Wrestling With My Sister

Celebs and Media

rourke_hairYou all have heard by now that Mickey Rourke is cool again with his amazing performance in The Wrestler. It’s nice to see him back, even though he looks like he’s been dragged 1000 kilometres over gravel and straight through a hair dresser’s apprentice convention.

Back in the 90s my sister had moved and based herself out in Calgary and her visits back to Ontario were sporadic but when she did return, the visits were packed with dense conversation. Until one visit. We were talking about secret shames and she revealed that she loved professional wrestling.

Like the Olympics?

No. The WWF.

Pause. Blink. Pause.

Here’s a woman who is university educated, highly intelligent and articulate who admits to enjoying watching men manhandle each other in clumsy, yet painful choreography. Okay I get the (homo/hetero) erotic aspect of it: oiled musclemen in shorts, the coiffed hair, the buxom wives cheering from the side. I admit that as I write this I have a Stone Cold Steve Austin and Bill Goldberg action figures sitting over my computer but I couldn’t make the connection between my sister’s obvious upwardly mobile class and this “sport’s” base common denominator appeal.

Then I started to pay attention a little more closely. Behind the moves, behind the sweat and “folded chair to the head” bloodbaths, there was a drama being played out. The backstage drama was just as important as the physicality in the ring. And that action in the dressing rooms was utterly camp: adultery, career machinations, homoerotic longing, smack talk… Perfect for the gay world. I’m actually baffled as to why more gay men don’t enjoy wrestling. Well maybe they do and don’t admit it.

I’m kind of jazzed to see this movie. A few years back while camping in Southern Ontario, SharkBoy and a few friends went off to Ingersol for their annual summer fair. We discovered that the midway had a wrestling ring and bleachers set up and we stayed to watch a few rounds. We were entertained by some real “grass roots” wrestlers: a feisty woman who knocked the crap out of some skinny kid by actually throwing him off the top of the bleachers, an “evil” manager in a cheap suit and luchador mask and the crowd-pleasing hunk with the standard long shoulder length hair. It was entertaining, to say the least, especially to see SharkBoy start screaming when the wrestlers broke the “fourth wall” and jumped into the stands to tear each other apart. I get a sense that the “comeback” Rourke achieves lifts him from similar rings and into a shot at the big time.

I certainly hope so. The stain of those awful slew of movies during the 90s need to be washed from his hair.

Sex Ed at 100 Klicks Per

Personal Bits, Travel

It’s a long ride between Toronto and Brockvegas, where I grew up.

When I was 13 I started to occasionally accompany my dad on business trips into Toronto. At that age I was ready to escape the bizarre conservatism that the town’s parents exuded and the boring, “lets get drunk every night” attitude my high school chums demanded I enroll in. Toronto was an “otherworld”, a safe haven where my hidden gay desires could be “not so hidden” and I would beg my dad to take me along with him, if only to sit in a hotel room in a large metropolitan city for a day.

As I said, it was a long ride, especially before everyone in Ontario collectively decided that 120kph was the unofficial legal limit (I doubt cars could sustain that limit for long, back then). It took under 6 hours with rest stops as opposed to the manic 4 hours you can do it today in good traffic/no peeing.

One particular trip to Toronto defined my car relationship with my father and was possibly the most notable. Trapped in Dad’s LTD, he decided somewhere around Kingston he was going to give me The Talk. Yes, The Talk where as a teen, you have to discuss sexual intimacies with a parent. Yes it was spine-curlingly embarrassing, with long pauses and awkward metaphors and aphorisms that made me press my back hard against the passenger door. I could see it in Dad’s eyes that his back was equally plastered to his door, the window crank making an indelible mark along his spine. But he was determined to get this parental duty done.

Dad started out slow with a statement that would make any teen boy writhe in panic. The harbinger of adult responsibility. The trumpet blow before your cocooned, responsibility-free young adult world crashed down around you.

“You’re at an age, now…”

The depths of which my father went into sex was kept to a respectable level, almost 10ft pole distance, but every so often he would prod one of my prudish nerves like some one-off serial killer extra on Dexter: “You… know about vaginas…?”

“Dad!”

“You know about sex, right? About …fucking…?”

“DAD!!!”

I tried to deflect it by pointing out that we get this subject in school now so this awkward talk can change to something else. But no, he continued.

