Apologies again for the lack of updates - studying for the New York Bar Exam has severely cut into my internet time.

Anyhow, here are some of things of recent interest:

#1: Someone has invented a reflective spray that works to make an individual unphotographable to electronic cameras. Instead of seeing your face in the picture, all that comes out is a white blur.

#2: There's finally an internet series worth watching. Michael Cera (George Michael on Arrested Development) has a new show called Clark and Michael that can only be found online. There's only two episodes so far, and they're both relatively short and in the vein of The Office.

#3: Japan has apparently been marketing non-alcoholic beer for children for years:

Sangaria started their line of fake alcoholic drinks for kids with Kodomo no nomimono (Children’s drink), and has been successful enough to offer it in bottles, cans, and even six-packs. They also expanded the product line to include children’s versions of wine, champagne, and cocktails. The beer, flavored like apple juice, even foams at the top when poured into a glass!

#4: This week, President Bush announced the United States would place tough sanctions against Sudan for their support of militias terrorizing non-Arab citizens in Darfur. In response, the Sudanese ambassador to the United States held a press conference where threatening to cut off the world's soda supply in retaliation:

I want you to know that the gum arabic which runs all the soft drinks all over the world, including the United States, mainly 80 percent is imported from my country," the ambassador said after raising a bottle of Coca-Cola.

A reporter asked if Sudan was threatening to "stop the export of gum arabic and bring down the Western world."

"I can stop that gum arabic and all of us will have lost this," Khartoum Karl warned anew, beckoning to the Coke bottle. "But I don't want to go that way."

The press conference may have been the most surreal since the days of Baghdad Bob (ah, the good ol' days in the Iraq war). Here's a sample:



#5: Battlestar Galactica's upcoming season will indeed be it's last. From the show's producers:

"This show was always meant to have a beginning, a middle and finally, an end. Over the course of the last year, the story and the characters have been moving strongly toward that end and we've decided to listen to those internal voices and conclude the show on our own terms," Eick and Moore said in the statement. "And while we know our fans will be saddened to know the end is coming, they should brace themselves for a wild ride getting there –- we're going out with a bang .

‘What are we doing here? Why are we still here?’

From Monday's New York Times:

Staff Sgt. David Safstrom does not regret his previous tours in Iraq, not even a difficult second stint when two comrades were killed while trying to capture insurgents.

“In Mosul, in 2003, it felt like we were making the city a better place,” he said. “There was no sectarian violence, Saddam was gone, we were tracking down the bad guys. It felt awesome.”

But now on his third deployment in Iraq, he is no longer a believer in the mission. The pivotal moment came, he says, this February when soldiers killed a man setting a roadside bomb. When they searched the bomber’s body, they found identification showing him to be a sergeant in the Iraqi Army.

“I thought: ‘What are we doing here? Why are we still here?’ ” said Sergeant Safstrom, a member of Delta Company of the First Battalion, 325th Airborne Infantry, 82nd Airborne Division. “We’re helping guys that are trying to kill us. We help them in the day. They turn around at night and try to kill us.”...

“In 2003, 2004, 100 percent of the soldiers wanted to be here, to fight this war,” said Sgt. First Class David Moore, a self-described “conservative Texas Republican” and platoon sergeant who strongly advocates an American withdrawal. “Now, 95 percent of my platoon agrees with me.”

On April 29, a Delta Company patrol was responding to a tip at Al Sadr mosque, a short distance from its base. The soldiers saw men in the distance erecting barricades that they set ablaze, and the streets emptied out quickly. Then a militia, believed to be the Mahdi Army, began firing at them from rooftops and windows.

Sgt. Kevin O’Flarity, a squad leader, jumped into his Humvee to join his fellow soldiers, racing through abandoned Iraqi Army and police checkpoints to the battle site....

When the battle was over, Delta Company learned that among the enemy dead were at least two Iraqi Army soldiers that American forces had helped train and arm.

Captain Rogers admits, “The 29th was a watershed moment in a negative sense, because the Iraqi Army would not fight with us,” adding, “Some actually picked up weapons and fought against us.”

