Category: mostly unimportant

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Don’t Hate The Band, Hate The Fans

I don't think these guys get it...

I’ve heard this argument before: “I don’t hate Dave Matthews Band, but their fans are so annoying!”  As in, the music isn’t beyond the realm of their enjoyment, but the people they have to enjoy it with are so terrible that it detracts from the intended experience.  The same could be said for a variety of other acts, I’m sure.

Except in the case of Coldplay.  Both their fans, and the band, are terrible.  But this should go without saying.

Increasingly, I find myself seeing a connection between this feeling toward music and toward religion, especially in the case of Christianity.  All too often in today’s culture, I feel ashamed by what seems to be the impression that Christianity sometimes portrays to the world at large.  Folks like those above, admittedly from the fringe group, the Westboro Baptist Church.  Do all Christians feel this way?  Absolutely not.  Yet any time they get attention, there are folks out there that think this is what Christianity is all about.  Much of the same can be said of Islam, where a few bad apples end up making the rest of the world fear a largely peaceful and just faith tradition.

There are examples like this guy, too:

...neither does he...

Again, I’m sure he’s in the minority, but when pictures and videos of this nature hit the internet or television, the message being spread isn’t “Love” and “Acceptance:” it’s “Retribution” and “Intolerance.”

I think I’m most sensitive to this issue when it comes to homosexuality and the Church.  I know a few folks who are gay, and they’re really good people.  Personally, I’d love for them to be able to go to church.  And I know some of them would like to.  But, their impression, based on images like those above, and from conversations they’ve had with other Christians, means they’ll probably never go.  These are people that want to learn more and want to get the same experiences that I’ve had throughout my life, but feel like they can’t, because they’ll either be turned away, or at least told that their lifestyle is going to send them to Hell.

Since when are the Christians the ones doing the persecuting, eh?

I’m tired of these folks above representing me.  Of having some bearing on how my faith and traditions are perceived by the world at large.  These people do not represent the whole of Christianity.  Nor does the feeling that homosexuals are evil.  Nor does the feeling that women who have an abortion are going directly to Hell.  These feelings are indicative of unacceptance, of intolerance, and of hate.  In my opinion, they are inherently unchristian beliefs.

To those people that want to quote Old Testament scripture or the Letters of Paul (neither of which are words of Jesus, for the record…), I give you this:

12 So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.     — Matthew 7:12; NIV

36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”  — Matthew 22: 36-40; NIV 

That is the Christian message, as I see it, straight from the mouth of Jesus Christ.  Treat others as you want to be treated.  Love God and love your neighbor as yourself.  These are the important aspects of Christianity, and if you follow these tenets, then you are not only a good Christian, but you’re also a good human being.  Unsurprisingly, the Golden Rule transcends Christianity and applies to other world religions, as well.  It’s just one of those things you should do.  Christians included!

These feelings always get stirred up around election season, when I see self-righteous “family candidates” like Rick Santorum up on a stage, talking about “family values” while denouncing pro-choice women and homosexuality, among other things, all the while representing Christianity on the world scene.  I’m appalled by the things this guy says, in the name of Jesus Christ and in the name of the Christian faith, as a whole.  I just hope that people around the world don’t think he, and others like him, are representative of all Christianity.

They’re not.

To anyone reading this that has been wronged by people in the name of Christianity, then I sincerely apologize.  I just hope anyone that knows me, or Brooke, knows that we’re Christians and we don’t feel the same way as those that seem to represent us.

And we aren’t alone.

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Nine Days of Potter

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Famously (or infamously), I avoided the Harry Potter franchise.  Not quite to the same degree I refuse to watch Titanic, but perhaps similar.  I jumped on the Lord of the Rings bandwagon and figured I’d put off Harry Potter until Meg would be old enough to appreciate the books.

Well, she’s not quite old enough, but now that all of the movies are available on DVD, we figured it had been long enough.  Brooke had never seen them either, though she read all of the books, a few more than once.  Last weekend, Meg was visiting my parents, so we borrowed the early movies and watched them, starting last Friday night.

