for 18 April 2000. Updated every WEEKDAY.
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Call Western Union So right on. I have to send your article to a woman I met recently. I was at a pool party, and the host's neighbor walked over to introduce herself, her cockatiel "just chilling out!" on her shoulder. She sat down and asked me almost immediately what I thought of the Academy Awards. "I thought The Insider was great", I offered. "Oh did you? I didn't see it but I heard it was really depressing. It must have been better than that American Beauty though. I can't believe it won. I mean, what an awful movie." She paused for me to ask "Why?" and then said "I just don't need to see that. I want movies to be relaxing. Boys Don't Cry, with the rapes? I mean you saw everything." She went on and on. "I mean I know people have terrible lives like that--I mean I live in this crazy building! I can hear everything! But I mean I don't go to the movies to watch people commit suicide! I can't wait to see "Return to Me". Right, Butterball? Yeeeess..." The bird must have been agreeing with her. This woman is clearly in the "Last Boy Scout II" camp. She's got enough social conscience in her life, so stop messing with her movies already. Someone hurry up and make Paulie II for this poor woman. mmmmmbuttery <mmmmmbuttery@hotmail.com> Bad news, mmmmmbuttery: they are doing a Paulie sequel... but this time Paulie's a lawyer! His little friends sent him to law school and his starting salary's 150K a year. He's the mouthpiece for a whole group of pirates with scurvy and rickets who are suing their captains and he's not afraid to tell it like it is! But don't worry, Paulie will get those sea dogs to sign depositions before you can say "Ahoy, matey!" Harvey Keitel co-stars as the great-great-great-great-great grandson of the founder of the Dutch East India Company. Harv better watch out if he drops trou in front of Paulie. Ouch! "Buttery," "Butterball"... I'm a little worried about your cholesterol. And be careful at those pool parties. Slotcar Hatebath  Excellent essay. It encourages us to think deeply and to speak honestly. Thank you for your hard work. Dan E Hale <imagery@neumedia.net> I've always said it's not the glitz and glamour that interest me. It's not the money and the fame. No, I don't care about all that stuff. That stuff is written in sand. Here today, sure, but as sure as shooting gone tomorrow. If my message can affect just one person — just one person — then it's all worthwhile. That's all I, or any of us, can hope for. Thank you, Dan, for being that one person — and thank you for daring to speak so honestly yourself. And while I'm at it, what the hell, I'd like to thank the Academy. They're making motions for me to get off... Slotcar Hatebath even though i really enjoyed "Hurricane" and was upset by you slamming such a well filmed movie i have to say the line "As the ideals of the early '60s vaporized into narcissism and random violence" was the best line/object/idea i saw on the internet in my whole afternoon of intensive office browsing. a great great line. thanks. Protector of Mankind <pofm@hotmail.com> Although I wouldn't expect the Protector of Mankind to have particularly good taste in movies, calling The Hurricane well-filmed is even worse than I'd predict. If TV movie-style visuals and a Niagara of clichés constitute the height of film aesthetics for you, Protector, mankind is in deep trouble. Be sure to let me know what you think of 28 Days. But excuse me, I have to go vaporize some more ideals. Slotcar Hatebath I agree. One of the sad things about this movie was that yes, the lawyers struck gold, but what about the cancer victums? The last time I checked, throwing large sums of cash at cancer does not "cure" it. The movie does not tell us about the horrible, painful deaths these semi millionaire lawsuit recipients probably suffered/are suffering. The sad truth is they would have been better off seeking valid alternative treatments (e.g., Dr Richard Shultze, thru Sam Biser, has a wonderful twelve tape set and three volumn manual on how to cure any form of cancer using large amounts of pure natural herbs and herb concetrates via various forms of treatment). The "message" I got from this movie was trust in the Lord (let herbs be as your medicine), not in man and his money. Edward L. Grau <edward.l.grau.