Change One Thing, Change Everything. Great movie. We went and saw it last night and we were impressed, or at least I was. I wondered before going in if I would associate Evan (Ashton Kutcher's character) with the persona of 'Kelso' from 'That Seventies Show', but I'm pleased to say Ashton Kutcher pulled it off without me thinking of him as Kelso even once. The character of Evan in the early stages of the movie is portrayed at a younger age for much of the time (played well by John Patrick Amedori), so by the time you see Ashton Kutcher again, you're already involved in the storyline and associate him with the character Evan rather than Kelso. Good move, whether it was intentional or not.

The story itself is related loosely to Lorenz's Chaos Theory (and hence the movie title) which, when he presented his theory to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, was titled "Does the Flap of a Butterfly's Wings in Brazil set off a Tornado in Texas?". To put it more simply, cause and effect.

The movie feeds off this idea and sees Evan (Ashton Kutcher) returning again and again to childhood to try and change disturbing events in the past that had an adverse effect in the future, only to find that by removing or changing these events in his past, he created other unpredictable changes in his future, changes that did not turn out the way he expected. It's one of those movies where you come out at the end thinking 'hmm.. so what if..?' Anyway the end result is that I recommend it. If you have the opportunity, go see it.

I'll rate it 4 weasels out of a possible 5. I might have rated it even higher but for two reasons, (a) nothing's perfect, and (b) posting a picture of half a weasel is just sick.

This is some amazing artwork. Barbs & Dave from NZ sent me a bunch of emails the other day which included some incredible pavement chark art, although there was no clue as to who the artist was. A quick search on Google revealed the artist. His name is Kurt Wenner and he has a website (www.kurtwenner.com) showcasing some of his work as well as his biography etc. I'm posting a few of the artworks here to for you to check out. Bear in mind that all these artworks are done with pastel chalks on a flat surface.

The first thing that came to my mind was woah, this is like Michelangelo without the ceilings. A truly gifted artist. Pictures published with the express written permission of Karen Schmidt for Kurt Wenner.

I've just been looking at some pics of my old local, Raglan (west coast, North Island, New Zealand) ..damn, I still get butterflies in my stomach whenever I see pics of Raglan going off (or any surf going off for that matter, but especially Raglan). This is a shot out across The Valley towards Indicators. I miss surfing this place a lot. Believe it or not, Raglan would pump like this on a regular basis, and this pic is only one of a series of points that the swell wraps around. The innermost is Manu Bay where many of the big-name international surf comps in NZ are held. Indies is the furthest out and in my opinion bigger, better and gnarlier than the rest.

This second pic is a recent shot of probably my most frequented spot for surfing over on the east coast of the North Island, Tairua. This was taken just before Christmas (thanks to Wilky at surf.co.nz for the pic), it brings back a lot of memories.

There's a few more pics of my own of NZ surf in the photos section if you want to take a look ..I should really scan and post some more of them there.

This rocks. Tairawhiti Polytechnic in New Zealand (polytech is basically a university but for more technical courses) has developed an Applied Surfing Option in the Certificate in Leisure and Sport. This innovative programme offers a stepping-stone into a career in the sport, leisure, fitness & surfing industries and includes a NZQA accredited surfing course. This offers surfers an opportunity to focus on the physical application of surfing, including computer aided tools, meteorology, an introduction to surfing techniques - plus heaps of SURFING! Successful completion of the certificate cross credits to a portion of the Bachelor of Sport & Leisure Degree at the University of Waikato. How awesome is that! Damn I'd be right into that if I was back in NZ. That just rocks hard.

Today has just got steadily colder and colder. It was about 30°F at 9am, and had dropped to 17°F/-8°C by midday even though it's a 'nice' sunny day. Tonight is predicted to get down to 8°F/-13°C with windchill at -11°F ..that's a nasty -24°C for you kiwi visitors! Unreal, might as well be living in Antartica. And guess what? Tomorrow is supposed to be even colder. I think back to summer not so long ago and temperatures of over 100°F/37°C ..crazy friggin city.

Yup that's right, US$162million. On December 30th 2003, someone who purchased a ticket at a lotto outlet in South Euclid won this massive jackpot, but the holder of the winning ticket did not immediately come forward. This prompted the lotto organizers to ask people in that area to recheck their tickets. Of course with that amount of money at stake I guess it's not surprising that someone had to try and scam it.

In the news shortly after came the story of Elecia Battle, who claimed in a police report that she dropped her purse as she left a convenience store after buying the ticket and only realized after the drawing that the ticket was missing.

"My ticket was lost. I do recall all the numbers. They are all somehow family related. No one can tell me what I did and did not play. I did it honestly and I have no doubt."

Shortly after this news item broke, the holder of the winning ticket, Rebecca Jemison of South Euclid, fronted up with the real ticket. She also provided another lottery ticket bought at the same time and had a ticket from a previous drawing with the same numbers. Proof positive if you ask me.

"I was angry at first, but not worried at all,'' Jemison said. "I knew what I possessed."

On Tuesday (yesterday) Rebecca Jemison was declared rightful winner of the Dec. 30 drawing, qualifying her for a lump-sum payment of $67.2 million after taxes ..damn! I think the US Govt should buy their own friggin lotto tickets - in NZ lottery winnings are tax free.

Later on Tuesday Elecia Battle sued, asking a judge to block the lottery from paying Jemison. What has now come to light is that Battle has prior charges of credit card fraud and assault. Police are now investigating whether she lied in the police report - a misdemeanor punishable by 30 days to six months in jail. When questioned about her past, Battle was defensive:

"I'm done with that,'' said Battle, "I paid the fine. That's end of story. It makes me look like I'm a bad person. Everybody has bad in the past. I'm not even worried about that, really. I never did any jail time for that.''

Oooo-kay. Yup we've all committed assault and credit card fraud in the past, right? Wrong. This person needs to admit when she's been caught out, because it's pretty damn obvious, especially when the winner provides supporting evidence of a ticket from a previous drawing with the same numbers as well as another ticket bought at the same time as the winning ticket. Trying to sue the rightful winner now and not backing down is just digging her own grave. Regardless of the evidence, the lottery ticket is a bearer note, which means whoever turns in a valid ticket is legally entitled to the winnings, end of story.

I would like to say, "Nice try, but no cigar." except that it wasn't.