Friday At The Movies When The Line Between Fact and Fiction Blurs

1) Telekinetic Coffee Shop Surprise, the video by viral marketing company Thinkmodo to promote the upcoming movie version of Stephen King’s Carrie.

Why can’t all those annoying telemarketers in Cantonese calling our cellphones (who hang up when you insist on speaking in English) do one-a these instead.

–

–

2) Buzzfeed’s The One Mistake In Gravity That Is Truly Unforgiveable – that Sandra Bullock exiting her space suit was not wearing an astronaut’s diaper. “A gross misrepresentation of space travel.”

I know, I know she should be wearing a diaper, and yet I also prefer seeing this:

To this:

And the moral of the story is, we go to the movies to be entertained. We shouldn’t expect it to be totally realistic unless they tell us. Because yes they left out the diaper, but do you really want to see the diaper?

I used to have a thing for Kevin Bacon. I don’t think I would’ve enjoyed Apollo 13 as much with him in a diaper. Tom Hanks in a diaper I don’t mind, he was Forrest Gump anyways. Y-eah they have a better shot at pleasing everyone if Sandra Bullock has a Hot Astronaut Workout Scene and they put the diaper on George. Okok don’t scream at me put the diaper on some unattractive unknown actor so the purists don’t wage Twitter war and we still get our eye candy fix.

Then give both Bullock and Clooney Hot Astronaut Workout Scenes. Oh, and throw in Kevin Bacon.

My work here is dones.

–

–

3) The West Wing Shutdown In Real Life and another reason I used to watch West Wing so much when I worked. They had a Filibuster episode too, but unlike “Wacko Bird” Cruz’ real life one, theirs was a beautifully warm and fuzzy filibuster-er grandfather who didn’t tell anyone he wanted at least the token autism research funding in the package because he had an autistic grandson. I like the fiction version better, especially when the fictitious president realizes why his opponent is filibuster-ing and is the one to call other senator allies to assist in the holding up of his own policy.

“…Such devotion to the idea of fair play politics and honor amongst politicians isn’t exactly rare on The West Wing — the show was, at times, not so much a political drama as an idealized vision of how politics should work…..“

Funniest comment in the thread: “In a lineup how many Americans would pick Josiah Bartlett (played by Martin Sheen) if asked “Who is the President?”

So maybe movies really are more fictitious than we’d like to believe. But I like to believe.

And well there’s latest updates indicating Republicans “Badly Damaged” By Shutdown Battle as support for Obamacare, the very thing they shut down to hold up, rises.

I don’t explain it that well because the argument ultimately lies on faith and belief, not logic (which I usually much prefer in these kinds of arguments) – in my case over the 11 years I worked in what people consider a particularly “nasty” industry (and which I consider no nastier than everywhere else there be politics which is pretty much everywhere there be people) I came to fervently believe that clear conscience was what allowed me to keep God close. Without a clear conscience I couldn’t proverbially look Him in the eye – that included prayer – and therefore I could do nothing without Him. Ergo, without clear conscience cannot get anything done. (Non-Christian friends would go “So, Karma <shrugs>”)

(Oh, and in the recent Cruz filibuster they coincidentally discussed how he might have been wearing “astronaut underpants” i.e. catheter, to assist his ability to stand there speaking for hours and hours and hours and hours without having to go to the bathroom. I just mention because of the Bullock-Clooney lack of space diaper thing.)

Anyway, new goal: watch British sitcom Yes, Prime Minister.

–

–

4) AND 11 (more) Mindblowing Facts That Will Change Your Perspective Of The World.

I like #3 “There are castles and even lighthouses that are less expensive than NYC apartments.”

Among others, Kings has been organizing Asia Bankers’ Club buying trips and things, and the hot locations have been KL and Bangkok, which are expected to experience attractive capital appreciation in the future. Around the same time, a Korean girlfriend of mine then explained the tradition of a newly-wed couple’s parents providing a furnished home for them as a wedding gift – the boy’s side provides the home, while the girl’s side provides the furnishings. And so I put two-and-two together and arrived at a thousand-and-one, at Kings’ offhand remark that he’d noticed some of the earliest buyers into these southeast asian properties have been middle-aged Korean couples…… 🙂

But #7 “A whole ecosystem lives in your belly button” would just blow your mind.

“Scientists found 2,368 different species of bacteria living in belly buttons after swabbing the navels of just 60 people. In that study, 1,458 might have been entirely new to the scientific record…”

And #8 “You can’t see as many colors as a chicken is what I’m entertaining Rockstar with, in honor of his current learning unit about animals.

5) And this should’ve been #12. Because Rockstar has a favorite coin he sometimes palms about and I told him if he flips it (which he can’t really do yet, so most of the time he’s kind of flinging it) he has an equal chance (i.e. 50-50) of it landing on either side.

Oh, you thought so too? According to a Stanford University Prof of Mathematics, the coin has a 51% chance of landing on the side that was facing up. 

This however only works on a new (i.e. clean) coin, because apparently grease and dirt can throw the weight distribution off.

We have school to thank for starting this particular conversation between Rockstar and I because he came home one day and found a use for the freebie Pepsi from our sometime weekend pizza meal orders – to clean coins. (Rockstar has pronounced all fizzy drinks “disgusting”.) Turns out the phosphoric acid in the soda removes the oxide layer.

And then I went and followed the discussion thread in the link above for some interesting comments on probability. Probability fascinates me because derivatives have always fascinated me and the price of a derivative, say an option, is dependent on the probability of the payout. NO, scratch that, it is dependent on what the market believes the probability of the payout to be. The confluence of the human element, math, and our limited knowledge – providing investment opportunity and encouraging faith, ironically in what most people deem a godless environment – is just so beautiful and exciting.

6) This week, Little Miss Rockstar takes matters into her own hands in more ways than one, in Feeding Time In The Rockstar Household Part II:

Have a good weekend dears. But eat your greens too…