Alice In Wonderland

We saw Alice in Wonderland Burtonland today. After hearing all the negative comments on the 3D aspect, we decided to go for 2D. Alice was originally shot in 2D and the 3D was added afterwards. When this isn't done properly your eyes and your brain don't communicate and you can get headaches and/or nausea -- which is what a number of people were complaining about. I get headaches at most 3D movies anyway so this decision didn't bother me.

The film is directed by Tim Burton so if you're expecting normal, you've gone to the wrong cinema. This film is odd, unusual, strange, bizarre, weird, atypical, freaky, nutty, yet still pretty damn visually fantastic. And, indeed, that's what it is. The movie starts off in Victorian England as Alice is being betrothed unwillingly to a suitor. She espies the white rabbit and the film is afoot.

Many odd things happen once Alice drinks that first potion and you will be captivated by all of it. Whether you like it, I'm not sure. I mostly enjoyed the film but I had some quibbles with some of the odd story tangents. Loved the Hatter, Cheshire, and the Red Queen and we could have used more of them and less of the White Queen for sure. The bandersnatch was an awesome creature indeed besides giving me the excuse to say bandersnatch. The jabberwocky wasn't nearly as impressive.

The one brief dance scene near the end was terribly contrived and I'm not sure why it was even part of the film. Probably just an excuse to use the word "futter" in the movie.

There were two kids in our group (5 and 7) and they were fine with it, so I give this a green light to most audiences. I was secretly hoping my favourite Jefferson Airplane song would make a cameo, but it didn't. It would have been most appropriate.

Sorry this review is shorter than what I originally wrote but Blogger farted and ate it all.

As much as it pains be to thank David Streeter in public, this video link he sent me demands it. It was an amazing bit of nostalgia. The clothing, the vehicles, the traffic chaos, the atmosphere. The film is from a cable car travelling East down Market Street in San Francisco, just a few days before the infamous Great Earthquake of 1906. You can clearly see the clock tower at the end of the street at the Embarcadero Wharf on the Ferry Building that is still there today. Authentic, live-action hundred year-old film is a rarity so treat yourself to this seven minutes of history.

Lastly is this great article on cover songs. Many songs you know and love are actually covers. Aretha Franklin's legendary Respect, Tina Turner's Proud Mary, and even Elvis Presley's Hound Dog to name a few. Most covers of legendary songs are big blunders. Sometimes a cover becomes the canonical version. Next time you're trashing Marilyn Manson for ruining a song (as he richly deserves) don't forget that not all covers suck.

Special thanks to Jose as we continue to work to figure out the final details to move this blog to its new home. I will remind me readers to look out for the notification that we've moved. The new URL will be http://www.darsys.org/ if you want to bookmark it now. That URL will always point to this blog no matter where it moves. For those of you reading via RSS you will need to update your feed when the announcement is made and not before.

Youth In Revolt (Movie Review)

We started the day with breakfast at Original House of Pancakes where I got the Mandarin orange crepes. Karen got a bacon and egg sandwich on sourdough. She wanted a car wash so we went and waited while they washed it all. As they were drying it, a bird kept shitting on the roof because they parked it under a tree to dry it. Quite amusing.

I've loved this book ever since I read it and damn near everyone I've recommended it to has loved it too. It's hysterical, perverted, romantic, and just plain ole' fun. I think Michael Cera is a great actor and have liked him ever since I fell in love with Arrested Development (thanks Maury). I was really pre-disposed to like this movie. Only, sadly, I didn't.

The movie was awesomely cast and everyone was believable in their roles which was good because I didn't really buy Michael Cera as Nick Twisp, but he pulled it off. CD Payne wrote the book and he had a hand in the screenplay so I figured the book would be followed closely, just with stuff missing to fit in to the allotted time. I should have known there was trouble when I heard how short the movie was.

It started of perfectly, and while things weren't quite in order, it was true to the spirit of the book. A significantly scene with Lefty was cut and that thing in the book which set it all in motion was replaced with a far more stupid reason. François was well done. Then when they visit Sheeni in school, it falls apart. (They pull in and are clearly the only car in the circle, but as the camera pans, cars mysteriously are parked everywhere. In the room at night as they are going to bed, sunlight is hitting them full on. At night.) The movie gets sloppy with continuity like that. Worse, it stops following the book and goes to Hell quickly.

The acting was fine -- odd but in line with the book -- but the whole thing felt weird. There were random Claymation™ and animated sequences thrown in for no good reason. It was just uneven and not in a good way.  Karen thought it was boring. Perhaps if I hadn't read the book I might have liked it better because it was still quite funny. It just isn't want this book's legacy deserved.

Afterward, we went to Rock And Roll Ribs, the new BBQ place owned by the drummer for Iron Maiden, Nicko McBrain. The service was absolutely horrific and if we hadn't had two hours to kill I'd have walked out. Twenty minutes and nobody came to our table and there are only fourteen tables and six waitresses. Brenda had to get up and ask for someone to come over and it still took five minutes. Not even an apology for not coming by. And it didn't get much better after that.

The food was not fantastic. I got my corn on the cob and it was still FROZEN SOLID. Yeah, they forgot to cook it. First, it's Florida and there is no excuse for frozen corn on the cob. None.  They at least apologized for that. My meat was tough and stringy. The sauce was decent (sweet) and the regular was okay but a bit too peppery for my taste. I didn't try the tang sauce. Karen's baby backs were better than my brisket. Evan's spare ribs were much better and if I went back, that's what I'd get.

The atmosphere was great and that's everything you'd expect from a rocker. Tons of memoribilia and if you don't like metal, you won't like the soundtrack. Karen hated it. I didn't mind it though I'm not a big Iron Maiden fan so many of the songs didn't interest me. It was a tad too loud and it was hard to have  a conversation, but they finally lowered it.

My desire to return is low not because the service is so bad, but when we complained, they just didn't care. We spent over $100 for our table (two checks) and that just isn't acceptable. Even a poorly run restaurant, the manager would have apologized and offered a free appetizer, drink, or desert. We didn't even get the apology and that is inexcusable.

After that we went to the mall to look around FYE Music (Karen got Kenny Loggins. EWWWW) Panther game and had a stellar win (if the Panthers win it's stellar). It sounds like a complaint filled day but we had a great time.

Bitches Deserving To Die

Some people stain the planet by their mere presence. This bitch is one such miserable cretin who is a shit-stain on the reputation of humankind. The only justice in this would be that her own son finally turned her in after she forced her own children into torturing animals. If you like animals, you probably don't want to click that link. It's really upsetting. I'm just not going to talk about it further.

Traffic cameras are slowly working their way into select cities in Florida. In Florida, they are illegal so the cities found away around it. They issue civil violations and not traffic violations, so you get a ticket but no points. They claim it's to improve road safety, though everyone has long suspected and/or known it's really just to take more money out of your pocket. Politicians are scum -- it's a good basic starting to point to work from. So a special YAY to the mayor of Dalton, GA who removed the cameras in his city after coming to the same conclusion. This article in USA Today explains how cities increase their revenue by changing how long the yellow light lasts -- if that doesn't prove it's about the revenue, nothing goes. The first of these cameras was installed in Miami, this month. Expect more. Plantation, Sunrise, Weston, all have them as well. They're coming to you soon. Beware. Be aware.

The people in Haiti need many things, and I am pleased to report that Interstate Screw Corporation, where I work, sent in checks totalling $4,000 -- this includes employee and customer contributions plus our own matching funds on employee contributions. We sent half to the American Red Cross which provides food, shelter, clothing, and other supplies to people in need after a disaster. We sent the other half to Doctors Without Borders which supplies doctors and hospital supplies to places stricken by natural disasters. There are many charities helping Haiti, but these two are reputable and a very high portion of their fund-raising goes to the cause as opposed to more fund-raising. (If you want an embarrassing charity, check out your local PBA, many of which shovel nearly 80% of what they collect back into more fund-raising. Please, check your charities out before you donate.)

Speaking of things they need in Haiti, there's this link from Mark Fischel who offers some biting commentary on what they might do with these solar powered bibles in Haiti. Indeed, if you collected enough you could use them to build a roof. Sadly, they are not edible.

The Late Night Wars (O'Brien vs Leno, round 666) continue to amuse, though my desire to comment on them has shrunk considerably. This article talks about Jay Leno being "Mr Nice Guy No More" and then poses the question "was he ever?" -- a valid point to be sure. Read it and make your own conclusion. This video courtesy of John Carney, my resident source of most Late Night articles posted this YouTube video. I do not speak Japanese Chinese, nor do most of my readers. Although this 1m54s video is entirely in Japanese Chinese, I promise you that you will still manage to understand what is said. It's a serious news piece, but I laughed my way through:

Speaking of amusing videos, here's a second one that is the subject of much controversy by Kiwis. Air New Zealand produced some awesome safety videos under the tag "Bare Essential" using actual staff members wearing no clothes and body paint instead. They proved to be so popular around the world, commercials followed. Now there's this mystifying advertisement which is brilliant for 90 seconds and decided less so for the final minute and the sole reference is a link to their website at the end. The PC police are up in arms. I don't care one way or another, but it's worth mentioning here.

"Something, Something, Something, Dark Side" is the second instalment of Family Guy's retelling of Star Wars. The first one was awesome beyond all belief and was funny as hell even after repeated viewings. This one, not so much. It was amusing but not wet-your-pants funny. I'm not sure what to say on this. I wanted to like it and I didn't. Thomas, who watched it with me, agreed. It was just okay. As a direct-to-DVD release, I have to tell you to save your money and watch it free when they show it as a two-part episode at the end of this season. They're going to do the third one "We Have A Bad Feeling About This" though I am not optimistic after seeing this one.

