It's hell getting old

I'm starting to understand why people get comb-overs. Yes, they look ridiculous and no, the people who have them aren't fooling anyone. But the other day, I was getting my hair cut and the idiot hair-cut-person goes to show me the cut at the back of my neck. She also manages to show me how she's very carefully arranged the hair on the back of my head to make sure none of it goes over this big, round pink spot at the top of the back of my head. I nearly screamed. It's easy when you have a full head of hair to say, "I would never do a comb-over," but when you're faced with this big, pink spot and it's really, really pink -- link sunburn pink -- you just want to hide it.

I'll have to see if I can get a picture posted.

ETA: I tried taking a picture; it wasn't very impressive. I think I'm just too good at hiding the bald patch.

My Industry Sucks

I just spent two hours at a Java User Group function, learning how they've developed this new technology that will allow an idiot off the street to develop a fully functioning web site in 20 minutes. This is not going to help me get a job. I don't need to know that the skills I've spent twenty years trying to develop, some schmuck off the street is going to be able to do with no experience whatsoever. And if you're not using that technology, then there's this laundry list of technologies you're going to need not just to understand, but to have 2 or more years of development experience with.

I could learn any language they throw at me with no problem. I've done it before. But don't expect me to learn seven languages, and also 10 applications that'll cost me $600 or more apiece just to learn them, especially since I'd be competing against people who actually have application development experience because they were working for companies on the cutting edge when I got jobs elsewhere.

That two years of experience means nothing. Really, trust me on this. You can learn a new programming language in a week, including Java. What matters and takes skill and what some people will never develop is the ability to analyze a problem, to develop a design, to work with a customer to reach a desired goal. But those things aren't measurable. So instead, we get laundry lists of languages and you can't tell the HR rep, "Oh, you don't really need that. You just think you do."

Ten Top Ten?

Last week, AFI broadcast what they called the 10 Top 10, the ten best films from ten different genres. I was really looking forward to seeing some movies get some recognition that usually get overlooked. I guess I should have known better. It was mostly the same list of the same movies as always, just reorganized, and they had to get pretty specific with their "genres" to do it.

Courtroom Drama is not a genre. Drama is a genre and Courtroom is a setting. And Gangster is just a sub-category of Drama ... unless the gangster movie happens to be funny or include a smattering of show tunes. Epic is not a genre. Epic is a scale. You can do Science Fiction on an Epic scale, you can do drama on an epic scale. You can even do romantic comedy on an epic scale, and frankly every list AFI puts out has those Epics anyway, so give some other movies a shot.

Sports? Sure, I'd like to give Chariots of Fire a genre ... which brings me to another part of the rant which I'll give you later ... but when you go into the video store and look under "sports", you're going to find Superbowl Highlight videos, wrestling videos, maybe some kind of golf instructional. You'll find Raging Bull and Rocky under Drama.

So, to help AFI out, here's a list of real genres for movies:

Drama, Comedy, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Thriller / Horror, Mystery, Action / Adventure, Musical, Animation, Holiday, and Western. Of course, that's 11 right there, which is a problem for AFI.

I was going to include definitions, but then I came to the definition of Action / Adventure and my brain cramped. (An action movie is a movie that has action?) Maybe somebody who's actually studied film will help me out on this?

I was then going to list some of my choices for the top movies in each category when I realized that i don't watch nearly enough movies. But maybe at some point I'll list my favorite movies in my profile by genre.

Now for my other rant: The ads for AFI's 10 Top 10 included scenes from The Incredibles, music from Chariots of Fire and I'd swear the space ship from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. NONE of these films were on their lists anywhere.

Welcome ... or are you welcoming me?

For years, friends have been telling me that I had to get an on-line journal. Of course, they would say I had to get one ... at one of those closed pseudo-communities that shall remain nameless, and I didn't want that. Then, through the miracles of the modern Internet (that is to say, somebody posted a picture of a really hot celebrity), I discovered the wonderful world of blogger and blogspot. So, here I am.

This blog is going to record my thoughts, and my thoughts can be pretty eclectic. So if you're looking for thoughts about movies, or thoughts about music, or thoughts about politics ... you might find them here one day and find something completely different another day. I can't promise you an adventure -- or a rose garden for that matter. I can't even promise I'll be able to keep up with this. But for as long as I'm here and you're here, I hope we both enjoy the ride.

So who am I? Metaphysically speaking, that's something I hope you'll discover as I publish. Or what's in a name? I try not to use my real name on line. I'm not sure I'm fooling anyone, but the names I use on line are LJ and Sasha. LJ stands for "Leather Jacket" and folks who know me by that name probably know me pretty well at this point. Sasha stands for ... well, that would be telling. A few people are starting to know Sasha in places where "Leather Jacket" seemed ... inappropriate. Anyway, I was going to call this blog "Sasha's World", but that was already taken (it happens), so by the time I got the name "Studies in LJ", I'd already said my name here would be "Sasha". And, of course, my e-mail address is "David Carr Fan" (heck, somebody has to do it) but no one really knows me as DCF.

Was that an incredibly lame starting point?