Tag Archives: husband

Snakehead Terror, revisited

Saturday night we returned to a simpler time, the time of Snakehead Terror. We enjoyed this gem when it debuted on SyFy (nee SciFi) in 2004. Would we enjoy it the second time around, nearly 10 years later?

Yes.

This classic made-for-TV craptacular featured Bruce Boxleitner’s carefree feathered mane as the sheriff and supermodel-turned-actress Carol Alt as the wildlife biologist determined to save us all from the Terror Of Snakeheads.

Bonus: it was set in our neck of the woods.

Downside: we really have snakehead terror. That’s why it’s set in our neck of the woods.

Snakehead fish“Snakehead Fish” photo of SFU biology grad student Michael Beakesis copyright (c) 2012 by Simon Fraser University Public Affairs and made available under a Creative Commons license.

Simon Fraser University, being in Canada, isn’t in our neck of the woods, but that photo is both awesome and available on flickr. Since this movie was clearly shot in Canada and not the Mid-Atlantic, and both it and this blog are low-budget enterprises, that seems appropriate. (Unlike syfy, this blog is not a profit-seeking entity and use of that photo doesn’t mean SFU condones anything in this post).

Trivia: 12 of the 15 actors credited on the Snakehead Terror IMDB page have appeared in an episode of Supernatural (even William B. Davis, the cigarette smoking man from the X-Files).

An interesting thing about this movie (no, really, this is interesting) is how much more strictly the old Saturday Night Craptaculars adhered to a (slightly) more sophisticated B movie aesthetic. The filmmakers could display a small bit of flare that suggested they do in fact possess a basic level of competence even if the budget doesn’t allow them the time or financing to truly display it. Decent editing. No extended day-for-night scenes. A few extra minutes clearly used to set the key and fill lights properly (and/or to actually use a 3 point lighting set up). Actors mostly hitting their marks. A modicum of wardrobe continuity.

B-movies have never been slick or glitzy (if they were they wouldn’t be B-movies), but Bruce Boxleitner’s hair doesn’t style itself and someone had to teach Carol Alt how to convincingly pronounce all those biologist words.

No, really, she’s convincing. As a biologist, maybe not as an action-movie actress.

Trivia: I’m fairly certain there is a jar of pickled snakehead in our refrigerator. I’m quite certain Husband should think carefully before he considers feeding it to me.

We still haven’t visited the Calvert Marine Museum’s invasive species exhibit, Eco Invaders.

I was going to post more about the movie, but I’ve gotten distracted by the fact that Bad Company is back together and touring and they’re playing at the Calvert Marine Museum, which just seems weird on all kinds of levels. Maybe it’s a really nice venue. I understand the museum is nice, but it’s a small museum far outside any metropolitan area, so the announcement immediately brought this to mind:

But hey, since Bad Company has figured prominently on Supernatural a few times, it seems only appropriate to mention it here. I’m on my first cup of coffee so it makes perfect sense to me.

Hyperbole and a Half

Husband is sick, which means he’s been laying on the couch moaning a lot. Last night he had a fever and chills. This means he tried to kill me by piling more blankets on us than one would need to pack out for arctic exploration even though it was already 70 degrees in the house because he was fussing about being too cold. I was too warm to sleep last night.

Let’s pause for a moment to mull that over.

I was too warm. I could not sleep.

These are things that happen pretty much…never.

So today I’m crabby and he’s a ball of whinge.

He was a greasy ball of whinge but I just marched him to a shower, so now he’s a squeaky clean ball of whinge.

On the upside, he’s using his downtime productively. When he’s not moaning and whinging, he’s been searching the internet and sending me funny links. He just sent me Hyperbole and a Half’s post about her new dog.

A lingering fear of mine was confirmed last night: My dog might be slightly retarded.

I’ve wondered about her intelligence ever since I adopted her and subsequently discovered that she was unable to figure out how stairs worked.

It’s a hilarious post, made more hilarious by the illustrations.

I finished that post and immediately got distracted by another one that was labeled “a better pain scale.” Brilliant. You must go read it.

Happy Monday!

p.s. I still need to fix these margins. I’d give the task to Husband but he really is sick and not up to it, all mocking aside. This is a serious situation. Husband has thousands of hours of sick leave, he’s rarely sick. I’m concerned. What if he gets worse? What if he’s contagious? And most importantly, who is going to feed me, damnit?

That whole yin and yang thing

I’m ridiculously organized. Martha Stewart doesn’t scare me. Sometimes I fear this could lead me to do bad things – like crime or drugs or scrapbooking.

Husband, on the other hand, has never met a piece of paper he didn’t love. He’s by no means a horder, but let’s put it this way: Remember way back in high school when you took the SAT and the registration form had that section that you were supposed to keep? It said, “Retain this form for your records.” Guess who still has that form in his records?

Yeah.

Despite me extreme tidiness, we do somehow have pockets of clutter that accumulate and every once in a while I sort through them and file or shred or otherwise dispose of things we no longer need. I was on hold today for an interminable amount of time, which did have the minor benefit of giving me time to sort through one of these clutter-pockets. It’s at these times that I discover things like commendation letters that my extremely modest Husband forgets to tell me about. My current favorite is one I just found from then-Vice President Al Gore that basically says, “Hey Eric – thanks for being you.”

If I had more than 30 free seconds today I’d tell you about the “Darth Vader baby pictures” incident.