I heard that the Muppets released their Green Album, a cover of some of their greatest hits covered by today’s up and coming Alternative artists and thought I’d sample it on iTunes.  My initial assessment was that other than the clip of Mnah Mnah, it kind of sucked.  After seeing OK Go’s cover of the theme to the Muppet Show on youtube however, I may change my opinion.  Check it out kids.

A. Is pointing at the answer to the maze.
B. Is lost in this piece of crap maze DESPITE knowing the way out.

This is from a local Maine chain of restaurants (okay, 6…it’s a short chain) called Governor’s Restaurant. The mascot, otherwise known as “The Gov” was modeled on the owner and proprietor of the original restaurant. I think it’s only coincidence that our current Fearless Leader bears a striking resemblance. The food is good. The placemats blow. FYI Zoe’s 11. When the waitress saw that she’d completed the “maze”, she replied “yeah, that one’s a hard one. Took a group of us about an hour to finish”.

And Disney….how about some collector’s glasses? Just sayin’

In all seriousness, I want to wish my older brother a very happy birthday.  I am very lucky to have two great brothers whom I have traveled with and killed zombies with (more on that later my loyal readers).

So to Craig, that crazy Son of a bitch…HAPPY BIRTHDAY.

In this movie, the exasperated, long suffering girlfriend is an exasperated, long suffering wife. Like John Candy, I’m playing out of my league here. Like John Candy I’m not complaining. On TV the guy who looks like his career choices are limited to ringing bells and hiding in windmills always has a good looking girlfriend/wife. I was never sure how that worked out, but I can tell you it does. The three of us are living proof. I don’t argue with it anymore.

My kids have played along with this theme, despite the fact that none of the three of them have seen the movie. That needs to change.

The youngest one loves trading smartass quips with me and more than holds her own. She actually sometimes thinks Dad is pretty cool. That honor is reserved for anyone under 6. Anyone older than that realizes that I’m not cool, just a weird, sad little man.

The boy is fine with me most of the time but hates it when I get all “old people” on him or make fun of him glued to his cell phone or Ipod touch. I don’t think twice about asking “hey, can I see that?” when he’s right in the throws of a text, thumbs ablazin’. He cautiosly hands the phone to me and I quickly turn it off and hand it back to him with a “finish your homework”. Sometimes he loves the insult-fests. His friends try to join in too, only to find they’re no match. It’s best they learn these things now before they set out into the cold, hard world. I’m happy to help.

The oldest daughter is always late, stalling at karate class or dance class. She’s the first one in the locker room and the last one out. It drives me nuts and it’s caused more than one knock-down drag-out between the two of us. Then a few days ago I figured it out. The older daughter is embarrassed to be seen with me. This doesn’t help as I’m usaully transporting her to and from said classes in my rusting, filthy, dented, disintegrating POS car. The steam rolling out of the tailpipe and the assortment of ambient noises emanating from under the hood just add to the picture. She’s also the drama queen of the house, and it’s getting worse as we approach the teen zone.

There is an upside to this movie epiphany though. I’m really looking forward to the parts of the movie where I get to torture the guys that try to hit on my daughters. That’s proving to be pretty fun so far as it’s started already. Maybe living the John Hughes dream isn’t so bad after all. It beats hanging out in a library with a bunch of cookie-cutter High School social stereotypes. And Charlie Sheen.

For those that do not know the story, Craig’s comment about being banned from picking a movie are correct.  In 2006, we traveled to Scotland with a group of high school students.  One night, when figuring out what to do, Craig mentioned going see a movie.  He said that “An American Haunting” looked good so it was agreed that we would spend roughly 20 dollars per ticket to view the movie.  End result?   It sucked big time.  While I tease Craig about this a lot, it wasn’t his fault.  Movies concerning the paranormal are so hit and miss.  The scares throughout the film are important but it is the final chapters that explain the film.  If the hidden theme is lame, the movie becomes lame.

The latest “strike-out” movie is “The Last Exorcism”.  It started out so well and I honestly thought the concept was good.  A priest who has lost his faith sets up fake exorcisms in order to help families.  He does not believe in them and refuses to accept the fact that God and the Devil exist.  Unfortunately, things are turned upside down when the girl is “seemingly” possessed.  The first hour and seventeen minutes rock out with your….well you know what I mean.  If you decide to watch it, turn it off at that point.  Accept the fact that you won’t know if the girl is really possessed or not.  Because if you watch on, and I am expecting you will, it will turn crappy fast.  The ending makes no sense and the director clearly wanted to make an ending which left the viewer thinking.  And he got me thinking that his movie turned in to a steaming pile of crap.

