How I Learned About Tax

When I was seven I lived with my friends family for two weeks. I still have no idea why this happened. When ever I think about why it happened, my mind only goes to one thing. Where were my brothers during those two weeks? Were they at a friends house? Were they at home? They would have been 13 and 15 respectively at the time. I suppose that is old enough for them to stay at home by themselves, but young enough that they couldn't be trusted to watch me.

They proved they couldn't watch me when I was four. I wanted some ice cream. They were probably having ice cream. I never would have thought of having ice cream on my own. I couldn't have scooped it either. I was a weak child.

The ice cream was too cold. It needed warmed up. I put it in the microwave. It was an old fashioned microwave. No buttons. Just some dials that you turned. I didn't know how the thing worked. I just turned the dial all the way.

My ice cream cooked in that microwave for 35 minutes. That's how far the dial went. The ice cream was now too hot. It was also just a puddle. I did the only thing I knew how to do as a kid. I cried, a lot. My brothers wouldn't scoop me more ice cream. I already had ice cream that I had to eat. Eventually, I ate the melted ice cream. Maybe that's why I don't like soup.

Maybe my brothers weren't home alone. It could have been that I just had to leave the house for two weeks. Either way, I'm fairly certain that they were at home for those two weeks. If they were to stay somewhere else, it would have been with the same family I stayed with. My whole family and my friend's whole family were best friends.

Whatever the reason was, it happened. Two things happened during the time that I stayed at my friends house. That I remember at least. It was two weeks. I'm sure more than two things happened.

The first is that I went to church with them. This was years before my family went to church with any kind of regularity. I didn't know anything about church. It got worse because my friend was born in 1984. I was born in 1985. This meant that the Sunday School class he was in, was one class higher than the class I should have been in. I would have been the dumb kid in my Sunday School class. I shouldn't have been skipped ahead like this. Surely they wouldn't ask me questions. I shouldn't of been in this class. They'd realize that and not ask me questions about religion.

I was the first one asked to answer a question. I didn't know anything about religion. Not a good excuse. I'm sure none of the kids in that class actually knew anything about religion. I answered the question the only way I knew how to. I cried, a lot. It was embarrassing. This just wasn't a bunch of random kids and my friend that I was crying in front of. I knew all the other kids from school. For some reason this incident never got brought up again. I'd still be mentioning it, had it have been someone else that cried.

The second thing I remember about those two weeks is the time we went to the mall. They had a lot of kids. I was like the seventh or eighth wheel. All of the kids were given a dollar to spend at the mall. I got one of those dollars. This was awesome. My mom never gave me a dollar when I went to the mall with her. I'd usually just say 'I want that' and she'd get it. I never bothered to look at the price. I was probably asking for stuff that costed way less than a dollar. I was going to make it rain with this dollar.

The six of us kids all got a dollar. We were all going to make it rain in that mall. That mall was going to remember us. We all went separate ways. We had different ideas on how to make it rain.

I made it rain in Toys 'R Us. I was into baseball and basketball cards as a kid. What kid wasn't? I'm told some of those cards are worth money now. Maybe there are. I don't have the time to find out. Then find some sucker that will buy them.

I found a pack that was only a dollar. Just my luck. I had a dollar. For some reason, they keep the dollar pack of cards behind glass. I had to ask the grown man behind the counter to grab it for me. In reality, it was probably a 16-year-old kid. But to me, he was a fully grown adult with a great life. His future, and his families future, was secure with his job at Toys 'R Us.

He rang up my dollar pack of cards. Then he asked me for one dollar and six cents. One dollar and six cents? What was this? I only had a dollar. I did what I always did in these situations. I cried, a lot. At least I wasn't crying in front of my friend this time. He was somewhere else in the mall, making it rain.

In fact, I was the only one in the Toys 'R Us. Except for the grown adult, supporting his family of four with his job at Toys 'R Us, behind the counter. The fact that there was only one customer in the Toys 'R Us and he only had a dollar to spend, probably explains why Toys 'R Us left that mall a year later.

The wealthy man behind the counter tried to explain something to me about tax. That's why my dollar pack of cards was one dollar and six cents. How was I supposed to know what tax was? The paper sign had a one on it. That's how much I had. I should be able to have my pack of cards. Him trying to explain to me how tax worked only made my cry harder.

I got my pack of cards. The millionaire behind the counter took care of the six cents. A drop in the bucket for him.

