The Shining is a very creepy book about ghosts and hauntings and family secrets and bloody hands and even bloodier axes from author Stephen King, back when he was good. It’s also the name of a very scary movie, starring Jack Nicholson and Olive Oyl.
Director Stanley Kubrik takes a creepy story and makes it even creepier.
The movie is about Jack Torrence, failed writer, and his wife and son. They move to the Overlook Hotel, up in the mountains for the winter to act as caretakers when the snows come and cut off all communication. While there, Jack goes slowly insane. Ghosts appear. And scary little girls make an appearance.
All of which means it’s just about ripe to make into a romantic comedy.
Which some youtube user went out and did. You dudes enjoy this little bit of oddly repurposed trailer. Heck of a way to start your weekend.
In Texas where I grew up, there’s an old saying: If you don’t like the weather, wait five minutes.
Well, I’ve waited twenty minutes and it’s still no good and I’m just about fed up with it. I mean, seriously. This last week or so has been the worst weather of the winter so far. Not that it’s been the coldest, but it’s been pretty cold. And it’s not that it’s been raining or drizzling or similar for the last week. Although it has.
No, the worst of winter weather is when it’s wet and rainy and cloudy and just barely above freezing. It’s miserable out there. If it were a couple of degrees colder, we’d be getting snow and that would be wonderfully amazingly cool. We love snow.
If it were a couple of degrees warmer, it wouldn’t be nearly as miserable as it is.
It’s this stuck in between places that really chafes. Metaphorically speaking.
I mean, what’s a dude got to do to get some good weather out of this place?
I’ve sent for a rainmaker, but she only makes it rain. She doesn’t send it away.
I’ve tried communing with nature spirits and beseeching them for colder weather, but all I got were pine needles in places where even I don’t want to contemplate and they’re my places. Let’s just say the whole communing with nature in the natural is more than a bit overrated.
I guess the only thing to do is hunker down and wait for it to pass. Or hope it changes.
All right. I’m going to give it five more minutes.
Here’s an interesting idea, something I’m pretty sure 90% of the dudes out there had no idea about. Did you know that each year, somebody comes up with a color for the year?
This isn’t something like the Chinese New Year, where they have a rotating set of animals, so that children born in that year supposedly have a certain set of characteristics. No, the color of the year can be any color. And this actually has some impact on what you see during the year.
The world is about to look a lot more vivid: the Pantone Color Institute has named “Tangerine Tango,” a radiant red-orange, as the top color of 2012. The color experts have been amping up their selections each year, with the serene and calming turquoise in 2010 giving way to 2011’s honeysuckle, a warm, reddish-pink color meant to lift spirits and instill confidence.
First of all, what? Seriously? Look, I know there’s scientific evidence showing that certain colors can have relatively small, but significant, effects on mood and suchlike, but really? I mean, don’t you think this is a bit much, thinking these color selections can actually do all these things? Lift spirits? Instill confidence?
Secondly of all, just who is the Pantone Color Institute and why do they have the authority to tell us what color is going to be in this year?
The current economic climate and frustrations call for something bolder this coming year. Pantone has turned to the “spirited reddish-orange” hue to “provide the energy boost we need to recharge and move forward.” Orange signals not only vitality, but also urgency and strength—associations that should resonate in a year where many are hoping to finally start seeing changes. “There’s the element of encouragement with orange,” said Leatrice Eiseman, executive director of the Pantone Color Institute. “It’s building on the ideas of courage and action, that we want to move on to better things.”
Look, I love orange as much as the next dude, (provided the next dude is someone who loves orange so much he has an entire section of his closet dedicated to that color and has tens of hats in orange and actually lobbied to have his bedroom painted orange. I like orange is what I’m saying.) but really? (Sorry about the open-ended questions, but I’m actually a bit flabbergasted.)
Eiseman’s background in psychology is put to good use in determining which color will specifically resonate in culture. In a statement, the color specialist explained that Tangerine Tango in particular is “hopeful and optimistic,” marrying the “vivaciousness and adrenaline rush of red with the friendliness and warmth of yellow,” while maintaining a quality of sophistication.
I think these dudes and dudettes might be attributing a bit too much power to a color, even if it is a color as cool and awesome as orange.*
*see what I did there? That’s irony-ical, that is.
