i wrote this one a few weeks ago and never brought it to school. kind of funny. we might call it, ¨will meets technology¨

i still love technology, but not as much as you, you see.

So who came up with this region thing for dvd’s? I assume you are going to tell me movie studios, and spending more effort than a simple, unhappy stamp of my foot and briefly shouted profanity allows me to see exactly where the idea came from and why. Nevertheless (I love three words that are added together to made one word without changing any of the letters, just jamming them together) I am not pleased to find out my computer will not simply be “super” and play all regions. I changed the region and was informed that I only have three remaining changes before the setting becomes permanent. A little more effort and I found that even if I rebooted everything on my computer or moved my dvd drive to another computer, I would still not be able to change the region setting once I had gone past my three remaining changes. Mind you I don’t have the disks to reboot windows or a clue about how to take the dvd drive out (although I do teach at a university where computer science is a major and my roommate is an engineer).

What a bunch of boo.

So I bought the dvd of the movie “serenity” when I saw it on the street today. A little less than $2.50 and I thought that at the worst I would have to listen to the person who brought the digital cam into the movie theatre to record the video eat popcorn, laugh a bit or move to let someone else in or out of the aisle. The joy of pirated movies.

No, the kid on the street had sold me a case that said serenity on the outside but contained some weird movie that was not the one I wanted. “11:14” was the Spanish title, or “horario de morir” with, and I am not good with names of movie stars, hillary swank. That is the lady from the clint eastwood movie that I never saw about a female boxer, I think.

Anyway.

The kid who sold me the movie was set up on the sidewalk outside of my apt, so I rolled back outside to ask him what was up. He was nicer about it than I thought he would be (so how often does this happen) and I found another box for serenity and went back to check it out.

Hillary again.

Back down the stairs and outside. This time we found the other movie, 11:14, but the disks on the inside were totally blank, thus not even trying to fool me that I had the right movie. I decided to give it a shot.

So when I went back down the third time, despite the kid’s suggestion that I try the other 11:14, or that I should simply buy another one, I gave up.

Too late. I had already changed my region. So I only have three chances left. I don’t like that. Why are the giving me the opportunity to change it around a few times if they wont give me the right to change as many times as I like? I paid for the stupid computer, why can’t I do what I like with it? Land of the free. Unless your freedom infringes upon the rights of a corporation, an entity that is not really a person but which has been conferred those rights in this case and in many others as well.

Castro would not like it one bit. I had an interesting conversation the other night with a guy who plays guitar in the bar that the profs sometimes go to on Friday nights. The brit was being entertained by four very short Mexicans (even when guys don’t immediately go up to her, which is rare, I always let them know that we are not together and that she loves to practice her Spanish. This gives me endless amounts of amusement and causes her lots of embarrassment, but in the end amusement wins.) and the other three profs who were with us were chatting about the university and its flaws. Blah blah blah. So I started talking to the new guitar player and it turns out he is pretty interesting. His wife is a student at the same uni where I work. I have no clue who she is, but that is not that surprising.

Within fifteen minutes I had apologized for my country like five times (why cant mexicans get visas, the usa only want us for our cheap labor, etc) and we shifted gears to a topic I was interested in: the death, or murder, of the president of ixtepec. Silence. He wanted nothing to do with that conversation. I pressed further and he shrugged, said corruption breeds violence and changed the subject. This is the common reaction down here. People are bothered a bit by it, but not too much. And they certainly do not want to talk about it. At least with foreigners.

And then somehow we started talking about cuba. While I agree that castro has done some good things there, I think anyone who has been in power for forty years needs to step down. We were in agreement there. But the answer to my next question proved difficult for both of us, mainly because we lacked a sufficient knowledge of Cuban politics, and partly because we had both imbibed a few beers. What would happen if castro died tomorrow? I don’t see it happening, but eventually, the man is going to go. Then what? Who takes over? The thought of his son jumping in and changing directions does not seem to likely. What direction does the country go in next? I would give him a few years at best before either the people or the usa takes measures to install a new leader. If the next president/dictator is a friend of the usa, will there be war? If the next leader is not a friend of the usa, will we start a war with them? cuba is the champion, the tiny place that resisted the mighty usa. Central and south American countries look to cuba, this is a gross generalization, and smile to themselves. They were able to keep us out, never mind guantamo, while our military had its way with just about every other country in the area.

And from what I gather, the people of cuba are damn proud of it too. As they should be. Resisting the usa is not easy. Doing it for forty years is incredible. The ussr could not do it. China is sort of doing it, but that is a completely different situation, I think.

So there’s cuba. Tiny island. Less than 90 miles away from florida. 90 miles. That is like san fran to sacto. Flag to the grand canyon. Charlottesville to Roanoke. Close.

This story doesn’t really go anywhere further. The guitarista and I discussed this and other political ideas for about an hour and then he had to go play. He is a great guitar player but I did not really like all the songs he sang. Oh well. Nobody is perfect.