Very impressive. I don't want to toot my own horn, but I just finished purchasing a pie and a cheesecake.
Google wars subtly on Christmas (result if you click the image).
My best effort was to go eat lunch at an Indian buffet, where the desserts offered included some sort of cheeseball dipped in syrup.
Expanding on a thought from my daughter: You know who the main casualties are in the War on the War on Christmas? The poor sods who just naturally say "Merry Christmas!" Now the priors on them being some kind of belligerent asshole is somewhat higher.
I'm in Nebraska. I haven't heard a "Happy Holidays" since I got here.
the desserts offered included some sort of cheeseball dipped in syrup.
Mmm, gulab jamun.
Ah, I was thinking it was an example of Sweet Cam-em-bert!
I am impressed with the tree. (well, the whole lot, but the tree especially)
We usually buy a kit but this year the kids all did graham cracker and frosting houses at school so we didn't need to. Hooray for public education.
Most impressive. I like the pretzel trim.
the kids all did graham cracker and frosting houses at school so we didn't need to. Hooray for public education.
Coincidentally, my public schoolteacher friend recently posted photos of the 60 undecorated graham cracker houses she put together one evening.
The daycare director (who was rather Cruella Deville-esque) finally got fired. The new director checked with all the parents and then gave the greenlight for holiday (secular) fun.
Pokey's teacher has essentially 8 years of bottled up Xmas joy that's been burning a hole in her pocket. She is basically Mrs. Claus. And for god's sake, what torture to plop Mrs. Claus in roomfuls of 3 years olds and deny her Christmas. Pokey came home with like 30 ornaments, and she made them these elaborate individualized cloth bags of treats.
||
Must remember: The fancy beers my brother and father serve are really fucking strong.
|>
Did you get to try on her Dalmatian-skin coat before she left?
She had the most awesomely wicked pencilled-in eyebrows and stilletos. When the search was underway for the replacement, all the staff and teachers started venting about how awful she'd been. She just loved ending projects, saying no, killing collaboration, etc. We'd hear things like "We can finally start having pre-K graduations again!" and "We can finally start collaborating with the such-n-such department that keeps offering to host children's programming for us!" and "we can finally accept donations from all these different organizations!" Etc. She seemed very demoralizing.
That house looks vaguely (not actually, but guess what's currently on my mind) like our new house. Next year in return maybe we'll make a gingerbread manhattan prewar.
http://www.waterpik.com/shower-head/holiday/
My brother in law is a horrible person horrible and here for the holidays but I feel like there should be some limit to the level of horrible that I am expected to tolerate but he is my brother in law what is the limit? I am his sister's husband.
Recommend that he hire your plumber?
Like just e.g. he brought his gun "for safety " which whatever but he REFUSES to keep it out of the reach of the kids and today he kept teaching my kids to say they "don't like Africans" which he thinks is hilarious not because he's racist (although he is) but to him it's funny because it gets a rise out of me. And I have to explain to the kids that their uncle is a horrible person and a drunk and they should never want to be like him but they like him because he brought toys. What is the limit? I am his sister's husband.
When can I just say "you are not welcome here anymore " but that will cause all kinds of tendons too severe. I will admit he brought good egg nog but that's not enough to compensate.
26: Holy shit, where is your wife in this? Keeping a gun in reach of kids crosses lines that even the other stupid stuff doesn't. Ugh.
He CLAIMS he brought good egg nog I don't actually know where it came from. Also today he showed the kids how to use pool chalk. Table tray.
My wife also is furious but is opposed to making him leave because of too much family drama or something although she wants me to make him out his gun away somewhere preferably out of the house but I can t really do that absent asking him to leave or giving him an ulterior matum put the gun away or leave but she doesn't want that.
I am only his sister's husband through marriage.
That's not what I meant I mean before he got divorced.
Um, hide all the presents and tell the kids that their drunk uncle shot Santa because Santa's not white and see if they evict him on their own? Sounds rough.
