No, not the Terry Gilliam/partial Python film.  I'm referring to those people - and you know who you are - who spend WAY too much time frittering away their days Twittering and Facebooking, etc., instead of getting done what needs to get done.  Then they tweet about how they're behind on deadlines and freak out over the pressures they've put on themselves to accomplish their goals in a timely manner. 

Oh, don't worry, I won't be a hypocrite.  I am pointing a finger at self (making it difficult to type), for being guilty of same. But I've learned the art of popping in and out like an obscenely overpaid CEO of a major corporation - give the queenly/popely wave and scram.

However, some of these time bandit enablers fall under the heading of 'celebrity' and post their sometimes inane comments whilst being driven to their destination, or whilst in makeup, etc.  Still, we don't need to know every little thought that enters their noggins.  Some believe if they post 18 play-by-play comments pertaining to a sporting event they are currently viewing that we will be entranced and forever in their debt for sharing said future glowing memory.  Yeah, no.

These social networking sites were created, well, to make oodles and oodles of money for their creators, but play along with me and we'll say they were created to bring people together.  Many people use these sites to 'build their platform' (euphemism for fan base/potential customers), including writers, actors to entice you to watch their TV show/movie, Off-Broadway show, etc., musicians, even used car salesmen.

OK.  Unfortunately, some of us crave that 'togetherness' a lot more than others and permit these Internet time bandits to steal our precious minutes.

So, moving forward (see blog on annoying overused phrases), be brief.  Brevity is the soul of something or other.  Do not kick off your shoes and get comfy.  We won't lose any sleep tonight if you don't post that photo of what you made for dinner, or a picture of your cat wearing a dog costume, or sharing the fact you've got IBS, or inform us that you can see in your neighbor's window and while the teddy and stilettos look good, perhaps he should have waxed his back.  Yeah, no.  Don't share that kind of stuff.

We really don't need to know that your dog just ate your favorite thong or that you will simply perish without chocolate, or that your toddler just made some wall art with the contents of his diaper.

So, as the beat cop always says in 1940s B movies, "Come on, Johnny, show's over.  Go home."  Everybody:  Get back to work!  Be productive!

You'd think by the title it would be an oxymoron, right?  I've always thought of the Amish, as a people, to perhaps be lacking in the humor department, but to be peaceful, hard-working, church-going, barn-building chill folks.  Then I read about a splinter group (who ever thought there would be a splinter group amongst the Amish?) involved in home invasions in 4 separate counties in Ohio, of other Amish people and forcibly cut off their beards.  And the man behind the beard-cutting's name is Mullet.  Not kidding.  He claims he didn't give the order to do this but says it's retribution for those who didn't follow some religious rules.

I'm sorry, I just find this fascinating in a comical way and can picture it as an SNL sketch  - one group of Amish men on the left in traditional Amish attire: black trousers, white shirts, black suspenders, black flat hats - another group of Amish men on the right similarly dressed - doing that semi-bent forward move and snapping their fingers like Russ Tamblyn and George Chakiris in Westside Story, then one group whips out scissors instead of switchblades and goes for the beards. 

Why is Lorne Michaels not calling me?!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/10/arrests-in-amish-beard-cutting_n_1003944.html

You know those cell phone commercials where the guy keeps asking if the person on the other end of the line can hear him?  You ever have those days where you think others can't see you?  Where you feel invisible?  Shop clerks don't seem to notice you, deli counter people, waiters ditto, and co-workers [unless they want something from you, then you are tres, tres visible] same thing.  You wonder if instead of your raincoat you've donned your cloak of invisibility. But wait, that's still in the cleaner's.  I've determined it's not that we sometimes seem invisible to others, it's just that to each of us we are the star of the show; others may either have bit parts, walk-ons, cameos, or are simply silent extras or 'background'.  So, next time you feel you are less than visible, just find your key light and turn your better side to the camera. 

Latest newsflash from Hollywood: A sequel to Beetlejuice is being discussed/planned - whatever the hip jargon is for this sort of thing that, of course, I am not privy to, not being a hip Hollywood insider. 
My first question was WHY?!  For the love of God, WHY?!  There are warehouses full - I repeat, FULL - of optioned screenplays just pining away and yellowing from years of inactivity and shameful neglect (and a sporadic if not lazy cleaning crew).  When I hear news like this I either fly off the handle (as in NOW), or freeze as though playing Statues and silently panic thinking, Good Lord!  All the writers on the planet have died!  What an appalling, cataclysmic event!  There will NEVER be another NEW idea again.
Then I get a grip, realizing I am still alive and I AM A WRITER! And so the torture continues. 
We writers of the new thinking, we writers of the fresh ideas, we writers who put a quirky, clever spin on things giving an old story a new twist, suck it up.  Apply a little ice to the bruised jaw (and ego) where we took this latest slam and with an attempt at a semi dignified toss of the head, we march onward.  On to our legal pads, PCs, laptops, micro-cassette recorders - whatever and whichever tool(s) we prefer to put down for all time our NEW, FRESH, INVENTIVE ideas for stories that would make audiences laugh, weep, gasp, cling to their seat mate in terror, or maybe just spend 120 minutes knocking back some über priced Jujubes and a watered down soft drink to try and forget about the crappy day they had with some entertainment.
AND, many, many of these scripts are devoid of expensive explosions, costly car chases requiring all kinds of payouts for permits to close down highways and neighborhoods in order to capture the carnage, and not a speck of computer generated images in the bunch.  Now, while I feel sorry for the actors who will lose wages for not having to don the lime green skin tight technical suits with ping pong balls attached in various locations to enable the CGI folk to make the magic happen, I can get over this.
Some days I feel like Martin Short's character Nathan Thurm (he of slicked down hair, greasy face and endless cigarette ash) who was wont to say, "Is it ME or is it HIM?  It's HIM, isn't it?"  Some days I feel like Colin Clive as the original Dr. Frankenstein crying, "It's alive!  It's alive!" in that way of warning others of something potentially scary and dangerous about to happen.  And yet, [spoiler alert if you haven't seen this 1973 film] other days I feel like Charleton Heston shouting, "Soylent Green is PEOPLE!"  My point being I feel the need to spread the word, not unlike Peter Finch in Paddy Chayefsky's brilliant Network.  C'mon, you know the line.  That's right, now I want you to go to your window and open it and shout out, 'I'm mad as hell and I'm not gonna take it anymore!'   [Ah, Paddy we hardly knew ye.]  Of course, other days I feel like Billie Jenkins who so aptly put it in her genteel way, 'Guess I gotta find a new liquor store.

P.S. The big scuttlebutt is: Who will take over the Michael Keaton role of Beetlejuice?  The answer is: Michael Keaton IS Beetlejuice and don't nobody think otherwise. 

P.P.S.  OK, now I'm really getting PO'd.  I realize I may be the last to know in many things, but I just learned that they are REMAKING Superman!  For the love of God, WHY?!   I don't even want to know what the budget is for this idiocy.  I'm sure it is an obscenely inflated amount.  An amount that could turn all 10 of my novels into screenplays, produce them in a very tasteful way, and still have money left over.

P.P.P.S.  What's the deal with Johnny Depp and his people asking Disney to cough up $250M to make The Lone Ranger with Johnny  as Tonto.  Now, sure Johnny made 87 of those Pirate movies for Disney and they raked in many billions, but how much do those silver bullets cost?  Seriously.

P.P.P.S. And when the Hollywood geniuses decide to make a Gone With the Wind prequel, sequel, or remake - and they will - the answer will be the same.  Nobody can replace Clark Gable as Rhett Butler, so just quit it.   No, I mean it.  Stop it already.