One question I also expect them to ask is how I watched TV without having my computer in front of me, firing off notes through Twitter, Facebook, or whatever social media network will be in vogue in 5-8 years from now. I’ll look at their cute, adorable little faces, and tell them as seriously as I can: There was a time when we watched TV on our own. We went to sporting events in small groups, we went shopping without telling everyone what we were doing, and we could vanish for hours on end without anyone knowing where we were.

The idea that we exist solely as individuals is rapidly becoming extinct.

I’ll freely admit that I’m on the leading (okay, okay, obsessive) edge when it comes to Twittering et al. I’ve been broadcasting status updates (in one form or another) for a couple of years, in frequencies varying from every few days to every few seconds — those of you following me during the 2010 Olympic Men’s Ice Hockey gold medal game or during last night’s Oscars know what I mean. That means I’m not only keenly aware of the potential these services offer, but also the potential impact.

Let me rewind a couple of weeks to the start of the Olympics on 12 February. While most of you watching the opening ceremonies might have had a word or two between you, there were a few of us (I’ll estimate at least a few thousand) who were offering up our views as the show proceeded. In real-time. Publicly. You could track the entire thing under hashtags, or even by following a few people.

As the Olympics proceeded, the effect only continued to grow. For me, it was a way of communicating — and to some degree, even participating — with the games through friends who were actually there. (Of particular note is Canada’s unofficial Lucky Charm, my friend Katrina, who was present for no less than two gold medal wins.) It was a real-time feedback, and a way for me to feel that I wasn’t just trapped here in Calgary, unable to witness it for myself.

And lest we forget the Olympic Men’s Ice Hockey gold medal game between the USA and Canada. All epic-ness of the game aside (I stand by my statement that the game is the Summit Series of my generation), the game probably produced the largest amount of Twitter and Facebook traffic from Canada this year (and that includes all events yet-to-come). You almost didn’t have to watch the game on TV (although, really, it was one of the best-ever hockey games) — follow a few people, and you almost got the play-by-play, along with healthy doses of (periodically profane) comments about plays, shots on goal, and so forth. The only thing that would have made it better is if Don Cherry were tweeting it.

Which, interestingly enough, was what happened last night on the Oscars. Except it wasn’t Don Cherry, it was Roger Ebert. Though not nearly as copious with comments as I had expected (he was live-blogging as well, which I didn’t have access to), events were still punctuated with exceptionally-timely thoughts, all backed-up with his decades of experience in the industry.

Okay, so what does this all mean?

I didn’t watch alone. I might have been alone in the room, in front of my TV, but my network of friends and contacts kept me company. For years, people had talked about interactive TV as being a major shift in the industry, but to virtually no fruition. The act of side-conversation might not be the interactive we all had in mind, but imagine the joy of side-discussions (and even trash-talking) with people who have the same interest, without the ugliness of having to pack everyone into a small room at once.

I don’t see this ending soon, either. While I don’t watch a lot of TV (I generally avoid everything except MythBusters and Dirty Jobs), this sort of thing would definitely play out for regular sporting events (hockey, football, basketball, and even — dare I say it? — golf), reality shows like Survivor and Big Brother, soap operas, and similar genres that tend to collect an obsessive and conversational bunch (imagine if Star Trek: The Next Generation or the rebooted Battlestar Galactica came out now).

And, of course, this goes beyond televised events. People in the stands of the game, people following poker tournaments, people watching parades, let alone people broadcasting the latest disaster (follow the #temblor hashtag sometime — the USGS does).

This is the promise of social media, folks. We always thought it was just about bringing people together. In reality, it’s about keeping us from feeling alone.

I must, in true Canadian form, say “I’m sorry”. I doubted. All I could see was fault, all I could see was mediocrity, all I could see was the world laughing at our attempts to be more than our humble selves. I thought that Vancouver was the wrong place to hold the Winter Olympics (having lived there a couple of years, I know how finicky the weather can be).

And I wasn’t alone. Thanks to media mainstays, such as The Guardian and the Denver Post, and CTV’s frequently slipshod and amateurish approach, there was little reason for me to think otherwise.

I find myself, now at the end, relieved to be wrong, and fiercely proud to be a repatriated Canadian.

The Own The Podium program had me enraged. It was meant to increase the chances of medal wins — to the point where we had the most medals. Not only was it arrogance beyond our Canadian norm, I found that the program sponsored only those who were in medal contention — and abandoned the rest. Considering we’re a socialist country, it seems a very un-Canadian setup. (And can someone tell me, please, why on earth the Men’s Hockey team received Own The Podium funding? It just seems odd to support millionaires who already have significant amounts of training and coaching resources.)

Then came the the death of Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili mere hours before the cauldron was lit. (And no, Tom Clark, CTV did not need to show footage of the fatal run to “tell the full story”. That was utter pandering to sensationalist news coverage. You want to be better than CBC? You’d better act like you are, first.) The pall cast over the opening felt almost suffocating.

The opening ceremonies themselves were filled with a host of flubs: lip syncing (seriously, we are unable to trust our biggest performers to perform in public?), slight delays (starting even with the snowboarder not coming down on cue), and mechanical failures (erectile dysfunction, anyone?). Problems seemed to continue past the hutzpah, with broken ice resurfacing machines, and an ill-timed rampage by ill-tempted and extremely short-sighted rioters. The press ate us alive.

Our lauded best, held on pedestals for months, were put to the test. But the gold we were promised didn’t come. Our speedskaters failed to place, and our former moguls world champion could only garner a silver. And admit it, Canada, for a little while, you doubted, too. Had we put too much pressure on our athletes? Did we expect too much? Maybe where I failed was not to recognise it as a beginning of something bigger.

The next day — less than 24 hours after our first disappointment — things started to change. Someone I’d never heard of, suddenly appeared on top. After almost 34 years of waiting, Alexandre Bilodeau had won Canada’s first gold medal at home. For a moment, the country stood and cheered! We would walk away with something, at least. We would feel like we’ve achieved. Maybe — just maybe — it was enough to take away our collective dread. Or at least mine.

But the medals were still slow to come. It was two days before another gold from Maelle Ricker. Five days into the games, we had a mere five medals. Our hubris was an embarrassment. Our medals, though appreciated, would stand more as an example of an effort not carried to fruition.

And then something happened that we didn’t expect. It caught me by surprise, as I know it caught many others. A word that is rarely used in Canada, because of the imagery of our neighbours to the south that it usually invokes: Patriotism. Not a fevered adherence to dogma, but a feeling of national pride the likes of which have not been since I was barely two months old. We all suddenly noticed that you can’t spell “Canada” without “can”. And we did.

For me, it was the evening of the men’s skeleton finals, 19 February. Canada had already won another gold in speed skating, but it was Jon Montgomery’s victory that seemed to spark something in me. He is not your typical Canadian — he is brasher, bolder, more outspoken, and not afraid to do things in public that the rest of us would feel the urge to poo-poo as “not proper”. His primal scream of victory was the first cry, followed shortly after by a tremendous leap to the top of the podium at the sliding centre; he carried the entire nation with him in that moment. This time, I didn’t look back down. I — like you, Canada — looked forward.

I started to believe.

(And yes, I even started to like that “I Believe” song. Probably because after watching enough coverage, you don’t really have much choice.)

We started the second week with seven medals. Forecasts still placed us well into the 20s. Even with all of our victories in preliminary curling and hockey, it just didn’t seem possible. But funny thing about believing — you worry less about failing, and you don’t want to get left behind.

Our games started with difficult stories: the disappointment of silver, the struggle in speed skating, and seemingly random disqualifications. The stories had changed. The commentators seemed to take on the energy not just of the crowds, but of the athletes themselves. The stories covered the brotherly dedication, the triumphant (and periodically beer-fuelled) victory marches, impromptu parades, double medals, first wins in new sports, and the sweetheart skaters who not only stole the gold but also the hearts of millions.

But no story could exceed that of Joannie Rochette.

I’m no figure skater — I can’t even skate, really. Growing up, though, I watched a lot of figure skating as a result of watching TV with my mom, a former skater herself, and still an adamant lover of the sport. So, in some small way, I am periodically attracted to it. It was with great fortune that I caught her performance, only days after learning her mother had suddenly died.

I couldn’t tell you how well she actually skated — I’m no judge — but I can tell you that on that night, Joannie embodied the strength and courage of an Olympian, producing her best possible performance, allowing herself tears only after she was done, to the sound of a thunderous standing ovation. Her medal may have only been a bronze, but as a local paper emblazoned on its headline: it was as good as gold to us.

Most of us Canadians never made it to the games, though I know more than a few who were there, who witnessed gold first-hand. The closest I ever got was my home in southwest Calgary, where I subjected my family to my growing obsession, cheering on my country in its quest for gold, to the point where Alex and I taught the Monkey to chant: “CA-NA-DA!” as loudly as she could. We all watched, we all cheered, we all hoped, and we all cried.

And we achieved. We achieved records the likes of which exceeded our expectations. Even with Own The Podium’s lofty goals, most of us never expected to set a record for the most number of gold medals won in a Winter Olympics. We might not have owned the entire podium, but we took the step that mattered the most to us: the top.

The top was capped with our national games: curling and hockey. Men’s curling gold, a three-time victory for the women’s hockey team, and a rematch against our oldest nemesis, the United States. It was joked many times by many people that the men’s hockey final would effectively close the entire country for the three hours the game would be played. I suspect the joke was not far off. The game would prove to be something special, especially to those born after the early 1970s — it would become my generation’s Summit Series, the game that we watched with extreme anticipation, desperately wanting that gold back in our hands.

Vancouver did something to Canada that few would have predicted, even with our previous experience with Calgary and Montreal. For a few weeks, Vancouver brought together our country — six timezones and a hugely diverse culture (yes, Canada, we are not just one group; we thrive in our multiculturalism, even if we can’t always recognise it). Not just in representation, but in anticipation and celebration. We broke out of our Canadian mould — we stopped thinking we’d stop short, that we’d choke right at the key moments — and we started to live the dream.