Wait what the fuck the gun's in your house? What the fuck. Good luck.
Make a replica of his golf driver that will shoot a poison dart out the top end of the handle when the ball impacts the face. Replace his current driver with that replica. Hope he doesn't lend his clubs to anyone.
tendons too severe! ulterior matum!
Maybe you should lay off the alcohol until you have the gun secured away somewhere, urple.
33 confuses me. Is he your wife's brother, or not?
I was going to suggest slipping the guy a laxative in order to send him to the can for the night, but, as LB notes, we can't exactly rely on the plumbing in this situation.
she wants me to make him out his gun away somewhere preferably out of the house
Holy shit, man. Why does she think you are the one to make this happen?
Oh my god, Urple. That guy is horrible. No guns in the house. It's your house, and you are allowed to make a rule and enforce it. He gets to choose whether or not to stick with his gun or visit with family. This is not about drama. This is about boundaries. Seriously.
Maybe there's a gun in the sewer pipe from a previous visit. Urple could have flushed the gun and been too drunk to remember doing so.
You'll be singing a different tune when ninjas burst through the front door and he's prepared to shoot them, you and several other people.
43 is right. Even gun-assholes acknowledge that kind of reasoning.
45 makes a reasonably good case for the Oxford comma. I'll consider that your Christmas gift to me, Ned, and thank you for it.
"Says racist things, shoots and leaves."
On Sunday I had to listen to my dad's uncle giving a lengthy explanation of which highways in the Florida area are dangerous enough that one should always carry a gun when driving them. Lots of sage nodding all around and "you can't be too careful these days". Sigh.
43 sounds right to me, but I have no idea how to implement that advice.
I'm in Florida right now -- because Jewish -- and haven't yet been shot or even shot at. Having said that, things did get a bit tense of Whole Foods this evening, and I might have used a gun had one been handy.
This is not limited to this thread, but what the hell is wrong with absolutely everyone? I'm pretty much a nutcase, and yet everyone else I hear from is even more of a mess.
On Sunday I had to listen to my dad's uncle giving a lengthy explanation of which highways in the Florida area are dangerous enough that one should always carry a gun when driving them. Lots of sage nodding all around and "you can't be too careful these days". Sigh.
Well, you know, zombie roadkill gators are no joke.
50: the way you implement yourself is you brace yourself to be unwavering, and if he chooses to escalate things then you have contingency plans worked out. Ie, be mentally prepared that there is a point when you call the police on a belligerent brother who will not remove his gun from your house. It is not negotiable.
This one visit might go smoother if you just suck it up and endure, but that's a terrible precedent. Plus you're setting a better example for your kids if you stick to your convictions when it's really hard to do so.
Also, wow, my family is not so bad.
This is not limited to this thread, but what the hell is wrong with absolutely everyone?
I should be fine, but thanks for asking . . .
(There should be a filk song using the line, "... I bet you think this comment is about you." You'd probably have to change "you're so vain." In the spirit of the internet I suppose, "you're so lame" is the obvious choice, but that's crueler than I was thinking of.)
when you call the police on a belligerent brother who will not remove his gun from your house. It is not negotiable.
This, like yesterday. "Hey fuckstick, either the gun leaves or you both leave. On your own or dragged out by the cops, it's all the same to me."
Technically, he has the option of threatening to shoot the cops in order to delay leaving.
Good times. Shooting some jackass at this time of year is an excellent way to get New Years off with pay. Maybe even Super Bowl Sunday if you say it was traumatic.
I take it he's not sensible enough to have a secure gun safe in his car where he could lock it up? One of my brothers is often concealed carrying these days (he's a cop), but he has a very strict no drinking with the gun policy and can lock the gun in his car if he needs to.
Or even one of the one of the travel ones for putting a firearm in your luggage. I have one of these. They're pretty inexpensive.
When the search was underway for the replacement, all the staff and teachers started venting about how awful she'd been.
