More Keynotes (OSCON XVI)

The focus on inclusivity continued, with talks about leveling the playing field and working on the pie chart (i.e. only 11% of committers to open source projects are women).

Leslie Hawthorne shared a story leading to a cliche in the diversity training circles, that dark skinned people cannot buy bandaids with a dark color tone.  No longer true thankfully, the market has responded.

She also recommended we experiment with changing our speech patterns (a kind of API).  As an example, Leslie mentioned she now avoids the word "lame" with regard to software and uses "un-groovy" instead.

My mental monkey objected with "namespaces" (the concept) and the fact that engineers frequently re-purpose words.  The "master / slave" relationship between disk drives is not an endorsement of slavery as an institution.  Program co-chair Matthew McCullough mentioned his "very lame" early software projects just moments later, when introducing Tim O'Reilly.  

Some speech habits are deeply ingrained and carry technical meanings.  Diversity also means accepting those already a part of a community, not just being disruptive of their status quo speech habits.

That being said, I agree with Leslie's goals and the importance of experimentation (trial and error) in achieving them.  My morning talk selection was attending the Girl Develop It (@girldevelopit) presentation, about encouraging women to get involved in OSS.  A combination of mentors, fellows and projects provides a game plan for a women-oriented Summer of Open Source.  The Code for America Brigade was really helpful in getting the GDI chapter in Philly up and running.

Tutorial on Node.js (OSCON Day 2)

Notes on: Node.js Three Ways by C. Aaron Cois and Tim Palk

I played hooky in skipping the Python tutorial on meta-programming, which looked interesting.  I hope Patrick will update me.   The presenter for that one was from Brazil.

Instead I'm planning to study Node.js, also work-related in that a revamp of the company guts is expected in this technology.

The tutorial covered the same territory as a Python Django workshop in giving us hands-on use of an MVC (model view controller) web framework.  The Express architecture is remarkably similar to Django in fact:  a standard HTTP request-response pipeline with routing to templates, a modeler for mapping the database and so on.  Meteor, presented in Act 3 is somewhat different.

Important:  we're not talking about client software in a browser.  Django and Express (the node.js framework we're looking at) run on the server, not the client.  One of the breakthroughs for the JavaScript community has been its moving to the server.  We're using Redis for our localhost webserver.

The idea of a project with an app.js and a package.json to guide npm (node package manager) in what dependencies to install.

The presenters have an ambitious workout planned wherein workers contend for a lock and talk to reddis, then later, mongodb.  I've installed a lot of open source software in two days at OSCON.

Matthew and Debra of O'Reilly School found me at the i18n table at lunch.  We mapped out some strategy for tomorrow, when we harvest video clips for later promos.

Tonight, the Expo Hall opens and I'll find out where our booth is.  Then:  the big festival / party, always themed.  OSCON is a well-oiled machine in many ways, a working formula.  Why fix what ain't broke?

I got lost in this tutorial thanks to this minor issue involving curl and npm.  However the presenters gave us the means to pick up anywhere by providing snap shots of the projects, with all source code in place.  Useful.  This is the kind of material I go back and study later, with my computer prepped as a learning platform.

Socket.io is an interesting utility.  No need to stick to port 80 and HTTP.  That's for letting servers push to clients, such as updating chat windows with other users' strings.  Meteor is a "reactive framework" for such an environment.  Clients update each other in real time, like in a multi-user game.

OSCON (Tutorials Day 2)

Notes from Playing Chess with Companies by Simon Wardley.

Everyone brings their biases to OSCON and I'm not talking about prejudicial bigotries towards specific genders or ethnicities, I'm talking about special interests.  I'm in Playing Chess with Companies this morning.  A Leading Edge Forum (CSC) guy is leading us.  He likes data, and kitten pictures.  How do companies play chess?  Many just fly blind, neglect mapping, hence this workshop. #Gamefication would be a tag for this talk.

Most companies forget about the "why?" of their strategy beyond imitating others they admire.  Companies you should emulate, like Kodak and Atari (he's showing some old book titles).  The premise: if X does A and succeeds, then you Y, if you do A, will succeed.  He's reading his slide, but in this case that's smart as he's mocking the jargon, generating business-ese much as that paper-writer does works in postmodernism.  Funny.

As I was saying... biases.  For example, I come from a medical research background, not as a researcher, but as a data harverster, cleaner and storer, a collector or curator one might say.  That's akin to the medical records problem, however our needs were aggregate / statistical and so could be shared in a more "anonymized" form as case histories.

