Notes on life, art, photography and technology, by a Danish dropout bohemian.
When you drink the water, remember the river.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Fast laptop roaming
Fast laptop roaming. Sounds cool. Man, I'm so happy I don't have to get in any planes or even cars in my work, though. A ten-meter commute is all right with me.
I have a better idea. Instead of figuring out how while moving about to connect your chemically dependent brain to the drug to which it is addicted, instead learn to withdraw from the drug in the first place.
You don't need the PC slot modem, a lot of cell phones can get the same data rate, then connect to your laptop by usb or bluetooth. Who needs cable and land line with that service.
Verizon's low speed "free" data service is sucky slow. There was a hack to get the medium data rate, reconfig your phone to a different ISP, they charged a lower rate.
Still, an airport in CA without a WiFi hot spot? Nah, especially if there is a Starbucks there.
Even the TransBay busses (AC Transit Ox) to San Francisco have WiFi, as do ACE and AMTRACK trains to Silicon Valley from Tracey/Stockton and Sacramento. I seem to remember seeing some Taxis advertizing WiFi connect too, and I think the ferries were offering it.
$60 a month for anywhere laptop convenience is a bargain compared to what I pay the local provider for my DSL connection. Back when I was in the states I remember my professor demonstrating this in the basement of the library. It was amazing he couldn't get the library's wireless, nor a cell phone signal, but could browse the web just fine on Verizon's network.
Hey, I pay $45 for my cable modem and TV. I pay $60 for two cellphones on a virtually unlimted voiceplan with browser and GPS navigation.
I also am paying $3:20 per USG for regular unleaded, and $1800 two insure two cars of reasonable milage, and $300,000 for a two bedroom house.
Do we really have everything cheaper?
Oh, bread, $2 for a cheap loaf, $4 premium. Beans, $2 per can Heinz equivalent. Biscuits $3:50 for a small packet. Twix/Mars bar (Milkey Way Dark) $.75
I don't think I'm better off here fiscally. It's swings and roundabouts. I just prefer the weather.
We seem to pay per gallon what the uk pay per litre, and have done for the last 15 years. Here we've only just discovered 30mpg is possible! Most people settle for 15-20mpg(us)
In the Bay Area it's about $3:50, It must be near $4 in San Francisco. Out in the boonies(sitcks, rural area) it's $2:50.
A lot of what makes up the difference between European and United Statian prices is tax, especially on something like gasoline or tobacco. Automobile fuel has gone up a lot since Hurricane Katrina -- a little bit before, in fact, around the summer of 2004, it started its rise. It seems to have plateau'ed out right about where people will still put up with it without really changing their driving habits (which, in most of the US, are astronomically irresponsible!).
We spend about US$55 a month for cell phone service, $50 for electricity, $125 for cable (which includes one tier up from basic level TV, a "land line" telephone but no special long-distance deals, and 50K? internet). Water and sewage service comes to about $25 a month. A loaf of bread is about $1.50 to about $4.50, a dozen eggs $1.
The trick when comparing, is to figure out how much that costs in average earning power, rather than merely in exchanged currency. An entry-level administrative assistant, making (for example) US$24,000.oo per year, would have a monthly take-home paycheck after taxes and workplace deductions (medical insurance paramount among these) of roughly $1,200.oo? Out of that, all expenses have to come, including food, rent, utilities, clothing, travel. What would the numbers be, about, over there?
I was thinking more for me, who would be earning the same no matter where I live. Of course now when the dollar is low, the US is looking like a good deal in buying power.
When I left the UK I found my raw salary numbers tripled, but my buy power only doubled. That was in '93.
I'm still not sure if my value increased in the transition? I went from bang to, from as fas as I can tell, an equivalent role with an appropriate wage.
My US figure is twice my sisters in the UK. We are both similarly placed in similar industries, with same experience level. We both seem to be financially as well off, with similar buy power at the end of the day.
I always wonder. Some people say that the USA is an economic "pot of gold" for anyone who's willing to make the trip and get the required paperwork. It certainly is for people from third-world countries, if only because opportunity here, plus a dominant currency, allows for sending money home. And plenty of educated professionals really like how low the tax rates in the USA are, relative to what they used to have to pay in Europe or the antipodes.
