Fish Stories

I don't know why, but there is almost never anything decent scheduled on Saturday evening television. Possibly it's because they don't expect anyone to be home. At any rate, that seemed like a good reason to pop in my DVD of Big Fish, probably purchased at the same time as House of Flying Daggers. I wasn't sure what to expect. It had sounded like something I would enjoy. And it was. Every minute of it. It's...comedic, and dramatic, and dark and bright, and, really, doesn't categorize well at all. At its heart is a father who tells seemingly unbelievable stories about his life, and a son who just wants to know the truth. One of the things that I really like is that there is no clear line drawn between fact and fable. The stories are presented as is. Excellently, and entertainingly, done.

By a strange coincidence, I picked up a book of "false logic puzzles." In other words, logic puzzles where people may or may not be telling the truth. You have some information (the guilty party told exactly one truth; at least one statement is false) but you still have to work through and figure out which statements are true and which are false. One of the simplest versions comes from the movie Labyrinth: Sarah comes to two door with odd-looking characters on them. She's allowed to ask one of them one question, and knows that one of them tells the truth and the other always lies (but not which). One door leads to the castle and the other two certain death. She asks the one on the left whether the one on the right would tell her that the door on the left led to the castle. He says "Yes." And this told her NOT to choose the door on the left. Why? Because if Lefty is telling the truth, then Righty is not, and so the door on the right goes to the castle. If Lefty is lying, then Righty would tell her "No" and be telling the truth, so the door on the right still goes to the castle. Anyway, the book is a lot of fun to work through. And gives me material for bonus questions on tests! ;^)