The battle changed the attitude among his soldiers toward the war, he said. “Before that fight, there were a few true believers.” Captain Rogers said. “After the 29th, I don’t think you’ll find a true believer in this unit. They’re paratroopers. There’s no question they’ll fulfill their mission. But they’re fighting now for pride in their unit, professionalism, loyalty to their fellow soldier and chain of command.”

Through The Looking Glass

LOST

**SPOILERS - don't read if you didn't see the season finale**

Here it was, the Return of the Jedi episode of Lost. Desmond and Charlie on the moon of Endor (the Looking Glass station), trying to knock down the Empire's force fields (er, jamming frequency), while Sayid, Bernard and Jin do the air (beach) battle and Jack et. al. have one last confrontation with the Darth Vader (Ben).

But that's not we're all wondering about, is it?

I loved the site of Jim Morrison-era Jack - bearded, bloated and drugged out. The entire show I tried to figure out where in the timeline this was - before/after he went to Thailand? Sometime around 1993, hence the blaring Nirvana ("Scentless Apprentice")? My girlfriend even pointed out Jack's cell KRZR phone was an anachronism - but it still didn't dawn on me. We're in the future - sometime after the events of the island we've been following for three seasons. This was the turning the show on its head moment I've been hoping for.

But it was terribly, terribly sad. Life post mysterious island has not treated the Shepard kindly, now that he no longer has his flock to lead. He spends his weekends flying on free Oceanic air mileage, hoping his plane will crash. Ben and Locke we're right all along, it seems - they weren't supposed to leave. He knows it too (we can assume that those maps in his home were island-related). I can't begin to speculate what's s happened between the scene at the radio tower and Jack's meeting Kate at the airport. That scene was both heartbreaking and mystifying at once. What's he “tired of lying” about? Who does she have to get back to? Whose funeral did no one attend to? Why do Jack and Kate seem so distant from each other? Is Kate still a fugitive? In the hospital Jack says that he’s not as drunk as his father is upstairs – does that mean he’s alive (Jack also claims his dad wrote him an Oxycontin prescription, but that he’s “out of town”)? Why was the naturally beautifully Kate covered in make-up? All questions that'll have to wait till January, 2008.

I'm going to miss Charlie. I hoped he wasn’t going to die. I thought he’d play his keypad version of Good Vibrations, save the day, and avoid drowning. Of all the characters, he had gone through the greatest transformation, from washed up, junkie rock star to family man and hero. Even when he only had moments to live, after Mikhail launches a grenade to flood his room with water, Charlie used his last remaining moments to warn Desmond that Naomi was not sent by Penny.

We all knew Hurley was going to save the day, but I didn’t see the return of the Volks Wagon van. I also didn’t see Sawyer killing Tom (aka Mr. Friendly) after he’d surrendered. The warm and fuzzy Sawyer (i.e., Han Solo) of season 3 is truly no more. Very well done.

The return of Walt was a welcomed surprise, puberty victim hood and all (yet still wearing the same kid clothes - my friend Dan recently theorized they removed Walt from the show because the writers would be unable to explain his rapid physical transformation). We don’t know whether he was the actual Walt or merely in Locke’s mind. Whatever the case, with Ben Linus having killed too many of his own people, now tied up and beaten to a bloody pulp, the ascension of Locke as the new master of the Island is clear. He even kills the mysterious Naomi, but is unable to shoot Jack. Speaking of Naomi, if Penny did not send her then who did? Why was she carrying a picture of Desmond? Perhaps Penny’s father, Charles Widmore, sent her.

There are more questions and observations, of course, but I’ve run out of time. I’ll pick up the slack later with comments.

Don't Ask...Don't Tell...

Apparently, making sure there are no gay dudes in the army is more important than capturing Al Qaeda, as nearly sixty Arabic translators have been kicked out of the armed forces for being homosexuals.

You can read about it here.

Three Things

Three things that made me laugh out loud:

#1: An artist's rendition of Pac-Man's skull




#2: The Stanley Nickel and its conversion chart


#3: A dramatic reading of a real break-up letter from a real person (requires sound). Thanks Aaron.

