Willie Horton, Chuck Norris, and... ME?!?

Okay, this blows my mind completely. Because for two years now I have heard overwhelming praise for this commercial that I created for my run for Rockingham County Board of Education in 2006. The comments that people have shared most often? That this is a "positive" and even "upbeat" political ad. And that's what I love hearing the most about it: that it doesn't attack anyone. Heck, I don't make negative ads, as a personal policy.

Here it is if you haven't seen it already...

So then this afternoon someone passes along this blog entry from the Denver Post newspaper in September that lists "some of the most infamous examples" of negative campaign ads.

The first one listed is Lyndon Johnson's diabolical "Daisy Girl" ad.

Then they name George Bush Sr.'s "Willie Horton" anti-Dukakis ad from 1988.

Next on their hit list is Mike Huckabee's ad from earlier this year featuring Chuck Norris.

And finally... there's my "Star Wars school board" commercial.

HOW the *#&@ does anyone figure that I'm somehow associated, in the least little way, with the Daisy Girl and Willie Horton?!?

Seriously though, I have to laugh about it. But that's still very... odd.

Read More

George Washington slept here (really, maybe)

After going to vote today I took a "scenic detour" back, going west on US 158 from Reidsville. When you get to the Monroeton community, turn right onto Monroeton Road (at the original Monroeton Elementary School buiding).

About one and a half miles on the right after that, you will find this stone wheel...

This stone marks the site west of Reidsville visited by George Washington during his tour of the southern states in 1791, when he was the first President of the United States. I've heard a lot of people say over the years that the stone even marks the spot where Washington and his colleagues camped while in the Monroeton area. The main draw during this leg of Washington's tour was the nearby Troublesome Creek Iron Works, which was used during the Revolutionary War. And then in 1781 General Nathaniel Greene and his soldiers camped there after the decisive Battle of Guilford Courthouse.

By the way, also nearby is Speedwell Presbyterian Church. Organized in 1759, it's not only the oldest church in Rockingham County but also one of the oldest in the entire country. In the cemetery behind the present building (built in 1844) there can still be found the grave markers of many soldiers who fought and died at Guilford Courthouse. And though it has never been conclusively proven, I have heard a number of people tell that Washington did attend a worship service at Speedwell while he was in the area.

(Speedwell Presbyterian is also the church that my Boy Scout troop is chartered to, incidentally :-)

In light of all that's going on today, and the tremendous amount of raw emotion that this election seems to have generated, I thought it would be a neat thing to pause for a bit. And reflect on where we as a country have come from... and what it took to get us here. That, to me anyway, certainly merits some appreciation.

Read More

Today I voted

And just as I said that I would do a few days ago, I cast a write-in vote for Chuck Baldwin for President of the United States...

There were a few others that I voted for too, but I'm keeping that information to myself.

There was a surprisingly low turnout at the poll that I went to today. There's been light rain since this morning. Two years ago when I ran for Board of Education, there was a heavy, steady drizzle and the polls were packed! But I've also heard that there was gobs of early voting this year: far more than there had been in previous elections.

So once again, I've done my civic duty by casting an informed and enlightened - as best I can muster anyway - ballot.

Read More

A message to every political candidate in the United States

To whom it may concern:

The very next "robocall" that comes into this house, I will go out, find the candidate who authorized it, and have him/her hung from the nearest telephone poll by his/her circular reproductive units. With piano wire.

This notice is being made regardless of party affiliation.

You have been duly warned.

Thank you.

EDIT 3:14 p.m. EST: I should elaborate that this only comes after I received four such automated calls from political campaigns within a span of five minutes. So yeah, I'm feeling more than a little honked-off right now...

Read More

TOO MANY people are WAY TOO TENSE right now

Look, I know that tomorrow is Election Day and many folks are feeling extremely anxious and even much worse. Personally, I'm sick of the whole damned thing. I've been an eager follower of politics all my life, but this is the first election ever that couldn't be a more dreary dull bore. And on the eve of what I keep hearing is "the most important election in our country's history" (except it's really not) I'm now more thankful than ever that I don't have a dog the McCain/Obama hunt (and I explained two days ago what I was doing regarding that).

So right now, I think most of us can agree: we need a good laugh.

I found this on YouTube not long ago and every time I watch it, it cracks me up hard! Someone took some clips of Bert and Ernie from Sesame Street and choreographed them to M.O.P.'s song "Ante Up". Watch this and see if you don't smile a lot too, no matter your political stripe...

Read More

This photo screams "AWESOME!"

My good friend and filmmaking collaborator "Weird" Ed Woody dons a V getup (as in V for Vendetta) and rocks hard on Halloween at a local Wal-Mart last night...