The media has suggested that maybe we’ll break out from our mould permanently, and be more like our cousins to the south. But we won’t. That’s not us. That’s not Canadian. These games are over, and we’ll return to our Canadian ways. But we won’t shrink away, we won’t forget what happened. We’ve gotten stronger; we’ve learned. We’ve learned how to perform, that success isn’t just a dream — it’s a reality. That we can compete head-to-head with the best the world has to show us, and not be just “that nice country”. We’re now that country: a tough competitor, a fierce opponent. The ones everyone else has to beat.

And it would be nice if we could get our legends back. Mr. Orser, are there not Canadians you can train? Can our curling coaches consider teaching our up-and-comers, rather than guide our competitors? And can we please treat all our athletes with some form of equality? If nothing else, these games proved that underdogs can achieve what no-one expects.

We’ll freely admit we had things that didn’t go perfectly. Massive events aren’t perfect — the best you can hope for is to mitigate the troubles. So, yes Mr. Kiszla, we had a few problems — I assure you that your lauded Denver games will have their own headaches that will made you cringe. And Mr. Donegan? I’ve heard better whining from my two-year old when her cereal ends up a bit soggy. Rather than suggesting you return to the golf courses you seem to understand so much better, I suggest you join London’s Olympic Committee and become personally responsible for London’s success. Because we’ll be watching. Closely.

Oh, and one more thing, Mr. Kiszla, about the trash talk? After listening to American bragging for so long, you have no idea how wonderful it is to say: It’s still our game. I believe it will remain that way for a long time to come.

A few years ago, the “hybrid” car was introduced, a shining new example of how to make vehicles more efficient, and spawned a new movement of environmentally-aware manufacturing. Today, Nissan stands ready to finally release the first mass-market all-electric vehicle, amping up the competition to become the centre of the environmentally-friendly transportation universe. I, for one, welcome the arrival of the electric car, long overdue from formal acceptance in North America. At the same time, however, I also curse its arrival because it doesn’t actually address a primary problem.

The electric car strives to perpetuate a bad idea: that we all need a car.

World War II changed the world in so many ways that it’s hard to keep track of them all. It ushered in our nuclear age, brought computers out of the closet and into our common perception, and brought about a new sense of prosperity and demand that the world had not previously witnessed — especially in North America.

The message was clear: prosperity through purchase. North Americans were told through the power of the media that they had to live the “American Dream”: own a large home in the suburbs, the newest appliances, fancy clothes, a television, and no home was complete without at least one car.

It was the car that became the shining star of the American household, and a symbol of freedom. No longer were you tied to others’ schedules — you were free to go where you wanted, when you wanted. The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 gave birth to the Interstate Highway System, and forever sealed the dream in the minds of Americans, and the neighbours to the north (because, let’s be honest, as much as we Canadians want to be different than America, we want to play with the same toys).

Long-distance travel changed. It was now about driving long distances in cars. It was driving into the city. It was driving to the local store. Drive-through restaurants, drive-in movies. Driving.

The automobile as we know it — an individualistic vessel of identity — encourages people to live away from their daily lives. Instead of living in tall buildings, we live in spacious suburbs. We thrive for neighbourhoods with only houses, and drive to expansive commercial malls. We want industry away from our little edens, and don’t want to our daily grind anywhere near our castles. When we have to go to other places, we want to do so on our terms.

All of this has come at an expense: fossil fuel consumption never seems to stem, nor does our energy use to allow us to live apart and at a distance. Our land use spirals, allowing some of our cities to resemble single-celled protozoa that expand to consume what’s near them. Calgary, in particular, has been listed as an “ecological disaster” on those very terms. I would be very curious to see a comparison with Manhattan, which I think it is likely the most efficient places in the world: over 27,000 people per square kilometre (most of them don’t own a car), hundreds of thousands commuting by public transit, and elevators use less energy than a refrigerator.

In our strive to achieve, we have forgotten the need to preserve.

Slowly, thanks to decades-long efforts and a few more mainstream mentions, the world is becoming attuned to alternative energy, with a notable focus on electric. It’s been a slow adoption, but the ever-present call to heed environmental changes and the need to act more responsibly has brought about mass demand for something beyond burning fossil fuels.

To be fair, there are three types of electric vehicles floating about. We have seen the parallel hybrids (Honda Insight and the Toyota Prius, to name a few), the very long overdue series hybrids (notably the Chevrolet Volt), and the pure electric (the failed EV1, and the up-and-coming Nissan Leaf). We have latched onto these vehicles as the saving graces for our obsession with the automobile. All of these have problems:

• Parallel hybrids are an awkward mish-mash of traditional gasoline power and electric power, where the gasoline half is still largely in control, and even the slightest press of the accelerator can throw off your mileage
• Series hybrids wisely disconnect the gasoline engine from the wheels and use it only to charge the battery when it starts to get low; diesel would be a far better choice for fossil power, though it is highly unpopular in North American-made passenger vehicles due to memories of the 1970s
• Pure electric vehicles try to come off as the greenest options, but conveniently side-step the question of power source — unless you obtain your electricity from solar or wind, you’re getting it from falling water or nuclear (slightly less green), or from burning fossil fuels (electric is cheaper, no question, but you’re still burning)

And none of them address the original fundamental problem: they all perpetuate the bad dream. All of them remind us that if we don’t own a car and a big house, live in a nice suburb, and drive wherever we like, that — somehow — we’re not successful.

Meanwhile, public transit withers. Yes, for all my bitching about my local public transit, I still find it a far preferable alternative to a car — at least when the public transit offering is well-handled. However, therein lies the problem — all over North America (which, really, is the biggest problem in the world), public transit organisations have to reduce service and inflate prices to keep themselves afloat. Long-distance train travel has gone from our primary form of inter-city travel to mere tourism. The long-distance bus services are now regarded as “last ditch” options when you can afford nothing else.

You think public transit is awful? It’s an inconvenience? Talk to the millions of people who float in and out of major cities on a daily basis through buses and trains. Talk to your average Londoner, who is fined if they try to drive their car into the core of the city. Talk to anyone living in Japan about the difficulty not only of owning a car, but trying to drive it. Public transit remains the best option for moving large numbers of people. And yes, it is rather easy to adapt to a known schedule and not have it wreck your life.

While one dream lives on, another one dies. The dream of a utopia where people live quietly and closely, where automobiles are rarely seen and heard. That dream started dying a long time ago, and save for a few dedicated efforts to preserve the utopia, there are few places in the world the car has not touched. The utopia will one day be merely a thought, a vague entry in our collective memory, passing into the distance like a car into the fog.

The year closed out on a more sombre note for me, in many ways. Much quieter, and I got to spend a lot of time with my family (which I cherish now, and cannot regret in anyway), but the future is a little less certain. I’m less concerned about that fact than I thought I would be, however.

On with the year that just was…

• Rang in the new year watching fireworks go off all over the Central Valley in Costa Rica (a spectacular sight, if you ever happen to be in Costa Rica at New Year’s)
• Had numerous run-ins with illness between The Monkey, myself, and Alex (and some far less pretty than others, lemme tell ya!)
• Experienced my first, bonafide, scare-the-crap-outta-me earthquake, measuring in at 6.2 at its epicentre
• In Costa Rica, travelled to:
  • Villa Blanca (Los Angeles Cloud Forest), three times
  • Arenal (for my very wet birthday)
  • Parque de Diversiones
  • Playa del Coco
  • Playa Hermosa
  • Playa Chiquita
  • Puerto Viejo
  • La Paz Waterfalls
• Had a few troubles with our trusty Suzuki, Dave, and spent more than a few bucks getting ‘em all fixed
• Managed to avoid becoming totally addicted to coffee, but still drank a lot of it
• Took pride in The Monkey starting school (yes, even though she wasn’t even 2 years old yet)
• Worked through the challenges of getting a startup business up and running; the stress took its toll on me and my family, and likely all lead to where I am at this very moment
• Travelled to Canada for a visa run, though it was originally planned as a family visit:
  • Barrie
  • Bolton
  • Oakville
  • And wee bit of Toronto (I had to go into the Toronto office) just for flavour
• Saw far too few sunsets on beaches
• Discovered great Indian food in Costa Rica
• Moved from our first apartment to a new apartment, after our condo management company couldn’t come to an agreement on a contract extension
• Got utterly screwed by the aforementioned condo management company, to the tune of about USD$1,500
• Celebrated 20 years of journalling/blogging with post #1,000 (total coincidence, I swear!)
• Did a Stampede-style breakfast for my co-workers
• Finally acquired my Temporary Residency visa … after realising that staying in Costa Rica long-term wasn’t an option for my family, and we’d decided to go home
• Waxed poetic on management and management style (perhaps too much so?)
• Cringed as The Monkey crossed into “The Terrible Twos” (which, thankfully, haven’t really been that bad)
• Finally snapped after running into a “Perfect Storm” of difficult project, dealing with the relocation company, organising the family, trying to sell the car, cancelling services, and making sure that what little money we had saved was properly moved out of the country before we left — I was an utter wreck at the end
• Ate far too many of our last meals in Costa Rica in a Denny’s
• Managed to survive the 19-hour ordeal of moving from Costa Rica; flying through Houston with a few bags, an irate cat in a bag, and a toddler hell-bent on doing her own thing; finally arriving in -18 degree weather in Calgary after 22:30 at night
• Moved back into a house we hadn’t seen in a year and a half, finding things we hadn’t seen in probably over three years
• Bought a 2006 Jetta TDI
• Critical Mass and I parted ways after about 9.75 years
• Landed a wonderful case of Benign Positional Vertigo on Boxing Day
• Realised that, yes, there are many things that Costa Rica has better than Canada … beyond the weather
• Rang in the new year year to come with a visit to the Calgary Zoo’s “Zoo Year’s Eve”, at -22 degrees Celsius

I’m missing easily a couple of months’ of detail in there, but the simple fact is that most of Q1 and Q2 last year were chaotic, busy, and stressful. I’m proud of what we all achieved, and I miss the people I left behind in Costa Rica. Time changes, and people have to change with them. As such, 2010 will be a year of change for me. I don’t see that as a bad thing, just that as with any human, change ain’t easy.

