The Marty McFly - Gremlins connection revealed!

I scratched another Saturn Award winner for Best Horror Film off my list of movies to watch earlier today, and this time around, it was 1984 winner, “Gremlins.”
I’d seen this movie before, but it had been a while, maybe more than 10 years. In that time, I’d forgotten how entertaining this movie actually was. Likely due to the large media build-up to this movie and its sequel, I can actually remember when this movie came out. I think I was in the third grade.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with “Gremlins,” it’s about a young man who receives a cute, furry creature as a Christmas present from his dad, who’s a traveling salesman and inventor. The dad, played by Hoyt Axton, buys the creature, called a Mogwai, from a back alley store in Chinatown and is given a set of rules to follow regarding the creature:
1. Keep it away from bright light. (Sunlight will kill it.)
2. Don’t expose the creature to water.
3. Don’t feed it after midnight.
Of course, it doesn’t take long for all three of these rules to be broken as soon as dad brings the Mogwai home, and the pet, which they call Gizmo, goes on to spawn hundreds of small, destructive, reptilian monsters. They cause havoc all over the small town of Kingston Falls before the lead character – the son, Billy Peltzer – can bring an end to it all. This film featured a number of well-known actors including Phoebe Cates, Judge Reinhold and Corey Feldman.
One interesting bit of trivia about this movie is that it was shot on the same set as 1985’s “Back to the Future.” Both movies were filmed on the Universal Studios back lot. According to the Internet Movie Database, the theater that blows up near the end of “Gremlins” was also involved in another accident when Marty McFly in “Back to the Future” smashes into the front entrance at the end of that film. The theater then burned down with the rest of the buildings in a fire that happened right after the filming of 1989’s “Back to the Future II.”
In the end, I enjoyed re-watching “Gremlins.” It was a nice trip down memory lane, and reminded me of just how good this movie actually was. From here, it’s on to the 1985 Saturn Award winner for Best Horror Film, “Fright Night.”

It goes well with nachos and wings, too...

I sampled another of this month’s Great American Beer Club selections yesterday, and this time around, it was Mystic Bridge IPA.
Brewed and bottled by the Cottrell Brewing Co. in Pawcatuck, Conn., Mystic Bridge is “copper colored, with nice lasting head and lace. Spicy hops and brown sugar aroma, the Centennial and Cascade hops are balanced, but distinctive. It’s notable flavor comes from the high quality house yeast blend. The hop bitterness is just right for an IPA, but not overbearing.”
IPA is short for India Pale Ale. These types of “beers of antiquity” are known for being “medium bodied and heavily hopped with initial malt character.” They are best served at around 55 degrees Fahrenheit with “hearty main courses of red meats, Cheddar cheese or sharp salad dressing.”
“Goes well with nachos and wings, too,” according to this month’s issue of “Beer Expeditions.”
The beer is named for the Mystic River Bascule Bridge (pictured above), which is a drawbridge that spans the Mystic River in Mystic, Conn.
According to Wikipedia, the bridge “is operated by the Connecticut Department of Transportation and connects the two halves of Mystic, allowing vehicle and foot traffic on Main Street n the center of the tourist district of town. The bridge carries U.S. Route 1 with an average daily traffic of 11,800. It opens approximately 2,200 times per year, with each opening lasting approximately 5 minutes.
For more information about the Cottrell Brewery and Mystic Bridge IPA, visit the company’s Web site at http://www.cottrellbrewing.com/. One cool feature of the site allows you to take a virtual tour of the brewery, and you’ll even find Charles Buffum’s e-mail address on the home page if you’d like to let him know how much you like Mystic Bridge IPA.

Dusting off the old sports hat...

After a three-month break, this week will mark my return to the sports desk at The Courant, so in addition to my weekly column, I’ll begin covering local sports teams and events for the paper each week. I only make mention of it because I want readers to contact me if you have anything that will make a good sports story. You can reach me by calling The Courant or by e-mailing me at leepeacock2002@hotmail.com.
When I first started working in the newspaper business 10 years ago, my first job was as a part-time sports writer for The Monroe Journal in Monroeville. Since then, I’ve worn a lot of newspaper hats, including delivery boy, reporter, photographer, publisher and editor. In other words, it seems that I’ve come full circle and will get to do the job that got me started and that I enjoyed the most. Courant Publisher and Editor Robert Bozeman told me three months ago that I was going to miss working at the paper, and he was right. Covering local sports, especially in a place like Evergreen, can be very fun and rewarding, and I appreciate Robert letting me do the sports for him on a part-time basis.
Call me if you’ve got a sports story you’d like me to work on or if you have details about an upcoming or recent sports-related event.

I don't know the Cottrells, but I'm pretty sure I'd like them...

I sampled another of this month’s Great American Beer Club selections earlier today, and this time around, it was Cottrell Old Yankee Ale.
Brewed and bottled by the Cottrell Brewing Co. in Pawcatuck, Conn., Old Yankee Ale is “a medium bodied American Amber that has a great up-front malt taste with a refreshing hop finish. A red ribbon winner in 1997 at the Great Northeast International Beer Expo in Providence, R.I., a year later it was awarded a bronze at the World Beer Championships in Chicago. Old Yankee has a rich, malty foretaste – flavorful, but not heavy. The finish is dry, with a hint of perfect hoppiness.”
According to this month’s edition of “Beer Expeditions,” the Cottrell Brewery has an interesting history.
“With roots going back to the year 1666 in the states of Connecticut and Rhode Island, the Cottrell family has led the way with inventions in many diverse areas of manufacturing. Perhaps you’ve heard of C.B. Cottrell & Sons, Inc. printing presses? For decades (from the late 19th and early 20th century), these presses gained a worldwide reputation as the best of the best. With more than 100 patents, the Cottrell Co. and the family descendants continue to leave their mark on the complexion of the American landscape. Since 1966, Mr. and Mrs. Charles Cottrell Buffum Jr. of this distinguished family, have been pleased to offer Cottrell Brewing Co.’s flagship brew, Old Yankee Ale, made using some of the country’s best water. The Westerly White Rock artesian well water lends a crisp cleanness evident in every bottle brewed. Evident, too, is the pride and attention to quality this family is known for.”
For more information about the Cottrell Brewery and Old Yankee Ale, visit the company’s Web site at www.cottrellbrewing.com. One cool feature of the site allows you to take a virtual tour of the brewery, and you’ll even find Charles Buffum’s e-mail address on the home page if you’d like to let him know how much you like Old Yankee Ale.

