Pensioner with an attitude

Walking sticks, zimmer frames, grumpy, smell of moths and fake teeth - the stereotype pensioner that at times are an unappreciated group of people.  I always knew that pensioners had secret talents. Skills that they have obtained from decades of living among us and spying on our ways of living. Most men have served time in the army.  Back then it was normal to spend years in the army as it paid well and provided an education.

Michael Caine, a brilliant British actor, has always been one of my favourites.  When he released his new movie about being a pensioner in a tough London suburb, I just had to see it.  Clint Eastwood did a great job explaining the living conditions in LA, so I was certain that Michael Caine could do it too. It's just different continents and London is a more dangerous city than LA apparently.

London is one of the (if not the) most dangerous place to live in Western Europe. Some say it's the most dangerous place in the industrialised world!  It even made it to the top 10 list, which is pretty scary actually, especially when you see some of the other cities listed.

The Movie "Harry Brown" is produced by the UK Film Council. I'm certain it was sponsored by the UK tourist board too.  Anyway, it portraits people who for some reason are attracted to crime, mob behaviour and use violence to control any confrontation. The movie also looks at the impact these thugs have on the community they live in.

Meet Harry Brown (Michael Caine).  He is a pensioner living in residential flats in the outskirts of London, shared with all levels of society, but mainly the lower classes. As any movie hero, Harry Brown has a secret past, which he has managed to keep contained for decades, and that surprises many of the thugs in the hood.  

Basically, Harry Brown is a loner who has tragically lost his daughter and wife.  His life is shattered even more, when his best mate is brutally killed by the local youth gang that are harassing the estate.  Enough is enough, and Harry takes matters into his own hands.  The police are attempting to assist, but are obstructed by legal red tape.  So, he tracks down the guys himself and kills them one by one, using his ex-marine skills and reflexes - as you do.  It is a brilliant movie that I can highly recommend. It makes "Gran Torino" look like a Disney movie.  Michael Caine becomes an unusual hero and saves day and the neighborhood.

Get it on DVD and enjoy a pensioner beat up thugs that deserve to be punished (not that I approve of vigilantes, but it was effective).  Characters and actors did a great job, making the movie a believable story, especially the young unknown actors that played tough criminals and drug addicts.  Even Vinnie Jones could learn some skills here.  Michael Caine brings a bit of  the"Italian Job", "Get Carter' and "Dirty Harry" back to the British screen, which hasn't been seen since "Lock, Stock..." by Guy Ritchie.

The real X-factor (Jedi mind trick)

My family and extended family celebrate individual birthdays with good food and drink.  We meet up in the house of the birthday person to celebrate the day.  Thankfully these events are mainly scheduled during the weekends.  This tradition has been going on for at least 12 years now, so it is something that has become an important part throughout the planning of the year's activities.  It is almost up there with New Year and Christmas.
...and, it helps me remembering all the birthday dates.

For some reason this year, the grand father decided to go away for his birthday, celebrating his birthday with his wife - a somewhat intimate and quiet birthday celebration for the elderly people.  Nothing wrong with that, but it might not be the best idea considering the tradition we have going and the high expectations of a free dinner. In their case at Loco Che's house.

When my 5 (almost 6) year old daughter got wind of the fact that her grand parents were deserting us and the party, to go abroad for a long weekend, she decided to take matters into her own hands.

She promptly contacted them and told them off.  Not only did she tell them that it was inappropriate to leave on holidays, but it was totally unacceptable to leave during a birthday.  "This is not the way we do things around here", she explained.  So, she kindly informed her grand parents that they had been X'd out of the calendar and the family.  It was their own fault.  They ditched the family tradition, so the family ditched them.

I think the grand parents were taken back, how honest and direct my daughter was. Tell me about it! I live with her 24/7, and I have felt her wrath a few times. It is not pleasant.

Shortly after, the family was invited to celebrate grand dad's birthday.  Another free meal, nice food, alcohol (for me at least) and a lot of good laughs.  Happy birthday grand dad.

When Men became Men...

