Month: July 2022

TBT: Big News: TPP is Going to the Dogs

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One year ago today was the eve of my picking up Murphy, my now-nine-year-old female bull terrier.  I had no—well, little—idea of what to expect, but rereading this post, I can see how excited I was.

Murphy has turned out to be the perfect dog for me.  She is house-trained and loving, and pretty much likes to eat and take long naps.  Naturally, we’re a perfect fit for each other.

She is also stubborn—a trait of the breed—and likes to do things her way, but she knows who the boss is, even if the boss is a bit of a sucker and a softy.

It’s been a good year with my old girl, and I’m praying for many more.

With that, here is 21 July 2021’s “Big News: TPP is Going to the Dogs“:

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My Latest Earworm: “Johnny Get Angry”

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I love many kinds of music, but I’m primarily a rocker—I like swaggering, almost comically masculine hard rock.  I want to bang my head, shake my fists, and rock out to thundering power chords and hypnotic bass lines.  When I listen to rock, I feel like a panther taking flight on the wings of a phoenix.

But I also have a softness—a weakness, really—for late Fifties/early Sixties doo-wop and rock ‘n’ roll.  Sometimes—perhaps, embarrassingly often—that love extends to female torch singers (I promise, I’m an allegedly heterosexual man).

Lately, I’ve had the 1962 tune “Johnny Get Angry” stuck in my head—constantly.  Songwriters Hal David and Sherman Edwards wrote this bit of bubblegum pop for Joanie Sommers, and it was a modest hit for the songstress.

That 1962 version is pretty catchy, and the instrumentation is interesting—especially the kazoo chorus when the key changes from D major to E major—but the version that really got me into this song is from the 1990 film Nightbreed, specifically the Clive Barker-approved director’s cut.  Other versions of the film apparently were missing the song—performed by actress Anne Bobby in the role of heroine/love interest Lori Winston—which is a travesty, as it’s really key to highlighting the struggle inherent in Lori and Boone’s relationship in the flick.

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Open Mic Adventures I: Oingo Boingo’s “Just Another Day”

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Now that summertime is here—its fleeting glory passing quickly, like the glorious smell of cooking grease after leaving the fast food district—I’ve been able to get back out to some open mic nights.  Most of these events shut down during The Age of The Virus, but a thirst for easy revenue and cheap entertainment has finally seen many venues bring them back.

During the school year I’m typically so slammed with work, lessons, and the desire to see my dog that I tend to miss out on open mic nights, as they’re almost always on weeknights.  By the time I’m done teaching L’il Billy how to play “Polly Wolly Doodle” on his Fender, I’m ready to go home to enjoy a night of reheated spaghetti and cheap horror flicks.

But with the hot summer nights I arise from my ashes like the Phoenix of Arizona, uttering my wild, bestial cry into the sticky night.

Two songs.  Eighty-eight keys.  Half a chance.

This is Open Mic Adventures.

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Monday Morning Movie Review: Ponty’s Top Ten Worst Films: #3: Titanic (1997)

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We’re finally in the top three, and Ponty is in peak vitriolic form with this one.  I can’t imagine how badly his second and first picks will be burnt after seeing this thorough roasting.

I was in middle school when 1997’s Titanic released into theaters.  It was all the girls talked about for months, including how many times they went to go see this film (a tad disconcerting, considering these were twelve-year olds).  I never saw it, and have only seen snippets and chunks on television since then (to my knowledge, I’ve never watched the entire film, at least not in a single sitting).

This film was so huge—such a phenomenon—that I still remember my older brother proclaiming he would not go see it, just so he could say he hadn’t.  He wasn’t always the wisest seventeen-year old, but he apparently had some foresight about this one (he’s a tenured professor now).

I won’t say more.  Ponty rips into this film like that iceberg into the doomed ship.  I’m not sure which is more devastating:

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Lazy Sunday CLIV: More Movies, Part XIX: Movie Reviews, Part XIX

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Ponty and I are getting down into our final three films for our respective Worst Movies lists, so it seemed like a good weekend to get back to looking back at some other movie reviews.  It wouldn’t surprise me at all if one the films here shows up on Ponty’s list; try to guess which one:

Three quite different films, but all films I’d recommend.  Which one did Ponty hate?  Take a guess in the comments below.

Happy Sunday!

—TPP

Other Lazy Sunday Installments:

SubscribeStar Saturday: John Carpenter

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Today’s post is a SubscribeStar Saturday exclusive.  To read the full post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.

The good folks at Shudder made the very wise decision to upload a bunch of John Carpenter films within the past couple of weeks, including Escape from New York (1981), The Thing (1982), Prince of Darkness (1987), and They Live (1988), the last of which I reviewed way back in the day, before I was writing movie reviews regularly.  Naturally, that’s meant a John Carpenter film festival at the Casa de Portly.

