average life

I have an irrational hatred of greetings cards.  Wait, it’s not irrational, greeting cards have some of the worst writing in all of creativity (and I’m including that commercial for built-to-order metal sheds that plays constantly on broadcast TV that I’m suddenly watching again for some reason).  Given this deep-seated loathing, it’s completely expected that I would love someecards, which exist in direct parody of the greeting card industry.  For those who have never read these cards, don’t, because if you haven’t read them already, you are likely to be offended by them.  In fact, stop reading because I’m going to post several.

Okay, now this last one will be the topic of our conversation today simply because it was in the Flirting section of someecards. (In full disclosure, this isn’t the real card that prompted this post, but this blog has my name in the URL, so I chickened out posting that one.) Now, it should be readily apparent that the site’s humor is over-the-top, but it got me thinking about flirting and how bad I am at it.

Actually, I’m pretty good at it, apparently, but with the wrong people. I’ve been told that I can be quite flirty with cashiers and waiters, but when the object of my interaction isn’t a business transaction, I become something akin to a DMV employee.

Potential Conversation:

Him: I’m pretty new to Atlanta, what’s fun to do here?

At this point, I’m wondering why this person is even talking to me; I feign aloofness. This almost always will be taken too far, giving me a completely disinterested presence.

Me: I don’t know. The aquarium is pretty cool, but it’s expensive.

Wow, great suggestion, it’s something anyone Googling the Atlanta Tourism Board could have come up with. Our subject, however, is not easily dissuaded.

Him: That’s cool, I’ve never been to an aquarium. Hey, are there cool music venues here?

Weird question, I’ll think (for some reason), and this thought will bleed into my tone.

Me: Um, what kind of music do you like?

This question is to help match him to an applicable music scene, but will come across as, “you like Ke$ha, don’t you?”

Him: Umm…

He’s thinking this isn’t going well, and it isn’t.

Him: Mostly indie-type stuff, I guess. Sigur Rós, Death Cab, Bloc Party, Metric, The Weepies…

At this point, I’m swooning, but never dreaming he’d be interested in return, I reign it in.

Me: Yeah, those are cool.

Him: I love going to concerts, but I don’t really know anyone here yet…

Aha! But not the right “aha”. Clearly he is gauging interest in spending more time together, but since I am completely oblivious, I see a need and out of a desire to be useful suggest:

Me: You know, you should talk to Jessica, she loves going to concerts, too, and would probably be interested.

And thus, we witness a fail.

I’d like to believe that my ineptitude in flirting comes merely by the low number of flirting possibilities in my associations, the reality is that even if my social circles included more flirting prospects, I’d continue being completely dense to other people’s intentions. So, to prevent confusion, I request the world start communicating by handing out small cards such as this:

So after the most active dating year I’ve ever had, I’m realizing that my specs for a relationship might be so prohibitive as to narrow the number of potential suitors to about, well, .2, and those ain’t good odds.  So, in light of my confirming bachelorhood, I’m been mulling the type of C.B. that I should be.

Type 1: The Serial Dater

Alright, who's next?

I could be the guy who’s always on a date with someone, but never “dating someone”.  I’d go on a date with just about everyone once – drawing the line only for those who refuse to use their real names (or people with hotmail accounts).  Short, tall, fat, skinny, bald, hairy, smart, dumb, boring, cool, or even plain average, I’m up for at least dinner and a movie.

Type 2: The Unabomber

Just ask me what I think about corporations.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, I could become a hermit and completely shut myself off from society.  This plan includes having a blog behind several layers of anonymizing proxies where I denounce the government for not disclosing everything they know about UFOs.  Only my close friends and family know my exact coordinates, which show up blurred on Google Maps satellite photos.

Type 3: The ATL => CDG => BLR => NRT

What do you mean, the peanuts aren't free?

Someone in every (air)port? I could be a world traveler who’s Facebook status is just airport codes and dates, who’s Flickr stream is full of images from places that no one has ever heard of (or cares about), and who’s blog reads like it belongs next to a Lonely Planet guide. I could develop a permanent farmer’s tan from riding on the tops of crowded buses in interior and start speaking with an indeterminable accent (is he British? …maybe German?)

Type 4: The Active(ish)ist

Wait, what's happening with these youths again?

I could devote my life to whatever cause is most important to me at the moment.  Blankets for the earthquake victims!  Water for the drought sufferers!  Food for the hungry!  Medicine for the disease stricken!  Freedom for the oppressed!  Chinese government = bad! Hugs for the snuggleless! Etc.

Type 5: The Crotchety Old Man Overly Concerned About His Yard

Just a quick nap before the 5 o'clock news.

Hmm… I think we might have a winner.

