Monastic Retreat

Things I will be visiting on my 10 day monastic retreat to Seattle, Washington:





Seattle Museum of Mysteries


Archie McPhee's Market


Olympic National Park


Science Fiction Museum


I'll bring you back a magnet...

Movie Review Haiku

The Assassination of Jessie James by the Coward Robert Ford

Glacial Art-Western
Fame, jealousy and tension
Lavish visuals

**** Stars (out of 5)

Movie Review Haiku

Lars and the Real Girl

Unexpectedly
moving tale of connections
or the lack thereof.

**** Stars (out of 5)

What if...

Hellboy was drawn by Matt Groening...




Watchmen was drawn by Charles Schulz...

Why not follow this all up with a poem...

Yikes!!

I love horror. Truly, I do. As someone who experiences very graphic nightmares, I appreciate the visceral quality of Joshua Hoffine's work:



Click on the above for some of his work -- I really like "Basement".

The Art of the Title Sequence

Few things make me happier than those first moments sitting in a darkening theater, willing the world to melt away...

HERE is a fantastic place that shares that love, bringing back watchable memories for you and I:

click

It's nice to see the Deadwood opening again, if only for a moment...

Happy 50th Birthday!

Happy 50th Birthday, Peace Symbol!

50 Years Ago Gerald Holtom designed the above symbol.
17 Years Ago I was the only graduate of my High School to have this symbol on my Gold Ring. It did not imbue me with the instant popularity I was looking for...

Click on the above for "This week in Peace History..."

Movie Review Haiku

Southland Tales

First 80 minutes
A work of total genius
Last third, hasty mess

Rating: incomplete (there MUST be a better cut of this)

Movie Review Haiku

Michael Clayton

Excellent Acting
Clooney's smile v. Swinton's guile
Satisfying stuff.

***3/4 Stars (out of 5)

Gone back to Space...

Arthur C. Clarke has left the planet.

Quotes:

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Every revolutionary idea seems to evoke three stages of reaction. They may be summed up by the phrases: 1- It's completely impossible. 2- It's possible, but it's not worth doing. 3- I said it was a good idea all along.

I don't believe in astrology; I'm a Sagittarius and we're skeptical.

Sometimes I think we're alone in the universe, and sometimes I think we're not. In either case the idea is quite staggering.

We have to abandon the idea that schooling is something restricted to youth. How can it be, in a world where half the things a man knows at 20 are no longer true at 40 - and half the things he knows at 40 hadn't been discovered when he was 20?

The world's now cold, featureless, and culturally dead; nothing really new has been created since the Overlords came...
there's nothing left to struggle for, and there are too many distractions and entertainments.
-- Arthur C. Clarke, "Childhood's End"

Movie Review Haiku

Lust, Caution


Ang Lee's Spy movie

Sexually explicit
Pretty riveting.

***1/2 Stars (out of 5)

Who's Watching The Watchmen?

If you don't know about WATCHMEN, you soon will. Widely known as the greatest graphic novel ever written, Alan Moore's WATCHMEN has been turned into a film by Zach Snyder, he of "300" and "Dawn of the Dead" remake-fame...

Very widely anticipated by geeks and nerds everywhere, cast photos have now been posted on the movie's SITE.

The Comedian

Click here for more...

"Because it's my birthday... and I wants it."
-- Smeagol

IF TODAY IS YOUR BIRTHDAY

February 27, 2008 -- Your fate is in your hands and anyone who tells you otherwise is not to be trusted. Despite what some might say life is not a meaningless jumble of unrelated events - there is a purpose and a plan to everything that happens. If you can find that purpose and join with it there are no limits to what you can do.

You know, for kids!

It's okay. We'll all just head to the Arctic.

Not that anything's going to happen, mind you, but it's real nice that we're taking precautions...

Tomorrow is the unveiling of The Doomsday Vault. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault - secured behind an airlock door - will hold 4.5 million batches of seeds. All the planet's main food crops. You know - should something happen to our stuff.

If only we'd come up with a Bee-Vault...


I'm actually a huge fan of brussels sprouts, and welcome any apocalypse that will force this unheralded food into the spotlight.

Click on the rendering of the "homey", nuclear blast-resistant bunker for the story.

