Movie Review: Idiocracy / Book Report: Body Painting / Shaq Report: Walking by me

It's been a busy 24 hours. Last night, we watched "Idiocracy," the Mike Judge movie that just came out on dvd after not really being in theaters. That's about as topical as I'll get with movies these days.

Luke Wilson is perfectly cast as an average guy who mistakenly ends up 500 years in the future, where he's the smartest guy in the world. Maya Rudolph comes with him and she is, as usual, rather funny. It's a bitter, angry satire, but also kind of a dumb movie. The premise: stupid people outbreed smart people, therefore the world is getting stupider, is thin. It's based on a perception that's always bugged me: things used to be better, back in the olden days.

But it has its laughs. Starbucks in the future offers sexual services. Costco is the size of Connecticut. The hit tv show is about a guy getting repeatedly hit in the balls (kind of like Jackass or America's Funniest Home Videos, ok, actually, exactly like those shows). And, again, this is a role Luke Wilson was born to play.

Then, I had a 'subway book' in Jane Hilberry's "Body Painting." I began it on the way in, and finished it on the way home. I should've ridden my bike today (I was just tired from riding the last three days and being, well, tired). I judge a poetry book as bad when I feel like I could've written anything in it. Hilberry writes often in the observational/nostalgic style, where it would seem that simply noting how summer days were when she was a girl, or what radishes are like, or how a girl speaks in Arabic to her father, is enough to constitute a poem. There's nothing in the way of language, no surprises, no challenges, nothing memorable.

I don't know how that book got on my list. I think it was recommended. If so, I hope the person who recommended it doesn't read this blog. Of if s/he does, let me know. Because I thought it sucked.

Then there's Shaq. I'm not an NBA fan. Not since I was a kid. I follow baseball avidly and football as much as I can. The NBA just bores me. Still, I was walking out of a Rite Aid today and there was Shaq. Honestly, I probably wouldn't have noticed him if not for the Rite Aid employees yelling, "Shaq!" I looked around, didn't see anything, then looked up, and there he was. He's quite tall.

Walking back to my office, I passed the Four Seasons hotel and saw another really tall guy in a nice suit going in. About 10 scavenger-types clustered outside with pens and notebooks, autograph-seekers, I suppose. I guess the Heat are in town. And staying at the Four Seasons.

Oh well, I think I'm going to get a poem out of the Hilberry book. Sometimes bad poetry gives me ideas. I heard Sammy Hagar (who in no way is a poet, but when I was 12 I thought he was awesome) respond to a question about his song lyrics by saying that he often mishears a lyric in another song and when he finds out that the song isn't saying what he thinks it's saying, he's elated, because then he can use that line.