Steve Likes to Curse Writing, comics and random thoughts from really a rather vulgar man. Statistics Unique Visitors: Total Unique Visitors: Outgoing: Total Outgoing: 23 1566 49 9508

Articles from Steve Likes to Curse

Movies That Kick My Ass, No. 6: Groundhog Day 2007-02-02 21:57:44 Movies That Kick My AssNo. 6:  Groundhog Day Granny ordered this movie on pay-per-view in 1993 because she was a fan of Bill Murray.  I sat in the living room and watched it with her.  She taped it, as she did many of the movies she watched on TV, and I liked the movie enough that occasionally when I?d come back to stay with Pap and Granny, I?d want to watch it again, enjoying it more every time.  Eventually, she let me take it home with me.  I still have that tape packed away somewhere, though I haven?t watched it since I bought the DVD. Until he starred in Lost in Translation a few years ago, Groundhog Day was the Bill Murray movie.  You could certainly argue that Ghostbusters or Stripes or Caddyshack were better showcases for Murray?s skill as a comic; however it was Groundhog Day that first demonstrated his worth not just as a funnyman, but as an actor.  He gets laughs both big and subtle playing disgruntled TV weatherman Phil Connors, but he also gets to portray a three-dimensiona ... Movies

This Day in History 2007-02-01 23:44:30 Today?s the 4th anniversary of the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, but I covered that a few days ago.  Here?s some other, less-depressing stuff that happened on February 1: The Chinese seized Taiwan in 1662. The U.S. Supreme Court convened for the first time in 1790. France declared war on the U.K. in 1793. Texas seceded from the U.S. in 1861, becoming an independent state, joining the Confederacy a month later.  Texas was sadly readmitted to the Union nine years later, on March 30, 1870. Thomas Edison completed construction on the world?s first motion picture studio in West Orange, New Jersey in 1893. Associated Press photographer Eddie Adamssnapped this happy little pic in Saigon in 1968: Roman Polanski jumped bail and hightailed it to France to avoid being arrested on child sex charges in 1978. Justin Timberlake ?exposed? Janet Jackson?s breast during the Super Bowl halftime show in 2004, giving thousands of hypersensitive American Christians yet another meaningless cultural event ... History

The line of the week 2007-01-31 22:35:02 Last night as we were getting started in my screenwriting class, Professor Hessler somehow got on the subject of the assassination of Julius Caesar.  I think it had something to do with a history of art class he?s teaching, and he was referencing the Shakespeare play.  Anyway, here?s what he said: ?I was thinking about Julius Caesar, and how Brutus just walked up to him and stabbed him in the capitol, and it occurred to me ? what an elegant solution to our current problem.? We all agreed, though it was unclear who in the current administration would have the guts to be Brutus.  Someone suggested Cheney for Cassius, though I think he just wanted to sound smart by referencing another character from the play; Cheney as Cassius makes no sense to me.  A little later in class the same guy wondered why there had never been a major film made from Julius Caesar.  When I said, ?What about the Brando version?? he gave me this blank look and said, ?There?s a Brando version?? Professor Hessler offe ...

Found on the Men?s Room wall 2007-01-30 20:43:38 The Men?s Room in the classroom building at HCC is full of interesting graffiti, but I?ve been impressed by one particular example.  It?s printed in black ballpoint pen on the yellow tiled wall of the far stall, in the ?For a good time, call? idiom, written with the efficiency of a classified ad:COME TO MY HOUSE AND I WILL SUCK YOUR COCKALSO HAVE MALE SLAVE YOU CAN FUCK IN ASSCALL (___) ___-____ASK FOR DENNIS Like a poem. ...

