I’m occasionally taken in by a good story, I’ll admit. I didn’t see the ending of Sixth Sense coming. It’s probably better for my enjoyment that way but it does occasionally make me feel foolish.

So here’s a little tale, completely true, about a visit to Sea World I was on with some cousins of mine. They won’t mind me telling the story since even if you knew my real name you couldn’t guess which cousins it was–I have a lot of them.

So I’m sitting next to my cousin, we’ll call him Stu, at the dolphin show, with his wife, we’ll call her Jane, on his other side. Gorgeous dolphins with incredible hang time, yay Sea World. They bring a family out–man, woman, daughter–to let the little girl give the dolphin a treat for its tricks. Aaww. The trainer suggests that Mom go up on a little bridge between the audience and the trainer area to take a picture of Daughter interacting with Dolphin. Aaaww. The next thing we know, Mom is in the water, she’s fallen off the bridge. And she’s freaked. She’s flailing and screaming as if there are barracudas in the pool instead of cuties who like to nudge you with their noses. A dolphin comes over to her and she goes even more berserk, screaming and splashing at the dolphin in a panic. Clue #1: No trainer had dived into the pool at this point. The sum total of their action consisted of encouraging the woman, via the microphone, to swim to the front of the pool where there was a ladder. I turn to Daddyman demanding to know how anybody can be such a total panicked loser twit that they would scream and splash instead of making nice with the dolphin and enjoying the accident of a lifetime. Probably his silence on this point was to spare my feelings. The bozo mom is making her way, with much trembling and drama, to the front of the pool, and still no trainer has taken charge of the situation. About this time, both woman and dolphin go under and suddenly the show finishes with some finale human-dolphin trick that I can’t remember right now. Oh.

I turn to Stu, deflated but giggling, “I feel so stupid. They really had me going.” Cousin Stu turns to me with a matching grin. “This’ll make you feel better. They took me in too … until Jane said, ‘You idiot, they got you with this one the last time we were here.’”

Eah. He works in the industry which is one of my primary areas of consumer input–Hollywood. I suppose a reasonable–reasonable, I said!–dose of credulity is an advantage for people who work on or just love good stories.

Man. I procrastinate reading Lileks for a few days, and this is what I miss:

… young idiots [drove] by and [shouted] obscenities at everyone … the gentleman at the next table whipped out a long thin bamboo tube and shot what appeared to be a sharp dart into the rear right wheel of the vehicle … the POP of the tire’s explosion was followed by two more, each punctuated by a sharp concise exhalation from the man at the next table … the vehicle had come to a stop, its driver too stunned to proceed, and by the time the driver regained his composure the fellow had opened the door and removed he youth who had shouted the obscenities to the ladies. He marched the youth back, and with the slightest pressure on his upper ear – a gesture that seemed to inflict a great deal of discomfort – he compelled the youth to apologize to the ladies, and empty his pockets to pay for the meal he had sullied with his vulgarities. Then he dispatched him with a kick on the seat of his trousers, but you could tell it was intended more for show than the actual infliction of injury. We rose in a round of applause, and thereafter amused ourselves watching the youths push their vehicle off to the side of the road. Shouts of “Get a horse” and “that’s right, lads, get your back into it” were laughingly proffered.

I hope Mr. Lileks forgives me for reprinting the heart of his story, but I’ve started three emails to him and abandoned them all as too fatuous, basically asking: “Are you pulling our legs?” So I guess I will just post the fatuousness here on the blog for all to see, instead.

Is he or isn’t he? He tells the story with what passes on the web for a straight face and gives no indication that he’s joking. But my basic experience of modern life inclines me to believe this is so unfathomably unlikely that I’m left … flummoxed. Not to mention that the “youths,” morons or not, would have had a good case of destruction of property to take to the police. Real or Not?

Verdict: Consult the laws of physics, Anwyn, you credulous girly girl. I’m going to credit it to Lileks having an Owl Creek Bridge moment, then.

Damn. I’m. Good.

Jane Seymour in the bottom two.

And Mark Cuban … outta there. Finally.

And after all his blowhard bluster about “If I can’t out-talent ’em I’m gonna outwork ’em” and he’ll do whatever it takes and he’s got to improve the technique and he will, his words to Kym on hearing they were finished? “Thank God it’s over, thank God.”

