Indeed, what if they do? That would be the most cruel joke anyone could play on the customers of this company.
And yes, if you click around, it looks like all it costs to be indefinitely frozen is around $30,000 dollars. You know, if you're small-minded enough to want to put a price on IMMORTALITY.
29 April 2009
23 April 2009
Another "Lost" post
Since I was right about my gut reaction the very first minute we saw Miles on “Lost” – that he was the son of Pierre Chang – here’s my prediction for his arc. I’m going for the win here.
Miles will get to see enough of Pierre Chang’s relationship with little Miles and his mom to believe that he needs to warn his dad about the impending genocide. He will feel that this is the only way to prevent the disaster and confusion of his childhood – having his dad with him as he grows up and being cheated out of that relationship by Ben’s cold-hearted mass-murdering ways. However, Dr. Chang will echo the silly mantra that “whatever happened, happened,” and will hope that he can bargain with destiny by sending his wife and son away, and offering himself up as a sacrificial lamb.
Miles will then come to understand three things:
(1) That he himself caused his own unhappy childhood. He will realize that Dr. Chang drove his wife and child away to save them, and that adult Miles was the catalyst for this action. The alternative to his miserable childhood would be lying dead in a ditch with the rest of the Dharma folks.
(2) That he was meant to have died on the Island and that whatever happened did not necessarily "happen." Or was not necessarily meant to have happened. This is why he can commune with the dead. (Because he is sort of un-dead himself, having cheated destiny.)
(3) That Widmore has brought him back to the island to fulfill his destiny (ie, die on it) because Widmore believes that he must give the Island what it wants in order to re-establish the pre-Linas state of equilibrium on the Island. So, Miles, having been temporarily saved by his father's sacrifice, will ultimately be consumed as Widmore's sacrificial lamb.
This presupposes, however, that not all the principals were brought to the Island for the same reason (similarities in daddy-issues notwithstanding.) But, I can already see that we’re going to grow incredibly fond of Miles like we did Charley, only to find that Miles must die.
And that, my friends, will suck.
20 April 2009
Unfixables?
Why, sometimes, will one of my feet not go where I tell it to? I intend to walk in a straight line, but every, say, fifth step is clearly not quite in the same continuum. This only happens every now and then, but it makes me wonder just how well I’ve figured out this whole “walking” thing.
When drinking a liquid, and it goes down the wrong way…of all the ways to ingest food/nutrients, drinking is the one we have practiced the most. Why do we still get it wrong?
We all rely on umbrellas, but they really don’t keep you dry below the waist. Our faith in them seems childish.
Our brains probably never stop working, and they process more information than any other device known to humans. But when asked, we usually say that “not much” has been up recently, even when we are eager for a conversation or a connection.
Leonard Cohen is 75, and he sounds happier about it and more at peace with it than anyone else on the planet is about anything else. I don’t want this fixed, by the way. I think it’s wonderful that it’s unfixable.
In spring, when the temperature hits 70 F for the first time, people take to the streets in what constitutes beach wear. In the fall, when the temperature finally drops to 70, people take out jackets and scarves. But both temperatures are identical.
I’m having a conversation over a meal. I know I want to say something. But I get flustered formulating the thoughts, and take a huge bite instead. Now, the natural pause in the conversation happens just as I’ve shoveled three bites’ worth of food into my mouth. I indicate through facial expressions and hand gestures that I have something to say and that I want to keep the subject going, but of course, I need 20 seconds to quickly chew the absurd amount of food. Three minutes later, I will do the exact same thing again.
Not enough people listen to Elvis Perkins. This one is very fixable though.
When drinking a liquid, and it goes down the wrong way…of all the ways to ingest food/nutrients, drinking is the one we have practiced the most. Why do we still get it wrong?
We all rely on umbrellas, but they really don’t keep you dry below the waist. Our faith in them seems childish.
Our brains probably never stop working, and they process more information than any other device known to humans. But when asked, we usually say that “not much” has been up recently, even when we are eager for a conversation or a connection.
