Lost in Lost

So tonight was Lost's first new episode since November. And for those of you who don't watch this show, I say to you now that you are fools. Fortunately for you, you can buy the first season on dvd and download all the 2nd season episodes so far off itunes, as my esteemed colleague Mr. Hanberg did. I'm already putting this episode in my top three for the season so far, and the trailer for next week was massively teasing. But for the love of god, don't try to jump into the middle. This is a show that builds on itself as you watch, and its so fricking good that you actually won't mind spending something like $60-$70 to catch up.

Also, there was a "review" episode on before the new episode, so people who haven't watched the show can get a general sense of what's going on. I saw some of it, and it featured worst example of a deep voice-over I have ever heard. It wasn't that the voice was bad, it's just that aside from being totally unnecessary, the writing was horrific. Whoever came up with that idea and wrote the dialogue should be fired so they can move to Wisconsin to work in the dairy industry, because they obviously feel there isn't enough cheese in the world.

Anyway, and excellent episode of a great show. I can't wait for next week.

Joe, why is there a huge gap between the title and the text?

And the answer is, I don't know. I'm trying to figure it out, but I haven't had a lot of time recently. Hopefully, the problem will simply go away on its own, because if I have to start really trying to fix it, I may accidentally destroy the internet.

It's not quite like Flubber, but it's close

So tonight was my first night playing broomball with actual broomball shoes. I've played with a Carleton alumni team here in the cities over the past couple years, but I didn't feel like the cost (usually $60-$80, mine were $60) was worth it, even though most other people on the ice had them. I also felt like I wasn't as good in relation to other people as I was a Carleton, but I figured that was more of an experience factor than an equipment factor. But then I put on these shoes.

Man, I was impressed. I wondered before if it would take me awhile to adjust to them, and it didn't. Aside from my ankle that I sprained last fall feeling a little weird (it was essentially sitting on top of a layer of cushiony rubber/foam, so there was a lot of side-to-side play that it hadn't experienced in a long time), I was off and running. It was great. My speed relative to the other people on the ice went way up, as did my response time. I'm looking forward to playing a whole season with these things (not to mention a real game, since our opponents didn't show and we just scrimmaged). Kreuser's back, baby.

The Future is Funky

Hey everyone. I'm on my way to bed, but before I go I thought I'd link this. I found this a long time ago, and have been meaning to post it, so here it is. Possibly the most ridiculous trailer in terms of what it's trying to market I've ever seen. But as I've watched it many times over a long period, I've decided that I really, really like it. If you've ever seen the original Star Trek, or have a sense of what the episodes were like, this will have you roaring. My favorite part is at the end, with the "friendly locals."

30th Century Fox Resumes?

No posts for awhile because of that crazy friend of mine Erik Hanberg has been in town, but I thought I'd throw this up quick. It's just a rumor, but ever since Family Guy came back on the air, I've been hoping this would happen.

Big as the Swing of Tiger Woods

For those of you not familiar with Dan Bern's song "Tiger Woods," it starts with the line "I got big balls". He then goes on to compare his balls with objects you wouldn't want to carry around between your legs.

Now, go read this article. This kid has probably got to carry around a wheelbarrow to hold up his pair. Wow.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/12/29/teen.iraq.ap.ap/index.html

How Long?

First post in a while, I know. But with inspiration from my friend Mr. Hanberg to write shorter, more reasonable posts instead of posts that register just this side of Homer in terms of line count, hopefully I can get back in the habit of more regular updates.

This is the first time I've posted from work, and I have exactly 6 minutes until my break ends, so here we go.

I got a kick ass new computer for X-mas (much thanks to Java for helping my parents select one that I wouldn't groan at). With this new machine capable of playing games made in the last 5 years, I also received X-Men Legends 2 (thanks again to Java). After playing the first short segment with the keyboard controls, I stopped playing until I could go to Best Buy and get a standard game controller, because without it I was bad. Anyway, I get the controller yesterday, and proceed to kill somewhere in the neighborhood of 5-6 hours last night playing it. Got to bed around 3, so I'm looking forward to my nap when I get off work today.

Time's up. Later (although hopefully not too much later).

Hand me the Raprod, Plate Captain

A lot has happened in the last couple weeks. A week ago last Friday I finally got a job. It's not the most perfect job ever, but it pays me in real money, the kind that can be traded for goods and services. So after my first week at a new job, my very good friend the Math Avenger comes to town for some Carleton Alumni-take-over-the-world crazy scheme meeting. We hang out, go bowling, I beat Java at air hockey (those of you familiar with this epic struggle will appreciate just how much I enjoyed that, although I don't think Java's heart was really in it-he wanted to be drinking), and we got to watch CUT kick the pants off Madison in the final of the Central Regional Tournament (and then watch the first few points of Syzygy taking it to Iowa). But this weekend was all about Hitchhiking.

I forget when I first read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy books-it was probably junior high, althoug it might have been very early high school. They remain among my favorite books, and after reading just about all of Douglas Adams' published works, I can safely say he was one of the most gifted humorists of his generation, and deserves to mentioned in the same breath as P.G. Wodehouse, one of his greatest influences. This means, of course, that any movie adaptation faces the staggering problem of placating the existing base of rabid fans, making a movie that's accessible to the general populous, and staying as true as possible to the source material. The process was helped by the fact that Douglas had been working on turning THHGTTG into a movie for over a decade, and finished a strong draft before he died. More than that, however, the form of the Hitchhiker's story has changed every time it changed mediums. Remember, it began not as a novel but as a BBC radio show. It then made the transition to the stage in the form of three separate productions that took place (I'm 90% sure) before the book came out. Then there was the BBC tv show, and finally after probably about 20 years of trying, a movie. For most people, I think, the book is the gold standard: the "real" story, and for good reason. In my opinion (and isn't that why you're all here?), Douglas' writing has two main strengths: first, he can create situations that are so outrageous that you never would have thought of them yourself, and yet at the same time they seem like the most obvious and hilarious things in the world (or galaxy, rather). Second, his descriptions of familiar concepts and events (like Space, for example) are written in such deft turns of phrase that the reader is caught off guard and bursts out laughing. Douglas is able (in a very different way on a very, very different stage) to do what Wordsworth and Coleridge did in Lyrical Ballads: he shows the familiar in the fantastic and the fantastic in the familiar.