But change is exciting.

Naturally, that evolved quickly to us getting tickets for the show, which was today. I think both Mommy and I had an idea of what we were going to get into, but having never been to an “infantil” show before, there was a considerable amount of guessing.

We were up early, no thanks to someone’s alarm clock and you waking up before 6:00 because Costa Rica has its time set too far back for the sunrise (seriously, we should be EASTERN time, not MOUNTAIN). Mommy and I tried to drag it out until 6:00, and I think we were at best only marginally successful.

The plan, a fairly simple one, was to have our Saturday breakfast outing at the Marriott, which is more-or-less along the way from our home to El Palacio de los Deportes in Heredia. It has a lot of things that are very yummy, and in particular, I get to have bacon. You’ve had bacon, and you like it, but we don’t give it to you often.

As we were eating, I came to a horrible realisation — that in our haste to get out of the house, we’d forgotten the tickets. Only one go at the buffet for me, sadly, and I was off back home to get the tickets. As usual, I got stuck behind slow drivers. Whee.

I was back by 9:45, which left me just enough time to suck back a second coffee before we left. Finding the Palacio was fairly easy, and we lucked into parking very nearby. It was perhaps not the best parking, as we had others park behind us and block the way, but the attendants told us that it was just for the show.

Less than a block away from the Palacio, we could hear the Backyardigans theme. It was being blared out front by Kern’s, one of the local juice producers (and a major sponsor of the show). We got in line, and slowly worked our way in. I was a little worried that we had only 30 minutes, and the line seemed to be very long. After a little while, it started zipping along and we were soon inside.

The Palacio de los Deportes is a sports hall, pure and simple. It looks like a really, really large community gymnasium. The floors were covered in plywood and covered with folding chairs in blocks. The upper decks weren’t fully open, but the areas that were open were packed.

To no surprise, the show didn’t start on time. It was about 15 minutes late, I think. Maybe 20. The lights went out, and the Backyardigan’s logo — featuring the Backyardigans themselves — started to move slightly. Then the characters blinked. A moment later, a “hole” appeared in the projection and spotlights behind the projection screen showed Pablo. You immediately took interest. This continued a few times until Uniqua walked out. You pointed at her.

Yet no-one got the same reaction as Tasha. You went fairly ga-ga over her, Monkey. Tyrone came out moments later, and four of the five were on stage. They then realised that they were missing Austin, and had the entire audience call out to find him. Then the projection screen went up, and we found the Backyardigans in their backyard. They sang their theme song, and the show officially began.

The stage play was an extended version of one of their episodes, I think it’s called “Brave Knights” in English. Of course, the entire show was in Spanish, but you’ve seen it so much in Spanish that you don’t seem to mind. They added a couple of songs and changed a couple of things, too.

I had thought you would scream and yell and jump up and down for this show. But you were pretty quiet, actually. For a good part of the show, you just sat there and sucked your fingers. Even when all the other kids were screaming and yelling (because they were asked to by the Backyardigans), you just sat there. I had to entice you to wave “bye bye” when the show was finally over.

At that point, Mommy’s friend Larissa and her husband Roberto asked us to join them for lunch at a special restaurant up north. It took a while to find it, and thankfully we have directions now should we want to find it again, but it was certainly worth it.

La Lluna de Valencia is one of those restaurants you’d be lucky to find on your own, which is to say, “not easily”. It really helps to have a local who knows the place (and it seems, the owner, too). According to Roberto, it’s the most authentic Spanish restaurant he knows in Costa Rica. He claimed that he compared it extremely favourably to the restaurants he visited in Barcelona.

Their specialty is paella, a Spanish rice dish that I hadn’t had since … well, since before I met Mommy, I think. Either way, it had been far too long. You and Luba (Larissa and Roberto’s daughter) ran around playing while we tried to figure out what we were ordering. We settled for two versions: a seafood paella and a paella with chicken and rabbit.

Paellas take a bit of time to make, so we also ordered a simple appetizer of cheese, sausage, a tomato garlic sauce, and bread. You’d try everything, and drank a few glasses of mora (blackberry) juice all on your own.

The restaurant is … well, I’d have to say “eclectic” only because it’s definitely not your run-of-the-mill kind of place. The tables are all made from thick slices of what was probably one great, massive jungle tree, so there were huge folds creating a really neat effect. Massive paella pans hung on the walls, and there was a large stage at one end.

You and Luba loved the stage. You climbed up the stairs and ran back and forth, doing this cute little hop/jump you’ve started to do. You ran back and forth, stomping around. Then you spied a Spanish flag hanging from the ceiling. You tried to catch it with your hands. You walked further and further into it … which was when we noticed that the stage didn’t sit flush against the far wall.

Considering that you tumbled face-forward over the edge into a space that was quite small without any preparation for it, you got out without so much as a scratch. (Mommy and I, however, had near heart-attacks. I’ve never seen Mommy move so fast before.) After only a minute of crying, you were back to prancing around happily.

The paella was worth the wait. It was fantastic. I ate far more than I should have. (I didn’t eat dinner tonight because of that.) You ate quite a bit, too.

The drive home was uneventful, and you slept part of the way. When we got home, we tried to put you back down for a nap, but you’d have none of it. You wanted to be with us, and I think the thunderstorm that was rolling past kept waking you up. We ended up watching WALL-E. Again. For the 20th time. (Not that I’m complaining. But after a while, you start to notice smaller details.)

After dinner, you watched The Backyardigans again, while wearing your new Backyardigans shirt. It was a Backyardigans day.

I just hope tomorrow isn’t quite so … Ya Ya.

There are no old people on the Axiom.

I’ve seen WALL-E now about 30 times. That’s a bit of a guess, mind you. I’ve seen it not just because it’s an awesome movie, but because it’s Monkey’s favourite thing after the Backyardigans. (She’ll either ask for “Ya-yas” or “Wally”, and rarely anything else.) I have no problem when she wants to watch it, so the two of us will sit and watch.

When you watch something enough, you begin to notice little things that had previously escaped notice. And in this case, it came after my mind apparently was chewing away subconsciously. Although Buy ‘N Large advertised the Axiom with an eldery woman on a hover chair, 700 years later the Axiom seems devoid of anyone past their 30s. No grey hairs. No wrinkles.

Okay, yes, I’ll grant you that in their “big baby” states, humans might keep their youth longer, but human biology wouldn’t likely weed out the aging process.

My take?

It’s a Logan’s Run-meets-Soylent Green thing. When someone turns 30, their hover chair dumps them into into a processor to end up as the next day’s special. Seriously! Did you see any greenhouses? Why is all the food ingested through a straw?

Maybe Pixar should make a really cool darker prequel, where the previous captain discovers the truth, and races through the ship on his hover chair, yelling:

Stop eating! Your Sexcentennial Cupcake-In-A-Cup is made of people! IT’S MADE OF PEOPLE!

They could even use Charleton Heston’s voice.

C’mon, it’d be great.

Come to think of it… Did anyone see any children or teenagers, either? Hmm…

That’s one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind.

It’s more than a line from a movie. It’s more than a scene from a newsreel. It’s more than a footnote from a history textbook. It’s the moment when the sheer power of human will and imagination proved that the impossible is not beyond reach.

Beyond the political undertones of the event (the Space Race was the most publically-visible part of the Cold War), it was something that brought considerable recognition to NASA and to the United States. Humanity had only taken flight a mere six-and-a-half decades before. Flown to the edges of space only a decade earlier. And in what today seems like unparalleled hubris, spent billions of dollars just to plant a flag on an extraterrestial surface.

It’s a lifetime ago. And every child born since 20 July 1969 will live in a world knowing that there are possibilities beyond our gravitational prison, that with enough drive, desire, and determination, there is literally nothing to hold us back.

I look at my daughter, and I wonder what will happen in her lifetime. Not just that someone walked on the moon. That the dreams aren’t dead, that we are not hoping for more than mere existence. That the desire to go beyond still lives on, that the need to grow isn’t limited by mere perceptions of economies. That humanity continues to grow, to expand, to learn, to adapt, to evolve.

It has been four decades since that moment. Since then, humanity has had a near-constant presence in space. But the path has been retarded, held back by governments and waning interest. I can only hope that with the anniversary, and with the plans for the Constellation program, that interest returns, and the fire may one day be restoked.

It’s isn’t about where someone walked. But where someone will walk next.

I went in, admittedly, with higher than normal expectations (press is hard to ignore entirely, and even Wil Wheaton claimed it was awesome). So there is a certain amount of disappointment. But now that I’ve had time to ruminate on the film, the plot, the acting, etc., I’d like to think I’ve got a decent view. 

And for those of you who haven’t seen the movie: Beware! Thar be spoilers ahead!

Okay, first off, let’s cover all the stuff that J.J. Abrams + Co. did (very) well: 

• Casting was spot-on. Excellent choices, there were the right people doing the right roles. Pine was an excellent young, rebellious, and a sooner-than-TOS captain (read: more brash, more in-your-face). Quinto might as well be Nimoy’s actual son for his ability to look like a young Spock.
• Acting was well-suited. A few people have called out Urban’s portrayal of Bones McCoy as being a bit “odd”, but the more I think about it, the more I actually like his mildly pissed-off, slightly backwater personality. I’m curious to see how he and Spock pit themselves together in successive movies (yes, I’m assuming sequels).
• Special effects done exceptionally well. Gone are the days of models (which I lament), but the CG executed in the movie is very good, almost seamless in some places. The collapsing Vulcan was oustanding.
• Many excellent references to previous movies and series episodes, for those of you paying attention. 
• Sulu still fences, but he has a switch-blade katana, and saves Kirk’s life. 
• Star Trek finally adopts the “used universe” for its sets. Using a brewery for the inside of a massive ship was a brilliant stroke of genius, as it made the ship look more “real”. (Although because I knew it was a brewery, I couldn’t quite get into the fact that it was supposed to be a starship.)
• The introduction of the alternate reality. 