I've heard plenty of times that European professionals are much more highly taxed than similar folks in the USA. I often cite this fact as an argument for why we shouldn't complain over here about how "high" our tax rates are, since in fact they AREN'T. (I wouldn't actually advocate increasing the US's taxes across the board, but I'm against that more because I think the government does such a bad job of spending their tax income, usually on the military, and I would advocate higher taxes for improved services in fields I value, such as education or public rail transportation.)
Some people say that the lower tax rates are just an illusion, and that you get what you pay for. If you move from Detroit to London, you pay more but you get urban safety, higher general literacy, many more valuable cultural and political institutions that are effectively "free" (or accessed by such a nominal fee that the price would be impossible in the US).
I have to own and maintain a car, in order to live in New Orleans -- without it, it's just impossible to function -- and that irks me, as well. I'd gladly pay $50 or even $100 a month for a pass on adequate public rail transit, plus another $10 or $20 increase in my month's worth of annual taxes. It sounds at first like a lot of money, but if you add up how much I have to spend on an automobile, the public transit option is much cheaper. And you can read on the tram!
Yeah, got to love that. In Lebanon, I practically don't use a car. Whenever possible, I take the private-public buses. (Otherwise phrased: the State is absent, but free enterprise is blooming.) You can travel more than 30 kms for no more than US$1, and depending on the line you take it can be half that amount. The only real downside is, they're not very fast, so this doesn't fit people who are in a hurry. Apart from that, you can travel about anywhere in the country. Probably cross it all in a day, back and forth, for under $10. Not exactly fast roaming, but it's a small country. Sometimes, it has its advantages. "Too small to be parted, too big to be swallowed", as one politician once said. ;-) Wishful thinking...
Another quaint but sometimes very convenient bit: here, you don't vote where you live, but where you were born. For confessional stability, I guess. Tough luck if you were born abroad from emigrated parents. Hugely convenient if, like in my region, there's a very heated upcoming election and you can just bask in your de facto neutrality while your neighbors are at each other's throats. Sometimes literally. :-/ Families are often so badly torn apart by politics, that not even duct tape could patch things up. Me, I'm a militant for the Nobody In Party-cular. Little field influence, but very relaxing to support. :-P
To get from my home to my old place of work, it was 40 miles. I could go one of three routes.
1) Ferry - Peninsular. a) walk or bus (AC Transit $1.25) 1mile to ferry. b) Ferry 7 miles ($3)to SF. c) walk 1/2 mile to MUNI(tram $2), then MUNI for 2 miles. d) Caltrain 35 mile ($4:50) e)VTA(tram $1:50) 1stop (4mile)
2) BUS-BART-CALTRAIN a) Bus 5miles (AC Transit $1:25) b) BART Colliseum to Milbrae ($4) c) Caltrain (3:50) d) VTA...
3) BUS - CALTRAIN a) Transbay Bus to SF (AC Transit $2:50) b) walk (1mile) of MUNI bus ($1) to Caltrain c) Caltrain ($4:50)...
4) New option 2 years ago a) Bus to AMTRAK (5miles %1:25 - free with Amtrak token) b) Amtrak 40 miles $5 (with monthly pass - the only system to discount passes) c) Shuttle Bus - Free to all on platform timed to ACE train alternately VTA Tram free with Amtrak token.
I could never understand why MUNI and VTA would not take Caltrain Tokens. AC transit take BART tokens for buses. But to get from home to work I had to use at least 4 transit agencies, each connection could be up to 20 minutes and there was no through ticketing.
A mass transit round trip - before the new Amtrak station, was $15 per day and 2 hrs each way. Driving with a bridge toll, and vehicle, tax, insurance, oil, depreciation etc, was $12 daily and 45 to 120 min hour each way (Yes it was that variable).
In Manchester I used to have a GM Bus Saver(Zone3) which was good on all buses and BR (back in 87-90). No car needed. In London they now have RF ID passes which are good on all systems (Tube, DLR, Busses). No car needed.
I am just jealous of Pascals ability to move by mass transit.