Dude, I can understand you feeling that way. You were so outclassed from the very beginning that it hasn’t even been funny. But don’t you realize how stupid you make yourself look on top of it all when you let us see you say that after all the manic bullshit? “I wouldn’t have traded it for the world,” he said then on mike.

Don’t let the door hit you.

I’m behind on my editing. I’ve finished the red-pen work on the hard copy, but after that I have to do notes and bibliography electronically, in Word documents. I’ve been working feverishly on the notes, working in the morning and thus taking time away from my son (I usually work after he’s in bed, but I procrastinated), and I got it done today. I’d been using Ctrl-S all along, saving every few pages. I hit Ctrl-S one last time and closed the document. Then I had a cold chill. The document was an attachment from my boss, and I realized I hadn’t saved it as a separate document but was making changes right there in the attachment. Well, no big, Ctrl-S Saves, right? No, unlike Jesus, Ctrl-S does not Save no matter what. There is no copy of the document anywhere that I can find. It did not save in the attachment. When I open the attachment document, it is manifestly the original document with none of my changes on it.

Any of you savvier-than-I tech folks have any idea if the computer is hiding something from me or if all my changes are gone forever? I did Windows’ search function already. No joy.

I am so upset. Five hours’ work down the drain.

Update: Nevermind. I’ve got the green light from the boss to take the extra time to do it over and Daddyman (The Bean’s dad and resident tech around here) says Outlook Express doesn’t keep temp stuff around like Outlook proper sometimes does. Oh well. Next time, Gadget.

Update x2: SAVED! Daddyman manipulated that handy bug known as Norton GoBack and got the document back in its next-to-last iteration–meaning I have only about one page (out of sixty) to do over again.

Whew.

Live-blogging Dancing with the Stars for the second week in a row. Procrastinating work. Yeehaw.

Marie and Jonathan, samba: Sorry, Marie, not your dance. Unless you can do those samba rolls about 3x as fast, no 10s for you. Jonathan choreographed that as if you were a doll that he might break if he played too hard, and unfortunately that’s exactly what you looked like. Judges say:

Oh my God, Marie collapsed. … Okay, she’s better, it appears. A fainting spell that’s happened to her before. No more sambas. You really were a breakable doll, poor thing. Trip-sevens on top of fainting on live TV. Not your week, dear lady.

The lift again. For pete’s sake somebody clarify the rules.

Jane and Tony, rhumba: Ouch. Hip action not Dr. Quinn’s strong point. I’ve got a feeling this is the least talented group of Latin dancers in three seasons, at least. Judges say: Oh, please, Bruno, she resembled Edyta no more than Celine Dion resembles Britney Spears. Well, judges ought to know but I thought it needed a lot more movement. Nines? Good grief.

Mark and Kym, samba: This ought to be bad, so bad it’s good. A lot of galloping from Mark here. No samba rolls. He thinks, probably truly, that the judges’ scores will be irrelevant because he will in the bottom two from now on and the only thing that will keep him on will be the voters. Let’s hope the field is now slim enough that the voters have no real power to beat the voters for the real dancers. Judges: Entertaining, no technique. Well, duh. Nice to hear them say it. Florence Henderson looks shocked that Tom Bergeron mentioned Heather Mills’s false leg on the air; clearly she didn’t watch last season. Sheesh. Even trip-sevens are too high. That demeans Marie.

Sabrina and Mark, rhumba: Hmm. A bit snappy for a rhumba, too many spins. The music puts you in mind of somebody a lot older than Sabrina–not good. Judges: BRUNO SHUT UP. Does he honestly believe opinion is objective and monolithic? Let Len have his own. Nines and ten.

Jennie and Derek, samba: She is right on the edge of being rock-solid but still appears too unsure of herself to really let loose, which is what the samba takes. Judges: Bruno’s right on–she was falterish. Carrie-Ann right on–she’s gotta mean it. Len’s been taking some happy pills this season, or he just thinks Jennie’s hot. Or both. Eight-nine-eight. On the other hand, I am warning to Derek. He was trying too hard early on but is relaxing into it now, I think.

