Morality is not determined by the church you attend nor the faith you embrace. It is determined by the quality of your character and the positive impact you have on those you meet along your journey
Gene Wilder, who regularly stole the show in such comedic gems as “The Producers,” “Blazing Saddles,” “Young Frankenstein,” “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” and “Stir Crazy,” died Monday at his home in Stamford, Conn. His nephew Jordan Walker-Pearlman said he died of complications from Alzheimer’s disease. He was 83.
His nephew said in a statement, “We understand for all the emotional and physical challenges this situation presented we have been among the lucky ones — this illness-pirate, unlike in so many cases, never stole his ability to recognize those that were closest to him, nor took command of his central-gentle-life affirming core personality. The decision to wait until this time to disclose his condition wasn’t vanity, but more so that the countless young children that would smile or call out to him “there’s Willy Wonka,” would not have to be then exposed to an adult referencing illness or trouble and causing delight to travel to worry, disappointment or confusion.
He simply couldn’t bear the idea of one less smile in the world.
He continued to enjoy art, music, and kissing with his leading lady of the last twenty-five years, Karen. He danced down a church aisle at a wedding as parent of the groom and ring bearer, held countless afternoon movie western marathons and delighted in the the company of beloved ones.”
He had been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 1989.
He had that impossible to tame mane of hair.
That is what I always used to notice about Gene Wilder in the movies.
Of course that was only AFTER I noticed that he was a comedic genius.
The Producers, Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, Silver Streak, The Frisco Kid, Stir Crazy, that is not just a list of the films that Gene Wilder made, that is a list of some of the greatest comedies ever made.
As well as a list of some of my all time favorite movies.
I remember that the hardest I EVER laughed in my life was in 1974 while watching Young Frankenstein with my best friend at the time. That movie was clearly created to make fourteen year old boys laugh until they peed their pants, and I watched some of it while sitting on the floor after falling out of my seat doubled over with laughter.
At that moment I became a Gene Wilder fan forever.
And then of course there was this.
I can't even count the number of times that I sat and watched Gene Wilder's performance as Willie Wonka with my little girl.
The surprise and pure joy on Carole King's face as Aretha Franklin starts singing the song that she made famous is all by itself a reason to watch this clip.
But then you add President Obama tearing, and just know it is something special.
By the way I am huge Carole King fan from way back. And Aretha Franklin....well who doesn't love her?
Teachers are reportedly receiving complaints that teaching the Harry Potter books in classrooms exposes children to "witchcraft and Satanism".
Tom Bennett, a school behaviourist consulting with the Government, has claimed concerns from parents, particularly of religious backgrounds, that the popular series of novels works to "trivialise acts of magic". Speaking at an event held at London's City Hall, Bennett stated, "Harry Potter deals with the occult. There are many, many parents who are uncomfortable with their children discussing or looking at or reading anything at all do with the occult.
For many parents, particularly of Evangelical Christian backgrounds, and sometimes of Muslim backgrounds, the occult is not something which exists in fiction and fantasy, the occult is something which is a very living, live part of the faith. Many parents, particularly if they are Jehovah's Witnesses, will ask their
children not to be exposed to books which trivialise or normalise acts of magic. It's part of witchcraft and Satanism.
They say they'd rather their children weren't exposed to literature or fiction which normalised or trivialised or even applauded or encouraged what they would regard as witchcraft."
Uh huh.
Well it makes sense that these parents would not want their children exposed to the magic in Harry Potter books, and the be able to compare it to the pathetic parlor tricks performed by the hero of THEIR favorite book.
Seriously, walking on water, cloning loaves and fishes, raising somebody from the dead?
I've seen that Criss Angel guy do those first two several times, and I learned that last one in my CPR/First Aid class.
I think these parents are just angry that J.K. Rowling had a more fertile imagination than the old primitive fools who compiled the stories of the Bible.
By the way if you ever want to read an excellent book about the writing of the Bible I suggest you start here.
A fourth grader in Kermit, Texas was suspended for making “terroristic threats” after allegedly telling a classmate that he had a “magic ring” that could make the boy disappear, the Odessa American reports.
According to Kermit Elementary School officials, 9-year-old Aiden Steward told a classmate that he possessed a magic ring forged in Mount Doom — a fictional location from J.R.R. Tolkien’s Hobbit and Lord of the Rings series.
Aiden’s father, Jason, told The Daily News that his family had just watched The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies earlier that week, and that his son “didn’t mean anything” when he told his classmate he was in possession of the “one ring to rule them all.”
