Wednesday, January 29, 2014
Saturday, January 18, 2014
Monday, January 13, 2014
CULTURE/SOCIETY - I’m Dating Someone Even Though I’m Married
January 6, 2014
I have a confession to make. I’m dating someone even though I’m married.
She’s an incredible girl. She’s beautiful, smart, cunning, strong, and has an immensely strong faith in God. I love to take her out to dinner, movies, local shows, and always tell her how beautiful she is. I can’t remember the last time I was mad at her for longer than five minutes, and her smile always seems to brighten up my day no matter the circumstances.
Sometimes she will visit me at work unannounced, make me an incredible lunch, or even surprise me with something she personally baked. I can’t believe how lucky I am to be dating someone even though I am married. I encourage you to try it and see what it can do for your life.
Oh! Did I mention the woman I am dating is my wife? What did you expect?
Sunday, January 12, 2014
Saturday, January 11, 2014
SPIRITUALITY/RELIGION - Keep Saturn in Saturnalia!
"For centuries, we have kept quiet and let our holiday to be trampled by 'religious correctness.' But no more. We Romans had have enough! It's time to take a stand for Saturn!
"Long before there was this so-called 'Christmas' we reveled in the weeklong festival of Saturnalia. It was a time to celebrate the children and the downtrodden of society, as well as to have some darn good fun. And let me tell you, as the people who invented the vomitorium, we Romans know something about having fun. You think you Americans over-indulge at the holidays? Hah! Bet you never ate a whole roasted boar, sang in a naked choir or burned down a major public building to celebrate the season.
CULTURE/SOCIETY - Haunting Photos Of Abandoned Cities Around The World
There are more abandoned cities than you’d think. But they’re also probably at least as creepy as you would imagine in your nightmares.
Craco, Italy
Kolmanskop, Namibia
Pripyat, Ukraine
Site of the infamous Chernobyl incident, the entire city had to abandoned in 1986 due to nuclear radiation.
Craco was a medieval village built high up on a steep summit for defensive reasons, but recurring earthquakes eventually made it impossible to sustain. Today, less than 800 people live there in a commune, while the majority remains eerily uninhabited.
Formerly a bustling diamond mining town, after the market declined, inhabitants began leaving the town after WWI; by 1954, it was completely deserted. As it was an enclave for German colonialists for many years, the architecture is not only out of place, but its abandonment enhances it even more.
CULTURE/SOCIETY - 9 Places You Never Want To Go On A Vacation
It’s almost vacation season, so you should start planning accordingly. In this case, here are some places you definitely do not want to book your tickets to.
2. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch
The Patch is a basically immobile, gigantic mass of trash out in the middle of the Pacific. Most estimates put its size—composed entirely of plastic bottles, chemical sludge, and basically any other kind of debris you can imagine—larger than the state of Texas. You'd probably rather go to Texas.
5. The Zone of Alienation, Ukraine
Although you probably wouldn't want to vacation in Pripyat either, the Zone of Alienation is the 19-mile decommissioned perimeter surrounding the grounds of the Chernobyl incident. It's administered by a branch of government specifically so that no-one is allowed into it, but there are a few hundred residents who refused to move. What's wrong with those people? You probably don't want to know.
Via Flickr: 13bobby
9. Mud Volcanoes of Azerbaijan
Sure, mud volcanoes aren't nearly as dangerous as their cousins of the magmatic variety, but when they do actually erupt, it's not exactly a pretty sight. In 2001, a new island grew out of the Caspian Sea, due to an increase in volcanic activity—right nearby where hundreds of these bad boys are. Generally, they go off every twenty years, and when they do, they shoot flames "hundreds of meters into the sky" and deposit tons of mud into the immediate area. Try wrestling your way out of that mud.
Friday, January 10, 2014
CULTURE/SOCIETY - 37 Things You’ll Regret When You’re Old
They say youth is wasted on the young. Are you wasting yours?
1. Not traveling when you had the chance.
Traveling becomes infinitely harder the older you get, especially if you have a family and need to pay the way for three-plus people instead of just yourself.
3. Staying in a bad relationship.
No one who ever gets out of a bad relationship looks back without wishing they made the move sooner.
5. Missing the chance to see your favorite musicians.
"Nah, dude, I'll catch Nirvana next time they come through town." Facepalm.
Sunday, January 05, 2014
ENTERTAINMENT - NOTES ON THE 100th BIRTHDAY OF GEORGE REEVES
NOTES ON THE 100th BIRTHDAY OF GEORGE REEVES
January 5 is the 100th anniversary of the birth of actor George Reeves.
