My First Blog Review

Hey there. I've been reviewed! Check it out, here. It's my first one and I guess it's not bad, right? Check it out and let me know what you think. Later!

Metallman's Reverie Review

New Orleans

Hey there. I finally have a few mins to post about our trip... and what a trip it was. It was my first time driving to LAX and parking there and for those of you who know, it's a nightmare. I knew that it was bad, but didn't know how bad. I wanted to be there an hour before our flight, my wife suggested 2. Good thing qwe left 2 hours before. After missing the exit (stupid mapquest) and having to exit the freeway, then getting back on the other way and then back on again... it took forever to finally reach LAX. Once there, following signs mind you, we cirled the airport like 5 times and when we finally were able to stop at a red light, I yelled at a bus driver for directions to a parking lot. Again, circled some more and finally reached the parking lot.

We hurried into a shuttle and off we went to the United Terminal. First time flying United, or TED as they call it now. We checked in and then went through security. I emptied my pockets, boarding pass included, so I was held up because I didn't have my pass with me. Stupid brain... I told the lady that it's in that bucket thing and after she searched for it, she asked my name to verify. I then was "cleared" and allowed through the metal detector.

Here we are at LAX


We ran up the stairs and walked briskly to our terminal. Once there, it was practically empty. We gave the woman our tickets and she was like, whoa, you guys are very late. Almost missed the flight if you'd gotten here "6 minutes later." Close call. lol Because we were so late, my wife and I didn't get to sit next to each other.

On to New Orleans. We stayed at the Monteleone hotel. Nice hotel and all. Had a pool on the roof, a gym, and spa. We settled in and off we went to explore the city. We took a walk towards the riverfront and checked out the Mississippi River. Here are a few shots of that. The jester in the front was pretty massive so I had to get a shot with that. lol



Further down, we stumbled upon 2 Holocaust memorials. The first one was a curved tablet with names on them and the other was a structure. The are structure was extremely interesting. At first glance it's just bars heading up in the middle of a star of david. After reading the plaque, you understood that viewing it at an angle, you will be able to see symbols to represent unity, strenght, and religion among others. I only snapped religion and unity.








Here is the plaque giving the artist credit for his work.



Oh before I forget... We were almost hit by a trolley! Stupid trolleys. No more than 15 mins in New Orleans and we were almost decimated. lol That's why we decided to snap a few pictures with a trolley in the background. I'm sure that's something that's going to stay with us for awhile. lol




Soon after we took a stroll down the famed Bourbon Street. There was plenty of live music playing, along with many restaurants, pubs, and it's fair share of strip joints. One in particular made me laugh since it had a pair of a woman's feet swinging from inside the building to the outside. Wish I took a shot of that but was too busy laughing to remember the cam. We tried the local drink, Grenade, and I ended up drinking them both since my wife didn't like it very much. To be honest with you, I have no idea what that drink is made of. We just ordered, and I drank em. lol Oh and in case you don't know what a blow job is, here it is. lol



And here is the origin of the word, Dixieland.



We also visited a local cathedral. I want to say that it was St. Jude's. Here is the sculpture located there.



We also checked out the IMAX and the Aquarium. I'll only post this one of the aquarium since I thought it was pretty bad ass.



We also killed some time at the casino. I believe it was a Harrah's. I thought it was a little odd that there'd be stars and a moon in front of a casino so we took this shot from the top of the small flight of stair in front of the back entrance of the casino. Pretty cool, I think.



Those are the higlights of our trip there. We walked into many stores and what not, but I don't want to go into every detail. So we're back on a plane, on our way back. I thought this shot was simply breathtaking so I had to include it.



So there you have it, friends. Our trip to New Orleans. Later!

Bug

Hey there. I caught this movie last weekend and I must say that I was disappointed. It had the premise to be a good flick but it lagged significantly in many areas. First off, I was drawn to this movie because Netflix recommended it, since I checked out Girl Next Door, which is pretty bad ass, and thought, what the hell, I'll check Bug out too. The description of it made it sound interesting. A psychological thriller full of suspense and what not. The movie left many questions unanswered and the ending was extremely disappointing.

