Adventures in freakdom.
January 24, 2005
Friday afternoon I called the spud into the computer room to show her the trailer for the new Fantastic Four movie. Go watch it, it’s germane to this section.
In the trailer, the following text shows:
“On July 4th, five people will be changed forever.”
(action)
“1 will be bad”
(action with that fine-lookin’ Christian Troy electrocuting someone with the static bizzap ‘o doom)
“4 will be…fantastic”
(more action, showing the flame guy, the stretch guy, the Thing, and the invisible chick. See? I know so little about them I can’t even name them.)
After the trailer ended with the name of the movie, the spud sat for a moment, staring blankly at the monitor while she processed what she’d just seen. Finally she spoke.
“I understand that one is ‘Bad’ and one is ‘Fantastic’,” she said. “But who are the other two?”
Not my genes, folks. Not my genes.
Speaking of movies, Cellular kicked some total ass. And speaking of books, which I wasn’t, Hostage is easily one of the best books I’ve read in a LONG time.
Warning: if you’re the type who feels the need to pass judgement and lecture people you don’t know on their child-rearing decisions, please close your browser now. Oh, and links in this section are generally not safe for work.
Have you ever had a memory of something that’s vastly different from the actuality of it?
Yesterday afternoon I sat down with the spud to watch Anchorman.
We made it about seven minutes.
I love me some Will Ferrell, but this movie was horrific. Even the spud agreed and asked me to stop it. To give you the gravity of just how bad a movie has to be for her to make such a request, consider this: the only other time she’s asked me to stop a movie was when we watched Battlefield Earth, widely considered by many to be the worst film ever made.
I stopped the movie and took the DVD out of the player. Looking through my personal DVD collection for something we hadn’t watched, I had a flash of inspiration. In my defense, this inspiration was based on a 5-year-old memory. I went into the computer room to confer with my wife.
“Bessie?”
She looked up from Hostage.
“The spud is practically seventeen now, and has seen plenty of R-rated movies. Don’t you think she could handle South Park?”
Robyn considered this.
“I mean,” I continued, speaking based on that memory. “It’s just got bad language, right? She’s heard us say plenty of bad words. I don’t remember there being any big sex scenes or anything.”
Begrudgingly, Robyn agreed that the spud could handle all the “fucks” and whatnot in South Park.
“Besides,” she said. “They’re just cartoons, right?”
I almost ran back into the den to put the DVD into the player.
“You’re in for a real treat,” I told the spud.
The movie started. We giggled, we laughed. We cackled at Terrance and Phillip and the song “Uncle Fucker”, one of the truly great moments in cinema history. Especially the fart solos. The tears, they were rolling.
The movie continued. I had a scary moment when Cartman’s mom explained what a rim job is, but the spud paid it no mind.
Then Stan asked the chef for advice on getting Wendy to like him.
“That’s easy,” said the Chef. “You just have to find the clitoris.”
The spud looked over at me. I pretended to study my fingernails.
“Fred? What’s the clitoris?”
Time ground to a halt. The ambient temperature in the room zoomed up fifty degrees in an instant. A bead of sweat rolled down my forehead. My mind raced. On the TV the movie continued, but I heard nothing except for the blood pounding in my ears. I felt like I was under an intensely bright light.
“Ah…” I said, ever the quick responder. “I. Well…”
The TV droned on. The voices reminded me of the wah-wah-wah techer voices in the old Charlie Brown cartoons. I tried to take a deep breath, wondering how the hell I’d gotten myself into this situation.
“It’s, well, you see…”
Suddenly her forehead smoothed. “OH!” she said. “THE CLITORIS!”
Safe.
Sadly, I’m not sure if she actually knows what it is, or if she just recognized that I was exceedingly uncomfortable.
Later in the movie, when Stan actually found the clitoris, the spud remarked that it looked like a big wad of chewed bubble gum.
Heh.
So, boys and girls, remember this: things aren’t always the way you remember them.
Late yesterday afternoon I stood in the kitchen, stirring a large pot of spaghetti sauce. The TV was on, and my new favorite video (which, combined with my recent Green Day purchase, I might point out, reaffirms my thought that the Toby Keith CD was just an anomaly) played softly in the background. Footsteps sounded on the stairs, and the spud walked into the room carrying a large softcover held open.
She gestured with the book. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Yes,” I said, then grinned. “And that was it.”
I never made it past fourth grade, can you tell?
She held out the book, which I saw was her Bible. It lay open to Matthew. Pointing at the Lord’s Prayer, she said, “I thought there was more to this. That it was longer.”
I looked at the book. Being one of the more modern translations, translated from the most reliable original texts, it lacked the whole “for thine is the kingdom, and the power, etc.” at the end. I explained this to her, and showed her the footnote that mentioned some texts contained those words. She thanked me and left.
Afterwards, it dawned on me that that was the first time I’d ever seen her reading the Bible since she found Jesus (he was behind the couch all along) and started going to church sporadically a couple of years ago.
I can’t help but wonder if it was watching South Park that did it.