Movie Review Haiku

The Ninth Configuration

Fascinating mess
Theological treatise
Existence of God?

**1/2 Stars (out of 5)

Pitchers and Catchers and Strength Coaches (Oh My!)

The above is the cover of this month's Sports Illustrated:

Johan Santana has yet to throw a pitch for the Mets, but his arrival in camp has lifted the gloom from last season's historic collapse and given New York a reason to believe again.

It has been a long winter. As a NY Mets and NY Jets fan, life has been dull. Soporific. There has been a void. What kind of void? An empty void (Love and Death).
But wait! What's this?! A glimmer of hope?
Surely I'm not setting myself up to be disappointed again!?

The season is coming. The season is coming.

The four page article, here.

The Sabbath

Generals gathered in their masses
Just like witches at black masses
Evil minds that plot destruction
Sorcerers of death's construction
In the fields the bodies burning
As the war machine keeps turning
Death and hatred to mankind
Poisoning their brainwashed minds.

Politicians hide themselves away
They only started the war
Why should they go out to fight?
They leave that role to poor.

Time will tell on their power minds
Making war just for fun
Treating people just like pawns in chess
Wait 'til their judgement day comes.

Now in darkness world stops turning
Ashes where the bodies burning
No more war pigs have the power
Hand of God has struck the hour
Day of judgement, God is calling
On their knees the war pig's crawling
Begging mercy for their sins
Satan laughing spreads his wings.
-- War Pigs, Black Sabbath

relevant.

Friday PostiALL GLORY TO THE HYPNOTOAD

click me

Do you know where this character is from?
If you do, I'll send you a check for fifteeALL GLORY TO THE HYPNOTOAD.

Movie Review Haiku

Sunshine

High Solar Tension
Within Kubrickian Space
When Sunny Gets Blue

**** stars (out of 5)

Cheaters and Liars.

Today's Lesson:
Cheaters and Liars don't always win...


Perhaps someone is watching over us...

The February Classic

Each February, a sacred rite of passage is held.
It's where all the hard work pays off, the victors drink the blood of their enemies, and the pretenders are left wailing in misery.

It's PUPPY BOWL IV.



Click HERE for this year's starting line-ups.

Last year's contest was brutal, in-your-face action. This year, I expect similar "never say die" attitudes from the combatants.
Just look into the eyes of a previous warrior, Domino.


His furious intensity is what this contest is all about.

This year I have big money on "Bailey", a Cavanese with the heart of a Champion. Don't count out "Finnigan", though. Although both their play can be neutralized by the dirty play of "Kodiak". He's a real bastard...

Anything an happen.

Half-Time. Super-Bowl. Animal Planet. Be there to witness history.

The 2nd Most Talented Johan (behind Bach)

Mets Rotation for 2008:

Johan Santana
Pedro Martinez
Oliver Perez
John Maine
El Duque

Meet the Mets, meet the Mets,
Step right up and greet the Mets.
Bring your kiddies, bring your wife,
Guaranteed to have the time of your life.
Because the Mets are really sockin' the ball,
Knockin' those home runs over the wall.
East side, West side, everybody's coming down,
To meet the M-E-T-S Mets, of New York town.

Sir Barack, Brave Knight?

'Twas a big weekend for the "forces of Hope". Say what you will about Presidential Candidate Barack Obama -- he gets people out there VOTING. His totals from South Carolina were more than his Republican opponents' totals combined.

Here are this week's newest endorsements of Obama's brand of optimism:

Patrick Kennedy (D - R.I.) and Ted Kennedy's (D - Mass.) endorsement.

and

"A President Like My Father", by Caroline Kennedy.

For this candidate's positions on the issues, jump HERE.

Thursdays with Alan...

“You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover is yourself.”

Show Must Go On?

Maybe not --
Head over to United Hollywood for Writer's Strike updates...

For Best Actor, this year I was able to see Daniel Day-Lewis in "There Will Be Blood" and Viggo Mortensen in "Eastern Promises".
Both outstanding.
Bowling-pin wielding "Daniel Plainview" versus naked, knife wielding "Nikolai".
A good matchup.
For all the nominations, jump HERE.