John Cena seems like he could be another Arnold Schwarzenegger. A big meat lunk who can do action believably, but is smart and self-aware enough that he can do drama and comedy.
Freelance isn’t a great movie, but it is good. It’s a bodyguard-in-a-dangerous-country movie. John Cena does a great job with the action. He has good timing and can deliver the dry wit convincingly.
Alison Brie may have peaked on Community. She owned the part of Annie. In Freelance, there are dozens of actresses who could have been the aggressive journalist.
Christian Slater is always worth watching.
Freelance doesn’t seem to be available for free on any streaming service, but if it come up, it’s worth watching. 6.5/10
People talk about the attributes of different generations, and it got me wondering who names the generations. They aren’t doing a good job: Baby Boomers, Generation X, Millennials, Generation Y and Generation Alpha.
This article from the Pew Trust explains some of it. Big national events and trends shape the children, giving the generations different characteristics.
Is there anyone who would like the TV show Archer, who hasn’t watched it?
People who consider The Simpsons and Family Guy as edgy animated shows, then they may never have found Archer on FX. The series finale just aired, but it’s streaming on ABC, FXNow and Hulu. There were a couple of slow seasons in the middle, but Archer is nearly a perfect show. 9.5/10.
Adam Reed was searching for inspiration. He’d just sold his stake in the production company he co-founded, 70/30 Productions — responsible for his animated series Sealab 2021 and Frisky Dingo…
Both of those animated TV shows are very funny. Sealab 2021 is an absurd adaptation of the 1972 show Sealab 2020. Frisky Dingo is about an alien who came to Earth to destroy us, but virtually nothing happens that like you’d expect.
Archer, centered on a profoundly narcissistic, idiotic, and effortlessly suave spy, Sterling Archer (voiced by H. Jon Benjamin), who does espionage for the International Secret Intelligence Service (ISIS, more on that name later), his mother Malory’s (the late Jessica Walter) spy agency.
The main character, Sterling Archer, is what a Brit might imagine as an American James Bond. Archer is handsome, talented, upper class and a total smart-arse. H. Jon Benjamin also voices Bob from Bob’s Burgers. They did a crossover episode at the start of season 4.
“I was trying to write Archer as the biggest bastard I possibly could,” explains Reed. “Working on the pilot, I was reading all these Flashman books, and Harry Flashman is the worst guy in the world, but you still kind of root for him.”
I have listened to the Flashman books. The first novel was published in 1969, but the premise of the series is that the books are the collected papers of Harry Flashman, a military man from the 1800’s. Harry Flashman is a coward and a womanizer who stumbles into several historical events and comes out seeming like a hero. The language is unbelievably racist and sexist. In spite of that, Flashman is likeable because he amusing and honest with himself. Sterling Archer is much like that. He is witty and a talented spy, but he is an absolute jerk.
With Jessica Walter and Judy Greer, were you inspired to cast them in this by their characters in Arrested Development? Because the characters they play hew close to the ones in that show.
They do very much. Certainly, at the beginning, I had pitched it as “Arrested Development meets James Bond.” I didn’t want to stray too far from that at first, and then we found ourselves in new and strange territory with those characters. The main reason — if not the only reason — that Judy had agreed to be on the show was that Jessica had already said yes. We shamelessly splashed [Jessica’s] name to all the VO agents.
Arrested Development is another TV show worth watching. All of these shows are funny and bizarre.
Archer Vice was probably the most divisive season of the show because it was such a departure from previous seasons. Looking back on that, how do you feel?
[They were] infuriated! I think that also coincided with the whole ISIS thing. Part of it was, I was feeling a little burned out. I thought Archer would be on for four seasons, so when they said, “Hey, let’s do another season!” I was like, “Oh, shit.” I talked to my agent about it and he was like, “That’s a terrible idea,” and I talked to FX about it and they were like, “That’s a terrible idea.” One of the first rules of TV is: if something’s working, don’t fix it. But I just thought it would be really fun.
Season 5 is when the show wasn’t it’s best. For a couple of seasons after that, the Archer characters were in a completely different setting. Those aren’t great seasons, but better than most shows on TV.
The interview is worth reading if you are a fan of Archer, and if you aren’t, then give it a try. One or two episodes is enough. There is continuity, so it’s best to start at the beginning.
This is another bad idea that we will have to spend a trillion dollars on before we give up.
I’ve ridden the Shinkansen in Japan and the LGV in France, and enjoyed both. The US is not Japan or France. America has a well developed rail system, and we use it to carry freight.
There is a high speed passenger rail project in California. The cost is estimated to be a quarter-billion dollars per mile. Biden could spend our money to put down 40 miles of high speed rail or he could have one nuclear power plant built.
Interesting article about how Gen Z and Millennials learn about managing money. The author does seem to have missed a few things.
