Mamma Mia!

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Until just a few hours ago, I'd had a very good day. They do these cool boat tours up in Sarasota (I say 'up' because I'm in Venice, south of Tampa, for the summer, rather than in college) where you get to see all kinds of bay area animals; dolphins, birds, fish and the like. It really made me appreciate Florida, since I often take living here for granted. It can be a fun state sometimes.

After that, I went to my aunt's condo and had pizza; Dominoes is hardly Claudio's or Ray's, but they're probably the best national pizza franchise at the very least. So that was good too.

Then, I saw Mamma Mia! (the movie) and my good day was ruined.

I'm not actually sure why I went to see it. I saw the touring production a few years ago and it was horrible. Maybe I was expecting this to be better? Maybe I just like seeing movies, and figured it couldn't be so bad that I wouldn't have a good time? Maybe I just missed Pierce Brosnan, since he isn't James Bond anymore?

In the end, who knows. The only thing I know for certain is that this is one of the worst pieces of trash to grace the silver screen in a very, very long time, and might be one of the worst movies in the history of cinema. (Think of it this way: I haven't reviewed something in how long? Months? This movie was so bad that I want to rip it to shreds more than I want to talk about the joys of New York City.)

I can't really pin the failure on any one thing because there was something wrong with everything. The casting, for instance was very strange. Meryl Streep, as my mother pointed out after the movie was over, is about twenty years too old for the part she played. Pierce Brosnan is a cool guy and a great actor, but he can't really sing, and it was painful to watch him try. I didn't care about Amanda Seyfried's Sophie (of course the part is quite shallow to begin with, so that's not entirely her fault). Everyone else was either just having fun or collecting a paycheck, but in the end, no one was truly emotionally invested in the film. Then again, the script is so terrible that I doubt anyone could be.

Ah, yes, the script. Of all the possible stories to weave around ABBA's numerous songs, why this one? The entirely depthless, Cinderella plot details valley girl wanna-be Sophie's quest to find out who her father is before her wedding to cliche'd dream-guy Sky (Dominic Cooper); her choices include Sam (Brosnan) and his comic-foil sidekicks Harry (Colin Firth) and Bill (Stellan Skarsgård). The incredibly predictable plot surpasses the so-bad-it's-good mark and just becomes bad all over again, which wouldn't be such a terrible thing if the cast (see above) had been, um, good.

The failings of this film, however, go far beyond the actors and the writing. Actually, my biggest issue was with Haris Zambarloukos' cinematography. I got more seasick watching Mamma Mia! than I did on the aforementioned boat tour. It seemed that every shot involved the camera spinning around, panning over, or doing some other incredibly distracting thing. Don't get me wrong-- Greece is a very beautiful place, but seeing it through Zambarloukos' vision was like watching it through the eyes of a stumbling drunkard.

Speaking of being drunk, the editors were on something when they were putting the movie together. The sloppy editing was a constant distraction, as if the camerwork and bad casting weren't distracting enough.

All right. Y'know what? I'm done with this. I don't have any more time to waste on this film. I'm gonna go do something more fun than think back on Mamma Mia!, like read the dictionary or paint my room with a toothbrush or something.

The Rundown
Cast: 1/10. There was one member of the ensemble who I thought was really funny. That was it.
Script: 0/10. It might've been of acceptable quality for, say, a Barbie direct-to-DVD film, but I can't imagine any other situation where that script would be considered good.
Cinematography: 0/10. Please, stop moving the camera! Just stop it!
Editing: 0/10. These guys didn't even care. Why should I?
Overall: .25/10. You probably won't even like it if you're an ABBA fan.

The American Cockroach

While I was in college, I didn't really have to deal with bugs. Oh, sure, we had ants, but they're not really a big deal; just clean up after yourself and they'll realize that your dorm isn't a good place to score food. Even if they do come around, squish one under your thumb and the others'll soon realize that sticking around isn't the best idea.

Since I've come home, however, I've been dealing with, for me, the absolute worst kind of bug: the American cockroach, sometimes known as the palmetto bug. "Palmetto bug" is kind of a pretty name, though, so I'll be referring to them as cockroaches or roaches for the remainder of this review; we don't pull any punches here at Reviews of Everything Ever.

