the pod bay door

¦¦ Yesterday in Sydney, Australia, there was a huge protest against the war in Iraq. A participant videotaped some of the march, it’s mostly raw footage with some short interviews interspersed throughout. (Note: an ad plays before you can watch the video.)

¦¦ The only film nominated in one of the major Oscar categories that I did not see in 2002 was Y Tu Mama Tambien. I hope to rectify that soon. In the meantime, read this fascinating short interview with the director, Alfonso Cuarón, from last Sunday’s NYT Magazine. Chances are you won’t guess what film he’s now directing.

¦¦ On March 25th in Toronto, Paul Cellucci, the US Ambassador to Canada, spanked our national ass and sent us to bed without supper.

¦¦ The Book-Film-TV-Video Critiquees are the awards voted on by members of Blogcritics (of which I am one – but didn’t vote, this happened before I was invited to join.)

¦¦ Many reviews of the Oscars have been written this week, and my favorite was in Michael Musto’s column in The Village Voice. His take on Jennifer Connelly is too good.

¦¦ “Should Celebrity Activists Shut Up for Now?” This piece appeared on Salon.com, and is “reprinted” on Bill Maher’s site, featuring interviews with two of my favorite entertainers, Maher, and Janeane Garofalo. (I saw both of them in NYC in November 2002)

¦¦ Did you hear that the Boeing 777 carrying Tony Blair to the USA to meet with Dubya was struck by lightning? A message from God, perhaps?

¦¦ Two librarians at the Leddy Library, University of Windsor in Ontario, have created a site called “Iraq 2003: Sources of News“. The site includes alternative media sources as well as mainstream outlets. The site creators are encouraging feedback. One of the librarians, Lisa Sloniowski, has sent an e-mail to a library-related listserv, describing the page. With her permission, I’m posting it here as well:
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¦¦ A word from the Harry Potter series has been accepted by the Oxford English Dictionary. In the books, a Muggle is a person with no magical powers. OED has accepted the word and extended its definition to mean “a person who lacks a particular skill or skills, or who is regarded as inferior in some way.” Previous OED definitions of muggle include “a tail representing that of a fish”, “a young woman; (spec.) a sweetheart”, and “marijuana. Also: a marijuana cigarette; a joint. muggle-head…a marijuana smoker” I wonder which of the previous definitions may have influenced JKR.

¦¦ With encouragement and guidance from Heavy G, I successfully embedded trackback coding into my templates tonight. (I know, it doesn’t make much sense to me either). But I’m glad I finally did it. Geoff mentioned an interesting graphical show-and-tell about how trackback works. I think it’s finally beginning to make sense. Now the Amazing Trotts, creators of Moveable Type, have written A Beginner’s Guide To Trackback.

Now I need to learn how to use it!

¦¦ The brain functions better with sleep, of which I have not been getting much lately. Today at work the world was spinning too quickly – so much paper pushing. Yeesh.

¦¦ Librarians looking for an interesting sig file can check Lib.Sigs., “Quotations for Librarians’ E-mail Signature Files”. The latest entry comes from the Oscars, courtesy of Michael Moore: “We like nonfiction, and we live in fictitious times.”

¦¦ Speaking of Michael Moore’s Oscar acceptance speech, this evening I watched a video of the IFP Independent Spirit Awards, which were handed out on Saturday night, the day before the Oscars. Moore won an award there as well, and his acceptance speech was essentially the same one he gave at the Academy Awards, but longer and more drawn out, as he didn’t face a time constraint, and the attendees, independent filmmakers, writers, actors, etc., were on his side for the most part. The nominees and award winners are listed here.

¦¦ Remember Clonaid and their claims of having created clone babies? Apparently this is a picture of the third one. What, you thought there were only two clone babies? Well, try five.

¦¦ Tired of the one-sided tv coverage of the war on Iraq? I’m disgusted with the coverage on CNN today, broadcasting interviews with families of captured US soldiers – what horse pucky! One interviewer asked a father if he’d prefer to have his son released. Well, DUH! Hey, can we get a few more retired generals on board? Cheer up and read You Might Be A Right Wing Republican If …

¦¦ I watched the Oscars tonight with friends, something I haven’t done for so long I can’t remember the last time it happened. I enjoyed watching the awards and exchanging comments along the way. In my predictions, I went 3-8, not a good score. I was thrilled for Adrien Brody, by far the surprise award of the evening. I thought Michael Moore’s acceptance speech started well, and ended poorly, but not because of its content. I support him, appreciate his anger towards the injustice in the world, and wish there were more like him out there willing to speak their minds so freely and with conviction. I realize that his words were in character, and were what we were privately expecting to hear. I wish he’d have expressed himself with more grace and dignity, and with respect for the moment. The rant that Dubya didn’t win the election because he lost the popular vote in 2000 is such old news by now. Regardless, I’m glad he won.

That said, check out his comments in the press room after he won the award. I admire him for standing by his actions, and he makes a convincing case for saying what he did, which is the defense of free speech in a country where free speech is under seige.

I was disappointed that Eminem decided not to appear. This may be the first time in 75 years that a nominated song was not performed at the Oscars, and then won the award.

As for Martin Scorsese, his award, if ever, will wait for another film in another time. That Gangs of New York didn’t receive one award, however, was a bit much – it’s a powerful film that at the very least deserved the award for Art Direction.