CLINTON ERA PENTAGON WANTED BOMB THAT MAKES YOU GAY

Holeee crap, this is funny and it's GOT to be a mistake. I think DemocracyNow.org has messed up on who they get their news from. Check out this from [http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/12/1415220|their headlines] today:

Pentagon Considered Building "Gay Bomb"

Meanwhile the Pentagon has confirmed it once considered building a chemical weapon that could turn enemy soldiers into homosexuals and make them more interested in sex than fighting. Newly declassified documents show the Ohio Air Force lab asked for $7.5 million in 1994 to develop a so-called "gay bomb."

I didn't know Viagra started out as a DARPA program! ;)

Someone tell me this is not true--I don't have time to research it--but it's GOT to be from The Onion... I hope!

UPDATE 6/13/7: IT'S TRUE. Check out this link for more info from a mainstream news source:

http://cbs5.com/topstories/local_story_159222541.html

CHINA SUFFERS FROM MASSIVE POLUTION

Don't let it be said that I only bag on America. It seems that my theory about China being "America without the morals" isn't the whole story--they're "America without the morals nor the clean air" which is a little frightening seeing as the US of A isn't exactly a poster child for pollution-free environment. [http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSPEK14476720070612?feedType=RSS&rpc=22|A June 11, 2007 article] from Reuters.com reports that:

Nearly two-thirds of Chinese cities suffered from air pollution last year and had no centralized sewage treatment facilities, state media reported on Tuesday.

Only 37.6 percent of 585 cities surveyed had air quality "indicating a clean and healthy environment," down 7.3 percentage points from 2005, the China Daily said, citing a report by the State Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA).

Thirty-nine cities, many scattered across the northern coal-rich province of Shanxi and China's northeastern rustbelt province of Liaoning, suffered "severe" air pollution, the paper said.

"The report also found that the ratio of quality water in the major urban areas, either for drinking or industrial use, had dropped by 7.24 percent," the paper said.

Two hundred cities had no "centralized sewage management system" and 187 had no garbage disposal plants, it said.

...

The report comes as the capital Beijing on Tuesday was shrouded in thick smog, which local media said was exacerbated by smoke blown into the city from crop burning in neighboring provinces.

On Monday night, an index measuring air pollution from Beijing's southern Daxing county read over 850 particles of "particulate matter" per square meter, which was eight times the norm, the Beijing News said.

Wow...

Then again, maybe the US can learn something since this quite negative news comes from China's state-run media. A generally amoral government (think: legal prison labor, legal buying/selling human organs, etc.) essentially tells it's people it's done a rotten job of regulating against pollution. That's a far cry from a government that lied to 911 rescue workers and told them that the air they were breathing was safe. That's a far cry from a government that did virtually nothing for Louisiana during the build up and even much of the aftermath of Katrina.

Sure, I'm still damn glad to live in America, but our media and our government could be more upfront and honest like the, ugh, like the Chinese.

Mind you, I've got nothing against the Chinese people. Of course, I do wish they would exert more pull over their government to make some moral choices, but I don't feel like I'm in a place to criticize the Chinese too much when my fellow Americans fail to lift an effective finger after two apparent fixed elections, our government fails to protect us against 911 and Katrina and getting us in to two wars that have only made the world more dangerous.

It's less a problem I have with America or China as it is a problem I have with humanity.

Project365 day 162

Project365 day 162 2007 06 11, originally uploaded by thepetecom.

A profile shot... sort of....



Actually, this was an accidental shot. I didn't even notice the iSight on

my lappie took it.

SWAMPED AS USUAL

Ok, sorry for the lack of posts since last week but things have been busy and hectic. Friday night was my bday dinner with my best friends here in LA. We went to Skooby's and then Beard Papa--the evening was awesome! The only thing that would have made the night better is if we has seen a movie, but alas, it took so long for us all to get into Hollywood that before we knew it midnight was rolling around and believe it or not LA gets pretty damn chilly that time of night.

Then on Saturday I woke up thinking I had to meet my writer-friend Chris in H'wood only to remember he was out of town. So, I spent the day cleaning up the homecube (still not done) and transferring more MST3K episodes to DVD--I used to think this was a never ending project, but I'm almost out of Joel episodes! MST fans will know what that means. For those that don't, it means that I'm more than half-way through the series.