Avatar: The Hype vs The Reality

So I saw Avatar today with Karen, Liz, Timmy, David, Kathy, and William. Pretty much spoiler free. This movie has been overhyped so I was not expecting so much from it. I knew it would be visually amazing, but with a slim story. I thought it would never live up to the hype. I must say, it lives up to the hype and the weakest part of the plot is the quest for "unobtanium" (who thought up that horrible name?)

I am always predisposed to Sigourney Weaver and I wasn't let down there. I am not a Sam Worthington fan but he did a bang up job in the film. Stephen Lang stole the show as far as real people go. The real star of the show was the special effects, something that is normally dangerous. But this movie delivers and doesn't seem one bit the 162 minute running time. We saw it in 3D but I am not a fan of 3D and would have been just as happy watching it in 2D.

I have a few quibbles. Early in the film the Navi arrows will not go through the glass on the spacecrafts but later they do. This is inconsistent and unexplained. Another thing that drove me crazy is that the Navi are much larger in size than humans. However, they vary in size from shot to shot. If you're (example) 1.5 times bigger then you're always 1.5 times bigger -- you can't keep changing it.

I really do need to say, this is a movie you should see. It's good. It's not great by any standard but it's a good, solid film.

In other news, it's 41º and raining. It's like a little bit of London come home with me. Not much to report for the rest of the day: woke up, went to breakfast with Dave, John, Liz, then skating with Evan, Liz, and John before going to the movie. Came home and ran to the dry cleaners and post office before setting in to watch the Jets v Bengals and write this post.

London Day Six (Cold Rain)

Today we got up and exchange our room keys. We're moving from paid nights to free nights for the balance of the trip. Everyone here's in a tizzy over VAT changing back because of the computer ramifications. They're going to make the entire hotel check out 1-1 and check back in at the new rate. Bloody hell. At least you don't actually leave and just go down and make a paperwork change and a key swap. That'll be two key swaps for us.

We went to breakfast and just had eggs and toast. I stopped at Paul's and got a café eclair on the way to the Natural History Museum. Our first stop was the Annual Wildlife Photography Competition which was fantastic. I didn't buy the guidebook and now I'm sorry. I may go back and get one before I return. Anyone who is here before this is over, must go. If you can't, peruse online. After that we went to the dinosaur exhibit, full of bones and such. I thought of William, of course. I'll burn him a set of the photos from that part of the trip. After that, we popped onto the tube at South Kensington to the Sir John Soane Museum (Holborn Tube) which was swamped -- which isn't hard since it's such a small museum. While there were only 30 in queue, that could have easily been an hour. You can't go in until someone comes out.

We also stopped at Eat for a quick snack before taking the Central line to Bond Street and changing to the Jubilee for St John's Wood tube, the nearest to Abbey Road. I usually do this first thing in the AM and not mid-day, and that would have been for the best. The traffic jam was because of idiot tourists taking photos in the world's most famous crosswalk. We took a few photos and bailed on idiot-city and came back to the hotel via Westminster where Karen was distressed to find the escalator wasn't working and it was a long staircase at the interchange.

After a rest, we headed off to the O2, where we saw the Official Michael Jackson exhibition -- for those who don't recollect, the O2 was to be the site of his 50 comeback shows before he died. While overpriced at £15 but was worth it as it turns out. We then went to the British Music Experience also in the O2 because they had an offer to add it on for an extra £5. Real music fans will really like this, though staff were not very organized. The BME gives you an RFID ticket that collects bits of what you do and lets you review them and the related music on the website after you're home. It also includes three free iTunes songs as well. Sadly, photos were totally forbidden in both, so these won't be posted. It's easier if you follow the links for full descriptions on what these two exhibits entail, but if you're going to the O2 for something else, tack this on for sure. Book directly at the box office and save quite a bit.

Karen had this burning desire for a burger, so we ended up at Cheyenne Spur one of several faux-American burger place in the O2. The burgers weren't half bad for over here.  I had a Hawaiian burger, and Karen had a bacon cheeseburger, which was made with Irish Back Bacon (as opposed to American style bacon). Speaking of bacon, Paul sent me this link to a comic showing six reasons bacon is better than true love. If you're at the O2 and feel like a burger, this place seems decent. The "Oriental" restaurant across the walk had a great typo on their menus "Poluty" -- yeah the R had gone missing from all their poultry.

Lastly, we went to the Vue movie theatre and ended up seeing Sherlock Holmes after a bad experience with the automated ticket machines. As you may recollect, many theatres have assigned seating here. We were unable to pick seats with the automated system. There are no humans running the box office, so we had to find someone to ask what to do. As it turns out there were no assigned seats for this showing because the 500+ seat theatre was nearly empty. What a fantastic theatre. One of the nicest ones I've ever seen though the seats were fixed back which wasn't so nice. The movie was 2-1/2 hours long and didn't seem very long at all. I fully enjoyed it, as did Karen. The acting was decent, and they left it open for a sequel. There are some gory scenes, and one in particular with big carcasses. That was sort of amusing though, because earlier I was watching Gordon Ramsey's "F Word" and they slaughtered, gutted, and cleaned a pig (gross BTW) so I had already seen it. I think the movie version might have been worse. We figured Holmes was the movie to see since it takes place in London. Some of the sets are recognizable and others aren't. I was impressed with the effects. We saw previews for Iron Man 2 as well as yet another remake of Robin Hood, this new one with Russell Crowe.

The O2 was freezing cold, and we were wearing jackets inside, though at least the theatre was comfortable. We took the tube back and went straight to the hotel in the rain, which is expected to continue through tomorrow before the temperatures plummet into the 20s. Not that we trust the weathermen.

Day Three (London Trip Journal)

Another rough night of sleep, but that's par for the course. Woke up and watched the news. The bomber is the big news, of course. Flight delays from London to the US are running on average over 3 hours. I'm going to have to try to figure out how to pack to come home or arrange to ship some stuff back. We left around 815am for breakfast which went without incident today: a nice, proper English breakfast. It was colder today (high was 7ªC) but nice and cloudless.

Our first stop was Petticoat Lane, located between Aldgate and Liverpool tube stations. The best way to do it, is just go to one and walk through to the other. We started from Liverpool Street simply because it's easier to get to from where we were. Petticoat Lane is by far the most famous market in London, one the most famous in the world perhaps. Not nearly the best in London much less the world, in my opinion, though if you're looking for absurdly cheap clothing, it's the place to go. It's got a long history and was banned several times before Parliament finally allowed it. We grew bored rather quickly and headed off to Camden Market which was far more fun. We spent some time there, did some people watching, because there are some really interesting people there.

After that, we headed towards Saint Paul's which is a short walk to one of the better museums in London, The Museum of London. While we enjoyed it, half of it was closed for refurbishment, and unfortunately it's my favourite half. The balance is due open Spring 2010. Everything from c1350 forward was closed. We stopped at the museum café for a drink and a slice of cake. After that it was back on the tube to Holborn where we opted to walk to Covent Garden instead of transferring and taking the tube.

We went to the London Transport Museum which I love because I am a subway nut. They have a lot of dioramas on the construction of the tube, simulators so you can drive the tube, lots of maps from the past, present, and future. They've got omnibus and other modes too. Naturally I enriched the museum's coffers in the gift shop. After that, we walked to Forbidden Planet because it was easy to knock off. I bought Karen an autographed copy of Little Brother as a gift for just £7.99, quite a steal. Forbidden Planet is a great bookstore devoted to science fiction, fantasy, horror, and comic books. They have tons of autographed copies of books* and regular visitors. You wouldn't know book readership is declining by looking at this store.

We got on the tube at Leicester Square, went to Gloucester Road and walked to the large Sainsbury's on Cromwell Road. I bought some grapes and a Limeade (not fizzy) and Karen bought tea and cashews. That left us time to chill before dinner. We left the hotel a bit after five for the tube to Notting Hill Gate, where the famous Geales is located. It's been redecorated since my last visit, and it's much nicer. The food remains good and I enjoyed my dinner though it seemed a little saltier than it used to be, but Karen said it was all in my head.

After that, we saw Nowhere Boy (see yesterday's blog). I didn't realize it was a Weinstein film, but it was. It was a good film, but it's very difficult to watch. Lots of depressing moments, very little joy. You will meet three of the four Beatles as teens. But you won't hear any Beatles music, nor even hear the word uttered. The film stops as the group is formed. It's hard to have spoilers in a bio-pic, but if you don't know Lennon's early life, it's possible so I won't discuss it. Over the closing moments you do hear Lennon singing. But all the other music is what inspired them and not what they recorded.

In unrelated news, one of the funniest articles you will ever read about Spandau Ballet was in the Toronto Sun. Apparently there's some chance they will be the first band to perform in space on one of Virgin Galactic's flights. The classic line it ends with is, "just long enough for someone to accidentally open the pod-bay door and turn Spandau Ballet from The First Band to Suck in Space to The First Band to be Sucked Into Space." If you like Spandau Ballet, don't read this article.

Also, a bit of oddity: yesterday my blog got a slew of hits from Turkey.  All were searching for "My Name is David" an excellent movie I reviewed some time ago. My blog will hit the magic 1/4 million mark within a fortnight. Maybe not a big deal to you, but I am quite impressed that this flight of fancy has turned out to be so damned popular.


*Jose, Jasper Fforde will be there on the 18th.

