Clearly, I did not review them.  My blog is mostly dead, but as Miracle Max made clear “There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead.”

So I watched Alice in Wonderland this weekend in 3D.  It seemed to use a different kind of 3D than Avatar, and that certainly didn’t play to its advantage.  I’m not sure there was much to be gained by the 3D treatment.

Tim Burton is weird. I know that some of my friends love his work, but I generally leave the theater feeling as if I spent the last two hours of my life fighting off insanity.

Of his many films, there is only one that I really liked and that was Big Fish.  And yes, that includes Batman.  Sure, it was good when it was the only Batman we had, but Christopher Nolan has shown us a great Batman.  Tim Burton’s is a joke.

So it comes as no surprise to myself that I found Alice in Wonderland to be primarily meh.  It wasn’t a waste of my time, but it was also not a great use of my time.  I didn’t laugh, I didn’t cry, and I didn’t marvel.

Instead, I just questioned the sanity of the filmmaker and spent my time trying to figure out if Johnny Depp meant to switch accents in every scene.  Depp is usually a solid performer even in Burton’s messy movies, but here he seemed a little lost.  Then again, he was playing the Mad Hatter so maybe that was the point.

The only bright spot for me was the realization that the White Queen (played by Anne Hathaway) was modeled after the white queen of the chess board.  Having never read the books, I had never realized that both queens were based on separate games.

Sadly, I could have come to that realization via Wikipedia.

The Cheshire Cat was pretty entertaining and his ability to vanish on demand was used to great effect.  He was probably the strongest character, despite a solid cast of actors.

If you like Tim Burton, you’ll probably like Alice in Wonderland.  If you have nothing better to watch, it won’t feel like a total waste of your time because Anne Hathaway is hot (even when painted white) and the Cheshire Cat is slick.

Verdict: C+ Tilt: D

I play video games, watch reruns of What I Like About You, Gilmore Girls and Star Trek: TNG, and I desperately search for something new (some good, and some bad).

This led me to the discovery that my TiVo is quite capable of showing me YouTube videos on my giant television.  Although YouTube is hardly a new invention, I have never really embraced the phenomenon.  I can always find better things to do on my computer than watch videos.

But watching videos on my television?  Well that’s an entirely different beast.  So I embarked and soon found myself subscribed to Marina Orlova, host and proprietor of HotForWords.

The premise of her website and videos are simple — discussion of the origin of certain words, what they mean, and what they used to mean.

Marina is a philologist by trade so she’s not just some fly-by-night internet researcher.  Her love for words makes her ’students’ hot for words, and there is no better motivator for learning.

Sure it doesn’t hurt that she has a sexy Russian accent and looks like a super model, but it’s really the content that got me to to subscribe.  Learning is fun, and learning in bite-sized chunks is even better.

That long introduction of HotForWords was really to get to a discussion about one of Marina’s latest videos:

This video discusses the meaning and origin of the word mondegreen. It is a word I believe I have come across before but I don’t think I could have told you the meaning before watching this video.

For those unwilling to watch the hot Russian girl above (seriously, what is wrong with you!?), a mondegreen is the mishearing or misinterpretation of a phrase, typically a standardized phrase such as a lyric.

I can’t remember all of the mondegreens I have come across in my life, but I know they are plentiful. From my youth, I can particularly remember mishearing a line in “Part of Your World” from The Little Mermaid.

The real line goes, “Bright young women, sick of swimming, ready to stand!” but I always heard it as “Pregnant women, sick of swimming, ready to stand!”

I always just assumed it was some sort of reference to Ariel’s unspoken desire to be a mother.

From the video, I have definitely been guilty of “Hold me closer Tony Danza.” I think the first time I heard Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer”, I had no idea what he was saying.  Given his preferences, I figured it was perfectly plausible that he had written an ode to Tony Danza.

What are some mondegreens that you’ve been guilty of? With all of the singing of pirate songs and rock concerts you people go to, surely you’ve run into a few.

Haha.  Those are two headlines that should have never ever been put near each other, eh?

Oh CNN.  You should hire someone to pay attention to your site.

It may be from a show you don’t watch.  It may be something you recognize readily.  It’s not really a game so much, but just a way to perpetuate inside jokes from pop culture.

I’ll try to do it every week, but who am I kidding?  This will probably be the only one ever.

If I do keep it up, I’ll just pick a quote that made me laugh and post it.  Kudos to you if you can figure out where it came from.

This week’s is:

“I want to go to there.”

See. That wasn’t so bad.  Now we’ll see if I drive people crazy by never sourcing it.

I consider myself to be in semi-retirement now, not being a member of a guild and not raiding on any regular schedule, but even still it takes a lot to make me smile anymore in relation to the game.