So how does all this translate in the movie? Well, there is of course the loss of some of the atmosphere of the book, since the first two novels don't really have a plot cohesive enough to stand up to a movie. But aside from a bit of disneyfication, a surprising amount of the irreverence has survived. Different things happen than in the book, and the characters are a little different, but like I just said, Hitchhiker's changes whenever it changes mediums. I really like the face-slappy-things on Vogsphere (and no, I don't have a better name for them), I like the direction they went with the Vogons as the ultimate bureaucrats, and I love the Guide voice overs. And really, any serious doubts I had about the movie were erased in the first five minutes, because when the filmmakers turn the dolphins' farewell into a song as fantastic as that one, you know the movie can't possibly have that many problems. I have no idea if Douglas actually wrote the song, but I was struck with the definate impression that he would have been spectacularly happy with at least that one part.

Breaking News

Hello Everyone. I've just been handed this shocking update from Rome about the deliberations of the College of Cardinals, aka Stanford (I'm not really sure why Stanford gets to choose the next pope, but since it's a tradition streching back hundreds of years I'll let it go). In a shocking turn of events, one Caleb Bartley has been selected as the new High Pope of Romeland (which, of course, is the official title). He will be installed as Pope C-Bar I in a ceremony later this week.

"I'm very excited," said Caleb in an interview early this morning. "It will be a great challenge for me to guide over 500 million catholics to the promised land of the Big Rock Candy Mountain, but one at which I do not intend to fail."

Many conservative catholics have expressed reservations at the Popehood being placed on such a young man, fearing he will side with more progressive factions of the church. But Pope C-Bar I urged his followers to remain calm and trust him. "Indeed, I above everyone recognize that I will need help and guidance in my new position. I cannot spend all my time bombing about Italy in my Popemobile looking for young and nubile girls to convert to the Holy Church of Caleb. That is why my first official act is to appoint my close personal and holy friend, Java Fortran, to the newly created post of Cardinal of Communication, for Java is the only man I know who has the ability to get me high enough to talk to God." C-Bar I went on to reveal that he had already initiated contact with the Almighty, and that a productive conversation had taken place. "I am happy to report that we toked, I mean talked, for a good hour and a half," reported Caleb. "He was happy to offer me a lot of advice on many problems the church is facing in this new millenium." One of the topics on which Caleb and God spoke extensively was the issue of allowing women to join the clergy. Though the previous pope was a staunch opponent of this change, Caleb gave signs to indicate his first decree will allow women to integrate quickly into the highest levels of the church. "When I agreed to take this job, the first thing I thought of was 'do I really wanted to be waited on by a buch of old guys with a prediliction for red robes?' My converstaion with the Big Guy confirmed that he wants as many women as possible working with me to help relieve the tensions of the church." The new pope also indicated that changes in the tranditional church robes could be on the way. "The church needs to become more health-conscious. Studies have consistently shown that exposure to sunlight, in moderation, has a positive effect on the mood as well as increasing levels of key vitamins in the body. I intend to design a new, minimalist, 'less-is-more' style of dress for the church, which will be tested on many of the new women clergymembers. I will keep in close contact with them so as to carefully monitor the results."

Caleb announced another appointment this morning, revealing that Erik Hanberg will become the first Vice Pope in 500 years. "I can't do it all alone," said C-Bar I. "I will need help reaching the people of the world, and no one can help me do that better than Mr. Hanberg. Together we will throw the greatest mass parties the church as ever seen." Vice Pope Hanberg was unavailable for comment, as he has already been sequestered to plan an introductory celebration to allow everyone to get to know the new Pontiff and his staff. Reports indicate that kegs of sacramental wine, communion wafers and shots of Russian vodka will be served.

The new pope finished his interview by revealing that in the upcoming weeks he would be considering changes to the sacrament of communion, specifically at replacing the wine with Jack and Diet Coke and the wafers with Sun Chips.

Twins Update

So in the first three games of the seaon, the Twins started Brad Radke, their long time ace, Johan Santana, last year's Cy Young winner, and Carlos Silva, a second year starter who had a very nice 14 win season last year. Santana, of course, has the ability to totally dominate a game, and Radke allowed fewer baserunners per nine innings than all but two other starters last year (I think). Silva, who did a great job, is nonetheless a sinkerballer, someone who needs a good defense behind him because he will have a lot of ground balls hit off him. So, of these three, who would you guess would pitch the best game? If you're smart (or have picked up a sports section in the past year) you guessed Santana, if you're sentimental you guessed Radke, and nobody guessed Silva. But, after Radke allowed 5 runs in a loss and Santana allowed 4 runs in a win, Silva came out and went 7 full innings, threw only 68 pitches, allowed only one run, a solo homer, and pitched out of a bases-loaded jam. He had no strikeouts, but no walks either, and got three double plays behind him. So one of the best pitchers in baseball and one of the most underrated pitchers in baseball can't keep the Mariner's to under 4 runs in a game, but Silva does it easily, throwing only 68 pitches! Baseball drives me nuts sometimes.

Seriously though, I was pretty impressed by Silva's outing, and if he can maintain that sort of form for most of the season, the Twins could easily have the best rotation in the game.

Sin City Review

So as to not spoil the movie for you yahoos who haven't seen it yet, I'm going to try and talk about aspects of the film as opposed to the film itself.

Most of the time, I think MPAA ratings are shit. Hell, most of the time I think the MPAA itself is shit. In fact, go ahead and cross out that most and put all. I think that a lot of R ratings are ridiculous: kids see and hear worse things on TV, at school and at church, to say nothing of what goes on in their own heads. This is especially true in regards to sexual content and the minds of boys (I can't speak for girls) from the ages of 10-17 (not that the thoughts stop then, it's just that you can go see the R movies then). But in the case of Sin City, I am definately of the opinion that children should be kept the hell away from this film. (When I say children, I am generalizing to mean people whose minds are not mature enough to handle the content matter. It is perfectly within the realm of possibility that you could find an 11 year old who would be better suited to watch this movie than many 17 year olds. In that case I would be in favor of letting that child see the movie. But we're talking about generalities here, people! Get off my back.) It's not that the movie is bad. As I will describe below, Sin City is fucking fantastic. And it's not that it has lots of sex and whatnot that most MPAA bitches think children should never, be exposed to, less they suddenly start fucking in the aisles. In fact, I don't think anyone swears in the entire movie. But Sin City is the sort of movie that should get an R rating, because it contains graphic, twisted violence. Usually, this is the sort of thing that the MPAA thinks is fine to show kids. But when you need to use the word "castrations" to describe a film, it's a good bet that kids might have nightmares.

