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July 31, 2008
Garfield Minus Garfield... the
Garfield Minus Garfield... the book!
So, I saw Dark Knight...
Spoiler free:
I saw Dark Knight, but I am still mulling it over in my mind for a couple reasons...
one, is that it was really stinkin' long with a ton of story,
and two, we saw it at IMAX, which, while it was really cool, it was sometimes hard to "read" the film like a normal movie. Some shots were so quick, especially during the hand-to-hand combat scenes, that you had no idea what was going on in the half-second frame.
I'd have to agree with some sentiments in this article, that Nolan could have done a much better job with those scenes. At least in the Bourne movie, you keep a sense of what is going on and who is where. Sometimes during Dark Knight, I had no clue.
Since the filmmakers were looking ahead to the IMAX showings (some scenes were shot in IMAX) you'd think they might have thought about the implications of all these quick shots and that they might not work on such a huge screen.
That aside, I think the performances were good. Heath did a really good job as the joker. I was wondering how much was ad-libbed on his part. I especially like his hospital bit.
Chester is bugging me to go on his morning walk... so I will wrap it up here and add more later... but did it live up to the hype (waiting to see it after things had settled down a little)... I think so. It was a solid movie, and The Joker is really compelling. Good enough to be IMDB's #1? Probably not. Best summer movie of the last XX years? Probably.
Thoughts? Best summer movie since....?
July 30, 2008
I use this site for good
I don't really have anything, so I'll post a hilarious Three Stooges pie fight.
July 29, 2008
Obama used to teach.
Obama used to teach. Now see the syllabus and finals he used. (via Metafilter)
Back from a fun trip to Minnesota.
Greeted home by this clip from Aaron, which might be the worst piece of fielding I have ever seen.
July 23, 2008
Keychain Fail
July 22, 2008
Top bidder: George1977
Want to spend $100,000 on Star Wars figures?
Mom, tell me you bought these and forgot to take them out of the back of the closet!
Notes from Kathmandu
Sometimes I get long, rambling (mass) emails from a high school friend of mine who is now working as an editor at a magazine in Nepal. I don't really understand all of the politics of it, but I thought I'd share:
...So, then, things are changing all around, and fast. Of course the more things change the more they, like, have to change again ... and here is the news now, just as I’m halfway through this sentence. It’s surprisingly difficult to stay up on things in general when you barely even get to see the sun for three days, as happened to me during the course of this past weekend of production on the new issue of the magazine. In the end, the issue came out – at 140 pages. When I finally left the office, around midnight on Sunday, I hopped on my bike, turned out onto the street, and in the pitch blackness of the road began riding over still ember-ing torches, just like the villagers had when they were pursuing Frankenstein, around 20 or 25 of them lying in a pile spread out over the road, the results of a torch rally that had taken place a few hours earlier by students and others protesting (still) the recent hike in diesel prices. ‘I gotta get out more,’ I told myself as I navigated through and over the glowing torches, feeling, as I do often on late-night streets, that the revolution had come and gone while I was sitting in an office chair.
Actually, during the last few days of production I don’t do hardly any sitting – more like levitating a few inches off the ground here and there and back again. But when you’re talking about the revolution, what’s the difference? ‘I was levitating here and there when the revolution came – and went’? Well, anyway there were results, huge, grotesque results: 140 pages by the end of it, almost twice as long as a normal issue, and at a time when our editorial staff (three people) was down by two, albeit with one new hire, and me off trying to do two jobs. 140 pages! And now, the day after we finally went to press, we just received an interview – one that was a year in coming – from the Indian prime minister, Manmohan Singh, just out of the blue. This happens, you have to remember, at a time when his governing coalition is facing a trust vote, on Tuesday, that will either end or dramatically change his government – all due to disagreements over this semi-continuing deal with the US over sharing of nuclear technologies outside of the auspices of international convention. An odd thing to stake your job on, admittedly, but an even odder time to answer questions from Kathmandu about India’s role in the region. Anyway, this interview has just come in a half-hour ago, and now we have to figure out how to slip it in. But larger decisions have been made.
Indeed, just ten minutes ago, as I was typing this first sentence, the final results of larger decisions were made semi-public, or at least public here at the UNMIN office. After three months of political stalemate, voting for the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal’s first-ever president took place on Saturday. Even out of the massively outsized (like our new issue) 601-member Constituent Assembly, the two leading candidates – one Maoist-backed, one backed by the mainstream Nepali Congress – came within just four or five votes of one another, and thus voting had to be redone today. That took place at eight this morning, and now, an hour ahead of schedule, the results are just about out. Let me back up for a moment and point out that on Saturday the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal’s first-ever vice-president DID win a majority of votes, and he turned out to be a Maoist-backed corrupt judge who failed to win more than a few percent during the elections in early May. His new boss, however, has turned out to be a stand-up fellow, and, most importantly, or most worryingly, not the Maoist candidate. This sets up the following governing structure: prime minister, Maoist; president, Congress; vice-president, Maoist; speaker of the Assembly, undecided. For various parliamentary-rules-based reasons that I won’t bore you with, this set-up will now most likely lead the Maoists – recently voted in by a relatively overwhelming margin, remember – to sit in the opposition in the new government. This is not for sure, of course – and, indeed, things here change by the hour – but would be a totally unforeseen conclusion (if that’s the correct word, which it isn’t) to what has been a completely insane political situation. It would also be incredibly unstable. Most importantly, these sorts of power plays continue to overshadow the fact that all of these 601 members were elected not only to legislate (if they ever get around to that), but, more importantly, to write the country’s new constitution. Technically, even the declaration of the country as a republic – almost the only thing to have taken place thus far, albeit a significant one – shouldn’t be legal until the new constitution is actually ratified. When that could possibly be is, at this point, anyone’s guess.
