Documentary-athon

Left to my own devices here over Thanksgiving, I watched three documentaries. Perhaps this explains why Garrett cleared out back to SJSU yesterday. Hmm.

• Enron -- The Smartest Guys in the Room. This was a bit more of a people story than Conspiracy of Fools, a terrific and gripping book on the Enron mess. But, if you want the short version of how one of America's top corporations got built like a house of cards, only to come crashing down, this is an excellent DVD to see. Seems timely given the shenanigans in the financial marketplace today thanks to money manipulators repackaging shaky sub-prime loans into investment grade financial instruments.
  
• No End in Sight. I'm not sure if it's possible to read or see anything on the topic of Iraq that doesn't come off as a political statement rather than an even-handed examination of events. This DVD is no exception, although it seems to make an attempt. It mainly examines the lack of planning and the long-lasting impact of decisions made in 2003 (e.g., disbanding the Iraqi army, de-Baathification, etc) as they led to the chaos we are still dealing with today.
• Sicko. I'm not a big Michael Moore fan, although I've seen both Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 911. He'd be a lot better if he just knew when to stop. Sicko is another great example of the problem. I suspect even our most virulent free-marketers would give a grudging acknowledgment to the skill with which Moore makes the logical case for universal healthcare in the first two-thirds of the movie. But, when he packs up 9/11 rescue workers and brings them to Cuba to get medical treatment, he seems to make a conscious decision to give the finger to a big part of his potential audience. Too bad, since this is a good movie addressing an important topic that impacts all of us.

All of them were worth watching. Maybe some lighter fare from Netflix next time, though.

Notable Books?

What does it say that I have not read a single book in the NYTimes 100 Notable Books list of 2007? I don't know how many books I read this last year, but my taste seems to have not lined up with the NYTimes Book Review section even once. I recognize ones I've picked up, read the back of, and put back down in favor of something else. Maybe I should be proud?

Stem Cell Hysteria

I occasionally read a blogger who entitles posts: Why Oh Why Can't We Have a Better Press Corps? That's the way I feel about the recent hoo hah over the publicity surrounding turning skin cells into stem cells. I knew we were in for a deluge of media-driven hype when the first person I heard interviewed was not a scientist, but was a Catholic bishop. Like other highly hyped medical breakthroughs that make the rounds, this one is a long, long way from being useful to those of us living in the real world. In fact, what it means is there is a long way for researchers to get to the same starting point that they have with embryonic stem cells. But let's not lose sight of the most important scientific advance: we might be able to avoid battling the religious right's agenda to protect every sperm. Gad.

Brief Cousin Encounter

After nearly intersecting several times, and exchanging EMail for a while, I finally managed to intersect with Justin Callaway and family yesterday evening. It was a lot of fun! They had driven down from Portland to spend Thanksgiving with Dina's sister and her husband, who live about 5 miles down the road right above the Stanford campus. I went over to their place and we had Chinese food and hung out for a few hours, exchanging family stories and catching up. Man Jude and Eliot are cute and personable. It must have been a battle of the cuteness titans when Thomas and Jude got together not too long ago. Hopefully I'll find a way to keep in contact since I get to Portland every now and then.

New Media and the Writer's Strike

I've been on a Daily Show fast since the writer's strike. Now we're about to hit the end of the serials, so we'll be reduced to a strict diet of reality show gruel. Turns out producers were pushing for content so it could be stockpiled, in anticipation also of the Screen Actors Guild contract being up in June and facing similar concerns from them about being compensated for "new media" content. So what's it all about? From an article in liberal magazine The American Prospect, here's how Patric Verrone from the Writers Guild of America put it:

[Writers and actors] can get together and actually do media without these guys and get it delivered. It goes back to this quote from Frances Coppola about 12 years ago, where he said that he wasn't going to make the next Godfather, it was going to be some 7-year-old girl with a digital camera. But how was she going to distribute it? Well, now we have the answer. We now have this distribution model that really seriously impacts the ability of the conglomerates to control production and distribution. What can help them survive in that brave new world is collaboration with the content providers, and yet it seems as though a routine has developed where they would rather try to find the cheaper way or the non-union way, or an approach that cuts us out.

Better renew your library card.

Gift Ideas 2007

Earlier is better these days: witness the frenzy to have the earliest primary. So, when my old buddy Hal forwarded a pointer to the 25 Most Baffling Toys from Around the World, I figured I should share it with you Christmas shoppers. I didn't want you to have to wait for Dave Barry's list to show up. Warning, if you're offended by juvenile or geeky frat house like humor, better stick with your Macy's catalog instead of clicking the link.

