Down To One

It's monday evening, which means that I have no class today. I do have a bunch of homework, and I have done about half of it, maybe a little bit more. Tomorrow is Game five for the Trail Blazers. Because of the way the last two games shook out in Houston, tomorrow could be the last game of the season. What's nice is that if Portland has to go out this early they at least do it in front of the home crowd. I feel like they will win, which means then they have to go down to Texas and win a game. I will say this now, though, just incase they do lose, and I don't get to go to the Rose Garden any more. I've had a great time working with the team, and the team has had a great season. I will feel like the season ended too soon, if it ends tomorrow. I may even feel like it ended too soon if we lose in the next round. Portland has a chance to be a great team in the future, but they also have been great this year. I think maybe some of the guys are still a little nervous, but its time for them to step up. I feel like I want to go into the locker room pregame on tuesday and let the team know just how great they are at basketball. I think that talentwise they are light years ahead of the Rockets. The difference is that Houston has some vet players that know how to step their game up in the playoffs. I feel like experience is not worth all that much. I think its only worth as much as you make it worth, and the Blazers are making it worth a lot. They are getting intimidated, they are over thinking, they are giving Houston WAY too much respect. If they come out and blow out Houston tomorrow, which is possible, I feel like there is a great chance for them to go down to Houston and tie the series. If they tie the series I don't think they lose game seven at home. But it's also possible that it will all be over tomorrow. I think that I will be happy if we get game seven at home. Win or lose that would be awesome.

I went to a couple of movies this weekend, to change the subject from basketball. Liv and I saw Sunshine Cleaning, and Martin and I saw Observe and Report. Sunshine Cleaning was the better of the two. I thought it was pretty good, but there were some things I didn't understand. There was a character with one arm, and I wasn't really sure what the purpose of that was. I also wasn't exactly sure how the audience was supposed to react to the main character played by Amy Adams. The back story on her was that she was super popular in high school, and was basically worthless after that. In the present of the movie she works as a maid. She switches to a crime scene maid because her high school boyfriend, who she now is having an illicit afair with, says she can make more money that way. What I don't understand is why the writer of the movie feels like that character should be sympathetic. Lots of times there are characters that were AWESOME in high school but failed in the real world. Usually they are set-up as a cautionary tale. Example: Trent McNeely in Can't Hardly Wait. He comes in at the end to tell Mike Dexter that guys like him are a dime a dozen in college. The moral is: don't be a jerk in high school because there is more to life. That's why I don't understand how I'm supposed to feel about Amy Adams' character. Was she popular and nice and got taken advantage of by the real world? or was she popular and a bitch and getting her just desserts from fate? That question goes unanswered, as do many, because I feel like Sunshine Cleaning doesn't want viewers to ask questions and just sit back and enjoy the films slightly quirky characters doing slightly quirky things. I blame Juno for this kind of movie. Short on story, or at least story that makes any kind of logical sense, long on weirdos. Observe and Report? Bad. Here's a question: why does the world need two mall cop movies in the same year? Here's another question: when will Seth Rogen stop being in movies? I don't have answers for either of those questions. Here's what I know about this little gem of a film. There is a sequence where, for basically no reason, Rogen's sidekick mall security guard asks Rogen if he can school him in his way of life. They end up doing lines of coke, smoking weed, beating up skaters, drinking, booting heroine, and finish by opening a safe in a jewelry store. Rogen's partner is also the guy that has been robbing the mall. This is a plot point. Here's my problem. The beginning and the end of the sequence are basically parts stolen from Wet Hot American Summer, but it that movie the long drug montage was a joke, capped off by Micheal Showalter saying how great it is to leave camp if only for an hour. In Observe and Report we are supposed to believe that Rogen and his buddy actually did all the things that they do in the montage. My problem: they don't look like they did a bunch of drugs when they open the safe. There is a sense in this sequence, and in the whole movie, that the people that are responsible for it can't decide if its supposed to be funny. Here's funny: A group of people set out to do something, they start smoking cigarettes, then start drinking, then weed, then coke, then robbery, ending with sticking needles in each other's arms in a house full of tweakers. What makes it funny is that after its all done, we see the characters again, and they obviously didn't do the stuff that we have just seen. What isn't funny is two guys doing drugs and beating up kids. It's what my TV writing teacher Thom Bray would call a joke shadow. That's a good description of Observe and Report, two hours of joke shadows. I left feeling confused, and not in a good way like you might after leaving a movie like Adaptation or Memento.

Right now I am watching two basketball games on the internet. Both are pretty bad, all four teams lost at least once to Portland. I really hope we win tomorrow. Now I am going to try not to think about it for the rest of the day.