The other thing I did with my Saturday was FINALLY start my screenplay for ScriptFrenzy.org. I'm over a week late, but when it comes to scripts, I'm pretty cocky comfy with the plan to finish by June 3. I wrote 18 pages on Saturday with a personal goal of 120 pages total. But I'm really excited about this script since it's a redo of an unfinished script I started years ago. Starting over from scratch was a great idea because this time 'round things are pushed much further. This, in turn, helps me stay excited to keep writing, as opposed to what happened with the first attempt at this story.

Then on Sunday I slept WAY in, waking up at 11:30am, of course I was up until 4am writing, so don't think that I'm some lazy bum. :) After that - did some more homecube cleaning, some more VHS-to-DVD dubbing and then hit Trader Joe's for some groceries. Once that was done it was a quick dinner and off to see the new Satoshi Kon anime movie at the new Landmark theater at the Westside Pavillion mall just minutes from my home.

Sadly, the movie kind of sucked, which is a shame since Kon's last two movies, Millennium Actress and Tokyo Godfathers were really wonderful, well-made films. Paprika, his latest just didn't do it for me. Watch for a Pocket Review in the next day or so.

I think that's enough for one weekend! Now back to that screenplay! (And maybe some blogging after that!)

Project365 day 161

Project365 day 161 2007 06 10, originally uploaded by thepetecom.

Me, continuing the positive and uplifting "Thumbs Up" series of photos.

Project365 day 160 2007 06 09

Project365 day 160 2007 06 09, originally uploaded by thepetecom.

What else do you do the night after your birthday celebration aside from

color your hair? You can't see it here, but I'm even MORE blond now!!

WAHOO!!!

Project365 day 159 2007 06 08

Project365 day 159 2007 06 08, originally uploaded by thepetecom.

Here's me and my very close friend MandarinDeli showing off how much we think alike. :) Of course, her shoes are legit Chuck Taylors made in a sweatshop in Asia while mine are imitation Chucks made by an unionized Asian sweatshop. They still get paid peanuts but they can take bathroom breaks. :)

This photo was taken the night of my birthday shindig, at Beard Papa while we all enjoyed oishiiyo (very delicious) pastries made with a recipe from Japan. It was my birthday party, so I was off my anti-sugar diet. :)

This photo was taken by the brilliant photographer Todd Sternisha. Check out the other pics from this event here:
flickr.com/photos/sternisha/sets/72157600405092058/

Thanks for shooting, Todd!!

SANJURO (1963)

[asin: B000K0YM0O]

Positive Experience/Entertaining? SUBARASHI DES! That's Japanese for "IT'S FANTASTIC!"


Technically any good? The writers really understood that in a sequel (this is a sequel to YOJIMBO) you have to give the audience something familiar but but change things some how to keep things interesting. While there are new challenges facing Sanjuro, he actually kind of has an easier time of it this time 'round so the story doesn't feel as intense. However, what the film loses in intensity it gains in emotional resonance. There was something more desperate with Sanjuro as a character. He seemed more regretful regarding the violence. I liked this and made me care about him and the people who followed his example. In short, the acting is as strong as you'd expect from Mifune and everything else was as strong as you'd expect from a Kurosawa film. Oh yeah and there's actual blood in this movie.


How did it leave me feeling? Definitely satisfied and even a little teary-eyed. It's always cool when characters not only evolve but help evolve the world around them, too. This movie does that.


Final Rating? SIYL - See If You Like - It's still a samurai movie and, like I said, there's actually blood in this one so some of the killing is even more brutal than in other Kurosawa films.

Click the poster image above to buy this movie on DVD or buy it with it's prequel YOJIMBO!

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA EVENT AT THE CINERAMA DOME

OK, yesterday was a pretty cool birthday as far as birthdays go. Almost by accident TheWife stumbled upon an ad in Backstage West for something called "Battlestar Galactica All Access Event". Well, we're both huge fans of the incredibly well written show so we were definitely interested in checking it out since, the ad explained, there would be stars from the show there to answer questions and the two main producers of the show, Ron Moore and David Eick. So, as a fan and a professional, I was gung-ho to go. They were also going to run some sort of footage on the big screen. The only catch was that just the first 500 would be allowed in.

This made me uneasy. Great, I get to sit in a line and possibly not even get in on my birthday.

