南亀

Whatever happened to quicksand in movies?

My childhood feels like one long montage of people trying in vain to suppress the urge to flail while sinking slowly. Quicksand has never been an action packed way to go, but it has delivered amazing dramatic moments. Any person who remembers Thundercats, Jem, G.I. Joe, and My Little Pony definitely remember the classic (and so much better as a memory) 80’s movie Neverending Story. The scene where Atreyu wept deeply after watching his best friend and horse, Artax, die slowly if it were not for the assistance of quicksand.

Don’t believe me? Then consider The Princess Bride. I don’t particularly care for the movie, but I clearly remember the scene where that guy jumped in the quicksand after the sinking woman. Instant drama.

Actually forget Princess Bride. That movie falls square in that patch of movies that you enjoy only after being forced to watch them i.e. Willow, Krull, that creepy movie where Tom Cruise was a glitter crusted elf twink.

Not a good place to be.

My point in all this isn’t to advocate for the return of quicksand. Lord knows we don’t want a patch of CG quicksand. I just want to know what our generations’ quicksand is.

One of my coworkers believes that terrorist are the new quicksand. That makes sense. Especially when you consider that the quicksand of the 70s and early 80s was Russia. Another of my coworkers thinks that sand was so heavily used in the late 8os because a lot of the fantasy and adventure movies at the time had very small budgets. Apparently its cheaper to shoot strange angles in the national forest than it is to organize a bitch jumping off of a building. 

At any rate, I sometimes miss the simple days of quicksand. The threat could be in your own backyard and you would never know it until your wife turned up missing. 

You know what’s really funny. The only time that I have actually heard about someone being killed by quicksand was when my father repeated to me the tale of a boy who his mother saw die in a patch of quicksand while swimming in a shallow creek. Sounded like bullshit to me then and still sounds like it now. 

Who dies from quicksand? 

No one that you will ever meet.

Who has actually seen quicksand?

NO ONE!

I still  love it though.

I, based on the information a karaoke machine was able to extract from my song selections, am 30.

Is there no justice.

Words that no one ever wants to hear at a job interview:

There will be others….

Doesn’t matter what comes after that. All you can hear is, “Your interview sucked! You poorly represented yourself and we will be looking elsewhere, like in the room behind you, for actual talented people who deserve to breath the same air and eventually receive similar pay as us! Be gone you foul, overly scented, fat bastard! Back into the night with you.

Oh, and please send in the next applicant.”

sob

I just had an interview for a new job and I don’t know if I did well or not. I’m so worried. I want this job. The pay is great. I want the pay, but I don’t think I was smart enough, eloquent enough, stylish enough, or just good enough.

WHY DON’T I SPEAK JAPANESE!?!???

I need to blow off some steam, but now I have to teach children. sigh

When did I become such an asshole?

One of my co-workers, a Japanese woman, told me that she was quitting her job soon. I was a bit surprised but assumed she was pregnant, stressed out, longing to travel, or getting married soon. Those are all conditions that women in Japan are obliged to consider just cause to quit working. Turns out she is getting married… in June and wants to work a part time job near her home.

My opinion of soon to be married women in Japan is low. My opinion of soon to be married women in Japan who view their impending marriage as an opportunity to walk away from the career that they probably worked several years to establish so that they can be good, devoted wives and mothers (should be read as lazy bitches) is downright aggressively toxic.

So when she told me her news with clapped hands and feigned teary eyes I didn’t buy it. Before I could begin to congratulate her I heard myself say, “Why?!”
Now I know myself. That “why” was probably dipped in all kinds of attitude, but luckily I heard it and was able to follow up with a half hearted request to be invited to the wedding.

I honestly don’t want to go and knowing me I will find a lame reason to not go. I have no desire to watch this woman throw her life away just to get married.

I always feel like women here are just wasting there time with school and what not. If your loftiest goal in life is to pump out children, cook meals, and clean house why go to school or get a job in the first damn place. There are tons of people who would kill for the spot you just wasted.