Discover Magazine's 25 Greatest Science Books of All Time

I saw in today’s Mobile Press-Register where today marks the 10-year anniversary of the completion of the Human Genome Project, and this reminded me of a great recommended reading list that I’ve never mentioned on this blog.
Before I get to the reading list, I feel that I should say a few words about the Human Genome Project. The project began in October 1990, and scientists expected to spend 15 years and $3 billion to complete a map of the human genome. Every cell in the body contains 23 pairs of chromosomes, and each chromosome is a bundle of DNA. This DNA contains the instructions for the creation of our physical traits, including our eye color, hair color, blood type, etc. The project wrapped up about five years ahead of schedule because private companies got involved and sped up the process.
As I mentioned earlier, this all got me to thinking about a recommended reading list that the editors of Discover magazine compiled and published in December 2006. The list is called Discover Magazine’s 25 Greatest Science Books of All Time. Without further ado, here they are:
1. The Voyage of the Beagle: Charles Darwin’s Journal of Researches by Charles Darwin
2. The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin
3. The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy by Isaac Newton
4. Dialogue Concerning Two New Chief World Systems by Galileo Galilei
5. On the Revolutions of Heavenly Spheres (On the Shoulders of Giants) by Nicolaus Copernicus
6. Physica by Aristotle
7. De Humani Corporis Fabrica by Andreas Vesalius
8. Relativity: The Special and the General Theory by Albert Einstein
9. The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins
10. One, Two, Three… Infinity: Facts and Speculations of Science by George Gamow
11. The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA by James D. Watson
12. What is Life? With Mind and Matter and Autobiographical Sketches by Erwin Schrodinger
13. Carl Sagan’s Cosmic Connection: An Extraterrestrial Perspective by Carl Sagan
14. The Insect Societies by Edward O. Wilson
15. The First Three Minutes: A Modern View of the Origin of the Universe by Steven Weinberg
16. Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
17. The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould
18. The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat: And Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks
19. The Journals of Lewis and Clark by Meriwether Lewis
20. The Feynman Lectures on Physics by Richard P. Feynman
21. Sexual Behavior in the Human Male by Alfred Charles Kinsey
22. Gorillas in the Mist by Dian Fossey
23. Under a Lucky Star: A Lifetime of Adventure by Roy Chapman Andrews
24. Micrographia: Some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies Mady by Magnifying Glasses with Observations and Inquiries Thereupon by Robert Hooke
25. Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth by James Lovelock
The list also included eight honorable mention titles:
1. The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud
2. Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher
3. The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James
4. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas S. Kuhn
5. A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes by Stephen W. Hawking
6. Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond
7. The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions and the Quest for the Ultimate Theorgy by Brian Greene
8. The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes
In the end, I’d like to know how many of these books you’ve read. What did you think about them, and which would you recommend? Let us know in the comments section below.

The gift that keeps on giving... for at least the next three months

My wife got me a cool gift for Fathers Day this year – a three-month gift membership to “The Beer of the Month Club,” aka, The Great American Beer Club.
As a member of this “unique mail-order club,” I get to “embark on an expedition to capture the rarest and freshest microbrewed beer.”
Each month, I’ll receive a 12-pack of four different types of handcrafted beer in 12-ounce bottles from small craft breweries around the country. Also included in each shipment is a monthly newsletter, “Beer Expeditions.”
I received my first shipment a few days ago. It arrived on my doorstep, neatly packaged with care in a large cardboard box. They arrived unrefrigerated, so I put the whole box in the frig for a day before sampling any of them.
The packaged contains three bottles of four different kinds of beer – two kinds from the Atlanta Brewery and two from the Cottrell Brewery. The Atlanta Brewery beers were Red Brick Blonde and Laughing Skull Amber Ale. The featured beers from the Cottrell Brewery were Mystic Bridge IPA and Old Yankee Ale.
I tried the Red Brick Blonde Ale first, and it was pretty good. It’s an American-style blonde ale, that is, it’s top fermented as all ales are. Golden in color, it’s “a perfect thirst quencher, malted grains dominate the flavor and the Cascade hopes lend zing to the finish.” This beer received a Gold Medal at the Great American Beer Festival in 2005.
The Atlanta Brewery is the oldest craft brewery in the state of Georgia, and Red Brick Ale was the first craft beer commercially brewed in the state. Their beer is now sold in seven Southern states.
I found it’s label to be particulary funny. Here’s what it says:
“Weep for your northern brethren: Long winters, suspect college football, and perhaps worst of all, no Red Brick Beer. Since 1993, we’ve been brewing fine craft beers for The South, and only The South. We’re proud to stand alongside grits, hound dogs amd mama as embodiments of the southern lifestyle. We’re proud to be beer from around here.”
Kind of makes you want to open up a brewery in T-town, doesn’t it?
“The Great American Beer Club” is one of many such clubs administered by Clubs of America. They have similar clubs dedicated to international wines, fresh flowers, hand-dipped chocolates, gourmet pizza, fresh fruit, premium cigars and gourmet coffee. For more information about Clubs of America, visit their Web site at www.GreatClubs.com.

It's a bird! It's a plane! No... It's the International Space Station!

My good friend David Johnson of Camden (one of the smartest guys I know) tipped me off to something cool last night when he posted a link about the International Space Station (ISS) on Facebook.
The link - http://spaceflight1.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/ - provides information on when and where to look if you’d like to watch the ISS pass over your location.
The site is simple and easy to use if you’d like to try it. Just visit the site and click “Go to Country” under “Sighting Opportunities.” If you choose the United States (as most of you will), then the site will take you to another page where you have to select the state or territory where you’re located. If you’re in Alabama, selected Alabama and on the next page, select the city closest to you.
The next page will give you the times in which the ISS will be visible from your location on days when sighting opportunities are possible. The site will also tell you in which direction to look to see the ISS “approach” and “depart.” It also gives you an idea of how many minutes the ISS will be visible. (Keep in mind that the weather will have to cooperate if you hope to see it.)
I first used this information last night and watched from my backyard as the ISS tracked across the sky for four minutes. It was dim near the horizons, but once it got up into the sky, it was very bright and moved rapidly across the night sky.
My parents were in the neighborhood tonight for a brief visit and happened to be here when the ISS made its pass tonight. Again, in the backyard, we watched as it moved across the sky. This time around, I not only got to see it, but my wife, kids and parents did too. It was pretty cool, and I couldn’t help but be reminded of watching Haley’s Comet make its rare pass over the Earth when I was in the fourth grade.
If you’re interested in watching it pass over the Monroeville area tomorrow (Friday) night, be outside just after 9 p.m. The ISS will pass over at 9:02 p.m. and should be visible for about four minutes. It will approach from the West-Southwest and will track toward the North-Northeast. (Keep in mind that the weather will have to cooperate, so if it’s too cloudy then it may mess up the viewing opportunity.)
The ISS is easily visible from Earth because it’s in low Earth orbit and is the largest artificial satellite that has ever orbited Earth. My wife, Crystal, wanted to know how far away it is and a little research revealed that the ISS maintains an orbit of between 173 and 286 miles. And that sucker is moving too! It travels at an average speed of 17,239 miles per hour and completes 15.7 orbits per day.

Faulkner... You either love him or hate him, right?

I read in today’s Mobile Press-Register that a rare collection of William Faulkner’s books sold for $833,246 during an action Tuesday at the auction house, Christie’s, in New York.
The highest price went for a first edition copy of “Absalom, Absalom!” which sold for $86,500. (That price exceeded the pre-sale estimated price of $40,000 to $60,000.) A first edition of “Light in August” sold for $47,500.
Faulkner, a native of Mississippi who died in 1962, is one of those authors that people either love or hate. Some of his books are unusual, and some people find them hard to read. Others love his quirky, unusual style and can’t get enough of him.
In all, Faulkner published 20 novels, scores of short stories and a number of poems.
Today, I give you a complete list of Faulkner’s novels, listed in order of publication. Here they are:
- Soldier’s Pay (1926)
- Mosquitoes (1927)
- Sartoris/Flags in the Dust (1929/1973)
- The Sound and the Fury (1929)
- As I Lay Dying (1930)
- Sanctuary (1931)
- Light in August (1932)
- Pylon (1935)
- Absalom, Absalom! (1936)
- The Unvanquished (1938)
- If I Forget Thee Jerusalem (The Wild Palms/Old Man) (1939)
- The Hamlet (1940)
- Go Down, Moses (1942)
- Intruder in the Dust (1948)
- Requiem for a Nun (1951)
- A Fable (1954)
- The Town (1957)
- The Mansion (1959)
- The Reivers (1962)
- Father Abraham (1983, written in 1926)
How many of these books have you read? Which are your favorites? Which would you recommend to readers interested in Faulkner’s works? Let us know in the comments section below.

