The Bored at Work Challenge #1: Expedia

It's no secret that we get bored at work, and it's not a secret that we fill countless hours finding novel ways to occupy our time so as to avoid both work and the inevitable boredom both work and not doing work create.

Sometimes I go onto Expedia and just check out how much flights to London, or Barcelona, or Shanghai, or Tokyo, or Santiago, or Johannesburg cost just to give myself a little thrill. Out of this little exercise, I created a fun game. Please interpret "fun" loosely here.

THE EXPEDIA CHALLENGE

If you want to kill some time, I challenge YOU, the reader, to find the longest travel time for a one-way trip you can on Expedia. We'll have a few basic guidelines:

1. The trip must originate from Dulles Airport (IAD)

2. You must use Expedia. This is to account for possible discrepancies across websites.

3. Layovers are allowed, but stopovers are not. That is, you cannot make the trip go from IAD -> DEN on May 15 and then DEN -> SFO on Sept 20. That's stupid.

4. You must post your itinerary in the Comments section with some basic info, e.g. March 28, IAD -> FRA -> GVA (8 h 43 m)

5. Multiple entries are allowed.

Other than that, you're free to roam.

The winner of the competition gets a free case of beer. I'm going to check your work, so don't cheat.

I'll start off the competition, and I'm also going to participate. Check the comments section to see who the current leader is.

CURRENT LEADER: Brice Lord, IAD -> ORD -> LHR -> ISB (48 h 30 m with connections)

Unrealized movie technology

If you're like me, which you are, you grew up with expectations of seeing not-too-futuristic technology used in the not-too-distant movie future show up in your everyday life. Some kids found these gadgets so cool and so helplessly attractive that they actually made up lies about its arrival to the marketplace.

Here's an ode to technologies and products we were all waiting for but that never came. It's not going to be an ode, like in a rhyming pattern, that'd be gay, it's just an ode-ode.



1. You can't spell "childhood myths" without "Hoverboard." Debuted in the trough of "Back to the Future II: Back to the Future Again," the hoverboard was a futuristic version of a skateboard that hovered instead of, well, skated I guess. The producers of this movie obviously knew what the hell they were doing, because when the movie was released in 1989, skateboarding was huge, and so the Hoverboard concept was met with fanatical desire. But, since Tony Hawk had not yet turned 40, skateboarding had no icon and the whole idea faded a few years later. The only thing anyone remembers from that movie were the flying cars and that scene where Marty McFly tries to escape from Biff and his fashionable future gang by taking his hoverboard over a pond in the middle of Futuretown, USA. The horror of time travel immediately became palpable to an anxious audience when the hoverboard strangely fails and leaves Marty stranded in the middle of the pond, hovering in place just inches above. "Hoverboards don't work on water!" shouted Biff, while looking into the camera, seemingly explaining this directly to the audience. "How foolish to think you could just travel into the future and get along with things as usual," thought the audience. Biff, though, had a hoverboard that worked on water, and it not only performed that remarkable feat, it was also built to intimidate. I remember it had like sharp edges and knife-like points on it, things the Consumer Safety Board might have a problem with. Anyway, 2015, the year in which BTTF II took place, is fast approaching, and there's no signs of a hoverboard. Of course, the technical infeasibility of building a hoverboard didn't stop some asshole from starting an all-too-believable rumor that someone had built one and was selling them and that they'd be in stores within like a year or something. It was so pervasive that it lingers on to this day. In fact, the guys on Mythbusters actually tried to build a hoverboard. It didn't work very well. The real irony is that a hoverboard would probably look pretty good to Michael J. Fox right about now. Whoah, that's low. Apologies all around.




2. Need to get downtown in 2 minutes? Are you in the future? Great, then just hop on into this tube. Once you jump on in, the tube will take you pretty much anywhere your imagination can conjure within instants. That's how revolutionary the tube infrastructure is. Nevermind the fact that you'd probably need to use an incredible amount of air pressure, enough to burst people's eyes, to send humans flying around at supersonic speeds. Also ignore the fact that tubes would need to bend, and so you'd end up with clumps of dead people who were slammed against the sides of the tubes as it bent around a sharp corner. Aside from all of these seemingly unsurpassable technological hurdles, to this day, I still want a fucking tube system. I'll take the random carnage and eye-popping any day; I hate sitting in traffic, and I hate leaving early for things that will take more than 5 minutes to get to. If I ever become a billionaire, which is looking pretty likely right now as I sit in my cubicle, I'm going to build my own personal tube system between my house, a bar, a wings place, some hot chick's house, and the beach. If I need to go anywhere else I'll just either have it delivered to me or buy the place I need to go to and have it moved next door to me. I'm not completely sure what show to blame for my exceeding expectations, but I think it's the Jetsons. Those fuckers.


3. Let's say I wanted to join a mining expedition several thousand meters underwater. How would I get there? How about instead of breathing air, I breathe a superoxygenated liquid? You may vaguely remember that scene in The Abyss where they put a rat in some pink fluid and the rat breathes the oxygen-rich fluid after flailing about for a little while. As it turns out, the rumor at the time that the rat was actually breathing that fluid was correct. The rumor that it will be used in diving and space travel in the near future was not. It turns out that there's occasionally some bad side effects to breathing superoxygenated liquid, like dying from oedema or hemorrhaging, which isn't too much of a surprise since we're built to breath gaseous air, not liquidous liquid. This technology would make my dream of dropping some acid and swimming around beaches, terrorizing the local sealife with a trident while pretending to be Poseiden a reality. Not that I'd ever do that since I'm terrified of the ocean, of course. Liquid breathing is yet another case of "Yeah, whatever happened to that?"




