OK. I am a geek, and really excited about the new X-Men movie. The trailer promises a good Phoenix story. I was also caught off guard by the quality of these HD previews online. I remember a few short years ago telling clients to not even consider online video due to the low quality. ha. ha. ha.

Warning: The X-men site seems a bit buggy. The sound effect would not shut off after I left the site ... then it wouldn't even shut off after I closed ALL browsers. I had to go shut-down the actual process. Not too much on the site yet anyway.

Eleven things I’ll always remember about 2005, in no specific order:

1. the wedding kiss
2. feeling Lake Michigan’s cold, soothing water after the Dune Climb
3. the quest for the Belt of Deltora with Sam
4. seeing the Pre-Raphaelites at Manchester Art Gallery
5. Erik buying ice for the Bears tailgating
6. meeting Lucas Cameron Wilson
7. fantasy baseball draft
8. celebrating Mom’s 60th birthday with her
9. eating crabs with the family in Annapolis
10. bee-sting in my mouth
11. starting a blog

When I was a kid and I would get my new issue of National Geographic World, I loved turning to the back and playing "What in the World?"

Now I can make my own!! Is this something REALLY BIG or really small (relative to an ostrich)??

So, I was playing around with Google Video, and I happened to find this amateur Batman short film. Suddenly distribution of films is becoming very, very easy. Now, I am not saying this is a great flick by any means. However, someone put a substantial amount of time into it, and I am impressed. The only short film I made was in 7th grade. A project called The Cell. My friend Romney Miller and I spent a whole day developing a film about cells. We turned it in to the teacher, and she didn't give us any sort of extra credit or anything. At least the internet provides a forum for people to share their under-appreciated projects.

Wednesday's word of wonder: Amphisbaena.

I particularly like the part about how one head stays awake while the other sleeps. What a great guard dog.

We saw Brokeback Mountain yesterday. It really deserves all the attention it is getting. Everyone is of course discussing the controversial love story at the heart of the movie and Heath Ledger's performance, which are both amazing. (Coupled with The Ice Storm, Lee is obviously very talented at making viewers feel incredibly uncomfortable about love circles.) However, I was taken back by Lee's mouth-gaping capture of the landscapes. WOW! Of course, the natural beauty is only on display during the time the guys are together. The other scenes in the movie have pretty mundane backdrops. Very well achieved Mr. Lee. Another recommend on my side.

Imaginiff... This is the name of one of the games Mary got for the family. It is a lot of fun, and really there is no reason to fork over "a few Hamiltons" to BGi Games. It is pretty easy to just do yourself.

I am not going to explain all the rules, write me an e-mail if you really want more. But the basic gist, is you pick 8 people that all the game-players know to write on the board. Then through the random roll of a die, one person is selected to be the subject of a question. All questions start with, "Imagine if" and then it would be "Cameron were a superhero, who would he be?" or "Imagine if Mary woke up in a burning house, what would be the first thing she grab?" Then they give you 6 multiple choice answers. And everyone has cards numbered 1-6. You put it the answer you think face-down and then the people who agree on the most popular answer get to move forward. [The above answers were Batman and family photos.]

If you are a brand-planner-strategic-type-person (like I am on occasional days ... although, as my Dad pointed out yesterday, he (like most people) isn't exactly sure what I do.) this game is something that we already play with brands. Pick-it up for brainstorming and expense it.

If you aren't in the industry, the game is still great. We found out some interesting things. For instance, we felt the piece of advice that Sam would fulfill was "always tell the truth" (with statements like, "this is not the best dinner I have ever had" or "when I hit the ditch the bike seat hit my penis.") He felt it was, "Trust no one." Which I guess as a parent you feel very safe with that.

Anyway, highly recommended game. We used both cats as characters, it worked well. Although poor Dixie's answers were always food oriented. Furthermore, the game recommends using celebrities and characters. Hmmmm .. if Napoleon Dynamite were on a crashing plane, what would he do? Bust out the tots, for sure.

Thank you SNL for "The Chronic(what?) cles of Narnia!" Click the button if you haven't seen it and want some good ole Parnell/Samberg rappin'

and thanks Ian for the button

I hate myself for buying DVDs and CDs. I know they are a thing of the past. Still, there is something about having them, right? I remember back in my Introduction to Media class in undergrad, they talked about one cable that would come into the house and supply all information, on demand (well, we didn't call it that back then). That is funny to think about ... because let's face it. That ain't happening.