If you want to get notified whenever Fred writes a journal entry, this link will do the trick.
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So will you be jumping in like to go see Fantastic Four?
Wow… the FIRST comment. Never been a first before. ::sigh::
Good grief, I sound like a teenage up there… “like” is supposed to be “line”, as in movie line. Oops.
Fred,
I thought “Anchorman” sucked too. And poor me. I paid admission to see it in the theater!
Haven’t decided about “Fantastic Four” yet.
“South Park” rocks
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA*SNORT*COUGH*COUGH*GUFFAW*!!!! That’ll teach you!
So, WHAT is THE CLITORIS? and does it really look like a wad of chewed gum? I wanna know
Always watch a movie before showing it to the youngin’s, embarrassing moments not likely to happen.
I had a movie day yesterday with some friends and we lasted about that long with ANCHORMAN, too. I, too, dig The Farrell, but geez, gah! In the interest of full disclosure, we also lasted through about 15 minutes of THE TERMINAL (I don’t care what anyone says, that movie sucked the life out of the universe). THE DOOR IN THE FLOOR and THE VILLAGE were good though.
Lori,
You can bet I’ll be in the line at the video store when FanFour comes out there, but not at the theater. Very few movies appeal enough to me to go through the hell of seeing them with other people around.
Fred
No criticism for the parenting skills; you seem to be getting along just fine.
Incidentally, I can’t believe she’s seventeen already. SEVENTEEN.
For the Spud: If you check the King James Bible you will see the full text of the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew. The abbreviated form is found in Luke 11. It’s interesting to study bible history about this subject. Apparently the Luke version is Roman Catholic. The additional lines in Matthew were added by a scribe at a later date (perhaps after Martin Luther’s Protestant Revolution)in order to jazz it up a bit. Just to confuse everything there are about a zillion different translations. Hope this helps.
Fred, you ain’t got no parenting problems. Y’all are great parents.
Faye, Thanks for clearing that up for me! I learned the Catholic version and am constantly confused by that extra bit at the end.
Okies.. I feel better now.
I have been long feeling like the horrid parent on the block for not covering my children’s eyes and ears the second that someone spits out a horrid word, censoring TV shows and anything they read. I have been of the mind that as long as the content is not deemed too sexfilled, horrifically language oriented or too graphic in nature that they wont keel over and die from watching it. Now.. I have had my own embarassing moments.. the “Mommy, where do babies come from” comment had me acting much like poor Fred.. However, Granny’s number on speed dial works wonders for those questions 
LOL I think we should censor to a degree what they watch, however if we do to all the unseen, then what happens when they walk out the door and over to a friends house??
BTW.. Anchorman sucked biiig time,even the hubby thought so, which is bad. And the Village, although really good.. wasn’t what I thought it was going to be. Now, Troy, although the critics had a field day.. I LOVED it.
My two cents.. going back to my corner of the net now.
“The Killers: Hot Fuss” = Kick Ass
(as in Fred’s Fave Video)
I have 3 sons and when they asked “where do babies come from?” My favorite questions responses from them (at about age 9) were: “Eeeewwww, is there any other way?” and “Where were you and Dad when you made me?” Gotta love kids…they keep life interesting.
My dad took me to the theater to see South Park when it first came out and I was 17. I liked the movie but it was a tad akward seeing it with my dad sitting next to me. Just a tad akward.
It tickles me to death that you guys found Green Day
My love for them started around 1995 (When I Come Around) and lasted longer than my marriage. Billy Joe got married and had kids and is doin’ the suburbia thing now - that just blows me away. I have each and every thing they ever made - including their newest single. Do I sound like a teen groupie now 
Love, love, love them - Jesus of Suburbia and Boulevard of Broken Dreams - mmm, mmm.
Now, go try ya some Godsmack! Get that country pop-crap taste out of your mouth (ducking and runnnnning)…
I’m really surprised that a 17 year old girl does not know what a clitoris is. Maybe your teen magazines are less explicit than the Swedish ones…
Mary –
We’ve been Green Day fans from way back in the Dookie days. Heck, my cell phone plays ‘Basket Case’ when it rings.
The big thing about American Idiot is that it was love at first sound for me, which hasn’t happened for a while with music of that genre. I thought I was turning into my dad there for a while.
Fred, if you don’t want your Toby Keith CD anymore, I’ll be glad to take it off your hands.
Q: What’s the difference between a golf ball and a clitoris?
A: A man will spend half an hour trying to find a golfball.
:)
Fred & Robyn,
I LOVE your book.
Thank you,
AnnaMarie
I’m 32 and despite my husband’s trepidation I thought that we could handle watching Sex and the City with my mother. Believe me, there were more than a few awkward moments. And although my mother is not a prude, she did manage to say, I don’t know what you think is so funny a couple of times. I was probably laughing out of embarrassment! Regardless of age, some things will always be weird watching with your parents. South Park rocks. As a Cdn, I esp. love the part in the film where they ask for $10 to go see a foreign film, from Canada. I can’t believe at almost 17, the spud has not watched south park! How did you manage that?