In short, insipid comes to mind

I watched The Golden Compass, which was taken from the book Northern Lights by Phillip Pullman. I liked the movie, and give an Eh on my movie meter. It's an Eh because it's nothing truly special. Cool effects, interesting concept, neat-o toys, but really... it's not a great movie. Just a good one.

I liked the polar bears, regardless of the CGI. In fact, I think I liked 'em because of the CGI. If the Coke polar bears had been like that, Pepsi would be no more. If REAL polar bears were like that, they wouldn't be endangered. We might be, but polar bear would definite be in for the contender status.

Now... after the movie; and I really, really wanted to watch the credits, this horrible, wailing, sad, sad, ragged bit of voice started to sing something that was supposed to be a song, but somehow, to my ears, fell so short as to being an actual song with something meaningful in it, that I had to turn off the DVD player and go look up the cast on IMDB.

Of course, I also had to look up who the singer was and what the heck the name of the song was and surprise to me; it was KATE BUSH. I could have sworn she had talent. Guess everyone has an off day. Or life, or whatever. And if you liked the song, great. I didn't and can't possibly listen to it again without driving a pen through my ear drums.

Still, it wasn't a bad movie. It was just an Eh movie, saved mostly by that last fight scene.

I read the news today, oh boy...

huh. The unemployment rate for the US in September was at 9.8 percent. Almost ten percent. Pert near plumb. With a current population of 307,602,055, give or take some newborns, that's 30145001. Minus decimal stuff. I tend to round down cuz I'm an optimist. Kinda sad, ain't it?

My department talked to the Sprint Tech department yesterday, something we do on a fairly regular basis. We were told that some of their technical and customer support offices were underwater. I suspect these are the ones in India, that have been deluged with rain for several days and are currently flooding. Then again, it could have been anywhere with a lot of water. Sprint's like that. My money's on India, though.

It's a chilly day this second of October, here in the fine state of Oklahoma. The sun is out, the clouds are few and the fair is going on downtown. Course, there's no Bells amusement park any more, and the racetrack is gone... or at least not in service ever again. The water park is going the way of the Dodo bird as well. So, I don't know, really, if I'll go. I haven't for five years. It won't be the same without walking down to Bells and riding Fantasmagoria.

Anyway, it's my day off, so I may just go to the Ray Harrell nature park in Broken Arrow. Took my lil sis, Capi there last year in March. I hear things have changed, so maybe it'll be a bit more modern, a bit more cleaned up. You know. Like nature was intended to be.

Ya'll have fun. I'll check in later, gator.

Hearts in Atlantis

"Sometimes when you're young, you have moments of such happiness, you think you're living in someplace magical, like Atlantis must have been. Then we grow up and our hearts break into two."
( Hearts in Atlantis - the movie )

It's been a helluva ride, so far. I'm wondering what will be next, just over that hill? Regardless, if it is a long, long trip or if it suddenly ends today, right now, as I sit here and wonder how you are all faring, I'll steal and paraphrase another quote from the movie.

"I wouldn't have missed a single minute of it, kids. Not for the whole world"