smacky and bucky

Out of the office today, as wife's mother went into hospital late last night with fever and has a post-operation infection to fight off now. The worst things about hospitals is that they're full of germs! You go in for one thing and catch something else as a side effect. I guess it's ironic that there's probably less chance of getting MRSA in third-world countries where antibiotics haven't been added to everything and sprayed onto every surface, creating new resistant super bugs.


I'm posting to say I'm really bummed to hear about the death of Stan Winston, special effects master. He did the effects for (just some listed here):
• John Carpenter's The Thing
• Aliens
• Predator
• Monster Squad
• Edward Scissorhands
• Batman Returns
• Jurassic Park
• Terminator 2: Judgment Day
• Iron Man

He created iconic images that have been copied a million times. He made good movies great and bad movies fun. He was only 62. Can I confess how freaky it is to say "only" 62? There was a time in my life when I would have thought 62 was super-old and a million years away. Now I have family members near that age, family members who don't have the word "grand" in their title.

And damn, Tim Russert's death on Friday was a HUGE shock. He was only 58! I really liked him. He didn't let the Bush administration walk all over him, and he put Dick "baby eater" Cheney on the spot on "Meet the Press," challenging him saying we'd be welcomed as liberators in Iraq (years and years ago, back when they said the war would be over in less than six months).

Russert dies and Rush Limbaugh continues to spew hate and fear, while smoking phallic cigars and taking oxycontin. What is up with this world? Why is God leaving all the assholes to us? How selfish to take all the good ones!