The Smarmy Carny

Since there are so many pet lovers who participate in the Blogathon, I figured I would pass on this link . . .

My Pet DMV allows you to buy a driver's license for your pet:

I don't own a pet, but I think it'd be fun to get a Toonces the Driving Cat license.

Here is the last batch of movies that are the third of three in its series:

• Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles: D Didn't we already see this movie? In the original, he goes to NYC and says the "That's not a knife" line. This time he goes to the west coast, where the jokes are exactly the same.
• Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: A+ This was a great sequel with stellar perfoemances from Harrison Ford and Sean Connery.
• Ocean's Thirteen B- This is a sequel of a sequel of a remake. It's more or less the same plot as before. But as long as it makes money, we'll keep seeing it.
• Star Wars—Episode III: Revenge of the Sith: B I enjoyed watching this dark chapter to the Star Wars saga, despite Hayden Christensen who seemed to be fresh out of the Keanu Reeves acting school when he showed up for Episode II.
• Star Wars—Episode VI: Return of the Jedi: B+ This movie tied up the entire plot, and Vader was taken care of in a semi-respectable manner. On the other hand, Ewoks abound in this movie. There was a huge uproar over Jar Jar with Episode I, but he paled in comparison to the annoying Ewoks.

Please feel free to leave a comment. What do you agree or disagree with, and why? Which third in a trilogy movies do you wish were included that I didn't cover in these four posts?

Over on the official Blogathon site, the current game goes like this: "This game was inspired by the current run of terrible songs on BERadio, played intentionally to make tired bloggers flag with horror. Tell me about your LEAST favorite song. The one that makes you dive for the off switch."

Here's the song I can't stand:

This is the song that never ends.
It will go on and on my friend.

. . . and so on. But this is my version, so it stopped early.

Due to a server outage for almost an hour, I was a bit late posting this and the previous post. But you'd never know unless you read this, because you couldn't get to my site to see that I hadn't posted But in all fairness to the spirit of Blogathon, I had the posts set and on-time in my HTML editor, Notepad.

Here are some movies that are the third of three in its series:

• Austin Powers in Goldmember: B+ Again, there was a drop in quality by the time they reached the third episode of Austin Powers. The movie kept trying to play on the jokes that caught on in the first two movies, and it came across as desperate instead of funny. This was a funny movie, though, but if it had come first, there wouldn't have been any sequels.
• Friday After Next: C+ They lost Chris Tucker and Tony Cox after the original but picked up Mike Epps and Terry Crews. The writing was still as solid as the original, but the constant change in cast threw each sequel off pace a bit.
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King: A This movie kept the great pacing of the first two movies, with the exception that it had to tie up all the plots by the credits. For once, I can say that it was a good thing that a movie was not true to the book. Despite the 12 conclusions at the end of the movie, we didn't have to sit through the ridiculous ending the book offered us.
• Spider-Man 3: B+ This probably won't be a trilogy for long. Spider-Man 3 was at least better than Spider-Man 2, the movie I like to call "Tell Everyone I'm Peter Parker".
• Red: A Krzysztof Kieslowski is my favorite director, so the final installment of the Three Colors trilogy is a shoe-in! A beautiful story and a wonderful plot. So long as you don't mind subtitled, check it out.

Please feel free to leave a comment. What do you agree or disagree with, and why? Which items do you wish were included that I didn't cover here?

One Economy Corporation's Digital Connectors program has young people helping their community through technology. Here are two brothers who worked in the program:

Jeremy and Justin Smith have enjoyed working with computers for years. Now the 16-year-old twins from south Chicago are learning enough to teach others – thanks to One Economy’s Digital Connectors program. In the fall of 2005, the engaging teenagers enrolled in the One Economy Digital Connectors course to prepare them for A+ certification in computer set-up and troubleshooting. Participants in the program received a small stipend and One Economy paid the fee for taking the A+ certification test.
Jeremy and Justin are already using their skills to help others – friends in the neighborhood, teachers at their school and even an occasional paying client who needs assistance with a computer problem.
“The Digital Connectors program is really great,” says Jeremy. “It gets kids involved with the community. I like giving back and this program gives me an opportunity to do that.”
Adds Justin: “It gives kids alternatives to just standing around on the street. It teaches them something that will be useful to their futures.” Despite a busy schedule that includes the computer training, coaching a little league team and participating in a robotics competition, the twins are already thinking about their future. Both are taking a course at a nearby college and they’re making plans for the computer business they hope to open someday. Also in the boys’ plans: a community center in Chicago to offer technology training to people in the area. “It’s something we really want to make happen,” says Jeremy.
One Economy’s work in Chicago has been generously supported by the Chicago-based John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

There are dozens of stories like this that come out of the Digital Connectors program. When you help kids to learn to help others, it's always a win-win situation.

Here are some movies that are the third of three in its series:

• Back to the Future Part III: C+ A decent film, but not nearly as good as the first two. Though the plot picks up right from the end of BTTF2, it seems like a completely disconnected storyline.
• Naked Gun 33⅓: The Final Insult: A- Leslie Neilsen could keep pumping this stuff out until he is 110 at the same quality.
• Look Who's Talking Now: D The two original movies were different from all those stupid talking animal movies because it featured talking babies After running out of material for that gag through two movies, they apparently decided to fall back on the standard talking animals.
• The Matrix Revolutions: B- The original Matrix was a truly great movie and left us wanting more. Sometimes it's best if that's the end of the story. The plot did get to play its One/Jesus analogy out in this final film, but after this one, we weren't wanting more.
• The NeverEnding Story III: B- There's a little more leniency with children's movies. (After all, they've made twelve The Land Before Time videos!) You could probably keep telling stories from this fantasy universe for decades to come . . . but just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

Please feel free to leave a comment. What do you agree or disagree with, and why?

The current game on the official Blogathon page asks us to draw or otherwise produce a picture of your favorite wild animal.

My favorite wild animal is Domo-Kun:

Come on, Domo-Kun, run faster! You need your sustenance!

. . . I'm now wondering if this might hurt my status with frykitty, the pro-LOLCATS Blogathon queen.