This is a hardcore film. People get capped, cut, castrated and cannibalized. And since the "good" guys are almost all on missions where they require information they don't have, they have the tendency to torture people until they give it up. My parents didn't like Kill Bill because they thought it was too violent; I told them not to bother going to this movie, because they'd probably walk out after the first 10 minutes. But if you can handle the subject matter, this is one of the best films you can see. It may take a little while to get acclimated to the dialogue and the voice overs, because it sounds kind of corny at first. But then you realize that this is a world where you can't speak like you can in our world. Most of us will never be violently threatened or hunted by people who want to do us harm. But in the beautifully stark world that Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller bring to the screen, everyone is danger all the time. There are no innocent bystanders. They can't speak with the watered down niceties that we do. The best description I've read is from Harry's review at AICN: "The characters spout - no erupt with the sort of high living and dying dialogue that gods speak before killing and fucking." Like I said, it takes a little getting used to, but once the movie gets going and you realize the danger these people are in, you understand the urgency and power of their dialogue.

Sin City, like the Republican party, utilizes some of the basest of human emotions. But unlike the Republicans, who have a propensity for fear and hate, Sin City appeals to your desire for vengence, sex and bloody justice. The heroes can't just defend the innocent and defeat the guilty, because everyone's guilty and nobody's innocent. All the women are strippers or hookers and all the men are thugs, murderers or worse. But within that context, Rodriguez and Miller show us people that have a sense of honor and ethics, albeit an ethics that has no problem killing people and making them suffer before they go. Sin City reflects the worst and best of what we have to offer, distilled to its essense and crammed into a two hour flick that manages to effortlessly alternate between moments of quite introspection and action that will make your jaw hit the floor.

There are a ton of actors and characters of note in this film, but it's pretty easy to generalize because the performances are outstanding. Mickey Rourke, Bruce Willis and Clive Owen carry the film as the three main characters Marv, Hartigan and Dwight. Rourke is particularily brilliant in what might be the ultimate tough guy role. Of all the other characters, only Brittany Murphy's performance didn't sit right with me, but that may be because it came at the beginning of a new story sequence and I wan't used to it yet. Keep your eye out for a couple of hired thugs that show up in Bruce Willis' two story sections. Their dialogue (I should say monologue, since it's really just one character's diatribe) is fantastic.

Like Sky Captain, Sin City was shot digitally using green screens for just about everything. But while Sky Captain was going for the soft, fuzzy look of an early pulp serial, Sin City uses the same technology to make everything hyper-realistic and gritty. It's the ultimate noir look, allowing Rodriguez to speak to the audience using selective color in the midst of a black and white film. The result is a look reminiscent of the digital color grading of The Lord of the Rings, only with a BALCO account and no congressional oversight. Sin City is one of the most visually arresting films you'll ever see, and will probably become the new gold standard for digitally created films.

I've never read Miller's graphic novels, although I've heard nothing but good things about them. From everything I've read, the movie is picked up from the comics almost frame by frame. Rodriguez and Miller do a fabulous job. Go see this movie.

Twins Update

Johan Santana, in an unprecedented bid to convince Bryan Singer to turn his new movie into a documentary, had not given up more than three runs in a game since the beginning of last June, a run of 22 starts. Last night, he showed his human side by giving up 4 runs to the Mariners in the first inning. After getting the final out, he went back to the dugout, where manager Ron Gardenhire took him aside and asked to borrow his wallet. After showing Johan two photo IDs, his Cy Young trophy, pictures from the crash site at Gardenhire's Oklahoma farm and a blood test, Santana remembered that he was indeed Superman and went back out and retired 14 of the next 15 batters he faced. The rest of the Twins, continuing their grand tradition of scoring runs for Santana after not scoring any for Brad Radke, hit 25 singles in a row until Jacques Jones realized that there was a way to advance more than one base at a time and hit a 2 run homer to give the Twins an insurmountable 7-4 lead. The victory was key for one Joe Kreuser, whose fantasy team benefited from the Twins' hitting and pitching prowess, but also from Mariners' 3rd baseman Adrian Beltre's ultimately harmless 2 run double in the first inning. The rubber game of the series takes place today at 5:35pm central, or 2:38am last Thursday pacific.

A Long-Expected Posting

Hello again people. Yes, I'm still here. I haven't died, moved to a remote desert island where they don't have broadband hookups, or contracted leprosy. I've been here, procrastinting, rationalizing and pontificating (but the last only in my head, unfortuneately). At any rate, I've been trying to keep busy, but I'm afraid that I got hit with a bout of malaise a couple weeks ago, and I've been trying to pull myself out of it. These sort of things happen when you're frustratingly unemployed as I am, and I apologize that all of you have had to suffer from the lack of posts detailing my fascinating thoughts and ideas that I know you all base your lifes around.

I thought that a quick post, just to let you know what I've been up to lately, would perhaps get the creative juices flowing enough for me to rededicate myself to posting at least every day or two. I'll do my best.

With the onset of April, it appears that Minnesota has seen the end of the horrible season that separates Winter and Spring, also know as Sprinter. We've had temps in the 60s and 70s the past couple days, and though it's going to dip back into the 40s and 50s the next couple days (I'm talking about high temps here, people: there's still ice on the lakes) the nice weather has been enough to allow the Ultimate season to officially begin, meaning that I was almost too sore to get out of bed on Monday after playing somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 hours of frisbee over the weekend. It was great, and the fact that I couldn't raise my left leg to put on a sock yesterday doesn't deter me for a second.

I've also been eagerly awaiting yesterday, which was of course opening day for baseball (fine, the Bo Sox and the Yankers played on sunday, but who the hell cares about them). This is doubly exciting since I'm on a fantasy baseball team for the first time this year. I of course was required to draft many Twins players to populate my roster, and though Mr. Hanberg's Mariners defeated them yesterday, I remain confident and excited (and, as I drafted the M's 3rd baseman and closer, I was able to pick up some positive stats). Although if I was you Erik, I'd be nervous about the fact that all your offense came from two swings of Sexson's bat.

