- Let this be a lesson to all of you would-be nurse abductors out there: nine days is the absolute limit for the amount of time you should leave a nurse, or any trained medical professional for that matter, locked in the trunk of their own vehicle. Had an unidentified Scottish man known about this rule, perhaps he could have avoided being arrested by police Sunday in connection with the abduction of a nurse who was found tied up in the trunk of her car and left in the trunk of her car for as long as 10 days. Clearly this man isn’t a deep thinker, otherwise he would have realized that when Magdeline Makola failed to show up for work at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary for several days and no one had heard from her, someone might call the police. That occurred on Dec. 18, with Makola last seen Dec. 15. She was found in the Scottish town of Airdrie, where police had tracked her through transactions made on her bank card. Oh, that’s lesson #155 in my seminar for aspiring-but-idiotic criminals, never, ever use the credit or bank cards of a person you’ve abducted, when police come looking for a missing person, that’s one of the first things they’re going to check. Fortunately, Makola escaped with relatively little damage, suffering from dehydration and pajamas. She lives in nearby Livingston, just west of Airdrie, with both towns sandwiched in between Glasgow and Edinburgh. It’s a bizarre case, for sure, and one that makes you think that the man who abducted her might be just a tiny, tiny bit (by tiny bit, I mean totally and completely) insane……
- Well, I suppose worse films have been the top earners at the box office in 2008, so in the last full week of the year, maybe a clichéd comedy starring Own Wilson and Jennifer Aniston isn’t the worst possible thing. The movie in question is Marley & Me, the tale of a couple's life with each other and their problematic dog, made an estimated $37 million this weekend, which brings the film’s four-day total to$51.7 million when you include the record $14.7 million it made on Christmas Day. Plus, I’m sure that the movie’s solid $10,632 per-screen average has the studio pumped for a successful extended run. And heck, there are worse things to do than stare at Aniston on a giant screen for the better part of two hours. Finshing second for the weekend was a movie for which there is no defense, unless you are under the age of nine: Adam Sandler's Bedtime Stories. Yes, I know Sandler is a great guy and he’s been the star or at the helm of billions of dollars worth of movies. That doesn’t mean his movies are good, it just means they are mainstream enough for parents and children to see them en masse, thus lining Sandler’s pockets with cash. Bedtime Stories finished second for the weekend with a $28.1 million showing for the weekend, just ahead of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which finished third with a total of $27 million for the three-day weekend. Finishing fourth with a solid-but-unspectacular $21.5 million haul was a movie that truly captured the warmth and spirit of the Christmas season: Tom Cruise’s Nazi-themed drama Valkyrie. Well, I suppose people like watching crazy people, at least from a safe distance, so Cruise’s movie doing well makes a little sense. The weekend’s biggest disappointment from an earnings standpoint had to be The Spirit, with the adaptation of the Will Eisner comic barely cracking the top ten (No. 9), with $6.5 million for the weekend. What gives, comic book dorks, I thought you all flocked to see one of your beloved dork books, er, graphic novels any time one of them made it to the big screen. The leaders from the previous weekend at the box office managed to stick around the top of the list, for the most part. Jim Carrey's Yes Man managed to stick and stay in the No. 5 spot with $16.5 million, while Will Smith's Seven Pounds also stayed in the top 10 with $13.4 million. Elsewhere, the reunion of two actors most responsible for the biggest waste of four hours in the history of cinema, Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet (yes, I’m still freaking bitter about that nightmare Titanic) reunited for the limited release (three screens) of Revolutionary Road. The movie took in $192,000, a great average of $64,000 per theater, although I don’t see that amount holding up when it is released more widely in the coming weeks. Quite an eclectic group of movies, to be sure, and shockingly enough, not all of them suck…..
