Bryce Moore's Blog, page 291

Movie Review Roundup

It's been a while since I posted a movie review. And once again, that's not because I haven't been watching movies. It's because of sheer laziness. And so now, to atone for that laziness, I give to you a few highly recommended movies, both old and new.



First up, we have Rise of the Planet of the Apes (aka The Movie with the Easily Confused Title). I saw this in theaters last week, not sure what exactly I was in for. I'd heard good things, but sometimes that's setting myself up for disappointment. In this case, they were spot on. Sure, the movie oversimplifies in some areas--particularly in its depiction of how the scientific approach toward drug development is handled, I'd imagine--but it's a movie about apes, people. Keep that in mind. The effects were incredible, and used perfectly. I really started rootin' for them there apes. Three and a half stars, and definitely theater-worthy. This is better on a big screen.



Then there's Red, a movie that came out back in 2010 that I finally got around to. In this case, the buzz I'd heard hadn't really been glowing, although a friend had recommended it heavily, and that's mainly why I gave it a chance. I'm very glad I did. Bruce Willis is an ex-special forces guy who's since retired and been classed RED (Retired: Extremely Dangerous). Someone starts trying to kill him. He doesn't take kindly to it, and takes matters to stop that person. It's a fun movie, and is now officially one of the few movies where I didn't hate John Malkovich in the film. They're few and far between, folks. Three stars for this one. Maybe a smidge higher.



Last night, Denisa and I watched The Tourist, another film that got a lot of buzz, then the reviews didn't pan out. But I'm of the opinion that no two hours spent watching Angelina Jolie is a complete waste of time, and I'm always ready to see what Johnny Depp has to offer. This was diverting and interesting, but it also had some really frustrating plotting and was fairly predictable. Jolie is the ex-girlfriend of a mysterious man who's wanted by the government, and Depp is a hapless tourist brought into the plot to capture Jolie's boyfriend. Hijinks ensue. Two and a half stars, but hey--Angelina Jolie. She tends to make up for it. I wasn't sorry  I'd watched it.



The Train is one that was totally new to me. It's from 1964 and stars Burt Lancaster as a train engineer set on keeping a train full of stolen French paintings from making it to Germany. It's got a bit of a convoluted beginning, but once it gets going, it's really good stuff. Tense action scenes, unpredictable plot--really a good WWII war movie. I have no idea how I hadn't heard of it before. Three and a half stars.



Peggy Sue Got Married--a film from 1986 about a woman who goes back in time to her high school years by some mysterious twist of fate. It stars Nicolas Cage and Kathleen Turner. I really enjoyed it, primarily because it handled the time travel so well. So . . . realistically, if that makes sense. There's no elaborate plot--no big quest to figure out how to go back. She's just there, and she has no clue how she got there. I don't know--hard for me to explain what I mean in just a few minutes. It's a good film, one that makes you think about life choices and their effects. I wasn't totally down with what Peggy Sue ends up doing, but I liked the journey. Three stars.



And . . . I'm out of time. See ya!

My Relative: Family History comes to Facebook

Okay. I'm not in general a huge fan of Facebook apps. So many of them turn out to be little more than free advertising for cheap companies and games. But I found one that I actually really enjoy and can whole-heartedly endorse (with a few caveats):



Relative Finder



Using this  handy app, I now know that Thomas Edison is my 7th cousin 5 times removed. Humphrey Bogart is my 8th cousin 5 times removed. Bing Crosby my 9th cousin 3 times removed. I'm related to the Presidents Bush, FDR, Ulysses Grant, John Adams. Four Mayflower passengers are my direct grandparents.



And I found all that out with a few simple clicks. Maybe this doesn't excite you. In which case, go and say bah humbug and leave me alone, because I think this is awesome sauce on a chili cheese dog. Check it out right away, especially since--if you add the app and use it, we can then see how we're related, too. (One of my English professors at BYU is also a distant cousin, for example. No wonder I got an A in his class.)



BUT you can only use this app right now IF



(And here come the caveats)



You're Mormon. Yup. The app is bigoted right now. Totally discriminatory. Why? Because you have to have an account in New FamilySearch, a church-run website that's still in the beta stage, and is thus limited to church members only at the present. They're working on broadening the reach, but it'll take some time for that to happen.
You or your family has done extensive family history work. Even if you're Mormon, someone needs to have done the groundwork for the app to dig in and find connections. I benefit in this case from the hard work of tons of my family--grandparents on all sides have spent hours and hours doing family history research, which makes it possible for me to click a few things and see connections right off. If you don't have this sort of system already built up, this app might not be nearly as cool for you.
(For info on why Mormons are so obsessed with family history, check this link out.) In the meantime, start using this app. Now. Because I want to see how we're related. Maybe we could have a huge family reunion. :-)

Which Author Photo I Chose (and Why)

First of all, many many thank yous to all of you who offered suggestions on which photo I should choose. I had a lot of you come out from lurking to post comments here, on Facebook, or directly by email. I really appreciate all the feedback. When it came down to it, there was a lot of support for five pictures. All of these had one good thing going for them right off the bat: they were relatively closeup (which mean the focus was on me, not the castle, which my agent very appropriately mentioned was kind of the point).