Where I live, I have no cellular service at my house, nor do I have access to broadband in any other way, except Satellite, which I pay $70.00/month for and if it snows too hard or rains too hard, it doesn't work. I also have satellite TV, because cable doesn't go out here. That is $70.00/month or so with HBO and Cinemax packages. I have to have a 4 wheel drive vehicle to get to and from my house in the winter and early spring mud season. My road is dirt, which when it thaws in the spring, becomes a dangerous mess of frozen mud under thawed mud that refreezes in the night to huge ruts and holes that you have to navigate. So, I have to say to live where I love to live, it does cost to have some of the amenities that urban folk have cheaper and easier access to. There is little to no form of mass transit. There are only two interstates. One cuts across the state diagonally and the other runs N/S longitudinally between my state and the next. Otherwise it is all two lane roads and dirt roads. To get to work in the more urbanized areas where the work is, most people have to drive a long way. I used to drive 148 miles round trip a day for a job and if I get hired again up there, I will be driving that road again. The other alternative is about a 40-45 minute drive to the bordering state to work. Either way, I have to drive somewhere to work. I have to drive the 40 minute drive to get to a large grocery store and other type of shopping. Heck, I have to drive that drive to see a traffic light! But, the beauty of where I live is worth it to me. I can't imagine living anywhere else. It is as if this place has embedded itself on my soul. I am not a person who lives well or comfortably in a town or definitely a city. Besides, where would my horse live in Manhattan or some other big city?
Hey, Alex, be jealous of this, mister: Our local sweet rabid islamists have managed to hit a power plant with their rockets. (The down side of living in a tiny country: nearly everything's within weapon reach.) As a result, we now have a regimen of 2 hours power, 6 hours "without". Um... in fact, it's gonna be that time soon. Sorry, gotta go now. Bye. (Whoooooshhh!...)
Me neither, Al. Several close shaves, but never been subjected to real suffering, lucky me. Sure, daily peeves are a pain. But not a physical one. It's when you see people having it really hard that you realize how lucky you truly are. I've had my eyes open for as far as I can remember (at least at age seven).
I just read this in a psychology article: people who have been in a war usually, and surprisingly to others, consider themselves lucky. "I'm still alive, aren't I?" While the son of a rich american family may consider himself very unlucky because he doesn't have the last Air Nikes or a PlayStation3. These futile group pressures in american movies have always felt to me like something out of the Zoolander script.
Not to say you SHOULD envy me. :-) Just realize how good you have it, all things considered. Which mustn't keep you from seeking better life conditions, of course. Keep voting discerningly, it's woth it.
I hate to recommend a film starring Scientology preacher Tom Cruise, but his persona in War of the Worlds really illustrated what's truly important in one's life. Remember this scene early on, when the first Tripod appears. Cruise hot-wires a car, enters it with his family, and a friend of his starts fretting that he's committing GTA (Grand Theft Auto). Cruise has already grasped the situation, and replies: "Get in, if you want to live." Seconds later, the friend has been zapped by a death ray, and the hero is driving away, not giving it a second thought, because it's a thing of the past which he couldn't help and the present needs his focus. The original novel was about a man who survives alone, while hoping his lost of sight fiancée made it. The movie was about a family man doing his best to make his own good fortune, in spite of difficult relationships with his children and his ex-wife. A hard lesson, but enlightening in a brutal way. We make our own luck by our perception and our resulting decisions. And by sorting out what's truly worth crying over. Which is very little, in the end.
We are never completely powerless. And we're never completely in charge either, outside events will happen. Remember that bit about courage to change things, serenity to accept them, and wisdom to know the difference.
Back on topic, I'd love to have fast internet instead of my sluggish dial-up. I'm hoping to perhaps manage to get it, one day. But in the meantime, I can't put my life between brackets, chanting "things will improve". They always can, as long as you breathe! I make the best out of what I have in the present day. Every day of one's life deserves to be enjoyed for the treasure it is.
A proverb of my own creation to ponder: "The best day of your life is always today. Live the Present."
Which version of War of the Worlds did you read to couple the author with a sightless fiancee? Last three times I read it she was a loyal and loving sighted wife.
Wait when you say "lost of sight" do you mean "blind" or "out of sight".
The original is a dissertation about man, and his place in the natural order of things. It speaks out against the European conquest of the world. It looks at the lust for war and adventure within each of us.
It is a great humanitarian piece.