Between Friday and Monday, we watched the first five movies.  The next three we spaced out due to Netflix DVD travel time.  Therefore, in a period of 9 days, we watched 8 Harry Potter movies.

Kinda nuts, I know.

Regardless, I must say that the movies, overall, hold up quite well.  The first movie, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, was released in 2001, so I expected the various CGI effects to have aged to a significant degree, however I found them to be surprisingly decent, even 10 years later.  This isn’t to say that the effects didn’t improve over the decade these movies were coming out: the last few, Deathly Hallows Part I and Part II had all the effects trappings of any other big-budget blockbuster.

The acting was always good, yet still improved over the years, likely because the three primary actors, Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson were all 11 or 12 when the movies were released.  By the time they reached the end, they were all doing very well in their roles and had likely surpassed the adults that had been alongside throughout the series.

Each movie had its own “flavor,” of sorts, to contribute to the franchise.  Some focused more on the school experience at Hogwarts, others focused on some specific activity, like the Triwizard Tournament, and later movies (and the books, of course) laid more of a focus on the Good vs Evil aspects that run throughout the series.  Thus, the latter movies tend to be much darker than the earlier movies.  Also, I felt that the earlier movies were better at being “standalone” features, while the latter movies (Order of the Phoenix and later) flow into each other to some extent.

Speaking of which, Order of the Phoenix was probably my favorite in the franchise.  This movie featured a level of “political upheaval” in the fiction of the series that I found to be interesting, and I wish they could have explored it further.  Brooke says that there was quite a bit more of the Ministry of Magic (the group that acts as a sort of governing body over wizards and witches) in the Deathly Hallows (the final book, separated out into two movies), but very little of it remained by the book was translated to the silver screen.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part I

One interesting bit about watching all of the movies in sequence in a short time like this is that you can observe all of the kids growing up.  I suppose it’s part of why these actors were chosen in the first place: their characters first attend Hogwarts when they turn 11, which is right around the age when the actors took on the roles.  Each book is supposed to represent an additional year at the school and, while they couldn’t quite keep the movies churning out each year, they still stayed close enough that the actors could have passed for 17 in the last story.  If my math is correct, Daniel Radcliffe turned 17 during the filming of Order of the Phoenix, which is the fifth book/movie of the series.  Still, looking at the pictures I’ve posted above, the actors have obviously aged during their tenure in the roles.

Overall, I was pretty impressed.  I’d expected a bit more “kiddie fare” throughout the series, but in actuality, it was really only persistent in the first movie, and followed into the second one to an extent.  The characters “grew up” relatively quickly, so the movies didn’t get bogged down in young-minded storylines to the extent I’d anticipated.

The latter half of the series, though, really seems to ape the “Star Wars” franchise, with Harry being Luke Skywalker and Lord Voldemort as…well…Lord Vader.  Much as Luke and Vader were connected by family, history, loss, good/evil, and so on, so were Harry and Voldemort.  I kinda wanted a bit more out of the Voldemort character, honestly.  He was present the whole time, and he was certainly bad, but somehow, he just didn’t seem evil enough to me.  They would constantly talk about their fear of “He Who Must Not Be Named,” yet the scenes we saw him in, he just wasn’t doing much that was particularly…evil.  Granted, it’s a children’s series, so you can’t get too dark, but I can’t help but think more could have been done.  Watching the movies, I was more disturbed by Dolores Umbridge, the teacher sent from the corrupt Ministry of Magic that is trying to sweep the return of Voldemort under the proverbial rug.  I’m sure the books make Voldemort seem more evil than he turns out to be in the movies, but I found him to be a bit lacking.  Perhaps it’ll take a few more viewings of the last two movies before I really settle on why that is.

