Absolutely beautiful here in Western, NY, and the birds are going to eat us out of house and home. They have really been eating a great deal lately. I would have thought they would let up and scrounge for other kinds of food besides our bird seed. The bluejays are such slobs. Everytime I see them out there they are throwing their food around and making a mess. Just like two year olds.

I have two video picks this week: The first one is a movie called The Green Butchers. It's a movie in the tradition of Eating Raoul and Sweeney Todd. It focuses on two butchers who open their own business and one of them stumbles upon a way to make his marinade more tasty. The one character who discovers this "secret" ingredient is not the sharpest tool in the shed and before the two of them know it their scheme spirals out of control and threatens to ruin them. There is an interesting side story with the mentally handicapped brother of one of the butchers. It's well done and while it is a bit predictable with a typical hollywood ending (it's not a hollywood movie) it's engaging and has a good pace. It is subtitled so if that doesn't scare you off, then check it out.

My second pick is a sprawling film from 1961 with an all star cast. Judgment At Nuremberg spans the trial of several judges who ruled during the atrocities of WWII. Set a couple of years after the war, the film takes us through the witnesses of the trial, the burden of the tribunal to decide if these judges are guilty or not and just who does share the guilt during a war. Spencer Tracy, Judy Garland, Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Montgomery Clift and Maximilian Schell (who deservedly won an Oscar for his role) star in the film. It's a finely made film and lest you think it's outdated then take a look at what's going on in our world right now especially the controversy in our judicial system.

Jaw dropper of the day: A village in Moscow is mourning the loss of its lake. All that's left of a lake in the Nizhegorodskaya region which is East of Moscow on the Volga river is a muddy hole. Of course it's not all that bizarre; officials think an underground water course or cave sucked the water down. Of course one woman thought that America took the lake. Even America isn't that good.

Enjoy your day,

paul