This reminds me of my favorite moment from Season II of Louis, when an unusually non-emetic Robin Williams and Louis run into each other at the otherwise unattended funeral of a mutual acquaintance and they start talking about how great he is until they exchange this very serious, searching gaze, realize they both hated the guy, and start trashing him.
51: I always feel slightly betrayed when you fly, like we're not on the same team anymore.
Urple wins the Shittiest Relative award, but I just found out my brother and sister-in-law are telling my 3YO nephew in the morning that he's on the naughty list and Santa didn't come. His crime? They couldn't get him to bed for two and a half hours past his bedtime. On Christmas Eve. WTF?
Good God. Urple, I truly hope you were able to get the gun out of the fucking house. And that your wife acknowledged that to getting him out might have to be done. (I am still confused by the relationship. But that pales next to the GUN!)
Merry Christmas, Mineshaft! Sorry about your brother-in-law through marriage, Urple.
That's not what he MEANT he means before he got divorced why aren't you people paying attention ugh JEEZ.
Merry Christmas!
63: Some years back, we got word that a much-despised leader of our organization was leaving while a group of us were in an introductory meeting with a guy who had just been hired to run our Hungarian operation. None of us could contain our big shit-eating grins; it was great (not to mention utterly unprofessional).
68: I'm still not clear. Is this his wife's sister's ex-husband, or his ex-wife's brother?
Either way, you don't have to put up with this shit.
Merry Christmas.
I'd like to offer a bit of holiday schmaltz, and propose a toast. I was reading Tim Burke's latest about MOOCs and felt a sad when I reached this passage:
[MOOCs have] been misused as vehicles for transforming higher education, but what they really document is that people who've had higher education want to have more learning experiences like that for the rest of their lives. It's why I always feel so sad when I talk to a Swarthmore alum who just wants to talk about books and ideas and research again and who starts to think that this alone is a reason to go on to graduate school. . . .
What has happened, I wondered, to my intellectual curiosity. "[B]ooks and ideas" sounds like the sort of thing I would be interested in, but I don't recognize myself in that description.
Then I read two sentences later and saw,
But look at who takes MOOCs: it's a close overlap with people who take community college courses for enrichment, with people who join book clubs and go to lectures, with people who just want to know more and talk with people who also have that aspiration.
And thought, "I'd much rather read unfogged than do any of those things."
So, to unfogged, the best place I know for bright, unambitious, easily bored people to collectively entertain each other.
In fact, now that I think about it, there's a certain resemblence to a fictional place described by Spider Robinson
The blog is run byoggedHeebie-Geebie. The regulars are welcoming and willing to listen to any visitor's problems, no matter how strange, but do not snoop if a visitor is unwilling to share. Strange and unusual events and visitors turn up with frequency in the stories. Regulars include ...
the best place I know for bright, unambitious, easily bored people to collectively entertain each other
True, true, but y'know, I was thinking just the other day that what I like most about unfogged is the ability to listen to / read other people argue about things I otherwise wouldn't have been engaged in; *and* the freedom to take a position myself, if inclined. That last part doesn't come my way often: you can listen to all the people you like argue, but how often can you weigh in?
Merry christmas, folks.
No idea what urple's talking about in 33 about the brother-in-law's divorce.
Urple, I'm with Gswift and Heebie. It's non-negotiable and you need to over-ride your wife's objections to scenes if that becomes necessary. If he can't keep the gun safe and you can't find the balls to make that happen then get George Zimmerman to handle the situation.
64: I'm going to the movies and eating Chinese food today. Better? Also, I think I've mentioned that I'm usually pretty okay when I'm flying with my family. I think the improvement owes partly to having something to do -- wrangling the younger boy -- and partly to thinking that if we all die together, my family won't have to waste its time mourning me and wondering how life would have been better had I only said no to giving yet another talk at yet another university located yet another plane ride away.
I thought Von Wafer's only fear was attending a Bay Area meetup whee Josh would be present.
