Hop's Thoughts

I'm always bothered when someone tells me a person is a good father or mother, especially when they are filled with hatred towards others, based on their appearance. You would think, the birth of a child would scare someone into acceptance. Worried, that something might happen or occur that would cause their child to be different, but it doesn't. The hatred filled inside someone, still remains today as it did before the birth of their child. The disdain for anyone who stands up against oppression brings this person out of their bigoted shell. I wonder if their child were to grow up gay, if they'd cast them in the river, hoping god would sort them out. Or would they feel they'd failed god and slaughter the innocents? It sounds horrid. These words I say are horrible, but they are the things I wonder. How can anyone look at their child, their flesh and blood and feel hate for any other human being, simply based on their appearance. That child, is like someone else's an...

A one handed catch and then another one. Snow Snow Snow. It's all anyone can talk about. Kid lies dead in the middle of the street and we talk more about uncontrollable weather events. Was it always like this or have our minds become mush? I see people posting, those I called friends, with so much hate in their hearts, that it almost makes me wish they could feel that pain, just briefly. The autumn chill turned to springtime today. I walked outside, took a deep breath, but it smells like winter. The party is over and on to the next. The turkey, hen, squab or duck. What will we have? Who knows? Who cares? I wish my brother would walk in that door and say he's done. He's back and I wish I could walk without pain. I wish my mother was here and my grandmother....scratch that, maybe not together, haha! I look forward to shoveling snow. Funny. I've stayed in almost every day, missing the warmth. Missing the beautiful foliage. Missing it, but not. The snow, I will embrace. Eve...

How many observed which one of your friends cheered the executive action taken by Obama this week? The day after, out of my 592 friends on Facebook, there were 27 posts regarding it. Twenty were negative, suggesting that the US was now part of Mexico, that unemployment and crime would go up or that Obama was Muslim (yes, still with this nonsense). Seven posts were in favor. Two were die hard liberals and then there were the five friends who posted...no comments, just a post. All Irish immigrants. All who have moved here and gained citizenship in the past two or three years. What does it say when those born and who spent more than half their lives in another country, show more patriotism and pride than most of us born here? Regardless of your views, you have to start questioning one who claims to be pro-America, who is against the principals the country was founded on. My Irish friends seem to understand. That friend, whose skin is so thin, that any comment regarding their appearance,...

...say they want someone funny, but go after everything but? ...say are there for you, when they never are when you don't need them? ...say they are thick skinned, yet run when called out? ...ask how you are, when all they truly want is to talk about themselves? ...say they like something, just to prove you wrong? ...say something, just to be part of a conversation, but add nothing of substance? ...say they aren't racist, when they have racist beliefs, even if they are few? ...seek so much attention from social media, but when it is private, want none of it? ...interest me so, when I know what they will say before they even say it? ...think it hurts me when they unfriend me? ...talk about the weather, if they are not travelling or bracing for a catastrophe? ...respect some and not others, yet have no reason for either? ...cause me to fantasize about knowing them (some better), while most I wish I could release? ...say they have overcome things they have caused? .....

A bagel with hummus, stuffed clams, a nice chat with an old friend (albeit electronically), a documentary on cave paintings. Sounds boring, but these are the kinds of things that go into a near perfect day lately. I don't go out anymore. Some would laugh at the life I've been living. Out to me, is checking the mail. Sitting in the backyard, eating a sandwich. The outside world hasn't seen me for months. Literally months. The recluse life isn't that bad at all. Despite what people might think, as time has gone on, I've drawn myself away from the social media pit that I'm sadly known for. I feel more connected to strangers who define themselves in 140 characters. They show emotions and disgust and love for me like others, but I don't have to hear about their kid's illness or their day in court. Their traffic woes are for their real life friends, but their tales of true horror, the one on screens, is shared with me and the others who get them. I've neve...