Meanwhile, my office at the UN right now is filled with the pedantic noises of an UNMIN-funded documentary on UNMIN’s two years in Nepal. It’s called ‘Backslapping’. Tomorrow is the 23rd, and is technically when everything needs to be wrapped up by, although I and a handful of folks will be lingering indefinitely (to the horror of the General Assembly in New York). Today everyone is stealing the staplers and, evidently, patting themselves on the back. I won’t pat anyone on the back, myself included, but will self-consciously continue to use my UN desk, chair, computer, internet connection and whatnot else to note down veiled barbs and unrequited follies. Meanwhile, the walls resound with folks melodies and village scenes of happy, brown-skinned folks discussing upliftment, human rights and maternal mortality – all in the English, as there are no Nepali words for these terms.
The Nepali for a torch rally is ‘masal julus’, and is going directly on my business card, next time I need some printed. Once I got through the strewn torches last night, my bike ride didn’t get significantly easier. For the same reason that the protesters had been protesting (though otherwise with very different motivations), the streets, even at midnight, were jam-packed simply because the petrol queues all throughout the city had, evidently, while I was working and levitating around, lengthened to miles upon miles. People are, again, sleeping in the queues, spending upwards of 12, 14 hours in order to fill up their car, cab, truck, bus. There is no other form of transport through the midhills, you have to remember, and so this is a significant thing – a situation that, again, reminds everyone of the foolishness, romanticism notwithstanding, of locating a national capital in a valley in the middle of the high mountains. The Kathmandu streets are already not built to deal with the current volume of traffic, and when every main thoroughfare has to deal with a whole line of cars and trucks and busses, there’s really hardly any room left for one-way traffic, much less two-way traffic, even at midnight. These are times when I’m very happy to be on a bicycle, of course, though others seem to be frustrated by my ease and righteousness. Biking late at night is always relaxing, however, and someone else’s gas-based frustrations can do little to change that. Home again finally, and home itself always looks different after such a long stint away: plants larger, food stores evolved, trash in the garbage that you don’t recognise. And, lo: hundreds of new snail eggs in the water garden, clinging to quivering iris stems, just waiting for the monsoon waters to rise.
July 21, 2008
Top 250 Movies..
When I first started following the IMDB Top 250, The Godfather and The Shawshank Redemption battled it out for #1. Then the Godfather firmly planted itself as #1... until now. Aaron (who just updated his blaag) pointed out that The Dark Knight is now #1.
...not that I give THAT much weight to IMDB users (have you ever glanced at the discussions? It's only 2 IQ points higher than YouTube).
July 19, 2008
He's evil and he sings...
...and he's Neil Patrick Harris.
Check out Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog before it's only on iTunes (and... well.. probably tons of other sites).
July 17, 2008
A pregnant spider I
A pregnant spider I found in a red bucket in the garage... check out the large or original size (unless you're Aimee).
July 16, 2008
Oh geez finally
New issue of Galactic Times up! Now in color!
I'm sorry, I know, it's been a year!!
"Duck Darwin Awards" --
"Duck Darwin Awards" -- dumb title but probably the cutest story you will see today.
July 15, 2008
Josh Hamilton's 518-footer in
Josh Hamilton's 518-footer in the HR derby Monday.
July 14, 2008
How to beat the claw game
July 13, 2008
Living in a garbage
Living in a garbage truck.. not as shabby as you'd think. (via reddit)
July 12, 2008
I think Iran's gone
I think Iran's gone a little overboard this time. (via reddit)
July 11, 2008
I phone
Well, iPhone 2.0 rolled out today, but not without some hiccups (note to self: don't try to update an iPhone day of a new software release unless you need a new paperweight for most of the day)... it seems to be fixed now, so people just need to take a deep breath and remember it'll be okay. You can live without a phone for a day. It's not the end of the world.
Anyway, this is a huge step. The iPhone is awesome but I can't justify the monthly fees. Right now I just use mine as an iPod and wireless Internet.
By far one of the coolest apps so far is the Remote. At first I thought it was just like an Apple Remote and you could play/pause, volume, skip forward and back, etc., but it gives you control of your whole iTunes library (if it's in WiFi range)! Sweet!
July 09, 2008
Can't think of a good segue
Anti-terrorism exorcise in China (via The Big Picture):
July 07, 2008
That was my reaction, too
Been having fun with
Been having fun with extension tubes + 50mm lens. Found this guy after crawling around the back yard (while Aimee was doing actual yard work).
And this guy has been hanging out by the back porch light (don't tell Aimee):
July 06, 2008
I bet those 1's and 0's are even more clear
$500 cable, anyone? Entertaining reviews, too. (via reddit)
1988 Fireworks mishap, Duluth, MN
I remember being there. Possibly the first and last fireworks down there with my parents.
July 03, 2008
The Last Days of Dr. Wily
Filed under Mega Man humor.
July 01, 2008
"True story about how