Post-January Jamboree

As it's been almost a month since my last post, how about a round-up of random happenings?

- Cloverfield - I went with my roommates to see this a couple of weekends ago. If you're on the fence about seeing it, let me try to help you make up your mind: If you're in the mood for a different take on the monster movie genre, go see it. Otherwise, you can skip it and not worry about having missed anything culturally monumental. I was in the mood for a monster movie, and it did everything I expected out of it, nothing more, nothing less. Basically, it was a neat experiment in film-making, and they didn't make any obvious mistakes. So if you can round up a group of friends for it, it's worth an outing to your local cinema.

- Dave and Buster's - I went to the D&B's in Philly last weekend as part of a friend's birthday celebration. I've been to a couple of other D&B's, one in NYC and one in Honolulu (of all places), and I had a good time in both. The one in Philly was a much different experience than the previous two D&B's I visited. Unlike those, this one was clearly a larger part of the city's social scene and was filled to the brim on a Saturday night. We got there at about 7:30 pm and couldn't get a table for dinner until 9:30 pm. Although I enjoyed the gaming we did while waiting for dinner, I suspect it was more because of the excellent company and less because of D&B's itself. Arcade games just don't appeal to me the way they used to, especially as I didn't see any unfamiliar or new games, other than arcade versions of Mario Kart and Virtua Tennis (unfortunately, not with Wii-style controllers, but rather standard joystick/button setups). It also occurred to me that, even though I've been to Philly several times, I've always gone to Philly for a specific event/venue but never taken a trip just to explore the city. I should try to remedy that before I leave Lehigh.

- Life-affirming moment - Sometime this past week, I was walking down from our school's post office, which is basically at the highest point of the academic portion of the campus, to my dorm, which is basically at the bottom of the campus. On the way, I noticed that it was about 1 pm, and at every hour from about 10 am until 5 pm, you can expect to see many people coming out of one building and/or going into another one for class. So I plotted in my head a route that would maximize my probability of running into someone I knew before getting back to my dorm (yes, I actually thought about it in those terms). By executing this plan, I ran into and said hi to 3 people that I knew and saw 2 others who didn't see me back, all in the space of about 5 minutes. When I arrived back at my dorm, I allowed myself a smile, because I realized that the fact that I make calculated decisions like that even when I'm walking around is all the proof I need that computer science is the right major for me.

- There Will Be Blood - I spent Saturday afternoon with Lehigh's Film Club seeing this movie. Although I can understand why this film got all the Oscar nominations it did, I think it's more because of the impression that this film is Oscar-worthy than because it actually is Oscar-worthy. Now, my feelings about this film may be colored by the fact that the theater was packed when my group arrived, and we had to watch it from the awkward vantage point of the front row. And to be clear, I did like it. But I came out of it thinking that it would have worked much better as a play than it did as a film. It seemed to fit the structure of a play, and there were some moments that, I think unintentionally, elicited laughter during the film that would have been taken more seriously and been more intense in a play. The cynical side of me thinks that the Oscar committee saw that the film touched on a present-day topic (i.e. oil) and reflexively nominated the film for everything it could, even though the oil business is mainly a plot device and isn't really commented on by the film. Nonetheless, it's a well-made film, and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a serious, well-acted, truly dramatic film.

- Obama - If you're voting on Tuesday, and you're a registered Democrat, please do me this one favor (in that unlikely confluence of circumstances, considering where most of you live): vote for Obama! If Clinton gets the nomination, I may skip the general election in November because I'll still be depressed from such a narrow brush with greatness. I actually watched another Democratic debate in full, this time just between Obama and Clinton, and although Obama isn't as inspiring in debates as he can be in speeches (see this speech from MLK Day for an example if you can spare half-an-hour), his responses were so well-reasoned that I can't understand why people would vote for Clinton over Obama. All I can think of is, Clinton has the Democratic mystique associated with Bill Clinton working in her favor, and she's been in Congress for longer than Obama. But people should be judged on their own merits, not the merits of those with whom they're associated, and Clinton's experience doesn't mean she'll actually be a better leader. Also, I noticed that the NY Times, which endorsed Clinton a week or two ago, posted yet another article attacking Obama's record, despite having (to the best of my knowledge) never posted such an article against Clinton, even though I know that her record's equally worth (and, in my opinion, more worth) scrutinizing. I can't help but think that's not a coincidence, and I worry that the timing was calculated to place enough doubt in undecided voters to swing the Tuesday primaries in Clinton's favor. (sigh) If you can't tell, I'm trying to temper my expectations, so that if Obama does fall short on Tuesday (and I've been ignoring the polls, so I have no idea what is the general consensus), I won't be taken aback like I was when he lost in New Hampshire.

In more general news, I've been going to the occasional weekly (or, in a good week, biweekly) party and procrastinating like normal. I'm hoping to get my thesis in gear this week, with the aim of having a substantial portion of it drafted my the middle of the month. I expect that, on Wednesday, once the primary results are set in stone and a result is known one way or the other, I'll have a celebratory or despondent post (depending on the outcome), so look forward to/dread that.