In the end, I still prefer the Lord of the Rings series over this one, though the Harry Potter series was fun, interesting, and well-produced.  In many ways, the effects in the first few movies hold up better than the effects from LotR, though they were definitely less complicated (e.g. putting a light at the end of a wand is a bit cheaper than modeling Gollum, let alone developing the technology to create the character in the first place).  Order of the Phoenix was my favorite of the movies, though I really liked Chamber of Secrets, despite it being an “early” movie.  The later ones got quite a bit more confusing, but it’ll make more sense when I re-watch them in a few years, once Meg’s old enough.

Maybe I’ll even read the books when Meg does.

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New Brewing Toys

While I received quite a new wonderful gifts for Christmas this year, I thought I’d mention a few of the brewing-related ones here.  Firstly, as you see above, my talented sister was kind enough to design beer bottle labels for us!  Two different versions, both of which look quite good (though the “hop”-containing green one is probably my favorite), and labeled “Andy & Brooke’s Linsenbrew.”  How exactly we never thought of “Linsenbrew,” I’ll never know, but I certainly got a kick out of these.  I’ll probably only use them on beer batches I save for aging, and for those I take places or give away (these three are destined for my cousin, for example), but I’m very glad to have them!

In other brewing news, we got some additional equipment that I’m looking forward to trying.  We got two wort chillers, which are essentially just “radiators” that pump cold water through copper tubing that you put into the wort after you boil it for an hour.  It’s important to cool the wort down as quickly as possible before adding the yeast, and up until now, we’ve usually filled the sink with ice and cooled it down that way (frequently taking 2+ hrs…).  Now, we have a means of cooling it down much more quickly, which will cut down on brewing time considerably.  We’ll probably use one of them for beer, and the other we’ll use for Brooke’s yogurt, which also requires a cooling step before you’re done.  Each chiller has slightly different fittings, so we haven’t decided which one will be used for which purpose, but regardless, we’re looking forward to giving them a try.

I also got a bottle drying rack, similar to this one.  Usually, I just clean each bottle and let them dry upside-down in laundry baskets.  This is a “functional” solution, but isn’t exactly ideal.  I usually need around 45 bottles cleaned, with the remaining beer going in 1 L or 2 L bottles.  This drying rack should take up far less space and leave the laundry baskets available for…you know…laundry…

Finally, we got a Chinook IPA beer kit.  This is a kit I’d considered doing awhile back but hadn’t tried it yet.  The key reason I wanted it was because it only takes around 6 weeks to make, while other IPA varieties like to have 2 months fermenting, followed by bottling and conditioning.  The last IPA I made got quite a bit better with an additional month of aging so, while I thought it ended up fine, it sure took a long time to be “drinkable.”  Hopefully, this recipe solves that issue.

So yeah, got some new toys for Christmas to feed the beer brewing needs.  I may get a chance to brew this one on New Year’s Day, but could push it off a bit, yet.  Then, we need to start thinking about what the next batch will be, likely either a Cream Ale or a Czech Pilsner.  We’re trying to get a recipe that’s radically different from the others we’ve made, as the Dunkelweizen that just finished tastes pretty similar to some of the others we’ve made.

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Tour of St. Louis Breweries Update

Since moving away from St. Louis in May, 2010, a ridiculous number of new breweries have opened, mostly within the “midtown” area. This explosion in the St. Louis brewing scene has been important enough to make national news in New York Magazine, among others. Of course, all this happens after we move away, but now that we’re back, we can finally partake in some of their wares.  I assume they are springing up because St. Louis does a good job with their water supply (in support of Anheuser-Busch…).  At the very least, I’m glad they’re mostly springing up in the City itself instead of the various surrounding municipalities.

Last night, I went along with old college roommate buddy, Tony, to Perennial Artisan Ales, located in an old Coca-Cola plant that has since been converted to lofts.  Tony lives above the place, so he goes down for a fresh pint from time to time (likely more often than anyone should…).  The neat thing about this place is that they really focus on different beer styles with odd flavorings, so they are purposefully trying to make a distinction between their beers and others in the city.  Their on-tap roster consists of a Southside Blonde, “Saison de Lis” Chamomile Saison, Hommel Bier, and Abraxas (a Mexican Chocolate Stout).  Each week, on Thursdays, they host tastings of some new beer they are unveiling, done on a small, 5 gal scale.  Basically, the head brewer just does what any home brewer does and then, if it’s good enough, they consider scaling it up to a full batch.  They just invest a little bit in materials to test it and then get their customers to tell them whether it’s worth production or not.  Last night’s was a Rye beer that tasted quite good, though the color left much to be desired (i.e. it wasn’t the most attractive beer I’d ever had, but after you taste it, you forget what it looks like).