Of those five, Number 10 had the fewest votes:

I really do like the picture, but it didn't have Trencin Castle in it, which was kind of the point of the photo shoot for this book. I might well use it for other pics, but not for this one.



Number 4 also had a fair bit of support (but not as much as others):

Again, I like it as a pic a ton, but unless you're wicked familiar with Trencin Castle, there's no way you'd see the reference.

Then we had a basic three way dead heat for the other three. Number Two:

Number Three:

and Number Eleven: 

Number two is a shot that I didn't think I'd like when it was taken. It felt kind of goofy and pretentious, but once I saw the finished picture, it grew on me a lot. But my editor pointed out that Vodnik is a comedy. Not flat out comedy, but definitely light-hearted, and not in the Lemony Snicket sort of vein. So she suggested I actually be smiling in the photo. This made sense to me, so there went number two.



That left me with three or eleven, and they were more or less a toss up for me. In the end, I decided that (although both of them make my forearms take on Popeye-esque proportions), I preferred number three. Most of the picture was in focus--as opposed to eleven, where everything but my head was slightly blurry.



Okay--I admit it. I also asked my wife which one of those she'd go for. In the end, Denisa's opinion trumps all. (It also helped that number three was the only one both my agents and my editor agreed was a good choice.)



So there you have it. A decision made at last.

What I Did on My Summer Vacation: July 23--Pictures from Big Ben, Hampton Court, and More

July 23rd, we went back to the streets for more fun and exciting London experiences. (Note: at the time, there was no rioting in London, so we didn't see anything like that.) Up on the docket for the day? Seeing Big Ben, checking out Westminster Abbey, and heading out to Hampton Court Palace.



Things didn't go quite as planned--at least not at first. I'd budgeted two and a half hours for Big Ben and Westminster. Due to an unforeseen delay, we only had an hour. When we got there, we discovered every other tourist in London had decided to visit those same places that day. The whole area was elbow to elbow *packed* with people. The kids were complaining, I had to carry DC again (which aggravated my already sore back), and the line to get into Westminster Abbey was at least 45 minutes long, which meant that by the time we paid our $50 to get in, we'd have all of 15 minutes to see the place.



We didn't go in. This was pretty disappointing for me--Westminster had been really high on my Things I Want to See in London list, but such is life. I've technically seen it before (Junior year of high school), so I just did my best to get over it. I'm way too cheap to pay $50 for 15 minutes of packed crowds.



Now somewhat dubious about our day, we headed out to Hampton Court Palace, where things got much better, I'm happy to say. They've really done good things at that place--there are free tours all over the place, the kids can dress up in costumes, there's a hedge maze (which TRC loved), beautiful gardens--all around a great time. (Check pics below for more comments.)



We ended the day by getting some fish and chips, or as I prefer to call it, hamburgers and more fries than you could choke a horse with. (They take their chips very seriously in London, or at least they did where we bought them.) (I also discovered there that Fanta has aspartame in it. For those of you who don't know, I'm allergic to aspartame: it gives me horrendous migraines. I only drank a bit before I found out, but the rest of the trip, I was really nervous I was going to get a bad migraine. Blech.)



Anyway--it turned out to be another successful day. Yes, my back hurt even more than the day before, but what's a bit of pain in the face of adventure? On with the pictures:



Since when did they build a giant ferris wheel across from Big Ben? Not my favorite design choice, but apparently it's done very well for itself.



TRC's first official trip picture that he snapped. He did a pretty darn good job.



At Hampton Court Palace, TRC and DC resumed their plans to make a successful acorn selling business. I'm still not sure exactly how this is supposed to work, but TRC has it all figured out.



Hampton Court Palace: Not too shabby, for a summer home.



I was looking for interior decoration ideas. Too much?



The king's throne. I don't know about you, but Henry VIII can keep his wives and his throne. I'll take running water and a flush toilet, and we'll call it even.



DC shows off her outfit and a palace hall.



TRC was our guide on the hedge maze. He's an expert.



Made it there with only one wrong turn. Go TRC!



