P.S. A Column On Things

Heading For The Mountains (and Next Week)

As you read this, more or less, Vicki, Marlow and I will be in the High Sierra above Yosemite Valley, hiking between the five High Sierra Camps for a week. It is rigorous, but we expect it to be fun as well. The day after I return, it's back to school. I'm saying this because I am not at all sure I'll be in a mood, or a position, or have enough time, to post on Aug. 21. Despite the unpaid nature of this column (on your part and mine), I feel badly when the continuity is disrupted, and for that I apologize. I promise a full accounting of the Yosemite experience after my return. That will boost my Google profile! [From my own Google efforts, I know a lot of people feel obliged to make detailed posts of their Yosemite experiences]

CCWS

They say the only constant is change, and I received a slap-in-the-face reminder of that this week. Those of you who have been paying attention know that I learned to play the tenor sax at the age of 40, and shortly thereafter started playing with a group then known as the Lamorinda Town Band. I have been with them for 14 seasons. In the meantime, it became the Contra Costa Wind Symphony, and gradually increased the difficulty of the pieces played. Last week the director wrote the band and told us he was going to cut back to one or two instruments per section, which cuts the overall band by 15 players. Those in the affected sections could audition for their seats. Although I have improved over 14 years, there is no chance I could be selected to play after an audition. I didn't leave the band, the band left me.

It leaves a hole in my life. The CCWS was very important to me; one of the few things I did for pure and absolute pleasure. I don't enjoy making solo music. I am thrilled to ecstasy making music in a large ensemble. I have come to love "Sleigh Ride" and "Stars and Stripes," selections we reliably play year after year.

I am pretty sure I have mentioned that the only thing I like as much as making music in an ensemble is announcing. My last journalism job was as an announcer. I announced JV Girls basketball at the local high school for two years. I was an announcer at my high school's 500-watt AM radio station, and I've been hooked ever since. For the last five years, with the exception of one concert, I have been the announcer for the Danville Community Band, whose director has generously invited me on several occasions to play with his band as well. During the time I was getting used to being a teacher, I didn't want to play in two bands each week, but the CCWS solved that dilemma for me. Come Labor Day, I'll be seated in the sax section of "the world's largest community band," a wry nickname for an estimable ensemble, rehearsing on Mondays instead of Wednesdays.

Life changes. Expect nothing to last and you won't be disappointed.

Fishing for contacts for Marlow

Normally, I wouldn't mention this in my blog, but the world is full of unexpected connections and weird coincidences, so I figure, what the heck, it can't hurt anything. My daughter Marlow has finished graduate school (BA Columbia, MA Leiden University) in international relations. With her degree in hand, and conversational Mandarin under he belt, she's looking for something in banking, insurance, investment banking or NGO, preferably in the San Francisco Bay area, with a focus on China or Asia. If you know a job like that, or know someone who does, email me (my address is in the bar down the right side of the column).

I am thinking of this because I just got around to cleaning up my long-dormant account at linkedin.com (and if I know you and you want to connect with me, look me up) in the hopes of providing her a built-in network.

GOP Abuses Terror Threat: Disgusting

From Tom Lasusa (I couldn't think of any better way to put it, except to say GOP abuse of the issue to distort our democratic system is disgusting):

Please read

Arrests Bolster G.O.P. Bid To Claim Security as Issue

about the Republicans taking advantage of the Foiled Terror plot in the hopes of regaining momentum for the fall elections.

People need to be reminded that this is a regular practice of the GOP -- they constantly jump on 'thwarted attacks' -- using them as a bandwagon to try and convince everyone that the country will benefit only through their leadership. They use incidents like this to defend the War in Iraq. It's cheap and underhanded politics at its best (or worst)

James Webb, a former Reagan administration official running as a Democratic candidate for Senate in Virginia, has a quote in the article which sums up the situation best:

The war in Iraq had nothing to do with the war against international terrorism, or very little to do with the war on terrorism. It has distracted our attention, it has pulled our forces in, and we are now in a situation where we have 135,000 on the ground, which affects our ability to do a lot of things that we would be able to do otherwise.

Can people really fall for this GOP crap again? How long has the U.S. Government known about the plot [Terror grounded: UK foils plot to blow up 10 planes]? How many times must there be a raised alert or arrested terrorist 30, 60 or 90 days before an election before people catch on? Out at the fringes, they're saying the entire plot was actually made up to help Blair and Bush both. Along the same lines, these stories from the Huffington Post:

• U.K. Terror Bust Already Spins U.S. Politics: Margaret Carlson
• Larisa Alexandrovna: Playing Politics with Our Lives
• Lorelei Kelly: Ghoulish Opportunistic Pandering

Briefs

• Bush Wants Wider War
• A bit of depressing news from the San Jose Mercury via Richard Dalton: How To Fix Our Broken Prisons. With a unanimity rare in public policy circles, politicians, penal experts, judges and special commissions are agreed: Every facet of California's $8 billion-a-year prison system is in a state of collapse.

