How Kevin Smith made the top story on CNN.com

I'd be willing to bet that bookmakers in Vegas are now laying odds on which "Evening with Kevin Smith" dvd will contain the rant about Southwest Airlines.  I'm thinking number 5, depending on how far along they are on producing number 4.

This is not a good thing for Southwest, because Smith is pretty much a self-effacing and honest guy with a pretty rabid fan base.  Which means he's not going to sugar coat it ("Dude, I know I'm fat,") and it's going to get a lot of play online.  Witness the fact that in the middle of the Winter Olympics it topped CNN's web page.  

Probably this won't be a major financial issue for Southwest, but it is going to focus a lot of attention on their fat people removal policy.  Plus a fair number of Smith fans are big guys like him, and I'm betting they're going to be avoiding Southwest at all costs in the future.

Some new insanity

I posted a little bit ago that I was going to be messing around with the html code on this page to make it a little more to my liking.  I'm still going to do that, but I'm going to wait a bit, as I'm going to be doing that exact thing on...my new blog.  Yes, I will now have two blogs, this one, and one I will be operating as part of my Digital Media course that I just started today.  This new blog (which I'm calling A Bad Move) will focus much more on issues pertaining to the publishing industry and generally be of a nature to try and induce the lecturer to give me a good grade on it at the end of the term.  As part of the course I will be messing around with the template, so I figured I'd do it there first where I've got someone to tell me how to fix it when I inevitably screw it up.

So what does this mean for this blog?  Well, probably that I won't be posting here quite as much, except when I've got something that wouldn't work on the other blog.  I'm going to be doing 2-3 posts a week over there, so we'll see how much energy I've got for posting over here.  This blog won't go completely dark (not that I haven't done that before), because I'll eventually lose the other blog at the end of the summer.  

You can check it out here.  Comments are welcome if you're at all interested in what I'm talking about.

The last time I will mention this.

My thoughts on the NFC Championship game:

1.  That wasn't pass interference.

2.  That wasn't a catch.

3.  Childress is a moron.

4.  It's been 11 years.  I can't believe they did it to me again.  I wonder how long it will take to recover this time?

Where I studied today

Today, despite what must have been serious misgivings, I was granted access to one of the oldest libraries in the world, the Bodleian.  It's the second largest in Britain (after the British Library), and is one of 6 "legal deposit" libraries in the British Isles, which means that it has the right to request a copy of any book printed in the UK or Ireland.  The Radcliffe Camera is part of the system, and that's where the four of us who got our cards today went to sit for an hour or so and do some work.  It's not open to the public, so it was pretty freaking cool to be able to go in.

Afterward we went and walked around Christ Church College, where the several scenes from the Harry Potter movies were filmed, including the dining room scenes.  All in all, an excellent day in Oxford.

Snow melt

So the Great British Snow Emergency of 2010 is now over.  The snow all melted inside of two days.  Kind of crazy transition-you could tell something like that was about to happen but it still surprised me.  But then, I'm used to snow sticking around for months.  In unrelated news, I've gone running around Christ Church meadow twice in the last two days, and both the Cherwell and the Isis are almost at flood stage.  Also, both were higher today than yesterday, so if they push up another inch or two I'll have to find a new running route, because mine will be underwater.

Changing the topic, I've become unhappy with the physical dimensions of this blog.  I've already made one foray into editing the html code to make it wider (ultimately I discarded the changes and decided to try again later), so probably sometime in the next week or so this page may be wider than it is now.  Should be exciting.

I just found this article in the New Yorker profiling uber-author Neil Gaiman, which covers his career pretty well and includes some cool facts I didn't know.  Also congrats to Gaiman, who announced last Friday on his blog that he and his girlfriend Amanda Palmer (of The Dresden Dolls) are engaged.

Finally, here are a couple of the photos I took of Oxford in the snow.  I'll see if I can get a couple of shots of the overflowing Cherwell & Isis for comparison.