There are times when the protaginist acts more like Cruise's neighbour, the insistance on returning the horse and buggy to the inn keeper for example, but that is only when the martians are perceived as an inconvenience, not a real threat. Later the survivalist impulses show, bludgeoning the cleric sos the Martians don't hear them.
One thing that surprised me was the 2005 version of WotW by Pendragon films. despite the low budget FX, and terrible acting, this film voiced the characters with real fear, defeat and defiance. Now listening to Richard Burton and David Essex discussing the futile defenses of the artillary "bows and arrows against the lightening", they seem smugly resigned, not fearful of the true horror that has gripped the nation.
There is a gritty sequel recently written, called "Scarlet Traces", which has the British smugly adoptinig the Martian technology, and maintaining it's Empire, believing that since it delivered the world from the Martians, then it owns the world.
What I read was the novel by H.G.Wells (is there another version?). If I recall correctly, early on the narrator loses contact with his fiancée, who might or might not be safe at her relatives', and then he's very busy just surviving. I think he wasn't married yet in the Wells novel. But it's been a while since I read it. No sign of any blind girlfriends, though. I'm positive about that. :-)
Thanks for the tip about the sequel. Sounds interesting, I'll look it out. It does make the brutal colonial metaphor of the first novel much more evident. (And to be honest, if the world should belong to those who saved us from the Martians, it should be the bacteriae, not the British!) :-P
Scarlet Traces is a series of comic books/graphic novels put out by Dark Horse. They also did an illustrated War of the Worlds. I think this gets close to where EO was going wiht his reference to The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
In the Musical Richard Burton has a fiancee. In the book, the Narrator has a wife, which he takes to relatives at the beginning, after the Martians get out of the pit.
In Scarlet Traces, The Great Game, they tie into many other UK SF & history. They include Cavorite, Montogmery, Treens (Dan Dare), and propose that the martians who struck against Earth were actually not Martians, but from the planet beyond Mars that became the asteroid belt.
22 comments:
I have a better idea. Instead of figuring out how while moving about to connect your chemically dependent brain to the drug to which it is addicted, instead learn to withdraw from the drug in the first place.
I wouldn't even attempt it.
You don't need the PC slot modem, a lot of cell phones can get the same data rate, then connect to your laptop by usb or bluetooth. Who needs cable and land line with that service.
Verizon's low speed "free" data service is sucky slow. There was a hack to get the medium data rate, reconfig your phone to a different ISP, they charged a lower rate.
Still, an airport in CA without a WiFi hot spot? Nah, especially if there is a Starbucks there.
Even the TransBay busses (AC Transit Ox) to San Francisco have WiFi, as do ACE and AMTRACK trains to Silicon Valley from Tracey/Stockton and Sacramento. I seem to remember seeing some Taxis advertizing WiFi connect too, and I think the ferries were offering it.
$60 a month for anywhere laptop convenience is a bargain compared to what I pay the local provider for my DSL connection.
Back when I was in the states I remember my professor demonstrating this in the basement of the library. It was amazing he couldn't get the library's wireless, nor a cell phone signal, but could browse the web just fine on Verizon's network.
Yes, it is also similar to what I'm paying for broadband.
The Americans are spoiled with their prices. Everything is near half what it is here.
Hey, I pay $45 for my cable modem and TV. I pay $60 for two cellphones on a virtually unlimted voiceplan with browser and GPS navigation.
I also am paying $3:20 per USG for regular unleaded, and $1800 two insure two cars of reasonable milage, and $300,000 for a two bedroom house.
Do we really have everything cheaper?
Oh, bread, $2 for a cheap loaf, $4 premium. Beans, $2 per can Heinz equivalent. Biscuits $3:50 for a small packet. Twix/Mars bar (Milkey Way Dark) $.75
I don't think I'm better off here fiscally. It's swings and roundabouts. I just prefer the weather.
I think gas is three times that price in UK.
We seem to pay per gallon what the uk pay per litre, and have done for the last 15 years. Here we've only just discovered 30mpg is possible! Most people settle for 15-20mpg(us)
In the Bay Area it's about $3:50, It must be near $4 in San Francisco. Out in the boonies(sitcks, rural area) it's $2:50.
