T w e n t y S i d e d

Short post this week, because I’m sick. Most of the house is sick, actually. This is a rural, farming area, and this time of year the temperature is fluctuating between the 60’s and the 90’s, there is a constant cloud of fine dust in the air, and drifting mildly-carcinogenic chemicals. Because people in this area would rather pay the price in health for the lowest expenses and highest profit-margins, it’s probably not going to change until the constantly decreasing water supply, underlying Dust Bowl 2 conditions, and steadily increasing earthquakes render the region unproductive, if not absolutely unlivable. I was going to write about movies that have a bad reputation that I think are actually quite good. I’m not talking about “so bad it’s good” like The Room or Battlefield Earth, or generally enjoyable for what they are B-movies or micro-budget Corman successes. I mean movies that zigged when they were supposed to zag, and so were dismissed. Movies that failed to meet expectations and were forgotten. I got the list up to two, and had developed arguments for both (in my head), then as I searched for a third movie to do, I forgot what the first movie was. Somehow, it just completely escaped my mind. The second film was M. Night Shayamalan’s The Village which was set up by expectations from Shayamalan’s previous movies to the extent that people, I think, failed to view it from different perspectives. It actually has some pretty deep narratives and implications (and a really cute love story) if you just adjust your perspective a bit. BUT I CAN’T REMEMBER WHAT THE FIRST MOVIE WAS, and now I’m short-circuited.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Drive-thru Burger Trends”

Paige Francis He/him

Interesting story behind that splash image at the top. I was pretty pleased with myself getting all the upgrades and repairs for the bathroom done, so I went looking for an image about “success.” The marquee ad for the 1923 Metro Pictures movie Success seemed the most appealing easily clippable Public Domain image on the first page of Wikimedia Images search. After editing, I figured I better look up the movie in case I was making a statement I didn’t want to support…I mean, the movie may have been about the rise of fascism or something. But believe it or not, it’s EVEN MORE applicable. Well, not the movie itself. I would call Success a twist on the famous and beloved Charlie Chaplin movie Limelight, except Success premiered in 1924 and Limelight appeared in 1952. But don’t get excited, Limelight is just one of the best-known versions of this type of story (and arguably is more of a “cousin” story). Actor is unable to deal with his phenomenal success, ruins his life with {insert here; drink in this case}, abandons his family including his young daughter Rose. Years later he tries to make a comeback, is hired as a dresser for the *big star,* his daughter Rose is the co-star and the subject of shenanigans, *big star* can’t perform, the has-been goes on stage and achieves wild “success”, a happy ending ensues for everyone.

But that’s not important. See at the top of the splash image, where it says the money man was Murray W. Garsson, Inc.? Murray Wolfe Garsson came to New York from England as a two-year-old in the 1880’s. He apparently achieved “success” in real estate and movies in the 1910s and 1920s, and got involved in the U.S. government in the 1930s, first in the Department of Labor and later as a civilian working for the House of Representatives. After the outbreak of World War II, Garsson and his brother used his government connections to secure munitions contracts for a non-existent company. After acquiring the contracts the Garssons partnered with two men who fabricated watch cases and compact mirrors to produce faulty mortar shells. Garsson’s inside man was Kentucky congress-person Andrew May, who just so happened to chair the extremely powerful and influential House Military Affairs Committee. May pressured dozens of government agencies and departments to throw business and other favors to the Garssons and their friends. The entire scandal was discovered after the war by a Senate committee investigating the fake munitions business due to the high failure rate of their product. May and both Garssons were sentenced to a few years in prison. Murray was flat-broke upon release, and died a few years later. His brother Henry lived until 1983 in obscurity. The crooked Congress-person served nine months while appealing his case all the way to the Supreme Court (which refused to hear his appeal). Despite this, he was still popular and influential in the Democrat Party, and President Truman issued a full pardon in 1952. Democrats *did* reject his attempts to re-enter politics, so he returned home and practiced law (he wasn’t disbarred or punished in any way for actually breaking the law) until his death in 1959, two years after Murray Garsson.

A very modern scandal, and at least May had a very modern success story. One that could be in the news today. Oh, and Murray’s first wife was named “Rose,” and I wonder if she was the namesake of the character “Rose” in Success. Which in turn makes me wonder how involved Garsson was with the production. I can’t find any information. But I didn’t come here to tell you any of that.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Bathroom Done, and the View From Nar Shaddaa”

Paige Francis He/him

This is a Star Wars: The Old Republic post for two reasons: one is the continued home improvement, which is going well. No pics, at least not for now…you don’t want to look at my bathroom renovation and I don’t particularly want to share it. I reserve the right to change my mind; as I started out thinking “sure, I can do plumbing repair and replacement, right?” to having accomplished “most” of the repairs and replacements over the past week. There is certainly a difference between knowing how to do something in your mind and actually having the experience of doing it. The biggest challenge remains: I need to replace the bathtub/shower handle and valve, which will require shutting off the water supply to the house. I actually wasn’t too worried about it until I tested, or tried to test, the new shower head and faucet. The connection to the valve for the faucet leaked horribly. Like, spraying water. I don’t know if it was leaking already; I don’t think so. I am guessing I damaged it during the installation of the new faucet. And now I’m worried the connection is actually damaged. I should find out tomorrow.

I spent the entire week in Tropico experimenting with strategies to increase my citizen’s happiness level as I grow my population. In my previous scenario successes, the average happiness of my Tropicans usually wound up between 35 and 40. If you remember, there was one training scenario that required you to finish with an average “Housing” happiness of 60. The solution there was to build a large amount of luxury Housing and Condominiums. As there was only one completion requirement, the moment you reached 60 the scenario was finished. You could hyper-focus on meeting that criteria at the expense of everything else. (NOTE: only to an extent. Even in the training scenarios, if you go into debt over $10,000, you will be get a College-educated wage cap. If you stay $10,000 in debt for another year, you will receive a High School-educated wage cap. If you stay in debt for ANOTHER year, you will receive a global wage cap. And if you STILL don’t fix it, you will be kicked off your island. So, you know, you can’t *completely* ignore your economy.)

But back in the present, the “Born Again” scenario requires both 300 Tropicans *and* an average overall (not just housing) happiness of 300. Last week I determined this would require learning a new strategy. As of Saturday, I can reliably reach 200+ citizens with 50 overall happiness. This should indicate I am on the right path and just need to optimize my building order and timing. Each play-through of the scenario reaches new experimental ground, which also introduces some new error in my thinking. I thought I had the problems licked yesterday, but once I hit 54 happiness I found myself scrambling to get the last 50 immigrants on my island while maintaining happiness. To address this, I have two possibilities to explore: I have been using an immigration office to help boost…well, immigration. I use this early on to get some skilled workers specifically, but I also noticed I’m not attracting many people to my high school. I will still use the immigration office to increase overall immigration, but I’m going to try a Presidential Edict I’ve never used before: the Contraception Ban. This will hopefully increase home-grown (heh) Tropicans, and also increase home-EDUCATED Tropicans.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “So When You Say “Dailies”… (SWTOR, Tropico, Plumbing)”

Paige Francis He/him