Happy Oktoberfest to my fellow Patrick Seitzes

I now have 22 “friends” on Facebook. We’re part of an exclusive club, in that we’re all named Patrick Seitz.
I won’t “friend” anyone other than people who share my name. So no traditional friends need apply. Sorry.
Seitz is a German name derived from Sigizo (meaning “victory”), according to Winslow Genealogy. The Seitzes originated from south Germany, mainly Bavaria, according to Ancestry.com.
Patrick is an Irish name. And I happen to be of Irish-German descent.
Of my nearly two dozen Facebook friends, 14 live in Germany, two in Austria, one in France and one in Finland. The remaining four live in the U.S.
So in honor of all my fellow Patrick Seitzes, happy Oktoberfest.

Photo from 2010 Oktoberfest in Munich.

Marijuana legalization inevitable

The tide has turned relative to America’s views on marijuana.
The mainstream public is starting to realize that legalizing pot isn’t going to unravel the fabric of our society.
People are coming around to the idea that resources wasted trying to combat the sale of marijuana would be better spent somewhere else.
Opinion pieces in major newspapers and websites are coming out in favor of legalizing pot and treating it like alcohol. Marijuana can be taxed and provide a source of revenue for state and local governments, just as beer and wine sales do today.
On Nov. 2, California voters will vote on Proposition 19, which would legalize marijuana for adults over 21.

“Even though police made more than 850,000 marijuana arrests last year, a recent government report shows youth marijuana use increased by about 9%,” Bill Piper, director of national affairs for the Drug Policy Alliance, wrote in a CNN opinion piece.

“Controlling and regulating marijuana will mean jobs and revenue that the state currently cedes to criminal cartels and the black market,” Tony Newman and Stephen Gutwillig wrote in an opinion article for the Sacramento Bee.

“The California Beer and Beverage Distributors is financing the campaign against the (pot) legalization initiative,” David Sirota wrote on Slate.

“A (poll in California) in July found that 47% of registered voters had tried marijuana at least once and that 50% favor some form of legalization,” according to the Sacramento Bee.

“The California government projected that at an excise tax of $50 per ounce (of pot), the new law would bring in about $1.4 billion in revenues for the state,” according to ABC News.

“For decades, illegal marijuana cultivation has been an economic lifeblood for three counties in northern California known as the Emerald Triangle … But high times are changing. Legal pot, under the guise of the California’s medical marijuana laws, has spurred a rush of new competition. As a result, the wholesale price of pot grown in these areas is plunging,” according to NPR.

If the California measure passes, “prisons would have more room to house society’s worst criminals, particularly violent sex offenders,” Michael Stetz wrote in the San Diego Union-Tribune.

“When will we learn that prohibition doesn't banish a popular product? It merely turns the trade over to thugs. The result is worse for society than if drugs were legal,” commentator John Stossel wrote.

“We’ve been throwing billions upon billions of dollars and hundreds of law enforcement and military lives at the drug problem for decades. At what point to do we take a breath and rethink our strategy?” MacKenzie Allen, a retired law enforcement officer, wrote in the Tacoma, Wash., News Tribune.

Also, here are the five biggest marijuana myths debunked, according to Coed Magazine.

George Soros wrote an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal titled: "Why I Support Legal Marijuana."

Nov. 3, 2010, update: California voters rejected a ballot measure that would have made their state the first in the union to legalize the personal use and possession of marijuana. (Washington Post)

Snakes alive! Encountering northern watersnakes in southwestern Connecticut

On a nature hike in a public park in New Canaan, Conn., this weekend, our family saw two northern water snakes, one of which was feasting on a frog. How cool is that?
I initially assumed they were poisonous copperhead snakes, but after reviewing photos and descriptions online, I’ve concluded they were the more common, non-venomous northern water snake. (See "Snakes In Connecticut" by the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection.)
When I approached one of them with a net we using to catch frogs to examine, the snake lunged at the net. It momentarily got its fangs stuck on the netting. It didn’t want to be messed with. So we left it alone. Same thing with the other snake.
But we did snap some photos of the two with my cell phone.

