Scary Movies

I’m supposed to be writing an article about smelly dogs right now which, as you can see, I’m not writing at the moment. It’s not a hard subject. There are plenty of things to write and I can even be humorous about it. I have solutions for the problem, which will make my client happy. I even have people on Facebook offering to send me their smelly dogs to inspire me. But, somehow, I’m not in the mood to write it.

Instead, I am playing hooky from work. I’m watching the wind blow the tree branches outside and the rain fall. I looked for and found a few four-leaf clovers outside a little while ago. I’m cooking some food for my old dog who needs a little extra something added to his regular dog food these days. I’m browsing the Internet to see what people thought of The Haunting in Connecticut, which I’d like to see.

Have I mentioned that I’m addicted to the series A Haunting? Everyday I take a break from work so I can watch people deal with the paranormal for an hour. I know it probably sounds ridiculous, but I love it.

It goes like this: people move into a new house. They begin to notice strange things happening but they try not to pay any attention. They tell themselves that they are imagining stuff or that there is some logical explanation for events. Then things begin to escalate until they can’t ignore them anymore. Then all hell breaks loose! LOL Okay, maybe it’s low-key hell, but people get spooked. That’s when they try to get some outside help, whether it’s a priest or a paranormal investigator or a local historian or someone like that. Half the time that doesn’t work and they have to keep trying. Or, they may just have to move out of the house. Most of the time they get things worked out. But sometimes they just learn to live with whatever is in their house.

I have loved supernatural stories ever since I can remember. I adore them. When I was very young I used to watch Dark Shadows every afternoon. I would dress up my cat in baby clothes and watch Barnabas and Angelique while I chewed my nails. It was wonderful. I always thought Angelique was just the best, smartest woman in the world. You have to admire her tenacity. I have always liked single-minded people, people who don’t let anything stop them. Like facts or someone’s aversion to you. :)) I thought Angelique was a wonderful role model in life. And, of course, she was very beautiful. Did you know that Lara Parker is from Knoxville, Tennessee? I only found that out much later but I think Tennessee should be very proud of her.

I loved other supernatural stories, too. When I was a kid one of our local TV stations used to show old black and white horror movies every afternoon. I remember that I particularly loved the old mummy movies. I never got tired of them. One of them was on TV again recently and I stayed up watching it late at night. I think I enjoyed it just as much now as I did when I was a kid.

I could never get enough vampire movies either. I used to try to watch every vampire movie on TV. I loved Frank Langella, Jack Palance, the Peter Cushing/Christopher Lee movies. Somehow I didn’t like the Gary Oldham movie very much. But I loved the Lestat books. I wasn’t crazy about the first movie with Tom Cruise but I thought the second movie with Stuart Townsend was pretty good. Not as good as the books, of course, but pretty good.

I know many people have explained why we love the paranormal and why we love to be scared. I still don’t know what it is that gives us such a delicious feeling when we watch a movie that frightens us -- and we sit there knowing in our minds that we’re really safe. I still think one of the scariest movies I ever saw was The Haunting with Julie Harris. And yet you really don’t see anything at all scary in the movie. It’s all done with atmosphere. But it’s terrifying. I have watched it again and again and it’s still great. On the other hand, the original Halloween scared me so badly that I wouldn’t watch the sequels for years. That was too much, especially for a kid. Now I can watch them and they’re no big deal but when I was 12 years old or so it was horrible. It did not give me the pleasant kind of scare. I still don’t like gory movies.

But I do still love scary movies. I really like the movies that have been coming to the U.S. from Japanese originals, like The Ring, Dark Water, The Grudge, and one I saw this week -- Shutter. It was good, too.

Maybe I can find a good scary movie to watch this afternoon instead of writing about smelly dogs.

The REAL Boleyn Girl

Every month I swear I’m going to drop my HBO package. It’s overpriced and it has nothing but lousy action movies on it that I never, ever, ever watch. Seriously, is everyone in the United States or the world involved in running drugs and selling sex? There are more hitmen on HBO than could possibly exist in real life. I don’t care who’s in a movie or how good it’s supposed to be, if it has hitmen in it, or if the plot involves drugs, prostitution, or other unsavory parts of life, the chances of me watching it plummet. I’m not a prude. I’m simply not interested. I find those stories boring. Yawn-worthy. They are, in fact, so far removed from my own life that I can relate better to a film about space aliens than I can to films about those subjects.

