Approve.

When I read this news, I think we might actually end up with the President from 'The West Wing.' Total lefty red meat: "Using forceful, but not angry, hand gestures, Obama literally backed up Lieberman against the wall, leaned in very close at times, and appeared to be trying to dominate the conversation, as the two talked over each other in a few instances."

Which reminded me of this:

Approve.

Bill Moyers rules.

Also, like Obama, Moyers comes from a Christian background, and while Moyers might also express this sentiment:

Approve.

...Only Obama can deliver it in this way.

Matrix Revolutions.... Yeah, just like the only other time I saw it. Spectacle and lameness. There is, however, one reason to watch this film. It's the one transcendental moment for all the Matrix films. It's the moment when Neo and Trinity are in their ship zooming toward the machine city, and they go up to avoid being destroyed. They break through the clouds and the sun is shining above, and we know this is the only time either of these characters has seen it. Neo has been blinded, so he can't see this, but Trinity says, "Beautiful..." And then the ship arcs back down into the dark melee of the terrestrial conflict.

There Will Be Blood... Wow. Just wow. Just.... I mean.... what can I say? P.T. Anderson channels Stanley Kubrik. A work of art. Someone's academic career will be made by spending years dissecting this movie. But watch it because it's beautiful and haunting. I had to pause it a few times, it's so engrossing.

Garbage Warrior.... Documentary about the architect who invented the Earthship housing design and concept. Battles with New Mexico legislature, trips to disaster-torn areas, lectures on sustainability that don't seem like lectures. If you're a greenie and you want your friends to understand, this is the movie.

Those Daring Young Men In Their Jaunty Jalopies.... Just out on DVD, rolling in from 1969. Annakin Skywalker was named after the director of this film. Silly road race movie set in the 1920s, with the proverbial all star cast. I wanted to see much less Tony Curtis and Terry Thomas and much more Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, but o well. It's the 'sequel' to 'Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines,' which is by far the better movie. Get 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang' instead.

Update:

Warning... It's a spoiler.

A friend of mine tells me that her email updates of my site contain ads.

Big, honkin' ads.

Around *my* content.

Posted on a lifetime account, that is also 'true,' whatever that means.

I don't get to choose what the ads are, and I don't get a kickback.

So tell me again why I should be helping Xanga make money?

A podcast (and transcript) by LL team leaders on education.

So there it is. A big ol' half-hour of arguments in favor of using Second Life for educational purposes.

1) The state should not be in the business of sanctioning marriage.

2) Since the state *is* in the business of sanctioning marriage, Constitutional guarantees of equal protection and due process apply. Thus:

3) Yes, of course.

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

Searching for a place to stay in the middle of Portland, OR. Consult Google Earth. Turn on both 'hotels' layers.

Looking around.... Looking around.... Holiday Inn is full, Shiloh might work, but do they have parking... Scroll around a little bit...

Ah! Here's one: Sekhet-Maat Lodge.

Yes, that's right. The Portland-area Thelemics are listed as having a hotel, probably due to the word 'Lodge.' I wonder what wacky hijinks have ensued as a result...

BTW, it looks like they eat well, those Crowleyites. And there will be an open house while I'm there. Hmm.

I just got started writing about people who are important to me on Second Life. I was thinking I'd write about The Sojourner, but now I have to write something very different.

She passed away this morning of cardiac arrest.

There's a memorial being set up on Dreams island.

I might have more to say about this later.

In the department of 'what he said...'

Enabling Voice, from friend of this 'blog, Ira Socol.

He's not just correct, he's an example of how correct he is.

A while back I had the idea of doing little profiles of people who are important to me on Second Life. I was hesitant, because first of all it could be sort of like sucking up to them or something, which I don't want to do, but mainly because it would require making a list of why they're important and trying to communicate those things without being maudlin or, you know, sincere.

Sincerity is so far out of fashion it's hard to even say the word. But say it we must because we need to re-engineer the culture to accept it as valid.

So I'm sincere when I say that I really enjoyed hanging out with Elpis Oh this afternoon.

She showed me her grove of trees that illustrates deforestation issues. Or more accurately, illustrates what is required to slow or halt deforestation.

Here we are hugging trees. The whole sim is covered with a randomly-generated forest of trees which will be felled at a rate proportionate to that of deforestation world-wide. You can save the trees, though, by paying them money, or by hugging them. Of course, hugging only prolongs the inevitable; the one way to really put off the destruction of your little tree is to pay it money.

The money collected will be donated to an as-yet-undecided charity working on the problem of deforestation.

But as you stand there hugging your tree or paying it, it tells you all about the value trees give to people.

This exhibit will open soon; I'm not sure when.

I mentioned offhand that I was trying to solve a tricky scripting problem: How to orient a prim to reflect the slope of the land. She said, "Oooo...." and I knew we'd spend the next 45 minutes trying to do it. Which we did.

Elpis is brilliant, and I'm glad to know her as a friend. But we never did figure out what the llGroundSlope() function return value actually means.

You know how the web is: You look for something, you end up finding something else.

I forget what I was looking for. I think it was a famous sculpture park on the Isle of Man, but I can't be sure, and I'd rather write this than re-research it. But I found this picture:

Which immediately reminded me of a recurring theme in many dreams of past decades: Being in a car that was on a roller-coaster track, or being in a car that was on a platform held up by cables much like this.

The sculpture is full-sized, by the way. Those are real cars.

Sometimes my real world and my dream worlds collide in ways I never thought possible. Something's down there, trying to send me a message.

Which leads me to my 'public good' theory for the Second Life proposal. But I need to refine it before talking in public.