Talent or Doo-Doo Pants?

I was talking to Gyuss on the phone the other day and we were commenting on the greatness of the movie Fandango. You can go to The Cave of Gyuss to see a few clips from this masterpiece. On a related note we were speculating if Kevin Costner had even five movies to his credit that would fall into the category of greatness. Even more specifically does he have even one good movie to his credit where he is the singular hero (and not simply a single piece of a larger ensemble cast).


So I now submit to you facts:


The top 5 Costner movies that are considered good but Costner's still crap

5. Tin Cup - There are a few guys that like this movie because they think it's about golf. They could not be more wrong. What it's really about is Kevin's terrible hair-piece and how many times he can say "golly-shucks" with his eyes to Rene Russo.

4. Waterworld - Arguably the only sci-fi credit to his name. This had lots of action, explosions, and Denis Hopper. Well... two out of three ain't bad I suppose, but this dud's worldwide gross barely covered production costs.

3. Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves - Two words: Accent Coach! Could the man not even try to have an English accent? By this time Costner was in his prime and really mailing it in. What a douche! The only reason this movie has any legs at all is because of the greatness of Alan Rickman.

2. The Bodyguard - Talk about a meteoric rise of one of the greatest singers in pop-music history. At the height of Whitney's popularity this movie burst onto the scene grossing more than $400 million world wide. I think we can all agree that Witney is the first, last, and only reason this movie is half-way good.

1. Dances with Wolves - Winner of 7 Oscars, one being best picture. Costner plays the single solitary lead about an epic tale of write and wrong in the American west. What is there not to love? How about that glaring error in the film when three birds flying over head are identified as geese when in reality there were cranes? What a continuity disaster!


The REAL top 5 Costner movies


5. Bull Durham - Perhaps one of the best baseball movies ever made. While Coster's role is arguably the lead, he still plays more of an ensemble character to the larger story. Great film but not just because of him.

4. The Untouchables - Perhaps one of the best mafia/cop movies ever made. Coster's role is sound but again, he's just one piece of an ensemble cast that includes Sean freakin' Connery.

3. Silverado - Perhaps one of the best cowboy movies ever made. Coster's role is great but he plays the smallest part of a very formidable ensemble cast.

2. Fandango - Perhaps one of the best college buddy movies ever made. Coster's role is one of the best in his career but still only an ensemble role.

1. Field of Dreams - Perhaps THE best baseball movie ever made. And Coster stands alone as the show's focal point and hero. Way to go, Kev!


There you have it, folks. If the measure of greatness is a single piece of work than Coster is up there with the greats, plus he has a few decent films where he plays a critical ensemble role. But time would indicate that this actor does not get better with age... in fact he may be spoiling over time.

Cyber D's Bottom Line: Costner is a Doo-Doo Pants actor.

Motivation... or lack there of.

I've got plenty to do but I don't want to do any of it. Nothing is urgent so I'm not hard pressed to put my "nose to the grindstone," as it where...

Damn, I've got to shake the funk and get busy!

The Mind of Man - Part 2

This is an excerpt of an email my old college friend, Braveheart sent to me yesterday. Braveheart and I have known each other for more than a decade and while we only talk three or four times a year it is amazing that we have almost identical taste in television and perhaps viewpoints on the meaning of life.



"...A few years ago I'd been on call for 3 or 4 days. I ended up working like 100 hours that 7 days prior or something crazy. Hadn't been home in 3 days. I finally came home, nothing to do for the next 2 days straight, and my wife was out of town for the weekend. So I sit down on my couch, wiped out, I turn on the TiVo, and there before me (because I hadn't watched TV in 10 days or so) sat recorded new episodes that I hadn't seen of the Sopranos, Carnivale, Deadwood, South Park, maybe a Venture Brothers, the Simpsons, a BSG, a Firefly that I missed the first time around, and the Family Guy. Plus there was even a second tier of stuff, like some History Channel's greatest disasters, Mythbusters maybe, or some other stuff.

I turn off the TV without starting any of them, go upstairs and sleep for 12 or so hours straight. Wake up around 3PM. Go out and buy a 6 pack of Guinness, a big ass bucket of KFC, and Ben+Jerry's. Came home, sat on the couch, with the above mentioned items, a trash can, and a roll of paper towels. Turned on the TV and . . . . People always say that your wedding is the best day of your life until your kids are born, and then that day is the best day of your life. I love my wife, and I'm sure I'll love any kids I have, but honestly? When I lay alone at night, between me and my maker, those next hours were . . . Yeah."


