For the People Who don't Believe in Climate Change

It's already been a very record-breaking hot year

By SETH BORENSTEIN

WASHINGTON (AP) — It's been so warm in the United States this year, especially in March, that national records weren't just broken, they were deep-fried.

Temperatures in the lower 48 states were 8.6 degrees above normal for March and 6 degrees higher than average for the first three months of the year, according to calculations by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. That far exceeds the old records.

The magnitude of how unusual the year has been in the U.S. has alarmed some meteorologists who have warned about global warming. One climate scientist said it's the weather equivalent of a baseball player on steroids, with old records obliterated.

"Everybody has this uneasy feeling. This is weird. This is not good," said Jerry Meehl, a climate scientist who specializes in extreme weather at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. "It's a guilty pleasure. You're out enjoying this nice March weather, but you know it's not a good thing."

It's not just March.

"It's been ongoing for several months," said Jake Crouch, a climate scientist at NOAA's National Climatic Data Center in Ashville, N.C.

Meteorologists say an unusual confluence of several weather patterns, including La Nina, was the direct cause of the warm start to 2012. While individual events can't be blamed on global warming, Couch said this is like the extremes that are supposed to get more frequent because of manmade climate change from the burning of fossil fuels such as coal and oil.

It's important to note that this unusual winter heat is mostly a North America phenomenon. Much of the rest of the Northern Hemisphere has been cold, said NOAA meteorologist Martin Hoerling.
The first quarter of 2012 broke the January-March record by 1.4 degrees. Usually records are broken by just one- or two-tenths of a degree. U.S. temperature records date to 1895.
The atypical heat goes back even further. The U.S. winter of 2010-2011 was slightly cooler than normal and one of the snowiest in recent years, but after that things started heating up. The summer of 2011 was the second warmest summer on record.
The winter that just ended, which in some places was called the year without winter, was the fourth warmest on record. Since last April, it's been the hottest 12-month stretch on record, Crouch said.
But the month where the warmth turned especially weird was March.

Normally, March averages 42.5 degrees across the country. This year, the average was 51.1, which is closer to the average for April. Only one other time — in January 2006 — was the country as a whole that much hotter than normal for an entire month.

The "icebox of America," International Falls, Minn., saw temperatures in the 70s for five days in March, and there were only three days of below zero temperatures all month.

In March, at least 7,775 weather stations across the nation broke daily high temperature records and another 7,517 broke records for night-time heat. Combined, that's more high temperature records broken in one month than ever before, Crouch said.

"When you look at what's happened in March this year, it's beyond unbelievable," said University of Victoria climate scientist Andrew Weaver.

NOAA climate scientist Gabriel Vecchi compared the increase in weather extremes to baseball players on steroids: You can't say an individual homer is because of steroids, but they are hit more often and the long-held records for home runs fall.

They seem to be falling far more often because of global warming, said NASA top climate scientist James Hansen. In a paper he submitted to the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and posted on a physics research archive, Hansen shows that heat extremes aren't just increasing but happening far more often than scientists thought.

What used to be a 1-in-400 hot temperature record is now a 1 in 10 occurrence, essentially 40 times more likely, said Hansen. The warmth in March is an ideal illustration of this, said Hansen, who also has become an activist in fighting fossil fuels.

Weaver, who reviewed the Hansen paper, called it "one of the most stunning examples of evidence of global warming."

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Truly alarming and impossible to deny, weather hasn't been acting normal for these past few months.  It worries me to see what's coming for this summer and beyond.
Industrialized nations, but especially the United States, needs to research and implement alternative power sources like wind, water, and solar power if we're ever going to help the Earth survive what mankind has already negatively impacted.
The problem with the United States is that the government officials that are supposed to be serving the people, are serving themselves by lining their pockets with money from big oil companies that bribe them to continue to block badly needed research and development of these alternative fuel sources.
Fossil fuels and the search for them, only powers wars, and ultimately complete destruction of the only place we can live in the universe.
A pretty steep price to pay for all of us don't you think?

Want to be well liked?

How to Be Popular at Work

By Geoffrey James

If you want to be appreciated at work, make sure everyone else feels welcome.