So, as I was saying, I've come home to a sort of cockroach infestation. Since my first night back, I have seen something like six or seven roaches and killed three or four of them. The exterminator came, only to inform us that, though the poison he'd used will be killing the roaches slowly, they'll be "crawling up the walls" trying to escape. Lovely. My most recent cockroach encounter, however, did not involve any sort of wall-crawling, fortunately. It was hardly an hour ago, in the bathroom. The thing scuttled beneath the sink and I haven't looked for it since.

What, you might ask, is my problem with cockroaches? Well, I have a few of them, actually. One is quite simply that they're not supposed to be in my house. It's almost a territorial instinct, left over from some evolutionary tract: this is my space, and you, Mr. Cockroach, are invading it. And I realize that there are plenty of other things, especially in a Florida house, that can wind up intruding: lizards, spiders, and what have you. The problem with roaches is that they're so much bigger than those other things. According to Wikipedia (which, I know, isn't a scholarly resource, but I'm not in school anymore), they can "grow to a length of 1" to [one and a half inches]." And they seem so wide, too, thanks to their broad exoskeleton and wings. I bet a lizard could fit inside the space a roach occupies just fine.

Another problem I have with them is that they're here to take my stuff. Eating my food, taking shelter in my house, drinking my water, using my space to store their eggs (oh, by the way, a female roach can have up to freaking 150 baby roaches!), et cetera. I like to think that, when it comes to a lot of other animal 'intruders', they're just kinda here by accident, and would rather be outside, given the chance. Not the roach. They're here to stay, since they're apparently incapable of building their own little shelter to keep warm in.

Yet another reason why I don't like roaches is that they don't really do anything other than hang around in peoples' houses. Unless I'm mistaken, the American cockroach doesn't really have any natural predators (other than my dog, who has eaten one or two on occasion, which is disgusting but whatever) so they don't contribute to the food chain, and the females don't pollinate or anything. So the most that could be said for them is that they contribute to the world's biodiversity, but why do they have to be so invasive while they do it?

Finally, they're just really creepy. I can't even pinpoint exactly what it is about roaches that makes them so wierd. All I know is that my mind starts setting off alarm bells as soon as I see one of the things. Maybe it's because their movement speed seems disproportionate to their size. Maybe it's because their black coloration and the almost mechanical way their legs work makes them seem soulless and robotic. Maybe it's the antennae. Who knows? In the end, they're just something that I want to get away from as soon as I get a glimpse of them. And I've been getting far too many glimpses lately.

The Rundown
Attractiveness: 0/10. Eww! Eww! Get the heck away from me!
Usefulness: 0/10. They eat my food, they stay at my house... They're like uninvited relatives, except really creepy and annoying!
Fun: 0/10. I personally cannot imagine any situation involving a cockroach being labeled "fun."
Respect for My Privacy: 0/10. My bathroom?! Are you serious?
Overall: 0/10. Well, I guess Windows Vista's customer service will be glad something scored lower than they did.

EDIT: By the way, the picture is public domain, hence the lack of legal jargon on the side.

Microsoft's Windows Vista Customer Service Website and Policy

I'll be the first to admit that this post is as much a personal vendetta as it is a review. I am frustrated about this topic, and I feel that this website is the most adequate way to both vent to and inform my readers about the dangers of buying a computer with Windows Vista installed on it-- or, more specifically, perhaps, the dangers of not carefully reading fine print.

First of all, let me clear something up. Aside from a few problems that probably wouldn't bother the average computer-user, I generally like Windows Vista. In particular, I think the redesigned user interface is both aesthetically pleasing and more efficient than that of Windows XP, or any prior Windows UI for that matter. (Dating back to Windows 95, that is; that was the first time I personally had used anything other than DOS.) As long as you plan on buying and using current, mass-marketed software, you'll be perfectly happy with Vista.

However, as you'll have noticed if you read the large, bold print above this review, it is not Windows Vista itself that I am crusading against. It is Microsoft's incredibly lacking and generally idiotic customer service policy concerning Vista.

The problems I've had that require customer service have generally dealt with compatibility. As I said earlier, this won't be a problem at all as long as the software you're using is fairly current (and, therefore, probably designed with Vista in mind). I, however, have several older programs that I rely on that haven't worked so well on Vista, and have, therefore, had to contact (or attempt to contact, but I'll get to that later) Microsoft's customer service department several times.

