Except.

I’ve given myself a pretty firm deadline to type the “The End” on draft zero, and it’s one I don’t want to miss. As you can see, though, as of the time of this posting, I’ve still got almost a third of the book to scribbled down.  Now, I know that seems bad, but trust me, the end parts come out quickly.  It’s the middles where a writer will tend to drag his feet like a kid headed for the dentist’s chair.

Anyway the point is that posts will be light this week.  I know, I know, “they’ve been light”, you say.  You have a perfectly valid point.  I’m sorry.  But trust me, it’ll all be worthwhile.  I swear.

And by “worthwhile”, I make no specific promises of any kind.  Sort of like your typical game show host.

Now, that said, it’s time for a quick rundown of What Puddin Read Last Week:

First, after many, many, many years of not reading The Great Gatsby – even though I swore I was so going to do it this time – I actually broke down and read the book that’s been persecuting middle-and-slash-or-high school students for decades.

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I somehow didn’t read this lo, the many years ago, in either middle school, high school, or college. And have been berating myself for missing out on an American “classic” ever since I started considering books as literature.

And now, having finally read Gatsby, I feel like the best I have to say is, “meh”.

I suppose if I read the Cliff’s notes or sat through a literature class, I’d see the myriad of wonderful things here. But most of what I found was Fitzgerald self-indulgently arguing that the world is a terrible place full of terrible people and terrible things, and we all just have to keep pushing through the terribleness. Nobody wants what they have, everyone wants the things they can’t have, no one appreciates much of anything, and everyone is perfectly willing to do awful things and then lie to themselves about it.

And I guess, sure, there’s plenty of that in the world. Certainly, I appreciate this as a cautionary tale, and I do very much like Fitzgerald’s ease with the language. It’s not easy writing this way while keeping it from seeming overwritten.

I didn’t hate Gatsby, and I can see why it’s considered an American classic. But I just didn’t fall in love with it they way so many others have over the years.

View all my reviews

Second is the new offering from fellow Northern Kentucky author, Howard McEwen.  I’m going to be honest, I wasn’t sure how I would feel about Daddy Issues, as it generally falls pretty far outside of my reading wheelhouse.  But sometimes when you take a chance on something, you find something out about yourself in the process.

Daddy Issues by Howard McEwen
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Scrolling down my list of read books, it’s pretty clear that Daddy Issues by Howard McEwen is not at all typical for me. I tend to lean toward escapism for my reading list, thinking that I get my fill of reality from the actual real world of day to day life.

Which is to say, I wasn’t sure how I’d feel reading Daddy Issues.

But even as it’s out of my usual area, I burned through McEwen’s latest in just a few days, which is not something I often manage anymore. The life of the characters he’s created is full of grit and hard questions that may not have any good answers, which is honestly about as true to life as one can get.

Somehow, McEwen manages to craft a main character, Wagner Sibenthaler, in whom I feel both a sense of kinship with yet also a revulsion for. In his attempt to provide for and protect his family — while faced with all the hard choices that modern society throws at us — a simplicity of world view mixed with a kind of subtle selfishness leads him to overlook the fact that his thoughts and actions actually prove to accomplish the opposite.

A fast, compelling read, Daddy Issues is a blue-collar cautionary tale for modern times, a Gatsby for the rest of us.

View all my reviews

I hope all your Mondays rock!

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to my manuscript before the Muse gets all pissy.

Pud’n

As I’ve said before, though, I don’t have that kind of time anymore.  Something about raising four-fifths of a basketball team while working full-time and trying to squeeze in an hour or so of writing regularly and, oh yeah!, not neglecting the poor Puddinette. So nowadays, if I really really want to see a movie, I generally go to see it at the Creeper’s Showing, which is always the 10 PM-ish viewing on Sunday night.

Don’t know what I’m talking about?  Trust me, go see a movie about then.  You’ll pick up on what I mean.  I swear I’ve had entire showings to myself before.  Which is, admittedly, nice, but then again, I always end up wondering if there’s something creeping up behind me.

Or maybe that’s just me?

The point here is that while I still watch most of the big movies that come out every year – I like movies; it’s a thing that’s kind of in my genes – I see the vast majority of them for the first time from my comfort of my very own couch or recliner, in sparking Blu-Ray format.  Because, hey, it’s convenient.  Plus also, it leaves me more cash for beer and chicken wings.  Err, I mean grilled chicken salads.

Still, as convenient as it is, part of me misses the excitement of seeing big, (theoretical) blockbuster premieres in a darkened theater with my feet planted firmly in the sticky muck of a days worth of spilled sodas.  Also, previews: I likes ‘em.