“Kids act out movies that they see. When I watched Superman as a kid, I went outside and tried to fly,” he said.
“I assure you my son lacks the magical powers necessary to threaten his friend’s existence,” he added. “If he did, I’m sure he’d bring him right back.”
Kermit Elementary Principal Roxanne Greer told the Odessa American that she could not comment on the suspension, because “all student stuff is confidential,” but Steward said that she told him that any and all threats to a child’s safety — including magical ones — would be taken seriously by the school.
So to be clear, in Texas guns good, magic bad.
What can actually cause you harm is considered safe, and what can never cause you harm is something to be feared.
I think I just invented the new Texas state motto.
A biology professor at Arizona State University is under attack for an image he showed in class that compared creationism to magic.
The conservative group Campus Reform, which targets educators it perceives to have a liberal bias, reported last week that professor Christofer Bang showed the image during a PowerPoint presentation in his Biology 100 class.
The PowerPoint slide, titled “Evolution vs. Creationism,” showed the March of Progress illustration of human evolution next to an image of Jesus Christ shooting lightning out of his fingers to create a human. The image shows Jesus saying, “MAGIC!”
A student told Campus Reform that the picture was offensive: “Quite a few students in the lecture hall were bothered by the picture, and it didn’t contribute to the lecture besides adding spite.”
Conservatives at Arizona State University also expressed their displeasure with the professor on Facebook.
“Liberal scum certainly exists on this campus! While I personally support the drawing on the left, I think it’s wrong and unethical for professors to shame those who believe differently,” one person wrote on the Facebook page for College Republicans at ASU.
Another conservative student complained on Facebook that the Founding Fathers also believed in Creationism, which is a point that is hard to argue against since Charles Darwin did not publish Origin of Species until 1859. (Yes folks, that's your college tuition money at work.)
You know I recognize that it must be hard for some of these students to come face to face with undiluted facts for the very first time, and it hurts their little irrational feelings when somebody points out that they have been lied to their entire lives. But really what's the solution?
I mean do you take each of these Christian school educated children into a room with soft light and soothing flute music, have them lie down on a comfy sofa with a cool drink, and THEN tell them that everything they think they know is bullshit and that their parents and teachers were fucking morons?
I mean come on if you suggest that Evolution, which painstakingly lays out exactly how organism evolved into what we see around us today, and choose to replace it with the idea that God made it all happen like this....
....then yes, you believe in magic.
Unless of course one of these little geniuses wants to explain exactly HOW God simply thought things into existence. Because I am fairly certain that the professor would LOVE to hear that hypothesis.
You would think that once you are passed the age of ten that you would no longer use magic, or the existence of supernatural forces, to explain ANYTHING.
And yet fully grown, seemingly reasonable, people do it everyday, in every part of the world.
I had a good friend in high school who used to do amazing sleight of hand magic tricks.
One day a fellow student, whose mind had just been blown by a disappearing balloon, said "That's impossible, it MUST be magic."
My friend looked him straight in the eyes and said "Just because you are not smart enough to figure it out, doesn't mean it's not something that can be learned."
If you think that a simple magician's trick could not make even the most intelligent among you at least briefly consider the supernatural, then you have not seen the right trick.
Before I begin this post I just want to mention that I used to be a power lifting and martial arts champion.
In other words I lifted really heavy things and punched people in the heads for trophies, and sometimes cash prizes.
Those are very, very manly things, I am sure you will agree.
Did you get that manly part?
Okay then, on to Winnie the Pooh.
In those emotionally overwhelming moments when I first held my newborn daughter, I made a decision.
Well the first thing I thought was that somebody needed to take her and hose her off a little because she was covered in goo and it was making me gag a little, but the second thing that I thought was that I was going to make sure my daughter was exposed to the best things that life had to offer, which included reading to her from the classics of literature. (I actually wrote about that in an earlier post.)
So the very first book that I bought for us to read together was this one.
As you can no doubt tell from the tears in the cover and the weathered overall look, this book has been read, and reread, many, many times.
However I was in such a hurry to start reading the "classics" to my new born daughter that I literally purchased this book, which is NOT the watered down Disney version by the way, just days after her birth.
Though I was completely convinced that my daughter would have the IQ of a genius, it did occur to me that the current level of her comprehension might make this unsuitable for bedtime reading for at LEAST a few more weeks.
So to prepare her for the first step on her long literary adventure I bought this:
I know, isn't that adorable?
However in the baby instruction book that I bought, (because for some reason she did not come with one), it said that my daughter's eyes may not be able to focus on the mobile very well for the first few months, so I decided to buy one of these for her to sleep on:
And, of course, one of these:
Only the original Pooh bear would suffice for my daughter.
