A new decade

So here's something you don't want to do: look for pictures of feet on a scale on the interwebs. If you ever thought feet were strange looking, browsing through dozens of pictures of them won't do anything to change that.

What am I saying? Feet. Not a pretty picture.

But contrary to what you've read so far, I'm not here to talk about feet. I'm here to talk about the scale.

Historically the scale has not been my friend. Whether it's my expensive digital bathroom scale, or the twenty-year old beam scale (yes that's what it's called, no I didn't have to look it up) in the doctor's office, they always come up with a number that shocks me. Of the two, I look more forward to the bathroom scale, because that one is usually off by three or four pounds in my favor. But the doctor's office scale pops that balloon real fast.

It's a number that says, "Well, looks like we're not keeping that resolution again this year."

Everyone has a different way of assessing their weight. Mine is in decades. Not the years, the increments. I call every ten-pound increment on the scale a decade. And here's the bad news: I thought I was in one decade, but come to find out I'm well into the next one.

It made me so mad at myself I had to have some sugar cookies just to calm down.

When I enter a new decade on the scale, it's not easy to deal with the shame, embarrassment and disappointment. Something my high school girlfriend used to tell me all the time.

And it's not like I don't have inspiration all around me. My close personal friend Rich Siegel—Peleton evangelist, proprietor and editor-in-chief of Round Seventeen—has recently undergone a physical transformation, dropping a ton (not literally) of weight. He looks great, feels great and is currently in the market for a newer, less tenty wardrobe.

When I ask him how he did it he said diet and exercise. Like I'm buying that.

Another close friend, the formidably talented copywriter, screenwriter and bronze medal winner in curling at the 2014 games in Sochi, Cameron Young is constantly encouraging me and generously making himself available to go for long scenic walks, where we can speak of things that matter, make fun of strangers and burn calories at the same time.

Walking. Isn't that what I do between the bedroom and the refrigerator? At midnight?

One problem is I can carry a lot of weight without looking too awful. But I can only kid myself for so long. It's a numbers game, and sometimes the numbers just decide to slap you across the face and call you Sally.

Anyway, seems to me there are really only two solutions. One is to give the scale a twenty-pound head start so I don't feel so bad. The other is to let it keep starting at zero and get serious about lowering the number. After all, it's not a lot to lose. I've done it before and I know how.

And since I've been measuring the ups and downs in decades, I'll have to do what Superman did flying counterclockwise around the earth, and Cher did singing on a battleship.

Turn back time.

Leap at the chance

It happens every four years. Not the election (although that can't get here soon enough), not the summer Olympics and not the World Cup. What am I talking about (a question I get all the time)? I'm talking about Leap Year.

Why is this year different than the three years before it? Because as you probably know, during leap year February has an additional day. So instead of 365 days, in leap years there are 366. Thank you Captain Obvious.

Since it's such an infrequent occurrence—like me exercising or Scarlett Johansson returning my calls, there are a few interesting facts about a leap year:

What do you call them? People born on February 29th call themselves Leaplings. Or Leapsters. Or Leapers.

Never tell me the odds. The odds of being born on February 29th are 1 in 1,461, or .068 per cent.

Happy birthday to you. Leap year babies actually get to have birthdays the other years. As a rule, they usually celebrate it March 1st.

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's his birthday! Superman was born on February 29th.

I was curious why we even have leap years—who isn't, amirite? So here's a little explanation I grabbed off the interwebs:

Leap days keep our modern-day Gregorian calendar in alignment with Earth's revolutions around the Sun. It takes Earth approximately 365.242189 days, or 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 45 seconds, to circle once around the Sun. This is called a tropical year, and it starts on the March equinox. However, the Gregorian calendar has only 365 days in a year. If we didn't add a leap day on February 29 almost every four years, each calendar year would begin about 6 hours before the Earth completes its revolution around the Sun. As a consequence, our time reckoning would slowly drift apart from the tropical year and get increasingly out of sync with the seasons. With a deviation of approximately 6 hours per year, the seasons would shift by about 24 calendar days within 100 years. Allow this to happen for a while, and Northern Hemisphere dwellers will be celebrating Christmas in the middle of summer in a matter of a few centuries. Leap days fix that error by giving Earth the additional time it needs to complete a full circle around the Sun.