- If you thought my fascination with the 2008 Detroit Lions would end after they made history by losing their final game to become the NFL’s first-ever 0-16 team, you would be oh, so wrong. There is so much more to this terrifically terrible story, facts and stats that went overlooked during the season in pursuit of the ultimate goal. When you’re chasing a mark like 0-16, you don’t always have time to stop and look at all of the amazing stats you are racking up, so I figured now was a great time to do just that. Here, for your (and my) enjoyment, I present just a few of the many noteworthy accomplishments from my favorite football team of all-time. First, the obvious: the Lions become the first winless NFL team since 1976 Tampa Bay Buccaneers, although the NFL season was only 14 games long back then, so the Lions obviously trump the Bucs here. Second, they are the first winless Lions teams since 1942, and while it’s disheartening to let a tradition of losing lay dormant for 66 years, let’s not dwell on the negative. Third, the futility can extend beyond 2008, as the Lions are riding a 17-game winning streak that dates back to December 30, 2007, when the Lions lost their regular-season finale against, coincidentally enough, Green Bay, the same team they lost to in this season’s finale. Fourth, the 2008 Lions put up a -243 point differential, meaning that on average, they scored 15.2 points per game less than their opponents, more than two touchdowns and two extra points. Fifth, they become just the ninth winless team in NFL history, but that 0-16 mark propels them right past the first eight in my book. Sixth, they were spectacularly awful on both sides of the ball, ranking 30th in yards on offense, 27th in points per game on offense, 31st in offensive 3rd down conversion percentage, last (32nd) in yards per game on defense, last in points per game allowed on defense, last in yards allowed per rush and last in rushing yards allowed per game. It’s a stellar resume that I don’t think you can fully appreciate in one, or even two, sittings. Look over those accomplishments, digest them and allow them to rattle around in your head. You’ll come away with a deeper and more complete appreciation of the 2008 Detroit Lions every time you think over what they have done these past few months……
- I think we can all agree to hate the tool who talks through an entire movie and disturbs everyone else in the theater, whether it’s talking to someone they’re with or on their cell phone. That being said, I’m going to go out on a limb and declare that shooting that person for talking during the movie is a slight overreaction. Take heed, James Joseph Cialella of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Assuming you aren’t in jail for a prolonged period of time, this advice could come in handy for you in the near future. When you went to see "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" on Christmas Day and threw popcorn at a young boy for talking during the movie, that was your first mistake. Not a fatal one for you, because at worst you’re going to get kicked out of the theater for that one. No one has ever been charged with assault by popcorn, to the best of my knowledge, so you could have recovered from that one. However, hard to recover from getting up out of your seat, walking across the theater and shooting the father of the boy you had just chucked your ridiculously overpriced theater popcorn at. Doing that will do a lot more than get you booted from the theater; it will get you charged with attempted murder, aggravated assault and weapons violations. Hope that was worth it, you tool. Fact is, I’m sure that a lot of other people in that theater were just as angry as you were about the family talking and disrupting the movie, but everyone else possessed a smidgen of self-restraint and oh yeah, the realization that using lethal force to solve the problem was out of the question. Besides, who goes to the theater packing heat anyhow? What, you figured someone might mug you in the hall and Goober-jack you? I’m not all that familiar with the Riverview Movie Theatre, but I feel safe in saying that you can go there and watch a film without needing to carry your piece with you. Maybe movie theaters need to install metal detectors at their doors, I don’t know. Besides, did you learn nothing from that ass hat Plaxico Burress? Like you, he carried a loaded gun into a public place and stashed said gun inside his sweatpants. Like you, he shot and wounded someone and is headed to jail in the near future. The only difference is that Burress is such a moron that he shot only himself, whereas you broke out your Kel-Tec .380-caliber handgun and shot an innocent man. No lifetime pass and unlimited concessions is going to make that nightmare go away any time soon for the people in the theater that day. So to clarify, it’s okay to confront tools who talk during movies and tell them to shut up, but the line is drawn when you feel the need to bring lethal force into the equation. All clear on that? Good, moving on…..
- Wooo, look at you China, big, bad world power. Yeah, because that expensive opening ceremony for the Summer Olympics was such an eye opener that we can overlook your many toxic products and the fact that you are now among the growing legion of nations declaring open season on my boys, the Somali pirates. You just couldn’t resist piling on, could you? Had to show the world how tough you are by sending Chinese warships toward Somali waters over the weekend to combat piracy. And you knew everyone would take notice because it’s the first time the your country has sent ships on a mission that could involve fighting so far beyond its territorial waters. I think the situation in the Gulf of Aden was going just fine without you poking your nose where it didn’t belong, China. Yes, the gulf has been the site of increasingly bold pirate attacks in recent months, but again, if you’re not down with the pirates, then you’ve got a problem….with yourself. There was absolutely no need for your navy to go from mostly guarding your own coasts to patrolling waters off the coast of a different continent. And no, I don’t care that the move was welcomed by the U.S. military, because I don’t go to them for approval when it comes to how I feel about people trying to shut down my boys, the Somali pirates. If the U.S. military wants to look like tools, escorting cargo ships in the region, then let them look like tools. There was already a long line of sheep behind them, nations like India, Russia and even a collection of nations like the European Union, all persecuting the pirates. It’s just not fair, because these pirates deserve the chance to earn a living just like anyone else. Simply because their chosen profession involves pillaging, plundering, looting and stealing, that automatically makes them bad guys and worthy of an international strike force looking to take them out? I don’t think so. So China, you can take your naval force that set sail from southern Hainan, including that supply ship and two destroyers armed with guided missiles, special forces and two helicopters, and you can send it right back where you came from. A big thanks for nothing on this mess also goes out to the U.N. Security Council, which early last week authorized nations to conduct land and air attacks on pirate bases. Leave the pirates alone, all of you, they are a pleasant reminder of a bygone era and you’ll be lucky if they don’t make you all walk the plank…..arrrrrggggghhhh!
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