007

Product Placement

Caught the latest James Bond flick, "Casino Royale", last weekend. I have been a big fan of the series… never mind the borderline silly plot, or (if any) one-dimensional character development… the films are always full of fun action sequences, high-tech gadgets, witty one-liners and beautiful Bond girls.

 

The biggest question this time, of course, is: can a relatively unknown Daniel Craig take on the James Bond role?
After watching the film, my answer is a resounding yes. And it was probably the best 007 film in the last few years.

 

Relative to Pierce Brosnan, Craig’s version is a lot rougher and more masculine. He would get his hands dirty (drowning bad guy in a sink). There are a few Jackie Chan-type action scenes. Not the typical British gentleman from previous films.
I think that’s a refreshing change, just the kind of boost you need on an old franchise series.

 

But the one thing that didn’t change is the non-stop product placement. I can’t even count how many times Bond uses a Sony Ericsson cell phone or a Song Vaio laptop (Sony bought a stake in the MGM Studio and distributes this film). He is wearing Omega (he said specifically not Rolex).
And Aston Martin is a must in any Bond films (and he crashed it, ouch!).
They usually pick high-class brands to associate with 007. But there is a huge disappointment: when he was in Bahamas, he drove a Ford.

 

Ford!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  WTF… Ford must be paying them big bucks… or it’s just a rental…

 

James Bond is known for the witty one-liner. Here are the 2 best ones from "Casino Royale":

 

Bartender: Shaken or stirred?
James Bond: Do I look like I give a damn?

 

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James Bond (to Le Chiffre): Now the whole world’s gonna know that you died scratching my balls!

 

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So, who is the best 007: Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton, Pierce Brosnan or Daniel Craig?

My choice is Timothy Dalton, hehe.

 

Hope they will bring Q back in the next film.

 

http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/casinoroyale/site/

Political jokes

Cocaine

Politicians, as we all know, are mostly liars. That’s probably why some people show little interest in politics. But if they are suffering from bad policies of the politicians, they really shouldn’t complain. At least if you vote, you get the right to whine (and throw the bastards out of office in the next election).

 

With the idiots and liars involved, there are bound to be some funny moments in politics…

 

Japan’s ex-Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori is well-known for his idiocy and his bad English. So, his aides gave him a suggestion when chatting with other leaders: just reply "Me, too" if he didn’t understand the English words.

 
On meeting President Bill Clinton, he greeted Clinton with "Who are you?" (what he meant to say was "How are you?")

 

Clinton, being a smart ass that he is, jokingly replied, "I’m Hillary’s husband, and you?"

 

A short pause and then Yoshiro Mori answered "Me, too".

 

 

Another (more recent) good one is Stephen Colbert’s (this guy can make any politician looks stupid) interview with Rep. Robert Wexler (D-Fla.), and got him to "admit" using cocaine and prostitutes. Super funny. See the YouTube link below.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rz7N4oT9JE

 

Sir T L Yang

Table Manner

Speaking of Rumsfeld, a political figure that I do respect, I was trying to think of one from HK… not an easy thing to do as most are either idiots or henchmen of the communists.

 

The only one that came to my mind is Sir T L Yang.

 

Actually, Sir T L is only a semi-political figure… he wasn’t involved in politics until he retired from the judiciary system and then campaigned for the post of Chief Executive in 1996. Naturally, he lost to Beijing’s choice of C H Tung (as a consolation, Sir T L was appointed to a few government posts). He is now the Chairman of the Hong Kong Red Cross and devotes his time to serving the community. He is also hosting a RTHK radio show (on learning English and other things).

 

Raised under the colonial/British education system and having served as the Chief Justice, you would expect him to be an uptight person. But he gets wittier as he ages.

 

I recall in a TV interview from a few years ago, he was visiting a high school and talking to students. That time, he was teaching the kids table manner in a formal dinner (i.e. to stand up when ladies go the bathroom, which direction of the forks and knives to start when eating etc.)

 

He mentioned the trick for eating soup and not slurping: "Of course the soup won’t flow into your mouth on its own if the spoon is flat, the key is to tilt the spoon a bit towards you and let the gravity does the work."

 

Another exchange between him and a student…

Student: What if you fart during the dinner?  Should you apologize in that case?