Those of you who know me well probably know I've been working on a definitive biography of Reeves since somewhere around the 64th anniversary of his birth. Those of you who know me really well surely know the anguish with which I mention that project's astonishing delay in completion. When I started this labor of love, I was making about $50 a year as an actor and had plenty of time on my hands to write and research. Little did I dream that a few decades later, I would have had substantially more time in front of a movie camera than Reeves had in his entire career, or that my life would fill up so full with blessings (and a few tragedies) that even a labor of love could be delayed so long. I had sincerely hoped to have this book completed and available for reading by Reeves's 100th birthday. How happy that would have made me! Yet it isn't to be, and the stories I've gathered will have to wait until, at long last, I complete the task I'm committed to completing.
But I can't let this anniversary pass unnoticed. George Reeves has been dead for nearly 55 years, but he's not completely forgotten. As long as baby boomers remain alive who remember tying towels around their necks and drawing S's on their t-shirts and running home to watch ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN on their black-and-white TV's, he won't be forgotten. For a dwindling (and comparative) few, he is their Elvis, their Michael Jackson, their John Wayne, despite never being nearly the household name for millions that those icons are.
I've often been asked during my researches, even by people who knew him, "Why George Reeves? Why write a book about him?" And the truth is, had he never stumbled (and I use that word advisedly) into the role of Superman at the beginning of the television era, he would surely be no better remembered than various other handsome young men who had minor careers in movies. John Ridgely, Rand Brooks, Robert Lowery, Richard Travis -- all capable actors, nice-looking fellows with substantial film credits, yet now forgotten by everyone but Golden Age movie buffs and fans of specific films they appeared in. Reeves could well have been one of these, but for Superman. Or he might have been a Gig Young or a Jack Warden, an Oscar-caliber player with a long career in the shadow only of superstars, had Superman not sent his career (and his life) along a different track. As it was, though, Reeves remains of interest largely to fans of his show, to film buffs of the more in-depth sort, and to mystery enthusiasts who wonder about the circumstances of his death. Even his friends sometimes questioned why I would want to write a book about him. All I know is there's something about the man and his life that fascinates me, that drives me to know him better, and that instills admiration.
He was an average actor, from the evidence available. He was quite capable of very good work, yet nothing we can see suggests the range or depth or style of an Olivier or a Brando or a Mitchum (nor the opportunities they got). It's said he was quite a good stage actor, but few there are now who can attest to that first-hand. In films, even his best director, probably Fred Zinneman in FROM HERE TO ETERNITY, realized nothing astounding from him (though, admittedly, little Reeves ever did on film could be considered a truly meaty or artistically complex role). Nothing makes George Reeves particularly special as an actor. Nothing except... him. ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN was a fun show, but we're not talking BREAKING BAD here, or THE SOPRANOS. It was a show that had some appeal for adults but was mainly designed as entertainment for children, who ate it up with a shovel. In all probability, the show would have had its success even with another actor in the title role. And yet, it didn't. It had George Reeves, for his better or worse fortune. And he brought something to the part that lingers, something that even his colleagues among the baby boom's childhood heroic icons (THE LONE RANGER's Clayton Moore, ZORRO's Guy Williams, et al) couldn't compete with. Superman fans didn't just admire Reeves in his portrayal, they loved him. More importantly, he gave them a sense that he loved them. More than talent, more than appearance, more than any other gift, Reeves's ability to connect through the camera to his young audience transcends his role and the work of others in the genre. Reeves's natural geniality and warmth, something remarked on by virtually every single person I ever interviewed, reached out through the lens and washed over his youthful followers in a way that lives with them still in their older years. That warmth, combined with the melancholy associated with his untimely death, puts George Reeves in a very special place for an awful lot of people now in their 60s and 70s. No, he hasn't the world-wide absolute familiarity that still clings to Marilyn Monroe and James Dean. But for some, maybe only hundreds or thousands rather than millions, he is a far bigger star and a far bigger role model.
