Nicolas Almagro US Open 2012

Francesca Shiavone US Open 2012

She is the only player that plays practice as if it's a real match, and every point is a championship point.

Janko Tipsarevic US Open 2012

Christian Harrison US Open 2012

Note:  I am not 100% sure if he is indeed Ryan Harrison.  If he's not, let me know and my apology to this fine young man and Mr. Harrison as well.
UPDATE:  Maybe Christian Harrison.

Novak Djokovic US Open 2012

Andy Roddick - US Open 2012

Breaststroke

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Again

There are certain movies that are better watched on DVD where commentaries, captions, and replays are almost mandatory,  TTSS (2011) is one of them.  Despite its somewhat un-Hollywood pacing and directing, the DVD is kind of hot and I have to reserve it online and wait for its arrival at a public library near me.  Or it simply reflects how bad the economy is, nobody is buying DVDs (that's me), or people are simply watching it on demand via streaming or pirating?  I have no idea.

The movie is without a doubt based on the novel by John Le Carre.  It makes a few changes here and there, which is expected, but in essence it's still boring and confusing, hence easily confused to be cerebral, or maybe it is, and therefore very Le Carre.  Hong Kong and Czechoslovakia are excised from the film for whatever reason.  And Peter Guilliam turns pink instead of a straight up heterosexual dude in the book.  Rarely do I see a movie with that many ugly looking guys, OKAY, maybe just one, Toby Jones who has the rare talent to make all his co-stars better looking than they really or already are.  A very interesting face if you are diplomatic.  Jones is memorable in the film for all the right reasons, the "what's that shrug for" and the final "walk in the rain in shame and anger" scenes are probably among the best and easily eclipse others'.  John Hurt usually ages well in movies, with the help of make-up and lighting of course, but he definitely looks lumpy here and perhaps that's what the character calls for, a paranoid curmudgeon who is ultimately ousted from the Circus and dies alone in the hospital.  Gary Oldman is a miscast in appearance which I can easily overlook.  You simply can't make the guy look bad.  In the last shot, he is practically a male model rather than the short fat Smiley in ill fitting clothes that's portrayed in the book.  The entire ensemble cast is exceptionally delicious, everybody does his utmost to look serious and seriously paranoid.  One unexpected light moment perhaps is when Mark Strong's character Jim Prideaux shot Bill Haydon, played by Colin Firth who seems to be gay cast ever since A Single Man.  Prideaux sheds a tear which is corny and unexpected, so I found it funny.

If you enjoy nuance performance, subtitles and commentaries, the TTSS DVD will not disappoint.

Back Crawl

Fifty Shades of Grey

Unless you live under a rock or out of this world, you probably have heard of this so called mommy porn, Fifty Shades of Grey, E L James' fan fiction based on the tremendously successful Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer, which is a best seller in its own right and not so surprisingly soon to be a motion picture near you.  Of all the unbelievable stuff in the book, I found the bit that the protagonist Anastasia Steele doesn't have her own computer the most unbelievable.  And mind you the story is set in the very near past like 2010 or something and Steele is a college student major in English literature.  The book says she uses the computer at school or from work or share one with her housemate.  Wow.  I can't comment on all the mommy porn stuff as I am out of my depth in that department (OKAY, they are salacious, hot and funny).  I read the e-book version on my sucky htc EVO 4G from the library.  The whole process is not exactly intuitive and actually quite annoying, I got it work but don't ask me how.  The book is supposed to self destruct when expired so nothing to return.  The good thing about e-reading is nobody knows you are reading Fifty Shades of Grey.  Not that there is anything wrong with it.

Swim

Birkenstock Boston

Cutting grass in the backyard

Work is important.

Let the good time roll

We were at the cheesecake factory. I searched high and low, every nook and cranny, but still couldn't find any ribs on the menu. It's weird, unacceptable and above all disappointing. I am surprised the boys were given kids menus, that saved a bundle. I think I still like Outback better. This one in the mall is really big, 2-story tall. I had a 22 oz Stella and some pasta. We were full and had left-over to take home.

Unbelievable

Of all the unbelievable stuff I read from Fifty Shades of Grey, I found this one the most unbelievable:  Anastasia Steele, a college student, or a recently graduated student, doesn't own a computer, not desktop nor a notebook.  She has to use her roomate's or one from her part-time job or at school.  Wow!  She has an iPod though.

