7 posts tagged “things that cheez me off”

My roommate doesn’t get things sometimes. Perhaps that’s because she’s management at a pretty big corporation and has never been one for worker’s rights and has a pure distain for anything having to do with the word “union”.  Sure, she’ll complain about how she and her staff are treated, how it’s unfair how much the guy at the top gets paid on the backs of his workers, but she’s not the type to actually do anything about it, and isn’t above crossing picket lines at the grocery store so that she can get her shopping done.

I don’t mean to make her sound cold, callous, or lazy, because she’s none of those things.  She’s just got a different perspective on things, and I can respect that.  But last night when we were discussing the writer’s strike, she could only reply with “they’re lucky they even have jobs.”

This is true.  I doubt any writer in Hollywood would say that he didn’t appreciate the breaks he was given in the business.  Those of us who haven’t “made it” would kill to be in that position.  However, I think that the public has a huge misconception as to what it’s like to be a writer.   Writers spend enormous amounts of time perfecting their craft.  It’s not a hourly, 9-5 job; you are never off the clock when it comes to writing.  It takes an immense amount of diligence and self discipline to become good at story telling.  And the payoff, monetarily, isn’t as great as one might think, especially if you’re an unknown writer.

Imagine, if you will, working three years on a screenplay, for which you get paid $90,000 (this is at the high end, actually…  screenwriters who get six or seven figures are a very small minority).  $90,000 sounds like a lot of money, but when you divide it by the three years you’ve been working on it, that only comes out to $30,000/year, which is less than I make now (and I can barely pay my bills) for a lot more work.  Most of the time writers get some sort of profit from sales at the box office, but production companies are not required to give royalties from monies generated from DVD and internet sales.  Considering the rise of DVD and downloading, Hollywood is making a killing off of new media and writers are not getting their fair share for their hard work.  This is especially true if something becomes a sleeper hit on DVD, such as the Blockbuster exclusive, Boondock Saints.*  These things can be negotiated in a contract, but if you’re an unknown writer, you’re not likely to get it or you may not even know to ask for it. 

Hollywood, like our government, is willing to pay insane fees for certain things, but seems to forget the foundation on which their enterprise is standing.  Actors get paid millions of dollars to appear in films, and yet the people who created those memorable characters are often shoved to the side.  Sure, the way that actor said that line was great, but what about the person who came up with it in the first place?

Say what you want about Unions, but to me, the argument for what they’re doing is a lot more complex than simply that people should take what they get and “be happy that they even have jobs.”  Writers are just as important as the actors, producers, crew, and directors that work hard to make a film good, and they should be compensated for that.  Just remember, if it weren’t for the writers, you wouldn’t be watching anything at all.

-K.

*Which became a huge hit on DVD sales and merchandise, but the writer got his fee and nothing else**

**Though the guy who wrote/directed it was a total douchebag and didn’t deserve even what he got.

Wanna hear the worst song ever?

Yahoo! music,  STOP PLAYING THIS CRAP.

Um, I'm a little bored today, if you couldn't tell by my frequent posts.

Alright, so I’m not gonna lie.  I’m not the type who keeps up too much current on politics. I don’t read hi-brow publications while drinking tea with my pinkie up.  In fact, most of my news I get from the likes of The Daily Show or the Colbert Report because frankly, so much of it is depressing I like to have someone make me laugh while they’re delivering the blows, even if it is skewed to make people look ridiculous.   But it’s not to say that I’m not balanced—I do take the other side into account, too.  I added both Tedwest and  Scio, Scio even though I don’t share their particular political views because I always like to see the other side of the argument formulated in an intelligent, cohesive format.  So, in a sense, I do keep up with things.  But, it’s rare that there is an issue upon which I’m so irritated I actually blog on it.  And now I’ve got not only one, but two:

Issue number 1: Alberto “I Can’t Recall” Gonzales

Oh, good God.  Not only is he still around, but like Voldemort in The Half Blood Prince he’s more powerful than ever, thriving on the blood of the attorneys he fired for not being loyal Bushies.

For those of you who don’t know, a revision was made to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act which allows all email, text messages, and phone calls to people in foreign countries to be monitored.  This kind of wire tapping was being monitored by a secret committee in capital hill, but now the buck has been passed over to our dear Attorney General (or “My Good Buddy Berto” as I call him) .  So basically, the Berto has full authority to listen in on my hot, steamy conversations with Paco, my Spanish lover.   He needs no court issue and no real reason other than he wants to hear what Paco is like in bed. 

But you see, this isn’t what upsets me, as I knew that this was coming.  What cheezes ME off is the fact that 41 Democrats in the House and 16 democrats in the Senate voted for it, giving it the 60 votes it needed to pass. 