Opening Day Poca Bella

I may have mentioned I love to hunt. You may have noticed I never have much success to report. I guess lately I havn't taken it as seriously as I used to. This year I decided just to spend opening day at home, I have a stand near the river and deer are plentifull here so why travel. AM I saw nothing so I went home for some coffee (thanks Mom and Dad) and some lunch. PM I started to the stand and I saw a small Buck in some brush, I waited him out and managed to down him, a 3 pointer. After the post kill chores I had plenty of time left so I went to my stand. I wasn't there more than 1 hour when a nice 6 pointer walked out, I killed him also. It was exciting, and seemed overdue considering the luck I've had recently where hunting is concerned. The downside is for me deer season is pretty much over, I could justify 1 more but probably won't even try. I may turn my attention twoard wild turkeys next. I hope I havn't offended any anti hunters in our readership, I know I am the only hunter and I hope no one will think poorly of me, but I don't get much to blogg about and this seemed worthy.

American Gangster

To my knowledge there is no book to damage here but over the weekend I saw American Gangster. Kirsti is very impressed with the acting abilities of Danzell Washington and Russell Crowe but she couldn't handle the gore that goes with the subject matter in this particular film. There is nothing like a good gangster movie for me though. Even George Will came down from his uppity perch to review it in the post. Its not hard for me to disagree with Will on anything once I translate the vocabulary, anyway, he spent his time comparing it to "The Godfather" and eventually got around to saying it was better. I disagree with him, though the film was good, it had a ways to go before it compared with the classic gangster flick. No matter how bad the main characters are in these films/Godfather/Scarface/Goodfellas/The Sopranos ect ect I can find something to like about them, even if I have to travel to a parallel universe to do it. But the American Gangster is despicable thru and thru at the end you only wish him the worst. Making Wills point that they really destroy others in their quest for riches and no one should think differently. Hooray for George Will to find another level of understanding(again) But I only give the flick a C+ well below every film I mentioned. Sorry George that's why they call it art.

Movies of Books

I noticed that there are three upcoming movies of books some of us have read. Keith recommended The Kite Runner, and I think a lot of the Harris clan read it. While I was poking around for the reviewlet I did of Charlie Wilson's War, I realized that must have been pre-blog days when I was sending my reading lists by EMail. However, I noticed I was commenting to Keith on his The Kite Runner post that Charlie Wilson's War was something that prompted me to pick up The Kite Runner. It's definitely one of those cases of truth being stranger and more entertaining than fiction. Given the rise of Al Quaida from the ruins of the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan, and our involvement in arming the mujahadin to fight them, it's also a lesson in the law of unintended consequences. Last but not least, I see that No Country for Old Men is making its way to the big screen.

I'm always a bit hesitant to go the movie version of a book I read. If the book's any good, it always seems they can only screw it up. There are certainly exceptions, and it's tough to share a bucket of popcorn over a book.

Twist on Fantasy Football

I'm not into it myself, but thought maybe Keith, you would be interested in this article on Draftmix from a techie blog I read. Sounds like a more efficient way to lose money to me. You don't have to wait for the season to be over!

Fall Reading List

Looking over the books I've read lately, I see I have been off of the non-fiction train for a while. My once strong taste for insight into the mess in Iraq and the history behind it has been overcome by such disgust that I can't bring myself to read anything in that category any more.

Navigator of New York, by Wayne Johnston. My first EBook. I've read a few other Wayne Johnston books I liked. They usually center on Newfoundland and involve quirky characters. This one also included a bit of a frozen bozo twist, with Peary and Cook and arctic exploration thrown in, so how could it miss? Well, it was a bit off the mark. It centered around the rivalry between Cook and Peary. Cook fathers an illegitimate son by way of a Newfoundland girl visiting New York. When the boy grows up, he eventually chases down Cook in NY and becomes his assistant in the quest to best Peary in the trip to the pole. I would have preferred more action and less of the tortured relationship navel-gazing.

The Exception, by Christian Jungersen. Translated from Danish, the story concerns three women working for a Danish group that studies and publishes studies about ethnic cleansing. When they receive an Email threatening them personally, it ends up unearthing deep-seated rivalries and hostilities between them. It was interesting, but in the end it seemed more like an episode of The Office that was taking itself too seriously rather than a major literary statement.