As I've reached a point in my career where generosity is something I'm able to offer instead of ask for, I don't believe I've ever considered a loan or a gift without the memory of reading in my youth how widely known George Reeves was for his generosity. In the years since, in my research, I've encountered hundreds of people who told me how he helped them, privately, without fanfare or expectation. He was, once he achieved real fame, unstinting with his time for charitable causes. Without consciously modeling myself on him, but without ever failing to think of him when confronted with the opportunity or challenge to be useful, he has been a role model for my own life. His reputation among friends and colleagues for cheerfulness and gregariousness and loyalty colors my own approach to people. No, he's not the only light I illuminate my life by, but he's one of the brighter lamps. In the decades I've researched his life, I've usually always enjoyed his work and appreciated his talents as far as they went and as far as they were well-displayed. But what has always drawn me to him and to his story has been the innate goodness of the man. He could be wild, he could be bawdy (sometimes very bawdy), he was a two-fisted drinker and not always a responsible one. His life was in some aspects far rowdier and profligate than the straight-up character he's most famous for playing, yet he loved life and he loved people and he did his utmost to show that love and to act on it. So whether he could out-act Gielgud or whether he's as famous as Elvis is beside the point. I started out researching the life and death of the guy who played Superman on my favorite childhood show, and came to realize I was really finding out some things about how to live, through the life of a man who was pretty good at it.
The facts of how Reeves died are just that, facts. The interpretations are as many as there are interpreters. There's some mystery, in the sense of there being things no one seems to know, but even if every single thing were known, there would always be wide division as to what "really" happened. The circumstances of Reeves's death are important to his biographer, and I've done wide-ranging research into them. But I want to pause here to celebrate on a significant anniversary the birth of a man I long ago ceased to be simply a fan of, one I've grown to care about as a human being, one I've come to look up to and look to for example. I don't idolize George Reeves. I admire him. And that seems quite the right way for this old baby boomer to see his childhood idol.
I won't deny having a little influence on the fact that Turner Classic Movies is celebrating Reeves's 100th birthday with four of his films, Sunday, January 5. They're not great films, but two of them represent Warner Bros.'s early attempts to see how George would work out as a leading man. The final one is fun, but silly, the sort of work Reeves really hoped to get away from and never quite did. But I'm really grateful to TCM for setting aside this little bit of time to honor an actor and a good man, less forgotten than some might think, more forgotten than he should be. Here's to Honest George, the People's Friend.
FATHER IS A PRINCE (1940)
ALWAYS A BRIDE (1940)
TEAR GAS SQUAD (1940)
JUNGLE JIM (1948)
January 5 is the 100th anniversary of the birth of actor George Reeves.
Those of you who know me well probably know I've been working on a definitive biography of Reeves since somewhere around the 64th anniversary of his birth. Those of you who know me really well surely know the anguish with which I mention that project's astonishing delay in completion. When I started this labor of love, I was making about $50 a year as an actor and had plenty of time on my hands to write and research. Little did I dream that a few decades later, I would have had substantially more time in front of a movie camera than Reeves had in his entire career, or that my life would fill up so full with blessings (and a few tragedies) that even a labor of love could be delayed so long. I had sincerely hoped to have this book completed and available for reading by Reeves's 100th birthday. How happy that would have made me! Yet it isn't to be, and the stories I've gathered will have to wait until, at long last, I complete the task I'm committed to completing.
But I can't let this anniversary pass unnoticed. George Reeves has been dead for nearly 55 years, but he's not completely forgotten. As long as baby boomers remain alive who remember tying towels around their necks and drawing S's on their t-shirts and running home to watch ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN on their black-and-white TV's, he won't be forgotten. For a dwindling (and comparative) few, he is their Elvis, their Michael Jackson, their John Wayne, despite never being nearly the household name for millions that those icons are.
I've often been asked during my researches, even by people who knew him, "Why George Reeves? Why write a book about him?" And the truth is, had he never stumbled (and I use that word advisedly) into the role of Superman at the beginning of the television era, he would surely be no better remembered than various other handsome young men who had minor careers in movies. John Ridgely, Rand Brooks, Robert Lowery, Richard Travis -- all capable actors, nice-looking fellows with substantial film credits, yet now forgotten by everyone but Golden Age movie buffs and fans of specific films they appeared in. Reeves could well have been one of these, but for Superman. Or he might have been a Gig Young or a Jack Warden, an Oscar-caliber player with a long career in the shadow only of superstars, had Superman not sent his career (and his life) along a different track. As it was, though, Reeves remains of interest largely to fans of his show, to film buffs of the more in-depth sort, and to mystery enthusiasts who wonder about the circumstances of his death. Even his friends sometimes questioned why I would want to write a book about him. All I know is there's something about the man and his life that fascinates me, that drives me to know him better, and that instills admiration.