And of course, the main draw on my time recently has been LotR. I started what will again become and annual rereading of The Lord of the Rings (as it was before the three years of movies disrupted it). I just finished book 3 (or the first half of The Two Towers) today, so I still have a ways to go. But it is, as always, a journey I enjoy making every time.

My post tomorrow will be a review of Sin City, easily the best movie so far this year and a stunning piece of visual work that will make your jaw bug out and your eyes drop. Or perhaps the other way around. Also, check out the sidebar soon for some new sections.

So until tomorrow (I promise).

And Hanberg, I expect trash talking baseball posts over the next few days!

A Special Announcement

Ladies and Gentlemen, your attention please. Thank you all for coming. As we all know, tomorrow is March 15th, the day when it befits us to honor one of history's greatest personalities. No, not Julius Ceasar. I speak, of course, of Caleb M. Bartley.

Caleb was born in the small town of Mumblican in North Dakota, where his family earned their living by using superintelligent llamas to mine the rich veins of coal 12 miles east of the Bartley farmstead. Unlike the other families nearby, the Bartleys did not revere the sacred statue of Vishnu. Their household god was a hard day's work, and Young Caleb's first job came at the age of four, when he began teaching the llamas to differentiate between a live canary and a dead one. His adeptness with the young llamas would prove valuable later in life, when he would convince the heirs to both the Betty Crocker and Cargill fortunes that young children are not really that different from young llamas, and that he could be trusted with the duties of a nanny.

After the supply of coal was exhausted and the superintelligent llamas left to conquer Canada, Caleb and his family moved to St. Louis Park, Minnesota. As they drove to their new home, Caleb discovered the existence of hills, and resolved to be the first person to travel down them by means of stapling two thin boards to his shoes. His determination was redirected but not blunted when he discovered that downhill skiing was widespread and popular, and he quickly joined Blizzard Ski School. This proved especially fortuitous as Caleb was able to combine his newfound interest in skiing with his love of work. Blizzard affored Caleb the opportunity to first call other members in the area to see if they would be skiing that weekend, and later, when his skills improved, he worked as an instructor for younger children (again asserting the lack of difference between children and llamas). It was in the course of the former that Caleb made first unofficial contact with the Kreuser household, a coincidence that would later be remarked upon and marveled at but never explained. The fact that he later became peripherally acquainted with my sister, Kate, is generally dismissed as the Universe playing silly buggers with us all.

Upon moving to Minnesota, Caleb had been enrolled at Our Lady of Perpetual Sorrow: Benilde St. Margaret, a catholic school of some repute and resources. He benefitted from the finest education and hockey team money could buy, and his intelligence and resourcefullness often aided him in attempts to extricate himself from lockers, and subsequently fool around with the girls who helped him in out of said lockers. Caleb's school years were hard, because he had unfortunately been stricken with Youngitis, a disease that stunted his vertical growth (which would have otherwise topped 6'3") and caused his features to give him the youthful appearance of a twelve year old. However, Caleb was able to avoid the pitfalls of his ancestors, and did not marry his high school girlfriend. Instead, he used his undeniable intelligence and boyish charm to gain admission to Carleton College.

At Carleton, Caleb blossomed into a beautiful flower of a manly man. Paired with Jesse Belnap as a roommate, he formed half of the original Odd Couple: Caleb got up at 6am to go running, and Jesse slept until 2pm to give himself more time to smoke (both kinds), drink, and do his radio show. He also met the rest of the wacky gang of 1st Goodhue, which included myself, Andrew and Java. Deprived for the first time of a rigidly defined job, Caleb decided to make classwork his job: he kept track of all the time he spent going to class and doing homework, and if he was under 40 hours for the week, he would do flashcards to bring himself up to the required amount. It was this penchant for flashcards that first introduced me to the wonders of the Fubgangerzone (I believe Webster's now defines it as the place where gangs go to fight with nerf bats). And it was the German class that the flashcards were for that would introduce him to Yogi Reppmann, his German professor who initially asked Caleb to help him set up his computer. Little did Caleb realize that he would soon be negotiating shady international business deals and that Yogi would pimp him out to his ever-changing group of Hot German Chicks. Faced with the prospect of losing his only link to the world of technology and his most valuable gigolo at the end of the school year, Yogi was forced to kidnap Caleb and take him to Germany for the summer, where Caleb would defraud the German national telephone company, learn to love both beer and Cuban cigars, drive ridiculously fast cars and finally see Yogi naked. I believe that Caleb's love of international relations stems from this time, since he was forced, at several points, to use all his diplomatic skill to avoid creating an international incident. In exchange for not filing suit against the college, Caleb was accepted into the German off-campus studies program, where he spent fall term learning to enjoy beer even more. It was this love of beer and cigars that Caleb immediately imparted to me when I arrived in Munich for Joe & Caleb's Big Adventure. Eschewing my lack of health, he bought me a liter of beer and a cuban cigar the first night I was there, and I will say this: after drinking a liter of beer, I was feeling much better on the walk home than I was on the walk there. Over the next 7 days, we cut a glorious swath across the German countryside, annoying and confusing the natives, drinking enough beer to stun a Yak and being force-fed enough food to feed a town of starving Mongolians for a calendar year.

When Caleb and I returned from Germany to start Winter term at Carleton, little did we know that we, along with Java, Kathreen, the Sara(h)s and Andrew (when he returned from Mali), would form one of the most infamous rooms Carleton had ever seen. From our amazing adventures in the tunnels beneath Carleton and re-plumbing Caleb's cabin to our own section of the dorm staff meeting, the influence of Goodhue 414 was impressive. We were so prolific that when a friend of Caleb's from Germany came to visit us in the spring, he never saw us actually sleep. There are so many stories from that time that it would be folly to recount them all, but Caleb's involvement can be characterized by the moment when he suggested, at 3am on a Tuesday (or maybe Wednesday), that we should start watching a movie. Caleb pushed our carousing to the limit. I, seeking to do my part to help, acquired the habit of turning Caleb's alarm off in the mornings when it would go off for his 8:30am class.

