Procrastination Opportunist

So I went to see Penn and Teller last night at the O2. It wasn't quite what I expected. The magic tricks they did were amazing, and they truly are the best magic duo in terms of the way they work together. They even had Paul Daniels make a special guest appearance. BUT... 90% of the show was talking! It felt like something was rather off: rather akin to going to see Gordon Ramsay swim a couple of lengths or booking a night out to watch Sting darn a sock.

Penn is a great talker, sure, but there is a reason that he and Teller are magicians, not politicians. And anyway, people don't pay for an evening out at the O2 to go see politicians speak!

I wasn't the only one in the theatre who felt ripped off - you should have seen my 10 year old cousin! P&T pulled off about 5 tricks; all with the usual "we don't care" schtick. One trick involved the typical cups and balls, carried off brilliantly, but the twist was that they then *repeated* the trick with transparent cups, so you could see exactly what they were doing. Strangely, this didn't ruin it, as they explained exactly what they were doing, albeit very quickly, throughout. This kinda made it cooler. Another trick consisted of fooling only one volunteer who had her eyes closed while rings were interlinked with her arms and round her neck, etc. Again, the audience could see how it was done, and could see that it must have been truly amazing for the volunteer. This was also pulled off very well.

However, all of this was interspersed with Paul Daniels asking Penn and Teller relatively unexciting questions about their history and past TV appearances. You might say the show lost its magic halfway through, ho ho. Towards the end, they even opened up the floor to questions from the audience, which would have been cool, if not for the inane British knobs who got up and asked silly questions to appear clever.

Paul Daniels did no tricks. He just sat there looking OLD.

Originally I had planned to write about the strangely attractive "bad look" in girls. However, there are always the odd few that would find that kind of comment a little more significant than it actually is. Like Mum would, if she read this blog.

Additionally, while dreads/tattoos/piercings have their own kind of appeal, that's where the appeal ends. Where the alternative look meets the alternative lifestyle, it all goes downhill. Plus there are relatively few of these kind of girls in my circles (unless you count my clients) and few among professionals in general. (I suppose there are also arguably very few well adjusted dreaded pierced tattooed girls that one would rush home to introduce to one's mother, in any event!)

But down to the point - it is usually guaranteed that these types of girls are attached to hippie alternative boyfriends. It kinda makes me wonder if it is a chicken and egg scenario... Did they have the look before they hooked up, or was the look, um, "cultivated," for the purpose of hooking up? My brother told me a few years ago that he knew a rather plain jane who never got a whole lot of attention from guys. But then came her pseudo-gothic sem-hippie makeover, and she had a new guy every week! Well, I guess she lived happily ever after. I had a very similar story about an acquaintance of mine, but I didn't want to cause distaste by describing the made-over girl I knew as a plain jane!

If you know me you know my dislike of all things Saturday-morning-cartoony. Cartoons these days suck. The animation sucks. The storylines suck. They don't seem to teach kids much aside from fart jokes and how to be even more ADHD. What happened to the good old days of cartoons of my youth, like He-Man, and Thundercats, and ...um... Rainbow Brite?

But then I realised the extent of my hypocrisy. What about those cartoons one forgets about because they aren't for children? No, not some sort of Disney porn; I refer to the kind of humour parents don't want their children exposed to because it would mean having to field some awkward questions later. I mean, I recall even Animaniacs being vaguely borderline at times, and Adventure Time with Finn and Jake deals involves the odd surprisingly adult situation.

But to get on with it, there is the Simpsons of course. An old favourite, and a little old hat. There is Futurama, still funny after all these years; they should stop cancelling it. However, the funniest of all has to be Archer. A cartoon mysogynistic alcoholic narcissistic spy, with something of an Oedipus complex. One of the oldest types of parodies in the book, and yet it's laugh out loud funny.

Then there's The Venture Brothers. It could almost be a Saturday morning cartoon! It has the right formula: mad scientist, two adventurous sons, lots of supervillans.... many carnal references and a womanizing bodyguard. Perhaps it does go a little far.

And Frisky Dingo. Who could forget that. It looks like they cooked each episode up in about haldf an hour, but they can be forgiven for that. Strangely enough, it's kind of a mixture of the above two cartoons put together, if that makes sense. Which it does not. You're just gonna have to take my ramblings at face value.

Just remember, not all cartoons are for kids. I remember my mother saying words to that effect about 20 years ago when I wanted to watch the Simpsons! I guess I never really moved on?

No one else has grasped the concept yet, and my colleagues don't quite understand my enthusiasm for it, but it is only a matter of time before it catches on. Just think of all the time you've wasted watching movies. All the suspenseful scenes that could have moved slightly quicker? All the cringe-worthy moments that you just wished were over?? Now they can be!

With movies in fast forward, everything moves at your pace. Want to fit in a quick movie before you go to work? While you prepare dinner? In a commercial break? Well, you can. It's the super simple combination of subtitles and the fast forward function (best operated on an Xbox 360 or with VLC media player).

I mean, does this really sound that outlandish? What if the movie you rent really sucks? Isn't it better to get it over with in half an hour than it is to waste the rental fee by not watching it? Or what about one of those must-see movies that everyone raves about but you just cannot be bothered with? I tell you, it's quick and painless. Double or even triple fast forward speed means less of your time is consumed, and it increases your speed reading skill to boot.