“You know how babies are made, right?”

“…Dad…? Please.”

And so it went through several topics, until, like some great engine seizing up with a lack of oil, our conversation seized at a long pause, unsure where to go next.

Those who know my father, know this whole incident skirts on the edge of irony. Three years after this scene, my father came out of the closet, finally admitting his own sexuality and becoming comfortable with himself to drive faster.

Flick to Distraction: iPhone Apps Review

Gaming

Recently Apple announced that they’ve reached 10,000 apps in their Apps Store. Who has time to download and play with all of these nuggets of code?

I’ve decided to take it upon myself to start wading through the flotsam and check out some of the apps for the iPhone. This week I’m going to review the free games and find out if they’re worth more than their price tag. I’ll be reviewing both regular and “Lite” versions of games (the free ones that tease you into buying if they grab your attention longer than 2 subway stops) and hopefully save you some download time so you can waste it properly, poking at your iPhone.
All ways never quite...right.
Topple (Lite):
ngmoco, Inc
Current App Store Rating: 4/5
Think of Topple as a cross between Tetris and Jenga (but the bored, after-Jenga play, where you stack blocks to their noisy fall). Simply put, you have to stack blocks to a height goal. Like most good games, a simple premise usually means lasting power, which Topple has plus some fun visuals as well. Each block has a spasmodic face that looks like it was designed by John Kricfalusi of “Ren and Stimpy” fame. If a block falls from the tower, it scrunches in fear or looks agape in horror. When placed level, a block makes a “satisfied” face I like to call “post-potty”. Cuteness abounds! The accelerometer allows you to balance your blocks left or right to extend the life of your tower as you drop irregular chunks onto it, which adds to the cleverness of this app. On the downside, I experienced a bug while playing: music from your iPod might crash the iPhone to full rebooting. You can reduce the volume of the game music (why not just turn it off?) but that doesn’t seem to correct the problem.



Wave Upon Wave of your loyal men...
Galcon (Lite):
galcon.com
Current rating: 4.5/5
“Lite” is appropriate for this fun, yet strangely obsessive strategy game. Galcon is one of those OCD games: it’s a poke-and-watch game which doesn’t lend much to game excitement, but the satisfaction of winning is like cleaning the bathroom. Job done! Oh no, Dirty again! Job done! Oh no…! Each screen is a system of planets that you and your opponent occupy. At the get go, you need to build up your resources by invading planets near your base and then en massing your armada to attack the enemy by sending wave upon wave of your own men to their doom, crashing into planets to claim them for your own. All the while, your enemy is doing the same. It takes a fast hand in the upper levels to control your ships and choose which planet to overtake. If you have an over active imagination you can imagine the exploding ships’ pilots screaming “I regret nothing!!” as they burn up in the upper level of the planet’s atmosphere. If you don’t, you might find this game a bit tedious after a while.


You. Stay. Down!
Funky Punch Free Style:
Solus Games
Current rating: 3/5
When developers push the iPhone into the realm of ambitious hand-held gaming situations, it’s limitations start showing. Just like a drunken pick-up at last call, FP:FS is sluggish, confusing and if you don’t know what buttons to push, then you’ve lost the battle. The game design is brightly coloured Manga-style but that falls away when the 3D characters appear for the actual fighting. 3D may be cool for the iPhone but FP:FS is nearly all sideways on. Why not go retro and create well rendered 2D characters instead of blocky Mii-like players? The navigation is a bit choppy – titles are highlighted but you press A like a real controller to select, which is counter-intuitive for the iPhone. I got three tournaments into this game and gave up having forgotten the major combos moves, which never seem to be 100% responsive in the heat of the fight. As a caveat, I let my 12yr old nephew try it and he played so long he ran the battery down.

