I slept in this morning after staying up quite late last night. As some of you already know, sleeping in is one of my favorite decadent activities. Now I discover that there’s scientific evidence to support the sensibility of my decadence. According to studies, night owls are more creative (if you need further evidence, just check out the wittylate-evening posts on my blog. There’s at least a couple.). Getting up early also increases stress hormones, a fact I’m sure to be reminded of as I’m sitting bleary-eyed in the shower tomorrow morning.

The fire alarms in my building are going off as I write this, but that isn’t going to stop me from fulfilling that most sacred blogging tradition: the end-of-year list:

Best Movie I Saw: WALL-E  Pixar’s tale of a solitary robot living among the ruins of an abandoned, ecologically wrecked Earth is dazzling in both visual and narrative terms. The artists manage the impressive feat of using ordinary objects, like a fire extinguisher, to create moving scenes of beauty. WALL-E’s lonely existence, and his inability to fully recognize that loneliness until someone shiny and elegant comes along and captures his attention, is a well-worn theme. But the best movies make those themes feel fresh and relevant.

Best Album I Heard: In Ghost Colors by Cut Copy  Is it electronica? Electro-pop? Whatever you call it, these candy-glazed tracks finally make melancholy something you can dance to. Whenever I was in need of a mood boost, I blasted this album through my speakers or earphones. St. John’s wort has nothing on these lads from Australia.

Best Book I Read: Berlin Noir by Philip Kerr. The Nazis have been fed through the pop culture recycler so many times that they’ve become generic bad guys robbed of historical context. Kerr’s triptych of detective stories set against the rise and fall of the Third Reich are entertaining and tightly plotted, but he never allows the reader to forget that Hitler and his lieutenants are the true criminals. The corrupt moral universe of Kerr’s Berlin brings into relief the basic decency of Bernie Gunther, the flawed and cynical protagonist.

Best TV Show I Watched: The 2008 Presidential Election  I mean, it had everything. The ornery war hero. The fresh-faced senator. Plumbers named Joe. The milf-y governor. It was like a really long season of Survivor, only with more mud and less dignity. And at the end, we all had the opportunity to vote.

Despite the absurd overuse of the word, 2008 really was a year of change for me. I hope 2009 brings you good things. And as always, thanks for letting me waste your time.

To the person who did a search on my blog for “sex” and “massage”: I’m not sure what you were hoping to find, but I’m willing to bet you left disappointed. Unless talk of fishnet stockings gets you all hot and bothered, you’re not going to discover anything here to get excited about. But keep checking in. You never know what will be the subject of my next post.

We have a long way to go before we fully comprehend the nuanced complexities of the human brain, but we are learning that the analogy comparing our brains to computers is not anywhere close to the truth. In fact, our brains are much more agile and flexible than we give them credit for. Consider the phenomenon of “blindsight”, which allows some blind people to naturally perceive visual obstacles and even facial expressions. Researchers believe that the brain has built-in redundancies that allow it to continue processing information despite significant trauma to other regions. I’d like to see a silicon wafer perform that trick.

If you’re thinking of seeing a movie over the holiday weekend, I recommend both The Wrestler and Milk. The Wrestler is an unblinking portrait of a has-been professional wrestler who now finds himself trapped in a lonely hand-to-mouth existence. Mickey Rourke brings a lot of pathos to the title role, playing the part with just the right combination of dickishness and goofy charm. Marisa Tomei is equally great as the small-town stripper who falls for the big lug. You know this story isn’t going to end well, but there are moments of sweetness to be found as these two damaged characters try to find some comfort in each other.

Milk is the story of Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to hold elective office in the United States. One of the dangers of biopics like this is the actor will work a little too hard to convince the audience of the subject’s importance, but Sean Penn keeps those tendencies in check. The audience sees Milk as both a leader and a flawed, somewhat narcissistic person in private. The film is particularly resonant given the recent passage of Prop 8 in California and it reminds us that, despite slow and incremental progress on the civil rights front, our society continues to excel at treading water.