The best day of a man's life... Indeed.

My cyber-thoughts go out to the Japanese.

You can imagene these turn of events come as particularly devesating news to all Cybermen everywhere.

Earthquake Article

Harry Potter Secrets Revealed!

I'm no Dagromm, but I am a Potter fan. I started late and read the books fairly quickly to play catch up because Dags was gracious enough to let me borrow his copies. Since I've caught up I haven't had the luxury or reading them ASAP.

When the Order of the Phoenix was coming out my mother (also a Potter fan) asked me if I was excited about the next release. I told her yes, but that I probably wouldn't read it for a couple of months. Shocked she asked why. Because my friend can't let me borrow it right away. He must read it and then his son wants to read it. As a surprise my mother purchased me a copy from Amazon and has continued to do so with every subsequent purchase, although since she and I haven't discussed the Deathly Hallows in any way shape or form I just assumed that the gesture would not be repeated by simple virtue of the fact that it wouldn't occur to her.

In typical mom fashion, she doesn't forget her past generosity and I find a copy of the latest release in my mailbox on Saturday. I have only had time to read the first few pages but I'm here to tell you that I had no idea that the Death Eaters would meet at the Malfoy estate. I can't wait to see what other surprises await!

Gone and done it again

I have had a nasty habit of following TV shows that are really damn good only to result in their cancellation like Farscape, Angel, and Arrested Development just to name a few. Since I've joined Blockbuster Online, my latest trend is to pick up a show that has been out for some time, only to discover that they have ALREADY been canceled, or are in the final death throws of a cancellation. The two most recent being Firefly and Rome.

Well I've gone and done it again! For reasons to complicated to name here, I decided to try out this critically acclaimed series on HBO called Deadwood. The only thing I had heard about it was that it had a great deal of cursing. But I also heard it was pretty damn good. Both turned out to be true... in spades!

What a great show. I've only seen the first four episodes but I am hooked like a heroine junky with a trust fund! I love it so much that I went online today to see when Season 4 might be released on DVD, as I had already noticed the first three seasons were available. Of course the untimely cancellation of Rome should have been my first hint that I shouldn't take such things for granted. It is just now that I learned the show was canceled approximately one year ago.

In the immortal words of Al Swearengen.... "Fucking cocksuckers!" Once again, television executives disappoint me.

Cybermen Rock

Need I say more?



Your welcome.

Weekend Jams

I have to say that a day at home with the boys is getting more and more fun all the time. Mrs. Cyber had to make some deliveries so it was just me and the cast of Magnum P.I. for the first half of our weekend. While mommy is full of educational learning and organized play, I'm all about random chaos! Consequently the house was a complete wreck but you can better believe that you never saw a more fun filled journey that included dinosaurs, Hot Wheels, water guns, and tonka trucks in your entire life!



Later on the family went to our local water park. This would be my oldest son's first time and we had a blast! He ran around the kiddie pool until he was bored out of his mind. Then we hit the spray tower and shot a few teenagers with water rifles. After that we floated around the main pool on a giant raft. To end the day we hit the lazy river that wasn't very lazy. There were points along the way that bottle-necked and made for a very fast moving stream. My son decided that I was a leather-back sea turtle and he was on a Diego adventure! Needless to say we did that about twenty times.



Mrs. Cyber and I ended the weekend with ice cream and a DVD after the kids were in bed. It was nice to have some quiet time with my lady, but we sacrificed sleep and a clean house to do it. All in all I give the weekend two thumbs up!

Taking Care of Business - Part 3

I hate sitting in meetings. What I hate most are meetings that have no purpose. Meetings that exist just so those attending and running the meetings can feel important.

I've got an interesting situation at my office where a co-worker feels compelled to create work around an issue that really is none of her concern. Our supervisor has told us that this issue is being taken care of by another department and that we should focus on our jobs and expect some results on this issue soon. Nevertheless, my co-worker wants results NOW and is dead set on getting everyone involved in our department (accept our supervisor). So she scheduled a meeting. It's never more obvious that this is a pointless meeting. While my presence was not mandatory, it was requested.

