Monday Update - 8/9/2021
It hit me as I began writing this paragraph that I have no idea how I normally start this. I think for the first few weeks I was like “Hey, this is a new idea!” but now it’s been like a month and the novelty’s kind of gone. Last week I apologized for how my post was late and now I’m doing the like self-aware thing about how I don’t know what to put in this paragraph. So, really, I’ve run out of options for next week unless I organically figure out what I’m going to say. I don’t envy me on Monday next week writing this, partially because I will almost certainly have forgotten what I’ve written here. Now the paragraph’s too long for people to ignore, also, so some people might actually read it and figure out that I’ve just filled it out to put text in white space before I talk about how I watched Melvin Goes to Dinner.
I watched Melvin Goes to Dinner last night. This was a 2003 film directed by Bob Odenkirk, based off of Michael Blieden’s play “Phyro-Giants!”. Blieden plays the titular main character, as well. I bought the DVD for Melvin Goes to Dinner back probably in October. The main plot is that Melvin goes to dinner. I liked this film, but I’ve been unable to come up with anything insightful to say about it. Life’s like that sometimes, and most people don’t put themselves in the position where they expect themselves to write something cogent about a movie they watched on a lark last night. All I’ve been able to come up with is a series of simple sentences of thoughts I had about the film, which will be served out of context in the next paragraph:
I will admit that I did not see the twist coming. I loved the directorial decision in the Houston scene to tell the story mostly by photomontage, it reflects the character’s hazy drunken memories. It is unfortunate that I have developed the viscerally negative reaction to Stephanie Courtney’s Progressive Insurance ads over the past fifteen years of my life. I spent the first like thirty minutes of the movie trying to remember Jenna Fischer’s name. Actually a huge part of me watching this movie was spent recognizing actors and comedians from the era, many of whom became much larger-profile stars over time - Fred Armisen, Jack Black, the aforementioned Jenna Fischer, David Cross, Jerry Minor. I am attracted to Stephanie Courtney in this film, both physically and her character’s personality. The last scene, and really the entire subplot about Melvin’s affair, could have been cut out of the film and I think it would’ve been better.
I also played Mini Motorways, which saw release on Steam last month. I was a big fan of developer Dinosaur Polo Club’s previous release, 2016’s Mini Metro, and this game I think originally saw release on iOS in 2019, but I really haven’t kept up with new iOS games in a long time. I think this one would work better with a mouse than on a little phone screen, anyway. What worked for Mini Metro was its relative simplicity - connect little colored train lines based on shapes. That was easy to understand and worked great on a phone. The balancing act for a sequel would involve adding some more complexity to that format without making it unwieldy, and they did here.
Building this around roads, houses, and presumable workplaces makes this more of a rudimentary city building game than Mini Metro was, but it doesn’t overcomplicate it to the point where it’s like a watered-down SimCity. I quite like this as well, probably more than Mini Metro, and I like Mini Metro quite a lot.
Before I finish this update, I would like to touch on the careers of two artists whose lives came to an end far too soon over the last week. The work of both men, in different arenas, has had a significant influence upon my life and development. The first being music producer Paul Johnson. I cannot remember how I came into contact with his music for the first time, but I remember repeatedly listening to his 1996 album Feel The Music during my Freshman year of college. Longtime friends of mine will remember the first five seconds of his track “About Your Love,” which for a long while was alphabetically the first track on my iPhone’s music library and thus would play automatically whenever I plugged my iPhone into my car.
Regardless, I love that album, I appreciate his work, and I’ll always admire him. He spent so much of his life making house music that gave so much joy to so many, and he did it all after suffering paralysis from the waist down after being shot as a teenager. He’s the first name listed on Daft Punk’s 1997 track Teachers, he had a worldwide hit with “Get Get Down” in 1999, in that way his work will live on forever.
The other is comedian and actor Trevor Moore. He was a part of the Whitest Kids ‘U Know sketch group, which had a television series that ran for five seasons on IFC between 2006 and 2011. Really thinking about it, this show, and Moore’s work in particular, was among probably the five or six most significant works for the development of my sense of humor. In that very important developmental period from age thirteen to sixteen or so (2008 to 2011), it was like Trevor Moore, James Rolfe, the hosts from the Talkradar podcast, the Sklar Brothers, the Mega64 guys, and the big mosaic of people who made up the YouTube Poop community around then.
They were one of the first sketch troupes to upload all of their work for free to YouTube shortly after each season aired. I purchased each season off of iTunes in 2010 and would watch them on repeat on my iPod Video during my first summer working at a summer camp. As a result of that, their work has a deeply-rooted presence in my brain. Some quote or some moment from a sketch will just crop up in different situations, many of them from Moore’s characters - I know I’ve unthinkingly used the way he says “This… This whole thing… All of this…” in the Secrets of the Pyramids sketch many times before in conversation. My favorite all time sketches from this show were the Space Shuttle Launch, the Bank Robbery, Stock Watch, the Babe Magnet, among so many others. He’d done a lot of great work between then and now as well, his 2013 album Drunk Texts To Myself was great as well.
It’s strange, difficult, to understand that both of these people are gone. Obviously, I don’t know them, and as an observer and fan of these people’s work, I can only talk about my admiration of their work and use the inspiration I’ve taken from those works in my own creations.
Last week, my only real outward creative effort was my Video Upload Regarding Cracker Barrel Peg Game. I might be less productive over the next few weeks as I’m preparing to move out of this apartment and I’ll be busy doing that and then I’ll have to move to a new city and I’m kind of dreading it and I’m not personally sure why I’m doing it, but that’s another deal, point is I’ll probably be very busy over the next few weeks and I might not get as much stuff out creatively. See you next week!