I tasted a few of them.  The Hommel was the “hoppiest” beer they had, so it’s the one I ended up buying for the evening.  I tasted their Chamomile Saison, which was pretty fascinating.  Chamomile is one of those flavors/scents that you recognize, but can’t always name, but believe you me, you could tell it was in this beer.  The flavor was good and very distinctive.  They also have a Strawberry Rhubarb Tart on occasion.  I can’t begin to imagine what it would taste like.

But that Abraxas.

Wow.

Seriously, it may be one of the best beers I’ve had in a long time.  And I didn’t go there thinking I’d like it that much.  The closest descriptor I could come up with as I had some was “it tastes like Christmas.”  It was chocolaty, but wasn’t overwhelming.  Its texture was definitely stout-like, but not too thick.  The beer was 10% alcohol, so I didn’t want to have a whole one and then drive home later, but geez did I want one.  They sell wine bottle-sized versions of their beers that you can take home, but it was going to be $20 for that one.  Perhaps after Christmas, I’ll grab one so Brooke can try it.

Their location is about as far south in St. Louis City as you can go, and they aren’t in what I’d consider to be a very good location.  I certainly hope they survive, at least long enough to keep their production going there and then sell their beers through bars in the city.  These guys are offering what few others are and are truly innovative, I think.

After having the beer at Perennial, I went upstairs to Tony’s and he shared some Black IPA he and his brother brewed awhile back.  Truly spectacular.  I don’t think I can let him have any of ours because his is far better.  That, or we’ll have to switch to full mash brewing techniques…

When Meg was staying with her grandparents a few weeks ago, Brooke and I checked out another new brewery, Urban Chestnut, and were pretty pleased with that one, too.  They are located closer to SLU, so their building is a bit easier to get to and probably a popular destination with college students and other loft dwellers from that region of the city.  Their offerings are a bit more standard, with a variety of German-inspired beers to choose from.  We tasted 5 or 6 of them, and then got a pint each.  If I recall, the Pilgrim 7 was Brooke’s favorite, and I ended up having a Holzrauch, which is German for “wood smoke.”  Now, this isn’t a beer I would ever attempt to have a 6-pack of, but it was so different, I had to have a full pint.  In the end, I think it would be best consumed with food, rather than just sipped, but it was still very good.

Overall, I’d say I preferred Urban Chestnut’s location (they have a very nice covered outdoor area with a fire pit and wood chips down, to let you sip your beer by an open fire…a nice touch!) over Perennial’s, but I preferred Perennial’s beers over Urban Chestnut’s.  Still, the important thing is that St. Louis’ brewing scene is getting even larger, making our move back to the are all the more fortunate.

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The Wheels on the Bus

Washington University School of Medicine, where I work, doesn’t have what I like to call “cheap parking.”  If I recall, it’s something like $60 or $70 per month to park within a few blocks of the building I work in, and personally, I’d rather spend that kind of money on video games or beer.

However, as part of their sustainability initiative, Wash U pays for all students and employees to have a yearly St. Louis Metro pass.  This means that, so long as I have the pass and present my University ID card, I can ride any bus or any MetroLink (the above-ground train system) for free.

Unfortunately, though, while the MetroLink has a reasonably decent reputation with regards to cleanliness and timeliness, the MetroBus system doesn’t.  And furthermore, we don’t really live anywhere near a MetroLink stop where I could hop on, at least, not in any convenient manner.  Therefore, I’m riding the bus.  The “scary, dirty, slow,” bus.