I’m eighty-sixing ‘Hawaii Five-0’

I’ve decided to remove “Hawaii Five-0” from my TV watch list after viewing the series premiere this week.
The pilot validated my concerns about the show going in. This reboot replaced the serious and suspenseful tone of the original show, which ran 1968-80, with a standard issue buddy cop show.
The producers of the new “Hawaii Five-0” cast aside gritty realism for fast-paced, hard-to-believe storytelling with plenty of light-hearted humor. The pilot was an origins story for the special task force and provided backgrounds of all the principals. I would have preferred being dropped into an interesting investigation and learn about the characters as we go along. The whole episode felt forced.
Plus, I have problems with the stunt casting of familiar faces Daniel Dae Kim (“Lost”) and Grace Park (“Battlestar Galactica”). The original show cast Hawaiian actors in those supporting roles for authenticity.
I miss Jack Lord’s stoicism and steely-eyed determination as the original Steve McGarrett. Alex O’Loughlin doesn’t have the same gravitas.
The only bright spot is Scott Caan as Detective Dan Williams. He’s terrific.

Friending Googlegangers on Facebook

In July, I wrote about how I had “0 friends” on Facebook and planned on keeping it that way.
Well, I’ve changed my mind.
Now I only want to friend people who share my name. There are more than 50 men named Patrick Seitz on Facebook. We’re brothers in name and heritage.
Some day we might have to battle to the death “Highlander”-style, because “there can be only one.” But the time of the Quickening may never come. So relax, everybody, and put away your broadswords.
People who share your name on the Internet are called Googlegangers, which is a play on Google and doppelgänger. In fiction, doppelgangers are evil lookalikes.
I hope none of these Googlegangers are my evil twins. At least none of them look like me, that I’ve seen so far.
Tonight I’ve sent friend request to 53 men named Patrick Seitz on Facebook.
Let’s see what happens.

Update: I eventually became Facebook friends with about 35 Patrick Seitzes. But ultimately I got bored with the project and unfriended them.

‘The Event’, ‘Hawaii Five-0’, ‘The Walking Dead’ top my fall TV viewing list

After consulting Entertainment Weekly, TV Guide and online sites, I’ve decided to add three new shows to my viewing list this fall. Whether I become a faithful viewer is another issue.
Two of those shows premiered Monday – “The Event” on NBC and “Hawaii Five-0” on CBS. The third – “The Walking Dead” on AMC – doesn’t premiere until Halloween night.
I caught the pilot episode of “The Event” last night and it didn’t grab me. Its jumbled timeline and incessant plot teasing are not the way to attract a devoted following. Supposedly major questions are answered in the second episode of this sci-fi tinged drama. But I’ll give it two more episodes to prove itself. This summer, I gave AMC’s slow-moving conspiracy drama “Rubicon” three episodes before quitting it.
I recorded “Hawaii Five-0” to my DVR, but haven’t watched it yet. From what I’ve read, I’m not sure they’ve taken this remake in the right direction. But we’ll see. The original, starring Jack Lord, was dark, violent and ominous. The new one seems more like a buddy cop show with humor and action. Plus, they’re going to focus on each character’s backstory. I wish TV writers would focus more on the front story.
The most exciting new show for me has got to be the zombie-apocalypse survivor drama “The Walking Dead.” It’s got a great pedigree in director Frank Darabont (“The Shawshank Redemption”) and executive producer Gale Anne Hurd (“The Terminator” and “Aliens”).
The preview footage looks terrific. I’m psyched for the Oct. 31 premiere. Season one of “The Walking Dead” will include six one-hour episodes.
I have a soft spot for the sci-fi, horror and fantasy genres. I like shows that go beyond the usual police procedural, courtroom drama or family sitcom. I like to be challenged, surprised and entertained.
Among returning shows, only the CW’s “The Vampire Diaries” and “Supernatural” are on my must-see list.

