Zzzzz....

That was a good Game 4, but overall, man, that was one boring World Series. Three of the past four World Series have been sweeps, and the one that wasn't only went to five games (the three before those were all six- or seven-game barnburners). The Red Sox winning in 2004 made for a great story, but by now they're basically just the Yankees with more facial hair. Not only did they come in as favorites and sweep the Series, winning two of the games by blow-outs, but they let all the air out of the Rockies' great run to win the NL pennant. The Rockies getting swept like that reflected poorly on the entire National League. In 2008 this thing better be won by a team with some charm.

Ode to L.A.

Geoff Manaugh writes of how he loves L.A. because it is "emotionally authentic."

Who cares?
Literally no one cares, is the answer. No one cares. You're alone in the world.
L.A. is explicit about that.

Not ever having lived anywhere else for more than a few temporary weeks, I can't vouch for how this compares to the rest of the world.

Movie Calendars

If you scroll down, you can see on the sidebar that I've added links for a bunch of calendars for local film programs. It includes info on commercial theaters as well as university screenings and things like that. If you have any suggestions for other ones to add, or better links, or whatever, let me know.

I've also tweaked a few of my other links, including listing my Amazon wish list, in case you want to shower me with gifts. (Actually, it's just a convenient starting part for my own shopping.)

DDT, people, and birds

I don't know who Hector Dauphin-Gloire is, or what his sources are, but if what he says in the 8th and 9th comments of this post here is accurate, it pretty much blows the lid off of that whole "banning DDT cost many human lives" idea that environmental naysayers bandy about.

Cirque du Soleil's "Corteo"

I haven't yet mentioned on this blog that I'm a big fan of Cirque du Soleil. On Tuesday my wife and I saw their traveling show Corteo, which is currently set up in a big tent in the parking lot of the Forum in Inglewood, and will soon be going to Orange County and San Diego before heading up to the Northwest. This was the fourth CdS show we've seen (we'd previously been to Dralion, Mystère [my wife's favorite], and KÀ [my favorite]), and they've all been nothing short of spectacular. Tickets are always pricey - this was $90 a pop - but the shows are such amazing, truly beautiful combinations of incredible physical feats and showmanship that I don't mind the price.Luckily, I was able to get tickets in the very front row, which was all kinds of awesome. Corteo had more emphasis on traditional circus skills (acrobatics, balancing, juggling, etc.) than the others, but was, as always, wrapped up in CdS costuming, music, timing, and general spectacle. Most memorable was a sort of trapeze-less high-flying act, but there wasn't a single act in the two-hour show that failed to dazzle me. I don't think it was nearly as mind-blowing as the two shows of theirs we've seen in Vegas, but it's impossible to be jaded when seeing live human bodies move in ways most of us could only dream of.One of the weirdest bits was the "Helium Dance," where the troupe's little woman came out floating in a harness from several big balloons, balanced so she could just tiptoe on a big guy's outstretched hand. Then he sent her out into the audience, where her feet would land on audience members' hands and they could then pass her around like a floating beach ball or something. That's something I hadn't seen before.

Nerd Score

According to Nerd Tests, I am a "Cool High Nerd."



Kinda weird results there; I went to Caltech (and aced all of the math or logic-based sections of the SAT and GRE) but scored below average on Math/Science nerd-dom. Maybe I'm good, but just not nerdy about it. I'm also seriously not into sci-fi at all, though I have a large comic collection. I should also add that despite my low tech/computer score, I have actually used FORTRAN. I found this test via Vic's site.

UPDATE: Somehow this test has my little sister being more than three times as "dorky/awkward" as I am... this is patently untrue. I question this test's validity.

Peacock

My favorite thing in this video about a peacock who attacks blue cars is that the peacock's name is "Ron Davis."

UPDATE: I can't seem to link directly to the peacock story. The story I'm talking about can be found by clicking on the thumbnail about the peacock in the link above. Can anybody figure out how to get the direct link to work right?

UPDATE 2: Victor Morton figured it out. I fixed the link.

Ambien

I've never taken the sleeping pill Ambien, but I see the commercials a lot. Actually, I see the commercials for Ambien CR a lot, which they only came up with because the original Ambien was going off patent (ask my pharmacist wife). My point, though, is that all the commercials say to only take Ambien if you have eight hours to devote to sleep. Well, what if you don't have eight hours to devote to sleep? Why not make a six-hour or four-hour sleep aid? I don't really understand how it's supposed to work for someone who's been prescribed Ambien, anyway --- if I'm lying in bed and can't get to sleep, then almost by definition it's less than eight hours before I have to wake up. Does anybody have any experience with this and know how it's supposed to work?

Vote early, vote often

Members of the Texas state legislature casually vote multiple times.