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As we welcome 2009, aren't you excited to have lived through the excitement and history that was 2008?
Just think; in 2008 we saw gasoline prices hit record-breaking highs here in the United States. People started dumping their gas-hog vehicles in droves, while the auto-makers boasted about their high-mileage vehicles that didn't go as far on a gallon of gasoline as cars did eight years ago. For at least a little while, those guys with the huge, honkin' four-wheel drive trucks that acted like my modest, four-cylinder truck was something to laugh at, weren't laughing when they were watching hundred-dollar bills evaporate every time they filled the tanks.
Then, just to prove that fate has an evil sense of humor, once all those guys traded in their macho monster trucks, gas prices dropped to the lowest they've been in five years. Literally. One thing I inherited from my Dad was a nearly obsessive compulsion to record gas purchases. Whenever I buy gas for my truck, I write down the odometer reading, the gallons purchased, the total cost, and the cost per gallon. The last time gasoline was this low was in December 2003. So now, when I'm filling up my truck, and across the island is some guy in the underpowered fuel-sipper that screams, "My wife thinks I'm finally growing up and being fiscally and environmentally responsible and I hate my life now," I'm still enjoying my truck.
This past year, American voters, for the first time, elected someone who isn't an old white guy to the office of the Presidency. Heck, either way the election might have gone, we would have seen history happen. We could have made history by electing the old white guy with the first woman Vice President. Instead, we elected the young black guy for President with the old white guy for Vice President.
It was also the first time that I can ever recall that the media complained that the President-elect took his shirt off while on holiday. I'm still not sure if previous President-elects or Presidents didn't take their shirts off, or whether the media just looked away because all the previous men in the office were so old and pasty-white they had to look away when they took their shirts off.
Then again, it might have just been a really slow news day, and some old white guy media moguls were jealous that Barack Obama looked better shirtless on the beach in Hawaii than they did. Who knows? Granted, John McCain might have looked better shirtless on the beach than those old media moguls do, but since they control the news, we're not going to hear about that, are we?
The Star Wars franchise broke new ground in 2008 with the animated "Clone Wars" movie and television series, proving that Lucas Films could give us characters even more two-dimensional than Jar-jar Binks. I haven't watched more than about fifteen minutes of the new series, but from what I saw, if I were a powerful Jedi being given such lousy scripts as are being produced for this show, I'd turn to the Dark Side and wipe out screenwriters instead of Jedi knights.
We were also treated to a true "blockbuster" movie based on a comic book series, as "Dark Knight" skyrocketed up the box office charts to land a solid #2 spot behind "Titanic". While it could be argued that Heath Ledger's untimely death was a publicity boon to the film, audiences agreed that his performance as the Joker was one of the most convincing portrayals of a sociopathic comic book villain ever presented. Jack Nicholson was manic and entertaining as the Joker in the earlier Batman movie; Heath Ledger was disturbing and frightening, and provided a believable threat to the gadgeteer hero. He also inspired more costumes at Comic Con 2008 than any other single character, and you could hardly swing a dead bat on the convention floor without hitting at least two people dressed as the Joker. Granted, the same would have been true if you'd been swinging a live bat, but if there is much weirder than swinging a dead bat, I think it would be swinging a live one. Those little suckers can inflict a nasty bite if you annoy them enough.
I don't want to disparage Nicholson's abilities as an actor, though, since I suspect he played the Joker pretty much the way it was written for him to play. However, I do think his talents were far better displayed with last January's "The Bucket List", where Nicholson's chaotic traits played so well against Morgan Freeman's contemplative character. There were a lot of things about that movie that the critics downplayed, but overall, it was one of my favorite for the year because of how well the two men played off each other.
On a personal level, the year drew towards a close with the sadness of my Dad's passing of cancer. Other folks claimed by cancer this year included best-selling author Michael Crichton, Oscar-winning director Sydney Pollack, special effects guru Stan Winston, former White House spokesman Tony Snow, baseball player Bobby Murcer, Pink Floyd musician Richard Wright, actor Paul Newman, singer/actress Eartha Kitt, and more names and faces than we have time to list. If you need an idea for a New Year's resolution, may I suggest helping to support cancer research? Directly or indirectly, cancer touches all of our lives.
Lest I end this column on a sad note, though, I finished up this year by enjoying a father/daughter project with AJ. She and I worked together installing a new door in their game room (her husband had to work, so he had to miss the fun). Maybe it sounds strange, but it was actually fun sawing a hole in the wall and framing up the new door together. If you need another suggestion for a New Year's resolution, consider resolving to spend more time with your kids or your parents or both.
May your New Year be filled with love and happiness, and may you look forward to the promise of history in the making through 2009.
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