Musing: A Darker Knight

No spoilers!

Yesterday I saw The Dark Knight. Frickin' sweet, dude. It was ten times better than Batman Begins, which I enjoyed but didn't love. First off, Chicago looks fantastic in it. In Batman Begins, the city was basically a nameless backdrop. They made much better use of the city this time around--if you know Chicago, you can actually recognize most of the locations, and they look completely bad-ass. Lower Wacker (or Gotham's Lower 5th Avenue) gets its best film usage since the Blues Brothers. LaSalle looks like a gothic urban canyon (and if you look close, you can see the word "Chicago" on a sign in the background of one shot). Navy Pier looks like a seaport, and the best "Chicago shot" of the movie is an aerial of Upper Wacker, packed with traffic, including the southern ends of several of the river bridges. I feel sorry for people who love Chicago but no longer live here--seeing this movie is going to make them ache with nostalgia. (One thing they may not miss though is our traffic. At one point in a chase scene, Gary Oldman as Commissioner Gordon yells at the officer driving his car, "Mount the curb!" because the street is packed with cars. I whispered to Marissa, "Ah, now it looks like Chicago.")

Marissa thought, and I agree, that another reason why Chicago works so much better in this movie than the last one is that you care more about the city this time around. In an effort to make things really dark, Batman Begins made Gotham into a place where all the citizens were creepy and evil (that is, when they showed the citizens at all), and consequently you had a hard time drumming up much sympathy for them. This time around, the plot draws in many more "normal citizens" and "non-hero cops" and the city feels more alive with innocents caught up in the action.

The performances are also quite good. I've had a little issue with Christian Bale as Batman since the last movie: he has sort of a weird mouth, and when he's dressed up as the Caped Crusader, that's the only part you see, so your eye is constantly drawn to his mouth and you get distracted wondering why it makes weird shapes when he talks. But, minor quibbles aside, he does a nice job as Bruce Wayne/Batman. Dropping Katie Holmes like a hot rock was a great idea--Maggie Gyllenhaal blows her away as Rachel Dawes. And Aaron Eckhart is a nice addition in this installment as Harvey Dent/Two-Face. Cillian Murphy is brought back to play Scarecrow in exactly one scene. That character was completely underused in Batman Begins, and apparently the filmmakers intend to keep it that way.

Be honest, it just looks weird.

But of course, the performance everyone is talking about is Heath Ledger as the Joker. And everyone who's talking about it is right: he's really good. He has a completely original take on the role, so much so that it takes you several scenes to flush out your preconceptions and see where he's going with it. And even then, you can't look away when he's in the frame. I'm not sure if his recent death may have something to do with the fascination you can't help but feel toward his character, but you literally have a hard time not paying rapt attention to his every little twitch and tic. In one scene, he's shown walking in the foreground while a complex of buildings explodes and burns in the background. It's a testament to how engaging his performance is that you ignore the pyrotechnics behind him because you don't want to miss it if he does something interesting.

His job was made easier, though, by the fact that the Joker is way cool in this franchise. Gone is the whole Joker-creation story that every other previous version of Batman has been saddled with, where he falls in a vat of nastiness that turns his skin white, his hair green, and slaps a permanent smile on his face. This Joker looks like a clown because he chooses to wear makeup, which is infinitely creepier. He has no goals except disruption, chaos, and terror. As Alfred says, he just wants to watch the world burn. That's pretty dark. And that's where I've been getting to with this post.

Cesar Romero... eat your heart out.

I see a lot in common between this new Batman franchise and the revitalization of the James Bond franchise that began with last year's Casino Royale. They both took a popular movie series that had become cheesy and too cute for its own good and kicked it in the ass by making it more visceral, more grounded in reality, and way, way darker. In the opening sequence of Casino Royale, when Daniel Craig was beating the piss out of some dude in a physical, brutal scene set in a tight bathroom, I remember thinking, "Roger Moore never could have done that.... I'm really going to like this movie." I got the same feeling during one of the Joker's first scenes, when he performs a little magic trick involving a pencil and some dude's head. I'm not sure Jack Nicholson couldn't have gotten that nasty. Cesar Romero might wet his pants watching that scene.

So why did everybody love that last James Bond movie and this new, really dark Batman? I think there's two reasons. First, in order to continue to affect an audience, the ante has to be upped. Now that we've seen Jason Bourne kick and punch like a badass, who wants to see James Bond played with a wink and a smile? Who wants to see Batman and his nemeses prancing around in brightly colored tights (which is one reason the Spiderman movies suck)? That explains the turn toward more visceral, realistic filmmaking.

But why so dark? Here's my opinion: just like James Bond movies have to be more physical to compete with other action movies' abilities to affect an audience, fantasy movies like Batman have to compete with... the news. Let's face it, these days it seems like everything's going to hell in a handbasket. War, shitty economy, you name it, we've got it. A new NBC/Wall St. Journal poll, finds that just 13% of Americans think the country is headed in the right direction (a new low, woohoo!). Now that we all know we live in a world where our safety is threatened by terrorism, we want a Joker who's not playing around. You want to scare us? Make him a psychotic, schizoid terrorist! Not just creepy... an actual TERRORIST! These feel like dark days, and it would be jarringly incongruous to go to a movie that's supposed to be about criminals and justice and have to look at... oh I don't know, Chris O'Donnell wearing spandex. Escapism be damned--art imitates life.

So dark is in. I loved Casino Royale and I can't wait for Quantum of Solace (even though that title is shit). It really is a shame that Heath Ledger won't be around to reprise his role in the next Batman movie (I'm pretty sure they intended him to), because he was perfect for the tone. But hopefully, the Batman gang will keep up the good work. Even without Heath, I'm sure the next one will be good, too... that is, as long as they (please, GOD!) do not even think about bringing in Robin. Or Chris O'Donnell. Or especially spandex.

Musing: A Big Donut For Neighborhood Preservation

A couple days ago, I saw the latest play at the Steppenwolf Theatre here in Chicago. It's called Superior Donuts, and it's by Tracy Letts. You may know him if you follow arts news at all. He wrote August:Osage County for Steppenwolf last year, which was moved to Broadway, won Tony awards for everyone involved (including the audience members), and scored the author a Pulitzer Prize. And, yes. It was that good. After I saw it last year, I started telling everyone that I thought it was the best new American play of the last two decades, despite the fact that I'd seen only a small fraction of the plays produced in America since 1988.