I'm with Gswift, Heebie, and Biohazard on your situation, Urple. Sounds like your BIL is getting his jollies by upsetting you, and doing it in a way that endangers your kids. Good luck dealing with this horrible situation. I hope your wife sees the sense of it.
How bad is Urp's relative? So bad that Chopper's amazingly awful sibling hasn't elicitied any comment.
My condolences to both.
Chopper's amazingly awful sibling isn't likely to cause a fatality unless their three-year-old is extremely well trained and determined.
Changing the subject from terrible relatives, Goneril's bacon sprouts have once again been a high point of our holiday meal.
83: If only I'd remembered that before you mentioned it! I've got a pot roast in the oven and was planning on making sprouts with pancetta, but at the moment I'm debating whether I'm too lazy even to just do a quick sautee.
Allow me to throw in a vote for leeks and brussels sprouts cooked in chicken fat. Yum.
I thought Von Wafer's only fear was attending a Bay Area meetup whee Josh would be present.
I suspect he's afraid of the Bay Area in general.
24-35 is liveblogging of me passing out. An ex-brother is not such a weird concept, although I don't know that there's a good word for it. Two people with kids from prior relationships marry; their kids are raised at least for some period of time as siblings. Then those people divorce. Although my bringing that up was confusing since it doesn't apply here. Regardless, my wife basically hates him. He's tolerated only for reasons of family dynamics having to do with her relationship with her parents.
FAR MORE IMPORTANTLY, though, based on family conversations over the holiday, I'm now convinced that the American public is uniquely unconcerned about climate change because all the warming predictions are reported in celsius and Americans literally don't understand what they mean. And I can't be the first person to realize this, but googling this morning I am surprised by just how many global warming articles don't bother to include a fahrenheit converison.
Ex-stepbrother, Urple. We would have understood that.
And I wouldn't be surprised if you were right about the global warming thing.
I am surprised by just how many global warming articles don't bother to include a fahrenheit converison.
Most reporters are just as innumerate as Andrew Sullivan, so, I'm not surprised--they can't figure it out either.
87: Yeah, that guy is incredibly bad news. Just exactly the kind of person around whom something horrible happens--horrible and absolutely preventable and his fucking fault.
Family dynamics are bound to be much worse when someone is accidentally or accidentally-on-purpose-too-much-booze-I-can't-believe-he-just-wouldn't-stop-shot.
Although my bringing that up was confusing since it doesn't apply here.
!!
92: 33 was to 30, not to 32. Although I see how that was confusing. 35 was to 33, apologizing for the fact that 33 was a completely unfinished thought. I'm not sure exactly what the thought was going to be, but it was probably something about how my wife and her brother were close before he got divorced, but he's gone off the deep end since then. This is my wife's brother, not ex-step-brother. 87.1 was to 74.
93: Do I tell you often enough that you're my very favorite commenter on the whole blog?
I would think that formally she was his stepbrother, but one should respect if they prefer to not use that term as needlessly emphasizing distance - my father has that relationship with his siblings.
And I thought "ulterior matum" might be some kind of fancy legal term. Until I just reread it now...
Now I want to use it.
He might have been her ex-stepbrother, if he weren't just the regular kind.
Ah, so 32 was a tautological and aphoristic lament on the contingency of in-lawship rather than an attempt to further elucidate the nature of the chain of relatedness between the three of you.
99: 32 was a direct quote from him (with pronouns reversed). He doesn't like me. I have no idea why he is staying at our house. But today he's leaving, so that's good. I don't think he'll be invited back. No one got shot in the four days he was here, so of course he feels vindicated.
94: Whom the gods love, they first make egg sister husband. 33 was to 30, not to 32. Millenium hand and shrimp.
You really didn't make him lock up the gun while it and he were in your house? Wait, did I just use the word "really" in reference to one of your comments?
