Coming February 6, 2024 . . .
MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
Pre-order at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop
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Coming February 6, 2024 . . . MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Pre-order at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
So I wrote this disaster flick.
-Really? Why?
Well, I had some things I wanted to say.
-In a disaster flick? OK, tell me about it. What happens to what city?
The setting is a small Japanese city.
-Oh, a monster movie! I love it!
No, no monsters. It starts with an earthquake ...
- ... which releases the monsters. C'mon, you're messing with tradition here.
Sorry, I don't want monsters.
-OK, just an earthquake. Shake the cameras, stuff falls down. Then what? Aftershocks? Doesn't sound like feature length stuff.
The epicenter of the earthquake is actually out to sea, and creates a tsunami that devastates the coastline.
-Well that's better than a monster. We'll have lots of completely unprepared Japanese running in terror from a wall of water as skyscrapers collapse all around them.
Actually they'll be pretty well-prepared - it just happens too fast for a lot of them. And their big buildings hold up, it's the little ones that get washed away.
-Uh huh. So the survivors, American tourists, I presume, heroically escape the onrushing water while people all around them perish?
No, the survivors were warned in time, and video the destruction from relative safety. They find the bodies later. No Americans, just locals.
-Boring.
Then some reactors overheat, meltdown and release dangerous radiation.
-Now you're talking. So the monsters will be in the sequel?
No monsters, no sequel.
-We'll see. How does it end?
People decide nuclear plants are too dangerous.
-And there's your sequel - they build them anyway!
Comments
You are right on the sequel.
I was just listening to rush making fun of the Japanese today at mediamatters.
This is all soooo very sad!
by Richard Day on Tue, 03/15/2011 - 8:42pm
I like this post, in that it's not dark humor so much as it makes one think. Well done, Donal.
by LisB on Tue, 03/15/2011 - 8:49pm
Donal, I like what you have written here. You may recall that I posted a blog a ways back that suggested we should take a new look at nuclear energy.
http://dagblog.com/reader-blogs/do-you-believe-magic-7422
You responded with a comment that you were against it. So far, the evidence is piling up in favor of your stance. I will say this. I have driven Japanese motorcycles since 1962 and my best cars have been Japanese makes. I have formed the impression that they, the Japanese, are superb at technology. If there is a sequel to the Japanese nuclear power plants I hope that they will have stumbled onto the fact that when you put a nuclear plant in an earthquake zone and it is close to the ocean, you should not put the diesel back-up generators that power the emergency cooling pumps ON THE GD BEACH!
I am available as a nuclear power plant consultant, at a very reasonable rate, when it comes to this tricky stuff. Other areas of expertise as the occasion arises.
by A Guy Called LULU on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 1:06am
Sorry - forgot to sign up ! lol
I'm betting dollars to donuts Mobil is on the side of OMG nuclear is so dangerous, lets decommision all the reactors, NOW. Well for anyone buying into this prime example of taking advantage of a situation for personal gain, just let me say that if you look it up, overall nuclear power has proven to be one of the safer forms of power. If this country would open it's eyes and go nuclear coupled with geo-thermal (yellowstone) with electric for transportation and heating we would be free of oil. Total renewabel energy !! Also there is a process called cold fusion, which is a nuclear reaction, creating heat with no radiation, which should be explored and developed. Back in 1989 two scientists claimed they had achived it, but either they didn't or it was suppresed when their results could not be duplicated. Let the people lobby for freedom from oil for real before they break our backs with this hostage situation to fossil fuels
by Tommy Holmes on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 1:32am
[Introducing Tommy - our mothers were childhood friends, and so were we, and we have reconnected through Facebook.] To me, nuclear energy is like the girl with the little, little curl, right in the middle of her forehead - When it's good, it's very, very good, but when it's bad it's horrid. Putting reactor plants in the ring of fire seems to have been a short-sighted decision. Storing spent fuel near the reactor cores also seems to have been a short-sighted decision. I used to watch you work with machinery, so I know that you know that mistakes will happen. The problem with nukes is that small mistakes can lead to long-lasting disasters.
by Donal on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 8:29am
Japan’s Long Nuclear Disaster Film
by Donal on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 2:53pm
The Limits of Incantation
by Donal on Thu, 03/17/2011 - 9:01pm
And there's the sequel:
by Donal on Tue, 03/22/2011 - 1:31pm