Read More

The Knight Shift endorses Chuck Baldwin for President

His name will not be printed on the ballot here in North Carolina come Tuesday.

But all the same: I have just today chosen to make a write-in vote for Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party for President when I go to the poll in a few days.

And if you have not done early voting already, I'm asking you to consider choosing Baldwin also.

In the past few days I toyed around with the idea of not voting at all. Why? Because in my own way that would be making a statement about how completely broken the political process has become. I never thought I'd ever see a Senate race in North Carolina get any uglier than it has in past years... but in the last week Elizabeth Dole proved me wrong. And I am still sticking to the policy I declared months ago: that I will not vote for any candidate who runs a single negative ad.

Friends persuaded me that I still need to let my voice be heard. Until this afternoon that meant casting votes for just three people on the ballot.

And now, even though I will have to write him in, Chuck Baldwin will join those three.

I don't necessarily agree with Dr. Baldwin on everything, but I do have all the faith and trust in the world that of the candidates running for President, he is the only one who has eloquently articulated and demonstrated a sincere understanding of the Constitution of the United States.

And through his many writings over the years, Dr. Baldwin has proven that he has an earnest desire to adhere to the Constitution. That is not something that can ever be said of John McCain, Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, or George Bush Sr.

"But Chris, you're wasting your vote! You're throwing it away! You're only letting (INSERT NAME OF CANDIDATE YOU CHOOSE TO HATE HERE) win that much easier!"

Bullcrap.

A vote made out of earnest conscience is never a "wasted vote". And a vote that results from critical analysis and personal integrity, regardless of which candidate it is cast in favor of, cannot possibly be a "thrown-away vote".

If nothing else, I see it as an affirmation of the power of that most despised minority of all: the individual.

So it is that on Tuesday I will affirm the authority that the Founding Fathers clarified and which so many have fought and even died that I might yet enjoy, and cast my own vote for the one man that I can honestly say not only deserves the responsibility of being President, but also my trust.

And I will sleep very soundly indeed, knowing that unlike too many others, I will not have voted for merely "the lesser evil"... which is still evil.

I'm voting for Chuck Baldwin. And I will gladly do so come Tuesday morning.

Read More

The BIOSHOCK Big Daddy Jack-o'-Lantern

Last year for Halloween I carved two Jack-o'-Lanterns: one of U.S. Presidential candidate Ron Paul and another of larcenous school board member Ron Price. The Ron Paul pumpkin garnered some "oohs and ahhhs" on the Internet and local schookids came by in droves to look and laugh at Ron Price's visage carved large and orange.

So... what was I going to do this year?

I juggled around lots of concepts, and in the end decided that I wanted to take a shot at doing Big Daddy from the video game BioShock. Here it is after two hours of work...

In BioShock, Big Daddies are the protectors of the Little Sisters (click here for the Big Daddy entry at the BioShock Wiki). They used to be human, before radical gene therapy took away their minds. Their skin was then flayed-off and the bare flesh steam-sealed to old-fashioned diving suits. The result was a horrific monstrosity that would roam the underwater city of Rapture, defending the Little Sisters to the death. As a result of the wild success of BioShock, the Big Daddy has become one of the most iconic monsters of the modern era. Suffice it say, you also have to fight these armored freaks quite often in the game.

And here's the Jack-o'-Lantern fully lit...

Yeah, I messed up the "H" in "BioShock" (the rind was rather thin at that spot on the pumpkin and part of it came off too easy while carving) but hey: it's a spot-on Big Daddy! Not too bad eh? :-)

Read More

Quoth the Raven... "EXCELSIOR!"

Quick Stop Entertainment has posted a video of comic book legend Stan Lee reading Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven" into a camera...

Mash down here for an amazingly powerful performance of Poe's classic poem.

Read More

David Tennant quits DOCTOR WHO!

David Tennant, whose madcap mixture of deadly seriousness and clownish buffoonery endeared millions to his portrayal of the Doctor on Doctor Who, is leaving the show after three seasons, it's being reported tonight.

Tennant will remain for four upcoming Doctor Who specials, including the now-traditional Christmas special, which were already scheduled in lieu of a regular season for the show in 2009 (in order to accommodate the sellout performances of Hamlet that Tennant has been enjoying on the London stage).

But after that, at the end of 2009, expect Tennant's Tenth Doctor to regenerate and another actor - the eleventh since the show began in 1963 - to take over the role. It will also coincide with the beginning of Stephen Moffatt's reign as showrunner.

As an aside, I'm starting to understand what it's usually like for a Doctor Who fan to have the departure of a Doctor happening on a semi-regular basis. First it was Christopher Eccleston a few years ago, and now Tennant. But as the Doctor would be the first to note, change is the one universal constant, is it not?

Okay so... anyone wanna guess who'll be the next to pilot the TARDIS?

