I first saw Jurassic Park as a terrified eight-year old who spent the second half of the movie curled up in a trembling ball on my mother’s lap.  Since then my (not at all irrational, mind you) fear of velociraptors and fan-headed lizards who spit poison into your eyes has somewhat diminished, so I’m able to watch Jurassic Park in all its delicious, meaty glory.

A few years ago I was caught the second half of the movie on television (bless you, TNT, purveyor of weekend-saving Lord of the Rings marathons) while simul-chatting with my friend Paul who lives in Washington, D.C.  Since Paul is a boy he loves dinosaurs and, therefore, loves Jurassic Park.*

So don’t read the rest if for whatever stupid reason you haven’t seen the movie and don’t want to be spoiled.  SPOILERS Y’ALL.  SPOILER ALERT.

Okay.  So there is a park with dinosaurs, y’all, and the park’s gone insane because Newman from Seinfeld decided to kidnap some embryos but had to disable all the safety gates in order to escape the park undetected.  He and a lot of other people get eaten because, as Ian Malcolm aka Jeff Goldblum aka my future husband so profoundly states: CHAOS.  LIFE FINDS A WAY.  CHAOS.  DINOSAURS WILL EAT YOU.

The film ends with a spectacular set piece in the main hall of the Jurassic Park visitor’s center.  The hall’s center holds a tyrannosaurus rex skeleton which is surrounded by a balcony.  A banner reading “When dinosaurs ruled the earth” hangs suspended over the whole diorama.  The whole thing is very dramatic.  Our protagonists,  the heroic academic couple and the young but precocious grandchildren of the park founder are getting chased around the main visitor’s center by the velociraptors, who are basically the scariest, smartest, fastest eaters of meat ever.  (I am reading this fantasy series, y’all, and there are these villainous creatures who are basically velociraptors but with swords for hands.  How amazing is that?)

So these velociraptors have totally cornered our protagonists.  I mean, our foursome has no chance of surviving.  They are about to become delicious burgers for the velociraptors.  And just as the velociraptors are about to pounce on our heroes, the random tyrannosaurus rex that had appeared earlier in the film comes in and eats the velociraptors.  (And also smashes the skeleton of the T. Rex–Irony y’all!–and then screams triumphantly as the banner comes crashing down around her.  Like she’d just won a Miss Jurassic Park pageant).

So I am watching this happen and chatting with Paul on the internet, and as the T. Rex turns the velociraptors into meaty burgers I type, in a moment of sheer cinematic genius:

“DEUS REX MACHINA.”

Hilarity from the other end of the computer.  Hilarity on my end.  Continued hilarity today.  People, I know this story is just about how I am good with puns, but really, I am so proud of that one moment in my life.  For one, crystalline moment, all my theatrical, cinematic, and linguistic knowledge came together to enable the perfect description of a moment in film.  I have yet to rediscover such simple, joyous harmony.

So that is my story and why, for the time being, the blog backdrop is WHEN DINOSAURS RULED THE EARTH.   Also, because dinosaurs are great.  Sword hands.

*I love dinosaurs too.  My favorite is the triceratops.