I’m not sure I have a favorite director—like most people, I just know what movies I like, regardless of who directs them—but if I had to pick, it would probably be John Carpenter.  I haven’t come close to seeing all of his films, but I know I like the ones I’ve seen—a lot.  The Thing might just be the best horror film ever made.  Big Trouble in Little China (1986) might be my favorite movie ever.

As such, I’d like to take this edition of SubscribeStar Saturday to celebrate the music and films and John Carpenter.

To read the rest of this post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.

Supporting Friends Friday: Andrea the Illustrator’s Children’s Book

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I should probably not trumpet so triumphantly and assuredly the death or hiatus of any given thing, especially as it pertains to this blog.  I’d decided to give Support Friends Friday a rest for a bit—and I did, for two weeks!—because I was running out of friends to support.  At least, I was running low on new friend-generated content to champion.

Then good old Andrea the Illustrator went and published a book with a bunch of contributors.  It’s called Creative Gems, Volume I, and it’s out in paperback, hardcover, and Kindle editions now.

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TBT: Modern Art and Influence

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It’s that dead time of the year, news-wise, when nothing much exciting is happening—unless, of course, rising food, gas, and home prices are your idea of excitement.  Everyone’s in a summertime mood, and no one wants to worry about the troubles and strife in the world when we can be out swimming and eating ice cream.

Of course, as we’re out there on the beaches, we’re going to see a lot of people, beautiful or otherwise.  We’re all beautifully and wonderfully made in God’s Image, and He Cares about each of us.  There is Beauty and dignity to be found in every human life.

Naturally, some humans are blessed with more Beauty than others.  Nevertheless, I’d like to think that, as a species made in God’s Image, we all instinctively appreciate True Beauty when we see it.  That our ruling class actively supports “art” that is anti-Beauty is another sign that they are illegitimate and, quite frankly, Satanic.

Most modern “art” is not worthy of the moniker.  We all understand that a great deal of its support comes from wealthy doofuses who want to look cool.  Unfortunately, these hipster doofuses—whether intentionally or not—are destroying culture in the process of celebrating “art.”  The destruction of Beauty is a crime against God and civilization; the celebration of ugliness is a sure sign of moral and artistic decay.

Fortunately, there’s still a great deal of Beauty in the world.  We just have to seek it out—prayerfully and intentionally.

With that, here is 28 July 2021’s “Modern Art and Influence“:

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Son of Sonnet: For the Chads

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Well, it finally happened—Son of Sonnet has composed the ultimate ode to Chads.

For the uninitiated, a “Chad” is basically a cool dude who is secure in his masculinity and faith.  At least, that’s the flattering definition; it started out as a pejorative term to describe super handsome dudes who get a lot of babes (known as “Staceys”).  But just like conservatives embraced the “deplorables” smear as a symbol of defiant glory, so the giga-Chads have taken to their name.

This website should prove of use to my older, less “with it” readers—ya dig, cool cats?

Now that I’ve insulted the majority of my readers, back to the poetry:  Son received a request from artist The Republikid to write a poem “For the Chads.”  She’s a pretty dang good artist in her own right, and Son is a big fan and champion of her work.  He’s commissioned her work, and her material looks great!

With that, here is Son of Sonnet’s “For the Chads”:

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Bible Study Update

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For the past month (roughly) I’ve been dedicating my mornings to Bible study.  I became very negligent about spending time in God’s Word over the past school year—and, really, over the past few years—so I have been doing my part to mend my relationship with Him and to immerse myself in His Word.

I’m pleased to report that, so far, I have largely stuck with it, only rarely missing a day’s reading.  I started simply:  reading through Proverbs.  A very common Bible study tactic is to read one chapter of Proverbs a day; in thirty-one days, or one month, you’ll have read the entire book.  I adapted that slightly, sometimes reading a couple of chapters a day.  As June has only thirty days, and I started late, I managed to end the month with Proverbs 31.

After finishing Proverbs, I realized I needed to expand my reading further.  To that end, here is my current reading schedule each morning:

  • Three chapters of Psalms (with 150 chapters, it should take fifty days to get through Psalms, although Psalms 119 might be its own day)
  • One chapter of Proverbs, corresponding with the date (for example, this morning I will read Proverbs 12)
  • One chapter of Isaiah, also corresponding with the date until I get to Isaiah 32 on 1 August 2022, at which point I’ll keep reading one chapter a day until I have completed the book (again, this morning I’ll read Isaiah 12)
  • A New Testament passage from a little “read-the-New-Testament-in-one-year” Bible someone gave me years ago (today’s passage will be Romans 1:1-17)
  • Some days, I do a reading from a little devotional, Our Daily Bread

In total, it takes me anywhere from forty-five minutes to an hour to complete this reading, as I try to read slowly and take notes in the margins (I also start readings with thorough prayer time with God, praying prayers of thanksgivings to Him; praying specific prayer requests; and praying for His Hand in my life and my budding relationship) and if I see connections to other Scriptures—which is happening more and more frequently lately—I will take time to note the parallels and tie them back.

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