Hematology, Urinalysis, and Ben Hur

Red blood cells, white blood cells, and urine. Such fun things to look at under a microscope all day. That's what we're doing right now... Labs. I was never much of a scientist, the only times I can remember being fond of any science was earning an Astronomy merit badge in Boy Scouts, and winning the mousetrap race car competition in my high school physics class. This has been a challenge for me thus far. Trying to count white blood cells is tedious, and I'm not wired for such tasks, but of course I won't have the benefit of a couple of lab techs working for me when I'm in the field, so here goes nothing. Other than that, not much exciting going on around here unless of course you like looking through microscopes all day. Actually, we parachuted out of airplanes yesterday, that was pretty fun.

Also of note- I found an old blockbuster receipt in my truck's center console which had a free non-new release rental set to expire this week. Being quite the movie goer, everytime I go into blockbuster I have a difficult time picking out non-new release films as I've pretty much seen all of the ones worth renting. As is my normal custom, I use these moments to experiment either in the foreign film section (usually Italian) or I opt to find an old classic that I've never seen before. The classic title which I ran across this time was "Ben Hur". I had no idea what this movie was about, but three things that stood out to me on the cover were: ancient Rome, Charlton Heston, and Best Picture 1959. I figured with those three things, surely this will be a decent film, and I was not disappointed. It took me two nights to finish it, and all I could think about afterwards was how the heck did Hollywood go from selecting films like "Ben Hur" for Best Picture to nominating films like "Broke Back Mountain" for such honors. By far, the best film of this year was "Cinderella Man" and if you haven't seen it yet- go get it after work Friday because nothing good is opening this weekend anyway- you will love it. Any film about religion ("The Passion") or traditional values ("Cinderella Man") these days gets snubbed for awards. However, if a film is about homosexuality, euthanasia, bashes a conservative political figure, or demeans religion it is automatically "One of the year's best films". This year, the Academy was so blatantly biased that even proponents of such films would have to admit that there is something wrong. Do actors even care? If I were Mel Gibson, Russell Crowe, Renee Zell..., Reese Wither.. I'd be pissed that my line of work's recognition system was so obviously discriminating. Hollywood is crazy.