Diagramming by value chain gives way to diagramming an evolutionary path i.e. the value chain is evolving in what it looks like, what it produces.  Stacey Matrix:  the axes are close and far from certainty.  Ubiquity and Certainty increase from genesis through "as a service" with competition a prime driver, in both demand and supply. Practices co-evolve as well:  Novel, Emergent, Good, Best.

The Air Force FIST mantra is akin to the Unix philosophy: have many simple components that do their jobs well and in an intelligent / intelligible manner.  Value chains with an evolutionary curve provide the strategy maps.  Scenario planning, comparison, communication:  these are among the benefits of value adding over time, assuming evolution from genesis (birth) to maturity (automaticity).  Red Queen effect:  the needing to evolve just to stand still relative to the surrounding ecosystem.

Inertia builds up owing to past success, then comes the punctuated equilibrium and a time of war, then new wonders.  Kondratieff Curves again -- I learned about those from other futurists.

Good speaker in that he recaps his slides, lets them appear again and again at different speeds.  Very effective.  Five stars for this guy.  He worked for Ubuntu in 2008, hired by Mark Shuttleworth.  Makes sense.  It was Canonical versus RedHat in some ways.  Ubuntu is now huge in the cloud.

Opening versus Patenting to speed up or slow down.  FUD also slows (negative feedback, "demonization" or raising concerns about a future model).

A bias here is we want everything invisible to become visible:  not true.  They try to sell us wars we don't want so sometimes applying the brakes is a valuable technique.  But brakes over here == rapid innovation over there.  Obsoleting war in its conventional outward forms, in favor of a more psychological dynamic (more inward) might be considered a Quaker goal, providing a "why?" motivation for our Countdown to Zero actions.

Innovate, Leverage, Commoditize:  Amazon's EC2 catalyzes the genesis of Big Data in the custom built zone, which enables Amazon to fast-follow the early adopters with a Big Data EC2.  That's like hitching your star to value adding "geniuses" (the genesis minded).

I'm sold on the idea that box and wire diagrams are far less informative.  User Need versus Supplier Need is something I still need to wrap my head around.  You can easily mess up your map if you don't know how to draw one.  A spectrum: Agile in-house, Six Sigma commoditized outsourced.

For a workshop exercise we mapped a Tea Shop, which at our table was like the Starbucks of tea shops, a Tea Shops Network complete with LCDs sharing inspirational programming.  One of my table mates is Mormon and doesn't drink caffeinated beverages, but herbal teas are OK -- but not if derived from a black tea base, as these Choice organic tea infusions seem to be.

CSC seems to downplay its Computer Sciences Corporation moniker (I'm just poking around the websites).

BizMos in 2014

I coined the term "biz mo" for "business mobile" in the 1980s to counter the spin on "RV" or "recreational vehicle".  If one does serious work for a living i.e. isn't just into goofing off, enjoying retirement, then "RV" is inapt.

The current (July 19) issue of Harper's Magazine has a good article explaining how many in my generation are in fact fending for themselves in repurposed RVs, as a migrant labor force of geezers showing up to punch tickets, pick fruit, and do shelving for Amazon.  Move over migrant farm workers, the geezers have arrived (the groups have mingled).

We call ourselves "gypsies" sometimes, which is apropos.  The jobs are sometimes physically grueling, but the optimist geezers see this as "getting paid to work out".  Shelving for Amazon may involve walking 13 miles a day if they don't give you a Segway, a lot like airport work / study work.

Wanderers 2014-7-15: Regarding Russia

:: William Brown shares with Wanderers ::

Wanderers is more into STEM than politics, by reputation at least, but we certainly have travelogues, and much about William Brown's presentation was based in first person / first hand experience as a traveler and speaker of the Russian language.  His degree is in Russian language and culture.

William wanted to help us break out of lingering stereotypes some of us might have, left over from the Cold War Era or from the time of the USSR's breakup.  Most of us alive today have no personal memories of WW2 except maybe as children.  One of the two Kyrgystani women in the room was six when the USSR broke up.  She enjoys that sense of independence that comes with statehood and would not surrender it back.  The institution of statehood itself was part of what we were looking at.

