Quiddity

Movies I watched last week

Return to Oz (1985):  The movie starts out with Dorothy about to get electric shock treatment because Auntie Em can't get her to shut up about her friends from Oz.  Luckily, she escapes and somehow manages to find her way back to Oz.  Then things start to get weird.  Really weird.  This movie freaked me out as a child.  Mombi and her collection of 31 heads still haunts me to this day.  And the image of the Gnome King lounging around in the ruby slippers is still a little disturbing.  3 Stars!

Marked Woman (1937): Bette Davis plays a young girl working in a clip joint that has just been taken over by one of the city's most powerful gangsters.  She thinks she can handle it until her younger sister shows up from college and finds out the truth behind what she does for a living.  A very young Humphrey Bogart is great as the prosecutor who is out to get the gangster.  However, the best part of the movie is the gorgeous clothes that the girls wear.   4 Stars!

The Letter (1940): Here's another over-the-top melodrama starring Bette Davis as a femme fatale who is in trouble with the law.   The opening scene with her shooting that man 6 times is classic.  Why doesn't Hollywood make movies like this anymore?  5 Stars!    

Monsters (2010):  Oh, how I had high hopes for this movie.  Oh, how it let me down.  If you see this movie thinking you're going to be in for a kick-ass alien film, you're going to be sorely disappointed.  There ain't a whole lotta action going on in this film.  It's basically about a photographer who is stuck escorting the daughter of his boss back to the United States safely during an alien attack or something.  To be honest, this is a chick flick with octopus aliens thrown in the mix to add some drama.  Sadly, the sexual chemistry between the two main characters is lacking.  I kept hoping that once the couple entered the "infected zone" that things would get a little more interesting, but the infected zone turned out to be just as boring as the non-infected zone.  2 Stars! 

 

Not your grandma's porcelain figurines

Check out Jessica Harrison's morbid makeovers of Victorian porcelain figurines.  

Link via rue the day.

Cuckoo's Nest Hospital being reopened

The psychiatric hospital that was featured in the film One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest has been reopened for patients.

The hospital has long has been the subject of controversy due to the history of abuses occuring at the hospital during its long tenure, the warehousing of the cremated remains of over 3600 psychiatric patients, and substandard care.  After separate  assessments in 1988 and 2005 declared the much of the hospital was unsafe and in need of demolition, most of the hospital was closed (including the adolescent treatment unit) although adult psychiatric treatment services continued to be offered.  

One of the staff has already been sent to the hospital after having their ankle broken by one of the patients.  

Link via mind hacks.

Earrings with a little something extra

The earrings seem pretty until you discover that they contain the genitalia of a horse.  Enjoy!

Link via bioephemera.

Do zombies go to the bathroom?

Do zombies go to the bathroom?  I've never really thought about it.  I honestly don't want to know.

Link via pcjm.

How to knit TARDIS socks

Here's the knitting pattern for TARDIS socks.  So very cool.

Link via neatorama.

Guess I won't bother getting my master's degree

According to Bill Gates and Arne Duncan, teaching is the ONLY job where more experience and training won't make you a better teacher.  (I'm not making this up.)  So they believe that schools should stop paying teachers bonuses for earning their degrees and gaining more knowledge in education.  

Duncan told the American Enterprise Institute on Wednesday that master's degree bonuses are an example of spending money on something that doesn't work.

On Friday, billionaire Bill Gates took aim at school budgets and the master's degree bonus.

"My own state of Washington has an average salary bump of nearly $11,000 for a master's degree - and more than half of our teachers get it. That's more than $300 million every year that doesn't help kids," he said.

"And that's one state," said Gates, the co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, at a speech Friday in Louisville to the Council of Chief State School Officers. Gates also took aim at pensions and seniority.

If that's the case, could Bill Gates or Arne Duncan reimburse me the $1,700 I'm spending out of pocket to renew my worthless certificate?  And how much money am I saving tax payers by spending my own money on class supplies?  I get reimbursed for some of it through tax breaks, but not all of it.  Now there's talk of taking away that as well.

 

 

Hello?

Just out of curiosity, does anyone still read this blog?  If not, I think I might quit.  I'm over having a huge readership (never gonna happen with my time schedule and lack of social skills), but it would be nice to know that someone else is still reading Quiddity besides me.  Just leave a quick hello in the comments (I'm not fishing for compliments).  Thanks! 

From Robocop, With Love

Adorable story about a little boy who received a letter from Peter Weller (I forgot he was on Dexter this season) after seeing pictures of him in his cute Robocop Halloween costume.

Link via web-goddess.

Bizarre story about twins' suicide pact

Here's a strange story about twin sisters who shot each other in the head at a shooting range as part of some kind of suicide pact.  One twin is dead, but it looks like the other one will survive.  Their poor parents.  

World's Largest Gummy Worm

World's Largest Gummy Worm: Like a regular gummy worm, only 128 times awesomer.

Another link via rue the day.