We had ourselves a wee little earthquake earlier this week. It started out as a 5.2, but it’s since been downgraded to a 4.9. Either way it was about two magnitudes too small to relieve any significant fault stress and make “the Big One” less likely… but it was kind of cute, as quakes go.

So at 11:30pm last night, I found myself waiting in line for a midnight showing of Star Wars, Episode II. I had not been very enthusiastic about the Attack of the Clones in the first place, but Nancy was very insistent that we see it. So there we all were: Me, her, Pat, Sam, Sue, and Nancy’s dad. Nancy’s mom, however, was missing. I do not want to shirk my duty in pointing out that Nancy lost her disabled and elderly mother in the crowd.

But I digress. Here’s a quick take on the movie, with only one very indirect spoiler:

• Special effects and scenery: superb
• Dialogue: adequate to wretched
• Future Dark Lord of the Sith Anakin Skywalker: pouty and whiny
• Interesing hint of moral ambiguity regarding the bad guy: raised, and then casually thrown away

Lucas has always been a prodigy with technology… and the few interviews I’ve seen with him make him seem like an awfully nice, sincere guy… but why oh why can’t he write? Or trust others to do it for him? Very frustrating.

In Other News: Shari, a friend from my MOTWM class, set me a note about Jonathan Safran Foer, a young Jewish writer whose last name differs from mine by only one consonant. Foer has just published his debut novel, he’s three years younger than me, he’s getting rave reviews from the likes of Joyce Carol Oates and Kirkus Reviews, and he can apparently get away with referring to Nietzche multiple times when talking about his own writing.

But heck, forget Foer — at 24, he’s all washed up, isn’t he? If you want a real prodigy, there’s Aaron Swartz. Aaron is the member of several web standards committees, he co-authored RSS1.0, and he writes clearly and concisely (with a wicked sense of humor). And he’s fifteen years old.

On the other hand, things are going quite well for me these days. For example, at Tuesday Night Poker, this old man won ten dollars this week. I even got a natural Royal Flush in a seven-card stud hand. Unfortunately, as Page points out, I’m still seventy dollars in the hole, lifetime.

Well, that which does not kill you makes you stronger… or something like that.