h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I dreamed that there was a pleasant guy who lived a block or two from where I work. He was quiet and unassuming, though friendly enough. I saw him occasionally over the course of thiry years or so, and then one day he stopped appearing.

Then they told me that he was J D Salinger, and he had just died. Not that I would have bothered him if I had known who he was. I think he was right to guard his privacy. I'm just glad to have been a peripheral part of his world. It was an odd dream, but no bananafish were harmed in the making of it.

Salinger was one of those people who suddenly appear as out of nowhere and leave a profound impact on generations

It must have been awful

No, it was really pleasant. He seemed like a regular guy and a good (if shy) neighbor.

What I meant was it must have been awful to become so famous all of a sudden. Sure, it "gave him butter on his bread" as we say here - and as a writer you want your stuff to be read - but I for one could certainly live without the publicity

I think that Salinger, like Greta Garbo, acted in a totally authentic fashion. At some point he must have thought that he had run out of ideas for his writing, and concluded that he had nothing more to say.

Was killing time before picking up a prescription refill and took a drive. Some guy was barrelling up the road in the bicycle lane on a motorcycle and not watching particularly where he was going. It reminded me of my dream from last night...

I dreamed that I was driving "somewhere in the USA" and was in an unfamiliar town in which, for some unaccountable reason, every one parked facing the oncoming land... AND they drove huge cars... Rolls Royces, etc. and the "parking lance" was not just narrow but actually the outside lane.

I was driving an SUV with isn't small in itself and was discombobulated by the unusual method of parking... The result was that I lost control of the van near an intersection slid right across the road and onto a sidewalk, turned 180 degrees. Luckily, I stopped inches from a chain link fence.

That's all I recall from the dream.

I should note that the guy on the motorcycle was on the wrong side of the road and facing the oncoming traffic.

If the guy on the 'ctcle was Nicholas Cage, you were in a movie, not a dream.

Nope... just some guy.

I was just checking. I sometimes see Mel Gibson in the checkout line at the supermarket. No, it's not really Mel, just someone who looks like him.

He's lucky it isn't me that sees him. I'd kick him in the shins. Hate the man. Won't watch his movies, except for Braveheart and only when he's not on the screen. The ONLY reason I watch that is that some of my favourite British and Scottish actors are in it. because they aren't in many other films.

Angus Macfadyen
Tommy Flanagan
David O'Hara
Peter Mullan
David McKay

I expect that there are many who hate him. He has a vile mouth when he's drunk. Given that he's an alcoholic, I expect that his health will go south before long, if it hasn't already.

The question is, do I want to stop watching movies because this actor is nutty as a fruitcake, that one is always pushing Scientology, and those actors over there are obnoxious narcissists? The key asnwer for me is that they are not playing themselves when you see them on the screen. They're playing someone else, someone who might shed some light on the human condition, or who might sing or dance or be amusing...

That's true, if their acting actually does that - shed light on the human condition.

As far as I am concerned, Mel Gibson does not. He's busy wrecking history most of the time. 'The Patriot' is bad propaganda. The man his character was based on was a slaveholder.

On the other hand, 'Valkyrie' is a great film. It tells an important story. Tom Cruise's religious beliefs are his own affair. It is irrelevant that he is too short to be Claus von Stauffenberg. That's what camera angles are for.

My reason for boycotting Gibson, quite apart from his personal quirks, is his well-known homophobia and the fact that he refuses to hire homosexuals in the making of his films. If he finds out someone is homosexual, he fires them.

I boycott Tom Cruise's films, as well. In his case because of his tirade about postpartum depression and depression, as a whole. He never really has apologised for that. While some actors (John Travolta, as an example) are scientologists (it does NOT deserve to be capitalized) they don't whack people over the head with it and pretend to be doctors. He has every right to be a fruitcake but I don't have to support him financially to tell me that my depression would be easily cured by scientology.

If Mel isn't hiring homosexual actors, chances are someone else will. I actually didn't know he was that uptight about the issue. I won't go out of my way to see him in a movie, but you have to understand that watchable movies are sometimes few and far between. I sometimes have to figure out which movie is the least crappy.

Yesterday was a case in point. I had seen most of the good or great movies, and all that was left was a totally awful cop movie ("Cop Out"), and a remake of "Crazies." The critics and viewers had given pretty good ratings to "Crazies," so I watched it. I left halfway through. I also left halfway through "Apocalypto." I got the gist of these movies, but didn't feel enough involvement with their characters or storylines to see the second half. That's how it goes sometimes.

When this happens, I rent old tv shows on Netflix.

A hearty recommendation: I have just discovered a great British series from the 80s, 'Robin of Sherwood'. Top-notch stuff.

Ray Winstone makes quite a good Will Scarlett.

Ray Winstone was in "Edge of Darkness" with Mel Gibson.



I've seen him in lots of other movies, like "The departed," "Cold Mountain,"
and so forth.

He's particularly buff in 'Beowulf'. And he made a good Henry VIII.

I saw him in "Beowulf," but I didn't see "henry the Eighth." Does it count that I saw "henry V" twice?

Only twice? (That film is like potato crisps, you can't stop watching it.)

Wouldn't two Henry Vs = Henry X?