Phantasmic Links 11.20.05

For most people, waking up and catching a matinee is as simple as waking up, and catching a matinee. Most people are not MCF, the Nexus of Improbability.

Waking up at 9AM on a Sunday is a feat enough in itself. Showering, eating breakfast, and making it to the nearest stadium theater 10 miles away by 10 AM was even more impressive. I wasn't expecting any problems since, after all, it was early on a Sunday morning. Those who weren't attending their respective religious services would be sleeping in after a late Saturday night. Imagine my surprise to find the line extending out of the lobby and into the parking lot! Undaunted, I waited since it moved relatively quickly, and I knew this particular theater showed at least twenty minutes of trailers. Yet when I was close enough to hear someone told that the show had been sold out, my plans truly unraveled. Faced with the choice of hanging around 2 hours for the next show or catching an earlier showing at a smaller theater in my home town, I opted for the latter. It wasn't a stadium, but it was apt to have a smaller crowd and less children, a fair trade. Upon arrival I discovered the first showing wasn't until 12:30.

I used the time to return home and sort through some boxes I'd brought home during the carpeting of my office. An hour or so later, I was back and buying a ticket. Soon I was sitting in a theater and though there were a few families, the kids were relatively well behaved. The standard cheesy slide show played on the screen. “Was this movie first a book, play, or comic strip?” “Can you unscramble these refrigerator magnet letters and find the celebrity's name?” Between songs a voice that clearly wasn't a professional DJ, but rather the theater manager, advised people to buy popcorn, silence cellphones, and enjoy the next song from Sheryl Crow. As ”If it Makes you Happy” played, I checked my watch and wondered when the movie would start. It was at least five minutes late. Then, in true improbable fashion, one of the theater workers ran in the back door and announced, “FOLKS! THE MOVIE IS IN THEATER THREE! NOT ONE. sorry.” Being in the back row and saddled with neither spouse nor brood gave me a decent head start on the stampeding mob, and I entered the other (empty) theater in time for the second half of the Superman Returns teaser trailer, which I had been looking forward to seeing on the big screen. I couldn't believe the place would allow one room to fill up, and start playing the movie in another room completely devoid of an audience. The good news is that the screen was a lot bigger than the one in the first room I was in. Obligatory improbability behind me, I was now free to immerse myself in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, every bit as dark and amazing as the book, and certainly earning its PG-13 rating.

That was this morning(and afternoon). Now it is this evening, and time once again for this week's PHANTASMIC LINKS:

At last! Now you too can find maps to celebrities! Hat tip to Rey, who interviewed a young local celebrity on the eve of his fourth birthday.

Megadeth in the Twenty Fourth and One Half Century! Courtesy of Sarcasmo, who also has classical painting superheroes and villains for us this week.

Ubersleep involves taking several naps rather than sleeping in one block of hours every night. Didn't Kramer try this once?

It's scary to think that school textbooks are riddled with glaring errors. I used to catch things all the time, and there were plenty of good teachers who taught us current facts, and not the outdated ones in the sometimes five or more year-old books.

Can you diffuse this bomb in less than fifteen minutes? It's great how many different problems are involved in solving this one.

Now you can generate graffiti on the internet! That's going to save a LOT of spraypaint, walls, and overpasses....

This is the longest list of the longest stuff at the longest domain name at long last!

Need background music for your next RPG gettogether? Radio Rivendell can help(get you even less dates). This one comes from Kev Bayer's new links feature.

Say, I wonder whatever happened to the cast of Goonies....?