Oh, Democrats. You complained that you couldn't do anything because you didn't have the power, so we gave it to you.  And yet you still do nothing.  It's just like it was before, except you're on the payroll now.  You truly know what it is to be a government employee, don’t you?  Thanks for protecting our privacy and our sense of freedom.  You’re really doing a bang up job.

Issue number 2:  “Windmills aren’t pretty.”

Environmentalists have proposed a “wind farm” five miles off the cost of Massachusetts in Nantucket Sound which would provide 75% of the energy needed by Cape Cod— energy, which at the moment is supplied by coal factories.  Windmills provide an efficient and renewable source of energy that doesn’t damage the environment, but locals are protesting the initiative because they say that the construction of these windmills will “affect their view.”*

Look, we all know that the rich tend to be… what’s the phrase… total selfish pricks—that’s it—so we expect this kind of thing from them.  This is why we have politicians to look at the facts and determine what’s best for everyone.**  But Ted Kennedy (the fat one) is ALSO opposing the bill.   See Kennedy, a self proclaimed environmentalist, has a home in Nantucket and he’s afraid the windmills will block his view, too.  But don’t get him wrong—he’s still all for renewable energy sources—but take those windmills somewhere else, like the projects, where people are poor and everything is already ugly. 

So, what does this all mean to me?  It means that like my advisor for my Master’s project, politicians will continue to disappoint me with their lack of moral fortitude and over abundance of selfishness that allows them to leave their family on Thanksgiving after getting caught in their office fondling their sweet, hot, undergrad student.  Happy Holidays to us.   

-K.

P.s. And while I’m complaining about arrogant jackasses, I just wanted to congratulate Barry Bonds on being a stealing the home run record.  Good job buddy!  Way to set an example for kids!  Keep on rockin' them 'roids! 

Hank Aaron FOREVER, BITCHES! 

*BTW, I’ve seen the pictures of what it would look like. The windmills are five miles out into the ocean and barely visible.  In fact, if you didn’t already know they were there you wouldn’t… know they were there. 

**It must be nice to live right off the coast so all that nasty smoke from the coal factories just washes right out into the sea, huh?  And let me tell you, those of us who live on the west coast LOVE all the smog that comes from the costal cities blowing into our atmosphere.  Thanks for your crappy air, Orange County and Los Angeles!  Wish you were here!

Show us something that makes you cross.
Submitted by Rev Stan.

 

This dude:

Cruisehitler

4 comments

This guy makes me so mad.  There are so,so many reasons, many of which include Katie Holmes Kate Cruise.  But my main complaint on this guy is his insistence on sticking his snout where it doesn’t belong.  And he has no tact in doing it, either.  It was bad enough that he decided to spout his mouth off about how women should feel after they've squeezed a bowling ball out their hoo-hah, but the fact that he actually pointed out Brooke Shields and basically publicly mocked her... man, I hate this guy.  I think most people would agree that mood enhancing medication is over-prescribed, but to publicly and specifically attack someone who’s never done anything to you sucks.  It's one thing to express your opinion; it's another thing to criticize someone who never ASKED for your opinion in the first place.  Did I ask you what you thought of me?  No? Then fuck off.

"But Kristin," you say, "You're such a hypocrite! You're directly pointing at Tom Cruise and criticizing him!"

To which I say "he started it."

You know, as an English major, I am constantly getting uppity at just about everything I see.  Whether it’s the menu at the movie theatre that offers different types of “Pepsi’s” or the sign at the mall that says “Your going to love our new style!” it seems like everywhere I find someone who is deliberately trying to piss me off.

Today, as far as the grammar train goes, I’m pissed off about Internet Speak.  Don’t get me wrong; internet speak ALWAYS pisses me off, but today it’s even worse than usual.  I’ve been entering information into an Excel worksheet at my job for students who have expressed interest in our program.  After doing over four hundred entries, I find myself asking, over and over again: What the hell is wrong with these people?  Why are they doing things like using a 3 instead of an E?  Why do they alternate between capitalization and lowercase?  And, why, for the love of God, do none of them have legible handwriting?  I mean, my handwriting isn’t… (anything to write home about? No, that cliché is too cutesy here… All that great? Not cutesy enough… Who’s a writer who I suppose would have nice handwriting?  Shakespeare, that’s it…) Shakespearian or anything, but at least you can READ what I’ve written.  Kids these days look like they’re hopped up on the dope, writing by placing a pen in-between their cleavage ala Molly Ringwald’s lipstick in The Breakfast Club.  Has the internet so taken over our lives that kids can’t write anymore- they’re just taught to type with bad grammar, using numbers instead of letters?  Good GOD, man, when will this madness stop?

