Last Friday, Captain Richard Phillips of the MV Maersk returned to his family. If you will recall, Phillips was taken captive by Somali pirates a little more than two weeks ago. A Navy SEALs’ nighttime raid rescued him Hollywood-style from his captors. While there is nothing cooler than hearing about a couple of punks getting their just desserts, I am APPALLED that this got that far.

Am I the only one who can’t believe the balls of these guys?!! The Johnny Depp movies aside, piracy is terribly out-dated. It worked in the 1600s because it preceded inventions like radar, GPS, and motorized engines. Their entire industry was based on raiding ships and then “disappearing” before anybody could track them. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure it was a ‘sweet science’ in its heyday, but now it is just high-seas car-jacking. I don’t care how well local fisherman-turned-criminals know these waters, they are just kidding themselves if they think that they’re getting away with anything. The US wouldn’t even have cared had they not kidnapped an American ship captain. So…3 bullets and 3 dead morons later, the Somali Pirates are vowing “revenge” on all US ships from here on out. Ooooooohhhhh!! That sounds pretty serious!! It might take a WHOLE clip to put these ruffians down.

The following is a list of pirates that I would be more concerned about:

SOFTWARE PIRATES-

Honestly, I’m not very scared of these guys at all. If I was working at Microsoft or Apple I might have a totally different opinion, but I digress..(I’m a Communications Major…I’m probably not even qualified to work in their HR Department)

PUFFY-SHIRTED JERRY SEINFELD-

“-this is gonna be the new look for the 90’s. You’re gonna be the first pirate!”

“-BUT I DON’T WANNA BE A PIRATE!!!”

ICE PIRATES (1984)

It’s a shame this movie isn’t more popular. The plot is a little convoluted, but basically Spencer: For Hire is a hot-shot space pirate who gets forced into helping a Space Princess recover her missing father. Paired with a sassy Space Sidekick (Chewblacka?), our heroes battle robots and monsters in order to save the galaxy or something. Robert Urich passed away 7 years ago, and I STILL consider him a threat.

THE PIRATES OF SILICON VALLEY-

Noah Wyle and Anthony Michael Hall star in this 1999 TV-movie about the early friendship/rivalry of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Both duos intimidate me. Jobs and Gates have the money to have me killed and cover it up, Dr. Carter’s addiction to pain-killers makes him that much tougher in a fight, and Brian Johnson once brought a gun to school.  (Flare guns can cause severe burns)

ONE-EYED WILLY-

Where to begin? This guy took out Chester Copperpot 400 years after his death….and when CC was peaking!!  There are booby traps and then there are booby traps!!!  (That’s what I said….”booby traps”)

THE PITTSBURGH PIRATES

I’m really only talking about Bobby Bonilla and Andy Van Slyke. I remember those guys being absolute Cub killers back in the day. I’ll also throw in Randall Simon, since he beat that giant Italian Sausage down with a Louisville Slugger back in Milwaukee.

CAPTAIN MORGAN-

I almost flunked out of college because of this pirate…and Mario Kart 64.

CAPTAIN JACK SPARROW-

He’s got a very impressive list of adversaries: the East India Trading Company, Captain Barbossa, Davey Jones, The Kracken, hordes of Tortuga whores, etc. I suppose I’d probably be safe as long as I didn’t get into an overly-elaborate swordfight atop a giant spinning wheel with him, but why take that chance?

THE DREAD PIRATE ROBERTS//THE MAN IN BLACK

This guy is a viable threat.  He beat Fezzik in a contest of strength, he bested blades with Inigo Montoya, and he even defeated the mighty Vizzini in a game of wits!!!  He also survived the Fire Swamp, killed a R.O.U.S, and came back from the dead. Oh yeah, and he also has built up an immunity to Iocane Powder. If only he had a wheelbarrow…that would be SOMETHING!!

BUTT PIRATES

A vast ye matey, ye best watch yer Stern side. Lest of course, ye want a one-way ticket to the BoneYard.

When you’re a child (or 30-year old child), there is nothing more crushing than having somebody black-ball an item on your Christmas wish list. I went through all the trouble of listing the gift in full, pricing it, sizing it (if applicable), and even leaving a page number from the catalog I found it in, only to have it shot down the second after I handed it in. BB Gun?… too dangerous. Skateboard?…too dangerous. Chinese Throwing Stars?…Illegal… and too dangerous. DVDs of Dangerous Minds, Dangerous Liasons, and Johnny Dangerously…too dangerous. etc. Long story short: if the package had any other warning on it other than CHOKING HAZARD, then I wasn’t going to get it.