Rollin' rollin' rollinggg!
Jelly Car:
Walaber
Current rating: 4/5
Remember how you got a “great new online game” forwarded to you from someone and you wound up playing Line Rider until your eyes bled? Remember how excited you were when it was announced coming to the iPhone? Remember the kick to the guts when you found out it was $3? Jelly Car uses the same physics and simplistic, addictive design as Line Rider, but places the gameplay in a mailable setting, sort of like driving through a breast implant convention, making it worthy of a download. You drive your SUV-like car over obstacles to reach a goal while manipulating the size of the car as it unnaturally rolls over a Miro-esque landscape (I’m being kind, the design of this game is purely kindergarden fridge art, but it is squishy!). The opening screen is the funnest I’ve seen in a while: the buttons to start the game, website information and set up are free floating mushy cubes that react to a sharp tilt. Jelly Car uses the accelerometer to flip the car out of traps and holes but this can also lead to moments of guttural frustration as your car lands on it’s roof after being thrown from an obstacle. I award Jelly Car my “Cheap Assed Game of the Week”.

‘Til next time, my zombie hordes!

Best of CList

General

Someone went to the cinema and got a little restless…

FORGIVE ME FATHER… ((DOUBT))

… for i have sinned. legal age donald miller here looking for his father flynn to “take an interest” and for mutual confession. no problem if you look like philip seymour hoffman.

Ohhh!! Kelly Clarkson!!

Need some waxing done……..

Hey guys, I require some waxing to be done in a few spots…anyone into it? Needs to be your place. 47, One seventy .

You had me at #29 (secretly, I hope this guy gets what he’s looking for, show creativity and humour):

Fifty reasons to date me !!!!!!!!

I’ll stash little notes for you where you’ll least expect them.
I always stop to pet dogs outside of grocery stores.
You’re safe with me.
You can always bring home good friends.
I am a good cook and I like it.
I’ll make you laugh.
I’ve never auditioned for American Idol.
I recycle.
You just can’t stop reading this!
I buy a new toothbrush every time the blue wears down.
I believe the glass half full.
I can take care of myself (but I want you).
I love my family.
I’ll cover you up and kiss your forehead when you fall asleep watching TV.
I’m secure with me.
I’ll hold your coffee for you when you’re driving.
We’ll make history together.
I don’t litter.
I love the earth.
You sleep better when I’m next to you.
I’ll take care of you when you’re sick.
I smell pretty good.
I’m magically delicious.
What else have you got to do?
I cower at bloody movies.
I can balance a checkbook.
I always put the cap back on the toothpaste.
My chin fits ‘just right’ in your shoulder when you hold me close.
The only drama I have any part of is on TV.
I promise not to burn the house down while you’re gone.
Romance is soooo important.
Sometimes I am a top.
Sometimes I am a bottom.
Foreplay is fun.
I’m really good at sneaking food into the movies.
You really kinda would dig having someone to cuddle with on the couch.
I’ll help you find your keys.
Sleeping in has a whole new meaning now that we will be doing it together.
I look both ways before I cross the street.
I have two great cats.
Sex should never be a quickie.
You’re getting very sleepy…
I know the difference between they’re, their, and there.
I know CPR.
I’m a Leo.
I know how to two-step.
I give to charity.
I AM CANADIAN.
I’m really good at making lists!
I’ll hold you as long as you want.
After reading this far you’ve already got too much time invested — you might as well e-mail me.

Full Circle

Personal Bits

The phone rings last night and it’s the Old Audio Dude (my third in line brother), he’s coming to Toronto with Heather and The Mop, my incredibly thick-haired nephew. No really, this kid’s hair is incredible considering he came from our gene pool of hairy backed, thin-on-top family. He can take solace (or sadness?) in knowing that no Mii editor, no Xbox avatar creator, no PS3 Home builder, will every be able to recreate his large, unruly mane.

I digress.

He’s here in town and to give Heather the day to herself, SharkBoy and I are going to treat him to a march down Queen West and a movie (Marley and Me). I think there might be robot shopping involved. Expect pictures. What makes me feel incredibly old and expectant, is the fact that he’s the exact age when I started to come with my Dad to Toronto on business trips and run around alone on the subway downtown (yeah, they use to let 13 year old kids wander the streets alone back in the 70s).

I’m slightly weirded out that this is how the legacy is passed on – trips to the Silver Snail with $20 in his pocket, a ticket to a movie and popcorn, chased down with big gulps of sugar water. That arcade is closed so I can’t show him that – he’s voiced his desire to plug into our PS3/Wii/Xbox combo until his eyes bleed, anyway. If I had more time I’d take him to the Science Centre but that’s too late. Oh well, we’ll teach him the fine art of shopping. Every young lad should learn that early.