The Fantastic Mister Fox is, well, Fantastic

Before I get to the review I had referred a number of you to a Facebook Dislike button add-on. It's been causing people lots of problems and has also started serving advertising. I had to remove it and the complaints are mounting. But, here's another one that is more popular and seems to be more reliable. I'll have more on Add-Ons for Firefox later in this post.

The Fantastic Mister Fox is great. No, ifs, ands, or buts. Voiced by an all-star cast, but it would have been just as good with a cast of nobodies. Based on Dahl's book, this would appear on the surface to be a children's movie. It's not but it's kid safe. There are so many adult subtexts to this from the marital stress between Mr Fox and his wife to the sibling rivalry between Ash and Kristofferson. There's lots of smoking but it adds a bit of grit. There's some language but they just say "cuss" instead of the real word. "That's a cussing big dog" (as an example). I would think it could develop into a catchphrase, though I fear with a $7M opening, it'll be gone from theatres before you know it. And that's a shame. The animation (stop motion) is fantastic and the details down the fox's fur is great. I liked this way more than I thought I would. We saw it with a large group of people (13) and everyone liked it as well. The plot is strong, the main characters are well-fleshed out (and flawed), the action is engrossing, and not once did I look at my watch. See this film. I'll buy it when it comes out on Blu-Ray.

Last night I had some insomnia so I watched the Forbidden Kingdom, a martial arts movie with pretty much damn near everyone in China in it starring Jet Li and Jackie Chan. This movie tells the tale of the Monkey King and the Jade Warlord wrapped inside a secondary story that is, to be honest, silly. The martial arts, as would be expected are great. The visual scenery is beyond belief. I enjoyed this far more than I thought I would. Jet Li and Jackie Chan both play two roles in the film so pay attention if you can.

And, because I enjoy pointing out things like this -- thanks Sue -- some fact checking on Sarah Palin's Bus Tour. Which, despite what it may appear, doesn't involve much bus and does involve lots of plane. And certain groups paying for it. Check out the video and story at crooksandliars.com.

Breakfast was at OPH and we had a party of twelve and they actually did a decent job of seating us. Sadly the waiter was borderline. We lost John and his parents before the movie and they were replaced with Karen (party of three), and my Mom. After that Liz and I went ice skating (by way of ColdStone) but we were reminded of why we don't skate afternoon sessions. It was crowded and we were knocked about several times. Not fun at all but I had fun with her because I got the telenovela update followed by lots of interesting people and travel discussions.

As promised, here's the list of Firefox Add-Ons I use and like. I have various codec plug-ins installed but they are machine specific so I won't list them. The add-ons below are Mac and PC compatible and work with FireFox 3.5 -- most work with earlier versions as well.

• CheckPlaces 1.6.3 -- validates your bookmarks to see if they're still valid and gives you a chance to fix them, delete them, etc. (Just started using this so maybe you want to wait for my opinions)
• Download Helper 4.6.5 -- Lets you grab video content of YouTube and other sites and save it easily without a kludge.
• FaceMod Dislike Button 0.7 -- See above. Adds a dislike button to Facebook
• Favicon Picker 3 0.5 -- Lets you add/change Favicons in your bookmark menu
  
• Firebug 1.4.5 -- This is a geek tool that Jose taught me to use so I can futz around with my webpages while they're live. Most of you won't want this one.
  
• Flagfox 3.3.18 -- This is one of the most useful extensions ever. It shows a flag representing the country the server presenting the webpage you're on. So if you're at BankAmerica and see a Chinese flag, you know something's wrong. Also installed on all our work machines as a security feature.
  
• Googlebar 0.9.15.14 -- Way better than the real Google bar. You will need to edit the version code to work with Firefox 3.5; Someone's posted the hacked version if you don't know how to edit XPI files.
• Open Bookmarks In New Tab 0.1.2009100801 -- Duh. Very useful.
  
• Password Exporter 1.2 -- Do not export your passwords. I don't recommend it. However, if you forget one this also lets you view them from the preferences area. Set a master password if you use this. 
• Print Image 0.4 -- Selects and prints images from websites (not Flash content but static images)
• SearchPreview 4.0 -- Shows thumbnail images of sites as part of Google/Yahoo/Bing searches
• StumbleUpon 3.52 -- You will waste more time with this than I can ever explain. But I love it. I'm 'darsys' if you want to follow me.
• TimeTracker 1.2.5 -- You can keep track of how long a window, session, or whatever has been open. Or from time installed forever. 
• WOT 20091028 -- (Web of Trust) Installed here and on all work machines. Sites show Green, Yellow, or Red warnings and if a site is Red it will ask if you're sure you want to proceed. This is the best extension you can install on your machine for safety reasons. You can also add and rate sites if you make a free account, all from within Firefox.
• Noia 2.0 (eXtreme) 3.69 -- This is the theme I use. I rather like it and you might too.

I'm doing laundry and getting ready to cook dinner as soon as I decide what to cook.

Where The Wild Things Are: Spoiler Free Review

So, I finally went to bed around 630 or so this morning (see post from earlier today) and was up around 830am. Today was Karen day. We went to Einstein Bagels for breakfast and got what we deserved: shit on a plastic tray. We knew what to expect, we went anyway, we deserved it.

First up was "Where The Wild Things Are" at the Aventura AMC which Liz was going to attend with us, but she was detained with some unspecified top-secret government project so we went without her. I must remind you from my previous posts that, at first, I was angry they were going to ruin another childhood memory, and then after I begin to see previews I changed my mind and grew hopeful and excited. I went in with High Hopes, something that is dangerous as hell.

It started, and for the first ten minutes or so I had this rapidly sinking feeling of "oh, shit, they really have ruined a childhood memory" followed by "I bet those mediocre reviews were right" and such. While I've not read any of the reviews purposely, they have been mixed by all accounts. About fifteen minutes in, I was sure this was going to suck. First, though, a brief kudos for Max Records, who plays Max; he deserves an Oscar for his performance. Seriously. No matter what you think, this kid is phenomenal: he nailed it flawlessly. He looks like Max, acts like Max, talks like Max, he is Max. He's the Max I remember from my childhood. Perfect.

The all-star (voice) cast is enjoyable. And once Max enters that world, the movie becomes magical, and amazing. And damn near flawless. Is it totally true to the book? No. Neither was Lord of the Rings as Peter Jackson saw it, but there were few detractors there and there should be none here either. This is that good. It is visually awe-inspiring, emotionally draining, dark, scary, happy, and every other emotion. It is not a children's movie by any measure, but it's a movie about all children. There are many metaphors, perhaps allegories. The adults will get that. The kids will like this film but it's not for them and yet it is. You will become emotionally involved with Max and his adventures. You will be angry at his petulance, marvel at his ingenuity, and feel many of the emotions he does -- and be repelled by others. But you will understand.

In spite of the irritating opening, I am going to give this movie a perfect 10 out of 10. This will definitely be one of the top twenty movies I've ever seen. This is LOTR class film making. This film will be the next Wizard of Oz. That film was also not for children but about children. This movie will be a classic. You can etch my prediction into granite tablets: that's how sure I am.

I did spot two minor continuity gaffes, and this isn't a spoiler unless you're one of those rare people who hasn't read the 368 word book. The monsters are still calling Max "King" but in one quick scene KW (I believe) calls him "Max" except she doesn't know his name yet. The only other gaffe I spotted is minor: the dirt spots on his costume and face move about.

After the movie was over -- Karen cried near the end, BTW -- we texted Liz for the next part of our adventure but she bailed on that for the same top-secret government project she was still working on. Liz had previously Twittered about an art exhibit at the Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale (part of the Nova Southeastern University) and the photo below caught my eye and made me want to go.

Click on the picture to go to the original

I really enjoyed the exhibit and that piece was definitely my favourite but there was some other really good pieces too. As in any exhibit, there were some sucky ones too. And on the way out, you will find Christ. (If you go, you'll know what I mean.) This really reminded me of a gallery at the Tate Modern and it really helped make the day just a little better than it already was.

Afterwards, it was close to dinner time and we ended up at Big Louie's Pizza (or some name close to that) in the same strip mall as John's beloved RadioActive Records.

I also found out that Apple does business leases on MacBook Pros. So there may be a new Mac laptop in my company's future instead of a Wintel after all. This pleases me.

I am really, really tired but am holding out for 10pm or so before I go to bed.

Purple Vans, Purple Vans (Apologies to Prince) + Movie Review, Etc

Paul: My thoughts are with you. I hope it all works out okay. 

You all wanted to see the shoes. Some of you whom I saw this weekend saw them in person. The rest, will have to see this photo. If you click on the photo, you'll go the Flickr page which has a bonus song for everyone and I hope it amuses you.

I had breakfast at 930am with the Higgins family at Original House of Pancakes in Davie. Afterwards, I ran and got a quick haircut and then met them at the theatre. We went to the Muvico Paradise 24 which is now a Cinemark. Usually the places is packed, but, well, it wasn't. Which was unusual. We would sound find out why.

Theatre had audio but no pre-movie slide show like it should (that's a good thing). Previews started and we got a very extended Where The Wild Things Are preview (awesome beyond belief). Also saw a Nick Twisp posted on the way out. The movie started but the projector was misaligned and it took them a bit to fix it. Some moments later there is a blue overlay counting down from 10 to 0 and then the slide show starts on top of the movie. I run all the way out to the front and get the manager who apologizes and says they only have one projectionist per side of the theatre. Yeah, one guy running twelve screens each. Nice. He comes, fixes it, and leaves. Five minutes later it happens again. Repeat performance by me and projectionist. Who leaves the light on in the booth -- not the small light but the blazing light. Fixed again but 15 minutes of the movie shot to hell. Then the bitch in front of me starts using her Blackberry to send SMS during the film and I tell to shut it off and tell her how rude she is. Stupid bitch. After the film ends, Dave complains and get us passes to return and see it again. Yay.

