Watching this again for the first time in a long time I’m struck by how amazing it is. He’s not the polished act that he eventually becomes so you get to see the raw (and prodigious amounts of) talent that are bursting out of him. It’s like when Michael Jordan first scored 63 points on the Celtics - Larry Bird thought it was “God disguised as Michael Jordan”. Or like when Tiger Wood demolished the course record at Augusta National. Or Aryton Senna destroying his teammate at Monaco by over 1.5 secs (.3 secs is an eternity in racing). All were young men just starting their careers and with so much talent that it seemed like it could not be contained because they had not yet learned what was possible.
Later, Tiger and Jordan (and MJ) would learn to control their powers and the polish would show up - they’d only show off their talents when it was most needed. They weren’t electrifying any longer - they were just great.
My first album that I ever got was Thriller, it was a birthday present from my dad for nearly 20 years I listened to that cassette tape until the tape was too stretched to give consistent sound. There was something in that album for everyone and there wasn’t any way to dis that album - it was an amazing piece of art.
Of course over the past 10 years you couldn’t have a conversation with anyone about him without someone saying, “Man, he’s crazy” or “He was cool until he went crazy”. His descent into madness was incredibly sad to watch - I don’t know what exactly happened but whatever it was, I wouldn’t wish it on anyone else.
Hopefully they’ll put that concert he did at Madison Square Garden on TV, it was the last live performance he did where he was still himself. The awkward bits were washed over by the amazing performance where you were reminded of what a magnificent performer he was.
So I’m taking golf lessons. Entry level golf lessons. The other 3 ladies are basically working on getting the ball in the air while I’m working on much more advanced stuff however I’m getting as much out of it as they are.
After years of constructing my own swing by watching TV and reading magazines I finally tapped out and needed lessons on the fundamentals in order to improve my game. That said, reconstructing your swing in the middle of golf season probably isn’t the best idea - once you’re out on the course your first instinct upon hitting trouble is to try what you know, not what you just learned on Wed night.
Changing your swing in mid-season is akin to you changing out all your aluminum pots and pans with cast iron pots and pans in mid-dinner service and you’ve never used cast iron before.
After two lessons I’ve realized that I’m going to have to spend a lot of time over the next few weeks hitting balls to burn in the swing changes. I’m gonna be really sore.
What a marvelous movie. You will cry and you will laugh and you will smile. It’s the first movie that has ever made me teary-eyed - the opening sequence is as beautiful as movies can be and in itself would be grand enough but the rest of the movie is wonderful. The talking dogs are as funny as anything I’ve seen in this century.
I can’t wait to see it again and it might just be the first movie I’ll watch in Blu-Ray.
P.S. The short, Partly Cloudy, is a total hoot too.