It was a dark and windy winter evening, more precisely a Saturday evening, and my lovely wife was going out. As in many relationships, that is when men decide to do all the stuff they normally wouldn't otherwise do; go to the chipper to get greasy food, drink normal coke, order pizza, smoke a pack of fags, watch horror or silly action movies (by the way, there are of course no silly action movies, just badly understood action movies) and play games on the Playstation. It wouldn't be any games, but gore, death and bloody games.

...and, while we do that, we play loud heavy metal music on the stereo.

Personally, I play 80's metal as it's so much more fun and the lyrics are crap.

My few hours of boyish behaviour was upon me and I was looking forward to killing a few zombies in the latest Resident Evil game and watching the shittiest action movies.

The evening started with a pack of Marlboro (reds of course) while I flushed down the batter burger with a few cans of Carlsberg. I have to support the local brewery.  At this point, the Van Damme action movie on the tele was coming to an end, which is the great thing about these no-brain action movies - they only last for max. 90 minutes.  Girlfriends just don't get this.

Time to chop the heads off of a walking zombie and shoot some bad guys in war torn Baghdad.

I loaded the Resident Evil game on my PS2 (Play station 2 for you who don't dig the lingo), turned off most of the lights in the apartment and turned up the volume.  Bring it on!

Soon, the living room was filled with screams, blood splatter on the screen and distant gun fire, as I moved my way through the various levels fully concentrated.  Adrenaline was pumping and I heard nothing other than the slicing of the chainsaw and the clattering chain-gun.

Zombies were reaching out from the darkness to smother me. Enemy snipers were trying to take me down.  Pure horror and terrifying effects were constantly placing my arse at the edge of my seat, ready for the next wave of pain.

This was a perfect boy night in.  My opportunity to show these fecking zombies who was the boss and commanding my unit effectively down the deserted streets of Baghdad.  I was in full control.  A real man in the making.  Nothing could cramp my style.

My character was walking down a dark corridor in the Hive (Resident Evil) and my fingers were ready for the next flesh eater.  Suddenly, a cold hand was placed on my shoulder and a soft voice asked if I was having fun.  I literally jumped 3 feet from the sofa, screaming like a frightened pig. I nearly wet my pants.  Fear of the worst kind had gripped me and I slowly moved into fetus position - the safest position to be in.

It was just my dear wife who had returned home without me hearing anything. She just wanted to check on me.  My reaction and pale white face made her burst into laughter, and she laughed uncontrollably for at least 10 minutes.  Personally, I didn't find this amusing.

Soon after this experience I sold my PS2.  Just couldn't get back into the game. I was always looking over my shoulder.

Arctic Conditions...

The winters in Ireland are normally wet, like the rest of the year, and windy.  So when it gets a little bit cold, and I mean less than zero, the country is preparing for the next ice age.  It's hilarious to see your neighbors pouring boiling water on their car windows, instead of just scrapping it off.  I wonder when they'll realise that boiling water is NOT good for the rubber around the window or the car paint.

One Wednesday in January 2010, snow and hail fell furiosuly for a couple of hours and as a result ALL roads were covered with a few inches of thick ice.  In all fairness, that would paralyze most traffic in any part of the World, for a few hours - but no more than that.

Irish drivers are at best bad drivers, rushing all the time, ignoring basic traffic rules and doing the usual hazardous routines while driving, such as:
- IUsing mobile phone when driving (international trend nowadays)
- Putting on make-up (which I'm finding difficult when driving the scooter and wearing a helmet)
- No right turn signs = turn right allowed (not actually sure if indicators come as standard in irish cars?)
- Red light means accelerate faster
- Bicycles and motorcycles are merely obstacles that has to be overcome

All in all, it is a bit like the famous PC game Carmageddon.  Throw in a bit of hazardous driving condition, and the game is on.

When snow does hit Ireland, it is like arctic conditions.  Plumbing in houses freeze, water reservoirs run out of water and the city councils haven't ordered sand or salt since 1981 when they were hit with the big freeze like most of Northern Europe.  As a result, the roads are not gritted, leaving the ice to get tougher and more slippery.
- I was horrified to discover why the reservoirs where empty.  Residents had been advised to keep their taps running, to prevent the pipes from freezing up!!!!

