Reviewing Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince

All of my friend’s and family know what a huge fan I am of the Harry Potter books and movies, and so, for the first time, I will review one of the movies for those who might be curious as to what I thought of the latest installment of the books in movie from-Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince. So here it goes…

If you are a fan of the Harry Potter books you are going to hate the 6th installment of the movies. If you love the movie versions, then you are going to love this latest of the series.

As a fan of both the books and the movies, I find myself decidedly torn as to just how good HBP in movie form is. To no surprise the director's and producer's of the movie series were forced to stray even farther from the book with HBP the movie. As a result, those who know the book well may be shocked as to how far from the book the movie strays. The main difference this time, however, is that the producer's and director made no attempt to hide the fact that they were going to have to stray from the book in telling this installment of the Harry Potter saga. From the opening scene the movie differs from the book, and throughout it's 2:30 (2:45 with previews) the movie has a choppy feel to it relative to it's book counterpart that another 10 minutes worth of film would have helped with greatly.

Fans of only the movies will love this one-if they can follow it and don't get lost. As a movie, HBP is one of the best so far, but it has a fundamental flaw: the director and producer's took a lot of creative lease with HBP. It was obvious from the opening scene that they were left without the choice but stray nearly 100% away from the book format. Further, for those who have read the books, you get the feeling that the director and producer's assumed that those who read the books wouldn't mind how far they were forced to stray while putting up the movie portrayal of HBP. As a result, fans who have only seen the movies may find themselves having a hard time keeping up with HBP and following the plot and fans of the books might get frustrated by all the differences between the book and movie. For example, there never is an explanation given for the time that Harry and Dumbledore spend together; and the relationships and humor that develop throughout the movie are jumbled together in ways that may leave viewer's who haven't read the book yet wondering exactly what is supposed to be going on and the ending feels 'sudden'-as if it was without a plan. However, it is very interesting how the makers choose to move HBP along, and fans of the books and movies (even the more critical of us like myself) will enjoy watching how they changed this one to fit the big screen, but given it's already 2 and half hour length, it's my opinion that they would have been better served adding another 10 minutes to properly explain the plot of HBP which is likely to elude many fans who have never read the books.

Did I still enjoy it? Yes. Was it worth my time? Yes. Was it worth the money I paid? Yes, but only because I went to the discounted matinee showing. If I had to pay the normal $8-10 for a movie, as a fan of the series, I would have been disappointed.

Perhaps I am being too critical of the movie makers, but I expected more out of the movie's as the series progressed through them. The Order of the Phoenix disappointed me and this one did as well, that said if you are a fan of either the books or the movie's all Harry Potter fans have to see this-if for no other reason than curiosity's sake.

Finally moving people...

There was a time that the Detroit People Mover was considered a regional eyesore. Neat, efficient and inexpensive, it was designed to navigate people around the downtown core. Unfortunately, there weren't enough "sights" that were on the route, to really make it profitable and show how it could affect traffic. And most of the area's professional sport teams arena's were too far away to get any real use out of it...As a result, for more than a decade after it's 1987 grand opening, the People Mover sat nearly useless But then the former "Coma" came...And then ford field came to downtown along with the Casino's and well, finally, the masses came...Suddenly the People Mover was moving people, and its still just 50 cents!!!! Unreal! 22 years in the making and inflation still hasn't caught up with it...Anyways....
Despite it apparently working out, and finally making a penny or 2, the People Mover is still half of what it could be. Another 6-10 miles of track (at a price that very well could come in at fewer billions of Dollars than they think) could really make something out of the People Mover and maybe something out of Detroit. How much more we wont know until we would see their first idea's, but, I think it could be done, and done well..I wish I could say that I believed in Detroit's ability to make something like this happen, but I don't, sad but true. I just don't have the faith that those who need to will change their old world ways and allow for The "D" to be reborn...The People Mover is finally moving people (and making a profit?), but I think it's too late for it to help save the city...sad, but true.

The economy: It's about us.

