Lead story, second section of today’s newspaper: local village going after a developer about eyesore property. Nothing earth-shattering about that. Real estate developers are about change and that always ruffles some feathers.
Therefore, public relations is a critical success factor if you’re in that business. You want to project the image of being a positive element and that your work is good for the community.
So, I read the article, curious to learn how they got crosswise with people who should be receptive to any development in this economic climate. The official complaints are in the lead, but I think a contributing factor is in the third graph. There it is, the name of the developer. B.A.D. Properties.
How did that meeting go? The lawyer advises his client that he needs a name to file with the state and it should be something that connotes being a worthy asset and of quality, appealing to all the elements in the community.
“B.A.D. Properties.”
“B.A.D. Properties? Max, you’re a genius! How could anyone not love that?”
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Saturday, October 17, 2009
20 millions miles and 50 years ago
“20 Million Miles from Earth.” I literally shuddered involuntarily when I spotted it on the television schedule. Does anyone shudder voluntarily? Nonetheless, it was obviously still an open wound on my psyche.
Released in 1957, it was one of the scariest movies of my childhood. That was back when a movie was a rare treat and theaters were regal and cavernous with colossal screens. A child was dwarfed by the scale, adding to the effect.
There was no way I would miss this. And, I would need a mountain of popcorn with real butter and more salt than the Dead Sea to help recreate the experience.
I went in with my eyes open. I’ve been down this road before with several other things from the past. They’re not the way you remembered them. Yeah, but it’s worth a shot. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.
The first thing I didn’t recall was that it was set in Italy. A spaghetti monster movie? Eastwood had a precedent to work from.
A spacecraft crashes off the coast of Italy. As it turns out, it’s of American origin and was on a secret mission to Venus. The beginnings of a proud tradition of self-flagellation.
The only one who survives is the handsome colonel. I didn’t remember that he was played by William Hopper. I now kept expecting him to start tailing a car for Perry Mason.
A mysterious canister washes up on shore and is retrieved by a young boy, who takes it to sell to the American biologist who is conveniently doing research in the area. Equally convenient is his stunning daughter who just happens to be the doctor who administers to the colonel. Already, this is a little contrived for my matured mind.
The canister contains a jelly egg. Naturally, the professor leaves it on the kitchen table of his trailer. A little later, he and his daughter return and discover it’s hatched and there’s a little lizard man running around the trailer. He puts on a pair of what appear to be gardening gloves and catches it. Cotton gloves are often underrated as a means of capturing aliens.
The creature is well done, especially for that era. It’s the creation of Ray Harryhausen who did other good movie monsters before turning to mythical creatures in “The 7th Voyage of Sinbad,” another of my old favorites.
The creature is deposited in a steel bar cage in the bed of his truck for transport to Rome. The next morning, they discover it has increased in size by a factor of five. Pretty impressive, what with a strange atmosphere and no food.
Anyway, they hit the road. In the meantime, the colonel has mounted a search for the canister, unaware that they have it. As soon as he traces the chain of possession, he’s hot on their trail. Quick work and probably got him the gig as Paul Drake.
Back to the professor and his lovely daughter. They’re bumping down a rough dirt road but still manage to hear that a corner of the tarp covering the cage has worked loose and is flapping. They stop to take care of that. Who doesn’t see this one marching down Main Street? Easy to see it coming, now.
The beast breaks through the cage and the tarp, having grown even more. Miraculously, it spares its captor. Even better, it doesn’t mar the alabaster complexion of the doctor. It takes it on the lam, seconds before the colonel and his entourage arrives. How’s that for timing?
The creature finds a farm and is perplexed by some of the agricultural animals. In the barn, it finds a hefty sack of fertilizer to feast upon. Space aliens are never portrayed as having sensitive palates.
The farmer’s dog isn’t too crazy about this and attacks the creature. Not a wise decision.
The farmer hears the ruckus and comes out with his lantern and shotgun. Luigi does Jed Clampett.
