Funny Games

Okay, so I watched the movie Funny Games last night. I would say that I liked it a lot, but I'm not really sure what it was. The story unfolds seemingly straightforward, but during the film I noticed at least three asides, which on the one hand made me feel better about laughing during parts that people probably just shouldn't laugh at, and on the other hand made me question the theme. Tim Roth and Naomi Watts were in their "A" game as usual, and the writing/direction was consistent and fresh. Apparently it is a remake of the director's own film from 1997. I'm assuming it was a foreign-language film. Otherwise the guy's seriously out of ideas. I recommend watching it (without the kids), and then I'd like to hear some of your thoughts on it. Oh, come to think of it, I bet it was a German film. You'll understand that if you watch German movies.

Homeownership...

My companion, Alex, and I have been living in our house for about nine years(?) now. We decided to go ahead and buy the place this year, mostly because we could get a mortgage for about the same price as our rent. I'll leave out the boring details, but financially it was a good move. We did this just a couple of months ago. In fact, we haven't even made our second payment yet! One of the first things we decided to do was to get cable hookup. We needed to have the internet on our home computer, so we just bought the bundle. The house has never had cable put in it, so the installer had to do the whole shebang. While doing it, he put one of his legs through the ceiling in our office. The company he works for promptly sent someone out to repair the ceiling, and they did a good job with it, so really besides the cleanup after the initial break, it wasn't a big deal. Well, about a week and a half ago, I noticed water dripping from our a/c vent in the bathroom. Before two days had past, a good portion of the ceiling in there was wet, dripping, and stained. To make a long story short, we had to have our a/c unit replaced this past week. The bathroom ceiling now needs to be replaced too. Now, it's been a long time since last I was a homeowner, and I remember the cost and work that can be involved with it, but two months/two ceilings is getting a bit ridiculous. This certainly has the potential to be a cumbersome adventure. I feel like the warranty just ran out on my car!

Welcome!

Hello, welcome to Random Heresy! I think that if I were to have lived a few hundred years ago, I probably would have been burned at the stake for heresy (thus, the name). I really don't try to be evangelical with my thoughts, but I'm rather forthright with my opinions, which may not be the same from one day to the next. I'm anti-religious. I'm reasonably anti-government. I'm philosophically against the monetary systems of the world. I think that if someone isn't upset by what you say, you probably aren't saying anything. I don't condone combativeness, but I think that honest conversation without the burdens of political correctness is the only hope we have of saying something meaningful through this limited tool we call language. I think that the words "believe" and "faith" and "truth" should be approached cautiously, for all three represent ideas that have already died. I love music. It communicates on a primal, pre-language level, as do the other non-verbal arts. I'm also a movie and book freak. I have a band called "The Book Of Lies". You can check us out at www.myspace.com/thebookoflies . Let's have some fun with this. -rick "The Heretic"