So, Superior Donuts isn't as good as August, of course. But that's not stopping it from playing to packed houses of people who don't want to miss Tracy Letts's latest, or from playing to houses full of Broadway producers in its opening week. It's a wholly different animal from August, which was a massive, epic family drama that was probably so cathartic for the writer that he won't be able to produce something like it again until he reaches retirement age, if ever. Superior Donuts is much smaller in its scale and focus. It's also very funny (it's sort of a black comedy/drama), very touching, and very good in its own way. But the really cool thing about it is that it is set in Chicago, and more than that, is uniquely of Chicago. The city is not just a setting or a backdrop, it makes up the themes behind the action. The play could not have been set anywhere else.

Very briefly, the play is about the owner of the last independent donut shop in Uptown--played by Michael McKean, who you might know from the Christopher Guest movies, or Lavergne & Shirley if you're really old--who is forced to face up to some of the failings of his character when a black kid from the neighborhood comes to work for him. As I said, it deals with several Chicago-centric themes (like ethnic tensions) to a lesser extent, but the main theme, and the one I found most interesting, is the passing of the neighborhood era in Chicago.

Chicago gets a zero for preserving neighborhood character. In other news, I like chocolate covered cake donuts with sprinkles.

In an interview between the director and the playwright that I read in the program, both noted how Chicago was the only American city they knew of in which people strongly identified themselves by their ethnicity. It might be a part of who you are if you live in another city, but only here do people routinely ask questions like, "Where are you from?" and think of themselves as Polish or German or whatever, even if their family has been American for two generations. Chicago used to be distinctly organized into ethnic neighborhoods, which formed strong social networks based on common backgrounds. My dad, for instance, grew up in Greektown and knew most of the other Greeks because that was his neighborhood. Still, to this day, he knows a lot of the Greek families in Chicagoland, because they all grew up together. Of course, the majority of the neighborhood was bulldozed to make way for UIC's campus, which turned Greektown into a strip where all the Greek restaurants are, instead of a neighborhood where all the Greek people live.

In Superior Donuts, the store owner is Polish. He gives free coffee and donuts to the Russian video store owner next door and the old alcoholic woman who comes in every day. He knows the two beat cops that stop in for their morning coffee, and they know him and everyone else who frequents the place. They ALL know each other, and they help each other out when they can, because they're part of a distinct neighborhood. Uptown is one of the last places on the North Side where you find that type of neighborhood character. But everything changes, of course--Superior Donuts is getting killed by the Starbucks that opened across the street.

Nowadays, North Side neighborhood distinctions in Chicago mostly matter for real estate listings. What was once an immigrant city is no longer working class. I live near Old Town, which is a pretty historic area in Chicago, the site of some major events in its history, like the riots during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. When I go to sell my place, though, my realtor will probably call my location Lincoln Park, because it might up the sales price a bit. It's pretty ironic that Old Town is also the birthplace of Crate & Barrel. I'm not trying to say that I'm opposed to gentrification or anything. (That would be awfully hypocritical--I'm about as yuppie as you can get). But I do get a little sad thinking about how Chicago used to be, and how homogenized it's become. My dad can tell you about the family of some Greek guy we might happen to run into at a restaurant in the suburbs. Me, I hardly know the people who live in my building. I get my groceries from Whole Foods (before they closed it down for a rodent infestation... hear about that one?), I get my coffee from Peet's, I get my furniture from Crate & Barrel. Just like everyone else. And I can't remember ever eating a donut that didn't come from Dunkin Donuts. That's modern urban living for you.

In other news, my fascination with reality competition TV continues (why and when did this happen to me?). My latest fixation is "So You Think You Can Dance". Seen it? I recommend it. The talent level is very high, and unlike on Idol, very few of the contestants are irritating. And there's a lot of hot girls (they're fricking dancers!). Aside from one of the judges, Mary Murphy, who is completely insufferable, the show is really entertaining. My male and female favorites are, coincidentally, a dance couple on the show: Chelsea and Mark. Maybe I'll go into why, if I feel like it in a later post.

I'm still alive, I'm pretty good at picking reality tv winners, and I am not safe from disease.

Ho-ho! Guess who's back! While reading Marty's blog today, I noticed on his cool little blog update widget that Tom had a newish blog post up. Which caused me to think, "Well shit. If Tom's finally writing in his blog again..." and here I am.

In the months that have passed since I last posted, several notable things have happened. Also, these two completely irrelevant things happened: one, Stephanie Izard won Top Chef, and two, David Cook won American Idol. The astute Wintery Mix reader (and if you're a Wintery Mix reader you can, by default, consider yourself the most astute Wintery Mix reader) may notice that I nailed that shiznitz, right from the start. I've got tennis elbow from patting myself on the back so often through the spring and early summer.

I'm most pleased about Stephanie winning Top Chef. She seems cool as hell, she's from Chicago, and it sure seems like she's got no plans to leave. The word here is that she's got a new restaurant in the works, the investors all lined up, and all she needs is to find an ideal space. Personally, I can't wait to try it. I hope it's awesome and we can add it to the list of kick-ass restaurants in Chicago. Really, we're turning into a dining Mecca over here. And personally, I've had some great meals lately. You can read all about them in my Yelp reviews.

Anyway, since I'm writing a blog post, I feel like I really ought to come up with a topic to write about... you know, another one of those random subjects that I find interesting despite the fact that no one else agrees. So here it is: I was listening to this program called Radio Times yesterday. It's on Philadelphia's public radio station and I get it on one of Sirius's NPR channels. The hour I heard was an interview with Dr. Robert Weinberg, who is an epidemiologist, or an oncologist... or whatever. He's into cancer, anyway. He also co-wrote an article in Newsweek recently that talked about what scientists know these days about what causes different types of cancers. The one bomb he dropped that really perked my ears up was his claim that there is absolutely no scientific evidence that eating organic food is any better for your health than eating meat and vegetables produced traditionally. Needless to say, the phone lines lit up and he was reiterating himself to every other caller for the rest of the program.

