"Seen any good movies lately, Jordon?" you ask.

In fact, yes. And thanks for spelling my name right.

I finally saw Across the Universe last week. It's that musical that's set in the '60s and based on Beatles songs (which feature prominently throughout). I liked it. It's a timeless story of boy meets girl, boy falls in love with girl, plus sex, drugs, and rock and roll, and also war. The visuals are appealing, and the music is, of course, great. It was pleasant to hear some of the Beatles' songs in new and exciting contexts. Who knew "I Want to Hold Your Hand" could be such a sad song? I do now. It was nice to see that their earlier songs weren't entirely ignored, unlike other recent re-imaginings of the Beatles' catalogue I could name. Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr liked the movie too, so that has to count for something. I would see it again.

I also saw The Corporation, a 2003 documentary that takes a look at the modern corporation and the effects it has on our lives. The problem with corporations is that they're required by law to make as much money as possible, and they do so without regard to anyone's interests but their own, "social responsibility" PR notwithstanding. A corporation is considered a legal person, but you can't put it in jail when it decides that breaking the law is more cost-effective than following it. The film makes the case that if a corporation were a real person, it would be a psychopath. A number of high-profile interviewees (including Milton Friedman, Noam Chomsky, and Michael Moore) make the case for and against the corporation. I recommend this movie to everyone. If you have a BitTorrent client, you can get it here.

And on Saturday night, I went to see Pixar's latest film, WALL-E. My friend Nacole invited me, and some other people were there too. It was the first time I had seen her since graduation a year ago, so it was a nice get-together. I also enjoyed the movie. If you couldn't tell by now, I guess I like most movies. But WALL-E is pretty great. If Nacole (whom I sat next to) is to be believed, just about everything in the movie is cute. But there's more to it than robots in love. I've heard it called a sci-fi film, and it really is. Don't get me wrong: I don't read much sci-fi (honest), but central to the plot is how the human condition could be impacted by technology, not to mention the huge corporations that provide it. This bleak angle sets WALL-E apart from Pixar's earlier films and makes it enjoyable in a different way (in spite of the plugs for Apple, which Pixar thinks it can get away with now that Apple is popular).

A commenter on my last post linked to the web site of Esperanto Lobby. I checked out the site a bit and learned Malgorzata Handzlik, a member of the European Parliament, is a fluent speaker of Esperanto who wants the language to be used more widely in the EU. At first I misread her name as Malzorgata, which would make her a neglected official.

My jokes, they are inaccessible.

Here are (according to someone) the 21 Best Mugshots Evar. #1 is my favorite.

Love to travel? Wikitravel is the travel guide that's also a wiki.

I like science, but I never liked designing experiments for my science classes. I could never come up with any really original ideas, so I did lame things like watch mold grow on bread or run electric current through salt water. So I envy this kid who, for a science project, found a microbe that eats plastic. Oh, the implications.