Trailerpark Training

Last night at a BW3's I saw a couple of kids playing one of this touch screen video consoles at their table. This wouldn't be remarkable but the game they were playing was beer pong against cartoon pirates. I mean, really? Is this something that 7 year-olds need to be practicing?

До свидания, Америка

Apparently a learned Russian scholar was quoted as saying that the current financial turmoil will cause the United States to split into several pieces. I can't say I'm terribly worried. This is after all coming from someone who has a degree in political science in a country that can't let its people actually vote. Russia seems to excel in the area of the Potemkin vote.

Art Deco-Inspired

Recently I've develop a strong interest in art deco architecture and style. Specifically I dig the streamline moderne style. One weekend I spent in New York I hoofed dozens of blocks to see some of the classic architecture.

• Road to Perdition - Depression-era gangster flick set in the Midwest around the Chicago area.
  
• Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow - An alternate history direct from a pulp magazine full of 1940s style.
  
• The Thirteenth Floor - Half the movie is set in "modern" times and half of it in a simulation of 1930s Los Angeles.
  
• Indiana Jones - Set in the 30s and 40s it features a lot of iconic objects like the Boeing 314 Clipper.
• Gattaca - Actually set in the future but with a retro styling completely reminiscent of art deco.
  
• Bioshock - Not really a movie but this video game is almost one in its own right. Set in a 1960s submarine city that was straight out of the 1940s.
  
• Crimson Skies - Also not a movie, but this game exists in a dystopian alternate history where rigid airships ply the skies with other 1940s aircraft.
  

A Born Leader

I've never understood the saying, "To lead a good life." As if somehow life is something that can be lead around by the nose. It seems to me that life is something that is inflicted upon us.

I'm going for "deep" here and not "emo".