This guy's point was that it doesn't matter what you shoot an animal up with--by the time it gets to your mouth, the chemicals present in non-organic meat and dairy are present in such small quantities (when compared to the enzymes and hormones your body naturally produces) that they're a non-factor in causing diseases. He said, "The dose determines the poison," (or words to that effect) and ran off a few examples of other substances you ingest that would be deadly at larger quantities, like table salt or the fluoride they put in our drinking water.

"Up yours, Organic Cow! Suck on that!... Farmer Bob, I'm ready for my midday injection."

To that, I say: "Kiss my ass". I'm just not ready to believe that eating stuff pumped full of antibiotics, growth hormones, preservatives and pesticides isn't going to cause some kind of harmful effects in the long run. So Dr. Weinberg can keep his Aldi brand burgers, I'm still (usually) overpaying for my organic meat, dairy and produce. Athough I don't think Dr. Weinstein is eating too many burgers. He also took potshots at pretty much the entire Western diet, quoting studies about the lower instances of cancers in non-Western countries and the dangers of eating a high-fat, high-carbohydrate, high-calorie diet. Oh, and just in time for the holiday, he says grilling your meat will kill you. And so will eating red meat in general. Happy Fourth of July!

Musing: Game On!

Check out the cover story of the March issue of WIRED. You can read it online for free... which is interesting, isn't it? They just give away the intellectual property... for free! Another good example of this is in my last post, where you can click on a link and read a big NYT Sunday Times Magazine piece... for FREE!! They used to make you pay to read the opinion pages, but now they let you access all of the newspaper's content at no charge (except the daily crosswords... unfortunately for me, you still have to pay a subscription to get those).

Anyway, it's a pretty interesting article (I'm talking about the WIRED piece again). The gist is that, in any business that takes place online, the price of everything trends toward $0.00. Take the price of digital storage as a for instance. It used to be that you had to pay for an email account (like the original version of AOL). Soon, they started giving them away with the price of your internet access. Then, free email accounts popped up all over the place, like Yahoo! and GMail... free, but you still had to pay if you wanted increased email storage. Now, not only can you get unlimited email storage from both of those companies, Google even gives you a free virtual portable hard drive. (It's called GSpace. Check it out--it plugs right into your browser. Sexy!) This is all possible because the price of digital storage has declined so much that, spread over the cost of all of a website's users, it becomes negligible. So you get it for... say it with me...

FREE!... right?

Wrong. You just don't pay any money for it. Instead, you pay with your time and your attention. Google may be subtle, but it rakes in untold billions from the ad revenue it generates. Today's digital business model is structured so that you don't pay for the content and services you use, advertisers pay for it for you in order to get their ads in front of you. That's not the only way to make money, of course. There's also the business model in which you give a product away, but make users pay if they want a better or deeper version of the content. A good example of this is the sweet music player and file manager I use for my sweet music collection. It's called Media Monkey. It's awesome! I love it! So I upgraded my free download version of it to Media Monkey Pro, which cost me around $20. In this model, 99% of the people using a product get it for free, and the company who makes it is happy to give it away. Because there's that last 1%, like me, who choose to pay cash money for it, and that 1% pays for the rest. That business model has nothing to do with the Google/Yahoo! model except for one important similarity: FREEEEE!!!!

Which brings me to one of my favorite pastimes (NERD ALERT!!): video games. There's a company called WildTangent that makes a new application called Orb. Basically, using Orb, you can stream and play games on your computer for free. The tab will be picked up by advertisers who will show you their ads in unobtrusive ways during loading screens. Or you can pay money to skip the ads entirely. Here's a quote from the company's founder, Alex St. John (I read this in PC Gamer... DOUBLE NERD ALERT!):

"Every consumer PC shipping this year--including the laptops--will have superior graphics capabilities to the Wii, and most will match or exceed an Xbox 360. That'll be 36 million consumer PCs--more than all consoles sold in the United States combined--going into people's living rooms in one year, and they'll be connected to the Internet with superior media capabilities. And every one of them will have a nice, big, high-res screen."

"Welcome back, Professor. Let's play... Global Thermonuclear War."

Which means that, if you're reading this, you already have a high-powered gaming machine, and now you can get your games for free. Is this the future of gaming? I think it's the future of ALL digital entertainment. The music industry got burned when it tried to stop piracy, and it sure looks like the film industry didn't learn from their mistake--acquiring video content still, for the most part, means buying a DVD with the latest anti-piracy protections embedded into it... or going to a website like Project Free TV and downloading free versions of the same content that have been uploaded by pirates immediately after they got done bypassing the latest anti-piracy protections. In WebTangent's model, consumers get what they want at the price they want (free!), and game developers get their product out to as many consumers as possible. And of course, they don't lose their profits to piracy, because what's the point of pirating something if the producers are already giving it away?

I wanted to save America, but someone got there first

Back when I was writing in my blog more regularly, I had this idea for a post I was going to write. The basic gist of it was going to be that through embracing environmentalism, a variety of the problems our country currently faces could be solved. While doing a little reading to compose my thoughts, I discovered a big piece that Tom Friedman of the New York Times had in the Sunday Magazine a whole year ago. Tom, obviously, made all of the points I was going to make (and more!) far more eloquently than I ever could, which really took all the wind out of my sails and I never wrote the post.

Home sweet home.

Today being Earth Day and all, this seems like an apropos time to look back on what I was going to say. If you've got the time to do a little reading, here's the link:

The Power of Green, by Thomas L. Friedman

It's not a short article, but it's dead-on. If you don't have the time, the gist of it is this: if America embraces the green movement we can go a long way toward mitigating global warming, but you don't have to be a greenie liberal to think this is a good idea. If American scientists and entrepreneurs were inspired and challenged in the way that we were during the 1960s space race, we would also solve the biggest threat to American security: our reliance on foreign oil. And a sweet little side effect would be the benefit to our economy of being the world leader in alternative energy technologies, which promises to be a massive industry in this century, thereby replacing many of the manufacturing jobs that have been shifting overseas for years, along with several other huge economic benefits.

That pretty much sucks as a synopsis. Please read the article.

And have a happy Earth Day!

Opinion: Pick your horse

A few weeks back in the Tribune, television critic Maureen Ryan did an American Idol article in which she gave her opinion of each contestant and their chances of winning. As usual, Ms. Ryan was dead wrong about pretty much everything. In general, I'd rate her opinions at about the same level as I'd rate "weather predictor" Tom Skilling's: ground level and getting lower. In fact, I'd put her second on my list of "People the Chicago Tribune Should Fire Today," right behind technology "writer" Eric Gwynn.