The bottom line is that Russia under Putin is embracing its Christian Orthodox heritage in ways never allowed in the Communist Era, meaning huge amounts of land and assets have been returned to the church.  A pent up hunger for religiosity has also fed numerous bigotries, especially anti-LGBT spasms, which is where William's story began, with Pussy Riot, the punk guerrilla protest group, branded as subversive, its members sentenced to hard labor, and used by government spin doctors to put face to, and paint a target on, a younger generation, making it OK for bullies and thugs to exercise their cowardice.  The state tends to look the other way as Russians grow psychologically weaker and less tolerant by the day.

This arc somewhat recapitulates what happened in the USA starting with president Reagan, when religious bigots of all stripes came out of the woodwork and began a long process of dismantling the secular apparatus.  Republicanism rode this wave, but ironically at great cost to the central government, with Washington DC by now a mere shadow of its former self in terms of relevance and credibility.  Religious nuts have enjoyed a more domineering role, which is comforting, especially to patriarchs battling their own inner demons and insecurities, and with a short fuse when it comes to defiance.

Fortunately, the USA's 50 states have a way of specializing and finding a new equilibrium and dire conditions in one area may be offset by corresponding changes in other regions.  I have to think that such dynamics are likely in any large-enough system with any free flow of people and information whatsoever.

Whereas average Russians may be more restricted in their radius of travel than average North Americans, if not for bureaucratic reasons then because of a generic reluctance to venture abroad (again, like many North Americans), terminal closed-mindedness is likely not in the cards for a people of such great cultural achievements, especially in literature and science.

William was clear that he brings some of his own biases to his narrative, as we all do, including yours truly.  He was trained as a media analyst in a military setting and is used to sifting through lots and lots of information in order to synthesize and summarize.  His analysis is therefore cogent, interesting, and based in doing lots of homework.

I was happy to get more of his perspective and hope to someday have more travel opportunities in that part of the world myself, maybe in connection with Python, a computer language popular in Russia and the Ukraine, and both of which host Pycons from time to time.   My visit to EuroPython in Lithuania in 2007 was certainly informative.

 
:: protest lyrics :: 

Changing Weather

Wow, downpour!

Good thing Lindsey didn't leave early this morning, on that multi-day trek, though sooner or later the rains will probably catch up with her.  Or not.  It's summer after all.  We don't have torrential monsoons like Manila does... usually.

I got Carol to Quaker Meeting before the rain, just thunder and lightning at 10 AM.  By now it's 10:30 AM and the lawns are getting watered.

I've been playing with "Quasi Quakers" or "Kwazis" for short.  The Kwazis on Stark Street don't have a Peace and Social Concerns Committee and have more of a tendency to flocking behavior (pastoral) than true Liberal Friends.  Not a big deal.  Quakers have forked before, many times.

Walker is cycling to Witch Camp somewhere further south, still in Oregon.  Country Fair, more established and commercial, will just be winding down around now.  I know some staff but haven't been myself in some years.  I'll know more about Witch Camp when Walker gets back.

English hosts many slang or coined neologism for what we might call "hybrid religions" (as if anything were purebred):  Jew-Bu (Jewish Buddhist), Quagan (Quaker-Pagan)... these exist, and in multiple incarnations.  The true complexity of on the ground inter-mixing of ethnicities belies the over-reaching simplifications of any computer model I've seen, not that I've seen them all (many are protected / proprietary).

Kwazis would be a mix of Liberal Quakerism inter-twined with other strands of neo-liberalism, some radicalisms.  This may not be a stable form in any case as nothing is stopping us from snapping back into shape at some point, as ye olde Liberal Friends, some plain vanilla generic version, less this exotic potentially unstable isotope (radioactive).

Transformations are like that: sudden, like changes in the weather sometimes.

Punctuated equilibrium means something in anthropology regardless of what evolutionary biologists do with the concept.

Memetic evolution happens so much faster than mere genetic evolution, and ethnicity is primarily memetic.

More Secret Lives

I plowed through two more of these today, where "plowed" does not connote "onerous chore" but "welcome privilege": to have time to partake of such fare.

An Afternoon with the Architect

:: not my car ::

I had a good afternoon with the Architect in my story, all this while a student of Systems Science at PSU, an unusually esoteric discipline for a PhD in the US of A, but not unheard of.

When my dad was getting his PhD in urban planning, around the late 1950s, only University of Chicago and Harvard offered it, or so I've been told.

North Americans are suspicious about planning of any kind, as if you're a big time polluting industrialist, you need your neighbors to see you as part of God's Will.