'The Dead Zone' stays true to King's novel

I recently scratched another Saturn Award winner for Best Horror Film off of my list of movies to watch, and this time around, it was “The Dead Zone,” which received a Saturn Award in 1983.
This movie, which was released in October 1983 and is based on Stephen King’s 1979 novel, was very entertaining. Starring Christopher Walken and Martin Sheen, this movie stayed very true to the novel, which I read a year or so ago. In a nutshell, it’s about a schoolteacher, who falls into a coma after a traffic accident only to awaken five years later with the psychic ability to predict the future.
One interesting bit of trivia about this movie and King’s novel is that they are loosely based on the life of Peter Hurkos, a famous psychic who claims to have acquired his powers after falling off a ladder and hitting his head. Hurkos, who died in 1988, appeared on The Tonight Show three times and numerous publications reported his exploits, including Time, Newsweek, Life, Reader’s Digest, Playboy and The National Enquirer.
Before watching it a few days ago, I’d never seen the film version of “The Dead Zone,” and I was surprised to see that Martin Sheen was in this movie. This makes the second Saturn Award-winning horror movie that he’d been in up to that point. He also starred in “The Little Girl Who Lived Down the Lane,” which won a Saturn Award for Best Horror Film in 1977. In both “The Dead Zone” and “The Little Girl Who Lived Down the Lane,” Sheen plays “The Bad Guy.” In “The Dead Zone,” he’s a crazed politician, who would eventually lead the world into a nuclear war if elected President. In “The Little Girl Who Lived Down the Lane,” he’s the weird neighbor who takes an unwholesome interest in a teenage girl who lives down the street from him.
From here, it’s on to the 1984 Saturn Award Winner for Best Horror Film, “Gremlins.” I’m sure that I’ve seen this movie, but it’s been a while. This is the first of the Saturn Award winners that I can actually remember when it was first released. If I’m not mistaken, I was in the third grade, and I can distinctly remember the media build-up to this controversial movie that gave birth to the PG-13 rating.

Modern Library’s 100 Best Nonfiction Books of the 20th Century, Part III

On Saturday and Sunday, I gave you the first two-thirds of a recommended reading list that I clipped out of the April 30, 1999 edition of USA Today, that is, the Modern Library’s 100 Best Nonfiction Books of the 20th Century.
This list includes many of the most influential, award-winning books of the past century, and I’ve enjoyed the few that I’ve had a chance to read. Today, I give you selections 67-100. Here they are:
67. A Preface to Morals by Walter Lippman
68. The Gate of Heavenly Peace by Jonathan D. Spence
69. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas S. Kuhn
70. The Strange Career of Jim Crow by C. Vann Woodward
71. The Rise of the West by William H. McNeill
72. The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels
73. James Joyce by Richard Ellmann
74. Florence Nightingale by Cecil Woodham-Smith
75. The Great War and Modern Memory by Paul Fussell
76. The City in History by Lewis Mumford
77. Battle Cry of Freedom by James M. McPherson
78. Why We Can’t Wait by Martin Luther King Jr.
79. The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt by Edmund Morris
80. Studies in Iconology by Erwin Panofsky
81. The Face of Battle by John Keegan
82. The Strange Death of Liberal England by George Dangerfield
83. Vermeer by Lawrence Gowing
84. A Bright Shining Lie by Neil Sheehan
85. West With the Night by Beryl Markham
86. This Boy’s Life by Tobias Wolff
87. A Mathematician’s Apology by G.H. Hardy
88. Six Easy Pieces by Richard P. Feynman
89. Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard
90. The Golden Bough by James George Frazer
91. Shadow and Act by Ralph Ellison
92. The Power Broker by Robert A. Caro
93. The American Political Tradition by Richard Hofstadter
94. The Contours of American History by William Appleman Williams
95. The Promise of American Life by Herbert Coly
96. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
97. The Journalist and the Murderer by Janet Malcolm
98. The Taming of Chance by Ian Hacking
99. Operating Instructions by Anne Lamott
100. Melbourne by Lord David Cecil
In the end, I’d like to know if you’ve read any of these, what you thought about them and which you’d recommend. I’ve denoted the few that I’ve had a chance to read with italics. Let me hear from you in the comments section below.

The Modern Library’s 100 Best Nonfiction Books of the 20th Century, Part II

Yesterday, I gave you the first portion of a recommended reading list that I clipped out of the April 30, 1999 edition of USA Today, that is, the Modern Library’s selections for 100 best nonfiction books of the 20th century.
This list includes many of the most influential, award-winning books of the past century, and I’ve enjoyed the handful that I’ve read.
Without further ado, here are selections 34-66. Read yesterday’s post for the first 33 selections and visit the site tomorrow for selections 67-100.
34. On Growth and Form by D’Arcy Thompson
35. Ideas and Opinions by Albert Einstein
36. The Age of Jackson by Arthur Schlesinger Jr.
37. The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes
38. Black Lamb and Grey Falcon by Rebecca West
39. Autobiographies by W.B. Yeats
40. Science and Civilization in China by Joseph Needham
41. Goodbye to All That by Robert Graves
42. Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
43. The Autobiography of Mark Twain by Mark Twain
44. Children in Crisis by Robert Coles
45. A Study of History by Arnold J. Toynbee
46. The Affluent Society by John Kenneth Galbraith
47. Present at the Creation by Dean Acheson
48. The Great Bridge by David McCullough
49. Patriotic Gore by Edmund Wilson
50. Samuel Johnson by Walter Jackson Bate
51. The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Alex Haley and Malcolm X
52. The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe
53. Eminent Victorians by Lytton Strachey
54. Working by Studs Terkel
55. Darkness Visible by William Styron
56. The Liberal Imagination by Lionel Trilling
57. The Second World War by Winston Churchill
58. Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen
59. Jefferson and His Time by Dumas Malone
60. In the American Grain by William Carlos Williams
61. Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner
62. The House of Morgan by Ron Chernow
63. The Sweet Science by A.J. Liebling
64. The Open Society and Its Enemies by Karl Popper
65. The Art of Memory by Frances A. Yates
66. Religion and the Rise of Capitalism by R.H. Tawney
In the end, I’d like to know if you’ve read any of these, what you thought about them and which you’d recommend. I’ve denoted the few that I’ve had a chance to read with italics. Let me hear from you in the comments section below.

The Modern Library’s 100 Best Nonfiction Books of the 20th Century, Part I

The second oldest “best-of” book list that I have in my bulging book list file at home is a yellow clipping from the April 30, 1999 edition of USA Today. In that edition of “The Nation’s Newspaper,” they gave readers a list of the Modern Library’s 100 best nonfiction books of the 20th century published in English.
This is a great list, and since its publication, I’ve read more than a few of them just because they were on the list. Here’s what I’m calling Part I of that list, and those that I’ve read are in italics. Here are the first 33 books on the list:
1. The Education of Henry Adams by Henry Adams
2. The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James
3. Up From Slavery by Booker T. Washington
4. A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Wolf
5. Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
6. Selected Essays, 1917-1932 by T.S. Eliot
7. The Double Helix by James D. Watson
8. Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov
9. The American Language by H.L. Mencken
10. The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money by John Maynard Keynes
11. The Lives of a Cell by Lewis Thomas
12. The Frontier in American History by Frederick Jackson Turner
13. Black Boy by Richard Wright
14. Aspects of the Novel by E.M. Forster
15. The Civil War by Shelby Foote
16. The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman
17. The Proper Study of Mankind by Isaiah Berlin
18. The Nature and Destiny of Man by Reinhold Niebuhr
19. Notes of a Native Son by James Baldwin
20. The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein
21. The Elements of Style by William Strunk and E.B. White
22. An American Dilemma by Gunnar Myrdal
23. Principia Mathematica by Alfred North Whitehead and Bertrand Russell
24. The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould
25. The Mirror and the Lamp by Meyer Howard Abrams
26. The Art of the Soluble by Peter B. Medawar
27. The Ants by Bert Hoelldobler and Edward O. Wilson
28. A Theory of Justice by John Rawls
29. Arts and Illusion by Ernest H. Gombrich
30. The Making of the English Working Class by Edward P. Thompson
31. The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B. Du Bois
32. Principia Ethica by G.E. Moore
33. Philosophy and Civilization by John Dewey
And we’ll stop right there for today. Visit the site tomorrow for titles 34 through 66 and let us know which of the above you’ve read in the comments section below.