Anyway, I'll take a crack at rating the six remaining contestants myself. I wish I had written this post a week earlier, before Kristy got eliminated, so that I could use the nickname I've given her, Kristy Lee Cock (so named for her mannish lunges). But there, I've managed to work it in anyway. Without further ado, here's what George thinks about the top 6:

Syesha Mercado Syesha's an odd bird-- she actually has a really pleasant voice at times, and she has a little bit of power when she needs it. But her pitch can be all over the place during some performances and no matter how hard she tries, she still ends up mostly forgettable.
Can she win? No way, Jose. Syesha ain't got the skillz. But she is the last "minority" (read: black) contestant, so don't be surprised if she hangs around another couple weeks.

David Archuleta Oh, David. Why does the Idol viewing world love you so? It causes me physical pain to admit this, but... yes, David Archuleta does have a nice voice. However, any talent he might have is completely overshadowed by his nausea-inducing personality. His "aw shucks" routine was irritating from the get-go, and soon grew to be unbearable. Now, the only way I can make it though his performances is by doing my impression of him for Marissa--it seems to release the pressure valve a little so I don't start throwing my shoes at the tv. (My favorite impression material is from his post-performance conversation with Ryan after singing "Another Day in Paradise": "Well, I just thought it was really meaningful because, you know, a lot of people don't have homes..."
Can he win? Sadly, yes. As much as I hate him, that's how much your average teenage girl seems to love him. And if he does... I might leave the country to protect my ears from the horror of his 10-emotional-ballads-in-a-row debut album.

Brooke White Say what you will about Brooke White, you'll never sway my devotion to her! I don't care that you think she's boring! I don't care how many cracks you make about her troubles picking good songs, not to mention making it through a performance with her shoes still on! I don't care that she appears to be somewhat manic depressive! I love her anyway!
Can she win? Sadly, no. In an interesting paradox, although Brooke just doesn't have the pipes to survive once the bigger voices start blowing the roof off the place, she can probably sell more albums as a solo artist than any of the other contestants. There's a market out there for her singer-songwritery vibe, and it's the kind of market that really doesn't care who wins American Idol. Which means that she doesn't really have to win.

Carly Smithson Carly was the odds-on favorite to win the whole thing when the finals began, and for a good reason: she's the best singer in a singing competition. But she's proven to have two serious issues: one, she can't pick a song to save her life. You'd think that a great singer would be able to find a song every week that showcases her voice properly. You'd be wrong. Two, just because she has vocal power, doesn't mean she needs to try to prove it every week. I half-expect one of her internal organs to come flying out of her mouth in the middle of one of her performances. She's as hard-working as Michael Bolton, and she's got the scrunched-up, angry-face to prove it. And by the way, they're not doing her any favors by showing us shots of her husband in the audience so often. This guy looks like he'd be at home biting the head off a chicken in a travelling carnival. Seriously.
Can she win? If she gets out of her own way, Carly can still win. Maybe as the coaching gets better week to week, she'll start getting better advice on how to present her talent better. But I doubt it. I think Carly's going down in the next couple weeks. It's a shame, really.

Jason Castro In the interest of full disclosure, I have to reveal that Jason is Marissa's favorite. She, like many female Idol viewers, thinks he's quite dreamy. So if I say anything too bad about Jason, I'm likely to cause repercussions at home that just wouldn't be worth the trouble. I can say, honestly, that Jason has a pleasant voice, and a light, laid-back style that's refreshing to hear between the power performances. But he's got to have just the right song for it to work, and that just doesn't happen very often.
Can he win? Nope. I'd say that, behind David Archuleta, Jason Castro has the biggest number of screaming-meemie teenage fans, and they're a powerful voting block. But unless he pulls out another perfect song every week (like he did with Jeff Buckley's version of "Hallelujah" and whoever's version of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow") he's going to get dropped. Who knows though... maybe there's a market out there for him.

David Cook Not only is David Cook an outstanding singer, he's got two other things going for him. One, he's the right kind of singer at the right time. The typical schlock R&B style that Idol tends to promote is wearing very thin seven seasons into the show. Although there's always been the "rocker" contestant, they've never had much of a shot. Now, post-Daughtry, there's a much better chance that a contestant who owns a pair of testicles can actually win. Secondly, David is not just a good singer, he's a good musician. His performances are fun to watch because he's so adept at taking a tired old song and turning it into something new. (Lionel Richie? Are you kidding me?) It also helps that that "something new" is always something alternative rock.
Can he win? He's got the pipes, he's got the musicianship, he's got the fan base... he can absolutely win it. But should he? Remember that Daughtry got bounced in the final four, put out a solo album and is now one of the best selling rock acts around. What would have happened if he'd have actually won? Would he still have the credibility to be a mainstream rock artist and not a teenie bopper phenomenon? Look at Kelly Clarkson's rough ride trying to be taken seriously as a musical artist and not just a talent show-winning singer. What will be interesting to speculate about is whether David Cook can sell more albums as an American Idol winner or as a loser.

How I became Comcast's #1 customer

Although no living, breathing people actually read my blog, it does not go unnoticed by the tireless automated bots trolling through the internet. As proof, I offer my recent experience with Comcast, in which I went from an average, angry customer to priority numero uno.

In the previous post, I laid out the troubles I'd been having with Comcast while I waited for a service appointment. My anger deepened later that afternoon, when I continued to have all the same problems, even after the repairman spent about 30 minutes in my place cleaning out and tightening all the connections and pulling out my ceiling speaker to change a splitter. Soon after I called to schedule another appointment for the following day, I noticed that someone had commented on the blog post. (Go ahead and read it now. I'll wait). Amazingly, that comment was actually left by a Comcast employee, and not someone trying to get my email address in order to send me even more solicitations for penis enlargement. "Mark C." called me that very evening even though I hadn't given him my phone number... that's when I started to think the guy might actually be for real.