So, that’s my general level of dissatisfaction with HBO. I saw an ad on one of my other channels this week that said the Starz network and assorted channels were going to be having a free weekend. I promptly turned them on to see what they had to offer. It wasn’t much better than what they show on HBO. I did find one movie that interested me even though I knew I was going to have problems with it.

The Other Boleyn Girl started out as a novel by Phillippa Gregory. It’s about Mary Boleyn, the OLDER sister of Anne Boleyn, who became the second wife of Henry VIII of England in 1533. It was turned into a big screen movie in 2008 starring Natalie Portman and Scarlett Johansson.

Now, I used to belong (still do, but I’m No Mail) to a very good Tudor history e-mail list. I’ve been hearing about this book for several years so I knew that, from an historical point of view, it was grossly inaccurate and that it portrayed Anne Boleyn in the worst possible light. I think the movie softened things up a bit but, historically, it was still pretty bad.

The movie completely overlooks the fact that both girls spent considerable portions of their childhoods in France. And, very importantly, it totally whitewashes Mary. Mary, you see, was the mistress of the King of France while she was in France. He had some very uncharming things to say about her which I won’t repeat here, but suffice it to say that her reputation was completely ruined when she returned to England. It’s no wonder that she quickly became Henry VIII’s mistress as well. Not to put too fine a point on it, the girl was easy.

None of this factual information is included in the film. Instead, Mary is portrayed as a shy, sweet, innocent young girl when she meets Henry. He is the one who commands that she becomes his mistress. Yeah, right. And Anne, of course, is the bossy, mean sister.

Actually, I thought Natalie Portman was splendid as Anne. I really didn’t think she was a good choice for the role but she was excellent and I thought she even looked quite a bit like her. Scarlett Johansson looked like Mary, too, with her fair coloring. She probably acted somewhat like Mary -- kind of clueless -- but Mary was by no means the goody-two-shoes that she is in the film.

The whole film just reeks of revisionist history. According to this movie Henry bestowed titles and riches on the Boleyn family because of Mary. Nope. Didn’t happen. The Boleyns got virtually nothing out of Mary’s liaison with Henry. Mary wasn’t very smart and she didn’t hold out for much. She and her family didn’t benefit much at all from the affair. And, Mary wasn’t married when Henry began fooling around with her. She only married later -- and didn’t get a very good marriage out of it. There is considerable doubt, too, over whether the children she had were Henry’s -- there were two, a son and a daughter. Many people think that if they had been Henry’s he would have provided better for them. Afterall, he had a son earlier by his mistress Bessie Blount and he made him a duke and even considered marrying him to his daughter, Mary Tudor (Katherine of Aragon’s daughter). Henry wasn’t miserly and if he thought Mary Boleyn’s son (or daughter) was his he would have done well by him. Yet, he didn’t.

The fact is that Mary was a momentary diversion and she ceased to have any importance at all after Henry met Anne -- who had been in France when Henry met Mary. After Anne arrived on the scene Mary didn’t matter at all.

Unfortunately, the character of Henry in this film is simply dreadful. Once again Henry is portrayed as a monster, which he was not. Certainly not in the early years of his reign when he was still young and handsome. And, really, is it so very difficult to cast an actor who has fair looks? Hello casting directors! Henry had blond/reddish-gold hair and blue eyes!!!! Yet all the actors you see playing Henry are dark and brooding looking. The man was known for his humor and cheerful disposition for a long time. He was very intelligent and could be very charming. It was only much later that his sudden anger and calculating darker side took over. Don’t look to this film to find a nuanced performance of Henry. This guy is brutal and always angry about something.

The costumes are beautiful. The sets are average and don’t display much variety. One setting looks very much like another. Everything could be set in the same castle for all the viewer can tell. You have no idea where you are most of the time.

Time periods are crunched together and you don’t get any proper idea of how much time is passing. At the beginning of the film Anne looks like a young girl and she still looks that way at the end, even though, chronologically, some 16 years must have passed. It’s very disconcerting. Everything in the movie is out of order -- Anne is sent to France after her ENGAGEMENT (not marriage) to Henry Percy, when, of course, she was only sent to Hever at that time. That was in 1525. By that time Anne had long returned from France. Anne’s first meeting at court with Henry is shown after that when it was actually around 1522. And so on.

Watch the film for a bit of fun but don’t trust it at all for historical accuracy. If you want genuine history about the Boleyns visit this site. Better yet, read Eric W. Ives’ excellent biography of Anne Boleyn and courtlife, The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn.