So while I don’t get to see movies opening at theaters much any more, I often wish that I did. But I know I might be in the minority here. After all, not everyone digs the crowds, expense, hours lost to a seemingly never-ending string of extended trailers, and the potential for possible bacterial infection.

Here, then, is your weekend debate at the outset of the 2013 Summer Movie season:

Catching a Movie the First Time: Better at the theater or A more perfect (more comfy, less pricey) experience at home?

Just like with real books, I’ll always have a special place in my heart for the traditional experience.  But  I’m just a cranky blowhard, what do I know?  Let’s hear what you’ve got to say on the matter!

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to win the lottery and invent a time machine so I can manufacture a few hours to see Iron Man 3 and Star Trek: Into Darkness.

Pud’n

Now that I really consider it, I think maybe not.  I mean, I didn’t even have any pulled pork or sweet tea while I was here.  Oh sure, I thought about hiking all over the terminal in search of some, but I hardly think the citizens of Charlotte would want me to judge their prowess at barbecuing pork butt by airport terminal kiosk purveyor.

Clearly, that wouldn’t be right.  So, instead, I picked up a little snack that I figured I could use to judge airports against each other (rather than cities): a non-Starbucks iced americano and a theoretically “fresh” brownie.

See?

gh

Yeah, okay, so the lightening isn’t great.  I do words, people, not pictures.

And for the record, Charlotte’s brownies aren’t all that great either.

I should have gotten some pulled pork.

Be home soon.  We’ll chat more tomorrow.

Pud’n

PS: I’ve spent serious time wandering through/loitering  in various airports over the course of the last couple of weeks, and I want to know: a thousand years from now, what will future generations think we did in these huge structures full of stores and doorways?

The worst thing is, I’m also not remembering to remove movies I don’t need to get anymore.  Case in point, a few weeks ago, I watched The Hobbit via pay-per-view – because, I’m impatient like that sometimes – and then, just three short days later,  received that very film by mail because I’d forgotten it was currently King of the Queue.

And nobody’s got time to watch three hours of the same first third of a book twice, knowutImean?

Anyway, at some point in the not too distant past, the Kevin James, school-teacher-fights-MMA comedy, Here Comes the Boom showed up at the house.  And then it sat, because I kinda, sorta wanted to see it, but I didn’t really really want to see it.

But then, a piece of good luck came my way. That is, Friday night rolled around and I had nothing to watch.  So, motivations aside, guess what went into the Blu-Ray player?

Here Comes the Boom

I was very happily surprised by this one. The film had cute, funny, and serious moments, but never strayed too far into any of them to imbalance off. The “twist” just before the Big Fight was actually a surprise, but the good kind I should have seen coming. James did a wonderful job of transitioning from the jaded, self-interested teacher at the beginning to the thoughtful educator at the end, and still managed to make the fights moderately believable. And the final fight, which you knew would go a certain way, even maintained the tension necessary to keep it interesting.

Long story short, Here Comes the Boom is the first Kevin James movie I can honestly say I’d be happy to watch again.  And with a very respectable PG rating, it’s even a solid one to watch with the older kids in the family.

If you haven’t seen it, I say take a jab at it.

Get it? A jab? Haha! Boom!

Wow. Sorry. I can even taste the shame from that one.

From now on, I’ll just stick to the movies.

Pud’n

In fact, I think I’m going to start referring to the Puddintopia writing area as the East Wing.  Because, why not?

Anyway, so back to the Weekend Debate. In case you weren’t aware, Mother’s Day is this weekend (if, in fact, you weren’t aware, you can thank me later.  Go buy a card and something nice for the lady who either a) carried your unappreciative, under-developed corporeal form to term while it incubated long enough to breath oxygen and survive the outside world, b) nurtured and raised you, cut the crusts off your sandwiches, and waited up to until 2 am to make sure you were alive and unharmed before she started yelling at you, or c ) all of the above.

Of course, mothers everywhere have been barking orders to “stop fighting!”, “quit bickering!”, and “empty the drainer” (maybe that last one is just for me?) since the dawn of time, so it seemed a little, I don’t know, wrong to be stirring up a fight on the weekend dedicated to her.

So I figured let’s take it easy this week.

On Sunday afternoon, fathers across the US will stumble into the kitchen and realize that dinner is their responsibility. Of course, that’s not to suggest they don’t normally manage dinner.  This isn’t Mad Men and I’d like to think misogyny of that order has no place on a blog titled for a guy nicknamed “Puddin”.