I want to focus on that last point for a moment. This bugged me at first, but then I not only saw the wisdom in this decision, but also came to praise the breaking from pattern that came with it. In the movie (SPOILER ALERT), an event 129 years in the future creates a black hole through which Nero (the bad guy) and the Original Spock (Nimoy) get sucked back in time. This creates an alternate reality (which is actually acknowledged by the characters in the movie) where things do not follow the previous Star Trek canon. 

Namely, the planet Vulcan and most of the Vulcan civilisation is destroyed. 

In pretty much every previous incarnation of Star Trek, some event occurs in the course of the given episode/movie that allows the regular timeline to be returned to normal. But Abrams and crew deliberately avoided hitting the “Reset Button” (Star Trek: Voyager, I’m looking at you!). Result? Uhuru and Spock are love interests, Vulcan is still destroyed, Kirk is a captain much earlier than in the regular timeline, and the technology is more advanced that it would be normally (though this pattern was started with Star Trek: Enterprise). 

What does this mean? It means Abrams (and future Star Trek movie makers) are not tied to the previous canon, and are free to create some of their own. We’ll likely see certain characters return, albeit slightly different, and some characters may never enter the new world (it’s possible we’ll never meet KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!).

The other thing it means is it (mostly) shortcuts all the nitpickers. Trekkies and Trekkers alike are nitpickers. They love tearing apart episodes and movies for continuity errors, plot issues, scientific problems, acting (especially important given the brand new cast), and gaffes. Because of the alternate reality, they can’t start claiming that something isn’t canon, or that a character wouldn’t do X, or that the planet Vulcan was never destroyed. 

I say “mostly”. Because there are some problems with the movie, too, that transcend the alternate reality. Remember, I’m a reformed Trekkie, which also makes me a nitpicker. 

• Supernovae destroy solar systems, not whole galaxies. That’s a pretty damned big plot hole to have, as it negates the events that lead up to the alternate reality being created in the first place. 
• Last I checked, anything — even a speck of dust — that enters a planetary atmosphere will start to heat up from friction (hence shooting stars). Yet Kirk, Sulu, and the ill-fated-red-shirt Olsen all “space dive” without ill effect. 
• Kirk is promoted to captain (from an officer cadet with no serving experience) after receiving a commendation for his actions in the movie. Spock, a “distinguished graduate” already holding the rank of Commander, who literally puts his life on the line (was mere heatbeats from colliding the small ship he was piloting into Nero’s ship to stop an attack), is apparently overlooked entirely and made subservient to someone who’s barely graduated the academy. I’m all for the Kirk/Spock relationship thing, but I’m having some trouble with this one.

It’s a new world for Star Trek, and Abrams’ approach to setting up that new world was done (mostly) wisely. For an odd-numbered Star Trek movie, it’s also pretty good (the only other exception being Star Trek III: The Search For Spock, which I like mostly due to Christopher Lloyd’s Kruge). But it definitely doesn’t top the charts for me. I think it sets a good precedent, though, and I am eager to see what they can come up with next.

May the new Trek live long and prosper!

Sadly, the music industry hasn’t quite figured this out yet. They’ve been fighting blindly to retain the status quo, and failing miserably. RIAA take note: suing your core audience for using your content, thus alienating them and their sphere of influence from future purchases is not good business acumen. Where did you get your MBAs, from Sally Struthers’ International Correspondance School?

It’s high time you accepted that you are no longer in control of your own future. Your audience is.

This is the way it’s always been, actually. The audience — those who support your business — will ultimately shape it. If they decide that something is no longer worth time (and especially money), are you going to keep that part of your business running? I think not. No businesses are that stupid. (Okay, almost no businesses.)

They way I see it, we’re going to see two classes of artists emerge from the Old School of Music: Creators and Performers. Together, they will help retain the creativity we’ve come to expect from our music industry, but will bring more depth and more options. Music might even take on more importance in terms of its creation and distribution, and the music industry will continue to thrive if it figures out where the revenue stream will be. (Subtle hint: pay attention to the rest of this article.)

Okay, first the Creators. These are the people you’re already familiar with: the artists and bands who create the music, record albums, and play concerts. In the future, they might continue doing these very things. But some of them might change. Like The Beatles in their Studio era, some Creators might decide only to focus on recording music (whole albums might even go away), and spend the time and effort to get them absolutely right.

Oh, and a note to The Beatles, while we’re talking about you. (I love you guys, I do. You created beautiful music and you will likely forever remain as the most adept composers and performers in the rock genre.) You and/or your Estates need to get the hell off your high horses. You’re good (still), but saying that your music is worth more than those sold for $0.99 on iTunes is the height of arrogance.

There’s a reason the $0.99 price point works well. First, it’s psychological — it’s less than a dollar (or pound, or euro — you get my point). Most people don’t think twice about something that costs less than a dollar. Doesn’t matter if it’s exactly one dollar (hence one teeny, weeny cent more) — that decimal point will immediately turn buyers away. Also consider economies of scale — the less something costs, the more likely you are to sell that item. In an era where piracy is being held up as the industry’s single largest threat, you should really consider that you’ll not only increase sales but decrease piracy if one of the factors for theft (the cost) is reduced.

Not that I haven’t already ranted about those very concepts before. Not once. Nuh uh.

“Okay,” you say, “if Creators are only making albums, how do they make any money? All the big money is in concerts these days!”

Yep. That’s where the Performers come in. Not every Creator will want to perform. Some of them, like The Beatles, will want to only create music. But then there are people who aren’t as interested (or even capable) of creating music — they’d rather perform. Want some examples? Look at most of the pop artists out there — they don’t write their own stuff.

The catch here is that the rules change a bit. Think “cover bands”. There are bands out there — you’ve seen them — who play the dingy bars and office parties of the world who don’t have an original note to their credit, but can play Baba O’Riley better than The Who. The Performers excel at creating a show, a spectacle of music that can come from one or many different Creators (even themselves, if they also create).

Yeah, I know that happens already. But this is the difference: They don’t ride for free. Right now, artists only receive royalties when a song of theirs is recorded by another artist — not when it’s played live in concert. Music becomes licensed for use, and any Performer can apply to use a given piece of work in a performance. The copyright laws already support such a model, just that this loophole exists.

A Creator could do very well if a license fee is paid for each song that’s played on a concert tour. The fees could easily be set per venue, where a small venue might garner only $20, but a large venue could net thousands. Per showing.

Yes, this could create a chaos where there are dozens of Britney Spears clones running amok. But similarly, it could also create multiple Cirque du Soleils. And since the prices of live shows would likely rise as a necessary result (since you’re paying for an experience), Performers would be competing to create high-quality shows to gain the most audience (and hence, most profit).

The music industry? Who do you think orchestrates contract negotiations between Creators and Performers, who helps organise the album sales, who helps set up concerts and takes a slice of those profits? No, the profits won’t be as large as they used to be, and artists will likely end up with control (if not complete, then certainly partial) of their own work, but the music industry can certainly support the efforts. The key thing is that it will still be smaller than it is now. That much is inevitable.

This model is, in my opinion, already emerging. It will have arrived when we finally see something new: a successful Performer who plays only music made by someone else. Quite literally, a Top 10 cover band. They’re definitely coming, though. It’s just a matter of when.

I’m listening to The Beatles. Studio-era Beatles.

I started to wonder — which I did aloud, as I often do when commuting with Mark — which of The Beatles’ incarnations were more popular? Depending on whom you ask, Studio-era gets more airplay. But does that make them more interesting?

Allow me to dig a little deeper on this one…

First off, let’s make sure we’re all speaking-dy the same lingua-dy. I refer to basically only two eras of The Beatles: the British Invasion, and Studio. (I’m sure you could break it down further, but we’re only talking a mere decade of existence, so let’s dispense with splitting hairs on this one.) I consider these two very important for one simple reason: the latter is when they got all weird.

For the record, I love Studio Beatles. But not everyone dug the sitar at first.

British Invasion Beatles changed the face of rock music as we know it. The Fab Four stormed the world and captured a lot of attention with with catchy music, a few snappy covers, and some very well-played marketing (the movies ring any bells?) that solidified their popularity. 

Studio Beatles (is it just me, or is this starting to sound like “Malibu Barbie”?) took their popularity, and used it to allow them the freedom to do things they couldn’t have done without their existing fame. (Well, that, plus a visit to India and a number of drug-related issues.) They created music that was, by definition, experimental — it hadn’t been done before. 

The breakpoint album for all of this is Revolver (1966). Prior to this album are songs such as Help!, Paperback Writer, I Want To Hold Your Hand, She Loves You, A Hard Day’s Night, Nowhere Man, and Drive My Car. After Revolver are With A Little Help, I Am The Walrus, Strawberry Fields Forever, All You Need Is Love, Helter Skelter, Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da, Revolution, and Let It Be.  Revolver itself is a transitionary album, including Taxman, Eleanor Rigby, Yellow Submarine, and Good Day Sunshine. 

I know what you’re thinking: What’s the difference? 

Listen to the music. Not just the words, but the instruments (aside from the sitar, there’s much more orchestral arrangements and alternative devices like the mellotron), the layers of sound (A Day In The Life, as a perfect example), the vocals (Helter Skelter, I Am The Walrus), and even how it was all put together (if you listen to Strawberry Fields Forever, you can here where the song slows down — that was done by hand, slowing the mixing tape with a finger).

Prior to Revolver, the music is more recognisable. But after India, some new elements played into Revolver, and after The Beatles gave up touring, they put all their energy into what was next.  And that next album was Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. An album that, according to some, caused Brian Wilson to give up on Smile and sink deeper into mental illness — he believed that The Beatles had beaten him to what he had been trying to create. 

And yet, I think, the Studio Beatles get more airplay. Not the weird stuff per se — you’re more likely to hear Hey Jude, Hello Goodbye, When I’m Sixty-Four, or Come Together. But it seems to be more of the latter.

