Portland Day By Day

George P/

My other blog that I just started is called Kids Movie Finder that I devised after watching endless movies with my son and 4 nephews.  I know right away if the movie is entertaining and if I can stay sane after watching the same movie 50 times in a row.  I will also have other sites coming soon covering some of the categories that I currently cover. 

George P/

I love it so far.  I have added 1 gig card to it which, allowed me to add over 150 mp3's.  I dont like how the songs you add can only reside in mp3 format.  I also whish Palm would have added windows player instead of Real.  The application side has jsut about everything a "Rachel" will need, things to organzie my day and month, etc.  Why don't phones come with a tipping calculator and I could not find one to download.  What else....the camera I am really impressed with the pictures are pretty good...I couldn't beleive almost better then my Nikon coolpix. 

Websites: Products: http://www.palm.com/us/products/smartphones/treo650/

review: http://reviews-zdnet.com.com/Palm_Treo_650_Cingular_GSM_GPRS/4505-6452_16-31138486.html

Carriers: Sprint and Cingular - Yuk

The best Palm Treo Blog on the web: http://blog.treonauts.com/

Starting in December, I decided from all of the hype that I wanted to read the Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown which has now turned into a movie.  See the trailer here.  I went to Powells Books and one of the employees suggested that I read Angels and Demons.  Without reading any reviews, I plowed into the book and was impressed with how quick the story picked up and all of the action involved.  Being a history buff and one who is intrigued by scandal and odd things, I really enjoyed all of the detail behind the story as it unfolded.  Next up was the Da Vinci Code and I have to admit that so far the book is really good, however, it took some time for the story to get going and really get exciting.  About 80% through the book I felt that I could put it down.  I don’t know if I’m more impressed with all of the background information that takes place about  Priory of Sion, Mary Magdalene or Opus Dei which before this book, I had no idea Opus Dei was even a real religious organization.  What the heck is the Opus Dei?  Well Wikipedia provides some nice historical information about the religious organization.  What is fact and what is fiction about Opus Dei.  According to Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code’s Website the story has been exaggerated like any good fictional book.  But exaggerated from what….the normal brainwashing that cults are known for?  According to James Martin’s article “Opus Dei In the United States” Opus Dei is an extremely controversial group acting in cult like fashion.  So who’s to blame here?  Opus Dei has come out against the “Da Vinci Code Movie” which I’m not sure does the religion any benefit, if anything it will just hype the movie more. 

George P/

I don't know if it was just me or everyone else in the world watching the Super Bowl last night, the Seattle Seahawks vs Pittsburg Steelers (and Ref's).  It wasn't like it was just a call or two it was very ovious in my mind that the enitre game from the beggining was called in favor for the Steelers.  Even from the pre-game it was all about the better sotry of the Steelers.  I'm wondering if the entire league allready had the Steelers winning.....no matter what....You can easily associate every single huge play that Seattle had with holding or some other penalty.  I was thinking, of course it goes both ways...right?  Not even close in this match up.  Seattle ovoiusly the better team (Offense and Defense) was out ref'ed and not outplayed.  Too all of the pregame analyst you got it completely wrong "the overly physical Steelers" which I sure didn't see, which, must have gone on somewhere else but not on anything I was watching.  Why even watch the Superbowl if they allready picked the team to win that has a better story.  I think the better story anway was for a team that has never been to a superbowl to finally win.  At least I know what I will be doing next year.  Looking for a dam soccer game to watch!

George P/

I’m watching the super bowl and so far it’s a great game except for terrible calls by the ref’s.  I count 4 times where Seattle has been held back including a touchdown.  The line judges have been paid by the Steelers.  Pittsburg first touchdown should have been overruled. 

George P/

Thanks god that I actually review movies that are different then the normal blockbuster hits that have the deep pockets more then I portlandmumbling will ever dream of.  Yes, the movies 9.9/10 that I review will never make it to a grammy award event, however, nor does any kungfu or most mafia movies.  To digress, we must look at movies that have aspects that make the great ones great... 

Warriors of Heaven and Earth Trailer here.  Jiang Wen (Lieutenant Li) a warrior by profession, Lt Li an officer battling the Turks in far Western China after a battle is ordered to massacre a group of prinsoners, all women and children.  Li along with his men, mutinied and in an fight kill a Tang officer and as a result Lt. Li is now the most wanted criminal in the Western Territories.  His crew constantly fleeing the authorities works as guards for camel caravans and is being sought out by Lai Xi a magnificent Japanese swordsman dispatched by the emperor.  Complications begin they are both faced with moving a caravan to the capital city, however, are in constant danger my Master An and his Turk bandits who are after a buddhist relic similar to Holy Grail.  This relic wold control all of the buddhist empires.  Other characters, one of my favorite actresses, Zhao Wei (Wen Zhu) the daughter of a high ranking general in the army of theTang Courts adds to the development of the story.  If you look close she will look familar and stars in Shaolin Soccer.  (See my post under Shaolin Soccer).  I thought the movie was great, fresh to see a movie that did not have all of the flying and crazy special effects.  Portlanddaybyday was actually surprised to watch a movie with a good plot and story.  The only disapointment was the ending but, the rest of the movie made up for the ending.  I gave it an "A" and even watched it twice on my own.

I have been waiting for an month to rent this movie at Just Be Video.  The Myth trailer here.  The movie stars Jackie Chan Jackie Chan who takes on two roles, a modern day archeologist and a Qin Dynasty warrior over two millenniums ago and the movie is mix between Indiana Jones and a kung fu movie.  Lot's of special effects and flying with great swoard play with of course Jackie Chan humor involved.   The moview was very choppy I thought this would make a good book but fitting in all of the content  in a two hour movie was difficult and kind of left you hanging for you to fill in the gaps.  The swoard play though made the movie and is worth watching.  I gave it an "A" here's some other pictures from the movie: