In an outstanding piece of timing and marketing Free Range Media has produced Grocery Store Wars for the Organic Trade Association. It is a Flash Movie based on Star Wars but with the names changed to protect the innocent. Starring Cuke Skywalker, Obe Wan Cannoli and many more I won't spoil for you. Missing characters I would like to see were "Boba Feta Cheese" and Jabba the Pizza Hut.
Can't wait to see Episode III this weekend...
This weekend I read a PHP and MySQL book cover to cover, watched Dodgeball at the Regal 24, met the lead singer of Keane and then was caught on camera in the background of a Fox 5 Atlanta outside broadcast this morning while I sipped my coffee and read the closing chapter of the Benjamin Franklin book.
As a veteran CFer and SQL Programmer I was intrigued to read about PHP and MySQL in "PHP and MySQL Web Development, Second Edition" by Luke Welling and Laura Thompson. Learning a new language is always going to reveal some interesting things and one that was particularly intersting was the availability of the GD libraries to allow the creation of dynamic images. This was of relevance to a recent thread on CF-Talk where someone brought up the idea of CAPTCHA images from a CF only standpoint. PHP uses the GD libraries to generate GIF, JPEG and PNG images which allow you to combine text and images on the fly for buttons or, indeed, CAPTCHA images. I reviewed the C code to implement this and it struck me as something which could be easily migrated to CF as a custom tag.
Imagine being able to call
<cfdraw imageName="myImage" height="300" width="300" format="JPG">
circle(10,100,50,red);
text(verdana,10,50,50,black);
</cfdraw>
to see a dynamic JPEG image of a circle at 10,100 50 pixels wide in red with some black text over the top in Verdana 10px font at 50,50.
That would be fun. The book was a little disappointing from an established programmer perspective. I would guess that 80% of what someone with existing programming skills would need to know to write code in PHP with MySQL is presented in the first 258 pages. Then pages 259 through 436 offer some advanced topics including the dynamic image information before the remaining 350 pages describe 8 example applications and offer some information on building large projects and debugging them.
A great book I recently finished was "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" by Lynne Trusse. I heard an interview with Lynne on NPR and thought the book sounded like fun. The British author takes a dicatatorial stance on the issue of punctuation and its abuse (note the correct absence of an apostrophe in its). Not only did I learn about the subtle mistakes in my own writing but I have a keener eye for spotting errors elsewhere. The book is a quick read with delightfully humorous examples taken from the media and her local environment. One example which stands out is the sign "Book's, DVD's and CD's" - where book's should be apostropheless since it is a plural whereas CD's and DVD's is correct since the apostrophe indicates the contraction of the word discs to d's.
Pick up a copy of "Beginning Java Databases" for an incredibly good account of writing Java to connect to a database, run queries and extract metadata about the database. Here the first 60 pages are a "what you need to know" quick-start guide to querying a database followed by a more detailed discussion of SQL concepts and JDBC application development. I have thoroughly enjoyed the book and it is empowering in many ways since it takes what you know about databases in ColdFusion and escalates you to the underlying principles.
Watch Dodgeball with Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughn. Seriously. It makes great light relief after a week of geeky books and it has to be my favorite movie of the year so far, ranking as high as Old School, maybe higher.
...and finally, after the Keane concert at the Cotton Club in Atlanta on Friday night I had a surprise opportunity to chat with Tom Chaplin, the lead singer of Keane. For the uninitiated, Keane's album "Hopes and Fears" is number one in the British album chart and they are making waves on US radio stations currently with "Somewhere only we know". There is a good review of the band at MetroWest Daily News. The fun part was knowing that this has the potential of another Coldplay. I saw Coldplay at the Reading-Leeds festival in 1999 when the band were new to the scene but still with a good crowd. When I moved to the US in 2000 I saw them play at a small club, maybe Metro, and there were fewer than 100 people there. Big contrast with the 2002 concert I attended in Atlanta at the Gwinett Civic Center where I strained my eyes to make out the band members on the stage from the rediculously priced seats I bought for Melissa and I.
I saw a preview showing of Underworld last night at the Regal 24 in Atlanta and I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed it. This movie is clearly a first of breed with subsequent movies to inevitably follow.
The movie races along at a good pace with plenty of well placed effects, which is surprising for a movie about the war between vampires and werewolves. Kate Beckinsdale does a good job in her lead role and the plot works. If you hate vampires and werewolves in stories then you still might enjoy this, or as Melissa commented as I called her after the movie "sounds fantastic. oh, I just saw the trailer... it has Scott Speedman in it".