4. Robots. I wanted to come right out and say it that time. Robots robots robots. I'm not sure when predictions of robots doing our everyday chores began (again probably the Jetson, though more likely H.G. Wells) but it's been the biggest bust next to the tube system. Instead of robots cleaning out toilets and tying our shoes (i, Robot) or eradicating all of mankind (Terminator) they're stupidly hobbling into walls and having monotone, digitized conversations with plants. Honda's ASIMO was heralded as a breakthrough because it could walk on two legs and recognize a couple commands. If these things went berserk, it wouldn't be much different than having a couple remote control cars with dying batteries harassing you; all you'd have to do is find a step or a stool or a grassy patch and continue eating your sandwich. Whenever it is that robots finally do become human-like, it better be a company called SkyNet that creates them, just to freak everyone out. In fact, I think someone else thought of this, because it looks like some Algerian is already on the case.
Above image: "Four coffees, huh? Uhh, okay, close enough, I guess."


5. Remember how cool that game of holo-chess was in Star Wars, and how badass it was in Total Recall when Governor Schwarzenegger threw out that holo-cube into the middle of the bad guys and they all tried to shoot him but he got the last laugh because it was just a hologram of him and he ended up shooting them all in the back instead? Yes, you do, and it WAS badass. But where's my holo-TV, my holo-phone, my holo-pets, my holo-friends, and my holo-porn? I swear to god that holograms were supposed to take over as the dominant form of looking at stuff like 20 years ago, but I sure as shit don't see any naked holo-men mincing around my apartment when my Moroccan boyfriend, Michael, is out of town (or at the grocery store, teehee!). Holograms are going to end up in a museum before they end up in my living room. The advent of ubiquitous hologram technology is just like virtual reality technology, it's always on the horizon. More like the fucking event horizon. Ouch! Got em with science that time.

Above image: exactly what not to expect within the next 20 years.

300: It was pretty good.

Historians and Iranian officials agree: Zack Snyder's 300, an adaption of Frank Miller's graphic novel (aka "comic book") by the same name, is not historically accurate. Aside from making headlines by restating obvious presumptions, I'll move onto the actual movie itself.

My expectations for this movie were probably the biggest problem. Upon seeing the trailer, I envisioned 2 hours of pointless battle and unbelievably badass characters. I got both, but my dream was interrupted with distracting, intermittently anachronistic dialogue and a still-born plot. In retrospect, I don't blame this on the director or actors, and here is the single most important piece of advice I can give you if you have yet to see this movie: it's a comic book. Comic books don't make boring, complex, subtle political distinctions wedge conflicting characters' motivations apart, they just pick two categories: good, evil; and let them go at it. it's beautifully simple.

So this format has some conditions.

I'll be the first (and not the last) to say that I hated Sin City (also Frank Miller--from Olney, MD no less). It's multiple plots had nothing to do with each other and some of them never came to climax or conclusion. I found the 1920's-noir dialogue forced and annoying, and the inclusion of bizarre supernatural characters downright stupid...though Tobey Maguire's "character" was pretty cool, especially for being Tobey Maguire. It seemed like the movie rode in back of its visuals, and that didn't work for me.

300 is better.

Each shot in 300 is prescribed and unapologetically overdramatic; villains and heroes pose in each shot as if each is a living statue of our 21st-century Romanticised vision of ancient civilization; the sky is in endless tumult; and violence is quick and simple, a pleasure for those involved.

300 had similar characteristics, yes, but I guess the setting of the plot--ancient Sparta--was far more supportive of this style. The fabled magic and creatures of the time period, such as oracles, etc, were stylized, but it made the scenes that much cooler. The movie existed more in the realm of fantasy than of history (one reason why its historical criticisms are fucking retarded), which is obviously more welcoming of artistic license. One issue, however, was the dialogue. It would switch between time-period appropriate fancy-talk and Die Hard tough-guy speak. It was a little distracting, and kinda made the whole movie less enjoyable. But again, thinking back to all those comic books I read, their dialogue was all cliched. If you're going to make a comic book movie and be accurate to the source, that's how it's going to turn out.

By far, and obviously, the most entertaining scenes were the battle scenes. Aside from the fact that the Spartans all had badass beards and throaty Scottish accents (for warriors, a far better choice than that cheeky British accent), battle scenes would pit the Spartans against escalating numbers of gay Persians that, with each wave got more evil, more fanciful, more powerful, and more cunning. It reminded me a lot of a video game actually. I found these scenes to be by far the coolest. I also didn't mind the instances with bare boobs, either; those were welcome additions.

I think the most satisfying part of the movie was that everyone who had it coming to him got it with no questions asked. There is little doubt revenge has been exacted when a sword gets plunged into someone's stomach and turned a few times.

