More Green Power Wonderings.

Recently, I have read several articles about power-generating "ivy" and I think this idea is fascinating, and possibly brilliant.

The applications of new, greener power systems feel limitless. Reading about this, about the idea of generating power from rain and about any number of similar initiatives give me hope that we can one day have cheap, renewable energy. Cheap, at least, once economies of scale start driving down the the costs of the items required to capture this energy.

In an earlier post, I touched on piezoelectric roads, and mentioned that I was concerned about increased fuel consumption on those roads. Here is an interesting alternative - a giant network of solar panels - cleverly disguised as streets! It's amazing what advancements in areas of materials manufacture have done for green energy initiatives. Glass roads that can be driven on, and actually have even better traction than asphalt. Even in the rain! (It doesn't hurt that the Brusaws - inventors of Solar Roads have a quote from Walt Disney on the www.solarroads.com home page, either.)

It's a fascinating world we live in, and we should all be doing our part to keep it going for as long as possible. Think about it - generating power from things that are currently just contributing to universal entropy. What an amazing idea that is, and how worth striving for.

The 4th Edition

So, I have finally gotten around to picking up Dungeons & Dragons, 4th edition. I am still running a D&D 3.5 campaign, which has been going strong for over a year. I've been playing since... let's see... the late 70's, not long after Advanced Dungeons & Dragons was introduced. So, I have seen a lot of versions. Below are some very preliminary thoughts on the basics of the system. There will be more entries related to this, and they will go into more detail. 

This one is interesting. There are things that I think are steps in a positive direction, and some I do not like. I really like the fact that they are encouraging a point-based system for character creation, at least as far as stats go. Since the beginning of the game, too much of how good your character ended up being was dependant on the luck of those first rolls. Similarly, giving every class standard hit points at each level makes creating characters along a certain concept easier. No longer will your fighter fall down easily due to a couple of bad hit point rolls. You can conclusively predict how many hit points he will have at each level going forward. 

However, they have completely changed the magic system, which was one of the things that always made D&D relatively unique. I think that the current system (abilities that can be used at will, once per encounter or once per day) is strong in some ways, but feels less like the D&D that I always enjoyed playing. Not to say that this system destroys D&D as a game, but for those of us who have been playing for years, it makes it feel less like the system that brought many of us into the RPG hobby. 

Another change that is interesting and has pluses and minuses is the idea of all rolling happening by the acting character/object. In the old days of D&D, you used to cast a Fireball, and everyone in the area had to make a saving throw to avoid taking some of the damage, then you rolled dice to determine that damage. In the new system, rather than those in the area making a defensive roll, they all have defensive ratings based on their attributes, and you have to beat those ratings with your attack roll. Quite often, for area-based effects, you still do partial damage on a miss, as long as your target is in the area of effect. This is interesting, and has a real strength in that it lets the players determine the results of their own actions. It also has a couple of drawbacks - again, it feels a little less like D&D, also, it means that when you cross an oil slick, rather than you making a roll to keep your feet, the oil slick makes an "attack roll" to try to make you fall. There is a little bit of a weird mind set there - the oil attacks you? Lastly, as a long time DM, it makes it harder for me to cheat. 

As anyone who runs these games knows, sometimes battles don't go the way they "should." Whether that means that an encounter that was not supposed to be challenging for the Players is about to kill them all, or that an encounter that was supposed to be climactic conflict is about to go south, because despite having an 80% chance to resist the spell that a player just cast on them, all of the big bad's 10 henchmen managed to fail the save. This is the kind of time where as a GM, I will cheat (often called "fudging" when the GM does it). Either for or against the players, depending on the situation, and what I think tells the best story. With this new system, it is harder to do so. The players are responsible for the resolution of their actions, with no stop-gap measure for me to adjust things accordingly. I haven't written any adventures for 4th edition yet, so I have no idea if it is easier to balance things so those things are less likely to happen or not. 

I'll keep you posted.

Power-Generating Roads

Okay, another try at blogging. I'm not going to promise to keep this updated as much as I would like, but I'll be trying.

Recently, I have been fascinated with piezoelectric materials (materials which generate electricity when deformed, or alternately deform when electricity is applied to them - follow the link for more detail) and with heel-strike generators (which is a broader term covering both piezoelectric and more traditional mechanical harnessing of the movement of people) as ways of harnessing the power that people naturally put out through their day. Due to this, I was fascinated when a story about Israel converting 100 meters (110 yards for those not fluent in metric) of highway to a piezoelectric generator arrived in my inbox.

