The Romantic

We watched "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" on Saturday night with Will (his first time). Call me an unrepentant romantic, but I just can't get enough of this song:

Coffee Break

It's Day 8, and we are still struggling to recover from our cold/flu/lurgy. V. and I were able to go out last night for a dinner and a movie ("No Reservations," a pleasant but forgettable film that wasn't as good as the original, "Mostly Martha") in Southbank. However, after we went to bed Will woke up a few times during the night from congestion and coughing. So far today he's managed no more than 30 minutes of sleep in a row. V. has dosed him up with Dimetapp, so I hope he gets some relief now.

Yesterday I attended an interesting talk by one of my new colleagues at UQ, Blake McKimmie. Blake is a social psychologist interested in the impact of psychological factors on the legal system. I learned a bit about the Australian legal system. It appears to be more similar to the one in the U.K. than the one in the States. And only the State of Queensland requires unanimous jury decisions. In the other states, a simple majority is required for most kinds of cases. I was also surprised to learn more about the infamous McDonald's coffee case. You know the story: in 1994 an old lady was burned by a cup of coffee she bought in the drive-thru. The U.S. jury in that case awarded her $2.9 million, although that was reduced to $640,000 by the trial judge, and even settled for less than that in the end. It is often brought up as a horrendous example of frivolous litigation, and did a lot to damage the reputation of the legal system. But here are some additional facts that Blake mentioned in his talk:

• All McDonald's coffee at the time of that incident was served at about 190 degrees F (88 degrees C), whereas most other restaurants never served coffee hotter than 160.
• The woman spent 8 days in the hospital and required skin grafts for the 3rd-degree burns she received covering 6% of her body, including her legs and groin region.
• McDonald's had received over 700 complaints about its hot coffee and resulting burns BEFORE this case, but had always settled such complaints out-of-court without adjusting the temperature of the coffee.
• The reason given by the jury members for awarding the large amount was that $2.9 million was equivalent to two days' worth of coffee sales for McDonald's in the U.S., and such an amount would send a message to McDonald's that it needed to deal with the problem once and for all.
• After this case, McDonald's indeed lowered the temperature of its coffee to no more than 160 degrees F, and added warnings to the cups.

For more information, there's a great Wikipedia entry about the case.

I don't remember hearing any of this back in the day. Isn't it interesting how what we do hear (via the news) can affect our attitudes about things for such a long time, even if they are based on incomplete information? Or should I say, isn't it scary?

Rain, Facebook, and Ms. Knightley

1. At last, it has been raining in Brisbane on and off for the last three days. To appreciate the significance of all this moisture, read this entry by another of my favorite bloggers, Mooselet. She, by the way, has some sort of unending reservoir of physical and emotional strength for parenting that I used up two days after Will was born. Just so I'm clear about the value of rain in Australia, it is measured in millimeters, not centimeters or something bigger. A forecast can include the chance of 5-10 millimeters of rain--that's not even a half an inch!!
   
2. I am now on Facebook. Why would a "middle-aged" man do such a thing? The answer is simple: peer pressure. EVERYONE in my immediate social group at UQ seems to be on this. I'll report back once I understand the benefits of all this "social networking." If you're on Facebook, please consider adding me as a friend...I am desperate to become popular.
3. The other night we watched "Pride and Prejudice" (the Keira version) on a DVD that I bought here in Oz. Guess what?! Viewers in the U.S. saw a different ending. Elizabeth and Darcy are shown cuddling and whispering sweet nothings to each other in the U.S. ending, but the rest of the world saw the credits hit once Elizabeth got her father's blessing for the engagement. (I've heard the Swedish version had an even racier ending involving Jane, Elizabeth, and Darcy, but this is unconfirmed. Maybe Sven will check on this). It appears that Americans can't be happy with their romantic movies unless they have a little kissing in the end...
   

An Evening at the Cinebar

V. and I had our first “date” in months this past Friday night. Our babysitter is a caregiver at a neighborhood daycare whom V. met while walking down the street one day, and who is entirely overqualified for babysitting but very cheap, by American standards. Once we waved goodbye to our son, who was really indifferent about our leaving, we headed off to Rosalie, a little neighborhood a few minutes from our home, where there are plenty of trendy restaurants to choose from. However, we opted to spend the entire evening at the Blue Room Cinebar. For a fixed price, we had a Thai meal on the cinema’s outdoor balcony and two tickets to see a Danish film, “After the Wedding.” The food was excellent (it comes from the kitchen of a Thai restaurant just below), and the entire concept was wonderful. Each of the two theatres has about 24 seats that were stuffed like reclining chairs with a sizable side table for two between each pair of seats. One can order a bottle of wine or other drinks that are brought to you during the movie (we didn’t actually try this out, but someone behind us had a bottle of champagne). You can even have your dinner in your seat during the film. It is all very cozy and convenient. The movie, by the way, was quite good--full of repressed emotions and family tragedy, typical of any good Scandinavian film.

I want to make special mention of the blog penned by Audra “Bryson”, an American who moved to Sydney in January. These two recent entries describe the exact Aussie appliances and the strange bathroom drain that we have in our home in Brisbane. It’s a bit eerie reading someone else’s description of what I thought was our unique experience!