@boeing.com> And I couldn't agree with you more. Even people with health insurance are in accord on this one: western medicine is no damn good! Especially HMO's and those discount dentists. And why are glasses frames so damned expensive now? Is there an herbal treatment for far-sightedness? Can you make your own glasses at home, or are we to be forever in the grip of Italian designers, if not thrift stores? What does the Lion's Club think about this? I'm picturing a movie with Richard Gere as a crusading ophthalmologist and Lion's Club member who's not gonna give in to those people. In fact, I heard he read a script like that, but he'd never seen the word "ophthalmologist" written down before, so he got scared and tossed it aside after he read the first scene. I was going to include a section on herb-based cancer treatments in my message movie piece, but unfortunately it got squeezed out by my discussion of Julia Roberts's underwear. Unfair! Slotcar Hatebath Slotcar Your discussion of Stanley Kramer's ups and downs with the Message Movie could have mentioned some of his earlier works. Not because it would have been relevant, but because it's fun to mention "The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T" wherever possible. Jim Burrill <get2jim@hotmail.com> If only The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. hadn't been produced by Kramer, maybe the message wouldn't have gotten in the way so much and turned Seuss's wild fantasy so morose. At least our Stanley had the sense not to direct it himself. Too bad he didn't let the good Doctor handle the direction — God forbid Kramer would ever take a real chance — instead of hiring Roy Rowland. As usual, praise be to Hans Conried. (1953 was a big Conried year; he also starred in Arch Oboler's The Twonky, a movie about a man whose TV takes over his life. Know anyone who can send me a tape? I've wanted to see it for a long time and haven't been able to track it down.) Slotcar Hatebath Skin Cancer Skins and themes are only a "usability nightmare" if you meet one (or both) of the following requirements: 1.. You are too stupid to figure out how they work. 2.. You are too stupid to realize that you don't have to use them. <redmist@pacbell.net> What if you're too stupid to realize that you have to use them in Netscape 6? What if you can't use the standard interface? What then? "Usability nightmare." Greg Knauss Mr. Knauss, yer off-base on a few issues. First, the case is overstated. A button is a button. The buttons in Mozilla M14 look like buttons. It's not rocket science to interpret them. Second, programs that use skins are generally used by people who are comfortable with computers and aren't intimidated by a slightly unfamiliar interface. In fact, they're bored stiff by having to stare at the same rectangular dull gray bevel-edged button a thousand times every day of their lives. It may take a little longer to learn an interesting interface than a boring one, but once the learning curve is done, it's *done*. If you're going to use the program every day for a year, the drawbacks of an interesting interface will vanish after the first couple of days. You're choosing between slight inconvenience up front, or a daily dose of boredom for the life of the software. Familiarity breeds contempt. You've missed the story here entirely. Once the novelty of mere functionality wears off, people want something to keep them interested. There are a million different kinds of toasters and telephones out there, all with substantially identical features. The real decision is, "what do I want to have to look at every morning?" Skins may not be suitable for somebody who's never used a computer before, but the pool of people who have never used a computer before is shrinking anyway. Third, QuickTime 4 may well be unusable, but by God it's got some wicked cool widgets! Fourth: ". . . chucking the whole idea for something "better" (not to mention more convenient for programmers). . ." "More convenient for programmers" my ass! Writing a re-skinnable GUI is at least an order of magnitude more of a hassle than using an existing widget set. That's why that kind of GUI is still so rare on anything that has a ship date. Don't be ridiculous. 80md <eightymd@hotmail.com> Thanks for writing, md, but I don't think that "Well, gosh, I'm sure bored with gray" is a reason to undermine everything that the common look-and-feel has accomplished. If a button is a button is a button, why are so many websites so hard to use? Why is switching word processors an exercise in frustration? Familiarity breeds comfort, md. And comfort is something that most people sorely lack around computers. And as for XUL making things easier for the programmers, I didn't mean its initial implementation. That's quite a feat. I meant the ongoing maintenance of the project. One of the stated goals of XPFE (Mozilla's cross-platform front-end) was to adopt an OS-independent