Caleb continued to cause insanity for the rest of his Carleton career, whenever he was not writing insanely long papers for his advanced Poly Sci classes. Fortuneately, when he becomes famous and tries to deny everything, I have the photographic evidence to prove it all. After more or less taking Junior year off (except for organizing the U.S. branch of the Trip to Visit Joe in London, a trip whose insanity needs no recount here), Caleb was back in top form Senior year, causing fresh chaos with myself and Erik Hanberg as roommates. Nothing could deter Caleb in his quest to buy booze for the freshmen, help Erik hit on the freshmen, and then disappear to London for a weekend. Truly, Carleton will never forget this man who ruled the Rec Center with an iron fist. And if they try (presumably after Caleb gives them large amounts of money), I'll be right there to remind them.

And now, as Caleb turns 25 and is able to rent a car, he looks to the future. Having conquered the hillbilly yokels of Mizzera, he will soon earns MS in International Security and World Domination Studies. Caleb will then move to England, where he will labour to gain entrance into the secret Cabal of Powerful People who Rule the World. Fortuneately, Caleb's lifelong commitment to work will serve him well, and I predict that it will not be long before Caleb manically, yet studiously, runs the world from his office Hoboken, NJ. And if he gets everything done is less than 40 hours a week, he'll do flashcards to bring up his numbers.

So, ladies and gentlemen, I propose a toast: Happy Birthday to Caleb M. (which I think stands for Mountebank) Bartley. Loyal, outspoken, more than a little crazy, with a sometimes acerbic wit and a penchant for drinking beer and then beating up people who make comments about his sister. Caleb Bartley, my Friend. Happy Birthday.

Ong-Bak Review

I first heard about this movie on AICN. It got rave reviews at their annual movie marathon event, but I largely ignored it until I saw a trailer. Then I was hooked. I'm a big Jackie Chan fan, especially his earlier movies which involve ridiculous stunts and fight scenes. Jet Li is cool, but his movies tend to employ wire-fu to some extent or another, which is fine, as long as it's explained within the context of the movie. I like Chan more because, at least in all his early movies, it's actually him doing those stunts. He actually does jump across an alley from the top of a building onto a fire escape. He actually does hang from a helicopter. And he actually does all those cool fighting moves. So Ong-Bak was exciting for me because the star, Tony Jaa, was sold as the heir to that tradition of no stuntmen and no wires, and I'll be damned if it didn't deliver big-time.

First things first: don't go to this movie looking for plot. You'll find just enough to justify the crazy fight and chase scenes, but nothing more than that. Also, you'd be well advised to check any "He couldn't survive that" or "There's no way he could fight after that" attitude at the door, as there are several moments toward the end of the film where both the good and bad guys overcome serious injury to fight at what appears to be their peak ability. One last thing: I found the ending a little confusing. The head of Ong-Bak (the diety/Buddha of a small town that was stolen at the beginning of the movie) has been recovered, the bad guys vanguished, etc., but supposedly at the cost of one of the good guys. But then the scene switches back to the small village and the celebration that the head had to be recovered for. Riding on one of the elephants is someone who looks very much like the guy who you supposed dead a few seconds ago. But they don't confirm this in any way, and I was left wondering if it was that character, or just some monk who looked like him.

There, that's done.

Now, the reason to see this movie: it rocks. The action is fantastic: the fight scenes are very well done, and the chase scene in the middle has some of the most ridiculous stunts I've ever seen. You won't actually believe they did them at first, but the director thought of this problem and decided to show all of the most spectacular stunts in triplicate, and from different angles, just to convince you that absolutely no tickery was used to make it easier for Jaa. I can't even imagine what the blooper reel looks like, but it was worth it, because your jaw will hit the floor about a dozen times before you walk out of the theater. In that chase sequence, Jaa does flips off people, tables, cars, and everything else, jumps through a hoop of barbed wire not much bigger than a basketball hoop, does a sideways flip between two panes of glass that I probably couldn't even get through, and slides a truck by doing a full split, all at top speed. It's amazing. Then, there are the fight sequences. Brilliantly done with some of the most massive hits I've ever seen. I'm pretty sure a lot of stuntmen were very sore after filming this, because it looks like they erred on the side of judiciously hitting them as opposed to judiciously missing them. In fact, the realism is driven home in the first scene, where all the young men of this small village compete to see who can climb a tall tree, retrieve a flag at the top, and then get back down. No big deal, you say? Well, it would be if it weren't full contact tree climbing. The ground around the base of the tree has clearly been dug up, and if they were nice they put mattresses or something under the dirt, but it can't possibly have mattered that much when you still fall from 20 feet in the air, sometimes hitting many large branches on the way down.

This is Tony Jaa's first movie, so it's a little early to crown him as the next great martial arts star, but with the stuff he pulled off in Ong-Bak, you'd be crazy to say that he couldn't be. His next movie, Tom Yum Goong, is filming now (according to IMDB), so I suggest we all wait until we've seen a little bit more of him before the inevitable Jaa vs Chan vs Li vs Lee questions come up. Be careful if you're squeamish about seeing people's heads get cracked by an elbow, but if you like action movies at all, Ong-Bak is the best pure action you're likely to see for a while.

Consciousness, Pericles, and a new Philosophical Theorem

Consciousness is a strange thing. It is our greatest attribute and the one most taken for granted. We live everyday with perhaps the most inscrutable facet of ourselves, the one thing that makes everything else possible. Some of us use it to push the boundary of what we know and understand about the universe. Some create amazing works of art that teach us about ourselves. Some of us look inward, and examine the depths of that consciousness. And some of us watch Jerry Springer and then catch an early showing of Son of the Mask. It took thousands of years of human history before Rene Descartes boiled philosophy and consciousness down to its simplist form in 1637: "I think therefore I am." It doesn't get more basic than that.

That, of course, is all well and good. But as important as thinking and being is, it does confine you to a rather lonely existence. Which is why Descartes immediately followed his first statement with his second: "I get mail, therefore I am." This worked well until the 1990s and the advent of the internet, when it had to be amended to "I get email, therefore I am." I certainly remember checking both my email inbox and Carleton mailbox at every possible opportunity, to see if some new proof of my existence and importance had arrived. But, my friends, I have recently discovered a new form of existential verification that Descartes neglected, possibly because he lived in seclusion in Holland for 20 years. I do not doubt that this form of verification has been discovered and know before this point, but, as I am gloriously unfamiliar with philosophic writings, I will describe to you how I came upon my therom: "I get recognized in bars, therefore I am."