Denisa's true views of herself come out at last:   :-)

What I Did on My Summer Vacation: July 22--London Calling

Look at this--I actually have a chance to post some more updates on what I did while I was in Europe. And more pictures, folks! We left Slovakia on July 21, and it wasn't exactly the easiest trip to London.



Drive from her mom's cottage to Trencin: 30 minutes
Train to Bratislava main train station: 1 hour 30 minutes
Bus trolley from train station to bus station: 20 minutes (through pouring rain)
Bus from bus station to Vienna airport: 1 hour
Wait in airport: 3 hours
Plane to London: 2 hours and change
Train from Gatwick to Croydon: 20 minutes or so
Get picked up from Croydon train station and driven to the nice family we were staying with: 20 minutes
Umm . . . yeah. We weren't all exactly chipper and happy by the time we were through with all that. But we made it in one piece, and after collapsing for a bit, even had the energy to go to an Authentic British Pub, which had awesome food.

But this isn't about July 21. This is about July 22, where we took the fam to the Tower of London and the British Museum. The verdict? Cool on both counts. TRC wasn't too crazy about the museum at first, mainly because he discovered that most Greek and Roman statues are pretty naked, and he felt like they all really ought to put some clothes on. Then he found the mummies, and he was happy after that. The Tower, on the other hand, was a hit right from the start. It helped that they had a torture chamber--increased the cool factor significantly in a 7 year old's mind. Though he did wonder why so many people kept getting their heads chopped off.

Overall, it was a great day. Very busy, and my back felt like I'd spent a few hours in the torture chamber by the time we were done, but the way I figure, you don't go to London to kick back and read a good book all day. You go to experience every last ounce of it you have time for.

Mission successful. More to come when I talk about July 23. In the meantime, how about some family pictures?

The Tower of London and Tower Bridge (taken from London Bridge. People get Tower Bridge and London Bridge confused a lot, apparently)

Sort of describes how I felt by the end of the day:



TRC at the Tower



 The kids at the Tower



Requisite picture of a funny looking guardsman. You have to sign a contract when you enter England that says you agree to taking at least one of these.



Fam in front of Tower Bridge



Paddington Bear got lost.



You can take kids halfway around the world. They still think playgrounds are more fun than anything else you found for them to do that day. :-)

Book Review: Variant

When I signed up with Netgalley (this great service that lets book reviewers and librarians read books ahead of time so that they can then promote them to readers like you), I spent a bit of time kicking around the site, checking out what else was on there. I was really excited to see Variant, a book by the brother of one of my good friends. (Also--in full disclosure--a guy I've played board games with on several occasions.) I downloaded the book and put it in my "to read" pile.



Of course, any time you pick up a book by a friend or acquaintance, you run a risk--a serious risk--of not liking the book. That's why I generally don't tell friends or acquaintances that I've read their book until after the fact. It's just easier to not mention it at all if it turns out I thought their book stunk. I don't shill books on my blog or to my friends. If I review something, then I stick by that review. There's no nepotism at work here. (At the same time, of course, I've found that I tend to like books that are written by authors I've met and liked. I was always a fan of Garth Nix, for example, but once I met him and saw what a cool guy he is, I became an even bigger fan.)



Anyway. The mere fact that I'm publicly talking about Variant means one thing: I thought it was awesome.



Really, as I was reading it, I saw a whole lot of potential for blockbuster status of this book. It's well paced, has great characters, is full of mystery and intrigue, and is just plain fun to read. The book that's most like it that I can think of is Hunger Games, and I really don't think I'm doing either book a disservice to compare them.



In Variants, the main character (Benson Fisher) finds himself at what he believes is a prestigious private high school. But when he gets there, he discovers he's basically locked in to a place that's much more Lord of the Flies than it is Dead Poets Society. There are no adults, and the kids have broken up into gangs to stay alive. Not only that, but there are some seriously sinister vibes coming off the place. Adults are in charge, but they're never seen in person--only remotely from time to time.



I don't want to give anything away, but you should read this book. Unfortunately, you have to wait until October to read it, but you can click that link and preorder it now. You won't be sorry you did.

Sick, and Some Final Comments on Yard Sales

I suppose it was only a matter of time. After a full work week, long hours of line edits, a yard sale, two drives to Bangor and back, and muggy weather for the past while, my body finally decided I needed to be sick. Feels like my head is in a vice today, but I won't go into all the fun details. I'm in bed, and I'm hoping that I get feeling better by tomorrow.