Train Times

I was a little bored this morning, so when I read this CNN article saying the new Chinese high-speed trains averaged 350kph I wondered what that was in mph.  Turns out it's about 218.  That got me wondering just how fast you could get from Minneapolis to Chicago in a train going those speeds.  According to this site it's 354 miles, so it'd be a little over an hour and a half train ride.  But you wouldn't just get a train straight from Minneapolis to Chicago, you'd at least go through Madison.  Long story short I'm thinking you could have one of these trains averaging 218mph between Minneapolis, Madison, Milwaukee and Chicago and get from one end to the other in about 2 hours (provided you only stop in those cities).  Put the terminus of the train in the downtown areas of each city and it probably ends up being faster than flying.  Sound good to anyone else?

Lost Supper

Holy cow, I love this shot.  The final season of Lost starts February 2nd.

Heathrow

The worst type of airline delays are when they make you just sit on the tarmac, either before takeoff or after landing.  At least when you're in the air you have the sense you're getting somewhere, even if you're just in a holding pattern (mostly because people rarely notice when they're circling).  But when you're just sitting there it seems annoying and pointless.

I landed at Heathrow at 10am, and didn't get off the plane until after 10:30.  Passport control and customs were easy, but waiting for my checked bag was another half hour or so.  Combine that with needing to change terminals to get to my bus, I spent over 2 hours trying to leave Heathrow.  I'll let the fact that the bus's first stop was another terminal pass.  But that's really a long time to spend trying to leave an airport.

On a bus

I'm posting this while taking the bus back from Heathrow to Oxford.  One of the cool things about the UK is that they seem to have wifi in most of their buses.  This is the first time I've used it, and I have to say it's pretty cool.

After a whirlwind 10 days in MN, where I got to see a lot of people, including a couple I didn't initially expect to be in town, I'm back in the UK.  It's clearly been snowing quite a bit here, as all the trees along the road are coated in snow.  The roads themselves seem ok, but traffic's going kind of slow.

It's nice to be back and I'm looking forward to seeing people again, but I've already got some things to take care of.  First off, I need to get my application for another student loan in.  I'm going to need to go grocery shopping pretty quick too.  And to top it off, I found out that my left headphone has given out on me, which means I got to listen to my new cds short one headphone, which is not optimal for Led Zeppelin.

I'll see about posting new pics soon, right after I come out of the jet-lag zombie-state.

Interesting Futurama tidbit

An interesting note on what Futurama might have been like (from Wikipedia):

At the time of his death, Hartman was preparing to voice Zapp Brannigan, a character written specifically for him on Groening's second animated series Futurama. After the murder, Futurama's lead character Philip J. Fry was named in Hartman's honor and Billy West took over the role of Brannigan. West later said that he purposefully tweaked Zapp's voice to better match Hartman's intended portrayal.


Now that would have been crazy.  Newsradio and Futurama are pretty much my two favorite sitcoms, and while I love Billy West's Brannigan, it would have been awesome to see what Hartman would have done with it.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy T-day to everyone!  I hope you all have a great time and a great meal.  I myself will be very busy today not eating turkey, relaxing and watching football, as I have a lecture, a seminar, a talk to go to (although since it features Phillip Pullman it'll probably be pretty cool), a group meeting for my Design project, and right now I need to got put in some design work before the lecture and seminar so the group meeting goes better.

So for me Thanksgiving Day (observed) will be on Saturday, when a bunch of the people here are getting together for dinner.  It will also be my first attempt at cooking a turkey.  I really hope I don't screw it up.

Moive Madness

I'm always confused by the way international movie releases work.  The first time I studied in England, there were of course a bunch of films that had been out in the US for awhile at that point, or had already left theaters.  But I did see two movies that hadn't been released yet in the States-and indeed didn't come out until a few months after I got back.  I found this to be pretty freaking awesome, as the movies were O Brother, Where Art Thou and Memento, two very cool movies that I got to see before pretty much everybody else (except Erik, of course, because he was there too).