A lot of what makes up the difference between European and United Statian prices is tax, especially on something like gasoline or tobacco. Automobile fuel has gone up a lot since Hurricane Katrina -- a little bit before, in fact, around the summer of 2004, it started its rise. It seems to have plateau'ed out right about where people will still put up with it without really changing their driving habits (which, in most of the US, are astronomically irresponsible!).
We spend about US$55 a month for cell phone service, $50 for electricity, $125 for cable (which includes one tier up from basic level TV, a "land line" telephone but no special long-distance deals, and 50K? internet). Water and sewage service comes to about $25 a month. A loaf of bread is about $1.50 to about $4.50, a dozen eggs $1.
The trick when comparing, is to figure out how much that costs in average earning power, rather than merely in exchanged currency. An entry-level administrative assistant, making (for example) US$24,000.oo per year, would have a monthly take-home paycheck after taxes and workplace deductions (medical insurance paramount among these) of roughly $1,200.oo? Out of that, all expenses have to come, including food, rent, utilities, clothing, travel. What would the numbers be, about, over there?
To be frank, I don't know much about that.
I was thinking more for me, who would be earning the same no matter where I live. Of course now when the dollar is low, the US is looking like a good deal in buying power.
When I left the UK I found my raw salary numbers tripled, but my buy power only doubled. That was in '93.
I'm still not sure if my value increased in the transition? I went from bang to, from as fas as I can tell, an equivalent role with an appropriate wage.
My US figure is twice my sisters in the UK. We are both similarly placed in similar industries, with same experience level. We both seem to be financially as well off, with similar buy power at the end of the day.
I always wonder. Some people say that the USA is an economic "pot of gold" for anyone who's willing to make the trip and get the required paperwork. It certainly is for people from third-world countries, if only because opportunity here, plus a dominant currency, allows for sending money home. And plenty of educated professionals really like how low the tax rates in the USA are, relative to what they used to have to pay in Europe or the antipodes.
I've heard plenty of times that European professionals are much more highly taxed than similar folks in the USA. I often cite this fact as an argument for why we shouldn't complain over here about how "high" our tax rates are, since in fact they AREN'T. (I wouldn't actually advocate increasing the US's taxes across the board, but I'm against that more because I think the government does such a bad job of spending their tax income, usually on the military, and I would advocate higher taxes for improved services in fields I value, such as education or public rail transportation.)
Some people say that the lower tax rates are just an illusion, and that you get what you pay for. If you move from Detroit to London, you pay more but you get urban safety, higher general literacy, many more valuable cultural and political institutions that are effectively "free" (or accessed by such a nominal fee that the price would be impossible in the US).
I have to own and maintain a car, in order to live in New Orleans -- without it, it's just impossible to function -- and that irks me, as well. I'd gladly pay $50 or even $100 a month for a pass on adequate public rail transit, plus another $10 or $20 increase in my month's worth of annual taxes. It sounds at first like a lot of money, but if you add up how much I have to spend on an automobile, the public transit option is much cheaper. And you can read on the tram!
"And you can read on the tram!"
Yeah, got to love that. In Lebanon, I practically don't use a car. Whenever possible, I take the private-public buses. (Otherwise phrased: the State is absent, but free enterprise is blooming.) You can travel more than 30 kms for no more than US$1, and depending on the line you take it can be half that amount. The only real downside is, they're not very fast, so this doesn't fit people who are in a hurry. Apart from that, you can travel about anywhere in the country. Probably cross it all in a day, back and forth, for under $10.
Not exactly fast roaming, but it's a small country. Sometimes, it has its advantages.
"Too small to be parted, too big to be swallowed", as one politician once said. ;-)
Wishful thinking...
Another quaint but sometimes very convenient bit: here, you don't vote where you live, but where you were born. For confessional stability, I guess. Tough luck if you were born abroad from emigrated parents. Hugely convenient if, like in my region, there's a very heated upcoming election and you can just bask in your de facto neutrality while your neighbors are at each other's throats. Sometimes literally. :-/
Families are often so badly torn apart by politics, that not even duct tape could patch things up. Me, I'm a militant for the Nobody In Party-cular. Little field influence, but very relaxing to support. :-P
Hmm, mass transit.