Parents: if you want to kill your children and avoid criminal liability, buy them a pair of these 2007-01-29 16:22:50 Those sneakers with wheels in the heel have obtained the rare spontaneous ubiquity that, when I was a child, was reserved for things like slap-bracelets and Tamagotchis.  The most popular brand is Heelys, but type ?roller sneakers? into Google and you?ll find a shitload of links selling similar products.  Heelys were invented about ten years ago by roller skate enthusiast Roger Adams, who ? I?m guessing ? hates both children and their parents. Ashley and I went to the grocery store yesterday.  There were these two girls, eleven or twelve years old at the most, gliding along behind their mother on their pairs of Heelys.  They were totally oblivious to anyone else in the store, the Heelys apparently having an affect similar to the mysterious alien game on that episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, where Wesley Crusher and Ashley Judd were the only ones not hypnotized, and had to save the crew.  Not my favorite episode.  Any episode where Wesley charges to the rescue will not come hi ... Children

In Memoriam: STS-51-L and STS-107 2007-01-28 19:45:55 Eleven years ago today the Space Shuttle Challenger lifted off from Kennedy Space Center on Merritt Island, Florida.  It disintegrated one minute and thirteen seconds later.  The shuttle?s crew cabin survived the disintegration intact, but impacted the Atlantic Ocean at 207 miles-per-hour two minutes and forty-five seconds later, killing all seven crew members aboard.  Challenger was the newest NASA shuttle, having flown its maiden voyage less than three years earlier.  It was aboard the Challenger in 1983 that Sally Ride had become the first American woman in space.  The Rogers Commission, appointed by President Reagan to investigate the disaster, found that NASA had contributed to the shuttle?s accident by ignoring warnings from engineers about the design of the shuttle and the cold weather on launch day. Onboard the Challenger were Commander Dick Scobee, Pilot Michael Smith, Mission Specialists Judith Resnik, Ellison Onizuka, and Ronald McNair, and Payload Specialists Gregory Jarvis ...

A cause for very mild alarm 2007-01-27 21:23:34 Yeah, so I?m taking this film class, American History and Culture in Cinema.  Last week we watched She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, which I reviewed yesterday, and this week we watched Allegheny Uprising, which I won?t be writing about here because it?s just not that interesting.  Something of greater interest took place during the post-film discussion. We were knocking around the themes of the film, how it portrayed its hero, how it reflected the attitudes of the times in which it was made, when someone brought up the fact that Claire Trevor ? the only female character of any significance ? spent most of the film running around in britches and a flannel shirt.  Professor Clemens, the history expert, explained that women at the time would not have worn men?s clothing, it would have been virtually unthinkable.  But since we were on the subject, he observed that in the year of Allegheny Uprising?s release, 1939, there was another huge film that centered around a female character.  It even won B ...

Tales of Mediocrity, No. 2: She Wore a Yellow Ribbon 2007-01-26 19:01:15 Judging from the syllabus, my American History and Culture in Cinema class is going to be a dependable well of inspiration for my film-related articles, especially those which fall into the category of . . . Tales of MediocrityNo. 2:  She Wore a Yellow Ribbon John Ford made She Wore a Yellow Ribbon in 1949, five years removed from World War II, when the United States was already preparing itself for another, very different sort of conflict with the Soviet Union.  It stars John Wayne, Ford?s favorite leading man who worked with the director on over 20 feature films, including his breakout performance as The Ringo Kid in 1939?s Stagecoach.  Ford and Wayne fashioned She Wore a Yellow Ribbon as an unabashed tribute to the U.S. military, specifically the cavalry, that much is obvious.  But much of the class discussion following our screening of the film revolved around framing the story as a Cold War parable, a propaganda piece created to reinforce traditional American ideals while demonizi ...

Fun With the Church Sign Generator 2007-01-25 21:51:02 Fun With the Church Sign Generator ...

Leavings from Screenwriting class 2007-01-24 22:11:22 Doug Hessler, my screenwriting professor this term, gave us an assignment for this past week:  write for 30 minutes a day, for five days; write in two distinct voices, in dialogue ? no description, no names, just dialogue.  Last night I turned my five dialogues in.  Looking over what I wrote, some was good and some was incredibly, unforgivably boring.  I?ve wanted to write a story in this basic format for some time now, actually.  I think it would be an interesting challenge to tell a story completely via realistic dialogue, with no descriptive prose whatsoever, so the reader would have to infer most of what was going on.  That?s not quite what this is.  This, the one I?m posting, is the fruit of my fourth 30 minute writing session.  It wound up being my attempt at channeling The Office.  Here ?tis: ?Well, come on in.  Sit down. ?Right, right.  Thank you.  So nice to meet you. ?Let?s see here . . . you are here to interview for the . . . ?The management position, yes. ?Regional manager ...

