Author Archives: Doc

Making it Pro

Posted on by

Making it Pro

By Scarful

Hello there you should read my story. It’s about my life. I really recommend it.My name is Tanner Rock. I am a 15 year old male. My dreams are to make it pro in the NBA but I’m not very good at basketball. I recently moved to Nevada with my mom. My dad passed away when I was younger. And I wanted to make him proud and make my dream come true. But my mom is living in rough conditions. We moved so my mom could get a better job. 

On the first day of school I met a really nice kid. His name is Oliver. His dreams were also to make it pro in the NBA. But he was 10x better than me. And he said he could give me some pointers on my ball handling and shooting. After school he gave me his number to text him. I  went to his house later in the day to practice my basketball skills. We practiced for around

2 hours and his mom said,

 “Hey do you wanna stay over and have some dinner?”.

 After I ate I walked home. It wasn’t a very far walk to my house. When I arrived home I told my mom what I had done at Oliver’s house. She was really happy that I made a friend. At my old school I didn’t have that many friends. Oliver and I tried out for the high school team. We both made the team.

After my freshman year I didn’t start that much and I still wasn’t a shooter, I was more of a passer. I only scored around 30 points the whole season. But my sophomore year I scored a lot more points than I did the year before. I was averaging 19.3 points a game. My junior year I was on varsity so I didn’t play a whole bunch but I was still averaging 17.6 points a game. But my friend Oliver was doing very well; he was averaging 25.0 points a game. And in our senior year I was averaging 26.1 points a game. My last game there was a college scout and this was my chance to make a college team. I was playing really well; this game I had 23 points in the 3rd quarter and I finished out the game with 36 points. And the college scout came up to me and we were talking for a while. I made the Iowa Hawkeyes.

Oliver on the other hand he did make a college team, but he’s on the Iowa State Cyclones. We both did pretty well; our freshman year he averaged 22.4 points a game and I averaged 23.2 points a game. And through the rest of my college years I decided to go in the NBA draft.I didn’t get drafted till the 5th round. I got on the Houston Rockets.

And so did my friend Oliver. We finally got reunited. I got the starting center position at 6’8 and my friend Oliver got the starting point guard position. He’s only 6’3 but he can do everything he can drive down hill. He can shoot three pointers really well. And he’s the best at his mid range shots. We were 24 games into the season and we were doing good.

Then Oliver tore his ACL. He was out for the season and the thing that sucks is it was his rookie season. He was on pace to get rookie of the year. He was averaging 22.3 points a game more than any rookie this season. I’m only averaging 19.8 points but I was averaging 6.4 rebounds and 6.1 assists. The very next game after Oliver got injured he got my first triple double. I had 16 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists. When we were getting to the end of the season. I actually got rookie of the year with averaging 23.1 points, 8.2 rebounds and 9.0 assists. 

The thing I was the best at was tip offs. I won almost all of my tip offs besides one and I only lost because I slipped when I jumped. After the season me and Oliver would train every day with our private trainer. When the next season arrived, me and Oliver both got 21 points in our first game of the season. 

Week 8 of the season we had to go against the boston celtics they were 7-0 and we were 5-2 not off to a bad start but we didn’t have the best start to the game we were down 10 points at the end of the first quader. The score was 29 to 19. I had 3 of those points with a lay up and 0ne made free throw but Olliver didn’t have any points so he was really discouraged but when we were on the bench I had to give him a little speech so he didn’t feel down on himself. 

After that when we went in halfway through the second i gave it to Oliver on the give and go and he got his first points. After that he got hyped up and got 10 points after and at halftime the score was 56-55 we were up by 1 point. During halftime our coach gave us a pep talk. I only had 7 points so I was kind of mad. But after half i got 14 points in 4 minutes. I had 21 points going into the 4th. We were up by 5 points with 2 minutes left in the game. Then they got a lay up and a three pointer with 20 seconds left and it was 120 to 120 and then they got a layup in 5 seconds so we had 15 seconds to either get a three pointer or a layup and we gave it to Oliver then he gave it to me in the post and i passed it to Oliver in the corner for a three and he MADE IT!!! To win the game. The only team to beat the Boston Celtics was us so far. 

  At the end of the last game of the regular season I had 45 points, the most I’ve ever scored. In the off season I was working out with Oliver and I was doing squats and I tore my quad. But luckily it was right after the season was over. So I had enough time to heal. It’s gonna take around a month for my quad to heal. After the offseason was over I was all healed up and ready for my 3rd season. On the first game of the season I jumped up for a rebound and got injured. After the game I went to the hospital and I found out from the doctor that I won’t be able to play for the rest of the season. And Oliver was having the best season of his career. 48 games into the season he was averaging 25.6 points a game. After the season they ended up 72-12 and won the championship. But gladly I got a ring. 