look and feel to make maintaining the product easier. That, I think, is a cop out. I want native controls (no matter what OS I'm on) and because the Mozila programmers are more interested in making their lives easier than pleasing me, I can't have them. Greg Knauss "No two Linux programs look the same anyway." Ahaha hahah ah ahah! Oh dear, oh dear. Ever heard of Gtk? Qt? They're totally taking the piss out of you at LT. And rightly so :) Mike Saunders <mike@aster.fsnet.co.uk> Yeah, I've heard of 'em. Along with Xt and Xaw and Motif and Lesstif and KDE and... Now which, exactly, is the Linux "standard Interface?" Y'know, you Linux zealots would be a lot more fun if you could, even just for a moment, consider that your OS isn't perfect. I like it, too, y'know — and I'm willing to bet that I've been running it a lot longer than you. But it's not perfect. So cope. Greg Knauss Telling Baby No I love it. I am one of those Baby Boomers. I survive by employing the "Me Inc." strategy when it comes to the work world. I have one core part-time job with great benefits. I switch hats and work other part-time jobs. If my second part-time job does not work out (usually it's one of those "flexible hours and great place to work jobs") I'm out of there. As long as I can get out of bed I will always have some sort of part-time job. I live modestly. I am a single Dad with a teenage daughter. I am home at different times of the day. I used to work from dark to dark. Who needs that. I dumped my Costco membership. Just more stuff. I love it! Don't mess with me. SWWM. You won't have a problem with me pally, just so long as you register all your gun purchases. I have to say though, you probably have come across a good way to deal with corporate job situations. I think the angriest people are the ones who sign on to companies and pin all their hopes and dreams on them, only to get frustrated when the machine doesn't pay off. With your way, you've got more control day to day than most people. Glad you liked the comic, Bert Admit it. You're jealous about sex and the drugs, right? <scarrif@deltanet.com> No, Larry, it's the herpes and short term memory loss that's got me jonesing. No, there's lots of sex and drugs out there - don't you old timers read MAXIM? Disco Rules, Bert This is awesome. It reminds of my father in law's company. I work for MCIWorldCom Network and Data Solutions. I would be interested in how your company is structured. Ken Minton <kenneth.minton@wcom.com> SUCK is structured on the policy of Might Makes Right and If You Don't Like It, Jack, There's Always Salon. It's pretty tough around here. SUCK's idea of a health plan is If You're Not Healthy, Plan to Look For a Job. You know what I'm saying? It's a long work week, too. As I was told, "Bert, if you don't want to work on Saturday, don't plan on coming in on Sunday." If you really want to know about SUCK, write Tim Cavanaugh (tim@suck.com), cause my whole work experience here is structured all around him. Bert Man, you made my day. Used to work at this strange job, editing the transcripts for National Public Radio on the far outskirts of the DC metro area. My average transcriber's age was 45. At one point, I had four lawyers working for me. Seething mass, dude, seething mass. Tee, hee, hee. <D.leach@elsevier.com> Wow, Talk about your front line veterans! As John McCain would say, "Thank you for serving, sir." Glad you liked the strip. I've had some angry boomers writing in and some letters like yours. One man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist, I guess. The Ageist of Aquarius, Bert Subject: yeah, well, ur site name pretty much sez it all u suck... i see, so baby boomers are stupid old hippies and disgruntled workers..and teenagers are gun toting psychopaths..... but not the gen-x'rs .... hell no.. u guys are level headed, completely sensible, well adjusted young adults... bite me... i dont hav anything to learn from the generation that made bands like 'poison' and 'motely crue' and 'ratt' and 'cinderella' rich... not from people that would get all teary over 'power ballads'... such crap... ur a cookie cutter generation... no substance.. all hype... even ur drugs are lame copies of the real stuff.... suck.com is right... u suck... Trip <TripTampa@aol.com> Cinderella? Ratt? Crue? Nobody was more disgusted than me to see those baby boomer metal acts conning decent kids out of their cash. Well "Trip," sorry you weren't into "Telling Baby 'No'". I tried to say nice things about Carly Simon and Bill Clinton, but you can't please everybody. I'm just doing it for the kids, Bert Blecht |
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