102: he really wouldn't. It would have involved throwing him out of the house, which, see above. Our first preference was to have him leave it in his truck, but he didn't feel safe enough. Our next preference was to have it in his bag but have his bag somewhere high up on a shelf out of the reach of children. But he also didn't feel safe enough. He did ultimately agree to leave it in his bag as along as his bag could stay on the floor. So we just monitored the kids closely and kept them away from the room he was staying in.
I'm actually really surprised by these comments, btw, because although the gun bothered me, personally it bothered me a lot less than him teaching my kids to say racist things as a "funny" joke.
(My wife, though, like all of you, was more bothered by the gun.)
The racist comments are easily addressable with conversations which your kids about racism, which we should all be having regularly already.
But for either the racism or the gun, he should be ejected from the house. The end.
(Actually, I almost hate to admit this, but we had the same argument about the gun when he stayed with us at Christmas a few years ago, except that time it was just my wife who was upset and I took his side, telling her to calm down.)
It's a lot easier to make a scene about the gun than the "jokes." Object to the jokes and the new joke becomes what an oversensitive person you are.
(But he was less persistently drunk a few years ago, and also less disagreeable generally.)
But holy shit, this guy is awful. So it would strain mutual third party relationships if you guys cut off all contact with him? I should get my brother and SIL to give you lessons on avoidance.
Actually, this brother is showing up to our family gathering today, when he had a ready-made excuse not to (that he recently saw us.) I think he only decided to do so a few weeks ago. I was touched and excited by this - "It's like he is just doing it so that he can spend time with us!" - and so I feel bad for talking behind his back here. (The wife and kids aren't coming, but I'm glad to hang out with my brother.)
He also spent three days going around the house with bottles of alcohol in hand, continually refilling everyone's drinks *over their vocal objections*. (Not just family but also friends who were over as guests.) Which ended up creating a lot of people more drunk than they wanted to be (when people were trying to be polite) and also a lot of wasted good alcohol (when people weren't trying to be polite). If someone hadn't touched their drink since he last refilled it, he'd literally go get another glass and fill it for them, set it down in front of them so they had two full glasses, and say something like "you're getting behind--drink up!"
Anyway, I'd so happy he's gone.
Honestly Chopper's relative sounds worse to me. I mean sure you should kick someone out of your house if they refuse to store their guns properly, but everyone's entitled to one crazy drunk uncle. At least he didn't take Christmas away from his own kid because the kid refused to go to bed on time.
but everyone's entitled to one crazy drunk uncle
And if you use the code GTMYDMNBRBN at checkout within the next four days you can get a belligerent, demented grandparent for no extra charge!
Yeah, holy shit I misread 65 and thought they were just telling him that Santa wouldn't bring him anything if he didn't get to bed. Actually not giving him any presents on Christmas morning because he didn't go to bed on time is beyond unconscionable.
I suppose it depends if one thinks Chopper's relative was exasperated beyond all reason in the moment and said something hyperbolic (and yes, totally dickish) but actually didn't follow through. For my part, I think leaving unsecured firearms around kids is unconscionable. And I'm not someone who's especially gun-phobic. One of my best friends is a cop, and he always has his Glock with him. So long as he keeps it on his person or, when he's drinking -- which is, stereotypically, often -- locked up, I don't much care.
That said, I really don't want it to sound like I'm judging urple, because family dynamics around the holidays are totally hellacious. My father has been stomping around having a tantrum -- like the overgrown toddler he is -- for the past 48 hours. I really should confront him and give him a timeout, but I can't stomach the thought of the fight that will ensue. And so everyone has to suffer for my cowardice.
I suppose it depends if one thinks Chopper's relative was exasperated beyond all reason in the moment and said something hyperbolic (and yes, totally dickish) but actually didn't follow through
Presumably having purchased and wrapped presents and then on Christmas Eve decide not to give it to the kid because he wouldn't go to bed? That just sounds insane to me.