My 4th season on my first game I didn’t do any good. I was still a little hurt from the previous season. I had 0 points in my first game. And I didn’t get too many in the first 10 games. So the Houston Rockets decided to trade me. They traded me to the pistons. I wasn’t a starter for the Pistons and barely got any playing time. And when I got in the game I wasn’t doing anything. Then the Pistons traded me the next season. Then every team that traded for me would trade me a season later then my last shot to prove I’m still good. The last game of the season I was playing for the Lakers and I got injured again. I knew my career was most likely over. And I got cut a week later and no team wanted to pick me up so I had to retire early. And Oliver went on to win 5 more championship games and be known as the GOAT.  

65 Roses (2019)

Posted on by

January 17

With time tight on a Friday, I found another documentary short film to watch this morning. This one I found on a website called Shortverse and it was from 2019. The title of the film was 65 Roses.

65 Roses is a symbol adopted by the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation for their organization. It is based on a story of a kid who could not pronounce the name of his disease and would call it 65 Roses.

This doc featured a 14-year old girl named Yllka Leti, who lived in Prishtina, Kosovo and she had cystic fibrosis. The doc looked at the things she had to do to manage her illness and her positive attitude overall about everything. She was very uch like a 14-year old girl who had to learn about and deal with this insidious illness.

The film spoke about how she would paint and sell her paintings to help fund the medicine that she needed to take. I wish there was more about this aspect of Yllka’s life in the doc. I would have liked to have seen more of the creative flow that the young girl had because selling paintings is not an easy thing to do and if she was able to do it to a significance of helping the costs of her medicine, that is an inspirational story. All of this is here, it just was not the main focus of the doc.

I have not had much experience with the illness of cystic fibrosis. The only exposure I had to it was the character of Emma on Bates Motel, who did have cystic fibrosis. Docs like this help to provide important information to help those of use who may not know as much as we should.

Shortverse had a ton of short docs available to watch, with a variety of topics for just about anything.

Bigfoot: Fear in the Woods (2020)

Posted on by

January 16

There are a ton of documentaries about the existence of or lack thereof of the legendary creature known as Bigfoot. I have seen several docs on the topic. Being a Bigfoot aficionado, I enjoy the docs and shows of the creature. So this Genre-ary, I found a doc on HBO MAX called Bigfoot: Fear in the Woods, a part of a doc series called Shock Docs, and I wanted to put it on the list.

I do believe in the existence of Bigfoot, but there are some way out there theories about the cryptid. Some of those theories were given some mention on this doc, but, the ideas that were more odd were not given much depth. The idea that Bigfoot is an alien from outer space or were violent cannibalistic animals that live in caves beneath the earth’s surface is mentioned, but there is not a ton of details presented to support such bizarre ideas.

However, there are some cool things in the doc that are much more possible. I did enjoy the discussion on the first plaster casts that were made in Bluff Creek, California by a man named Ray Wallace. Some of this section was a fascinating piece of this documentary.

Even more intriguing was the information about 300 elongated skulls that had been discovered in a grave in Paracus, Peru in 1928. It was initially believed that the skulls came from tribal head binding, but the absence of the sagittal suture, “a dense, fibrous connective tissue joint between the two parietal bones of the skull.” (Wikipedia), have made some wonder what the true nature of these skulls were. This whole section about the Peru skulls was very interesting and made some sense.

Of course, I do not know what the doc may have left out, detail wise, in order to make their narrative fit. Still, this was a neat concept that I had not heard of before.

In the end, this doc did not provide anything startlingly new or mind blowing, but it did keep the concept of Bigfoot alive and well, even if there is no true evidence that such a creature ever existed.

Goosebumps: The Vanishing S1 E3

Posted on by

Spoilers

“The Haunted Car”

I watched the third episode of Goosebumps: The Vanishing series on Disney +. I will admit that I did not like this one anywhere near the first couple. Still, this was entertaining enough and still does have moments that I really enjoyed.

I was not a fan of the whole haunted car bit during this episode and the character of Alex has not been the one that I have embraced at this point. Since this was a major part of the episode, that pulled down the episode itself.

