Richard Uhler

Thanks for posting this, Bob. Ofra's voice was (and of course still is) riveting.

I believe that's actually Thurl Ravenscroft singing. (Thurl provided the "Tony The Tiger" voice for Kelloggs cereal commercials, among other things.) I jumped to a conclusion, Karloff did the narration. But the song still rules. True!

I believe that's actually Thurl Ravenscroft singing. (Thurl provided the "Tony The Tiger" voice for Kelloggs cereal commercials, among other things.)

Wow, that takes me back. I *loved* Panzerblitz & Panzer Leader as a teen. I haven't played since my college years in the early '80s though.

You're welcome.

Yes: http://www.amazon.com/Alfred-Hitchcock-Pre...8990&sr=1-1

I'm sorry to hear this. My partner & I lived in Lakewood from 1999 until last December; it sounds like we picked a good time to leave. Although we never had such a problem as you described, it was obvious to us that the area was no longer as stable as we used to think it was. Nevertheless I enjoyed my years in Lakewood and will remember it with fondness.

Thanks. ALfonso Chris - Provocative idea! Anyone know how to find bestseller lists from the past so one could actually ask the "whatever happened to that book" question about bestsellers from the 1950s? Alfonso A Google search provided these, among others: http://www3.isrl.uiuc.edu/~unsworth/course...lers/best50.cgi http://www.hawes.com/no1_nf_d.htm Other than Atlas the only novels from 1957 on that first list that I've even heard of are Peyton Place and On The Beach, and I kinda doubt that either of these changed anyone's life as AS has done. (I did read Day Of Infamy from the NYT list as a teen, but the same comment applies.) Alfonso, I wonder what you had intended to say...? Just thanks. Alfonso Ah. You're welcome.

Right; On The Beach was on an optional reading list in a class I took when I was 13 or 14; I passed it over in favor of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, IIRC.

Thanks. ALfonso Chris - Provocative idea! Anyone know how to find bestseller lists from the past so one could actually ask the "whatever happened to that book" question about bestsellers from the 1950s? Alfonso A Google search provided these, among others: http://www3.isrl.uiuc.edu/~unsworth/course...lers/best50.cgi http://www.hawes.com/no1_nf_d.htm Other than Atlas the only novels from 1957 on that first list that I've even heard of are Peyton Place and On The Beach, and I kinda doubt that either of these changed anyone's life as AS has done. (I did read Day Of Infamy from the NYT list as a teen, but the same comment applies.) Alfonso, I wonder what you had intended to say...?

Chris - Provocative idea! Anyone know how to find bestseller lists from the past so one could actually ask the "whatever happened to that book" question about bestsellers from the 1950s? Alfonso A Google search provided these, among others: http://www3.isrl.uiuc.edu/~unsworth/course...lers/best50.cgi http://www.hawes.com/no1_nf_d.htm Other than Atlas the only novels from 1957 on that first list that I've even heard of are Peyton Place and On The Beach, and I kinda doubt that either of these changed anyone's life as AS has done. (I did read Day Of Infamy from the NYT list as a teen, but the same comment applies.)

Indeed. When I re-read the trilogy after seeing the films I merely skimmed the whole interlude-with-Bombadil section, thinking it a dull digression. I didn't miss it in the films at all.

Point taken.

I thought Casino Royale was loads of fun. Daniel Craig makes an excellent Bond - hard, cynical, driven, and with an undercurrent of personal dysfunction that makes his suave public face look interestingly false. Until I saw this film Sean Connery was, as far as I was concerned, The Only Bond Who Counted; but I would love to see Mr. Craig in further Bond films.

Thanks. I've never known any Objectivists in daily life; I have no idea what their actual attitudes towards these things are. Certainly a term like "swinging" is loaded language, but had the article in question called it polyamory I'd still have said to myself, "yes, and that's one place where she really screwed things up for herself and her movement." And it's a funny thing - having just typed that, I felt a sort of rush of compassionate affection for this woman I never met - as if knowing about her mistake drives home to me her humanity, makes her life more immediate in some way. That'll want some thinking about on my part.

And the difference is...?

...and I just got home with the DVD, which will provide this weekend's necessary catharsis. And maybe next weekend's too.

But...I think that many, many people are more likely to try to see others through the lens of their own attitudes and experience and get a distorted or completely false picture. That is to say, they see only what they wish, or only what they expect, or only what they are familiar with, and will try to force their perception of another into that "preset." One's real personal attitudes may not be visible to them at all. As an example, in my experience many people seem to insist on seeing both confidence and a reserved manner as arrogance; and they generally don't bother to find out if they're right or not.

I wonder if the cat, being a predator, is able to literally smell the onset of death in another animal, and so also in the humans involved here?

If the United States is attacked by Saudi and Egyptian commandos again, like 9/11, who should the US retaliate against? W. Any realistic suggestions?

What if it were built and launched from a sufficiently high orbit - would this legally circumvent the treaty? Your post pretty much answers my previous question on this general topic; thanks.

Sure, but this one keeps going around in circles. I want to see what's going on over at Gliese 581c! Seriously, I think that humanity has a need for a frontier built into it - not in all humans, but enough that it's an active factor. And we don't really have a frontier at the moment; sooner or later we'll have to create one.

Why not? If the ship was assembled in orbit and a landing craft included for use at the end destination, couldn't it be built as large as was needed (given sufficient funding, of course)? Using the Space Shittle (the tiled abomination which kills crews) it would take many expensive flights to build a very large vessel with a big enough section to rotate for centrifugal force (i.e. artificial gravity). We can't afford it. etc etc etc Ba'al Chatzaf Right. In general I agree with you, especially about the Shuttle; it's the AMC Gremlin of spaceships; it's an eight-track tape deck; it's a Commodore 64; it's bloody ugly. We'd be better off with unmanned cargo pods like the Russians have been using for decades. I don't have the figures but I'd be willing to bet that the cost and trouble of refitting the shuttle inch by inch and tile by tile in between missions and recovering the jettisoned rockets offsets any gain we achieve in using a "reusable" launch vehicle instead of an Atlas booster. All I was getting at was, is there a specific technical or engineering reason we couldn't make a centrifugal-spin module on a spaceship work, all other things being equal? My own layman's answer to all of this is ORION. Man oh man, would I love to see Orion fly in my lifetime! I'm not holding my breath, of course.

Why not? If the ship was assembled in orbit and a landing craft included for use at the end destination, couldn't it be built as large as was needed (given sufficient funding, of course)?

As I recall (I don't have time right now to look all through Expanded Universe and Grumbles From The Grave for the exact quote) RAH's attitude toward the Russians was essentially "We're not safe with them around - let's conquer and rule them." I expect his attitude toward the Islamic world post-9/11 would have been the same.