This is a really fascinating possibility for harnessing existing traffic into a useful source of power, but it has a couple of downsides in my not-so-humble opinion. The first is that this could very easily increase the energy required to travel over this section of highway, which means that we are turning a relatively scarce resource (gasoline) into something that we have many other ways to generate, many of which are already clean. Sure, the idea is that it is incidentally generated, but that becomes less true if we increase gasoline consumption to generate the power. The second issue is that I think it is fundamentally irresponsible to become more dependent on people driving, at least until hybrids and electrical cars are the rule rather than the exception.

That said, the possibilities of these materials seem practically limitless, including to be used in areas of high pedestrian traffic (running a subway system from the energy of its passengers? Las Vegas casinos running from the power of all the people walking their floors? Dance clubs powering themselves with the energy of dancers?) and perhaps even to power electrical cars, or NEVs within smaller communities. In that case, where we would have electrical vehicles powering themselves, even if they get a little less mileage, it seems to be a very powerful tool. 

I know that I am looking forward to the results of this test. 

Long time, no post.

Okay, so I haven't posted for a while. Sue me.

I went fishing yesterday. Really fishing. Deep sea fishing. I was further out into the ocean than I have ever been on an ocean-going vessel before. Maybe 60 miles (round that off to 100 kilometers for my Canadian friends) from land. We were hoping to hit Snapper or Grouper. We didn't. A few people on the "party boat" we were on did, but still nothing huge. I did catch a grouper, but it was way below the legal limit, and I had to throw it back. I caught a Ruby Red as well, and used it as bait, but it caught nothing. I enjoyed the experience. I might do it again, but not in a rush.

I also got sunburned. Not badly, but unevenly. The left side of my body took much more than the right, because that is the side that was facing the sun for the hour-and-change ride back in from the fishing spots.

I also learned that there can be some really irritating people on fishing party boats. There was one guy on the boat who was trying to sound like an authority on everything. He, unfortunately, did catch something - a 20.5" Red Snapper - .5" over the legal limit. He even looked like an idiot bringing it in. Rather than bracing his pole against one of his hips, he had it braced against his crotch, just above his junk. And he was pretty much doubled over. And his buddy had to help him. It was sad, and of course, on the way back in, I had trouble blocking out his commentary on catching it. Like he was the great hunter, catching a fish that just barely didn't ahve to be thrown back.

Still, the company was good (I went with my boss, Steve, with whom I get along very well), and being out on the ocean was fun. This is the kind of thing I wanted to try when I came down to Florida. I'm glad I got to. And now?

I'm off to get ready for a visit down here from my wife.