It'll all be wireless.

Anyway, my new favorite music provider is courtesy of our friends at Pandora, where I currently have three stations: Chill Out Music, Rock Radio and Soul Sounds. "The Music Genome Project" seems to make some great recommendations on new tunes... The cool thing is if you are just in the mood for one performer, you can set a station to that person and get music that is ONLY synced with that one artist, or even one song. [Side note: Can someone explain to me why the Blogger spell-check does not have the word 'blog' in its dictionary?]

Sam's big brown eyes ... are really freaky in a negative.

I know many of you did not get to see any wedding photos since ... well, we didn't really have any. However, Sam did get a great shot of the first kiss. I know we got married over 6 months ago, but hey at least I finally got it on the blog, right?

Required reading. My brother is currently reading the Dave Eggers edited Non-required Reading. Ironically, it got me thinking about the great required readings I have had in the past. And to get in the holiday theme, I am making a list and I may check it twice. Here are the top 10 required readings I had that made me realize the power of words, diction, literature, imagination and all those other important literary things.

J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in The Rye/ Nine Stories
Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Shakespeare’s Hamlet/King Lear
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby
Raymond Chandler’s The Long Goodbye
Keats' Eve of St. Agnes, La Belle Dame Sans Merci and Ode on a Grecian Urn
George Bernard Shaw’s The Arms and the Man
Herman Melville’s Moby Dick
William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying
George Orwell’s Animal Farm

OK, I know I get no politically-correct points because I picked 10 dead white British/American guys, but oh well. And I am not saying this is the best stuff I have ever read, or even the best required stuff I ever read. These were just the works that I read and something clicked … I understood why these collections of words were so great and so important. It was partially these works that got me from failing 9th and 10th grade English to getting nearly a 4.0 in my English classes in college as a major. (I would have a 4.0 if it weren’t that darn Moby Dick paper where I had to try and fly in the face of my professor’s teachings. I should have just done Young Goodman Brown like everyone else. Oh well.)

Today I got a really nice compliment. Someone said, "Cameron, I bet you find a way to make any meal special." Now granted, she may have been commenting on my gracious mid-section, but I think there was more to it. I do think food is a great way to make something special out of an everyday occurrence. Some people do this with fashion and their clothes or decorating their home; however, I do like to make the most out of my meals and consider it a grand achievement that someone basically unfamiliar with me would make such a comment. I owe it to my mom for sure, who taught me the power of food. That and the good Cajun upbringing. It is amazing what a little bit of extra effort on presentation and meal planning can do for the whole experience. I'll close with this lovely Caprese and salami salad we recently enjoyed.

On this the day BEFORE winter BEGINS (even though the high in Chicago is 21), I wanted to take a look back at summer. However, I picked a picture that at least shows Sam (with cousin Patience) casting summer away into the dark grey abyss. (Photo credit: Mary Maddux)

I have a new definition for cold. I wore cold-temperature sport socks, plus an extra pair of regular athletic socks, North Face all-weather boots, Hanes extra-thick boxer-briefs, jeans, North Face snowpants, thermal shirt, long-sleeved t-shirt, hooded sweatshirt, cotton vest, winter coat, ski gloves, a head sleeve, a knit hat, both hoods … a beard … and I was still really, really cold at the Bears game. I mean ridiculously cold. WOW!

We made it to half-time. Lost one of our members to trespassing (on the field … I’ll fill you in on the details as soon as the judge removes the gag order.) I could tell you about how this same person bought ICE for our tailgating, but you wouldn’t believe me. And my head nearly split with a headache created by some Norse god of hate.

It was AWESOME. Go Bears!! I had a blast. And every time I am cold for the rest of my life, I’ll be able to say, “Sure it is cold, but not cold like at that Bears game!!”

King Kong, I guess gets a B+. At first I wanted to give it up to the fact of how could Peter Jackson follow-up Lord of the Rings? Once you take someone up to that pinnacle of fantasy/creature storytelling how do you keep going? I just started reading Will’s World (Stephen Greenblatt’s award-winning biography of Shakespeare) and it got me to thinking how Shakespeare would just switch tones and themes in his plays and continue to achieve the most amazing plays ever put to paper. (Side note: In Neil Gaiman’s great The Sandman comic book series Morpheus has a wing in his library completely devoted to stories that were dreamed up but never put to paper. I hope my afterlife involves this place. You’ll find me scampering between Shakespeare and Twain.) Anyway, I’m getting way off subject. King Kong.