First off, the movie is based on a theatrical play. The director thought the play was bad ass and figured he'd make it into a movie. So this is what he came up with.

The opening scene is a corpse lying on the floor in a room covered in foil. It's there only for a second. Enough time for you to say, "What the fuck?" and grab your attention. It grabbed mine. I instantly thought, oh hell yeah, this is gonna be good. Next thing you know, we're introduced to Agnes, the main character, and her phone constantly ringing off the hook. She answers it, but no one responds on the other end. She thinks it's her ex since he just got out of jail and she figured he'd be after her.

Agnes works in a bar and while there, she meets her friend RC. RC and Agnes soon go the Agnes' place and RC brings along a guy named Peter. While at her place, they drink and do drugs. Peter, being a quiet one doesn't do any of that and while he's in the bathroom, RC confesses that she just meet him that night and they joke that he's an axe murderer or something of the like. Peter tells the ladies that he's not and soon after R.C takes off, leaving Peter behind. Agnes invites Peter to stay since it's revealed that he's "in between homes".



Morning comes and Agnes gets up and sees a pot of coffee on the stove. She pours herself some and then walks over to the bathroom to thank Peter, since the shower is running. When the door opens, it's not Peter, but her ex, Jerry. They argue and fight and then he strikes her down. At that point, Peter walks in and Jerry gives him a few cold stares and then tells Agnes that he'll be back and takes off.

Peter and Agnes, then sit and talk about Jerry and what happened between the 2. Evidently, Agnes was in a store with her son in a cart, but when she turned, he disappeared. They both show compassion for each other and consequently, the have sex. Soon after, Peter gets up complaining that he got bit by a bug and they start looking for it on the bed. He finds it, but Agnes can't see it. Peter then blurts out that someone is after him and starts to get dressed. Agnes tries to convince him to stay since she is lonely and loves to hear Peter talk. Peter takes off but then soon returns and tells Agnes his story.



He tells Agnes that he was once in the military and that they used to do experiments on him. Injected him with all kinds of stuff and since the two had sex, he fears that he may have passed whatever they gave him to her. He then tells that the people that are after him is the military since he went AWOL. The two then get some sleep.

Come morning, the room is full of fly paper cause Peter is trying to rid the place of bugs. Jerry breaks into the place and confronts Peter, who is sitting on a table looking at his blood under a microscope. R.C. and Agnes then enter the three of them force Jerry to leave. Once he's gone, Peter shows Agnes that he has bugs in his blood. R.C contests that there are no bugs and all this is unnecessary. Peter then tells Agnes that she has bugs too. R.C. then blurts that they went to a doc and they found nothing wrong with Agnes. This infuriates Peter, believing that the doc is in on the experiment and lied to Agnes. He then lifts his shirt and shows all the "bite" marks all over his body. R.C. accusing him of doing it to himself, then tells Peter that a doctor was looking for him. After saying his name, Peter flips out. He starts to have a seizure and Agnes kicks R.C. out for trying to take Peter away from her.



Soon after, as the two lay down together, Peter's tooth starts to hurt. Convinced that the experiments done on him implanted bugs, the concludes that there is a nest of eggs on his tooth. With this, he storms up, grabs some pliers and pulls on his tooth until he gets it out. He looks at it under the microscope and discovers the bugs. Both look at each other in terror and then the scene fades.



The doctor looking for Peter starts to knock on the door. After some convincing Agnes opens the door. We then notice that the whole room is now covered in foil. The doc asks for Peter and tells her that he experimented on Peter and that he can "fix" all of this. She refuses to tell him where he is. The doc then brings up her lost son and claims that he knows where he is and he can bring him to her. With this, Peter storms out of the bathroom and holds the doc at knife point. After Agnes tells Peter that the doc knows where her son is, he stabs the doc to death. Hysterical, Agnes asks why he killed the doc and Peter goes on about people being implanted with microchips and that everyone has one and that's how the government keeps tabs on people. He found his and cut it out, that's another reason why they're after him. Then, a knock on the door. It's the pizza guy delivering a pizza they didn't order... they slip money under the door and tell him to leave it outside. Once he leaves, they get the pizza and inspect it under the microscope. Peter flips out when he finds bugs on it.

