BillSaysThis

Yes, this was the fourth viewing. No, we didn’t see it on the just released DVD–I’m waiting for the massive 12+ disc deluxe set sometime in 2005. Turns out the movie theater in Milpitas has a special on Tuesdays, only $1 per ticket (with a couple of exceptions). But hey, who could pass up LotR:FotR for $1, especially since it’s been six months since I last saw it? At the end was a trailer for The Two Towers, which is a different version from the one showing now before other films, does not have the Galadriel voiceover. Only four months and change until that’s out for your holiday viewing pleasure!

Possibly, TV Guide nonsense aside, the greatest TV show ever. Watching it via Tivo’s Season Pass daily now. Pre-credits opening scene on this episode: NYPD Det. Mike Logan (Chris Noth) of Law and Order, another great cop show, delivers a prisoner to Det. Frank Pembleton (Andre Braugher) at the Baltimore train station. The prisoner, played by eccentric film director and lifelong Baltimore resident/devotee John Waters, has waived the extradition hearing and faces two charges of first degree murder. The three of them stand around for the scene and explain to each other why their city (well, it’s two on one) is better: Dorothy Parker, Edgar Alan Poe for Baltimore, Babe Ruth for NYC. All to set up the prisoner’s punchline, in response to Braugher’s comment that at least the time will be served in their jail: “I maybe guilty but I’m not stupid.”

Just amazing, literary allusions, alliteration, and a terrific punchline.

The latest blogging craze: BlogTree.com

As I’ve written previously, illegal aliens are a hot button issue for me. The San Jose Mercury News (unlinkable as always) ran an article today that use this ass kissing phrase. I wrote to the reporter who authored the article and the paper’s reader representative:

I am confused by the use of the phrase “undocumented immigrants” in today’s article “County reconsiders ID policy.” Use of this phrase smacks of political correctness rather than journalistic accuracy since the more precise term would be illegal immigrants. The article itself points out that they do have Mexican documentation and slides around the fact that the people in question are in this country illegally.

Given the recent (and justified) outrage around enforcing other laws, such as those concerning business executives and construction (environmental and “NIMBY” concerns), I have a problem understanding why this group of people should be treated differently. Further, in this time of strained government budgets, why would our governments (local, county, state, or federal) spend any money on them? The United States has legal avenues for migration and if these people choose not to follow them, I see no reason why we should extend them journalistic courtesies much less valuable benefits.

I would appreciate an explanation from the Mercury News of how these individuals are undocumented and why this phrase is used.

The article’s author had the following non-response:

Thank you for your opinion, and for reading the paper so carefully. We stand by our use of the word as appropriate.

There was no response from the Reader Representative.

Haven’t printed a recipe in awhile, so here’s a pretty basic number that goes well with a short pasta like Ziti, rice, or even just some fresh Italian bread (we had it with some Chiabatta bread from the Mountain View Farmer’s Market) and a nice salad. Forgive the somewhat pretentious dish name, it was something I just made up having never cooked this before. Nothing too fancy but fresh ingredients make a big difference in taste, serves three-four.

Ingredients

• 1 lb. Ground beef
  

• 1 lb. Tree Ear mushrooms, roughly chopped
  

• 1 medium size yellow squash, sliced thin
  

• 2 medium beefsteak or hothouse tomatoes, diced
  

• 2 shallots, diced
  

• 1 cup, fresh cilantro
  

• 5 cloves garlic, smashed and chopped
  

• 2 tbsp. soy sauce
  

• 3 tsp. Hoisin sauce
  

• Olive oil
  

• salt and pepper

Preparation

• About 1-2 hours before cooking, marinate ground beef in soy sauce and 1 tsp. hoisin sauce, with a pinch of salt and a few turns of fresh ground pepper
  

• Heat olive oil in cast iron pan, then add meat, stirring and chopping to brown meat and separate into tiny bits, then drain oil
  

• Stir in shallots and garlic, then add two tablespoons of olive oil, simmer for a minute
  

• Stir in tomatoes and half the cilantro, simmer for a minute
  

• Stir in squash and 2 tsp. hoisin sauce, add a pinch of salt and a few turns of fresh ground pepper, simmer for 2-3 minutes
  

• Stir in mushrooms, simmer for 5 minutes
  

• Turn off heat and fold in remaining cilantro, then serve hot

This page, oddly uncredited to anyone, uses the recently released Amazon SOAP interface to create graphs which show how Amazon links books together. Click on the Home link at the bottom and you can enter other titles, or click on any title on this graph to get a Similarity map for that book. I would print an example chart here but they tend to be a too large and a thumbnail would be of little value. Very interesting, but beware that it could lead to hours of mindless exploration.