Settling anew and some complications therewith

Okay, so I am starting to feel settled in my new apartment (I've been living there 3 weeks as of today) but for the fact that my mattress hasn't been delivered yet. I'm still sleeping on my couch.
That is expected in 2 weeks, I believe. Or it might be 3. Doesn't really matter, this couch is comfy enough to hold me that long, and it has a nice cover on it, so it isn't even non-hygenic for me to be sleeping there.
I should also mention, before I go to far, that my apartment complex is under construction right now - they are doing improvements to the outside of the building. Which is nice, but has the somewhat negative side-effect of none of the apartments having numbers on the outside wall right now. I'm in building 4, and while the building number is clearly on the building, I can see how one might have trouble locating my apartment. This, and the fact that I do not yet have a home phone (more on that later) add to the feeling taht I am not completely settled.
I also don't have a dresser yet. Which is okay, I have a big closet (or two) and lots of hangers. (And a shelf above the hanger bar in both closets for underwear and socks, and things that don't hang well) but this is a little less convenient than a dresser. I don't have a proper entertainment centre, either, but a few 5 foot long 2X8's and some bricks are handling that quite nicely.
So, it doesn't quite feel entirely like home yet, kind of like I am still floating a bit, but that feeling is dissipating day by day, as I do all the normal menial tasks, like cooking meals, taking out garbage and doing laundry.
At least I do have a computer desk, with internet connection working now. Getting that internet connection was a pain. Down here, there is one company (Brighthouse, who I understand is a WB subsidiary) who offers cable and internet packages. I chose to go with Earthlink as my ISP (it really doesn't matter - I am going to stick with gmail as my e-mail address, so any of the three they offer will work. I just knew I wasn't going with AOL) and also ordered HBO and Cinemax. After the first Birghthouse-contracted tech (who arrived on time, at the very beginning of his 3-hour window, much to my shock, coming from Toronto, where such a thing is unheard of) got done, I checked my internet and watched some TV. A little later in the day, I realized that my digital channels (HBO and Cinemax) were not working. I e-mailed Brighthouse and got an appointment set up for the next day.
That technician (a different one) arrived (on time again!) and installed a booster right where the cable came into my house - before the cable modem. The digital channels looked good. I'd be able to watch movies and such to my heart's content. Unfortunately, he made a little mistake when installing the booster, and blew my cable modem. Not a big deal, he had another one in the truck. He went and got it, and installed it, and we still couldn't get a connection. So, he called in to the office, to get them to send a clearing signal to my modem, at which time they informed him that there was an enormous outage in the Brighthouse network.
Okay, I had to go out anyway, so I told him "that's fine, I can just check it out later when I get home." I got home kind of late that night, so I didn't check it that night, but did look in the computer room and noticed that the modem was off, which was not how I had left it.
The next morning, Tuesday, I hooked it up. It worked. Yay! 10 minutes later or so, however, the modem shut off. I reset it, and it lasted about 6 minutes this time.
I went in to work, and e-mailed the nature of the issue to Brighthouse, asking them to set up an appointment for the following Sunday, between 8am and 11am to come replace the modem. I told them at the time "I have no home phone right now, so don't bother calling ahead - the last number you have on record for me is a hotel I was staying at." They replied, and the appointment was set. Keep in mind as you read the entries below that each time I spoke to someone, or e-mailed them I explained the problem: the modem shuts itself off after a brief period of connectivity.
Flash forward to Sunday, 7:30 AM. I put an 11X17 piece of paper in my windown that said, "Brighthouse, this is Apartment 4-11" with an arrow pointing to the door (just in case they were unsure of which apartment the window belonged to.
Flash forward again to Sunday at 12:15 pm. I am at the local Publix grocery store, on a pay phone. "Hi, I was supposed to have an appointment between 8 and 11, and the tech never showed up."
"OK, let's see what happened there. Hmmm... it says he called and the number wasn't valid."
"Yes, I mentioned in my e-mail when placing the original call that I didn't have a home phone, and there would be no point in calling ahead."
"Oh, ok. It also says there were no numbers on the building so he couldn't find the apartment."
"Then he missed the 11 by 17 inch sign in the window?" I said it with only a touch of irony - I wasn't really mad here, just a little irritated, as I did have other things to do.
"I guess he must have."
"Okay, so what do we do about this?"
"Well, let me talk to my supervisor."
"Sure. Thanks."
... On Hold ...
"Sir? My Supervisor put you in the 'All Day' queue."
"Which means what?"
"It means that there will be a technician there before 6pm."
"Well... okay. I guess that'll have to do. Thanks."
"Is there any thing else I can do for you sir?"
"Nope. Thanks."

So, I head back to my house to wait, but also put another sign up in another window. Now, it was a pretty windy day, and I had no tape in the apartment, so it was clear to me I couldn't take my preferred solution - to put a big sign up on the door. And I didn't dare go out and buy tape - I might miss them.
Okay, now it is 6:20 and I am back on the same pay phone.
"It appears that the tech cancelled the appointment."
"I... see. And why did he do that?"
"Well, he tried to call and..."
"Yeah. Can I speak to your supervisor please?"
"Sure."

So, then I am online with a supervisor - a nice guy, who seemed to genuinely feel bad that I was stuck in my house for 10 hours waiting for a tech that never showed up.

"Okay, I will put you at the very top of tomorrow's 8am timeslot."
"With a note to not bother calling, since there is no home phone, and will not be until I am done with this issue, since I am going to be using VOIP?"
"Yes."
"Okay, thanks."

Flash forward to 11:15 the next morning, finding me at the same pay phone. (I waited that long, because I figured these techs might sometimes re-arrange their load to make their time more efficient.)