My Cavewoman Moment

Oh, the shame. I am so ashamed of myself. I was in the grocery store this morning -- where else is there to go on a rainy Saturday morning? I was zipping around the aisles, happy that I had my bills paid and still had money for something as frivolous as food. I was nearly through shopping when I came up to the buggies near the front where the store puts out things on clearance that they want to get rid of. I always stop to see what they have here. I’ve picked up some great things in the past -- Starbuck’s coffee (I cleaned them out that day), cans of tripe for the dogs, weird salad dressings. Today I immediately noticed that they had a couple of bags of dog food. Now, I consider myself a dog food connoisseur. I spend a lot of time reading and writing about dog foods and their ingredients. So, when I saw these two bags of Newman’s Own Organic Dog Food I was all aquiver. I’ve never bought this food before but I’ve read lots of great things about it. Actually, I don’t even know why it was in the store because I’m pretty sure that my grocery store doesn’t carry it or sell it. But there it was and I pounced on it.

I picked up a bag and the original price was $20. Ouch. But I kept looking until I found the marked down price. $3. THREE DOLLARS! Oh, yeah. And it said that it was for active and senior dogs. That was exactly what I had. So I was greedily putting the bag in my cart and reaching for the second bag when a woman picked it up practically out of my hands. I’m sure my mouth fell open. I was beside myself with vexation. “Oh, were you going to get both bags,” she said. I struggled for a moment. Should I bluntly tell the truth or be polite? Finally, about 200 years of my family living in the South rose up and beat me over the head. “Oh, no. That’s okay. Go ahead.” I said, very primly. And I wheeled quickly away. I was totally steamed!

I jerked my buggy up and down aisles to finish shopping and I kept thinking about that dog food and the nerve of that woman virtually stealing it from me! How rude. Well, of course I was going to get both bags. Anyone could see that. That’s why she sidled in and picked up the food when my head was turned. But I decided to go back and see if the food was still there. So, I turned the corner and looked. There it was! There was my organic dog food. Joy! Happiness! And then I felt like a total bitch. Lord, I was trying to hoard dog food. I had probably been a complete churl to the poor woman. I had been acting like some kind of cavewoman fighting over food. What was even worse, that woman seemed to have better manners than I did since she put the food back.

I guess this goes to show that people can act irrationally about just about anything. I don’t even feed my dogs organic food but when it came to getting a good bargain on something I behaved terribly. I think I acted as badly as those women you see in videos who trample each other trying to get a wedding dress on sale.

To top it all off, I was thinking about the healthy dog food when I was checking out and asking the checkout lady to get a carton of cigarettes for me. Yeah, I want my dogs to eat healthy but I don’t seem to give a damn about my own health. How’s that for irony?

Art and the Need for Experts

Any fans of The Graduate out there? Remember that scene where Benjamin (Dustin Hoffman) tries to find something in common with Mrs. Robinson (the great Anne Bancroft) and brings up the subject of modern art? As I recall, he stumbles through some one-sided conversation and she has nothing to say. Then, when he asks her what she majored in in college, she says her major was modern art. That scene always makes me laugh, though the expression on Mrs. Robinson’s face is awfully sad.

I think I just had a similar experience tonight. I watched a program on the Ovation channel about Modern Art. I minored in Modern Art in college and worked at an avant-garde art magazine after college. I really haven’t given it much thought since then. I came to hate, loathe and despise everything to do with postmodernism when I was in graduate school So, watching this overview of modern about this evening was an, er, interesting experience. I felt like I simultaneously knew everything I was being told and like it was all new to me. The art works were all the same but some of the interpretations were a little different than I had previously known.



There was good old Cubism. Then, for some unknown reason, the show took a completely ridiculous turn to discuss Nazi art. I have no idea why because it was completely inconsequential and racist. Pure propaganda. Then it went back to discussing what I would call real art -- abstract art and abstract expressionism. After that I began to lose interest. I could never pretend to be very interested in Pop art or art of the 1960s-70s and later. Conceptual art mostly bores me. I like to look at art and understand it, or at least receive a visceral impression. I don’t want to have to read a description to understand it or prepare myself for it by reading a manifesto.

