dannye's New Writeups

Ray McKinnon (person)

2013-05-13T21:23:58Z

The Little Rock Film Festival starts here soon. In many years, this would not be a big deal. This year is somewhat of an apex of what has been a burgeoning period for Arkansas filmmaking. Even though many people would attribute this to the fact that Billy Bob Thornton made a couple of movies around here which got a lot of attention. First, Sling Blade (1996) and then"Crystal" (2004) - starring both Billy Bob and Lisa Blount, I personally attribute it to the fact that Ray McKinnon (born 11/15/57 in Georgia) married Lisa Blount (born 7/1/1957 here in Little Rock). They moved back here in 1998. She wanted to come back home to live. He agreed and they began acting as an active pair of promoters for local filmography.

Let me begin with Ray and try to tie this in with one of the best films I've seen in a while, Mud, written and produced by Jeff Nichols (born 12/7/1978 also here in Little Rock);a film getting more and more acclaim with each new viewing. In…

Asamoth (poetry)

2013-04-19T21:26:59Z

I was perusing my node heaven
When I chanced upon a dud I'd killed
Not out of spite or hatefulness
Nor due to lack of will

Only because bones had fired me
And I'd asked for a week or two
To clean out my weakest twee
Which had long been overdue

The writeup that I found in there
Was too close to the truth
I thought, "Would I want my daughter
Reading this pointless story from my youth?"

Then I thought of all the gems we've lost
When some good user decides to toss
It all overboard in a fit of rage
Years of work, gone missing page by page

Creases, Paraclete, ToasterLeavings
All the joy that the artist brings
Ripped out and burned upon a whim
Nothing learned; the web more dim

And yet the 'moths from years gone by
Return like clockwork with new names
Often reposting nuked and halfassed tries
That now look at…

Car Wheels on a Gravel Road (fiction)

2013-04-02T16:11:38Z

The sunflowers were especially high this summer, probably around five feet. Unfortunately, the weedy grass was also about that tall. She had already had to pull one tick off of the top of the head of her oldest son when all he had done was walk through the yard. Unfortunately Dewayne was probably not going to be home any time soon to cut the grass. In fact, she suspected that Dewayne would never be coming home again after what happened last time.

The old blue and white trailer in which they lived was so faded out on the outside that the blue part had almost melded into the same color as the white. Baby blue does not hold up well in direct sunlight, nor were her baby blue eyes which used to be so sparkly.

She was living in a Southern ghost town from whence almost every young person her age had long since escaped. She'd stayed because she had made three babies with Dewayne and now her future was pretty much sealed along with most of the buildings in that forgotten…

Low-hanging fruit (thing)

2013-03-30T15:33:27Z

This is a term, the origin of which should be self-explanatory. I assume that the apple eaten in the Garden of Eden would've been the first example of this phenomenon. It roughly translates as, "good things which can be gotten with a minimal amount of effort."

It is often used in the world commissioned sales when a salesperson takes over a new block of clients whom he previously did not have. For instance, in the business I was in for most of my life, life insurance, it would mean that an agent working for the same company had either retired, gotten fired, died, etc. and his block of clients must now be serviced by someone different. This happened to me when my company had a very experienced and respected agent in Northwest Arkansas (just south of Branson, Missouri) retire and I was given a chance to pick up his block of business. This fellow was a nice guy but he had never stayed abreast of the times, thus there was a load of low-hanging fruit sitting…

Searching for Sugar Man (review)

2013-03-27T15:46:01Z

I watched a highly compelling documentary film yesterday. The explanation for the odd title comes from a coincidental name and a song title on Rodriquez's first album in 1971, Cold Fact. What makes one documentary film better than another? In this case, it's primarily the subject and the way the arc of the film follows the arc of the subject's story.

Searching for Sugar Man is a Swedish-British documentary film directed by Malik Bendjelloul, which follows the journey of two Cape Town fans in the late 1990s, Stephen 'Sugar' Segerman (thus the coincidental title) and Craig Bartholomew Strydom, to find out if the rumored death of American musician Sixto, or Jesus Rodriguez was true, and, if not, to discover what had become of him. Now that I think of it, "Strydom" would have been a better movie title as a joke on stardom for which Rodriquez had to wait a lifetime. Rodriguez's music, which never took off in the United States, had become wildly popular in South Africa, but…

Stacy Lewis (person)

2013-03-03T22:48:27Z

Stacy Lewis is a young female golfer from Arkansas, born February 16, 1985. She won the HSBC Women's Champions 2013 this week and became the leading current money winning female golfer in the world. The LPGA has been looking for a young attractive American to take over leadership of the tour and improve their television ratings for quite a long time. The LPGA has the same marketing problems as does the WNBA and pretty much all other televised female sporting events. The best players are just not that attractive or personable. I would suppose that the television revenue generated from beach volleyball is the highest grossing female sporting event currently televised. I'm just guessing about that, but I bet I'm right. So even though Stacy Lewis is young, American, and reasonably attractive, it's unlikely that she is going to boost the LPGA's market share. The reason is that she just does not look happy playing golf. She doesn't have that beaming smile or the winning personality that makes for a…