The colonel, et al arrives about then. He tells everyone to put down their guns because they didn’t find these creatures to be especially aggressive on Venus, unless provoked. He then, paradoxically, proceeds to poke at it with a pole. It does not react well. Just in case it’s not irritated enough, the farmer sticks a pitchfork into its back. Okay, game on!
The enraged monster is now beating the crap out of the farmer. The colonel’s entourage is shooting it, with little regard for the farmer, but the bullets have little effect. The colonel picks up a shovel and commences to whack at it, which drives off the creature. Rifle bullets don’t faze it but a Sears garden spade is too much? Go figure.
The colonel leads everyone outside and they close the barn door to trap the monster. Steel bars couldn’t hold it but an old wooden barn will? Even the creature noodled this one out and burst through the back wall and was gone.
Now they’re wondering how to deal with this alien who appears impervious to bullets. The colonel, of course, has a solution. He tells them that while on Venus, they accidentally discovered that these creatures were especially sensitive to electrical shocking. The mind grasps for the circumstances that led to this accidental discovery.
The creature is now approximately the size of Mighty Joe Young. The colonel’s plan is that they drop a conducting net on it from a helicopter and apply a controlling electrical current. In rural Sicily, how long do you figure it’ll take you to throw together the equipment and team for that? One, two hours, tops?
So, they track it down and do a perfect net drop. The soldiers run out to stake down the edges. I have to tell you, that’s one detail I’m not volunteering for. This thing ripped through steel bars when it was about ten percent of its present size and I’m going to be out there calmly hammering down some wooden stakes? Pass.
They have a small mountain of equipment cabinets humming away, probably obtained from a convenient Sicilian Radio Shack. They run some jumper cables over to the net and the lizard lets out a wail that I take to be Venutian for, “Don’t tase me, bro!” But, they zap him and he goes down like Paris Hilton on a television producer.
Fast forward and they’ve got the lizard on a slab at the Rome zoo. You can tell it’s alive because the abdomen is rising and falling with its labored breathing. It’s shackled, but unconscious. A scientist is explaining that they flew in one of the world’s leading anesthesiologists to administer just enough electricity to keep it under, but not enough to kill it. That’s a phone call I would’ve wanted to be in on.
“Hello, doc? We’ve got a 70-ton lizard from Venus we need to sedate. What’s your experience level with that?” Of course, they just can’t look for one who knows this stuff. He’s got to be on their PPO’s list.
The colonel wonders why the alien doesn’t succumb to bullets. The lead scientist explains that the creature has no heart or lungs, so you can’t hit a vital organ. Then you see it breathing because? Details, details. This is making Richard Heene seem credible.
Well, you can’t let it end here, so someone has to do something really inane. Cue the idiot. Someone has to move a transformer or other device using a small crane. Naturally, he swings it into the guts of the electrical setup and they lose power. The creature awakens and angrily rips off the shackles. Not a morning person.
The entourage draws their revolvers. You know, I think we’ve already covered this. I’d be making use of my shoe leather about then, not a sidearm.
On the other hand, if I’m the creature, I’d be opening up the industrial drum of whupass. But, he decides to go through the back wall. Apparently, they’re not big on doors on Venus.
That wall adjoins the elephant pen and the colonel yells to get the pachyderm out of there. Easy to say from my Barcalounger, but I think the welfare of the elephant is the least of your worries at this point. Dumbo and the creature throw down. Two zoo attendants are trying to prod the elephant away. The jobs can’t possibly pay that much. Predictably, they get smeared.
The rumble spills out onto the streets. Italians don’t do monster panic near as well as the Japanese. I guess it’s hard to run in designer shoes.
The elephant is dispatched and the alien dives to the bottom of the Tiber River. Naturally, the colonel has a plan. Lob grenades off the two bridges and drive the creature out of the riverbed. Aside from the facts that it is impervious to projectiles and nothings says it’s going to be hunkering down by a bridge, I have to ask why we want to stampede it down Via Flaminia, smushing up the citizenry. If it wants to burrow into the mud and mind its own business, fine by me.
The plan works (surprise!). The creature is off and running. The colonel says it’s heading for the Coliseum and the troops should amass there. How does he know? Was it highlighted on the alien’s tourist map?