• Blog: Iran uranium smuggling claims questionable. That great Republican President Abraham Lincoln allegedly said: You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time; does George W. Bush really think he can again fool some of the people? (Note that all of the people were not fooled the last time (e.g., PSACOT, Ted Kennedy, Russ Feingold, and Robert Byrd)).

• Joe Lieberman Will Drop Out (we can only hope…) Michael Moore interprets the Lieberman loss.

• More voting hanky panky.

Technobriefs

by Craig Reynolds

Ballbot: a Robot That Balances and Moves on a Ball Instead of Legs or Wheels, more details and videos (bottom of page) Dynamically-Stable Mobile Robots in Human Environments. There was a fanciful ball-footed robot in Bill Kroyer's 1988 Technological Threat. See Ken Perlin's page Rosie the Robot - a Question of Balance. (Bill, Ken and I first met during the production of TRON.) In the post-Segway world, self-balancing inverted-pendulum robot designs are not so remarkable. Back in the 1980s this was a very bold concept when Marc Raibert built the first such robot, the 3D One-Leg Hopper. Early software simulation of that robot inspired the welding robot for The Works (see also WC PH RA). And while were are on the subject of robots and balls: Spherical micro-robots could explore Mars. (I hope I'm not the only one that thinks that illustration looks like a device for interplanetary delivery of fried eggs. (Oh no! Its the Yokians!))

Hot stuff: according to the White House, global warming is just a myth. Thank goodness, otherwise all the hot weather would be worrying: The deluded world of air conditioning and July hottest month in Netherlands in 300 years. Besides, what do the National Academies know, anyway?: Panel Supports a Controversial Report on Global Warming and Backing for 'hockey stick' graph.

Outer planet news: Pluto: Is It a Planet? Titan-orama: lakes, caves and craters: 'Great lakes' seen on Titan moon, Titan may be a land of lakes after all, Titan may be riddled with caves and Images help solve mystery of Titan's missing craters.

Domain kiting is the practice of abusing domain names during the 5 day grace period before they need be paid for by large volume brokers. For example, running up the price of the domain you consider using: Company Swiping The Domain Names You're Thinking About Registering. It is also used to find near-miss domains which can be used to generate advertising revenue: 35 million names registered in May. Only 8% of registrations were paid... Special site on the issue: Domain Name Kiting

SIGGRAPH note: while I was away at SIGGRAPH 2006 Dan Grobstein posted a link about Mova's Contour system for simultaneous capture of both facial and body performance. Their SIGGRAPH trade show demo proved to be quite popular. Small world note: my wife has known Steve Perlman, Mova's founder and president, since high school. For general SIGGRAPH geekiness, see Tor's annual compilation of SIGGRAPH 2006 papers on the web. I gave a paper about crowd simulation at a co-located symposium, and there was a cool paper about a novel approach to crowd simulation at SIGGRAPH itself.

Technobits: Cobalt green, a pigment invented in 1780, shows promise for room temperature spintronic devices: Green pigment spins chip promise --- How people with autism miss the big picture --- Amazing photo of tungsten needle: sharpest manmade thing --- Google sees privacy threats from gov't intrusions and Google offers live traffic maps on cell phones --- Bump keying: $1 keys open any lock --- From snapshot to cover model in a single click --- sex in space --- Tiny animals on fingers photo gallery --- Many kinds of Oranges.

The Top 17 Positive Aspects of a Scorching Heat Wave

August 8, 2006

17> New words appearing on the casual Friday rules list include "shorts" and "topless."

16> Barry Bonds switches to injecting himself with ice water.

15> Dehydration-induced delirium makes Mel Gibson's apology sound almost reasonable.

14> Great fun watching White House officials deny global warming while wearing swim trunks and Panama hats.

13> Hasidic Jews wearing little fans on their wool hats.

12> The advice to "replace fluids" means you can crack that first cold Pabst Blue Ribbon at 6:15 am!

11> Technically, if it evaporates before hitting the ground, it's not public urination.

10> Pudding! Everything turns into pudding and I like pudding!

9> New Rob Schneider movie promoted as "Two solid hours of theater-grade air-conditioning."

8> Your pocket watch becomes much more valuable as a Dali collectable.

7> Easier to trick girls into checking out your display of posed "X-Files" figurines in Mom's cool, cool basement.

6> Make tasty panini under your hat!

5> Between Starbucks and the bus stop, your Frappuccino turns into a 20-ounce espresso.

4> Easier to understand why those Middle Easterners are so darn cranky.

3> Hollywood starlets don't have to worry about an attack of RCPNS: Red Carpet Pokey Nipple Syndrome.

2> Al Gore starts development on the World Wide Refrigerator.

and Topfive.com's Number 1 Positive Aspect of a Scorching Heat Wave...

1> Grab the stick up Ann Coulter's ass and -- BOOM! -- instant Bitchsicle!

[ The Top 5 List www.topfive.com ]
[ Copyright 2006 by Chris White ]
=======================
Selected from 128 submissions from 44 contributors. Today's Top 5 List authors are:
---------------------------------------
Andrew Hackard, Austin, TX -- 1 (9th #1)
Paul Schindler, Orinda, CA -- 15

Miami Vice

3 stars

I toyed with giving this 2.5 stars, but Vicki, who saw it with me (and normally has a strong visceral dislike for "bang bang" films) talked me into 3 stars with the simple statement, "For the genre, it's pretty good."