Oh, right, the movie. We were seeing "9" a film I really hadn't noticed or heard of. Dave picked it. I actually enjoyed it, but was a little lost having missed the first bit of the movie. It has an all-star voice cast. Elijah Wood, Crispin Glover, Christopher Plummer, and Martin Landau (he's alive???). The animation is decent but I couldn't decide if the fire was animated or rotoscoped because it was so realistic. It's a Tim Burton films so you have that overall dark feeling to it. This post-apocalyptic world is interesting as are the sack-people. The plot, as I said, was murky but it may have been because we didn't really see and hear the introduction due to projection problems. I recommend this film based on what I did see.

Lastly, I read an article in today's Miami Herald that sickened me. I have to share it. I nearly skipped it but I only noticed it because the Herald's editors -- whom are illiterate twits -- have in the HEADLINE "It's release has sparked...." and that grammar error horrified me. I find several errors a week in the fishwrapper but rarely in the headline. Once some years ago there was a shark story, I wrote in with a copy of the article and marked it in red and told them to hire a proofreader. They wrote back and argued with me that it was right. IT'S = contraction for IT IS and ITS = possessive indication of ownership. Anyway, if you haven't heard about the dolphin slaughterIn Japan, you need to educate yourself because this is nauseating. This image will make you sick. I am not including it in-line because it's so disgusting. The water is literally red with blood. Google for more because I just can't stomach it enough to post more.

ADDENDUM: Disney is remaking the Beatles' Yellow Submarine. I am not making this up. Please, please, please someone stop them. Please?

Weekend In Review

Saw Mom and Grandma Saturday and had a nice visit and a huge breakfast at Mo's. That was the start of the day and I was feeling okay then, relatively speaking. Afterwards, it was going to be "guys day out" but we ended up with Lizzie so our plans changed accordingly. We met up at Sawgrass Mills and instead of a movie for big people (probably the Tarantino film) we saw Ponyo.

Ponyo is an animated film by famous Japanese director Hayao Miyazaki. While hailed by critics, it is -- in my opinion -- pretty much the Little Mermaid tale all over again. That's not a knock but I do need to put it out there because this isn't "original" like his other films. It's got an all-star voice over cast so as long as the lips and words being out of synch doesn't bother you, this might be worth your time if you're a fan of the art form. It's hand-drawn old-fashioned animation. It's also a movie for kids so don't expect heady stuff on multiple levels like a Pixar film. But, all that aside, I enjoyed the film. And the critic that matters here, Lizzie, liked it and didn't get distracted except during the first few minutes.

Afterwards we roamed the mall for a bit and then went to Books-A-Million and Best Buy. At Best Buy on the X-Box (ew) they had a demo of Beatles Rock Band. The visuals were fantastic. The songs were awesome of course. We watched the guy playing it, then Evan took a hand at Yellow Submarine on the easiest level. Some kid came up and thrashed a hard song on expert level. It was all good fun. We went our separate ways, but I wasn't in the mood to be home alone so I called Erin to see if she wanted company. She was willing so I accompanied her to purchase Snow Leopard (the new Mac OS) which we played with a bit at the Apple Store at a different mall. We stopped at the Vans store where I found awesome shoe but not in my size -- now ordered on-line. I'm sure you'll all hate them but I really like them: they have colour. Lots of it. In spades.

Afterwards we decided to have dinner and drove around in a freak rainstorm that just dumped water everywhere and the roads were flooded out. It was quite a challenge driving around and down Las Olas where a number of our choices were out of business. We then used her iPhone to find more choices which were, sadly, out of business as well. We ended up at Anthony's Coal Fired Pizza. I've heard about this chain but never been. The Pizza was okay but not great because I really didn't care for their tomato sauce which was reminiscent of chunky apple sauce and was also a little overboard on the olive oil. Loved the crust and cheese. Erin ordered the wings appetizer. I don't normally do wings, but had one anyway and it was way too salty but otherwise it would have been really good. The place isn't bad but not somewhere I'd pick myself. For dessert we ended up at "Goofles" a new frozen custard place that was surprisingly good. After that I went home. I had my usual fitful sleep though it lasted longer than normal.

Sunday AM got the skating call at 1030 due to a miscommunication and bolted out the door. We ended up eating an early lunch at Cheddar's which was both decent and surprisingly cheap. Though for a place called "Cheddar's" I'm surprised the cheese they use on the burger is such bad quality. Still it was a good experience and I'd go back. We had time to kill so wandered about Barnes & Nobles for twenty or so minutes before heading to the rink which was as crowded as I'd ever seen it. They were having a huge tournament. Nonetheless, we skated the first session and part of the second one, and I knocked off a bit before 3pm and headed off to get my skates sharpened at Play-It-Again, not realizing they close at 3pm. I went in they said they were closed but I asked if they could sharpen me and they said they would. The guy had quite some trouble saying my blades were too thick (horseshit) and mis-sharpened by the previous person (absolutely true). He showed me the problem: they were not sharpened on center so he had to cross-grind and start over. Next time I skate, we'll see how they are. No dizzy episodes on ice today.

Headed home for laundry and nearly dozed off in the car so called people to talk to in order to stay awake. Listened to the Sting album Mom got me as I typed this (Brand New Day) and am wholly unimpressed by most of it.

For some reason my Snow Leopard download button isn't appearing on my Apple Developer account and I'll have to deal with that Monday. I was planning to install it today. *grumble*

Movie and Book Review

I have a few days worth of updates. Saturday was a busy day. Woke up and after tending to some medical business, I worked my way over to Erin's. We ate breakfast, walked around CompUSA and Borders before I totally ran out of gas. We went back to her place and watched Flash Gordon on TV. Or more accurately, I dozed in and out of consciousness on her couch. We watched some Catherine Tate and Muppet Show DVDs as well. The weather, as all you locals know, was horrific. The bad weather we got is now Tropical Storm Claudette and heading towards North Florida. After that, we went to TooJay's for dinner and I was very unimpressed. My food was really subpar and the service was bad, but we really weren't in a hurry so it didn't much matter. We had some ice cream afterwards, and then went back to Erin's and watched Ratatouille. After that I went home.

Meanwhile Tropical Storm Ana doesn't look like much of a threat to us other than some wind and rain, probably around 40mph or so. Bill looks like he'll become a hurricane and is more of a concern though it is appearing more likely that he'll go further north now. It's so far out nobody can really tell.

It's been a bad weekend in the sense I blew of skating today because I was unable to face a group of happy people. Bad attitude on my part. I suck. I know. Sorry, guys. My head's still all messed up and with all the medical issues and such this may happen from time to time. I'll skip the details because I'm sure you'll all sick of them.

I ended up going to see District 9 instead. Despite my total inability to concentrate, I did enjoy the film. It was nothing like I expected. It's a documentary style film and that's mostly how it plays out when not in "action" mode and consists of a largely unknown cast and is set in South Africa. It's sci-fi officially but it's definitely got action and some major suspense too. It's also very bloody and has some pretty serious gore levels, hence the "R" rating. The film is of note because it's done by Peter Jackson of Lord of the Rings fame. I don't want to spoil it, but you should see this film. I hope they make a sequel because they left room for one. And the story's intriguing as all hell.

I finally finished the book Dave gave me Friday night (at least I think so -- my time sense is all out of sorts too). It's called The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove and it's a humorous fantasy novel or sorts. And it is, indeed, quite funny. Quite bizarre, quite unusual, and well written. Usually when things get too odd, they aren't well written. I would call this "laugh out loud" but definitely amusing. Christopher Moore did a good job with this and I think any reader of fantasy or sci-fi who likes a bit of humour thrown in will find this an amusing read. Certainly not what I expected, but a good read. If I ever wade through my huge unread book pile, I'll try more of his works. The titles alone make me intrigued.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: The Review

Ah, yes, Mister Potter. As has been traditional, I saw the latest Potter film with Jace and Grant. No reason to break that tradition as it's always been a fun thing to do. First, I think I will go on record as saying this 2h 48m monstrosity is the best Potter yet. And I am happy because I really didn't enjoy the last Potter film.

I've always thought Daniel Radcliffe made a great Potter and every film he proves it while Emma Watson (Hermione) is the least changed in her role and that's a good thing, for she is the rock that anchors all three friends. Rupert Grint (Ron) continues to get better as he gets older. Mercifully Tom Felton (Draco) barely appears at all. I guess when you cast a film of kids, you have no idea how they'll look down the road. And poor Neville Longbottom looks like he's play by a different actor than when the films started.

There was, as to be expected, chunks of book just gone missing. But I realize stuff has to be left out. They spend some time on the horcrux(sp?) because it's so important to the book. There are so many characters, very few get a lot of screen time other than Harry, Ron, and Dumbledore. Even poor Hermione is barely in the film. If you haven't read the book the next bit is a spoiler: the death of Dumbledore was changed quite a bit from how I remembered it. I think it was done quite well in the film and do not find any fault at all.

Helena Bonham Carter played Bellatrix Lestrange and she was just awesome. She tore her scenes up like nothing else and I was really impressed. You'd never even know it was her.

One goof I noticed and most Londoners will notice is that this book took place in 1996 or 1997. (Not when it was written, but when it took place.) There is a scene with the Millennium Bridge which connects the Tate Modern in Southwark with Saint Paul's Cathedral and that bridge is destroyed. That is really a neat trick since the bridge wasn't even built until 1999. And I love that bridge. It's amazing.

