It doesn’t feel like a milestone birthday. I’ve always been forty, spiritually — jaded, cynical, charmingly embittered — though I hasten to add that I’ve also always regarded myself as a bruised optimist.
So, yeah, big birthday. Not doing anything particularly special for it. Might get a new cell phone. Haven’t really decided.
Here’s the thing about my birthday, though: It inevitably falls in the days before the press screenings really explode, signifying that my life is about to be put in a box for a month as I descend into the busiest period of my work year. (Cannes may be madness, but it’s over in less than two weeks.)
Don’t feel sorry for me or anything; I love what I do, and the annual pre-TIFF dread will give way to the thrills of discovery and social interaction once I see my first really great movie. This is just the way things go at first. Which is another reason I don’t get too excited on my birthday.
However, I can use the fact that I’m boldly moving into a new demographic by looking backward in my latest Sympatico/MSN movie column — a gallery of unnecessary adaptations, remakes and sequels that serve to crush our collective childhood memories.
Feel free to point out anything I might have missed. I’m sure I did; those senior moments are a bitch, you know.
So…I guess this means you finally got around to seeing the new “Indy”. Not overly impressed I take it…
Happy Birthday anyway…
I guess you were just a few years too old for the Transformers to be an essential part of your childhood.
People say that George Lucas ruined their childhoods with the Star Wars prequels. Well, Michael Bay raped and murdered mine, then dismembered the corpse, pissed all over it, and set it on fire.
Happy birthday. Welcome to your forties. I hate to tell you, though, that it’s not your mind that determines your “fortyness”, but the alarming way your body starts to fall apart. I forget who said it (middle-age moment) but be kind to your knees, you’ll miss them when they’re gone.
Happy Birthday Norman. Call me your newest fan. I am a big movie and baseball geek. Mike has entertained me well over the years on the baseball side, I am sure you’ll do the same with your movie reviews.
40 eh? I think you’ve one decade of ‘youth’ left in ya before wrinkles, regular doctor visits and a special kind of pill(they say it’s blue)will take over. Have a blast.:)
Happy Birthday! 40 is the new 30, blah blah.