Complacent Administration

This is the best assessment of Barack Obama that I have seen so far.

Barack Obama’s former mentor criticises ‘complacent Administration’

Tai Shan's Farewell

Video from Tai Shan's farewell party.

Video of Tai Shan's Day.

Catherine Zeta Jones on Letterman

I can't pass up a Catherine Zeta Jones video. Here she is on Letterman last week.

5-Second Rule Flow Chart

From the A new way to think about the 5-second rule in the Los Angelos Times

J.D. Salinger's Safe

The mystery grows: What's in 'Catcher in the Rye' author J.D. Salinger's safe?

Pictures of the Flood

It did flood at the Inner Harbor, but I don't think it was enough to get into any buildings. I lucked out. I was going to the bank, and because I had $10 in pennies I needed to take my book bag. I took my camera out of the bag, but then decided to put it back. So when I got to the Harbor just as the clouds were breaking and the water was spilling onto the walk ways, I had my camera.

Pictures of the Flood

Black & White pictures inspired by Aubrey Bodine.

Phineas Gage on Flickr

A picture of Phineas Gage has shown up on Flickr. Phineas is famous because in 1848 a 43" tamping iron shot through his eye and out the back of his head. He survived and is remember today as one of the first documented cases where a brain injury affected a man's personality. The Smithsonian has an article including the picture.

Crazy Heart

A Video of Scott Cooper the writer and director of Crazy Heart, a movie starring Jeff Bridges, Maggie Guyllenhall and Robert Duvall. I see that Jeff Bridges just won the Best Actor award from SAG for this film.

The Big Burn

Here is Timothy Egan discussing his newest book The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America. I think I preferred his previous book, The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl. The most interesting aspect of the new book is to see how the arguments in politics today are almost exactly the same as the argument that went on in the past. If you are into the genre of natural disaster books, both of these books are worth reading.

"Water for Elephants" the movie

Reese Witherspoon, Sean Penn and Robert Pattinson possible for the movie of Water for Elephants.

Almost-close encounter

Meteorite hits Lorton doctor's office

Mexico's Cueva de los Cristale

Video of the Cave of Crystals in southern Chihuahua Mexico.

Alice in Wonderland

The Times has what it claims is an exclusive first look at Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. I went to the Tim Burton exhibit at MOMA last week end, and I have a new appreciation for him as an artist. There must have been about 1,000 pieces of his work there. Unfortunately, it was so crowded it was had to see a lot of it.

Unemployment in the United States

A dynamic map that shows the spread of unemployment over the US in the last couple years.

The End of a Tradition?

Edgar Allan Poe Toaster is 'Nevermore'

What to eat?

The 11 Best Foods You Aren’t Eating

The Nature Conservancy - Nature's Best Photo

You can vote in the The Nature Conservancy's Nature's Best Photo contest. I was going to vote, but I cannot decide which pictures I like best.

Pictures From New York

I was hoping to take more pictures on Sunday, but it rained in the afternoon. I got pictures of Times Square on Saturday night and Central Park on Sunday morning.

Saturday Night & Sunday Morning - NYC 01/2010

A Little Night Music

Everything about A Little Night Music was great. The only criticism I could think of is that Desiree, the character Catherine Zeta Jones plays, should be just a bit past her prime. By no stretch could you say that Cathernine Zeta Jones is even a little bit past her prime. But I am willing to over look this for the sake of art.

Here are a couple clips. The stars discuss the show.



Catherine Zeta Jones - Send in the Clowns



Angela Lansbury - Liasons

Slash: Paper Under The Knife

I went to the Museum of Art and Design today, primarily because I thought it would be a good place to stay out of the rain today between the time I had to check out of my hotel room and when I was supposed to catch the bus. I was happy I went. It was far less crowded than MOMA, and I saw one of the best art exhibits I have seen in my life: Slash: Paper Under The Knife

Rembrandt in the Bathroom

One of those stories that is almost to incredible to believe.

New Exhibit Features Mysterious Rembrandt Etching Found in Nugent Hall

Hilary Mantel discusses Wolf Hall

Hilary Mantel discuss her book Wolf Hall, which won the 2009 Man Booker Award.

And the Word of the Decade Is . . .

An interesting article on the meeting of the Linguistic Society of America in Baltimore.

American Dialect Society picks 'tweet,' 'Google' as top words for 2009, decade

North Atlantic Oscillation

OK, So this is why it is so cold. Although I do remember some colder days from last year, when I stood for hours to see Obama when the temperature was 16.

North Atlantic Oscillation blamed for cold spell

Strawberry Crab

New crab species discovered in Taiwan.

