WBQotW #9 is one of those phrases that you hear walking through a crowded restaurant and then really wish you hadn’t.

The word “almost” is dangerous. You never want to date someone who is “almost” a woman.

I just love this collection of photos from this most ancient and revered Christmas tradition. You know, the one where beleaguered parents stand in line at the mall for three hours with their stir crazy toddlers so they can pay $10 for a blurry Polaroid of their precious child screaming bloody murder on the lap of some poor schlep making $5 an hour to wear a red velvet suit that wreaks of sweat. Ahh the joys of Christmas.

(Link via Airbag.)

While in Amarillo for Christmas, I went with my father-in-law to see “Flight of the Phoenix”, a remake of the 1965 film of the same name. I’ve never seen the Jimmy Stewart original, but from what I’ve read, it is almost identical to this version which, in my opinion, takes most of the wind out of the sails of the remake.

The basic plot is that a group of oil field workers are leaving their drilling site in the desert aboard a cargo plane. The plane crashes in a sand storm and when all hope of rescue is lost, they decide to build a new plane from the wreckage of the first one.

What a great plot, eh?! Add to that all sorts of character conflicts in the cast and this should be a real hum-dinger. However, comes out flat.

You can’t blame the actors. I felt that every part was played to perfection. You can’t blame the effects. This show has one of the best plane crash sequences I’ve seen.

So, if the plot is good, the acting is good, and the effects are good, what could go wrong? How about a script? I’m not sure this movie had one. I envision the cast, before each scene was filmed, gathering around a little TV and VCR playing the original movie and saying, “Yeah, let’s do that.” There is no character development, the plot is handled like a rollercoaster, and the dialog sounds like a top-notch junior high drama club play. (“I think a bee stung you on your big dumb ass.” Oh, if only I were making that up.)

In the end, you have a very entertaining story being told rather badly which earns “Flight of the Phoenix” two grins out of a possible five.

I’m sure you will all be happy to know that we survived the Christmas holiday. We drove to Amarillo Thursday in the snow. (Yes, I know, can you imagine all those Dallas drivers skating around in confusion and we still survived. God still does miracles.) We just finished the drive home and unpacked.

A wonderful time was had by all and Saint Nick was generous. We have had a very blessed year and we are thankful not only for our comfortable status, but also for our hope in salvation that Jesus brought us when he came to earth.

I’ve got a diggy-cam bustin’ with pictures that I hope to have posted in the next few days.

God bless you and have a great new year.

If there is something strange about this post, please forgive me. I am forced to make this entry directly into the database, rather than use my blog site. I’m not sure why, but I can’t get logged on from here.

I am at Microsoft Brainwashing again, this week. What?! Training on the week of Christmas? Yes. Isn’t that sad?

There is much I’d like to post about, but I dare not while Big Brother Bill is monitoring my every thought. I’ll be sure claw my thoughts into the flesh of my arm so I’ll remember to post about them next week.

Until then, BUY MICROSOFT OR DIE!

Alas, the Lord has heard my whining and granted a reprieve. We did not go climbing last night. Instead my dear wife and I sat on the couch from 6 to 10 and watched my new movie, ROTK. (Yaaay!)

Need I bother with a review? Well, of course! It RAWKED!! There were a couple of scenes in the extended edition that left me confused. It has been about three years since I finished the book and my memory is fading, but I’m pretty sure they changed some things. I’ll be taking some free time (Good Lord willing) over the next couple of days to reread a few passages of the book.

The acting in this last chapter of the LOTR trilogy was really moving. As doom closes in and all seems lost, we get to see the tender, emotional side of all the key characters and they all do a grand job. Sean Astin, as Samwise Gamgee, has already proven himself in the previous movies. More than any other character, I believe he deserved an Oscar.

The one that really struck me was Billy Boyd, playing Peregrin Took. His character is the child of the fellowship and always the one getting in to trouble. Up to this point in the story, he’s been almost entirely carefree. But in this last edition, he really goes deep with the character and does it with excellent results.

Many of the actors had to do scenes in which they had to tell the story without words. There are many long close-ups that serve only to express the emotion of the moment. Any actor can tell you that is the hardest kind of scene. And they all pulled it off wonderfully.

And so, I risk setting a dangerous precedent, but I feel it’s only just. For my very first movie review, I award the LOTR trilogy a perfect score of 5 grins.

Now look what you’ve done. You’ve gone and made me start thinking about movie reviews. I’m going to have to create a whole new post category and post reviews of all the movies I’ve seen in the last few months. Shame on you. Now go to your room.

Last week… no… the last month has been insanely busy. We wrapped up the Christmas play on Sunday with great success and relief. Tammy and I were looking forward to a solid week with no commitments AND (insert cheesy trumpet fanfare) the release of LOTR ROTK. (If you’re not geek enough to know what those acronyms mean try mousing over them.)

Sunday night, our great friends, the Preeces, invited us to “scream out our stress” from the last few weeks at Six Flags. Okay, we’ll start our relaxing “us” time on Monday.

Monday, we realized we still had yet to go grocery shopping since we’d moved into the new apartment… three weeks ago. We had absolutely no food and were dangerously low on other essentials, like toilet paper. Okay, we’ll start our time of rest on Tuesday.

Monday night (more like Tuesday morning) one of our kids called us. She’s been experiencing huge amounts of stress too and she really needed some quality time. So we decided to take her out for dinner Tuesday night. We ended up at the mall until way past our bed times. Tammy had picked up the ROTK extended DVD at lunch, so we would snuggle up and watch it on Wednesday night. Half a week of rest is better than nothing, right?

This afternoon (Wednesday) another of our kids called. She’s the one we’ve all been stressing about because she is suffering through a deplorable situation at home. Long story short, she needs a ride to church and there’s no way we’re turning that down, even if her mom has dragged her off to some new boyfriend’s house an hour away.

Okay, “us” time is not in the cards for this week. We’re going climbing with the Preeces tomorrow and Friday God only knows what’s in store. Maybe we can sit down and watch the movie together on Saturday. Maybe.

I don’t mean to sound whiney. I am humbled and honored by the fact that God has trusted us with so many responsibilities. I relish the fact that we are doing His work.

But still…. I’d really like to see that movie.

Well, it looks like the time has come for our Ultima Online shard, Montis Draconis. My old buddy Phlegyas (not his real name) who started and hosts the server has finally had enough with all the ex-OSI players whining about how things “should” work. So we’re making a break.

There’s no time table yet, but this will be a dramatic change for the players on our server. I won’t give away all the gory details, in case any of my readers play on MD (or would like to *hint hint*), but I can say that I’m looking for good custom UO maps. Yep, the world is gonna be changin’.

I’m also working on a new look for the site. All I’ve got so far is this banner that we’ll use on the top shard lists to advertise MD. Dai-San (not his real name) is also a GM on the server and will be working on many many custom scripts. Basically we’ve got a lot of work to do before this big event takes place, but it’s going to be a lot of fun.