I watched The Fifth Element with Mike Nelson's RiffTrax commentary over the weekend, and it's really the only thing to make it bearable. I know I saw this movie once in its original form, possibly under boyfriend duress, but because of the post-traumatic stress syndrome I'd blocked out all of it except for some chick with orange hair who was supposed to be a perfect being who could save the world, which pretty much destroyed the premise immediately, because... orange hair.
The main bad guy in the movie is an enormous ball of evil headed towards Earth, and as it hurtles closer, Mike narrates, "Ball of evil, comin' through!" Mike is sad when the ball of evil is destroyed (plot spoiler at the beginning of the sentence, by the way). "The ball of evil was my favorite character!" he says. Mine too, for had it succeeded, the ball of evil would have wiped out Bruce Willis and Chris Tucker.
Therefore, in memoriam, I would like to recognize those little Balls of Evil that remain in our hearts, the people, places, groups, and intimate objects which, left unattended, could indeed destroy us all.
Today's Ball of Evil is artificial waterfalls.
I was in Cocoa Beach on Sunday and stood on the top floor of a hotel for a view of the Cape and some pre-school year moments of oceanness. I dropped my purse, faced the water, inhaled, and heard:
SPLAAAAAAAAAAAAASH SPLAAAAAAAAAAAAASH trickletrickletrickletrickleSPLAAAAAAAAAAAAAASH SPLAAAAAAAAAAASH
It was every bit as relaxing as it sounded. It drowned out the ocean. It drowned out the traffic on A1A. It drowned out the air conditioners in the hotel and it drowned out life as we know it.
Ironic, given I'd come here to listen to water as a means of decompression, but this was not nature-produced. I could have rented a room and started the shower and unclenched more. It did not relax me; it made me want to pee. It was worse than the Hot Springs Portable Spa baptismal fonts currently crapping up the vetibules of most American Catholic churches. I haven't been around many tropical waterfalls in my days, but I'm pretty sure that they aren't supposed to sound like a fire hydrant praying for death.
Good on ya, Artificial Waterfall! You're the little Ball of Evil in my otherwise peaceful galaxy.
don't even get me started on hold music at: mb@blondechampagne.com
Monday, August 07, 2006
Ball of Evil, Comin' Through
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6 comments:
Yeah, I have never found artificial waterfalls (or any kind of continuously running fountains in general) to be relaxing. They always make me nervous for some reason, because they seem to be...working so hard. Incidentally, for a treat that combines the twin balls of evil of artificial waterfalls AND hold music, check out the famous "dancing fountains" at the Bellagio hotel in Las Vegas -- go to this site: www.bellagio.com and look under "Attractions." You can't imagine how spectacularly, thrillingly tacky this ball of evil is unless you see it in person.
You did better than I did after my first viewing of The Fifth Element. All I could remember abou the entire movie was that Luke Perry had really good hair. Luke Perry. Who is in approximately the first 10 minutes. Yup, great flick.
I have tried for 2 years to get them to change the hold music we have at work. It is early 80's synth classical music. Yes, I said 80's, it's that bad. If I like someone, I'll just lay the phone down on my desk. If not...well...Once or twice I have cackled evily with joy at putting a-holes on hold.
Finally asked our phone repair tech (spotted him one day out of 730 days of my employment) and he said that our building is so old, it would require a $500 'brick'. Do you know how tempted I am to take a real brick and thrash our current system???
(P.S. whenever our other location puts us on hold, we don't hear their cool music, we hear:
de de de de de deetle de, de de de deetle de, de dum bum bum. AARRGHH!!!)
I've heard that, Tamar! It sounds like a two-year-old playing one of those five-cent finger pianos.
GoDaddy.com has the best. hold music. ever. Vintage swing!
MB forgot to mention I watched the RiffTrax with her. It was great! I enjoyed it so much more than MST3K, probably because the movie was more current and Mike's jokes were more easy to understand this time around. Maybe it was simply because there weren't any robot shadows to distract me...
Excellent, love it! » »
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