Everything with David Schwimmer as Anthony and Sam McCarthy as Devin with the mysterious plant/animal creature and the vines was great. I do wish that they would just talk to each other. That is a horror film trope that I wish would not be here in this series. Hopefully, it will not be too many episodes because if they get together, they may be able to have more success than they are having separately.

Trey is back. Not a fan of this character, but I was not supposed to love him. He seems like he has been through it and Anthony’s discovery of and caring of the boy when he did showed a strong side to Anthony. It will probably lead to them bonding at some point.

So while I still liked this episode, it is definitely my least favorite of the season so far. I hope it continues to elevate the Anthony story since the haunted car took a header into the water.

EYG Favorite Comic Covers of the Week

Posted on by

January 15

Another week where I do not have the complete books to choose from as the books coming from Diamond did not arrive because of a snowstorm in the Memphis area. That meant that there would be no Marvel or many of the smaller companies. However, the big news of the week was Diamond declaring bankruptcy, throwing everything into question about how the comics are dispersed moving forward. There are huge questions facing the industry now.

Yet, I do have several books this week (and some from last week too) and I have enough for three medalists once again. And all three are Cover A’s.

Bronze Medalist

Juvenile #2

Cover art by Jesus Orellana

Another cover similar to the first issue, with the falling drugs and more around the character’s face. The white background is again a personal favorite.

Silver Medalist

Challengers of the Unknown #2

Cover art by Sean Izaakse & Romulo Fajaroo

The Challengers under water and the blue is beautiful. Oh, and there is Batman.

Gold Medalist

Knights vs. Samurai #4

Cover art by Gianenrico Bonacorsi & Bjorn Barends

A beautifully brutal cover with what looks like someone coming out from the inside of a dragon, along with some intestines and a skull. This one really stands out and shows how some horror can be lovely.

The Rocket on the Roof (2016)

Posted on by

January 15

It is Wednesday, which is always one of the busiest days of the week for me (NEW COMIC BOOK DAY) and so with the Genre-ary, it is time for another documentary short. I found this one on YouTube entitled The Rocket on the Roof and it was wild.

A doc crew investigates a rocket that is on the roof of a building that no one seems to know or care about. It is a large red rocket with USA on it, and the questions about how it got there or why it is there abound.

Thing is, our lead face of the doc, Wesley, is anything but outgoing. He would seem to be quite timid at times and has not been able to overcome his own fears and uncertainties to try and answer the nagging questions about the rocket.

When Wesley comes across the former manager of the building, Harry, things seem to take a weird turn. The manager had his own suspicions about the rocket and felt like a very sketchy individual.

The meeting with Harry was the incentive for Wesley to climb the fire escape and finally get a close up view of the rocket.

The doc’s theme of unanswered questions and the challenges of human nature speak through clearly in this doc short. It is just over thirteen minutes long, but it is a fun, crazy ride. The end may feel like a letdown, but I do think that is part of the point.

Skeleton Crew S1 E8

Posted on by

Spoilers

“The Real Good Guys”

Skeleton Crew came to a rip-roaring conclusion with the eighth episode of the first season that saw a big time happy ending and some very stressful moments.

Skeleton Crew has been a joy all season long, and the last few episodes have been filled with action and tense drama. Jod showed his true stripes and took up the mantel of the real villain of this season. Jude Law was sensational in this role, creating a real horrendous human being while still being charming and enthralling enough to wish he would make the right decisions. His past was driving him to this grand theft attempt and, for me, his actions were irredeemable, but when everything was obviously over, he threw aside his blaster.

What a great episode for Wim, who had been having so many troubles all season long. He had his dreams shaken by the realities of the galaxy, but he never completely gave up his hope. Wim was an absolute standout in this episode and the image of Wim standing with the lightsaber was epic.

It was nice when Wim’s father finally began listening to him. The parents played a huge piece in the story with Wim and Fern.

Our young heroes truly stepped it up. KB was awesome as she was able to pilot the Onyx Cinder back up past the barrier to get a message to Khym to send help… it the form of X-Wing fighters.

Oh, and by the way… was that Luke Skywalker????

I never once believed that KB had crashed the Onyx Cinder and had died though. That beat of the story was clearly not in the cards.

I am a little underwhelmed with the final few moments. I wanted more and I needed to know what the kids were going to do, what Jod was going to do etc. I needed more falling action after the huge climax. That is a minor complaint, but I just wanted to know what was next for these characters that have been such a wonderful group for the past eight episodes.

Skeleton Crew delivered some exceptional Goonies in Star Wars action and was one of the best Star Wars Disney + shows, right up their with Andor.

