In the year 2000

Whenever someone complains about the lack of flying cars or hoverboards or whatever, I think about those AT&T ads from the early '90s where Tom Selleck told us about all the cool shit we were going to have at some unspecified future date, courtesy of AT&T. They made quite an impression on me as a kid, but I hadn't actually seen them for years, until they were mentioned in a tweet yesterday from @suemarks by way of @RossHero.

Surprisingly, they were pretty on the mark in their predictions. (Well, not so much in terms of set design. Check out their idea of the grocery store of the future. Yeah, Safeway looks just like that.) Certainly more so than that Qwest broadband commercial from ten or so years ago, back when everyone was still excited about the internet, where the weary traveler checks into a rundown motel in the middle of nowhere and asks what sort of entertainment options were available, to which the bored girl working the front desk says something like, "Every movie...ever made...on your TV." I'm still waiting for that shit.

What's interesting is that AT&T got most of the overall concepts right (i.e., video phones), but some of the details are just laughably bad (i.e., video phones in phone booths). Here are some other misses in these ads that, in hindsight, seem quaint, if not ridiculous.

"Have you ever...sent someone a fax from the beach?" - So close! But not quite. AT&T correctly anticipated the rise of tablets, but still thought we'd be sending faxes? This isn't nearly as bad as Back to the Future II's wall-mounted fax machines, but it seems like a failure of imagination on AT&T's part.

"Have you ever...paid a toll without slowing down?" - Were EZ-Passes really that hard to anticipate? Imagine having to drive around with a credit card reader mounted on your dashboard. I think I'd rather just slow down and pay cash.

"Have you ever...bought concert tickets at a cash machine?" - Check out that spiffy 3-D interface. Now go to Ticketmaster. Where did we go wrong?

"Have you ever...carried your medical history in your wallet?" - I'm cringing just thinking about that one. "Oh, no! I lost my wallet. And, uh, my entire medical history. Shit." People are worried about online medical records being hacked into now. Imagine if they were all contained on one easy-to-read card that could be lost or stolen.

"Have you ever...gotten a phone call on your wrist?" - I know we all loved Dick Tracy, but is there a single more impractical idea than a phone attached to your wrist? Try having an imaginary conversation on an imaginary watch-phone and see how long before it feels awkward and uncomfortable. Even now, I recently read in Wired or somewhere that some company is trying to make the idea work. It's not going to happen, guys.

"Have you ever...renewed your drivers license at a cash machine?" - Geez, AT&T was really big on us using ATMs for all kinds of things, weren't they? They probably would have been disappointed to learn that 20 years later, we still use them exclusively to get cash from. And given the rise of electronic payments, not really even so much that anymore. But this one is noteable for two reasons: First, we're still waiting in long lines at the DMV. At most, we can renew at home online, but that's it. It's not like a new license pops out of our modem. Second, what are the odds that both actors in that segment (Wallace Langham and Traylor Howard) went on to be...well, not big stars, but at least achieve "Hey, it's that guy!" status?

"Have you ever...had an assistant who lived in your computer?" - This one was the biggest reach. It's so out there, I can't believe even AT&T's most optimistic people thought this was a possibility. They basically promised artificial intelligence. Describe Google and StubHub to someone in the '90s after they saw this ad, and they'd probably be disappointed. "You mean I'll have to do the typing myself? Why can't the computer just do it?" I'm surprised AT&T didn't also have the computer make the woman breakfast and give her a massage.

Five things I learned at today's Phillies/Nats game

1) Roy Halladay is mortal. We were surrounded by Phillies fans in our section, and each home run the Nationals scored stunned them. Like, actual moans of pain, getting progressively worse with each one. It was like what people in Metropolis must have felt the first time they saw someone use Kryptonite against Superman.

Not only is he mortal, but even though the Nationals lost, he made them look pretty good. So here's what I don't get: If the Nationals can homer three times off of arguably the best pitcher in baseball, why the hell aren't they homering a dozen times a game off the dregs of the National League?

2) Phillies fans really hate Jayson Werth. I get this to an extent. I understand booing. That's almost mandatory. But the chants of "Jayson. Jayson. Jayson," and "Werth-less"? Come on. The man left Philly for $126 million. There isn't a Phillies fan in the world who, for that kind of cash, wouldn't not only decamp for D.C. in a heartbeat, but also get the Nationals logo tattooed across his or her chest.

