Mindless Philosopher

I travelled to New York to watch the midnight showing of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on IMAX 3-D with Seth42 last night. Unlike Martian687’s experience, few theater-goers were dressed in Potter-verse costumes. Mostly it was 20-something artists and grad students. The text “below the fold” is spoiler-rific, but the following is my overall take on the film.
Just like the book, this film is much darker than the previous Harry Potter installments. I think they did a fantastic job with Harry’s dreams, and I though Dan Radcliffe played the role extremely convincingly. The movie also moved quickly — it was much less chapter-y than say Chamber of Secrets and did not include the extended passage-of-time sequences that peppered Azkaban. The director also did a nice job of using Prophet headlines to demonstrate public sentiment. Taken together, the main thrust of the story moved quite rapidly, and since the writers left out many non-essential parts (job well done!), that left plenty of time for the climax. Unfortunately, and this is my biggest gripe, they did not use this time to actually play out all of the book’s final chapters. They really skimped on the MoM fights and a few of what I though were the best final scenes.
Moving on to movie-specific parts, the writers did come up with some great lines that added to the film’s comedic value. Unfortunatley, the score (by Nicholas Hooper) could not even come close to comparing with the prior brilliance of John Williams. Casting was great: Imelda Staunton, while not looking exactly like my vision of Umbridge, emulated the character’s speech patterns nicely. And, Evanna Lynch truly was Loony Luna Lovegood — I agree with JK’s one-word assessment: “perfect“. And I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I thought Emma Watson’s (Hermione) performance was a bit weak.
All in all, a great film. I’m not quite sure it tops Azkaban for “Best Potter Movie So Far”, but well worth at least one theater visit.

Continue reading →

After about a decade of high school, college, and pick-up sports, my cleats finally gave way last Thursday. Amazingly, both the left and right gave out in the same pick-up soccer game (though maybe one was torn first making me favor the other foot). The last softball game I played in those shoes was something to talk about though. After our starting pitcher gave up 6 runs in the first inning, I came in and pitched 6 straight innings of shutout softball. I got out of jams with a runner on third and less than two outs twice.
Unfortunately, my first softball game in my new cleats (a pair of black and white Umbros) did not go as well. Our previously solid defense (to which I owed so much of my previous win) faltered, and that combined with some poor pitching decisions on my part led to a 14-17 loss. It’s amazing how easily you can give up 17 runs in softball. But I have a chance for revenge this evening.
As for my soccer abilities, I’ve played once with the new boots, and they’ll take some getting used to. They provide a good amount of traction though.
Speaking of ends of eras, the release of Deathly Hallows is quickly approaching. My predictions will be up next week, but for now I wanted to highlight something JK said recently. For years, the final word of Book 7 had been “scar”. This fact gave me supreme confidence that Harry lived — I can’t imagine how to finish a book by speaking of a characteristic of a dead person. (Maybe I’m just not creative.) But, JK has now revealed that “scar” is not the last word of Deathly Hallows. Could this spell trouble for Harry? I would still guess not, as I’m sure the ending did not change so dramatically in the last year to kill off Harry when he originally lived….but now I’m not so sure.
After softball I’m off to NYC for a midnight showing of “Phoenix” with Seth & Co. — IMAX 3D, baby!

Bush commuted Libby’s jail sentence today; apparently lying to and obstructing the FBI in a national security investigation is only worthy of a fine. As much as this is great news for Scooter, how much does it suck to be Judith Miller today? She willingly went to jail for 85 days to protect Libby. In fact, she went above and beyond the call of duty (cf., Matthew Cooper) as Libby had signed a waiver for Miller to testify but Miller was worried that the waiver had been “coerced.” So she stayed in jail until Scooter called her personally and told her to testify. And now Libby, who actually perpetrated the crimes, gets off with probation.

So, yesterday, I was going through my pre-softball game ritual of watching the daily ABC Family Gilmore Girls re-run up until the first commercial break (games start at 5:30). Rory and Lorelai were conforming to their show-lasting theme of Lorelai being less mature than Rory — Lorelai crawls into bed with Rory complaining that the termites are eating her. Rory, barely awake, notes that “It’s eleven o’clock at night.” Lorelai retorts: “Here. But somewhere in the world it’s…” And the audio cuts out! And I’m left bewildered what Amy Sherman-Palladino could have possible written that ABC family would have to edit out. After all, GG was originally broadcast over the the air on the now-defunct WB, so whatever the line was had to pass FCC muster.
One google search later reveals that Lorelai said “it’s still Miller Time.” So…Lorelai can’t speak of Miller Time, even though beer is often mentioned in the show? And, GG often has post-coital scenes — I don’t think those are removed! Maybe it has some something to do with corporate sponsorship…whatever it is, I’m stumped.

Regarding state restrictions on strip clubs, Angelina Spencer (head of an organization of strip clubs) said “Look, everyone wants to say only perverts and geeks patronize those clubs.”
Hey! Since when are geeks lumped with perverts when it comes to erotic dancing?! Maybe Angelina was rejected by the hottie on the math club in high school.

