On one hand, they are scientists and probably have at least a bachelor’s degree. But on the other, the important qualities of a weather man/woman are things like attractiveness and sense of humor.
They take the weather so seriously (see future post about Weather Wars), but everything they say could be wrong. A weather prediction that winds up being off is more than useless, it could ruin your day (or your suede jacket!). Why allow guessing in a news program? Maybe the reporters should start informing us of an impending crime wave or which Golden Girl is most likely to kick the bucket next?
While they’re no-nonsense about persisting with their scientific guesswork, they present it with every absurd bell and wacky whistle they can come up with. They sing, they make pun after pun, they offer trivia, create flamboyant, personalized graphics, share tales of housebreaking their pets, show off their awkward high school photos…. I hope they get paid well for playing the fool for the whole community.
I imagine every weatherman falls into one of two categories. Either they hate every minute because they have to act goofy despite really wanting to be an anchorman or taking weather very seriously. Or they love every minute! Either way, you gotta pity these people!
If weather is so uninteresting and unimportant that they have to jazz it up so much to keep people from turning the channel, why do they spend so much time and energy on it? Or do people really like all the wacky hijinks, and the weather man was in the wrong place at the wrong time and got stuck with the added Fool duties? As much as I don’t care to watch the weather report (it’s Vegas—the weather does not change!), I often find myself grinning, mesmerized by the local Weather Fool. My boyfriend and I tease each other about our attractions to the local weather woman and weather man. Apparently we’re not the only ones—a recent Sonic commercial features the wife of the Sonic couple daydreaming about her sundae and the local meteorologist…. And you remember when Kelly Bundy got a job as the local news program’s Weather Bunny on Married…With Children….
Another post coming about Weather Wars and Doppler Radar madness!
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
The W., H.W., Gibson and Stone Conspiracy
A couple weeks ago, Conspiracy Theory was on TV, and I watched most of it. There was a line Mel Gibson said that struck me as interesting, he said something like “Oliver Stone is in cahoots with George Bush.” The weird part is that when the movie was over, I went to sleep, and the very next day was the first time I saw the preview for Stone's new Movie "W." (which was the first I had heard of the movie). Weird.
As to what Mel’s character could have been referring to…
I think he meant the older Bush (the movie was from ’97), who was the head of the CIA in 1976, and in JFK Oliver Stone makes it sound like the CIA was behind JFK’s assassination. (Also, there is some evidence that links Bush to the CIA at the time of the murder and that that was covered-up.)
But how does that put them on the same side?
Well, I guess one result of the public's reaction to Stone’s movie about Kennedy was the JFK Act that Bush signed in ’92 shortly before leaving office. The Act basically created a committee that released all the assassination-related documents to the public (well, they started releasing them and will be done in 2017!). I read somewhere a viewpoint that this Act was kinda just a big show, to look good. Because really all the documents should be available to the public through the Freedom of Information Act of 1966. And documents released by either Act are subject to redaction (blacking out). And some documents are exceptions to the Act, and some have already been destroyed.
So in a way Stone helped Bush and the government look less like conspirators trying to hide something, without them having to really do anything different. The public is pacified by this meaningless Act. Thanks Oliver.
So I think that’s what was meant in Conspiracy Theory. I wonder if that’s a common theory or if they just made it up for the movie to make Mel Gibson sound like a nutcase. I read that the scenes where Mel is talking about his conspiracy theories to passengers in his cab are mostly ad-libbed. He seems like he would have some theories (Jews are responsible for all the wars, right?), so maybe the line is one of his. Note that Mel and Oliver have never worked together. Or, the line could have come from the writer Brian Helgeland, who worked on The Bourne Supremacy (and wrote A Knight’s Tale). The director, Richard Donner, has directed 6 Mel Gibson movies (and The Goonies) and a common theme in his movies is the main character believing something despite others’ doubts.
Anyway, I’m just speculating…but I’m curious: Who wrote that line? What did they mean? And does it have any meaning in relation to the new movie?
As to what Mel’s character could have been referring to…
I think he meant the older Bush (the movie was from ’97), who was the head of the CIA in 1976, and in JFK Oliver Stone makes it sound like the CIA was behind JFK’s assassination. (Also, there is some evidence that links Bush to the CIA at the time of the murder and that that was covered-up.)
But how does that put them on the same side?
Well, I guess one result of the public's reaction to Stone’s movie about Kennedy was the JFK Act that Bush signed in ’92 shortly before leaving office. The Act basically created a committee that released all the assassination-related documents to the public (well, they started releasing them and will be done in 2017!). I read somewhere a viewpoint that this Act was kinda just a big show, to look good. Because really all the documents should be available to the public through the Freedom of Information Act of 1966. And documents released by either Act are subject to redaction (blacking out). And some documents are exceptions to the Act, and some have already been destroyed.
So in a way Stone helped Bush and the government look less like conspirators trying to hide something, without them having to really do anything different. The public is pacified by this meaningless Act. Thanks Oliver.
So I think that’s what was meant in Conspiracy Theory. I wonder if that’s a common theory or if they just made it up for the movie to make Mel Gibson sound like a nutcase. I read that the scenes where Mel is talking about his conspiracy theories to passengers in his cab are mostly ad-libbed. He seems like he would have some theories (Jews are responsible for all the wars, right?), so maybe the line is one of his. Note that Mel and Oliver have never worked together. Or, the line could have come from the writer Brian Helgeland, who worked on The Bourne Supremacy (and wrote A Knight’s Tale). The director, Richard Donner, has directed 6 Mel Gibson movies (and The Goonies) and a common theme in his movies is the main character believing something despite others’ doubts.
Anyway, I’m just speculating…but I’m curious: Who wrote that line? What did they mean? And does it have any meaning in relation to the new movie?
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