4 8 15 16 23 42 = 108!

Television Review: "Lost"

Sorry I haven't posted in almost 2 weeks, but remember that bug I thought I had...well, I still have it and I don't think it is just a bug now. So I have spent the past 2 weeks eating nothing but mashed potatoes, soup and bread...anything else enters my body and I get horribly sick. I'm walking around in a constant state of nausea and have gone days at a time with out consuming anything! Not fun.

So today, after all the water cooler discussions here at work, I decided to turn from the big screen to the small one and talk about the best show on television today - LOST.



I will start by saying that I have been a long time fan of J.J. Abrams - his writing has been incredible for close to 15 years and I remain addicted. From his screen writing for Regarding Henry and Forever Young (we'll just ignore Armageddon), to his breakthrough TV gems of "Felicity" and "Alias", J.J. spins a tale like no other.

After Season One, I thought to myself, they cannot keep this level of effort up for yet another season, can they? But truly, they have. Now, I will preface this by saying that the following are theories, not Spoliers. These are just some revelations my Lost buddies and I have come up with. But let's start with the obvious, but not-so-obvious items.

The Numbers:
These numbers are everywhere. Some people may have missed it, but all throughout Season One, they seemed to pop up all over the place. Dates spoken, times spoked - Mr. Rutherford's time of death, 8:15 - soccer jersey numbers, medicine vials, even the flight number - all have the core 6 numbers in them...until Season Two, this was it for the numbers...now we have a new number - 108. Well this number, duh why didn't we think of this before, is the sum of the mysterious 6 numbers...oooooo, intrigue.



The Tailies:
The 23 survivors from the tail section on the plane. They have dwindled in numbers - why? Most likely, they are being tortured by the Others. Or this mysterious disease has gotten them. My first thought was that this was an Alive scenario, but I have since thought better of it.

The Others:
Are these the Tailies? I think not - I think these are a different set of people hiding on the island. They are the ones who stole Danielle's baby and this is the group where Ethan came from...remember him? The Others like to kidnap children. Did this crash occur just to get Walt?

Walt:
Some sort of "special" kid. He makes things happen on the island by thinking of them - the Polar Bear from the comic book. He appears as an apparition to Shannon and the only discernable word out of his mouth, if I was reading lips right, was "button." So he knows about the button...hmmmmm.

The Button:
Does it or doesn't it? Is it the way to prevent something unspeakable from happening? What might happen if 108 minutes pass and the button isn't pressed?

The Orientation Film:
What is missing? That movie jumped around too much to not have been spliced. I worked in movie theatres too long not to recognize the tell-tale splicing. Something was cut out of that movie...but what? What was too disturbing to show, or what did the first hermit cut out so that Desmond would stick around?

Desmond:
Hermit #2 with amazing healing powers...is he sent from the heavens? I feel like he had something to do with Mrs. Dr. Jack's healed spine and Locke's sudden ability to walk again. And where is he running to and what will happen when he gets there? This is not the last of him...and are his powers tied to Walt's?

Locke:
Why was he in that wheelchair? What happened between his lady friend catching him at his dad's house again and him being unable to walk? Why does he have these survival skills (and all those knives) if he worked at a box company and a toy store? And what is his fascination with certain survivors...Kate, Boone, Claire?

Claire and Charlie & Shannon and Sayid:
Will they or won't they? Will this show ever go there? C'mon, they have been on this island for 40 some odd days - people are getting close - are you telling me there is no action going on here? Even on Survivor, it takes less than 39 days for 2 people to hook up. They have to go there soon - we can only suspend disbelief for so long...

The Hatch:
...And then there were 2. So the Original 42 have a hatch and the 23 Tailies have a hatch (notice the numbers) - what is going on with the hatches? Observation posts? Why do they need such powerful magnets? Well, magnets do mess with navigational systems - this is probably why no one has found the island on purpose...

That's all I can think of at the moment - I may build on these theories more later.

Are you watching this show, too? If so, feel free to respond with your own theories - I would love to read them. If not, why not? What are you afraid of? If you too are sucked into this - check out The Fuselage and Oceanic Airlines...these are some great sites!

Stroke of Luck

Movie Review: The Greatest Game Ever Played

Yet another Mommy Movie since I was in San Francisco - this is a nice little tradition my sister-in-law and I have. Believe it or not, it is always quite enjoyable!

This week was an interesting choice, but actually a pretty decent movie. Look, if this had not been the chosen movie for the Reel Moms, I probably would not have seen it in the theatres - let's be honest. But I certainly didn't feel like my time was wasted in any way.

So let's discuss the odd and varied carrer of Bill Paxton to start. Believe it or not, he is the director of this flick and I would have to say that he did a very nice job in creating the right mood and atmosphere. He has come a long way from the days of the Fish Heads music video - one of my personal favorites! Honestly, I think this was the most redeeming quality of this movie - the direction and cinematography - it made it worthwhile.

Now, I'm not implying that the acting of the young Shia LaBeouf wasn't good - it was - but I feel like he left something on the table...something was missing here. What he did, he did well, but he still has some work to do on his craft. I don't know what it is, but he always seems the same to me not matter what the emotion - but let's face it, he IS young.

After the movie, we had a nice lunch and headed home. Unfortunately, by the time we got home I was violently ill and ended up flying home ill (thank goodness I had an entire 3 seats to myself to stretch out and sleep). Today sucked as I was still terribly ill - I can't seem to keep anything down...BLECH. Not the way I wanted to end my trip at all!

An Incredible Birthday

How can it be? How does time fly by so quickly anyway? It seems almost unnatural for Maggie to be 4 years old already. I remember holding her as a baby and watching her take her first steps and hearing her first words...

Now it is 2005 and Maggie and I have long and quite cohesive telephone conversations. She knows what she wants and isn't afraid to ask for it! Starting with her birthday cake for her 4th birthday party (which was held yesterday). Maggie has known for some time that she wanted an Aunt D chocolate cake and that she wanted The Incredibles in a purple bubble on it..."all of them, Aunt D, even Jack Jack"

Okay, well, let me start by explaining that I am not a great artist - I just cannot draw. Pen and paper is hard enough, but try using an icing bag! So I had been stressing over how I was going to draw 5 superheros in a purple bubble (for those of you who don't know, the "purple bubble," as Maggie likes to call it, is the force field that Violet uses as her super-power). However, I had an epiphany - bakeries have been putting kids' school photos and the like on cakes for a few years now. All I had to do was find a bakery willing to do a scan for me and not have me buy the cake from them...enter Christina, my sister-in-law. She called a local place and they said it was no problem - $12. BOOK IT!

So here is the end result:


I'm happy with it and Maggie was happy with it - what more can I say? All in all it was a great birthday experience for Maggie and she will hopefully remember it always!