So what do you think? British Invasion, or Studio? Which do you choose, and why?

I considered this a bit of a coup, myself. Not the lambasting of the movie — the fact that I managed to get the article into the school’s newspaper which, at the time, had a policy of first-received, first-published. For those of you who won’t know, the University of Waterloo once held the lofty position of Geek Central. (It’s now a trendy school, apparently. I’m having trouble coming to terms with that.) There were more Trekkies per capita at that University than for 1,000 kms in any direction. 

What I didn’t realise at the time was that I’d actually missed something extremely significant about the movie, that would come back to haunt Trekkies and Trekkers alike many years later. Something so important not only to Star Trek, but to the genre as well, that there’s a serious need to retcon that movie. 

Kirk shouldn’t have died.

At least, not in the way he ended up dying. He died because, effectively, a bridge fell on him. A pretty lousy way to go, if you ask me. Maybe if he were trying to hold up the Golden Gate Bridge, then at least we’re talking something more impressive. But a flimsy catwalk? C’mon, this is not the way you end a legend. 

Yes, legend. Kirk was — and is — legendary. Within the world of Star Trek, he was The Man. Everyone either wanted to be him, be with him, do him (c’mon, you’ve seen the Original Series, admit it), was awed by him, or was afraid of him. Kirk did the things no-one else had the cojones to do, and never thought twice about doing something potentially stupid. The entire Klingon race was scared of him, for crying out loud!

This is not how you treat a legend, killing him with a bridge in a barely so-so movie. 

Yes, I’m a Trekkie. Actually, a “reformed” Trekkie. I used to know a lot about Trekdom, but have long since given it up — I needed the space in my brain for other nonsense (like all these damned passwords I have to remember). I went to the conventions (two of them), and I own most of the Star Trek movies (I refuse to own Star Trek V or Star Trek: Nemesis). I know the Star Trek universe enough to know when it went wrong.

This is about mythology, and as silly as it might sound, Star Trek is every bit mythological as it is scientific. It plays upon myth and the mythic style of story-telling, and creates characters and situations that play exactly into mythic tale-telling. The heros are not just bigger-than-life, they’re epic. Their actions are bold and decisive. Their conquests are immense and impossible. Their foes are terrifying and strong.

How should a hero die? In mystery. How they died should be completely unknown, only that they’re no longer around. As if to suggest that it’s possible they might one day return. (Or at the very least rise from the dead, become omnipotent, and then disappear.) This is how legend and myth are created: by deliberately avoiding the details that would otherwise ground the story in fact. Which as we all know is gloriously dull.

Want a great example of how a hero should walk off stage? Luke Skywalker. Not the one from the movies — the one that’s lived on in books and comics. That Luke Skywalker goes on to found a new Jedi order, turns to the dark side (and back), defeats a clone of himself, saves the galaxy a few times over, and so forth. By the time his storyline runs out, he’s over 150 (a fary cry from Yoda, but pretty good for a human). How does he die? No idea. And George Lucas refuses to let anyone write it. That’s the way it should be — without detail.

Babylon 5, long maligned as a “wannabe” against Star Trek: Deep Space 9 (though I consider B5 a much tighter story-teller) had a perfect ending for its central hero, John Sheridan. Knowing he had only days left to live went off to say goodbye to the galaxy and waited for the First Ones (basically near-omnipotent beings) to find him. All anyone found was his ship floating adrift in deep space. Heck, even DS9 ended with its principle character, Benjamin Sisko, disappearing into a supposedly firey death only to be rescued by the wormhole entities … and told he’d return when the time was right (which could be anytime, or never).

Best death in all of science-fiction? Spock. (Some people say Lorne Greene’s Adama. I say no way.) Spock realises that over 200 people will die if the Enterprise’s badly damaged warp core isn’t fixed. Knowing he can do it, rushes into the reactor chamber and does it himself, exposing himself to a fatal dosage of radiation in the process. The needs of the many must outweigh the needs of the few … or the one. 

Best. Death. Ever. 

Kirk? Felled by a stray piece of metal.

This is not the way James Tiberius Kirk should go out. Kirk’s death should be more dramatic. He should go out in a major battle, delivering the great final blow that leads to victory — but himself mortally wounded like Wolfe at the Plains of Abraham. (And no, I in no way compare the ending of Generations to even close.) Or vanish while doing what he did best: exploring. The only decent line in Star Trek V (which although I hate as Star Trek canon, brings one good aspect to Kirk):

I’ve always known I’ll die alone.

Kirk was never meant to be an old man. Spock lived to a very old age (Vulcans do that). Scotty hid himself in a transporter and survived to 80-odd years in the future. Bones lived to the point where he was practically walking dust. (Who knows what happened to the rest of the original crew.) But Kirk? Kirk shouldn’t have lived much longer past Star Trek VI, and he shouldn’t have met Picard.

So I choose to ignore the fact that Kirk died in Generations. Wasn’t him. A clone, maybe. The real Kirk? He found an unknown planet populated by beautiful women and life goes on forever.

And he’s in no hurry to come back.

But make no mistake, I have no actual Top Whatever list. I rarely ever rank movies because that suggests that I place one movie over another. Which I don’t and can’t. There are some movies I watch because I’m simply in the mood to watch them. Others remain special for me, even if I haven’t watched them in a long time. 

The key thing of every movie in this list: I’ll watch it if I see it on TV, and if someone hands me the DVD, I’ll be happy to sit down to watch without a second thought. 

And now, in no particular order…

Die Hard

(This appears first because I’m watching Die Hard 2 at the moment.) Not only was Die Hard the prototype for the “ordinary guy caught in extraordinary circumstances”, it made Bruce Willis a movie star. The second movie, though not as good as the first movie, still holds its own as an action movie. The third — Die Hard With A Vengeance — could very easily hold a position in this list on its own. I’m not totally thrilled with Live Free or Die Hard. It’s a good movie, but I don’t think it quite holds up to the first three. 

The Hunt for Red October

I still remember the first time I saw this movie in the theatres. Not only does it have excellent pacing, good special effects, solid dialog, but it has the best hair Sean Connery has in his post-Bond work. The last 30 minutes of the movie are so well-executed that I totally forgot the popcorn I had been eating during the movie. If I had an actual Top 3 list, this would likely be in it.

The Mummy

A lot of people look at The Mummy as a big ball o’ fluff: no substance, nothing special. But this movie — and its first sequel, The Mummy Returns (the second sequel, Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, was an utter waste) — are pure fun. These are the kind of movies that Brendan Fraser does well — they suit his style of bravado and self-mockery. (That, and the first two feature Rachel Weisz.) These are not movies that invoke thought — they allow you to sink into campy fun, not unlike the Indiana Jones movies. Speaking of which…

Indiana Jones

I grew up to these movies, and it was a very happy day when I realised that, yes, classic movies were being made in my lifetime. The first three movies are cinema gold for me, supplying that sense of adventure that only comes from serial-inpired plots, characters, and dialog. (I have yet to see Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, however.) 

Star Wars (Eps 4-6)

Here we enter the dilemma. I need not reason why Episodes 4 (A New Hope) and 5 (The Empire Strikes Back) are on this list. If you’re not sure why, go watch the damn movies. I include Episode 6 (The Return of the Jedi) because it does a nice job wrapping up the original trilogy, even if the Ewoks are a little irritating. However, I do not include the three prequels because, as a collected group, they are far inferior to the original trilogy. Technically, I could include Episode 3  (Revenge of the Sith) as it is a good movie, but then I have to acknowledge the bantha poodoo that are Episodes 1 and 2. 

The big dilemma? What will I show my children — the entire saga, or start with just A New Hope? (This is a question friends of mine and I have debated for a while.) My answer: just the original trilogy. I’ll certainly allow my kids to watch the first three, but with the caveat that it’ll possibly ruin the original trilogy. 

Star Trek II, IV, VI, and First Contact

You’ll note that I’m leaving out several of the Star Trek movies. I leave them out because they’re inferior. Grossly so, in some cases (*cough* Star Trek V *cough*). For me, these are the classics, and Star Trek II stands above them all as one of the finest pieces of science-fiction filmmaking. It is, quite simply put, nearly perfect as a movie. 

The Lord of the Rings

In principle, this is a trilogy. In reality, it’s a 12 hour epic that’s been conveniently cut into three pieces to allow easier viewing. If you view it only on the herculean effort it took to make the movie, the leap of faith it took from the production companies to willing make it into three movies (instead of one). While I will watch any of the three (even out of sequence) willingly, I really do need the time — the shortest of the three is 3 hours and 28 minutes. 

The Bourne Identity

I’m a sucker for spy movies. Always loved them, and I’m not really sure why. Either way, the premise has always fascinated me. While Bourne himself isn’t a spy per se (he’s an assassin), it’s still along the same lines. The action is solid, and it has some of the best vehicular action scenes in recent movies.  No, Matt Damon is not the best actor, and his performance can be criticised as being a little two-dimensional. But I also think that’s what makes the character work a bit more — Jason Bourne doesn’t have a lot of substance, since he doesn’t even exist. 

James Bond

Like I said, I’m a sucker for spy movies. And I’d be remiss to mention the James Bond series. And yes, I still think Sean Connery makes the best Bond. Goldfinger rides very high on the list as my favourite. Timothy Dalton, sadly, rides lowest on my list for best Bond. And while I think Daniel Craig has far exceeded all expectations of being an adequate James Bond, the latest Bond movie — Quantum of Solace – isn’t really a James Bond movie. It’s a (damn good) spy action flick with some Bond elements.

The Incredibles

Possibly Pixar‘s best movie, even considering Wall-E. Excellent story, great voice action, amazing soundtrack, and they were willing to put the time in to tell the story as it needed to be told, and not cut it short. That said, I put pretty much any Pixar movie in with The Incredibles, and am willing to watch pretty much any of them without so much as a second thought.

Big Trouble in Little China

This is one of those classic cult movies from my teenage years. It’s Kurt Russell in one of his best roles, playing a totally campy, over-the-top egotistical, bombastic buffoon who yet somehow still turns out to be a hero. It’s all in the reflexes. 