As for the plot, whatever, I have mixed feelings. Less plot would have made room for more battles, and more plot would've been fruitless considering the dialogue and battle-focused basis of the whole story. So I guess it's about right. When it comes to pure action movies (see Blade), plot is the last thing on my mind.

All in all, after thinking about it for a few days, I definitely enjoyed the movie and would enjoy seeing it again. I think its stylization and boiled-down, no-nonsense entree is going to be very popular in the future. With a little refinement, this genre could be groundbreaking.

Energy, etc

So this is a more serious post, well, more serious than the beard post.

Where I work there's a lot of people who know a lot about a lot of different stuff, so I run into some pretty interesting information every now and then. This is the expectoration of that interesting info I heard; I know what adjective I used.

Energy's a hot topic right now. This is because of a fun concoction of high gas prices, instability in the area of the world that provides a lot of that gas (not to mention also literally setting its price), and rising concerns that, indeed, mankind is so dominant a species that it is actually affecting the planet's climate and environment in deleterious and irreversible ways. Enter self-interested politicians, green politicians, lobby firms, NGO's, foreign governments, environmentalists, international treaty bodies, government bureaucracy, corporate interests, and consumer single-mindedness, and you can see how things can get pretty wacky. In fact, considering all these things, it's amazing anything gets done whatsoever. That's nothing to cheer about, but, well, whatever.

It's no secret that Americans epitomize consumption; we're the original consumer economy. Of the 15 terawatts of energy consumed globally every year--this includes fuel for cars, electricity for lights, and batteries for vibrators--fossil fuel use (gas, oil, coal) accounts for 86% of that. Oil, by itself, accounts for 38% of global energy consumption. We (the U.S.) consume 64% of the world's oil production. This oil is used beyond just fuel in your car, it's also converted into jet fuel, plastics, and yes, the petroleum jelly you're so fond of. The large majority of oil is converted to gasoline, however. In the U.S., we use about 64% of our oil to fill our cars with gasoline.

Working our way down all those fun percentages, we wind up figuring out that the U.S. uses about 16% of the world's total total energy consumption for its cars. That's a lot of gas. That's also a good reason for why fuel efficiency has been such a hot topic lately. Americans like to move around so much so that a bit more than a quarter of total U.S. energy consumption is used in the transportation sector. In other words, if you can change how much gas we use, it would have a profound effect on the three points of conflict I originally listed.

So, if, say, in 2006 the U.S. government had raised emissions standards to be comparable to China's--that is, raised it from 25 MPG (miles per gallon) to 35 MPG--we would have saved 28.5 billion gallons of gasoline, or, in other words, we would've used 20% less gasoline. I actually used a figure of 28 MPG for the U.S., since by my fuzzy math it turns out that represents actual consumption.

Below: World fuel economy standards. The y-axis is in MPG.

Now, why the hell have I gone through all the trouble of calculating this? I'm wondering that myself right now, and that's most likely because I'm getting hungry...I need to eat soon, but it's cold outside, so I can't walk too far. Shit.

Anyway, by now it should make sense why energy-conscious individuals think it's important to increase fuel efficiency as a means of better controlling our situation. To give you some perspective on the importance of this subject, the article on Wikipedia I used to reference some of these oil statistics is longer than articles on religion, God, Christianity, democracy, and European history (not combined, though that would be more dramatic, so just pretend I said that). And out of the cacophony of views and ideas people have had for improving this over the years, the U.S government in 1975 enacted the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) "in response to the 1973-1974 Arab oil embargo," [this is coming straight off the feds' website] whose goal was to "improve automotive efficiency...for passenger cars and light trucks...The near-term goal was to double new car fuel economy by model year 1985 (to 27.5 MPG)." A laudable goal, surely. Because of some boring bureaucratic tomfoolery, the CAFE (to the cafe!) for cars was lowered during 1986-1989 but then raised back to 27.5 MPG. Not so surprisingly, the price of oil quite literally crashed in 1986 until the Gulf War began in...take a guess...1990. It's just government at work.

This brings me (finally) to the point of this homily. Along comes ethanol. I could write a whole other diatribe about the smoke and mirrors of the ethanol buzz, but I'm going to focus more on a curious piece of legislation enacted in 2000 that includes some language on vehicles that are capable of burning ethanol. This little law says that any automobile that is capable of burning Ethanol 85 (85% ethanol/15% gasoline) will receive fuel efficiency credits towards its CAFE MPG. This means that if your ("you" meaning Ford in this case) shiny new Ford Focus in 2000 is getting 23 MPG and you need 27.5 MPG to make the cut, you can add the capability to burn E85 to and that'll nudge you up to par. Seems innocent, right? Actually, it doesn't even seem innocent.

It's no stretch to say that increasing a car's fuel efficiency means a lot of money to spend for the car companies (not to mention less oil to sell for the oil industry). They have to retool the entire engine and fuck with its aerodynamics, etc. While for a car to be able to burn E85 it's a pretty straightforward task on the exhaust system; costs about $50-100 per car. I doubt this logic escaped our lawmakers' grasp when writing this legislation. I have a feeling the car industry told them, in fact.
What this means for fuel efficiency is while automobiles are indeed required to meet emission standards, there's this cute little loophole for them all to jump through so as not to actually meet the standards, all the while it looks like the car companies are actually trying to be more green. And if you think, "Oh, but Brice, but if I use E-5 exclusively in my cute Ford Focus then it will actually get 27.5 MPG! LOL!1!" then you are hilariously mistaken. Per unit volume, ethanol gets 30% less energy conversion--i.e., it's 30% less powerful--than gasoline. So, when you burn E85 in your cute Ford Focus, you'll start wondering if there's a leak in your fuel line since you keep having to stop for gas more often. That is, of course, if you can manage to find and pick out from the 200,000 standard gas stations one of the 1,200 stations in the country that has E85.

