Misson

Well, I was talking about Foghorn Leghorn in another post. That quote would be, "Go away boy (or son), ya' bother me." However, it is not a movie quote. If we were to be able to quote cartoons, I would have much to say and you would all have to kill me because I am a genius when it comes to cartoon quotes. Well, old WB cartoon quotes. And Tom & Jerry cartoon quotes*. "Eh, what's up, doc?" "Allow me to introduce myself: My name is Wile E. Coyote, Genius. I am not selling anything, nor am I working my way through college..." "I.." "...and so, let's get down to cases: you are a rabbit and I am going to eat you for supper. Now don't try to get away! I am more muscular, more cunning, faster and larger than you are and I'm a genius! While you could hardly pass the entrance examinations to kindergarten. So, I'll give you the customary two minutes to say your prayers." "I'm sorry mac. The lady of the house ain't home and besides, we mailed you people a check last week." "Why do they always want to do it the hard way?" [To Hare is Human, 1956] "Allow me to introduce myself. My name is mud." (Coyote falls over.) "And remember: mud spelled backwards is dumb!" [Operation: Rabbit, 1952] *Note: This is a sorry attempt at humor indeed, as there are almost no spoken lines in T&J cartoons. Except for Spike/Butch the Dog, Tuffy** mouse, Tom's owner, that annoying little duck that Jerry should just let Tom have and the Narrator (on occasion). (If I missed any, I apologize.) **Also called Nibbles.

This was on the cover of either Cracked Magazine or Crazy Magazine (both of which are now gone) at one time. Now it is reality.

Aaaaaaaa HA..... that's it...... You posted the photos in YOU IN YOU GARB..... and now all the women want your body........ They can have it. It might be cool to be able to go around without it. No more frozen shoulder or tendinitis. I am reading a book just now about phantom limbs and the psychology embedded therein. The author suggests that we actually have multiple experiences of our body as a sort of metaphor. For example, did you know that you can lose the ability to identify objects visually and thus not be able to see, yet still be able to catch something thrown at you or correctly orient an object like a letter so you can put it into a mail slot? The book explains that there are at least 30 processing areas in our brains that perform various tasks in deciphering images. If the area that identifies objects gets damaged, you can lost the ability to "see" but can still see and react to objects despite this. Simply amazing. (What were we talking about?)

I'm? Honest and truly? (All praise Maitland McDonagh without whom I never would have gotten this one.) Hmm. I can either post a really hard one or a 3D quote. We just had a really hard one, so I'll go with the 3D quote. It's something that's been popping into and out of my mind lately anyhow: http://www.markck.com/Sounds/botherme.mp3

Well, I don't wear cologne, so it couldn't be that. (Pheromones? ) To be honest, it's never happened to me before either. (Two other odd things have along the same lines, though. Do I look like someone suddenly famous or something? Squinty Frack? I think not...)

The strangest things keep happening to me lately... I was in a grocery store recently and these two girls in front of me were loudly discussing the pluses and minuses of the various tabloid stars and their babies. Actually, one of them was loudly discussing it and the other one was flipping through a tabloid. They made hints that I was invited into this conversation while we all waited for checkout. (I ignore thee.) Then the loud one noticed what I was buying. To wit: two bottles of wine, a healthy chunk of Asiago cheese and an avocado. She started commenting on that and I was unwillingly drawn into the conversation. I gave monosyllabic responses and tried not to make eye contact. (I ignore thee.) Understand, these girls looked about 16 to me based on their clothes and manner and I really have no interest in Britney's baby. The magazine flipper had a peace symbol in the shape of a heart tattooed at the nape of her neck. ("I could fight crime, protect the innocent, work for world peace! But first...") So I just wanted them to leave me out of it. Soon they were gone and I thought that was that. Not so. I was pulling out of the parking lot aisle and a car was coming towards me with the driver waving frantically out her window. What the heck?! So I stopped. It was my two pals. The loud one driving and the flipper in the passenger seat. Oh boy. (Dammit, I ignore thee.) The conversation went something like this: "Hey my friend says you got a date tonight." (Apparently the wine and cheese indicated this.) "I'm afraid your friend is wrong. I have a date tomorrow night." "Who with?" (Really! Maybe you know them or something?) "A friend." (Very non-committal, see? I ignore thee. Actually, I canst believe thee would query me so.) "Oh, well my friend says she would like to hook up with you." (Great Scott! How do these things happen to me?) Flipper giggles. "Your friend looks like she's about 15." (Go 'way, lass. Ya' bother me.) "Naw she's 23." Flipper giggles. "I'm much older than she is." "That's ok!" Flipper giggles. "Have a nice night, ladies." "Aw c'mon!" And I drove off. Understand, it's not that flipper wasn't visually appealing. It's that I think I would have more enlightening conversations with my cat. (Plus my cat doesn't have a peace symbol in the shape of a heart tattooed on her body. Sure, she asked if she could get one once, but you have to be firm about these things.) This is the third such bizarre event lately. Do you 'spose I'm giving off some sort of weird vibe?