'G.I. Joe' movie disappoints

I finally got around to watching 2009’s “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra” yesterday, and I was disappointed by the movie.
Back in the days when my TV only got four stations, I grew up watching the “G.I. Joe” cartoon series on Channel 15 out of Mobile. Also during that time (we’re talking fourth through sixth grade here) and with the aid of my grandpa, I used to buy monthly issues of Marvel’s G.I. Joe comics at the Junior Food Store in Frisco City. Long story short, at one time I was well up-to-date on all things G.I. Joe. I even had a few of the action figures.
So when I heard that a live action G.I. Joe movie was in the works, I was more than a little interested. I pictured something along the lines of the very slick X-Men, Spiderman, Blade, Daredevil, Punisher, Ghost Rider and Iron Man movies that have come out in recent years. I guess I had my hopes set too high, because “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra” fell well short of the bar set by those movies.
In the movie, G.I. JOE has to stop a multi-national arms company and terrorist organization from destroying some of the world’s largest cities with “nanomites,” that is, microscopic robots that are designed to consume metal. As you would expect, after a few set backs, the members of G.I. JOE, which stands for Global Integrated Joint Operating Entity, saves the day.
While watching the movie, I couldn’t figure out if the acting was just plain terrible or if the writers were to blame for the movie’s poor quality. I tend to side with bad acting after I learned that Producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura and Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner chose screenwriter Michael Gordon to do the script on the basis of his work in “300,” which is an awesome movie.
On the upshot, G.I. Joe was not short on action. Rated PG-13 for “strong sequences of action violence and mayhem throughout,” there were over 250 explosions in the movie and 112 cars were destroyed during filming, which was a record number of cars destroyed in a movie at that time.
In the end, it’s unlikely that I’ll ever watch this movie again. There is a sequel in the works, and I hope that it will be a lot better than the first movie. Have any of you seen “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra”? If so, what did you think about it? Let us know in the comments section below.

The Next 100 Great Southern Books: Part II

Yesterday, I gave you the first part of “The Next 100 Great Southern Books,” which was a sub-list of “A Southern List: 125 Great Southern Books,” which was compiled several years ago by the James Agee Film Project. (On Tuesday, I gave you “The Top 25 Great Southern Books” list, which was also a sub-list of “A Southern List.”)
Today, I give you the final part of “The Next 100 Great Southern Books.” This list, unlike the Top 25, is in alphabetical order, and I’m picking up where I left off with the list yesterday.
Those of you who read the posts on Tuesday and Wednesday will remember that this list was put together by the James Agee Film Project while they were working on the award-winning documentary series, “Tell About The South: Voices in Black and White.” The list of great Southern books was compiled after a poll of book editors, publishers, scholars and reviewers. They were each asked “which of the thousands of Southern prose works published in during the past century should be considered ‘the most remarkable works of modern Southern Literature.’”Without further ado, here are the rest of the books on “The Next 100 Great Southern Books” list:
- The Violent Bear It Away by Flannery O’Connor
- A Good Man Is Hard to Find by Flannery O’Connor
- Wise Blood by Flannery O’Connor
- Mystery and Manners by Flannery O’Connor
- Everything That Rises Must Converge by Flannery O’Connor
- Lancelot by Walker Percy
- Love in the Ruins by Walker Percy
- Pale Horse, Pale Rider by Katherine Anne Porter
- Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter
- Edisto by Padgett Powell
- A Long and Happy Life by Reynolds Price
- Kate Vaiden by Reynolds Price
- Collected Stories by Reynolds Price
- I’ll Take My Stand by John Crowe Ransom, et al
- Mumbo Jumbo by Ishmael Reed
- O Beulah Land by Mary Lee Settle
- Oral History by Lee Smith
- Fair and Tender Ladies by Lee Smith
- Strange Fruit by Lillian Smith
- Killers of the Dream by Lillian Smith
- The Voice at the Back Door by Elizabeth Spencer
- The Collected Stories of Elizabeth Spencer by Elizabeth Spencer
- The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron
- Lie Down in Darkness by William Styron
- Sophie’s Choice by William Styron
- The Fathers by Allen Tate
- The Collected Stories by Peter Taylor
- A Summons to Memphis by Peter Taylor
- The Old Forest and Other Stories by Peter Taylor
- Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
- In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens by Alice Walker
- Jubilee by Margaret Walker
- World Enough and Time by Robert Penn Warren (pictured above)
- The Optimist’s Daughter by Eudora Welty
- A Curtain of Green by Eudora Welty
- Delta Wedding by Eudora Welty
- The Golden Apples by Eudora Welty
- One Writer’s Beginnings by Eudora Welty
- The Robber Bridgegroom by Eudora Welty
- The Ponder Heart by Eudora Welty
- Losing Battles by Eudora Welty
- You Can’t Go Home Again by Thomas Wolfe
- The Burden of Southern History by C. Vann Woodward
- The Strange Career of Jim Crow by C. Vann Woodward
- Uncle Tom’s Children by Richard Wright
In the end, I’d like to know if you’ve read any of these books. What did you think of them and which is your favorite? Let us know in the comments section below.

The Next 100 Great Southern Books: Part I

Yesterday, I gave you “The Top 25 Great Southern Books,” which was a sub-list of “A Southern List: 125 Great Southern Books," which was compiled several years ago by the James Agee Film Project.
Today, I give you a part of the rest of the list, which the good folks at the James Agee Film Project called “The Next 100 Great Southern Books.” This list, unlike the Top 25, is in alphabetical order.
Those of you who read yesterday’s post will remember that this list was put together by the James Agee Film Project while they were working on the award-winning documentary series, “Tell About The South: Voices in Black and White.” The list of great Southern books was compiled after a poll of book editors, publishers, scholars and reviewers. They were each asked “which of the thousands of Southern prose works published in during the past century should be considered ‘the most remarkable works of modern Southern Literature.’”
Without further ado, here’s what I’m calling “The Next 100 Great Southern Books: Part I.”
- A Death in the Family by James Agee
- I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
- The View from Pompey’s Head by Hamilton Basso
- The Unsettling of America by Wendell Berry
- Beasts of the Southern Wild by Doris Betts
- Dirty Work by Larry Brown
- Black Thunder by Arna Bontemps
- Good Scent from a Strange Mountain by Robert Olen Butler
- Brother to a Dragonfly by Will Campbell
- God’s Little Acre by Erskine Caldwell
- Other Voices, Other Rooms by Truman Capote
- I Am One of You Forever by Fred Chappell
- The Awakening by Kate Chopin
- Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy
- A Childhood: The Biography of a Place by Harry Crew
- Deliverance by James Dickey
- Speak Now Against the Day by John Egerton
- Sanctuary by William Faulkner
- The Unvanquished by William Faulkner
- Go Down, Moses by William Faulkner
- Intruder in the Dust by William Faulkner
- Independence Day by Richard Ford
- From Slavery to Freedom by John Hope Franklin
- Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier
- A Gathering of Old Men by Ernest Gaines
- A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest Gaines
- Death of the Fox by George Garrett
- Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons
- Victory Over Japan by Ellen Gilchrist
- Barren Ground by Ellen Glasgow
- The Keepers of the House by Shirley Ann Grau
- Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All by Allan Gurganus
- Roots by Alex Haley
- Dreams of Sleep by Josephine Humphreys
- Dust Tracks on the Road by Zora Neale Hurston
- Mules and Men by Zora Neale Hurston
- The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man by James Weldon Johnson
- Let the Dead Bury the Dead by Randall Kenan
- Our Southern Highlanders by Horace Kephart
- The Velvet Horn by Andrew Lytle
- Shiloh and Other Stories by Bobbie Ann Mason
- Suttree by Cormac McCarthy (pictured above)
- Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
- All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy
- The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers
- The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
- Ballad of the Sad Café by Carson McCullers
- The South and the Southerner by Ralph McGill
- Elbow Room by James Allan McPherson
- Coming of Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody
- North Toward Home by Willie Morris
- Trainwhistle Guitar by Albert Murray
- Wolf Whistle by Lewis Nordan
And, I’ll stop right there for today. Visit the site tomorrow when I will pick up with the O’s and take us through to the end of the list.
In the end, I’d like to know if you’ve read any of these books. What did you think of them and which is your favorite? Let us know in the comments section below.

