Bump and grind

Most people think it was the epigrammatist (google it, I had to) Friedrich von Logau who wrote one of my favorite passages ever:
Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small;
Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He all.
I'm pretty sure that he was going for a "you reap what you sow" kind of vibe, but he also clearly knew that a good metaphor can have lots of meanings, maybe even some the guy who wrote it never saw coming.
The way I've always taken the von Logau passage is not just an observation that you should be nice to folks. I've always read it as a reminder that the conveyor belt is always on and it rolls faster than anyone can run.
It's not, however, a clever reminder that everyone dies. That diddy was played out even in von Logau's day in the 1600s. What a lot of great thinkers miss in their hurry to foretell on the inevitable death of the people that pushed them around in high school is that the ticking clock is as much a friend as an enemy.
Think of the nights you literally could not imagine how you were going to get up and function as a human the next morning. From getting too high to getting fired from a Fortune 500 company, everyone's crashed full speed into a wall they knew for sure was the end of the line, the thing that would stop them for good or at send them spiraling toward an anonymous end.
And yet, the mill ground on. You rolled out of bed at 3 p.m., ate some peanut butter straight from the jar and pulled yourself together enough to go buy some paper towels. You broke down sobbing and punched a hole in the sheet rock the moment you got back through the door, but still, you'd obtained an artifact from the world outside your grief and fear and that was enough to sustain you a few more hours.
Later, you came out of the haze long enough to halfheartedly hit the gym or meet up with friends. You briefly surfaced, thinking, Damn, I really used to like this kind of thing. Then your ex texted you or the bill from the funeral parlor came in the mail and the tide surged back, washing you back out to sea even as you fought. The uncaring mill went about its work.
Then some day you awoke to realize that you had a new job, new girlfriend or new house you had been taking for granted. Strangely, you didn't heave a sigh of relief and thank your god of choice for the opportunity to not be a wreck. You just shrugged and said, So. This is what it's like. This seems familiar somehow.
And that's how the mill works. It will grind sadness as soon as happiness. Skill and wisdom accrue like silty ore and pain and confusion wash gradually downstream. Age and guile are extracted from youth and inexperience at a rate so slow no one even notices until they exclaim, God, my back hurts. And where did all this gold come from?
•••
So long sweet summer/ I stumbled upon you and gratefully basked in your rays/ So long sweet summer/ I fell into you/ Now you're gracefully falling away

Dutch Bros. and expensive socks

New blog coming soon. In the meantime, Here's my (potentially) nationally syndicated story about alpacas.

And here's my story about Dutch Bros. moving to Carson City.

Less sex, more murder

It's a long one, guys, but I owed you 500 words or so anyway. I think it's worth it if you stick it out til the end.

The Motion Picture Association of America announced last week that it will now consider cigarette use when assigning ratings to films, noting that "depictions that glamorize smoking or movies that feature pervasive smoking outside of an historic or other mitigating context may receive a higher rating." If you're one of the hardy few who still take the MPAA seriously, now might be a good time to reassess your position.

For years, the group epitomized a lot of the problems with the "family values" crowd -- generally that they are more than happy to pass judgement on everything under the sun but get righteously indignant if folks start looking into their own families and values. In one breath, it's "Hey, if you aren't doing anything wrong, you should have no problem with us checking out you out" and "How dare you drag my personal life into this?" the next.

The MPAA is among the worst offenders, because one of its major functions is literally to judge what is appropriate for America's children to see and hear. From mpaa.org: "The (Ratings) Board uses the same criteria as any parent making a judgment: theme, language, violence, nudity, sex and drug use are among content areas considered in the decision-making process."

I have several cheap shots permanently locked and loaded in case I ever meet a board member (The opening salvo would be "If you guys really have your finger on the pulse of the healthy American family, how come a third of you are divorced?), but I think it's more interesting to try to consider the group logically rather than immediately branding it offensive just because I don't agree with its vision.

Simply put, I think the board or someone in charge of them is stuck in the 1950s on every topic except smoking. Horrible violence can easily clear the board as long as there's no visible mammal blood ("Alien vs. Predator" and "Pearl Harbor" both pulled PG-13 ratings in theaters but went up to R when red gore was reintroduced on DVD), while relatively benign movies about sex or politics routinely get hammered ("Kung Fu Hustle, "American Pie" and most of Michael Moore's movies all got Rs, and "An Inconvenient Truth" got a PG for "thematic elements.")