(You don't think I overdid it do you?)
So long story short, my daughter was raised around Winnie the Pooh, and Winnie the Pooh paraphernalia, and yes, she grew up LOVING the Winnie the Pooh stories. (So yes parents OCCASIONALLY the things you want your children to do they will actually do. Remember, I said occasionally!)
So let's fast forward about twenty three years into the future, to two days ago.
There I was surfing the net, looking for adventure movies full of action, and violence (and hopefully some tasteful nudity), to watch this upcoming weekend, when I happened to notice that this movie was also playing at the local theater.
Have you ever smelled a smell, or heard a sound, and suddenly found yourself transported to a different time and place? A distant, happy, nearly forgotten place which seems to envelope you in warm, soothing memories that quickly dissipate just as you find yourself reaching out to touch them?
Suddenly all thoughts of superheroes, giant transforming robots, and immature scatological comedies completely left my mind and all I wanted was to watch this movie. This animated, G rated, Saturday matinee friendly movie.
Did I mention I used to be a bouncer at a strip club? Well I was!
But you know I didn't REALLY want to see this move.........alone.
In fact there was only one way I would actually go through with it and humiliate myself by sitting in a sticky theater with a bunch of over caffeinated preschoolers. And let's face it there was NO WAY my too busy to even text her father back, adult daughter was going to want to watch this movie!
Right?
But I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask, so I did.
"So Honey, I happened to see that there was this new, probably completely screwed up, Winnie the Pooh movie out. And I was wond..."
"Oh yeah, I was going to ask YOU if you wanted to go to that! I think it looks really good! Do you remember all of that Winnie the Pooh stuff you bought me? I kept it and still have all of it in storage! (You do?) So can we go tomorrow?"
"Sure.....I mean....if that is what YOU want? I guess I could find the time."
So it looked like we were going after all.
The only potential obstacle to our plan was that the movie started at 10:15 in the morning, which was the only time I could make it due to work commitments, and my daughter is NOT an early riser. (That kids, is what is known as a HUGE understatement!)
So the next day I decided to start waking my impossible to rouse daughter a whole hour before the movie was supposed to start. (Imagine ripping a giant tree trunk out of the ground, only then imagine that when you turn your back it replants itself and makes you start all over, and you will have SOME idea of what it is like to get my daughter out of bed before noon.)
However right when I had a couple of pots and pans to bang together in my hands, and was walking up to her bedroom door, I noticed that she was already in the bathroom getting ready. (Yeah I admit I had an "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" moment there.)
Before I knew it she was ready to go and we were on our way. On our way to see Winnie the Pooh. The matinee showing. My twenty four year old daughter and I. Why was I doing this again?
On the way we managed to catch up on all of the things that we are both too busy to discuss while living in the same house and sleeping only TWO DOORS AWAY FROM EACH OTHER! (Did I mention that she texts me from inside her room when she wants to tell me something, rather than open the damn door and say "Hey Dad, I have something to tell you?" Well I am mentioning it now.)
When we got to the theater I told her she could get anything to eat she wanted, my treat.
So she did.
Thirty five dollars later (When did theaters start serving Filet Mignon?), we were ready to find our seats.
As anticipated the smallish theater was full of sticky little ankle biters that had apparently just broken out of the cotton candy factory, and were so hopped up on sugar I swear I saw their eyeballs vibrating. But once the movie started they settled down to only intermittent screams of "Stop touching me!" and the occasional maniacal giggle.
The movie was okay, nothing special. To be honest I liked the old Disney version a little better, but it was relatively entertaining. You know, for a cartoon.
But just as I was about to lean over and whisper my disappointment into my daughter's ear, I heard her laugh.
It swear it sounded different than her usual laugh, yet also...familiar.
So I glanced over.
It was just for a moment. One bittersweet, precious, magical moment.
You know I sort of thought I would just relax today while doing some odd jobs around the house, like finally putting my Christmas tree back in the box, cleaning my bathrooms, and surfing the net for interesting ideas to possibly post about.
How completely crazy do you have to be to saw people's body parts off to make magic?
These people need to be rescued from their ignorance, and I don't give two shits about their culture! Not when they are maiming or killing little children like this!
I know this is a stretch but perhaps having a man whose father came from Africa leading this country, will inspire these people to learn more about the rest of the world and finally recognize how barbaric their superstitions truly are.
Well so much for my calm and peaceful afternoon. Damn I cannot get over that video!
