A newscaster is so overcome by JLo’s image that he blurts out exactly what comes to mind. Be sure to turn up the sound to hear the newscast in its entirety–classic. Big ups to Santi for sending me this.

Stan Lee sues Marvel for $10MM in order to get a fair share of the “jackpot” being reaped in by the Spiderman film–$400MM domestically, $1B worldwide. Marvel claims that after they still don’t have a profit–that must be Enron accounting they are using. He is also suing for a fair share of The Hulk, Daredevil and X-Men II. Marvel better stop fucking around with Stan–greedy fuckers.

Kenneth Adelman and his wife are putting the California coastline on the Web in digital pictures. The California Coastal Records Project is intended to take a photograph of the California coast every 500 feet for the entire 1,100 miles–from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Los Angeles airport–everything. At the site people can lookup images by coordinates or image captions (i.e. landmarks). The couple are using a Nikon D1X digital camera connected to an Apple PowerBook laptop and the GPS receiver installed in a Robinson R-44 helicopter to record the scene and the exact location of the camera when the photograph was taken. The system takes a picture about every three seconds. Kenneth takes the pictures while his wife flies the helicopter. Check it out, I was able to find Wayfarer’s Chapel and the Queen Mary on the site. Kick ass project.

The deadly tornadoes that struck this weekend from the Great Lakes to the Gulf Coast left 35 people dead. Surprisingly, a lot of the states that were hit are East of the infamous “Tornado Alley”. The people that live in Tornado Alley are resilient, if not stubborn. After each tornado they say, “we will rebuild.” I’d take the insurance money and move the hell away from there. I’ll take a 30-second earthquake over a 15-minute tornado any day.

The guys that started collecting AOL CDs to give back to the company (see previous blog) less than a month ago already have about 80,000 of them. Their hope is that when they reach 1,000,000 CDs they’ll show up at AOL headquarters and dump them sayin’, “You’ve got mail.” Sweet. At this rate these guys will have 1,000,000 CDs in only about seven to nine months.

Meerenai Shim launched her music website recently–check it out. If you need a classical music ensemble for a special event or would like to learn to play the flute give her a call.

The opening scene of the movie opens with a van violently crashing and an organ being delivered at the end of the driveway to Barry Egan’s business, played by Adam Sandler. It was as if Barry had to choose whether to embrace violence or something else. The organ symbolizes not only fullfillment, but a bit of sanity and love. Although Barry doesn’t completely denounce violence, it is clear that he’s trying to find something else–the audience goes along for the ride. Great film. Also you may want to read Larry O’Brien’s review of the film.

All the critics have already told you that Eminem kick ass in this film and I am here to tell you that it’s all true. One of the best scenes in the film is just him sitting in silence in a bus looking at his surroundings. In this scene he communicates self-doubt and insecurity brilliantly. It is an excellent film about a poor kid’s journey of self-realization searching for self-confidence. Even of you don’t like hip-hop you can appreciate the story–great movie.

A storm in the Bay Area is wreaking all kinds of havoc. At school, a huge branch flattened a student’s car breaking the windshield and denting the hell out of the hood. Moral of this story–don’t park under big ass trees when it’s windy.

The Republicans won back control of congress last night. Now, although I am a little excited about the lower taxes that the Republican “party” will bring, here is the hangover we may expect after it’s all over:

1) Foreign Policy Problems – The Republican way of separating America from the world with separatist foreign policy will ensure that the world will hate us. They will promote a war on terror by promoting fear of “the evil doers.” Vague bullshit that will only serve to make people scared and maybe join the NRA. Shitty foreign policy–shitty world perception.

2) More Poor and Homelessness – More homlessness is inevitable as services decrease for the poor in a Republican congress. Have you walked down the street in San Francisco lately? We don’t need the homeless problem to get any worse.

3) Fear and Loathing – Did I mention the fear? As America ostracizes itself from the rest of the world (see #1) fear will pervail domestically. The “From my cold, dead hands!” rhetoric from Charleton Heston and the NRA gang will have the masses shaking in their boots and afraid of each other. We are already promoting fear of the world, I mean, “the evil doers.”

I take comfort in knowing that everything in life, including public perception, is cyclical and things will move from “right” to “center” in time. Also, I live in a liberal city within a largely Democratic state. The bottom line is that if we educate ourselves and keep open minds we shouldn’t have to live in fear of anyone–even Republicans. Because even they will do the best they can while in the driver’s seat.

My friend Larry O’Brien just finished writing a book for Prentice Hall about C#, the programming language that is part of Microsoft’s .NET framework. The book will retail $50, but he’s offering it online for only $5. The only difference is the online book doesn’t have a full index. This is an awesome deal if you are a geek in need.

I was reading my friend Jimmy’s blog when I came across this entry where he refers to search engine queries as “random shizzle on the inter-nizzle” and almost peed my pants. It did inspire me to research the ways that people find my website. Overwhelmingly, people have found my site by searching for “fucked company” because of this page from the iMind Parody site (also on this domain). Other queries include “societal decline” and “frank chu san francisco.” It’s interesting to see how people end up here. Rock on!

Absolutely nothing of interest going on in the world today. Just a lot of preparations for tomorrow’s elections. I am freezing my ass off in Denver. Check out this realtime report from Weather.com:

28F Partly Cloudy, Feels Like 21F
UV Index: 0 Minimal
Dew Point: 23F
Humidity: 76%
Visibility: Unlimited miles
Pressure: 29.87 inches and rising
Wind: From the Southwest at 7 mph

As reported at Buckley Arpt., CO Last Updated Monday, November 4, 2002, at 10:56 PM Mountain Standard Time.

Amazingly, nearly 200 cars crashed in fog on the Long Beach Freeway near Los Angeles. Melissa and I were in the thickest fog we’ve ever seen between Long Beach and Wilmington on New Year’s Eve 1990–we had to drive 5MPH on Pacific Coast Hwy. to get home–crazy.

Michael Moore’s Bowling for Columbine is a thought-provoking documentary that explores the root causes for the violence of the Columbine shootings. In doing so, it masterfully implicates our society, the media, the NRA, and Charleton Heston himself. But even if Charleton Heston is a racist and the NRA sometimes acts like the Klan in sheep’s clothing, ultimately it is the fears that are perpetuated by the media that may be responsible for the violence. Check out the website–the worldwide firearm homicide statistics shocked the hell out of me. Watch this movie and make your own decisions–you won’t be dissappointed.

Friday Five from Smattering.org.

1. Were you raised in a particular religious faith?
I was raised Roman Catholic.

2. Do you still practice that faith? Why or why not?
No, I am not a practicing Catholic. I don’t believe in any organized religion–they all essentially strive for “goodness.” I want my “goodness” without the guilt, restrictions, and threats of eternal damnation. Besides, the evangelistic mantras pit the religions against each other. More people have been killed in the name of God than for any other reason–the Crusades were a bad idea. Karl Marx said, “religion is the opiate of the masses” and I tend to agree. However, I have actually gotten into Buddhism recently because it’s an introspective philosophy more than a religion persay–it implies a certain personal pragmatism. But, who knows? Maybe South Park is right; the correct answer for “salvation” is the Mormons.

3. What do you think happens after death?
The people you leave behind throw a big party with your money.

4. What is your favorite religious ritual (participating in or just observing)?
Picking up a Grande Latte at Starbucks in the morning.

5. Do you believe people are basically good?
I do believe that everyone has the capacity to be good, but all the mofos I’ve come across in my lifetime were not all good. If you try and live a life that you can be proud of then you will be rewarded someway somehow. I am a firm believer in karmic retribution.