This year, I watched seven out of the ten nominees for the Academy Award for Best Picture and I remember thinking how good the vast majority were.  The King’s Speech was fantastic, The Social Network was masterfully done, and even Inception was a huge achievement.  (Don’t even get me started on True Grit.)  But, for this post, I’m going to focus on some less than stellar films.

Now, I’ve seen a lot of bad movies in my day.  Maybe not as many as Niki Lemley, but I still think I can conclusively say that “Mormon movies” and “queer cinema” are, by far, the movie genres with the lowest mean quality level in all of filmdom.  I’m even counting horror because, while there are plenty of awful horror movies out there, there are some that are so great that one day Brooke is going to show up at my door with a Blu-Ray of The Orphanage and watch it with me just so I will shut up about it already.  (You should totally watch it.  It’s on Netflix streaming and everything.)  The best gay and Mormon movies, however, are only tolerable enough for me to have on in the background while I’m ironing clothes.  The worst, I’ve lasted only a couple of minutes.  That’s right, not even past the titles.

But, while their content is vastly different, they are actually terrible for similar reasons.

(Disclaimer: I do not recommend that anyone, anyone, watch the movies that I’m going to discuss in this post.  For the love of everything good in this world, don’t watch these movies.)

(Oh and when I mean “gay movies”, I’m referring specifically to gay men.  ‘Cause I don’t know jack about lesbian cinema.)

They Pander To Their Audience
Both Mormon and gay films only have a couple of core values.  For gay movies, it’s sex and “being true to oneself”.  For Mormon movies, it’s black and white morality and family friendliness.  It is extremely rare for either genre to betray its core values, even if all other aspects of the movie suffers as a result.

Mormon movie offender: The Singles Ward (2002).
I used the DVD cover for two reasons: 1) There isn’t a decent screenshot on the Internet from this movie and 2) I wanted to have proof of that tag line.  You see it up there?  See what it says?  “The road to eternal marriage has never been longer.”

Sigh.

This film is probably one of the most well known of the Mormon movies.  In it, stand-up comedian (no, really) Johnathan Jordan returns to the singles congregation (the titular “singles ward”) after divorcing his ex-wife who left the Church.  (We know she’s no longer practicing Mormonism because she’s holding a beer in that one scene.  Because, you know, you leave the Church, you start drinking.  Or vice-versa.  Whatever.)  So, anyway, he returns to the single’s ward, immediately sees a woman he’s interested in.  She’s not interested in him.  Eighty-something minutes later, they’re together.  In that eighty minutes, Love Interest loses interest (for about five minutes) after she attends one of his bitter comedy routines where he disses the Church, in the most absolutely benign way possible.

Since the movie doesn’t allow anyone to do anything actually bad – the worst being Mr. Jordan’s offensively unoffensive rant, there characters don’t ever change or learn anything.  They do, of course, but it feels as though they only learned the lesson because the script told them to.

Gay media offender: “Queer as Folk” (US 2000-2005)
True, this was a TV show, not a movie, but the Showtime series (based off of a BBC show) is one of the better examples of pandering to the gay audience, simply because show is merely sex scenes surrounded by flimsy dialog in order to set up the situations for those sex scenes.  Hey, we don’t really even need that.  Maybe just the sex scenes.  We’ll work out the dialog later.  Oh yeah, and gay pride.

I recognize that premium cable apparently has a minimum number of sex scenes per season that they have to portray, but geez, it’s like the writers of “Queer as Folk” weren’t even trying.  The series really wants you to root for the main couple, the underage Justin and the well-overage Brian, because, you know, Justin is better off with the drug using, philandering Brian than with his parents, homophobic as they may be.  Because accepting oneself = promiscuous sex = the gay ideal.  Always.

They Exploit Their One Interesting Story
They know it, too. For Mormon movies, it’s the missionary experience.  True, it’s usually man vs. himself, but at least there’s conflict(ish) and somewhat of a struggle.  These movies say, “hey, remember when you went on a mission?  Remember all those crazy emotions?  Well, this movie is about missionaries.  Be prepared to feel those emotions again.  Not from the plot, of course, but simply the memories that they trigger.”

Offending Mormon movies: The Best Two Years (2003), God’s Army (2000), Money or Mission (2006)

Gay movies have a similar exploitable experience: the coming-out story.  “Hey, remember when it was really hard telling everyone you were gay and some people didn’t take it too well?  Remember how disappointing that was, but how it got better and in the end you felt much better for having come out?  Well, this movie has a kid coming out, so you’ll remember all that and it’ll trick you into thinking this was a good movie.”

Offending gay movies: Summer Storm (2004), Shelter (2007), Were the World Mine (2008) – To be fair, I only lasted 2 minutes in this last one; there was singing.

They Have an Unnatural Obsession With Vampires

(I’ll let you figure out which is Mormon and which is gay.)