Army of Darkness

When my friend Chris took me to see Army of Darkness when we lived in Ottawa, I’d never heard of Bruce Campbell, Sam Raimi, or The Evil Dead. We saw the movie three times that week, and by the end were quoting lines along with over half the audience. We’d quote lines for another 3 months afterwards. And still do. 

Armageddon

A lot of people give me grief for this one. It’s too American flag-waving, it’s too silly, too unrealistic, too bla bla bla. I’ll tell you what this movie is: pure fun. It’s 2 hours of Michael Bay at his best when it comes to glorious camera angles, cinematography (the sequences towards the end of the movie are stunning), and the characterisations are nearly perfect. Incidentally, most Michael Bay movies fall into this category, including Bad Boys I and II, The Rock, and Transformers. But not Pearl Harbor. Sorry, Mikey, but I can’t hack that one.

The Great Escape

One of the Steve McQueen classics. A fictional version of a true story, it’s a beautifully-told story, combined with comedy, drama, and a bit of action. Even though McQueen went diva during production (where do you think the motorcycle sequences came from?), the end result is still and endlessly-watchable film. In a similar vein is Bridge On The River Kwai, though that one I don’t watch as much, mostly because I think of the lack of comedic sequences. 

Blade

First off, I love vampire movies. I have for years. I can watch all manners of vampire movies without much pause. Blade in particular is a wonderful movie because of the Blade character, and Wesley Snipes‘ portrayal. I don’t dig the sequels as much, though I’ll watch Blade II fairly readily. I won’t touch Blade: Trinity – there’s a number of plot points that bug the crap out of me, and Ryan Reynolds‘ character is just plain annoying. 

Underworld

See above note about vampires. (The same applies to werewolves, for the record.) Add to that Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight leather and laytex. Um. Yeah. That makes up for stinkload of acting issues (someone tell me how Scott Speedman keeps getting major roles?) and plot issues. Same applies for Underworld Evolution. (I haven’t seen Rise of the Lycans yet, however.)

Fight Club

The first rule of Fight Club is … tell everyone to watch the movie. I’ve said this many times, but Brad Pitt needs to do roles where he has a slight out-of-balance character, otherwise he’s just window dressing and really dull to watch. This is a movie where he excels, and Edward Norton really balances out the roles. That, and when I first saw this movie, I really identified with Edward Norton’s character.

Apollo 13

I was fascinated with space every since I was a kid, so I knew the story of Apollo 13 before the movie was made. But there’s the documentary version of the story, and then there’s Hollywood’s version. And frankly, accuracy notwithstanding, I much prefer this telling. It’s not a significant difference — it’s the little things that make it truly sing. 

Amélie (Le Fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain)

If I had a Top 3 list of movies, this would be in it. And not just because Audrey Tatou creates perhaps the single cutest character in the history of filmmaking. It’s because of the story it tells — the need to help people find balance, the need for one to find the perfect love, and the playfulness one can find in life. The only thing I wish this movie had is complete English subtitles on the DVD release — they’re crap, and my French is still too weak to handle the movie without them. 

Emperor’s New Groove

I didn’t see this in the theatres, but bought the special edition DVD on a whim. I watched it that afternoon with Chris, Calvin, Doug, Adrian, and a couple of other friends, and we all nearly pissed ourselves laughing. Eartha Kitt creates — without any doubt or question — the best Disney villian. She was a perfect voice actor, and her loss is a dreadful shame on the industry for not using her more. 

Wallace and Gromit

This (currently) comprises four films: the three shorts (A Grand Day Out, The Wrong Trousers, and A Close Shave) and the full-length feature film (The Curse of the Were-Rabbit). I was introduced to Wallace and Gromit by my friends Brenda and Marek when I was working in Toronto back in the mid-late 1990s, and have loved them ever since. 

Sin City

Aside from the fact that I love Robert Rodriguez‘s films to begin with, this is one of those opus works that will be hard for Robert to outdo. (Though I eagerly await the chance that he might.) It’s a tough movie to have filmed, and the resulting work is outstanding. It’s exceedingly violent, so it’s a movie I need to watch on my own, or at least with someone who also loves the movie. 

The Matrix

The original Matrix movie was a ground-breaker. I still remember walking into the theatre with my coworkers from Radical Entertainment, thinking I wasn’t going to like it. It was a Keanu movie, after all, and I didn’t have a heap of faith given that the trailers didn’t really say much. My eyebrows raised when Trinity did that first bullet-time leap at the beginning, and I was sold when Neo wakes up in the power tower. After that, I was all over it. And while I do accept Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions as sequels, there were a number of issues I saw that prevented them from ever equalling the original. 

Airplane!

I am serious. And don’t call me “Shirley”. It’s a real classic. I could watch this movie repeated for a week and still laugh at it. It gets better with age. 

Blade Runner

I’m still not sure which version I like more. Although the Director’s Cut is extremely good, there is something about the voiceovers I’ve always liked. 

Batman Begins / The Dark Knight

I don’t separate these movies for two simple reasons: First, they both did extremely good jobs at making Batman “real”, and The Dark Knight made The Joker into a villian worth of an Oscar performance. Second, because there’s enough intelligence that it’s not just fluff. One day, I’ll convince Alex to watch them. I hope…

Pirates of the Caribbean

Two words: Jack Sparrow. I could give a crap about Will Turner, myself. (I could almost not care about Elizabeth Swann, if it weren’t for the fact that it’s Kiera Knightley.) Performances in this movie redefined the pirate genre for me. I remember the first time I saw the movie, when my friend Adrian and I weren’t entirely certain if it would be any good, but didn’t care. Afterwards, we couldn’t stop talking like pirates, much to our friends’ annoyance. 

Spirited Away

Before I get too much into this movie, I pretty much include anything made by Hayao Miyazaki. The man is a genius when it comes to story-telling, and his artwork is utterly fantastic. This, in my opinion, is his best work. Story-telling aside, I think it really brings out some of the great parts of Japanese mysticism, the needs of children to know when to grow up, and even a nice little view on the evils of greed. 

Office Space

Anyone who’s ever worked in an office laughs at this movie. It’s hard not to. It’s brilliantly-written and performed. About the only wrong thing with it is Jennifer Aniston — I’m not entirely sure why she’s in the movie. It could be any other actress and it would be just as good. 

Ronin

John Frankenheimer left us the best cinematic car chases ever filmed. Yes, even better than Bullitt. It’s a complex story, and the MacGuffin actually gets distracting. Some people don’t like it on the first watch. But watch it two or three times, and you’ll see what an excellent piece of work it really is. 

Ocean’s Eleven

Not the Sinatra version — I mean the 2001 “remake” with George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Don Cheadle, Matt Damon, Carl Reiner, Elliott Gould, etc. Aside from the fact that it’s a heist movie (and I love heist movies), it is the definition of “cool” in filmmaking. I don’t mean “cool” as in “boy, isn’t that cool”, but in being suave, collected, having an amazing attitude and behaviour. If I had a Top 3, this would likely be in it. 

Monty Python and the Holy Grail

I went to the University of Waterloo. If there were an official movie for the school, this would be it. When I was there, it was shown regularly in the Campus Centre, and pretty much every residence on any given weekend. It was an unwritten requirements to be able to quote most of the major scenes, especially if you were in the Mathematics faculty. 

V for Vendetta

Alan Moore might be a whiny little twit about this movie (if you’re going to whine about how people interpret your work, don’t sell the right in the first place), but I felt this was beautifully executed. I think when I die, I want my corpse detonated to the 1812 Overture. And I’m amazed at Natalie Portman‘s English accent.

The Shawshank Redemption

This is a bit of a weird one for me. Not in that it’s not an outstanding movie (it’s been at the top of the IMDB lists for years), but in that it’s a movie I own, but I’ve not gotten around to watching on DVD. Yet I’ve watched the movie about two dozen times on TV. There are few perfect movies out there, this would be one of them.

Sleepy Hollow

I’ll watch nearly any Tim Burton movie without a second thought, but this one in particular stands out for it’s characterisations (Johnny Depp is a brilliant actor, no two ways about it) and it’s sheer creepiness (the adaptation of the story is very intelligent). And it’s got Christina Ricci. I mean, c’mon…

Snatch

Guy Ritchie makes a good movie, especially a good heist movie. Jason Statham might be no Shakespearean thespian, but he delivers probably the best performance (so far) of his career. That, and it’s one of Brad Pitt‘s weirdest roles (which thusly makes it one of his best, as well). There’s not a single “good” character in the entire movie, which is why it’s just plain dirty fun. 

Hey, what about…?

Yes, there’s a whack of other movies that could easily be in this list. There’s even a few I cut out (The Fifth Element, The Muppet Movie, The Princess Bride, to name but a few) that nearly made the grade, but were dropped for one reason: 

When I made this list, and flipped through my pile of DVDs, I zipped past them without a thought. That for me suggests that they’re as watchable as the others.

As we all know, the vast majority of said covers are … well, crap. People don’t spend the time to consider the message or the music that went into the piece, and are quite happy to churn out a version that doesn’t sound much different than the original, or sounds so substantially worse that you really have to imagine what on earth they were thinking. 

But there are the gems — the music that was reinvisioned (sort of like when Tim Burton reinvisioned Planet of the Apes, but with more positive results) and create — in effect — a new piece of music that can stand alone from the original. 

Now there are a number of really good covers out there, and I’m not going to compile a list of all of them (this is the internet folks, it’s already been done many times over). These are just my Top 10. 

1. Hard to Handle - The Black Crowes. 
   Otis Redding probably has the record for most-covered songs. I count this one because The Black Crowes really make this their own song, and it was a wild hit on its own. It still remains a hard-driving song, the sort of thing you blare out your car windows in the heat of summer.
    
2. I Heard It Through The Grapevine - Creedence Clearwater Revival
   CCR had a complete knack for taking well-known songs and taking them into near-opus form. Not only with Grapevine, but also Suzie Q and I Put A Spell On You. 
    