One Photo Reviews: Reducing movie criticism to a single snapshot

For people who think star ratings are too complicated for movie reviews, here’s a website that reduces film criticism to just one photo of the reviewer’s face.
Movie fan Scott has created a website on Tumblr called One Photo Reviews.
“I give thorough reviews of the movies I see. And by thorough review I mean one photo of me,” he writes.
I like the idea of his website more than the execution. For a lot of his “reviews” I can’t tell from his facial expression alone whether he liked the movie or not. But maybe that’s the point, because so many films are just OK and merit a blasé response.
Judging from his one-photo reviews, you can tell that Scott hates chick flicks (“Eat Pray Love,” “Sex and the City 2” and “The Twilight Saga: Eclipse”) and likes guy flicks (“The Virginity Hit,” “The Expendables” and “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World”).
One Photo Reviews is more evidence for the end of movie criticism. We’ve gone from thoughtful film critiques to star ratings and letter grades and thumbs up-thumbs down summaries. And the web has brought us Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, which aggregate reviews into numerical ratings. Then there’s the real-time input of Twitter, which limits posts to 140 characters. And now One Photo Reviews.

Photos: Scott’s reviews of “The Virginity Hit” (top) and “The Twilight Saga: Eclipse” (bottom).

UFL football game a fun outing for kids

I took my 7-year-old son today to the season opener for Connecticut’s new professional football team, the Hartford Colonials of the United Football League.
He didn’t want to go, but ended up having a good time.
The Colonials beat the Sacramento Mountain Lions, led by former NFL quarterback Daunte Culpeper, 27-10 before an announced crowd of 14,384 at Rentschler Field in East Hartford, Conn.
The Colonials played a solid game, highlighted by an outstanding performance by former UConn running back Andre Dixon, who rushed for 94 yards.
Colonials quarterback Josh McCown, an NFL veteran who rejected an offer from the Chicago Bears two days before Hartford’s training camp opened, was 11 of 21 for 265 yards and three touchdowns, according to the Hartford Courant.
UFL games make for good family entertainment thanks to affordable tickets ($15 to $30), quality football and stadium entertainment.
The stadium speakers pumped out lots of pop music between plays and whenever the Colonials scored men dressed as Revolutionary War colonial militia fired a cannon. Plus, there were lots of pretty cheerleaders on the sidelines.
The halftime entertainment was recording star B.o.B who performed his hit songs “Airplanes,” “Nothin’ on You” and “Magic.”
Not everything was perfect though.
The lines at the concession stands were astronomically long. And the souvenir stands didn’t sell any of the tri-corner colonial hats that some fans had procured elsewhere.
Talk about a missed opportunity.

More movies turning up on Netflix streaming that aren't available on DVD

Lately I’ve noticed a number of movies in my Netflix queue that are available for online streaming, but not on DVD.
Could this be the shape of things to come?
As DVD sales decline, movie studios likely are becoming more selective about which movies they put out on physical discs. Those with a more limited audience are candidates for online streaming only.
The above screenshot shows five movies in my queue that are available on Netflix Watch Instantly, but not on DVD. Three are older movies – “The Heartbreak Kid” (1972), “The Swimmer” (1968) and “Medium Cool” (1969). The other two are foreign films – “The Chaser” (2008) from South Korea and “The Last Mistress” (2007) from France.
I can see the shift to digital-only distribution happening in my Netflix movie queue.

Wild tigers: Not in my backyard thankfully

As a member of the Wildlife Conservation Society, which operates the Bronx Zoo, I’ve been getting e-mails lately from the group asking for my help in protecting wild tigers.
Sounds like a noble cause, right?
“Wild tigers are on the brink of extinction,” Joe Walston, director of the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Asia program, said in an e-mail plea. “Victims of brutal poaching and habitat loss, there are as few as 3,200 of these majestic and awe-inspiring animals left and their numbers are declining daily.”
Americans have no problem supporting tigers in the wild because we don’t have them here.
How would we feel about the situation if there were 3,200 potential man-eaters roaming around our country?
We freak out when an occasional coyote kills a pet dog or attacks a child, as happened recently in Westchester County, N.Y.
In the U.S., we’ve done a good job eliminating wild animal threats. In other words, we’ve killed off a lot of predators capable of killing humans. There are still alligators, bears and cougars in the U.S., but mostly in remote areas and they’re largely under control.
But none of those beasts are as threatening as tigers, which can measure up to 9 feet long.
Here are some facts from the Wildlife Conservation Society’s website:
“Expert hunters who kill their prey with a bite to the throat or back of the neck, tigers are carnivores that eat large mammals like deer, pigs and buffalo. In order to satisfy their large appetites—and their offspring—these big cats must have access to wide swaths of land and large populations of prey.”
Yikes!
The largest tiger population is now in India, but there are wild populations in numerous Asian countries.
In 2006, WCS and Panthera, a wild cat conservation group, together launched Tigers Forever, a collaborative effort aimed at increasing tiger numbers by 50% at eight WCS tiger landscapes across Asia over 10 years.
OK, as long as they stay in Asia. I can support that.
The Wildlife Conservation Society is encouraging people to write their congressmen to support the Global Conservation Act of 2010 to help save wild tigers and other imperiled species from extinction.
If passed, the act would require the six federal agencies that conduct conservation programs around the world “to pursue a unified strategy to stop illegal wildlife poaching and to reverse environmental destruction endangering tiger populations,” Walston wrote.

