Cuppacafe

Here's Leno's monologue from Monday night. Basically, Leno says nothing but how he saw things shake out. I don't watch Leno, and I don't watch Conan, but this late night drama has been a hoot to watch. This looks like it's going to wrap up quietly. We'll see.

Oh, and I'm trying out TMZ's video app. Let's see how this works!

So, you might have heard, Sarah Palin is now a commentator on Fox News. Ya gotta wonder how that’s gonna turn out (and will she quit halfway through her contact).

Still, all of the news these days isn’t goofy silliness, there was this thing that happened in Haiti:

Until Dick Cavett comes back on the air, I’ll stick with Jon Stewart.

The Perfessor

So, the holiday toy shopping season is long since past but there are those of us toy geeks who like looking back over the past years and remembering not only toys from our youth, but the really cool items. Well here’s a nifty site that has tracked the hottest-selling toy for Christmas for the past 50 years.

As can be expected, toys have become more electronic over the years, with some of them being truly odd. In 1960 it was Barbie, 1970, Nerf balls held the high spot, 1980 Rubic’s Cube, While 1990 was the Super Soaker, and 2000 was the Razor Scooter. Anyway, you can check out the whole list here.

The Perfessor

I just read an article about the top 10 most anticipated films of 2010, While I agree with most of the choices, I have to say that (for me) the single most anticipated film of this year is the following:

The Expendables
Release Dates: August 13 (US), TBD (UK & AU)

No, this isn't a remake of the obscure Vietnam War film. The Expendables is a tribute to every cheesy action movie the '80s ever gave birth to. The plot, such as it is, sees a team of trigger-happy soldiers sent to oust a South American dictator. In true B-movie fashion, a few good men and a lot of explosions are all that's necessary to fight off hordes of faceless bad guys.

The premise may be simple, but the casting is where things get really interesting. Sylvester Stallone directs and stars in The Expendables. Joining him are a Who's Who of action movie giants, including Jet Li, Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, Micky Rourke, Bruce Willis, and even the Governator himself, Arnold Schwarzenegger. How could you not want to see a movie with those names attached? If you need a testosterone boost this summer, we bet The Expendables will send you to the emergency room with a serious overdose.

You had me at “...a tribute to every cheesy action movie the '80s ever gave birth to”

The Perfessor

Anyone with an SLR type camera has thought about making long exposure "trick" photography. I remember making my first "ghost" photos about 25 years ago. Simple ones where one person stays still, and the the other is in the photograph for only half of the exposure. You can see through the person that moved.

You can also choose to paint with light. Have people interact with the objects you create by moving a flashlight around. It only takes a few hundred long exposure photos, a lot of planning and lots and lots of patience. These Russians are a strange lot.

"Samolet Gallery" Promo from FREEZELIGHT.RU on Vimeo.

Some people have a thing about the Red Cross. I don't trust the Red Cross to judiciously use its resources dontated to it. Through some anecdotal issues, I decided some time back that I would never again donate to the Red Cross.

So, when the ability to text money aid to Haiti came about, I thought it was a great idea -- until I found out that the Red Cross gets the money from the text number most advertised by most major news sources -- and even Hillary Clinton of the State Dept.

The interface between texting and the phone company and the charity is being facilitated by mGive [http://www.mgive.com/]

So this post is to advertise other charities you can text Haitian aid to:

* Text HAITI to 25383 to donate $5 to International Rescue Committee
* Text HAITI to 45678 to donate $5 to the Salvation Army in Canada (for you Canadians up there)
* Text YELE to 501501 to donation $5 to Yele
* Text RELIEF to 30644 to get automatically connected to Catholic Relief Services and donate money with your credit card
* Text HAITI to 864833 to donate $5 to The United Way
* Text CERF to 90999 to donate $5 to The United Nations Foundation
* Text DISASTER to 90999 to donate $10 to Compassion International
and you can still
text HAITI to 90999 to donate $10 to the American Red Cross

I'm also not a big fan of The United Way either.

I'm not a Catholic, but I'd lean toward Catholic Relief Services [http://crs.org/].
Yele has had some issues [WashPo] and is probably a bit too politically severe for some out there.