Whenever people gather in any social setting, there is always one person who becomes the primary center of attention. People want to be around that person, and unconsciously seek his or her approval.
In almost every case, the "most popular" person in the room is the one who is the most effective at building rapport, from his or her first interaction with others.
This ability to build rapport may be (and often is) unconscious, and even operates among people with limited social skills. At a technical conference, for example, the engineer that is best at creating rapport with fellow engineers will be the center of the discussion group.
While rapport building comes naturally to some, however, it is a mistake to believe that its something that can’t be consciously developed. Rapport building, like all human relationship skills, can be learned and taught.
According to Dr. Earl Taylor, president of Dale Carnegie Training's North Carolina practice, the key to doing building rapport is to draw upon other experiences in your life where rapport-building came naturally.
Treat Others as Honored Guests Some people mistakenly believe that business conversations go more smoothly if they begin with reference to a shared cultural experience, such as a recent sporting event. Far from being sure-fire rapport-builders, such remarks can often fall flat.
For example, there are some people (I'm one of them) who have absolutely no interest in sports. (True story: I once wondered aloud–on a radio program of all places–whether a basketball game might be canceled because it was raining outside.) But even if the other person is a sport fan: Yeah, you might have a conversation about your favorite team–but it's a conversation the other person could have had with anyone.
According to Taylor, it's far more effective, when you meet somebody for the first time, to visualize that person as an honored guest in your home. If you’re like most people, when you welcome guests into your home, you are glad to see them and want them feel welcome and at ease.
While the specifics of what you might say in a business situation are different from what you might say to a house guest, if the motivation and attitude behind the words are the same, they'll get the same result.
Just as you graciously make your guest comfortable, when you meet with a customer or colleague, find the place inside yourself that is truly grateful to have this opportunity to spend time with this individual, and to be of service.
Conversations That Build Friendships After that initial greeting, open the conversation with a remark that lets the other person know that you have put some thought into the other person's concerns and issues. Then follow with a question that leads toward a conversation.
For example, you might begin a meeting with a technical expert by mentioning that you heard the expert had recently presented a paper at a technical conference. Then ask a question like: "What kind of response did you get?”
The specific content of your opening remark is far less important than the hidden message–which is that you care enough about this person to take some extra effort.
When you're sincerely interested, the person you're speaking with will remember the feeling of being valued long after the specific subject matter of the meeting is forgotten.
Do this consistently, and you'll be welcome everywhere, because you're an expert at making everyone else feel welcome.
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Happy Easter to all my friends and loved ones!

Priest

Released: 2011
Sci-fi
Director: Scott Charles Stewart
Starring: Paul Bettany, Karl Urban, Cam Gigandet, Maggie Q
Rated: PG-13
Running Time: 87 minutes

The breakdown:  This is a futuristic, distopia, vampire story that's entertaining to watch.  "Priests" are specially trained Church warriors that have killed off most of the vampires threatening humanity, but one recent attack outside the safe city walls has called out a Priest to finish them off once and for all.

I heard this movie got terrible reviews, but I was pleasantly surprised.  I ended up really enjoying it.
In the beginning we are told there have always been vampires, always been people, and they have always fought.  Vampires are vicious hunters and are able to tear people up in nothing flat, and no human can beat them.  Then the Priests come along.  They are human's who are hand picked by the church to train to be the best vampire fighters we can muster.  They are a small, but powerful group of warriors who fight and kill most of the vampires.  The ones that are left, go off into the wastelands to live underground and are no longer considered a threat.  In the first opening scenes in the film, Paul Bettany is in a "hive" of one of the vampire groups and loses a fellow Priest.  This is important for a little later in the film.  Meanwhile, what's left of the world isn't much after the vampires have been controlled.  The wastelands are barren deserts with little to no life and inside the city walls, the church has a hold over everyone, where no one can ever leave and no one can turn there back on the church....because according them them - to turn your back on the church, is to turn your back on God.
At a wasteland outpost a family suffers a vampire attack, seemingly out of nowhere, at their home and the wife is killed.  The father is badly mauled and the daughter is abducted without being harmed.
Well, back in the city there's only a handful of Priests left since they are pretty much not needed anymore.  One Priest in particular (Bettany) has a visitor who says Bettany's brother has been attacked and his niece has been kidnapped.
The Priest goes to the church council and asks to be allowed to go look for them.  He is denied and told that vampires are not a threat and that bandits must've committed the crime.
The Priest defies the church and leaves the city limits on a cool motorbike to go to his brother's house.  Upon arriving there he is met by the man who told him of the attack originally.  This turns out to be a  lawman who was the love interest of the kidnapped girl.
Meanwhile, the church sends the remaining and only 4 Priests to track down Bettany and bring him back dead or alive.
Bettany's brother dies and Bettany and the lawman go off in search of the girl following what leads they have.  Eventually, one of the Priests finds Bettany.  A female Priest who seems to have a deep love for Bettany. 
I'll stop there because for the movies I think are worth something I usually stop before I ruin things for you.
If you want to know what happens next, you'll have to see it.
I really enjoyed it and thought it was a good movie worth seeing.

