A couple of quick notes:
• I just finished the first two books in C.S. Forester's "Horatio Hornblower" series of books about a British naval officer at the beginning of the 19th century. The books are a lot of fun and different from what I usually read. They're extremely accurate (at least as far as I can tell) and hearken back to classic forms of literature.
• Excited about the $280 million Powerball lottery? Take a look at this Motley Fool article. It's not just another screed about how stupid people are to waste a buck on such terrible odds. The article talks about the incredible human cost of state lotteries. The per capita spending on lotteries in Massachusetts is $525 per year. Here's a quote:

... Five percent of the people buy 60% of all the lottery tickets sold in Washington, D.C. This means that in 1997, of the $202 million wagered in the District, 5% of the buyers accounted for $121 million. That comes out to be $4,368 per person in that year, or more than $11 per day.

The per capita income for Washington, D.C. in 1997 was $35,700. If we assume that these heavy lottery players earned the district average -- which we should not -- they spent more than 12% of their total pre-tax income on lotteries.

I went to a Portland (Maine) Sea Dogs minor league baseball game on Tuesday night. It was a perfect night (except it was little hot), the seats were great (behind home plate), and the home team won. It was a perfect taste of Americana, what true American culture is all about—not movies or TV or weird art. No, it's families gathered together for a simple evening entertainment of watching earnest young men pursuing a dream, playing a game they learned as boys. And for $8 a ticket, it's hard to beat for value. Minor league baseball is a hidden treasure in this country.

More movie reviews: Continuing on my quest not to miss any of the summer movies I want to see, I went to a matinee showing of Rush Hour 2 today. (It was also an excuse to get out of the heat.) I'm a huge Jackie Chan fan and have great fun at his movies. More than just a martial artist, he's also a great comic actor, broken English and all. In the movie, Chris Tucker's character is called 7-11 because "his mouth is always open." Unfortunately, that's all too true. While Tucker is funny most of the time, I sometimes wished he'd take a break from all the jabbering and motormouthing. All that said, this sequel was even better than the original, although it's not quite as good as Shanghai Noon which I think is one of Jackie's best movies. And probably the funniest part is the outtakes during the credits. Don't miss them! I'm looking forward to Rush Hour 3.

I also caught Castaway on DVD this week. It was an excellent movie, be warned, it's an internal movie. It's not slap bang constant action, but a look inside the mental, emotional, and physical limits of one man, what drives him to survive, and how he continues to survive when the world he returns to is not the same one he left. If you get the DVD, make sure to watch the excellent documentaries and interviews. They add a lot to the understanding of the film. This is what DVDs are good for.

Finally, I also saw Sandra Bullock's Miss Congeniality on DVD. Short review: it was better than I expected and had some good laughs. William Shatner was a hoot.

Movie Reviews: August is a slow news month so I've gone to a couple of matinees this week. The first was Planet of the Apes, a remake of the 1960s Charlton Heston classic. The movie was fine, Tim Roth as General Thade was excellent, Mark Wahlberg was wooden, and the ending was incomprehensible. Either director Tim Burton was trying to make an amazingly subtle point (that happened to escape me and everyone else) or he just went stupid when approving the script. And if anyone can give me a plausible explanation for where the horses came from, I'll give him $10. But the movie was good fun, if littered with confused liberal, lefty preaching. I think the point they were trying to make was that we treat animals today like the apes in the movie treat humans. Except, of course, that animals today don't speak, reason, build stuff, or wear clothes, and we don't chain them up as house servants. Like I said, confused. I bet someone thought this was clever social commentary. Watch it at the cheaper second-run theater or rent it.

The second movie was Jurassic Park III. After I had come home and was sitting at my desk to start working, I realized that my heart was still beating fast from adrenaline. Most times those cheesy marketing slogans about a movie being an "adrenaline rush" are just that, cheesy. But this time it applies. From the moment they set foot on the island again, the adrenaline kept pumping as they were alternately attacked by dinos or waited for a dino to jump out and attack. I have to say that they were successful in capturing the elements that made the first movie so great, except for one bit. The children in the first movie held that trademark Spielberg element of being the viewpoint of the audience. They were curious, frightened, trusting, and funny throughout. That element was missing here and an adult's viewpoint was substituted instead. But this is a must see in the theater. Only on the big screen with the pounding surround sound bass will you get the true sense of fear and excitement that make this movie trilogy what it is. I think the ending missed some potential, but overall this was a fun movie. And although Jeff Goldblum was okay in Two, Sam Neill is the "dinosaur man" and I was glad to see him back.