To be fair, I’m only riding it in the evenings.  Brooke is driving me to work in the mornings, then dropping Meg off at daycare and then finally going to work herself.  Most mornings, this isn’t a problem, though there’s something of a “sweet spot” in timing that we try to avoid.  If we leave the house by 7:40 am, or after 8:15 am, we can get me to work in 15 min or so.  If we leave anytime inbetween, it’s closer to 30 min.  Yay, St. Louis traffic.

But in the evenings, I’m riding the bus.  Brooke picked me up for the first week or two, since I didn’t have my bus pass yet.  This “worked,” but Meg wasn’t exactly happy having to sit in her car seat for nearly 45 min every afternoon.  It’s made things much easier now that Brooke can just bring her straight home.  My bus trips tend to take 20-30 min in the evenings, so it isn’t a huge deal.  As long as I leave before 6:00 pm, there are buses running just about every 20 min to the stop(s) near my building.

The buses themselves are alright.  They aren’t all that dirty, and while I haven’t exactly figured out the best time to go outside to wait at the stop, I can’t really say that they’re consistently late or anything.  The bus stop where I get off the bus is on Kingshighway, so after I get off, I still have to walk a few blocks before I get home.  Right now, it isn’t an issue, but once we get a foot of snow on the ground, I may think otherwise.

I do want to address the “scary” part of the city bus stereotype, though.  Is the bus full of rich, white, Americans?  Nope.  Lots of African Americans, lots of Hispanics, lots of elderly people, lots of low-income people…and lots of other people inbetween.  Heck, on the ride home last night around 5:30, white people out-numbered black people 2:1 on my bus.  Was I a bit apprehensive the first time I rode the bus, looking down the aisle at the various “characters” that I’ve been told would terrorize me over the last decade?  Yeah, I probably was, to some extent.  Now, after a few weeks, it’s pretty easy and I don’t give it a second thought.  And, to be fair, there are seemingly “well off” people riding the bus as well.  Perhaps not as many, but they’re there.  In total, it’s probably the most diverse place you’ll find in the greater metropolitan area.  And they just want to get where they’re going each day without much fuss, just like anyone and everyone else.

I guess I think it’s important that I ride the bus, partially to show others that it really isn’t all that scary, and partially to “walk the walk” when I talk about sustainability.  Mass transit, overall, is a good way to save money and help the environment.  It takes cars off the road and reduces demand on gasoline.  Because there are fewer cars on the road, that means fewer cars that go to scrap yards some day, fewer tires that go into the landfill, and fewer emissions that go into our air.  Generally speaking, using mass transit is an ideal way that people can do their part to help the environment.

There are plenty of people around that think we should all use mass transit more often, but these same people wouldn’t be caught dead on a city bus.  The city bus isn’t good enough for them.  The city bus is dirty and dangerous and they will only use services like MetroLink, or like the Metro system in Washington, D.C.  Rather than submit to riding the bus, instead, they will drive their car that 4 miles and park it, even though the amount of time spent doing so is equivalent to riding the bus.

I’m sure I’ve told people in the past that I’d use public transportation if I had it.  And for many years, I didn’t consider the bus to be “public transportation.”  To me, and to many others, I’d argue, “public transportation” equals “light rail,” while “riding the bus” equals “only for poor people and minorities.”  Maybe it goes unsaid, but that’s the general impression I get from other people when the prospect of “riding the bus” comes up.  However, the only reason light rail systems like MetroLink exist is because there were enough people riding buses for that distance that it made financial sense to build a rail system.  Thus, the more people that ride buses within the city of St. Louis, and other communities, the more likely municipal officials will be to finance more light rail systems.

Therefore, I’m trying to “walk the walk” after “talking the talk” about mass transit.  If I can do my part to ride the city bus, I’ll do it as long as I can.  It saves me money and it saves my wife and kid time that they don’t have to be in the car to pick me up every day.  Win/win.

But in the end, if the bus is good enough for the other people that ride it, the bus is good enough for me.