Lingerie Football wardrobe malfunctions just part of the game

Congratulations to photographer Kelly Bailey of Kent, Wash., who captured the first photo of a wardrobe malfunction this year at a Lingerie Football League game.
Bailey, who runs ClusterClick Photography, photographed the Aug. 27 LFL game between the Los Angeles Temptation and the Seattle Mist at the Showare Center in Kent.
The photo in question shows L.A.’s Ashley Salerno breaking a tackle, but exposing her rear in the process. Just part of the game, according to LFL player contracts.
(Dec. 18, 2010, update: Thanks to Lisa Tacchi of Very Special Girls for noticing that the player getting pantsed was Salerno and not Riley Maddex as the photographer identified her.)

Photo by Kelly Bailey.

Plus, a bonus video grab below from the same game, this time with a Seattle Mist player getting pantsed.

Update: For uncensored photos, check out the LFL Wardrobe Malfunctions blog.

Mainstream media not showing Lingerie Football the love, but John Pozadzides is

Three weeks into the second season of the Lingerie Football League, the nascent sport is generating scant coverage in the mainstream press.
A search of Google News finds very little coverage of the LFL, which features attractive female athletes playing tackle football in bras and panties. There’s no serious coverage of the games or the sport. But there are a lot of photo galleries from bloggers and the alternative press.
Recent galleries include a pictorial of the Seattle Mist LFL team by the Seattle Weekly and photos of the Chicago Bliss season opener by NBC Chicago.
John Pozadzides, a technology executive who writes One Man’s Blog, recently posted 385 photos from the Sept. 3 LFL game between the San Diego Seduction and the Dallas Desire at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas. Check out his photos on Flickr or his blog.
Since a picture is worth a thousand words, his article would make a good piece in the Economist.

Photos by John Pozadzides. (See links.)

Mila’s Daydreams: This baby website is so cute

New mom and blogger Adele Enersen has created a super cute website featuring her baby Mila.
“This blog is my maternity leave hobby,” she writes. “While my baby is taking her nap, I create (a) scene around her and take quick snap photos.”
Enersen, an advertising copywriter who lives in Helsinki, Finland, says she spends only a few minutes on each picture, including creating the idea and shooting it. She doesn’t want to disturb her daughter’s sleep, she says. That’s a relief, as that was my only concern upon seeing these adorable photos.
Check them out for yourself at Mila’s Daydreams.

Lingerie Football League show on MTV2 needs retooling pronto

The Lingerie Football League premiered on MTV2 over the weekend and I was underwhelmed.
Kudos to the game announcers for playing it straight and treating the LFL like a sport, instead of just an excuse to have pretty women run around in bikini lingerie.
The “LFL Presents: Friday Night Football on MTV2” is shown at 11:30 p.m. Eastern Time, a time slot usually reserved for Cinemax soft-core skin flicks.
Unfortunately “LFL Presents” is an overproduced mess. There are way too many quick cuts and jarring graphics for my liking. They're distracting.
Each show covers the previous week’s game in a half hour (more like 20 minutes minus commercials).
For a show featuring gorgeous female athletes in skimpy uniforms, most of the action is shot from a distance. The video shot on the field and close to the players captures the sport better.
The producers of “LFL Presents” need to make some changes to the show pronto.
Here are my suggestions to the producers:
For starters, lay off on the swooshing graphics like that metallic LFL football that fills the screen between plays and all the quick edits. Don’t be afraid to hold a shot for more than a few seconds.
Get on the field or the sidelines, close to the action.
Also, the few times you used slow motion to capture a key play worked really well.
Provide more player profiles and interviews. We, the viewers, want to get to know these athletes better.
And finally, why blur out the wardrobe malfunctions? This is cable, not broadcast. And it’s late-night TV. No kids should be up.
Then again, MTV did produce the infamous Super Bowl halftime show in 2004 that featured Janet Jackson’s nipple slip that spawned the term “wardrobe malfunction” in the first place. So, maybe you're overly cautious.