3) Global warming is real. It was hot as fuck. I saw more bottles of water poured over heads than consumed. There was enough collective sweat at the ballpark to fill every public pool in D.C. The Metro ride home was completely packed with wet people. It was actually more traumatic than the game itself.

4) MLB really needs to crack down on All-Star ballot stuffing promotions. Before the game on the JumboTron, they listed all the prizes you could get by turning in All-Star ballots (presumably ones voting for Nationals players). I forget exactly what they were, but one ballot gets you some worthless trinket, 100 gets you a Pudge Rodriguez bobblehead, and so on, up to 10,000 ballots, which gets you on the field during batting practice or something.

At one point, I saw a 30-person deep line in front of the table where you could pick up ballots and thought, "Hey, good for Nats fans! Sure, it's bribery. But it's also team spirit." Then I realized the water fountain was next to the table, and that's what people were lined up for. Did I mention it was hot as fuck? Because it was.

So I question the value of ballots that are bought and paid for, and so should MLB. On the other hand, I do kind of want that Pudge bobblehead.

5) Teddy will never win. At least not anytime soon.

I was wavering on whether or not I wanted to go to the game today. On one hand, it's not like I ever really need my arm twisted to go to a Nationals game. And I do like seeing a great pitcher in action, regardless of what team he's on. On the other hand, it was against the Phillies, which means busloads of Phillies fans coming in and basically taking over the stadium, which is never fun. But when the Washington Post's Dan Steinberg theorized that today might, just might, be the day Teddy finally won? I was all in. Look, this is a team that isn't even close to contending. We have to take our landmark franchise moments as they come.

So anyway, you know that guy who claimed he saw signs the world was going to end on May 21? And all those people who bought into it and gave away all their worldly possessions and gathered together to await the apocalypse that never came? That's kind of what happened here, with Steinberg playing the role of that crazy guy, and me as the equally crazy, yet much sadder, person who was like, "Hell, yeah! This guy's onto something!" (I wasn't completely nuts. I went to the game with two friends, and wisely didn't speak of my hopes for Teddy. Because then I would have been the mad prophet, raving nonsense about Teddy finally winning.)

Obviously, he lost. Again. And the sad thing is, even at this point in the race:

I still thought it was in the bag, and that the monster lead Abe, George and Tom had was deliberate, just to make Teddy's eventual win that much more dramatic. Then Abe won. Or George. Or Tom. I dunno. I stopped paying attention at a certain point when reality hit. For all I know, the Pittsburgh Perogies parachuted in and stole the win. It doesn't matter.

But in the end, I'm fine with the result. Would Teddy winning have been cool to see? Sure. Would it have made Jayson Werth happy, resulting in his batting average doubling virtually overnight and sending the Nationals skyrocketing into first place in the division? Almost certainly. But I can't disagree with those who say Teddy should win only when the Nationals finally win the World Series. Or make the World Series. Or a playoff game. Or some important day in Nationals history. Not just a Memorial Day game played in front of a crowd of people who would just as soon vomit on Teddy as see him win.

So I'm glad Steinberg got this one wrong. And since it was either going to the Nationals game or sleeping in, then trying to finally finish Red Dead Redemption in my underwear with the AC cranked up, I think I made the right choice.

Panel of the Week

From Gotham City Sirens #23:

Stars and shorts

As we found out last week, the new Wonder Woman TV series wasn't picked up by NBC. Based on how bad the pilot supposedly is, no one seemed to really care one way or the other...until this photo was tweeted a couple of days ago.

After nerds took to the internet to decry the original costume, NBC's apparent reaction was to chop half of it off. Now those same nerds seem either really glad the show wasn't picked up or really upset it wasn't picked up.

I forget where I read it, but someone said this outfit made Lynda Carter's old costume look like granny panties. That's a gross understatement. It makes a lot of Victoria's Secret underwear look like granny panties. Especially when you consider that Adrianne Palicki would presumably have to actually run around and kick people while wearing it, not just pose for photos. Also: Hello, chaffing.

And while, as a comic book reader, it's tempting to look at that photo and say, "This thing would have been a train wreck and thank God it's never going to air," I kind of hate to admit it, but I have to give the producers credit for staying faithful to the comics, despite all common sense and probably the costuming department warning against it. Over six Batman films, Hollywood hasn't once tried to faithfully recreate a Bat-suit, preferring instead to make them look more like suits of armor. The less said about the upcoming CGI-ed Green Lantern costume, the better. That weird belt buckle she's wearing aside, this costume is almost too faithful.

