Jeffrey Miller's Blog: Jeffrey Miller Writes, page 17
May 16, 2013
International Market Research competition at SolBridge — Round One
On the evening of May 16th, 19 teams of 4-5 students participated in round one of the first International Market Research competition. Students had to choose an APEC country and by looking at various aspects of the country, including, but not limited to, infrastructure, economy, and industry, and then make recommendations during a ten-minute presentation for foreign investment in that country.
Round two will be held next week followed by the finals the week after next. Students who advance and win this competition will an international study trip during the summer. The second place winners will all receive digital cameras.
Win or lose, all the students are winners because they had the chance to work on their “soft skills” something you hear a lot at SolBridge. These soft skills are important for preparing students for the job market after they graduate.
Congratulations go out to all the students who participated.
International Market Research competition at SolBridge — Round 1
On the evening of May 16th, 19 teams of 4-5 students participated in round one of the first International Market Research competition. Students had to choose an APEC country and by looking at various aspects of the country, including, but not limited to, infrastructure, economy, and industry, and then make recommendations during a ten-minute presentation for foreign investment in that country.
Round two will be held next week followed by the finals the week after next.
Congratulations go out to all the students who participated.
Fifty “must see” summer movies
Summer is just around the corner and Hollywood over over the years has released some memorable movies.
Perhaps you have seen some of these films before; perhaps you haven’t. Many there are some on this list that you don’t agree with you; others that you think should be on this list. (Although Star Wars opened on Memorial Day Weekend in 1977, it is still technically a “summer movie”). There are some classics here and there are some that might you have scratching your head wondering why I would include them on this list. Regardless of whether they are classic or not, there are a lot of cinematic gems here.
I started going to a lot of movies in 1975, probably because I had a car and a job at the time. Living in the Illinois Valley, we had a lot of movie theaters to choose from: in LaSalle there were the Majestic, the LaSalle, the Illinois Valley Twin Cinema (originally the Jerry Lewis Cinema) which showed adult films on one of its screens, and the Drive-in east of town. Peru, Mendota, Princeton, and Ottawa had movie theaters as well as the drive-in theatre in Earlville (which is still open today).
I went to a lot of movies in the summer of ’75. Jaws was the big movie of the summer, but other movies like Aloha Bobby and Rose and White Line Fever (both of which I saw at the LaSalle Drive-in) were summer favorites.
It was also the summer I started making plans to go into the Air Force after I graduated.
I have seen most of the movies on the list; many I have seen several times. How about you? How many of these films have you seen?
Fifty "Must See" Classic Summer Movies
Listly by Jeffrey Miller
Fifty "Must See" Classic Summer Movies
Here are some "must see" classic summer movies of the 1970s. Some where blockbusters; some were not. How many of these have you seen?
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Jaws (1975)
Directed by Steven Spielberg. With Roy Scheider, Robert Shaw, Richard Dreyfuss, Lorraine Gary. When a gigantic great white shark begins to menace the small island community of Amity, a police chief, a marine scientist and grizzled fisherman set out to stop it.
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American Graffiti (1973)
Directed by George Lucas. With Richard Dreyfuss, Ron Howard, Paul Le Mat, Charles Martin Smith. A couple of high school grads spend one final night cruising the strip with their buddies before they go off to college.
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The Godfather (1972)
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola. With Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Diane Keaton. The aging patriarch of an organized crime dynasty transfers control of his clandestine empire to his reluctant son.
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Chinatown (1974)
Directed by Roman Polanski. With Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Huston, Perry Lopez. A private detective investigating an adultery case stumbles on to a scheme of murder that has something to do with water.
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Star Wars (1977)
Directed by George Lucas. With Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Alec Guinness. Luke Skywalker, a spirited farm boy, joins rebel forces to save Princess Leia from the evil Darth Vader, and the galaxy from the Empire's planet-destroying Death Star.
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Rollerball (1975)
Directed by Norman Jewison. With James Caan, John Houseman, Maud Adams, John Beck. In a corporate-controlled future, an ultra-violent sport known as Rollerball represents the world, and one of its powerful athletes is out to defy those who want him out of the game.
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Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
Directed by Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones. With Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Gilliam. King Arthur and his knights embark on a low-budget search for the Grail, encountering many very silly obstacles.
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Murder by Death (1976)
Directed by Robert Moore. With Eileen Brennan, Peter Falk, Alec Guinness, Peter Sellers. Five famous literary detective characters and their sidekicks are invited to a bizarre mansion to solve an even stranger mystery.