To get from my home to my old place of work, it was 40 miles. I could go one of three routes.
1) Ferry - Peninsular.
a) walk or bus (AC Transit $1.25) 1mile to ferry.
b) Ferry 7 miles ($3)to SF.
c) walk 1/2 mile to MUNI(tram $2), then MUNI for 2 miles.
d) Caltrain 35 mile ($4:50)
e)VTA(tram $1:50) 1stop (4mile)
2) BUS-BART-CALTRAIN
a) Bus 5miles (AC Transit $1:25)
b) BART Colliseum to Milbrae ($4)
c) Caltrain (3:50)
d) VTA...
3) BUS - CALTRAIN
a) Transbay Bus to SF (AC Transit $2:50)
b) walk (1mile) of MUNI bus ($1) to Caltrain
c) Caltrain ($4:50)...
4) New option 2 years ago
a) Bus to AMTRAK (5miles %1:25 - free with Amtrak token)
b) Amtrak 40 miles $5 (with monthly pass - the only system to discount passes)
c) Shuttle Bus - Free to all on platform timed to ACE train alternately VTA Tram free with Amtrak token.
I could never understand why MUNI and VTA would not take Caltrain Tokens. AC transit take BART tokens for buses. But to get from home to work I had to use at least 4 transit agencies, each connection could be up to 20 minutes and there was no through ticketing.
A mass transit round trip - before the new Amtrak station, was $15 per day and 2 hrs each way. Driving with a bridge toll, and vehicle, tax, insurance, oil, depreciation etc, was $12 daily and 45 to 120 min hour each way (Yes it was that variable).
In Manchester I used to have a GM Bus Saver(Zone3) which was good on all buses and BR (back in 87-90). No car needed. In London they now have RF ID passes which are good on all systems (Tube, DLR, Busses). No car needed.
I am just jealous of Pascals ability to move by mass transit.
Where I live, I have no cellular service at my house, nor do I have access to broadband in any other way, except Satellite, which I pay $70.00/month for and if it snows too hard or rains too hard, it doesn't work. I also have satellite TV, because cable doesn't go out here. That is $70.00/month or so with HBO and Cinemax packages. I have to have a 4 wheel drive vehicle to get to and from my house in the winter and early spring mud season. My road is dirt, which when it thaws in the spring, becomes a dangerous mess of frozen mud under thawed mud that refreezes in the night to huge ruts and holes that you have to navigate. So, I have to say to live where I love to live, it does cost to have some of the amenities that urban folk have cheaper and easier access to. There is little to no form of mass transit. There are only two interstates. One cuts across the state diagonally and the other runs N/S longitudinally between my state and the next. Otherwise it is all two lane roads and dirt roads. To get to work in the more urbanized areas where the work is, most people have to drive a long way. I used to drive 148 miles round trip a day for a job and if I get hired again up there, I will be driving that road again. The other alternative is about a 40-45 minute drive to the bordering state to work. Either way, I have to drive somewhere to work. I have to drive the 40 minute drive to get to a large grocery store and other type of shopping. Heck, I have to drive that drive to see a traffic light! But, the beauty of where I live is worth it to me. I can't imagine living anywhere else. It is as if this place has embedded itself on my soul. I am not a person who lives well or comfortably in a town or definitely a city. Besides, where would my horse live in Manhattan or some other big city?
Sounds like a web business might be right. Take a look at sitesell.com.
Hey, Alex, be jealous of this, mister:
Our local sweet rabid islamists have managed to hit a power plant with their rockets. (The down side of living in a tiny country: nearly everything's within weapon reach.) As a result, we now have a regimen of 2 hours power, 6 hours "without".
Um... in fact, it's gonna be that time soon. Sorry, gotta go now. Bye. (Whoooooshhh!...)
Pascal,
I'm not jealous anymore. I wish there was more I can say, but apart from a few small terrorist incidents I've never faced anything serious.
Alex
Me neither, Al. Several close shaves, but never been subjected to real suffering, lucky me.
Sure, daily peeves are a pain. But not a physical one. It's when you see people having it really hard that you realize how lucky you truly are. I've had my eyes open for as far as I can remember (at least at age seven).