Here's what really bugs me, though. In the context of the show, what possible reason would Wonder Woman have for wearing this costume, as opposed to the other one? I mean, in the comics, she just has the one outfit, so it's not an issue. But on the show, she'd presumably spend most of her time in the less revealing costume and only break this one out occasionally. But why, exactly? If, unlike her comic book counterpart, she actually owns a pair of pants, what would make her forego them for...well, no pants? Is that her costume for really hot days? To land an endorsement deal with Nair? When she's trying especially hard to get laid?

At least Palicki comes out ahead. Sure, the loss of a regular paycheck sucks. But I don't even want to think about all the salads and gym time it would take to fit into that thing.

Panel of the Week

From Batman: Gates of Gotham #1:

Upfronts

There's a movie called The TV Set starring David Duchovny that came out a few years ago. It's about a TV writer trying to launch a new series and keep it true to his vision, despite efforts from the network and his own actors to dumb it down as much as possible. It's not especially hilarious and it's not like it's all that difficult to satirize the entertainment industry, but it has a good cast and there's something about a constantly exasperated Duchovny that's just inherently funny, so it's worth watching.

The one thing the film does really well, though, is capture how incredibly awful and/or cheesy the trailers for new series are that the networks show at their upfronts each year. Much worse than movie trailers, which are only about 90 seconds, generally have more to work with, and only need to sell you on committing to a two-hour film. On the other hand, TV show trailers can be twice as long, can't really encapsulate what the series as a whole is about since they only have the pilot episode to work with, and are trying to entice you to spend 30 minutes to an hour each week watching the show for (they hope) the next several years.

Having watched all the trailers/clips/behind-the-scenes features for this fall's new TV shows (don't worry, I did all this viewing all at work. Obviously, my personal time is valuable and reserved for more important things like...well, never mind), I don't think there's a must-see series among them, despite liking quite a few of them. But at least it's not as dire as last year, when NBC was telling us how awesome Perfect Couples was going to be.

NBC

Free Agents: Great candidate for the first cancellation of the year. As a Buffy fan, I like seeing Anthony Head, but I can't imagine the viewer who will watch the first episode and decide Hank Azaria and Kathryn Hahn navigating an on-again, off-again relationship for weeks...months...years is in any way an appealing prospect.

Grimm: Could be fun, could be stupid. Regardless, this looks like a Syfy series that somehow escaped from basic cable and ended up on a network.

The Playboy Club: I guess the only way to make Playboy seem relevant in 2011 is to go back to the 1960s. I approve of a series about Amber Heard walking around in a bunny outfit, but not enough to watch a lame period piece starring the dude LeAnn Rimes cheated on her husband with.

Bent: I didn't know David Walton's name until I saw it in the trailer, but I recognize his face, and this will be his third sitcom in the span of little over a year. So I guess NBC's determined to keep trying until either he gives up or we do. Actually, this one does't look all that bad, even though I've never quite gotten the appeal of Amanda Peet.

Awake: This seems like it could be really good. The trailer reminds me a bit of Journeyman. Remember Journeyman, America? That great show you let get cancelled a few years ago? Let's not make the same mistake twice.

ABC

Work It: That's the clip the network thinks will make viewers want to watch? ABC cancelled Mr. Sunshine to make room for this? No wonder Matthew Perry is back in rehab.

Charlie's Angels: I'd watch a show where Minka Kelly reads a different city's phone book each week, so the karate is just a bonus. I hope Hollywood learned its lesson with The Bionic Woman remake, in that '70s action shows featuring women fighting crime while undercover as swimsuit models or tennis pros or whatever, don't need to be reimagined as dark, brooding series where everyone keeps their clothes on all the time.

Once Upon a Time: Jesus, God, this looks bad. Jennifer Morrison almost single-handedly ruined this season of How I Met Your Mother, but I'm not sure she deserves this.

Man Up: The title's dumb, but I like Dan Fogler and the clip made me laugh. I'm in.

CBS

Person of Interest: I'll watch just because of the involvement of J.J. Abramas and Michael Emerson, but I'm still suffering from Lost fatigue and not really in the mood for another series with a dense mythology. Jim Caviezel just blowing shit up is fine for now.

