Props to Sir John Harrington

I just wanted to take a little time out of the busy holiday season to say "thank you" to one of western civilization's pioneers, Sir John Harrington, member of Queen Elizabeth I's court, and inventor of the toilet.

Indeed, we owe a lot to Sir Harrington's invention - even more than everyday convienience (and a place for drunken frat boys to lay their heads). Without "the john" (coincidence? I think nay!), there wouldn't be any custom toilet paper, or toilet paper origami. Toilet humor would need a new name, and those adorable Charmin bears would need another gig. So, I say, Thanks Sir John. Thank you for providing such a needed service to society.

For more information about your commode please visit Toilet Paper World, or The Toilet Museum.

iPhone, you phone, we all phone.

Nothing quite beats obsessing over new technology for me. Granted, it is kind of creepy when you compulsively name- drop applications every five minutes, but the return is so appealing... ever the more so with the iPhone, where the world is at your fingertips.

Below I have compiled my top apps, not because they will necessarily improve anyone's life, but because now that I have a trendy hipster phone, I am even more narcissistic than before.

Facebook - Speaking of trendy... speaking of narcissistic, the Facebook app for iPhone is great. While it does not yet have all the bells and whistles of the networking site, it's "friends list" is much more intuitive than on the web.

Bejeweled 2 - It doesn't matter where I play this game, I am just too slow mentally for it. Still, lamenting my own ineptitude takes time, making this good for long waits.

YouVersion Bible - Regardless of your religious inclinations, the Bible is worth a read. With this application, you can choose just about any translation known to humanity.

Social News - Reddit, Digg, Slashdot, Fark, you name it, and the headlines line up in a nice display. This app is fantastic for jumping on every hot meme the 'nets can toss at you.

Daily Deviations and Deviant Art - Like having a museum on your phone, DeviantArt serves up an incredibly diverse offering of art. My only complaint is that neither app allows you to save artist info, robbing up- and- comers of crucial traffic.

Finally, post jailbreak - Appulous is indispensible. Right now they are updating their servers, but once upgraded, this little application can provide you with just about any other app for free.
Am I advocating app hacks? No, but I dig that I can now try out stuff before I buy it, which the iPhone store doesn't seem to have down yet.

Oh, Nooo you din't!!!

Exactly how I feel right now.

Not- So- Kids Movies

So, as we all know, horror movies are typically marketed towards adults, so it is a child's own misfortune for watching them. Still, what about movies that are made for kids, but have that one scene that scares the poo out of anyone under twelve? This list is in no way exhaustive for me, think The Secret of NIMH, Watership Down(One of Fiver's death prophesies is depicted above), or even the freaking Care Bears Movie. In the realm of cowardice, was I a lightweight as a child? I'll let you judge from the below...

5. The Last Unicorn: This is one of those movies that you are seriously obsessed with as a kid, but also feel a little apprehension towards in retrospect... Case in point: A dungeon skeleton gets a little too thirsty.

4. Ralph Bakshi's Lord of the Rings: Long before "The Other Trilogy" by Peter Jackson, and Cool World, cult animator Bakshi put his mark on Tolkien's classic. Let me just say that little hobbits (nearly) getting stabbed to death while they sleep still puts my teeth at edge.

3. The Dark Crystal: Let's face it, this entire movie is pretty damn creepy.

2. Raggedy Ann and Andy: A Musical Adventure: I never thought that rag dolls were that interesting, as they can not accessorize like Barbie. What a piece of crapola. I guess the writers thought it would be entertaining to have a giant blob sing a song about candy, and then proceed to try to EAT RAGGEDY ANN's HEART.

1. The Wiz: Someone (Charlie Smalls), decided to make an inner city version of the Wizard of Oz. Where kids in the city may not identify with flying monkeys, we sure know a man-eating subway trash can when we see one. Tragically, there is no online clip of this scene for me to showcase, but the vivid memory alone is enough to land this flick in pole position.

There you have it,these movies will scare your average child back to the womb. Cheers!

5 reasons for therapy

In keeping with the Halloween theme this month, I thought I would harken back to the days of my childhood, when I had the uncanny ability of comming across age inapropriate movies. I suppose it didn't help that I would read the Encyclopedia of Psychotronic Film like a comic book, nor should my parents take any blame for my actions, even though my family is extremely movie- centric - they were always wary and attentive.

Below I have indexed the five movies to blame should I ever be categorized as insane, all five were viewed before I was a teenager.

5. The Hand. Ok, so I have never actually seen this one, but my mother maintains that the trailer was accidentally shown before a kid's movie. Since I can't even remember this experience, I will count it as my first exposure to the horror genre. It is an Oliver Stone movie, strangely enough.

4. Fantastic Planet. A cartoon, but not for kids. I had forgotten about watching this until it was featured for a split second in the J.Lo movie The Cell.

3. Mr. Sardonicus. Another movie (like Fantastic Planet) that had to have been shown on Sunday afternoon television. Until the advent of IMDB and Wikipedia, I had a hard time convincing people that this movie existed.

2. Alien. This one I watched when I was a little older, in the company of my parents. My dad covered my eyes during the infamous "breakfast scene" (the link above is interesting andectdotal material), but the sound was way more effective than the special effects could have ever been.

1. Tourist Trap. This was the grandaddy of all scary movies for me. I was only able to see a few scenes before my dad found me and turned the T.V. off, but someone filled me in on the storyline at a visit to Barnum and Bailey's Circus. The resulting fear is legendary in my family. My parents tried to convince me it wasn't scary because it had received a "turkey" in a film review. They also had to endure me waking them up for every night for about 2 months. The movie is crap, by the way.

That is it... now I can blame Hollywood if I go crazy.

I ain't afraid of no ghost.

Ahhh, October... the pumpkins, the sweaters, the ghost stories... Some filmmakers have realized that people like myself get into the Halloween spirit way before the 31st. Couple that with an extreme affection for viral marketing (Snakes on a Plane opening night AND t-shirt, thank you),and start up auteurs don't even need to get us at "hello".

Take, for instance, the insanely crappy Blair Witch movie: had the whole "true documentary" thing not have been blown for me prior viewing, I would have seriously bought into the premise. The spin was so effective, I even knew of someone who researched the movie in the library prior to the reveal. There is a beauty to the versimilitude created via lo- fi video, which is why I am glad that movies are jumping back on that band wagon. How can you not be excited for films like The Fourth Kind, seemingly composed from secret never-before-seen footage, and the unapologetic Paranormal Activity, which does not claim authenticity, but purposely uses the familiar home camera approach to draw the audience in. Add to that the latter's rabid internet marketing, and you have a movie whose viewers have personal investment in it's success. Technically, it is a smart move, and a lot of us are sick of torture- porn scares, anyway.