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Hunger Games (as required by Internet Rule # 47854b)

Ramblings Post #188
There are certain Rules. You always stock hot sauce. The socks stay on. You don't talk about fight club. You don't place a special order then get mad when it takes a while to make. You don't show up late for trial. And it is always the biggest you've ever seen. And if it is a hot topic, your blog must comment on it...if only in passing. So, today, we discuss of all things, a book series I've never even read.

Three books. I guess.

Full Disclosure Warning: I have not read any of the three books. I have no intention of reading these three books. I don't think I've even read the dust jacket or the back cover of one of these books.

What little I do know might have come from SKIMMING the Wikipedia entry.

That said, what follows is NOT an informed opinion. Heck this isn't even going to be about the movie or the book, but about the idea of the book into movie in general. I'm hoping to skirt the rule by believing that the series at least instigated the conversation. At least that's what I'm going to tell the Internet Cops if it comes to that.

Now, I understand that the trilogy (in the rack next to register at the campus bookstore) was supposed to be Young Adult reading, and maybe that's what soured me. The Young Adult works that I have tried to read, well, the writing in general tends to turn me off. It's usually simplistic, lacking depth and poorly plotted. My understanding is that while this story is wildly imaginative, and apparently very popular - it's also ridiculously derivative of Lord of the Flies, The Running Man, the Most Dangerous Game and as I understand it a Japanese novel and film called Battle Royale.

Let me also be clear that I have no intention of seeing the movie. Aside from the fact that I haven't been to the movies in years, the Book to Movie conundrum should give any fan of the books pause. This conundrum is that a popular book being made into a movie generally has to leave some of the things that the fans of the book really liked out...because of time constraints or a directors mental vision. Or more likely, that Hollywood thinks it can do better. That's why Micheal Keaton was the cast as Batman. Twice. Bad example, I liked those films, but in far too many cases this has generally resulted in the film being an unrecognizable mess that upset the real fans. This was true up until faithful adaptions of Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings proved successful proving that fans like good stories, good writing and not just stars.

So which does the Hunger Games film give it's fans? A heavily edited Hollywood version of the book or a faithful vision of the story? Which brings us back to the writing, Young Adult fiction. Which I think is simplistic, lacking depth and poorly plotted. And as I understand from comments at various sites my original thought appears to be right on the money for this series - not so great writing to begin with. So not a good start.

Hopefully this joint will make a few million, some fans will be joyful, a few more actors will get jobs and the world will keep turning. Or maybe it could be the next John Carter?

In any case, I'm not going to see it. Homework.

Gimme two on GM to cover, and let the rest ride...

Ramblings Post #22
Capitalism is broken. But much like my car, when it breaks down I fix it, I don't park it in the garage and walk everywhere I need to go. Let me explain to you the idea of my morning commute. There are a lot of things wrong with the current system, but the current system is the same system that got us here. I shudder to think of the alternatives.

I stopped watching financial news when it turned into a Monty Python sketch. Let me explain.

If you ever really watched the financial news on CNBC, Bloomberg or Fox Business News or really anybody in the whole financial news sector, you'll notice that it's not about the actual occurrences at the business, or actual profits or anything silly like that. If you look and pay attention, it's really all about expectations and hopes and dreams. Just like gambling. No, really.

For example, at We Know What We're Doing, really any bank or industry in 2007, well at WKWWD Inc., last year they earned .37 per share and were doing real good. Well this year, they made .34 per share, but they were supposed to make .41 per share, so they're doing horribly.

Did you see that? Were you paying attention?

They just ran a Vegas Line on you. The touts, I mean financial experts, picked them to turn a profit this year of .41 cents per share, and they only made a profit of .34 cents per share. They turned a profit this year, just like last year! They almost made as much as last year! But just like your favorite team who won, but because they didn't ...cover the spread... you still lost. They don't make what the touts, I mean experts, expect and it's like they used the company funds to binge on cocaine and Thai hookers. Stock price drops, disproportionately and millions in value are lost on sheer expectations.

And this was in the good times!


And if you do that now, it all sounds even worse. Each round of layoffs to protect a irrational share price and reduce an over leveraged core businesses only accelerate the market's decline. Now? Now they're worried about fiduciary responsibility? I mean when WKWWD Inc., lowers it's expectations to .22 cents per share, most folks don't realize THEY'RE STILL FORECASTING A PROFIT! But to the touts, it's as though predicted the end of the world. Maintaining isn't good enough, everybody has to always get better according to Wall Street, and that is breaking down. Spend fifteen minutes with the Journal and you'll see what I mean.