2 Broke Girls: I like Kat Dennings a lot, but the other actress's voice is like nails on a chalkboard. Pass.

A Gifted Man: Somewhat Lifetime-esque, this might be a show I somehow end up watching and enjoying, but deny ever watching or enjoying. (Cough...Joan of Arcadia...cough.)

Unforgettable: Another cop show with a lame gimmick. I suspect we're getting closer and closer to that show at the end of Forgetting Sarah Marshall, where Kristen Bell talked to animals, becoming a reality.

Fox

Terra Nova: I guess it's nice that the networks keep trying out sci-fi shows, even though most of them suck and they never, ever seem to work. I gave The Event two episodes before bailing. I'll give Terra Nova at least that.

Alcatraz: Another J.J. Abrams show, this one is obviously nothing but dense mythology. But it also looks really good, so I'll give it a shot.

New Girl: Zooey Deschanel being adorable and wearing glasses? Sold!

Panel of the Week

From Flashpoint #1:

Thor

Ever since X-Men came out over a decade ago, Marvel's been pumping out films on a regular basis. They haven't all been winners (Spider-Man 3, Fantastic Four, etc.), but there have been only two that when they were announced, I thought, "Is this really a good idea?" The first one was Man-Thing, which went straight to DVD. The other one was Thor.

There's something just profoundly uninteresting about the character. Granted, I say that as someone who's read maybe three issues of Thor in my entire life, and only a handful of Avengers comics he appeared in. But at no point have I ever thought that this is a character who needed to have his own movie. Twenty years ago, Thor appeared in one of the Incredible Hulk TV movies, and it was pretty much a train wreck. That's more or less what I expected here.

I was sort of wrong. Thor isn't a great movie, but it gets by on sheer enthusiasm, if nothing else. And it sure looks pretty.

Spoilers follow...

The Good:

-- The casting. I love the fact that aside from Natalie Portman and Anthony Hopkins (and the various actors making cameos), pretty much everyone in the film is either an unknown or a "Hey, it's that guy!"-type actor. Even better, they're actually really good. I mean, this stuff isn't exactly Shakespeare. You need people who can play roles that require ridiculous costumes and dialogue and do so convincingly. Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston somehow manage to get through all their lines without once coming off as campy.

-- Hawkeye. This is the benefit of staying away from spoilers. I knew Jeremey Renner would be playing the character in The Avengers, but I had no idea he'd be introduced here. (And when you consider how many movie sites seem to have decided news like that doesn't count as a spoiler, I'm amazed I missed it.) When you see the hand grab the purple bow, I think half the theater had a geekgasm. Not to be confused with an actual orgasm, which I'm almost positive the woman behind me had when Hemsworth was walking around with his shirt off.

-- The special effects. CGI has gotten to the point where I'm not even sure how much it's possible to improve on it going forward. Asgard looks that good. The best thing that ever happened to Marvel was the film rights to its various properties being tied up through the 1990s. Imagine if they'd tried something as ambitious as Iron Man or Thor back then. The effects would look ghastly compared to now.

-- I finally learned how to pronounce Mjolnir! Okay, this isn't something that's weighed heavily on my mind. But when I actually heard it said correctly, I realized that whenever I've read a comic where Thor appeared, I'd been subconsciously reading it as Ma-jawl-nir. So I'm not big on Norse mythology. Sue me. Unfortunately, Kat Dennings' character immediately started pronouncing it as meow-meow, which is now stuck in my head.

The Bad:

-- The plot. I'm not sure it could have been more by-the-numbers. Worse, it doesn't really make a lot of sense. Thor proves he's worthy to wield meow-meow--I mean, Mjolnir--by being willing to sacrifice his life to protect innocent people? Is there any reason to think he wouldn't have done that beforehand, even before he was exiled? Everyone in Asgard seemed to think he was a pretty stand-up guy. A little impetuous, and maybe rude to his father. But a good, loyal friend. I'm not sure what lesson was learned here.

-- The romantic subplot. Look, most, if not all, human beings would agree Natalie Portman is pretty hot. But when you come from a race of (mostly) physically perfect Norse gods, I'm not sure she's that hot. I definitely didn't buy Thor promising to come back for her after knowing her for all of two days.