"Yeah, still no tech." This to another supervisor - I was too mad at this point to deal with another front-line person - they didn't get paid enough to put up with me at this point.
"Hmmm... let's see here... he cancelled the appointment."
"Let me guess, he didn't notice the note not to bother calling, tried to call and the nubmer was invalid, then he came by, failed to notice the two 11X17 signs in the windows saying what apartment it was, couldn't find the apartment and so cancelled it."
"Ummm... yes, that's what it looks like."
"Okay, so what are you going to do about this?"
"Well, I could put you on top of the list for tomorrow morning..."
"I work tomorrow. And, now, put yourself in my shoes. Despite the fact that last weekend, two techs were able to find my apartment, this appointment has been cancelled three time in two days because the tech cannot find it. If you were me, do you think going for 4 times in 3 days is the best solution?"
"Well, no..."
"So you're telling me that I will be another week without internet because you people can't replace a modem?"
"Sir, if you'd like, you can go to a Brighthouse office, and they will replace your modem."
"I'm sorry, what?"
"If you are sure it is the modem, you can just take your current modem into one of our offices, and they'll replace it on the spot."
"Where is the nearest office?"
"Given your address, there is one at (names location less than 10 minutes away)."
"Okay. At this point, I would love to go over there, and spare myself another 13 hours of sitting around waiting for a technician to not show up."
"And I've also credited your account with a $20 credit because the tech was late."
"What are you're office's hours?"
"They're open until 5:30 today" there was a note of surprise or something in his voice - I think he actually expected me to be greatful at this point that they had just paid me a little less than $1.54 an hour to wait for them.

Half an hour later, I had reliable internet access. And only 5.5 days longer than it should have taken!

Now to figure out why Vonage hasn't delivered their adaptor to me yet.

Nice Neighbourhood

So... I think I saw a guy using the hotel I am staying in as a no-tell motel last night. He was complaining that the Days Inn up the street wouldn't let him rent there because he is a local. When I walked into the office, he was with a reasonably attractive woman, who was wearing a fairly revealing top. Thing is, that's not uncommon down here. Quite the opposite, in fact. You see, it's hot. Men wear wife beaters, and so do their wives. So, really the only reason that I suspect this is that buddy (who was wearing a wife beater) was renting a room at a cheap-ish motel, paying in cash, and seemed to know renting motel rooms pretty well, since when he was telling me that the other day, he couldn't get a motel room from the Days Inn which was weird, as he had been rented one from the woman who runs the place a couple of days earlier.

And, of course, the first night I got in, I went for a little drive to get to know the area, and saw a prostitue who actually hailed me like I was a cab. As you might guess, I didn't head over. Now, this wasn't the same girl (I didn't get a good look at either, but one was black and the other white, so I'm pretty sure) but there is certainly evidence that such goings on happen in the neighbourhood I am currently living in.

The area I am moving to is supposed to be nicer, though. After all, it is right on a private golf course. And there are no cheap motels right in the area. The only thing in the area other than the golf course of note is the Middle School. So, I am looking forward to this weekend's move for several reasons.

I also went to see a movie yesterday - Cry_Wolf. Not the greatest movie ever made, but if you like horror movies, certainly not bad either. I'm also a little bit of a fan of Lindy Booth. If you ever watched Relic Hunter, where Tia Carrere did her best Lara Croft impression, you might know her as the secretary Claudia, although she was replaced in the last season by Tanya Reichert, a woman who may be more what some think of when they hear beautiful, but who I didn't find had the personality that Lindy did. However, Tanya scores some cool points by showing up in Club Dread. She's one of the girls going with the guy for the threesome at the beginning of the film. I find Lindy to be charming on screen. I have seen many of her films, not necessarily because she was in them, but because they interested me anyway. She has a certain ingenue quality, which she often plays against. Her voice and face are particularly innocent, but her eyes can be very knowing. She was outstanding in Century Hotel, which I highly recommend if you like interesting, vignette-type movies. She was very good in Cry_Wolf too. As was Jon Bon Jovi.

But I didn't start talking about it to talk about the actors, though I obviously could for hours. (I'm like that) I wanted to talk about the theatre. It is called the Oaks Paradise 10 or somesuch, and what a great place to watch a film. The seating was comfortable, even for a "plus sized" guy like myself. A matinee is $5.00. I didn't buy any popcorn, but if I had gone whole hog and bought a bucket that would fit over my head (with no exaggeration) and a large drink (also a sizeable beverage) the whole thing would have cost me about $14. Which is about what a ticket costs in Toronto. (Now, granted, the whole exchange thing figures in, but still..) The decor was tasteful. The doors were all wood, with brass handles, the washrooms clean. It was a great experience. I am looking forward to the next time I get to see a movie out there.