That's hardly news, however. Many people, including movie critics Roger Ebert and David Ansen, have argued that the system appears to be run by homicidal nationalist prudes. Ansen claims the rating system is geared toward looking at trivial aspects of movies (he has repeatedly noted that the board tracks how many times and in what context certain expletives are used; for instance, the f-word can be used up to three times as an exclamation in a PG-13 movie but never as a verb) rather than at the general theme of the picture (for example, if realistic consequences of violence or substance abuse are shown). I agree, and my favorite example was when the MPAA rejected a trailer for "Teaching Mrs. Tingle" that showed a dog licking a wine bottle on the grounds that it "promoted underage drinking." In all fairness, though, there's no way that dog was 21.

But lately, things have been getting downright surreal. The board famously took issue with the (relatively tame) orgy scene in Stanley Kubrick's "Eyes Wide Shut," demanding that some of the actors' special areas be digitally obscured before they would even give the thing an R. Meanwhile, Kubrick's earlier feature "A Clockwork Orange," which contains perhaps the only graphic rape scene in all of cinema to be considered high art, also pulled an R with 30 seconds worth of edits -- most of them to a depiction of consensual sex and none of them to the rape sequence. What's the message here? That a bunch of folks enjoying non-missionary sex is just as offensive as gang rape? That's not a leap I'm prepared to make just yet.

What ties it all up for me, though, was the movie "The Descent," which I saw for the first time last week. It was a great movie, maybe one of my top 25 ever, but that doesn't mean I ever want to watch it again. In case you're not familiar with it, it's the story of a group of six Gen X women who go caving in the Appalachians and run into some serious trouble in the form of cave monsters and unresolved personal issues. By the end of the movie, you're a lot more afraid of some of the women than you are of the carnivorous freaks, all of whom seem to be male. Call it the ultimate chick flick.

On top of the fact that it's well-filmed, well-acted and well-choreographed, I liked it because it was deep as hell and "the descent" into the bowels of the earth parallels one woman's character arc. When did you last see a big-time movie with actual character development? This one's a winner and you should check it out.

Still, it's harrowing throughout and depressing in some of the conclusions it draws about human nature. Major characters die slow and hard, and keep coming back, not as zombies you can hate, but as real people bleeding out from horrible injuries, regretting their life's mistakes all the way. It's hard to watch and the movie deserved its R rating. Still, the message is well worth the arduous trip.

But you can feel the MPAA's hot, reptilian breath all over this masterpiece. In a film where the combat is scary realistic, where people actually fall down when struggling in slick conditions and the untrained do not fight at all like like Bruce Lee, where everyone and their mom is wielding a blade or a set of claws, no article of clothing is ever torn, because a pretty lady showing too much skin might send the wrong message. Several other scenes are as careful to show naked women only from the neck up as later scenes are to show their entire bodies as they are disemboweled.

Even when one character tumbles into a giant pool of blood and has a total epiphany and it would be absolutely appropriate to have her emerge freaked out and naked, in both the psychological and literal sense, she splashes out wearing only a Sigourney Weaver grimace. I can only assume that the MPAA was afraid that someone might get a jolly or two if she realistically shucked off her disgusting top layer of clothing before soldiering on. But I think I speak for most guys when I say that it's hard for me to get too fired up about a blood-soaked woman when I've just seen several of her friends devoured by shrieking trolls.

What the MPAA needs to realize is that the average person has a much greater chance of seeing a member of the opposite sex naked than they do of seeing someone shot through the heart or punched in the face, and so they're protecting us from the wrong things. I am by no means a fan of smoking, but I see it for what it is: a self-destructive personal choice not unlike heavy drinking, excessive film watching or moral crusading. If seeing a person smoke in a movie is the worst thing a kid sees this week, I count him lucky. He could be watching the news, for God's sake.

Gotta have Faith

If you listen to Fair Game with Faith Salie on NPR, check out the May 8 edition, about 20 percent (6:30) into the show. They parody the article I wrote for the Carson Times about firefighting sheep. She may not be the first attractive woman to bust my chops in public, but she's the only one I'm aware of who has a national audience. Next stop: Ann Coulter.