Goosebumps: The Vanishing S1 E1, E2

Posted on by

Spoilers

“Stay Out of the Basement Part I”

“Stay Out of the Basement Part II”

I was not that interested in the new Goosebumps series on Disney +. I had watched the previous one a couple of years ago, and I liked it enough, but it did not blow me away. It was clear that this was going to be a new cast in what appeared to be an anthology type show starring David Schwimmer of friends fame. I had a moment to watch episode one Sunday night so I gave it a shot.

Holy cow! I was knocked over with the show. I was able to watch episode two tonight and things only got creepier as the show seemed to go full Audrey II.

I loved these first two episodes. I was completely invested with the new characters and the new scary story.

It kicked off with a flashback to a group of kids who disappeared and were assumed to be dead years before. One of those kids turned out to be the brother of David Schwimmer’s character, Anthony. It is a family mystery that is still very relevant for them.

Anthony’s twin children, Devin and Cece, came to visit him for the summer, kicking off plenty of weirdness and wild encounters. Devin has had several issues immediately, trying to impress an old friend/flame, Frankie. She was dating Trey, a real jerk of a guy who lived across the street from Anthony’s place and kept parking his car in his driveway. It was a deal he had made with Anthony’s mom while she was there. Unfortunately, she has been taken to a home with dementia.

The family element was stronger than I expected with the actors involved playing things deeper than a show like this would normal have. Schwimmer was excellent with the sadness and the confusion on how to deal with the problems he is facing.

Anthony is a botanist and that leads him to find a spore (or so he thought) on his brother’s clothes, which had just now been released by the police. That spore turned out to be an animal and a carnivore. So Anthony did his best Seymour Krelborn imitation and started feeding it dead mice from the pet store. Guess what… it started growing. Feed Me Seymour.

Trey gets eaten too… or transformed… or something.

All of the episodes are currently on Disney +, but I do not have the time to binge the rest. Maybe some time in the next week I will get to the remainder of this show, and I am excited because I really liked the first couple.

Have You Seen Andy? (2007)

Posted on by

January 14

Today’s documentary in the 2025 Genre-ary was a tough one to watch.

According to IMDB, “”Have You Seen Andy?” is the personal story of a childhood friendship abruptly ended by the tragic abduction of a young boy. On a hot summer day in August 1976, ten year-old Andy Puglisi was playing along with dozens of other children at the Higgins Memorial Pool in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Then suddenly, he disappeared. Twenty-two years later, filmmaker Melanie Perkins, Andy’s childhood friend, begins her search for answers in this feature-length documentary.”

For someone who has spent most of his adult life working with kids, this doc about the missing 10-year old boy dealt with the possibility that he was taken by and killed by a pedophile who had been stalking kids for some time. Using a story of needing help finding his missing dog, Wayne Chapman would be the predator that the doc’s filmmaker, Melanie Perkins believed was at fault.

Shocking events that seemed to occur all helped prevent this case to be solved. The story of a bloody sock that was found in Chapman’s car that matched the sock that Andy had been wearing were taken for evidence and lost. There is no knowledge of where the sock went. There are unbelievable moments such as this that are littered through the doc.

There were also leads that turned into disappointments that piled up with this case. All the while being made all the worse with some of the beautiful pictures and home movies of Andy and his happy life.

Honestly, this doc was a labor of love from a friend looking for closure. Sadly, it has never come. Chapman died in 2021, after being released from prison.

I have a pit in my gut after watching this film. It was a painful story that is just too common in our world.

Fanfare Phan-tasy Podcast E1

Posted on by

This is the first episode of season two of the EYG Podcasts foundon Spotify. The Middle School Actor’s Guild is back, some old, some new, for the seond season. Once again it takes place in Dalton Hill, sort of. New characters this year including Penny Everwood, a sevnth grade girl into investigating the mysteries of Dalton Hill.

There will be six episodes of this second season and this is the first episode, entitled “The Beginning of the Path.”

Will & Harper (2024)

Posted on by

January 13

I have not been a fan of Will Ferrell. He has some movies that I absolutely hate. Yet, this Netflix documentary may just make me want to reconsider that opinion.

Will Ferrell and his friend of thirty years, Harper Steele, went on a buddy road trip across America. The hook? Harper Steele had just completed gender transition and was out as a trans woman.

Ferrell met Steele when Farrell joined SNL and they quickly became close friends. When they decided to take this trip across the country, Harper had given Will the right to ask any question about the transition. The openness of the friendship and the kind, sensitive manner in which they spoke to one another gave a real insight into the friendship they had built over the years.