If you like sci-fi or vampires and have an open mind you should enjoy this one.

I give it a 3 out of 5 for solid acting, an interesting plot, some really cool props, and good special effects.

Breakdown

Released: 1997
Suspense
Director: Jonathan Mostow
Starring: Kurt Russell, Kathleen Quinlan, J.T. Walsh
Rated: R
Running Time: 93 minutes

The breakdown for Breakdown: During a long trip through the desert, a man's wife disappears after their car breaks down in the middle of nowhere.

So this couple (Russell and Quinlan) is moving across the country from Boston to San Diego for new jobs.  During the trip through the southwest they have an almost accident with a rough looking older pick up that pulls out right in front of them.  At the gas station later on, they see the same pick up stopped there as well and have a few tense words with the driver.  A little way down the freeway they have some car trouble and have to flag down a big semi for help.  The husband is a little reluctant to leave the car alone and travel with the trucker and his wife 5 miles down the road to a little cafe, otherwise, the next town is 60 miles ahead (says the trucker).  So the wife hitches a ride with the nice trucker and says she'll call a tow truck from there and see him later.  He waits for a while and then realizes what is wrong with the car isn't so hard to fix on his own.  He drives down to the cafe to meet up with his wife (only 30 minutes has passed since they split up) and she's not there.  No one in the cafe says they've seen her and they are also not much help.  He leaves, going on down the road to look for her and sees the same semi driving down the road.  He speeds up, catches up to the trucker and makes him pull over.  When they start talking, the trucker says he's never seen him or his wife.  He acts like he has no idea what Kurt Russell is talking about.  A cop happens along and Kurt Russell flags him down.  He explains that he thinks this trucker has his wife and the cop inspects the semi.  He talks to the trucker and lets him go saying he can't see any signs of struggle and there's no sign of Russell's wife anywhere.  The cop tells him to go 30 miles to the nearest town and see his deputy.  File a report for a missing person and hopefully they'll figure this out soon.  Russell goes down there and isn't comforted by what he sees.  In the police station there's a big pin board with TONS of missing persons fliers.

This story unfolds to a conclusion that was interesting, but the action scenes towards the end of the film are very far fetched, taking away some of the pleasure of the film for me.

Overall, it's a good enough movie.  I've seen a lot worse lately.
I give it 3 and 1/2 out of 5 for a good story, but some ridiculous action sequences that are totally unrealistic.

Melinda, Melinda

Released: 2004
Drama, Comedy
Director: Woody Allen
Starring: Will Farrell, Vinessa Shaw, Chiwetel Ejiofor
Rated: PG-13
Running Time: 99 minutes

The breakdown:  A conversation between playwrights in a restaurant shows how two different perspectives would spin the same story about a woman who's down on her luck named Melinda.

I can't stand Woody Allen, but I didn't know he was directing this one before I started watching it.  He's not in it, but Will Farrell plays Allen's personality in it, so it's like he's in it still.
So this conversation starts off in a restaurant with 4 friends discussing how they differ in view points.  One likes to do drama's and tragedies, the other likes comedies.  One of the people at the table says they will tell a true story and see how the two people react to it.
The movie switches back and forth between the two versions retold by the playwrights, and at parts, I have to admit I got confused.  The same actress plays Melinda, but all the other players change between the two versions.
Overall, I didn't care about any of the characters.  I found the playwrights to be speaking pretentiously and arrogantly, which is a big turn off for me.
The drama/comedy plots were also boring and didn't keep my interest.  Plus you can't relate to all the characters in the film because they are living the high life in New York and are socialites and wealthy.    

I say skip this one and watch Sliding Doors instead for a similar parallel woman's story, but with much better plots.

1 out of 5 for Steve Carrell who plays a small role, and for Chiwetel Ejiofor, who's character, I did like.  The acting is solid, but the plot is completely uninteresting.