A friend offered to pick up the whole tab on her credit card, “for the points.” At the time, six years ago, “for the points” meant nothing to Saint-Vil, now a 30-year-old planning manager in Brooklyn, so he pressed for more details. They lingered over the dim sum meal as a larger conversation unfolded about annual percentage rates, credit-card debt, payment schedules and more.
Sparky enjoys novel experiences. Well, I think he does, who knows? He still runs like mad when we play “Chase the Moose” with the Maxx. For all I know, he thinks Mr. Moose is being kidnapped. With Winter coming, we need an alternative. In snow, the Maxx breaks traction, spins around and is no challenge. Sparky grabs Mr. Moose, and drags the RC car back to the deck. On wet grass, we are evenly matched.
I found a 25% off Black Friday deal for an Axial Deadbolt. It’s a 1/24th scale RC rock crawler. For $100, it’s pretty nice for a house car. The game is to hector Sparky as he tries to evade it. Following the car around the house was awkward, so I put a camera on the Deadbolt and drove it FPV.
Sparky isn’t afraid of the Deadbolt, but doesn’t like when it comes toward him. Since Sparky is much faster, I have to use strategy to try to heard him into a corner.
Sparky obviously knows something is up when he saw the camera. On my first attempt, the Deadbolt hit the camera, so I moved into the solarium.
Most of the time, Sparky’s tail is wagging, so he is entertained. When his tail is horizontal and still, he is on alert. When he looks at me or comes over, he is telling me that he is in over his head.
Gun season is over and I got nothing. There are two bonus days later in December, but I’m not optimistic. Deer get smarter as the season progresses.
My second time out, I saw two does, but didn’t have a shot. My hunting associate that day took a shot at a buck after I’d left. He hasn’t confirmed this, but it was probably a desperation shot because he wasn’t able to recover the deer.
My third time out wasn’t a serious effort on my part. I went primarily to hangout with my friend who owns the property. He is a teacher, so we don’t often get a chance to do a morning hunt.
After gun season last year, I invented this hunting hat from items I had laying around. The Walmart trapper hat hasn’t been worn for years. I have a few extra headlamps, and the foam had deteriorated from these headphones.
I made it because I had parts laying around, but it was actually handy when I used it this year.
Sound is important when hunting, but with the leaves down, if I am alert, the deer can be spotted on approach. Especially if I’m in a tree stand. Listening to audio books or a podcast helps me remain alert for the hours of sitting still.
When it’s raining, like it was on the third hunt, I put my hood up over the hat. That holds the hat in place, so when I turn my head to scan, the hat remains in place as my head pivots inside. This is helps reduce the motion observable by a deer.
It isn’t clear what ChatGPT is good for, but that doesn’t stop people from predicting it’s going to take all the jobs. Try hiring a handyman or someone to cut your grass. They are busy and expensive.
ChatGPT – LLMs in general – are very good at form but absolutely terrible at function. That’s because they are supercharged autocorrect engines; they know only what words fit where, statistically.
They can make a legal filing that looks correct, but it will reference laws and decisions that don’t even exist.
Physical jobs like home maintenance or lawn care are safe, but knowledge work is where ChatGPT is supposed to be a threat. Teachers talk about this quite a bit.
Radio, television, videotapes and the internet were all predicted to replace classroom teachers. Instead, these technologies are effective for motivated people and tools for a teacher. That got me thinking about what ChatGPT could have helped me with when I was teaching.
Visual presentation, the form part of a lesson, was important to me, but function was critical. I can’t think of any aspect of lesson preparation, presentation or assessment where ChatGPT could help.
For the most part, teachers like their students and want to help them master the concepts. What teachers hate is the bureaucratic bullshit that ineffective administrators may insist on. It’s work that doesn’t advance the educational objective at all, and takes the teacher away from the core objective.
I would have been happy to set ChatGPT to generating lesson plans, curriculum benchmarks and pedagogical objectives to be submitted weekly. The content doesn’t matter because shitty administrators are dumb bullies.
Where they genuinely are transformative is in visual art, because there form largely is function.
I think I might like this ChatGPT ability. My PowerPoints, worksheets and assessments were loaded with copyright infringing images.
I was recently talking to a nephew about the frequency of power outages. The general topic was about having a supplemental heat source in case the power went out in the Winter. I estimated that my power goes out about 6 times per year, but usually it happens in clusters. If the power goes out once in a day, it may go out once or twice before the issue is resolved. Also, I am shit at remembering random things like that, so have no confidence in my estimate.
This link shows the length and number of power outages per state. I found it surprising. This map gives the general idea. Dark is bad, light is good. The link provides actual data.
It seems like the power is out in California often and for a long time, but California is ranked 34, so at the lower middle of the pack.
Weather can cause power outages, but Florida is the second most reliable, with nearby Louisiana being the least reliable.
With our federal system of government, the states are the laboratories of democracy. It seems like states would also be the laboratories of power distribution. If the Federal Department of Energy can take a break from trying to nudge us toward an all-electric impoverished future, they might put some time into figuring out what features are necessary for a robust electrical grid.
