Land of dodgy enchantment

Hi-ho, there.  Taking the "Friday" out of Friday Random Ten this week.  Had to refresh the playlist, and didn't get around to it last night.  Saturday it is!

Tonight I watched Ace in the Hole.  I've liked-to-loved most Billy Wilder movies I've seen (Some Like, Apartment, etc) but hadn't seen this one.  It's depressing in terms of plot and maybe a little overcooked, but it certainly makes an impression.  Kirk Douglas is really on fire in this, too.

Also I'm pretty sure it's actually shot on location in New Mexico.  A lot of the exteriors are, at least.  And that is some amazing landscape, between the cubist desert and the cliff-dwellings that are some of the earliest signs of human life in the Americas.

A dose of steampunk cool

The Search Engine from Melissa Wright on Vimeo.

I find this quite beautiful and well done. The title "search engine" is given something of a more concrete nature than we usually see with it. If I read it right it's got a happy ending too.

Be back soon.

A friend in need's a friend indeed

Here's an interesting blog post.  It has to do with placebo buttons.  These are just what they sound like: fake peyote buttons you press to give you something to do, but that don't do anything in themselves.
 

Computers and timers now control the lights at many intersections, but at one time little buttons at crosswalks allowed people to trigger the signal change. Those buttons are mostly all disabled now, but the task of replacing or removing all of them was so great most cities just left them up. You still press them though, because the light eventually changes.

In an investigation by ABC news in 2010, only one functioning crosswalk button could be found in Austin, Texas; Gainsville, Fla.; and Syracuse, NY.

The city deactivated most of the pedestrian buttons long ago with the emergence of computer-controlled traffic signals, even as an unwitting public continued to push on, according to city Department of Transportation officials. More than 2,500 of the 3,250 walk buttons that still exist function essentially as mechanical placebos, city figures show. Any benefit from them is only imagined.

- New York Times, 2004

   
The thing to note is that as far as traffic lights go, I already knew this.  I've heard much the same thing through other sources.

And yet I still press the buttons.  Even at crossings where the light never changes from "Don't Walk" to "Walk" I'll keep hitting it in blatantly false hope.  (I live near one of those, by the way.  Technically I can't cross the street to get home without jaywalking.)  So yes, I guess you do have to grasp at straws sometimes in order not to feel helpless.

Door close buttons on elevators are a different subject.  I never press those in the first place, because if the door closes on someone trying to get on I don't want to be blamed.
   

Friday Random Ten on the road movie

I just watched Five Easy Pieces tonight.  A little frustrating in that there are a few times when the dialogue is almost impossible to make out, largely in the first third of the movie.  But wow.  It's a great film, and the complaint is a small one.  Hollywood would only finance t these kinds of plot-light, character driven films for a few more years.  The "kind of a prick" approach to writing an antihero isn't as popular as the "kind of a prick, but he carries four guns everywhere he goes.  Still mayor.

EDIT Okay, I have no idea what I meant by "Still mayor."  Seems to have been the product of general grogginess.  Point is, while Bobby Dupea is an antihero, neither the "anti" nor the "hero" part is action oriented in the way that would survive into the age of blockbusters.

1. L'Attirail - Suite en Solde
2. Edith Piaf - Adieu Mon Coeur
3. The Beatles - Glass Onion
4. Martin Denny - Taboo
5. Roxy Music - Dance Away
6. TV on the Radio - Crying
7. Arcade Fire - Black Mirror
8. Radiohead - I Might Be Wrong
9. The New Pornographers - All the Old Showstoppers
10. Nat King Cole - Our Love is Here to Stay

Now I lay me down to sleep...

I really hope that no one wakes me up at 4:30 or quarter to five by calling me repeatedly from a gas station phone, only hanging up when I finally answer. Because if that shit happens twho nights/mornings in a row, someone is getting hurt, somehow.

Old babies

Motherhood a few centuries back wasn't that different from what it is now, except for the staggeringly greater chance that your baby would die in infancy. That's my takeaway. Okay, it's kind of a big "except." But still, it's interesting to see how far back the roots of modern parenting styles go. Even further than this, I would wager in a lot of cases.

The painting at the top of the linked article looks insane to me. I've never seen one waking baby who looked that calm, never mind two. The artist took some heavy liberties there.

Saturday Random Ten au naturel

As I walked home tonight I found out the World Naked Bike Ride was riding through the neighborhood. Two different groups I saw.  Good for them, I guess?  It's not really something I can get excited about either way, so I'm not going to gawk.  Which officially is how I think they prefer it.

Hope they bring talc in case of seat rash, anyway.

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1. Roxy Music - Still Falls the Rain
2. Rasputina - My Orphanage
3. Arcade Fire - Ocean of Noise
4. Yo La Tengo - Mr. Tough
5. Brian Eno - Driving Me Backwards
6. Elvis Costello & the Attractions - No Action
7. Andre Cluytens + Philharmonia Orchestra - Marche Au Suplice (from Symphonie Fantastique by Berlioz)
8. R.E.M. - Catapult
9. Radiohead - Pulk/Pull Revolving Doors
10. The Beatles - Don't Pass Me By