The Top 25 Great Southern Books

Nothing lets you know that you live in the South like these long, hot, humid summer days, but if you really want to get in the summer mood, you should add a dash of Southern Literature.
While a great number of Southern books have been written over the years, you’ll be hard pressed to find more than a handful of “best-of” lists for great Southern books. One outstanding exception to this is a great best-of list that I ran across several years ago. Called “A Southern List: 125 Great Southern Books,” this list was put together several years ago by the James Agee Film Project while they were working on the award-winning documentary series, “Tell About The South: Voices in Black and White.” The list of great Southern books was compiled after a poll of book editors, publishers, scholars and reviewers. They were each asked “which of the thousands of Southern prose works published in during the past century should be considered ‘the most remarkable works of modern Southern Literature.’”
The list is broken down into two parts – The Top 25 Great Southern Books and The Next 100 Great Southern Books. Tonight, I give you the top 25.
1. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
2. Let Us Now Praise Famous Men by James Agee
3. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner (pictured above)
4. The Mind of the South by Wilbur Cash
5. Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe
6. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
7. The Color Purple by Alice Walker
8. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
9. Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner
10. Lanterns on the Levee by William Alexander Percy
11. All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren
12. The Collected Short Stories by Eudora Welty
13. The Civil War: A Narrative by Shelby Foote
14. The Moviegoer by Walker Percy
15. Tobacco Road by Erskine Caldwell
16. Black Boy by Richard Wright
17. Cane by Jean Toomer
18. Native Son by Richard Wright
19. As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
20. Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
21. Up from Slavery by Booker T. Washington
22. The Last Gentleman by Walker Percy
23. The Complete Stories by Flannery O’Connor
24. The Collected Stories by Katherine Anne Porter
25. The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman by Ernest Gaines
Visit the blog tomorrow, and I’ll start in on The Next 100 Great Southern Books, which are arranged alphabetically by author. Of the books mentioned above, how many have you read? Which is your favorite and which would you recommend? Let us know in the comments section below.

Is there anything to the 'Poltergeist Curse'?

I scratched another Saturn Award winner for Best Horror Film off my list of movies to watch this morning, and this time around, it was 1982 winner, “Poltergeist.”
“Poltergeist,” which literally means “rumbling spirit” in German, was released in June 1982, and even though it’s considered horror films, no murders or fatalities are depicted in the movie. In fact, it’s rated PG. (Keep in mind that it received this rating in the days prior to PG-13.)
Written and produced by Steven Spielberg, “Poltergeist” is about a family of five who unknowingly live in a house that’s been built over an old cemetery. Things go from bad to worse when things begin to go bump in the night (and day) and when the youngest member of the family disappears after being sucked into her bedroom closet.
In addition to having received the 1982 Saturn Award, “Poltergeist” was also nominated for three Academy awards and was ranked No. 80 on Bravo’s 100 Scariest Movie Moments. The New York Times also selected it as one of the Best 1000 Movies Ever Made, and the American Film Institute ranked it No. 84 on its 100 Years… 100 Thrills list.
Sort of like “The Exorcist,” there is a so-called “Poltergeist Curse” because several people associated with the movie have met with untimely ends. For example, Heather O’Rourke, who played Carol-Anne, and Dominique Dunne, who played the family’s teenage daughter, both suffered early deaths. Dunne was strangled to death by her boyfriend in 1982, the same year the movie was released. In 1988, O’Rourke died of intestinal stenosis. Both are buried in Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles.
Interestingly, Drew Barrymore was first considered for the role of Carol-Anne. During her audition though, Spielberg selected her to play a part in 1982’s “E.T: The Extra-Terrestrial,” which he was working on at the same time as “Poltergeist.”
From here, it’s on to the 1983 Saturn Award winner, “The Dead Zone,” which is based on the novel by one of my favorite writers, Stephen King. I’ve never seen this movie, but the novel was very good, so I’m looking forward to having NetFlix deliver it to the house.

Lynyrd Skynrd doesn't disappoint (intended for yesterday)

I heard Lynyrd Skynyrd live for the first time Saturday night, and they were as awesome as I expected them to be.
As part of their “Gods and Guns” tour, they played for a little more than 1-1/2 hours before a huge crowd in Atmore, and I don’t think that anyone left disappointed. I got the biggest case of the chills of my life when they played “Simple Man,” and I thought the National Guard was going to have to be called in during “Sweet Home Alabama.”
I did have two conversations prior to the concert that left me with a couple of questions that I couldn’t answer. I got to talking with one guy about how some of the original band members were killed in a plane crash back in the Seventies. This left us wondering just how many of the original band members were still a part of Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Lynyrd Skynyrd currently consists of nine members: Johnny Van Zant (lead vocals), Gary Rossington (guitars), Rickey Medlocke (drums, guitars, backing vocals), Mark Matejka (guitars, backing vocals), Robert Kearns (bass, backing vocals), Michael Cartellone (drums), Peter Keys (keyboards), Dale Krantz-Rossington (backing vocals) and Carol Chase (backing vocals.) Of its original members, only Gary Rossington remains with the band as of Saturday night.
Another friend wanted to know where the band got its name. I knew there was a story there (a story that I’d heard before), but I couldn’t remember for the life of me. A little research at home led me to the story behind the band’s unusual name.
After trying a number of different names, the band, in 1970, settled on the name “Leonard Skinner,” which was meant as a mocking tribute to their P.E. teacher at Robert E. Lee High School in Jacksonville, Fla. Skinner was notorious for enforcing the school’s “No Long Hair” policy for boys. The band adopted the distinctive spelling of its name shortly before the release of its first album.
Altogether, the band has released a dozen albums since 1973. They include Lynyrd Skynyrd (1973), Second Helping (1974), Nuthin’ Fancy (1975), Gimme Back My Bullets (1976), Street Survivors (1977), Lynyrd Skynyrd 1991 (1991), The Last Rebel (1993), Endangered Species (1994), Twenty (1997), Edge of Forever (1999), Vicious Cycle (2003) and God and Guns (2009).
In the end, I enjoyed the concert and would encourage any music fan to listen to Skynyrd live if you get the chance.

