Sunday, February 15, 2009

Karin Murphy: Dec 8, 1980 - Feb 2, 2009

Some of you may have heard, and some of you may have not heard. Karin Christine Murphy, also known as Gerd, passed away on February 2nd, 2009.



I can’t begin to explain how emotionally devastated I am, nor can I begin to tell you how much grief her family feels. She is going to be sorely missed by family, friends, coworkers, employers, classmates, neighbors, doctors, librarians, retail clerks, Starbucks, and me. Terribly missed.

This post is not meant to be insulting, flippant, nor belittling. For those of you who knew her, you know she would be offended if I didn’t write something about her. I could go on for days about how incredible she is, but I will keep it short and simple in this post. But please understand I have been writing pages and pages of things about her since that awful day.

I’ve been writing lists of things that Karin and I didn’t get to do, so her family knows we had made plans both long-term and short-term, some serious and some entertaining. I’ve been writing lists of things that Karin and I did get to do, so her family knows the time we had was special to both of us and we enjoyed each other’s company and grew as people. I’ve also been writing lists of things I’m going to miss about Karin, which includes quirky things that annoyed me and things I looked forward to every day.










Last night, M.Edium, who is 4, asked me if I was sad that Karin had died. It was painfully difficult to keep it together in front of him. I told him I was very sad that she had died. I hope he never has to find out how sad I really am.

Karin, I would have done anything for you.

Top 5 things about Karin Murphy
1. She is beautiful
2. She is intelligent
3. She is hilarious
4. She loves her family, dog, friends, and me (in that order)
5. She makes me feel special

The only bottom things about Karin Murphy
1. She’s no longer with us

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Lollipop Girls in Hard Candy – Uptown Theater – Minneapolis, MN

I’m not going to go into too much detail on this film, due to the fact that I have … uhhhh… conservative family members who read these posts.

I heard the Uptown Theater was showing a Midnight screening 3D version of an adult film featuring John Holmes (if you don’t know, don’t ask). I read the reviews of it and it sounded like you needed to go see this for the comedy – and for John Holmes – and for the 3D. So I took a quick poll (pun intended) of my out-of-town friends to see if inviting another male to go see this with me would seem gay. The unanimous answer was, “of course not!” So I sent a super tactful message to an unnamed male friend. He seemed intrigued and finally caved due to the same reasons I was interested in going. And Gerd was in no way shape or form interested in going to this, so I didn’t even have to concern myself with her.

I wasn’t sure what to expect with this crowd having never been to a rated-X film in an actual theater. Was it going to be creepy single guys in trench coats or would it be couples or would it be normal folks? Turns out it was a combination of all of the above. Including my friend's neighbor kid, Ibanez. When we saw him in line in front of us we assured him his mother sent us to keep an eye on him at this adult film. The place was going to be full of people. We were issued a set of 3D glasses and headed into the theater.

The Uptown Theater is an awesome old theater with a stage and a big screen. It’s a little worn down as far as the seating and paint, but it’s got an awesome homey feel to it. And apparently the midnight crowd is of the Rocky Horror variety who like to be quite vocal. The best line of the entire evening was before the film even started. The MC at the theater walked up on stage to tell us about the theater and film, and someone yelled from the balcony, “it looks so LIFELIKE!” Hilarious.

The MC told us due to the turnout, this type of film might become a more regular feature to their “independent film” repertoire. While people yelled out “porn!!” and “take off your pants!!” and “show us the goods!!”, the guy told us refunds would not be issued once the movie was 20 minutes in. This brought on a chorus of “I won’t last that long!!” and “Who needs more than 20 minutes?!?!” Again, hilarious.

I won’t get into the film too much, but the plot didn’t make sense in any way shape or form. And yes, you will remind me it’s porn, so there shouldn’t be a plot. But let me suggest this: maybe someone took a random movie from the 70’s and then spliced in a handful of hardcore porn. There were roman soldiers who ended up in a bunny suit, a chicken costume, and cockroach costume (I think). Not sure what they were doing. There was some sort of candy factory who was going to go out of business unless they could develop some super awesome flavor. The bad guys stole the aphrodisiac lollipops and mailed them around the country so no one could track them. All this mixed in with every opportunity to put in various 3D scenes of things moving towards the camera. Pieces of mail down a mail slot and then an egg down the same mail slot. A broom being wielded like a spear. And then various bodily fluids moving creepily towards the camera. Not sure who decided that would be fun, but someone did. So the movie would be rolling along with its weak plot, and then BAM! Scene cut to people who may or may not have been in the movie earlier were going at it. Then random scene change back to civilian life in the candy laboratory.

When there was too much dialogue (which was VERY often), people in the theater would yell, “BORING!!!” And there were really long stretches of dialogue. REALLY long. And when things would…uhhh… reach a climax, the crowd would go crazy. It was really quite a sight to behold.

The movie wrapped up, and we all looked confused because of the lack of plot and disjunct scene changes. And as we took our 3D glasses off, my friend and I realized our vision was totally destroyed. Our right eyes were devoid of any red coloring and our left eyes were devoid of any blue coloring. Thank you 3D glasses. My friend asked me how long this effect was going to last and I assured him I had no idea whatsoever. Fortunately, it didn’t last very long and I was able to drive home safely. The entire way home, we would ask questions of each other such as, “what was with those roman soldiers?” and “was that a coackroach?” and “did John Holmes play like three different characters?” Clearly, we were NOT going to be able to understand more than about 20% of this film.

Since I didn’t go into detail on the film, I’ll just give you the top and bottom 5. And don’t bother seeing this movie. You won’t get it.

Top 5 things about Lollipop
1. I’ll never be able to hear the words “Tally Ho” again without giggling
2. Hilarious costume changes mid-scene and mid-sex-scene
3. Comments during the MC announcements
4. The 3D aspect of this film
5. Comments from the crowd

Bottom 5 things
1. My vision afterwards
2. John Holmes’ acting skills
3. The written-In use of 3D effects
4. The audio track was really quiet and then really loud
5. Comments from the crowd

Lollipop Girls in Hard Candy from IMDB