For every Mick Jagger or Bruce Springsteen, stars who not only survive but thrive through the decades, there are Keith Moons, Brian Joneses, and John Entwhistles who die young. There are the one hit wonders who don’t get to make a career in the public light. But perhaps the saddest are those, like Peter Green, showing brilliant talent early and losing it all because of the damage drugs have done to their minds. Green was fortunate, enough, to survive, eventually find a few supportive freiends, and make himself nearly whole again.

Green was the original guitarist in Fleetwood Mac. That’s him singing and playing guitar on the original version of Black Magic Woman and Oh Well. The group’s original name was Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac, as Green was as big a name as the other two; they’d all played together in one of the most important British blues bands of the ’60s, John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers. Indeed, Green was the replacement when Eric Clapton left that band. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998 along with the other members of Fleetwood Mac and even had the chance to jam on Black Magic Woman with Carlos Santana (who was also inducted that night).

But he took too many tabs of acid and by the very early ’70s his mind had deteriorated to the point where he not only had to leave Fleetwood Mac, he had to be institutionalized. Even that time away wasn’t enough, as he spend much of the ’80s living on his own hearing voices. As you might expect he hardly touched a guitar in all this time. Finally in the ’90s he got his life and mind back when a few longterm friends and family took him in and spent the necessary time with him. By 1995 he even was able to relearn the guitar and launched a band with ex-Black Sabbath drummer Cozy Powell.

What was his life like through that time? He said: “On the medication, I was surviving like a worm… or a mouse. Even a mouse was having a better life than I was having.”

Ovation Network ran a half hour special on Green and included a few clips from early in his comeback. He looked old and a little weak but played, let’s just say, better than I ever could.

Two quite different voices:

Thomas Friedman: Bush’s Shame

Steve Denbeste: The Bush Strawman and then Steven furthers his Strawman analysis by extending it to Friedman’s essay. Maybe it’s the deep rooted liberal in me but I have difficulty with Steven’s riding an “end justifies the means” road.

As in, “You can fool…”: Bottled Water Is Still Pure, but It’s Not Simple Anymore. Please tell me that none of you reading this page are foolish enough to believe that these waters are going to improve your health in anyway, other than the general benefit of drinking water. 64 ounces a day is the recommended amount of plain old water. These bulked up waters are just expensive snake oil, don’t let yourself believe otherwise.

Yeah, baby! I have no clue what the reviewers were going on about when they said Austin Powers in Goldmember was a tired and stale retread of the formula. I walked out thinking about AP4 and how the “secret” ending opened up all kinds of interesting possibilities. Okay, I do understand what the reviewers meant about formula: lots of the same bits from the previous film show up again but dammit they did it really well.

Verne Troyer is the big surprise here, even though he never speaks, with some great physical humor. Michael Caine’s father is spot on, you see just where Austin got his mojo. The Goldmember character, who hopefully won’t be back next time, didn’t work quite as well, but was not really important enough to the film to be a problem. Seth Green and his disappearing hair and incipient insanity gave good laughs.

Maybe next time around we’ll meet Austin’s teenage son?

Highly recommended

Face it, France sucks. Sure, they had some great painters and thinkers in the past. But they had a national case of amnesia, from which they never recovered, over their need to have America save their bacon twice this century from the Germans and spend big bucks for the last 57 years making sure it doesn’t happen a third time. They’re a nation of anti-Semites. They worship Jerry Lewis. So any time something happens to infuriate these people, I smile.

The latest bit of good news and slap in the derriere is a ruling by the European Union, formerly a captive branch of their government, forcing the government to abandon a law requiring all food labels and food advertising to be printed in French even if it is printed in another EU nation and imported to France. Making the whole thing even funnier is that the case was triggered by a French supermarket chain which was fined for selling some bottles of Coke labeled in English.

Why does Ted Koppel keep saying the E Street Band is reuniting? That was true two years ago when they did the tour that resulted in Live in New York City but not now. I’m noticing that Bruce is a nervous interview, especially if he has to talk about himself and his life outside of music–he giggles all the time, tries to turn answers into punchlines. As if he somehow doesn’t believe he’s good enough to warrant an interview on national TV. LMAO!

I wonder if the rehearsal song segments they’re showing, at least the older songs, are a preview of what to expect in concert. So far I’ve noticed at least: Backstreets, Two Hearts, Promised Land. Backstreets Magazine has setlists of the recent rehearsals/shows. He’s played Does This Bus Stop at 82nd Street? and For You and I would totally love to hear those!

Wanna bet the E Street is inducted in the next class of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? Damn if they don’t all look old enough. Except maybe Max, he’s got the eternal youth thing going on. Hard to believe he and Roy joined the band 27 years ago.