Elvis Costello review

Two religious experiences to discuss this morning:

1. Check out my Elvis Costello review here and

2. If Dennis "They're after me Lucky Charms" Kucinich isn't in your MySpace top 8, you ain't really livin'.

Say it like you mean it

Call it a quirk. Call it a flaw. Call it a psychological anomaly positively crying out for professional attention. But I think it's hot when a girl busts my chops in a less-than-serious way.
For the women who just threw their arms in the air and took a victory lap of the living room (if, indeed, girls do take victory laps — I've never seen it happen, but I've heard the stories), telling a guy to take out the trash does not count as flirting. It's just mean. In fact, ladies, if you make a series of negative statements to most guys and the anger you're expressing is more than 30 percent genuine, you're no longer having a discussion. You're having an argument, and it either ends with you crying or us standing there quietly for 20 seconds looking like we've been slapped before saying, "whatever" and going to play some more X-box. Opinions differ about who's more mature at that point.
But that's not what I'm talking about. The other morning, I staggered into an unfamiliar coffee shop on my way to work, in spite of the fact that I was half-awake and running late. I had on my green shirt that makes me look like Leonardo DiCaprio (I wasn't the one who decided he was attractive, but I will totally ride his overrated coattails) and my hair was either cowlicked or artfully tousled, depending on your perspective. Amid a great gnashing of utensils and slamming of microwaves, the coffee girl emerged from the back room and said, "What can I get you?"
"Uhh..." I said, trying to discern the difference between a Northwest Sunrise and a Southwest Omelette. It seemed to have something to do with capers.
"We're all out of 'uhh,'" she said, smirking. "We have bagels, though."
It was early, so it took me a couple seconds to catch up. I usually don't have to be charming before 11 a.m. Slowly, my brain engaged.
"Too bad. I was looking for more of a scone," I pouted. "You'll make me one from scratch, right?"
"Absolutely," she said, fiddling with the neck of her second-hand t-shirt. "I'll tell the baker. Oh, wait, that's me. No, we won't. The baker says pick something from the menu, sweetie." She gave me a big smile and turned around and started refilling the pastry case.
It was on now. I was so money and I totally knew it. She looked back at me over her shoulder and the tension was palpable to at least one of us. I inhaled to speak again and a family of eight burst into the narrow shop, bickering about onion bagels and whether the middle daughter had actually enjoyed the lox she'd ordered last time they'd stopped by. The matriarch stomped up to the counter, her nose perhaps 18 inches from a bold-printed list of bagel varieties, and announced, "So, what kind of bagels do you have here?"
If looks could kill, it would have been the St. Valentine's Day Massacre all over again, with Matt Farley standing in for the gunman. T-shirt Girl's much more generously proportioned coworker helpfully arrived to take my order, which I took to go.
Later, on the way back from an interview, I stopped off at a cafe in an allegedly hip new district of Gardnerville for a snack. (Reporters need to stop for lots of snacks, you see, otherwise we might make it back to the office before closing and be forced to write something.) I walked up to the counter and one of the two college-age girls behind it said, "Oh my god, you guys are totally wearing the same shirt! That's so hot!"
I looked over at her associate, who was indeed wearing a handsome green shirt, although she didn't look much like Leo as far as I could tell. She made eye contact and said, "Yeah, but I think mine's cuter."
Three thoughts immediately sprang to mind:
1. Note to self: Wear this shirt more often.
2. Look away from the nice girl's enormous Hot Topic belt buckle, Farl. C'mon. You can do it. Act like you've been there before.
3. What were these college-age girls doing 35 miles from the nearest community college on a Wednesday afternoon? Maybe I wasn't playing the varsity squad here, so to speak.
What I said was, "That is a nice shirt. Did you get it new?"
Two things happened at once. The first girl started laughing and Green Shirt Girl looked terribly offended. The problem with ironic game is that people who are too stupid to understand irony take it seriously and feel bad. As I watched my chances for a color-coordinated relationship do a convincing impression of the Hindenburg, I asked the first girl, "That was pretty funny, right?"
"Yeah," she said. "I should probably be the one to help you now, though. What can I do for you?"
A thousand comebacks raced through my head. Maybe more. But all I said was, "Coffee and a brownie, please."
As the saying goes, you can't entertain all the people all the time, but you can entertain yourself all the time. Or something. I forget the exact phrasing. All I remember is that if you take yourself too seriously, someone is bound to see through you eventually.