From that moment on, I was receiving phone calls at a rate of at least two per day from Comcast employees, following up on my situation. I had calls from Mark, who's in customer care out on the east coast, John, who is a regional VP for the Chicagoland area, and Felicia, who's been keeping me posted on all the progress. They've all given me their direct extensions. Two days after my blog post, they had a line crew in our alley replacing the drop from the pole to our building. This appears to have completely solved the problems with my reception. In fact, we had a condo board meeting yesterday, where I learned that all the Comcast users in my building were having similar issues, and this has probably solved the problem for everyone. Not only that, but during that first phone call from Mark C., he also managed to speed up my internet connection. ("While I've got you on the phone...") Amazing.

I've changed my tune on Comcast. Throw "The Hammer" in jail.

So as I promised Mark C., here for public consumption is the blog post in which I eat crow. Comcast does NOT suck. Their customer care employees are extremely friendly, and can fix the shit out of a problem when they put their mind to it. [I've been holding off on writing this post for a couple of days, just to make sure there's been a real improvement. But so far so good, and I'm guardedly optimistic that all my cable television worries have been solved. But I'll still be hanging on to all the direct extension phone numbers they gave me.]

The moral of the story, as I see it, is that I ought to be writing in my blog WAY more often, and complaining my ass off about EVERYTHING. You never know who's listening.

Musing: Comcast Sux

I've been away from my blog for so long! I went out of town a couple weeks back, which caused me to get completely out of touch with all of my online activities, and when I got back I just... never really got back into them. Does this ever happen to you? It's funny how you get so in the habit of looking at the same websites, writing on the same blogs and boards and reading the same solicitations for penis enlargement that it all just becomes part of one big daily routine. Then when something breaks the routine, it's actually pretty refreshing to just get away from it all. So aside from checking in on my Scrabulous games, I've been offline for most of the last couple weeks. But then something happens to jump start the routine again. For me, that something was Comcast.

The entire time I've had my Comcast DVR set-top box, it's been malfunctioning. It started by freezing up pretty much every time it had to receive new information, which was about every 15 minutes. I'd hit the buttons on the remote, and it would just sit there for several seconds--sometimes as long as a minute--before spewing all my commands out at once. Then, it started jacking up my recordings. If I tried to record something--ANYthing--on HBO HD, it would come out unplayable. The sound dropped out of a lot of recordings and you could occasionally get it back by rewinding. Sometimes this would happen over and over again. Most recently, it'd begun to get really pissy for a few hours at a time. It would digitize the picture ("tile" in Comcast lingo) every few seconds and the sound would drop out.

A screenshot of George's inner life.

This was pretty much the last straw--finally enough to make me forsake all my recordings and series recording setups and take it in for a new one. [This is a pretty craptacular experience in and of itself. See my Yelp! review for the details about my inner thoughts during this episode, which include musings about hand grenades.] Here follows the only good news of this entire, ongoing Comcast ordeal: they have a new model of set-top box, and it's prettier. Unfortunately, the only problem it solves is the whole freeze-up situation. I'm still getting the pissy "tiling" issue. So I call in a service appointment and miss work this morning. The guy is late. So I miss work this afternoon. The results: to make a long story short, I have another appointment scheduled for tomorrow. Luckily, Marissa will be around to meet the guy this time--I do still have a job.

But the lighter side of this whole experience is that I found myself sitting on the couch for several hours with nothing to do. (Life pretty much sucks when you're at home with nothing to do and just turning on the TV is enough to make your blood pressure skyrocket.) So I managed to compose a whopping NINE (9) Yelp! reviews and began missing writing in my blog.

A look back in mild interest: Top Chef, Idol, Michael Haneke

The Tribune review for Funny Games came out this morning, and it was less than complimentary. Apparently, something is lost in the translation. This is kind of sad to me, since for most of the American audience that turns up at the theaters for this movie, it will be their first exposure to Michael Haneke's films. If it's not any good, it will also be their last, which is pretty unfortunate. So don't let that happen to you, occasional reader! This guy's movies are not exactly audience-friendly, but they're very good, and very thought provoking. I've had better conversations about them (usually trying to figure out what the point was) than about any other movie I can think of. If you think Funny Games is crap, check out Cache instead on DVD.

Cache = Hidden in French.

Another week, another contestant forcibly removed. Mercifully, David Hernandez did indeed get the boot, reaffirming my faith in America--for now. I fully expect America to completely blow it in the later rounds, and expose our collective consciousness to the stomach-turning tragedy of a David Archuleta solo album.

Are you watching Top Chef? You should be. It was already a good show, but now we get treated periodically to some awesome shots of Chicago. In the first episode the producers did a nice job of showing how beautiful the city is, and I hope that continues. Several of the contestants described Chicago as being a cutting edge dining city, so it's nice to see our restaurants get some props. Also, two of the contestants are from Chicago. One of them, Valerie something, grew up in Glenview and was a year older than me. I'm pretty sure I sang in choir with her, only back then she was just called Val (...something). And the other Chicagoan is Stephanie Izard, who opened Scylla in Wicker Park a few years ago, then sold it (I think it's closed now). If I remember correctly, the menu was heavily seafood-oriented, and I think the Trib gave her three stars. You should root for her.

Musing: Horror Movies Blow

The other night, Marissa and I were out for dinner with Harold. As often happens these days, I was pretty much ready for my "comfy pants" by about 9:30. The fact that it was Saturday night didn't make much of a difference, but Harold did come by for a while to watch a movie, so I suppose it was more active than the average week night.

Anyway, one thing that came up in conversation was that horror movies completely suck. Why is that the case? It seems that in every other genre, there's an adherence to a certain yardstick for quality. If a drama features poor performances, a crap script, and generally poor filmmaking, everyone decides it's bad, and no one wants to see it.

The yardstick seems to be totally different in the horror genre though. Most horror films feature raspberry-worthy performances by B-grade actors; cringe-inducing, tin-ear writing (by D-grade writers); and a total disregard for artistic filmmaking. And yet, tons of people enjoy the films anyway, and put good money down to see them. They're getting worse too. The original Halloween or Friday the 13th were not nearly as tragic as the garbage being slung today, like Hostel or the Saw sequels.

I know that a lot of people enjoy horror films because they like being scared, but why the double standard? Is the "jump factor" that important and desirable that the normal standards for movie-making are out the window when assessing a horror film's value? If that's the case, doesn't it mean that horror films are not really the same art form as films of other genres? Maybe they're something more like porn movies, where things like performances, writing, etc., are not the point and nothing more than window dressing. You see a porn movie for the sex, you see a horror movie for the jump factor.