However, I did want to give one last parting observation on yard sales. Yes, we ended up selling the sofa and the oven, although it was touch and go there for a while. In the end, we took in about $200 at the yard sale, and then we boxed everything else up and took it straight to good will. I'd heard you should ask for a receipt when you donate things, so that you can take it as a tax deduction come April, so I did. They gave me a simple form to fill out, with three blanks: one for my name, one for how many boxes I donated, and one for the estimated total value of the donation. They also included a handy sheet for figuring out the estimated value.



I got home and got to figuring out just what my donation was worth and how much that would then save me on my taxes. End result? I'll save $67.50 (I think--I'm not exactly a tax professional). So let me get this straight . . . For the yard sale, Denisa and I spent probably around 20 hours--at least. We made $200, for a grand total of $10/hour. For the charitable donation, we spent about a half hour driving the stuff there and dropping it off, and made $67.50, for a grand total of  $135/hour.



I wasn't a math major, but I think it's pretty clear which was a better use of my time.



It should be noted that our thrift store doesn't take computers, furniture and certain other items, so I wouldn't have been able to donate those. Still, I could try Craigslist or just asking around on Facebook to see if anyone's interested in those sort of things.



Plus, if I can just donate items as I go, a few boxes at a time, I'll never have the huge backlog of boxes to store and worry about. So my mind's made up: I'll likely not be doing another yard sale any time soon. I could probably make a bit more money doing a yard sale than I could just donating items, but the sheer amount of time and effort I have to invest in that yard sale dwarfs the ease of charitable donations. (This might change once I look at my taxes next year.)



How about you? Any of you tried both? Any words of wisdom? Do share. I'll be going back to sleep now . . .

Thoughts on Yard Sales

I went up to start my yard sale this morning. Got things rolling around 7, and I stayed until Denisa came to staff the table while I traipsed off to work. I've never done a yard sale. What did I think?



Honestly, I kind of felt guilty for asking for money for some of the stuff. "Come buy the crap I don't want." Some of the stuff--the stuff that I actually borderline wanted to keep--I felt like I was selling for far too low. "That's a Calphalon pot. No, I'm not going to sell it for $2. $10 is already a steal." Other stuff--stuff I really felt embarrassed to even be putting on the table and admitting that I once owned--sold for much more than I thought it ought to. "You'll pay a whole dollar for *that*? Sold!" Still, the hoarder in me is having a bit of a rough day. It doesn't feel freeing or liberating to see individual items go. To see it all go as a group? Great. But I've got separation anxiety from things. Like a toy of TRC's that he played with for years. Maybe I should have watched Toy Story 3 again before I did the sale . . .



I have decided I had far too many books. They'll be getting donated to a library or goodwill.



Overall, the sale is going okay. We still have the couch and stove that I really want to ditch. Anybody want them? Real cheap! :-)



Will I do another yard sale? I suppose. But it hasn't been a really pleasurable experience. If we don't make a lot of money, it might just be worth it next time to donate directly to goodwill and be done with it. This is a lot of headache and hassle. Also, I really don't want to be buying stuff that I eventually just turn around and try to sell for $2. That's not a sound investment. :-)



I'm going to be headed back in a few hours to see how Denisa did in my absence. My theory is that an attractive woman will sell more than a bearded man. What do you think?

A Minor Vodnik Emergency

The other day I was talking to Denisa about my Vodnik revision, and she mentioned in passing that I'd gotten the description of one of the folklore characters a bit off. No biggie, I thought. I'll just ask a few more questions, tweak it some, and all will be well with the world. It's a fairly significant character (the Slovak personification of Death), and it's important to get it right. So I asked questions. I did some internet searches.



And I discovered a fairly big problem.



The personification of Death that most Slovaks are familiar with (at least, younger Slovaks) is based on a character from a movie that came out in 1985. This just happens to be the personification I based my character on.



Allow me to put this in perspective. Say someone wrote a book in Slovakia about Indiana Jones battling the evil forces of Cobra, the Decepticons, and Voldemort. As awesome as this would be, it would still be very much fan fiction--and open to quite a few lawsuits.



That's kind of sort of what I'd done. Except I'd thought that Indiana Jones was a mythical/legendary character, sort of like Santa Claus, the Grim Reaper, or Robin Hood.



Can we say panic?



Thankfully, everything worked out okay. I had a few good things going for me. First, Death is a concept and a character over in Slovakia. It's not like I'd based my character on a complete fabrication of someone else. I mean, every culture has some sort of representation of Death. Second, the Slovak representation of Death *is* indeed a woman with a scythe (sometimes).



Once I confirmed those two things, all that it took was a bit of name changing, changing her description, and switching up her personality to give me ownership of the character. (Again, to put it in perspective, Indiana Jones' existence doesn't mean other people can't write stories about adventurers or people who use whips. They just can't write stories about whip wielding adventurers named Indiana Jones. Make sense?)