Invictus

I saw Invictus today. Every time I see a movie directed by Clint Eastwood I always come away thinking there is no way anyone else could have made the movie any better. He always gets everything just right. When you watch Morgan Freeman you actually do believe that he is Nelson Mandela.

The title of the film comes from this poem:

Invictus by William Ernest Henley

     Out of the night that covers me,
     Black as the pit from pole to pole,
     I thank whatever gods may be
     for my unconquerable soul.

     In the fell clutch of circumstance,
     I have not winced nor cried aloud.
     Under the bludgeonings of chance,
     My head is bloodied, but unbowed.

     Beyond this place of wrath and tears
     Looms but horror of the shade,
     And yet the menace of the years
     finds and shall find me unafraid.

     It matters not how strait the gate,
     How charged with punishment the scroll.
     I am the master of my fate;
     I am the captain of my soul.

Greedy Credit Card Companies

A video about the greedy credit card companies.

Visa Reigns With Silent Tax

Cap and Trade

This is from last August's issue of the Smithsonian Magazine, but I just got around to reading it. This is the best explanation of Cap and Trade that I have read.

The Political History of Cap and Trade

New Years Day Photographs

Two years ago on New Years Day I walked by the Charleston Restaurant. It was empty except for the black and white balloons that had been left from the night before. The balloons had begun to lose helium and they were all floating three or four feet off the floor. I have never been so upset that I did not have my camera, and that was before I had a camera on my phone. So for the last two years I have walked by the Charleston Restaurant on New Years Day, but guess what. No balloons. So there are no pictures of deflating balloons here, but since it was so overcast I was able to take a couple pictures of the Katyn Memorial, and it shows up better than it does in the bright sun.

New Years Day 2009

Six Movies

I made it to six movies in the last four days. Here they are from the one I liked most to the one I liked least.

Young Victoria - It always helps to start with a good script. Julian Fellows wrote the script for this. It is actually very different from the script he wrote for Gosford Park. Gosford Park was an incredible script, but at the same time it was very complicated and almost impossible to follow unless you watched it multiple times. The number of characters in Young Victoria, is probably the minimum you could have and still tell this story. With a character like Queen Victoria it would be tempting to add more characters, just because of the number of people she actually had to deal with. By limiting the number of characters in the film, it allows each character to be fully realized, which would not have been possible if more had be crammed into the movie. I particularly enjoyed Miranda Richardson's portrayal of the evil mother.

It's Complicated - This film gets second place because it has so many laughs. Who could pass up getting to see Meryl Streep stoned. The other performance that I thought really stood out was John Krasinski, who played the son-in-law to be. I would expect to see him in a lot more movies.

Up in the Air - I would say that this film is witty rather than funny. George Clooney was perfectly cast as a man who flies around the country laying people off from their jobs. Clooney is always likable no matter what he is doing, which is quite an accomplishment. I thought the story was OK, and it was helped because it is so topical in the present times.

Me and Orson Welles - The plot of this film is almost the same as the plot of An Education, which is also out now. I guess the story of a young person going out into the big world and finding that things are not as expected is fairly common. I liked An Education much better. With Zac Efron it hard to judge his acting, because in this movie you are not sure if he is acting or just playing himself. Also, I am not sure how you portray someone like Orson Welles who was a larger than life personality in the real life, but the performance of him in this movie seemed a little cartoonish to me.

Avatar in 3D - The amount of melodrama in this movie was way past my tolerance level. Technically the animation was incredible, but the 3D affects did not really make the movie any better for me. It seemed to me to drag on forever. The script was not that bad, but it was not that good either.

Fantastic Mr. Fox - It may be partly because I was tired, but I just did not like this movie. I thought the characters were to human, they should have been more foxy.

This leaves me with the opinion that the best movies of the year were these two that came out earlier.

The Hurt Locker - I don't think you can take a war movie seriously unless there are scenes that are almost impossible to watch, and this movie certainly has some of those. But I still think everything about this movie was flawless.



In the Loop - This movie probably has the best script of the year, and a long list of great actors.

Today is a Palindrome

01022010

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

Here is a video of Jamie Ford discussing his novel "Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet". It is now 26 on the New York Times trade paperback list, and it deserves to go much higher.

Health Care Cost from the New Yorker

Here is an article from the New Yorker about health care cost. The author draws an analogy between Health Care today and American agriculture around 1900 to make the argument that Health Care may become more efficient and cheaper on it's own, even though the current legislation before Congress does not do very much to control the cost of health care. I would like to believe that this is true, but I am not sure that it is.

Mickey Rooney on marrying Ava Gardner, love and addiction

Anyone who has lived to be 89, and has been married 8 times has to have something interesting to say. Video Here