Before I continue, let me say that I consider myself a decent composer (of music, that is). However, I have fairly limited knowledge of musical theory, and I therefore rely on a certain program (Anvil Studio, which is an excellent little gem of a program that you can find easily enough by using a search engine) in order to write whatever songs may pop into my head. Before I owned the computer I am currently using, I ran Anvil Studio on Windows XP with great success. When I got my new computer, one of the first things I did was install Anvil.

Unfortunately, however, the program didn't run so well. I'd manage to keep it open for around twenty seconds or so before it would freeze and subsequently crash my computer. Frustrated, I went to the Vista customer service site and initiated a chatroom conversation with one of the representatives. While I do not have a record of what was said, I distinctly remember that it was immediately suggested that I downgrade to Windows XP if I wanted to run the program. No matter how many times I spoke to the person, I was repeatedly referred to another department where they could instruct me on how to remove Vista from my computer.

I, however, had just paid for Vista. I didn't want to remove it, I wanted it to work. Therefore, I instead contacted the support people over at the Anvil Studio website. They fixed my problem in a quick and expedient manner, and, while Anvil still doesn't run as well on Vista, it no longer crashes.

Unfortunately, I'm afraid that that was merely the first in a string of apparently unresolvable compatibility problems I've since encountered-- once again, all with rather dated software, mind you. It is, however, the most recent issue that has vexed me the most, and which was the catalyst that led to me writing what I write now.

I do not just write music for the sake of writing it. I also consider myself an amateur computer game designer, although I'm not nearly as skilled in that as I am in music composition. (Incidentally, it is worth noting here that all the songs I write are in midi format; that is, all the sound is generated from the computer's sound card.) I often use the songs I write in the games I create; I find it more convenient than having to obtain permission from someone else.

Ever since switching to Vista, I've noticed that my games have occasionally been plagued by severe slowdown that gradually fades away the more I play. Initially, I assumed that it was the software I used to create the games, but I eventually discovered a connection between the complexity of the midi I was using and the slowdown affecting the games. (In other words, the more complicated the song, the worse the game would perform.)

Figuring that the problem had to do with my computer's ability to play the songs rather than the game-making software, I decided to check and see whether or not other people were suffering from the same issue. It didn't take too much forum-scanning to realize that anyone who worked with midi music on Vista seemed to be having similar troubles; apparently, the technical lingo for it is 'clock drift', though I'm still not precisely sure what that means.

At any rate, with some additional searching, I managed to find the source of my woes. Apparently, "[t]his problem occurs because the Dmusic.sys file was removed in Windows Vista." (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/943253; italics mine.) The webpage goes on to say, essentially, that Dmusic.sys is basically integral to properly playing back midis, and that when it was removed, they didn't add a replacement. Why they removed said file is beyond me.

Fortunately, however, the support site also provided a hotfix. Unfortunately, when I installed said hotfix, it didn't actually do anything, near as I can tell. So I decided to go back to the support page, intent on sending an e-mail requesting an explanation-- after all, I could've somehow installed it wrong.

I never did find out whether or not it was my fault.

Why, you might ask?

As it turns out, I only recieve "no-charge support" for the first ninety days after I've bought my computer. After that, any phone call, e-mail, or chat with a customer service rep I have costs me.

How much, you might also ask?

$59.00, "plus total applicable taxes per support request." (http://support.microsoft.com/oas/default.aspx?ln=en-us&prid=10295&gprid=436647.)

Maybe you didn't quite let that sink in; I'll say it again:

It costs me $59 to ask Microsoft a question.

A question.

I found that to be a little absurd, personally.

So absurd, in fact, that I spent the next few hours researching different possible versions of Linux to install on this computer instead of Vista, just to see whether or not their support website was any better than Microsoft's.

Once again, let me reiterate: I still generally like Windows Vista as an OS. I think it has a lot of potential. That said, I would not reccomend tht you buy it unless you absolutely have to until they work out all the bugs. If you do wind up having to buy it, make sure you report even the smallest complaints to customer service.

If you don't, it'll come back to haunt you.

The Rundown
Ease of Use: 1/10. It took far too long to find the hotfix I'd been looking for. In fact, it took far too long to find just about everything I've ever looked for on Microsoft's support website.
Confidence: 0/10. If the support reps aren't confident enough to reccomend sticking with their own product, why should I?
Cost: 0/10. Simple support via e-mail should be free. I doubt Bill Gates is hard-up for money.
Effectiveness: 0/10. The one thing they sent me to fix my problem didn't even work.
Overall: .25/10. Congratulations! This support service has just become my lowest-scoring review so far!