Silver Jacket

Author: Matthew Hutson

  • The Plot Unravels

    SphereThis week David Edelstein, film critic for Slate, collaborated with his readers to build a list of the top 20 most-idiotic-twist endings to movies. The survey is relatively comprehensive, but includes one glaring omission: the terrible twist in Sphere.

    At the end of Sphere, the three surviving protagonists collectively decide to forget—all together on the count of three! (is that even possible?)—all of the unusual events leading up to that point in the movie. And WHAMO! By some alien-endowed mind-manifesting metaphysical stunt, all those events cease having happened! History is erased and the entire movie is nullified. You've just watched an account of something that never happened, even in the fictional universe of the movie. Glad I invested my time.

    Oh, and if only it were that clear-cut. The moviemakers make no move to illustrate how the characters will explain their missing comrades.  Or the gigantic glowing sphere that comes rocketing out of the ocean in full view of hundreds of Navy cadets.

    Maybe if I concentrate and count to three I can forget the whole flick.

    Adendum:

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  • Naked Air

    Nakedairlogo02It’s Wacky Weblink Wednesday everybody! Please pass the nuts. (NSFW)

  • Rock On

    WorldrpsPeople don’t think there’s any strategy to Rock, Paper, Scissors, but the website of the World RPS Society delves into some of the common psychological and  physical strategies used by players in the know. They also name the eight most popular gambits:

    Avalanche (RRR)
    Bureaucrat (PPP)
    Crescendo (PSR)
    Dénouement (RSP)
    Fistfull o’ Dollars (RPP)
    Paper Dolls (PSS)
    Scissor Sandwich (PSP)
    Toolbox (SSS)

    It’s hard to whether these people in full honesty believe RPS is more than a game of chance, but I defy anyone to beat my lifetime winning percentage of 56%.

  • Lingo Mania

    DadMy dad's first book just came out: L.eadership in N.onprofit O.rganizations by B.arry D.ym and H.arry Hutson (B.arry and H.arry!). [I have added periods to prevent my parents (H.arry and Sally!) from accidentally discovering my blog via Google. See likely scenario.] He's a leadership and organizational consultant but has decided to write books too. No doubt there is some source of value (and income) in this line of work, but to be honest I fell asleep reading the back cover. It advertises features like

    "Chapters on leadership constructs such as fit, dynamics, readiness and flow which provide useful insights and methods to enable success,"

    and the "Overarching concept of alignment which reframes leadership as an active process where the awareness of and response to the interplay of multiple, relevant factors matters more than charisma, pedigree or power."

    Super. I am reminded of Office Space, or the multiple websites enumerating managerial lingo/jargon/buzzwords for giggles. Such as:

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  • Language Police, Episode I

    Call me a fogey. Call me a prescriptivist. Call me a pompous prick. But I still routinely flinch at the use of plural pronouns to signify gender-neutrality where singular pronouns are required. ("If you have a friend in trouble you should help them.") The correct generic pronouns are he and him. (I learned this lesson long ago from a female English teacher.) If you are uncomfortable with the practice, you can use the more awkward he/she and him/her, or simply alternate genders. But I think most people use they and them not for aesthetic or political reasons but out of laziness. Ok, in casual speech I can understand it. I do it sometimes too.

    But if the gender is explicitly specified, I cannot tolerate it. Example from a website I encountered recently:

    "Every Valentines day you rack your brains for that one special, unique gift that will show your wife or girlfriend [singular, feminine] that you really do care for them [ouch] more than any other."

    Update: In multiple posts, the linguists at Language Log have argued the case that singular they is grammatically correct. In this post they cite Shakespeare as precedent and call me a "particularly puristic pusillanimous pontificator" (but not a pompous prick.)

    For more on the subject, go here and here.

  • The Illmatic

    Kj01Did you know Kim Jong Il keeps a blog? Check it out. It’s hi-falutin’-larious. Start at the bottom and read up. He also includes many of his IM chats with W. ("License2KimJongill" vs. "Bush43"). I had not realized that the Korean translation of LOL is ROR.

  • The RZA Revealed

    Rza_200The mastermind producer behind the Wu-Tang Clan, the RZA — AKA Robert Diggs, Bobby Digital, Prince Rakeem, The Abbot, and Rzarector — was interviewed by Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air this week. Most startling revelation: Bobby wrote for the high-school newspaper. Most awkward exchange:  RZA explains to Terry the flute melody he used in the Ghost Dog theme:

    RZA: It was joy mixed with sorrow and morbid.

    TG: Morbidity, did you say? Yeah. Well there’s something very eerie about the theme.

    RZA: That’s what I mean. I think, I meant eerie then, if morbid and eerie don’t mean the same thing.

    TG: [laughs] What…

    RZA: Do they mean the same thing? Morbid and eerie?

    TG: Well eerie is kind of mysterious and morbid has to do with death. But I think it’s both, because the movie has a lot to do with death.

    RZA: Right. Well I’ll say eerie then. And morbid.

  • I’m learning Spanish!

    Since moving to San Diego almost a year ago, I have already begun to learn the language of the Spaniards. How? Simply by listening to the radio. Here is an example: I frequently tune to the "urban" station Blazin’ 98.9, where they frequently remind me that they are "Noventa ocho punto nueve: Hip hop y mas." From this, I have deciphered that "y mas" is Spanish for "and crappy R&B."  Loco, ese!

  • Girl vs. Machine

    ArmwrestlingI’m writing an article for HowStuffWorks about artificial muscles (known in the field as electroactive polymers, or EAPs). The International Society for Optical Engineering (SPIE) held their Electroactive Polymer Actuators and Devices (EAPAD) Conference here in San Diego this week, and on the first day they had an arm-wrestling competition between a human and a trio of EAP robotic arms. Panna Felsen, a local high-school senior, defeated each arm in mere seconds. RoboCop, look out! So who is this super-human? Well, it turns out it doesn’t take much strength to overpower artificial muscles, but check this: Felsen designs robots, she gets straight A’s in half a dozen AP classes a year, she teaches ballroom dancing, she’s been a competitive swimmer for eight years, and she builds "EXTREME SAND CASTLES!" Plus, look at that headshot. Modeling can’t be far behind. How do I console myself? I consider she’s probably much uglier in real life. Besides, I heard the Internet subtracts 20 pounds. Ego spared! 

    UPDATE: After finding more photos of Felsen on the Internet, my hypothesis has fallen. She is genuinely attractive (for a 17-year-old of course…) Ego crushed!

  • Damn Write

    Free shout-out to the first person who can tell me which New Yorker writer has Kelis’s "Milkshake" as his ringtone.