I’ve seen it all.  I was there for almost every major event in WoW history; if not in game then in spirit as I read the blogs that chronicle every nuance of every event.

But this morning, something happened that I wasn’t expecting and that I’ve never seen.

I was checking my mail in Shattrath City when there was an announcement — Level 70 Elite Tauren Chieftain would be performing in the World’s End Tavern (home of such auspicious patrons as Haris Pilton) at the top of the hour.

I looked at the clock — 5:59am.  Perfect.  I hopped on my wyvern and headed down to the tavern to see what the fuss was all about.

And sure enough, the band showed up and performed one song.  It was just me and a lone Draenei Pally in the audience, but I partied like it was 1999, stripped down to my tabard, and did my Britney dance.

Apparently this is not a new phenomenon, but it has escaped my attention until this morning when it hit me by complete surprise.  I /cried when they finished their set, and the Draenei Pally /comforted me.

With as much reading and playing as I do, I don’t know how I’ve always missed the L70ETC concerts, but I’m glad I did.

The surprise was able to bring a smile to my face from a game that rarely does anymore.  It’s always the little things…

(click on the pictures for something that doesn’t resemble a blurry mess)

Bush pledges what now?

They have one of the most interesting villains ever conceived — played by one of the most charismatic and interesting actors on television — and what do they do?

They start treating Sylar like a bad run of 1980s Barbies.

This week we got ‘Secret Agent Sylar’ complete with HRG sidekick and slick New York accent.  Push his belly and he’s sure to say funny things that all Secret Agents say.

For example, “We’re going to need some coffee!”

Next week it looks like we get ‘Housewife Sylar’ which is sure to set villain rights back about 50 years.  Perhaps he’ll come with a vaccuum cleaner and some baking pans.

Oooh maybe they will also release the ‘Housewife Sylar’ dream kitchen, complete with Peter Petrelli in his slippers and smoking jacket!

Push Peter’s belly and you can hear him say, “Get in the kitchen and make me a pie or I’ll stop time, freeze you, nuke your hair, sonically destroy your ears, and tell you your future as a Barbie!”

Don’t get me wrong.  Season 3 is thus far leaps and bounds better than the disaster that was Season 2, but they have to find something better for Sylar to do.  He’s simply too good of a character to treat this way.

Why make him the partner of HRG for only one episode?  The concept of Sylar being an agent was actually a good one that could have led to tons of creepy dialogue and interesting character development.

And what’s with him suddenly being the (half?)-brother of Peter and Nathan.  Seriously?  Can we say left field?

Sylar is the best character Heroes has.  I literally cringe to see him treated like a bad Barbie doll.

Tune in next year to see ‘Star Trek Sylar!’

Though it is dated, silly, and not all representative of what life in the fifties was probably really like, it’s still a great show with some of the best displays of tv tropes in our short television history.

This past weekend I watched an episode all about Wally.  He started dating a girl who’s older sister (by 3 years) was already married.

Ward and June were absolutely horrified by all of the time Wally was spending with the married couple and were sure he was going to drop out of high school and get married prematurely.

So, being good parents they questioned him about his new girl over dinner.  Wally got short with them, and finally asked them to stop. Why?

And I quote: “It’s kinda creepy like when the gym coach watches you shower.”

Wait–what? Did Wally really just say that?  Wally was playing ball for a pedophile and his parents are worried about a girl?

Ah.  The fifties.  So innocent.

No matter how you look at it, this is unacceptable garbage journalism.  If CNN wrote an article titled “How to duck the cops while running a prostitution ring out of your basement” I’m pretty sure they’d receive a little bit of flak.

Speeding is illegal.  Publishing, writing, or endorsing an article on a professional level which discusses effective ways to safely break the law is downright absurd.

Someone should seriously be fired for that.  Anyone with half a brain should know not to publish that.  Would that same person publish an article about the most effective way to dispose of a dead body?  I bet not.

I’m not trying to be a hypocrite here.  I know we all speed.  I speed, you speed, your mom speeds, and my cats would speed if they could drive — but that’s not the point.

We’re all breaking the law when we’re speeding and whatever clever contraptions we may use to try avoid getting caught doesn’t make the act any less illegal.

I especially like this tip from the article: “If it’s ok legally, get a radar dector.”

If we’re going to promote criminal behavior, I say let’s go all out.  Couldn’t they spare a few words on how to hide a radar detector from the police?

I don’t know why I even read CNN anymore.  They post sensationalist headlines that are oftentimes outright lies, and now they are promoting the breaking of laws by their readership.  The whole organization has descended into unprofessional madness.