Obligatory LOST Related Geek Posting

Tomorrow marks the season finale of LOST, meaning no new episodes until 2008. Until then, enjoy the new video game version for your iPod, available at the iTunes store here for $4.99:

Join your favorite castaways in their quest to seek the truth and survive in the official iPod game of the hit television series Lost. Help Jack search for dynamite, tend to the wounded, and avoid the black smoke. Relive the crash scene, open the hatch, and ultimately try your best to escape from the Others. Immerse yourself into their mysterious world with authentic settings and a genuine storyline created by the writers behind the hit show.

If anyone actually ends up downloading this, let me know if it's any fun. I've been suckered by too many gaming adaptions to think this is anything but awful. IMHO, Goonies II for the original Nintendo was the only good game ever made of a movie/tv show. When I was young, I think I tried all of them
















The Back to the Future adaptation truly broke my heart. This guy knows what I'm talking about [I love that this dude is in his bedroom with teddy bears and Nintendo Power posters on the walls, while drinking Rolling Rock and saying curse words. He is like the Lenny Bruce of the nerd community]:

Nevermind American Idol...

In the spirit of the American Idol finale airing tonight, the New York Times has an op-ed article about Eurovision. Europeans, from whom we imported the concept of Idol, have been competing in Eurovision for over fifty years.

This year 43 nations participated, including Israel and Turkey, with each country nominating a song to represent them in competition. Like Idol, the songs are performed and then voted upon by the audience through text messages. You can vote as many times as you like, the only stipulation being that you can't vote for your nation's song. When all of say England's votes are counted, the country whose song received the most votes gets 12 points, the one with the second most points, 10 points, the third most votes 8 points, and so on.

What's really interesting is that nations tend to vote for other nations not based on talent, but on regionalism. From the NYT OpEd:

So imagine my surprise when Serbia not only won, but crushed the opposition, beating second-place Ukraine (yes, the drag queen [PICTURED]) by 268 points to 235. Britain, with a paltry 19 points, narrowly edged out Ireland to avoid last place; and Sweden scraped together a meager 51 points, coming in 18th out of 24. What was going on? Two words that were shouted across the British dailies the next day: “Bloc Voting.”

I had heard about this practice, of course, whereby geographical and cultural neighbors tend to vote for each other, and nobody votes for Britain (well, except for Malta). But it was startling to see just how flagrant it was. The Scandinavians all voted for one another; Lithuania gave 10 points to Latvia (whose entry, bizarrely, sang in Italian); former Warsaw Pact countries voted for Russia; and almost nobody voted for Britain (surprisingly, Ireland did — and, of course, Malta).

But Serbia was the overwhelming beneficiary of the system, receiving the top score of 12 points from every other member of the former Yugoslavia — Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Slovenia — suggesting that memories of war and ethnic cleansing can be set aside with surprising ease when it comes to the serious business of winning a singing contest. It’s hard to say whether the 60 points that the former Yugoslavia effectively gave to itself altered the final result, but an enterprising Irishman suggested that if all the Irish counties were allowed to secede, they would be unstoppable....

But it was also obvious how little love Eastern Europe feels for the West. Although the “big four” — Britain, France, Germany and Spain (Italy does not participate) — basically pay for the contest, none of them made it into the top 16;

This is unfortunate. Not because I have much sympathy for Britain, France, etc. - but because I am a fan of true international competitions (e.g., the World Cup)

Apparently NBC has negotiated the rights to bring a similar format to the United States - with all 50 states competing. I don't think that sort of competition would be as compelling. I could see something like all the coastal (blue) states voting against the inland (red) states, or vice versa. But maybe doing that once every four years is already entertaining enough (ZOINKS!)

Below is a video of this year's second place winner, the Ukraine. Really, this puts Melinda Doolittle to shame.

Apologies for the lack of updating, as I've been busy finishing law school. Congratulations to my brother and sister-in-law, for the birth of their daughter Brynn Danow. She's cuter than you are:



You can see more pictures of her here.

Why Paying Extra For A Decent Tattoo Artist Is A Good IDea

The Departed

Not to make fun of the dead, but I find it comical any time a person finds themselves seated in front of a giant portrait of themselves.