The host was saying some interesting things even if I had stopped looking much at the art work. He said something about how accessible art is now. That anything can be art and no one can tell you that it is or isn’t. Well, isn’t that just swell. Or, is it? Frankly, it probably means that a lot more bad and mediocre art gets accepted as good art now. I know that we probably don’t need an Academy system as once existed in France, where a group judges painters and paintings and puts a stamp of approval on what is Art. But, honestly, there is so much junk being called art now that it trivializes everything.

All of which made me think that we have democratized art to the point where there are very few respected critics or judges anymore. And, the same is true for many other areas of life. We, our society in modern times, has tried to do away with all of the experts. We’re democratic. Everyone is equal. Everyone’s opinion is equally valid. Therefore, we don’t need and don’t trust expert opinion. My opinion is just as good as yours. The opinion of the man on the street is just as valid as that of someone who has studied a subject for decades.

Perhaps this kind of thinking began when the monolith of the Catholic Church crumbled during the Reformation and Protestants announced that they didn’t need the expert opinion of the Pope. They didn’t need priests or saints to intercede for them with God. They could pray directly to the man upstairs themselves. Get rid of the “experts.” Of course, the next step is to get rid of the king -- have direct rule by the people through elected representatives. I’m sure if we could get rid of them we would.

We still have a few experts that we haven’t managed to get rid of yet -- doctors, lawyers, plumbers, computer geeks, and the like. We worship at the altar of those who can do things the average person can’t do. Just look how superior athletes are treated in our world. There’s an entire commentating class built around discussing what athletes do on Sundays. But, for the most part, we prefer to think that we’re all equal and that the things we produce are just as good as what other people produce. My artwork is as good as what’s in the museum. My poem’s as good as that girl’s. Anybody can write a novel.

From my perspective, there are also people who are trying to get rid of the experts on animals. Many dog, cat, horse and other animal breeders have devoted their entire lives to raising animals. They can tell more by glancing at an animal than some people can tell from a battery of tests. Yet, because our society prefers to believe that everyone’s opinion is equal and no one’s knowledge is anymore valuable than someone else’s, these animal experts are being ignored in favor of people who would rather believe animals are like furry children. This, of course, is the next step in our democratic movement -- animals must have rights too, don’t you know? And who else can speak for the animals but the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). It’s also nice that there are more fundraising dollars in promoting this kind of “democracy” for animals, isn’t it? Get rid of the animal experts -- the breeders and those who work with animals -- by means of legislation that outlaws breeding and owning more than a couple of animals. Then the “guardians” and “caregivers” (oh, we don’t “own” animals -- that would be wrong) of the fur-children can send you lots of money so you can work to get more animal rights.

No matter what realm we’re speaking about, be careful about getting rid of the experts in a field. They are the ones who know the past and can predict the future. Their knowledge isn’t easily replaced.

The Turn in the Road

Sometimes I think that we all have to choose our own particular brand of mental illness in this world. If we don’t, then something far worse may be visited upon us. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is my choice of mental illness. I am always expecting the other shoe to drop. I’m always waiting for the bad thing to show up or the wolf to come to the door. No matter how well things are going -- especially if things are going well! -- I expect something bad to happen. There has to be a turn in the road.

I’d rather choose my own poison than let someone do something to me. When I was about eight years old I had to have my tonsils out. Back then I hated needles and shots. I’d had strep throat repeatedly and my parents had taken me to the doctor constantly. It seemed like I was always getting my finger pricked or getting a shot for something. So, when the nurse came in my hospital room to draw blood I told him I wanted to do it myself. I figured that it wouldn’t hurt so much if I could stick myself. Either I was very brave or just a control freak.

So, right now things seem to be going very well in my life and it’s got me worried sick. There has to be a catch. I’m waiting for something to go wrong. What will it be? Clients that don’t pay? Something that goes wrong with the house? Health problems for me or my dogs? The car breaking down?

I have this theory that if you can imagine the worst things that can happen and make plans for how you would deal with those things that you can be a little more prepared. It helps, marginally. You can prepare yourself for some things. You can prepare yourself for what to do if you have a flat tire. But there is no way to prepare yourself for everything. There is no way to prepare yourself for being told that your dad has cancer everywhere and only has a few weeks to live. There is no way to prepare yourself for waking up and going into the living room and finding your mother dead from a stroke. There’s really no way to prepare yourself for losing a house or a job, no matter what you tell yourself.

There are some things that will eventually happen to everyone, like losing a parent. We know they’re coming eventually but you still can’t adequately prepare for them.