Have you been to a book store lately and browsed the "hot titles" or current events/social sections to see what was new? It seems like every other title is either about how great the Obama ideology is or how bad it is, but there is not one title that is about 'us', the American people; the people who put Obama in office; the people who his policies affect. No one wants to talk about it from our perspective, and it's not only annoying but treasonous in my opinion.
At the risk of sounding like a nationalist (i.e. national socialist) I am choosing to take up this argument because the truth is that both sides of the fight as it concerns our Federal Governments current domestic and economic policies have no ones interest at heart but their own. Oh sure, they try to make us think otherwise by using fancy language and complex economic formulas to confuse and/or convince us that they know better and that because they are the only ones smart enough to understand it all, that we have to take their word for it and trust that they know what they are talking about. The problem is, I happen to be one of those outside of the system who really does understand it-and I don't need them to tell me (at least) whether or not Obama's domestic and economic policies are bad or good for America.
But since this is about us-the American public-and since I feel more obligation to my fellow man than those whom we have elected to office, I am going to take the time to explain some simple economics to you.
First, allow me to assume something, something which I have experienced often in my life: the average American does not understand how Capitalism works. This isn't a slight on anyone, and in no way am I saying you are stupid, but, it has been my experience that the average person in our country, even many whom are college educated, have no real understanding of how our (American) economy works relative to what helps it grow and to what makes it contract (shrink). This is no fault of your own as our government funded public educational institutions have gone to great lengths over the last 75 years to make sure that the 'average' American stays woefully ignorant as to how American economics and politics work. With that said here is 3 things that economists know works for our economy: limited (or a decrease in) taxes-particularly on employers and corporations, limited (but necessary) regulatory controls at the Federal Governmental level and governmental incentives to spur research and development and growth of new industry.
Here are 3 things economists know does not work in our economy: increasing taxes-particularly on incomes and corporations, strict and unnecessary Federal regulatory controls, and Governmental involvement in the private sector economy (whether through regulation or attempts at competing in the marketplace).
How do we know these things? History.
History tells us, that after both FDR and LBJ passed the broadest sweeping and most expensive socialist domestic policies in our history that our economy recessed for years afterward. In the case of FDR, his New Deal package of bills was necessary for the time due to the Great Depression, but even he recognized that they should only be temporary laws (which they were until LBJ came along and helped to make them permanent), and after they were passed, the economy shrank further (something our schools like to skip over as it relates to us working out of the Great Depression is that FDR's policies weren't working and that it wasn't until we were forced into WWII that our economy came around).
History also tells us that the Federal Government is horrible at business. Amtrak, the USPS and the USA Today are all easy and relatively recent examples of poor business attempts by the "Fed". And we need to look no farther than the current state of our National deficit's to see that our Federal Government has no clue how to run or operate on a budget (and yet they have the audacity to tell us that, as individuals, we need to 'tighten our belts' in terms of the money we spend-!?Que).
History also shows us that in times when Capitalism is left alone-not unregulated per se, just not over regulated-that we experience great periods of economic growth. Of all the recent presidents Bill Clinton seemed to understand this best. He didn't let Capitalism run amok like the domestically truant Bush did for 8 years and he didn't over regulate it either. He simply left it alone. One of the deregulations which he did allow, however, was within the telecommunications industry which is what lead us out of our early 90's recession into a 5 year period of rapid growth. Although, just like all growth, there were growing pains associated with it and the growth was much to rapid which, in the end, caused a partial collapse. But this was no fault of Capitalism, this was just how Capitalism works (relative to whether its being over regulated or not-there is fine line to regulation). And, if anyone had noticed the "bust of the tech bubble" had no where near the affect on our economy as Bush's lack of regulatory watch-dogging had during his administration-the way too long 8 years of it.
In sum, what history shows us is that, when Federal Governments make economic policy that is more about government growth and control, than about personal growth and freedom, economies suffer, which mean we suffer.
This brings us full circle to what I started off with: all these books attacking Obama's policies or supporting them. None of them truly cover the economic's of his policies from our perspective. No, they only cover them from the particular partisan perspective of the respective writer which is either a far left liberal or a far right conservative. True, they attempt to draw us into the discussion, but their attempts are thinly veiled at best, and in either case, they attempt to skew the information in their favor just to make them look better, all the while succeeding in doing nothing but alienating one side or the other while at the same time muddying the waters as to what is really going on and alienating the people they are trying to win over to their side of the debate.
So, in an effort to clear up the 'water', so to speak, I will put down (yes, put down) Obama's economic policies much more simply and succinctly than any book today can...Here are a few more things that history tells us: 1. That large governments are unsustainable without the leadership of a dictatorship (and still they are not permanently sustainable). 2. That governments who claim economic growth through growth in govermental jobs are parasitic to economies because, 3. It forces the over taxation of a small percentage of the population which is usually the most productive and the most intelligent of them. This in turn leads to (4.) the smartest and brightest of a population to flee to more economically relaxed nations.
Now, I don't ask you to take my word for it, all I ask is that you do the research for yourself-look back at history (honestly) and see what it tells you about how Capitalism works and under what conditions economies grow and shrink, then reexamine what Obama's domestic and economic policies are and then ask yourself (honestly) if you still think that Obama's domestic and economic policies will work. Seeing as how his policies are about them (the government) and not about us (the average American) your answer should be obvious-unless you see 'us' as including the goverment. If so, then I have to believe that you believe the needs and aims of our government are the same (at least relative to today). And if that is the case, then there are a lot of things besides how Capitalism is supposed to work that you may not understand either (No offenses I hope).

