Odds and Ends 9-15-2012

It baffles me that certain movies are not out on Blu-ray or took many years to get issued, such as Lawrence of Arabia. Having obtained a minty used copy of the special edition DVD set of The Right Stuff and watching it last night, I can’t understand why there is no Blu-ray of it. It is a stupendously beautiful looking and sounding movie that deserves the full high definition treatment. It also is the shortest over three hour movie I have ever watched. By watched, I mean repeatedly over the years.

While I like my Iview Cypad 7” Android based tablet, I do need more horsepower. The Google Nexus was a disappointment in my view, since it has no HDMI out or memory card slot. The new Kindle Fire HD 7” looks terrific, but still lacks the slot and leaves you tied to Amazon’s proprietary store. Even with that, it is the current top candidate for a replacement. Ainol, a Chinese manufacturer, has a new tablet, the Novo 7 Fire, that has everything I want, but there are some early technical problems involving overheating. Its specs beat both the Nexus and Fire HD, so if they work out the difficulties, that is the one I would like to get.

After many years, Black Mesa rolled out yesterday. Black Mesa is a mod for the Source engine that recreates much of the original Half Life with all the bells and whistles of newer technology. I did a short run as far as the highly annoying jumping the crates level and have to say the wait was worth it. The attention to detail is simply amazing and the voice acting isn’t bad at all. There is a possibility they may do the Xen levels later, but hardly anybody liked those. I can’t wait to get into the fire fights and see how they are executed.

The strong horse versus weak horse theory of Arab society has gotten some strong buttressing by the events the last few days. Nobody respects a weakling and the perception world wide is that Obama is one. So far, nothing he has done has disproved that, so things in the Middle East will continue to get worse. So will the situation in Asia now that China is getting aggressive with its navy. When both Israel and Japan believe they are being abandoned by America, you know the foreign policy of the current administration is an abject failure.

Though I know the mainstream media to be hopelessly partisan, the reaction to the attacks on our embassies has been astounding. A desperate effort was made to make Mitt Romney the villain out of all this, which is simply insane. His comments were appropriate given the horrendous failure Obama’s foreign policy has been. They also were issued before the ambassador was known to have been killed.

Speaking of that, it is clear a cover up is underway to downplay the full horror of what happened in Libya. Claims that he died of smoke inhalation and the crowd dragging his body around were trying to help him do not match up with local reports from the Arab journalists in the area. While not verified, he was apparently pulled out by force, tortured, then raped before being strangled. The latter two are done to humiliate an opponent and show they consider them weak. So far none of the accounts out of the administration jibe with timelines or other information given. Now they are stonewalling the press – and if the liberal press devoted to protecting Obama think something is off, you know it is really bad.

Scored a used Blu-ray/DVD set of Thor for $14 at a pawn shop. To my delight, it turned out to be a nearly untouched disc with no sign it had been played more than once. I will have to do a review of it sometime in the near future. My goal is to get all the movies leading up to The Avengers on Blu-ray. Hopefully they will go on sale around the release of that movie.

Wow gasoline has gotten expensive. It is over $3.90 a gallon around here and I highly doubt demand is what is driving prices since industrial output is down again according to August figures. Food prices get worse with every visit to the grocery and making long distance trips to La Crosse for bargains are no longer worth it. My dad and I have been frequenting local stores the last few years as a form of community support, but to my recent surprise we do better on the grocery bill thanks to this.

The Subaru Outback is in the shop again, so I am without wheels for a week or two. Once again I am having to rely on the help of friends to get to to church and the weekly gaming session. One of these days I might become more comfortable with that, but I rely so much on others in life that adding to it irritates me greatly.

I am debating discontinuing my Netflix DVD rental subscription. It has nothing to do with their service, but with my having accumulated a large library of movies and a waning interest in mainstream Hollywood offerings. Lately I have felt like I am inundated with too much media to the point of not being able to take much more in. Each new thing replaces an old thing in my memory and I do not like that. So I would rather build my library and get some obscure movies from my past in the collection. I can purchase one to two DVDs each month for what I pay to Netflix, since I am very good at finding bargains. Very good.

Halloween is not far away and I have some movies I need to get reviewed to make space for scary movie reviews. Beowulf and Godzilla Raids Again are up next, then time to bring out the classic horror flicks. I’ll also finish out Bleach season one and hopefully Fractale Revisited. Time will tell.