The Bourne Identity (2002)

Hum, sigh. I have had people recommend this movie, so when it was on Japanese TV last night, I watched it.

[WARNING! THERE BE SPOILERS AHEAD!]

It was the 2002 version (according to http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0258463/ the star was Doug Liman?). Lots of action, but the underlying story is that of an amnesiac trying to figure out who he is. Since he's a spy/assassin, this is complicated by his own folks being out to get him. And, of course, there is a love story. I think this is where I really had the most trouble with the film. He meets the girl in the street, offers her $10,000 to drive him to Paris, and of course things get complicated. But the main impetus to their sexual encounter seems to be him washing her hair and cutting it. This is to disguise her, although his buzz cut blond hair never gets touched?

And the shadowy bad guys who are running the outfit apparently wipe out their own head agent, just to clean things up. So Bourne is free to track down the girl (which apparently isn't too difficult) and there are hints of "and they lived happily ever after."

Apparently the incident that started the whole thing off was him being assigned to kill Nykwana Wombosi - and he finds him surrounded by children, and decides not to go ahead. In trying to get away, he is shot, which brings us full circle to the beginning of the movie. But . . . aside from the continued high-paced action, this seems like a hohum movie to me? I never felt terribly sympatico with the star - somehow that blond All-American boy didn't cut it for me as a role model - and the complications felt forced.

Why do people find this a good movie? Just the popcorn chewing action?

Keeping My Hands off the Keyboard

I sometimes forget that people don't know how I use a computer.

I have been using Dragon NaturallySpeaking for about 10 or 11 years -- the first version I got was still making a big deal about this being a continuous speech dictation system instead of requiring that you stop between each word. It certainly is not a perfect product, and I think the marketing that the current company -- nuance -- uses is severely flawed, but it is just about the only reason I am still able to use computers.

When I first started using it, I was having burning pains shooting from my hands into my upper arms. You could hand me a glass and about half the time I would drop it even though I thought I had it in my hand. The pains in my arms were waking me up at night. The doctors suggested immobilization, cortisone shots, and similar remedies if I insisted on continuing to type.

Or, they suggested, I could stop typing and start dictating. So I did. I pretty much stopped using my UNIX workstation and switched to a Windows system with Dragon NaturallySpeaking.

And after a period of not using a keyboard, using only Dragon NaturallySpeaking, the pains started receding. The first month probably saw the pains at my elbows or forearms, Probably six months after I stopped typing, I was pain-free for the first time in years -- I don't actually know when the pains started because they were such a slow growth.

Even now, doing a large paper and using the keyboard extensively for a day or two, I can start to feel pains in my hands. The knuckles hurt, little muscles and sinews ache, and I can start to feel the sinews in my forearms.

I use Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 Preferred. Daily. I also use a trackball because the mouse instructions really are not very good. And sometimes when I'm editing, I still use the keyboard. But I really can't use the keyboard on a regular basis.

When I read people saying that Dragon NaturallySpeaking is crud, or complaining that it doesn't handle foreign languages (they're right, I usually have to spell Japanese words or use the keyboard for them) -- I have to remind myself that the reasons for using it are different. Most people just want a toy, something that they can use occasionally as an alternative.

I don't have that luxury anymore. Dragon NaturallySpeaking is the way that I use the computer. And y'a know, it works for me.

Do you suppose salmon know the difference?

At lunch time, the furosato (home country) story on the news was about the salmon fishing up in Hokkaido. And I got to laughing. See, the announcers asked the owner of the yamazuke (salted preserved salmon) factory how to tell the difference between male and female salmon. So the owner lifts one in each hand, and says "Just look - the noses are different." And the announcers nod, as if this answered the question. But what I found especially funny was that in a similar show last week with a different salmon related bunch, the expert had told us to look at the eyes and the curve at the end of the lip!

I wonder if anyone has done a comparison of the various methods of identifying male/female salmon. It's the nose, it's the eyes, it's the curve of the lip. What fun.

Of course, each of them has plenty of practice, with the practical feedback of finding eggs or not. So their pet method probably does work - at least for them.

And I have a suspicion that they probably let their eyes glance at the width of the body and the fullness of the belly, in any case, which might be even more likely to give away the sexual orientation of the salmon in question, eh?