I am under the impression I should be posting to this a lot more than I am. Four days is a rather long gap for what is, officially, the most frequently-updated part of my site. But hey, it's been a long weekend, though, so hopefully that will excuse this and the fact that I've done absolutely no revision, even though my exams are in exactly one week -- a timespan that has gone from embarrassing to scary in a surprisingly short space of time. I should be studying right now, of course, but since I've watched three movies, done two loads of laundry, cooked and done the washing up twice I don't think procrastination holds any fears for me right now.

I am more than slightly scared at this news (from SlashDot of course) that Amtrak lets the Drug Enforcement Administration have a link into their passenger database in order to track the movements of suspects. This would be scary enough in the big brother style, but even better, in return the DEA gives Amtrak a cut of the proceeds from seized property if any arrests are made! Fantastic! They are literally paying the train company for tips, by contract. Let me reiterate how determined I am to stay the hell out of the US -- not that the UK is any better, but at least there doesn't seem to be the active decline going on in the US. I used to think Titan (the one by Stephen Baxter) was the most depressing science fiction novel I'd ever read, but now I think it may have just been prophetic.

Speaking of which, I finally saw Dogma last night, and it truly is a fantastic movie, everything I expected. Alanis was a little bit lame, and you could tell they'd skimped on the special effects in a couple of places (notably the end of the movie) but it can be forgiven by virtue of actually having a good script, a real rarity. One movie without a good script and certainly without good acting was Spice World, the Spice-folk merchandising vehicle complete with an actual merchandising vehicle in the form of the Spice Bus. It happened to be on the BBC today (one of the three movies above) and as usual I enjoyed it immensely despite these lacks. Like Metrosexuality and more generally MTV, it is a continuous succession of pretty shiny images and occasionally hilarious one-liners, entertaining even for those with a 15-second attention span. Unlike the latter two, however, Spice World has no pretensions to deeper meaning at any point, and thank goodness. If you just suspend your disbelief by a good strong chain and check your brain at the door, it's great fun. Like anything, come to think of it.