Leonard Cohen is 75, and he sounds happier about it and more at peace with it than anyone else on the planet is about anything else. I don’t want this fixed, by the way. I think it’s wonderful that it’s unfixable.
In spring, when the temperature hits 70 F for the first time, people take to the streets in what constitutes beach wear. In the fall, when the temperature finally drops to 70, people take out jackets and scarves. But both temperatures are identical.
I’m having a conversation over a meal. I know I want to say something. But I get flustered formulating the thoughts, and take a huge bite instead. Now, the natural pause in the conversation happens just as I’ve shoveled three bites’ worth of food into my mouth. I indicate through facial expressions and hand gestures that I have something to say and that I want to keep the subject going, but of course, I need 20 seconds to quickly chew the absurd amount of food. Three minutes later, I will do the exact same thing again.
Not enough people listen to Elvis Perkins. This one is very fixable though.
12 April 2009
Can I start a new genre of criticism?
I've been under the sway of the middle section of Essence of Decision. The second framework the authors look at is organizational theory perspective of historical analysis,which is endlessly fascinating to me.
As I watch "Lost" and "The Wire" (we're still in season 4), I keep thinking about how the structure of the organizations in which the characters exist impact their actions. In "The Wire," you have individual agents working within large, stagnant bureaucracies. To get things done, the agents must deliberately confound or undermine their organizational framework - in fact, they seem to thrive in the hand-offs between different departments, and they manipulate the hierarchy because, well, one exists.
The fact that the hierarchy is defined means that the individual agents can take advantage of the routines and idiosyncracies of their organizations, which often respond in predictable manners. Sometimes the ripples cause unexpected outcomes, but what is often exhilarating about the show (besides the fact that the writing makes process narratives seem very vivid and human) is seeing an individual actor taking on the inertia of their bureaucracy - not by challenging it, but by finding a large enough margin in which to operate.
"Lost" on the other hand features a bunch of confused actors. The hierarchies are undefined and very fluid. It's not even clear how many "organizations" exist on the show. And though the individual agents have complete freedom (or so it seems) to act and to do whatever they choose, they are routintely stymied not by routines and organizational inertia, but by the fact that they are operating in an organizational void. As viewers, we are slowly being introduced to different layers of the organization and its management structure, and the knowledge imbalance between someone like Ben Linas or Charles Widmore and everyone else is what temporarily creates a power structure that will, we hope, ultimately be completely flattnened.
Someone smarter than me should write about this extensively. And they should extend the discussion to "The Hudsucker Proxy." Good luck to whoever you may be, smarter person!
As I watch "Lost" and "The Wire" (we're still in season 4), I keep thinking about how the structure of the organizations in which the characters exist impact their actions. In "The Wire," you have individual agents working within large, stagnant bureaucracies. To get things done, the agents must deliberately confound or undermine their organizational framework - in fact, they seem to thrive in the hand-offs between different departments, and they manipulate the hierarchy because, well, one exists.
The fact that the hierarchy is defined means that the individual agents can take advantage of the routines and idiosyncracies of their organizations, which often respond in predictable manners. Sometimes the ripples cause unexpected outcomes, but what is often exhilarating about the show (besides the fact that the writing makes process narratives seem very vivid and human) is seeing an individual actor taking on the inertia of their bureaucracy - not by challenging it, but by finding a large enough margin in which to operate.
"Lost" on the other hand features a bunch of confused actors. The hierarchies are undefined and very fluid. It's not even clear how many "organizations" exist on the show. And though the individual agents have complete freedom (or so it seems) to act and to do whatever they choose, they are routintely stymied not by routines and organizational inertia, but by the fact that they are operating in an organizational void. As viewers, we are slowly being introduced to different layers of the organization and its management structure, and the knowledge imbalance between someone like Ben Linas or Charles Widmore and everyone else is what temporarily creates a power structure that will, we hope, ultimately be completely flattnened.
Someone smarter than me should write about this extensively. And they should extend the discussion to "The Hudsucker Proxy." Good luck to whoever you may be, smarter person!
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