Cable's Out, Kill Me Now

The danger of having both cable TV and a cable modem is obvious. When the cable goes out, the information deprivation is downright dangerous.

After several hours of intense boredom last night (arranging all my pocket change to be heads up, alphabetizing those little cards that fall out of magazines and playing with the baby) I realized that I could watch TV if I really wanted to. I had a Netflix DVD sitting on the shelf that had been there for months. I'd put off watching Million Dollar Baby because of a friend's warning that she couldn't eat or sleep for a week after seeing the movie. But last night, in an act of true desperation, I finally gave in.

Now that I've seen it, I understand why it won all those Academy Awards. That being said, Million Dollar Baby is the worst, the worst, movie I have ever seen. What kind of sick bastard would make a movie like that? I remember watching Born on the Fourth of July, and feeling physically ill. That is story of pain and anguish. And it's a true story! What I can't believe is that someone would dream up a story like the one told in Million Dollar Baby. It's just sick. Get out the Prozac.

Like I said. I had been warned. But as I'm watching the movie, I'm thinking, "OK, there's obviously a twist coming, but how bad could it be?" I've seen Rocky IV like 17 times and I never got upset when Apollo Creed went down. (However, I'll admit to being mildly upset with Mr. T for years after watching him beat down Burgess Meredith in Rocky III.) But none of that prepared me for the shocker in Million Dollar Baby. Maybe it's because I'd been television and Internet deprived for several hours so the moving pictures had that much more impact. But as the credits rolled, I just wanted to kill myself. Or better yet, have someone sneak into my room and do it for me.