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New Brewing Setup

Since moving in a few weeks ago, I’ve slowly been trying to get all my beer brewing materials moved to their ultimate destination in the basement.  One of the perks to living in this house is the double-sink down there, allowing for soaking and cleaning of bottles and other brewing gear without the need to take over the kitchen sink.  Unfortunately, however, the sink was clogged up (likely from whatever painting and plastering materials had been cleaned previously in that sink…).  Anyway, I think I’ve got it mostly cleaned out, though running water through it over the next few weeks will probably help dislodge whatever’s left in there.

Regardless, I set up our large folding table next to the sink and have stacked most things either on it or under it.  I probably need something a bit better for all the bottles, but for now, this will do.  I also ran an electrical cord around so I could plug in an old computer stereo set to listen to music and podcasts while working in the basement.

For my birthday this year, Mom and Dad got me an outdoor propane burner and a large, 5 gallon brew pot, which I finally got to use last week.  Obviously, I can only use it outside, but I can already tell this is a better way to go than using an electric oven.  It’s usually very easy to get a “boil-over” using the electric range, but with gas, it’s very easy to back off with the heat to slow down the boil.  Thankfully, it was a beautiful night last week to brew outside.  I’m probably not going to be so lucky when I’m out brewing in February, though…  😛

Last, but not least, here’s our first beer in the new place: a Dunkelweizen.  It’s still bubbling away downstairs and should be ready for bottling early in the week after Thanksgiving.  Brooke’s hard apple cider is already in bottles and should be conditioned well enough by Thanksgiving, however this Dunkelweizen will probably not be aged long enough until Christmas.  I think we’ll probably try to get another one fermenting within the next week or so.

Anyway, I’m excited about the new setup.  Should make it easier to clean up and get some brewing done without having to get the kitchen cleared up in time for brewing.  Hooray, beer!

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Fred Flintstone Wants To Kill You

I’m slowly catching up on podcasts from the last few weeks when I wasn’t really in Podcast Listening Mode, and recently, I listened to On Point’s discussion on recent research on vitamins.  Much of the discussion focused on recent reports suggesting that over-dosing on vitamins for years could do more harm than good.  Specifically, they discussed a recent study called the Selenium and Vitamin E Cancer Prevention Trial (SELECT) where men took the daily recommended dose of Vitamin E and were found to be 17% more likely to develop prostate cancer over the 7 years they were followed.  This news comes after another recent study from the Archives of Internal Medicine suggesting that multivitamins, folic acid, and iron and copper supplements may increase mortality in older women.

This all reminds me of what Dr. Shaffer told us in psychopharmacology class back at Truman: you don’t need vitamins if you eat a healthy diet.  Human physiology is set up to absorb the nutrients you need and get rid of the ones you don’t, provided you eat the diet your body needs to survive.  This includes vegetable, dairy, grain and meat sources.  If you start removing any of those sources of food, you either a). replace those nutrients with something like a multivitamin, or b). die sooner.  Apparently, however, new data like those referred to above suggest that even with the replacement of nutrients, your body still may not be very happy with you.

Brooke and I talked about this a few days ago and we both had a question about Folic Acid (Vitamin B9) intake, as this is one of those vitamins pregnant women are instructed to take to limit the risk of congenital malformations of children, including spina bifida and cleft palate.  The recommended daily allotment of Folic Acid is between 400 and 800 ug for a pregnant woman per day, though your doctor may prescribe more if there’s a history of problems in your family.  Bear in mind, however, that it’s important that women of child-bearing years have Folic Acid in their diet or take supplements before they are pregnant, as it’s more important in the early stages, before many women even know they’re pregnant.

Speaking of which, what are the ways to get Folic Acid in your diet, aside from a pill?  Spinach, peas, beans, egg yolks, sunflower seeds, white rice, fortified grain products (e.g. pastas, cereals), livers and kidneys, among others.  Now, I ask you: How many women between the ages of 18-25 are eating anything from that list on a daily basis?  I’d guess not very many.  They’re probably going to get most of it from breads and cereals, though the recommended daily allotment of folate is added to the product: it’s not endemic to wheat.