More fun movie lists: Futuristic films that proved accurate, plus depictions of the end

7 futuristic movies that got it right (Mania; Jan. 20, 2010)

10 best depictions of the end (Minyanville; Sept. 16, 2009)

10 disturbingly powerful fictional film corporations (IFC; Aug. 13, 2008)

10 great newspaper movies (Chicago Sun-Times; Dec. 24, 2009)

The 10 best political comedies ever made (Huffington Post; Sept. 1, 2010)

Movie lists: Summer blockbusters, superior sequels, athlete cameos

Day three of my break from blogging, where I post interesting movie lists instead.
Enjoy!

The 30 best summer blockbusters ever (Time Out New York; May 13, 2010)

15 sequels that topped the originals (Entertainment Weekly; May 8, 2010)

Top 20 athlete movie cameos (Bleacher Report; Aug. 17, 2010)

7 horrifying moments from classic kids movies (Cracked.com; Oct. 15, 2009)

Top 10 movies that mess with your mind (Time; July 16, 2010)

The worst Best Picture winners, remakes, sequels and spin-offs

Here’s another batch of curated movie lists.

Worst Hollywood remakes of the decade (Movieline; Dec. 16, 2009)

Worst movie spin-offs (IGN; Dec. 2, 2009)

Top 10 worst sequels (Listverse; May 20, 2010)

Top 10 worst Best Picture winners (Listverse; May 12, 2010)

Fun movie lists: Taglines, trailers, quotes and fake ‘Seinfeld’ movies

I’m feeling lazy, so it’s time to play web aggregator.
The following are fun lists about movies that I’ve curated from across the World Wide Web.
Enjoy!

66 great movie taglines from the past 30 years (Adweek; April 15, 2011)

The 15 worst movie taglines ever written (Huffington Post; Feb. 2, 2010)

The 50 greatest trailers of all time (IFC; June 25, 2009)

100 movie quotes every geek should know (GeekTyrant; Jan. 5, 2010)

The fake movies of “Seinfeld” (GeekTyrant; May 2, 2010)

American public sours on Obama

When Barack Obama was elected president, he became a pop culture icon. His image sold posters, comic books, trading cards and T-shirts.
His image is still selling T-shirts, but the sentiment has turned from hope and optimism to disappointment and resentment. The samples above and below from ThoseShirts.com are representative of T-shirts you see for sale online these days.
Perhaps it was his pursuit of a national health care overhaul instead of focusing on the worsening economy that soured the American populous.
His approval ratings have tanked. Right after his inauguration in January 2009, 68% approved of the job Obama was doing, while 21% disapproved, according to Gallup. In a Sept. 3-5 poll, just 44% approved of the job he is doing, while 49% disapproved.
And now he says he’s focused on the economy.

My first music albums: The Partridge Family, Don McLean, ABBA

The other day I got to thinking about the first music albums I ever owned.
Most young people get albums from performers they’re later embarrassed to admit ever liking. I was no exception.
My first two albums were from the Partridge Family. I owned “The Partridge Family Album” (1970) and “Up to Date” (1971).
I grew up watching “The Brady Bunch” and “The Partridge Family,” which were on Friday nights on ABC in the early 1970s.
I had a crush on Susan Dey from “The Partridge Family” and was too naïve to know that she didn’t perform on any of the albums. Come on, how hard is it to sing background vocals and play the tambourine?
In the fourth grade, I loved “American Pie” (1971) by Don McLean. It was a new song then and played on the radio a lot. At 8 minutes and 33 seconds long, DJs probably put it on so they could take bathroom breaks. It was the only song I played off the album. Of course, now I can’t bear to hear it.
After that, I took a liking to Swedish “super group” ABBA, as Casey Kasem always called them. My girlfriend at the time gave me “ABBA the Album” (1977), which featured the songs “The Name of the Game” and “Take a Chance on Me.”
Now they’re popular again, thanks to the jukebox musical “Mamma Mia.”
Who would have guessed that way back when?

