the groundhog day project

Nope, no slinky . Just nerds using science to be superheroes. Or maybe I should explain the slinky thing. Except, it's not a. Slinky thing. That name is misleading. The slinky was more important as a metaphor for big, shiny movies that more people go see. The first reason. But the second reason was really just why I chose to write about, or inspired by, Obit. instead of 2004's King Arthur . Watching Obit. I was reminded of how I used to write about obituaries early in the Groundhog Day Project . In retrospect, that came from two things: depression and one of the central conceits of Groundhog Day , the measure of a person. Which is also a necessary part of movies like the new King Arthur: Legend of the Sword , or Big Hero 6 , or The Fifth Element . Korben Dallas is measured and mankind is measured accordingly. King Arthur, especially in Hollywood films insisting on origin stories, must be measured as worthy of being king. (However, the sword-in-the-stone bit sets up a bit t...

I don't think that I will get to the second reason that I brought up the slinky mention from Obit. today. Instead, I have to take advantage of the film I had time to see today. See, today was a busy day, a Mother's Day thing at my sister's house, a few hours of D&D and then dinner and a movie with some of my D&D friends. Then home and it's after 10 o'clock already, and I've got a job interview in the morning and some driving to do, then the usual Monday stuff. But anyway... The film in question tonight: The Fifth Element . Twentieth anniversary screening. And, I remember well seeing it the first time in the theater two decades ago. Only movie I saw that weekend. Not the only movie I saw this weekend. (Saw the new King Arthur and Obit. of course.) And, honestly, there isn't much to say about The Fifth Element that hasn't likely been said many times before in the intervening twenty years. What is worth saying, in terms of recent points I...

If you're reading this, you've probably got a slinky somewhere in your house, or you have had one in the past. Maybe it was just some cheap plastic knockoff, the kind you get for a few tickets at Chuck E. Cheese, but still. Is a slinky useful? Barely. Does it do what its advertised to do? Maybe that one time you got it just right at the right distance from the top step in your house and you got so excited that it was still going after four steps that you jumped for joy and shook the step just enough as to send that fancy little coil off course and it settled into itself on the next step. But, just that one time. Otherwise, it goes a step, maybe two and then fails to go further. I bring up the slinky for two reasons. First, they mentioned the choice to run with the obituary for the guy who invented the slinky* in Obit. , which I saw in the theater today. You run that obituary because that there is that ubiquitous connection to so many people in the readership. You want the name...