andylangager.net

agreed -- there could be a separate holiday where everyone gave gifts and acted cheery to escape the freezing cold monotony of winter. Christians could even celebrate the birth of Jesus when it most likely actually took place (sometime in April or October), and focus more on what it means to believers (much like the other major Christian holiday of Easter) instead of associating it with gifts and santa. the reason all the disagreements about the meaning of the holiday exist in the first place is because Christians allowed secular culture to influence one of their two most sacred holidays. the problem's actually that Christmas IS "associated with bad fruitcake, tinsel and the singing of off-key holiday classics." we should associate that stuff with Givingston Day and let Christians celebrate Christmas as a separate day. then everyone could be happy. but Christmas and Givingston Day will never be separately recognized, so these same articles are going to provide CNN with material for a long time.

Actually, it was most likely early Christians who adopted December 25th as a way to convert pagans to Christianity. For the opposite end of the Christmas spectrum (away from Bill O'Reilly), check out:

http://www.eliyah.com/paganexp.html

I hope I'm not being placed in the same boat as someone like Bill O'Reilly. I'm not trying to say anything too terribly different than many of the things mentioned within that link -- I was just trying to portray that if you're going to have a gift-giving, santa/carols/fruitcake holiday, you can't go and say that you're doing it because of your religion. For many Christian people, those kinds of Christmas traditions have overtaken their holiday when it comes to celebrating the birth of Christ. Referring to the protesters in the article, it isn't exactly Christian to think that other people can't celebrate age-long holiday traditions just because they don't believe in the same things -- especially when you're celebrating the same exact traditions.

Hey -- no boat-placing going on. I was only pointing out that there are Christian groups that think the whole idea of Christmas is wrong -- as opposed to Bill O'Reilly who thinks that saying "Happy Holidays" is somehow anti-Christian.

That's what I figured you meant. I'd guess that our opinions of Mr. O'Reilly are pretty similar...I would also guess that our opinions of Andy's hygiene are roughly the same as well. See Kong yet?

No Kong, yet. I have noticed that almost nobody has talked about the little-known sequel to the 1976 King Kong -- 1986's King Kong Lives, starring Linda Hamilton!! Why has this classic never been granted the praise it deserves?

I just got back from Kong. It's long. The effects are pretty good, but I don't know if it's enough story to justify a 3 hour running time. You know what's going to happen, and at times you just want them to hurry up and get on with it already. Kong has some good rampages, though.
And I plan on celebrating Kong's b-day on the 25th, as the early Christians would have wanted it. Banana splits all around.

They should have gotten an actual Italian guy to play Mario instead of Jack Black.

Yeah, but it was still sweet when he destroyed the barrels with the hammer.

Still haven't seen it, but I will say that it's hard to imagine why any film about a giant monkey would need to be three hours long. The original was just half that length. Three hours is a long time. I also think it's fairly silly to spend 200 million dollars on a movie about a giant monkey. Did they learn nothing from Godzilla? It will make it easier, though, for me to get the 500 million I need to make my Mothra mini-series.

Even at three hours, they have a few sub-plots that you think will be interesting or give it a twist, but in the end are abandoned.

I would describe Kong as: Once Upon A Time in America meets Predator meets Original King Kong meets Jurassic Park meets Lord of the Rings meets Iron Giant meets Nell. If the trip to the island would have been about 35 minutes shorter, the movie would have ruled. I thought Kong's big fight midway through the movie was the best CGI action scene of all time (though its tough competition all lies within the last, er...first three Star Wars movies, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and Kong). That scene alone is worth the three hours (but on a totally different level than the highway scene in the second Matrix movie). Altogether, I really enjoyed my three hours at the movies. I want to see it one more time on the big screen.

P.S. You don't seem like the Mothra type. I pegged you as more of a Ro-Dan guy.

I have always been a mothra's boy.

According to IMdB, Adrien Brody did his own driving stunts in Kong... During the movie, I made the comment "He's the best backwards driver ever!"

Adrien Brody driving backwards... You just gave away the whole movie!

Dan, I'm glad I didn't see that pun before Christmas or it may have ruined my entire holiday. Boo.

fhineqaniak yiup