So not only is this blog wildly entertaining to read, it's also educational. You're welcome.

Leap years are like daylight saving, except instead of springing forward an hour you get to do it for a whole day. Ok, so analogies may not be my strong suit, but you see where I'm going.

My point is you have an extra day to do something you like, be nice to someone, forget all about pandemic diseases that may wipe out the entirety of mankind with a sneeze, and not listen to news about the unstable genius and his incoherent orange ramblings.

As everyone says to the bride, this is your day.

So do with it what you will, and make it one to remember.

Because no matter how you decide to celebrate your extra 24 hours, you'll only have four years to think of a way to top it.

2019 Edition: The Con is on

I don't usually repost pieces on here. But it's the Comic Con time of year again, and I was going to write a post about going. Again. But then I reread this little gem and realized it said exactly what I wanted to say. Again. We don't have to re-invent the wheel each time out people. Let's just take tonight's post at face value, and enjoy the writing for what it is - an excuse not to think of something new to write. Wait? Did I say that out loud?

Don't say you haven't been warned. For four and a half days this week, my son and I will be living amongst 'em (well, actually we'll be living at the Hilton and walking amongst 'em, but no one's under oath here): the Stormtroopers, Wolverines, Lara Crofts, Jokers, Iron Men, Darth Vaders, Zombies, Batmen, Supermen and other assorted, costumed inhabitants of Comic Con.

As you can see here and here, this isn't the first time I've written about the Con. And it won't be the last.

Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not saying it's the only subject I'll post about for the next few days. But if you happen to notice my writing in the Thursday through Sunday posts have a nerdist, geekesque, maybe-I-ought-to-get-a-life, gee-he-sounds-REALLY-tired quality to them, then I've done my job and you'll know we're having a fine time.

For those who've never been - and really, like the Rolling Stones or Rick Perry trying to complete a sentence, it's something you need to see at least once in your life - please to enjoy this little taste of my next four days.

Welcome to my world.

A-maize-ing

Johnny Carson was born there. So was Ashton Kutcher. And The Duke himself, John Wayne. Herbert Hoover is from there. As are comedian Adam DeVine and actor Elijah Wood. TV Superman George Reeves hails not from Krypton, but from Woolstock, Iowa.

The point is a lot of famous things come out of Iowa. Not the least of which is corn.

I had my very first experience with Iowa this past weekend. Instead of going to one of the premier universities in the California system located virtually around the block from our house, my daughter had her heart set on a private college in Iowa, which we moved her into this past weekend.

Sure, it would've been nice to have her closer to home, but then we wouldn't get to pay out-of-state tuition, take two airplanes, drive two hours and travel 1,692 miles to see her. Apparently she doesn't know there's an east coast and it would've been even further from us. Maybe she'll learn about it in college.

Here's the thing about Iowa: cornfields everywhere. And by everywhere, I mean everywhere.

There's a certain beautiful monotony (Note to Rich Siegel: Beautiful Monotony, The Whiskey '06) to the rows of corn as you zip by them on the two-lane highways. And what it made me think about—besides how I was going to die when the driver of one of the eighteen-wheelers coming the other way fell asleep and slammed into me head on—was just how big a part cornfields have played in some of my favorite movies.

I know people don't like Signs because a) it stars Mel Gibson b) it's directed by M. Night Shyamalan and c) it's a story about faith lost and found, and not aliens (for the most part). But it does have Joacquin Phoenix, German Shepherds and cornfields, so that makes it a must see in my book.

The ultimate father-son film couldn't help but be corny. Field Of Dreams takes place almost entirely in an Iowa cornfield. One of the ball players in the movie asks Kevin Costner, "Is this heaven?" To which he responds, "No, it's Iowa." Boy is it.

The first film anyone mentions when I say cornfield is Children of the Corn. Not exactly quality motion picture faire, but a horror classic for it's kitschiness and that tall, ugly red-headed kid. That short kid is yelling and chewing scenery all throughout the movie. Good thing most of it's edible.

Lions and tigers and corn, oh my. Perennial favorite The Wizard Of Oz not only has a cornfield, but a talking, singing and dancing scarecrow right in the middle of it. Ironically, the song the scarecrow sings is the same one our fake president sings to himself every night.

The other thing Iowa (and South Dakota where I connected through) have plenty of are the nicest people I've ever met anywhere. It's startling how genuine they are. Glad to see you, ready to help, open and honest, it really is a refreshing change of pace.