Ron Watters' Outdoor Literature Class Reading List

I love the outdoors, and over the past several months, I’ve given you several outdoor reading lists. Today, I give you a recommended reading list that Ron Watters uses in the Outdoor Literature class that he teaches at Idaho State University. (Watters is also highly involved in the selection of the annual National Outdoor Book Awards, which is sponsored by the National Outdoor Book Awards Foundation, Association of Outdoor Recreation and Education and Idaho State University.)
Without further ado, here’s Watters’ outdoors recommended reading list:
- Walden by Henry David Thoreau
- Scrambles Amongst the Alps by Edward Whymper
- The Exploration of the Colorado River
- Steep Trails by John Muir
- Journals of Robert Falcon Scott by Robert Falcon Scott
- To Build a Fire by Jack London
- The Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory by Peter and Leni Gillman
- Roughing It by Mark Twain
- Beyond the Hundredth Meridian: John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West by Wallace Stegner
- A Lady’s Life in the Rocky Mountains by Isabella Bird
- Travels in West Africa by Mary Kingsley
- Shackleton by Roland Huntford
- The Singing Wilderness by Sirgurd Olson
- The Man Who Walked Through Time by Colin Fletcher
- Into Thin Air by John Krakauer
- The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses by Robert Service
- A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold
- Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey
- Never Turn Back by Ron Watters
I’ve read a few of these, and there are a few on the list that I’ve been meaning to read for a while. Which of these books have you read? Which is your favorite?
For more information about the books mentioned above, visit Watters’ Web site at www.ronwatters.com. The site contains a wealth of information on outdoors books and claims to be “the web’s most extensive collection of reading lists for outdoor book lovers.”

No deerstalker cap in this version of Holmes

I finally got around to watching last year’s “Sherlock Holmes,” which starred Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law as Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick Dr. Watson, respectively. This movie was fun to watch, and I enjoyed it a great deal.
Unless they’ve been living under a rock for most of their lives, most people are at least somewhat familiar with the famous, fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes, who was created by Victorian era writer, Sir. Arthur Conan Doyle. This movie, which was directed by Madonna’s husband, Guy Ritchie, presents the famed detective as never before and is an interesting take on the super sleuth.
In this movie, which was released on Christmas Day 2009, Holmes and Watson are called on to get to the bottom of a series of murders that seem to be the result of occult rituals. They learn that the villainous Lord Blackwood, who they thought was dead, is the cause of it all, and the movie doesn’t reach its climax until a dramatic confrontation at the top of London’s Tower Bridge.
For those of you who enjoyed the movie, you will likely enjoy Doyle’s four novels and 56 short stories that gave birth to the famed detective. One interesting footnote about these stories and the movie is the fact that the entire movie takes place in the year 1891. According to the Internet Movie Database, this “sets the story during the period which, in the original Arthur Conan Doyle stories, Holmes was believed dead. According to ‘The Final Problem,’ Holmes and Professor Moriarty apparently plunged to their deaths over the Reichenbach Falls in May 1891. Holmes did not reveal he had survived until the spring of 1894, as described in ‘The Adventure of the Empty House.’”
Fans of the movie will also be pleased to hear that a sequel, Sherlock Holmes 2, is already in the works. Pre-production began in March, and the sequel is scheduled for release in December 2011. It was rumored that Brad Pitt would play the villain, Moriarty, but those rumors eventually proved untrue.
In the end, I really enjoyed this movie and actually plan to watch it a second time with my wife before sending it back to NetFlix. Have any of you out there seen this movie? If so, what did you think of it? Also, how many of you are fans of the original Doyle stories? Which of those stories is your favorite?

Any resemblance to undead in 'An American Werewolf in London' is coincidental

I scratched another Saturn Award winner for Best Horror Film off my list today, and this time it was the 1981 winner, “An American Werewolf in London.”
This was an excellent, entertaining movie and one of my favorite Saturn Award winners so far. One thing that made this movie very different than most horror movies was that it was very funny in parts. The movie was also artfully put together, and some scenes left me wondering if the movie had been directed by Stanley Kubrick. (The movie was actually written and directed by John Landis, who also directed “Animal House,” which might explain the funnier portions of the movie.)
In a nutshell, “An American Werewolf in London” is about a young American man who’s bitten by a werewolf while backpacking in rural England. He eventually ends up in a London hospital, where he begins to be plauged by bad dreams. He falls in love with an attractive young nurse, but things go from bad to worse, once the first full moon rises.
One thing that made this movie very different from most werewolf movies was that the werewolf’s victims didn’t actually die, but became “undead.” The victims would follow the werewolf around (even though no one else could see them) and planned to do so until the werewolf’s bloodline becomes severed. One funny bit of trivia about this is that the legal disclaimer in the closing credits reads, "Any resemblance to any persons living, dead, or undead is coincidental."
This movie was well-received and was a huge box office success. In addition to a Saturn Award, it also received an Academy Award for Outstanding Achievement in Makeup.
In the end, I really enjoyed this movie and would recommend it to anyone old enough to vote and enjoys horror movies. How many of you have seen this movie? What did you think about it? Let us know in the comments section below.
From here, it’s one to 1982 Saturn Award winner, “Poltergeist.” Like most of the movies on the list, I’ve seen bits and pieces of this movie over the years, but never the theatrical release. If it’s as good as “An American Werewolf in London,” then I’m in for a good movie.

Happy Birthday, Patricia Cornwell...

I saw in the paper this morning that today is author Patricia Cornwell’s 54th birthday. Cornwell’s 2002 non-fiction book, “Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper – Case Closed,” is one of my favorite all-time books, and I’ve always wanted to read Cornwell’s other books, which mostly fall into the crime thriller category. To date, including “Portrait of a Killer,” Cornwell has published 29 books.
Cornwell is best known for her books about fictional medical examiner, Dr. Kay Scarpetta. Novels in the “Scarpetta Series” include:
- Postmortem (1990)
- Body of Evidence (1991)
- All That Remains (1992)
- Cruel and Unusual (1993)
- The Body Farm (1994)
- From Potter's Field (1995)
- Cause of Death (1996)
- Unnatural Exposure (1997)
- Point of Origin (1998)
- Black Notice (1999)
- The Last Precinct (2000)
- Blow Fly (2003)
- Trace (2004)
- Predator (2005)
- Book of the Dead (2007)
- Scarpetta (2008)
- The Scarpetta Factor (2009)
- Port Mortuary (2010)
Cornwell’s other fiction books include:
- Hornet's Nest (1997)
- Southern Cross (1999)
- Life's Little Fable (1999; children’s book)
- Isle of Dogs (2001)
- At Risk (2006)
- The Front (2008)
In addition to “Portrait of a Killer,” her non-fiction books include:
- A Time for Remembering (1983)
- Ruth, A Portrait: The Story of Ruth Bell Graham (1997)
- Scarpetta's Winter Table (1998)
- Food to Die For: Secrets from Kay Scarpetta's Kitchen (2002).
Cornwell’s books are extremely popular and are said to have heavily influenced a number of forensic science television programs, including the “CSI” series of shows and “Cold Case Files.” How many of Cornwell’s books have you read. Which is your favorite? Let us know in the comments section below.

Saturn Award winners for Best Animated Film

Over the past several weeks, I’ve written a good bit about the Saturn Awards for best horror, sci-fi, fantasy, action, adventure and thriller films. Tonight, I give you the list of movies that have received a Saturn Award for Best Animated Film. The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films has been giving an award in this category only since 2002.
Here are the movies that have received top honors in that category since then:
2002 – Spirited Away
2003 – Finding Nemo
2004 – The Incredibles
2005 – Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride
2006 – Cars
2007 – Ratatouille
2008 – WALL-E
How many of these movies have you seen? What did you think of them and which do you think is best? Let us know in the comments section below.