Planners with their pesky zoning ordinances and growth boundaries, public land use plans, are the thorn in the side for any would-be land-grabbing developer with nary a need but his or her own in focus.  Elizabeth Furse, an ex Congresswoman who sometimes joins us at the Linus Pauling House, could tell you some stories.

We sat at this table in the photograph above, outdoors at Angelo's, and if you click through you'll get to more of a timeline, a well known secret if you're a long-time blog reader. Back up a ways and you'll see slides from our most recent Wanderers talk for example, about projects in Senegal / Guinea / West Africa.

John Driscoll is the Architect's name. He showed up in Portland having ridden across the country on his bicycle, then living in the Netherlands or vice versa.

He landed in the so-called Voodoo House, so named by Willamette Week in its attack-piece on Santo Damie, must have been pick on some tiny religion week.

Anyway, one of the top dudes in that faith was the property owner. As renters (John and housemates), myself their visitor, their / my closest contact with actual "cult practices" was just to admire the tasteful decor.

John was not so pleased with the ending of Her (see movie review), which I thought was brilliant, but then that's a story worth telling in many ways, with many endings.

Rich Cultural Heritage

I started my morning one day this week, with a couple of treats:  these two episodes from The Secret Lives of Machines. 

Barry had been bugging me to see these, as he thinks they're excellent, and now I do too.  Count me a fan. 

The edgy somewhat South Parky animations really add to the texture, as does the whacky inventor.  Shades of Myth Busters too, but of course it predates all that.  Bill Nye...

What a privilege to be able to dial in / dial back.

Gay Pride

I dressed up in my AFSC clothes, meaning I had a tasteful / small badge on my lapel, but then donned the giant nametag and had Patrick take my picture.

Like just about every other government, church and nonprofit, I wanted to show solidarity with a huge percent of the population, the GLTBQQI (gay, lesbian, trans, bi, questioning, queer, inter-sexed).

First came government, with police and military, then came the high powered politicians, then the corporations, then the churches, then the more theatrical and artistic, friends of, fellow travelers, and scattered non-profits.

Churches included official congregations, in recruit mode:  Lutherans, Methodists, Unitarians, United Church of Christ, Havah Shalom, West Hills Friends Church (no sign of Multnomah this year, Liberal Friends conspicuously absent).

Some Catholics and Mormons were also present, the Mormons least officially, as families for marriage equality, not branded congregations.   The University of Portland's psych department was well represented, but not its theologians.  Theologians (students of Theo I guess that means) tend to be more threatened by the human species and it's unprogrammed (unpredictable) behaviors.

Corporations included Nike, Adidas, US Bank, Alaska Airlines, Chase, Citibank, Nordstroms and many others.

Bookmark

I read in Confessions of a Failed Egoist as I awaited my procedure this morning.

I walked some miles to the venue on a bright summery day, but was escorted home by a computer scientist, a precaution, given the drugs involved (nothing that put me under this time).

I was wondering about linking Trevor Blake's writings to Rorty's (my thesis adviser's, one of them), in terms of standing up for oneself.

Thoughts for another time, as appointments must be kept.  Tea with Lindsey.  Looking forward.

Follow-up:  the procedure was routine and fairly uneventful.

Falling Down (movie review)

Michael Douglas is exquisitely good at portraying psychos or getting caught up in some psycho situation.  I'd not seen this before.  Look how she runs to the phone, even though she knows it's probably her anger management problem ex.  They're slaves to that ringer, and when I hear it again, I remember, you had to run.  It was always important.  No caller ID.  No voicemail.  Dark ages.

This is a dark comedy about a defense contractor who loses his job and goes postal but in a way that builds.  The funnier role is the old cop (probably my age) about to retire (last day) who starts seeing the pattern and can't help but jump in.  It's a personal growth experience for him as well, and ex dad gets to go swimming while angel child has her birthday, so happy ending.

Anyway, Lindsey pulled this from her stash of VHSs because I'd told her I was "resigning from Oversight" (as an Overseer of our Quaker meeting) and that sounded melodramatic, like maybe I'm being "Mr. White" (Breaking Bad) or this guy, in Falling Down.

Although I've been dressing up more, sporting a blazer, I'm actually more the Voodoo Donuts guy, pushing something softer and sweeter (new donut place on Hawthorne, Blue Star).  And no big deal on the Oversight thing as I worked double time in April-May so earned early retirement big time.  I deserve the R&R and left a flurry of fun memos.