3. Walk This Way - Run DMC and Aerosmith
   It could be claimed this isn’t a cover because Aerosmith is actually playing in the song itself. But a cover it is, and a defining cover because it was the first to blend rap (hip-hop) and rock ‘n roll, and do it very successfully. (Hey, it revitalised Aerosmith’s career…)
    
4. Run Run Away - Great Big Sea
   Most non-Canucks have never heard this version. It was what brought Great Big Sea to my attention. Slade’s original version was much more hard-driving rock, with synth bagpipes for laughs. Great Big Sea ran with the celtic aspect, and made it into a song you’d swear had always been played in east coast kitchens.
    
5. Respect - Aretha Franklin.
   Remember the original? Idon’t either. Another Otis Redding original. But no-one can out-do Aretha Franklin for presence in performance. That, and she spun the song from being male-focused to female-focused. That’s a great twist on an original!
    
6. Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door - Guns N’ Roses  (also consider Live and Let Die, but not Sympathy for the Devil)
   I got nothing against Guns ‘n Roses, especially when they can what was previously a fairly laid-back Bob Dylan piece of gold (made famous later by Eric Clapton, another amazing version of this song), and then chew it up, spit all over it, use it to snort a few lines of coke, and still have it sound great. I also like G’n'R’s run on Live and Let Die for the same reason. 
    
7. Higher Ground - Red Hot Chili Peppers
   Stevie Wonder wrote a complex song that is hard to play … so Red Hot Chili Peppers turned it into a wicked base-line and leapt all over it with a lot more crunch. They even gave a nod to Stevie towards the end of the song.
    
8. Light My Fire - Shirley Bassey
   The Doors, big-band style. Shirley Bassey has a voice like no other, and she gives this her all. It’s especially fun in the remixes that were released in the early 2000s. 
    
9. Hurt - Johnny Cash
   This is a song I don’t actually own. Because it actually hurts to listen to it. You can’t watch the video without crying, unless you’re dead. This isn’t a cover — it’s a lament. You feel every inch of Johnny Cash’s life, and every drop of his pain. 
    
10. With A Little Help (From My Friends) – Joe Cocker
    For years, I kid you not, I thought this was a song Joe Cocker wrote. It wasn’t until one day, listening to The Beatles original, that I had the realisation that Joe Cocker had covered it. This is my prototype for a cover song — take the original, and make it your own. To this day, I don’t think anyone does it better than Joe did in 1969. 

Okay, so those are my picks. What do you folks think?

I speak, of course, of yesterday’s Let’s Rock event where the apparently-not-dead (but much gaunter-looking) Steve Jobs talked at length about iTunes and iPods. And they played Jack Johnson, who is somehow the most popular male performer on iTunes to this point in history. (Yeah, I don’t get that either. Don’t get me wrong, Jack, you’re a great performer — just didn’t see that coming.) 

But why — oh why! — does Apple have to continually deny us a complete entertainment experience? 

I blogged about the iPhone shortly after its launch (well, I’d written the blog entry, just took a couple of months to get posted — long story) about how I felt that Apple had missed a killer opportunity. Like, as in a killing-the-competition-kind-of-killer. 

I still feel that way. It’s been over a year and a half, now. And still, Apple plain refuses to pick up that ball. 

Let’s review. Apple has the following in their product and service lines:

• iTunes: a massive database of media (music, video, podcast) that now includes HD video and the ability to get movies without leaving your house
• Powerful computers (with ample disk space) to store your collected content from iTunes, and serve it out to…
• Apple TV (version 2; version 1 was a dud), which serves beautifully as a device to put your iTunes-served content onto your 50″ HD television. (It’s even kept under the iTunes section on the website, for crying out loud!)
• Mac Mini, which could serve as a node on an internal network to receive content from a central server and sent to Apple TV, providing additional functionality (such as web browsing — can you say “interactive television”?)
• AirPort Extreme (Wi-Fi, which I’m getting to)
• Front Row, which allows easy access to any of your content through a simple remote (which is the way it should be — one device, not 10). And for the love of all things geeky, amp this up, will ya? You downplay it too much. It’s slick. It’s nice — give it more presence!
• And of course, the iPhone and iPod Touch, both Wi-Fi internet-capable devices that sync with iTunes

So, Steve, where is my home entertainment environment? 

You’ve got all the pieces. They’re right there. Sure, with enough work I could figure it out on my own — it’s not that hard. But you’re missing a killer market here. You’re an experience-based company, for Pete’s sake! You know all about experience, because that’s what you sell.

Apple makes hardware and software. Big frickin’ deal — so do all of your competitors. But you spent the time to make them work well, and in a way that users don’t just love, you turn them into rabid fanboys. (Sorry, Microsoft, but your fanboys don’t come close.)

And while you’re at it, how hard would it be to make an app for the iPhone / iPod Touch that would allow you to flip audio/video between nodes in your house? To allow you to — literally — carry a tune from your node in your kitchen to your bedroom via your Wi-fi device (iWhatever) without skipping a beat. Video, too — so my wife can continue to watch her favourite movie in bed without missing anything. 

While I’m at it, I have a couple of other requests I want to add:

• Let me rip my DVDs into iTunes. DCMA be damned — I bought the movie, and I want to use it on my devices. There is no reasonable explanation for why I shouldn’t be able to do this. 
• 50″ Cinema Display. People would give up vital parts of their anatomy to have one of these. Imagine how an iTunes-served movie would look on one. Just sayin’. 

C’mon, Steve. Don’t make me beg. It’s not a pretty sight. 

Heck, it could be like that already, for all we know.

Today, it was announced that Hillary Clinton would be willing to consider a Vice-Presidency with Barak Obama as top billing. But here’s a thought: Are Americans ready for this?

Let’s review the American presidential history, shall we?

43 Presidents. Every single one of them a white male. The closest the United States has ever gotten to breaking that mould was with Geraldine Ferraro in 1984 — an election I remember well, notably due to her Presidental candidate Robert Mondale. (Refer to a previous post featuring [[The Shrub is back|lack-lustre Democratic nominees]].) It was a risky time to attempt such a running mate. Abortion was a hot topic of the day, and the United States was a lot more conservative back then.

A black man (or African-American male, if you prefer)? The Rev. Jesse Jackson tried twice, in 1984 (defeated mostly as a result of himself) and 1988 (defeated by, of all people, Michael Dukakis). He wasn’t the first African American to try, but he’s been the only one until Obama. And by far the most successful. (Colin Powell declined not to run, though he might have done well.)

But the question remains: Given the history of the last two elections (one being a near-travesty of democracy), will this work? I think that both Obama and Clinton could stand on their own. They’ve broken through the problem of charisma (they’ve both got it in spades, which accounts for the delay in getting the nomination pinned down), and could stand well against John McCain.

But together on the same ballot?

It almost seems too liberal to me. Personally, I’d love to see it, but I have my doubts that even after eight years of Bush’s rather dubious leadership that they would turn to an idea that radical. (Remember the United States’ tendency for Red vs. Blue states, and a number of states that voted out gay marriage in pure terror of change.)

Maybe I’m being too cynical. Maybe I’m not giving enough credit.

I know this much, though: McCain had better watch himself. The mere second he even thinks of using race or sex as part of his stance, he’ll immediately alienate a huge section of voters. If nothing else, this will be the most politically-correct election you’ve ever seen.

• Another day, another video. This is the sort of stuff that should be delivered to clients, not to people who understand.
• Co-chairs return the stage. Much clapping.
• Housekeeping items.

Tim O’Reilly + Jonathan Schwartz

• Looks back at the past and how things have gone.
• Introduces Jonathan Schwartz, CEO Sun Microsystems
• Schwartz sees blogs being one day achronistic
• Sees one part of his job as communicating, which the internet serves well
  • It’s harder to do it inside the company; so answer both at once
• Most terrifying day when the General Counsel descided to write a blog (turned out to be really good)
• Doesn’t think he’s terrified anyone but the securities group (SEC compliance, apparently)
• Discussion about MySQL — what’s the strategy?
  • Deal is closed and integration is going well
  • Sun acquired a financial asset that is growing like a week
  • MySQL was actually working towards going public
  • Sun sees this as a way of expanding the market as a result of all the downloads
• Open source strategy connecting with the cloud strategy
  • The goal is about delivering value, not *how* that value is delivered
  • You have to reach out to the market with an asset, which will draw them into the network (cloud)
• Sun distributes 50MM Java runtimes a month
• Cloud distribution of databases, not so much to worry about the database and more about making sure you can get the data
• Moore’s Law supporting social networking — the cost to have thousands of cores is trivial
  • Scientific computing, which was traditionally the largest benefitter, is “collapsing” as they don’t get the same benefit
• Working to everything being virtualised
• Efficiency doesn’t lead to less purchase — it usually leads to much more
• Green computing
  • We’ve already hit problems
  • Costs more to run your server in Japan than the cost of the server itself
  • Not many of the CIOs are responsible for their own power bills
  • Sun wants to green their infrastructure to stay competitive
  • A fifth of all energy is just to move air around; very inefficient for cooling
  • Sun now builds data centres in shipping containers for fast deployment anywhere
  • • 1/3 more efficient than an equivalent data centre
• ZFS to be GPL’d

Fake Steve Jobs (Daniel Lyons)

• “It’s great to be here at the peak of the second dotcom bubble”
• This guy is pretty funny in person
• Long intro, but totally worth the time to hear it
• Paranoid about being Twittered like Zuckerberg + Lacy
• Why?
  • It was mostly a stupid prank, but was really boredom
  • Can’t believe he’s doing speeches about it now
  • Was also a part of fear — saw his business being distrupted by the web, so he decided to learn how to do it (hard partly been crucified by an articled “Attack of the Blogs”)
  • What if a transparent CEO went “nuts” and was insane on this blog?
• Why Steve Jobs?
  • Seemed perfect — takes himself too seriously, no sense of humour
  • “Dude, it’s a fucking cell phone! Get a grip!”
  • Started as a sort of comic strip, then started adding news
  • Had 90,000 readers in six months; sparked the manhunt
  • The person who offered the reward to find FSJ was the publisher of Forbes (Lyons’ boss)
• Why does it work?
  • It works because the audience feeds him ideas
  • Has a Fake Noam Chomsky and Fake Vladimir Putin sending him ideas
  • It’s almost a social platform onto its own
• The big discovery is not taking content from another channel and putting it online, it’s about feeding back into the online media and watching it evolve
• Thinks it’s not long before the big media companies figure out how to exploit this