The Ugly:

-- The post-credits scene. We've had four of these now in the Marvel film universe: Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2 and now Thor. It was cool at first. Tony Stark walking into his living room and finding Nick Fury? Awesome. But ever since then, the gimmick's been providing diminishing returns. The bit at the end of The Incredible Hulk had a Stark cameo. Iron Man 2 introduced Mjolnir. Thor introduced the Cosmic Cube. It just seems like they've devolved into a series of, "Hey, this'll get the fanboys all hot and bothered!" moments. Which...okay, I guess, but if you're going to make people sit through the entire closing credits, it'd be nice if these scenes were a bit more substantive.

Panel of the Week

From The Boys #54:

Free Comic Book Day 2011

To be honest, I'm a bit down on comics at the moment. Creatively speaking, the comic book industry is always one of peaks and valleys, and it seems that it's been in a bit of a valley for a while. I think the most excited I've been inside of a comic book store recently was a couple of weeks ago when I saw there was a new Hitman TPB out. In other words, a collection of comics from the 1990s that I'd already read a dozen times.

But that's the great thing about FCBD. It allows longtime comic book readers to sample stuff they otherwise wouldn't have seen (Love and Capes and The Sixth Gun were last year's best discoveries) and allows new readers to tip their toes into the great ocean of geekdom without spending a dime.

Area comic book stores celebrating FCBD include Big Planet Comics, Fantom Comics and Laughing Ogre Comics. Go down and stock up. Hell, pick up a Hitman TPB, too. It's not free, but it is maybe the greatest comic ever published.

As always, here are the best bets of what free comics to pick up:

Green Lantern: Flashpoint Special Edition: What's Flashpoint? If you don't already know, don't ask. It'll just make your head hurt. But you're probably going to see Green Lantern this summer, so you may as well familiarize yourself with the character in this origin story.

Super Dinosaur Origin Special #1: Yeah, I know. Super Dinosaur? Really? Frankly, I'm not overly optimistic, either. But it's the comics that have the dumbest-sounding premises that often turn out to be the biggest surprises.

The Amazing Spider-Man: I'm a DC guy, so am I willing to pay to read a Spider-Man comic? Probably not. But will I read one for free when it's written by Dan Slott, the guy who made me break my no-Marvel rule with his excellent run on She-Hulk, easily one of the best comics of the past decade? Yep.

2000 AD: Aside from the collections of Alan Moore stories, I haven't read much 2000 AD, the long-running British sci-fi series. What I have read can be described as either: 1) Pretty cool, or 2) I just don't get the British. Hopefully, this issue will be the former.

Bongo Comics Free For All: I realized recently that I don't watch The Simpsons anymore. I think I've seen maybe five episodes in the past two years. But for some reason, every FCBD I look forward to The Simpsons comic. There's also a Futurama comic if you're into that sort of thing. (I realize this'll cost me major geek cred, but I could never get into Futurama.)

Captain America/Thor: Cap and Thor get sent back in time to King Arthur's Court! Yeah, uh...I don't know what to tell you. Marvel kind of skipped over the goofy Silver Age stories that DC happily embraced back in the '60s and '70s. Maybe they're making up for lost time? Whatever. I'm sure it'll be fine. And hey, more movie tie-ins!

Misadventures of Adam West: I'm pretty sure Bruce Campbell already did this gag with My Name is Bruce. But come on:

"The Man, The Myth, The Amulet? Legendary star of the small and silver screen, ADAM WEST, has his career youth-enized in this hip-whimsical,trans-dimensional epic of an adventure. When a mysterious fan delivers an exotic amulet to Mr. West's doorstep he is Dorothy-fied on an odyssey that will change his career, his love life and inadvertently make him the man that saves the universe!"

How do you not read this?

Me, old women and buses

All of these took place in the last month.

-- It's finally spring, which means a great many things, but if you're a heterosexual male, it mainly means women are wearing skirts. Hooray!

As I do every morning, I was taking the bus to the Metro station, and an attractive woman wearing a fairly short skirt got on. Now, I'm very conscious of the thin line between looking at a woman's legs and staring/leering in these situations, and I do my best not to cross it. Do I always succeed? I dunno, probably not. I mean, I don't think I ever "leer," although maybe I occasionally linger a bit longer than is proper. ("Proper" being entirely subjective, but if you're a woman and you think a guy should never pay attention to these things, well, welcome to fantasyland.) But in the very least, I've never been caught staring and had the woman quickly pull her skirt down to cover more of her legs, as I've seen happen to other guys. Nor do I do the move where I take furtive glances every few seconds, as that feels somewhat pervy.