Had breakfast with Evan and the kids -- no John or Liz :( We then went to skating -- Liz and Brenda didn't join us, nor did anyone else for that matter. The ice was horrific. The public side is just not acceptable any more and we've decided to not return. Pines Ice Arena sucks -- it's a mess and they just don't care as evidenced by their response to our complaints as we left early. We're going to alternate Kendall and Incredible. This will inconvenience everyone, but we just can't skate at a rink where there are speed-bumps on the ice, the humidity is pushing 100% and there's no effort to ensure the safety and enjoyment of the patrons.

I did laundry, went to Publix, and continue to doze on and off regularly. I think it's time I schedule a visit to my GP for a full physical. I believe I've got something wrong with me. This isn't like me. I'll call and arrange it right after my MRI follow up this coming Tuesday. The infection in my mouth continue to improve -- though it doesn't really hurt less. The teeth in that area are killing me and are hyper-sensitive, so that is going to require some attention as soon as that infection heals. They pretty much just throb all the time. I continue to lose weight. I have bought some fattening stuff to eat that I may be able to keep down. While I want to lose weight, a pound or more a day is just unhealthy and my explain why I'm so sleepy all the time, and do indeed doze off, as well as my light-headedness.

Shout out to Evan: Good luck buying the new car. Erin: good luck at the doctor Monday.

Bruno, Books, and Stitches

I visited Erin yesterday, we went to Stevie B's for lunch, then we went and saw Bruno (same idea as Borat). It was really, really funny. But both Erin and I agreed it had too much dick. This movie was a vertibale pickle fest. Bouncing penises are not funny. But many of the jokes were. Much more of this movie was staged compared to the first one and those segments are obviously staged. Within the first ten minutes an entire group of six people walked out, and that's a good thing because they mixed the bicycle with the dildo on the end. I wish I had missed it. This movie needed an NC17 and has no business being an R film. It's funny -- hysterical in some places -- but it's very vulgar even when compared to Borat. It's also short clocking in at under 90 minutes.

Also, I had, shall we say, a fall and thought I was okay. As it turns out I ended up in the Emergency Room and now have 9 stitches in my lower lip, and my teeth in that area hurt like all fuck. It was a pretty hard fall. It's all swollen and I can't talk or eat without a lot of pain. Never go to the ER on a Saturday night unless you're bleeding to death. I was, I guess. A second ice pack is apparently too complex. Somewhere along the way, my driver's license seems to have vanished, and I suspect it will not return. Thanks to those who checked in on me to make sure I was okay. Here's the shirt I was wearing with blood-stains:

I have some pictures of my post-surgered face and pre-surgered face but you really don't want to see them.

While I was waiting in the ER I did have the chance to read an entire book called The London Mystery by Siobhan Dowd. I got it in London a year or two ago and then never got to it. It's about one kid who goes missing on the London Eye. He gets on and never gets off -- a seemingly impossible trick on a Ferris wheel. There's another teen in the book who, we slowly learn, is autistic. He's the one who cracks the case because that's how his mind is wired. It's neat because they never actually tell you that he is, you just learn it from reading.

Off to the pharmacy for some antibiotic cream for my lip.

The Day From Hell

It started off okay. Woke up, had a cup of tea (Decaf Earl Grey) with loads of milk and sugar. I never drink tea in the states, and this is God's way of punishing me for breaking with custom.

Met everyone at OPH for breakfast (everyone: Three Higgi, Three Berners) and the food was fine and the service wasn't as bad as usual. We finished in about an hour, and had some time to kill so we walked around Game Stop and then Lowes. In Lowes I saw some cool bathroom faucets and I had been contemplating changing mine. We went to the movie (Karen met us).

We saw Ice Age 3D which had been receiving very bad reviews. One of my friends really liked it, so I was hopeful it would be amusing. Sometimes one's hopes are dashed to Hell on the rocks. There were some very, very funny moments. The animation was spectacular, and the new character Buck stole the show -- I'd see a movie about him. Simon Pegg played Buck, he of Star Trek (Scotty) fame. I think I'm beginning to like him as an actor. He's 2 for 2 with me.

Many of the reviews said "Yawn of the Dinosaurs" and sadly, witty dialogue does not a movie make. While the dialogue was often funny, the movie was a long bore. Sad a 94 minute movie seems really long -- and no post-credit surprises either. So, I cannot recommend this film.

Anyway, after the movie it was raining and I started thinking about those faucets. I went into Lowes and bought them and all the necessary hoses and such to do the job -- and I bought a new toilet seat too. I figured I'd make my bathroom nicer. I've been here almost fifteen years (Nov 2009).

I'm handy with some things and have done light plumbing work before (as well as light electrical, phone, and data cabling). I figured it would be a half-hour job for each one. I emptied out the cupboards under the sinks and made room to work. I even brought up a small bucket and shop towels -- working with water after all. Then I shut off the water to the sinks.

I remove the drain stop first, then I remove the bolts -- one of which is so rusted it broke meaning I can't put it back together and give up -- holding the fixture to the sink counter. It won't move. Odd. I explore and remove cover plates. I see the problem, and squirt lots of WD40 on it, and the nut moves a little. Finally it comes off. Same issue with the second one. Try harder and harder but it won't move. More WD40. Finally it turns. And breaks. The people who installed it (Lennar) had apparently broken it and instead of replacing it had tack welded it to the water line. Yeah, I broke it. In half. I stop it up quickly -- no damage at all. I am, unfortunately, having to call a real plumber. Which I do. Roto-Rooter to the rescue. I replaced the toilet seat while I waited.

$310 later, the job is done. It took him a long time to fix that spot. Since he was here, he did the other fixture in about 20 minutes. They look nice. And here's a before and after for you to look at, but I'd never attempt this again. Wow.

Click for larger image

I am too tired to go out. I had agreed to go hang with Karen and do some 4th of July stuff, but I just don't have the energy now. What a day. So I decided to watch TV and noticed my DirecTV receiver was cycling lights: first all four video resolutions went red (1, then 2, then 3, then 4), then again in yellow, then again in green. And the TV reported "no video signal detected" -- lovely. That's right no TV -- so I have an old non-HD receiver so it's not quite that bad. But a call to DirecTV indicates that after power-cycling, resetting, replacing the access card, etc. that the damn thing is just dead.

The moral of this story: Don't drink tea when you're a coffee person.

Transformers II Revenge of the Fallen, The Michael Bay Vision Returns

Wow. I was figuring this would at least be as entertaining as the first one. I knew it wouldn't be good because it is, after all, a Michael Bay film. But he does entertaining (mindless) pretty well and he does explosions great. This film had lots of explosions and toys. I think there was a plot but it was sort of hard to tell. Shia LaBeouf Did a fine job as did the always smokin' hot Megan Fox. Josh Duhamel Did his very small part well but John Turturro wasn't very good and Ramon Rodriguez was so irritating I can't explain it.

They obviously cut corners but not even using a continuity guy here. It was sunny, it was dark, and sometimes not in the right order. The same problem was in the first film. In the Deli, Sam removes his hat twice. JetFire walks out of the Smithsonian into the Arizona desert. WTF? That's huge. Also the car chases change locales unexpectedly -- and we get a cameo by an Oompah-Loompah. And they use boats launched in the ocean to land in Cairo to see the pyramids? HELLO -- LOOK AT A MAP! Not possible. The Air Force base in "New Jersey" shows mountains in the distance? Apparently Jersey has new geography. I could mention the Paris Police have blue-only sirens and not red but that's almost nit-picky. And was I the only one who noticed that when the pyramid eating robot is tearing down the pyramid in the foreground shot, there is a pigeon on the nose of the sphinx that takes up the entire nose? The world's largest pigeon.

The dialog was stilted and so bad I was bored. Karen and I mocked the film. It was a painfully long and I kept checking my watch. We did have a nice (company not food) dinner at Friday's after the movie with SWMBO and William.

The Taking of Pelham 123 (The Remake) Review

First, I really liked this movie. A lot. It shares the same basic concept as its predecessor -- the 1974 cult classic with Walter Matthau as Garber a role which Denzel Washington does a fantastic job with in this remake. But John Travolta has nothing on Robert Shaw in the original. The concept is the same: hijack a subway car for an absurd amount of money and then stage a perfect getaway. The difference is huge, though, because this isn't the same movie.

I am a fan of that original film (The Taking of Pelham One Two Three) and have been for years. It's real, gritty film shot in a subway and showing the full operational details behind it. Being a subway freak, you knew I'd fall in love with it when I first saw it. Please, see the original. The original has Jerry Stiller (really) and James Broderick in it as well. The original is a great suspense picture and is not to be missed. It's rooted firmly in realism and details and they get a lot of them right, too. A line like "Pelham 1-2-3 is in motion" makes your spine tingle -- something the new one never manages.

The remake is a good film too, but it's not the same film other than you know what will happen at the end. (Spoiler Free). This was a Michael Mann film and, as such, the camera direction is dizzying, and I don't mean that as a compliment. Jumpy camera tell no story, improve no story, and just say 'this guy is trying to be a pretentious filmmaker at the expense of the story'. As I've already said Denzel Washington is phenomenal in this film, a perfect ten. Travolta is good, and I'm not dissing him, but he's no Robert Shaw who was awesome. This film has far less detective work and far more action so it will appeal more to modern audiences. But you lose a little when you let go of the heady suspense film and drift toward a less-heady action film, ultimately settling in the middle somewhere. Washington and Travolta playing off each other is quite enjoyable for sure. And for you subway geeks out there: not nearly as fun as the first, but still fun. (You can pick apart all the errors like I did, though I left them out of here due to wanting to keep my readers awake.)

