Happy Memorial Day.

As Memorial Day has become yet another homogenized holiday (as have all the rest), I actually had to Google it to get the full meaning of the day.

Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service...

...To help re-educate and remind Americans of the true meaning of Memorial Day, the "National Moment of Remembrance" resolution was passed on Dec 2000 which asks that at 3 p.m. local time, for all Americans "To voluntarily and informally observe in their own way a Moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever they are doing for a moment of silence or listening to 'Taps."

It’s sad, really, going back to my original tangent, how meaningless holidays are now compared to when I was younger. They mostly represent either a day off work, or an obligation to purchase a card or present, now. Which holiday it is simply defines what color the card is. Or maybe it’s just that I’m cynical in my old age.

Annnnd scene…

Speaking of obligations, I saw Star Wars last night.

meh.

The majority of the compliments I heard coming out of the theater (and my mouth) were along the lines of, “It was a hell of a lot better than the first two,” which, if you think about it, isn’t a compliment at all. I’ll go slightyl one better and say that the lightsaber battles were cool, the last 30 minutes or so where everything got wrapped up was cool, and Samuel L. Jackson was killed, which was great.

The dialogue, however, was horrible. The Lucas should really just stick to inventing new effects, or cut out the dialogue dramatically as in THX 1138.
>
“I love you!”
“I love you more!”
“Nu-huh, ’cause I love you the most!”

Atrocious… and just a little offensive.

And I know Natalie Portman can act… I don’t think even Meryl Streep could have made that script palatable.