Living With All The Lies.

Why are you all lying?

When we were kids, we were told to always trust people who constantly lied to us, to always believe anything anyone said, if we liked that person. We were told it’s perfect normal and acceptable for our elected officials to use their office and power to enrich themselves, with the American public paying the bill. We were told its ok if health insurance only pays when they want and how much they want, while raising your premiums. We were told all news organizations were the communistic liberal media and that we should believe nothing they say, even if they provide undeniable proof. We were told Fox News was the impeachable truth, even after Mr. Rubert Murdoch admitted under oath that several Fox News hosts intentionally lied on camera, and he did nothing to stop them. We were told to trust everything our teachers taught us, unless it involved slavery, race relations, the economy, history, or politics.

This is, of course, ridiculous. We were taught to honor the truth and use it as our guide. We were taught to be skeptical of everything, not buying into the first thing that sounds good, but to do our own research, using multiple sources to try to determine the real story. We were taught to think for ourselves, no matter how much of an inconvenience that might be to us.

If you’ve read this far, you either feel good about yourself for doing you best to be someone who does actually think for yourself or you resent me and these ideas because they are uncomfortable. Uncomfortable because you don’t look to multiple sources for news, because you voted for a convicted criminal, a serial liar, a serial cheater at golf and every other game he’s played, a serial cheater and liar in his three marriages (he actually cheated on his first wife while she was pregnant with their first child.), a man who views empathy as weakness, a man who admires dictators and makes every effort to be just like them, and a man who started a war with Iran without congressional approval, without a clear plan, and without any reason. That’s right, this man sent American troops into battle across the world for no reason at all. And you voted for this man. I don’t blame you. If I was that profoundly stupid, I’d resent someone pointing that out as well.

The Rape of the PC gaming enthusiast.

I used to play computer games.

A lot.

Starting with Wolfenstein 3D and progressing through lots and lots of games. Part of PC gaming is being in a sort-of regular upgrade cycle as developers were constantly improving sound, graphics, etc.

I used to upgrade my PC every two years. My budget was generally $800. That worked for quite a while.

Not now.

See, throughout most of my PC gaming addiction, most PC components weren’t really cheap but were mostly affordable. You could build a pc capable of playing any contemporary game and any new game for a year or so at max settings for around $1000.

Today, if you wanted to build a pc that can play any game, you probably need to spend around $3000. Most of that cost is the video card. But every part of the build is expensive now. Making consoles, a much better option.

So farewell to pc gaming, at least until the bottom falls out of the video card market.

Why Why Why did I watch “Blood and Lace” 1971?

(It’s a good question and I actually know the answer.)

A small portion of my video library.

I love movies. Always have. I’ve been buying them since home video became a thing.

First it was VHS movies. Then Laserdiscs. Then DVDs. Then Blu Rays. And now 4k Blu Rays.

My library consists of nearly 350 titles, mostly Blu Rays. Mostly movies but a significant number of TV titles.

Problem is I would not actually watch them. Yeah, I know.

A couple weeks ago I decided to watch all of the ones I had not actually watched.

So far I’ve watched “Alice, Sweet Alice” 1976 (GREAT movie), “The Beyond” 1981 (GREAT movie), all three of the original Evil Dead movies (all great).

Today I watched “Blood and Lace” 1971. It’s not great. It’s not even good.

Frankly, it’s bewildering.

I saw this movie in the theater when I was in high school. It was a midnight movie and I remember the theater being packed. A high school acquaintance had gushed about the movie as being gory. “There’s a hand that gets cut off and other stuff and YOU SEE IT ALL!” How could I say no to that?

So when the Blu Ray came out I had to buy it. I had to.

Watched it today and I just don’t understand this movie. It has the look of every other low budget drive-in movie from the 70’s except for a couple of things. There’s no nudity at all. None. That’s like a death sentence for an exploitation film from that time. It tries to fill that gaping hole with creepy sleaze, and it succeeds. There’s not a character in this movie who doesn’t make you want to take a LOOOONG shower after seeing them. This isn’t a fun movie. This is the sleaziest movie with zero nudity.