As always, I don't do spoilers, so not really a review, more of a critique. Let me start by saying I normally despise the found footage genre. It is usually a hindrance to a decent idea and limits what we are allowed to see. There are exceptions, but this one stuck to its guns. I had heard nothing about this film other than praise by friends on twitter. I gave it a try and realized instantly, it was going to be about something other than initially proposed. The premise is pretty standard, with the wrinkle being that this film appears to almost not happen. The three main characters are female and in many ways, share nothing in common, which works. Even though two are mother and daughter (Jill Larson & Anne Ramsey), you can see that there is something odd between the two. We find out later, it's a little cliche in some sense, but it doesn't bog down the plot. The interviewer/researcher Mia (Michelle Ang) is also very cute, but no nonsense. While she's not on camera ...

I miss laughter. I mean the silly laughter over nothing. The laughter over a connection between two good friends. The stuff that starts over one thing and carries on to all those other things throughout the night. The kind you wipe your eyes, but it doesn't help. I miss that laughter I got from seeing the body of another jerk with the uncontrollable flailing of someone who has lost it completely. That contagious laughter. I can't get that through the computer screen. Then again, only one or two even try anymore. I can't get that through the phone or on TV or even from my memories. Not the laughter I'm talking about. I guess for now, I'll settle for the chuckles, the smirks and the giggles. It beats the alternative.

I just woke up, so I'm limiting myself to three minutes. I usually attempt humor when I first awake, but lately I've found the outside world, at least the one I'm connected to through technology, to be a sad place. Everyone wanting affection for their woes, reminding me of those children I miss, who care not if the attention comes from their positive or negative actions. They just need it. The nanny doesn't replace the parent, the parent doesn't replace both parents. The kid who wants to have a catch or to have a tea party. Both parents too busy, but the reality is we're all too busy for any adult who desires this attention. Some even use their children, to entrap us. Playing on the emotions they know some of us can't let go of. Then there are those who need something, but know not what it is. New pressures, white lies or just loneliness. I sit back in my big chair laughing, occasionally a tear.

I never give any details in my mini-reviews, but wanted to get a few things off my chest about this film. I know I don't watch films like most of those I know and maybe it's a curse. Who knows?  I'm not claiming to be smarter or say my opinion is any better than anyone else's, I'm just saying this movie is too cool for school. Everyone is claiming this film to be brilliant and such a revelation, but anyone who watches a lot of films, especially films heavy in symbolism, metaphors and allegories, realizes that just paying attention gives away a ton. In Snowpiercer, too much was given away. Spoilers ahead Stop reading now if you haven't seen it, but I'll just state what ruined the movie for me. Gilliam - anyone who saw Brazil, know Terry Gilliam directed it and this was an homage to him. That being said, the name, plus the name actor playing him, you knew he wasn't going to be a minor character. You also knew he would not make it. The Train - forcing...

Veteran's Day is such a welcome break on social media. Universal praise for one day. No complaints about traffic, the kids or the weather. It would be disrespectful to complain on the day we honor men and women who have seen horrors we can only imagine. Many still trying to forget those memories, while we try and remember where our keys are. For one day in November, we honor those who have earned the right to complain and usually don't.  An old man stands in an outdated uniform. The bugle sounds and he barely hears it. Shots fired, symbolic acts, that ironically send some scurrying. The politics of war is so common, yet on this day, we avoid talking about the politics. We simply honor the men and women who courageously defended our freedom. How will we honor these men fighting today? Neither defending our freedom or protecting us in many ways. Bringing democracy or some form of it, to lands that have no use for our brand. Our war on terror seems almost comical, when every fe...

