Q and A childhood roundup

After last week’s cartoon classic awesomeness, I thought I’d tackle all the movies I remembered watching over and over again while growing up… you know, when I was just a jester in training, as it were.

If you have no idea what’s going on, you should probably start here.

Over the years I’ve incorporated what seems to be an ever increasing absurd amount of movie dialogue into my day-to-day lingo.  This week’s theme, as already discussed, is all relating to movies I loved as a kid.

Oh, who are we kidding, I still love these movies.

Q: What do you say to your buddy who is going up to the counter to order some food for everyone?
A: “Marcus, score us some nacho chips and some radical salsa.”
– Fester (Patrick Labyorteaux) – 3 Ninjas

Q: What do you say to someone who shows a bit of insight you thought was beyond them?”
A: “Miyagi have hope for you..”
– Miyagi (Pat Morita) – Karate Kid

Q: What do you say when someone asks why you are rearranging your house again?
A: “Why? Why, oh I don’t know, ’cause I wanted to redecorate. You know, a couple of throw pillows, a TV news reporter, what do ya think?.”
– Raphael (Kenn Scott) – Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

(Interesting.  Did anyone else see a theme within the theme there?)

Q: What do you say when someone asks about the people you’ve lost?
A: “Death is a primitive concept. I prefer to think of them as battling evil in another dimension.”
– Grig (Dan O’Herlihy) – The Last Starfighter

Q: What should you say when pondering the mysteries of life, the universe and everything?
A: “If this is all a dream, what’s gonna happen when we wake up?”
– Ben Crandall (Ethan Hawke) – Explorers

Q: What do you should say after stopping to ask for directions?
A: “Try to make your directions clear because we get lost easy.”
– Max (Paul Reubens) – Flight of the Navigator

(What?  Another theme within the theme?  Crazy!)

Q: What do you say when someone asks what you know about makeup?
A: “The first rule of eye makeup is that you can never wear enough blue eye shadow.”
– Shelly (Jamie Lee Curtis) – My Girl

Q: What do you say when you are fed up with a situation?
A: “I’ve had enough of this doo-doo!”
– Peter Mitchell (Tom Selleck) – 3 Men and a Baby

Q: What should you say as often as possible?
A: “This has got to be the weirdest day of my life… well, so far.”
– Mikey (Bruce Willis) – Look Who’s Talking

Q: What do you say when you are accused of BS’ing, joshing, lying, stretching the truth?
A: “Bull true.”
– Chris (River Phoenix) – Stand By Me

How many of these have you seen?  What’s on your list of childhood favorites?

………

Ah, what a lovely trip down memory lane.  I hope some of you respond with the movies you loved as a child.  Do you still watch them when they come on TV?  Do they still mean as much to you now as they did then? Do you know that here there be monsters, and silliness, and memories?  Thanks, as always, for playing along.

Q and A Classics part 2

And so it is that we embark on another adventure of Q and A silliness…  Well, that’s how we started last week anyway, and since this is a continuation, you don’t mind that I’ve stolen the opening line again, do you?  Right?  Yes?  No?  Speak up, I can’t hear you?

Anyway, moving on.

This time we will be pulling out the classics, again, with just a bit of a twist.

Not entirely sure what is going on?  All previous Q and A silliness is conveniently stored here.

Over the years I’ve incorporated a lot of movie dialogue into my day-to-day lingo.  And what better place to pull quotes from than those films considered the best of the best.  (And, yes, this is a direct copy from last week’s post… it’s okay, they are my words and I can steal them if I want to.)

Q: What do you tell someone to do when they ask for your advice on how to woo their true love?
A: “Climb the castle walls. Sweep her off her feet. Carry her off in style.”
– Little John (Phil Harris) – Robin Hood (1973)

Q: What is one of the best insults you could ever hurl?
A: “Impudent piece of crockery.”
– Merlin (Karl Swenson) – The Sword in the Stone (1963)

Q: What do you respond when someone asks where you are going?
A: “Second star to the right and straight on till morning.”
– Peter Pan (Bobby Driscoll) – Peter Pan (1953)

Q: What do you say to someone who is slowly getting on your bad side one too many uttered words at a time?
A: “You are losing my interest, and that is very dangerous.”
– King Haggard (Christopher Lee) – The Last Unicorn (1982)

Q: What do you say to someone who is trying really hard, and failing, to be scary?
A: “Oh my, you are so fierce!”
– The Shadow (Hans Conried) – Faeries (1981)

Q: What do you say to someone asking for advice?
A: “Let your heart guide you. It whispers so listen closely.”
– Littlefoot’s mother (Helen Shaver) – The Land Before Time (1988)

Q: What do you say when someones asks you if you are hurt after tripping over your own feet and stumbling to the ground?
A: “Nope. One of my better landings, bud.”
– Orville (Jim Jordan) – The Rescuers (1977)

Q: What do you say when someone is trying to coax you out for an evening on the town and you don’t feel up to it?
A: “Have ya looked outside? It’s suicide out there!”
– Wilbur (John Candy) – The Rescuers Down Under (1990)

Q: What should you say when someone says you are looking good?
A: “I’m not bad. I’m just drawn that way.”
– Jessica Rabbit (Kathleen Turner) – Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)

Q: What do you say when someone questions your parenting?
A: “He’s with me, ain’t he? And I’ll learn him all I know..”
– Baloo (Phil Harris) – the Jungle Book (1967)

That Phil Harris got got around, didn’t he?  An amazing voice actor, a one-of-a-kind voice…

………

Do you think my bit of silliness regarding “the classics” will become a classic itself?  You don’t?!  Well, I don’t either it, but it sure was fun to do a second round of them.  Did you see what I did this time?  It was pretty obvious.  All of these movies came out before I was 10 years old and they are the films I grew up watching.  Do you have a list of cartoon movies you grew up watching?  Thanks for playing along with my Friday Q and A silliness again.  Never forget, here there be monsters, and really really really talented voice actors and actresses, a few world class scripts, and some amazing artists too.  These monsters are the stuff dreams are made of.

the river

In a few weeks time, I will pack my little family up, throw them in the car, and drive them away from civilization, away from the hustle and bustle of everyday life, and into the wild.