So why would the government do such a thing? Why would they create a rule to dilute the CAFE's standards? Pressure from the car and oil & gas industries. E.g.: in 2002, the oil and gas industry gave $25,000,000 to Congressional members. That same year, the automobile industry, despite being mired in debt of course, gave over $15,000,000 to Congressional members. Contributions in 2000 were roughly 40 and 20% larger, respectively.

With so much money in its pockets, Congress obviously finds it hard to think green, ironically. It's like asking turkeys to vote for Christmas (thanks to the Economist for that quote).

Or, to put it simply, the car and oil industries paid for a law that would use more oil.

Below: Missourians enjoy an offputting mix of environmentalism and racism.

The Beard

Having absorbed enough outdoorsman culture from the week I spent in Seattle in January to start wearing a backpack instead of my "man purse," I was surely primed before my recent trip to Vail to easily absorb its mountainous stoner backcountry culture. After all was said and done, and two weeks have passed, I've got myself a beard. I've played with the beard idea before: once in freshman year of college, though it didn't really fill in well, and it was borne out of pure laziness rather than diluted laziness; and in sophomore year I donned the chinstrap beard after a messy ending to a strained relationship. Fortunately, my Wes Borland-chinstrap days only lasted a month or so--guys loved it, chicks not so much.


So begins a new era of beardery, one which will likely end before the weekend is up. For starters, I feel like I'm constantly surrounded by the specter of the early 80's. I find myself constantly distracted by REO Speedwagon and Jethro Tull songs, and as great as that sounds, I now know why those bands aren't around anymore. And additionally, my Moroccan boyfriend, Michael, hasn't been too hot on the beard, saying that "it doesn't not look good, you just look better without it" and "it makes you look...older." Nevertheless, I hope my bearding activities won't go unheralded by those at Man Beard Blog.


For the record, here's a picture I took with my phone's camera. I'm not sure why I look so surprised in this picture.

Vail

I went skiing out West for the first time over President's Day weekend, and despite delicious steak dinners, nightly hot tub dunks, perfect ski conditions, beautiful weather, and gorgeous scenery, I can say I absolutely loved it. I hope that sentence was as confusing for you as it was for me.

If you missed the title, I went to Vail. It's an amazing mountain (actually 1.5 entire mountains). I think it's only drawback is its relative difficulty to get to from the East Coast; between winter snow storms in the West, Midwest, and East, and the 2-hour drive through countless mountain passes to the resort, the stars pretty much have to align for you to make it there without any hiccups. For instance: my flight out of Dulles was cancelled. Also, beginner skiers might be better served to build up their confidence at other slopes; Vail is massive and quite technically challenging, and a wrong turn could leave you stuck on some frightening terrain as 65-year old men whisk by in tight flourescent suits.

One thing you always hear people talk about is the powder out West, and how skiing in powder is far superior to the groomed runs we're so used to. Well, for those who have only ever skied on groomed runs, I have some words to heed. Skiing in powder is fucking hard, it's also really fucking tiring. You see those videos of people that look like they're jumping out of the snow to make each turn, well, they are actually jumping out of the snow; you have to actually jump out of the snow to make turns. If you don't do it right, you lose your ski, maybe a pole, and fall into the snow. And getting your equipment back on after wrecking in powder can be a 20-minute ordeal. Not only are you 2 miles up with a bunch of awkward, rigid ski gear attached to you, but you're also struggling in waist-deep snow, which tends to suck you in the more you struggle, like quicksand kinda. The only benefit of powder is that when you do fall you don't have to worry much about hurting yourself, that is, unless you hit a tree, which of course are naturally drawn to areas with a lot of powder.


Vail offered the most tiring and challenging skiing I've ever faced. For starters, the altitude really effects your performance. The various peaks at Vail are all around 11,200 feet (Blue Sky Basin is ~11,500), and you can really feel it when your pushing yourself around and starting off a run. Your legs burn more, your heart races, and you just get out of breath fast. You need to drink a lot of water to keep from getting a headache from dehydration. Altitude also has some weird effects, like tripling the effect of alcohol, and giving you really strange dreams. One of my dreams the first night at altitude featured a naked woman with what looked like Mordor script being written across her chest. Further, the vertical drop between the peak and base is about 3,500 feet, which makes for some damn long runs, particularly the winding catwalks.

Aside from the physical challenges I endured, Vail has the most variety of runs I've ever seen. If you like easy cruising down groomed runs, hopping through powder in the trees, mogul-pocked fields, or picking your path anywhere along the face of a mountain, it's there waiting for you. And if you find a chance to stop, you can enjoy massive vistas of the Rockies fading into the horizon a 100 miles away.