Americans are obsessed with lists. Christmas Lists, Top Ten Lists, Shopping Lists, Hell, when I was a kid, one of the most popular books was aptly titled, The Book of Lists. We're obsessed. I make lists all the time and while I try to use the universally accepted limit of ten items, they rarely end up that way. That being said, lists are a terrible thing. I have never, not once in my life, used a shopping list. You know what I'm good at? Shopping. I buy what's on sale, forgoing the avocados this week and buying some peaches that looked ripe and at a bargain. I walk down every aisle and find things I'd never think to add to the holy list, but now see the large can is but 89 cents. Lists keep us from exploring. The inspiration for this, was not a rebuttal to a friends first blog, in which she lists things, proclaiming lists are a part of her life. No, this was inspired by a comical moment had at 5:18 in the morning. I went to get a glass of water and gazed in the frid...

And everyone is there? The people who have hurt you. Maybe beaten, raped or even killed you. The people who made life on earth hell. Those who you felt were bad, but had been absolved of those sins. What would be so heavenly about it. What if it was truly heaven as we think of it? The people who you love are missing. The indiscretion you didn't know about, keeps your lover from joining you. Your daughter who bullied her classmates is nowhere to be found. Your son who didn't listen when she said no, is absent. What would be so heavenly about it? What if heaven exists and it's only as good for you as you made it for others? Would you want to go? Would that never ending look into the mirror be pleasant or damning? Would you want to be treated as those you love, those you call friends treat others? Would you want a life like the ones you gossip about or ridicule? What if this the concept of heaven is that we're all given something perfect? We are given ...

Let's get this out of the way. Voting is a good thing and it's a right, not a privilege. We owe this right to those who fought, protested and died before us. We are given a single voice with the idea, a poor one, that we can then choose who represents us. That in theory is a beautiful thing. The problem arises when we are only given two choices. This is like walking into a restaurant and being told the vegetarian dinner choices are steak and ice cream. You're given a choice, but in reality, your morals allow you only one and it's not even close to what it is advertised. So let's get it out of the way, the right is a right, but it's a poor choice generally. Thanks to social media, all the little cunts who voted decided to post on their Facebook pages how they are superior to those out there who didn't vote. They usually followed this up with "you can't complain if you didn't vote" or "I don't want to hear it if you didn't vote...

So many thoughts, but the problem with the world today, is that we're all connected. I want to praise one for their courage, but feel badly for the one whose actions I take for granted, merely because they praise themselves so. I want to call out those I care about for not being there and those who have for not doing it right. I know how that sounds, but when you do for others so often, you feel your way is the path. It all sounds so silly. I worry greatly about my mind. Awakened in the middle of a dream, her blouse was being unbuttoned and then I awoke to the sound of branches outside. Sleep came back, but the dreams were of rioters, with torches blazing, while I sat in a tower like some sort of Frankenstein monster. Copyright laws that I've broken, due to a silly thing posted. I don't know the rules and in so many cases, I act like all Americans and just plead ignorance. The decade I've spent, which I want to attack, even if just for therapy. The simple changes I'...

Anyone who follows me on social media has noticed that for the month of October, I have participated in the Macabre Photo Challenge. The only twist was that I did last year's list, because I enjoyed it more. So here is my 2014 version, some photos will be omitted Favorite Movie Killer  - Leatherface, Texas Chainsaw Massacre Sentimental VHS Rental - Maniac Creepiest Doll/Puppet - Leech Lady Best Or Worst Remake - Let Me In Funniest Horror Comedy - Tucker & Dale VS Evil Favorite Black & White Movie - Nosferatu Best Kill With An Object - Basketball, Deadly Friend Freakiest Circus/Sideshow - Freaks Favorite Ghost - Sisters, Rigor Mortis Best Dracula - Bela Lugosi Coolest Transformation - American Werewolf In London Best Zombie Franchise - Romero's Dead Series Favorite Friday 13th Moment - Sleeping Bag Meets Tree Favorite Freddy Moment - Johnny Depp Eats It Biggest Crush - The Twisted Twins Guilty Pleasure Movie - Deep Blue Sea Ugliest Alien...

Another Belle comes; door eases forward, gathered hunters invited. Jumping, kindly lunging momentarily. Notice of parents; quick results. Smiling thanks under veiled words. Xenophobic youths? Zero.