There was only four cards in the pack. I had never seen this before. The packs my mom bought me always had at least ten. I felt like I had been taken. Especially since my friend had gotten some Gobstoppers with his dollar. That box had at least 20 Gobstoppers in it. It wasn't fair. He was more experienced than me. This obviously wasn't the first dollar he had spent. I was a rookie when it came to the spending a dollar game.

I did learn one thing about money that day though. The value of crying is six cents.

Marty Breaks Down Prodigal Sons

Paul McKerrow was born in a small town in Montana. He was voted 'best looking' and 'most likely to succeed'. The star quarterback, the star basketball player, valedictorian and a ladies man. Paul McKerrow had it all. Upon graduating, he went to the University of California, Berkley.

Paul McKerrow never went back to Montana. He never will, because Paul McKerrow is now Kimberly Reed. It's been 20 years since Kimberly, then Paul, left Montana and for her 20th high school reunion, Kimberly decides to go back and make a documentary.

Sounds like a pretty good story line for a documentary. Only that's not the most compelling thing about this documentary. It's barely a side story. The star of this documentary is Kimberly's brother, Marc McKerrow.

The story starts at the high school reunion. Kimberly is received well at the reunion. It's at the reunion that we are introduced to Marc. Marc is adopted and was only a grade ahead of Kimberly in high school. So it isn't weird for him to be at the reunion. He is weird though. We find that out when he just randomly tells people about having to file for bankruptcy.

Marc was always in Paul's shadow in high school. He wasn't the sports star and he certainly wasn't the popular one. He was just Paul's brother.

Marc suffered severe brain damage in a car crash at the age of 21.

The brain damage left him mentally incapacitated. He became prone to seizures. He'd frequently succumb to violent fits of rage. We first see one of these hilarious fits of rage when he explains his crash and what it did to him. Complete with breaking a glass picture frame.

It's then that we meet Todd McKerrow. The youngest of the McKerrow kids. It's unclear as to why he is ever in the documentary. He isn't really needed. He's doesn't really communicate with family anymore. I think he is just thrown into the documentary because it's somewhat interesting that he is gay. He does show up at the family Christmas gathering. Where he plays a key role in the greatest scene in cinema history. His appearance at the family event seems to be more for sake of the documentary than anything. I certainly don't think it's because he likes his family

The McKerrow family consists of Kimberly, who was born Paul. Todd, the least interesting of the family as he is just gay. Then we have Marc. Who is severely developmentally challenged and frequently violent. Quite the family

The documentary jumps around a lot. It's not a hinderance though. Each time it does jump, it gets more interesting.

It's at this point that we, and Marc, learn about Marc's biological family. He does get to see his mom. He got to go to her funeral. It's only shortly after her death that Marc learns the identity of his mom.

It's Rebecca Welles. The daughter of Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth. Marc's birth was a secret. Something that was quite common back then with families or prominence. Orson never knew of his grandson. It's likely Rita didn't know about Marc either.

Marc's grandparents are the great Rita Hayworth and Orson Welles. Learning that Marc exists, the lover of Orson Welles at the time of his death, Oja Kodar, wants to meet him.

The documentary then moves to Croatia. Where Marc meets the lover of Orson Welles for the last 20 years of his life. The only interesting things that come out of this are that we learn that Marc is married and has a daughter  A fact that is only briefly brought up again. I feel like Kimberly should have spent more time on Marc's family. Marc also shows a picture that makes Kimberly uncomfortable in Croatia. It's of himself, Todd and Paul as young boys.

Kimberly is embarrassed by the picture. Being that she is now standing in front of these people as a woman. She confronts Marc about this. The scene is a little awkward, since Kimberly is in a swimsuit as the argument takes place. The argument ends with Kimberly saying how good Marc's shirt makes him look.

This is when the documentary briefly gets boring. It start to focus too much on Kimberly. She goes to San Francisco. Where we see the apartment she rented as a male. When she moved out of the apartment, she was a female.

After the brief foray into boredom, we get back to the good stuff. Kimberly goes to Spokane to see Marc and his family. She also plans on driving a truck, that Marc has, back to Montana. The truck mention seems pointless at first. It pays off in the end though.

Kimberly wants to drive the truck back in the morning. The gas gauge is broken. It's been broken for years, but Marc decides he wants it fixed right now. Hilarity ensues.