But first, I will give a brief account of the Guthrie Lab's presentation of Pericles. I wrote my review of the text of the play earlier, and I must say the adaptation on the stage took me a little by surprize. The set was excellent. Versital, interesting, familiar and exotic as the scene required. The costumes were also excellent, and here we come to the first, and most notable, aspect of the production. Pericles, through a series of travels, comes to several (I think a total of six) different countries, and the production showed the change in scenery by radically different costumes (which were fantastic) and accents. The accents and mannerisms took a while to get used to, since that didn't really occur to me while I was reading the play. But I realized that it was the best way to show the differing cultures the play was set in, and I admired the international feel that it gave the performance. The dramatis persona was pared down to a meager 17 characters, which was handled by a total of eight actors, who did an excellent job of jumping back and forth. All the characters are played a little over the top, which can often end in disaster. But the director clearly knew what he was doing, and brought the actors right up to the point where their performance gave the play just the hint of the ridiculousness that it needed. It's a long way down for an overacted play: Joel Sass (the director) takes Pericles up to that cliff, takes a long look down, but ultimately decides not to jump. The play succeeds in being colorful and silly without losing its dignity. Of all the characters, I was most surprised how much I was impressed with Gower, an English poet who was a contemporary of Chaucer that Shakespeare resurrects to play the Chorus. The performance (by an actor who I first saw at the Lab in an excellent turn as Othello) was lively, and Sass weaves Gower into the fabric of the action, as opposed to leaving him out in the cold to stand on his own. But what perhaps impressed me most were his actual lines. You would think that I would have gotten that out of the text, but clearly these lines (like so many of Shakespeare) were meant to be read aloud. Gower's rhymes frame the action with a lightheartnedness that belies the seriousness of some of the sequences on stage, and give you the idea that everything is going to end up okay.

But now I come to the meat of this particular post. As some of you know, perhaps my favorite bar in Minneapolis is the Monte Carlo, discovered before the aforementioned Othello performance at the Lab, when we had an hour to kill and wanted something to drink. I have now been there several times, and have kept the tradition of going either before or after Lab performances. It's a fantastic, old school bar and restaraunt. Atmosphere to the rafters but an easy and welcoming style. About half or 2/3 of the public space is given over to dining room seating, but the heart of the Monte Carlo is the bar. About 20 feet long with a copper top, the bar occupies the front of the restaurant and is pretty much all you see looking in from the front window. Running the length of the bar is a mirrored wall that is covered with four long glass shelves, stocked with a plethora of liquor that would be more than sufficient to drop any elephant that had the mischance to wander in and order a drink. I'm always dazzeled by the array of vodkas, gins, tequilas and other hard liquors (including at least three brands of the Scandinavian Akvavit), but when you put me in a bar that makes me feel like I should be wearing a pin stripe suit, a fedora and smoking an extremely expensive cigar, there's only one thing I'll really want to drink. I may start off with a martini, I may order something else, but what I really want is a shot at the largest collection of single malt scotch I've seen in a bar outside of Scotland. And it is therefore fitting that scotch is the reason I can tell you this story.

The last time I had been to the Monte Carlo was about 3-4 weeks ago. Java and I were celebrating the clearing of a number of boxes and packaging materials from his company's downtown offices, and in appreciation they expensed our little dinner. Freed from financial constraints, I ordered a cucumber-infused Hendrik's Gin martini, and then two glasses of scotch. It was the scotch (first a Highland Park and then Oban) that caught the server's attention, and he spent a few moments chatting with me about scotch. Nothing major, just a few remarks that showed he knew what he was talking about.

So. Java and I enter the Monte Carlo after the play, ready to enjoy not only their fine selection of alcohol but also their fantastic teryaki green beans. We sit down on the end of the bar, facing in toward the restuarant. One of the two waiters behind the bar comes up and asks us what we would like. Java orders a vodka tonic. I reply that I want a glass of scotch, but I don't know what kind yet. The waiter gets Java's vodka tonic, sets it down in front of him, turns to me and says: "You were liking the Highlands and the Islays the last time." Being the master of observation, I quickly realize that it is the same waiter we had several weeks ago, and that, against all probability and odds, he has remembered me. "Yes," I replied. "Have you ever tried Lagavulin?" (Pronounced lagga-voolin, and yes, I had to look this up.) "No," I answered, still stunned that this guy (who couldn't possibly have been more than a year or two older than us, if that) remembered me and what I drank a month ago. "Let me get you a glass of that..." And so began my life after being recognized in a bar. And not just any bar, but one of the best I've ever been in. Like finding email in your inbox or a laminated card letting you know you have a package waiting for you, it's one of those experiences in life that makes you feel important. I stumbled into it totally by accident, by virtue of endearing myself to the waiter by ordering from his area of expertise. It's all well and good to go along thinking and being, but every once in awhile it's nice to get some outside confirmation.

Constanticles: Reviews of Constantine and Pericles, plus a rant about the original Superman

Okay, so let me protect myself first by saying this: I've never read Hellblazer. I know, I'm a bad comic book fan. But it's true. In fact, it's only been relatively recently in my comic reading career that I've been branching out from Marvel to some of the more critically acclaimed series, but I've picked up Watchmen, Gaiman's Sandman (the first nine anyway), The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and the first two volumes of Hellboy. It's not much, but it's a start. In any case, I do plan to rectify the lack of Hellblazer in my collection, but suffice to say I went to see the movie without my traditional comic-knowledge background. I have no idea what the purists think, but that movie fuckin' rocked. It was fantastic. If you haven't already, you'll probably heard a fair number of mediocre-to-negative reviews. That's because people don't like Keanu. I'm not really sure why: I've never really had a big problem with him, provided he sticks to characters that fit his style. I've only seen him in Constantine, the Matrix movies, Much Ado about Nothing, The Replacements, and Speed. He does better with brooding characters who don't talk so much, and John Constantine is definately one of those. So if for some god-unknown reason you can't stand Keanu, don't see this movie, because he's in most of it (and he even has some lines). But he's far from bad, and has some fantastic scenes, particularily at the end. When Satan shows up at the climax, Keanu's offhand "hey Lu, what kept you?" sets up a final scene worth the price of admition.