While I used to be fine with being a rabid fanboy, standing in lines for hours (4.5 just to get Phantom Menace tickets and another 8 to get in the night of), maybe it's my birthday or maybe "fandom" has grown tiresome. In short, I almost didn't make the trip into Hollywood. On a literal whim today at around 2pm I thought to myself "Well, it's either Paprika, the new anime film from Satoshi Kon (director of Millennium Actress and Tokyo Godfathers) or possibly a wasted afternoon/evening in H'wood OR possibly a blast seeing actors and producers I respect and some BSG on the big screen. Screw it, let's take a bus ride!"

I hope I'm not the only person who refers to himself as a separate person...

Anyway, so I make the trek and get there around 3:30pm to see probably only 80 or 90 people in line. Or it could have been close to 200--I'm terrible at estimating--all that matters is that it was nothing like 500, so I decided that I'd get in. I snapped a quick pic on my phone (see above) and thought about pulling out my laptop to start work on a screenplay I was supposed to start on June 1 (see: ScriptFrenzy.org). However, there are these fountains at the Dome now that spritz water on you when the wind blows and didn't want to subject my new lappie to such moist torture. So, I stood around and hoped that TheWife would join me soon.

Before she did, the folks sponsoring the screening (the SciFi channel, I believe) had this dude who was trying to get the crowd fired up. He held a little trivia contest and gave the winners all T-shirts. Of course, this was kind of a waste of time since:

1) We all got free the same T-shirts just for showing up.

2) We're Battlestar Galactica fans, not Trekkies. Trivia? Contests? Free prizes? We like good story, character and drama. I knew this judgment was accurate when I saw the very lukewarm response from the crowd (certainly lukewarm compared to the responses I remember before my retirement from Trekkie-dom).

Still, I do like my free T-shirt--it says in tiny, red print on the front "Frak Off". BSG fans will get what that means.

So, then we go in, watch the season 3 finale on the big screen (which was pretty cool) and then got to see Katee Sackhoff (Starbuck), Jamie Bamber (Apollo), Mary McDonnell (Roslin), Edward "Eddie" James Olmos (Adama), David Eick (exec producer), Ron Moore (exec-producer/writer), and Lucy Lawless (one of the cylons) talk about the show and answer questions. They did run a preview of the new mini-series/2 hour special (not sure what it is) Battlestar Galactica: Razor which will air in November.

The Q&A was brilliant--they're all smart, sharp actors and of course, Ron Moore talking is enough for me to want to listen. The guy wrote some of the best eps of Next Gen and his stuff is even more brilliant on BSG. The clip was a bit of a let down as it wasn't for the new season of BSG--after the season 3 cliffhanger, I want to know what's going to happen in the new season, damn it!

Still, it was a great and special evening for my birthday and I felt lucky to have known about the event at all, let alone have gotten into it.

I think the show is really great, in case you hadn't noticed. If you haven't watched it, I highly recommend Netflixing the DVDs and get watching. I've got most of the series on my iPod and when I've got nothing else to do or watch, I'll put on an ep.

Oh and James Callis (who wasn't there but plays Baltar) makes me want to be an actor soooo bad.

He's enough to make me want to fool myself into thinking I have some talent in that arena... :)

I took some other pics at the event and will post them in the next day or two.

ALL THIS AND WORLD WAR II (1976)

Positive Experience/Entertaining? Generally, I'd say yes. Sadly, this is one of those movie that sounds so much better in theory, but finding a person to execute the story who can really make a movie like this that reaches it's potential is hard, and in this case, it didn't happen.


Technically any good? This film is simply a long sequence of World War II movies and stock footage cut together with Beatles cover songs slapped on top of it. In only very rare occasions does the movie actually take advantage of its own cinematic structure and make commentary--even silly commentary. It's a real shame this film wasn't better because the idea was so strong. However, not only did the director fail to make more than a few real comments on anything, the film ends up being pro-American propaganda. It completely ignores any footage from Dresden and shows a single atomic explosion so we see nothing about Japan.


How did it leave me feeling? VERY disappointed. I can only recommend this film to total cinema/history buffs. Sorry, but it's really not worth it.


Final Rating? NFI - NetFlix It - Again, only if you're passionate for movies and/or history. Actually, I'm not even sure it's on DVD. :(