I really can’t tell, either by reading the essay or by perusing the remainder of the website, whether Global Mind Control Slated For Humanity By 2004 is serious or a parody. Rev. Terry-ana Robinson, MC (where MC apparently means Melchizedek Cloister) writes of a terrible plot against humanity by a group of humans conspiring, and interbreeding, with aliens. Her methods for developing immunity to this bioweapon, though, is simply to become closer to the God or Higher Power in which you believe, eat a healthy diet, exercise, open your mind/rid yourself of dogmatic, unthinking beliefs, and learn new things. Doesn’t this sound like a pretty basic way in which you mainly live already? [Weirdness via garret]

Consolation Champs has gotten an extra copy of the new book on CSS by past master Eric Costello and is giving it away in a haiku contest. Here’s my entry:

Wind blows through tables

Internet gracefully bends

Styles are flexible

Sadly, this movie came highly recommended (although it did not receive good reviews); I cannot recommend it to you, my reader, unless I was recommending it as a sedative. K*19 is the true story (co-produced by National Geographic Films, no less) of a Soviet submarine pressed into duty early in 1961 before the boat is remotely close to ready, to meet a political need, and how the maiden voyage could have triggered World War III.

Or at least that’s what the makers would have us believe, since there is little else in the way of dramatic tension to keep us awake. Harrison Ford is brought in at the last minute to be K*19’s captain, pushing Liam Neeson down to executive officer even though he is beloved by the crew and Ford is seen by them as a careerist who married a politician’s daughter to advance his career. I had no trouble seeing where director Katherine Bigelow (Strange Days) and writer Christopher Kyle (TV’s Homicide: Life on the Street) thought the tension would be.

“There are great human dynamics in this story,” Neeson said in a publicity piece, and this is the crux of the problem–the dynamics just aren’t that great. Sorry. Running drills on a submarine don’t make for tension as they are only drills. Towards the end, when the boat is stranded and an American helicopter flies over to reconoiter, the Soviet crews’ response to the enemy is a mass mooning. Wow, that was just how I would have answered my mortal enemy during the depths of the Cold War. The one bit that I found interesting, when the young officer in charge of the reactor crew refuses to sacrifice himself, is Hollywooded away without his ever being confronted by any other character onboard for his cowardice.

Not recommended

My sister Joanne loves the beach even more than I do. For the last few summers, she’s gotten out of the New York City heat by taking a share in a beach house with friends. They’ve experimented with the Hamptons and the Jersey Shore but seem to have settled on Fire Island as the favorite. I’ve never been there myself but maybe one of these days…

John Grisham had spent some time away from his legal thrillers with a couple of homespun coming of age tales but returns to form in The Summons. Ray Atlee is the son of an old, dying retired Mississippi county judge, brother to an addict who can’t seem to chose a favorite substance to abuse, and a legal professor who can’t connect with women. Ray and the brother have been summoned home by their father but when Ray shows up the father is dead, having finally given in to the cancer. He finds $3 million in a cabinet in the house, which gives us the basis for our tale, and nearly has a nervous breakdown.

This is nowhere close to the level of suspense and complexity Grisham is capable of, or used to be, in novels like The Firm and The Rainmaker. We never get a reason why we ought to be cheering for Ray, other than the fact that he’s the main character and we meet him first. The explanation for the money’s source turns out to be reasonable, not mysterious, though not truly aboveboard. The source of danger is only mildly intense. Grisham has a way with words, no doubt, and I kept reading to the end, though I just turned out dissapointed.

Not recommended

Time Magazine has him on the cover again, 27 years after his first appearance: Reborn in the USA:

He’ll be the featured story on Nightline tonight, including a solo acoustic performance of new Song Empty Sky and be feaured on the Nightline follow-up show UpClose tonight and tomorrow night, then on David Letterman Thursday night.

Robert Hillburn reviews The Rising in the LA Times: Hope Won Out.

Finally, after you pick up your copy, don’t forget to head over to Backstreets.com and give your verdict in their Readers Poll.

Nils is playing the slide guitar parts. Bruce is playing the leads. Soozy Tyrell is now an official member of the E Street Band, bringing the total to 10, and I wonder if by the next tour he’ll be bringing back the Monopoly players from the days of the Bruce Springsteen Band. Amazing how much the crowd is into this, they already know the words to sing along to The Rising. Glory Days is the surprise older tune he threw into the set; he brought out the battered Telecaster for it and Steve has the mandolin.

Listening to the Big Man’s sax layering on top of the guitars, reaching higher, higher, higer, it just sends chills down my spine. In the interview before he started playing, Bruce said that he saw his role as testifying anf getting people up to dance. He means testifying in a religious sense and I get it, all the way, especially when he’s throwing his hand up during the “It’s all right” choruses on Lonesome Day.

The fourth song is Into the Fire and Bruce really has his mountain voice on. Hard to listen to this song, seeing the crowd, and the band, and not feel the tears slipping down from my eyes. This song is the power of rock and roll, the depth of the lyrics, the connection to who we are, who we can be, and still get up and dance.

“No Better Colors: Red, White, and Bruce” read one of the signs held up and surely that can’t be argued with.