Darker Comedy

Portlandia, the TV series / comedy about Portland, might miss the mark a tad in that Portland's humor is somewhat darker / edgier than the tone of that show.

That's OK.  No one said a TV sitcom has to be as demented as the reality it purports to portray.

A Geeks' Geek

Memo to Quakers

Here's is something I posted just today to an EcoMind Group, like a reading circle, at the Friends meeting I attend (typos fixed, more hyperlinks added).

I'm summarizing the ISEPP lecture last night as a part of it.  Great talk, great Heathman dinner afterwards.

Then I stayed up until 2 AM watching movies (Mr. Death again).  I'm a bit of a glutton for media, aren't I?  I've lost quite a bit of weight though, despite the gluttony.

=====

Re:

http://workthatreconnects.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Planetary-Hospice.pdf

I was glad to see methane getting more focus in this reading, not just CO2.

I recently viewed the funny-edgy documentary 'Got the Facts on Milk?' and somehow it spoke to my condition such that I haven't needed to chug down a huge glass of milk at a sitting for many weeks now.  I don't even have it in my refrigerator, had to borrow some from the neighbors when Friends Ek and Scholl came by to help with the tree planting. 

Lowering our methane footprint ties into Lappe's writings in that if we so-called "rich people" can wean ourselves from our big steak big milk fast food lifestyle, we'll:

(a) enjoy greater health and longevity
(b) return more land to cultivation for people, not their proxy livestock and
(c) help cut back on a greenhouse gas that, pound for pound, is far more damaging than CO2.

Milk is not helping with keeping calcium in the bones.  It leeches the stuff away and osteoporosis is higher in milk-drinking cultures.  It's basically liquid meat with growth factors (what milk is primarily for:  to boost growth in babies).  Our beliefs about milk are manufactured on Madison Avenue by "mad men" (the same ones who told us cigarettes were good for us).

This idea that the more economically privileged will naturally want to give in to uncontrollable meat addiction with big meat every night is highly questionable I think.  Such slaves to meat are not "privileged" that much is clear.  Economics textbooks all purvey this myth, that the better off you are the more you indulge in your meat habit.  I find that assumption to be questionable.

"Affluenza" (Galbraith) should be included in the DSM is what I think, as an obviously debilitating mental disorder -- at least I can add it to my spellchecker dictionary.  Quakerism's simplicity testimony is about countering pathological over-consumption, endemic in this culture.

The ISEPP lecture last night, by science fiction novelist, futurist and computer scientist, Ramez Naam, was a lot about global warming. 

Check out these graphs:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/kirbyurner/14140165804/ (exploding CO2)
https://www.flickr.com/photos/kirbyurner/14136596051/ (ratcheting up the temp)

I liked the line:  "Republicans in Alaska believe in global warming, as the permafrost is melting right beneath their feet."

Naam was not coming off as super pessimistic.  He's a big believer in the power of innovation, our one unlimited resource (that's the title of his new book):

https://www.flickr.com/photos/kirbyurner/14140219754/

(The Infinite Resource:  The Power of Ideas on a Finite Planet)

He's open to a kind of open source not-for-profit genetic engineering aimed at helping decrease dependence on expensive fertilizers and pesticides, and like Stewart Brand, he still thinks there's hope for these smallish nuke plants that you bury in their own sealed containers and never move.  Storage battery technology figures big on his radar.

He pointed out that sperm whales made a come back when people discovered kerosene burned as well in their lamps.  A species on the brink of extinction may be saved by a simple substitution sometimes. Population is no longer exploding as it once was.  As infant mortality drops and women have more choices, 2.1 kids on average is becoming the norm, and is the replacement rate. 

The ozone hole appears to be healing thanks to banning CFCs, despite dire warnings from industry about how that ban might hurt them.  Corporations can be such cowardly wimps sometimes.  They may be "human" under [white man] law, but that doesn't mean we need to look up to them as role models.  Many of them are "ethical cripples" meaning they don't get enough moral fiber with their breakfast cereal.

Wanderers 2014.5.6

We were a small group at the Linus Pauling House this evening. 

I was all gaga for Big History, having just rented the three DVD set at Movie Madness.  I'm only through the first four episodes, in the order of salt, horses, gold, cold, I think in that order, as guiding principles of human history. 

Very phase rule, very Euler in showing those topological networks in its cutaways about "connecting the dots". 

All rather breathless and swoopy, just right for a jaded audience used to fast cuts. 