All in all, it was an incredible trip.

First Jesus, and now HYDROX

You probably well-remember HYDROX; that inscrutable, non-capitulating rival to the beloved Oreo, which mysteriously vanished from grocery store shelves sometime in the somewhat-distant past. Like me, you probably can't pinpoint when you realized HYDROX were gone, in fact you probably didn't even realize it until just now, but somehow you already knew. It's not like figuring out when "Black Hole Sun" was popular. I can link that song to stalking an ex-girlfriend of mine; we weren't yet dating--proof that stalking DOES work (try it kids!).


But with HYDROX, I can only remember the feeling of confusing disappointment when I would open the kitchen cabinet, see what I thought was a thing of Oreos (it's not really a bag), but then see that it was instead HYDROX. I kinda remember thinking, "Okay, well, they're pretty much Oreos, right? I mean, Mom still loves me, maybe she's just too busy to realize she bought HYDROX and not Oreos, or maybe they were on sale or something. They're fine and all, but maybe I forgot to bring it up last time we got HYDROX instead of Oreos. Do I even care? I do care...I think."

Some of the more offbeat families were the HYDROX families. It was pretty clear upon stepping into a house that you were going to find HYDROX, in addition to other weird brands like Oh Henry!, generic Safeway "Froot Hoops," and those offputting pink coconut things. HYDROX families were typified by frantic, tightly-wound parents and kids with multiple siblings and no restraint for declaring possession. HYDROX were plentiful and frequent mainstays at these homes.

I've spoken before about the destruction and dessication caused by the Cola Wars, but what to make of the muted struggle between cookie manufacturing juggernauts Keebler (HYDROX) and Nabisco (Oreo). Sources close to Keebler will say that it decided to pull HYDROX out of the competition because of dragging demand due to the notion that the cookie contained poisonous chemicals ("hydrox" happens to be a popular molecular binding agent), but it may surprise you to learn that the Jews killed HYDROX. Yes, first Jesus, and now HYDROX.

Until the late 90's, if they wanted to enjoy a scrumptious creme-filled cookie snack, kosher Jews were relegated to eating HYDROX since the ingredients and processing of Oreo cookies did not lend itself to kosherness; maybe it was the Yellow #5. For years, all parties were happy: Sunshine Biscuits (original maker of the HYDROX) had its captive market base, the Jews had their kosher cookies, and RJR-Nabisco had its insurmountable lead without having to pander to a bifurcating vocal liberal religious minority. Things changed when rival Keebler managed a lunchtime hostile takeover of the Sunshine Biscuits corporate headquarters in late Fall of 1996, and act which forced RJR-Nabisco's hand and forever changed the face of creme-filled cookie eating across the U.S.

In retaliation at such audacity, and foreseeing a violent marketing push for HYDROX on the horizon, RJR-Nabisco's food engineers (read, "chemists") hurriedly reworked the Oreo formula to fit into kosher standards, and thus flanking HYDROX's devout market base. Ignorant of the corporate D-Day taking place, Jewish children everywhere thankfully ate up their new kosher Oreo snackfoods, just happy to be part of mainstream kid Oreo-eating society.

The move crushed HYDROX in a matter of months, leaving the elves at Keebler reeling; Keebler stock fell almost 25% that quarter, and Keebler magic plummeted 70%. Not long after, Keebler rose the white flag and pulled HYDROX off the shelves and out of production forever. Nobody noticed.

And that's how the Jews killed HYDROX.

Eat a dick, Mother Nature

I was away this weekend so wasn't able to voice my abject disappointment over not getting off work last Tuesday OR Wednesday. (See below post to really get a sense of my expectant glee)

I was let out two hours early last Tuesday and was allowed to come in two hours late last Thursday...wooooooo, thanks. I'm surprised I wasn't docked pay for those hours I was told I could take off.

This is now the third winter in a row without a full snow day in DC, and it's really pissing me off. What's the point of it being cold if you can't even get a fucking snow day? I want to take my big red saucer screaming down Wisconsin Avenue, how am I supposed to do that in rush hour traffic at 2:30pm? I can't. I just can't. Sigh.

Bring it on!!!

This is the first time I've been able to get a view of the Doppler of what the East Coast is supposed to get pounded by (supposedly) over the next 1.5 days. I was pretty dubious, as anyone living here needs to be to avoid the type of humiliation the weather forecasters endure, but this system looks like a mammoth. I'm praying, absolutely praying, that I get one goddamn day off this winter, and I really hope this is it. Bring it on!!!

Horribly Overrated Movies

Forcefully inspired by a link in an article a friend sent around, I've decided to take out my frustration at mankind in this little post. It's my little "fuck you" to the world for all the ire it's unknowingly caused me--at least that the world of film has caused me. Here follows a list of movies that I think are so overrated and, well, overenjoyed, that they drive me to near-madness just thinking about them.

Rather than give a brief, ranked list of movies that are overrated, I'm going to go so far as tell you WHY these movies are due mockery. First, let me cleanse your palette; I'm sure your mind is already grinding away trying to predict what movies I've put on my big shitlist, and I want to avoid that, I want to surprise you, like that time I hid around the corner in a stairway with a rusty hacksaw as a friend unwittingly walked up the stairs.