GM out of Bankruptcy

Whatever you want to say about GM’s bankruptcy proceedings, one thing you can say for certain is that I was quick. It only took a few months for GM to drag it's overly large corporate structure out of bankruptcy and what do we have left? A company privately controlled but 60.8% owned by the American government (i.e. American taxpayers) and Fritz Henderson, GM’s supposed CEO, telling us that "business as usual is over". What this means is anyone's guess, but based on what is left of the GM that most of us grew up with and have grown to know, “GM” essentially no longer exists.
The changes to GM are vast: They only have 4 makes now instead of 8, they have cut thousands of blue and white collar jobs along with restructuring their union contracts, and have slashed nearly 2000 under performing dealerships nationwide. Even with all of these changes and cuts our Federal Government still had to spend nearly $50 billion on GM to help save the company. That’s right, we, the American tax payers essentially donated $50 billion to a lost cause.
I call it a lost cause because the GM that was once there is no longer, in fact, you can’t even say that it is a “shadow” of it’s former self. What is left is little more than a shell and it leads me to having many questions about the situation, as well as similar ones concerning Chrysler which hasn’t come out of bankruptcy yet.
However, I will restrain myself to only 2 of them.
Firstly, I would like to know why, if it was going to take such massive measures to bring GM back to being a productive company, the Federal Government didn’t let GM die and allow Capitalism to pick up the pieces naturally? In other words why did we the tax payers have to spend so much money on “helping” GM get through bankruptcy if in doing so GM no longer going to exist anyways?
Secondly, how and when GM is going to repay this $50 billion loan? It is a loan after all (so the Fed says anyways), so it is fair to expect that GM will have to pay this money back, but, how are we to expect them to repay us in a reasonable time frame if what is left of the Company is little larger than a regional retail outlet?

As I see it, what is left of “GM” is not capable of repaying the American taxpayers who paid so much money to help it come out of bankruptcy. Making it worse is that over 60% of what is left of GM is now owned outright by our Federal Government.
From a capitalistic standpoint this majority ownership means a lot of things. It means that everything GM does from here until the load is repaid will have to be done with government approval first. If no government approval is obtained, then GM will be unable to do many of the things they would otherwise be able to do to repay their debt to the American tax payer. This in turn means that private sector investment will all but dry up because of the Fed’s pathetic history in its attempts to run businesses who compete with the private sector.
All added up you have to ask yourself what was the point? If this is what it was going to take to make GM a viable company again then why didn’t the Federal Government simply let GM die as a result of its on gluttony and burdensome unionization?
Of course we can speculate as to why this is, but only Obama knows the real reason for it is he who approved the massive “bailouts” given to both GM and Chrysler. Whatever the reason’s, what we now have is government ownership of private enterprise. This is called Socialism, and from the looks of it we will be dealing with it for some time to come.