Still that doesn't explain why they can't be held to a higher standard. There are movies out there every now and then that are very scary, but because they're good movies, nobody really thinks of them as "horror." Silence of the Lambs is a good example. Harold and I talked about how we both liked that Nicole Kidman movie The Others that was out six or seven years ago. And I really liked Steven Speilberg's War of the Worlds, which is definitely not considered "horror," but I found to be pretty horrifying in places.

The movie that Harold, Marissa and I watched was called Benny's Video, by German-born director Michael Haneke. Most Americans aren't familiar with Haneke's work. He studied psychology and philosophy before becoming a filmmaker, and his films usually feature short bursts of extreme violence, and long pensive static takes. They often explore the darker psychological undercurrents that are repressed in middle class life... not your typical horror fare, but very terrifying in a completely different way. I first discovered Haneke late at night a few years ago when I couldn't sleep and was flipping through the channels. I stopped on Funny Games, just a few minutes into the movie. My reaction was something like, "Wha...?!!!" and I was riveted. Now I own a DVD set of his earlier stuff, and I'm working my way through it.

The reason I bring this up is that Haneke is remaking the film Funny Games, in English, for an American audience, and it opens tomorrow (Friday, March 14th). From what I can tell in the previews, the film is almost exactly the same only instead of two weird German people playing the married couple at the center of the story, it now features Naomi Watts and Tim Roth, so that's an improvement.

The American version

I'm really excited about seeing this movie, but I may not get the chance for a while. Next week I'll be skiing in Colorado. I expect to write a nice blog post about the trip, from my hospital bed in traction. Probably it will feature some action photos of me destroying a knee. Maybe if someone takes pity on me, they'll wheelchair me into a movie theater and I can watch the movie while I convalesce.

Opinion: Idol, Week of 3.10

I should have another blog post coming tonight or tomorrow morning, but it's about an hour before the Idol results show, so I need to get this in under the gun. The man-on-man stripper, David Hernandez, has got to go. I also won't miss Syesha if she gets the old heave-ho. Chikezie's stock, however, has risen dramatically since he showed last night that he can sing a song that doesn't bore you to death. I was thrilled to see everyone else's favorite, David Archuleta, crash and burn. My own favorites, Brooke and David Cook, haven't changed.

David Hernandez, your table is waiting.

As if Idol wasn't enough to keep me busy, Top Chef's new season starts tonight, and from Chicago no less. I LOVE Top Chef, and I've missed it so since last season ended. To think, it's been months since I've seen a nice, tasty plate of foam.

A look back in mild interest: Idol and Republicanism

I'm a little late revisiting some of last weeks topics, but I have a new, not-so-exciting blog feature to unveil. Check out the picture I've put in below, and you'll see that through the magic of digital manipulation, I've managed to put people from TOTALLY DIFFERENT PICTURES into the SAME PICTURE! In my spare time, I often like to play around with images and create "wag the dog" pictures. Once, I amused myself for an entire evening taking a vacation photo of my friends Eric and Christine and pasting them into every location we visited on our Mediterranean cruise. I use Paint Shop Pro during these hours of giddy ecstasy. You can too! Sadly though, I can't think of anything to use my boredom-sharpened skills on besides my Idol recap for this week.

So it turns out Eric was right, and America just wasn't ready to see Chikezie go, but I'm sad to see Danny Noriega go in his place. Danny was pretty bad, but he made for some comic relief. The other three of my four picks last week did hit the skids:

Kady, Danny, Luke and Asia'h (WTF?) burning in the eternal fires of obscurity and the viewing public's complete lack of interest.

My two favorites are still David Cook and Brooke White:

George's favorites, surrounded by a saintly blue glow.

In other news, my last post (about our inability to fix things like we used to) pulled in a couple of interesting responses. Here's one that has not been chosen at random:

Michael: "[Sentimental value] should not be a factor. If it is cheaper to buy a new than fix the old one, than it is inefficient to fix it. If everyone acted on inefficiency, wealth would be lost (or at the minimum not created) and new technology would not be developed. Companies would stop (mostly due to lack of funds) research and development. Static advancement is never good! Also, Marissa is correct. Americans live fast paced lives. Therefore, if you want to add another variable to your equation (besides a & c), you should add b. b should equal time spent fixing the piece of shit. In other words, time cost and not sentimental cost should be the factor!"

Bravo! Spoken like a true Republican! This is a well thought-out, articulate point that takes into account all kinds of interesting economic concepts like "time costs" and "inefficiency" and "static advancement." However, as a liberal, I completely zone out when I hear anything that doesn't have to do with myself and my feelings. After all, what good are concepts like "time costs" when I'm trying to work out my Oedipal issues with my therapist? And so in my world, the sentimental issues rule! Why wouldn't I sew another rip in my torn up woobie? I wuv my woobie, and I don't want another one!

Seriously though, the point I'm not quite making is that the whole crux of the issue is that our consumerist instincts are overriding our sentimental instincts, and maybe that's not such a good thing. The little tidbit I mentioned about wanting to fix the light bulbs in my car when they burn out is a good example. I've seen the guy at the car place do it. It takes him about one minute to change a taillight, and he doesn't charge me a dime. It takes me closer to twenty minutes to do it myself, and that's not including the time it took to drive to Napa Auto Parts or whereever to buy a bulb, which costs a couple bucks at least. But I still want to do it myself, because I like feeling like I fixed something. So it's good for my emotional well-being. If I could fix more of my stuff, wouldn't it follow that I'd have something like that "I just built a computer" feeling more often... and wouldn't that be great for my mental health? To put it in Michael's terms, there's a value to the fixing that can't be measured in terms of costs, whether time or monetary. Or maybe it can... fixing stuff adds value to your life that you're willing to spend a significant time cost and a little bit of money on.