My belief is that this board has been "found" by spammers or bots or some such. We already have the system where you have to register with a valid email, which makes me think that these are not bots. (But I'm not 100% certain. I don't intimately know how bots work.) The variety of the posts also makes me think that there are several different sources. For a long time there were no pharmacy posts and all the porn links were either lists with no photos or photos of celebrities. Now there is a new type with photos and there is pharmacy stuff. So more of whom- or whatever have found us. Note that we still get the other links, so the older purveyors of spam are still with us. I think we actually could check incoming registrations, though. I used to think this was a bad idea, but I am coming around. I monitored the number of spammers for a 5 day period and it was the same as the number of new registrants we had had for that week minus one (17 or 18). So, either we had one valid user register for that week and all the rest were spammers or else there was another spam link in another forum or one that Captain Grey deleted that I didn't happen to see. I would guess that our valid registrants per week are usually less than 10 on average. It would not be that hard to screen, although it would involve a delay in the ability of new users being able to post. The only problem is that Booty would likely be stuck with this job. She works for the site owner (Bloody Buckets is his user ID) and appears to have been sort of given this job in addition to her more pressing jobs. So it's not like she can sit around a check every registration request as it comes in. Maybe the mods could do it - I don't know. I have collected a list of over 100 spammer usernames and they're not completely obvious, but neither do they look like typical usernames. There is a pattern of sorts to them and I think (at least at first) that most people could spot invalid spammers. (If only because they would not think to use "Captain" or "Jack" somewhere in their usernames. )

The Bishop's Wife? (If not, I give.)

I did manage to get the snaps off my phone, by buying a memory card with a converter. Now I no longer need to ever bring a camera on vacation. I can just use my phone. So benefits were received by all. Based on these photos, I think my pirate name should be "Squinty" something. Squinty Mission. Squinty Caraccioli (Uck.), Squinty Jack. Squinty Zach, Squinty Hack, Squinty Frack, Squinty Doc Palsy. Squinty Surgeon. Squinty Sturgeon. Squinty Winters. Shelly Winters. Squinty Quint. Squinty Wint. Squinty Kidd. Squinty Squiggy. Squinty Lenny. Squinty Shirley. Squinty Osama, Squinty Obama, Squinty Yomama, Squinty Pinty Piddy. Squinty Brick-A-Bracker, Fire Cracker, Sis Boom Bah! Squinty Kitty. Hello Kitty. Eh... The cannon, flag and skull added greatly to the scene. (They fired that cannon, too, they did.)

I think it's because they don't want you bringing some liquid or another that could be used to make an explosive device. The stuff available after the security checkpoint is presumably ok. Not knowing a whole lot about explosives, I can't even guess what they suspect you might be bringing in that they couldn't find by smelling it, but, then again, maybe they don't want to add smelling every container to the list of things the security folk do. So it's easier to just create a blanket law that says "Nothing larger than this!" It's lazy, but it's easier for the government. (Which appears to be one of the tenets of "restrictive" laws according to the ever increasing and encroaching, near brainless Byzantine government protocol.)

Give us another hint!

I believe Grant had the choice of the two roles in Philadelphia Story, but that's not the same as switching roles. Got me. Anything I'd guess at this point would be just that: a complete, stab-in-the-dark guess. Unless... It's not Topper is it? That line would certainly work there, although I haven't seen the flick in ages...

At long last I can post a pic of me in garb. It is not, in fact, my garb at all, but an assortment of garb loaned to me by Red-Handed Jill and her pirate confederates. (In fact, my garb that Michael Bagley and Mary Diamond are helping me assemble will be mostly period correct where this is more like movie correct.) Still, it's me in garb! With an iconic Mission skull. (Aren't I dashing in my borrowed stripey pants?) Here's a better picture of the real star: the skull.

Aren't some of the old Cary Grant movies great? They are so witty. Here's a wild guess: Bringing Up Baby? (I'm pretty sure that's wrong, but what the heck...)

Boy, that sounds familiar. I can't place it, though. (I recently saw The Invisible Man which is about as close as I can get, but that's not right. I'll bet it's a comedy...) Oh, and Jill; best BS quote: "Mongo just pawn in game of life." (By God, I love that line.)

That sounds interesting, especially as it seems to interest you. I wish you good luck with your venture. Perhaps what you really need to find is your first customer so you know exactly what parts you really need to find. Then Google away!

I checked a week ago with Booty and it seemed to me (from my records) to be all spammer and no new pirates. I have actually recommended turning off the registration function for a week or two with a message saying "Your registration is suspect and if you think you have received this message in error, you should contact the admin", but I don't think it's going to wash. (If there are no pirates and many spammers, who would know? The spammers sure won't complain. And maybe they'll go away if they think the filter is that good.)

Darn, I wanted to do another 3D quote, but something has gone awry... Here, this should be simple. "If it's all the same to you, I'll drive that tanker." (It's even searchable for you movie quote Googlers (ie. cheaters! ))

I asked Billie, a friend of mine this question. The response? Scarface. I think that's a good choice. (I have never seen so much memorabilia available for a one shot movie made almost 25 years ago.)

