2 Days in 1: My unfortunate day with transformation and Superman: the Return

I couldn't believe my luck! My transformation failed for the 2nd time (no colonies grew on the plate), and I just ran my third trial today hoping that it would work, or else I would have to postpone my whole week's of protein purification project. Currently, I am trying to blame the fault on something else besides myself, such as the agar plate itself; however, I was remembered that I was the one who prepared the plate. Urgh, got to find out the source of error real quick before my LB media gets bad. Fortunately, I had a nice "newbie" squash game with Tania at the gym today, which helped to mitigate my sense of frustration. I called it newbie because we did not know any of the rules and we just try to bounce the small semi-inelastic ball off the wall to one another. It was a good workout for me, but I guess it was just a warm up for Tania. That should put me to shame that I have such a low level of fitness compared to her. And shame on me! While I was trying to be fit over the summer, here I am munching away on Chips Ahoy (my third dinner for the night) dipped in milk. I guess the day that I look like Brandon Routh will just never arrive.

Talking about Routh, I just watched Superman: the Return on iMax theatre last night, and it was the preview (yeah, the movie officially starts tonight). And the cool thing was that parts of the movie was in 3D. Seeing Superman zooming in and out of the flat 2-dimensional screen was a thrilling experience, especially when you thought that the spaceshuttle (or whatever that was going to fall on you) was actually going to land on you. Also, 3D graphics can be really psychological: when the images of snow flakes fell on me, I shivered unintentionally, subconciously thinking that the icy cold water droplets would trickle down my neck when the snowflakes melt. Yeah, that was kind of silly, but it got me there.

Another cool feature the movie was that Brandon Routh (Clark Kent aka Superman) really resembles the deceased Christopher Reeve: they have the same body build, character, and even the same voice. And the beginning and the ending of the movie are very faithful to the earlier 2 Superman movies, which I think was cool albeit the credit fonts could use some technological touch in them.

One character that I dislike most in the movie (nope, not Lex Luthor, although he is a good antagonist, I must say) is Lois Lane. Her character was just absurd and I do not think that she understands Superman well enough to actually love him. And I think that she was apathetic towards the people around her. The most obvious reason was because we know that although Lois shared many intimate moments with Superman, she could not see the resemblance of Superman in Clark Kent. Was it because she chose to focus on the superstar and could not care less of the people around her? Superman did not bother to undisclose his identity (or else we would be watching a masked Superman), yet she wasn't aware of that. Did she love Superman because he is a world celebrity and paid less attention to the mediocre Clark Kent? Even her son and fiance, who have just met Superman, could see the resemblance between Superman and Clark Kent. Also, during the 5 year-period when Superman left, she became bitter and resentful towards Superman, which made her win the Putlizer Prize for her article entitled "Why the world does not need Superman". That wouldn't really make sense because she was the closest to Superman and should understand his motives and actions. Perhaps she was being emotional because she had his baby. Maybe she thought that Superman had left for good and would never return again; however, if only she had pooled her thoughts together, she could perhaps reason out why Superman was missing, or maybe have a little faith in her that one day he will return. Even Margeret, Superman's foster mother, knew that Clark would one day return, so why couldn't she? Maybe the director would think of adding a few touches on Lois's character in the next movie so that her love for Superman would be more convincing.