Questioning Joe Dumars

If you know me, then you know that I have much respect for the Detroit Pistons General Manager Joe Dumars. When Dumars was first hired in 2000 he made some moves that turned heads and made people in the world of professional Basketball ask "Is he on crack?", but considering how well those moves turned out, and the success which those moves generated for most of the decade, everyone, including myself, recognized the brilliance of Joe Dumars as being one of the, if not the best General Manager in all of professional sports.
Fast forward to this month and some very interesting moves that "Joe D" has made for the pistons.
The signing of Ben Gordon and Charlie Villanueva are nice additions, but I question the price he paid for them. Gordon gets $11 mill a year, and Villanueva $7 mill a year. That is a lot of money for a pair of players who, to be quite frank about it, have done nothing in their careers. I don't claim to know much about Villanueva, but I've watched Gordon play against the Pistons for years as a Bull, and the best they can boast of is a 2nd round defeat against the Pistons a few years ago. As such, I have a hard time understand why the big dollar contracts were dished out to 2 players who are only going to make it more difficult for established players such as Rip Hamilton and Tayshaun Prince to get minutes along with rising stars Jason Maxiel, Will Bynum and the heir apparent to Chauncey Billups, Rodney Stuckey.
Leading to more questions about Joe D's moves as of late is the way in which he handling the coaching situation the last 2 years. He gives Mike Curry a shot after only one year as an assistant with the organization, saddles him with Allen Iverson in a last ditch attempt to get to the Finals with the core of players he first developed, then, when it all fell apart, Dumars got rid of Iverson and the coach. After firing Curry, he had Avery Johnson sitting there for him on a silver platter-2 years out of the league and chomping at the bit to get back in, but, instead of trying to make a deal work and staying fast to this stance that he wanted someone with more experience, what does Joe do but go with another assistant. This one the Cleveland Cavaliers "offensive" coach John Kuester.
True, Kuester possesses much more experience than Curry did when he was hired, but again I have to ask: what has Kuester done? This guy's claim to fame is coaching Lebron James offensively-as if that is a hard freaking job!
I just don't get it. The Pistons are obviously heading into a transition year and the last time they did so they went to the Eastern Conference Finals before winning it all in 2003 against the Lakers. Back then, even though you couldn't see what the plan was back then, you could tell by teh personality of the players assembled and the coaching staff in place, what kind of team they were going to be.
This year, with players who have more of a playing history to examine, it's impossible to tell what kind of team they are going to be heading into the 2009-10 season. Will they score 100+ a game? Will they give up more than 100+ a game? Will they play a 3 guard set or play point forward? As of now, we have no clue, and, based on Dumar's past, we won't have a clue until we see it all on the court.
Regardless of how you look at it however, it does make you wonder-again-about the decision making of Joe Dumars.

The loss of passion in America

Over the last 20 years or so, it has become apparent to me that passion in America has gone from a tool utilized to “fire up” the masses, alerting them to the idiocy or dangers of certain policies or laws being put forth by their elected officials to a nuisance emotion better left dead.
Today it just seems to me that showing any passion for anything is construed as anger, emotional instability or pointless complaining over that that you-as an individual-have no power over. The pendulum has swung so far from the very passionate decade of the 1960’s-when leaders such as Martin Luther King, Jr. made it “hip” to be passionate-that even having passion for simple things such as time spent with your family, is ridiculous and mocked by many of those you many count as friends. And don’t ever get caught telling your buddies about planning a night of “passion and romance” with your significant other because they will, as the British like to say, take the mickey out of you for weeks for it.
Even worse is showing passion for a particular movement or belief.
It used to be that someone who was passionate about their beliefs could stand up, orate them freely, and attract a crowd of supporters cheering them on, regardless of location. Today such actions would be seen as those of either and angry and unstable person, or that of an raving lunatic who belongs in a loony bin. Take the Fair Tax and "Tea Bag" movements of today. Those how vociferously support these movements are considered "wacko's" by those who do not.
Of course there are other, and in some ways better, methods to express ones passion today (such as using the internet), but gone are those individual acts of passion which spawn whole movements as Rosa Parks did in the 1950’s.
No, unfortunately American's are either too scared, to weak or just don't care enough. As a result America hasn’t just turned its back on passion, I think we are losing more of it each day.

The decade of decadent Corporatism

When history looks back on the first decade of the 21^st century it unfortunately may be remembered more for its greedy corporate downfalls than for the global acts of terror perpetuated by radical Islam that started with the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Beginning with the collapse of Enron in early 2002 and culminating with the bankruptcies of 2 of Detroit’s Big 3 auto’s these last 2 months, the last 7 years of corporate America have been by far the worst in our nation’s history. So sever and dramatic have these numerous collapses and bankruptcies been that former president G.W. Bush felt ‘obligated’ to bailout Wallstreet banks and brokerage houses to the tune of $750 billion in funds because he couldn’t “let the backbone of our economy collapse”.

