Why would anybody want to get rid of their Mariah Carey Funko Pop?

Somebody traded this away, it's on the shelf at McKay's.

Looks like I made the second episode of "9-1-1 Nashville". It was just as a background extra, we had to time our walk so that the guy on the Segway would zoom out right in front of us. Must have done a dozen takes at least.

Fantastic show, saw it at TPAC.

I thought fiber optic cable usually came wrapped in orange tubing. So either this black plastic tubing is something other than fiber, or the Secret World Government is trying to hide the fact they're installing more fiber here in Nashville.

To collect more data from American citizens.

Apologies for the dusty screen, I need to clean my loaner car. But wanted to share this XM screen, seems Milli Vanilli is still up to their old tricks. Now instead of pretending to sing, they're pretending to be from the Police's Synchronicity album.

Boat dock at the Harrah's Laughlin. Fish are enjoying the shade, at least until the water taxi has to dock on this side.

Sunrise over the Harrah's Laughlin casino. As seen from the convenience store across the street, which just so happens to also be owned by Harrah's.

Taiwan's Most Iconic Breakfast Spot Serves 1000 People an Hour | Street Eats | Bon Appétit YouTube video by Bon Appétit

I need to take a trip to Taiwan that is focused not on sight-seeing but on eating. Like some kind of street-food tour.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQfE...

The tenderloin is the best part of the watermelon.

Reminder that Thunderbolts is now available to stream on Disney+. Definitely worth the watch if you missed it when it was playing in theaters.

It's about diversity -- better that other companies like Sony make money and thrive, than Netflix owning everything.

I'm arguing that Sony should have kept the rights and all the profits. Instead they hedged, settling for a much smaller share of the profits and letting Netflix own the IP.

Sony Pictures could have used a big hit, instead they've let Netflix have it.

KPop Demon Hunters (2025) ⭐ 7.7 | Animation, Action, Adventure 1h 35m | PG

Whatever Sony bean-counter decided to sell this show to Netflix, needs to be kicked out of the movie industry forever. Sure Sony made a small $20 million profit on the deal. But Netflix now controls a billion-dollar franchise.

Bad bad decision at Sony.

www.imdb.com/title/tt1420...

In descending order, the 12 Summer 2025 movies I saw this year ("summer" = May thru August)

Thunderbolts
Superman
F1: The Movie
The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Weapons
The Naked Gun
Jurassic World: Rebirth
Mission Impossible - The Final Reckoning
Sketch
Ne Zha II
Oh, Hi
Elio

I take that back -- I did work for one guy back in my CNET days who probably drank from a cup like this.

Thankfully, I never worked for somebody who needed a cup like this. I've certainly had bad bosses but not to this level.

Forecast said it would "only" be 98 today. But my car's thermometer said it was 100.

Of course this was driving on a road. With all that lovely blacktop absorbing extra radiation. Probably more than enough to explain the extra two degrees.

Weapons (2025) ⭐ 7.9 | Horror, Mystery 2h 8m | R

Not really a fan of horror but this one was pretty good. A clever structure where the story is told from multiple character viewpoints. As each character's plot unfolds and intertwines with the others, you learn more and more about what's happening in this town.

www.imdb.com/title/tt2658...

Volkswagen Customer Care may be the most annoying bureaucracy I've ever dealt with.

F1: The Movie (2025) ⭐ 7.9 | Action, Drama, Sport 2h 35m | PG-13

I did not see this movie right away because I thought it wasn't my kind of movie. Boy was I wrong, it's fantastic.

Definitely worth catching in a theater if it's still playing near you, just for the racing scenes.

www.imdb.com/title/tt1631...

I'm sharing this photo not for the remote-control R2 unit, but for the "Kanban & Scrum Flex Board" sitting to the left of the droid. Somebody managed to trade that in at McKay's, the store is listing it at $49.95.

Sorry, Agile is not worth that much money at least not to me.

I have no idea what this pattern is supposed to be. It's not a camouflage, what the heck was the intention behind this paint job?

The Naked Gun (2025) ⭐ 7.1 | Action, Comedy, Crime 1h 25m | PG-13

Thumbs-up on this new Naked Gun flick. Not a classic like the original, and only a few real laugh-out-loud moments. But it had its moments, it just kept throwing so many jokes at you that inevitably some of them would land.

www.imdb.com/title/tt3402...

Box Office: ‘Fantastic Four’ Craters By 66% in Second Weekend, ‘Naked Gun’ Debuts to $17 Million "The Fantastic Four: First Steps" is quickly losing steam at the box office in its second weekend.

Ouch -- Fantastic Four dropped 66% in its second weekend. With 'Superman' continuing to do well, there's no "comic-book fatigue".

But Disney has to consider that there may in fact be real "MCU fatigue" in the marketplace.

variety.com/2025/film/bo...

‘Master And Commander: The Far Side Of The World’ Finally Gets A 4K Blu-Ray Release—On A 100GB Disc Dolby Vision pictures and Dolby Atmos sound promised, along with beautiful steelbook packaging.

I never understood why this movie didn’t do better at the box office. So good, definitely worth seeing if you haven’t already.

I might pick up this 4K edition for my collection.

www.forbes.com/sites/johnar...

I really wish I knew the story behind this wreck that I saw being carried down the road. Hard to see but that front driver-side tire is completely gone, it's just the broken wheel. What the heck did they hit, to cause the whole tire to come off the wheel?

The Fantastic Four: First Steps

As of this writing we only have five days of box office data for Fantastic Four, but I'm gonna call it -- there is no way they can catch Superman. Not at the domestic box office at least.

They're already almost $13 million behind, no way they can make it up.

www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl24...

Not something you see everyday on the streets of Nashville. A pickup truck pulling a flatbed trailer loaded with bales of hay.

Standing on 2nd Ave, looking west up Commerce Ave.

Nearest building on the left is being transformed into the new Dolly Parton Hotel. I expect the facade will look quite different from what it is today.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps

Fantastic Four had a bigger opening day than Superman, but fell behind Saturday and Sunday. Its opening weekend ended up about $7 million behind Superman.

That's quite a hole to climb out of. It's going to be difficult for F4 to overtake Superman domesticly.

www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl24...