The special effects went beyond anything I had expected. As a zoology freak (anyone still looking for a present for me? “The Life of Mammals,” “The Life of Birds” and “The Blue Planet” DVD boxed sets are always a safe bet), I was amazed at how real King Kong looked. You really had to stop and think … wait I am not watching an actual giant ape. I cannot imagine anyone ever creating a better King Kong. You simply can’t mimic an ape any better. The fight scenes were the best giant monster battles of all time. The raw power and carnage was total fun. The scene did a great job of capturing depression era New York.

There was something missing from the relationships of the characters in the story. This is really the only complaint I have, but it is kind of the core of what makes the great movies great. But, I am not going to elaborate. I hate to color perceptions. Personally, I had a tough time connecting with the characters and I also believe it has more to do with the script than the acting. The acting was amazing. Some of the reactions they had to what you know must have been a gigantic green screen were phenomenal. Funny to think how today’s acting schools probably have a whole class devoted to “reacting to the green screen.”

Anyway, go see this movie … the movie theater was created for this type of experience.

No really, this is Alabama. Who had any idea? Anyway, I had the joy of experiencing Talladega National Forest right after a major rainstorm. The reason there are so many pictures of waterfalls is because (a) they are easy to make beautiful and (b) they shout at you to come see them. Check out some tranquility here

Shakespeare and Haagen Daaz

Last night, Sam and I were talking about his school friend Carter. I asked him, "We should have him over; where does he live?"

Sam said, "I don't know..."

Later that night, he jumped online to play this game RuneScape. He is a mage or ranger or something, scouring the world, slaying spiders and fellow competitors. While playing, he said, "Where's Carter?" A light went off in my head as I noticed he was more concerned about where Carter was in this online world than his actual residence in our neighborhood. RuneScape-- where Sam can be playing with a kid in Japan just as easily as next door...

OK, time for me to build a RuneScape character.

Oh- by the way ... my cell phone was lost/stolen yesterday afternoon on a 4-minute interval through the Merchandise Mart, CTA Station and Chicago Brown Line train stop. I have a new one on the way, but I won't have it until Thursday. It is much like losing your wallet ... it is not the money, it is the trouble of getting a new driver's license etc. I don't miss the phone, but the numbers!

So, please ... e-mail me your phone numbers so I can enter them into my new phone. Thank you.

I finally did it. I lost a piece of Cajun yesterday. I walked into The North Face and bought a pair of snow pants! Despite having spent about 88% of my life in Southern Louisiana and East Texas, I have purchased clothing that will allow me to have comfort during extended periods of snow-playing. Yes, the fact that I am going to Soldier Field for a night game in late December did play a role in pushing me over the edge. But what a commitment. No longer will I stand to the side while Mary and Sam dive into the snow. No longer will my snow forts need a blanket for kneeling on. No longer will I experience the bow-legged gait of walking home from sledding and then the pain of peeling wet and frozen jeans from my body. No, I have given up myself to the winter. This is a major purchase, $150 … and these aren’t all that stylish. Not like I dropped that for some Diesel jeans. Well, I’m sure we’ll get some pics of said pants soon. But, the contract is signed in scientifically-proven fabrics … I’m going to stay in Chicago for a bit.

So, I just made a resolution at the Aquafina Resolution site. I have decided to "have more fun at work."

However, it was a close second to finding the actor in this Flash piece and breaking him.

As promised, here are some pictures of little Lucas Cameron Wilson. He is absolutely darling, a real treasure. I am not sure who is luckiest, Anthony and Jeanette for having such a wonderful little baby, or Lucas for having such caring, loving parents ... or me for getting to know and spend time with all of them. Enjoy the pics.

What a wonderful day! My friends Anthony and Jeanette just brought a new baby into the world! His name is Lucas Cameron Wilson. Wow. I am so incredibly freaking happy! But, I am also massively tired. Reports and presentations and facilitating a focus group today ... but I am going to see them this weekend. I will be back with pictures... Congratulations to the family.

If you ever get the chance to see the Kaiser Chiefs ... take it. They were the best thing about Lollapalooza ... well besides the smell of baked brains... BRAINS!

My friend Anthony has a book coming out next month. Check out Shadow And Shelter: The Swamp in Southern Culture . If you have any library contacts, be sure to mention that this book is a MUST-HAVE for their collection. Good job Anthony.

Belated photo credit.