I'm cheating again, writing tomorrow morning's entry...

the night before.  But I'm at loose ends.  I'm taking a break from the fiction stuff I'm working on, I've done my reviews of all films seen to this point, and so I might as well get a head start on the morning entry.

I was disappointed by "Chasing Mavericks", because the true story it is based on is so compelling and we got so little of what Paul Harvey would have described as "the rest of the story", following Jay Moriarity's famous ride at Mavericks.

I loved the visuals of "Cloud Atlas" and didn't have too much trouble following the multi-layered non-linear structure tying six separate stories together, but still felt that there was too much going on and it detracted slightly from the visual awesomeness that the filmmakers managed to achive.  If there were a Best Oscar for visual presentation, it would be a strong contender.

My breathing was a bit worse this weekend and that bothered me a bit.  I talked to the doc about it and we're going to do some tests over the next few weeks.  It may be that we need to take a different medical approach to some treatment issues.  Will let you know what happens.  For now, just know that I am sucking air after any serious exertion and that is a major pain in the ass.  Or lungs.

Ah, a good night's sleep.  Not the hours I'd have chosen if given a choice, but I'll take them.  9:30 to 4:30 is 7 full hours.  Longest night of sleep I've had in awhile.  Feels good.

The Giants sweep the Tigers and win the World Series.  I bet the Dodgers paid more to their players on a 'per game won' basis this year than the Giants did, but who went to the post-season and who went home?

Every person who defends public employee pensions says "well, they don't get Social Security so the pension makes up for that."  The problem with that idea is that these employees also don't pay into the Social Security system and the money they don't pay in is supposed to fund a pension.  So there's no need to make that pension come to double or more of what a Social Security old age payment would be.

I'm playing multiple games of Words With Friends at the moment, and pondering why the heck I keep getting three or more I's in more than one game at a time.  Would someone please tell the vowel fairy to be just a tad less generous?  Worse yet, in other games I couldn't buy a vowel even if I had Pat Sajak's wallet.

The newscasters are all blathering about how huge Hurricane Sandy is.  It was at best a Category 2 hurricane and its gale force wind diameter was just over 900 miles.  In 1979 there was a typhoon in the Pacific that was named "Tip" and it was a Category 5 storm with gale force winds spreading over a 1,380 mile diameter.  It kill more than 50 when it made landfall in Japan.

There's an urban legend about a "hurricane party" that was held at the Richlieu apartments in Pass Christian, MS, during 1969's Hurricane Camille and that all but one of the partygoers died.  In fact, 23 of the residents of that building chose not to evacuate, although no party was held.  Eight of them did die.  Warning to evacuate should not be ignored, is the point of this anecdote.  Mother Nature doesn't get furious often, but when she does, look out.

I'm pondering why anyone really cares that two actresses from the same cancelled TV show wore Minnie Mouse costumes.

I'm pondering why Dianne Feinstein is running campaign commercials at all, let alone with some slightly specious claims, when she couldn't lose this election even if she were arrested for selling crack in the Tenderloin.

I'm pondering why these political consultants choose to start commercials for Props by saying "Have you heard about Proposition XX?"  Do they all have to use the same tired line?

I'm pondering cheerleaders.  Not just in general, but in specific.  Pro football has cheerleaders.  Pro basketball has cheerleaders (love watching the Laker girls).  Pro hockey has no room for cheerleaders, they'd be in the way on the ice and no one would see them standing on the other side of the boards from the players.  But why doesn't pro baseball have cheerleaders?

Hill Street Blues lasted 7 seasons.  Third Watch lasted 6 seasons.  But only the first two seasons of either show are available on DVD.  L.A. Law isn't available on DVD in the U.S. at all.  Well, you can buy season 1 on Region 2 DVD and it will probably work in your U.S. DVD player.  But the other 7 seasons aren't available. 

Lots of older shows have their entire run available.  Why can't the shows I want to watch become available on DVD?  I just finished watching season 2 of Third Watch and there are four more seasons I cannot view.  No network is running the re-runs so that's not the reason for holding them back.

We have a quiz in class today and I need to read carefully and answer slowly.  The one question I missed last quiz was the final question and I got into a hurry to be done and missed the "trick question/trick answer" thing by not reading carefully and slowly.  Lesson learned.