So the woman in the skirt sat down, and I quickly got my eye candy for the morning. Super. I then happened to look over at an old woman who was sitting directly across from her. She was looking right back at me. Then she started violently pumping her fist up and down in what is the universally understood pantomime for jerking off.

What the fuck.

I was immediately mortified, as I thought the old woman was...well, I didn't know what exactly she was doing. Registering her extreme disapproval of my looking at a woman with lust in my heart, I guess. I started to question exactly how long my eyes had been on the woman in the skirt. Maybe I had been staring? No. It was just a second, tops. Even if this woman was the biggest prude in the world, that wasn't long enough to even warrant a disapproving glare, never mind, being called out in such a public (not to mention, highly disturbing) way.

As she kept pumping her fist, still looking at me, I wondered how I was going to get out out of this. The other passengers were undoubtedly going to notice what she was doing. Then they were going to notice who she was staring at. We still had a good seven or eight minutes before we reached the Metro station. This had the potential for getting really uncomfortable really fast. And I see a lot of these people every single day. So, great. I was going to be known as the bus perv.

Suddenly, the woman stopped pumping her fist, opened her hand, and inside, she had a small container of nasal spray that she'd been shaking. She gave herself a quick puff in each nostril, put the spray away, and went back to her book.

Irritated at her for putting me through that, and myself for being paranoid, I spitefully took another glance at the woman in the skirt's legs. This time, for a full two seconds. Then I looked back at the old woman to see if she wanted to make something of it. She didn't. It felt stupidly triumphant somehow.


-- When I boarded the bus, I noticed that all the seats in back were full, but there were three or four in the very front which were empty. It seemed odd, as those are the ones people generally gravitate to first, as you have more leg room and can get off faster. So I sat down next to an old woman, and started to fiddle with my phone.

Immediately, the most godawful stench in the world assaulted me. I can't even describe it. It was literally like nothing I'd ever smelled before in my life. It wasn't body odor. It actually smelled vaguely chemical in nature. I've never been around embalming fluid, but for whatever reason, I decided that's what this woman smelled like. Not just embalming fluid, either. Embalming fluid after it's been injected into the corpse and then drained.

It suddenly became clear why the seats around her were empty. The weird thing was, she was dressed exquisitely. Hat. Brooch. Stylish coat. In other words, not someone who should smell this bad. Maybe she was into making her own perfume in her bathtub like a moonshiner or something?

Oddly, my first thought wasn't, "Holy God, I have to get away from this woman as fast as possible or I'm going to die." It was, "If I flee to the back of the bus or even just move down a couple of seats, I'm probably going to hurt this poor old woman's feelings." So like an idiot, I just sat there for the whole ride, and every ten seconds or so, the weird odor would wash over me and my brain would temporarily stop working. I couldn't even breathe through my mouth because I was terrified I'd somehow taste the smell, which just seemed like it would be so much worse.

For the rest of that day, the odor would periodically hit me out of nowhere. I couldn't tell if it was just sensory memory or worse, if the woman's stench had clung to me, like in that Seinfeld episode with Jerry's car. This is the price you pay for being caring about other people's feelings.


-- It was evening rush hour, and the bus in front of the Metro station was filling up fast. I sat in one of the front seats. This is always tricky, because if an elderly, handicapped or pregnant person happens to board, you're obligated to give up your seat to them. This was especially true in this situation, as everyone else in those front seats that day was either female, elderly or a little kid. Thus, if anyone would have to surrender their seat, it would be me.

So of course, an old woman got on. I was tired and I really didn't want to give up my seat. But on my Golden Girls scale, she was a Sophia, so I kind of had to.

"Excuse me, miss?" I asked. (An old friend of mine who fancied himself a pick-up artist once told me that I should refer to old women as "miss" instead of "ma'am." His theory being, old women will appreciate it and young women will see you do this, and find it charming. I think this is bullshit, but I kind of fell into the habit of doing it when I knew him, and can't get out of it.) "Would you care to sit down?"