The “Paranormal Activity” series were decent in the way they clearly drag you in to viewing the camera scenes as they happen.  The stories make no sense and my worry is one day they will attempt to describe why the house is haunted.  When they do, we will all think it sucks and another series is down the drain.

The “Blair Witch Project” was very good in its individualism, using the view of the main character as he/she goes through the motions.  It allows the viewer to be scared along with the protagonist.  But this is played…so played.

Craig is right to think I want to see this newest survival paranormal movie.  It looks very good but random girls in white robes has been done before.  Once I find out more about my Daddy and Baby Monster Hunters series, I plan on writing a story dealing with the paranormal.  The reason I think it will be different is the stories are real.  Whether you believe in spirits or not, my brother and I lived in a haunted house in the early 2000′s.  While the backstory will be fictional, the events and hauntings will be real.

UPDATE:  Saturday April 30th

One thing I was pondering as I was watching “A Haunting in Connecticut” was the fact that if a person has been a part of a haunting, he/she doesn’t experience what we see on the movies.  Creaks, voices, shadows, footsteps:  those are all part and parcel of living in a haunted house.  But some of the movies seems to build off of unnecessary scares without realizing that a real person who might not believe in the paranormal might be afraid of small things.

I dedicate these videos to my brothers. It’s that time of year kids. I’ve even gotten into the spirit, joining up in their fantasy league. I don’t know baseball, so we’ll see how well I do. I’m holding out for September when the Patriots take the field again.

I’d also like to welcome the newest Derosby brother, Keene Robert Derosby, who joined our family on March 28th. Congrats to Keith and Elaine for yet another gorgeous Derosby kid. I’m still not sure how we pulled off so many cute kids, as it’s certainly not because of the Derosby genes.

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One of the engineers here at the office has a daughter the same age as Izzy and the wallpaper on his desktop is of her wearing her Kai-Lan tee shirt.   My comment was “that little monkey is a bastard”.  He agreed (because he really is, he’s a little troublemaker).  I commented that every time I hear his name, Hoho, I crack up. 

He asked if I’d seen the snow episode and emailed it over to me.  This is funnier than the Hoho thing.

Star Wars Glasses from Burger King 1977

 I want them.  No other way to say it.  I believe there’s even a Maine law that states that any collectible commemorative glassware becomes the property of the husband upon placement of ring on finger. 

McDonalds Collector Set 1977

Needless to say, leaving those glasses behind put me in a nostalgic funk.  When we were kids, our Star Wars glasses were like gold to us.  We didn’t even have the whole set, but that Obi Wan glass was my personal treasure.  At my Grandmother’s house, my aunts had 2 or 3 of the McDondald’s glasses sets from the ’70′s.  Now those were really cool, mostly because we didn’t have them, but still cool.  As we entered the ’80′s, then came the Peanuts series, the Garfield series, and the set for the Great Muppet Caper (the one with the bus is my all-time favorite glass).

The Great Muppet Caper set from McDonalds 1981

Now that we’re all married with children (yes, Keith finally joined the “what the hell were you thinking club” and awaits his official initiation sometime in March/April) we’ve got new glass sets collected and collecting dust, but it’s not the same.  All BK or Mickey D’s seem to want to promote these days are Disney or Shrek.  If you like anything else, you’re sh$t out of luck.  So I went searching, and by a strange coincidence, one of my friends on FB (thanks to E of Girls Gone Geek) posted a picture of her gift from her Husband (my new hero by the way).  He bought her a Teen Titans glass.  I googled the image to see if I could find others and found a picture showing both the front and back sides of the glass.  On the back side was printed the website of the manufacturer, ToonTumblers. 

http://www.toontumblers.com/index.aspx

I struck gold.  Maybe not exactly like the ones we had when we were kids, but these glasses are still pretty sweet.  I couldn’t wait so I went to the website during my break at work and spent all 15 golden minutes of it checking out the merchandise.  My 2nd childhood has been saved.  ToonTumblers allows you to make your own sets too as you can pick and choose the glasses and quantities of each.  I’ve got my eye on a Batman, Robin, Mr. J, and Harley set.  Maybe another with Spidey, Cap, Iron Man, and Wolverine.  The possibilities are endless.  And as I just cleaned out our cupboards a week ago, I’ve made room for more crap.  In a few months, I’ll be drinking in style.   Click on the link and enjoy.  Now to find the Transformers glasses…..

Batman & Robin TOON TUMBLERS Glass