Saturn Award winners for Best Action/Adventure/Thriller Film

Over the past several months, I’ve written more than a little about the Saturn Award winners for best horror, fantasy and science fiction films. The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films has been given out these awards since early 1970s.
However, in 1994, the Academy also began given an annual award for the Best Action/Adventure/Thriller Film. Many of you will have seen some of these movies, and tonight I give you the complete list.
1994 – Pulp Fiction
1995 – The Usual Suspects
1996 – Fargo
1997 – L.A. Confidential
1998 – Saving Private Ryan
1999 – The Green Mile
2000 – Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
2001 – Memento
2002 – Road to Perdition
2003 – Kill Bill, Vol. 1
2004 – Kill Bill, Vol. 2
2005 – Sin City
2006 – Casino Royale
2007 – 300
2008 – The Dark Knight
How many of these movies have you seen? What did you think about them?

Outside's 'Game Changers' list

The April issue of Outside magazine featured a cool Top 10 list that it called “Game Changers: The Ten Greatest Adventurers Since 1900.”
I enjoy lists like this, and I’m passing this one on to you tonight. Here it is, counting down from ten to one.
10. Loic Jean-Albert (1978-): Famous wingsuit flyer, at times clocking over 100 miles per hour in what’s the closest thing to human flight so far.
9. Robyn Davidson (1950-): In 1977, she became the first woman to cross the Australian Outback. It took her six months, and she covered 1,700 miles. She wrote a book about it in 1980 titled “Tracks.”
8. Greg Noll (1937-): Famous surfer, known for riding the biggest wave ever ridden at the time (30 feet) in 1969 at Oahu’s Makaha Point.
7. Doug Ammons (1957-): Famous kayaker. In 1990, he did the second descent of British Columbia’s Grand Canyon of the Stikine, a 60-mile Class V stretch. In 1992, he did it solo, something that’s never been repeated.
6. Yvon Chouinard (1938-): A rock-climbing legend, who “pioneered big-wall climbing and ground-up style.” Also the founder of the Patagonia brand of clothing and outdoor equipment.
5. Lynn Hill (1961-): A dominant force in the world of sport climbing. She claimed the first free ascent (using only her hands, feet and a rope) of El Cap’s 2,900-foot Nose route.
4. Thor Yeyerdahl (1914-2002): In 1947, Yeyerdahl “and a crew of five sailed a handmade balsa replica of a simple Inca pae-pae raft 5,000 miles from Peru to the South Pacific, stunning naval architects and revolutionizing anthropology.”
3. Beryl Markham (1902-1986): A native of Britian, she completed the first east to west solo flight across the Atlantic in 1936.
2. Reinhold Messner (1944-): One tough dude. He climbed all 14 of the world’s 8,000-meter peaks, including Everest, without supplemental oxygen. Considered to be the greatest climber of all time, he’s also known for his beliefe in the Yeti, aka, the Abominable Snowman.
1. Roald Amundsen (1872-1928): “The Norwegian (pictured above) was the first to sail the Northwest Passage, in 1903, trek to the South Pole, in 1911, and definitively see the North Pole (from a zeppelin) in 1926.”

Can you spot Slim Pickens eating Wolf Brand Chili?

I scratched off another Saturn Award winner for Best Horror Film yesterday, and this time around it was 1981’s “The Howling.”
Released in April 1981 and based on the novel by Gary Bradner, this movie is about a female news anchor, who has a traumatic experience after going above and beyond the call of duty to get the story behind a serial killer that’s been plaguing Los Angeles. Afterwards, to recharge her batteries and recover from the experience, she takes her therapists’ advice and decides to spend some time at “The Colony,” a secluded resort up in the hills. She brings her husband along, and it’s not long before the wolves begin howling at her door – literally. Turns out, all of the folks at “The Colony” are werewolves, including the thought-to-be-dead serial killer and her therapist.
The most impressive thing about this movie was its special effects, which had to have been innovative for the early Eighties. Let’s face it, the test of a true special effects artist has to be whether you can convincingly turn a person into a werewolf. They pull it off in this movie, and it’s so unnerving that it’s hard to watch.
Another cool thing about this movie is that it’s loaded with in-jokes. For example, all of the main characters are named after directors of other werewolf movies. Also, in one scene, one of the actors is watching a TV set turned to Walt Disney’s “The Three Little Pigs,” which prominently features The Big Bad Wolf. In another scene, you see the local sheriff, played by Slim Pickens, eating a can of Wolf Brand Chili. There are a number of other similar references throughout the movie, and its fun to try to pick them out.
In addition to winning a Saturn Award for Best Horror Film, this movie was also ranked No. 81 on Bravo’s 100 Scariest Movie Moments. To date, it’s also spawned seven sequels.
In the end, I wouldn’t recommend this movie to anyone not old enough to buy beer, but I would recommend it to people who enjoy horror movies, have a strong stomach and aren’t easily offended. While there’s almost no foul language in this movie, it does contain some nudity and graphic violence, plus lots of gross transformation scenes.
From here, it’s on to the 1981 winner, “An American Werewolf in London.” I’ve seen bits and pieces of this movie over the years, but I’m certain that I’ve never seen the theatrical cut. After all, I was in first grade the year it came out in theatres.

All Pro Dad's recommended reading list

One of my favorite Web sites is Tony Dungy’s All Pro Dad (http://www.allprodad.com/).
For those of you unfamiliar with All Pro Dad, it’s a fatherhood promoting program of Family First that was launched in 1997 with the help of Dungy, who was the head coach of the 2006 Super Bowl champion Indianapolis Colts. All Pro Dad uses a football theme to get its message across and has more than 50 NFL players and coaches speak across the country on the importance of being a good father.
After reading Dungy’s 2007 book, “Quiet Strength,” I became one of the more than 47,000 daily subscribers to All Pro Dad’s “Play of the Day” e-mail, which is the most widely read fatherhood e-mail in the world. (Visit the link above, and you can sign up for it too.)
Since then I’ve read hundreds of these Play of the Day e-mails, and the one that stands out foremost in my mind is the one that contained All Pro Dad’s Recommended Reading List for Children. Since I’ve never shared this list before, I’m doing so today. Before doing so, here’s the introduction to the list from All Pro Dad’s Web site.
“Once your children feel confident and comfortable reading on their own, the two of you can read aloud – together. The following list is suitable for children ages 8 and older. When the titles might be of particular interest to boys or girls specifically, (G) for girls and (B) for boys follows. If a title should be reserved for children of a certain age, the recommended age follows in parentheses.”
Without further ado, here’s the list:
- Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl (G) (12)
- Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery (G)
- Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
- The Black Cauldron by Lloyd Alexander
- The Borrowers by Mary Norton
- Charlotte's Web by E. B. White
- Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury (B) (11)
- The Enormous Egg by Oliver Butterworth
- The Hobbit by J.R. R. Tolkien
- The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes (G)
- Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell (G)
- The Little House on the Prairie books by Laura Ingalls Wilder
- Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (G)
- The Narnia Series by C.S. Lewis
- Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane
- Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
- The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson (G)
- Sarah, Plain and Tall by Patricia MacLachlan
- Treasure Island by R.L.Stevenson (12)
- 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne
- Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls (B)
In the end, I’d be interested to know how many of these you’ve read. How many have you read to your children?

Dracula and Scott Baio have the same barber?

