Ducks always fly in a V.

Ducks and geese migrate in a V-formation.  One bird flies in the front and the rest follow forming the lines of the V.  By doing this, they split the work of flying a long distance.  The first bird in the formation takes all the force of the wind resistance, but in doing so, it breaks the wind flow behind it, making it easier for the other birds to follow.  Without the wind resistance, they have much less to fight against to make the long journey every winter and spring.

I was also once told that whenever one of the birds is injured or tired, it will find a place to land and one of the other birds from the formation will stay with it until it is rested or healed.  It will protect the injured bird, help it get food and be there for it in any other way it can.  Then, together the two birds will again take flight and help each other continue on their long trip.  It’s a great system.  No bird is ever on its own.  There’s always help to fly straight and far.  There’s always protection.  There’s always the presence of another to communicate with.

This morning as I was getting into my truck, I heard a haronk.  I looked up to expecting to see a V fly overhead.  Instead, I saw a single goose flying overhead with great intensity.  I can only imagine it stayed behind to help an injured friend only to watch its friend die and be left alone to fend for itself.  That was definitely a sad way to start the day.

Password Protection

I’ve just posted my first password protected entry.  You can ask about the password if you want, but don’t hold your breath.  There are only a couple of reasons that I will password protect entries.

The first is that the entry contains my private thoughts that I do not wish to make public.  It could be a fleeting thought.  It could be something that I want to record for my own benefit but not have word get out.  (Maybe I’m a closet Duke fan, or more likely something actually believable.)  It could be that I am planning something and want to have it recorded for later public release but intend to keep to myself for the time being.

The second is that the entry contains information that was given to me in confidence that I do not want the entire blogging community and facebook community to find out about.  In this case, I will likely not use names even inside the post, but I also do not want the information available to the general public for them to question me about it.

Now that I’ve said that, you can ask for the password if you want to, but don’t expect a reply.  It’s nothing personal if you don’t get it.  Keep in mind that everyone who asks will probably get less of a reply than even a “No.  Thanks for asking.”  If I do put a password on an entry, I’ll try to post another so you don’t feel too bad about not getting to read my lovely writing.  Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

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Avatar

I saw Dances With Wolves Avatar last night.  It was better with Kevin Costner 20 years ago.  Has it really been that long?

Anyway.  Avatar did have amazing visuals and effects.  James Cameron is good at that.  In fact, that was probably the best part of Titanic.  The movie looks amazing.  The acting was good.  The story has been done: Dances With Wolves, The Last Samurai, which I can’t believe I watched.  I’ve even seen the visuals before.  Floating mountains have appeared in numerous video games, as well as at least one movie, whose name escapes me.  The planet looked like Fern Gully.  The creatures were straight out of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter-Martian series of books as well as the Resident Evil games and movies.  The exo-skeletal suits for the marines looked exactly like Uller battle mechs from the BattleTech and MechWarrior games, and they are supposed to be piloted the same way.  Yes, I realize that none of you have a clue what I’m talking about with that last one, but that’s not the point.

Granted, it’s nearly impossible to come up with completely new ideas for a movie.  Cameron made everything in the movie amazing to look at.  The political themes in the movie were easily pushed aside.  Yes, the movie is about destruction of the environment for economic pursuits.  Yes, the movie is about the lack of respect for other cultures.  Yes, the movie is about how militaristic conquest is bad.  It’s actually pretty easy to push all that aside, even though Cameron tried his best to bring it forward every five minutes, to enjoy a fairly entertaining if not long movie.

I won’t say it was a great movie or that it was some kind of masterpiece.  It was a decent movie, and it was pretty to look at.  It did not come close to being as good as the hype.  It was not as good as Titanic, the other decent yet over-hyped James Cameron epic movie.  What Avatar really left me with was an opinion that James Cameron would be a pretty good film maker if he could tell a story in less than three hours.  It’s really not his fault that everyone declares him to be so great, when he really is not.  Good.  Not great.  Me?  Yeah.  I’d be downright awful, so I’m going to shut up now.

You spin me like a record.

I’ve had a song in my head for the past few days.  I won’t go so far as to say it was stuck there, but it was a featured song in the soundtrack to my mind.  The song: Right Round.  The artist: Flo Rida and Ke$ha.  The reason: It seems to be all over the place, particularly in movies and television right now.  In fact, I’ve heard it so much that I was starting to think I had gone crazy thinking the original lyrics didn’t include “When you go down, when you go down, down.”  Last night, I finally broke down and looked up the song, and it turns out I wasn’t [as] crazy [as I thought] after all.  I managed to find the original lyrics with the record from 1984.  Not only did I find that, but I found a glam-rock video to go with it!

The new version does have a slightly catchier back-beat and music.  I also think Ke$ha has a great voice, even if she got a bit ahead of herself with her name.  At least Prince had the decency to be huge before he had a symbol for a name!

That was my thought for the day.  My brain is shutting down now.

premie

Apparently, I let the cat out of the bag before I had actually intended to.  I was going to wait until I had something actually worth mentioning in here before I linked it to facebook and let everyone know about it.  I was planning on getting all the formatting that I wanted in place before then as well.  It appears that when you leave yourself logged into wordpress and comment on someone else’s blog, it leaves a tag.  Congratulations to Val for being my first visitor!  As your prize, I will take you out for a round of frisbee golf if it ever gets warm.  As for the rest of you, you’ve probably got another couple of days before I post the link, so :-P.

Sherlock Holmes

I braved the ice and snow (Yes, it’s still on the ground and to a much lesser extent, roads.) to see Sherlock Holmes yesterday.  I admit that I’ve only read The Hound of the Baskervilles, and it has been quite some time ago.  In fact, it has been so long, that all I remember is something about smoking a pipe.  Nevertheless, I went to see the movie and found it to be entertaining, if not a bit action-oriented.  It was kind of like Adrian Monk meets James Bond.  The bits where it shows precisely what will happen before it happened were annoying, although it did show a well thought-out plan.

I have a feeling that I appreciated the Victorian British mannerisms much more than the average movie-goer due to my reenacting.  I recognized proper behavior and often Holmes’ lack of it, much to my delight.  Also, due to my ability to slip into a Victorian mindset for reenacting, I probably got more enjoyment out of Rachel McAdams than the director probably intended.  I never caught the actual date in the film, but based on clothing and references made, I would place in the 1860-1890 range.  During this time, it was completely inappropriate for women to wear trousers.  Trousers showed the shape of a woman’s leg and also exposed her ankles, which was likely to make men randy.  In fact, assumptions could be made about the lifestyle or occupation of women who dressed like that.  I do completely understand the reason for putting Ms. McAdams in pants though.  It is probably quite difficult to run, jump and fall in a dress without hurting or exposing yourself to the unwanted gazes of the crew, those filthy gaffers and best boys!

Sherlock Holmes was far from a masterpiece, but it was quite entertaining and somewhat more intelligent than your typical summer action movie.  I’d probably still wait for it to come out on tv to see it.  I don’t think the editing will cut much out for the networks.  I’m definitely looking forward to Mr. Downey’s Iron Man 2 this summer even more now.

New year. New blog.

This is it!  I’m going public.  I’ve been thinking about it since a real and blogging friend of mine went public and I figured I couldn’t hide much longer.  My response is this: a brand new blog for a brand new year.   I have lots to say, and now people will have an easier time finding out what it is.  There will probably be disclaimers forthcoming, but for now I’ll just say that the views posted here reflect only what I’m thinking at the moment and may change at any time without warning and likely without a posted update.