Musing: We're All Completely Useless

Recently I read an article in WIRED magazine about we've all lost the ability to fix stuff. The writer's point was that back in the day (and by "the day" I suppose I mean sometime around the 50s or 60s), your average run-of-the-mill American male, let's call him "Biff", had the ability to fix a lot of the stuff he owned. If the radio broke, Biff could open it up and do a little soldering. If the car broke down, Biff could pop the hood and do more than pretend he knew what he was looking at. Et cetera. Nowadays, if something breaks we do a simple calculation: suppose a is the amount it would cost to repair and b is the inverse of the amount we give a shit (as in, did I really like that toaster anyway?) and c is the cost of a new one. If a + b > c, we just throw the thing away and get a new one. (I'm completely paraphrasing. I don't remember there being any algebra in the article I read. Actually, now that I read back over the little equation I just described, I'm starting to think I got that all wrong. But you get the point anyway.) So this writer was working away with a soldering iron, bemoaning his complete lack of skills, as he struggled to make a clock out of a couple of voltmeters--one, to denote hours and the other, minutes.

Biff?

It reminded me of a conversation I had with my irritating roommate my freshman year of college. He was all worked up that he didn't know how to fix his computer. (Actually, that was my computer! That bastard didn't have one of his own, and he and his girlfriend were always using mine. What really pissed me off was when his girlfriend used to get frustrated at the game she was playing and bang on the keyboard. So I guess I should have been the one getting worked up that he didn't know how to fix the thing.) His feeling was that the cause of our inabilities was that everyone's job was becoming more and more specialized, so they were less and less likely to be able to perform more general tasks like Biff could. I'm not sure I really agree with that assessment. Or rather, the observation is probably valid, but I'm not sure I agree that it's the cause of my inability to fix my cordless drill.

Maybe the cause is that our stuff itself is getting more complicated, so that it requires too much knowledge to fix. But I don't think that's the case either. A radio is a radio, n'est-ce pas? Is it that our stuff is getting less "fixable"? That probably does have a lot to do with it. I've read a lot in the last few years about how many products are "made to break." Companies have been more accepting of the fact that it costs a lot more to maintain a repair division than it does to just replace their broken merchandise--especially since most consumers don't bother sending it back. Apple is a perfect example of that phenomenon. Remember that whole period when people were getting all worked up about how the batteries on their iPods were breaking? Apple responded that iPods had about a two- or three-year lifespan, so people shouldn't expect that they'll last longer than that. Really, they just realized that trying to fix all the broken ones would cost them more profit than just enduring the small bit of bad publicity and selling people a new iPod. (Because that's what an iPod user is forced to buy if they want a new mp3 player, once they realize they can't play all the music they downloaded from iTunes on anything else... but that's a whole other blog post, and this one is already looking like it's going to go on way too long.)

And if the stuff we buy is actually made to break, our inability to fix it is probably compounded by the fact that it was shitty to begin with. Why does everything have to be made of plastic these days? I'm sure it was much easier for Biff to fix his kid's RC car when the car was made out of metal parts. These days, you're lucky if you can get a damn RC car open without breaking it even more.

The last reason for this phenomenon that I can think of is that, like most of us tend to do, I'm totally idealizing the 50s and 60s. Maybe the whole idea that people were able to fix any of their mechanical stuff is just an idealization of a bygone era. But that would mean there actually is no Biff. And that would be no fun. So let's just forget that one.

I can say this: fixing complicated stuff is awesome. I built a computer last year, and these days that basically means pushing cards into other cards and using a screwdriver very sparingly. But still, the first time I turned it on, and it actually... WORKED!!!... I was so proud of it I nearly did a dance. Honestly, you'd think I was a prehistoric apeman discovering the miracle of fire. And I really get off on replacing the lightbulbs on my car myself when they burn out. Even though they'll do it for free at the shop. And more importantly, even though it's just a stupid lightbulb, not the carburetor. But for one short minute, I feel like Biff.

And I'll say one other thing: I would LOVE to have a double voltmeter clock. And a soldering iron.

Opinion: Idol, Week of 3.03

In my second post in a row inspired by crap television, I'll be kicking off what I hope is a recurring topic in my new blog. The subject can be best described thusly: "THIS... IS AMERICAN IDOL!!!!" Sadly, I've become hopelessly addicted to Idol this season in a way I never have before, which is surprising to me, since there are not very many cute girls, and the few there are aren't very good. But anyway...

After watching this weeks performances, here are my unsolicited opinions:

Kady Malloy and Luke Menard have GOT TO GO. And I won't miss Asia'h (WTF?) Epperson and Chikezie Easy.

My current favorites are Brooke White and David Cook.

Kristy Lee Cook would be very cute... if she wasn't so mannish.

On an unrelated note, I've realized now what the whole point of my blog is. I'm hoping to engage my friends (and maybe if I'm lucky, some friends of friends) in conversation about things I find interesting. So to that end, I'll fish around in the comment bag and pull out one lucky winner.... What do you know? It's Eric!... who was the only one who commented on the Prince Harry stuff. Thanks, Eric! Eric says: "I get the Drudge Report is basically a gossip site but I am very upset that they broke the story and have sworn it off for the time being."

I actually have never read the Drudge Report, so I admit to knowing very little about it. My impression of it, though, was that it was more political gossip than the usual celebrity stuff. Am I wrong about that? Either way, it's probably worth mentioning that the NYT reports that the information about Harry was first published by an Australian magazine and a German newspaper. Which would normally net the Drudge Report some sympathy votes in my book, except that Drudge's initial citing of these two sources was "almost immediately reneged and [Drudge] labeled the news a 'world exclusive.'"

Opinion: Prince Harry

After finishing yesterday's inaugural blog post, Marissa and I settled in to watch the episode of 20/20 we'd been DVRing. Just the fact that there was something interesting to watch on TV last night made it something of a banner evening. We even celebrated by ordering in some Thai food. Since I'm sure anyone reading is now green with envy at the thrilling life of glamor, action and international intrigue I lead, I'll quit my bragging.

Anyway, I actually don't like 20/20 very much, and I think Barbara Walters is bordering on insufferable. (Note to self: write a future blog post on the horror that is "The View".) But last night's episode was an "in-depth exclusive" on Britain's Royal Family. Apparently, 20/20's cameras were given "unprecedented access" into the lives of the Family (should this word be capitalized?) for a year. Mostly this was schlock, and my general opinions are as follows: Prince Charles is still a total dweeb, Camilla is even uglier and bears a remarkable resemblance to some of the Royal Family's horses, the queen is amusing when she gets irritated, Helen Mirren is an a fantastic actress who absolutely nailed her performance in last year's The Queen, and the diplomats and heads of state of Ghana are in dire need of some advice on fashion protocol (seriously, this one dude was wearing this traditional African robe thing that was slung over one shoulder, leaving his entire armpit exposed throughout an official state dinner at Buckingham Palace. I don't think I could have eaten.) Also, the fact that the British public keeps the Royals around is pretty unfathomable, considering they cost the taxpayers something in the neighborhood of $70 million a year.