Marc gets some choice words in and some good hits, but Kimberly gets the last laugh. She leaves with the truck.

We then hear a phone message from Marc, apologizing for reacting in such a way about a stupid truck.

Things fade to black. That's when it happens. The greatest scene in cinema history. I'm not even going to say anything about it. It's that great.

The cops come after that. As far as I'm concerned, the documentary is over after that.

To not leave you hanging though, I'll continue. He threatened everyone with a kitchen knife and is taken to jail.

The documentary ends with Marc going to several hospitals and having many psychiatric evaluations.

Marc McKerrow died in 2010. Shortly after Kimberly appeared on Oprah for her documentary.

One is the loneliest number, 28 is the scariest

I just agree with people when they say I moved to New York City to chase the dream, when in reality, I did it to run towards my fear.

In 2007, I took a beginning acting class at Utah State University. I was below a beginner. There were maybe three people in there that had any real acting skills. Not to say that no one else had any potential. At this point, even I could probably do a decent acting job. There was only about 15 people in the class. None of us knew each other, except for the three with real acting skills. I assume it's because they had other acting type classes together. It wasn't like there were best friends.

I never would have hung out with any of these people before the class. I never did after the class. During the class, I only hung out with any of them once. On the last day of class, half of us went to Olive Garden. To this day, it's one of the best times I've had. I kept in brief contact with one girl from the class. But that died out after a few years. Other than having two or three people from the class as Facebook friends, I've had no contact with anyone in that class for years. Hell, I don't even know most of their names anymore, just personal details. Even with that, I'll never forget any of them and in a way, they know me better than anyone else.

As I look back, there wasn't really much acting or learning about acting taking place. It was really just group therapy. Which I've since learned, is fairly common for acting classes.

I think it was the second week of class. We were each taking turns saying the thing in life that scares us the most. No one was taking it seriously. Everyone just said the stock scary things: snakes, spiders, ghosts, heights etc... I don't even remember what I said.

After we all gave lame answers, the teacher expressed his disappointment. He wasn't mad, just disappointed. That's when the weirdest, most misfit of us started speaking. Which is saying a lot. We were a class of misfits. We were all such misfits, that none of us fit in with each other.

I don't remember what he said, or maybe I just don't think you should know, but there was a lot of crying. From him and everyone else in the class. One by one, everyone re-answered the question of what scared them the most. Some were funny, some were tear jerkers and some were in between. But there was real emotion behind all of them. Class went about 30 minutes longer than scheduled that day. No one cared. I doubt anyone even noticed. We all sat there as everyone said the thing they fear most and once we were done, we continued to sit. Mostly in silence.

I took my turn somewhere in there. It was sometime in high school when I really started to think about the rest of my life. What would my life be like when i was older? What would it look like? Being a teenager, I had all kinds of fantasies. Some realistic, some outlandish. But in thinking out the rest of my life, all of the possibilities had one thing in common. Not one of them had me being older than 28.

I thought nothing of it at the time. I had more than 10 years until I turned 28. But as I finished high school, I did start to notice it. Why was I never over 28 when I pictured myself? Even in my outlandish dreams about my life, like being a pro-athlete, I was still never over 28.

I thought about it a lot after I realized it. It started to gnaw at me. By the time I took that acting class, I had convinced myself that the reason was because I wasn't going to live past then. I was 22, and the only question I had about it, was whether I'd die at 28 or if I'd get to live until 29.

My fear didn't end when I told the class about it. They continued for quite some time. Telling people didn't dispel the fear, but it did help me feel like I could tell these people anything else. Things that helped me in other ways. It helped me open up a little bit in my acting. Not saying that it still was atrocious.

It was about that time that I was taking the idea of doing stand-up comedy seriously. That's partly why I took the class. I figured it would help in some small way. Little did I know how big of a help it would be.

I didn't actually step on a comedy stage until late 2009. Two years after the class. But I can say with certainty, I never would have gotten on stage if it weren't for that class. The class helped me open up a bit.

Two years into being a stand-up, things were going well and I started to think about the future. That's when I noticed something.  I was picturing myself past the age of 28. I could see myself doing stand-up at 30, 40, 50, 60...

That's it though. I still couldn't see myself doing anything else. It's still that way. Everything I see me doing past the age of 28 is still me on stage. Sometimes I'm not on stage. I'm sitting at a table, just talking with other comics. But that's it. I still haven't been able to see myself doing something not comedy related.