As I'm from Denmark, where you do get snow, I have some experience in driving in these conditions (by no means an expert), but driving a scooter on 3 inches of ice is NOT recommended.  It basically took me 2 hours to get home that afternoon.  And, I now know what trench feet are.  My feet were frozen solid for a few hours, but other than that I made it home.

The airport was closed for 24 hours, and even then, the amount of flights leaving was reduced drastically.  Not even sure the Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) has defrost for the planes, hence they are stuck at the terminals.  Most airports in the Northern hemisphere have defrosting machines, so the planes can leave.

The most "amusing" thing is that Ireland only seem to have a handful of gritting machines and snow plows, so the secondary roads were left alone.  For those people who knows Dublin, that means that the only main road cleared was the M50.

The day after the "heavy" snowfall, I decided to take the car to work.  I barely made it out of the estate, before I the so-called SUV was sliding all over the road.  We should probably have changed the tires 2 years ago, so there was no grip.  At the first traffic light, I was basically stuck - wheels spinning, but going nowhere.  Just as I was getting a grip, a giant 18-wheeler truck came sliding by (in front), almost jackknifed, and that's when I decided to go back home.

A bit of snow and the fecking country was paralyzed.  It was pretty annoying having to call work that morning, telling them I couldn't get out of the estate.  To make things worse, in order to get into work Friday, I had to treck for almost 3 kilometres, across th frozen tundra, stranded cars and white landscapes.

I almost peed my pants laughing, when I saw the news headlines "Arctic Conditions in Ireland".  Have these people not heard of countries where snow is a regular occurence and where winters are pitch black, only lit up by the white snow.  Some parts of Russia have -50 degrees, but the roads are still cleared.

I'm just waiting for when we get a real winter and all pipes in house freezeor burst, then they'll realise that they have built and insulated hourses wrong.  Who in their right mind would recommend having water pipes on the outside of the houses?

The not so glorious Bastards...

Quentin Tarantino hasn't released many great movies in recent years. So, when I heard he was making a World War II movie I was anxious to see it.  Surely, the man who created "From Dusk till Dawn", "Pulp Fiction" and "Reservoir Dogs" would be able to make a class movie, combining the gory fight scenes, the humorous dialogue and story.

The cast, as usual, was a lot of less famous actors and then one of the greatest male actors in the last decade - Brad Pitt.  This was bound to be a great World War II movie, following a unique squad of US soldiers trying to kill as many Nazi soldiers as possible.

The trailers were great, portraying Pitt's character as a real mean bastard that was looking for his scalps.  These helped build up the excitement and the anticipation grew.

Finally it arrived on DVD.  We don't get to the cinema that often, so we normally wait for the titles to be released on DVD.  It's much easier too.  You can just pause the movie, get coffee and snacks.

Excited, hoping for a movie similar to "Where Eagles Dare" with a Tarantino twist, I quickly started the movie.  The first 10 minutes was a scene in the French country side, showing a farmer hiding Jews and how the Nazis tries to get him to reveal where they were hidden.  They succeed. They killed all the Jews and let one little girl escape.  So, the plot was already there.  The girl would obviously play an important role later in the movie.

Thereafter, the movie turns to shite.  It rarely shows the bastards or any of their dirty deeds. It  focuses mainly on other smaller groups of the resistance that are trying to kill Nazi leaders.  Most of the dialogue is either in French or German, which is no problem, but there were only few of Tarantino's classic bloody fight scenes - in fact, I only counted three.  Well below the Tarantino standard.

Poor screenplay and a lot less action than I expected.  So, you can imagine how surprised I was, when I saw the movie was nominated for an Oscar.  For what? The worst WWII movie in recent years? The crappiest foreign movie produced? Blimey, I'd rather watch "Legend" with Tom Cruise, than see the "Not-so glorious bastards" again.  I rarely turn off movies before the actually finish, but this one I did.

The trailers and movie poster, and the attention from the press, gave the movie a lot more credit than it was worth.  I wonder if Tarantino is getting old and soft.
- I have to admit, the bad guy in the movie (the Nazi officer) was well acted, a real bastard.  And, Pitt did a great job too - when he was on.