Now if they could just truck that to the big cities the same way they do their corn.

Send fries in lieu of flowers

Michael James Delligatti deserved more.

He is after all the man who invented a uniquely American culinary icon. Made literally billions for the company he worked with and for. And his invention was a very happy meal indeed.

Delligatti should've died last week at the age of 98 (maybe Big Macs aren't so bad for you) with an estate worth billions to leave his heirs. But all he got from McDonald's for his creation that's responsible for over 25% of their profits is a plaque.

Some people might argue that's more than Moe Green got (Godfather reference, look it up). But for my McMoney, it wasn't enough.

Delligatti was a franchisee who told McDonald's they should offer a double-patty burger. McDonald's, having the foresight and keen intuition for trends that they demonstrate even to this day, told him no. So, as the NY Times said, Delligatti went rogue. He ordered a larger, sesame-seed bun from a local baker, split it in three and made his own double-patty burger.

To everyone's surprise but his, sales skyrocketed. Funny thing. Once that happened, suddenly McDonald's was interested in offering what later became the Big Mac.

There seems to be a tradition of companies who make money off of these innovative ideas by screwing the people who come up with them.

One of the more famous instances was Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster who created a little character with a red cape you might've heard of - Superman. There were a slew of lawsuits, settlements and more lawsuits with the two families about ownership, and they still continue to this day (too much to go into here, but if you want to read more about it you'll find it here).

Ronald Wayne, the third founder of Apple along with Jobs and Wozniak. Wayne quit a few days into the partnership, scared the boys didn't know what they were doing and he'd be on the hook financially. If he'd held onto his stock, which he sold for $800, it would've been worth over $32 billion today. He took himself out of the equation, but still it would've been good karma for Jobs to reward him with a stipend for getting the company on its feet.

Philo T. Farnsworth, the farm boy who actually invented television at fourteen-years old and got screwed out of the patent by RCA.

John Walker, inventor of the self-igniting friction sticks, or as we call them in my country, matches.

How about Gary Kildall, inventor of the operating system you're probably using a version of right now. He got royally hosed by a nerdy billionaire from Seattle who usually gets the credit.

Of course, there's a saying my therapist taught me. I know what you're saying to yourself "But Jeff, you seem so well-adjusted, why would you have a therapist?" You have no idea.

Anyway, what she always says is there are no victims, only volunteers.

Many of these people didn't patent their ideas in spite of being urged to. Or some signed a contract without reading it. However they lost hold of their brain work, it seems ashame they weren't able to benefit from the rewards of it.

Even if a company owned their ideas fair and square, there's more than enough money to go around. Giving the creators some of it just seems like the right thing to do. Although I realize we're living in a post right-thing-to-do era.

Anyway, rest in peace Mr. Delligatti. I've enjoyed your creation many times over the years, and still indulge the occasional craving for it. Only now I take out the middle slice of bread.

It's a lot healthier that way.

More power to me

There are a lot of powers I'd like to have.

I'd like to be able to fly like Superman. It'd get me where I need to go a lot faster, I wouldn't have to deal with those pesky TSA people, and I look absolutely fabulous in a cape.

Or so I've been told.

Invisibility would also be a good one, being able to move through the world unnoticed (of course I could accomplish the same thing by having a show on NBC), slipping into places unseen by anyone. This is definitely a power I would've put to much better use in high school. Now I think I'd use it mostly to get around taking out the trash and unloading the dishwasher. "Where's dad? He was here a minute ago."

Telekinesis is a favorite. I'd love to be able to have a driver flip me off on the freeway, then be able to flip them off the road by sending their car over the side rail just by thinking about it. Seems fair.

Sadly, I don't have any of those powers. The one I will have shortly is one I hope I never have to use. Power of attorney over my son's health and affairs.

As you might know, young Mr. Spielberg is going to one of the finest film schools in the country. That's the good news. The bad news, besides the tuition, is it's not in the same state as I am. So just like my weight, taxes and where my next gig is coming from, I file this power under things I don't want to think about but have to.