I see no girlfriends, wife, kids or different job. Maybe they'll come. But I can't envision it.

That's why I moved. Things were good for me in Salt Lake. Really good. I probably would have eventually  made something of myself in comedy had I stayed there. But I can't wait. I left for New York to speed up the process. Even if it essentially means starting over at first. And likely, never amounting to anything.

I can't take the slow road. I can't take the chance that maybe 28 is it. Because in my mind, it is. Until I turn 29, I'll always believe that. Comedy is the one thing that gives me hope, that maybe it isn't.

Still Standing There

This makes a little more sense if you read this one too, Goodbye.  

I have a cabin at Bear Lake. A cabin where I can do whatever I want. Go whenever I want and take whomever I want.  

It’s weird looking back. All the parties there, the late nights, blue-darts, crazy hook-ups, the eerie sounds at night, the people showing up that no one knew, the cold nights, the hot nights, the friends, the babes, the days on the lake and did I mention the crazy hook-ups? It’s weird looking back on all of that now. Because none of it ever happened.  

I don’t even know where the cabin is. I don’t want to.  

I only have one image of the cabin in my head. That’s of it sitting on a trailer, ready to be moved.  

I barely remember the grounds where the cabin now sits. An area surrounded by trees, an area with no trees, just big enough for a cabin to sit. Standing in the treeless patch you had a clear view of the stunning blue water of Bear Lake. That’s all I remember of it.  

I never saw that cabin come off that trailer. I know it now sits in that treeless patch facing the blue waters of Bear Lake, but I can’t go back there. I don’t know where it is. I don’t want to know.  

It’s been 18 years since I last saw that cabin sitting on the trailer. It’s the only image of the cabin I have and it’s one to many. I don’t want any images of that cabin in my head. I have a hard time just going back to Bear Lake; I could never look at that cabin again.  

When I said goodbye two years ago, I thought it would be easier. I knew I could never go to Bear Lake without the memories coming back. But I thought I could at least go to Bear Lake without the tears.  

I was wrong, as my latest trip to Bear Lake showed. The tears still follow. I was also wrong in not wanting them to follow, or thinking they wouldn’t follow just because I said goodbye.  

I’m still standing there. Standing near the lake, the cabin on the trailer in front of me. A part of me will always just be standing at Bear Lake. Saying goodbye didn’t change that. I realize that now. Now, I’m glad a part of me is still standing there. Standing there helps me remember.  

Some things should always bring tears to your eyes.  

I used to try and stall the tears that followed me to Bear Lake. I’d try to keep myself occupied. Keep my mind on other things. But they’d always come. Whether they came at the lake when I’d have a moment to myself or when I’d get back home, the tears would always come.  

I used to think the day would come when the tears would stop following me to Bear Lake. But now, 18 years later, I don’t think they are going to. The tears still follow me to Bear Lake and I don’t want the day to come when they don’t.

Marty's Take On Batman

People always obsess over the new. It's the ADD society we live in. Whatever is the latest, is the coolest. Remember Pogs? Remember when people first learned about 'Family Guy'? It's still just as funny. What about 'The Office'. Is it really not as good as it used to be or is it just not new? How about 98% of the crap on the radio? Seems good for the first few months right? None of it holds up though. I seem to remember a little thing called "I'm Rick James bitch". How come no one says that anymore? It's not new and fresh anymore. 

Sure, the cool stuff holds up. It does come back down to earth though. Michael Jackson, he was huge in the 80's. He could do whatever he wanted and he did. Now, he's not so cool. His songs are still good though. No matter how many kids he serves Jesus Juice to. Hell, if it were possible, I would have had sex with my TiVo when I first got it. But eight years later, I'd probably stop after a little making out. 

Sure Batman was good, but it wasn't 'freak out' good. Most people would have sex with the movie if they could. I wouldn't. I'd probably just undress it with my eyes a little. I'd stop before I got the movie naked. Weird birth marks would start to be seen as articles of clothing come off. Those weird birth marks are the defects in the movie. And there are quite a few. 

Give it time, and Batman hoopla will die down. People won't want to have sex with it anymore. They'll just want to make out with it a little. As for me, I'll finally be able to act as if it never existed. I don't mind birth marks, but when the movie is covered in them, we have a problem. 

