The first day of another working week. It's President's Day today. If you cannot remember why today is President's Day or if you never knew why to begin with, here is some information.

I finally book my first flight within North America, after 18 months in this country. Got a good deal (considering I had such a small advance window) from HotWire.

Found a review by Jonathan Yardley of 'Tobacco: The Story of How Tobacco Seduced the World' by Iain Gately off Arts and Letters Daily. It features the following extract from King James VI's tract called A Counterblaste to Tobacco. I remember this as part of a chapter in our Class X English text back home in India.

"Smoking is a custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black, stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless."

Just found out about IMDb's new subscription site IMDb Pro, which bears an interesting interface chock-full of nuggets like box office figures, news and the like. All for $12.99 a month or $99 a year. I think I'll stick with the free version for now, but "If you use IMDb to do your job, then you need IMDbPro.com.".

Dialogues make a David Mamet film memorable. Click here for quotes from THE SPANISH PRISONER.
Some of the lines are funnier if you have seen the movie, but there is still enough to make a click worthwhile.

Daily Readings for Lent
Leviticus 19:1-18: The Ten Commandments
Matthew 25:31-46