Maybe just as bad, but not as insane, would be if parents for some reason had not gotten the kid presents and then just needed some explanation for why Santa didn't show up.
My holiday wasn't too bad, aside from getting sick, although the moments like sitting at a table where everyone else is talking about how much they loved Paul Harvey and Andy Rooney and how informative they always were remind me that sometime between childhood and now I crossed over into a bizarro universe where the same things exist but everything has a different valence.
sometime between childhood and now I crossed over into a bizarro universe where the same things exist but everything has a different valence.
I think they call that time "college."
Or junior high, for some of us.
Probably graduate school for other, come to think of it.
And for others, it's when they joined the Church of Scientology.
114: everyone's entitled to one crazy drunk uncle
No Billy I don't care what he told you, cereal does *NOT* make you weak! Now shut up and eat your Cheerios.
So they wound up telling him that Santa didn't come for him because he was naughty, leaving the show h would normally have filled empty, and giving him the gift that "Santa" would have got him as being form "Mom and Dad." He was apparently oblivious. So no real harm. Still think they're serious dicks. Also, WTF, shoes aren't filled on Christmas in Dutch tradition, and we're not fucking Dutch, anyway.
Now I feel kind of bad for not inviting people to my house for Christmas based on my step-mother's 10 minute tantrum last year and my desire to avoid spending another $5,000 entertaining guests, paying for their hotels and meals, buying sufficient presents to keep everyone happy, etc.
FWIW, I'd like to think I wouldn't let the guy enter my house with a gun. The racist stuff I'd probably call him out on after losing my temper. I lost my temper on my FIL a few years ago when he was complaining about how he wasn't going to tolerate gay men hitting on him.
He probably does. I suspect that's the root of his homophobia.
If you're a straight guy, getting hit on by gay guys is the best. It's a total validation that you're looking good, with no obligation to do anything about it -- totally free flattery. It doesn't happen to me often but the last time it did my main thought was "thank you Crossfit."
But women only notice you for your mind.
I think the implication is that when women hit on Halford, he's obliged to do something about it. Pay royalties to Crossfit, maybe?
My brother and brother-in-law are tossing extra food in a fryer. They nailed onion rings and calamari.
I found that playing with the kids when they were little worked best if I amused myself first. I like blocks, and trains, so I'd build elaborate Brio train layouts, and whine and complain if the kids took the pieces I wanted -- that kind of thing. I'm not sure if the kids enjoyed it, but I was technically playing with them, and I was entertained.
Wrong thread. But as I said, as long as I'm entertaining myself, I don't really care.
We already had a logisitcally complex travel plans due to work and other obligations this Christmas which my hospitalization then complicated much further. As a result only one of the five of us made the trek to SW Ohio (my one son went, and also did the honors of ferrying my parents down there). And I must say that each one of us was quite content with not going and we had a thoroughly satisfactory quiet Christmas day*. I think we incompletely concealed our contentment which led to some unreasonable disappointment from those that did assemble. And of course *my* excuse was bulletproof (it is sweet to have the unassailable high moral ground once in a while).
Yay, satisfactory and quiet.
Maybe I should start working on persuading my parents to do Christmas at my place next year. No need to encounter all the other crazy relatives, and one less plane trip I would have to make.
134: That was me with our Duplo trains (and Duplo and Lego in general).
136*: We went out to see Nebraska a lot of which was filmed in small towns in the vicintiy around Mobyville (and I believe it premiered there). Recommended on its own, but also good for context for Moby childhood stories. Although I suspect MH himself will chine in with a lot of caveats and protestations, as most everyone does about movies filmed in locations they are familiar with.
Then we followed it with the traditional Christmas Thai "tapas." (Place was packed--several large family groups. In a big Jewish neighborhood, however.)
My parents are annoyed at the relatives who weren't sufficiently appreciative of a gift certificate to what my parents consider a nice restaurant.
