Thursday, May 3, 2007

Sweet Gary Indiana


As you may have noticed, I have failed miserably at the question of the week, but I take refuge under the umbrella of Trevor's question of the century. That gives me 100 years to slack off. So in an attempt to reclaim a weekly Brad, I will be providing one thing per week that I really dislike or hate. However, in an effort to achieve balance and harmony in the universe, I will also share something I love (yes I mean hate and love in the completely meaningless modern sense...stay tuned for the notes from our trip for further examples). The love will come early week as a pick-you-up. The hate will come later (like today) as a downer that can be easily relieved by the advancing weekend. This means that this week there is only hatred...

I hate things with people dancing in them. Some dancing things are okay. When the dancing is legitimate and people who enjoy real dance can take it in, that's great. Also, when dancing is hilarious, that is great. For examples, movies like Center Stage that Erika as a dancer really enjoys fulfills the former. The Nextel commercial with the guys dancing in their office fulfills the latter. These are the only instances that are okay. And I do not enjoy the former, but I recognize the value of its presence on earth for those who enjoy serious dance.

Now that that's out of the way...I hate crappy dancing in things so much. Here are some examples of the most heinous offenders. The silhouette dancers on mortgage ads on websites, any commercial for a woman's product with women dancing (slim-fast, play-tex bras, and things like that), EVERY Nancy Meyers movie, Dancing with the Stars, So you Think You Can Dance, any other tv show or movie with dance in the title (note this does not include Breakin').

These are only the worst offenders. There are plenty more out there. I think that maybe my problem with most of these is that they undermine dance as an art-form. But it is probably more that they annoy me so bad. I feel like I am unable to put into words my contempt here. Also, on comedies, when there is dance, I think it typically displays a lack of creativity on behalf of the writers. There are exceptions to this, but rarely.

Some who have known me since anytime in my life will note that I dance for a variety of personal exaltations. I can't know where to stand on this. It is a nice outlet for my positive feelings, and it seems that many derive enjoyment from such displays, and to an extent I enjoy consequential ethics, but it also betrays my underlying desire to keep dumb things out of the world. Who knows.

PS- You are welcome to share one source of irritation with us as I just have. This is an open dang forum. Speaking of dang, my band name is Dang Nation now.

2 comments:

Trevor said...

Love the band name!!

I don't care if dancing in comedy displays lack of creativity because I still think it's dang hilarious--Hitch is one of my favs.

For my thing I hate so bad this week I will go with cars. I have been walking everywhere since we came to H-town and I really like it (notice I did not say love, so I have not used up my love for next week). I do waffle at the fact that I like to drive and I like being able to get places that are far away, but I hate how cars always make us in a big freakin hurry and have radios so we can never think. They also make smog, noise, and accidents, which are worse than the accidents my son has in his pants.

Ryan 1 said...

Clarification...Some car accidents are worse than the accidents Isaiah has in his pants. Others are not.