But reporting-wise in the past few months, however, it's become a race to see who can put out the bad news the quickest. After they failed to see the obvious patched over problems in the financial markets and institutions for the past five years, no one wants to be the news source that didn't ring the alarm. One can almost see the news anchors hopping in excitement as they wait for whatever catastrophe to roll off the wire. Unemployment is up! Foreclosures are still skyrocketing! Troubles in Europe! Mars needs women! China looks to repossess Taiwan! Credit markets have marked down the lima beans, but the chicken doesn't look fresh! We warned you! We warned you!

The whole thing has turned into a parody of a Python sketch that for years I've called "Drinking Chateau" but is better known as the Four Yorkshiremen. That sketch is hilarious. In it four men try their best to make their past situations sound insanely difficult to have made it though. And if you switch the channels, you can almost see the reporters smirking and going, let's see them at Competition Network Channel top this bad news!

And if it wasn't really happening to me and those around me, retirement plans withering and dying, homes destroyed, well watching the financial news would be funny too.

Our current market is built on two things: Trust and confidence. That's it. I wish there was more to it, but when a guy sends another guy he never met except via telephone a few million dollars because of a promise....that's trust and confidence. More than a few million jobs in the country are built on just that. And right now, as a lot of folks are finding out everyone isn't so trustworthy and a lot more are faking the funk, all the doom and gloom news isn't helping.

It's hard to stop being depressed if all you ever hear is depressing news. And depressing news is killing the confidence that runs the markets.

We need to get back to fundamentals. In the past few years, we've turned our lives into that of overgrown kids who expect the best and most for the least possible effort. And for a while we thought we'd figured it out. Only it turns out my mother was right:

"If it sounds to good to be true, too fantastic to be real, then that's probably the case."

And since we were all gonna get rich doing nothing...guess what? It seems kind of obvious looking back.

Barkeep. Whatever my friends want...within reason. Beer-wise. Let's not get silly.

Musing's Fall Comment Drive

This would be a Post. Right Here. Posting.
I listen to the classics on WABE in my local area, and right now they're in the middle of their fall pledge drive, raising money to keep public radio public. And no, I have yet to donate. According to their numbers it takes about three to five years before a listener donates, so i got at least another year. Okay...maybe I'll donate. But in any case, it gave me the idea for this!

Welcome to the middle of our Fall Comment Drive. The writer of this blog in conjunction with the fevered recesses of his mind and the occasional help of frustration and Maker's Mark (fine whiskey) work hard to bring you the reader a compelling and interesting read. We cover a broad range of topics from stuff that doesn't matter to stuff that doesn't matter even less, all with sultry wit and dashing style. Salsa.

And it's not cheap.

I know you're thinking: what is he talking about. The internet is free. Or at least the part he's on. And if this fool thinks we're going to pay for this... Hey, hey, calm down. Not that. But here at the virtual bar we've got a virtual tab that has be calculated by the same virtual computers needed to mathematically figure why people play Second Life, as opposed to actually living the First Life. So...what is the old whiskey soaked, but reasonably good looking, old man sniffling on about?

My ego needs stroking something fierce!

I said my EGO! E - G - O. Minds all in the gutter, but then that's why I like you.

Feel free to comment, leave a note, get a word in, drop a line, ask questions, correct me, make a speech, get your point across, put in your two cents in, be wrong, start an argument, make a false assumption, lie, conspire to make me a better human being, attempt a verbal coup, lay it all on the line, tell me off, but jeez, just say something... dammit.

So, you come and read the fine stylings and occasional rant, and decide to contribute a comment or at least a snide remark, what do you get?

For a comment you'll get not the tote bag, not the coffee mug, not the key ring with the craftily designed extractor of caps which enclose liquids (i.e., bottle opener), not the nine piece dish set or the my musical double CD - the one of me singing West Indian Celtic Folk tunes on disc 1, and me breaking to causation and economic theory of Congolese monkeys on disc 2. No, you'll receive the grand prize, and since I don't actually have any of the afore mentioned stuff, what is really the only prize: A really good feeling for having said something.

And it will feel great. Well good anyway. Okay. It's not a bad feeling. Think of it as finger exercise.

The staff here at the Musings, and by staff I mean Me, the venerable and always funny Myself, and cool and collected and add another adjective here, Aye, would like to thank you for checking in, and ask that you do your part to support this fine bit of foolishness we've thrown up and nobody has been smart enough to take down yet. Your comment and $1 wouldn't buy a cup of coffee, but a comment might just help out a guy writing because he likes it and who probably keep on writing in any case keep on writing for reasons other than the reasons he's already got to keep doing what he's already doing and continuing writing (breathe) but said comment would be greatly appreciated.

Operators are standing by....



Barkeep...a round of drinks on my tab. Of course I'm good for it.

Bar Reading

I think it needed to be said. Looking at what's coming I'm not sure I wouldn't want to leave him his legacy...but we need a strong hand in the future.