It is a truth universally acknowledged

that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.

I'm not really the target audience...

Jerusha used her feminine wiles to get me to see New Moon on Saturday, along with some of her work friends. I won't bother reviewing it, as that's not a good use of anyone's time. I'll just list the highlights. First, when the werewolf dude rips off his shirt to reveal his chiseled abs and rock hard pecs, the earth shook as all the women in the audience sighed as one. Second, at one point in the movie the girl and some guys go see an action movie called "Face Punch", which made me chuckle. Third, during said movie the girl sits between two boys, both of whom have their arms on their respective arm-rests, held in such a manner as to easily engage in hand holding, should the girl in any way put her arm near theirs. It's actually a funny image if you see it. So that's about 30-45 seconds where I was enjoying the movie. Other than that, I spent most of the time thinking, "man, I would so much rather be watching Buffy right now."

Basically you should see this movie only if you are some combination of (a) female, (b) a teenager (c) into well-muscled, shirtless teenage boys (d) in a relationship with someone fitting (a) , (b), or (c).

Best. Animal Name. Ever.

Pfeffer's Flamboyant Cuttlefish

Majestic!

Three on the money

Well, I said I'd go three blogs without a health care blog and I did. So suck it!

I heard a really interesting segment on Science Friday last week talking about values in the health care debate, and I think they addressed a few of the things bounced around on m3's earlier blog. I'm not going to rehash the whole thing here, but I will list a few of the points I enjoyed.

1) The panelists mentioned this quote by Thomas Jefferson: "Liberty is to the collective body, what health is to every individual body. Without health no pleasure can be tasted by man; without liberty, no happiness can be enjoyed by society." Now, I'm not going to claim that this means that TJ was all about universal health care, but I think it's interested that he's analogizing health and liberty, considering that a lot of the rhetoric going around is essentially saying "health care reform = tyranny".

2) Probably the most revelatory part of the show for me was a story from one of the panelists. I won't relate the whole thing, but the upshot is that insurers and some others don't like the terms "universal coverage" or "universal access" because they imply that you can get sick, walk into an insurance office, and they have to cover you. The term they favor is "universal participation", which implies that everyone is in the system, everyone is paying even when they're healthy, and when they get sick the system is there for you. Which is basically what I've been trying to argue for all this time -- everyone pays, and everyone is covered.

3) Confidential to StevensJ: one of the dudes was talking about the part in Leviticus that instructs you to leave the corners of your fields unharvested for the poor and the alien, and how in our time he feels that health care is as basic as food (whereas in days of yore you were probably better off not going to a doctor at all), and that this verse would apply to that as well.

If you have the time (and your place of business doesn't block the mp3 like mine does) I recommend having a enjoy listen time. It's a call-in show and the callers just waste everyone's time (as usual) but there are only a few of them so it's not too bad.

I am shocked. SHOCKED!

Ok...not really.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Democracy simply doesn't work.

50-1

If you watch the financial news, you may have heard that Berkshire Hathaway bought a big railroad company. I don't mind that at all. I mean, I love trains as much as the next guy. But I was a little sad to see that as part of the deal, BRK is splitting their class B shares 50-1. This is a first for Berkshire, which has (until now) never split its stock. This is why a class A share will set you back about $100k (B shares have been worth about 1/30th of an A).

Now, I have to tell you, I was pretty proud of myself the day I put $2500 in my IRA and bought my single class B share (I even BABAI). Buying them at $60 a piece isn't really going to have the same impact, though I guess it will make it a bit more convenient. Still, I'd rather Buffett had stuck with the no-split policy. I feel like I just got kicked out of a really cool nightclub.

Not that I've ever been to a really cool nightclub, but you can imagine what it'd be like.

It's a Facebook Conspiracy!

M1 is in Colorado for some kind of tubes conference, and he hung out with Fiznatch and me over the weekend. On Friday we were talking about Facebook and he said, "Noah, I'm going to do to you what I did to M3 to get you on Facebook." It turns out that you can recommend someone to be on FB and then suggest friends for them even before they've agreed to make a profile.

So long story short, I've been friended by at least 5 people since Friday, and now if I don't make a profile I'll be like a jerk or something.

Peer pressure is not cool, people!