The Luna Park Gazette

Now that was one serious game of kick the can. In the climactic gun battle of Johnnie To’s 2006 gangster flick Exiled , a can of Red Bull is kicked high up into the air while about a dozen characters pull out guns and start shooting each other. That bit of product placement hasn’t inspired me to buy this particular energy drink, but the film, which I rented from Netflix, has changed my attitude toward movie gun fights. I’m fed up with them. This may sound strange coming from me, since I’ve always enjoyed good action movies. Put on an exciting, intelligent crime film, western, or adventure movie and I’ll gladly pull up a seat. Obviously, I’m concerned about the epidemic of mass shootings that’s drowning this country in blood. But, to mangle a phrase from my dear friends at the NRA, movies don’t kill people, guns kill people. I’ve had a particular fondness for spaghetti westerns and Hong Kong actions films like John Woo’s The Killer . The gun battles are brilliantly choreograp...

How did I ever survive the rotary phone? Was there really time when I put my index finger in a hole, dragged the wheel around seven times before I reached the party to whom I was speaking? And did I actually use typewriters for many years—along with Liquid Paper and White Out? And how did I ever get by without a DVR and only a handful of TV channels? I also remember when people smoked on airplanes—actually they smoked just about anywhere they wanted. These and other pressing issues rolled through my head the other night after I attended a Meetup event in Manhattan. I’m trying to keep that New Year’s resolution about getting out more so I signed up for a group that sounded pretty cool and had a nice time. I figured I’d be the oldest in the room, which is something I’m getting used to, but I did run into one other guy who seemed to be in my age bracket. We were sitting at a table with a young man and this geezer kept up bringing up all the ancient equipment from my childhood. ...

I don’t like this. The thought came to me this morning while I was washing the dishes. My mind had been slogging through some negative territory—I honestly forget now what the hell was bugging me—and I suddenly realized just how uncomfortable I was feeling. I didn’t like this state of mind and I told myself exactly that: I don’t like this. It sounds like something a two-year-old says when you try to feed him vegetables. Four simple words, but they were enough to get me into the present moment and away from the hostile path I had chosen. I believe this awareness is largely due to my meditation practice. I had a particularly relaxing experience this morning and I’m slowly seeing that peace of mind is more enjoyable than the internal turmoil I typically inflict upon myself. The holidays are officially over and now the work on those New Year’s resolutions gets real. I want to be more positive, so I’m monitoring my thoughts more carefully because the bad intentions have a way of ...

So, can event be an absolute bust and a smashing success all at the same time? This may sound like the Kobayashi Maru training exercise from The Wrath of Khan , but I’m here to tell you that the answer to this musical question is yes, yes, and hell, yes. I really want to socialize more in this new year, which, admittedly, is a promise that I make every January 1 when the horn blows at midnight. This year, though, my various vows are being fortified by a pact I made with my sister where we promised to help each other keep our 2019 resolutions in a kind of Mutual Yenta Agreement. I have to confess I’ve suffering from New Year’s Resolution Syndrome, a sense of creeping panic that comes over me when I see that I’m not accomplishing every single thing I said I would in the first three days of the year. It’s ridiculous, of course, but I reckon it’s a requirement of the resolution ritual. Whenever I get the heebie jeebies my shoulders tend to tighten and bunch up somewhere north of...