I have to point out some very serious errors in the film. The film was set during the day, a nice sunny day, the train when it was underground had an inexplicably wet windscreen covered in raindrops. Which vanish and return repeatedly. So did some of the above ground trains moving along in the sun. This is a major slippage of detail. Also bugging me was the fact that while this was happening, trains continued to run -- through the whole film -- on the track next to the hijacked train. Can you imagine them running live trains three feet away from people with automatic weapons in New York City? I thought not. And since there were people walking on the track, and the power was off, I'm not quite sure how the trains were running to begin with. They also make a point of some kid's laptop going off with a dead battery. Later in the film he uses it again. I can pretty much guarantee there are no laptop-chargers on subway trains.

The film is rated R based on language. While there is some violence, most of it would pass as a PG-13 nowadays.

Last night was definitely fun. I didn't sleep well, but had fun. This concludes my mystery clause.

Up -- The Review (not much spoiling here)

I wanted to love Up because it was a Pixar film. Pixar has produced some excellent films, the only disappointment to me was Cars. First, I liked Up, but I didn't love it. I couldn't figure out why and I was thinking about it while waiting for lunch and on the drive home. Then, it hit me.

If Up were a live action film, it would have been very average. I'd have been bored off my ass. The animation saved it, but that meant it wasn't a good movie. (The Incredibles, for instance, would have been just as good as a live-action film or as a hand-drawn animated film.)

First, in defence of Up, the first ten minutes were brilliant. Absolutely phenomenal and entirely lost on kids. The rest was just okay, a summer popcorn film. It wasn't a work of art. Wall*E was much better, I can tell you that.

Edward Asner (as Carl) has always been a favourite actor of mine, so I expected good things from his character and mostly got them. But Jordan Nagai (as Russell, the kid) damn near stole the movie -- as real as any human kid. Villains, always the hallmark of any good animated film, are important and Christopher Plummer just was weak, which is surprising because he's very good at being bad. John Ratzenberger had his standard Pixar cameo -- very brief. I also liked Dug the Dog only he had very little screen time.

I certainly recommend this film to kids. I think most adults will like it because as a Pixar film it's very lavish and well done, but I'm just not feeling the love.

Afterwards, we had lunch at Cracker Barrel, simply out of convenience. Too bad because it was more below par than usual. The service was good though.

My ride home was delayed due to an overturned boat in the SunPass lane so everyone had to drive around through the paid-toll lanes and it was pretty backed up.

5-31-09: BTW, a retro post was made today for those who are fans of the ECHL Matadors -- hockey fans take note. Of absolutely no interest to anyone else :)

6-2-09 Edit: Fixed title to make SuzieQ happy.

6-2-09: My company is now on Facebook at this URL: if you've got an account, please become a fan :)

Night At The Museum: Smithsonian (Review)

Well it was going to be a big day out: Erin, Evan, Brenda, their two kids, The Higgi (4), and Tara (3), Karen, and Steve (2), plus me. Karen cancelled due to mother issues, Tara didn't show for reasons unknown, and Erin had ambulatory issues (though she did join us after).

I wasn't expecting a good movie. I was expecting entertaining. There's a difference and it seems many people who review movies don't get that. This was a movie that wasn't designed to be good but was designed to be fun.

So, I arrived at 1020, earlier than I had planned. Steve was next. The Berner clan followed. Then the Higgi. We waited for Tara until quarter to 11, then went in. After 30+ minutes of previews including a great one for the new Potter film, it finally started. There were about ten minutes of really slow, boring stuff at the beginning before it got good. But unlike the first one, this stayed fun right from one end to the other. I liked it better. I had fun. This movie will win no acting awards, that's for sure. Stiller clearly was on auto-pilot but I didn't care. I had fun.

I beat up The Berner kids which is always fun. After the movie, we all went to Lucille's except for Steve and Evelyn who went off to do errands. Erin joined as for lunch. After that, I took her home, went to Sawgrass Mills, bought new shoes, and came home. I am currently doing laundry. And charging my cel phone battery which seems to randomly lose its charge. I may have to replace the battery. It hung up on Jose today.

Josh called me yesterday but I missed his call. That was exciting -- so I hope we can actually speak again. Been a very, very long time.

Yesterday I visited Erin and brought her breakfast (Bagels and cream cheese and milk). I visited her and we watched the Catherine Tate Show (Series One DVD) which was a riot (mostly).

Star Trek The Review (Spoilers)

I wasn't going to see the new Star Trek. But Jace said it was good and I trust his movie opinions so I went. I saw it and we're still friends.

As far as movies go, it was an entertaining film though it definitely had some Lost-ish stuff mixed in. And I am so fucking sick of time travel as a plot device, I'm going to scream.

First, the acting:
Kirk: Chris Pine was very good. I didn't find him irritating which is an endorsement
Spock: Zachary Quinto sucked. Really. He can't act. This was Sylar (from Heroes) with pointy ears. He has the acting range of a daffodil. His performance was as animated as a two by four. He had some good moments, such as when he was fighting and such. But mostly I am displeased. I did like the kid who played Very Young Spock. He could act.
Chekov: Anton Yelchin was fantastic. My second favourite of the lot. I never heard of this guy, but he's good. And I was reminded vaguely of original Checkov.
Sulu: John Cho was fine except he was miscast. I kept thinking he was going to set course for White Castle. I couldn't get him out of my head and that sort of coloured my view of this role.
Scotty: Simon Pegg stole the show. He channelled Montgomery Scott the whole way without any problem.
Bones: I actually liked Karl Urban in this role and I didn't think I would.
Uhura: Zoe Saldana gives Uhura a real WOW factor. She's hot and her and Spock have some thang going. It almost disturbs me but that's the Sylar factor.

Second, let me pick. They definitely took liberties with the original canon. Bones came from "Sawbones" the old name for an old west doctor. They changed it entirely in the film. I may be the only person that bugs but it changes the core of the character.

Third, I like that they had several nods to the original series throughout. It kept it real. Leonard Nimoy also appears as Spock. Believably old, and still a comfortable fit in the role. A Kirk cameo was sorely missed.

So I was entertained. I cannot emphasize how bad Spock's acting was and it dragged the film down considerably. I'm sad to report that, but it is what it is. Still enjoyable.

I'm sorry Liz and Erin didn't show up. However, I did find a new place for breakfast.

Companies That (Still) Suck and Movie Reviews

First, special venom today for Winn-Dixie (previous post) for case 790762 which on 3-3 and 3-11 they promised me a reply from their "District Office" and which hasn't happened. At least we know why they've been bankrupt once already.

Second, even more venom for Tony Roma's (previous post) which still hasn't replied about my issue from 4-16-08, 4-24-08, and 5-23-08. Hell, it's been a YEAR and they haven't given me the promised response. Apparently "Karen Weinberger" who is going to call me is a bit behind. I haven't eaten there since.

And I and am mystified why Rock Beach Grill hasn't checked on their company's name. It's always good to Google your company's name. When a complaint appears above your own company's page, it's good for the complainer's page and not so much for your own. Some companies must love negative publicity.

The day started with the typical OPH breakfast, followed by skating. We went skating at Pines though "skating" is a relative word as the chillers were broken and the ice was the consistency of a Slurpee™ and we were making Bow-Wakes at the far end due to the 1/4" of standing water. Still we had fun and got our exercise in. Johnny and Liz didn't join us for the movie and lunch.

Next up, we saw Monsters vs Aliens. Was more excited about seeing trailers for Wild Things, Ice Age 3, Star Trek, and Up than I ended up about the movie. The movie wasn't bad, it wasn't good, it was just sort of there. It was funny -- much like the second Shrek -- but I didn't actually GET anything out of it. Ice Age 3 will be much like that, too, but I'll go just for a dose of Skrat. Star Trek looks abominable and dropped so far down my "must see" list that it isn't there any more. Wild Things is at the very top of that list now. Up looks amusing.

Today's Cracker Barrel experience was typical. We all had fun, but the service at the Davie branch is always sub-part. The wait today was especially atrocious -- we planned on a late lunch and ended up with dinner. We had a party of 8, and there were people who arrived, were seated, ate, and left before we were seated. But the food was passable and we didn't go for a dining experience. I bought Bottle Caps candy on the way out: FLASHBACK. They no longer have lemon-lime flavour though :(

Shane and Lizzie wore me out. Wow. What a long, rough day.

Coraline by Neil Gaiman

“Friends are God's way of saying 'sorry' for your family.” A friend said that to me and I must say I'm truly enamoured of it because it's so spot-on. I like my friends. I want to expand the list a little, but I'm content with what I've got. I think most of 'em I can count of for most things. At least one I can count on for absolutely anything -- and he's proven himself. Twice. Had dinner with the Higgi, Erin, Timmy, Liz, and Johnny after the movie.

Ah, yes, the movie, Coraline. It's much like the book though there are some changes like a character who isn't in the book. I think that was to change the pacing because some stuff had to go. The book was darker and scarier, and more vivid. However I feel the film maker preserved the world as Gaiman envisioned it, no small feat. The soundtrack was a bit irritating but that's a quibble. It's very Nightmare before Christmas because it's the same people, and it was a good choice for both the feel and view of this world. That's what it needed.

It was enchanting seeing the characters I read brought to life in the way I envisioned them. Some characters weren't quite as scary as I remembered, but I think the edge was taken off all around. The movie is rated PG but there are some very PG-13/R rated innuendo and visuals snuck in. It's quite enjoyable. I'd see it again. We did not see it in 3D and I didn't miss it.

