Good morning everyone. Please reset your watches. We are now on Universal Shock and Awe Time.

MORE UGLY THINGS I CAN'T LOOK AWAY FROM

What a bewilderingly stupid lineup of movies down at the local Hideosityplex this week. I count five tired comedies, two merchandise tie-ins, two shoot 'n' stabs, two unoriginal horrors and Chicago, which as I've mentioned before features Renee Zellwegger singing. Have you heard that the Oscars will feature a Queen Latifah-Catherine Eater Jones duet? I really should go and see Chicago, because I can't mock the damn thing properly sight unseen. What crude weapon fashioned from deadfall and shale chips will bring this film down?

I usually enjoy watching the Academy Awards, mostly because it's amusing to watch a gigantic hallful of people utterly deluded about their relevance to the universe, but this year may be a bit much for me. Last year was bad enough - did Hollywood actually believe that doling out awards to Poitier, Washington and Berry was some late blow in the war for civil righrs? - but I expect even worse this Sunday. Patriots and protestors will be salivating for a soapbox on Oscar night. The Hollywood aristocracy will demonstrate their largesse by shucking their diamond-encrusted evening gowns and standing around in sober black d�shabille as if for a funeral and not for a festival of mutual back-patting. Perhaps they can trot out a heterosexual and straight-toothed Tom Cruise again to proclaim, as he did in 2002, that the world needs movies "now... more than ever". I know it's been a while since The Player, but please¹.

AN ODD MOMENT

Yesterday I was reading a mimi smartypants (link below) entry in which she mentions that she cringes inside every time she hears the phrase 'fully functional'. I had no idea what made her cringe, but my mind immediately flashed to a scene in First Contact, in which the Borg Queen gets all slinky with Commander Data. She asks: "Do you have a complete range of human attributes"? Data replies with a catch of lust in his voice: "I am fully functional"². Anyway, I scrolled down the page and found that her cringe reaction was also associated with Data's cybervirility. Zeitgeist is a terrifying thing.

Here's a suggestion: the next time a bully is trying to choke your lunch money out of you, simply stand your ground and say, "You, sir, personify the crassest misreading of Hobbes' philosophies!" Be sure to convey the correct balance of haughter and aggrievement. I suspect your bully will let you alone.

LATEST LOUSY BAND NAME

Ungodly & Creme

WHAT'S IN A BURGER KING GARDEN SALAD?

1/4 medium tomato, cut into 3 pieces
1/4 head of iceberg lettuce
1 suggestion of red cabbage
moisture

¹For those who didn't see The Player back in 1989, Tim Robbins plays a murderously sleazy movie executive whose studio bears the slogan "Movies... now, more than ever".

²Okay, so at this point in the film you're pretty much convinced that Data has sealed his class revolt by getting down with the enemy, but at a crucial moment Data saves the day and kills the Borg Queen, thereby destroying the entire Borg hive mind. How is it that a gigantic hive mind doesn't have redundancy built in to its most important node? I tell you, if I had a hive mind, I wouldn't go walking around with a big sign saying "I am the head. Cut me off and the body will die". No, I'd be modest, dress like my peers, and not have sex with androids. No, scratch that, I'd probably have sex with androids. But I wouldn't tell them I was anything special. I'd pose as a hard-up drone with a taste for modelled sexual response.

(secret bonus link)

parode - exode