Month: July 2020

Media Diary (July 2020)

Some things I’ve experienced lately, in no particular order, and not necessarily only recent stuff:

Fear City: New York vs. The Mafia (TV): Man this was good

Los Espookys (TV): An absolute delight, can’t wait for more

Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man (Book): Bleak, bleak, bleak

Hamilton (Movie): Was generally familiar with the soundtrack but had never seen the play (wow!)

Love on The Spectrum (TV): Found this fascinating, funny and moving

Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies, and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators (Book): Have just started, on my wife’s enthusiastic recommendation

Mucho Mucho Amor: The Legend of Walter Mercado (Movie): Man, what a life!

Die Hart (Quibi): To be clear, this isn’t great, but it does have Travolta raging around in a warehouse, so 🤷‍♂️

I’ll Be Gone in The Dark (TV): Chilling

Welcome To Chechnya (Movie): Absolutely sickening what these poor people have to endure

Unsolved Mysteries (TV): Back in action!

Greyhound (Movie): I respect Hanks’ powerful “old man trying to keep it together” energy in this

Brave New World (TV): Just starting this, but like the vibe

Hello America (Quibi): Has the occasional decent bit, but definitely still finding its sea legs

Terminator: Dark Fate (Movie): I enjoyed this more than I expected (big, dumb, goofy and fun)

Corporate (TV): This show is so hilariously grim, glad it’s back

Mr. Jones (Movie): This hit a little too close to home in 2020 America

Tickled (Movie): So amazingly weird (The Tickle King followup is also good)

Home Movie: The Princess Bride (Quibi): Had its moments

The Two Popes (Movie): 2 Furious

We Are Freestyle Love Supreme (Movie): I have a low “hanging out with theater people” threshold, but was cool to see longtime friends reuniting

Life Size Toys (Quibi): Eh

The Resurrection of Jake The Snake (Movie): I went on a little bit of a wrestling documentary binge this month, including this…

Nature Boy (Movie): This…

Macho Man: The Randy Savage Story (Movie): This…

Warrior: The Ultimate Legend (Movie): This…

Born to Controversy: The Roddy Piper Story (Movie): This…

The Life and Times of Mr. Perfect (Movie): Aaaand this 🤼


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Lotta Ins, Lotta Outs

Back in the before times, I made a short list of “Caffeine-Free Diet Proverbs” that I’d found to be true over the years. Since the past few months have been 30 years long, I thought I’d add some new 2020-fueled additions:

  • Your Internet connection speed will never be good enough for your children. 🐢

  • It’s not that text chatting is inherently less effective than face-to-face communication, it’s that you’re unwilling to strengthen your writing muscles.

  • As the reaction to mandated masks has proven, it turns out that rugged individualists are just assholes. Who knew? 🤷‍♂️

  • You don’t get credit for being the first to discover something good if you later end up ditching it for something bad.

  • People that excessively mourn (or rage against) the recent loss of “big moments” in life would be better-served by appreciating average, uneventful days more, or learning to celebrate these milestones in different (maybe better!) ways. We don’t need a dystopian community car parade to mark your kid losing a tooth, gang. 🦷

  • Some people would sooner throw themselves into traffic than admit they’ve benefited from any institutional advantages.

  • Anyone that doesn’t want to “get political” during a discussion simply isn’t prepared to defend (or confront) their to-date-unchallenged opinions and biases. 💫


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Pit Stop

Going on from that place, he went into their synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to bring charges against Jesus, they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”

He said to them, “If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable is a person than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”

– Matthew 12:9-11 (NIV)

Your thoughts, modern-day evangelicals? 🎙️

  • The law’s the law, I mean Jesus said we should give to Caesar what is Caesar’s!

  • A lot of my friends and family build pits. Pit lives matter too!

  • Your “but…they’re…dying in pits!” Facebook comments are really divisive. Trust me, you’ll catch more flies with honey.

  • You need to realize that people need time (steps over fifteen dead sheep) to find their own convictions on these types of issues.

  • Just so you know, I’ve heard that those sheep are actually Soros-funded crisis actors.


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