The Morning After

"...came in from a rainy Thursday on the Avenue, thought I heard you talking softly. I turned on the lights, the tv, and the radio; still, I can't escape the ghost of you. What is happening to it all? Crazy, some say. Where is the life that I recognize...." --Ordinary World, Duran Duran

It appears that everything that was scheduled has been cancelled. All classes were dismissed. There are lists of streets that are closed, and places I dare not tread. After being woken from a very pleasant slumber to the phones in the house ringing constantly with Purple Alerts from NSU that campuses are closed and classes will not commence, I had two cups of coffee before peeing out the kidney stone. I took pictures, named it, sent out a birth announcement, and I was surprised that I didn't feel any tremendous pain, just a feeling that something was stuck in my tract before it shot out into the toilet. What's funny is I started to hurt after, and I still have a strange, slightly dull pain in my pelvic region. Photographs are forthcoming, to match those already posted for review on Facebook.

I completed two hours' worth of work on the Activities Binder, and I finished the small list of goals I was hoping to cross off my list before the week is over. There is still a rather large pile of shirts and pants that desperately need to meet the iron, and the porcelain veneers lacquered over the bathroom appear to be developing a biofilm that needs to meet the bleach. I have only one pressing t0-do that's about to pull me out of the warm comfort of my bedroom, and then I'm back home to do the Microbiology shuffle and work on the upcoming quizzes and exam. I also have an Anatomy Lab exam to prep for and take sometime in the next few hours.

I thought I'd take a few moments early this afternoon, the day before Halloween, to post the next in my list of my personal horror top ten. Let's see... we're up to number four now, aren't we?

4. Jacob's Ladder (1990, Directed by Adrian Lyne)

There is something that is seen in war, something that is so horrible and permanently debilitating to those who have been subjected to its wrath never seem to really get over it. It seems as if veterans are changed forever by the experience. My father was definitely scarred from what he saw during the Vietnam Conflict to such a point that he rarely discussed that period of his life, and if it was brought up, very little was said. I remember his very loud, very vivid nightmares waking us all up well into my adolescence, and I never had the chance to actually sit down with him to discuss what it was all about.

This movie is terrifying on so many levels. In fact, there are two scenes that are permanently burned into my memory. The scene of Jacob and Jezzie dancing in the nightclub and the bizarre morphing that begins to occur in the startling strobe light is one I'll never be able to forget. What is she dancing with? Wait... is that her? What in the hell is that? The other is the scene of everyone trying to get Jacob's fever down as they pour him into a cold bathtub and begin throwing ice all over him to try to lower his body temperature. Every time I've been sick and run a fever since seeing this movie, I always revert back to the memory of that scene. Lyne does a fine job of mixing reality with the surreal and is able to effectively deliver a story with something of an intense political message at the same time.

Also recommended: John Frankenheimer's The Manchurian Candidate and Michael Cimino's The Deer Hunter - One could argue that neither is typically classified as a "horror" film. One would have to watch both films and judge that ideology for themselves.