bullets or missiles or fangs and claws to avoid being killed before I know I've successfully grabbed the shot.

At least Steven Spielberg wasn't worried about actually being bitten by the shark as he filmed Jaws.

Oh well. Anyway I slice it, I'm getting paid to play games, and that's cool. It's a moral victory for me each time it happens as I remember when I was a kid and my dear old mom telling me that playing games on my computer was a waste of time. Okay, I'll shut up now.

Posted by flargh at 09:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Some recent news on MacCentral has readers debating on the relative merits of Apple's own retail stores and its support -- some would say waning support -- of independent dealerships. It's got me thinking.

First of all, the background: By the end of this year Apple will have somewhere in the vicinity of 80 retail stores open around the country. Most of them are in malls -- many of them upscale malls -- located near large population centers or rich suburban areas that Apple has deemed demographically appropriate for its efforts.

Independent dealers feel threatened by this, because they see Apple favoring its own retail stores when it comes to promotions, early seeding of in-demand stock and other benefits that give Apple an upper hand in selling to end users. I'm not so sure this is a bad thing.

I have an excellent local Mac dealership I'm very fond of. MAC/PC Sales and Service is about a twenty minute ride from my house and they really bleed Apple colors -- you can't miss it when you go by their shop in East Falmouth, because they've got Apple logos everywhere and iPod posters in the windows and the whole nine yards. Left to my own devices, I'd buy stuff there all the time. They also offer top-notch service and friendly support.

Alas, they're the exception, not the rule. Many, many independent dealerships -- not just for Macs but PCs as well -- are owned and operated by surly malcontents that would just as soon sneer at you as help you. And they're often only too anxious to push obsolete stock on you to get it (and you) out the door as offer you the right product for what you need. Their shops are often shabby, with little thought given to presentation or to the customer's experience. Often it's because the people running these stores have absolutely no retail marketing experience or training. Often it's because they just don't care.

Apple stepped into the retail channel exactly because of this sort of experience. They've got the money and the brainpower to get into high-visibility locations with a retail experience that is miles apart from the geek-cave experience of the average indie shop. And while they may not always bat 1.000 when it comes to giving people the right advice or being able to answer the question, you have to admit that it's a much less daunting task for a new Mac user or a new computer user to walk in to an Apple Store and see stuff work than it is for that same person to walk into the average independent PC vendor store and do the same.

Having said all that, I don't necessarily want to see Apple drive out independent resellers all together. They serve an important role, reaching out to potential Mac buyers with a retail presence that wouldn't be profitable for Apple to manage on its own. And sometimes -- though increasingly rarely, it seems -- they can work together with the customer to develop a custom solution that Apple probably couldn't do on its own. When Apple Stores first opened, that was the idea -- Apple said it would pass off customers looking for custom solutions or those that needed extensive hand-holding to local retailers. It doesn't seem to have quite worked out that way.

I suspect that it's only a matter of time before Apple closes ranks and stops supporting independent Mac resellers all together, except in extreme cases of geography where it just doesn't make sense for Apple to compete. Maybe my local guy will be lucky and Apple won't try to run him out of town. I can't really see that Cape Cod is that big a market for Apple to compete in, though I suspect getting a prime spot at Providence Place Mall down in Providence, RI *must* be on the agenda at some point.

Posted by flargh at 10:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Well, we said goodbye to Scully today and brought her back to CLAWS, the shelter we adopted her from about a month ago. It's become clear in the last couple of weeks that she's not happy here, and having suffered problems with an unhappy cat before, I felt the best thing to do was to give her back, which the woman who runs CLAWS said we could do if things didn't work out.

Scully was a pretty mellow cat most of the time, but she really began to mistreat Max -- the other cat we adopted -- to the point that we have to bring him to the vet tomorrow to have a big bite wound on his side cleaned and treated (I just discovered it last night when I was petting him and my hand sunk into a wet spot like chewing gum stuck to the bottom of a chair. On top of that, she scratched me -- actually, she scratched the shit out of me, scratched the kids, and wouldn't stay off the goddamn counter or table.

I know that some cat experts say there isn't necessarily anything wrong with cats jumping on tables or counters, but for me it was the dealbreaker, and we couldn't seem to convince her out of it. I have a problem with it because cats use their paws to scratch in their litterboxes. While they might be fastidious creatures, there's no way I can get around the fact that those paws that were scratching in crap and pee-soaked clay are now on my counters and table, where I prepare and serve food.

Surprisingly, none of the kids seem particularly sorry to see Scully go. They're a bit sad and disappointed, but they're not bawling. After all, they still have Max, and he's a very gentle and sweet kitty that's transitioned quite well into our house, Scully's abuse not withstanding.

Posted by flargh at 06:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Bonnie and I scored a couple of hours away from the kidlets (thanks, Mom) so we ended up down at the big theater in Hyannis to see The Passion of the Christ. Beside Big Fish, which we've missed in its local run, it's the only movie that Bonnie has expressed any interest in seeing, and while it wasn't exactly a feelgood movie, I'm happy we went.

I'm not a biblical scholar nor have I ever been particularly interested in the New Testament, and I don't speak Latin or Aramaic. So I can't speak to the accuracy with which the story was told nor can I tell you how authentic everyone sounded speaking dead or nearly-dead languages. What I can tell you is that the movie was gripping, dramatic, deeply moving and intense.

Much has been made about the gratuitous violence exhibited in The Passion, and I must admit that even I found it a bit hard to take -- and I usually laugh when I see zombies tearing limbs off people. I think part of what I found so hard to take was not the depiction of violence itself, but the almost cartoonishly sadistic glee exhibited by the romans and temple guards. They were just having too much of a good time pummelling, scourging and otherwise humiliating Jesus to be seen as much more than vulgar caricatures; caricatures that otherwise diminished the power of what happened to Jesus in his final hours.

As usual, the whole movie-going experience was sullied by the absolutely crappy manners of other people in the theater. A woman four rows behind me insisted on taking *photographs* during the movie, with her *flash* on, if you can believe it. Several times, at several different crucial moments, the theater would be momentarily illuminated by the brilliant strobe of a Sony digital camera. I saw her after the lights went up. The theater was almost packed to capacity on this Sunday matinee show, and if it hadn't been filled with people clearly moved by what they had seen, I might have accosted that woman for her *incredible* lack of tact. The other problem was the obligatory asses that refused to turn off their cell phones. One fool even took the call, speaking in a stage whisper for a couple of minutes. At least no one brought infants.

Posted by flargh at 10:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)