So, they show up at the Coliseum with some troops. They don’t see the monster, so the colonel tells the squad to fan out. By now, the monster is the size of John Madden’s head, so how can he hide? And, you’re sending some riflemen out to freelance? Again, count me out. I’m on break.
They find it and use their weapons to drive it to the upper walls, where it picks up stone blocks and lobs them at the army. You gotta like a lizard who suddenly develops the intellect to employ tools.
But, the colonel doesn’t, so he drills it with a bazooka. It’s a gut shot and the creature goes down. Never mind that tanks and artillery haven’t managed to raise a welt. The creature plummets to its demise in the street.
The colonel and the doctor, who have been playing grab butt throughout the movie, stroll off arm in arm. Hey, wait a minute! You just dumped a hundred tons of dead lizard meat in the middle of the street and you’re just going to leave it there?
The flick closes with the scientist looking meaningfully into the camera lens and intoning, “Why is it always, always so costly for man to move from the present to the future?” He ought to see our current budget.
Well, I didn’t relive the terror of my youth. But, it more than made up for it with humor.
Released in 1957, it was one of the scariest movies of my childhood. That was back when a movie was a rare treat and theaters were regal and cavernous with colossal screens. A child was dwarfed by the scale, adding to the effect.
There was no way I would miss this. And, I would need a mountain of popcorn with real butter and more salt than the Dead Sea to help recreate the experience.
I went in with my eyes open. I’ve been down this road before with several other things from the past. They’re not the way you remembered them. Yeah, but it’s worth a shot. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.
The first thing I didn’t recall was that it was set in Italy. A spaghetti monster movie? Eastwood had a precedent to work from.
A spacecraft crashes off the coast of Italy. As it turns out, it’s of American origin and was on a secret mission to Venus. The beginnings of a proud tradition of self-flagellation.
The only one who survives is the handsome colonel. I didn’t remember that he was played by William Hopper. I now kept expecting him to start tailing a car for Perry Mason.
A mysterious canister washes up on shore and is retrieved by a young boy, who takes it to sell to the American biologist who is conveniently doing research in the area. Equally convenient is his stunning daughter who just happens to be the doctor who administers to the colonel. Already, this is a little contrived for my matured mind.
The canister contains a jelly egg. Naturally, the professor leaves it on the kitchen table of his trailer. A little later, he and his daughter return and discover it’s hatched and there’s a little lizard man running around the trailer. He puts on a pair of what appear to be gardening gloves and catches it. Cotton gloves are often underrated as a means of capturing aliens.
The creature is well done, especially for that era. It’s the creation of Ray Harryhausen who did other good movie monsters before turning to mythical creatures in “The 7th Voyage of Sinbad,” another of my old favorites.
The creature is deposited in a steel bar cage in the bed of his truck for transport to Rome. The next morning, they discover it has increased in size by a factor of five. Pretty impressive, what with a strange atmosphere and no food.
Anyway, they hit the road. In the meantime, the colonel has mounted a search for the canister, unaware that they have it. As soon as he traces the chain of possession, he’s hot on their trail. Quick work and probably got him the gig as Paul Drake.
Back to the professor and his lovely daughter. They’re bumping down a rough dirt road but still manage to hear that a corner of the tarp covering the cage has worked loose and is flapping. They stop to take care of that. Who doesn’t see this one marching down Main Street? Easy to see it coming, now.
The beast breaks through the cage and the tarp, having grown even more. Miraculously, it spares its captor. Even better, it doesn’t mar the alabaster complexion of the doctor. It takes it on the lam, seconds before the colonel and his entourage arrives. How’s that for timing?
The creature finds a farm and is perplexed by some of the agricultural animals. In the barn, it finds a hefty sack of fertilizer to feast upon. Space aliens are never portrayed as having sensitive palates.
The farmer’s dog isn’t too crazy about this and attacks the creature. Not a wise decision.
The farmer hears the ruckus and comes out with his lantern and shotgun. Luigi does Jed Clampett.