I've noticed those looks of envy when I've walked into work and asked, "Well, I watched five movies last night; was your Tuesday evening as productive as mine?"

Just think; the time you spend watching movies could be better spent... Watching more movies!

It's not a common phenomenon, so it just makes the sporadic instances more galling... I'm talking about that one line of a song that just ruins it for you. Whether it's out of place or out of sync, there is something about it that just grates. Like the 'sha la la la la' in Texas' "Put your arms around me".

Maybe this sounds like the most random of gripes, but my pet peeve came roaring back to me while I was listening to the album "Encounter" by The Green Children. Soaring melodies, cute lyrics, sure, their song "Skies on fire" has the best of it all:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DQhSgcrYQU&feature=relmfu

But just what is with the line "How it feels to get close to you.... like a rainbow (!?)" I mean, that's totally incongruous! It's not an imaginative simile, and it's not said ironically, so I suppose they're serious. Perhaps with a name like The Green Children they wish to set the bar low.

And the rest is history. Man, did the rest of that story get old fast.

For something completely different, here's a list of things that were only cool once:

1. Chatter rings
2. Napster
3. Tamagotchis
4. Pillow fights, vampire wars, and 'poking' on Facebook
5. Flash mobs
6. Pauly Shore

With Heidelburg behind us, we pressed on to Frankfurt. It had begun to dawn on me that we would be pushed for time in returning the rental car. I started to entertain all sorts of visions of enormous financial penalties, which were not helped by us arriving at the airport and having to head back out again because we (I) had forgotten to fill the tank up. If you neglect to do so, Hertz informed us they would charge 3€ per litre! Filling it up at the service station was no problem - the problem began when I tried to start the car again and nothing happened. No combination of foot on the brake, foot on the clutch, foot halfway down on the clutch, foot on the brake and clutch, foot out the window, would start the car! Finally, before I gave up and resorted to asking someone for assistance, Mon asked to try, and wouldn't you know it, the car started. She maintains that she didn't know what she did - I suspect sabotage.

Once the car was successfully returned we took a taxi to our hotel. However, the man at the hotel told us that he had a large group of Asian tourists staying with him, all of whom had been forced to stay a further night because of some flight issues, and our room was therefore unavailable. Of course, we saw straight through this; it was much better business for him to have a bunch of people staying another night than it was to have us stay one night only! He sent us to a hotel across the street where he had paid for a room for us. We set ourselves up in the unexpected hotel, and then walked down towards the river. We stopped at a bar on the way and enjoyed some apple wine, which appeared to be more of the flat cider persuasion than wine. Apparently the bar was sold out of pretty much everything else, since the FIFA quarterfinals had just occurred. This did not worry me too much, and so after finishing up (one large glass, no effects felt) we walked down to the waterfront and took pictures of the Frankfurt skyline, which, Mon reported, is supposed to be one of the best. On our way back we stopped at a dairy to get some water and Mon amused me, but not herself, by accidentally purchasing sparkling water, which she only discovered once we were back in the lobby of the hotel. While I can stomach the stuff, I do not know why Germans drink it by choice! Mon, however, was unable to take so much as a sip without feeling sick, and so I had to return to the shops to buy the right stuff.

The sleeping arrangements were strange; while they claim twin share, the beds were actually pushed together, and did not appear to be movable. Thus Mon began a strange act of dragging her mattress onto the floor, claiming it would be a few degrees cooler down there. Because she went through this effort, it meant that I did not have to, so it was fine with me.

After a roasting night, we returned to the first hotel for breakfast, which was very pleasant. Germans like their pastries, boiled eggs and nutella, and I like that they like this. Naturally, I tried to fool Mon again by bringing her sparkling water, but she could see the bubbles, dammit.

Following breakfast, we took a trip to the Franfurt Zoo, which was, I have to say, more impressive than anything we have in New Zealand, but probably run of the mill to the locals. They of course had lions and tigers and bears, oh my, but also huge ape enclosures where Mon felt right at home. The best part was an island in the middle of a large pond in which two monkeys were playing tag. The island was planted out in trees and ropes had also been put up, which gave the monkeys a lot of freedom to move around, and at some speed.

Finally the time had come to go, and we returned to the hotel to grab our stuff, check out, and catch the subway to the airport. We made it there with only minor incident when we were unsure of which train went to the airport, and the only fellow available to ask spoke no English. In my haste I fumbled and nearly forgot the word 'flughafen' for airport, but once he heard that he was able at least to point us in the right direction.

We flew to Berlin on a one hour flight, where we enjoyed a four or five hour wait for our connecting flight to Helsinki. I was excited by the presence of a Burger King, but Mon was not so overjoyed, so we found a slightly more costly place called 'The Red Baron' where we had smoothies and lingered for a while. After we left, Mon then decided to my chagrin that she wanted the soup from that place. Females. We trundled back and shamefacedly booked another table for Mon to recommence her meal.

Once that was all over, we walked to our gate and I was stoked to see that the security officer bore a real resemblance to Doogle. Also like Doogle, he kinda went to town on the rubdown, which I wasn't so stoked about. With my dignity impugned, we went to sit with the masses in a large noisy hall to wait for our flight to Helsinki.