(Side-note: The U.S. government, on their Women’s Health fact sheet, says that vitamins are still essential to ensure you are getting the daily allotment of folate every day, and that it’s possible to do so by diet alone, yet difficult.  Anyone reading this should go by what their doctor tells them.  I’m only using folic acid as an example.  I am, by no means, a medical professional.  :-))

I guess my larger point is that vitamins are alright, but trying to rely on them in order to avoid eating foods that we as Homo sapiens have evolved to require over millenia is unwise.  It’s more important that we get proper dietary sources of vitamins and minerals that our stomachs have “learned” to take advantage of for generations.  This isn’t to say you should only eat organic food, or only eat food that you grow yourself.  Sure, organic sources can be healthy, but I’d argue that it’s better you eat your broccoli every day regardless of whether it’s organic or not.  Women of child-bearing years should be eating food from the outlined sources above anyway.  Men at risk of prostate cancer should be eating grapes, leafy green vegetables, and avoid trans fats anyway.  Heck, regardless of whether you’re “at risk” of prostate cancer or “at risk” of becoming pregnant, these are things you should be eating anyway.

So yeah, I don’t really think that vitamins are that bad for you.  But what is bad for you is trying to rely on them, or other supplements, as a substitute for a healthy diet.

(Final Note: An actual medical professional posted this article up on Huffington Post to help assure people that they shouldn’t necessarily stop taking all their vitamins and that there are some flaws in the conclusions being drawn from these studies.  As with anything in science, more studies are needed to come to any real conclusions on this matter)

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Scary Movies 2011

It’s that time of year again.  Unfortunately, we’re kind of in the middle of a move, so my typical holiday classics of “Halloween,” “Alien” and “Hocus Pocus” are packed in boxes at the moment.  Therefore, I’ve got Netflix to help me out in this time of transition.

I made Brooke watch “Scream” last year, as she’d never seen it before. To be fair, I hadn’t seen it in years either, but watching it for what was probably the fourth time, it still held up and was quite good. I didn’t particularly care for “Scream 2,” and “Scream 3” was overly terrible, but the reviews for their fourth outing earlier this year were surprisingly positive. “Scream 4” came in the mail late last week, but I didn’t get a chance to watch it until Sunday night. I can safely say that “Scream 4” is right up there with the original. The question of “who the killer is” became easy to answer as the series moved forward, but this flick does a good job of drawing that final reveal out further, so while it may be obvious early on, the ending itself isn’t as certain. If you liked the original, I highly recommend this one.

Never seen it and it’s been in my Instant Queue since last year at this time, but still haven’t gotten around to watching it. It’s a remake of the 1973 George A. Romero flick of the same name about the effects of biological weapons testing near a small town in Pennsylvania. The 2010 remake is now set in Iowa and deals with a “mysterious toxin” that infects their water supply, leading to zombie-like behavior. Obviously, we wanted to watch this because it was set in Iowa. Now that we’re moving, it seems like the appropriate time to watch it.

“Red State” is fascinating to me, not because of the subject matter, but the way it even came about. In short, it’s about a group of teens doing what your typical horror movie teens do (drugs, sex and rock & roll), and how they get lured in by fundamentalists looking to make an example of them in a particularly violent and gruesome manner. Kevin Smith (of “Clerks” and “Mallrats” fame) wrote and directed the movie. He even got the movie financed and distributed himself, partially just to prove that it could even be done by a single individual or small company, without the help of a major distributor or movie production company. In many ways, it was a return to his roots in “Clerks,” famously filmed for $27,000. Regardless, I’m fascinating by this movie. It’s very existence is so odd, self-produced/marketed/written/directed by a guy that is famous for making movies about “dick and fart jokes.” Looking forward to it, for sure.