That said, you can’t screw up Mother’s Day dinner, and  you can’t mail it in.  All the options, though, are fraught with more peril than spending a day with He Who Shall Not Be Named. Dining out when everyone else in the free world with a mom is dining out  – which, FYI, is pretty much everyone (well, except for those pod-grown clones, but that’s another post) – can lead to waiting and frustration and Just The Worst Day Ever.  On the other hand, if you try to make her a special meal of her favorite salmon croquettes and the result is a plateful of some knobby mounds of greasy fish pucks after you’ve destroyed the kitchen with Hurricane Dad, you’re not exactly scoring major points.

So, the question is,

Mother’s Day Dinner: Cook for her at home or Dine out?

Drop some knowledge about your Mother’s Day situation, peeps. Let’s pro and con this bad boy.

In the meantime, I’ll be looking up croquette recipes.  You know, for a friend.

Pud’n

Which means that it’s time for More. Summer. Movies! Huzzah!

As I looked over the list of movies coming out this summer, one thing became abundantly clear right away: there was no way in pink, puffy, Marshmallow-Land I could possibly give you 100 words about each of the motion pictures I’ve got checked on my “to see” card this year.  If I did, this post would scroll longer than a Beyonce contract rider*, and most of you would die of old age or extreme disorientation before you got to the end.  Plus, bed sores.

Well, I guess not everyone reads my blog on a tablet in bed. Can you get “office chair sores”?  “Toilet sores”?

Ahem.  Right.  Off topic. Rambling, even.

So, anyway, like I said, I’ve perused the list of Summer Movies for 2013, and right now I feel pretty confident saying I’m in the market for a second mortgage.  Because holy raining Benjamins, Batman, am I ever going to drop some serious greenbacks at the MegaUberCinePlex in the next three months.  Seriously.  Like, whoa.

First, it took a considerable amount of time and effort and self-restraint, but I managed to whittle down the list of Movies I Want To See™ to a list of Movies I Can Make Time For©.

Prime Movies for Me: Because I’m a big movie nerd at heart and I always will be.

Iron Man 3 (May 3) – Because, duh, it’s Iron Man. Also, while the initial reactions seem split, people whose opinions I trust are onboard. I’m in.

Star Trek Into Darkness (May 17) – Maybe I’m not such a huge fan of lens flare, but I’ll never miss a Star Trek movie.

Man of Steel (June 14) – You don’t NOT see Superman movies at the theater. It’s, like, a rule or something. Of course, I’ve heard a ton of moaning, kvetching, and fanboy tantruming that they’ve ruined everything by making a “darker” Superman following the Dark Knight trend. I say, give it a rest, fellow nerd people, and let the film people have their day. At least see the movie before you geek rage on it, okay?

The Wolverine (July 26) – I’m not going to lie to you, this one may end up relegated to the Blu-Ray bonanza list below (especially as I’d like to figure out how to get Pacific Rim from down there to up here). I lurves me some Wolverine, and I really think Jackman has done a tremendous job portraying the character.  But…it feels like they’re making Wolverine movies just to be making them now. If they’re going to make one, I want it to be (capital-A) Awesome. So, this better be so, Marvel.

For the kids: Because they see commercials and sometimes they earn fun time rewards for good behavior (e.g, not killing each other)

Monsters University (June 21) – We still watch Monster’s Inc. fairly often. Could this be The Attitude’s first movie at the theater?

Despicable Me 2 (July 3) – If you didn’t find the first Despicable Me original and funny, I’m not trusting you with my kids. Or my dog.  Hell, even my fish. You’re some kind of damned monster, is what you are.

Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters (August 7) – I have sons reading these books. Plus also, I’m writing books for this age range of kid. I‘m pretty sure that means I have to shell out the clams to see this (get it? clams? It’s a pun, see. You know, because of the sea. You know, sea monsters.  Oh, nevermind). Also, let’s hope they stick a bit more closer to the book this time. The Lightning Thief went too far off-text for my liking, and for not good reason.

Disney’s Planes (August 9) – If Monsters University isn’t The ‘Tude’s first theater experience, this will be.

Blu-Ray Bonanza: Because as much as I love seeing movies at the theater, I’m not actually made of either money or time. Also, these may not turn out to be “all that”.  Or a bag of chips.  So maybe we’ll just wait and see them when the Blu-Rays hits in October.

Pacific Rim (July 12) – Aliens? Huge robots to fight them? Um, yes please!

World War Z (June 21) – What’s that? A zombie apocalypse where the focus is the actual apocalypse rather than surviving the aftermath? Yes, please!

