All posts by Steve Stern

A Tale of Two Places

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Today, here in Olympic Valley CA – known as Squaw Valley, it is two days after Christmas: December 27, 2009. The day started with a warm front moving through and a soft snow fall.

Snow C,A,S-1912

By the end of the day, the front had moved through, the skies cleared, and people came out to play.

Snow C,A,S-1970

It could not be more peaceful. The country is on vacation, on hold. Sure, life still goes on – some wacko tried to blow up a plan by sewing pentaerythritol tetranitrate into his undies and the US is going after Al Qaeda militants in Yemen. But, by and large, we had a nice Christmas with our biggest worry being the weather.

In Iran, it is the Day of Ashura 1388 and it is not snowing. It is a couple of degrees above freezing in Tehran and almost nobody is thinking about the weather.

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They are thinking about revolution and freedom, and teargas. They are thinking about the risk of getting killed to get freedom. 

Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, and the American male archetype with a gratuitous jab at Fox and a guest appearance by Mad Men’s Roger Stirling

Americana, What's a man?

In their own ways, Jon Steward and Stephen Colbert represent two main American archetypes:  the humble man and the braggart. When I was growing up, the humble man was the ideal we all aspired to (would you be happier with "to which we all aspired"?). The shy, reticent Gary Cooper playing Sgt. York or the sheriff in High Noon was the ideal American hero. The French with their fancy clothes and braggadocio manner were one thing, but real Americans were quiet, even taciturn. Think John Wayne. Think the great Baltimore Colt quarterback Johnny Unitas.

While not taciturn, Jon Stewart is in this tradition. Often his humor is based on him being wrong, the reasonable but humble everyman.   

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
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Daily Show
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In my memory, the first of the braggarts was Mohammad Ali but, really, the braggart archetype is older. George Washington went to the Continental Congress hoping to be appointed Commander in Chief of the American revolutionary forces and to accomplish that end, he had a natty powder blue General's uniform made so he would look very generalish. Nothing reticent there. All the Civil War generals before Grant enjoyed their displays of splendor (when Grant first arrived at General Meade's Headquarters, he snarkingly said that this must be Caesar's Army with all the flags and pomp). Now, it is pretty much universally considered manly to put on a display: think almost any NFL football player after making a touchdown. And nobody does it better than Stephen Colbert.


The Colbert Report

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Avatar and IMDb

Film

Last night, we saw Avatar. To quote Roger Ebert, "Watching Avatar, I felt sort of the same as when I saw Star Wars in 1977. That was another movie I walked into with uncertain expectations. James Cameron's film has been the subject of relentlessly dubious advance buzz, just as his Titanic was. Once again, he has silenced the doubters by simply delivering an
extraordinary film. There is still at least one man in Hollywood who
knows how to spend $250 million, or was it $300 million, wisely."

Like Star Wars, we enter a whole new world:

Like Star Wars, it is not a great movie – it can even be argued that it is not a particularly good movie. It has a formulaic plot lines and characters we have all seen lots of times. But it is a total immersion into a new world. The depth and detail of the new world – especially in 3D – are mind boggling. Like Star Wars, it is as shocking – in it's way – as jumping into a cold river. We were away and all the distractions of the dry world were forgotten.

The best non-video example I can think of is to go to the Internet Movie Database (IMDb). On the IMDb, the page for an old movie (for  the best effect – any effect, really – use the following links), like, Casablanca to pick a random example, is a very handy, fact-filled page of information. For new movies, Clint Eastwood's new Invictus, for example, the page is the same. But Avatar is a whole new ball game.  

Avatar-Neytiri-Movie

World Wide Web Wackiness*

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* that makes me realize that I don't know very much about the World Wide Web, or The InterNets, or Bloging, or what the future will bring. 

A couple of days ago, I posted a comment on the Monterey Historic Car Races. Today I found it on General Racing's Facebook Wall with seven comments. I have no idea how it got there.

When I first saw my post, I had a moment of horror. My posts are not private (duh!) but they are not something I expect many people to see or be very interested in. In that regard,  they are sort of unrequited. To have my post show up on the Facebook wall that my post is about was a moment of panic in which I was afraid that I had no idea what I was talking about. Then, what button did I push to post it there? I have no idea how it got there and now I am pretty sure that it wasn't me;  just WWWW.