Then…this year… something fell through the cracks.

This year, some thoughtful and careless individual deemed it appropriate to allow me to get my hands on the R2 Fish School- the most efficient goldfish training system on the market. I’m sure it seemed like the perfect gift for a fish enthusiast such as myself, but you’ve just given me a slimy, scaly, loaded gun.  When I look at this video, I don’t see little fish-athletes named Minnowdinho and Guppie Abdul-Jabar (formerly Lew AlCichlid) playing fish soccer and basketball. I see two covert operatives in Phase 1 of their combat training. I’m talking about weaponized military goldfish.  (WMGs)

Think about it. If they can be trained to put a ball in a hoop, why can’t they be trained to put a homing device on a boat? If they can be taught to “limbo” and “slalom” then they can be trained to infiltrate. Sure, goldfish aren’t very big, but who says you have to stop at goldfish? How about blue gills? How about marlins? The 1973 movie, Day of the Dolphin touched on this subject when they used the aquatic mammals to put magnetic limpet mines on watercraft, but I’m taking it a step further. While dolphins are hands-down the smartest creature in the ocean, they aren’t very inconspicuous. Between their constant frolicking and their need to surface, dolphins can be spotted from a nautical mile away. On the flip side, a entire school of jacks could pass under your boat without you even realizing it…until it was too late.

Before everybody freaks out and packs up their family to live in the desert, let me assure you that I have NO plans of World Domination on the horizon. While I look forward to impressing my friends with my sporty goldfish, I highly doubt that I’ll take it much farther than that. I’m not gonna lie to you. The idea of stealthy weaponized disaposable (flushable) aquatic minions may appeal to me right now…. but the beauty of ADHD is that you never really get to involved in anything before something else tickles your fancy.

Hey! It’s  lunchtime!

With this disc, I thee rule

For those that aren’t in the know, (which puts you only one month behind me) Disney is finally making a sequel to their 1982 cult hit TRON. Can you believe it’s only been 26 years since we last joined the deadbeat Lebowski, Lacy Underall, and umm.. Bruce Boxleitner in their quest to take down a corrupt Master Control program? TR2N, as it has been titled, debuted to the public with 3 ½ minute teaser footage of an updated LightCycle chase followed by a close-up of a pensive Flynn (Jeff Bridges) overseeing the action.

Needless to say, I was pretty jazzed to hear this news. TRON is one of those movies that I loved as a kid, but never understood. (Putting in a class with The Last Unicorn, and Breakin 2: Electric Boogaloo) I was so mesmerized by the glowing lacrosse helmets, the laser-light motorcycles, neon tanks, and the combat Frisbee/backpacks that I didn’t care about the plot what-so-ever. As it turns out, it’s not that shabby of a story either: renegade programs working within a corrupt system in an effort to take it down. The thought of a sequel sounds exciting and marketable, but it raises so many questions:

No, we didn't take this idea from T2!

– Is this sequel too late? When you break it down, the original TRON was basically an early interpretation of story lines in the Matrix Trilogy. It has a LOT of the same elements: “unique” human protagonist, rebelling programs, agents of control, evil Master Control/Main Frame, etc. (I think their scripts may even share a “Whoa!” or two) My point is: Will audiences look at it as a second chapter to an innovative classic techno-adventure, or just a copycat Matrix-ish movie trying to cash in on former glory?

–How will they account for the time lapse between the films? TRON was a story that took place in a time when computers took up a whole room in your house, and when BASIC was the standard CPU language. While it was cutting edge at the time, the entire language of TRON is obsolete by today’s standards. The flying toaster screensaver is  more complex than anything mentioned in TRON. Also, Jeff Bridges is OLD. He appears to be the only returning cast member, so does that mean he has an active role? Let’s face it, the only disc that Flynn will throw will be the one in his back when he tries to mount his LightCycle.

–Will I finally be able to make a TRON Halloween costume that people will appreciate rather than ridicule?

While we can speculate and pontificate all we want, the real answers won’t be addressed until the films release date in 2010/2011. Until then, all we can do is sit patiently and watch the load-up screen of our hopes and dreams slowly climb to 100%.

Until then…… 011100101 011011,my friends