This guy can't win for losing...

So it seems that Mehmet Ali Agca, the guy who shot the previous Pope back in '81, is getting out of jail. 20 years imprisonment in Italy for shooting John Paul II, then another 5 years to complete a sentence in Turkey for shooting someone. And then...

since he's been in jail for most of his adult life, he hasn't completed the mandatory military service that's required of all Turkish males. So the draft board (or whatever the Turkish equivalent is) is going to be waiting at the prison gates...

(Actually, this may or may not happen - Agca turns 48 tomorrow, and normally the Turkish conscription regulations only apply to males 20-41. Depends on how PO'd the Turkish government is with him, I suppose...)

Oy vey

In other news, today was the first day of Hebrew class for the new year. We're about done with the first book, and ready to start on the next book. After another week off for MLK's birthday, of course. (We just had two weeks off for Chanukah and New Year).

Amazingly, I remembered almost everything, despite not having looked at the book for three weeks (I misplaced it after the last class before the break and only found it again after frantic searching last night.).

Hebrew's a rather logical language. My brain likes it a lot. Makes more sense than English or most of the Romance languages, anyway.

The only problem I'm having is with vocabulary retention, as my exposure as a kid was to people using Ashkenazic pronunciation, while we're being taught "Standard Hebrew" as used in your average Reform synagogue, which is primarily based on Sephardic pronunciation. Really throws me...

TV commentary

So tonight was the much-promoted episode of CBS's Cold Case in which all the songs used to set the mood of the flashbacks were by Bruce Springsteen. (Bet it was fairly cheap, too - Springsteen used to be on CBS Records back in the day.) Being somewhat of a fan of Springsteen pre-1988, I was actually looking forward to this one.

But darn it, they lost me from the opening.

Date given is 1980. Four high school kids in a '69 Chevelle SS convertible, speeding down the highway, backseaters swilling beer, all singing along to No Surrender.
Problem is, No Surrender is from Born in the U.S.A. Which didn't come out until 1984.

It was like that the whole way through. They used music from four albums - The River (1980), Nebraska (1982), Born in the U.S.A. and Tunnel of Love (1987). All out of order, though - they used the music from the later albums in flashbacks that were supposed to be taking place in '80 and '81, and then in the scenes in '86 and '88 they used stuff from The River and Nebraska. And the last one... well, the song they picked from The River was so obvious I was thinking "Oh good grief, I hope they don't use that, it's just so obvious..." But they did.

Not one of their better efforts on the music front. I've noticed things like this in previous episodes set in the '80s. Maybe because that's when I was a teenager and listening to American Top 40 every weekend, and Top 40 radio every night as I did my homework. I still have a bunch of rough tapes from the radio that I made during the years 1982 (when I got my first Walkman) to 1986 (when I stopped listening to Top 40 and started listening to hard rock). It was influential... and that's pretty much the same music I still listen to most of the time.

survey meme (courtesy of izzytart)

1. name:
2. birthday:
3. place of residence:
4. what makes you happy:
5. what are you listening to now/have listened to last:
6. do you read my lj:
7. if you do, what is particularly good/bad about it:
8. an interesting fact about you:
9. are you in love/have a crush at the moment:
10. favourite place to be:
11. favourite lyric:
12. best time of the year:

RECOMMEND
1. a film:
2. a book:
3. a band, a song and an album:

PLUS
1. one thing you like about me:
2. two things you like about yourself:
3. put this in your lj so i can tell you what i think of you.