AIG, Citibank, Bank of America and all the rest didn’t deserve one penny of our-the tax payers-money. They got to where they are by their own greed and poor business practice, and along the way nearly brought down the greatest economy in the world.

Unfortunately, the worst part may yet be to come.

Because of their collective irresponsibility on the part of these companies, the government, and the consumer (yes the public is responsible too), the politicians in D.C. were “forced” to step in with government “bailouts” and so called loans because these companies are “too big to fail”. The result was and is the perfect opportunity for the Democrat party and its leader Barack Obama to expand their socialistic policies and influences by “buying in” to all these companies to keep them from failure until their loans are repaid-which could take so long that the U.S. Federal Government could be forced to own them outright.

When it is all said and done the biggest victim of all may not even be the American people themselves, but the very idea of Capitalism itself.

These corporations took advantage of the very worst aspects of the greatest economical engine ever devised while they were under the watch of a domestically truant president-George W. Bush.

Thanks to Bush falling asleep at the proverbial domestic policy wheel while favoring the war on terror (specifically in Iraq), these corporations were able to bilk the investing public of Billions of dollars through the packaging of poorly written mortgages as investments, thereby allowing them to fleece the public at both ends through their warped Friedmanesque ideals of Capitalism.

In the case of General Motors and Chrysler, it was the sudden spike of oil prices (driven by speculation) combined with terribly negotiated union contracts, with greedy and corrupt union officials, which prevented them from being able to fairly compete in the global and domestic marketplace.

When the dust settles and the smoke clears, only time will tell how we, as a nation, come out of this decade of corporate decadence, but for now, thanks to this greed, the greatness of Capitalism is in dire straights. I only hope that it survives and bounces back well enough from the attacks of socialistic policy currently being implemented by our President to prove that, once and for all, Capitalism is the best form of economics ever created.

The idiocy of the governmental budgeting process

After 2 years of shrinking tax coffers and watching all levels of governmental bodies forced to slash programs and cut jobs, I am forced to contemplate the process by which our local, state and national legislative bodies establish and set their budgets for the “coming” year.

What I question is: how can you establish a budget and allocate resources when you don’t know exactly how much money you have to work with? To me, this is the same fiscal attitude which gets so many young adults into financial troubles early in their life-they spend money they don’t yet have by using “credit” cards with the thought in mind that they will repay the money back later. But then, they lose their job or their hours get cut and now that lavish lifestyle they have been subsidizing on borrowed money, which they “expected” to have, they can no longer support.

How did we allow our legislative bodies become so backward thinking about our money? Can’t they learn to manage their-sorry our-the way every middle class family in America does-by planning for what they want and need with the money they know they will have. This is not how our local, state, and federal officials run their budgets; no, what they do is they speculate. And we, as a society, learned about what speculating got us over the last 5 years didn’t we? Unrealistic prices which free market Capitalism cannot support.

How this relates to our various levels of government is this: by speculating on what they think they will have to spend in the coming year they allocate funds for projects and programs that actually do not exist. Not only is this a pathetically poor budgeting process, but it also creates a government that is in constant flux across all its departments, lacking no long term fiscal or managerial stability.

With this sort of budgeting ideology in practice nationwide, it’s a wonder that more cities and states aren’t in the same situation as Detroit and California are-the verge of bankruptcy.