An interesting sidenote to this was the people attending the preview. Sponsored by 96Rock and the self-proclaimed de facto movie site on the web, CHUD.com, the attendees were predominantly members of the local science fiction group in Atlanta. This was interesting because when the trailer for Resident Evil 2, came on, all cheered as I sat bewildered at what I thought was the most ridiculous commercial for skin care from the Umbrella Corporation. I felt humbled. The other attendees were some of the cast of Netherworld, the "premium house of horror in the tri-state region". Some freaky costumes but not an easy crowd to work with since they are used to seeing Klingons on a regular basis.
It's great to see stuff like this. Freaksauce posted this great tip. Open up a command window (for those of you who don't know:
Click Start > click Run > type cmd > click ok.
Next type:
telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl
Star Wars in ASCII!!
I forgot to mention that I made it to American Wedding (the sequel to American Pie and American Pie 2, combo dvd available at Amazon) last week with my new roommate and his friend Elissa. I used my typical sequel rule of thumb to evaluate the movie, which means that it should never be compared to the original or any previous movies in the series - just look at it within the genre.
That said, was it a good comedy? Yes. From the outset the movie has fresh new material, it focusses on Stiffler with a Jimbo and Shitbreak playing good supporting roles but most importantly, the wet weekend character of Kevin gets just three or so lines. Great. Interesting scenarios leave you cringing behind your bucket of popcorn with more shocking situations. The only part of the movie that I didn't enjoy was a scene that develops in Boys-town in Chicago as the gang go in search of a wedding dress designer. For me it wasn't funny enough to conceal the sillyness.
Slightly off topic, I moved to Boys-town by accident when I first came to America. The people who showed me the apartment neglected to tell me that the neighborhood is predominately gay male oriented. I went to explore and wander round the shops. As I walked into a clothes store there were racks off leather chaps and the gentleman behind the counter kindly offered to "help me try anything on".
Prior to watching Matrix Reloaded, I bought the Matrix limited edition DVD from Blockbuster yesterday and made Melissa watch it with me. This works on two levels. One so I have someone to watch the new movie with who has seen the first and two because it is such a great movie. This morning she sent me a link to this article about the Matrix on MSN. I love how it makes you think about fate and your own existence. The fight scenes are just icing on the cake for what is a great premise for a movie.
Last night I went to see Anger Management again since it's such a great movie and since this was a paid movie and not a screening, I got to see the latest trailers. Here's a summary of those I saw and some more I found at http://www.petesmoviepage.com/release.shtml while trying to confirm release dates:
| Release Date | Link and Description |
| May 2nd | X-Men 2 I loved the original X-Men movie having watched the animated version in my late teens on a Saturday morning. The trailer looks awesome with all the original cast (as far as I could tell) plus more big names. |
| May 9th | Daddy Day Care This one looks interesting since I haven't seen Eddie Murphy in a movie since The Klumps over inflated our screens and the trailer raised several good laughs |
| May 15th | Matrix Reloaded Who needs to explain why the sequel to the Matrix trailer got me excited? |
| May 23rd | Bruce Almighty Another AWOL actor returns as Jim Carrey appears with Morgan Freeman and Jennifer Anniston to deliver a movie about a concept I've pretty much been obsessed with since I was young. I'd love to be god for a day. Here's a link to the trailer |
| June 13th | When Harry met Lloyd: Dumb and Dumberer I enjoyed the first one and the trailer covered some great highlights. It has the potential to be crap but I'm giving this trailer the benefit of the doubt. |
| June 20th | Hulk Some guys at work said that this trailer looks dumb since the hulk picks up a tank and swings it around but this is Marvel Comics Hulk, not Bill Bixby's TV version. |
| June 27th | Charlies Angels Full Throttle Cameron Diaz is in my list of women that I would be allowed to be unfaithful with, along with Julia Roberts and Gwyneth Paltrow so the movie is already at an advantage. That plus my youth obsession with the TV show Charlie's Angels made the first movie a hit and this one looks even better from the trailer. |
| July 2nd | Terminator 3: The Rise of the Machines I hope this doesn't turn out like Aliens 3 which tarnished the memory of the greatest movie ever (Aliens 2). The trailer shows a movie not dissimilar to the first two. |
| July 2nd | Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas If anyone hasn't seen the older version of this movie I recommend a trip to Blockbuster this instant. These cheesy old movies were years ahead of their time and carried a few laughs along with them. The trailer isn't available yet but I'll keep my eyes open. |
| July 9th | Pirates of the Carribean: Curse of the Black Pearl This looks a bit crappy to start with but then when you see the pirates turn to ghosts it's a little more intriguing. I'm not sure if I'll wait for this on DVD but here's the trailer. |