You should see Constantine for the atmosphere, the style, and the visuals. The scenes in Hell are beautifully done, the pace is slow enough to build the tension nicely, and keeps you sufficiently in the dark (or at least it did me) for the ending to throw you a couple of curves that you might not be looking for. Perhaps more significant that anything else, this is DC's first good movie in a long, long time, and gives those of us waiting for Batman Begins and the Bryan Singer Superman movie a sign. A sign that DC (and its parent company, Warner Bros) can actually turn a comic book property into a good movie, ending a drought that began with (depending on who you talk to) Batman Forever or, well, the original Superman.
[I'm sorry, but I need to say this. In the comic book world it's widely accepted that Superman set the bar for superhero movies. That it made you believe a man could fly. Well, let me say this, after seeing it for the first time as an adult: Christopher Reeves is the only thing that movie has going for it. And he's amazing. He actually made me buy Superman/Clark's total lack of disguise (other than the glasses). His presence is phenominal. But other than that, Superman bites. And it's not the actors' fault. The script is horrible. The direction (and here I am speaking to the decision to have Gene Hackman play the most campy, ridiculous Lex Luthor I could have possibly conceived in my darkest dream) is awful. So. There, that's off my chest now. Thank you.]
To recap: Constantine good. Go see it, you'll like it. And if you didn't, don't blame me. There's obviously something wrong with you.

Now then, I also finished Shakespeare's Pericles a couple of days ago, in preparation for seeing it at the Guthrie Lab in the near future. Pericles is the first of the Romances, the genre which includes The Winter's Tale, Cymbeline and The Tempest. If you're reading a Shakespearian play with a happy ending that involves reuniting long-lost loves, involves major characters either being brough back to life or revealed to have not died in the first place and no revenge/retribution killings, you're almost certainly reading a romance (or at least in my experience you are). Pericles, prince of Tyre, goes around to some different cities, endures at least two major storms while en transit at sea, and gains, looses and gains a wife and daughter. He doesn't do anything wrong, he has no fatal personality flaw that makes him suffer. Bad shit just happens to him, which makes this one of Shakespeare's simpler plays. Which means, of course, there are 5-10 major angles you can analyze the play from as opposed to the standard 50 or so. At its most basic, I think you can describe the main point of Pericles like this: Life ends up throwing a lot of shit at you, even if you're a king. You can either give up and stop bathing and cutting your hair like Pericles, or you can keep on hoping, even without reason, and retain your virtue by convincing every John that comes to the brothel you've been sold to that they should give up whoring, thus driving the brothel out of business, like Marina (his daughter). Truly a lesson that applies to us all. Like I said, I've only read it at this point, so I'm interested in seeing how its staged. I'll be sure to let you know.

Barbarella: Queen of the Galaxy!

Wow. So I finally watched this movie, courtesy of Mr. Java Fortran. And as I promised, here is my review. Yes, the interior of Barbarella's ship is entirely covered with shag carpeting. And yes, she does spend the entire first scene of the movie naked (not that you see anything). That should really tell you all you need to know about this movie, but just in case it doesn't, here's some more info:
Barbarella, played by Jane Fonda (who is amazingly hot in this movie-I had no idea), is never actually called the Queen of the Galaxy. She gets a call from Earth to go to a planet and look for an Earth scientist named (are you ready?) Duran Duran. That's right. And they say his full name all the time. Every time they did, I cracked up. It was great. You see, Duran Duran created a great weapon and then disappeared, making the Earth government worry that something might threaten the centuries of peace and love everyone had been enjoying. So Barbarella goes to this backward planet where they're a bunch of sadists and hedonists, quickly learns the upsides of having physical sex (as opposed to taking a pill and holding hands, which is what they do on Earth now) and becomes just a little bit of an addict. She does it with the first guy she meets when her ship crashes in the icy desert of the planet, she does it with the angel she meets when she gets to the city, she does it with a machine Duran Duran puts her in to torture and kill her, and she almost does it with the crazy BDSM chick who runs the planet's main city. It's really the backbone of the movie. In fact, I would go so far as to call this a movie about the feminist awakening of Jane Fonda to the pleasures of sex. Or maybe not.

In terms of things other than Barbarella doing it with different things, this is a quintessential B movie. Cheap production values, etc. But as long as you don't have a problem with that, there's absolutely no reason you can't get some good laughs from this movie. I know I did.

How to make a Joe-Improved Pizza

It's a classic: the Joe-Improved Pizza. If you've hung out with me when there's a kitchen and requisite ingredients around, you've probably had it. It's always gotten good reviews (so if you bastards were lying, it's your own fault), even though half-truths and semi-slandarous words have occasionally been spoken about the presence of charred carbon remnants where the cheese should be. So I thought I would toss the recipe up here in order to say that even you (yes you, Java) can make this extraordinary delectable delight yourself.

frozen pizza (count based on how many people you're trying to feed)
shredded mozzarella or block cheese
pepperoni
green and red bell peppers
yellow onion
thai chilies
garlic powder
basil leaves

The first step is to identify the type of frozen pizza that works well for you. For me, it's Jack's, but to each their own. Be aware that if you have a rising crust pizza it will take more time for the crust to cook and you may end up singeing the top. Preheating the oven is fine but not necessary. I suggest an arbitrary temperature somewhere in the range of 375-415, regardless of what it says on the pizza box (although definately on the high end with rising crusts). Now, I personally recommend starting with a sausage pizza. Spread the pepperoni to attain the desired coverage. Slice the onion and put on top of the pepperoni. Be sure to leave the rings whole-don't half them. The cut the bell peppers into strips about 1/2" wide and scatter among the onions. The thai chilies should be cut fairly small (maybe 1/4") and don't use more than three unless you really want to fry your mouth (an excellent alternative is to use pepperjack cheese instead). Spread (or grate and spread) the cheese, and feel free to mix in a few different types if you can (mozzarella, chedder and a little parmesean work well together). Then sprinkle the garlic powder and basil leaves over the cheese (I suggest a liberal application of garlic powder). Cook until about half of the mozzarella is brown. Remove, cut and wait a few minutes for it to cool down, because it's too hot right now and you'll burn the roof of your mouth. Then eat.