Based on the television series of the same name, written and directed by Michael Mann, the writer/producer of the series, the movie features high-powered talent:

• Colin Farrell as Detective James 'Sonny' Crockett (where's Don Johnson when you need him?)
• Jamie Foxx as Detective Ricardo Tubbs (memorable and controlled as always)
• Li Gong as Isabella the love interest shared by Crockett and the drug lord (please stop taking her word for the fact that she can speak English and loop her dialog. Please?)
• Ciarán Hinds as FBI Agent Fujima (from Julius Caesar to this cameo?)
• John Ortiz as drug underboss José Yero (Am I the only person who feels he looks uncanilly like Geoffrey Rush with dark makeup and glasses?)

In a way, this is the celluloid equivalent of the comfort food they serve at all those diners; you could tick off the copy movie tropes as they rolled by. Undercover agent gets too wrapped up in his false identity? Check. Revenging a dead informant? Check. Arrogant FBI agent proves operationally incompetent? Check. Cop falls in love with girl from the other side? Check. Movie concludes with amazing, blazing, night-time gun battle? You got it, Chester.

Nothing wrong with recycling old ideas if you do it well and with some style. That's what Westerns and Musicals were all about, back when they made those kind of films. Of course I heartily object to a 130 minute running time! Come on, Mann, you could tell this story in 90 minutes. That's the director's cut I want to see on most movies! The shorter version you could have made if you'd had more time to edit.

To sum up: "For the genre, it's pretty good."

Barnyard

2.5 stars

The best thing you can say about this film is that it is only 83 minutes long. It's now official: computer-generated animation is so cheap it can be used to create a feature-length movie with a crummy plot. The voice talent is interesting (albeit mostly second-tier) and the "funny stuff" is mildly amusing. But at the fairly crowded showing I attended, the plot was too infantile for the adults and too complicated for the five-year-olds ("Why is that cow sad, mommy?"). Not only not fun for the whole family, but barely fun for the toddlers. Of course, if you're in a heat wave, it's an hour and a half of air conditioning. No new or interesting ground is broken in computer animation or childrens' movie music. How many more films with anthropomorphic father-son relationship troubles must we endure?

Conversations with Other Women

4.5 stars

Director Hans Canosa and screenwriter Gabrielle Zevin are geniuses. Their only previous credit is Alma Mater, a 2002 movie they worked on together). Once again, they prove that you have to be a neophyte to really challenge the standards in a field--because you don't know what "can't" be done. In Conversations with Other Women, they are fiddling with the technical and narrative aspects of film-making in brilliant ways, in the service of a fascinating and ambiguous story. This could be the Citizen Kane of our generation, blazing new trails in terms of technique and organization. There have been split-screen films before, but never like this. There have been odd two-people dancing, plot-points dribbled out scripts before, but never like this. I was particularly fascinated by the way the pair toyed with each other about the nature of their previous relationship. I don't imagine anyone talks like this in real life, but it was fun to watch. See if it doesn't cause you to wonder what it would be like to meet an old flame decades later--it certainly had that effect on me.

The film is rated R for sex and language. If you don't like talk (and a quick peek) at sex and adultery, this film is not for you. Helena Bonham Carter (who calls herself 38, and really was 38 when the film was shot) and Aaron Eckhart between them have 90% of the lines in this film, yet it never feels stagy or boring. In fact, it would make an excellent play.

The extra half star is for making a serious film that is only 84 minutes long.

Zoom

2.5 stars

It is nice to see Chevy Chase back making films again--IMDB shows him with 50 film credits, and those of us of a certain age can remember when it looked like he might be one of the all-time great comic actors. Somehow, despite a few memorable films, the dogs came to outnumber the winners and he faded from view. Chase has replaced his trademark pratfall with a rapid blink (both parodied within the film), but his droll delivery and, well, funny face, are always a pleasure to see on screen. Perhaps it is intentional irony that Courtney Cox takes a number of pratfalls in this film--homage to Chase's famous falls? Tim Allen, of course, is lovable, family-friendly Tim Allen.

It is a shame to see such great live-action talent wasted in a decidedly second-rate piece of genre' hackwork. Allen plays a retired superhero who comes out of retirement to train a new team of young superheroes and protect them from the depredations of a power-mad General Rip Torn (delightfully chewing all the scenery in sight as usual). You could write out the plot yourself about 10 minutes into the film. And talk about clumsy handling of the exposition--I thought you were supposed to show things in movies not tell them. I guess the rules don't apply when the audience is children. In fact, I didn't stay for the end (it would have made me late for Conversations next door), but I'll bet I can tell you exactly how it ended.

There are worse children's films (especially animated ones), but you're going to spend more time wondering about how much Wendys paid for the product placement than you are pondering the eternal verities of the plot. The message of course, is uplifting. It's just that I've seen all this done better.