Requisite Requiem
Michael Jackson was dead by the time I got to work on Friday, probably well before, actually, and it's a little hard to believe. I mean, we're the same age. Of course, he had a lot of problems that I don't, not least being an apparently excessive surgical modification jones, but that's pretty young for a heart attack, so I'm inclined to think he was over-medicating again and his doctor will have something to answer for, at least as much as any doctor treating Elvis in the King's final days would have.

I wasn't a fan, although I acknowledge his song-writing abilities and his dancing. He was deeply disturbed, even if he wasn't a child-molester, and the court system says not. I read someone sneering at his comeback attempt, but from the public displays of grief and mourning, I'd say he'd have solved at least some of his final money woes with this tour, and I'm sorry it won't happen. There'll be plenty of money somewhere for his kids, though, and for his family to fight over, I expect, although their focus will be on fighting over the kids, so I'm sorry for them, too, perhaps especially. What will happen to all those efforts to keep them relatively anonymous? So much damage done to him, perpetuated now and for how much longer?

At some point, they'll stop playing his songs non-stop on the radio, the news repeats will go into bulletin mode and then die off pretty much altogether, but there'll never really be an end to it all.

Any chance he's really still alive? Like Elvis?

0101010101...
Last weekend I bought a digital t.v. set-top converter, but couldn't for the life of me get it to work. Luckily, the salesman at the store was helpful, acknowledging that pretty much everyone who'd bought that particular model had tried to bring it back as defective, when really it was just the instructions failing to mention a few crucial configuration matters. Like which wires to plug in where. (Not just a matter of swapping out the aerial feeds, apparently.) And how to get the menu displayed.

Never mind, it's working now, and I have two whole additional channels, leaving aside the additional public access stuff (one of which broadcasters was presenting the results of the 2007 Sculpture by the Sea awards - a repeat, I guess). Unfortunately, it's also altered my ability to record one program and watch another, and not for the better. Suddenly, entering the digital age returns me to something slightly pre-digital. Not that I record very much generally. Frankly, the DVD mail-order thing is more worthwhile than anything on broadcast television anyway, HD or SD. Other than getting cable, which is expense, this is probably as far as I need to go.

I heard that the digital change-over recently accomplished in the US wasn't entirely successful - I wonder how many people have no t.v. now, having failed to get a converter - but the anecdote's I've seen have largely been in regard to signal strength. What with the numbers of drop-outs I experienced last night, I'd guess there are a few people back home who are not entirely pleased with Congress right now.

Four Straight
New South Wales’ got the Blues, alright, with Queensland taking the rubber in two straight games out of three for the fourth year in a row, and while all credit to them for a fine sporting achievement, the NSW side’s performance was marred from the very beginning by some truly atrocious ball-handling, resulting in egregious turnovers deep within their own territory throughout the night. While in the second half the Maroons started out with some errors of their own, they never faltered in defence, easily outmatching the Blues’ strategy of running sideways along the line looking for a hole that just never turned up.

Olympic Park’s ANZ Stadium is the home field for the Rabbitohs, so I’ve spent many an evening and afternoon there (80 minutes at a time), but I’ve never attended a State of Origin match, or any other event capable of filling the 90,000-seat capacity venue. This one was off that mark by just under 600. It was jam-packed, with queues for food and drink and toilets, and crowds milling through the corridors. It’s an expensive ticket, so I normally wouldn’t have gone, but I had an invite via a vendor, so who wouldn’t jump at such an offer. Of course, your first thought is naturally: sky box! corporate box! – not: ow, my nose! But for all my vertigo being seated so high and at so nearly perpendicular a pitch, I can’t really complain. We were seated in front of and to one side of a group of young men whose enthusiasm for the Maroons could not be contained for a single moment, one in particular of whom spent the entire match foully slanging the NSW side individually and collectively, when not chanting, Queens-land-er, or offering an alternative Queensland-AAH! and managing to instigate a first quarter punch-up – almost – snatching the cap off the guy sitting in front of him following his side’s second try. A bad baiting choice, as the Blues supporter and all his friends were of a size sufficient to use the kid as a toothpick or snap him as easily. Luckily it came to nothing, and for a minute the chants and cat-calls were notably muted, if not entirely silent.

It was a fun night, generally well-behaved coming and going, but I’d still rather have seen the Blues make more of a game of it. Maybe next year.

Summer Blockbuster Checklist
So now that I’ve seen Terminator Salvation I can get on with the art-house movies maybe. T4, if I can call it that, may very well make Sam Worthington the newest Australian Hollywood superstar. The movie itself is as full of holes as most of its characters by the end, but it rocks along with only a few bits where you wonder if they’ll ever get around to wrapping things up. It ought to be the final in this franchise, too, speaking of wrapping things up, although for as long as these things can continue to make a buck, or a million of ‘em, it won’t be. Oddly, however, it must have made an impression, as I had apocalyptic Terminator dreams all night, even despite the typically cheesy ending that ought to have spoiled the whole thing.

Fitness Levels Fading . . .
I’m seriously considering registering for the World Master Games, if just for one event, really, which I guess would be the 1,500, which is the closest approximation to my high school track distance. The fact that I’m present running my marathon training at about 6 minutes per K means I can expect to do very, very badly if I do, so is AU$220 really worth signing up for that much humiliation? Even though that price includes being admitted to compete in as many as four additional indoor events and all the outdoor events, I wouldn’t, especially as that would merely heap humiliation upon humiliation. I haven’t even signed up for the half marathon in September or the City-2-Surf in August yet. Nevertheless, the deadline approaches; a decision must be made.

Nerdiliciousness
I went to see the Star Trek reboot over the weekend, having waited for enough time to have passed so that the larger numbers of the fan base would have already seen it, but also taking the precaution of choosing Sunday at 10:30 a.m. (which helped, but still left me buying my ticket among vast hoards of children attending Bob the Builder and Night at the Museum 2. It’s not terribly comfortable being an older single male adult. Parents seem to regard such persons in close proximity to their progeny with some suspicion. Oh, well, tough.

So Star Trek was fun. It was a bit loud, but it was fairly suspenseful throughout, even if you did always know the good guys would win. Sylar, I mean the guy playing Spock, was a good casting call, as was everyone else, I’d say, except Leonard Nimoy, whose dentures were very distracting, although at least it was nice to seem him having fun with the role, something he had some trouble with in the past, but how believable is it that the only thing that will make him lose control is a series of “yo’ mama” jokes? And are telescopic swords really standard Star Fleet issue when they’ve got phasers? (Nice redesign of those, by the way.) I did get a little tired of hearing McCoy use the “I’m a doctor, not a . . .” catch-phrase as often as he did, and Kirk must have a cast iron nose, not to mention indestructible teeth to get so very punched-out so very often and not to be spitting a lot of chips.

Well, now I can get on with some art-house stuff.