I can report not much has changed in this respect.  Up, which I missed in the States, is still out in theaters here, mostly because it didn't get released until October 9th.  At the same time I've seen two movies I've seen here that haven't come out yet in the US yet, at least not in wide release.  I highly recommend both The Fantastic Mr. Fox and The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus.  Mr. Fox is very well done, with a funky stop-motion animation that fits the style of the film.  It's immediately recognizable as a Wes Anderson flick, and if you've enjoyed his previous films there's a good chance you'll like this one.  I can't remember the Roahl Dahl book all that much, so I didn't have to content with comparing the film to the book, which honestly was kind of nice.  All in all very much the sort of movie I was expecting after seen the trailers and Anderson's previous movies.  Mr. Fox didn't supplant The Royal Tenenbaums as my favorite Wes Anderson movie, but it's nonetheless quite good.

The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus is a little less straightforward of a film.  I quite liked it, but I can understand that others might not.  Like most Gilliam movies (who, I found out from IMDB, was born in Minneapolis, MN!) it's quirky and weird, but visually awesome and conceptually quite cool.  It's also Heath Ledger's last movie, which is initially distracting but it goes away faster than you'd think.  His character is replaced during the film by three other actors, Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell.  You might think this makes no sense, but honestly, it really does.  In fact, the changes was so seamless plot-wise it felt like the decision to change actors was made based on the script, rather than out of necessity.  

I don't want to give anything away, so I'll just say I really enjoyed The I of Dr. P.  It reminded me most of Mirrormask, albeit with a more tangled bunch of characters dealing with more mysterious (and adult) problems.  However, I suggest giving it a try if you get the chance...at Christmas when it actually goes into limited release in the US.  It's already out of the Oxford theaters.  Hmm, maybe I'll get the chance to see it again.

More Iranian News

There's a very good article in The Times about Arash, the Iranian guy who did my course last year, then got caught up in the post-election protests and now can't go home.  I was just talking to one of the Professors on my course, and they mentioned how much they're hoping he'll get a job soon.

You can check it out here.

Lion vs Deer

For some reason, a young deer decided to literally jump into the lion's den at the National Zoo in DC. Everyone on the video is rooting for the deer-is it wrong that I'm rooting for the lion? Also, much like the Packers Offensive line in the Metrodome, the lion seems distracted by all the cheering.

Who to call

Happy belated Halloween to everyone. I hope you all had fun-I certainly did. Just a quick post with a very nice cover of a classic song. More newsy-type posts soon, as I ramp up my procrastination in the face of my marketing test on Wednesday.

Publishing in Iran

Tonight my program had a seminar entitled Publishing in Iran. It was a presentation given by a former student (an Iranian), who had gone through the course last year. He had been one of three former students who had given a short speech on the first day of our induction on what to expect over the course of the year. He gave a very interesting talk on the Iranian publishing industry, the censorship the government imposes on the industry and how they implement it, and the state of copyright issues in Iran (officially there aren't any, because Iran hasn't signed any of the international copyright treaties). It was a very interesting talk.

He also mentioned that he had been in Iran during the protests after the presidential elections a few months ago. Drinks were served after the talk (which was odd-usually we have drinks before a talk), and I got the chance to ask him what it was like being in Tehran during the protests. It was then that I found out that he had been the doctor (before entering publishing he had studied medicine) who had been standing next to Neda when she was shot and the one who subsequently tried (unsuccessfully) to save her life. Needless to say, I was floored. I paid quite a bit of attention to the Iranian election and subsequent protests, and Neda's death was the most significant event of the demonstrations, other than the obviously fixed election results themselves. I asked him a few more questions about what he thought about the post-election state of Iran, and the feeling in the country during the protests, but the fact that he was involved in such a pivotal moment kind of threw me off my game. An extremely powerful revelation.

Youtube links are here, here and here to give this some context, in case you don't know what I'm talking about. In the first link, Arash is the guy on the right in the white shirt. Wow.

