Stuff
In addition to the Mallards, there are now adorable little black and white striped duckings on the Avon. From the ruddy ducks (I should really figure out what species they are).
LA Film critics pick the ones that got away.
Doctor Who movie? I’m posting this because the past 2 Sundays I’ve been watching Doctor Who. I totally don’t understand what’s going on, the special effects are jaw-dropping awful at times, and it quite often leans towards seriously camp, and yet… I kind of can’t stop watching David Tennant being totally manic. It’s strangely hypnotic.
I’ve been told by one of my co-workers that it helps to have seen the previous Doctor Who series, which… I mean is interesting. But how weird is it to have a TV show where you have to start years and years ago to get what’s going on? I mean, at this point, if someone wanted to start watching Lost, they’d have about 66 episodes to catch up on. To catch up on Doctor Who… you’d apparently need to watch 700 episodes. Not including specials. And that’s just to get up to the pilot of the current series (which – what? Had Christopher Eccleston and then David Tennant? I’m sooo confused.) I get that when one doctor dies, a new, younger actor comes on to replace him… and that’s about all I know.
Hey – Billie Piper was in it for 2 years. Maybe that’s why she’s famous. God – I kept seeing her name in the tabloids in the UK and I could not figure out who the hell she was.
Apparently lots of people must really love the new series.
So – I’ve talked with another one of my coworkers today, and he says it is possible to just start watching the new series to catch up, which makes it like Lost. He offered to give me that and Heroes, but unfortunately, I no longer have a computer, soo… that’s a no go there.
Stephen King on violence in movies.
Check out the first photo here. Presumably.
Inside I’m Not There. I didn’t realize Todd Haynes did Velvet Goldmine, which I totally love. And not just for the scene featuring Christian Bale and Ewan McGregor having sex.
Gaiman wants Gilliam for Sandman. Ok – first off, it mentions Good Omens, which I just started yesterday, and you know a book is gonna be good when the forward and LIST OF CHARACTERS makes you laugh. Secondly – Gaiman mentions a budget of 70 million for Good Omens – now what does that remind me of? Oh, right. Stardust. I worry a lot that Stardust being a non-starter at the domestic box office means that Gaiman adaptations are going to have trouble getting off the ground in the future. It would help if Beowulf does well, and… I’m worried about that one, too. We’ll see how the reviews are when they come in. Thirdly – I totally agree that you need someone like Zach Snyder to helm Sandman. Someone who is dedicated to the source material. Because truly no Sandman movie is better than a bad Sandman movie.
Also – wouldn’t the Death movie be easier to get off the ground? Sandman is so vast and sprawling, that even Watchmen really lends itself better to adaptation. I mean, with a movie, you’d lose all the short stories and tangential threads contained within Sandman. It is awesome source material, but… where would you go with a movie? Each of the books is too short for a film but the entire series is too long. What would you make the plot, then?
Also, also – I share the writers concerns about Gilliam. I’d love to see him return to form, but I’d like his next couple of films to demonstrate that before he embarks on anything Gaiman.
25 best documentaries. Which is really mostly people complaining about how they aren’t the best. As someone who doesn’t watch many documentaries (I’ve seen Koyaanisqatsi, Farenheit 9/11, An Inconvenient Truth, Winged Migration (which I love, love, love), and Woodstock. And bits of Super Size Me and Bowling for Columbine) the list seems generated to get people to watch ones they’ve heard of but haven’t seen. The ones people feel were overlooked? Ken Burns (do his count if they’re looking at movies?), Nanook of the North, 7-up (again – isn’t that TV?), Paradise Lost, the Sorrow and the Pity, and Harvey Milk. Me? I’d vote for Microcosmos. Not like I’m entomologically-biased or anything.
I got this site from Jon, and it is awesome. It’s called Bands In Town, and basically it lets you know what gigs are coming up for bands that you like or bands that it thinks you might like based on your favourites. Now, it does me no good at the moment to be reminded that I am missing Tori Amos and Evanescence or to now know that I am missing the Dropkick Murphys, Interpol, Jimmy Eat World, Regina Spektor, the Decemberists, Fiona Apple, and Yellowcard (practically all playing the Warfield… shocking…). But, its recommended some other bands I might enjoy missing, such as of Montreal (the songs I know of theirs, I like), Broken Social Scene, hellogoodbye, the Jesus and Mary Chain, The Pipettes (I feel like I’ve heard them…), The Walkmen, Nightwish, and avenged sevenfold. Anyone know anything about these bands? Maybe some new music to check out? Anyhoo – it’s fun to play with, and I’m sure it’ll be useful once I’m back in the US and solvent enough to attend shows again.
In other news, I don’t know when the rankings came out, or whether I posted about them before, but I was bumming around the US News and World Reports site and Pomona is #7 and Columbia’s Environmental Policy program is ranked #12 (tied with Johns Hopkins and Princeton). So – mom – there you go. Bragging rights.
Weirdly; also from US News, the 10 best places to retire:
• Bozeman, Montana
• Concord, New Hampshire
• Fayetteville, Arkansas
• Hillsboro, Oregon
• Lawrence, Kansas
• Peachtree City, Georgia
• Prescott, Arizona
• San Francisco, California
• Smyrna, Tennessee
• Venice, Florida
One of these things… and listen to how it starts out, “San Francisco isn’t most people’s idea of a retirement spot. It’s really expensive, it’s loud, and it’s crowded.” But basically, it’s the spot to retire if you’re a city person. Important factoids:
Median home price: $765,000
January average temperatures (high/low): 58/46
July temperatures: 68/54
OH MY GOD I’M NEVER GOING TO BE ABLE TO AFFORD A HOUSE. Seriously – say you have 2 upper middle class people earning (together) $100,000 a year. Say you manage to find a house going for 650,000 and get a 30-year, 8% mortgage. You’d still be paying like 4,700 a month on your mortgage. That’s 56,000 per year. Which is more than half your income. Leaving you with 44,000 for car payments, insurance, student loans, food, clothing… How does anyone afford a house? My generation is going to have to wait until the boomers die to invest in real estate. I actually just read an article…. somewhere… about how more and more people are just renting long term because it doesn’t make sense to own a home in the current market.
And how much do our temperatures rock?
Tags: Travel
jwdmeow
I am going to see the PIpettes on Nov 12th (was supposed to see them next week, but the show got moved or something). They are a cute, British girl group. And I mean that not in the sense of the Spice Girls, but rather the Murmaids. Or, you know, the Shangri-Las.
You left out taxes. If you’re making $100,000 combined, that’s about $78,000 after taxes in 2006. And that’s Federal. You still have State and City, and SF’s taxes are maybe the highest in the land.
Why do you think I had to work two jobs for 13 years? It’s hard to get ahead in San Francisco.
If you’re very rich, it would be a nice place to retire….
I really feel like I know something by them…. Oh – did they sing Pull Shapes?
I think probably NY taxes are the highest… Still, I’d rather have high taxes and not own a home than have a republican in the white house.
What? If you live in SF, there won’t be a Republican in the White House? I didn’t quite get that connection. A bit of a logical fallacy, surely?
I just mean that I’d rather not own a house and not complain about high taxes. I’d rather have the taxes than a republican, even if it means not affording a house as a consequence.
Well, that would be nice, but it doesn’t necessarily follow…
Good luck to us all, though! Get out the vote! Only 15 (blech!) months to go…