The colonel, et al arrives about then. He tells everyone to put down their guns because they didn’t find these creatures to be especially aggressive on Venus, unless provoked. He then, paradoxically, proceeds to poke at it with a pole. It does not react well. Just in case it’s not irritated enough, the farmer sticks a pitchfork into its back. Okay, game on!
The enraged monster is now beating the crap out of the farmer. The colonel’s entourage is shooting it, with little regard for the farmer, but the bullets have little effect. The colonel picks up a shovel and commences to whack at it, which drives off the creature. Rifle bullets don’t faze it but a Sears garden spade is too much? Go figure.
The colonel leads everyone outside and they close the barn door to trap the monster. Steel bars couldn’t hold it but an old wooden barn will? Even the creature noodled this one out and burst through the back wall and was gone.
Now they’re wondering how to deal with this alien who appears impervious to bullets. The colonel, of course, has a solution. He tells them that while on Venus, they accidentally discovered that these creatures were especially sensitive to electrical shocking. The mind grasps for the circumstances that led to this accidental discovery.
The creature is now approximately the size of Mighty Joe Young. The colonel’s plan is that they drop a conducting net on it from a helicopter and apply a controlling electrical current. In rural Sicily, how long do you figure it’ll take you to throw together the equipment and team for that? One, two hours, tops?
So, they track it down and do a perfect net drop. The soldiers run out to stake down the edges. I have to tell you, that’s one detail I’m not volunteering for. This thing ripped through steel bars when it was about ten percent of its present size and I’m going to be out there calmly hammering down some wooden stakes? Pass.
They have a small mountain of equipment cabinets humming away, probably obtained from a convenient Sicilian Radio Shack. They run some jumper cables over to the net and the lizard lets out a wail that I take to be Venutian for, “Don’t tase me, bro!” But, they zap him and he goes down like Paris Hilton on a television producer.
Fast forward and they’ve got the lizard on a slab at the Rome zoo. You can tell it’s alive because the abdomen is rising and falling with its labored breathing. It’s shackled, but unconscious. A scientist is explaining that they flew in one of the world’s leading anesthesiologists to administer just enough electricity to keep it under, but not enough to kill it. That’s a phone call I would’ve wanted to be in on.
“Hello, doc? We’ve got a 70-ton lizard from Venus we need to sedate. What’s your experience level with that?” Of course, they just can’t look for one who knows this stuff. He’s got to be on their PPO’s list.
The colonel wonders why the alien doesn’t succumb to bullets. The lead scientist explains that the creature has no heart or lungs, so you can’t hit a vital organ. Then you see it breathing because? Details, details. This is making Richard Heene seem credible.
Well, you can’t let it end here, so someone has to do something really inane. Cue the idiot. Someone has to move a transformer or other device using a small crane. Naturally, he swings it into the guts of the electrical setup and they lose power. The creature awakens and angrily rips off the shackles. Not a morning person.
The entourage draws their revolvers. You know, I think we’ve already covered this. I’d be making use of my shoe leather about then, not a sidearm.
On the other hand, if I’m the creature, I’d be opening up the industrial drum of whupass. But, he decides to go through the back wall. Apparently, they’re not big on doors on Venus.
That wall adjoins the elephant pen and the colonel yells to get the pachyderm out of there. Easy to say from my Barcalounger, but I think the welfare of the elephant is the least of your worries at this point. Dumbo and the creature throw down. Two zoo attendants are trying to prod the elephant away. The jobs can’t possibly pay that much. Predictably, they get smeared.
The rumble spills out onto the streets. Italians don’t do monster panic near as well as the Japanese. I guess it’s hard to run in designer shoes.
The elephant is dispatched and the alien dives to the bottom of the Tiber River. Naturally, the colonel has a plan. Lob grenades off the two bridges and drive the creature out of the riverbed. Aside from the facts that it is impervious to projectiles and nothings says it’s going to be hunkering down by a bridge, I have to ask why we want to stampede it down Via Flaminia, smushing up the citizenry. If it wants to burrow into the mud and mind its own business, fine by me.
