Disney buys LucasFilm: My Initial Opinion

Everyone has been asking my opinion on Disney buying LucasFilm and making more Star Wars movies. (At least 2 people. I know. Crazy.)  I realize I have been opinionated about this in the past, but now I am hesitant to say much.

Disney can restore Star Wars to the beloved series that it is if:

1. Cut CGI by 90%. Make sets. Use Models. Use actors. Even use puppets. The magical quality of the original movies was that everything looked real because it was. 
2. Make the Thrawn Trilogy into the next movies (please lock the ideas George has been retooling for years in a box and place it under the next theme park). 
3. Stop making toy designs first. Make a quality movie and the toys will sell themselves for years. Otherwise you have to keep making new content just to sell a toy that will only sell for a few months.

This could be the best thing ever for Star Wars or the  final nail in the coffin. Either way I will be happy. I will get quality content or I will be able to finally forget the entire series.

Plane Report

I made another cross country flight yesterday. I took some notes about what I was doing/thinking about on the way.

• I kinda like weird cheese.
• Men in Black 3 - Thumbs up.
• Chocolate Chip Cookies are better when traveling faster than 400 MPH or while above 35,000 ft (possibly both).
• Playing Pocket Planes on a plane is a little like Inception.
• Seeking a Friend for the End of the World makes you evaluate your life. Not sure that makes for the best comedy, but its a good movie.
• Drink lots of water.
• Hey look, it's Salt Lake City or a close facsimile.

• Moonrise Kingdom - very odd but I enjoyed it.
• Wow. I'm watching a lot of movies on this flight.
• The Watch - You can't kill someone and take their skin. It's not cool. (Only saw the first part of it and it was not as good as I had hoped.)
• Why is it that it takes hours to fly over Nebraska and only 6 minutes to fly over California?

Maybe I should just try to sleep on the plane, but the cheese plate was pretty good.

Chocolate

Back in July Kira and I participated in a Chocolate Walking Tour of San Francisco. I have always thought of San Francisco as a Seafood Town and had considered places like Hershey, PA to be Chocolate Towns. I didn't have any idea of what we were going to see or do, but thought that a walk around San Francisco would be fun and if they happened to have chocolate then it would be a lot of fun.  It was a whirlwind of chocolate history (and tastings) from around the world. San Francisco seems to have every kind of chocolate imaginable within a few short blocks.

The first stop on the tour was a place called Scharffen Berger. They gave us a quick education about their company and products and then out came the tasting samples. Wow. I wasn't tasting chocolate. There were berries and flowers and other unrecognizable tastes happening. I was amazed. I was hooked. Over the next few hours I experienced more of the same. My life was changed in a very good way.

Fast forward several months to today. I have tried chocolate from all over the world now. (Thank you to Fog City News and their wonderful selection of bars.) Some have been great. Some only enjoyable. Recently I came across a new bar from the company that started me on this adventure. A limited edition bar called Markham Valley. This chocolate made from beans grown in Papua New Guinea is excellent. A great chocolate flavor with wonderfully subtle fruit flavors that just make it probably the best chocolate I have ever had. Seek this one out while they still have some.