You may be wondering why I use garlic powder instead of fresh garlic. After several taste tests, I came to the conclusion that you get a more powerful garlic flavor by baking the powder directly into the cheese. Also, you're already chopping up a lot of things-give yourself a break. This is supposed to be easy, damn it!

Did Eco write for Garfield & Friends?

Note: This review will contain revelations about the climax of The Name of the Rose. If you don't want things spoiled for you, go read the book really quick and them come back and read this post.

I picked up Eco's The Name of the Rose after a conversation I had with my good friend the Math Avenger. I had just finished The DaVinci Code and remarked to him that I had enjoyed the mystery and thought the ideas were intriguing, but found the writing to be pedestrian at best and groan-inducing at worst (there's one passage where the main character describes entering the Louvre as "walking into another world"). The Avenger recommended Eco as an alternative, saying that he found him to be similar in ideas but better in execution. After finishing the book last night, I must say I agree. Eco's style is much more cerebral and demands more attention from the reader. There are more characters, more subplots and more issues raised. Eco's writing is excellent: I'm not familiar at all with medieval writing styles, but Eco says in the postscript that he studied several manuscripts of the period so he could write as a monk of the period might write. I have no idea if he actually succeeded (in that I don't know what a scholar would think if you gave him a copy and asked him how close it was), but the narration was certainly in line with what I might expect out of that period, and it created the right tone and atmosphere for the novel. Before I get to what I actually want to talk about, let me just say that after a bit of a slow start where I had a lot of problems tracking all of the different sects of monks people were talking about, I really enjoyed this book. The characters are excellent (William is Sherlock Holmes as a monk in the 1300's), the mystery is fantastic, and the religious questions that are raised (particularily concerning heresy) really give you something to wrap your brain around, if that's the sort of thing that gets you going. The long descriptive passages, where Adso (the narrator) goes on at length about the various imagery he encounters reminded me first of Homer's long registry of Greek ships that sailed to Troy, and second of some of the more imagistic passages of The Faerie Queene. I did have one problem, which is that I have never read a book that would benefit so much from footnotes. Now a sort of mini-discussion about medieval religious sects would be great, and some of the imagery that pops up could definately use a gloss. But more than anything, I want the latin (and various other languages) translated. Do you know why? That's right, because I can't read Latin, and some very important lines in the book, including the last one that gives the book its title, are in Latin. So it drove me a little nuts, since I was looking for some closure on the book, and I didn't have the last line of the book! So that is my one major problem. You'd think that since the book was already translated from the Italian, it wouldn't be a problem for the guy to do a few more quick lines and just shove them down at the bottom somewhere. But my main purpose wasn't really to review the book, but to talk about one of the main ideas it brings up. (It's at this point that I'll start talking about the climax, so if you don't want to know what happens stop reading now.)

Early on in the book there are several conversations about the licitness of laughter, which take the form of the monks debating about whether or not laughter is something that should be recognized as holy or not. Although it comes up a couple times early in the book, my memory of it was overshadowed by discussions on the nature of heresy that dominate the later half of the novel. As I was approaching the climax, I found myself wondering what massively dangerous knowledge was in the mysterious book everyone kept chasing. Since the Math Avenger recommended this book as an alternative to The DaVinci Code, I figured it was some secret that would destroy the church, but I knew that it wouldn't be the same sort of revelation because there had been absolutely no preparation on that front (and anyway if the book said that Jesus was married and the apostles were sexists the monks would simply have dismissed it). I was initially confused by the revelation that this dangerous text is actually the second book of Aristotle's Poetics, where he describes the nature of laughter and comedy. But Jorge's explanation of why he feared a society with comedy elevated to an art form with the blessing of Aristotle was convincing and intriguing. An excellent payoff, and it started me thinking about what exactly laughter does for us.

Before I get to that, let me go back a few days, when I was at the beginning of the book, and had just read some of the early discussions about laughter. It so happened that, either that evening or the day after, I went to Java Fortran's apartment, and watched a particular episode of Garfield & Friends, one of the better saturday morning cartoons of my youth. One of the episodes featured a US Acres bit where group of aliens who have come to steal Earth's laughter, since it is a dangerous weapon on their planet (which is also why Jorge goes to such lengthes to keep the book secret). After a song describing what the world would be like without laughter, the aliens are defeated when the US Acres crew makes them laugh. Although obviously on a different level, I was struck by the fact that a children's cartoon show and a highly engaging but difficult historical novel shared this theme. What exactly does laughter do for us? There's a Calvin and Hobbes strip somewhere where Hobbes suggests that without laughter, we couldn't react to a lot in life. When I posed the question to Java this evening, he replied that the reason we laugh is to make ourselves happy. Douglas Adams considered P.G. Wodehouse one of the greatest English writers because of his sublime humor. In the G&F episode Orson says (sings) that life without laughter would be boring, and in Name of the Rose Jorge sees it as an uncivilized and ungodly response that would threaten the church if legitimized. William, on the other hand, notes that "laughter is proper to man, it is a sign of his rationality." I see laughter as a mental safety valve: a release that allows us to react to things that would otherwise confound us. In the fall of my sophomore year at Carleton, there were two evenings I stayed up all night playing Risk with some friends. Both times I ended up getting so punchy that something set me off and I literally fell off my chair laughing. Humor is a personal thing, in that what is funny for one may not be for another, or may be but to a different degree. The same person may find the same thing more or less funny depending on their mood. Laughter calms us down, makes us happy, and relieves stress. It can help us physiologically as well as mentally. Laughter helps our mind to counteract stress, tedium, disappointment and pretty much any other negative emotion you can come up with. It literally keeps us sane. If those space aliens had succeeded in stealing out laughter, we'd have much bigger problems that being bored all the time.

I'd love to hear any thoughts you might have on this subject. The weather here sucks (it was 45 damn degrees today) so I can't really bring myself to expound the benefits of winter. My other thoughts for today: Smallville rules, the Pats are going to win the Superbowl, and Pericles starts at the Guthrie Lab next weekend, so I'm going to get to read my first new Shakespeare in awhile.