Here's some exceptional movies:
Lord of the Rings Trilogy
Star Wars Trilogy, Ep. 4-6
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Predator*
LA Confidential
Lawrence of Arabia
The Fugitive
Se7en
Office Space
Batman
Indiana Jones Trilogy
Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure*
Fight Club

*these movies aren't exceptional, they're CRAZY exceptional

Now that you're daydreaming about the AT-AT Hoth scene in Empire Strikes Back, I'll drop a load of fresh shit on your head.

Scarface: Boom. In how many college dorm rooms did you see the poster of Al Pacino with the machine gun? 95% seem like a fair estimate? Of those people, you know how many people have actually seen the movie? Zero. Here's a typical conversation about the movie.

Me: Scarface huh?

Scarface poster-owner: Hell yeah.

Me: What's that movie about anyway, I've only seen bits and pieces.

SPO: Pacino plays this badass, you know? "Say hello to my little friend!" (with accompanying machine gun pantomime)

Me: Yep, that's right there on the poster.

SPO: ...

If you asked these people about the plot, they'd simply tell you it's about a drug dealer in Miami, and that rudimentary response is only thanks to playing 100 hours of GTA: Vice City. I did finally saw this movie, and its plot is as static as its camera work. Anyone watching it can tell that even the cameraman is coked-up by how fixed and immobile every single goddamn shot is. When the plot finally does pick up about 2.5 hours in, you don't even care because you're either too drunk, too stoned, too coked-up, or just in the other room eating a sandwich having forgotten you were watching the movie to begin with. Finally, after much fanfare, Al Pacino gets shot to death and you're happy it's all over [SPOILER, whoops].

Meet The Parents/Fockers: Begin scene. Awkwardophile Ben Stiller butts heads with stone-cold coolster Robert Dinero. Only, rather than in Ronin, Bobby D plays the same role in the exact opposite movie. Stiller endures homicidal dogs/cats, gasoline fires, lie detector tests, pot-smoking in-laws, and alien rectal exams; this movie is horrible. Bobby D must have been coerced into doing these movies to prevent his family from being executed on Christmas Day, that's the only explanation I can conceive of for how he got involved in these movies at all.

(LEFT): This may as well be a picture of me 10 minutes into the movie.

$hrek 2: A good friend of mine, one who I trust(ed), recommended this movie to me, and HOLY SHIT. I can't even look him in the eye anymore. The top page of the script the voice actors read before joining on must have simply stated their salary and had a long line underneath for their signature. There was absolutely no plot to this movie. As far as I could tell, a big green JPEG walked and talked about something in a Scottish accent for 90 minutes and then asked for $9.50 out of my wallet.

(ABOVE): "Can we have some more money?"

Deathwish: Much is made of Deathwish for its ushering common violence and the revenge saga into modern cinema. If you, however, actually watch this movie, you'll be treated to an experience comparable to listening to the "Video Input 4" setting on your TV at maximum volume for 2 hours. A fair estimate would be that there's 30 lines of dialogue in this entire film, 10 of which, at least, include "oh yeah?", "what?", and "hey" in them. Saying this movie has a soundtrack is inappropriately generous since it rudely interrupts only at the few times when you'd expect there to be no music.

(LEFT): Charles Bronson proves to the film crew that he can, indeed, balance on two feet.

Animal House: The seminal college comedy, right? Fuck that. The only funny parts in this movie are courtesy of John Belushi's coked-up mumbles. If Animal House ever comes up in conversation someone inevitably mentions that "Kevin Bacon was in that movie, you know?" Yes I do know, everyone knows that. Kevin Bacon was also in Tremors, which was a far awesomer movie. I think that the most poignant moment in this movie arrives about halfway through when the delta tau deltas go to a downtown bar and one of the female characters remarks that she's studying "primitive cultures," which is immediately followed by a shot of black people dancing. Not that this blatant racism ruins the comedic value of the entire movie, but I also don't think 85 minutes of waiting to chuckle at John Belushi cokingly swing across a rope during a parade merits eternal commendation. Eternal condemnation, though? Yes.

Star Wars Trilogy, Part 2: Except for my dream of having a tube system send me anywhere in the world in a matter of minutes, I've never seen something so overanticipated and underrealized in my life. The original Star Wars trilogy circumscribed the sci-fi genre for a mainstream audience for the first time. It combined elements of comic books heroism, mythology, history, and science fiction in a concoction so potent even the Fonz wasn't too cool to enjoy it. Ironically, every actor in the original series except Harrison Ford and Billy Dee Williams (I consider those Colt 45 ads a smashing success) fell flat after Return of the Jedi. The ironic humor is lost, however, in Star Wars: Episodes 1-3, that so brazenly belie the spirit of the original movies and, for all intents and purposes, may as well have sodomized the original three. Not only do "special effects" not make a movie, not having a plot also does not make a movie. People are already thoroughly bored and confused by international politics, why would we care about a fake intragalactic congress? I think their DVDs should simply relegate the first 2 hours of each one to the "Additional Materials" section of the menu screen. to avoid wasting people's time trying to follow the nonexistent plots.