Lone Ranger (July 3) – I’m torn here. As a young kid, few things were as awesome to me as hearing “Hi, Ho, Silver!” But. I’m not sure anyone wants this movie. And while I heart me some Depp, I’m equally not sure why on this spinning blue marble they’d cast him for Tanto.

300: Rise of An Empire (August 2) – 300 was a magnificent piece of work. But I’m worried that without Zack Snyder and Gerard Butler the Spartans might be a little less, well, “This is Sparta!” and a little more, “This is a cash grab!”

There you have it.  As I said last year, that’s how my summer movie dance card looks. What’s yours look like?

Pud’n

*feel free to Google that one

Case in point, yesterday’s post about finding “Aquaman” scrawled across the door frame of a men’s room in New England was intended to be this quick, one shot thing.  I’d just post a camera phone picture and hammer out a few dozen words about it, and just like that – Wham! Bam! Thank You, Bob’s Your Uncle…

Err, wait, I think I messed that up.

Anyway, whatever, I’d be right back to putting words together for Secret Project: Other Thing.

Which, by the way, is coming right along, as you can see by the progress meter at the right, thank you for asking.

What happened, though, is that instead of submitting that post and then going on to spend the rest of my evening contemplating the perfect bread/peanut butter brand combinations (What? You can’t just assume Skippy/Wonder is the way to go), half an hour later I found myself musing about Aquaman, the DC Comics superhero, as I was giving The Attitude his nightly bath.  And, because I tend to imagination (it’s my blog and I’ll verbify words if I want!) things once my mind starts churning on them, it wasn’t long until I had this concept for an Aquaman story where I figured a way to make him more super hero than super lame-o.

Of course, me being, well, me, I couldn’t help but tweet about it later in evening.  You know, because I pretend not to want attention but yet crave it and the approval of strangers like a sad puppy.

After scrawling today’s #puddintopia post (bit.ly/11dx8rX), I mused a bit on Aquaman. I swear I thought of a way to make him awesome

— Jason A. Rust (@jasonarust) May 7, 2013

Not long after that, one of my twitter pals (@todayIwatched, who has a blog you should totally check out if you even pretend to like movies) suggested I was swinging at low-hanging fruit because Aquaman was already awesome.

I scoffed, of course. The chuckling scoff of a man who is quite certain of himself and knows things, and, well, these whippersnappers should maybe take some notes or something.  I mean, everyone knows Aquaman is like the kid brother superhero that the Justice League has just been letting hang out all these years, right?

Behold, through the magicks of HTML, I give you our discourse:

@todayiwatched My friend, you are clearly not familiar with the Justice League version I grew up with.

— Jason A. Rust (@jasonarust) May 7, 2013

And then he went an blew my mind, by which I mean he offered a spoonful of puddiny comeuppance:

@jasonarust I’m referring to the orange shirted Superfriends version. His powers work in water because he protects people who LIVE in water

— TodayIWatchedaMovie (@todayiwatched) May 7, 2013

Thus, it struck me. Aquaman isn’t lame. He is awesome. He’s like, King of the Superheroes or something.  He’s, I dunno, King Arthur and Superman and Batman and Martha Stewart (What? She’s hardcore. She could make Doomsday cry with nothing but a knitted doily and a perfectly roasted turkey breast) all rolled into one.

That is, if you live within his watery domain.

None of us do, see.  Instead, we spend all our time judging him based on our own assumptions, prejudices, and points of view.

And yes, I do realize we’re talking about the fictional King of Atlantis here, the point is still a pretty valid one.  People, in general, think that Aquaman is lame.  But, really, we’re the ones who are lame, because of the way we think.

That how we judge Aquaman is symptomatic of how we judge others who don’t share a common world with us.

So, maybe, just maybe, we should cut a little slack to the sea dwellers (fish folk? mer-people?). And with them, the tree elves, the mountain dwarves, the cave trolls, the space people, and well, that new neighbor who just moved in from that other side of town, too.

Which is to say, never judge someone until you’ve swum a mile in their flippers.

Pud’n

P.S: If you’re thinking to yourself, “come on, Puddin, you’re seriously trying to go from Aquaman to social prejudice? Dude, it’s a comic book, lighten up.  Have a beer and few M&Ms”. I say, nonsense! This is why we have books, movies, comic books, etc. Sure, entertainment is a big part of it, but social commentary has been a subtle – and sometimes not so subtle – part of it since the Greeks started doing tragedies in amphitheaters.

Instead, I offer you this seemingly random image.

