We've been watching ST:TNG episodes lately, and, since we broke through the first season and it started getting good, we've been inhaling a lot of them (it's been a while since I've seen some of these, especially in order). We just finished with the two first Locutus episodes, and they made me wonder a bit about a couple of things ( Read more... )

The PBS show 'History Detectives' is not uninteresting, although it's for some reason never actually gripping enough that I seek it out (I suspect the fictionalisation of a hunt for information, glossing over long hours in this or that library, the expert advice that feels flat and weirdly too-well-suited (no long rambling conversation in which ( Read more... )

Sometime last week, someone in one of my classes brought in Cars, the newish Pixar movie. So I put it on, for us to look at while they worked and while I went around to help people out. My students seemed to generally think it was cute, but my constant complaints of 'What the crap was that?!' and 'Are we supposed to think this is funny?' and 'Who ( Read more... )

Hey, internet: do you think that in this strip, the whales' dismissal of the humpback's idea has anything to do with the fact that whales did, in fact, already do what he's suggesting (and subsequently returned to the water)? Or do you think it's just a simple stupid-idea-reaction gag? I think there's no sign of a nod to whales' origins; I think ( Read more... )