He was an average actor, from the evidence available. He was quite capable of very good work, yet nothing we can see suggests the range or depth or style of an Olivier or a Brando or a Mitchum (nor the opportunities they got). It's said he was quite a good stage actor, but few there are now who can attest to that first-hand. In films, even his best director, probably Fred Zinneman in FROM HERE TO ETERNITY, realized nothing astounding from him (though, admittedly, little Reeves ever did on film could be considered a truly meaty or artistically complex role). Nothing makes George Reeves particularly special as an actor. Nothing except... him. ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN was a fun show, but we're not talking BREAKING BAD here, or THE SOPRANOS. It was a show that had some appeal for adults but was mainly designed as entertainment for children, who ate it up with a shovel. In all probability, the show would have had its success even with another actor in the title role. And yet, it didn't. It had George Reeves, for his better or worse fortune. And he brought something to the part that lingers, something that even his colleagues among the baby boom's childhood heroic icons (THE LONE RANGER's Clayton Moore, ZORRO's Guy Williams, et al) couldn't compete with. Superman fans didn't just admire Reeves in his portrayal, they loved him. More importantly, he gave them a sense that he loved them. More than talent, more than appearance, more than any other gift, Reeves's ability to connect through the camera to his young audience transcends his role and the work of others in the genre. Reeves's natural geniality and warmth, something remarked on by virtually every single person I ever interviewed, reached out through the lens and washed over his youthful followers in a way that lives with them still in their older years. That warmth, combined with the melancholy associated with his untimely death, puts George Reeves in a very special place for an awful lot of people now in their 60s and 70s. No, he hasn't the world-wide absolute familiarity that still clings to Marilyn Monroe and James Dean. But for some, maybe only hundreds or thousands rather than millions, he is a far bigger star and a far bigger role model.
As I've reached a point in my career where generosity is something I'm able to offer instead of ask for, I don't believe I've ever considered a loan or a gift without the memory of reading in my youth how widely known George Reeves was for his generosity. In the years since, in my research, I've encountered hundreds of people who told me how he helped them, privately, without fanfare or expectation. He was, once he achieved real fame, unstinting with his time for charitable causes. Without consciously modeling myself on him, but without ever failing to think of him when confronted with the opportunity or challenge to be useful, he has been a role model for my own life. His reputation among friends and colleagues for cheerfulness and gregariousness and loyalty colors my own approach to people. No, he's not the only light I illuminate my life by, but he's one of the brighter lamps. In the decades I've researched his life, I've usually always enjoyed his work and appreciated his talents as far as they went and as far as they were well-displayed. But what has always drawn me to him and to his story has been the innate goodness of the man. He could be wild, he could be bawdy (sometimes very bawdy), he was a two-fisted drinker and not always a responsible one. His life was in some aspects far rowdier and profligate than the straight-up character he's most famous for playing, yet he loved life and he loved people and he did his utmost to show that love and to act on it. So whether he could out-act Gielgud or whether he's as famous as Elvis is beside the point. I started out researching the life and death of the guy who played Superman on my favorite childhood show, and came to realize I was really finding out some things about how to live, through the life of a man who was pretty good at it.
The facts of how Reeves died are just that, facts. The interpretations are as many as there are interpreters. There's some mystery, in the sense of there being things no one seems to know, but even if every single thing were known, there would always be wide division as to what "really" happened. The circumstances of Reeves's death are important to his biographer, and I've done wide-ranging research into them. But I want to pause here to celebrate on a significant anniversary the birth of a man I long ago ceased to be simply a fan of, one I've grown to care about as a human being, one I've come to look up to and look to for example. I don't idolize George Reeves. I admire him. And that seems quite the right way for this old baby boomer to see his childhood idol.
I won't deny having a little influence on the fact that Turner Classic Movies is celebrating Reeves's 100th birthday with four of his films, Sunday, January 5. They're not great films, but two of them represent Warner Bros.'s early attempts to see how George would work out as a leading man. The final one is fun, but silly, the sort of work Reeves really hoped to get away from and never quite did. But I'm really grateful to TCM for setting aside this little bit of time to honor an actor and a good man, less forgotten than some might think, more forgotten than he should be. Here's to Honest George, the People's Friend.
FATHER IS A PRINCE (1940)
ALWAYS A BRIDE (1940)
TEAR GAS SQUAD (1940)
JUNGLE JIM (1948)
Friday, January 03, 2014
CULTURE/SOCIETY - How to Celebrate the Festival of Sleep Day
The Festival of Sleep Day was created for people that would like to get some "shut eye" and relaxation after the holidays. After the Christmas shopping and present opening deadlines and the New Year celebrations, it's time to celebrate -- in "Sleep Land". Observe this wacky and unofficial holiday on January 3rd.