A week ago today, I was in Wallingford, Connecticut for reasons. While I was there, I had dinner at the Old Dublin pub, which might just be the most awesome craft beer pub I’ve ever personally set foot in.  But that’s a different — much longer — post.  One I imagine you’ll see on Hoperatives before too long.

As for the image above, well, as is typical in most of your better beer-drinking establishments, there was a bounty of random things scrawled on the walls, etc.  Normal I ignore all such nonsense because, believe it or not, I’m not ever really in need of knowing whom to call for the proverbial entertaining time.

For whatever reason, though, someone had taken a moment to leave their mark on the door of the Old Dublin by invoking the name of Aquaman, who I think we can all agree is the least super of the super heroes of our youth.

And if that isn’t the most ironically awesome piece of public bathroom graffiti ever, I don’t think I even know you any more.

Pud’n

Choose wisely!

Pud’n

Admittedly, there are many different facets to this particular topic of debate. Some people just don’t like Amazon. As the 600 lb. Grape Ape, er, gorilla, in pretty much any room Amazon enters, that’s not terribly surprising. There’s especially quite a large and vocal contingent of writers and publishing-types that can’t even look Amazon’s way without thinking they should probably hid the good silver and send the kids to another room for their own protection.

My own feelings about Amazon aren’t so cut and dried. I don’t like that they tend to strong-arm their way into getting what they want, especially since the Bezosians don’t seem to mind hurting a few writers, publishers, and/or other little people along the way.  And, let’s face it, any company that suggests you go check out a book at your local bookshop just to see if you like it and then whip out your iPhone and order it from them for less is taking advantage and deserves a trip to the woodshed (picking their own switch along the way).

On the other hand, though, I think there’s a metric crapton* of people reading books either from Amazon or on their devices these days that didn’t previously read books on a regular basis.  And, as I’ve said, more reading is better; so I can’t bring myself to hate them like a five-year old with a plate of  Brussels sprouts that have been boiled-to-a-greyish-pulp. Not only that, Amazon is getting more money to authors, especially ones who might never have published “the old fashioned way” to begin with. 

So, it seems not so black and white.  Definitely a grey-ish thing to me.

But, uh, Amazon is a different post.  Today, we’re just talking about the tablets.

Which brings us to the Weekend Debate topic for May 3rd, 2013:

Which e-Reader tablet is better: the Kindle Fire HD or the Nook HD?

For me, it breaks down like this: I like almost everything about the Nook HD better than the Kindle Fire HD.  I like the interface better, I like the presentation of apps better, I like the reading experience better. Truth be told, if I’m buying an e-book, I like buying them from Barnes & Noble better, too, because it makes me feel like at least I’m giving my money to a company that’s mostly about books. On top of all that, the Nook HD has much better parental control options and multiple user support. Also, the Nook supports the universal ePub format, while Amazon refuses to accept it, which is just irritating.

All that said, up until this morning, I still would have claimed without reservation that the Kindle Fire HD was my preferred device. 

Why?

Simple: app restrictions. 

All along, Barnes & Noble has been much too restrictive with it’s apps, making it nearly impossible to get any that weren’t offered by B & N.  And yes, Amazon has some of the same restrictions.  For instance, you couldn’t get the Android Google+ app or the app I use to check in to TV shows and movies, GetGlue, for either tablet.

However, the Kindle Fire HD allows for “side-loading”, which is a method by which you install a different app to download and install the apps you want but can’t get straight from your tablet vendor.  Amazon allows the practice, in most cases.  Barnes & Noble strictly does not**.

And that one little thing has been the reason I’ve considered the Kindle Fire HD the more useful device since the first of the year.

This morning, however, That. All. Changed.

Barnes & Noble announced that effective immediately, you can now download and use Google Play on the Nook HD Tablet.  Suddenly, the Nook world is completely open to pretty much every Android app you ever wanted but couldn’t previously install without “rooting” your device, remaking it in Android’s default image and voiding your warranty six ways to Sunday in the process.  Oh, and by the way, if you wanted to root it, you needed a list of technical instructions as long as Santa’s list, a hearty constitution, an entire afternoon for figuring out how to fix the perfectly good tablet you just “upgraded” into a doorstop, and, in all likelihood, a fifth of Jack Daniels.

None of that is necessary now.  And because of it, I’m happy to say, unequivocally, that the NOOK HD gets the Puddintopia stamp of approval.

But, hey, that’s my opinion.  I could be wrong***. 

So, what’s your opinion on the matter? You know the drill. Now make me proud!

Have a great weekend.

And, uh, try not to set the place on fire.

Pud’n

*metric craption: 0.633 of an imperial crapton
**Or, well, did not.
***I’m not, but I could be