And that is it, with the good and the not-so-good of my stay here in Florida from yesterday.

Later, peeps!

Go South, not-so-young man!

Okay, it has been forever and a day since I last updated this or my comic book blog, Infinite Opinions. There is a reason for this: My life has changed.

Unlike many, who blog about their lives, I had reached a point where the only thing consuming me could not be publicly discussed. I was getting ready, thanks to an offer from a company in Melbourne, Florida, to move there. People I work with might be reading this blog, and I didn't want to tip my hand too early, and hurt my career there, in case this move didn't work out.

And so I have. I said goodbye to my friends, and to my wife, for about a year, not counting visits, and headed down here. The choice was tough. I had been at my last job for so long that I'll miss it quite a bit. But, three days of driving later (I had to be careful with the speed - I was towing a trailer) here I am, living in a dingy motel for another week until I can move into my apartment. Then, at last, I will be really here.

Which is when I expect the missing people to start to settle in. So far, I do miss my wife, but more in a "I went on vacation without her" way than a "we won't be living together for a year" kind of way - although I did cry when I drove away from her to start my journey. I expect the full impact to hit me once I have settled down here, though.

I do feel somewhat badly - I didn't give any good-bye speeches, even at the events that people organized for me - for fear that I would start crying, or start others crying that would be a chain reaction and we'd all float out of the bar we were at on a salty river of tears. I don't tend to be demonstrative when it comes to my emotions, but this was definitely tough on me.

By the way, for what it is worth, I will, and do, miss you all. The hardest part of having this dream is knowing that it meant walking away from the best friends a guy could possibly ask for. You've all been there for me when I needed you, and I know you always will be. Anytime after the 1st of October, you are welcome to come visit me in my new apartment, right on a golf course, here in beautiful Florida. Although, for the nervous among ye, you might want to wait for hurricane season to end, although Melbourne typically doesn't get it too badly.

Anyway, right now, I do not have internet at home, so don't expect regular updates. But once I am all set up, I should have a little more time on my hands than I have of late.

Weather's great. Wish you were here.

Things that are too geeky, even for me...

Okay, a word to all of those fan boys out there: I was just on a message board about a Collectible Card Game (yes, I am a gaming geek, computer geek, comic geek and movie geek... You haven't figured that out yet?) and there was a heated discussion as to who would win in a fight, Batman or Dr. Doom.

These characters are definitely two of the cooler characters ever to be written into comics, I guess I can see why people would be interested in seeing a comic where the two go at it, but when these questions are debated, I am always shocked by the stupidity of it. (The answer, by the way is, no matter who we are talking about as the characters, whoever advances the writer's story right now.)

I try to picture two professors, knowledgeable in the beliefs of ancient man debating if Ra could kick Zeus' ass or something... It blows my mind. (Zeus would totally win, by the way.)

It's amazing how many times I have heard variations on this kind of discussion at a comic shop, or seen it on various boards around the internet. It brings to mind childhood taunts of "my daddy can beat up your daddy," only in this case it's more like "my fictional daddy can beat up your fictional daddy."

There are a lot of us who enjoy the hobbies I do, and live otherwise normal lives. Then there are those who are way beyond my own level of enjoyment. I attended GenCon one year. That is (or was, at the time) the biggest Role Playing Game (think Dungeons & Dragons for those of you who don't know what a role playing game is outside of the bedroom) convention in the world. It was fun. I was travelling with some good people. But some of the people who share my hobby with me frighten me. I played in a DC Heroes game, a Role Playing Game (hereafter RPG) based on the heroes of DC Comics. The characters we were playing were based on a series called "The Young All Stars." Being a fan of the series, I was quite looking forward to it. That I ended up getting the wussiest of all the characters in the series, Danny the Dyna-mite as my character (no, I'm not kidding) did little to dull my enthusiasm. On the other had, the guy who was sitting next to me - so pale as to make one assume he was the stereotypical guy living in his parent's basement, and with the entire series of Young All Stars comics in tow, in a comic box, each issue meticulously placed in a comic bag, supported by an acid-free cardboard backing - was one of the people who made me realize that maybe gaming conventions weren't the place for me. On some level, I can respect his passion, but not sharing it, I think maybe I don't need to participate in the same activities as him.