Taming of the Shrew

Nikkor 24mm f/2 and f/1.4 compared at f/2

Both at ISO100, f/2 and 1/5000s, no filter or lens hood.  So the mortgage your house lens is a clear winner in terms of color, contrast, sharpness, details (resolution) and even bokeh.  But that shouldn't be a surprise.  Both shot on tripod, live view manual focus.  If you can't tell which is which, congratulations.

(Note:  This cannot be a "fair" comparison as in comparing a current production that costs a whopping $2,000 to a out of production 1981 lens that costs at most 1/5 of the cost of the former in the secondary market.  The Nikkor 24mm f/2 is shot wide open while the f/1.4 lens is shot close down at f/2)

Ice Cream

Nikkor 24mm f/1.4 at ISO400, f/1.4 and 1/60s.  Focused on his right eye or the left eye on the picture.  I don't think there is a problem with the focusing.  NEF converted to JPEG, with a slight S curve adjusted, no USM or sharpening applied.

NOTE:  I got tons of emails asking me about the lens.  No, I don't own it.

Linsanity

Shot using a mortgage-your-house Nikkor 24mm f/1.4 at f/1.4 , 1/100s and ISO400 on the Flushing bound number 7 train.  I guess the only useful thing about this lens is to me, it can auto focus.  I find it increasingly difficult for me to manual focus my 24mm f/2 lens fast enough to grab the shot.  This f/1.4 is phenomenally quiet in focusing, I can't even hear the motor.

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

The latest movie adaption was released some time December 2011 with the nutty Gary Oldman playing George Smiley, the fatty, shorty and mouldy super spy whose lethal specialty is to bore his enemies to death, and the readers or audience as collateral along the way.  In John le Carre's meticulously constructed spy world, Smiley is like the Kate Moss of super spy, he is kind of old, kind of short, kind of retired but he's nevertheless proven to be the best that is out there and hence always in demand.  OKAY, not exactly Kate Moss but neither is Gary Oldman as far as physical resemblance is concerned.  The film is a reinterpretation and reimagination of the book, as such  I can easily over look any physical difference between the character in the book and in the film.  Unfortunately I overlooked way too much, I slept through the entire movie save for the very beginning and the end while being a captive audience on board of a Cathay flight over the Pacific.  I had no idea how good or bad the film was.  More importantly, the chance of better understanding the book via the movie was totally squashed.  So it was with utter disgust and dismay, I proceeded to read TTSS one more time, back to back in immediate succession.  Am I a masochist or what?  The book is a perpetual dread with confusing characters that have multiple worknames to compound the confusing factor, complicated plot lines with many tangled knots, and a timeline that goes forward, backward and sideways.  To understand the story, one must be exceptionally lucid because the story is anything but.  One is easy to get lost in le Carre's spy world in the best sense and worst sense of the word "lost."  The story, in a nutshell, is a simple one rather: Smiley is brought out of retirement because he is good, remember Kate Moss good, to hunt down a mole in the Circus.  And of course the devil is in the detail, and there are plenty of them.  In the end, the mole Gerald or Tailor as codenamed by Control the head of Circus, is caught and bored to death by George Smiley by his accusatory and lethal silence treatment.  Tailor is such a colorfully complex character personally (a bisexual painter who was born to inherit the Earth!) and professionally (a double agent, duh!) that it's impossible to know when and why (the decline of England as a world power and the hatred of America, really?) exactly he became a double agent for Smiley's nemesis Karla, the Russian spy master whom Smiley met when he was caught and jailed (boo boo boo ...) and probably felt some kind of kinship towards his archenemy--he let the man have his monogrammed lighter, a gift from his unfaithful wife Ann, the illusion of the illusionless man, Smiley.  Perhaps Karla gained Smiley's admiration because he never wavers his adherence to Moscow Centre even when returning to Moscow means death (Karla survived).  Gerald, on the other hand, chooses to betray his country, friends and lovers.  But the sin of all sins for Gerald, being a double agent is,(no, not screwing Ann, his cousin and Smiley's wife) he couldn't simply let his friend/lover die after he betrayed and "orphaned" him, which ultimately brings upon his own demise.  Fool.  In the end, the story is as much about espionage as it's about a yearning to connect, to make sense, to not to be lonely and to be loved--just like any other books or the movie The Avengers.