Yeah, it's probably going to go down as the Best Comic book movie ever. But is that really any kind of accomplishment? Sure the movie was good, but it isn't really worth talking about in my mind. I only bring it up to bring some of you back down to earth. It's just not that good. 

Problem one and as many other problems I feel like mentioning at this point. It's 2 1/2 freaking hours long. It doesn't need to be. I seriously felt like I watched 2 movies after seeing it. It's not the fact that it was long that makes it seem like 2 movies in one. The whole Two-Face thing, that's it's own movie. As it is, it seems forced in there. It's like they had a circle, but the only hole they could find was a square. Sure, the circle went into the square whole eventually, but it left the circle deformed. 

Take out the last half hour of the movie and no one complains. In fact, the movie is better if you do that. 

Four times, I thought the movie was over. Four times, I was wrong. The first time I was fine with it. The second, third and fourth times, I was pissed. It just kept dragging on and on. And when it finally did end, it was bout 'effing time. 

No one understands what's really happening. Even after multiple viewings people are still confused. I've heard countless people say, "I didn't really know what was going on, so I just started watching it for the cool stuff. Then I went again." 

They still don't get it after that. I'm all for having stuff in a movie that you won't really get in one viewing. That's part of what makes movies good, rewatchability. But if I have to watch a movie again to understand the main plot of what's going on, not only am I not going to do it, doing so would be retarded. If you didn't get it the first, second or third time, why the hell would you know what's going on the next time?

The plot problem could probably be fixed by not trying to jam two stories into one. The way it is though, you're not sure what stuff goes with what story line. Like when they randomly just throw in foreshadowing for second contrived story that deserves it's own movie. It's confusing. 

The movie is visually stunning, I'll give it that. I did see it in Imax though, so maybe that clouds my judgement a little. If I want something visually stunning, I'll just watch Planet Earth. At least I can understand Planet Earth. Like the time that crazy bird just danced around so he could get some chicks. I knew exactly what was going on. Not to mention it was hilarious. Or better yet I'll just walk outside if I want something visually stunning. 

The movie also seems to suffer from what I call the Indiana Jones problem. It's the 'we havnen't blown enough stuff up or had enough people running around for no real reason yet' problem. Compared to Indiana Jones, Batman barely suffers from it. But there is still a lot of stuff that just happens just because they can do it. 

Those are just a few of the problems with the movie. It's not like they are huge problems. The movie is still a 7.5 or maybe an 8 tops. My biggest problem with the movie is that people have blown it out of proportion and given it like a 12. 

Another thing. 

Does anyone realize that per minute, the movie costed 1.2 million? 152 minutes of movie, compared to a budget in the area of 180 million. A figure that is made even more ridiculous when you think about the fact that at least 30 minutes of the movie could have been cut out, without ruining anything. As I've mentioned before, the movie would be made better if certain crap was taken out. They could have taken the 30 million plus saved and put it towards the sequel. 

Repost: Ledge the Legend

For some reason, I have no clue why, Ledge the Legend is back in the news. I've decided to repost what I wrote immediately following his death. Keep in mind, this was written less than 24 hours after his death, so some of the information is faulty. But it's the only information they had at the time. I did reread it and I would like to add a couple of things. I'll add the new stuff in Italics. 

The edit at the very end of the note, is an edit I did a day after the original post.



The next Matt Damon.

A young Marlon Brando. 

Those words have been used to describe one man. He was more than a man. He was a living legend. Now he's a dead legend. 

As many of you probably already know, actor extraordinaire Heath Ledger died yesterday. Taken from us to soon. He had so much more to do in his life. Like act in some more movies. Don't worry though, he's got one more move left in him. He'll be in the new Batman movie. Does anyone know when the Batman movie is coming out? I haven't heard anything. I kind of want to see it, but it's like they ran out of money for promoting the movie. I heard it was supposed to out this summer, but I haven't heard anything about it yet.

He was also in the middle of filming some other movie. They will probably just re-cast his role, but here is what they should do. It's called 'The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus'. Not to be confused with 'Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium', which came out last year. 

They have to re-cast his role. Someone has to play it. But the stuff Heath has already filmed, keep it in the movie. It would be a great homage. And since they film movies out of order it would also be hilarious. You'd get Heath in one scene and then some other dude in the next. I recommend getting Zac Efron. Turns out this is exactly what they are doing, at least as far as I understand, that is what they are doing. Three fourths or so of the movie had been filmed at the time of his death, so a lot of it will be him. Sadly, when they re-casted, they didn't choose Zac Efron. They did do something better though. They chose multiple people. Johnny Depp, Colin Ferrel and Jude Law were all re-cast. This is going to be great.