Anyhow, there really isn't much point to this, just an observation that I have noticed about behaviour that I find ridiculous. And before you point out that I am mocking those even geekier than myself - a behaviour I blasted in my previous entry, allow me to point out that no where in this post do I do so. I mock a behaviour for its pointlessness.

And by the way? Batman can definitely beat up your daddy.

Revenge of the Sith observations - spoiler free

A word on the title - this is only spoiler free if you have seen the first 5 films. If you haven't, then there are some spoilers below, particularly ones that might affect your enjoyment of the end of Empire Strikes Back. If you want to avoid them, stop reading at the paragraph that starts with "The movie itself was a fitting end."

I had the extreme pleasure of catching the 12:01 show of Revenge of the Sith with some friends Wednesday night/Thursday morning. It was something to be a part of. The last of the Star Wars films. Ever. One of the guys I was with also had the pleasure of seeing the sneak preview at 7:30 downtown, and then headed out to see it again with us. Yup, we're kind of geeks.

But how could I not be? My first memories of a movie were of being so scared by Star Wars when Darth Vader makes his entrance to that now-famous music that I hid my face so I didn't have to watch. (I scared easily as a child, and I was 5 and-a-half when I saw it.) Then, when it was over, I wanted to stay and watch it again.

I have no specific memory of the circumstances surrounding my first viewing of Empire, but I remember leaving school early, and being driven by a friend's mother to see Jedi at the Runnymede theatre (now a Chapters) when I was 12 and it was opening day. I also have fond memories of watching a double feature of Star Wars and Empire not long before that with some friends, to refresh the movies in our minds - like we needed it.

I loved those movies. I loved the characters. When Han Solo got frozen in carbonite, I went home, and took my Boba Fett action figure, put him in a cup of water, and put that in the freezer. (My mom loves that story.) Boba Fett has since become one of my favourite characters in the whole sextet of movies.

I camped out (in shifts with some others, including my wife who was as anxious as I to see it - if not more so) to buy tickets to Episode I. I will admit to being disappointed, compared to what I remembered, compared to the ideals these movies had become to me. But it didn't matter. I bought the DVD, and I have seen that movie a number of times as well.

When Episode II came out, I didn't camp out, but there I was, loyally, at the midnight show on opening day. Again it fell short of my (possibly unfair) expectations. A good movie, lots of cool effects, and some amazing battles, but not a stellar link in the Star Wars chain. We saw this at a theatre on the North side of town, and the press were there, and there were people dressed up. It was something. A great experience made even more so by the people who were there with me.

So now, Episode III has hit the theatres, and again, I lined up at 6:30 pm or so for the 12:01 am show. (For the record, we were not first in line, there were two guys ahead of us) There were a few people in costume, really hard-core fans who had been down to Indiana for Star Wars Celebration III who tried to get some of the audience involved in a little pre-movie fun. Unfortunately, they were not the most charismatic of figures, and it didn't go over well, and they were heckled. And this is the point I wanted to make: One of the hecklers, when it was described which group (Halton FanForce, I think it was) these people were from yelled, "That is the nerdiest thing ever!" To much laughter. Now, the spokesperson for the group was a woman, in her mid-to-late 20's who was there with her son, who she said was 9. So not only are people mocking her in front of her son, but here we are, sitting in a midnight show for a movie, which would lose nothing by being seen 19 hours later, when most people who aren't nerds would see it, and we (as a group) are heckling someone for being more nerdy? Where is the line? Apparently doing without sleep to be the first to see the movie is cool, but being into it enough to dress up and let the excitement take you is too far. Many of the people who were there were probably mocked at some point in their lives for being nerds or geeks. Yet, the feel the need to draw some bullshit line as far as how geeky is okay, and throw that same abuse downward. I was embarrassed for the girl, and for her son. Fortunately, I really needn't have been. They didn't let it bother them. And it was forgotten when the movie started.

The movie itself was a fitting end (or is that mid-point?) to the saga of Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader. The dialogue was trademark Lucas. That is to say, not great. The acting was better from the main players than in any either of the previous films, and was certainly enough to keep you involved. All the loose ends required to move from the first trilogy to the second are tied up.