Okay, okay, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, we won’t actually be going that far off the grid.  There will be other people there.  There are showers, and a store, and a hotel (of sorts) if they are needed.  There are other amenities too that will make our week of roughing it a whole lot less “rough” and a whole lot more “relax.”

It is supposed to be a vacation after all…

We will be tent camping it, though, which will be a very interesting experience, I think, with a 3 month old.  We’ll see how that little adventure goes.  We know it’s doable because I was camping there at 3 months old too.  It’s almost like the start of a little tradition, just as camping is for our family.

My maternal grandfather, and some of his friends, started camping there in the 40’s… and we’ve been going ever since.  The campgrounds have changed.  The staff have changed.  And, still, we keep going back.  The rules have gotten stricter.  The costs have gone up.  And, still, we keep going back.  Some years we go as a large group and some years we go in smaller family units as we can find time.  Some years we go for weeks at a time and some years we run up for a very short weekend.  Some years the weather is perfect, some years we get rained out, some years it is so scorching hot we can’t keep ice in the ice chests.  And, still, we keep going back.

It’s the river that calls to us… the sound of it thundering down the canyon, the sight of it cutting through the rocks, the fish hidden within it’s cold and swift depths, the beauty of it, the power of it.  When I’m rock hopping out to the middle, when I cast my line just right, and snare a fish in a hidden pool, I feel connected with the rest of my family in a way I don’t get at any other time or place.  I wonder if my grandfather, my great uncle, my father, my uncle, my brother, my cousins, have been on the rock before me.  I bet they have, and that makes me smile.

And now, this year, my son will be going for the first time.  He’s a few years too young to be on the river, but he will fish it with me one day, and that too makes me smile.

many questions and one firm statement

I was bullied in Junior High: pantsed, laughed at, mocked, knocked around, chased, tormented…

I was fast, though, and, when I could, I would run.  I’d run away from my tormentors, run away from my bullies, run away from the pain…  Sometimes I managed to get away clean.  Sometimes I didn’t.

Regardless.  I could never outrun the shame and humiliation.

I often wished I had the courage to stand and fight, to take the punches and kicks, and lash out with my feet and hands, returning blow for blow.  I wished I had the strength to turn my shame into channeled fury.  I wished I had the fortitude to turn my fear off, to not worry about what they would do to me if I stood to fight, to not worry about what it would mean for my school career, the suspension, the possible expulsion.  I wished I could inflict the kind of pain on them that they had inflicted upon me.

But…

Would that make me as bad as them?  If I hurt them as they had been hurting me would I too be a bully?  Where was the line between defending myself and taking it too far?  Would I have known that line?  Would I have ever even come close to the line… me, against all of them…

Would I be a different person now if I had?

Because I like who I am now.  I like where I am now.  I love the people in my life and I wouldn’t give them up for anything.  Did those terrible experiences in junior high set me on this path?  Did I have to go through those trials and tribulations to make it here, to appreciate what I have now?

As much as I wonder how my life back then would have been different if I had chosen fight over flight, I wouldn’t go back and change anything.

However, if my little prince is ever bullied, I will let him know it is okay to stand and fight, it is okay to set aside the fear of the consequences and give as good as he gets, because if the time comes we will face the aftermath together.

When I Was Young

When I was young,
And spent my days in school,
I was of two minds:
One side the good student,
The other, his alter ego.

When I was young,
I was nobody’s fool,
Always right on time,
Doing what was prudent,
Simply just playing the zero.

When I was young,
I wasn’t seen as cool,
Kept myself in line,
Shirking peer’s influence,
Hiding my other self below.

When I was young,
And free of the school’s grip,
Then the other me,
Would come out of hiding,
To paint the town in shades of red.

When I was young,
My parents would have both flipped,
If ever they’d seen,
The monster me riding,
All devil may care, as they said.

When I was young,
Through the rules’ cracks I’d slip.
I wanted to be,
Nearer to the edging,
Never thinking I could be dead.

When I was young,
I had a place and time,
To be both of me.
But now I hide again,
The half that wants to rave and rend.

When I was young,
It wasn’t hard to find,
Moments to be free,
Of the shackles of sin,
And the morals that never bend.

No longer young,
My alter ego’s mind,
Fun as it may be,
Remains hidden again,
But always there until the end.

…………………………………………………………………………………………….

Another Prompts for the Promptless from Rara that I couldn’t resist:

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

The Alter Ego, in Latin, literally means “Second I” or “Second Self”.  It can refer to an opposite side to the personality within someone, or a counterpart like a trusted friend.

More info on the history of the Alter Ego, as well as alternate meanings here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alter_ego