The Pitchforker's Pride is a Fallacy

At 1:30am on Sunday morning, while I was doing some homework (I know), I happened to discover that there was a new Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy book coming out. The next day. In London, at an event called Hitchcon '09. The book, since Douglas Adams had died in 2001 (one of the saddest days of my life), had been written by Eoin Colfer, with the approval of Adams' widow and publisher. H2G2 was a serious influence on my life, and I knew that I had to go to London the next morning to get the next book. Unfortunately, because I am a lazy bastard (well, technically just lazy), I missed the one panel discussion I really wanted to see, which was a discussion about Douglas by people who had known him. So my day wound up being me buying the new novel, wandering around looking at the various paraphernalia they had laid out, watching a bit of the BBC H2G2 tv show they had running on a loop, going out to get some lunch, and then coming back to have my book signed by Colfer before I returned to Oxford. Altogether an amazing day.

I finished reading the book (And Another Thing...) Monday afternoon, and I can tell you it's good. Unfortunately for all of us, Adams was fantastic. Superb. Amazing. Whatever term you want to use to describe him, he was a step (or several) above good. Colfer has done a fine job with the characters, with the universe, and with the plot (in true Adams' fashion, it makes little or no sense). What Colfer cannot sustain is Adams' brilliance of phrasing, of putting things in such a way that is both unexpected yet perfect. This is not Colfer's fault-he actually achieves this at least a couple of points in the book, but can't sustain it like Adams.

That said, this book is worth the read. Especially if, like me (and Adams, as quoted in The Salmon of Doubt), you've always felt that Mostly Harmless is an uncharacteristically and undeservedly bleak end to the H2G2 series. The characters all return (except Marvin, who's death makes the end of So Long, and Thanks... the best of all the H2G2 novels), and Colfer does an excellent job of name dropping that dedicated fans will enjoy. Things are decidedly more upbeat, and even certain death is faced with the knowledge that things will turn out ok.

I was thrilled to learn about the book, and very happy to meet the author and get it signed. It's just that (without offense to Eoin Colfer), I wish it had been Adams doing the signing.

Views of Oxford from South Park

Yes. That's it's name.

MNF

I really, really wish I could be back in MN for this game. Not that I'm not enjoying myself in Oxford, but damn, this should be epic.

Why I'll Miss the Dome

If you're a Minnesotan baseball fan, you know why the Dome has to go. It's a football field. The sightlines were never meant for baseball. The concourses are too small, the bathrooms are too small, and you have to pee in a trough. But I'm going to miss the Dome. First all, it was home to the only two Minnesota sports championships of the modern age (i.e. not counting the Minneapolis Lakers), the '87 and '91 Twins, one of which ('91) is rated, if not the greatest, then among the greatest World Series ever played. I can't imagine a pair of more dramatic games than game 6 and 7. This was where Puckett and Hrbek (my favorite Twin) played. This is where a fly ball went up but never came down, where David Ortiz (Red Sox/steroids version) hit a massive should-have-been home run that hit a speaker and bounced back into play. This is where a capacity crowd welcomed the '87 Twins back home after defeating the much-favored Tigers in the ALCS. This where Kirby said goodbye, and we said goodbye to Kirby. And this is where, after the last game of the 2006 regular season, the most amazing regular season I've ever seen, I watched the Tigers lose and the Twins clinch the division.

But more than all those moments, the Dome was the ultimate home field advantage. We knew how to take advantage of it and everyone else had to deal. Even after so many years, you could always count on an opposing outfielder losing a ball in the roof several times a season. Back when the field was as hard as a rock, you could bet on the visitors playing bounces wrong. The Baggy in right is tricky is you don't know what you're doing. Add it all up and you get a home field advantage unmatched anywhere else in baseball. Sure, sometimes it cost us too (coughLewFordcough), but it always cost them more.

I'm psyched about the new stadium next year. While I worked downtown over the last year, I would take my lunch break and walk down and look at the progress at least once a week. From everything I've seen and heard, it's going to be fantastic. But it's going to take a while for it to be home. Talk to me after Mauer and Morneau have a couple of world championships under their belts.