What really irritates me is that most of it is just a stretch.  I can tolerate (in moderation) things such as BRB, TTYL and the very occasional LOL*  but there are many things that don’t even make sense, such as using a 4 instead of an A, or using letters instead of typing out the words (such as: u, r, ur, b, b4, neone, sum1, etc.), or as is done on one of my online communities, saying “bb” instead of “baby.”  It doesn't work that way!  BB does not sound like “baby.”  It’s missing vowels, you assholes.  VOWELS!

Man, just thinking about this stuff really chops my chives.  But then again, this all may be because I’m very bitter about the fact that most of these kids entering college were all born in 1989.  Yes, 1989.  I am upset at this information, simply because of the fact that I was eight in 1989.  I was coherent in 1989.  Things happened that I remember in 1989.  And now there are kids going to college who were BORN in 1989?

I, my friends, am getting older, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.  I mean look at me- I’m already complaining about “kids these days.”  Clearly, I am one step away from standing on the porch, shaking my cane and yelling at the damn kids to get off my lawn.

Oh well. At least I’ll have good grammar when I do complain.  Damn kids.

-K.

*Only appropriate if the person is ACTUALLY laughing out loud.

I honestly wish that people would stop trying to pick fights with my car.  Yesterday someone almost rear ended me and had to step on the brakes so hard that the front end of his car was smoking.  Today on the way to work some broad decided she was going to swerve into my lane without bothering to look first.  I honked and honked again and was met with a wave.  I mean, I know the rental company gave me PT Cruiser which is perhaps the most pompous vehicle I’ve ever seen (because, as I told my best friend, it looks like it’s trying to be a Rolls-Royce when it’s really just a Hearse on a Neon platform… reminds me of everyone I went to high school with, actually) and so people probably want to hit it to knock it back down to earth, but I really am tired of having so many people trying to kill me with their cars.  It’s uncool. 

And hi, big coincidence, when I went to pick up the rental I was offered a Nissan Mulano, but declined it because it was out on a run, and I needed to get to work.  The car that almost hit me?  A Nissan Mulano with a “Enterprise-rent-a-car” license plate holder.  Could that car have been the one I was offered?

I want my car back.  It may be a five year old Kia, but it’s MY Kia, dammit.   It won’t be ready until a week from Friday.  I had to call Tahoe Bitch’s (the dumb broad who ran into me a couple of weeks ago thus sending MY car to the hospital) insurance company and give a statement this morning.  I hope they accept liability for this because I really don’t feel as though I should have to pay a $500 deductible because she’s an idiot who doesn’t bother to look in the direction she’s turning before she does so.

In other news, today I was accosted by someone from the PE building.  I walk through the PE building every day to get to my temporary office and I often see them sitting in their offices which have windows along my pathway.  I stopped off at the vending machine to get a beverage this morning and one of the fellows told me that if I kept walking by every day without waving, “it was on.”  I told him I believed he could take me, so I promised to wave.  Unfortunately it wasn’t cute P.E. guy, but I doubt I could have had that much of a conversation with him since I tend to turn into a babbling moron whenever there’s someone cute around.  But hopefully if I start waving every morning cute PE guy will realize his undying love for me and we’ll live happily ever after.

That is, if he doesn’t get all clingy or compliment me.  Because then it’s game over.

And finally I bought me a backback to carry my photography stuff in.  It’s got little compartments made especially for cameras and lenses and such.  This is going to make my life much, much easier when I go to take pictures.   I’m really excited and cannot WAIT until it comes in.  Weeeee!

-K.

I got an email last night saying letting me know that someone had mentioned my Vox blog in THEIR Vox blog. When I got to the page, however, I saw that the blog I was mentioned in was one in which someone who has taken it upon him/herself to act like the Ebert and Roper of the online world and review other people's blogs- a "who's who" of the Vox world, if you will. The "review" I was mentioned in was basically just an entry complaining about people who only write in their Vox accounts to answer the question of the day. My blog was listed as one of those who commit that volatile sin. The complaint was against people whose answers simply weren't deep enough because it is, of course, so horrendous to simply answer a question quickly rather than reflect on how the question makes me recall memories of my childhood or some other incredibly inane response that should be saved for friends only entries. "QOTD should be a jumping off point for a deeper entry," he/she argues. And you know, I really would love to share my deep thoughts on "what celebrity people say I look like" (today's question), but golly I just don't have the time these days to share anything meaningful with judgemental douchebags.  You'd think I'd make more of an effort, but alas, I do not.

So in conclusion, there's no real point to this entry than to announce the shocking fact that the internet continues to be full of pompous jackasses.

-K.

*Joke's on them- no one reads this damn thing anyway.