Don’t give Paxton too much credit here. Since taking office, the guy went to bat defending both automated Red Light Cameras and automated license plate scanners — until they proved unpopular with the public, and illegal under the Texas Constitution. He had no worries then about the government tracking you using…

In my youth (back in the 70's), the tradition was to leave the tooth in a small glass of water by the bedside, so that the tooth could be easily swapped for a silver dollar.

Like a lot of Zemeckis work, the special effects are in-your-face and imperfect, but they are most often the groundbreaking first attempts at techniques which are now polished, seamless and commonplace - even on television. In this Hitchcock homage, they work. If you care about technical direction and effects, this is…

The lego set looks more Spaceballs than Star Wars. To me, that’s not a bad thing.

My brother had five kids and always struggled to provide for them when they were young, so fast food was off-limits just because of the expense - except for when they got to visit Granny and Grandpa. Going to the McDonalds, playing in the playground, playing and eating with their grandparents: These were occasional…

It employed hundreds of people, none of whom apparently thought to check the boat plans before they built it, to see if it would actually be able to reach the ocean. It reminds me of Lake Wobegon’s Sons of Knute Lodge, who built eight foot tall duck decoys in the church basement (ducks fly so high, they obviously…

TV stations love to talk to folk who have no clue. Here’s the gist: Last year, thousands of old trees were injured by the weeklong freeze, but survived - although many suffered cracked limbs and gashes that opened in their bark. This week, there were about four hours of freezing rain before the temperatures dropped to…

Creepy.  Looks like the tiger rug in the Addams Family. I’d rather have a Wampa.

Mantis will be killed early on to set the stakes. Drax, Groot and Rocket will leave to become Ravagers. Star-Lord will sacrifice himself. Adam Warlock, Thor and Nebula will carry forward. Gamora may exit, but may reappear in the next space-based MCU film. I’d like to see Monica Rambeau show up as the next audience…

That’s a good strategy - if you have that option.

In the Bugatti video, the guy spends almost half the time straddling two lanes. Understandable, but not exactly a demonstration of being “under control”.

I saw Hamlet in one of Dallas’s better arthouse theaters, arriving early to find a delightfully diverse crowd - high school students on assignment, college students (like me), and Shakespeare devotees, many of whom were long retired. All of whom were happily chatting with the rows of people around them, people they…

Branagh’s Hamlet is one of only two modern films I’ve seen that actually filmed an intermission for the theater-goers, which works beautifully in the viewing experience — even if you didn’t need to run to the bathroom 2 1/2 hours into the 4 hour film.

Thanks for the clarifying headline. The moment the news first hit, my first thought was that a quarter of the U.S. bought into the rumor that taking a horse dewormer was preferable to taking a proven vaccine. Imagine how many would joyfully jump on weed as a “cure” based on even the least bit of justification.

I have a hosting account on cloudaccess.net, who is blocking administrative functions via Private Relay, saying the IP address I am using is blacklisted - no identification of which blacklist. If I want off the list I can call them and “negotiate.”

It doesn’t have to be beautiful and shiny, but I’d rather not have to cook with a tray that looks like it’s been broiling on a backyard grill for three years. An overnight soak with baking soda and hydrogen peroxide and fifteen minutes of elbow grease can make the worst of them into something you’re not afraid of.

Not quite yet, but soon it’ll be tomato seedlings under a grow light.

I used to drive across Arkansas once a year on a very regular schedule. The public radio (not National Public Radio) station out of Little Rock ran a progression of hour long shows as I was usually driving: An hour of Reggae, a Bluegrass/Gospel hour, and an hour of Delta Blues. The Reggae guys would play twenty…

Every world in Star Wars is made up of a single climate. You can find more diversity in a single state than on every whole planet in the films. That is so patently ridiculous, I could never take the stories as more than a fairy tale, anyway.  Hard to get upset about another fairy tale.