WALL•E (Images)

zOMG. That was quite probably the best movie I've seen all year. Including Iron Man. I can't begin to explain how much fun that flick was. I strongly recommend that you borrow kids to take with you, or to see it during the day when kids are there - not because you need them, but because the only thing that could have been better would have been to see kids laughing and responding to it rather than the smattering of adults in the theatre late on a weekday night.

I caught the following tropes/references on the first time through, and this is just a smattering of the total I'm sure (some minor spoilers):

• Cockroaches and Twinkies will survive us.
• Macintosh II boot chord.
• Almost all of 2001, including:
  • Red-lit camera lens on:
  • Potentially hostile ship control computer
  • Also Sprach Zarathustra all over da place
  • Secret Orders to the computer
  • Open the Pod Bay Doors, Hal
• Possibly a Silent Running homage
• All kinds of Apple references besides the boot chime (an iPod, Macintalk, etc.)
• Galaxy Quest (hint: ship's computer)
• Classic Star Wars scene (hint: I had everything under control until...)
• Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home reference (hint: "Computer...?")

...and these, as I said, are but a few.

Wow. Just...wow. And the short beforehand? As close to a Looney Toon as anything I've seen since the originals.

That was a good night at the movies.

Appreciation (Consumables)

Good lord. I just noticed that the ever-dwindling stock of A.H. Hirsch bourbon has driven the price of a 750ml bottle of the 16-year-old whiskey up north of $200. I think that means that I'm officially out of the race to drink up the last of this miraculous stuff; I'll hug my last unopened bottle, save it for a special occasion, and find a new whiskey to take its place on my sideboard.

A moment to recite the Seven Words. (Symlink)

Rest well, George.

Ice, ice, bab...no, I can't. (Gear)

Still, WOOHOO IT'S ICE! The Phoenix Mars Lander reports finding ice (and, funny enough, not by baking it) on Mars. Just to be modern about it, the lander 'reports' this via Twitter.

AIIIIGH (Sounds)

I just get scheduled to go to Texas for business July 1-3, and I find out that Alabama 3 are playing New York City on July 1st. No, worse; they're playing two blocks from my office.

AIIIIGH.

/me starts trying to shove travel and tickets around...

By the way, this reviewer pleases me when describing Alabama 3: "They swing like the devil’s own dick."

Damn right they do, bitches.