This is where the movie goes from bad to worst... They both start talking to each trying to figure out why them. They conclude that everyone around them is in on it. R.C, Peter, Agnes, Jerry, and their son all are intertwined in some way. After babbling on about what probably happened, Agnes loses it and starts shouting that she's the queen bug and they were meant to be together so that Peter and her can make millions of little bugs. They then look at each other knowing what to do and then they strip naked and cover themselves with gasoline. They then ignite themselves on fire and the movie ends. After the credits roll, that intro scene is then played again.

My first complaint... You NEVER see the damn bugs. This was a huge disappointment because it doesn't help to understand Peter and Agnes. Are the bugs real? Are they psychological? And if so, how did the "bite" marks occur? It just leaves so many questions opened that it did not make the movie satisfying. Then there's the issue with the doctor. Was he really an android as Peter made him out to be, or an actual person that Peter murdered due to his paranoia? I mean, they act through the second half of the movie smacking themselves killing bugs but you don't get a sense of their presence. You only see what they believe is out there and there is never any clarification what so ever. Did the army experiment on him? You don't know. Just not my fancy and again, an extreme disappointment of a movie.

Ode to Star

A lone diamond twinkles brightly
Like an unsung hero that passes on
No dark clouds to shroud you over
Like a black veil that covers face
You blink
You turn
You light
You burn
O heavenly body, how I envy you
To live in the heavens and watch over
To live a million lifetimes
Our feeble minds advance and regress
While you shine as radiant as ever
As I watch you rise, and soon, your fall
I detest to follow suit
For I know I won't rise with you, my friend
To see your luminescence once again

-Metallman

Kids Say the Craziest Things

Hey there. Yesterday, we went to the market to buy us some groceries. Nothing unusual while we're roaming the isles filing up our cart. Once we're outside in the parking lot, I turn to make sure that the kids are not in the way of cars and I notice that our middle child, who will be turning 7 in June, is walking with her eyes closed. Soon after she says something to my wife, which I didn't catch, and my wife is laughing her ass off. Practically in tears. As she composes herself, I asked her, "What did she say?" She told me that she said, "How can Chinese people walk with their eyes closed?" LMAO We laughed. Now, we don't mean any disrespect. I'm not racist, sexist, or any other negative "ist" out there. The fact that I saw her walking with her eyes closed and then her making that comment just completely threw me off guard and started laughing.

Still in the parking lot, loading groceries into the trunk, I explained to her that different people have different features. Every one is unique in their own way. I told her to look around and she'll see people with different skin color, different eye color, different hair color, and that very rarely, you'll see two people looking the same. I explained to her that our Chinese friends do not have their eyes closed, they are open, just not as open as your eyes.Therefore, they are not walking with their eyes closed. She just gave me a look and said, Oh, OK.

Again, don't mean to disrespect or offend anyone. It's just that kids these days are so observant and voice their observations out loud. I believe children should be well informed. I don't tell our kids that because people have different features from theirs, those people are "weird" or whatever. Golden rule in our house is treat everyone the way you want to be treated, regardless of nationality, race, color, or whatever.

Sometimes an innocent question from an untainted child really puts the world into perspective. Most of us watch (or read) the news so we know of hate crimes and what not that goes on in our world. Kids don't. To them, life is about school, homework, and play. Repeat as many times as possible. If they never know of the wrong doings that go on, they'll never do it. Don't get me wrong, if your kid notices something that someone did, you should inform them. Let them know what's going on but let them know it's wrong. If us, as parents instill in our kids that it's OK to get along with anyone and everyone, the world should be a better place because of it.

Later.