Cutting the Cord and Cutting the Bills: Website provides money-saving tips

For some people, over-the-top TV is a supplement to traditional pay TV services like cable or satellite. For others, it’s a replacement.
George Hines, author of the blog Cutting the Cord and Cutting the Bills, says you can save a lot of money by switching from pay TV to free over-the-air broadcast TV and over-the-top TV services.
Hines reached the breaking point when his cable bill hit $165 a month. He dumped cable TV in favor of broadcast TV and over-the-top TV, including Netflix. He also replaced his landline phone with an Internet phone service. His monthly bill dropped to $42 from $165, he says. That’s an annual savings of $1,476.

Check out his website at CuttingTheBills.com.

R.I.P. Netflix Friends, 2004-10

Netflix finally pulled the plug on its social-networking initiative.
The online movie subscription service shut down the Netflix Community features on Friday. Earlier this year, Netflix announced its intent to terminate the Friends and Community section, but didn’t set a specific date.
I especially liked the top 10 lists in the section. I had some good ones of my own, including underrated horror movies, movies featuring the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, good and bad remakes of foreign movies, and the best single-season and two-season TV shows.
Sure, people created a lot of crummy lists with the feature, but some of them were gems. They included lists of movies that featured the twin towers of the World Trade Center, movies with credit sequences by Saul Bass, movies based on stories by Philip K. Dick, and movies that inspired “Star Wars.” There also were lists of movies filmed in Chicago, St. Louis, Connecticut, San Francisco, Central America and elsewhere.
All those member-created movie lists are gone now.
I’m convinced that my movie lists helped my Netflix reviewer rank. I’m currently No. 1,455 out of more than 15 million members.
I’m not the only one who misses the Netflix Friends section. Check out the responses to the news at the blog Hacking Netflix.

Digg botches launch of new website, but has recovered

Social bookmarking website Digg stumbled badly recently with the launch of a new version of its website.
For years, Digg has been a favorite place online for people to find and share interesting articles, photos and videos. I scan the categories (particularly entertainment and technology) occasionally looking for popular posts that interest me. I also use Digg to save fun and informative articles and media for myself.
But the online world has changed a lot since Digg first started in December 2004.
It’s easier for people now to hit the Facebook “Like” button on an article than it is to walk through the steps of submitting it to Digg. Twitter, Google and Yahoo also offer ways for people to share their favorites.
In response to the changing online landscape, Digg unveiled a redesigned site Aug. 25 that upset a lot of long-time users.
The thing I found most distressing was how slow and buggy the new Digg was. I repeatedly got error messages when Digg couldn’t process my requests. (See screenshot below.)
Also, rival Reddit took advantage of flaws in the new Digg to take over the main page with submissions from its website.
The good news is that a week after the debut of the new Digg, things appear to be settling down. Crummy Reddit links aren’t spamming the main page and I’m not getting error messages anymore. And the quality of the submissions has improved greatly.
I still like Digg. Hopefully the glitches are behind it.

Bad idea: Silly Bandz as neckwear

Novelty companies now are making Silly Bandz big enough so kids can wear them around their necks like necklaces or, worse, chokers.
Silly Bandz, in case you’ve been living in a cave this year, are those silicone bracelets that come in themed packs with different shapes. Some are shaped like animals, others sporting gear, etc. They’re popular with young kids who like to trade them and wear them on their wrists. Silly Bandz is the best known brand but there are many others.
I’ve seen several news reports about doctors warning parents that the rubbery bands can be dangerous. (See this report, for example.) If worn too tight, they can cut off blood flow to a child’s hand.
So imagine my surprise when my 7-year-old son told me they were making extra large silicone bands that kids could wear around their necks.
Sure enough, we saw a boy at McDonald’s the other day in Norwalk, Conn., wearing some around his neck. (See above photo.) That’s a very bad idea. I wonder how long it will be before we hear about the first injury from this trend.