Helio and Julianne, rhumba: Damn, nice car. Sorry, back to the dance. People, all people, please stop dancing without music. Wait till it starts. Well, he quit smiling so much, but still, it’s not quite his dance either. Bad night for Latin, it seems. Even some of the pros seem off their game, and I don’t like Julianne’s choreography here. Helio’s just … stiff. Judges: Carrie-Ann, no chemistry and awkward lines. Len agrees: mechanical. Bruno agrees, shock of shocks. Eight-seven-eight.

Mel B and Maks: Started well, but somehow the actual steps seem to be eluding everybody who tries the samba. Feet are kind of cloddish. Very bad choreography mistake to leave her sitting on the floor in the splits for that long, especially in such a fast dance. Judges: Len loves it. Bruno loves it. Carrie-Ann agrees, best samba of the night. Maybe I’m cranky. Or maybe I just prefer steps to be right on the beat, with snap. Take some snap from Sabrina’s rhumba and put it in. Ten-nine-ten. Eah, I just don’t see it, but I guess that makes her Sabrina’s primary competition.

Cameron and Edyta, rhumba: Okay, Susan Lucci giving Edyta tips? Come on. Wow. By George, I think he’s got it. He seems to be letting completely loose, although it’s only fair to say the burden of rhumba choreography really falls on the woman. Still there are certain elements the guy must bring to it, and Cameron’s got ten times more fluidity and heat than Helio had–all the other men did the samba. Bruno loved it with his usual over-the-top sound bytes. Carrie-Ann: Chemistry good, lift fanatic wins again. Len: Cameron good, Edyta on his nerves. Guess the happy pills aren’t all-encompassing. I’d say Cameron’s the steadiest of the night. Eight (darn you Carrie-Lift-Ann)-nine-nine.

Prediction for bottom two: Mark Cuban and … Jane Seymour? It’s got to be somebody. Mark Cuban will you PLEASE GO NOW.

From episode “Kindred,” from a Mexican police officer to a girl who says she’s going to America: “Why don’t you leave before I call the border police?”

As if Mexico has any freakin’ northern border police.

Yeah, I’m still slogging through to get to La Bell. I hardly think it’ll be worth it at this point.

Chuck. Hands down. Funny hourlong with a bit of real love story among its satirized action, not sitcom-funny, tall goofy-cute geek lead, short annoying-funny sidekick, and in my rundown of promising cast for this year’s shows, how in the hell did I keep forgetting about I’ll-Be-In-My-Bunk Baldwin? (As an update, Private Practice and Big Shots are both well out the window at this point, and the other two are stacking up on TiVo. Slim pickings this year.)

P.S., Dawn Summers, the show is a parody. And a pretty sharp one at that. I bet you don’t like Weird Al Yankovic, either.

…to deserve a nightmare about Sylar coming after both Venomous Kate and me, with lethal intent, and other bad things happening, reminiscent of 9/11, in NYC?

It was slightly mitigated by the dream right after, which seemed somewhat post-apocalyptic but also in which I was involved with Greg House. Excellent.

Because she really is a super-cool progressive, see, so she’ll make the most beloved character in a generation of literature retroactively gay and hope nobody notices that if she’d actually said so in the books, she wouldn’t have sold nearly as many.

Oh well. The fact that she didn’t say so in the books means I can just pretend it didn’t happen. If I can do it with three whole Star Wars films I can certainly do it with the after-market remarks of the richest woman in the world.

Via the headlines of the Beta Heartbreaker.

What are you wearing?

A cutout of a giant baseball sewn out of your mom’s living-room curtains circa 1985, looks like. Jennifer Connelly, where did you go wrong?

Hellooooo, Vancouver!

Can those of you who live there please tell me what the cost of living is like compared to the rest of Metro Portland? What kind of house or condo or rental or apartment would $37K per year get you? How much more than that would a family of three need to bring in to live comfortably?

A friend of mine from the Midwest wants to know. Any info appreciated!

Thanks.

Son: “How old is Papaw?”

Me: “Fifty-nine.”

Son: “When I’m fifty-nine I’ll be big enough to smoke.”

Me: “…”

As long as he waits till then, I guess.

… maybe, we shut down all schools that are funded by foreign governments? Isn’t allowing those just an open invitation to come and subvert our system of government? Survey of Anwyn says: Yes.