Boogie Nights

Released: 1997
Drama
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Julianne Moore, Burt Reynolds, Don Cheadle
Rated: R
Running Time: 155 minutes

The breakdown: Wahlberg plays a young man who's noticed by an adult movie director at a night club and is an overnight sensation in the porn industry because of his "big" talent.

I had remembered that this movie was nominated for Oscars and other awards.  I thought that meant it was going to be good, or entertaining.  I thought it was neither.
This is a period piece that takes place in the late 70's and continues through the 80's.  Wahlberg is a young man who never finished high school and has two dead-end jobs, but of course, he has big dreams of being a movie star.
Burt Reynolds plays an adult movie director who sees him at a local night club and convinces him to make some movies with him.
Wahlberg's character has an immense penis and does very well in the industry.  Eventually he goes down the path of egotism, drugs, and ruins his career by having a big fight with Reynolds.
There's a few other subplots, but none of them are very interesting just like the main plot.
There's a lot of good actors in this movie, but it just didn't engage me.  I didn't care about the characters and two hours and 35 minutes was wayyyyyyy toooooooo damnnnnnn longggggg.  There were theses scenes that were awkwardly slow for me, and the movie would've benefited big time from some more editing.
I didn't think it was anything special.  Do not waste your time.

I give it a 1 and 1/2 for good solid acting, but no interesting plot and a terribly slow pace.

Happy Anniversary!

To a very special couple!!!
Today it's been 41 years!!!

Friends with Benefits

Released: 2011
Romantic, Comedy (I think not on either count)
Director: Will Gluck
Starring: Mila Kunis, Justin Timberlake, Woody Harrelson
Rated: R
Running Time: 109 minutes too long

The breakdown:
I would retitle this movie Actors without Chemistry.

Timberlake and Kunis have both just ended relationships with their ex's when they meet each other in New York.  She's some head hunter and he's an up and coming art director for magazines.  She head hunts him and finally gets him to meet her in New York for a meeting with GQ Magazine.
They hit it off as friends and he gets the job.  So he moves from L.A. to New York and she shows him around until he settles in.
They spend so much time together bitching about relationships they decide it's better to forgo the relationship and just have sex.
Of course this doesn't work out and they end up "falling in love" with each other and decide to be a real couple.

The movie has talking heads full of cliches instead of actual dialogue.  It's predictable, it's boring, and it's all been done before in much better romantic comedies.  This movie could not keep my interest at all, of course, how could they with such hollow characters.
Do not waste your time on this one.  Instead see "The Adjustment Bureau" for a real innovative romantic sci-fi movie.

1/2 out of 5 for a lame overdone plot with boring characters who never have any on screen chemistry and Timberlake is NOT an actor.  He should just go back to boy bands.

Easy A

Released: 2010
Comedy
Director: Will Gluck
Starring: Emma Stone, Amanda Bynes, Penn Badgley
Rated: PG-13
Running Time: 92 minutes

The breakdown:
A good teenage girl helps out a friend and ends up starting a bad rumor about herself that gets way out of control.

Overall, I wasn't expecting much of this movie, but it was cute.
The good girl in high school who isn't noticed much by anyone tells a little lie to her friend in the girl's bathroom that is overheard by the religious nut of the school.  It is then passed around and all of a sudden the good girl has a bad reputation for sleeping with just about everyone.
The good girl continues to lie for guys that need help with ladies by saying she slept with them, but the lies get her into trouble, and become completely unmanageable.
It was funny at parts, and cute at others.


I give it a 3 1/2 out of 5 for loosely being based on The Scarlet Letter (which I had to read in high school) being funny more times then I expected, and having some sweet romantic moments tucked in.

Sucker Punch

Released: 2011
Adventure, Fantasy
Director: Zack Snyder
Starring: Emily Browning, Vanessa Hudgens, Abbie Cornish, and others you've never heard of
Rated: R
Running Time: A crushing 110 minutes

The breakdown:  This movie is so terrible, I can barely review it.
From IMDB.com:
A young girl is institutionalized by her abusive stepfather.  Retreating to an alternative reality as a coping strategy, she envisions a plan which will help her escape from the mental facility.