Neil Gaiman is so talented I can't stand it.

Tomorrow is skating. See the usual thread if you want to go. Johnny and Liz have skates. YAY!

No More Scooter News Really

Scooter is still in hospital. All tests so far are negative and the gas is gone and she's still immobile. The vet is running additional tests in an effort find the problem. She's not comfortable at all and there's no clue as to the issue. I am expecting additional news later today, but that's all I've got now.

A rare work related item: Boeing's 787 program has been delayed due to fastener failure. Obviously I have interest in this topic. It turns out they are not installing them properly and there are gaps between the head of the fastener and the metal (see Aviation Week 11-10-08). Why is this bad? In an airplane, the play would allow the metal to flex, metal that flexed gets metal fatigue. Metal Fatigue causes failure, and failure causes planes to crash. Metal fatigue is actually small microscopic cracks the develop in airframes. They occur at pretty predictable rates which assume number of landings/takeoffs and number of air hours. They cannot account for metal flexing due to improperly installed parts (be they fasteners or something else). Thus the failure will occur before an inspection.

I saw Bolt today. Bolt was much better than I expected and was quite enjoyable though due to my circumstances the cat caused me a great distraction. It's an entirely predictable Disney film, so if you're looking for surprise, this isn't it. We saw it in 3D but that really didn't add much, so save the extra $2 and see it without the 3D. It's a little longer than your typical Disney cartoon which worked well and Bolt himself is a very loveable character, though the fat hamster steals the parts of the film in which he appears. Yay hamster.

Dave Barry's Gift Guide was in today's Herald/Fishwrapper. In other news, the exchange rate £ to $ is down to 1.47 today!

315pm Update: Dr. Child called. Scooter is still in pain but she is unable to find a cause. She's got Scooter on pain medications until this evening when they other doctor comes in. All of Scooter's blood work came back GREAT. She's in great health THEORETICALLY. Only she's not. So another night or two in hospital for Scooter :(

What a Bad Day

What a bad day. I woke up, because Scooter decided it was time for breakfast. I went to the bathroom and did my usual stuff and she followed. She did something really weird, put her paws full forward, spread her rear legs and looked like she was trying to take a crap in the bathroom. Certainly not normal behaviour. I carried her downstairs, put her down and she walked to her bed. I noticed there were little poo chunks (Hershey Kiss sized) all over the living room. Very odd. I picked 'em up with a towel and disposed of them and then washed up. I then went to get the paper. When I came back in, she was lying in a very odd position on the floor. I went over and picked her up and set her down. Her legs collapsed and she was unable to stand.

I grabbed her carrier, put her in it (she didn't resist) and drove off towards the 24/7 Emergency Vet at warp drive, nearly running the vet over in the back alley short-cut. I slammed on the breaks to talk to the vet (Dr Child) who was on her way back from Starbucks. I drove around to the vet, and they let me right in.

After several tests, xrays, etcetra, they determined there was extreme gassy building up causing pressure on her spine. She was treated for the gas and the pain and some sub-something-or-other fluids because she was a tad dehydrated. $400 for that emergency visit. Anyway, got her home and she JUMPED out of her carrier (a good sign), she ate, and went to her litter box and took a dump (another good sign). She was shaking a bit like she was cold but I figured it was a bit of a reaction to the anti-gas medicine because he stomach was gurgling and well, the gas WAS coming out. (The less said, the better.)

So I figured she was happy and well again. Went to have breakfast and then see Quantum of Solace. Came home. Scooter has one of those carpeted kitty-condos. She doesn't much use it anymore except to keep her toys in the bottom part which is dark and enclosed. She's not been in there in over six YEARS. She was half in, laying on her side.

I pet her. Then I tried to pick her up and she cried in pain. I grabbed her cat carrier, picked her up as gently as I could, my poor heart breaking at her plaintive cries, and rushed her to the vet (again) calling ahead to warn them I was coming. I rushed in, flew through reception and into the office. They took another x-ray which showed even MORE gas. Something must be causing it. So anyway, they decided they'd keep her for a few hours and told me to go. Dr. Child called me a few times to let me know they were giving her a Barium Shake and that so far it was showing all sorts of gas and she had no explanation as to where it was coming from because all her tests (heart, liver, blood, reflex, etc) were all perfectly normal for a 21/22 year old cat.

She called me at 7pm to say Scooter isn't better and she has to spend the night at the vet :(

----

Quantum of Solace Review: Yay. Another fine Bond. Mr. Craig is second only to Connery in his Bond. The arch-Villain is creepy as hell, and the Bond Babe is a Babe. Not many gadgets but plenty of action and suspense. And plot! But what a horrid theme song. And the walking silhouette that shoots the eye? At the END of the film. This film starts with action and is pretty much action from start to end. It's a tight film and clocks in at around 1-3/4 hours.

I really enjoyed it because I knew Scooter was better. If I had realized she had a sudden relapse I'd have never stayed. I feel bad.

Also, whilst waiting for the film to start I did a lot of holiday shopping. I am about done. Waiting for a big box from Amazon which will take care of quite a few people.

Pineapple Express (and various other items)

We saw Pineapple Express today. If you see any film with the word Pineapple in the title, make it this one. A fast check of IMDB reveals this is the only one. So much for that plan. It was funny -- definitely a better film than Tropic Thunder (see previous blog post). I laughed most of the way through it, though the last 3-1/2 minutes didn't need to be in the film and it would have been much better since they were an awkward and unfunny 3-1/2 minutes.

Another Judd Apatow and Seth Rogan film with Seth in the lead, but James Franco steals the show. It's a stoner film cast in the mode of the early Cheech and Chong flicks such as Up In Smoke and is a worthy addition to that particular oeuvre. If you can appreciate that sort of humour, this film's for you. Full of drug humour, foul language, yet surprisingly no sex to speak of, though references of course abound. Lots of classic "icky" moments like when we find out Rogan's girlfriend is still in high school. The squeamish factor is high and that makes it extra enjoyable. Really.

I have written letters to all concerned doctors about the mess with Progressive and explained that State Farm has stopped paying. I've let them know they should bill Progressive though they may not be paid for awhile. I'm also going to be filing another complaint with the State of Florida Department of Insurance against Progressive. They clearly have no intention of paying or handling this in a fair and equitable manner. They continue to treat me like I'm stupid. Within the next two weeks, there will be legal counsel involved. Then they will have to pay my medical bills and attorney's bills. I cannot tell you how sucky Progressive is. I hope and pray you never get in accident with any of their insured because you will never get paid and they will treat you like a criminal and an idiot.

Science Fiction, Double Feature (RHPS)

Well in a post-birthday celebration, we had a great evening out. First, we (everyone except Karen and Timmy) ended up going to Renegade, the awesome BBQ restaurant at the Hard Rock. I tasted alligator -- the first time I've ever eaten it. It tastes like ..... chicken .... and I wasn't even going to eat it, but Erin was so upset that Johnny had ordered gator (because she went to UF and is a gator), I had no choice but to eat it. It tastes like very rubbery chicken -- little flavour without the BBQ sauce. I had the brisket this time. The BBQ here is authentic American Indian so the woods they use are different than typical. Afterwards, I went and donated $20 to the tribe through a slot machine. Then we were going back to Erin's until she issued a change of plans. So, then it was to Jaxson's for ice cream -- Erin insisted, even though I was already so full I didn't feel well. Adrian was full, but Evan seconded the detour and off we went.

Afterwards I felt as bloated as I ever have in my life. I couldn't finish either dinner or desert. We went back to Erin's after that, and watched some Olympics until it was time to go to the theatre. It all came out in the end (insert drum roll) right before the movie, thankfully.

Ah, yes, we went and saw the legendary Rocky Horror Picture Show. I hadn't seen it in about eight years and was overdue. A thread was started on my message boards (membership required) and soon we had a plan. As it turned out the date picked was the day after my birthday. It was the UK version -- same as the US version but with the SuperHeroes segment included.

In attendance at the RHPS was JohnnyB, Liz, Adrian, Timmy, Erin, Karen, me, and Evan. We had a no show by my sister, David, and Andy. Whilst waiting for the delayed start of the film, we watched some of the group playing skee-ball. (The theatre is Flipper's in Hollywood).

Like all RHPS shows, there is a "shadow cast" -- ours being the Faithful Handymen. If you've never been, in front of the screen volunteers act out the movie using props and such. It's quite fun. The cast was excellent. The lines, not as much. I've been to RHPS about a dozen times, and it's always vulgar but this one was a bit over the top, but my complaint is more like they were shouting so many different lines you couldn't hear any of them. Most theatres it's pretty organized with the cast shouting out the same lines, and the random audience member throwing one in from a show they went to in another city. (All cities have some of their own lines.) The Frank and Eddie guys were most excellent and everyone else was good too. Frank always steals the show, but that's to be expected.

I wore my Coconut Grove 1982 5th anniversary RHPS t-shirt which didn't fit me worth shit anymore. But at least everyone knew I was not a RHPS virgin. I know most of the songs so could sing along, and clued my friends in when to throw stuff. The cast was pretty good about alerting people to get props ready -- the nice thing is they sell prop bags so you don't need to bring your own stuff. The show started a little after midnight, and ended just before 2am. I raced home using the warp drive in my car, and was in bed a little shy of 3am.

