The Fall

A few years ago, I saw this trailer, and knew I wanted to see this movie. Then I promptly forgot all about it.



Tonight M and I watched "The Fall". I also remember thinking no movie could possibly deliver what that trailer seems to promise. But it did. It was beautiful, both visually and emotionally. I will be buying a copy of the film in Glorious Blu-Ray for my own collection.

It's also the best depiction in film I've yet seen of the kind of emotional collaborative storytelling I've experienced in the best roleplaying games.

Nothing would surprise me with this kid.

So, this morning during church, my son E, who is 4, had me convinced he could full-on read (possibly in Spanish). Now, I know that he cannot - he's in Reception (which is like Kindergarten but it starts with 4-year-olds here) and he's learning some phonics and can sound out simple words like 'car', 'into', and 'the'. All of which is well and good - in fact, I think he's proceeding quite well and am immensely proud in a proper, dignified, fatherly way.

He was looking through my Bible, as he often does to keep occupied during church, because he knows that his name can be found on a page in Genesis, and because I have scattered throughout it some transparent Jesus stickers that someone gave me and that I put in there during my mission. Also, my Bible is nonstandard - it is a dual-language version with Spanish in the left column and the corresponding English in the right. It is a standard Born-Again Bible in other respects - minimal index, but pages on how to be saved by accepting Jesus, Christ's words in red, etc. Anyway, it's my Bible and its the one I read cover to cover as a missionary and it has all my notes and markings in it. Here's the page E was looking at:

So after he looks at it for a minute, he turns to me and says "He didn't say anything."

Me: "Wait, what?"

E: "Jesus. He didn't say anything"

Me (internal monologue):WHOA! That's verse 7 right there! Not only can he read silently, this kid is reading and paraphrasing what he's reading!

Me (aloud): Uhhhh, how do you know that?


Any guesses? I'll post the answer in comments tomorrow.

Link Roundup!

If I were sharing items this week I'd have shared:


Not Zeppelins, exactly; we're talking mile-wide inhabited geodesic spheres, man!
"Because the geodesic structure increases in strength as it gets bigger, and its surface increases at a power of two, while its volume increases at a power of three, Fuller hypothesized that heating the interior air even one degree will set the Cloud Nines aloft.

Obviously, as a sexy, futuristic utopian image, Cloud Nine is hard to pass up, but holy crap, Bucky, did you think for two seconds about the urban fabric and the social experience of living trapped in a floating dome? I'd love to see someone write an SF story about it. Because I think it might be a fantastically totalitarian disaster."


Lui Bolin is a chameleon.



Very cool creature concept art over at The Morae River

io9 ponders whether we're going to see 'doping scandals' over academic performance-enhancing drugs

Subterranean Design

I have, perhaps foolishly, embarked on a new blogging venture I won't have time to nurture properly:

Subterranean Design, a blog about the intersection of art, underground, fantasy, ecology, and architecture. Or something like that.

Anyway, I'm thinking it'll be a multi-person effort, so if that sounds like the sort of thing you might be interested in, drop me a line (dave dot younce @ gmail dot com) and I'll make you a contributor.