One of the really interesting things about this film is the theme that the wrong choices can be made for the right reasons. It happens throughout this trilogy. Jar-Jar Binks (the much-maligned Gungan whose presence in this one is almost nil) is responsible in Attack of the Clones for helping the Chancellor create a clone army to fight on the Senate's war. The imagery here is clear - these guys are destined to become the Storm Troopers one day. Jar-Jar wasn't sitting there thinking "I know, I'll help to create an army that will enslave and kill the whole galaxy one day." He was thinking "we need to be protected. I will hand a little power to the government to do so." This is not unlike modern politics in the USA. The Patriot Act is a little power handed to the Government at the cost of some freedoms. Now, I'm not trying to compare the Emperor to Bush (though I wouldn't swear that Lucas wouldn't draw that comparison at this point) but it is interesting the way the movies parallel some modern themes.

This is Anakin's story as well, in many ways - he makes the wrong choices, but for the right reasons. This is why his fall is all the more telling. Saying anything more would definitely take me into the realm of spoilers though. So just allow me to say that this movie has a mature and interesting, if somewhat dark theme, and tone to it.

Overall, this was an excellent watch, and while it still didn't hit the heights of Empire Strikes Back, it was certainly the best of Episodes I through III in my opinion, and may be the third best of the series, behind Episodes V and IV. I highly recommend it to any fan of Star Wars, or anyone who used to be a fan, but was left feeling cold by the last two.

May the Force be with you. Always.

Survivor Finale

Man, I don't think I could ever win Survivor. Among the obvious reasons, like not wanting to do without food. and such, I do not think I could handle the utter self-righteousness of people who do not deserve it at the final tribal council. I'd blow up at them.

If you haven't watched the final episode of Survivor: Palau and care who won, read no further... there will be spoilers.

It actually started well before the final Tribal Council. Katie, who had tried by this point at least twice to kick Ian off of the Island, and who had eliminated him from an reward challenge in which you got to choose your target, was really upset that Ian hadn't taken her on a reward challenge trip with him, because he said he would. She was in tears, and reduced Ian to tears as well, since he had betrayed her. Hello? Weren't you the one who was into the all-women's alliance to remove Tom and Ian, until it went south thanks to Caryn? Didn't you, right after eliminating the rock-solid ally of yours from the reward challenge agree with Greg and Jenn to vote Tom then Ian out as soon as you were at five people left? Where the hell do you get off being upset at someone else for playing the game, and for "betraying" you?

Similarly, Greg was planning on voting Tom out when they were at six people, rather than at 5 where they agreed all bets were off. Tom and Ian saw it coming, and with the help of Caryn and a little last-minute strong arm of Katie, voted Greg out instead. Yet Greg's moment at tribal council was to call Tom on the carpet at that final Tribal Council demanding to know why Tom didn't honour their deal. It must have been hard for Tom not to say, "Gee, Greg. I guess for the same reason you lied to me, Mr.'at least I left with my integrity intact.'" I know I would have had a really hard time.

Season after season, there is a parade of people who tried to lie and manipulate their way to the top and failed, who when they get up there, and aren't being judged by those around them like the final two are, make a big deal out of the deceptions of the two who made it while taking a moral high ground, based on deception or at the very least, a very different view of history than what has been recorded on national television. Katie might have been one of the worst, and least deserving final two in history. But at least she admitted every flip-flop, every questionable move was a part of a strategy to win a game, and didn't try to hide behind some non-existent veneer of honesty.

Or of omniscience. Coby claimed that he "was looking for honesty tonight, and didn't get it from Tom." This is another recurring theme. That somehow those who have been eliminated know everything that went on, and that the view they have decided on is the only possible version of the truth. Tom did answer Coby honestly, it just wasn't what Coby wanted to hear. And if you go back through the history of Survivor, there seems to be at least one question of this sort per game, and usually with the same "I know what the truth is, regardless of if I have any way to tell" filter in place.

My only regret is that Steph, who may have been the most deserving person of the title of Survivor in the history of the game didn't get a chance to meet Tom at tribal council. Ian showed a great deal of character, I thought, in the way that he came in third, particularly because I think he could have won that challenge and been sitting at the final tribal council with Katie, who I think he could have beaten.

But still, as it was, the person who won was probably the most deserving of everyone in this game. I'm just sorry Wanda didn't compose an ode to Tom as her tribute to his victory.