Revving Up the Hate Engine

OK, maybe hate is a little bit strong. But the Sadly Unimpressed Engine just doesn't have the same ring. At any rate, if you want to make absolutely sure that I will not share your high opinion of something the easiest way to go about this is simply to extol the virtues of this hypothetical thing. Allow me to illustrate this point with several examples pulled from ancient through recent history.

Clerks - Back in the college years I remember coming back to school after a semester of working at a co-op job to roommates who had apparently each experienced multiple, hands-free orgasms while watching Kevin Smith's Clerks. They couldn't stop talking about how freaking awesome this movie was and how it would simply blow my mind. (Or other regions as I have already mentioned.) So I was, needless to say, somewhat let down when I saw the film the next weekend. (For this I wasted two hours? Two hours that I could have used to fritter away on some other pointless task?) Did not like. The movie Kids also falls into the category as the circumstances were identical. (May have even been the same semester?)

World War Z - I'm not a zombie aficionado, and that may have something to do with my response to this book. Regardless, I avoided it for some time simply because I was worried that I might not like it. (Also because despite my non zombie fan status I was attempting at the time to work on some zombie stuff and didn't want it tainted (or worse find that it was redundant.) At any rate, I did finally read it and was it ever a disappointment? Yes. Yes it was. I still haven't told TacoP. Hi, TacoP!

Watchmen - I think in this case that I must have read the wrong comic books. Seriously, I'm the only person in the world who doesn't think this is the best comic series EVAR. I'll probably go see the movie, though. Maybe it will somehow reach through my Super Cynical Mind Shield power. Probably not. Have to admit that I find the commercials pretty annoying.

So the upshot is that the best way to get me to like something is to not tell me that it is any good before I go to see it. Otherwise you should get ready for me to be a big fat wet blanket after I have seen/read/wahtevered the work in question. Also note that I will, in return, rarely speak highly of works that I like in non subjective/personal terms. Because I want you to like it!

Not Made Up

So the Grimmlet and I are eating dinner the other night when she says this. I should point out that she had just received an award for reading which is why we were eating such fare.

Grimmlet: "Daddy, why do you have a sad meal?"
Me: "Bwuh?"
Grimmlet: "Well, I have a happy meal with a toy, and yours didn't come with a toy."

It is all true. My meal didn't come with a toy. Of course, all I got was a McChicken sandwich. Not a meal at all really. But I was happy to stop eating after I finished it. (Although later I did eat something else to wash the taste out of my mouth.)