| July 25th | Lara Croft: Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life Since playing my Playstation throughout college I've adored Lara Croft and thought (although I'm amongst the few) that the movie was actually half decent. The trailer sends me back to my hall of residence when, at some ungodly hour of the morning, I completed the second game... |
| November 7th | The Matrix Revolutions Not seen the trailer but this may be removed from the list depending on the quality of the second release next month. |
| December | Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King Three hours is great value for money in my mind and when this comes I'll be one of the first to watch it. My only complaint is that 1 year is too much suspense between pre-recorded sequels where the story is so deeply involved. |
| December 25th | Cheaper by the Dozen If this is a remake of the old black and white film about an efficiency expert then I can't wait to see it. A guy and his wife have 6 boys and 6 girls and he reminds me of myself for my anal approach of timing and recording mundane things like my weight, body fat percentage and workouts. |
| May 21st 2004 | Mission: Impossible 3 Great effects and James Bond style entertainment that always goes down well. |
| June 18th 2004 | Shrek 2 |
| July 2nd 2004 | Spider Man 2 |
After rain finally resulted in the softball being cancelled this evening, I was able to make a free movie screening of the new Adam Sandler/Jack Nicholson movie Anger Management courtesy of Clare. Some predictable but still entertaining cameo's sprinkled throughout the movie, it keeps you laughing which is just what you expect out of Adam Sandler. Jack Nicholson's character is hilarious and even Jon Turturo pops in for another visit since Mr Deeds. There is very little more I can tell you about the movie without spoiling it but I'm pretty certain there is an element my good friend Mark Richards will appreciate for it's Broadway element.
Somebody told me last week that Old School was a big waste of time unless you like slapstick and Laurel and Hardy Movies but Melissa and I went to watch it last night and I thought it was fantastic. There is always that danger that the preview shows all the funny parts, leaving the rest of the movie looking really drab but Will Ferrell and Vince Vaughn really keep the movie running at a funny pace. Vince Vaughn hasn't been this good in a movie since Swingers and Will Ferrell shows that his Saturday Night Live years haven't been forgotten as the character Frank The Tank. Luke Wilson's character brings less humo[u]r to the film but his performance is solid.
Tonight I was supposed to spend an evening at home with the dog, reading and listening to music. Instead I came home early, went to the gym, wolfed down a grilled chicken sandwich and went to see a preview showing of "Bend it like Beckham", an incredible comedy combining Indian Weddings with English Football (soccer if you prefer). The film grossed 11m pounds at the box office or 17m dollars and was made in 35 days on a budget of about 3m pounds, 5m dollars according to the writer and director Gurinder Chadha who gave a Q&A session after the preview by Fox Searchlight pictures held at Phipps Plaza in Atlanta. The film is good fun and should do well based on the remarks of most of those in attendance. It stars Parminder K. Nagra, the lovely Keira Knightley(see photo or more pictures) and Jonathan Rhys-Meyers (it's only fair I should include a link to his fansite). Good for British film-making and good for Bollywood, which helped inspire Gurinder. Her next piece is a Bollywood style musical encompassing British, Indian and American musical styles in a remake of Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.
The funniest story of the night came from a friend before the movie who made no obvious objections to me passing this on. My friend Simon (not travelling Australia Simon but the Brit in Atlanta) told me about his date last Monday with a girl we met in the Darkhorse on the Saturday before. He called her after getting her number and had arranged to meet at 7.30pm at the Soho Cafe in Vinings. As he arrived at 7.15pm he was horrified to see the bar was closed and was beginning to feel like this would be a bad date since he didn't feel to great to start with. A large BMW pulled up outside and Simon was mortified to see the girl inside with leopard skin pants on, lots of make-up and chatting on a Betty Boop cellphone ushering him to the car. She detached herself from her call and instructed him to get in. He got into the car thinking her a little forward and her BMW span away to find another restaurant, with her still on the phone. He was really not interested at this point since what he had seen was not his type by any stretch of the imagination. As she hung up the phone she introduced herself as Mimi. This is the point where I would have loved to see Simon's face. The girl he was waiting for was not called Mimi. Explaining the terrible mistake it turns out that she was set up for a blind date by a friend with a guy who wasn't called Simon. Since she had never seen her date before she just asked him to get in. They span back to Vinings to the restaurant and per Simon's request she pulled up around the back so he wouldn't be seen stepping out of another girls car by his date.
Mimi pulled around the front and as Simon walked back around he met a guy who looked equally dismayed. He asked if he was waiting for Mimi. Yes. Simon explained and pointed out the BMW out front. The other guy pointed to another car close buy indicating that she was Simon's date. They both got into their respective cars and drove off for a rather embarrassing first date, with the ultimate ice-breaker as a conversation piece. Classic.