On the accumulation of wealth: selfishness and greed

Every time that I hear the Liberal movement or those dreaded wealth envyists, talk about how the “evil rich” are “selfish and “greedy” half of me wants to laugh my ass off at their open ignorance, and the other wants to grab them by the scruff of the neck and angrily put their closed mindedness in its place.
For starters, the words selfish and greed are way over used and completely misunderstood by the Liberal movement and wealth envy class, in my opinion.
To be selfish or greedy are natural aspects of our inherent human natures. As a child is it not considered “greedy” to want bigger and better presents for Christmas than our siblings? As adults, are we not selfish while in college if we are more dedicated to doing well academically, so as to have a successful future and career, rather than spending our time and money partying those years away? Even our core human instincts of survival: self defense, need for food and shelter, and mating are based in some part on selfishness and greed.
In sum, greed and selfishness are natural for humans.
The irony is that the Liberal movement combined with the wealth envy class, by their own actions, show themselves to be just as selfish and greedy as those they scream about. Is not “spreading the wealth” in some way greedy by essentially saying that “what is yours is mine also”? Is it not selfish to monopolize the press and portray your viewpoints as being more “evolved” than those of the other side? How selfish and greedy was it of their “chosen one”-Barack O’bama-to go out and raise $100’s of millions for his presidential campaign-more than double what his opponent could raise-and then use all that money to monopolize the airways to scream his bogus message of “change you can believe in” in our faces everywhere we turned? Nahhhh, that wasn’t selfish at all…
The Liberals and wealth envyists seem to forget many important things about the “evil rich”.
For starters, many of their own party and movement are wealthy themselves.
Those with money have the money to give away!-to the tune of $100’s of millions each year to charitable organizations-which is pretty freaking unselfish of them if you ask me.
The Liberals and wealth envyists also seem to forget that it is those with money have the means and ability to not on create 10’s of thousands of jobs, but whole new industries to boot.
There is, however, one place where selfishness and greed are big problems-corporations.
There is little doubt that the world’s largest corps seek to profit at the expense of the common man-especially these days in America. But they are the exception and not the rule, and they get away with it because the consumer, i.e. the American public, fail to hold them accountable. In other words, just don’t buy their products and services.
But, then again, to the Liberal mind, that would be considered “mean” I bet…

The NBA and Stanley Cup Finals

(Note, this post was originally written on 6/15/09).

Since I was “indisposed” for a bit and unable to comment on either the NBA or NHL Finals’ matchups as they took place, now is as good of a time as any to catch up and take a look back on them…

I have to admit to not being very surprised that the Orlando Magic made it to the NBA Finals. I didn’t pick them, per se, but I wasn’t as surprised by it as most seemed to be. I could tell from the beginning of the Eastern Conference Finals that the Magic had Lebron’s and his Cavaliers number-they just matched up too well against them. The biggest surprise to me, however, were the Denver Nuggets. I knew that when they acquired Chauncey Billups in the Iverson trade with the Pistons that they would be better, but its been quite some time since I’ve seen one player have such a profound impact on the overall attitude of an entire organization. After the Nuggets stole one from L.A. in L.A., I thought maybe they had punched their ticket to the finals, but, alas, it was meant to be the Lakers year, and once they had made it to the Finals I knew it was only a matter of time before they were crowned champs once again. Does this settle the Kobi question of whether or not he can lead a team without Shaq to a title? I’m not so sure about that…When considering this question you have to consider Kobi’s supporting cast and I would say that his supporting cast this year was better than Shaq’s supporting cast in Miami a few years back when he lead that team to a championship without Kobi before Kobi was able to do it without him…Anyways, I did think that the Magic would give them a little more of a challenge than they, but, ah well…Before I move on, I have to give some credit where credit is do: my good friend Mike Davies called the Magic for the Finals before they had dispatched the Boston Celtics-a point on which at the time I disagreed with. Good call my friend (bow)…

As for the Stanley Cup Finals…What the fuck happened to my beloved Red Wings?!! They have game 7, at home, and they can’t manage to score more than 2 goals against those pathetic tuxedo clad arctic birds?! Come on! After finding out the outcome, I was almost glad that I was unable to watch that game 7-almost (I still believe that I had been able to watch it, they would have won lol). Anyways, no one was really much surprised that it was a rematch of the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals in which the Wings won, particularly after Detroit got rid of pesky Anaheim, but I do think Pittsburgh pulling off the win the way they did surprised most people especially given that the Wings outscored them for the series. Unfortunately, all that matters are the wins and losses and the Wings lost the most important game of the season during the most important series of the season-a trait we Wing Nuts are used to seeing in our beloved team…Oh well, there is always next year, and, like the Yankees of Baseball, the Wings are more likely than not to be there when it’s all said and done…Again I have to give some credit where it is do. My life long friend Amy called me during the Eastern Conference Finals to tell me that, should the Wings at that time have made it too the Cup Finals, they “ didn’t stand a chance against either Washington or Pittsburgh in a 7 game series”. As a die hard Wing Nut, her statement shocked me and of course I abused her for making out. However, in the end, she was proven to be more right than I and so, it is with much eating of crow that I say-good call dude, you got me, this time lol.