Speaking of Bean... (We were speaking of him in the movie quote thread which appears to have once again died...)

i wondered about the spurs. I mean, they added a sound effect and everything, but...why? Is this supposed to be more villain-like? "Your spurs." "There are two kinds of spurs, my friend. Those that come in by the door... (Tuco crosses himself) ...and those that come in by the window." (And, apparently there is a third type: those that came on pirate villains.)

I can't think of any reason to watch bad TV. Most of the world is covered by ocean and we haven't explored much of that. Our inner worlds are even less explored than the bottom of the ocean. New ideas, new ways of doing things, new creations, new concepts...it's really quite exciting. "A hundred years ago, as the nineteenth century drew to a close, scientists around the world were satisfied that they had arrived at an accurate picture of the physical world. As physicist Alastair Rae put it, 'By the end of the nineteenth century it seemed that the basic fundamental principles governing the behavior of the physical universe were known.' Indeed, many scientists said that the study of physics was nearly completed: no big discoveries remained to be made, only details and finishing touches. But late in the final decade, a few curiosities came to light. Roentgen discovered rays that passed through flesh; because they were unexplained, he called them X-rays. Two months later, Henri Becquerel accidentally found that a piece of uranium ore emitted something that fogged photographic plates. And the electron, the carrier of electricity was discovered in 1897. Yet, on the whole, physicists remained calm, expecting that these oddities would eventually be explained by existing theory. No one would have predicted that within five years their complacent view of the world would be shockingly upended, producing an entirely new conception of the universe and entirely new technologies that would transform daily life in the twentieth century in unimaginable ways. [A black swan was preparing to take flight.]" -Michael Crichton, Timeline

Auric Goldfinger (Sounds like a French nail varnish.) "Do you expect me to talk?" "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die! There is nothing you can tell me that I do not already know." And, without thinking about it much, the raccoon chick from The Transporter 2 was memorable, if only because she was so entirely improbable and unrealistic. (Thinking more on it, Sarah Conners from the Terminator movies would actually be a better choice. She was technically good, but she wasn't. I wouldn't want to stand between her and her goal.)

Ooh, a good one from Amazon. The email address threw me (although it shouldn't have. They obviously would have my email address if they sent me the email. ) "Hello USERNAME@SOMEMAILSERVER.com, Greetings from Amazon Payments. Your bank has contacted us regarding some attempts of charges from your credit card via the Amazon system. We have reasons to believe that you changed your registration information or that someone else has unauthorized access to your Amazon account Due to recent activity, including possible unauthorized listings placed on your account, we will require a second confirmation of your identity with us in order to allow us to investigate this matter further. Your account is not suspended, but if in 48 hours after you receive this message your account is not confirmed we reserve the right to suspend your Amazon registration. If you received this notice and you are not the authorized account holder, please be aware that it is in violation of Amazon policy to represent oneself as another Amazon user. Such action may also be in violation of local, national, and/or international law. Amazon is committed to assist law enforcement with any inquires related to attempts to misappropriate personal information with the intent to commit fraud or theft. Information will be provided at the request of law enforcement agencies to ensure that perpetrators are prosecuted to the full extent of the law. To confirm your identity with us click here: [link edited out] After responding to the message, we ask that you allow at least 72 hours for the case to be investigated. Emailing us before that time will result in delays. We apologize in advance for any inconvenience this may cause you and we would like to thank you for your cooperation as we review this matter. Thank you for your interest in selling at Amazon.com. Amazon.com Customer Service http://www.amazon.com This message and any files or documents attached may contain classified information. It is intended only for the individual or entity named and others authorized to receive it. If you are not the intended recipient or authorized to receive it, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or taking any action in reliance on the contents of this information is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately then delete it from your system. Please also note that transmission cannot be guaranteed to be secure or error-free.

I finally got hold of this one and watched it. The score was outstanding - it was the highlight of the picture for me. The story was decent enough and many of the background characters were quite good. I thought Modine was really good (in a role that sort of presages Captain Jack in a way.) The main problem I had with it were two actor portrayals. The first was Dawg Brown. He didn't seem nearly villainous enough to be a significant threat to me. Somehow I just couldn't buy Langella as being a bloodthirsty evil pirate. If it were just that, it still might have been a good movie, though. The real problem was Geena Davis. There have been roles where she was really good (Tootsie, Beetlejuice and A League of Their Own come to mind) but a piratess was apparently not her cup of tea. Every time she spoke, she spoiled all that wonderful character work going on in the background for me. She didn't even attempt to sound like she was from the GAoP, much less a pirate. Plus she didn't display as much emotion as you'd expect a girl whose father had just been killed, putting her into a position where she had to win the crew over. She seemed miscast for the role to me. Unfortunately, the whole film turned on her portrayal which is why I suspect it didn't do that well at the box office.