(ABOVE): "If the Catachingians balk at the resolution we've pushed through the Lower House on tightening security restrictions on steel imports, I don't see any way that the Gangli Federation won't try to retaliate by selling off excess space credits in order to devalue our foreign-held assets and ultimately destabilize our economic grip of the outlying planets' mineral production."

Silence of the Lambs: I guess this movie was revolutionary for some reason, but I still haven't figured out why. Was it the cum thrown on the chick's face scene? Was it when the tragic hero/serial killer inexcusably escapes his creepy cage and builds a little human deli counter for himself? Oh, I get it now; it's the shock value. Know what else is shocking? Cap'n Crunch pounding Little Debbie in the ass. Now give me a fucking Oscar and millions of dollars. I've earned it. Further, I think that playing a maniacal murderer is probably the easiest character to interpret. Why? How many of them have you met? Yeah.

Finding Nemo (Cars, Over the Hedge, Happy Feet, The Incredibles, Monsters, Inc., etc): Disney/Pixar/Ultraconglomerate Animated Picture Films Studios really keeps striking gold with these movies. Their production is obviously not driven by artistic integrity, since they're all carbon copies.
(LEFT): "Did you know that we're animated by single, bearded, 30-something men? Teehee!"

Here's how your generic computer-animated movie goes:

Intro: Anthropomorphized object/creature innocently going about its life in its recognizable natural surrounding + song.

Event 1: The stupid anthropomorphized object/creature's friend or relative gets in trouble and it must set out accompanied by its character foil against seemingly impossible odds to straighten everything out + song.

Lesson 1: Anthropomorphized object/creature meets its match and nearly pays with its life; said object/creature reflects on the consequences of its foolhardiness and what is at stake; a grave lesson is learned + song.

Event 2: With renewed enthusiasm, anthropomorphized object/creature continues on its quest, probably leading even more objects/creatures of similar but different types due to its newly acquired leadership skills + song.

Climax: Anthropomorphized object/creature faces its enemy and physically, rhetorically, and ideologically defeats it convincingly.

Outro: Anthropomorphized object/creature's friend or relative, in addition to those it met and conspired with in its quest, rejoice in scripted song and dance in its recognizable natural surrounding.

Spiderman: There was a time when I tried to collect every Spiderman comic. Why? Because Venom was fucking badass. But instead, let's use the most unrecognizable and downright uninteresting villain from the comic book, Green Goblin. I heard this phrase a few times back when it was out: "No, not Hobgoblin, Green Goblin." And to boot, how 'bout we put the jockey from Sugarbiscuit or whatever into the most venerable comic costume of all kind and let him shit inside of it. Great idea. I think the best characters in this movie were Kirsten Dunst's tits. Aside from the minor detail of characters, is it me or did the CGI web-slinging scenes look like they were clipped straight from the video game that had obviously already been produced before the movie was cast? Spiderman also featured intriguing textbook examples of both overacting AND underacting, sometimes at the same time and from the same actor. Hilariously, the ending--having the Green Goblin being pelted by angry, unafraid New Yorkers who apparently missed the part of the movie where he terrorizes the entire city--was rewritten to what you saw on the screen after the September 11 attacks on the WTC to be more patriotic. It's obviously not hilarious that 9/11 changed the movie, it's hilarious that the movie's script was so loose that it allowed the entire ending to be rewritten! Please don't make Venom in Spiderman 3 look like he's from a SciFi Channel original movie. Please...

Life Taxes Spontaneity

I was driving somewhere sometime earlier this week, and I caught this advertisement on the side of some bus. In one of my usual dyslexic stupors, I read it as "Life Taxes Spontaneity," which caught me off-guard because not only was it unexpectedly depressing, it was also on the side of a bus. Of course, the ad actually read, "Life Takes Spontaneity," and it was probably an ad for Mastercard or something. Pointless as the story is, it seemed kinda interesting to me, nonetheless. I used to be more spontaneous, back when I didn't have to be in the office every day, Monday-Friday, at 8:30am for mandatory start-your-day-off-right meetings. Of course, I used to be more irresponsible and care-free, too, from which that spontaneity likely blossomed (e.g. I used to go out 5 nights/week and get into work ~10:30am). That caused me some great troubles at certain times, and accompanying those troubles was a lot of stress. I guess spontaneity makes life more interesting, but if "interesting" means "stressful," maybe it's not the right way to go about being spontaneous. Or, maybe you just can't be spontaneous without being irresponsible and stressed out. Whatever, who knows. I'm gonna go buy some CDs and Slim Jims and drive around the beltway until I feel like stopping.

(Above left) Mr. Gore worries that the the photographer might blink unexpectedly.

(Above right) Mr. Osbourne summons a demon.

ETCW! leapfrogs Libertarian National Committee in Google Rankings (Reuters)

Washington, DC (Reuters) - In what some insiders consider a pyrrhic victory, newcomer blogosphere personality Brice Lord of "End The Cola Wars!" has leapfrogged the Official Website of the Libertarian National Committee and seems set to announce a New World Order.



When a user recently entered into Google's search engine the catchy signature of master blogger Brice Lord (owner and proprietor of ETCW!), "end the cola wars", they were previously directed to a page of links listing the LNC in first place and ETCW! in a seemingly distant second. Prominent K Street-based blogocrat Mordecai Wilfong, however, explains that "[sic] everyone in the business knew it was just a matter of time" before ETCW! made up the distance and surpassed the dated Libertarian cola wars platform. "It's just more current, more hip, more 'je ne sais qua'--whatever that means." added Wilfong.