Less Oscar nominee-related bitching than anticipated 2007-01-23 21:15:23 This morning at some ungodly fucking hour in Los Angeles, the 2007 Oscar nominations were announced.  A few surprises, but nothing shocking.  Clint Eastwood was nominated as Best Director, but only once, for Letters From Iwo Jima, which was also nominated for Best Picture along with Babel, The Departed, The Queen, and motherfucking Little Miss Sunshine, bitches!  And the good news is, since Dreamgirls wasn?t nominated, Little Miss Sunshine actually has a slim chance of winning, whereupon I will ecstatically shit my pants.  Though my money?s still on either The Departed or Letters From Iwo Jima, especially since the latter was not among the Best Foreign Language Film nominees.  Scorsese was nominated for Best Director yet again, and this might finally be his year, unless Clint plays the spoiler like he did two years ago when Million Dollar Baby took Best Director and Best Picture over Scorsese?s The Aviator. Alan Arkin and Abigail Breslin were both nominated in the Supporting Actor cate ...

Happy Anniversary, Legal Elective Abortion! 2007-01-22 23:32:14 ...

Party/Counter-Party 2007-01-21 17:56:18 Yesterday my little brother had a party for his 22nd birthday.  Ashley and I stopped by after we ate dinner with her parents.  Danny?s friend Brandon, who I haven?t seen in like ten years or something, was there, which was nice even though Brandon had been drinking since that morning and drifted in and out of lucidity every few minutes.  Dad?s drinking buddy Lloyd was there, too; Lloyd is a nice guy whose idea of a good day is drinking beer continuously starting at 9 a.m., which is what he did yesterday.  Since Dad was with him most of the day, that?s what Dad did too.  Ashley and I hung around for about half an hour and went back to her place.  My DVDs of the American version of The Office had arrived, so we watched the first episode of that before we left for Jamie?s. Brian?s birthday party was last night, too.  It was at Jamie?s because it was a surprise party.  It was a surprise party because a few weeks ago Brian said, ?You know, my birthday?s coming up and no one?s ever thrown me ...

The most retarded place on Earth (outside of Texas) 2007-01-20 20:35:10 We stopped by the mall last night before going to the Black Steer for dinner, so Ashley could get a birthday present for her friend Brian.  She got him a Zippo at a jewelry vendor set up in front of Suncoast.  ?You mind if we walk up to Spencer?s?? she asked. ?Sure,? I said, grinning obliviously, ?I don?t care.? Visiting Spencer?s every so often is good, I think, because it reminds me of why I never, ever fucking visit Spencer?s.  If I didn?t go there every so often to remind myself of what an obnoxious waste of time the place is, I might find myself going there all the time. They were playing the Woody Woodpecker theme over the speakers when we walked in.  Because it?s ?hip? and ?cool,? I guess.  We made our way through a small herd of recently post-pubescent girls, all of whom seemed more interested in their cell phone conversations than anything in the store.  Ashley stopped and looked a few t-shirts and some of the dirty birthday cards.  I noticed some D.C. Comics action figures ? ... Texas

Lisa?s birthday: when tech nerds celebrate and normal people couldn?t give less of a fuck 2007-01-19 19:40:51 Today in 1983 Apple released the first commercially available personal computer with a mouse and a graphical interface, the Apple Lisa.  It had a 5 MHz clock speed, ran 1 MB of RAM, and came equipped with twin 5¼ inch floppy drives.  It ran its own operating system ? LisaOS ? and came with programs to write documents, draw, and generate graphs.  It cost $9,995, was a complete commercial failure, and was discontinued within three years. But there are still Lisa?s floating around out there.  Not just as collector?s items, either ? this guy uses his Lisa 2 (a later model released around the time of the Macintosh) to host the most boring website ever.  Seriously, this site about getting the most out of PostScript and Ghostscript I just found through a random Google search is more interesting.  I don?t even know what the fuck Ghostscript is. ...