My Football and B-movie induced cabin-fever brain death weekend

Hola!

My foundational thought processes and cognitive organs are severely impaired, as I have endured a weekend where I was snowed in due to an intense blizzard bringing life-threatning chills and panic-ridden media noise. The snow started early Saturday morning and didn't let up until Sunday afternoon, and all the while, I contracted/experienced a perfectly timed cold while being subjected to the horrors of mind-numbingly stupid television. In the end, however, this might be one of the most enjoyable weekends I have ever experienced in my life.

On Friday night, knowing that it would snow heavily during the weekend, I ran to Hollywood video to reap the benefits of my computer-glitch aided MVP. I picked up 3 movies, thus incrementing my free movie total to about 60. I rented the following: (1: One-Eyed Jacks (a western from 1960, I'm starting to get into old movies these days) (2: Barry Lyndon (A Stanley Kubrick classic) (3: Buffalo '66 (a surreal comedy from the late 90's)

The previous weekend, I had purchased a cult classic from Borders bookstore, a DVD entitled 'Hard Rock Zombies'....Now, I have been salivating over the possibility of watching this movie for months -- supposedly, it's a rare movie, and those who have watched it all seemed to agree (based on the IMDB reviews) that it's the ultimate 'so bad it's good' movie......

In situations where I'm about to experience what I feel is an brilliantly unprecedented art form, I will become EXTREMELY IRASCIBLE. Any talking, couch movement, TV tray rustling, unfavorable sunbeam glare, mission-impossible plumb line spider falling from the ceiling, peripherally visual disturbances due to houselights or misplaced digital clocks, etc...MUST be eliminated before I can watch the movie that should (but never does) change my life.

In addition, I was very sick from a cold, so my mission for Saturday was to do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. And this mission was widely accepted by all in the house. And I thought to myself, "That's pretty damn cool"...

OK now for the movie: I won't go into the details.....trust me, you would be the one to regret it, not I. For the first 50 minutes, it really does live up to its billing as one of the most ridiculous movies ever...Why? The jokes are terrible, the attempted humor is a disgrace, yet there's this vibe in the movie that's just so addictively silly and fun such that you can't help but loving it. However, this movie WILL indiscriminately slay several million brain cells, with or without alcohol, so you have been warned. You may find yourself twitching and winking uncontrollably afterwards for several hours.

I tried to watch normal television afterwards, but the news networks were absolutely ablaze with blizzard-related panic!....I'm talkin' news updates every 3 minutes for coastal flood warnings, black-ice hysteria, NJ governor soundbytes, etc. Needless to say, there was nothing on television! So I watched 5 more hours worth of movies, in 'One-Eyed Jacks' and 'Barry Lyndon'...Both excellent movies, especially the latter...Stanley Kubrick is a genius.

Sunday brought football to the television screen, and with that brought endless television ads about beer, low brow masculine humor, and plastic women. I've tired of watching sports in recent years because these commercials just shove the values of the viewing demographic down your throat (In this case, 20-45 beer guzzling guys with huge pot bellies)...It makes me depressed. But my masculine side needs to be satisfied occasionally, so I watched the games anyway. Yep, 6 hours of football......In retrospect, maybe this is why I am nauseated..

What is even more damaging to a guy's creative and intellectual faculties than alcohol, drugs, sports, or Fear Factor is football commentary. If you want to hear the essence of brute, cro-magnon masculinity, just listen to football announcers...You will hear sentences that I once thought were too simplistic to be uttered, such as, "Now, the Giants are losing by 10 points. If the Giants can score 10 points in the second half, WHILE holding their opponent scoreless, they won't be losing this game anymore."

....And that was my weekend....I did ABSOULTELY nothing but watching TV, and because of my cold, I was limited to JUST that. I was forced to be happy and stupid for 2 days, and I must say that it was quite a guilty pleasure.