Finally, “The Thing.” I like throwing in some classic scifi/horror movie when possible, especially one I haven’t seen before (gasp!). This one’s also on Netflix Instant Queue, so you can’t argue with convenience. This one is by John Carpenter (who also did the aforementioned “Halloween”) and it’s actually a remake of 1951’s “The Thing From Another World.” Of course, now that it’s 2011, it’s time for another sequel (or prequel…) to come out, though this latest iteration isn’t getting the best reviews. Regardless, I’ve never seen it and it’s sitting in my queue, so I don’t have much of an excuse anymore.

I think that’s a reasonable list.  I’m sure others will pop in there, as well.  I don’t start the new job until November 1st, so that gives me some free nights to watch some scary movies over the next week.

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Nostalgia

Ah, it’s like I said: the more things change, the more they stay the same.

— Quark, speaking the final line of “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.”

The third Star Trek series, “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine,” is now on Netflix Instant Queue.  I don’t want to dwell on the series or the franchise as a whole, but I do want to say that I’m looking forward to re-watching the series.  I have seen all of “Next Generation” and all of “Voyager” twice (or more…) when they’ve been in re-runs over the years, but “DS9,” for some reason, hasn’t been re-played as often since it left television 12 years ago.  At the time, I didn’t like “DS9” as much because, especially in the latter half of the series, they moved to more of a “serial plotline” structure where each episode tied into subsequent episodes.  Back then, I didn’t like it, but now, in the wake of excellent shows like “Lost” and “Battlestar Galactica,” I think I may appreciate “DS9” more than I did.  Today, it seems like practically every drama on television is doing it.  As my Mom always says, “everything goes back to Star Trek”…

Nay, the real reason this post exists is because we visited St. Louis this past weekend.  As has been mentioned before, Brooke has been living down there four days a week while Meg and I have been in Iowa, only seeing each other on weekends.  This past Thursday, however, I went down to speak with a potential employer at Washington University.  No details to write on that front yet, but hopefully it’ll pan out in the near future.

As part of the visit, I decided to stay down there through Sunday (with Meg, of course), getting a chance to see some people that I haven’t seen in awhile.  Meg and I went by SLU on Friday morning, then I went out to lunch with some friends from there.  We went apple picking on Friday afternoon (more on that in another post) with other friends, and then had dinner with them Friday night.  We checked out a potential place to live (assuming I get this job soon…) on Saturday, then went out to dinner with Brooke’s family on Saturday night.  And finally, we went to our old church, Webster Hills, on Sunday morning.

And that brings us to the apropos quote from above: the more things change, the more they stay the same.  Things at SLU had definitely changed a bit.  Some new construction, some new faces.  Dr. Westfall will be retiring sometime late next year, so more changes are definitely in store for my old department.  New progress on research that has carried on in my absence, which is the way of things.

Oh, and in news where change isn’t so good, it seems like every light on Kingshighway now has a “Photo Enforced” sign on it.  Very bad.  I’ll be doing my best to avoid those shenanigans.

At church on Sunday, though, in many ways, it’s like we’d never left.  They did an acoustic “service in the round” where all the folks in the congregation were in a circle surrounding the altar area (this was our idea a few years ago, for the record).  The music was mostly stuff we knew, but there was a newer one we hadn’t heard before.  They also interspersed Bible verse readings between the verses of some of the songs: a nice addition.  There weren’t many new faces there, but there were quite a few people there we hadn’t seen in a long time, so that was excellent.  Basically, being there felt like “home” again.

I guess this separation of our family is just getting to me.  While I don’t mind moving forward with life, getting to do “bigger and better things,” in many ways, I just want to go back to the life we had when we lived in St. Louis: just with a baby along this time.  We ate out on the patio in Soulard on Friday for lunch and all I could think of was how I missed living down there.  It was a spectacular day, after all, and with the leaves starting to change color, it made me wish I could walk home rather than have to drive 5 hours to get to my real house.

It will be interesting to look back on our time in Iowa in 12 years like I’m looking back on “DS9,” whether I will dislike it because of our most recent experience(s), or whether I will grow to appreciate it more.  Right now, though, to continue the analogy, I just want to go back to “The Next Generation:” I was happy with it.