Read More

Music 4 Games interview Steve Jablonsky about his score for GEARS OF WAR 2

Music composer extraordinaire Steve Jablonsky (who among many credits also does the music for Desperate Housewives and did the score for last year's hit movie Transformers, which longtime readers will remember this very blog going more than a little crazy about) gets interviewed by Music 4 Games about his work on Gears of War 2, due out next week.

Here's some of what Jablonsky has to say about working with Epic, Cliff Bleszinski and music director Mike Larson (who also gets interviewed) on the second chapter of Marcus Fenix and Delta Squad's war against the Locust Horde...

For Gears 2, the guys at Epic wanted every aspect of the game to be bigger, darker, and crunchier than the original game. And I guess they had heard some of these qualities in my film scores. I love writing for orchestra and choir, but I also love experimenting with electronics and different types of percussion. I basically use anything I can get my hands on when composing a large scale score like Gears. Epic gave me a blank canvas, which was really great. I experimented with a lot of hybrid organic/electronic elements, and combined them with the power of a large orchestra and choir. The one thing that we discussed keeping from Gears 1 was the Locust riff. It's a short aggressive rhythmic phrase that works really well in the original game, and they asked for my take on it. The rest of the material and themes are all new. Mike and Cliff made it clear that Gears 2 is bigger, meaner and even more insane than the original game. So I knew I had a big task ahead of me, and the music had to match the intensity of the game.

Click on the above linke for plenty more. And Gears of War 2: The Soundtrack is due for release on November 25th.

Thanks to Greg from Music 4 Games for the heads-up!

Read More

You mean there's another WATCHMEN trailer too?!

EDIT: I have found out that this is NOT the second trailer for Watchmen. That one is still due out with Quantum of Solace. This is just some preview footage shown during the Scream Awards last night. Still looks awesome though :-)

Rorschach's illegal entry. Dan's sexual fantasy and mushroom cloud. Dr. Manhattan's demonstration on the tank. Adrian's Antarctic retreat. Laurie's realization. The blood-stained smiley-face button...

This will be the Citizen Kane of comic book movies when it comes out in March.

So here's the second trailer for Watchmen:

And speaking of the Watchmen movie, there are reports that the ending has been altered significantly from the book. Namely, (SPOILER highlight to read) that the "alien" cooked up by Ozymandias to destroy New York City in his mad bid for world peace has been replaced with a scheme involving free energy and Dr. Manhattan. But a number of sources have also assured that the original ending is in the movie, or at least has had effects work done related to it.

Regardless, I'll be there opening day to see this. I've waited almost 20 years to see Rorschach's cool mask on the big screen... and in a few short months it's going to finally happen!

Read More

The teaser for BIOSHOCK 2: SEA OF DREAMS

I have a confession to make...

Ever since first playing it this past March, I have become absolutely addicted to the video game BioShock.

Actually, "addicted" isn't the right word at all. "Enchanted", "enthralled", "captivated", or something to that effect would be much more apropos. The game finally arrived on PlayStation 3 this past week and owners of that system are finally getting to discover what Xbox 360 folks (like me) have known for some time now: that BioShock might be the most beautiful and thought-provoking video game yet produced. Let's face it: a game that examines with cold brutality what human nature is capable of doing in the absence of God and higher morality is certainly going to be cut from a different cloth than the rest.

So I've played BioShock all the way through three times now, always getting to the "good" ending 'cuz I just can't bring myself to harvest any of the Little Sisters, and all the while coming up with new ways to try to take out the Big Daddies protecting them. Some nights I even dream of Rapture: the underwater city that is the setting of BioShock.

And speaking of dreams of BioShock...

If you get all the way through the PlayStation 3 edition of BioShock, you unlock the following teaser for BioShock 2: Sea of Dreams, due out next year. Would you kindly hit the "play" button and commence to arousing your curiosity:

Two things stick out from this spot to me: first, that's apparently a Little Sister, now quite a few years older. And then the BioShock 2 logo is encrusted with barnacles and sea rot... so perhaps that means a return to Rapture several years after the original game. 2K (the company that produced BioShock) has hinted that BioShock 2 will be both a sequel and a prequel, so maybe we'll also get to at last witness the terrible events of the night of New Years Eve 1958, when the society of Rapture self-destructed.

Can't wait to play this! :-)

Read More

No TRICK 'R TREAT this Halloween (thanks for nothing Warners!)