Seeing how Will was protective and, at times, fearful for Harper was so sweet. The places that they traveled to were shown on the doc and the people that they came across spoke with respect and kindness.

But how many actually meant it? They came across the governor of Indiana, Eric Holcomb, at a basketball game and Holcomb dropped his rhetoric to get a picture with Ferrell. Holcomb has been an outspoken anti-trans proponent, passing severe anti-trans laws in his state.

When Farrell, dressed as Sherlock Holmes, took Steele to a steak house in Texas, the crowd at the restaurant was pretty taken aback. The social media response to the dinner was off the charts, with a ton of hatred spewing across the platforms. Of course, these people were all taking their outrage and vitriol to the safety of the internet where they can post their hatred with a certain amount of anonymousness.

However, much of the doc played against the caricature of the ignorant American and showed people who were very supportive and kind. Will Farrell was amazing with Harper, supporting her and treating her with such respect and acceptance that you could see how intimate and special their years long friendship had become.

The film was not just a powerful doc, but it was hilarious as well. Some of the scenes were just outright funny, which I guess you should expect with two funny people at the front of the film.

Will & Harper was a really enjoyable film that showed the power of friendship, the humor of a buddy road trip and the capacity of dialogue and communication.

MMS 7th Grade Short Stories

Posted on by

I am a teacher at a middle school and I have assigned my class a short story writing assignment. As a way of trying to inspire them, I told them that I would publish their stories on my website when they were finished with them. I knew I had a section on the site for Fan Fiction and I decided that I could easily post these stories under that section.

These stories will not be perfect. These are 7th grade students who do not have a lot of experience in writing stories. They have been introduced to the idea of a plot map and they are working toward using thas as a tool when they write. The story assignment was supposed to have some connection to a sport or a sporting event. I was following the end of unit assignment from the HMH curriculum that we use.

The assignment is due this Friday, January 18th so I will start posting the stories some time that day and perhaps over the weekend.

The students will all have a pseudonym on their stories just as a way to protect their identities. I know my community here is great, but the internet itself can be a negatove place and I want to protect these kids as much as possible.

There will be a variety of writing. I know some are really working well on this while others are wasting time. I am sure the product will show this as well. However, please be kind to the kids. Most of them are working fairly well on their stories.

Thanks to everyone who gives this a chance.

The X-Files S7 E14

Posted on by

Spoilers

“Theef”

There were a lot of controversial themes hidden in this X-Files episode. Okay, maybe not that hidden, but when the story swings on the choice of a doctor to end the suffering of a patient who could not be saved, it can create a lot of intrigue.

Picket Fences dealt with the concept of Euthanasia several times, but one would not expect it to appear on an X-Files episode.

The episode also featured “hexing” which seemed to be a backwoods form of voodoo, including the voodoo doll, called a poppet which was how the episode villain was using this pwoer.

The villain, Orell Peattie, was played by Billy Drago, and he was excessively creepy. He played the father of the girl who had been given the excess morphine by the doctor, Robert Wieder, played by James Morrison. Both of these actors did a great job in the episode.

The only issue could see was making Orell Peattie apparently not very highly educated, making the whole character a stereotype. The misspelling of the word “thief” being the title of the episode and something written after his victims.

I do not remember watching this episode when it first aired in 2000, but I did enjoy this one now. As I said, there were several themes in this episode that could be looked at deeper yet including not only Euthanasia but also modern medicine vs. practical magic.

Scully keeping Mulder on his toes is a fun moment in this overall creepy entry.

Battlestar Galactica S4 E3

Posted on by

Spoilers

“The Ties That Bind”

It is pretty clear that they are into the final season of Battlestar Galactica because major stuff is going down.

The Cylons are fighting within themselves and it sure seemed as if John Cavil (Dean Stockwell) set up the whole group of his opposition to be killed. I’m not sure how that will go over, but it sure looked that way.

Cally discovered the truth about Tyrol. She thought he was having an affair with Tory Foster, but she discovered that they, along with Tigh were Cylons. What did she get for her trouble? A trip out the space vent. Of course, this was after Cally was preparing to kill herself and her son by doing the exact same thing.

Cally had really lost herself the last several episodes and this was the final straw.

Is the show trying to make us dislike Laura Roslin? The show seems to be making her less like a president and more like a tyrant lately. And she is anything but forgiving.

This is really getting dark and I do not know where it is heading. I am trying to keep any spoilers for what’s coming up next away to ty and keep the suspense up.