Oh my gosh this movie stinks to high heaven!
Do you know how I qualify bad films?....if they have lots of music montages.  This movie starts out with the lead actress (what's her name? Never heard of her...Emily Browning?) singing a slow agonizingly bad rendition of The Eurythmics "Sweet Dreams (are made of this.)"  She sounds like a cross between Marilyn Manson and Bjork.  Oh it makes your ears bleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeddddddddd!!!!  Turn it off pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!
Quickly......the mother dies and leaves all her money to her kids, two girls are left with their abusive stepfather.  After he tries (or does it's unclear to me) to rape her younger sister, a blonde only known as Babydoll tries to shoot him.  She aims point blank range and misses him, but I guess accidentally kills her sister.  He has her committed to get the money.  In 5 days time she's going to be lobotomized.  Babydoll then escapes (in her mind) to fantasy world after fantasy world, led by a mysterious stranger, to find five items that will help them all escape the asylum.  Somehow, that's supposed to make sense, but it doesn't.
In the end, she comes out of the fantasy world and gets lobotomized.
THE END.

What a piece of crap!
There's really no plot and certainly no characters (just people saying empty lines.)  There's pretty girls trying to prove their badasses by doing physically impossible action sequences all the time.  THAT does not make a movie....Which reminds me.....how on Earth did this rotten egg ever get green-lit????!!!!!!

This movie is sooooo pointless, and such a complete waste of time, I was angry after I tried watching it.  Granted, I couldn't sit through the whole thing, I actually had to fast forward through a lot of it, but the time I did invest in it, I WANT BACK.

These girls are all dressed like a middle-aged man's fantasy....a school girl, a pilot (of some kind), fishnets, high heels, corsets, underwear, the blonde, the Asian, the brunette, etc.  They are supposed to be fighting with guns, knifes, swords, and all sorts of weapons against things like steam powered NAZIS, dragons, samurais, and cyborgs!!!!  With barely any clothes on?  Come on!
I couldn't make up a worse story if I tried.

I give this a 1/2 stub out of 5 because some of the CG stuff was visually stunning, but the plot was ....wait, did I say plot, what plot?  PLEASE please please.....do NOT see this movie!

PS
Here's my recent review of it on Amazon.com

"You know how when you're walking through the park and the day is beautiful and then you look down and realize you've stepped into a big steaming pile of dog doo?
That's this movie.
I had heard it was terrible, but I thought I might be able to get some laughs from it.  No, not a one.  It was pure agony just to try and sit there while this movie played on my television.
It wasn't entertaining and I'm really glad I didn't pay anything to see it.
There's absolutely no plot.
There's absolutely no characters.  "How can this be?", you ask, I dare you to just try and watch this movie and you'll understand.
In fact, I've seen 30 second commercials that had more meaning to me, and more substance.
I've seen adult movies that had better storylines.
Here's this movie summed up.
A girl gets admitted to a terrible mental ward, that apparently only has female patients, by her evil stepdad to collect the money her recently deceased mother left her.  She's about to have a lobotomy so that she can't tell the police anything about how horrible her stepdad has really been.  She goes off (in her mind) to create a fantasy world where the girls are all strippers and on the side fight off dragons, cyborgs, and steam powered Nazi's in barely any clothes (and certainly no protective armor).  Somehow, this is supposed to relate to getting all the girls out of the mental ward and away from abusive employees.  And somehow this movie is supposed to make sense.  She had the surgery at the end and is comatose.  The end!  Wow, what a great plotless, characterless, piece of cinema crap!!!!
The only good thing I can say about this movie is some of the CG work is fantastic and is beautiful to look at, but it can't save a movie that's missing a plot.
How did this movie ever get green-lit???!!!
DO NOT SEE THIS MOVIE!!!!  The production value is amazing, but there simply is no plot."


Update 7-14-12
I love this little mini-review from Sandy Schaefer at screenrant.com

"Zack Snyder's ambitious attempt to blend his trademark hyper-realistic visuals and rockin' soundtracks with an original storyline that pays homage to Alice in Wonderland (and borrows a few tricks from Inception) certainly looked and sounded like a shiny, female-centric action blockbuster... in early trailers and clips, that is.

Sadly, Sucker Punch ultimately proved unable to coherently address its own existential themes or create interesting (or even discernible) characters; the film's action sequences and set pieces weren't all that thrilling, either. Snyder, by his own admittance, attempted to structure the movie as a meta-commentary on the often-sexualized nature of geek culture; his inability to pull that off resulted in Sucker Punch feeling more like an (inadvertently) exploitative two-hour long music video that isn't nearly as brainy as it fancies itself to be."