Last December I attended Butt-Numb-A-Thon 9. For those who don't know, Butt-Numb-A-Thon is an annual film festival/geek pow-wow that Harry Knowles of the Ain't It Cool News website hosts at one of the Alamo Drafthouse theaters in Austin, Texas. For twenty-four straight hours, the invited are treated (and sometimes assaulted) with some of the best examples of the motion picture medium, hand-picked by Knowles. Almost a year later and I still can't help but giggle madly whenever I think of Feels So Good (the urethroplasty documentary that we watched during breakfast) and no doubt a lot of people who were there have tried to explain "BECAUSE YOU ARE WHITE!!!" to their friends. But anyhoo...

The final movie of last year's Butt-Numb-A-Thon - the one holding the coveted slot of "best unreleased film you had no idea was coming" - was Trick 'R Treat, a horror anthology by writer/director Michael Dougherty. Starring Anna Paquin, Dylan Baker and Brian Cox among numerous other familiar actors, I thought that Dougherty had crafted quite a wonderful "love letter" of sorts to Eighties-style horror movies with Trick 'R Treat. I wrote at the time that I was very much looking forward to watching it again when it was released the following Halloween. Y'all have no idea either how much I've been telling other people to be looking for this movie, 'cuz it was most certainly a terrific "treat"!

Except it ain't happening.

For whatever insane reason that they've got for doing this, Warner Brothers is withholding Trick 'R Treat from release. Barring some crazy miracle of distribution, it won't be seen this Halloween at all. Maybe next year though. Maybe.

Folks, there's a reason why Trick 'R Treat is being called by those fortunate enough to have seen it as "the absolute best horror movie" in years. It's darned perfect. The four tales told in Trick 'R Treat are so exquisitely orchestrated, the pacing is just right and the casting is spot-on excellent (to say nothing of Dougherty's wonderful script and directing) that this is a movie that demands not only a proper release, but for the suits at Warners to throw an unconscionable amount of money at Michael Dougherty's feet so that he can make that entire series of Trick 'R Treat films that he hinted about at Butt-Numb-A-Thon. Considering that the current slate of films is still recovering from the writers strike, Trick 'R Treat should be downright obligated to have prime territory at the cinemas.

This is, really, a very sad thing. I now feel like one of the lucky to have been able to enjoy this film. And everyone else should have the opportunity to be as delighted about Trick 'R Treat as we were at Butt-Numb-A-Thon last year.

C'mon Warners, give this film the wide release it deserves!

Read More

"Weird Al" Yankovic offers "Whatever You Like"!

"Weird Al" Yankovic is hard at work on his new album and he couldn't wait to share the first single from it! "Whatever You Like", a parody of T.I.'s hit song of the same name, is a spirited anthem (or is that a dirge?) for the current economy...

Speaking of Weird Al, this month's Wired magazine has an excellent article about his career and how he's still finding gobs of new fans!

And if you enjoyed "Whatever You Like", you can own it for yourself (and give Al some hard-earned cash) by buying it through iTunes or Amazon.com or Rhapsody or Napster!

Read More

The Return

If you haven't already, take a look at "Last Day", the absolutely haunting and beautiful new commercial for Gears of War 2:

In its own way, that spot (which was made by the same crew that pulled off the award-winning "Mad World" ad for the original Gears of War two years ago) conveys more of what I've gone through in the past two months than I care to find words on my own to articulate about.

Okay well, my personal life has changed quite a lot. And not in ways that I would have ever expected or wanted to have happened. My faith in many things got rattled to the core. Including my faith in God. That came back. Other things... didn't. Since the last real post I wrote over a month ago (which was made in very unusual circumstances) things in the outside world have taken a turn for the worse. Heck, the United States is now a de facto socialist country, whether enough of us are willing to admit it. And in case anyone was wondering: yeah, my info was about Wachovia. And that ain't to brag about it either...

It may or may not be the wisest thing to at the moment, but I'm going to take a stab at returning to blogging. It won't be as intensive or regular as it has been, and I've no intention of "going after the bad guys" again for awhile. Right now it's just something to help me through some things, and still share what I think is cool and interesting stuff with what turns out to have been quite many more regular readers than I knew were out there (appreciate the e-mails y'all :-) It makes me happy to do that. Sometimes getting to laugh at myself, and having others laugh too at it... I like that also.

I don't plan on discussing politics anytime soon either, by the way. But in case anyone's wondering: right now there are two people that I'm currently set to vote for. There may be a very few others that I might consider casting a ballot for, but those are the ones that I know haven't made any negative campaign ads. I'm sticking to the policy that I talked about months ago here: if any candidate runs a single negative ad, they don't get my vote. Might mean that I'm gonna turn in a pretty vacuous ballot, but I don't mind. It's a small enough price to pay for sticking to one's principles.

(Actually, I've told many of my friends that for President I'm going to vent my frustration by doing a write-in vote for "A glass of whiskey a gun and two bullets". I might post the pic of that on here come Election Day :-)

Okay well... let's find something neat to talk about, eh?

Read More

Read More