What the hell do I have to say?

One of the things I like about getting older is not needing to talk so much. Some of you that know me may wonder if I've lost all perspective in asserting that I don't talk that much. Oh, if you knew me when. I crave silence more than fear it these days. Used to be a time when I was on the phone first thing in the day and out in the bars until long past closing time. Talk, talk, talk.
I had tea yesterday morning with the lovely and talented Grace Carter. We talked so much that I lost track of time. What a pleasure. I told her my self-effacing story about writing a scene for Dangerous Writing that gave the set-up and then said, this goes where it goes. So cavalier and trusting of the moment am I. Then Joey jumps off of a very expensive motorcycle and rips the baguette from the grocery sack. He breaks off a piece and starts gnawing it. The bike nearly goes over and the one bag of prop groceries that we have is ripped. We're trying to get this shot off before we need to break for dinner and we're in a busy underground parking lot on a dolly with no permission. So much for seeing where it goes. I yell cut, rip off my headphones and smash them to the ground, march over to Joey and yell at him for being such an impulsive and irresponsible fool. The boys taped up my expensive headphones and I got back on the dolly for more takes. So much for spontaneity.
I saw the Simpson's movie with my family. It was rated PG-13, so we did a little research before taking our children. What a joke. There's a three second shot of Bart's penis. Which from the message boards you would think it was some hentai, anatomically correct monstrosity instead of the simple line drawing that looked like an inverted flip of the bird on his groin. We don't protect each other from seeing our genitals in our family. No flaunting, but if my children come into our bedroom when we're dressing we don't shout them out the door and dash for cover. As for foul language, well my kids make more money from the quarters I hand out for saying bad words than they make in interest on their college funds. They're just words. There were some laughs for sure. My son saw a friend and went to go sit with his family. It was awesome to hear his laughter from afar, what a laugh that kid's got. I enjoyed the movie, but if you're looking for a good plot, stay home with a Russian novel.
There's a lot of hullaballoo about bridges these days. I heard on NPR that the Civil Engineers of America submit an annual list of bridges that need repair. Of the 100,000 bridges in the US, a very high percentage need repair. I'm listening to this as I drive the other day. The money just isn't there to bring all of the bridges up to snuff. I'm also thinking that people don't like bridges to be closed down as it interrupts their familiar routes of travel. Which brings up the whole issue of a lot of people driving around in cars by themselves. Another thought is coming to mind though -- we hate paying taxes in America. Yet I look around and I see a lot of people driving $50,000 dollar cars and putting additions on to 3,ooo square foot homes. Don't get me started on the $1,ooo/wheel rims that are on a lot of cars. Or the proliferation of cedar fences going up in Portland. There's a lot of money being spent on shit that we don't need. Our schools suck, our bridges are time bombs and health care is a joke. I'm not one to want to pay more taxes in order to buy Tomahawk missiles at 1.5 million per or to fund more weekends at Camp David for Dumbass, but our priorities are completely fucked.

Head back in the sand,
Signore Direttore