The plan works (surprise!). The creature is off and running. The colonel says it’s heading for the Coliseum and the troops should amass there. How does he know? Was it highlighted on the alien’s tourist map?
So, they show up at the Coliseum with some troops. They don’t see the monster, so the colonel tells the squad to fan out. By now, the monster is the size of John Madden’s head, so how can he hide? And, you’re sending some riflemen out to freelance? Again, count me out. I’m on break.
They find it and use their weapons to drive it to the upper walls, where it picks up stone blocks and lobs them at the army. You gotta like a lizard who suddenly develops the intellect to employ tools.
But, the colonel doesn’t, so he drills it with a bazooka. It’s a gut shot and the creature goes down. Never mind that tanks and artillery haven’t managed to raise a welt. The creature plummets to its demise in the street.
The colonel and the doctor, who have been playing grab butt throughout the movie, stroll off arm in arm. Hey, wait a minute! You just dumped a hundred tons of dead lizard meat in the middle of the street and you’re just going to leave it there?
The flick closes with the scientist looking meaningfully into the camera lens and intoning, “Why is it always, always so costly for man to move from the present to the future?” He ought to see our current budget.
Well, I didn’t relive the terror of my youth. But, it more than made up for it with humor.
Friday, October 02, 2009
The next fad
I predict a new product. Maybe there’s time for you to get the jump on it and make some good dough.
Picture the two-wheel trailer you see hitched to the back of some touring motorcycles. Now, scale it down a little and hook it up to the back of someone’s belt. You got it. A people trailer.
I see it as an inevitable trend extension. I believe we started with a minimalist perspective. I clearly recall streaking out of the house clad only in t-shirt and jeans with my mother bellowing to put on a jacket. That mode of dress would continue through college. Who needed more?
About a decade ago, people began to tote water bottles everywhere they went. Like there isn’t ample water supply in virtually every building in this country? Like you’ll dehydrate if water isn’t three seconds away? You’re going to the mall, Sparky, not crossing the Sahara.
Then came the propagation of cargo pants and fanny packs. But, that wasn’t enough. Apparently you need to be prepared for every possible eventuality from an impromptu bivouac up to and including a tsunami.
Enter the backpack. Oh, I bought one years ago, but limited its use to backpacking. No imagination.
I recently took a plane trip and everyone had one, bouncing off each other in the halls of the terminal and bludgeoning those in aisle seats on the plane. Who could survive terminal to terminal without half their worldly possessions? Worse yet was a visit to one of my favorite outdoors stores. The daypacks had proliferated like kudzu, choking out many of the desirable product lines.
And the final harbinger revealed itself when I was downtown for a meeting. People are using wheeled luggage in lieu of attaché cases. Can the people trailer be far behind?
I think not.
Picture the two-wheel trailer you see hitched to the back of some touring motorcycles. Now, scale it down a little and hook it up to the back of someone’s belt. You got it. A people trailer.
I see it as an inevitable trend extension. I believe we started with a minimalist perspective. I clearly recall streaking out of the house clad only in t-shirt and jeans with my mother bellowing to put on a jacket. That mode of dress would continue through college. Who needed more?
About a decade ago, people began to tote water bottles everywhere they went. Like there isn’t ample water supply in virtually every building in this country? Like you’ll dehydrate if water isn’t three seconds away? You’re going to the mall, Sparky, not crossing the Sahara.
Then came the propagation of cargo pants and fanny packs. But, that wasn’t enough. Apparently you need to be prepared for every possible eventuality from an impromptu bivouac up to and including a tsunami.
Enter the backpack. Oh, I bought one years ago, but limited its use to backpacking. No imagination.
I recently took a plane trip and everyone had one, bouncing off each other in the halls of the terminal and bludgeoning those in aisle seats on the plane. Who could survive terminal to terminal without half their worldly possessions? Worse yet was a visit to one of my favorite outdoors stores. The daypacks had proliferated like kudzu, choking out many of the desirable product lines.
And the final harbinger revealed itself when I was downtown for a meeting. People are using wheeled luggage in lieu of attaché cases. Can the people trailer be far behind?
I think not.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)