lots of random stuff

[austin_tycho]

It rained yesterday! Probably not enough to fix the drought but still quite a lot! Huzzah!

My Birkenstocks are about to die. The bottom part on one of 'em is splitting. I'm told for a mere $60 they will re-sole them, thus preventing me from having to buy new ones. But I can buy new ones from eBay for $40, so I will probably do that. I've had these for 5-6 years, which is a good run for a pair of shoes that I wear a lot.

I'm in 'fuck everything up' mode. Yesterday hub told me to take the pump for our sensory deprivation tank into the pool store, because the salt has seized it up or something. He also told me to take the impeller, which he described as a plastic propeller-looking thing. I happened to pick up another piece of plastic that looked like a propeller, and was most decidedly not the impeller, judging from the way the guys at the pool store pointed and laughed. So I came home, threw everything in a box and gave it all to them. *pthpbpbpbp*. Then I posted a personal message to a friend, which went out to an entire list of people. I sent out an email to the list apologizing, and I had ribbed the friend and hope he won't be too embarrassed (knowing him he'll have a good laugh about it). At least I didn't make any snarky remarks about other people on the list like I did another time that got sent to everyone. It's not exactly the stuff nightmares are made of, but it was not one of my finest moments either.

Apparently Tom Cruise doesn't believe in clinical depression. I could not give less of a shit, but I was amused by Alton Brown's reaction:

Dear Tom Cruise,

Your lack of belief in the existence of clinical depression tells me one thing: you didn’t spend $10. to see War Of The Worlds. If vitamins can possibly help me out of this spiraling funk, please let me know which ones. Dinos? Pebbles? Freds?

Please, I’m crying out for help.

Alton Brown

Out ot morbid curiosity, I looked this up. Tom thinks Brooke Sheilds is a wanker for taking anti-depressants to fight post-partum depression, and thinks psychiatry is a bunch of crap. Turns out the American Psychiatric Association didn't take kindly to that remark (!!!) and said "It was irresponsible for Mr. Cruise to use his movie publicity tour to promote his own ideological views" Yes, the whole Association said this. Really- the article did not attribute the quote to any one person. Of course, this same source that said "Brooke started to take anti-depression after the birth of daughter Rowan Francis in 2003." Sloppy, people.

Anyway, this reminds me of something my dad's been bitching about lately- Hollywood people making us listen to their stupid opinions about politics and anything else, when they should just shut up and stick to being entertaining. Now, while I happen to think Tom is full of shit with regards to his opinion about psychiatry, I have no problems with famous people spouting off about stuff that isn't their field of expertise. I mean, why not? I have opinions about all sorts of things I'm not qualified to have opinions on, and if people were interested in hearing them, I'd sure tell them. Dad seems to think they are somehow unfairly taking advantage of their fame. I guess I thought that's what fame was. People you don't know wondering what you think about stuff. I'd be a lot more interested in hearing about (random stab) Joss Whedon's political viewpoints than in hearing what he eats for breakfast or who he took to the Grammys or what he wore.

Speaking of my dad, I have a puzzling urge to go see 'Bad News Bears', mainly because Billy Bob Thornton reminds me of Dad when he was drinking. Now, Dad was an asshole in many respects when I was growing up, and he was/is (depending on your definition) an alcoholic. But I don't have any specific associations of him being an asshole in direct relation to his being drunk. In fact, as I recall, he was a pretty funny drunk. I'll probably be seeing this one on my own... or maybe if it tanks I'll catch it on Netflix. I don't care about how it measures up to the old movie or baseball or anything like that, I just want to see Billy Bob act like a funny drunk. In double-checking how to spell his name with IMDB, I've found that he did a Coen brothers movie too, so that's going on the queue. Somehow I haven't heard of this one ('The Man Who Wasn't There') but it looks cool. I heart Netflix.

Comments

[starcrossedlady.livejournal.com]

I heard a radio spot for bad news bears-- I wasn't *too* interested in seeing it (at ten dollars for a movie ticket? Holy heck!), but hearing some of the lines made me at least want to do matinee ;)

and I think there's a difference between having an opinon and freely expressing said opinion as opinion, and trying to make your opinion "fact" and "true" and that it must be listened to-- no ifs, ands, or buts. Cruise is using information solely gleaned from Scientologists. Thus his opinion is skewed and not as factual as if he had actually bothered to crack open a psychology text, or read the unvarnished history.

And (ramblerambleramble) sad to say, an inherent danger to this is that many people who are diehard fans will take his words to heart, and not think to do the legwork of cracking open a textbook/book/magazine that will offer a counterpoint.

I think that's one reason why Pen and Teller's Bullshit! is interesting. They readily admit their bias, but try to show how they got those in the first place. While I may not agree with all that they come up with, I can still laugh, consider their points against my own experience and research, and feel like I can agree to disagree.

whoops-- my Libra's peeking out ;)

[mielikki.livejournal.com]

Yeah; I should have specified that while I'm happy to hear Famous Hollywood Star's opinion, I also reserve the right to think that s/he is full of shit and doesn't know what s/he is talking about. Of course, that doesn't mean everyone will.

I will have to check out that Penn and Teller bit you were talking about. Is it a book or a dvd or what?