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A Bridge Too Far (1977)
Directed by Richard Attenborough. With Sean Connery, Ryan O'Neal, Michael Caine, Laurence Olivier. A historic telling of the failed attempt to capture several bridges to Germany in World War II in a campaign called Operation Market-Garden.
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Animal House (1978)
Directed by John Landis. With Tom Hulce, Stephen Furst, John Belushi, Karen Allen. At a 1962 College, Dean Vernon Wormer is determined to expel the entire Delta Tau Chi Fraternity, but those troublemakers have other plans for him.
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May 15, 2013
Jay Cutler’s Going to have a Stellar Year
I am going to go out on a limb here and make my first Bears’ prediction for 2013:
Jay Cutler’s going to have a stellar year.
With a new head coach, drafting Kyle Long and other plays to shore up their offensive line, this could very well be the year that the Bears make it to the Super Bowl.
Here’s what some analysts have to say about this at the Bears’ official website.
If the offensive line can give Cutler more protection and Bears’ coach Marc Trestman opens up the passing game, Cutler could have an explosive passing game. Of course, the big question mark that remains will be the defense with the departure of Brian Urlacher.
May 13, 2013
“Ground Control to Major Tom….”
This is awesome.
Astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield has the perfect crowning touch for his time in the International Space Station: his incredible rendition of David Bowie’s “Space Oddity.”
Bowie would be proud of this rendition and Commander, we’re all proud of you down here on Earth and what you have done to make science and space so interesting.
Well done, Commander and welcome back to Earth.
May 10, 2013
Ice Cream Headache and Oglesby, Illinois
Although there might be some truth to the claim that you can’t go home again, I most certainly did when I wrote Ice Cream Headache. And it’s only fitting, given the number of years that I have lived overseas, that I “return” home a lot in my stories, especially when I am waxing nostalgic about “back home.”
This photo alone, brings back many memories for me: walking home from Washington Grade School, stopping in at the Supreme Dairy Bar for a milkshake or a Green River, buying candy and comic books at Balconie’s, and going to the library. This was the center of my universe from 1966-1976.
What I tried to do most with Ice Cream Headache was to capture some of the small town flavor that is rapidly disappearing across the United States.
Let There Be Light
And let there be “duck lips.” When did this look become so popular?
May 9, 2013
SolBridge Sports Day
Students got a little break from their hectic schedules at SolBridge today with the annual Woosong/SolBridge Sports Day.
The SolBridge Jumpers
Salsa, Salsa, Salsa
May 8, 2013
Worst Photoshop Photo Ever
South Korean President Park Geun-hye (L) shakes hands with U.S. President Barack Obama at a White House meeting on May 7. (Yonhap)
If there was a contest for the worst photoshopped photo, the Yonhap News Agency in South Korea would would hands down with this photo. The person President Park is really shaking hands with is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
Why couldn’t they just have used both photos?
May 6, 2013
This Book Review Rocks!
There are book reviews and then there are book reviews!
This latest one left at Amazon for Ice Cream Headache, definitely rocks!
Jeffrey Miller is an instinctive navigator of the human heart. His ability to draw universal thoughts and emotions from commonplace characters in simple settings is reminiscent of Stephen King in Hearts in Atlantis.
In the novella, The Ice Cream Headache, the locale is a small town in rural America and the time is 1968. And while it is true that the troubling Vietnam War, combined with widespread civil dissent, enshrouds the drama which Mr. Miller slowly unfolds, the time and place could just have easily been a gloomy castle in medieval Denmark or a 19th Century whaling ship off the coast of New England. The Vietnam War as viewed from the homefront is, nevertheless, the flashpoint for the story and lends to it a certain texture, poignancy and intensity it might otherwise not have had. Under the low-lying dark cloud of war, the finely-crafted characters act out their personal dramas within a milieu of sadness, regret, guilt, envy, greed, cowardice, bitterness, prejudice, lust and small-minded cruelty. But there is also in equal measure all-consuming love, courage, loyalty, kindness, mercy, gentleness and the enduring strength of the human spirit. The well-developed characters, in Mr. Miller’s skillful hands, never trip over the central story drawn in lines which intersect at various points, many of which are only suggested and, therefore, sustain a tale suffused with psychological suspense until the end.
This is a book which is highly readable any time and anywhere, just as its events—both chronological and psychological—could have happened anytime and anywhere. The book’s powerful emotional content makes it one which can just as easily be read at one sitting or savored over time. Either way it is highly enjoyable.
Wow.