Heath Andrew Ledger, sometimes he'd go by Heathcliff. You gotta love that. He was destined for stardom. He never took an acting class and he never graduated high school. He was just a natural. Acted on instincts is how he put it.

He started in Australia. He played a gay olympic hopeful. Cyclist I think it was. Then he comes to America and he pretty much immediately gets a role in 10 Things I Hate About You. A movie that had a sweet high school in it. 

I think he actually got his first american role in The Patriot. 10 Things I Hate About You was just released first. He was discovered by Mel Gibson. Mel freaking Gibson.

He then went on to make 3 million for his role in A Knight's Tale. A movie that I get confused with First Knight. I don't remember which one is which. I still get them confused to this day. It used to piss me off, but now I like that I can't keep them straight. Heath Ledger's legend will always live on in my mind if I keep confusing the two movies. 

He then went on to do Monster's Ball. A movie made famous by Halle Berry's boobs. 

He didn't really do any movies of consequence again until 2005, when he was in The Brothers Grimm. 

He was also nominated for for an Oscar in 2005. It was for his role in some western. At least I think it was western. I saw a preview for the movie once and he was wearing a cowboy hat, so I assume it was a western. He had this real rough and tough sidekick in it played by Jake Gyllenhaal. I bet they went around raising some hell in that movie. Shooting people up. Stuff like that. 

He lost the Oscar though. Philip Seymour Hoffman won for his role in Capote. That was a movie I did see. It was good. A brilliant acting job by Hoffman. I can see why Heath lost. Although they should probably go back in time and take the Oscar from Hoffman and give it to Heath. It would be a way of paying respect to The Ledge. Hoffman will have more opportunities to win an Oscar. Ledger won't have any more, he's dead and he sure won't get one for a stupid Batman movie. 

Why didn't people call Heath Ledger The Ledge? They should have. I'm gonna start calling him Ledge the Legend. 

But just like Ledge the Legend lost his Oscar, he's now lost his life. The good news is we still have one more blockbuster coming from Ledge the Legend. The Dark Knight should be out sometime this summer. The bad news is that people are saying his portrayal of The Joker isn't as good as previous actors who played the same role. I find this hard to believe. Ledge the Legend is a legend. He doesn't do bad acting. 

(I just realized that I am now going to get First Knight, A Knight's Tale and The Dark Knight all confused with each other. It's even going to be more confusing than before. Especially since Ledge the Legend is in two of them. Then again, Ledge the Legend will live on in my mind forever, so that is good.)

Perhaps Ledger's greatest role came in bagging an Olsen twin. (Although if he had done this 5 years earlier he would have been a god in the eyes of many. He was a little late on the Olsen twin train. But still, it was an Olsen twin. A freaking Olsen twin.) The problem with that movie is that the ending wasn't very good. It just ended with him dying naked on Mary-Kates bed, a bottle of sleeping pills nearby.

May Heath 'The Legend' Ledger live on forever in our hearts.


*edit*

Turns out it wasn't Mary-Kates apartment he was found in. That was just some bad snap judgment journalism from someone. That rumor is all but dead now. But he could have bagged an Olsen twin had he wanted to. He was still found naked in an apartment by a masseuse he ordered. It appears it was his apartment though. Now his final role was just a bad movie. Both the beginning and ending were bad.

It appears as if Heath is the front runner for Best Supporting Actor right now. The sad thing is, that he may win it just because he is dead. Not saying he wouldn't get it if he were alive. It's just that there is no way his death is not going to be a factor in him getting it, assuming he does. It's a shame because the real Best Supporting Actor, Oswaldo Castillo, is not going to win what is rightfully his award. 

A CD Marty Won't Be Buying

I wrote the title before I went and did any research. Turns out I'm tempted to buy the CD. To be more correct, CDs. I just can't bring myself to do it. Which is saying a lot. When I can't be talked into buying a CD, that means it really, really sucks. I buy a lot of crap. 

I was watching TV yesterday. RJ was watching Josh and Drake on Nick. He left about 5 minutes into it, but I couldn't change the channel. I had to see what happened. It was actually a fairly good episode. Drake accidentally got punched by this nerd and given a black eye. Rumors started that Drake was talking trash on the nerd's sister, so the nerd punched him. The nerd went with the rumors, as they were now making him the cool kid. Drake was looked at as a loser now. I'm not going to ruin the ending for you. You'll have to watch. 