Mr. Lord commented that this recent movement was simply another indicator of the growing popularity of the ETCW! party's movement to stymie and eventually eradicate pointless and wasteful commercial guerrilla warfare that stretches back "well over a decade," says Lord. "It is irresponsible and downright depraved for us to continue to ignore the suffering caused by this damaging and costly clash of juggernauts," he added.

Meanwhile, violence continued in the Midwest states as top cola-rival Pepsi unveiled a destructive new campaign against entrenched Coca-Cola loyalists in Illinois, Michigan, and Indiana. PepsiCo Counterintelligence Director Nicholas Ermanis stressed it was merely a preemptory move to suppress an impending strike against the cola manufacturer expected to last into Superbowl Monday. Coca-Cola operations spokesmen fiercely denied these claims.

It is commonly known that Lord strongly favors Coca-Cola over Pepsi, though denies holding favorites. He has even gone so far as to say that the only way to effect a peace plan should involve a dissolution of PepsiCo itself. "I do like Coke better, it's true. But this isn't about product loyalty, this is about protecting the American people from negligent flavorcide. In addition, PepsiCo is guilty of flagrantly perpetuating an ever-escalating war against its hated rival, and it should be punished for its crimes." Lord continued to cite detailed analysis supporting his platform, and it seems like many many others have joined his rallying call.

"The people have had enough!" cried Lord from a hill-top podium overlooking a field packed with avid supporters and victims of past Pepsi atrocities such as Pepsi Twist and Pepsi Jazz. "They are tired of being told that Pepsi is 'America's Choice.' They are tired being coerced into making 'The Choice of a New Generation.' And they are downright fed up with splinter cells of PepsiCo hit-squads forcing innocent citizens into the 'Pepsi Challenge.' Pepsi wants a choice? Then the choice is clear, and it isn't Crystal Pepsi!"

While the recent gains in Google rankings and growing support for a forceful arbitration to end the cola wars are evidence of Lord's grassroots popularity, he admits there's a long way to go. "Sure we're making great headway, but there's no telling when some imitating McSweeney will bump you out of the top spot. But we're not too concerned, our supporters know that you can't beat the real thing."

Lord says that while his platform is based on ending the cola wars, he has a few other ideas "your average red-blooded American" can agree with. He would not disclose further, stating that he is waiting for the country to be ready.

Interested parties can follow the struggle on Google's webpage located here.

--Asa G. Candler reporting.

Free is good

Who's Worse?

Steve Miller Band or Jimmy Buffett?


Exhibit A














Exhibit B

Pop Quiz

1. I've been at my job since September 2004; that's 28 months. How many emails do you think I have sent?

A) 1500
B) 2500
C) 3500
D) 4500
E) 5500
F) 6500
G) 7500

Answer: If you guessed A,B,C,D,E,or F, you're wrong. I've sent just about 9500 emails in the past 28 months. That's ...opening Excel... 340 emails per month, and 16 emails per work day.

2. I regularly interact with notable scientists, and have met and worked with several Nobel Laureates. How many Nobel Laureates do you think I've made out with?

A) 0
B) 1
C) 2
D) 3 or more

Answer: If you guessed B, you are correct. I made out with Dr. Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, known especially for his calculation of gravitational collapse despite electron degeneracy pressure, a year ago during a conference in Prague on Earth-bound extramarital objects.

3. I am responsible for a variety of projects at work, from the small, easy, and quick to the complex, frustrating, and endless. What moment in my professional career has given me the biggest feeling of accomplishment?

A) Figuring out a way to cut $10,000 from a report's printing budget to keep the project on track
B) Receiving a promotion after a year on the job
C) Meeting Dr. Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
D) Being offered a postdoctoral position from a university professor when I don't even have a Master's
E) Succesfully shooting a rubber band across my cubicle and landing it so that it hangs from a thumbtack stuck in the wall.

Answer: If you guessed E, you're right "on target." It took me at least 3 months to get the firing trajectory and power level just right so that I could even just hit the thumbtack; sticking it onto the tack, however, was God's work. The rubber band still hangs there to remind me of why I'm here.

4. People who know I do something "sciency" often confuse where I work with other notable sciency organizations. Which organization is most commonly confused with where I work?

A) National Science Foundation
B) National Aeronautics and Space Administration
C) The Weather Channel
D) The CNN.com Astrology Page
E) National Car Rental

Answer: If it was left up to you, I would be trying to rent you a convertible instead of the compact economy car you asked for.

5. According to the general public, the Universe consists primarily of and is interconnected by:

A) Transcendentalist ether
B) Very thin, very long rope
C) Failed dreams
D) Failed hopes
E) Griffins
F) Marshmallows
G) Dark matter

Answer: As delicious as it sounds, F is incorrect, despite what the Jet-Puffed company has tried to tell you. According to the latest astronomical research, swarms of the mythical half-eagle, half-lion Griffin inhabit the heavens, policing the Cosmic Order and ensuring that the Infinity Gauntlet, Rings of Power, and Symbiote Suit are never used again.