Got a haircut from my sister last night. Her kids are insane. The older one is in a play at school and was endlessly repeating his lines (he plays a cashew) while the younger one kept trying to go for a ride in the dryer, something his dad taught him. No grad school for that one.

In 1997 the last Geo Metro rolled off the assembly line in Canada. It had a 55hp inline three cylinder engine, driver and passenger airbags and a four star safety rating.

The 2008 Smart car has a 70hp inline three cylinder engine, driver and passenger airbags and a four star safety rating.

The Smart car gets 33 city and 41 highway, and the Metro got 44 city and 49 highway. Oh, and the Metro had a back seat.

That's not a lot of progress for ten years of automotive design.

Yeah, I know, it's been a while.

You know how life is not like it is in the movies? Well, it's our own fault. Every week something happens to me that I later realize was the screenwriter's attempt to get the plot moving, and I always seem to ignore it. For example, a few weeks ago I saw a homeless guy who had made the interesting sartorial choice of wearing what looked to be the torn and soiled remnants of a Biosafety Level 4 containment suit, with severed tubes dragging behind. His hair and beard were long and unkempt and he had what I can only describe as an... unsettling look in his eyes.

Just think of the rousing adventure fighting shadowy government operatives and saving the world from a manufactured plauge brought back in time from a dystopian future that I did not have by avoiding eye contact with this obvious plot hook.