Warwick Davis, actor extraordinaire

I think it's long overdue for we mere mortals to give the proverbial shoutout to Warwick Davis, the most versatile thing to hit the acting world since Judi Dench.

We were first introduced to Davis as the lovable Ewok "Wicket" in "Return of the Jedi". He parlayed the success of this role into two follow-up Ewok-centered films, "The Ewok Adventure" and "The Battle for Endor" which, as any child from the age of 12 down will tell you, were awesome. Then opportunity came a-knocking, and Davis answered with gusto (using his own finger, mind you), landing the title role in "Willow". From there on, it's a wild ride into history. You may remember him in such roles as Reepicheep and Glimfeather in the made-for-TV "Chronicles of Narnia", the Leprechaun in "Leprechaun", and, most recently, Professor Flitwick in the "Harry Potter" movies, not to mention a wide variety of other small-person roles along the way. He was in a movie called "The Princess and the Dwarf". Guess which one he was.

To summarize: Wicket the Ewok = Willow = Reepicheep = Leprechaun = Prof. Flitwick.

Warwick Davis. Small in stature, big in talent.

Just in case you thought those skits on Saturday Night Live were exaggerated...

I was watching a bit of C-SPAN 2 today (ok, apparently I amthe type of guy who sits around and watches C-SPAN in his spare time). By the way, C-SPAN 2 is a pretty great channel if for no other reason than it allows you to watch the British Government in action. After watching a couple of sessions, I have come to the conclusion that Parliament fucking rocks.

Here's why: there's a bit where they have "Prime Minister's Question Time". This is when Members of Parliament (or MPs, for those in the know) get to stand up and ask the Prime Minister questions. Think about it. The leader of the country is forced to answer any and all questions the MPs can throw at him. Plus, in case they get bored, they are allowed to hiss, boo, heckle, applaud, yell, and otherwise express their approval/pissiness. It's like the Detroit Pistons meets Congress. And it's not a short period of time, either -- the questioning goes on for quite a while. Now, you may not agree with Blair, but that man sure knows how to defend himself ... rhetorically speaking.

Another reason why Parliament rocks: Today, as you may know, the Queen addressed Parliament. She does that, so I'm told, to mark the State Opening of Parliament. She gives a little speech -- kind of like a State of the Union, but it's actually written for her by the majority party in the House of Commons. As you might expect, there's a lot of pageantry surrounding the whole deal: House of Lords gets tarted up, fanfare, crown-wearing, bowing, etc. etc.

Anyway, here's the awesome part. At one point, this dude called the Black Rod, so named because he carries a (you guessed it) black rod, goes from the House of Lords to the House of Commons to let the MPs know that the Queen's about to speak. Part of the ritual is that, as he approaches the door to the House of Commons, it is slammed in his face. I'm not kidding. He then has to knock three times on the door. Then he is asked, "Who's there?" He responds, of course, "Black Rod". Then they let him in, and make fun of him as he walks to the center of the room. Again, not making this up. Then he tells the friendly MPs that it's time to hear the Queen speak. After the ceremonial keg stand, they head on over to the House of Lords and proceed to vomit in the Duke of Worcester's lap one by one.

Ok, that last part I made up. But the rest is totally true. Check out wikipedia (or C-SPAN 2) for verification. To summarize: Parliament fucking rocks. We should totally import that shit.

Why I'm not teaching now

I've thought a lot about the answer to that question. My standard answer is because there's too much bullshit to put up with to be effective. The reason I originally wanted to teach was to change the world, to help people. Turns out the traditional system behind teaching isn't really structured to let you do that kind of stuff.

But the real reason is this: I like big ideas. I loved the discussions I used to have with my professors and fellow student teachers about the nature of teaching, the nature of curriculum, the nature of discipline. I could write for hours about those things. But the little things eluded me. For example, how do I get this asshole to stop throwing paper across the room and listen to me? How do I get these two kids to stop yelling stuff at each other? Why is this little shit jumping on his desk? But also other things like how to build rapport. But mostly the discipline things.

That is all.

One last thing

Ok, I promise this is my last politically-themed post. Unless something else both political and nonsensical happens again.

As you may have heard, news of John "The Pride of Missouri" Ashcroft's resignation broke today. I was walking into work when I found out. Coincidentally, all the TVs in my office used to be tuned to Fox News. Around election time, they all changed to CNN and have stayed that way. Hmm...

Anyway, the crawler got my attention. It said something like, "Ashcroft resigns: states 'goal of securing Americans from terror has been achieved.'" "Really?" I thought to myself. That sounds odd. So I looked up the whole story. Sure enough, the following can be found in his resignation letter:

"The demands of justice are both rewarding and depleting. I take great personal satisfaction in the record which has been developed. The objective of securing the safety of Americans from crime and terror has been achieved."

Huh. I guess we won that pesky war on terror thing. And the war on crime as well! Remember the days when there was crime? Man, that sucked, huh? Thank goodness we can all finally turn in our firearms and leave our doors unlocked all day.

Kerry vs. Reagan

Recently, my brother despaired at the fact that he'll have lived 20 of his years during the reign of either a Reagan or a Bush. Well, Al Franken said something during his appearance on the Late Show with Dave Letterman just now that might cheer him up.

Dave was asking Al for his reaction to the election. Al kind of groaned playfully. Dave said, "They're saying Bush received the most popular votes in history."

Al responded, "That's true. But you know who received the second most popular votes in history? John Kerry."

A dgcopter independent investigation verified this claim. Prior to this election, the record holder for most popular votes was Ronald Reagan in 1984, with 54,455,000 (Link to Federal register's historical data -- scroll down to 1984). Bush received 59,459,765 votes. Kerry received 55,949,407. (Link to CNN's election results). Now, admittedly, coming in second place in an election doesn't mean much, but this much is true:

Kerry got more votes than Reagan.

No sleep 'til Brooklyn

There's only so many times a man can hear "too close to call" before he finally gives up and goes to sleep. I haven't reached that point yet, but I suspect in an hour or two, the urge to embrace oblivion will overwhelm me. Tomorrow I'll wake up, and it'll all ... still be going on, probably. Fuck.

I did my part for Rhode Island, though. No problems to report. I was met at the door by a vanguard of very friendly people who were hoping to persuade me to vote one or the other of 'em for councilman. Made me feel important. In the end, I ended up voting party lines anyway, but they were awfully nice folks. God bless you, Mr. Delgiudice. Or should I say, Councilman Delgiudice? You had a firm handshake and a sincere smile. And I think I voted for you.