One Pissed Off Veteran

It was exactly ten years ago today that I published my very first post on this blog, a blog that I wondered at the time if I could even carry on for six months without running out of stuff to wri...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/06/ten-years-down-i-quit.html

If by some odd chance you have not already seen Rob Zombie 's "two-film trilogy" of cult=classic exploitation horror movies, starting with 2003's House of 1,000 Corpses and ending with its 2005 ...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/06/monday-music-break-free-bird.html

One thing that has nagged at me for the last 50+ years is the "Hidell Draft Card " that was allegedly found in the possession of Lee Harvey Oswald, which neatly tied him into the receipt of the M...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/06/jfk-assassination-hidell-draft-card.html

Regular readers know that I am fascinated -- maybe obsessed is a better word -- by the assassination of John F. Kennedy. I just stumbled on a fairly reasoned analysis on a site called Stratfor...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/06/more-on-kennedy-assassination.html

OZYMANDIAS by Percy B. Shelley > I met a traveller from an antique land > Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone > Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/06/saturday-poetry-slam-ozymandias.html

My brother-in-law was here from Hawaii all week and he goes like a bat outta hell. He doesn't have anything but high gear. So I am exhausted from running around after him. It's not fair -- he's a...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/06/what-week.html

This week I am proud to present 1978's Rockers , a semi-documentary look at the old-school Jamaican roots reggae culture. Trailer: This film, loosely based on that masterpiece of Italian neo-r...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/06/must-see-cinema-rockers-1978.html

Here's Bruce Springsteen with Born in the USA from 1984: But really, the big question is this: Are politicians, especially Republicans who seem to have carved out their own patriotic niche just...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/06/monday-music-break-born-in-usa.html

I'll be taking a break for a week. My brother-in-law (i.e., the famous IBIL ) is in town and will want for a lot of attention and hand holding. I'll still post the ones that are in the system, so...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/taking-break.html

The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) (also his second appearance here) >     Turning and turning in the widening gyre >     The falcon cannot hear the falc...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/saturday-poetry-slam-second-coming.html

Seriously... This used to be a joke, but now the Rethugs have come up with a plan to pay for the Trade Adjustment Act benefits available to people whose jobs have been lost and offshored due to...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/keep-your-goddam-gummit-hands-off-my.html

I am happy to present  the Orson Welles 1958 masterpiece, Touch of Evil . This movie is widely considered to one of the last -- and best -- examples of Hollywood's classic film noir era. Tra...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/must-see-cinema-touch-of-evil-1958.html

Now that we've exhausted (in more ways than one -- see Maniac from two weeks ago) the 1930s, it's time to move on to the 1940s. This week's feature is Devil's Harvest from 1942: Full movie:...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/exploitation-movies-devils-harvest-1942.html

In memorium on this Memorial Day, I raise a salute to the men and boys from Cowlitz County, Washington, who lost their lives during the War in Vietnam. You can read all 27 names here , especial...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/in-memorium-on-memorial-day.html

Here's a special Memorial Day music break, the moving and haunting Where Have All the Flowers Gone? written (mostly) and performed by the late great Pete Seeger .

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/special-memorial-day-monday-music-break.html

SAILING TO BYZANTIUM by William Butler Yeats . 1928 THAT is no country for old men. The young In one another's arms, birds in the trees - Those dying generations - at their song, The salmon-fall...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/saturday-poetry-slam-sailing-to.html

This week's must-see cinema is a fairly new one, Rosewater from 2014, directed by The Daily Show's Jon Stewart in his directorial debut. Trailer: This is a terrific movie, especially the psych...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/must-see-cinema-rosewater-2014.html

For those of you who think that I don't listen to any music from this century, here's the terrific group Pink Martini with City of Night: If you ignore the kind of amateurish wipes and transit...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/monday-music-break-city-of-night.html

DULCE ET DECORUM EST by Wilfred Owen. , 1893 - 1918 > Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, >  Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge, >  Till on the...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/poetry-slam-saturday-dulce-et-decorum.html

I've used this joke hundred times to illustrate pure chutzpah: A guy murders both of his parents and then pleads for leniency because he is an orphan. And that's kind of what we have with fullt...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/please-judge-i-am-orphan.html

It's a concept that is almost gone from common English, but there used to be nouns in our vocabulary that described collections or groups of birds, animals, even humans. Some of them were pretty ...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/a-jam-of-tarts-assay-of-trollopes.html

I note that the latest Pew Research poll holds that "56 million Americans now identify themselves as agnostic, atheist or 'nothing in particular.'” We are called "nones", for "religious prefer...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/rise-of-nones.html

Although it didn't originate in the United States, the chain gang became an almost uniquely American feature of "justice" after the Civil War. When it was finally clear that The South didn't hav...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/must-see-cinema-american-chain-gang-1999.html

Now that Liberia has its Worst Disease in the History of the World, i.e., ebola, under control, what will the fuckers at Faux News find to worry about? What, no Obamapocalypse ? It wasn't that...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/a-perfectly-good-threat-wasted.html

The 1930s produced a cornucopia of grindhouse exploitation films (aka "sexploitation" movies), usually disguised as "educational" movies that were ostensible cautionary tales about one social pr...

http://opovet.blogspot.com/2015/05/exploitation-movies-maniac-1934.html