We saw Her which was unbearably, stunningly terrible -- there are lots of dumb movies but few as profoundly dumb (and interminable) as that one. Also American Hustle which wasn't exactly a great movie but was still a lot of fun.
140 is adorable. Isn't that the chain where you can throw peanut shells on the floor?
We almost chose the new Coen Brothers film; did not decide until we were in line (playing in same place at the same time). Will probably catch try to that over the weekend.
143: "try to catch that"... jeez.
I did have a bad vein day for my first external test, 8 holes for one vial. Four at my docs before they gave up and sent me to the hospital with a scrip, four more there before they got it (and the one phlebotomist there had successfully done me while I was in). Maybe I should drink gallons of water ahead of time.
142: Yeah, I think so.
Sometimes I wonder if my parents think I've become an irremediable snob.
Sometimes I wonder if my parents think I've become an irremediable snob.
Have you?
145.2: you can commiserate about that with Blume.
And with me, I guess, coastal upbringing not apparently with standing. At least nobody gave me a Gladwell book for Christmas.
139: I probably won't see it. Certainly not before it hits Redfox or netflix.
Certainly not before it hits Redfox or netflix.
You watch movies on rfts?
Thought of urple when I saw this. Sorry your ex-stepbrother-in-law is a piece of shit, urple.
before it hits Redfox
Ow! Right in the eye, too.
141: I pretty much hated American Hustle.
Oh, it's not a great movie and I wouldnt really defend it (plenty of plot holes and a saggy middle) but I was going in without high expectations and it's definitely a fun movie. Her OTOH is a movie where I know I will very shortly be losing respect for the politics and aesthetics of people who like it.
155: Chobits! Kawaaii!!
Do you oppose legally recognized marriages between humans and personal computers? Should companies provide PC health benefits?
I don't know, an awful lot of people like Her. But I only got all the way through Malkovich before I gave up on Jonze and English-language media.
Politics? Tell us more, please.
I think it's both a profoundly anti-feminist and pro-corporate movie. But that would be forgiveable if it wasn't also so deeply stupid and boring.
I think it's both a profoundly anti-feminist and pro-corporate movie.
That was my worry when I heard the premise, but I have also seen a lot of positive reviews.
I loved American Hustle, but I'm soundly in the tank for David O. Russell, and I'll forgive him any amount of meandering. I loved the emotional presence of all of the characters. It's the exact opposite of every other heist movie ever, where everyone lies like butter wouldn't melt in their ass cheeks and at the end Rebecca Pigeon walks off with your balls.
Yes, that's a good point. It's fun to watch a heist movie where the characters are over-the-top emotional instead of super constrained.
Hey if we're talking movies I finally watched "Goodfellas" the other night. Reactions: a) it's really weird to see DeNiro playing something other than a parody of himself and b) Joe Pesci was the least believable 21-year-old ever.
Oh, I definitely see the appeal if you like movies driven by characters, and judging from the laughter I heard I think lots of people in the theater liked it. I generally dislike movies that rely on over the top emotional characters over plot, regardless of genre, and I especially dislike it when they drop those characters into historical situations that are not entirely fictionalized. At least American Hustle doesn't pretend to be a hisorical film, in the based on a true story sense.
I think if you're not drawn in in the first 20 minutes it becomes a long, long, slog to the credits while you wait for everything to get increasingly fucked up until it gets resolved and in the meantime lots of people yell at each other while wearing 70s outfits.
Extremely late to this, but wow, LB, that is a beautiful gingerbread house. I love the front walkway, and the roof, and the porch, and the shutters. Very impressive!
Positive reviews of Her from Alyssa Rosenberg and Tyler Cowen who, not surprisingly, praise very different aspects of the movie.
Ceremonial house disassembly video now in Flickr pool.
I missed this thread in real time, but I'm so solidly in fake accent's camp about American Hustle that I want to make put that on record anyway. I like David O. Russell's body of work, but I found American Hustle sloppy and disorienting in ways that couldn't be redeemed by the generally good acting.