Terror-In-A-Can Part I

I'm not a fan of the modern horror movie genre. I've seen my fair share. Don't care for them much. They are an entirely different breed from the old school monster movies from back in the day (did you like how I juxtaposed the mentioning of classical movies with modern day slang? Cool, huh?)

I've decided that it's not the blood-and-guts (even though that's not good). It's not the bad acting. It's not even the fact that their entire purpose is to put fear into the viewer (which, spiritually speaking, is generally considered a bad thing).

(Did I mention I like Facebook better than MySpace?)

No, the problem is their predictability. Here is my hypothesis:

98.6% of modern horror movies are a loose plot with stale characters, on which a series of "stock scenes" are hung.

To prove my point. Here's how to make your own horror movie (if you are interested).

1. Pick your setting. I recommend doing this first because it makes steps #2 and #4 easier. A spooky and/or creepy location is preferred. Or, at times, an everyday location can be effective because of the juxtaposition of horror with everyday life. Your choice.
2. Pick a villain. The villain should somehow relate to #1, the location. It would be somewhat silly to have a killer scarecrow haunting a space station. No wait...I think I've seen that one.
3. Determine why/how your villain exists. Was he created by an experiment gone wrong? Maybe he was unjustly murdered. Was he (or she) the victim of a bizarre electrolysis accident? Did someone build something on top of his/her graveyard/burialground/tomb? You get the idea.
4. Pick your victim group. Group of teenagers? Average family (with at least one cute kid)? Stranded travelers or vacationers? Just moved into town? Again, this should probably relate to #1.
5. Select several scenes from the stock set of horror movie scenes (to be detailed in upcoming blogs). This step is totally independent of steps #1 - #4. It doesn't matter if the setting is a farm town or an urban mall. The scenes are all the same.
   
6. Type a rough outline of points #1 - #5.
7. Film the movie.

I believe it's that simple. Tune in next time, where we will discuss the first of the "stock scenes".

Bonus thought:
I used the phrase "tune in next time" in the previous sentence. I wonder if in ten years teenagers will even understand where that phrase came from, or even what it means? There will be no analog television. Most will listen to music on iPods, the internet, or satellite radio, so there will be no radios to tune. In their day-to-day lives, there will be no "tuning" involved (unless they play the clarinet). I'm old enough to remember really tuning our TV. For the UHF channels (that's the higher numbers, for you young'uns out there), you actually turned a dial on the TV to hone in on a particular channel.

Just thinking.

MySpace Is Out - Facebook Is In

Okay, okay. I know that MySpace and Facebook are old news, but I just created a Facebook page, and it's cool. Not my page specifically, but Facebook itself.

Did you know that you can link to your blog from Facebook. It will automatically pull your blog into your Facebook page. Myspace won't do that (not that I can figure out). It has a wonderful photo uploading tool, and just works well in general.

Check out what RhettandLink think about it:



So, for those of you who have been catching up with me on MySpace...

Sorry! I'm phasing it out. It's dead to me.

Helen, GA - Mark II

My last post was a small little thing...but it yielded what I think is the funniest comment on my blog to date. Please enjoy:

You know...the pictures of your vacation looked so nice, I really thought I should visit there.
But unfortunately Tonya is working and wouldn't be able to go.
So I said "Tonya, I'm thinking about visiting Helen."
"What?" she said. "Who's Helen?"
"Helen's in Georgia," I said. "Would you be willing to run the store for a few days while I go there?"
"To Georgia?" she said.
"Yeah," I said.
"To visit Helen?" she said.
"Exactly!" I said, happy that she finally understood.

I need a place to stay. For some strange reason she's upset with me.

I have a comment on my blog from an internationally published author!

Helen, GA

So the family and I went to Helen on Monday. (Jeff - did you catch that? I started with "so". And I hyperlinked to your post...)

It was very, very nice. The town is beautiful, the food is great (at least what we had was), and the countryside is amazing. You can float down the river in an innertube (which we didn't do), hike up to see beautiful Ruby Falls (which we did), or take a carriage ride around town (which we did).






Here is a beautiful tree growing on a boulder (Ruby Falls).











Here is one half of the beautiful twin waterfalls of Ruby Falls.












Here is my beautiful wife and son.




It's late. I'm. going. to. bed.

O Power, Where Are Thou?

You know, I find that I love life's little conveniences. You know what I'm talking about, right? Like turning on the light, and the light turning on. Or another example would be your computer monitor having colors and such on it, instead of it just being black.

We had a nice little thunderstorm come through Atlanta today. West of my house, their power stayed on. Just north of us...everything okay! How's the east doing? Still cookin' with power. Southside? Aw, yeah! We're lit up!

My house?

Pitch black.

Apparently a power line went down about 300 yards from my house, only effecting my neighborhood.

"So, Aaron, how are you blogging?" you might ask. "On your trusty laptop at a cool Starbuck's Coffee Shoppe?" (I spelled shoppe like that so I would feel like I was in England) No, I'm blogging from my friend Joshua's laptop sitting in his spare room. My fam is bunking at the Perkin's abode tonight.

In Atlanta, in the summer, no electricity+ thunderstorm = incredible heat and humidity.

For all of you that thought this blog was going to be my much awaited (haha) blog about our vacation...sorry! That's have to wait until tomorrow...when I have POWER!!!