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Here's what I know I know:

1. It's been hotter and more humid for longer than any other summer that I remember being or living in New York. The really bad hot/humid weather usually lasts for a couple weeks in mid August but the rest of it is bearable. This year it started in early June and just lingered. It hung around like a bad relative, unwilling or unable to leave. I measure this by how many times I have to turn on the air conditioning in my apartment because at the current Con Ed rates, if I turn it on, it'd better be because parts of me are melting off my body.


2. Summer movies blow if you're an adult. I enjoyed Mamma Mia and that had no real weight whatsoever. It was over the top splendor, ridiculous camp and a solo by Meryl Streep that took a mediocre song like "The Winner Takes it All" and actually made it about something real. Poor Pierce Brosnan though; cringe-worthy singing and mind numbing exposition "I have been trying for two days to tell you that I'm divorced but I can't seem to find you while staying in your own hotel on this tiny Greek island" Sheesh. Whatever they paid him, it wasn't enough. But everyone had a good time and people were singing in the audience and it's been one of the highlights movie-going wise.


3. Remakes of old creations are good if they stay true to their material. Sex and the City used their 2 and a half hours wisely by simply giving us where Carrie and Company would be at this point of their lives. Still fabulous and still sexy. OK and over-dramatic (although the bit about the plot hinging on Charlottes daughter swiping Carrie's cell phone when Big is trying to call her is abit convenient but I'm willing to let it slide because everything that comes from it was so good).


4.However, Indiana Jones... sigh. I wanted to like the movie so much and I thought it did an admirable job... but it stayed with me afterwards and not in a good way. I kept trying to be excited by the movie but I realized I wasn't and worse, if/when the next one comes out, we have to live with a character named Mutt Williams rather than Indiana Jones? Ugh.


5.I had hopes about the X Files movie but then I heard that creator Chris Carter not only never had a "bible" of the shows mythology but none of it was going to be used in the movie. Uh oh Number One. Then when I saw a trailer and I was utterly unmoved, not a ripple or tingle anywhere, well, it was uh oh Number Two. But then I heard that the plot hinges on (spoiler alert) a gay man that wants his head put on a woman's body. Or some such nonsense. The blogs gave me the low down and while I avoid most gay blogs as over hysterical about this type of thing (my people can really be over sensitive and this coming from the King of Sensitivity), I couldn't avoid it and furthermore, was really turned off and disappointed. So uh a sort of anti gay movie. Well, uh oh number three and strike out. Maybe I'll rent it when it comes out on DVD...


6. Note to X Files creator Chris Carter: alienating your fan base (by telling them all those hours trying to connect the dots of the alien mythology were meaningless, because there wasn't anything to connect) won't bring in the mainstream, it'll just piss off the ones who would have made your movie the big success it should have been. How Hollywood can't seem to learn this lesson is beyond me. Producers of LOST, this should be a wake up call for you. As the heir apparent to the mythology driven show, please for God's sake make sure the series makes sense by the end of the run and for no reason whatsoever NEVER tell us that you were making it up as you went along. We suspect as much, try to prove us wrong. Please.


7. Which reminds me, six more months til the next season of LOST starts. Sigh.


8. Which reminds me, whatever happened to summer reruns? (OK I know that they phased out years ago but I never missed them more until last night I was flipping around the channel during prime time and never have I seen such a collection of out and out crap on the tube before!)


9. Wall-E was brilliant. Nothing more to add other than to reiterate that Pixar generated a more complex character in the first five minutes of the cockroach character in Wall E than Kevin Costner did with his character in the entirety of Swing Vote. The cockroach was infinitely more believable too.


10. I doubt I'll see The Dark Knight but it's grossed $400 million in 18 days and columnists are chuckling at the fan boys who are looking to topple the $600 million domestic gross of Titanic a decade ago. Hmm. Nothing encourages a bunch of fan boys more than Hollywood telling them that something can't be done. I think the gauntlet has been thrown down in what seems like a well orchestrated maneuver to make sure the flick spins to 600 mil in record time. And by the way, writer Martin Pasko makes a point on his Facebook page saying that he's worried about what the PR flaks have in store for Michael Caine and Aaron Eckert now that a number of Batcast have made headlines (and none in particularly good shape... Morgan Freeman, get well!!)


11. I need a vacation and badly but I cannot afford it and even if I could, the price of fuel would cripple me and the add ons of air travel would break me. That leaves rail travel. I'm glad I live on the east coast where rail travel is actually realistically possible. I can actually get somewhere without needing a sleeper car. So I'll continue to do 'staycations' in the city on the weekends although that's not really the same thing as, you know, leaving the island once in awhile.


12. My back pains of the last week were a result of a. general lack of exercise, b. stress, c. sitting slumped over a computer too long and too frequently and d. lifting a heavy box that aggrevated the 'bad place' on my back. I'm doing things to alleviate it including going to a chiropractor who has already worked wonders in just two sessions. However since my copay is $30 I'll have to curtail how many sessions I can afford and hope that I am completely well by the time my coverage peters out. But again, universal health care is for Communists. Whatever.


And that's some things that I know today.