November 2006 – Page 3

A Magic Trick has 3 parts or acts:
The Pledge; the magician shows you something ordinary, but of course it probably isn’t.
The Turn; the magician makes is ordinary something do something extraordinary.
(Now you’re looking for the secret but you won’t find it, which brings us to the third act)
The Prestige; the part with the twists and turns, and you see something shocking that you’ve never seen before.

Last night C and I went out with another couple to dinner and to see The Prestige.
An excellent movie, I won’t spoil it for anyone who hasn’t seen it. It’s not quite as fast paced and ‘thrilling’ as the trailer would have you believe, but it’s still quite good.

It seems to be getting average ratings of 8 or so on a scale of 1-10 and that’s pretty accurate. The acting is quite good, Michael Cane is always good and even David Bowie as Professor Tesla wasn’t too bad.

The Prestige at IMdb

I think an 8 out 10 is just about right.

November 2, 2006November 2, 2006

Andy Furman, 700WLW Good Riddance

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Andy Furman, to know him is to either love him or hate him, there is no in-between.

He’s been on 700WLW for a long time. The Enquirer says 18 years. I don’t think he’s been ‘the’ personality for 18 years but he’s been around for a long time.

(pull)I know he’s been aggravating me and making Sports-Talk hard to listen too for a very, very long time(/pull). Sports fans listen to sports shows to talk about sports, not racial conspiracy theories.

Andy wasn’t always a bigot and a racist but he’s always been at or over the top obnoxious. That was just his style. Over the last few years however he’s really turned it up a notch or 10.

I completely understand there are sport figures and teams (the lowly Bengals who hadn’t won in 10 years would be in that group) who deserve to be dug into from time to time.

Talk radio is about stirring the pot. But Andy’s style was far too aggressive, far too obnoxious, and far too vile.

I don’t know if it was simply jealousy, or what. But it was always clear; Andy had no respect for anyone, except those who kissed his butt. No matter what the issue, Andy it seemed would turn it into a racial issue. I mean it really didn’t matter. Certainly there was a time and place, during the Cincinnati riots, where race was an issue and a top ‘button’ to push. But I never really understood how that affected our sports teams? Once in a while, there might actually be a race related story out there. But with Andy, playing the race card was a weekly occurrence.

People like to try and compare Andy to Bill Cunningham. Bill Cunningham is an entertainer, he’s also borderline obnoxious. But that’s his style. A style that was in place long before Andy came around. When Willey was on during the night time, he too was often controversial, the difference was, Willy made sense most of the time. Rarely did he reach beyond common logic.

Andy it appeared to me, tried to steal from Cunningham’s play book, only in a more vile and hate spreading way. Andy simply went way too far, too often, and I for one am surprised it took this long to get rid of him.

Nope, Andy you won’t be missed by many. Only those whose butts you’ve kissed along the way and somehow avoided offending. After all these years, I don’t know how many people that could be, maybe 5 or 6?

Good luck to you in your future endeavors.

Enquirer Story

November 1, 2006

November…

This time of year just blows.

We’ve turned back the clocks, and while I used to appreciate the extra hour of sleep, now that I’m older I also recognize that the kids just gained an extra hour before bed time.

I mean, 9pm or 10pm rolls around and I’m tired, because it’s really 10pm or 11pm, or was. At 8pm which used to be 9pm, I’m ready to send the kids to bed or at least start the process which takes an hour, sometimes two. But they look at the clock and say, no way, it’s only 8pm.

It’s now dark a whole lot sooner after I get off work.

The weather, It is sunny one day, cold the next, cold and rainy the day after that, then mildly warm again, then who knows after that?

Do we really need Winter? I mean if it is going to get cold, just get cold. This in between stuff isn’t any good.

Yeah, this time of year is no good.