 

Yang: Of course not, just pretend it never happened. What’s done is done, can’t do anything about it.

 

Student: What if somebody accuses you?

 

Yang: Deny until the day you die.

 

 

Try his radio shows from the link below. I’m sure you will like it.

 

http://www.rthk.org.hk/elearning/yangtl/index.htm
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%A5%8A%E9%90%B5%E6%A8%91

Rumsfeld

Vase

Like any lost election, there is always a casualty… and this time, it’s Donald Rumsfeld, the US Secretary of Defense. His resignation was announced yesterday.

 

I’ve always liked Rumsfeld… when you are fighting a war on this scale, you need his kind of strong personality and forceful leadership. Not an easy job for a 74-year-old.

Whether his execution is good enough or not, that’s another matter…

 

The other thing I like about him is his witty comment (usually when dealing with media)… the most memorable one is this "vase" quote in a press conference, after toppling the murderous Saddam Hussein regime. He was discussing the security situation in Iraq and he went off to comment on a TV footage with a man looting a big vase:

 

Q: How quickly do you hope to do that? Isn’t that a pressing problem?

 

Rumsfeld: Wait. Wait. your question… suggests that, "Gee, maybe they were better off repressed."
Let me say one other thing. The images you are seeing on television you are seeing over, and over, and over, and it’s the same picture of some person walking out of some building with a vase, and you see it 20 times, and you think, "My goodness, were there that many vases? Is it possible that there were that many vases in the whole country?"

 

Classic Rumsfeld.

 

Another famous quote, he can be very logical as well:

 

"Reports that say that something hasn’t happened are always interesting to me because, as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns — the ones we don’t know we don’t know."

 

Confused?  This comment has been ridiculed by the biased media… it’s actually not that hard to understand. Here’s an example…

 

Unknown unknown: An elementary school student does not know he/she does not know Calculus, as this math subject is not even on the curriculum
Known unknown: A student just starting high school knows he/she does not know Calculus since it will be one of the compulsory math courses to take
Known known: A math major in university knows he/she knows Calculus because of all the Calculus courses taken along the way

 

Pretty clear?  If not, here is another example I can think of (I’m sure you can come up with more)…

 

Known known: The writer knows this blog is pure non-sense yada yada yada
Known unknown: Some friends don’t know yet this blog is pure non-sense yada yada yada because they haven’t read it, even though they know about the existence of this blog through MSN
Unknown unknown: Some strangers don’t know this blog and consequently, don’t know it is pure non-sense yada yada yada

 

What can I say?  Rumsfeld is quite impressive, one wise old man.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unknown_unknown

Seize the Day

Snow

I planned to write something witty about (cheap) airlines but then I thought: I can’t keep writing non-sense yada yada yada all the time… so here’s something different.

 

Went to pick up a friend for lunch today. As I was waiting in the car at the building entrance (listening to Jolin’s recent album, not bad, perhaps will write about that later, she is HOT!), I see some white stuff slowly drifting down…

 

Snow!!!

 

Time flies indeed… and it’s winter again. I can still remember watching Times Square year-end countdown and a midnight drive to airport on New Year’s Eve vividly.

 

It’s been an eventful year, for me at least… some bad and some good memories… I have seen friendships totally shattered right in front of my own eyes, I pushed a button too fast twice and ended up paying $28 for parking (instead of $8), I misspoke and lost my best friend, team England crashed out in the World Cup etc…

 

Regrets aside, I have mostly enjoyable 2006 moments to play back in mind… Liverpool winning the FA Cup, got to level 60 in WoW, Niagara wine tasting trip, a baseball bachelor’s party, SJA reunion West Coast trip, horseback riding in Muskoka, a visit to my high school TSS, etc.

 

One thing I do notice is people around me have changed a lot ("life event changes" in HR terms), for the better… friends moving out of Toronto, couples having babies, people getting married etc. At times, it seems I am kind of staying at the same place and I’m still the same person… perhaps it’s not necessary a bad thing (?).

But like I said many times before, I’m quite a forgetful and optimistic person. Only the joyful moments will be retained in memory… if I remember them at all.

 

I hope you have a productive and memorable year so far, too.
Keep in mind: whatever new-year resolutions you wrote down in January, you still have 2 months to achieve.

 

Seize the Day!