Author: ssw15

Recently watched “Bourne Identity” on video – decent, fun, action-packed, but poignant (character-wise) movie. Now I’m just looking forward to seeing the sequel, opening tomorrow, “Bourne Supremacy.” Doesn’t hurt that “Entertainment Weekly” makes the upcoming movie sound curiously interesting ((a) I’m too easily swayed when EW says something’s good and I can sense that it is too; and (b) apparently, Matt Damon as Bourne gets to use a rolled up magazine as a weapon – very cool).

Recently finished reading Sharon Kay Penman’s “Dragon’s Lair,” British medieval mystery. The young hero, the series’ protagonist, is developing nicely as a compelling character, although I still felt that the mystery’s plot was somewhat weak (wherein Justin, Queen Mother Eleanor’s man, has to figure out what happened to stolen chattel that was supposed to be ransom to rescue the kidnapped King Richard; murder and royal court soap opera make things complicated).

Recently finished reading J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets,” the second book in the series. I thought it was better than the first book – more development of the character of Harry. Whether I’m still on pace to read all five books of the series before the summer is over is debatable, but I’m inching toward book 3.

Visited StarTrek.com – wherein there is the announcement of the passing of Jerry Goldsmith, Hollywood composer. He is most known for the Star Trek theme from “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” which later became the theme for “Star Trek: The Next Generation.” The article notes that he also made the themes for “Star Trek: First Contact” and for “Star Trek: Voyager.” Could’ve sworn he also did “Deep Space Nine”‘s theme too. I’ll definitely agree that Goldsmith made great music – not only does the theme for Next Gen always send thrills in me, that “First Contact” soundtrack was stunning stuff.

StarTrek.com also provided updates on the upcoming Season 4 of “Enterprise” – I’m either encouraged by the news out of the rumor mill or else really scared that this is going to be a roller coaster quality type of season. Too soon to say.

Spent most of Thursday night watching a “Scrubs” marathon on NBC. Ah, so much fun. This show and “Arrested Development” on FOX are the two most watchable comedies of the current generation of network comedies currently on the air. Wish NBC showed more reruns of “Scrubs” (wished my VCR actually taped more of the episodes, but that’s another story) this summer and that NBC was actually consistent about the timeslot for “Scrubs” (that network so disrespects anything that isn’t a reality show or a show prefaced with the words “Law and Order”). I haven’t forgiven NBC’s entertainment division for cancelling “Boomtown,” and I’m not surprised that CBS has done much better in the ratings with consistent servings of reruns of its good shows. (“Amazing Race” is clearly good quality (even if I’m not watching it, I can tell); whereas when will CBS ever learn that “Big Brother” isn’t watchable???). And, I agree with the professional tv critics – so not fair that the Emmies did not nominate John McGinley of “Scrubs” for an acting nomination – he is so good as the aggressive but compassionate (to the patients anyway) Dr. Cox.

Fascinating article on MSNBC – geneaology and DNA testing may help people trace their ancestry back to Genghis Khan. Hmm, and that means what, exactly? That he was one busy conqueror, populating Eurasia??…

And, back to looking forward to Friday.

Rain, rain, and more rain in the NYC metro area. It’s practically flooding in Jersey. Yech.

Interesting little quiz on Slate.com: “Red or Blue—Which Are You?”, wherein you fill out the on-line Scantron sheet (so reminiscent of my public school days, when we were inundated with Scantron sheets) and see what state (of mind, anyway) you are – red or blue. I answered the questions; turns out I knew some answers such the my state of mind is more “in the middle” (although I’d like to think that I leaned toward blue, being in a blue city in a bluish state; but I’m a proven moderate after all).

Apparently, Rolling Stone magazine has an interview with Garry Trudeau, the Doonesbury comic strip man, about what he recalls of his overlapping with George W. Bush in Yale, and Associated Press gets to reveal the interesting soundbites of said interview. Personally, I’ve heard some of Trudeau’s lines before (either on the interview he had with Ted Koppel way back when or in some article I read elsewhere). I’d be more interested if Trudeau had some recollection on John Kerry (who, I think, had some overlap with Trudeau and Bush at Yale; Yale must have been an interesting place in the 1960’s…)

I really don’t know whether to be relieved that ex-football coach Mike Ditka is deciding not to run for the GOP for the U.S. Senate seat of Illinois. And, why oh why are so many ex-athletes Republican anyway? Sports Illustrated had this odd photo spread (for the “Where are they now?” issue of profiling ex-athletes); the only politician (former or active)/ex-athlete who was a Democrat in the picture was Bill Bradley.

Check out “Beyond ‘Buffy’: State of sci-fi on TV” on MSNBC. Interesting article. It’s not like I have actual cable access to make my own accurate assessment on the state of tv sci-fi. But, if I’d have to put in some commentary, it’d be like this: local syndication has given me seasons 1-5 of “Stargate SG1” so many times (well, season 5 or 6, I forget which, is being shown like the third time this year on Channel 9…) and so what little of “SG1” I have seen has ways of irritating me for some unexplained reason (the writing isn’t tight enough for me or I’d wish they would develop the characters’ storylines just a tad more or else the parasite-power-mad alien premise just freaks me out too much or what; I just can’t figure it out). On the plus side, “SG1” has a talented cast; I’ve stopped seeing actor Richard Dean Anderson as his previous signature character of MacGyver (of course, that show has been gone so long so it’s only understandable that I would not ID him as MacGyver anymore; cannot say the same about Tom Selleck – will always see him as Magnum PI, which either says he’s not that good of an actor or else too good as Magnum – although he did a good job on “Friends”)…. Plus, I miss “Angel” and “Buffy”; their (inconsistently shown) reruns don’t quite satisfy. “Star Trek: Enterprise” needs improvement so badly (and I’ve probably said that so many times). What little of “Smallville” I’ve managed to catch this year only serves to annoy me (I am not a Superman person; can we please have Batman back? For real now, not some tease). “Charmed” is starting to really tick me off for skimping on its drama (and going too heavy on its campiness and having too many dumb holes in its plots; I’m too old for this show, obviously)…. Ok, I could go on, but it won’t be pretty, so I’ll just stop now.

I guess I got loaded on MSNBC links in this post. I guess I got bored with my usual websurfing sites; maybe I should look for new stuff to view.

Major League Baseball All-Star Game on right now. What the heck was going on with that top of the first inning? Pitcher Roger Clemens giving up all these runs; his nemesis Mike Piazza catching him, but definitely not making Clemens feeling very comfortable. Crazy stuff that the NY baseball fans/NY media will feed on…

What’s with that annoying “Jeopardy” winner, Ken Jennings? Will he ever finish his never-ending run on the show? How I miss the days back when champions were not allowed to stay on longer than a week.

The passing of Isabel Sanford, best known to tv fans for her role as Louise “Weezie” Jefferson. Salute to a tv icon (I don’t have TV land or other rerun channel, but I spent way too much of the 1980’s watching stuff like the “Jeffersons,” a true sitcom classic. Like, remember the weird Halloween episode where Weezie, George, and the rest of their gang had to stop a murderer? Ah, there goes that theme song: the Jeffersons, livin’ way up in the sky…movin’ on up…).