blogging will be light since snark and derision don’t work so well in third-world countries.

i suppose i could be sympathetic (poverty and corruption. how sad) or appalled (poverty and corruption! omg!), but neither tone suits me well.

i’ll be back stateside on the 11th. holla.

ian points to a new one, titled the final destination, aka final destination 4. IT’S IN 3D.

it should be noted that i am in no way endorsing this film. i just can’t get over the idea that they all must die horrific deaths. what’s wrong with a heart attack?

from the nyt:

News reports from Yemen said the child was 5 years old and had been taken to a hospital but did not give further details. Later reports said the child may have been 14 years old. Neither report could be independently confirmed.

this is definitely the opening scene of a sci-fi or horror movie … off the top of my head, samurai girl, final destination, probably the back story of one of the x-men mutants …

the internet has imploded.

or as athina points out, “Ryan O’neill is gonna be piiiiissssssed.”

the academy of motion picture arts will feature 10 nominees for the best picture category instead of the current 5.

why this doesn’t matter:
1. personally, i do not watch. since i don’t watch them, they obviously don’t matter.
2. we have no idea if this will effect the outcome of the best picture winner. statistically it should, but then again, we have no idea how close the tallies have historically been anyway. we actually have very little idea how the academy works. it’s the era of obama. transparency, people!
3. will this improve the academy’s relevance to the rest of the world? um, no. the same 6,000 people are voting, and their taste is just as out-of-touch as last year.

why it does matter:
1. we assume this will include more mainstream movies. dark knight and wall-e were excluded from last year’s list, but frost/nixon made it? i didn’t watch frost/nixon, but come on.
2. more mainstream movies will mean higher ratings for the telecast since the tv people assume people will want to watch an award show with films they’ve actually seen. or heard of. “the reader? isn’t that the one w/ kate winslet’s giant nipples?”
3. higher ratings means more money for abc. maybe.
4. the telecast will be thatmuch longer. ugh.
5. five more movies will get a PR bump. while the “awesomeness” of a nomination will likely be diluted, at least for now, it will be a boon for the films that might not have made the cut previously.

so in conclusion, winners = abc and movie studios; losers = the integrity of the academy? i just laughed out loud at what i just wrote.

a high school student who lives in or somewhere near newport beach, talking about the colleges he might go to: “you’ve heard of case western university? score!”

welcome to cleveland, surfer dude! you are in for an unwelcome surprise.

ok, daunte.

i think you’ve been drinking too much of rb kevin smith’s kool-aid, if you know what i mean.

my bold prediction: i am confident we will beat our record from last eyar.

the department of education is taking down the hideous facade that has graced the front of the otherwise staid dc office building for 7 years.

obama is dumping the no child left behind name altogether.

“It’s like the new Coke. This is a rebranding effort,” said Joe Williams, executive director of Democrats for Education Reform. “The feng shui people believe you need to take the roof off buildings to allow bad chi to escape. Let’s hope this helps.”

wow. that’s a lot of analogies. it’s more like when coca cola stopped putting actual cocaine in their pop. coked-up coca cola had its run, then the government decided it was no good anymore and ditched it, just like NCLB. except the law isn’t awesome like i imagine cocaine-laced soda would be.