Sometimes your pointless meetings ARE mandatory. In today's installment I'm going to talk about a tried and true way you can avoid attending those meetings that amount to nothing. I like to call this:

- The Conflict Solution -



The first order of business is to make sure you are not expected to present, run, or otherwise contribute in any way to the subject matter of the meeting. If this is the case than proceed with the plan, if not, you're screwed... go to the meeting.

Assuming you know you're going to be an innocent bystander to this office "circle-jerk" you can now begin with your plan. Go check your calendar. Let's say you have another meeting (one of consequence), or a series of meetings later in the week. If there is any opportunity to provide input as to the date and time of the pointless meeting, chime in. Suggest to the organizer that your Thursday is wide open. Then when Thursday arrives you can bail for the more important meeting.

Other examples of conflicting schedules include a meeting with your boss or any other boss up the corporate ladder. Call up the Associate Vice-President and see if you can schedule some time. Nobody will fault you for skipping out of a minuscule little staff meeting when the AVP is expecting you!

Finally there is the silver bullet of "get out of jail free" cards - The client meeting/phone-call. If you feel that you would rather jump off a tall building than attend this dumb-ass meeting, then simply bail. Tell them you had to take an important client phone-call. Better yet, leave the office for an hour and go see a client on-site. The bottom line is you don't have to subject yourself to every excruciating little pow-wow that comes up when you know that it will never amount to anything. Your time and sanity is worth far too much. There it is another easy yet fun way of working around stupid people in your office. Much love to you all!

It's all in the strategy

Last week in Finland the annual Wife Carrying World Championship was held. The winning couple received the wife's weight in beer and five times her weight in cash. So what would your strategy be? Would you slim down for the race to increase your chances at victory or would you "swing for the fences" and bulk up in the hopes of taking home that many more pounds in cold hard lovingly beautiful cash... and beer?

clip of the event in action

Who would have thought... A Classic!

Everyone knows I'm a work-out buff. I'm into pumping a little iron every now and then. Mind you, I was a shade more athletic in my youth but I like to think I can keep up even today. I remember back when I was just getting started and those thirty minute weight training shows were all the craze!

My favorite was Flex Appeal... because of the articles!

Anyway, what ever happened to Kiana Tom? I'm not really sure. All I know is that ESPN was a weekday morning staple on my TV until it got moved to ESPN2. Then ESPN2 became a weekday morning staple. Then it disappeared. Today I went back to the gym for the first time since my second child was born in March and I am pleasantly surprised to see none other than Kiana herself greeting me a hearty good morning on ESPN Classic. Finally, a reason to tune-in!

Punch?

This rating was determined based on the presence of the following words:

crap x3

dead x2

punch x1

Please bring your seat to an upright position.

Last year I talked about The Stupid, Crazy, and Selfish. Today I'd like to share one such story about the before mentioned "Selfish".

It was a sunny Thursday afternoon and that meant I was leaving SoTex to head back for my home in NoTex on the lovely Southwest Airlines. I had my work notes in hand and was conscientiously reading them in my lap, as I have learned that the pilot is unable to get the plane off of the tarmac if my tray table is down. Now other members of The Quad poke a little fun at ol' Cyber for being "Mr. Corporate Guy". If that is the case than the gentleman sitting to my right made me look like a Casual Friday All-Star. This guy was the whole package: gold cuff-links, Armani suit, and slicked-back-hair. Of course he had his seat leaned back, his tray table down and his wireless laptop burning up the information super-highway!

It's one thing if you're stupid. I can almost abide the stupid. They don't know how they are supposed to play their part in preparing the plane for departure. But this jerk would actually fold down his laptop screen every time an attendant walked by in an attempt to avoid turning it off.

What an A-hole!

Eventually the hard working young air-hostess was forced to confront the man several times. Eventually he did place his seat in the upright position as well as fold up his tray table. But the guy never turned off his damn computer. Can you imagine the nerve? Everyone could tell that the poor girl was getting really annoyed as she kept walking by to gain his compliance. Eventually the pilot had to stop just short of the runway as the crew confronted the big time businessman as a group.

I'm sure the conversation was a heated one and I wish I had been able to hear, but my ipod volume was up pretty loud. Oh well, at least they finally were able to get that selfish pig to turn off all electronic devices.