Rob Curry, Dash

• Connected GPS for cars
• Crowdsourced traffic — other drivers provide info back into the system to provide real-time traffic updates
• Can do Yahoo searches based on location
• Can provide (anonymous) data about where people conduct searches (e.g. knowing where to build a new Starbucks based on requests)
• Can subscribe to data sets for search
• Has an interesting long tail

Matt Cutts, Google

• “What Google knows about Spam”
• People spam mostly for money, but also for recognition (e.g. church trying to get more people)
• Build trust and reputation into your system
• Make spams frustated, and they’ll usually stop
• We know most of this stuff, nothing new
• Can register the site on google.com/webmasters/ to be alerted to hacks or issues

Matt Mullinway, WordPress / Automattic

• “AH-kiz-mit”
• This guy doesn’t really seem comfortable on the stage
• 1/4 of traffic comes from the US
• 99.999% of blogs get under 10,000 pageviews a day
• WordPress.com gets 10+ million pageviews to permalink pages
• New feature: (Possibly) Related Posts
  • Introduces a form of personalisation
• A Wikipedia and a half of new content is being generated each month on WordPress.com
• http://ma.tt
• Monotone (theme) will adjust the colour based on the picture in it.

Not that I really would have missed much, admittedly. I have to admit, it was one of the more boring years.

Jon Stewart is a good host, but I really do miss the years like with Billy Crystal. Corny as it sounds, a good musical opening number that pokes fun at the biz was always interesting to watch.

There were a few surprises, but all-in-all no shockers. I feel kind of bad for George Clooney, though. I’m sure he did a great job in Michael Clayton (haven’t seen it yet), but you have to wonder if he swore a blue streak when he saw Daniel Day-Lewis’ name show up on the nomination. I mean, that’s just gotta suck.

I miss the old days, where people weren’t confined to two minutes of talking time, where the presenters would do political postulation, where the outfits were outrageous (coughChercough), and the show was almost more about spectacle than self-congratulations.

But hey, this might be my last watched Oscars for a while. Life has a way of getting in the way of traditions, and probably the only reason I watched this year was because Alex and the Wee One were out of town. Next year will definitely be different.

That’s what Discovery Channel‘s Dirty Jobs is all about. If you haven’t watched it, you really should check it out. It’s one of the few decent things on television, and one of only three shows that I’ll go out of my way to watch (the other two being Dirty Jobs’ sibling, Mythbusters, and ABC’s Pushing Daisies).

But there’s something about Dirty Jobs’ host, Mike Rowe, and the way he handles the content of the show, that really adds another layer. Namely, poo.

If you’ve seen the show, you know what I’m talking about. And to that end, you might have thought the same thing Alex thought of: there really needs to be a drinking game behind all this. So we bring you our version of the Dirty Jobs Drinking Game. (There is one other I know of, but I wanted to add some complication to it — what’s the point of having a drinking game if it’s easy to do?)

The Rules

1. Something alcoholic is preferred, but you can go with pop (soda) or chocolate milk if you have to. Otherwise, it’s just not as funny.
2. No pausing the show to drink. If things come fast and furious, you need to keep up. So keep a good stock of liquids at the ready.
3. Don’t pre-watch the episode. That’s just taking the fun out of it. Repeats are fine, since few have actually memorised anything. (And after running through this, you’ll likely want to forget it anyway.)
4. If you’re the last one standing, you’ve got a Dirty Job of your own. But don’t call Mike — I’m pretty sure he’ll pass.

Drinking Definitions

• Drink – a sip of wine or hard alcohol, swig of beer
• Shot – 1/3 glass of wine, shot glass of hard alcohol, 8 oz beer (technically over 1/2 a North American bottle, but 1/2 will do for ease-of-comparison)
• Chug – a glass of wine, 3 shots of hard alcohol, a complete beer (yes, this seems somewhat lighter on the beer crowd, but that carbonation does pack a wallop)

The Conditions

This is broken down not just by amount to drink, but by what’s said/going on. You’ll understand why after your third beer…

What Mike Says

Drink when:

• “I’m Mike Rowe”
• “Poo”
• Any derivative of “poo” (e.g. “crap”)
• Says “You’ve never seen the show, have you?” when someone suggests that whatever Mike’s about to do is easy/routine
• Makes a derogatory comment about his (in)ability to use a piece of equipment that he’s used in a previous episode
• Makes a comment about his own crew
• “You’re a dirty man/woman”

Shot when:

• Swears
• Make a comment about the size of tools/equipment used by someone he’s working with
• Makes a comment about Dave, the producer
• “I love this job”
• Makes a comment about needing to take a shower at the hotel that evening

Chug when:

• Screams/yells as a result of being “attacked” by vermin
• Uses a swear in lieu of “poo” (e.g. “shit”)

What Mike Does

Drink when:

• Conned into eating something that’s edible, but not necessarily ideal (e.g. raw oysters, cow feed)
• Has to catch/trap an animal

Shot when:

• Falls into/onto poo (manure, guano, cowpies)
• Loses some article of clothing as a result of what he’s doing (e.g. footwear, hat)
• Eats something that while technically edible, not even the workers around him would touch (e.g. crab meal)
• Sings
• Is scared to death of trying to catch/trap the animal
• Has to collect semen samples (double if the animal is bigger than Mike)
• Has to insert his finger/hand/arm to determine sex or otherwise “assist” a natural process
• Gets visibly ill, but without actually up-chucking

Chug when:

• Eats poo (accidentally, often due to flinging or splattering)
• Sings the Dirty Jobs theme song (yes, there is one)
• Vomits (only done this once that I’ve seen)

What Happens to Mike

Drink when:

• Gets sprayed with something (e.g. water, mud, concrete) but not poo
• Gets hit by a piece of equipment

Shot when:

• Gets bitten/pinched by an animal (double if it draws blood)
• Gets hit with poo
• Gets spat on by an animal
• Gets stuck in the ground he’s walking on (double if the ground is made of poo)

Chug when:

• Gets poo’d on by an animal

What Happens to Those Around Mike

Drink when:

• Mike gets upstaged by the guide/guest/demonstrator
• Crew appears on screen

Shot when:

• Mike gets upstaged by a kid
• Crew gets more than just a passing mention, including being heard on-camera
• Crew nearly gets hit by something Mike is doing
• Equipment is damaged/destroyed (double)
• Mike intentionally trips/fells one of the crew

Chug when:

• Mike gets upstaged by an animal
• Crew is in an accident, with damage/destruction to equipment

And Finally

Because poo seems to play such a large part of things that happens on Dirty Jobs, any time the word “poo” is mentioned (especially by Mike), not only follow the conditions above, but you must also yell “POO”!

And let’s be sure we’re talking here — he was aiming to be on the ballot in South Carolina. But the Democrats down there decided to throw him off.

Big mistake.

The Democrats have had some serious issues getting the right people in front of the American public for President. The last two have gone down in infamy, having lost due to a legal decision, and the second time because … well, we’re not really sure why. But I’ve got my own thought on that.

Simply put, they were boring.

Al Gore wasn’t exactly noted for being rambunctious, flamboyant, or extraverted. More alone the lines of “dull as a rock”. Smart, yes. Became a wonderful defender of the environment. But that was after losing to someone who shouldn’t be allowed to run with scissors, let alone a country.

John Kerry became famous for changing direction like the wind. That, and he didn’t seem physically capable of being interesting. Howard Dean, by comparison, was great until he shoved his foot so far in his mouth he could stand on his own colon.

The key here is that boring doesn’t win. If you think it’s about putting in the right person, you’re missing the point. It’s about who has more charisma. (Throw in whatever conspiracy theory you want, the reality is that government is done largely by committee, no matter country and/or political system.) Subconsciously, everyone wants a President who represents the spirit of the United States. Dubya didn’t win because he was the right one (he’s proved that several times over) — it’s because he at least had some form of presence.

I know this because I look at Canadian politics. If we had to elect our own Prime Minister, we’d be screwed. Most of them have no more excitement than a stick. So thankfully, we just vote for the party we think is right. They sort the rest of that crap out for us. Doesn’t always work, but then we just vote them back out again the next time.

Colbert would have been a great candidate. He would have won the Presidency, too. Tell me that he wouldn’t have buried every other candidate by throwing them oddball questions that they wouldn’t know how to answer. No script in the world could account for someone who talks on his feet. Think Man of the Year is pure fiction? I’m willing to bet Colbert could have taken South Carolina without trying.

A million people already support him. That’s grass roots support. Sure, Obama’s got that, too, but it took him several times longer to get it.

After eight years of Bush, the world needs someone to laugh at for a while. If nothing else, it would make for the most interesting (if not funny) election ever seen.

In my world, this is pretty significant news. But then, I am a movie geek.

And like many who appreciate the spy movies, most of us remember the older James Bond flicks (particularly the Sean Connery era) as the best of the Bonds. And Lois Maxwell was the best of the Moneypennys.

That’s not to say that subsequent Moneypennys weren’t good, it was more an issue of the appropriateness. The newer Moneypennys were sexy. That’s not to say Lois wasn’t, but that she wasn’t as “dolled-up”. That was intentional — the smart, witty, and strong in herself sort of person.

She set a pattern that lasted almost as long as the original Q (Desmond Llewelyn), featuring in every James Bond movie until (and including) View to a Kill.

The fact that she was Canadian just made it all the more appealing. At least for us Canucks.

Best wishes to her family, friends, and fans.