I will tell you what happened to Josh though. The girl who Josh just broke up with was always hanging out with this other guy. Josh assumed this guy was her new boyfriend and that she was bringing him around Josh to make him jealous. This new guy was awesome. He wrote a book in 7th grade, was on Oprah and the President called him once. Josh got mad and confronted his ex. Turns out the dude is just her cousin. Josh then realized his faux pax. The episode ends with them making out. 

I'm not here to talk about Josh and Drake though. What I'm here to talk about is one of the commercials I saw. I really need to start watching commercials more. I get a lot of good material from commercials. Like the time I saw themale guard. TiVo has stifled my writing career. 

One of the commercials I saw got me excited. Family Matters is coming back to TV. So now Jill can rectify her childhood by watching it. I also did some research and it turns out the movie with Tom Hanks and Reginald VelJohnson, better known as Carl Winslow, the dad from Family Matters, is Turner and Hooch. It is a Tom Hanks movie, not whoever Mary thought it was. (Jill, I can't tag Mary in this note as we are not friends. Please tell her I mentioned her.) Hanks and VelJohnson are police partners in the movie. A dog also plays a pivotal role in the movie. As an added bonus, Craig T. Nelson plays the police chief. 

I'm not here to talk about that commercial though. I'm here to talk about Kidz Bop 14. I'll just give you a brief overview in case you don't know what it is. If you want more info, ask Justin. He seems to have a lot of info on Kidz Bop for some reason. 

All Kidz Bop is, is kids singing hit songs. Not the bands that originally sang the song, kids. I don't get it. 

I went and checked out kidzbop.com, so I would know that I was talking about. I kind of felt like Chris Hansen would be walking into the room any minute and asking me what I was doing as I browsed around the site. 

After browsing the site, i checked itunes to see if I could listen to some sound clips. I had heard some of the songs on the commercial, but the stupid guy was talking over them, so it wasn't the same. To my delight you can find Kidz Bop music on itunes. I listened to a few songs. I was pleasantly surprised. They were actually kind of good. In a weird way. I couldn't get over the pedophiliac nature of the songs though. And the fact that they have an ensemble of kids on all the choruses. 

I don't know who buys this crap. Apparently someone is though. The commercial I saw was for Kidz Bop 14. That means there was 13 that preceded it. It gets worse. There is more than 13. There was: Kidz Bop 80s Gold, Kidz Bop Country, Kidz Bop Gold, More Kids Bop Gold, Kidz Bop Christmas, The Coolest Kidz Bop Christmas Ever, A Very Merry Christmas Kidz Bop, Kidz Bop Halloween, Kidz Bop Hanukkah, A Kidz Bop Valentine and Kidz Bop Sports Jamz. 

I'm not counting those, because I'm not lame, but that is a lot of Kidz Bop crap. Stop buying this crap or this is never going to end. 

The worst part of Kidz Bop 14 is the guest "artist". He isn't an artist. He's a loser. I know he's a loser because he was homeless and living on the street a few years ago. "But Marty, he believed in his music dream so much that he was willing to live on the street until he made it." Shut up, you're an idiot. He didn't believe in his dream. He quit on his dream so he could get off he street. He took advantage of a crappy music system that allows you to just steal a song and turn it into a hit. He knew he wasn't going to make it with his music, so he quit his dream and stole a song. 

He stole one of the greatest songs of all-time, the only song to be in the top 10 in two different decades. All he did is say "beautiful girl" and "suicidal" a few times and somehow this made it to the number one song. Are you retards? That songs sucks ass. Sean Kingston knows it sucks. Why don't you? You must be the idiots out there buying Kidz Bop. 

At least Sean knows he is a no talent. He's trying to cash in while he can. If he had real talent he would not be appearing on a CD that has little kids singing hit songs by real artists. 

The only redeeming quality of that suck ass song is that now I can say that "Stand by Me" is the only song to chart in the top ten in three different decades. But If I do that I also have to admit that pile of ass exists. 

What's next Sean? "Under the Boardwalk" and "My Girl" have some catchy bass lines. Throw in some "pretty girl"s and "depression"s and you have yourself a hit. 

Really people? Number one. That songs sucks ass. You people sicken me.