New England White, by Stephen L. Carter. I liked the Emperor of Ocean Park by Carter, with a story that took place in a thinly disguised version of New Haven, so I thought I'd try this one. I enjoyed this mystery with an academic bent quite a bit. The dead body of a professor is found by the president of the university and his wife, who also turns out to be the long-ago lover of the deceased. He was investigating the circumstances surrounding the alleged rape of a white girl by a black man many years go, uncovering connections to the two current presidential candidates who were former roommates at college when the rape happened. A bit too much circumstantial crap and Robert Ludlum-like committee-of-seven stuff going on to make it go down smoothly, but enjoyable nonetheless.

The Lightning Keeper, by Starling Lawrence. I gave this book to A.J. when I saw him at Missy's a while back. It is an engineer's love story, centering around an immigrant who invents a new kind of water turbine to generate electricity, and his long love relationship with the daughter of his employer. I liked this book quite a lot. It had a mixture of real-world characters and circumstances, a bit of intrigue between GE and Nicolai Tesla, and a decent love story mixed in. Wonder if A.J. liked it.

The Last Town on Earth, by Thomas Mullen. Set in the Pacific Northwest during the flu outbreak during World War I, a remote town decides to quarantine itself and keep anyone from coming in or going out. When some lost soldiers bumble their way out of the woods, a young town guard kills one. The killing sets people against one another, as they try to keep it quiet and the flu descends on them anyway. A good people story, with plenty of historical background on the flu pandemic at ground level and the unrest surrounding involvement in WWI, but not very cheerful fare.

A Sense of the World, by Jason Roberts. The only non-fiction in my list this time, this is the story of James Holman (born 1786). While serving as a lieutenant in the British navy, he comes down with a mysterious ailment that leaves him blind. He ends up becoming probably the most widely travelled person of the time, publishing travel memoirs and gaining fame as the Blind Traveller. He did it all with basically no money and almost totally on his own. Sounds strange, and it was! Still, quite entertaining.

A Good Man in Africa, by William Boyd. I liked a William Boyd spy book, and when Mom said she had read other things by him, I thought I'd pick up another. This story follows a seemingly pathetic middle-aged bureaucrat in a backwater African country. He struggles with the incompetence of his superiors, his mistress, his infatuation with multiple other women, and the complexities of Britain meddling in local politics. He actually turns out to be a "good man" in the end, but the journey to get there was fun to read.

Sharp Objects, by Gillian Flynn. A tough Chicago reporter with plenty of complex family baggage returns to her Missouri hometown to cover a murder. Turns out there was an earlier similar murder, and of course there is a connection to that complex family baggage. I liked this book a lot, especially the main character, but you'll need to deal with plenty of psychologically damaged individuals and small town drama if you're going to read it.

One Mississippi, by Mark Childress. A very funny coming-of-age type of book. It follows a family that relocates to Mississippi from Indiana. The oldest brother enlists for Vietnam rather than stay, and the younger brother finds a local friend. They cause an accident after prom that results in a bizarre injury of the first black prom queen for the newly integrated school. That sets in motion a series of entertaining events leading to the not-so-funny final resolution that I won't reveal.

The Willow Field, by William Kittredge. William Kittredge is most often cited for his growing-up-in-Montana memoir, A Hole in the Sky, something I read a long time ago. This story is the fictional account of the life of Rossie Benasco beginning in the Depression, following his ambition to spend his life working with horses. He joins a team driving horses from Nevada up to Calgary, meets a girl there, and settles in Montana with her and her rich parents. I really enjoyed the early parts of the book, but his struggle with mooching off her parents, his foray into WWII, and his political ambitions amidst the McCarthy hearings left me unsatisfied in the end.

Halloween/FrontRoyal

Not as exciting as an earthquake, but mildly entertaining, the annual Halloween invasion at our house in town. Because the majority of the area is sort of rural with houses spread far apart, the 2 densely populated areas are visited by all trick or treaters, and we happen to be lucky enough to live in one of them. Our neighbor actually counted them this year (only the kids not adult escorts) and the total was 575 give or take a few. The town sets the time 6:30 to 8:30 so its pretty packed for 2 hours. There was actually a line in the driveway at times and the streets are unofficially pedestrian traffic only. We have a few friends over for the spectacle and sit out in the driveway handing out candy and admiring the costumes. Its a great time. The little ones are so cute in their costumes, and even the big kids get into the action we seemed to have quite a few high school kids, one group of 5 sang a nice Christmas song for us.