Good use of repetition, not wasting good shots by showing them just once.  Repeating in different patterns.  I appreciate the technique.  Yay History Channel.

But of course the conversation roamed through a lot more than just that.  In Open Forum, we meander like crazy.

Glenn has had his eye on that building at the base of Hawthorne, next to the School of Rock.  He thought the story in the Business insert in the Portland Tribune, the issue with the full page goat on the cover page, about NewsBeat breaking into the news biz, was resonant with his plans for studios and editing rooms.  I mentioned the same building to AFSC as one of my hats as an Area Committee member is to scout out possible locations, if only to inspire our imaginations to higher heights.

More soon.

Dick (movie review)

I confess this one cracked me up a lot.  I was LOL-ing about in my living room, appreciating this 1999 take on the Watergate scandal.

Two teenage girls stumble into getting to walk Checkers, the president's dog, but are also witnessing G. Gordon Liddy sneaking around.

Woodword (Will Ferrell) and Bernstein (Bruce McCulloch) learn of their "secret youth adviser" information once the one girl's crush on Tricky "not a crook" Dick is replaced with loathing when he turns out to be a potty mouth (mirroring a demographic's reaction).

They meet in an underground parking lot.

The girls have just learned the title of a porno film their brother gets busted for watching, by the angry nuclear family dad, so tell the journalists they're "Deep Throat".  And thereby hangs a tale.

Oh, and lets not forget the Hello Dollies, cookies unintentially spiked with the brother's stash, that get served around the White House, prompting peace talks with Breshniev to go unexpectedly well.

If you lived through the original events, as I did, as not much older than a teen myself, all this may seem especially hilarious, did to me.  Kissinger, Haldeman, Dean (no Ellsberg yet)... they're all there, chewed up and spit out by the zeitgeist, enshrined in our memories as clowns.

Portraits

Rufus Jones, father of AFSC.  With thanks to AFSC Liaison Program.

Right to Dream Too

Dear Friends,

This is a video on Right to Dream Too, the proposed move to the Pearl
District last year and the meeting at City Hall. You are welcome to share
it with your friends.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_BbO3YrPEM

Peace,
Lindsey

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (movie review)

Ever since Lego World, I've been mentally inserting the outtakes of the child in whose fevered imagination we're having this fantasy.   Cut to Tommy in his Captain America pajamas, jumping on his bed, cogitating on the themes of our day.

Transliterating to a more boring set of newspapers and mags, Tommy is worried the CIA and its drone program might just be a lot of Nazi stuff percolating through DC by osmosis or, in the myth, taking form under the Potomac in the form of Nazi aircraft carrier flying submarines.  These must be stopped or Robert Redford's diabolical realization of Totalitarian America (safety in fewer numbers, with culling by algorithm) will come true.

Newcomers to Marvel Comics, now Studios, may find such worldly questioning to be precociously bold to the point of subversive, but us geezers who've lived with comics forever know these superheroes typically ruminate on ethics, duty, loyalties, in ways that may go against authoritarian views.  Captain America's moral qualms are entirely faithful to the genre in other words.

I enjoy Natasha the most in these Avenger movies, but she didn't seem as slippery and psychological in this one, more just a martial arts doll, though clearly friendly to Captain America, whom we can't help but like, plus to her credit she did get passed security using deception.

I'm not a huge comics reader, compared to some, and am not highly versed in the time capsule nature of the Captain America trajectory.  I do see how it serves the plot though:  a 1950s innocence, a clear head about right and wrong, suddenly transported to Orwellian America (our day).

So yeah, I was kind of lost some of the time, as in bright lights flashing, she got away, good, but what just happened really?  I have no idea.  I was way up in the back of a packed Bagdad.  They're pouring in in response to the first run titles and McMenamins is raking it in.  They're deserving, as I always thought Disney was, but I do not begrudge competition nor inward dissent.  I hope we get back to the OMSI Science Pubs and such like -- just make 'em "first run" in another sense (subversive distro networks), take advantage of that equipment, pack 'em in.

Redford has been in the CIA before and knows the Cold War.  He's in the Cult of Milk (see below) you can see clearly, like Tom Cruise no doubt.  These are the studly males who get up in the middle of the night for a late slurp straight from the carton.  Cold lactose, yum.  Been there done that. Like all CIA directors he has a big Buddha head or something tastefully oriental, proving he's a brain of some kind, however diabolical and Nazified.