Yesterday, I finished watching another of the Saturn Award winners for Best Horror Film, and this time around, it was 1979 winner, “Dracula.”
This movie was released in on July, Friday the 13th, 1979 and is based on Bram Stoker’s novel “Dracula” and the stage adaptation by Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston. (Unless you’ve lived under a rock your whole life, you know the basic story of “Dracula,” even if you haven’t read Stoker’s novel, so I’ll skip a synopsis of the movie. After all, I’ve heard it said more than once that there have been more movies made about Dracula than another other subject in history. Think about it.)
This movie was very good, and in my mind comes in only second to “Bram Stoker’s Dracula,” which came out in 1992 and starred Gary Oldman, Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder and Anthony Hopkins.
The 1979 version was remarkable for a number of reasons. Frank Langella plays Count Dracula. At the beginning of the movie, I thought he was a lame choice for the role, but by the end of the film, I thought he was awesome. (I guess he was considered very handsome for late 1970s audiences, but his hair cut kept making me think of Scott Baio from “Charles in Charge.”) Most notable about Langella’s performance was his uncanny ability to make his eyes dance almost imperceptibly during scenes in which Dracula has to fight the urge to drink blood. I’ve honestly never seen another actor pull it off as Langella does.
Langella was one of several big names associated with this movie. Laurence Olivier played Professor Abraham Van Helsing. Donald Pleasence (the doctor from “Halloween”) played Dr. Jack Seward, and John Williams composed the movie’s musical score.
There have been many vampire movies made over the years, and this one is the first one that I can remember watching in which the vampire hunters (the good guys) use a horse to find the grave of a sleeping vampire. They turn the horse loose in a cemetery, and the horse sniffs out the vamps grave and marks the spot by trampling the fresh eart. I’ve read Stoker’s 1897 novel, and I don’t remember that scene being in the book.
In the end, this was a good movie. Have any of you seen it? What did you think about it?
From here, it’s on to the 1980 Saturn Award winner, “The Howling.” This is another one of those movies that I’ve seen bits and pieces of over the years, but I can’t say with any degree of certainty that I’ve seen the theatrical release. Thanks to the good folks at NetFlix, it should arrive in my mailbox in a few days.

Stephen King's Favorite Horror Books, Part II

Last night, I gave you the first part of Stephen King’s list of favorite horror books, which was published in the back of his 1981 non-fiction classic, “Danse Macabre.”
In all, he listed about 100 titles, alphabetically by author, and yesterday I gave you authors A-K. Here’s the rest and remember, King’s favorites are marked with an asterisk (*).
- Fritz Leiber. Our Lady of Darkness*
- Ursula LeGuin. The Lathe of Heaven*; Orsinia Tales
- Ira Levin. Rosemary’s Baby*; The Stepford Wives
- John D. MacDonald. The Girl, the Gold Watch and Everything
- Bernard Malamud. The Magic Barrel*; The Natural
- Robert Marasco. Burnt Offerings*
- Gabriel Maria Marquez. One Hundred Years of Solitude
- Richard Matheson. Hell House; I Am Legend*; Shock II; The Shrinking Man*; A Stir of Echoes
- Michael McDowell. The Amulet*; Cold Moon Over Babylon*
- Ian McEwen. The Cement Garden
- John Metcalf. The Feasting Dead
- Iris Murdoch. The Unicorn
- Joyce Carol Oates. Nightside*
- Flannery O’Connor. A Good Man Is Hard to Find*
- Mervyn Peake. The Gormenghast Trilogy (3 vols.)
- Thomas Pynchon. V*
- Edogawa Rampo. Tales of Mystery and Imagination
- Jean Ray. Ghouls in My Grave
- Anne Rice. Interview with the Vampire
- Philip Roth. The Breast
- Ray Russell. Sardonicus*
- Joan Samson. The Auctioneer*
- William Sansom. The Collected Stories of William Sansom
- Sarban. Ringstones; The Sound of His Horn*
- Anne Rivers Siddons. The House Next Door*
- Isaac Bashevis Singer. The Séance and Other Stories
- Martin Cruz Smith. Nightwing
- Peter Straub. Ghost Story*; If You Could See Me Now; Julia; Shadowland*
- Theodore Sturgeon. Caviar; The Dreaming Jewels; Some of Your Blood*
- Thomas Tessier. The Nightwalker
- Paul Theroux. The Black House.
- Thomas Tryon. The Other*
- Les Whitten. Progeny of the Adder*
- Thomas Williams. Tsuga’s Children*
- Gahan Wilson. I Paint What I See
- T.M. Wright. Strange Seed*
- John Wyndham. The Chrysalids; The Day of the Triffids*
In the end, I’d be interested to know how many of these books you’ve read and what you thought about them. I’ve read a few of them and they’re all pretty good, especially “Rosemary’s Baby,” “I Am Legend” and “Interview with the Vampire.”

Stephen King's Favorite Horror Books, Part I

On Saturday and Sunday, I gave you the list of Stephen King’s favorite horror movies from the year’s 1950 to 1980. That list was first published in Appendix I of King’s 1981 non-fiction book, “Danse Macabre,” which is King’s take on horror fiction in print, on the radio, in movies and in comic books and his feelings about how horror fiction has influenced popular culture.
Also, included in the back of that book is Appendix II: The Books, which is a list of King’s favorite books from 1950 to 1980. Here’s what King has to say about this list.
“Below is a list of roughly 100 books – novels and collections – which span the period we have been discussing. They are listed alphabetically according to author. As with my list of films, you may not find all of these to your taste, but all seem – to me, at least – important to the genre we have been discussing. Once again, I’ve marked with an asterisk (*) books which I felt were particularly important.”
Without further ado, here’s the first part of the list, which, as King noted, is arranged alphabetically by each author’s last name.
- Richard Adams. The Plague of Dogs; Watership Down*
- Robert Aickman. Cold Hand in Mine; Painted Devils
- Marcel Ayme. The Walker through Walls
- Beryl Bainbridge. Harriet Said.
- J.G. Ballard. Concrete Island*; High Rise
- Charles Beaumont. Hunger*; The Magic Man
- Robert Bloch. Pleasant Dreams*; Psycho*
- Ray Bradbury. Dandelion Wine; Something Wicked This Way Comes*; The October Country
- Joseph Payne Brennan. The Shapes of Midnight*
- Frederic Brown. Nightmares and Geezenstacks*
- Edward Bryant. Among the Dead
- Janet Caird. The Loch
- Ramsey Campbell. Demons By Daylight; The Doll Who Ate His Mother*; The Parasite*
- Suzy McKee Charnas. The Vampire Tapestry
- Julio Cortazar. The End of the Game and Other Stories
- Harry Crews. A Feast of Snakes
- Roald Dahl. Kiss Kiss*; Someone Like You*
- Les Daniels. The Black Castle
- Stephen R. Donaldson. The Thomas Covenant Trilogy (3 vols.)*
- Daphne Du Maurier. Don’t Look Now
- Harlan Ellison. Deathbird Stories*; Strange Wine*
- John Farris. All Heads Turn When the Hunt Goes By
- Charles G. Finney. The Ghosts of Manacle
- Jack Finney. The Body Snatchers*; I Love Galesburg in the Springtime; The Third Level*; Time and Again*
- William Golding, Lord of the Flies*
- Edward Gorey. Amphigorey: Amphigorey Too
- Charles L. Grant. The Hour of the Oxrun Dead; The Sound of Midnight*
- Davis Grubb. Twelve Tales of Horror*
- William H. Hallahan. The Keeper of the Children; The Search for Joseph Tully
- James Herbert. The Fog; The Spear*; The Survivor
- William Hjortsberg. Falling Angel*
- Shirley Jackson. The Haunting of Hill House*; The Lottery and Others*; The Sundial
- Gerald Kersh. Men Without Bones*
- Russell Kirk. The Princess of All Lands
- Nigel Kneale. Tomato Caine
- William Kotzwinkle. Dr. Rat*
- Jerry Kozinski. The Painted Bird*
And, I’ll stop right there for tonight. Visit the site tomorrow for the rest of King’s list.
In the end, let me know if you’ve read any of the above books and what you thought about them. I’ve read a handful of them over the years, and those that I’ve read are pretty good, especially “Something Wicked This Way Comes,” “The Haunting of Hill House” and “The Lottery and Others.”