"Oh, no, I'm fine. Thank you," she responded, and grabbed onto one of the hand rails near my seat. Well, whatever. I'd tried.

Between then and when the bus departed, one of the seats up front opened up and a guy about my age sat down in it. As the bus was pulling away, he looked up from his iPod and noticed the old woman standing by me.

"Ma'am? Do you want to sit down?" he asked.

She again started to decline, but the guy practically leapt out of his seat, put his hand on her shoulder, and gently guided her into it. "I...well, okay," she said, and sat down. I had to fight the urge to give her an incredulous look. Like, what, my seat wasn't good enough?

"That was very nice of you!" a middle-aged woman who hadn't been on the bus when I'd offered up my seat, whispered to the guy, just loudly enough for everyone nearby to hear. He beamed, seemingly agreeing that he was indeed pretty awesome. Then she glanced over at me, still in my seat, more than a little judgmentally.

"Hey, whoa, don't even! I tried to offer her my seat! She refused! I respected her decision to remain standing! He practically wrestled her into his seat! I'm the good guy here, not this attention whore douchebag!" That's what I wanted to say. Instead, I just inwardly sighed and accepted defeat. Sometimes, trying to correct people's misconceptions isn't worth it.

I won't go so far as to say that when a guy offers a woman his seat on the Metro, she's obligated to accept it. There are numerous reasons why she may not want to, ranging from getting off at the next stop to hemorrhoids. But generally speaking, if there is no compelling reason not to sit down, it seems like the nice thing to do would be to just take him up on the offer.

America's new enemy

The last time I made a point of walking by the Newseum was the day after the 2008 election, when all the newspapers announcing Obama's election were on display. There were lots of people there, posing in front of and taking photos of the various front pages, and everyone was generally really happy.

Yesterday, I headed over there to see the various announcements of bin Laden's death, and like before, there were lots of people there, posing in front of and taking photos of the various front pages, and everyone was generally really happy. A bizarre kind happiness where someone being shot in the eye and dumped into the ocean brings us pleasure. But still really happiness.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal's was my favorite front page.

Simple. To the point. Red font, evocative of blood. In fact, I think the only way it could have improved is if if the letters had been dripping blood, but I guess the AP Stylebook would probably frown on that.

As I was perusing the newspapers, a group of high school kids walked by and upon seeing the papers, one kid moaned, "Great, we need a new enemy now."

At first, I didn't think much of it, but when I got back to work and checked Twitter, I found this, via @briantruitt and @Fowler_IGN.

I think America just found its new enemy.

As an artist, there are certain things you don't do. You don't try and improve on the Mona Lisa, you don't take it upon yourself to write a sequel to Catcher in the Rye, and you don't butcher Smells Like Teen Spirit. I love the song, too, Miley. That doesn't make me qualified to get up in front of a big crowd and sing it.

Now am I saying that we should treat Miley Cyrus the same way we did bin Laden, sending in a SEAL team to capture or kill her? No. But after this, I don't think rendition to Gitmo should be taken off the table.

Summer Movie Scorecard 2011

2011 feels a bit odd in regards to summer movie season.

Maybe it's because with stuff like Sucker Punch, Source Code, Scream 4 and Fast Five already out, it feels like it actually started a few weeks ago, and fatigue is already setting in.

Maybe it's because while there are a ridiculous 25 films that I'm either going to see or might go see, there isn't one that I'm especially jazzed about, like with Star Trek or The Dark Knight in years past. The one I'm most looking forward to is probably Fright Night of all films, because I loved the original and think the remake with David Tennant could be even better.

Or maybe it's just that a lot of this year's films look like they have the potential to really, really suck. Yeah, I'm looking right at you, Green Lantern. Also, last year, the summer movie season started with Iron Man 2. This year: Thor. I don't have a good feeling about this.


Have Seen:

Definitely Seeing:

Thor
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
The Hangover Part II
X-Men: First Class
Super 8
Green Lantern
Transformers: Dark of the Moon
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2
Captain America: The First Avenger
Rise of the Planet of the Apes
Don't Be Afraid of the Dark
Fright Night
Final Destination 5

Might See:

The Beaver
Everything Must Go
Priest
Bad Teacher
Larry Crowne
Horrible Bosses
Crazy, Stupid, Love.
Cowboys & Aliens
The Change-Up
30 Minutes or Less
Conan the Barbarian
Our Idiot Brother