I know some of you are thinking that I'm an idiot. And while you're right (I'm an idiot about a lot of things), in this case, I don't think I was too idiotic. When I started Vodnik, I had Denisa tell me all about mythical characters and creatures in Slovakia. I made notes, brainstormed ideas, and came up with a final plot. It's not her fault that she listed a character and didn't realize how recently that character has entered the cultural consciousness. Almost all Americans know who Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is--and he just appeared in 1939, but he's now an integral part of the Santa Claus story. Fiction influences culture, and culture influences fiction.



In any case, problem solved. I should have done some more research about the Slovak personification of Death back when I was writing the first draft. Shame on me for not having thoroughly vetted the story. Thankfully, Vodniks aren't the creation of some 70s Slovak guy, or I'd really be sunk. :-)



Back to the line edit.

I Don't Homeschool My Children, But . . .

I don't homeschool (and no, neither does my wife). I'm not against it as a rule or anything--I think there are some children in situations where homeschooling works best (though I do tend to think that the decision to homeschool should be made with specific children in mind, as opposed to a flat out "homeschooling is better" sort of mentality). But I don't really want to turn this into a big discussion about homeschooling, mainly because I realize that there are very strong feelings on both sides of the aisle. Since I don't have strong feelings, that's one beehive I'll try to keep my nose out of.



That said, if I DID homeschool, I would read this article in Wired Magazine. Now. And if I were a teacher, I would go read it. Actually, if I were a parent at all, I would read it.



Never mind. Go read it.



It's all about Khan Academy. What is Khan Academy? Well, it's not a place where you go to learn all about The Wrath of Khan (although that really ought to be part of the curriculum at any place that calls itself Kahn Academy). It's the site of a guy who's started a place where he posts videos focused on basic educational building blocks. How to do algebra. How to understand physics. He records all the videos himself and keeps it going. They're all lectures, with him doing rough sketches in Paint to explain as he goes along.



That in and of itself isn't too mind-blowing. But he's got this whole extra layer that brings it to the next level. He's devised a system that tests users on content areas. Once you can get ten problems of a particular type right in a row, it suggests you move up to the next level. Right now it's focused solely on math, but I imagine he'll eventually start branching out into other areas, as well.



This is cool for a variety of reasons. First of all, it allows you to learn at your own pace. If you learn one concept very quickly, then fine--you can go on to the next. If it takes you forever, then that's fine, too--you can keep watching the videos to work out what you're doing wrong. The system even provides hints for you if you get stuck (although that resets your correct answer streak).



Second, it lets teachers (or parents) see what students are doing--how much work they've been doing, in which subject areas, how quickly or slowly they're moving, where they're stuck. It just provides the instructor with (what seems to be, at least) a really good overview of what their student is doing. Very granular--lots of detail.



Third, it uses game mechanics as a motivator. You earn points for effort. You earn badges for doing great work. You can share these badges with others, to show them how you're doing. So you in essence gain levels by doing well. Cool.



I've tried it out some to see just how it works, and I came away very impressed. Is it perfect? No. But it's also based mostly on the efforts of one guy to this point. It's a proof of concept, and I'm excited to see where it goes from here.



I plan on showing this to TRC and getting him going with it as soon as I have a moment to breathe and collect my thoughts. (Probably not this week.) And that's the thing with this: homeschooling or not, parents can and should take an active part in the education of their child. Know what they're learning. Sit down and study with them. Help them with homework (don't do it for them--but help reexplain concepts they're struggling with.) The Wired article talks about how successful 1:1 teaching is, and how unattainable that is in a typical public school setting. Yet, each parent can do that all on their lonesome with some supplemental instruction after school. (Yes, that presupposes you actually know more than your children, and that you've mastered the material first--but who says you can't use something like Khan Academy to stay a few steps ahead of your kids?)



Also check out the sidebar in that Wired article, which has some other valuable online teaching tools.



Bottom line is that I'm amazed sometimes by all the innovation happening in the world today. In some ways, there's so much of it going on that it's difficult to keep track of all of it. Something like Khan Academy can be out there for years without you being aware of it. Unless you know something's there, Googling it to find it can be very difficult. At the same time, you can use the crowd-sourcing effect of the internet to follow certain blogs and stay on top of information in any area you can think of. These days, ignorance of a certain topic is no longer really excusable with any other reason than "I didn't have time to learn that." Anything you want to learn can be taught--and lessons are waiting for you online.



If it's like this already, where will we be in another ten years?