The timing of this show though was interesting, coming just days after the revelation that Prince Harry, Charles's and Diana's son and third in the line of succession to the throne has been serving on the front lines in Afghanistan. If you've not been paying attention to this story, it goes something like this: Prince Harry completed his military training last year, and reportedly, he wanted to go serve in Iraq, but was not allowed to, since he and his fellow soldiers would have undoubtedly become a special target. For the last three months, he's been serving as a battlefield air controller in Afghanistan, with the full knowledge of the British press, who collectively agreed not to report on it at present, in return for getting open updates about his status, some interviews and video footage, etc., to report later on. Amazingly, this all held up until the Drudge Report published the secret last week. Harry has now been sent home, but he's said that he can't wait to get reassigned. If you want to read more about all this, go here.

I suppose this new development came too quickly for 20/20's producers to address it in much detail-- after all, they had a year's worth of "unprecedented access" that had probably already been cut and canned-- but Barbara did mention it near the end of the episode. It reminded me of something I'd been thinking about (actually two things, but the second is just that Prince Harry is obviously NOT Prince Charles's son. On "Real Time" last Friday they showed a picture of him next to Princess Diana's stableboy...). Since I heard about this story, it's struck me as somewhat amazing. I mean, here's a kid who has more money than God and can basically do whatever he wants with his life-- the Royal Family members are free to pursue whatever career they like, or spend their time doing charity work or whatever else a phenomenally wealthy Prince of the Empire might think up. And instead of finishing his military training and becoming some token officer in one of the armed forces, he actually angles to get on the front lines in a hot zone in the world and brokers a deal with a notoriously overeager press corps to ensure that he receives no special treatment at all. Apparently, his unit has come under fire on at least one occasion, and in all other ways is no different from any other serving in the field. When the news broke and the media finally descended on him, Harry admitted that he hadn't showered in four days. This just strikes me as an incredibly honorable and brave thing for a kid in his position to do, and I have a whole newfound respect for him and his stableboy dad.

[I'm about to get incredibly self-righteous, so you may want to stop reading if you've had a big lunch.]

This is especially true when seen from our point of view as Americans. How refreshing that in England, it's still looked at as honorable to serve your country as a normal soldier. Here in America, it's become a socially accepted fact of life that most children of privilege avoid military service, using any excuse available to them.

[Ugh, I'm starting to make my own skin crawl. I promise not to be so serious in the future.]

Post the first, in which I point some things out.

The thing is, I have no real reason for starting a blog. My friend Marty has been writing one since he left Chicago to pursue his cycling industry dreams in Milwaukee. My friend Tom has one that appears not to have been updated in several months (possibly since Marty left for Milwaukee, in an odd coincidence). And my girlfriend Marissa has one that hasn't been updated in at least the entire time I've known her. In fact, I know so little about Marissa's blog that I can't even link to it... so I suppose it's entirely possible that she's been secretly writing in it all along, perhaps weekly updates about the many challenges of spending serious amounts of time with me, only one of which is that I'm a know-it-all... but I doubt it. So it's not like my whole friend group consists of a bunch of netizens of the blogosphere, tap-tap-tapping their peer pressure so persistently that I just couldn't resist broadcasting my own deepest thoughts and dreams into the digital void.

[I find myself mildly amused by the way I keep qualifying all the names with labels like "my friend" and "my girlfriend" since I fully expect the audience of this rambling to consist of only my friends and my girlfriend who, of course, all know each other. But in the event that a Google search for "total jackass" sends some unwitting web surfer to my blog, and they are suddenly trapped under something heavy during a freak earthquake and can only stare, frustrated, at this ridiculousness, I'd like to give them some context.]

[I just ran a Google search for "total jackass". Sadly there was no link to this page. My favorite among the first page of results was a link to a video in which a group of people try to drive a Jeep up a steep rock. Hilarity ensues.]

My blog beginnings went something more like this: I had a free moment at work. No one had made their plays in my Scrabulous games. I thought, hmm, I think I'll start a blog. I spent the next twenty minutes agonizing over layouts and colors and fonts. Only now, four hours later, have I gotten to the serious business of actually posting anything. But now that I've brought up the layouts and colors and such, let me just point out how attractive my color combination is. Some other notes:

• "A Wintery Mix" is a phase meteorologists in Chicago, and presumably other northern cities, use to describe the phenomenon of precipitation when ground temperatures are near, or moving through, the freezing point. When this happens, it causes a delightful mix of rain, sleet, snow, and general depression to fall from the sky. We were supposed to get a wintery mix at some point today, and Marissa and I were comparing notes this morning about the weather information we'd both acquired in our separate preferred ways. (Note to self: write a future blog post about the total scam that is weather prediction.) As it happens the wintery mix, sadly, never came. We have hopes for tomorrow. Anyway, it sounded like a good name for a band, but I've decided to start a blog instead.
• To the left, you'll notice links to some blogs. Hopefully I'll add some more so I don't seem like such a friendless loser, but at present, there is only: transplanted.chicagoan which is Marty's blog (this qualifier is directed at the poor web surfer trapped under something heavy); tdope, which is Tom's ancient history; and My Old Kentucky Blog, which is my favorite music blog.
• As my need to spew unsolicited opinions at total strangers was reaching a boiling point, I joined Yelp a few weeks ago and started reviewing restaurants and other businesses. Since it makes me feel more self-important to imagine that someone reading this may want to read that, I put that little flash applet on this page. Also, that constantly updating, animated, customizable little window was just too cool to pass up.
• For those of you reading this who don't know (which is exactly none of you) I organize a meetup.com group. We see indie rock bands at local venues. You can click on the link to check it out, and I hope you do. But seeing how the Meetup badge is so phenomenally ugly, especially compared to the sweet Yelp applet above it, I may give it the boot and replace it with an old fashioned link. (Seriously, you can't even customize the background to get rid of those heinous white corners. Dudes at Meetup... get with the program!)

So there you are. It's George's blog. Let the angels rejoice.