With the 2007 state legislative session winding down, I just wanted to note what an amazing half-year it has been for gay marriage/civil union/domestic partnership rights. Progress was made in five states and now same-sex couples can form some sort of union in any part of the west coast (inc. HI) or any part of New England. Here’s the lastest map from Wikipedia:

The state-by-state 2007 run-down:
NJ: On February 19, 2007, New Jersey became the third state to recognize civil unions. This action followed a mandate from the state supreme court. The legislature, unfortunately, chose not to implement full marriage. While civil unions supposedly affords the same rights as marriage, such rights are limited to the state government. For instance, some private businesses treat marriages and civil unions differently.
RI: On February 20, 2007, Attorney General Patrick Lynch issued an opinion that same-sex couples’ Massachusetts-performed marriages would be recognized by the state of Rhode Island.
WA: On April 21, 2007, narrowly-elected Gov. Gregoire signed a domestic partnership law into effect. A brief glance at the bill indicates that it’s a complicated mess. I don’t know why they didn’t just say “same rights as married couples” and be done with it.
OR: Governor Kulongiski signed Oregon’s domestic partnership law on May 9, 2007. Oregon used the term “domestic partnership” to stay in line with the other west coast states’ terminology; the text of the legislation is civil-unions simple, however.
NH: On May 31, 2007, Governor John Lynch signed New Hampshire’s civil union bill into law, thus completing the New England’s conversion to being same-sex union friedly.
So, that leaves all the “solid blue” states with some sort of same-sex partnership, except for New York, Maryland, Delaware, and Illinois. I think the legislatures of NY, DE, and IL are still in session with civil union legislation pending, but I haven’t heard good noises come out of any of those states. One can only hope I wrote this post prematurely and more will happen in 2007. But, for now, I say Dayenu!
Although we’ve made real progress, it’s important to keep in mind that, as the New Jersey case demonstrated, passage of these bills does not ensure equal rights for gays and lesbians. This is especially true on the Federal level, thanks to DOMA. One legislative session at a time, I guess.

The Food Stamp Challenge: Progressive elected officials are going on food stamps for one week. That’s the equivalent of $3/day; Rep. Jan Schakowsky’s solution was plenty of Ramen. NPR stories here and here. Kudos for Oregon Governon Ted Kulongoski for starting this whole thing off. I think I might take up the challenge the week before Yom Kippur in the fall (ending with the pre-fast meal before the 24-hour, no-food-at-all endeavor) — that’s probably the most appropriate time. Yes, as Schakowsky admits, the challenge is a bit gimmicky, but I think it’ll be a good personal experience and will help spread the word about the need for increased food stamp appropriations.

The last Gilmore Girls ever was on Tuesday. Even thought they were still negotiating contracts when they wrote the episode, it’s clear that they knew it had a high probability of being the last adventure in Stars Hollow. Other than the lack of Mrs. Kim, the epi really did live up to its role as the grande finale. I got a bit of emotional, and SethB-H informs me that he was bawling tears in Manhattan.
To celebrate/mourn, Miranda and I had a gathering at our apartment. I made a pop-tart themed cake: frosting with sprinkles and some strawberry jam hidden inside. This picture gives you the general idea, but doesn’t quite do it justice:

We ate most of the cake — I hope Miranda can finish off the rest, because I’m now in DC starting my four-state (DC, NY, MA, ME) road trip.
With the passing of Lorelai and Rory, I don’t have any television shows that I’m really into (Ugly Betty is a poor substitute). I’ll just have to watch DVDs of The West Wing, Firefly, and Dead Like Me instead.

Saturday, I celebrated being done with Generals by taking the train to NYC and seeing friends. Chicklet and I headed over to Queens and toured the hands-on NYC Hall of Science (where my BoA card got us in for free). They had lots of great exhibits, including a replica Mars Rover that you could control by inputing a series of movements. The Rover also sported an IR sensor that could look for water in the fake rocks they set up. If only Moses had one of those in the desert! I also noticed that the mathematica exhibit was a near-replica as the one in the Boston museum of science. I wonder if one company creates the exhibit and then sell it to various museums…
After museuming, we caught up with the rest of the folk at Blockheads — this good but cheap Mexican join in midtown. The crew:

Then we headed over to Dave & Busters where we played trivia and skeeball. Thanks to Alissa’s quick wit and Jessie’s mastery of the 40-point circle, we collected 1240 tickets! The group generously redeemed those tickets for a talking Yoda as a gift for finishing generals (and possibly for paying for their D&B cards ;). An appropriate selection given the accomplishment I think.
Sunday was Souk! A middle eastern festival with great food (falafel), drink (funky juices), and dancing (let’s just say I attempted). Pics:

Next stop: DC. Dinner on Wednesday night. Detailed email invites out shortly.

American down (I think I passed); methodology to go. It’s on Thursday. Celebration dinner on NYC on Saturday (email invites out soon).