I woke up at 855am -- very late for me -- and was off to Adrian's for breakfast and skating. We ended up seeing "Tropic Thunder" which was a spectacular waste of time. I didn't hate it, and it occupied time, but wait for the dollar theatre. Or the fifty-cent theatre. It has some great scenes, it really does. But there are parts where it drags painfully. And Robert Downy is just horrible in this film as is Ben Stiller. Jack Black is awesome, though. Then I came home and am catching up on two days of mail and such. And writing this for the benefit of you, my loyal readers.

Scooter had her appointment for the mysterious black stool, but a full analysis indicates it's weird looking but contains no blood, worms, or parasites. So monitor for awhile and look for additional changes. Scooter's feeling extra affectionate today. I am now doing laundry if you care.

A Very Movie Weekend: Mamma Mia and The Dark Knight.

The concept of a film called "Mamma Mia and the Dark Knight" amuses me greatly. I wouldn't see it, but it amuses me. So on to the reviews of both.

Mamma Mia (the film)
Since the play and the movie have no substantial plot, I'm not much worried about giving it away. The goal is to wrap a bit of a story around some great music. I will start by saying that I love the play. I've seen it in London, Charlotte, and Las Vegas. It's not a good play by any stretch of the imagination but it's fun. So from the movie I was expecting good music and fun. The play is better than the movie, so I'll have to be up front about that. Merryl Streep is a surprisingly good singer and I was blown away by her voice. She was also miscast because I never saw Donna: only Merryl Streep. Nothing is worse than when you only see an actor/actress and not the character they were playing. She over powered the role. Pierce Brosnan can act, but I finally found someone who, when digitally and studio enhanced, STILL doesn't sing much better than me.

As Maury said, "The two hour movie seemed much longer than the three hour play." Sure they did some nice things such as the initial boat ride, and cutting some of the long songs down a bit to improve the flow, but mostly part of the magic of the play -- your imagination of everything -- is ruined by the film. It was okay. But I wouldn't see it again.

The Dark Knight
Holy shit, this film rocks. I shan't mince words. This is the best film you will see this summer. It's over and everything else loses. This isn't a comic book movie either, and almost everyone will like this. The biggest problem is this movie is not for kids. That's right. I do not recommend you take your children (under 13) to this film. Heath Ledger's Joker is a sociopath and insane. And he's not fun insane like Nicholson's version, or even wicked like Hopkins' portrayal of Lechter. This is just creepy. Almost like he wasn't acting. He should win an Oscar for this. The buzz is accurate and it's not because he died. He earned it and owned this role.

Christian Bale's Batman echoes the previous film, with Michael Caine doing a nice job on his scenes as does Morgan Freeman (who is apparently in every movie made now). And if Heath wasn't here, they would be standouts. But they're not. This movie is owned by one performance and that performance sucks you up. When he's not on screen all you do is wonder when he's coming back.

I wasn't a fan of Two Face and if you took all of his scenes out of the movie, it would have played just as well. I'd see this again without hesitation. And I'll buy this on Blu-Ray because I want to see the outtakes. This film is phenomenal. Really.

In other news, Steven Brust's new Vlad Taltos novel is out as is Eion Colfer's new Artemis Fowl. I bought both but am currently in the midst of Glen Cook's new Garrett novel. My unread book pile is obscene -- nearly 20 books. I am so far behind. (And go read Little Brother if you haven't. I am serious.)

Mostly Wall-E (Wall*E) Review

First, a few clarifications about my new car for those asking. It's the 3.0 version of the X5 which is 6 cylinders and not 8. I didn't need the power or the crappy-ass fuel penalty. Secondly, one of the big deciding factors was the all inclusive maintenance that includes absolutely everything except tires. That makes a big difference in total cost of ownership. Figure a few oil changes per year at $29.95 are free, the 15 and 30K services, a few hundred. Some wiper blades, fluids, and so forth. At least two brake jobs, and that's another grand in my pocket. All free.

Second, the report on Wall-E (Wall*E in earlier presentations and actually Wall•E in the film). We started with breakfast at OPH at 1015. I ate light because I knew lunch was coming. Our party of eleven (The Three Higgi, Erin, me, Johhny B, Liz, Timmy, Karen, Evan, Shane) became a party of twelve with the cameo appearance of legend VanMuph. Breakfast was enjoyable. Took a few razzings over the fact I was in my old car and not the new one -- that was due to insurance issues which will be resolved Monday. After eating, we all went to the theatre and got tickets (minus Murph who had a flight to catch) for the 1205 show. Saw some horrific previews (there's a Chihuahua movie coming out that is vapid at best). And then the main event.

This review contains spoilers.

I will say the opening short is better than many FILMS. It's BY FAR the best Pixar short and it was WAY better than Cars, for instance. Very short, short though. Wall•E is a great film, one of the best Pixar films to date, though I still think Ratatouille is the grand champion of all Pixar films. Wall•E is definitely better than Nemo which seems to be everyone else's favourite. We have a story for the ages here. It could be many things but at its heart, it's a love story between Wall•E and Eve. Wall•E has an iPod, sounds like a Mac II when he reboots, and has some very cool personality, all while looking like a cross between ET and Short Circuit. And he lives alone and watches musicals. (Wait, he's not Michael Jackson. I promise.)

Wall•E lives alone on Earth, everyone else having gone to the stars because the planet is overrun with trash. Wall•E and his clones are supposed to clean it up, but except for him, they're all done running. The planet has not been recovered/saved/etc. Then comes Eve who is looking for plant life. Soon, she's leaving the planet only Wall•E has fallen in love and follows her. And until this point the movie is basically dialogue free.

They reach the ship Axiom and the fun begins. The human race has turned into large, sedentary, lazy cows. I mean worse than now, to be accurate. Wall•E and Eve are separated but they eventually find each other and the trip back to Earth begins. The movie gets an A+ for sure.

Afterwards we all went to Cracker Barrel and ate until we were bloated, leaving there nearly at quarter past four. No dinner for me, thanks.

Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting (Panda Review)

Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting
Those kicks were fast as lightning
In fact, it was a little bit frightening
But they fought with expert timing

Thanks to Carl Douglas for that quick excerpt and flashback. We now return you to the present day where I just saw Kung Fu Panda. Today's outing included Dave, Steve, Evelyn, Karen, and Erin -- in addition to myself of course. We met at 9am at the Original Pancake House for breakfast and made it to the theatre just in time for the 10am showing in the Big Theatre.

Jack Black stars as Po The Panda* who works in his father's noodle restaurant but secretly desires to be a Kung Fu star like the Furious Five -- Tigress, Crane, Mantis, Viper and Monkey. All of them really don't have much of a role in this film except as cameos for their voice counterparts. Of the lot Jolie stands out as Tigress. Master Shifu, as voiced by Dustin Hoffman, really steals the show as does the villian: Ian McShane's Tai Lung (a snow leopard). Po owns this movie and it's his show except when Shifu is on screen. I really didn't notice the animation which is a testament to how far it's come along. You won't mistake it for "real" but every now and then the animators are clearly trying to knock your socks off.

This is certainly no new modern work of art. But it was better than Ice Age 2 (and 3's coming soon) and way better than Shrek 3. I'm sure there will be a two, but they'd be better off leaving well-enough alone. I enjoyed it and had fun. Take the kids. Etc.

Afterwards, I went home and the car-shopped some more. No real news but it's looking more like the BMW X5 (the v6 version, not the v8) will be the winner. More shopping to come though. This is a decision that ought not be rushed.

* Please remember the Panda is not a bear.

Indiana Jones And The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Long day. Dad called early and woke me up asking if I could find him an earlier flight home. I gave this off to Karen. No dice for Dad. Last minute flights on Memorial Day are just a fantasy.

Yes, I saw Indiana Jones And The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull today with The Higgi Clan, Mr & Mrs Johnny B, Timmy, Karen, and Adrian. If you're looking for nostalgia, you've got it. If you're looking for fun, you've got it. If you're looking for action and adventure: you've got it in spades. If you're looking for the vicarious thrill of seeing Indy again after all these years, you've hit the jackpot. It's all good except for, surprisingly, Cate Blanchett who uses an accent that made me wonder where Boris, Rocky, and Bulwinkle were. There's a nice little Area 51 bit, a tip of the hat to the coming Nuclear age. There's a ton crammed into this movie. And it's all good. Oh and be prepared for the really stupid ending. Really Stupid. Apparently Mr. Spielberg decided to splice in a bit of Close Encounters. Ugh. Still 4 out 5 stars for sure. Highly recommended. And the music remains as catchy as ever. Running time about 2h 17mins.

Useless trivia from EW magazine: the forest is all CGI. None of it's real. Really. How cool is that. But the film was very cgi-lite until the end and that was good. I was afraid I'd hate Shia LaBeouf, but he was good in the role.

This was followed by lunch with all of the above (except Karen) and adding the Berner Clan and Erin for a total of 13 for lunch at Cracker Barrel. Lunch was good. Okay, it was average but we had fun and that WAS good. Afterwards some of us went off to Pines Ice Arena to watch Shane's first experience on-ice wearing full gear. Cute kid. He and Erin were having a blast.

Afterwards, I came home, dropped kitty litter (80 pounds) and food (20 pounds) off at work, then came home and had an explosive reaction to lunch. So much for that. I think I'm in for tonight and certainly done eating.

I've mentioned to many of you (and in my website) one of my favourite performers of all-time: John Charles. Well his agent has a flash video with a few clips of his. By no means complete and doesn't even show him at his best. But take a peek at this two minute clip.

I have often commented on the worst food in London (the infamous Aberdeen Steakhouse chain) and now there's an article on it from the stalwart London Times. Maury sent me this URL -- she's in London right now visiting friends.