My brother and I have started playing Scrabulous, the Scrabble knock-off that is quickly becoming the most popular time-waster on the Facebook network. Our game is looking like something out of a medical textbook with words like “aorta” and “urea”. My brother warned me that this game can become an obsession and I’m beginning to understand how right he is. If I start using words like “ephebe” in my blog posts, you’ll know that I’ve been playing way too much.
The Borders bookstore in the downtown Minneapolis Block E complex is finally making good on its promise to close up shop. This news follows a string of other announcements from retail businesses stating that they would leave their downtown locations. The news about Borders’ departure is particularly troubling because it couldn’t find another tenant to sublet the space. The restaurants and nightclubs in Block E are thriving, but the city councilmembers who voted to subsidize the development probably didn’t envision that it would have tens of thousands of square feet of vacant retail space within five years of opening. And I have yet to understand why the city invested millions of dollars in a poorly lit, poorly designed structure that looks like something out of a cheap theme park.
Minnesota Monthly recently ran article on how Block E could be improved. Some of the ideas are questionable (giant video walls?), but almost anything would be an improvement.
Gawker Media, the New Media empire that operates several popular blogs that run the gamut from personal productivity to politics, has just launched a new science fiction blog with the cryptic title io9. It covers an interesting mishmash of topics such as “What’s with all the three-breasted women in science fiction?” and “Which science fiction drug would you most like to try?“. The authors also throw in the occasional post on real, honest-to-goodness science. I wonder if they need some part-time writers. Daddy needs the ST:TNG DVD box set.
Obama and Huckabee appear to have won their respective caucuses. A rather remarkable turn of events, considering that the dominant political narrative for much of 2007 had Clinton and Giuliani as the presumptive frontrunners. Expect to see a lot of establishment Republicans gnashing their teeth and doing their best to downplay the significance of Huckabee’s win over the next few days. Obama looks well-positioned for the New Hampshire primary. If he wins there, he will probably be the Democratic nominee for president.
The Iowa caucus is tomorrow night and I’m not even going to try to predict the outcome. The polls are all over the place, but I must admit that I’m hopeful Edwards will come out on top. As for the Republican side of things, I’d like to see Ron Paul get put out of his misery so that his supporters can turn off their computers and go back to reading The Fountainhead for the nth time. That’s probably expecting too much, though. Frankly, I regard the whole caucus process as woefully undemocratic. Why should ten percent of voting-age adults of a relatively obscure Midwestern state exercise such tremendous influence on the selection of a presidential nominee? I get the fact that we like to perpetuate the myth of the heartland as the soul of the nation, but it’s just that, a myth. Not to pick on Iowa, but it’s hardly representative of the country as a whole. Hell, it’s not even that representative of the upper Midwest. The Iowa caucus is just one more example of American tradition getting in the way of progress.
I went to see a movie this afternoon at a little art house theater in Edina, a Minneapolis suburb where everyone is wealthier and prettier than me. Lots of other people must have had the same idea because the ticket line stretched across a whole block. My friend and my nurse were gently goading me to use my gimp status to cut ahead in line so that we could escape the biting cold, but I was having none of it. There is a time and place to play the cripple card, but with great power comes great responsibility. Sure, I could have probably spared myself the numb hands and partially frozen lips, but everyone in that line would have thought I (and by implication, every other person in a wheelchair) was a total wuss and I won’t be responsible for perpetuating such insidious stereotypes. Of course, I am a wuss, but only when nobody is watching.
All bloggers are mandated to post some kind of end-of-the-year list. Bloggers who don’t comply risk ostracism and snarky, veiled put-downs from their peers. Since my need for approval can politely be described as “all-consuming”, here’s my obligatory list:
Best Movie I Saw in A Theater: The Lives of Others At a time when Americans are becoming ever more complacent about daily intrusions into our privacy, this brilliant film is a devastating study of a total surveillance society and its effects on both the watchers and the watched.
Best Movie I Watched at Home: Pan’s Labyrinth This fairy tale for adults is a powerful reminder that fantasy doesn’t have to be about boy wizards or talking lions with messiah complexes.
Best Book I Read: Spin by Robert Charles Wilson Anyone who says that science fiction can’t rival the artfulness of mainstream literature needs to have this book shoved into their faces. I’m anxious to see if Wilson can deliver another bravura performance in his sequel Axis.
Best Album I Heard: Untrue by Burial I didn’t know this artist until a few weeks ago, but his ghostly electronica is enthralling.
Most Disappointing Political Trend: The Democratic Congressional Majority that Wasn’t Yes, they raised the minimum wage, but that doesn’t excuse all the other times they allowed the Republicans to bend them over the table.
Biggest Thrill for Me (Not Involving Fishnet Stockings): Blogging for the BBC Any other media outlets interested in my services?
Happy New Year, Constant Readers. Here’s hoping 2008 brings me lots more fuel to feed the blogging fires.
One of the gifts that elicited the most enthusiastic response from me was the Blade Runner Collector’s Edition DVD set that I received from my brother. Its five discs contain every version of the film ever released, along with with a three-hour making-of documentary. Three hours. I haven’t watched the doc yet, but I’ll be very disappointed if it doesn’t include footage of Dick discussing how his story ideas were beamed into his head from space. This should tide me over until the day arrives when I can purchase my very own replicant that looks like Darryl Hannah. Of course, I’d only use it for polite dinner conversation and light housework.
When my brother arrived last weekend, he told me in no uncertain terms that he wanted to spend a week vegging out and playing computer games. Always one to oblige my guests, I downloaded a copy of BioShock. It’s been years since I’ve played a first-person shooter, but comparing this game to earlier standards of the genre is like comparing a Lamborghini to a Big Wheel. Yes, it’s a shooter and the primary goal is still to blow stuff up, except that you get to blow stuff up in a beautifully realized undersea city with an unfolding story that is equal parts James Bond and 1984. It’s the kind of game that helps me justify the money I poured into my new system. I don’t know if we’ll reach the game’s end before my brother leaves next week, but we’ll have fun trying.
According to Sitemeter, someone from the State Department spent a half hour on my site. Had I known I was going to have such high-ranking visitors, I would have posted my insightful position paper on America’s role in promoting disability rights around the globe. Maybe I’ll just FedEx it to Secretary Rice tomorrow.