I just read this in a psychology article: people who have been in a war usually, and surprisingly to others, consider themselves lucky. "I'm still alive, aren't I?" While the son of a rich american family may consider himself very unlucky because he doesn't have the last Air Nikes or a PlayStation3. These futile group pressures in american movies have always felt to me like something out of the Zoolander script.
Not to say you SHOULD envy me. :-)
Just realize how good you have it, all things considered. Which mustn't keep you from seeking better life conditions, of course. Keep voting discerningly, it's woth it.
I hate to recommend a film starring Scientology preacher Tom Cruise, but his persona in War of the Worlds really illustrated what's truly important in one's life. Remember this scene early on, when the first Tripod appears. Cruise hot-wires a car, enters it with his family, and a friend of his starts fretting that he's committing GTA (Grand Theft Auto). Cruise has already grasped the situation, and replies: "Get in, if you want to live." Seconds later, the friend has been zapped by a death ray, and the hero is driving away, not giving it a second thought, because it's a thing of the past which he couldn't help and the present needs his focus.
The original novel was about a man who survives alone, while hoping his lost of sight fiancée made it. The movie was about a family man doing his best to make his own good fortune, in spite of difficult relationships with his children and his ex-wife.
A hard lesson, but enlightening in a brutal way. We make our own luck by our perception and our resulting decisions. And by sorting out what's truly worth crying over. Which is very little, in the end.
We are never completely powerless. And we're never completely in charge either, outside events will happen. Remember that bit about courage to change things, serenity to accept them, and wisdom to know the difference.
Back on topic, I'd love to have fast internet instead of my sluggish dial-up. I'm hoping to perhaps manage to get it, one day. But in the meantime, I can't put my life between brackets, chanting "things will improve". They always can, as long as you breathe! I make the best out of what I have in the present day. Every day of one's life deserves to be enjoyed for the treasure it is.
A proverb of my own creation to ponder: "The best day of your life is always today. Live the Present."
Which version of War of the Worlds did you read to couple the author with a sightless fiancee? Last three times I read it she was a loyal and loving sighted wife.
Wait when you say "lost of sight" do you mean "blind" or "out of sight".
The original is a dissertation about man, and his place in the natural order of things. It speaks out against the European conquest of the world. It looks at the lust for war and adventure within each of us.
It is a great humanitarian piece.
There are times when the protaginist acts more like Cruise's neighbour, the insistance on returning the horse and buggy to the inn keeper for example, but that is only when the martians are perceived as an inconvenience, not a real threat. Later the survivalist impulses show, bludgeoning the cleric sos the Martians don't hear them.
One thing that surprised me was the 2005 version of WotW by Pendragon films. despite the low budget FX, and terrible acting, this film voiced the characters with real fear, defeat and defiance. Now listening to Richard Burton and David Essex discussing the futile defenses of the artillary "bows and arrows against the lightening", they seem smugly resigned, not fearful of the true horror that has gripped the nation.
There is a gritty sequel recently written, called "Scarlet Traces", which has the British smugly adoptinig the Martian technology, and maintaining it's Empire, believing that since it delivered the world from the Martians, then it owns the world.
What I read was the novel by H.G.Wells (is there another version?). If I recall correctly, early on the narrator loses contact with his fiancée, who might or might not be safe at her relatives', and then he's very busy just surviving. I think he wasn't married yet in the Wells novel. But it's been a while since I read it.
No sign of any blind girlfriends, though. I'm positive about that. :-)
Thanks for the tip about the sequel. Sounds interesting, I'll look it out. It does make the brutal colonial metaphor of the first novel much more evident.
(And to be honest, if the world should belong to those who saved us from the Martians, it should be the bacteriae, not the British!) :-P
Scarlet Traces is a series of comic books/graphic novels put out by Dark Horse. They also did an illustrated War of the Worlds. I think this gets close to where EO was going wiht his reference to The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
In the Musical Richard Burton has a fiancee. In the book, the Narrator has a wife, which he takes to relatives at the beginning, after the Martians get out of the pit.
In Scarlet Traces, The Great Game, they tie into many other UK SF & history. They include Cavorite, Montogmery, Treens (Dan Dare), and propose that the martians who struck against Earth were actually not Martians, but from the planet beyond Mars that became the asteroid belt.
All good fun stuff.
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