But I know that we can’t spend our entire lives worrying about things that may or will eventually happen either. My life seems good right now. I know there will be ups and downs. I also know that how I choose to look at things will make a big difference. I can wait for something bad to happen or I can enjoy what I have now. I think it probably makes more sense to enjoy the moment.

I know you'll never read this...

...but I need to tell you anyway.

I wanted to say thank you.
Thank you for being there.
Thank you for making me feel like a human being again.
Thank you for showing me the value of honesty, no matter how little or big.
Thank you for making me smile.
Thank you for the bittersweet memories.
Thank you for reminding me that some people do care.
Thank you for reminding me that tears can heal some wounds.
Thank you for giving me the energy to keep going.
Thank you for the self-confidence.
And most of all, thank you for just being you, even though I may never see you again.
Thank you.

Forced Sterilization

I went to see my therapist yesterday. Just the regular, sort of necessary monthly visit. I think they consider me to be on “maintenance.” My therapist likes dogs so she was asking me to explain to her why the idea of a mandatory spay/neuter in our city/county was a bad idea. (See Why I Hate The Idea of Animal Rights.) I was explaining and she pops up and says that she thinks FORCED STERILIZATION FOR PEOPLE should be required. I just stared at her. What can you say to that? She started saying something about welfare mothers with too many kids, blah blah blah. I finally said I didn't really like anything forced or mandatory.

She is a nice older lady. But how do I get these fruit loops?

Just to be sure I wasn't crazy I came home and checked online. Yeah, forced sterilization is considered a crime against humanity. So, it's not just me that thinks it's a bad idea. The Nazis did it for eugenics reasons. They have done it in India and China as birth control. It just sucks. I can't believe I have a therapist who actually thinks we should do that here.

I would change therapists but with my luck I would get someone even worse.

I was struggling with this information all night. It boggles my mind that there are Americans in favor of forced sterilization. It generally boggles my mind when people want to take rights away from other people, but this is something extremely personal. I don’t know where in the Constitution it says that we have reproductive rights but I’m pretty sure I was born with those rights. No one should be able to take them away from me because I make below a certain income level or my I.Q. is low or for any other reason. And you know it’s always the poorest folks in a country who are singled out for laws like this -- they’re the ones least able to fight back.

I struggled with whether or not I would post this story here because I wasn’t sure I wanted to tell all the world I see a therapist. But I did post it and I do see a therapist. I have what’s called social anxiety disorder. It’s not so bad now because I take medication for it but for a while it was ruining my life. Some people think of it as shyness but that’s not really an accurate description. It can take the form of agoraphobia. I was afraid to leave my house because I didn’t want to see people. I couldn’t answer my phone because I was afraid to talk to them. If I had to call someone I had to write down what I was going to say so I would be prepared. Sometimes it would take me a day or two to work up the nerve to call somebody. If someone came to my door I was terrified. I had panic attacks all the time. Anything could set me off. I was living in a state of fear all the time, afraid of everyone and everything.

Fortunately, after trying to get some help and not getting the right diagnoses, I found a good doctor and got the right medication. I’ve been getting better ever since. I live a fairly normal life now. Most people think I’m very outgoing and they can’t get me to shut up.

I’ve had a couple of great therapists over the years but the last couple I’ve had have been less than stellar. This current therapist is a nice lady but I’m a little worried that we’re not connecting very much. The whole forced sterilization issue kind of brought that out in the open.

If you didn’t know it, the United States has had laws on the books about forced sterilization.

The United States was the first country to concertedly undertake compulsory sterilization programs for the purpose of eugenics. The heads of the program were avid believers in eugenics and frequently argued for their program. They were devastated when it was shut down due to ethical problems. The principal targets of the American program were the mentally retarded and the mentally ill, but also targeted under many state laws were the deaf, the blind, people with epilepsy, and the physically deformed. Native Americans, as well as Afro-American women,[17] were sterilized against their will in many states, often without their knowledge, while they were in a hospital for other reasons (e.g. childbirth). Some sterilizations also took place in prisons and other penal institutions, targeting criminality, but they were in the relative minority. In the end, over 65,000 individuals were sterilized in 33 states under state compulsory sterilization programs in the United States.[18]

(Wikipedia)

It’s been tried here before on the state level so you shouldn’t imagine that it’s something that could never happen here. We were right up there with our Nazi friends, leading the way toward a more eugenically-perfect world before WWII. Americans seem to have lost interest in the idea after seeing Hitler’s efforts, thank goodness. But it could happen here again.