My boy will be a two and a half hour flight away, and that's provided the planes are leaving when I need to go. God forbid if something should happen where he's unable to make decisions for himself, either myself or my wife are going to have to make them for him. No parent ever wants to think about this. But the only thing worse than it actually occurring is not being able to do anything about it. I asked him to grant my wife and I power of attorney, and he'll have to sign documents giving it to us. As I was stumbling around trying to explain it to him, he took the opportunity to explain it to me: "It's like a fire extinguisher. You never want to use it, but it's good to have around if you need it."

Clearly he's already much more mature than I ever was at his age. Or even my age.

I'm taking this as a learning opportunity for both of us. I get to teach him to read this document - all documents - carefully before he signs them. He gets to teach me he's a capable, grown man - something I sometimes have trouble remembering (and realizing).

I finally understand why parents treat you as kids no matter how old you get. He's always going to be my baby boy no matter what state he's in or how old he is.

The other thing the wife and I are forced to consider is that plane ride I was talking about. If events were moving fast, there's the very real possibility we wouldn't be able to reach him before decisions needed to get made.

Fortunately, I have a great friend named Cameron who lives in the city where he'll be. He's graciously offered to be my son's boots on the ground while we're not there, and not just for emergency situations but for homecooked meals, advice and anything else he needs as well. Cameron's included in the legal document as the alternate after the wife and I, so there won't be any question about his authority should it ever come to that. I'll never be able to convey how much of a relief it is knowing he's there for my son, or how thankful the wife and I are.

So tomorrow morning, we sit down with our lawyer and he'll sign the papers. And I'll try not to think about what they actually mean.

I guess that is one more power I have. The power of denial.

Your outside voice

I recently wrote a post that dealt with a kind of phone I thought had disappeared but hadn't. Today's post is about a phone I know has been vanishing for some time now.

That urban American cultural icon, and improvised Superman dressing room, the pay phone.

Not a surprise really. With the proliferation of cell phones, the pay phone and phone booth were on borrowed time.

I always felt there was a class system when it came to pay phones. There were the thick wooden phone booths, like the ones you can still find at Philippe's downtown, or Musso's in Hollywood. Then there were the metal ones, filled with graffiti and wreaking of urine, that you'd find on the corner of every gas station.

There are any number of movies where someone is on the pay phone, in a phone booth, at night, in the rain. The romance of those shots rarely matched the reality of trying to hold the receiver a few inches away from your face in case some of the nastier germs decided to make the leap.

Despite the inherent risk of using them, I miss pay phones. Not half-booth ones like above that got such a huge laugh in Superman II, but real ones.

When I'm at a place like the restaurants I named, I make it a point to call someone. I love the feeling of ducking into the booth, closing the door and shutting out the world.

Barring finding out I actually came from another planet, which many people I work with believe, the phone booth is probably as close to being Superman as I'm going to get.

The romance of the phone booth was also captured in the song Operator by Jim Croce. In it, he has a conversation with a pay phone operator, asking her to connect him to a lost love. It's a song I always loved, maybe because it reminds me of nights before cell phones, when I was on a pay phone trying to get back together with someone.

Or maybe I'm just a sap. It could be that too.

Hoskins in Hollywoodland

A great, great actor died yesterday. Bob Hoskins was 71, and he leaves us one remarkable performance after another. It's hard to know where to start - Roger Rabbit, The Long Good Friday, Brazil, Nixon - when you talk about his films.

To me, like Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Hoskins was similar to Gene Hackman in the sense that he was brilliant no matter how good or bad the film. His was the performance you looked forward to.

One that sadly not a lot of people saw was in a small film called Hollywoodland (originally called Truth, Justice and the American Way). It was about the suicide and alleged murder of George Reeves (Ben Affleck) who played Superman on the television series. Hoskins played Eddie Mannix, a studio executive whose wife (Diane Lane) had a years-long affair with Reeves. It is by turns a frightening, tender, poignant and powerful performance.

And never anything less than riveting.

I'm really going to miss Bob Hoskins. I wish there were some way I could thank him for the honor of watching him work, and the joy he's brought me over the years.

Maybe the best way is to keep watching his movies and enjoying them.

The Long Ranger

I'm not usually one to go by what the critics say. I'm of the belief that whether it's music, movies, plays books or restaurants, a person should see it for themself then make up their own mind. One man's ceiling is another man's blockbuster and all that.

I found out last night this is not true in all cases. When it comes to The Lone Ranger - and you'll thank me for this - listen to the critics.

