Things I learned (or had re-validated) today:

1. Orlando Bloom is, according to Rebecca and a friend, “bangin’”. Except when he has curly hair, which apparently cancels out his bangin’-ness.

2. Gene Hackman looks a lot like my father.

3. I will never again, under any circumstances try on a bathing suit in a retail store of any kind. This has nothing to do with the scary results of fluorescent lighting, but rather the number of “sanitary liners” that were pasted to the walls of a dressing room I was in today. I find it hard to believe that all of these were from bathing suits that were destined to be purchased (or shoplifted) by the women who tried them on.

4. The range of those vibrating devices that restaurants use to alert you to your turn arriving to put on the feedbag is not as far as they would lead you to believe.

5. Scrapbooking is an amazingly expensive hobby, around which an entire industry has been constructed out of paper, scissors, stickers and glue. Forget about those high tech stocks – as the economy’s momentum returns invest in those companies that feed the need of women to fill their idle time.

6. It is impossible to exit K-Mart or Target without spending as much as Martha Stewart is investing in her defense team.


Movies: Runaway Jury. I read the John Grisham book on which this was based, although I have no recollection of the story. Pretty standard fare - well-made, glossy, not a lot of surprises, interesting actors in not very interesting situations.