I can count on half a hand the number of movies I've ever walked out of. Even the crappiest movies have a great line or moment, a memorable effect to get you talking, a nuanced performance in the midst of the badness. An actor who's always great no matter how terrible the script is. The Lone Ranger has none of that.

I couldn't get out of the theater fast enough.

It's just a mess with an identity crisis. Does it want to be a drama with a touch of comedy, or a comedy with some drama? It's supposed to be a period piece, yet even the Indians in the tee-pees are saying things like "not so much."

You never really think about a consistent tone in a movie until there isn't one.

Also, when did it become necessary to explain the origins of every character's situation, how they got to be who they are. It seems like the first five hours of the film are letting us know everyone's backstory. Whatever happened to just hitting the road running - making the assumption the audience is already familiar with the character, which would be the point of making a film starring a character everyone knows, or giving them credit for having enough imagination to just jump in and hang on for the ride.

This is not a problem unique to this film. Tell me again how Superman got here, why he can fly and why bullets bounce off him. I didn't get it the first seven times.

Regardless of what you know about movies, I'm sure you know editors play an essential part in shaping a film. Apparently The Lone Ranger didn't have one. It seems like every single frame they shot is on the screen. It is the most unnecessarily long and unwieldy film I've almost ever seen all the way through.

I'm sure my show from last night hasn't let out yet.

I had a special interest in seeing this film. Thanks to his friend's aunt who worked on it, my son and his friend went to the shoot in Moab and actually worked as production assistants for a few very hot days. I love my son, but even love has its limits. Mine stops at sitting through all twenty hours of The Long Ranger.

I like both Armie Hammer and Johnny Depp. But Hammer was a monumental bore ("Who was that masked man?" "Who cares?") and has nothing at all to work with in the way of a script. Depp is essentially recycling Jack Sparrow, only this time it's a crow instead of a bandana. His eccentricities are forced, and his Injun-talk is really just another version of Sparrow's slurred speech.

It was unusual to hear the Lone Ranger's signature line "Hi-yo Silver away!" coming from the audience instead of the screen as they walked out the door. BAM! Thank you, I'll be here all week. Tip your waitress.

If you want a Lone Ranger story that's actually entertaining, try this one by Jay Thomas about Clayton Moore, who played him for years on the TV show a lot of us grew up with:

That guy

Last night my son and I watched The Green Mile. It was the first time he'd seen it. It was my millionth.

From Tom Hanks to Sam Rockwell to Michael Clark Duncan, there are lots of reasons to love it. One is because of that guy. You know, the guy who plays the older Tom Hanks character at the beginning and end. The guy who's always a judge. Or priest. Cowboy. Reporter. The guy that was on every TV show when we were growing up.

Yeah, that guy.

His real name is Dabbs Greer. It's the kind of name that could've been one of the more than three hundred character roles he played before he died five years ago.

When I was growing up (no, I'm not finished yet), I remember seeing him most on the old Superman television series. He was on it all the time, as a reporter (not mild-mannered) or one of the bad guys.

It's an interesting career being a character actor. If you're lucky, like Dabbs was, you work for decades. You avoid the spotlight and glare of the tabloids. You turn in one quality, scene or movie stealing performance after another. And absolutely everyone knows who you are: you're that guy.

There are many sites like this one dedicated to all the "that guys" who've graced the large and small screen over the years.

Every once in awhile an A-list actor becomes, either by choice or a career slow down, more of a character actor. The one that comes to mind is Alec Baldwin. Of course, as an A-lister he carried some great films like Hunt For Red October, Miami Blues (a personal favorite) and The Cooler. But the problem is you have to balance the mix. When you do films like The Marrying Man and The Shadow, people tend to forget the good ones.

Taking on character parts, he's doing some of the best work of his career. We got a hint of it from his ten unforgettable minutes in Glengarry Glen Ross. Then he sealed it with roles in The Aviator, The Departed, The Good Shepherd and State and Main.

For my money - $8.50 matinee or $12.50 after 6PM - character actors are the foundation of any great film. They put craft and art before pride and ego, and they make every actor on screen who comes near them look better. It forces everyone to raise their game.

They don't get recognized nearly as often as they should. So consider this post a thank you to all the character actors that've brought joy and memories to every person who's ever seen an image flicker on the large or small screen.

Especially that guy.