Symptoms about to end

Today I attacked the last third of Chapter 2 "Symptoms". It looks like I'll have it ready for review by tomorrow.

Items handled this evening were all under the heading "Suboptimal coding standards" and included "too vague rules", "too stylistic" and "too extensive". This last third seems to be least affected by the change in point-of-view I made in this second draft version.

The book has in total 40 thousand words, which would make it probably a 100-page book. I should point out that Chapter 2 has almost tripled in size in this second round. I don't think that will happen for all chapters, but 3 "Root Causes" and 6 "Benefits" might behave similarly. Chapter 1 is actually missing altogether. I only have a Preface and I'm not sure I'll keep it. It is the oldest relic of writing in this book and it seems like I now have a better grasp of the the whole thing and could better explain and introduce it. Probably I should.

I'll need to write some kind of instruction on how to read the book I guess. Instructions like, which chapter contains what and who is each chapter meant for and most useful. It seems to be common practice. Strange isn't it? Books meant for educated professionals need to have reading instructions in them, while practically anybody else can just pick up a novel and read it with enjoyment.

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Yesterday, we saw the movie "United 93". It is practically a documentary about one of the hi-jacked planes on 11-Sep-01 in America. Realism is a difficult genre, but the movie succeeds fairly well. It seemed that the movie shouldn't be critiqued at all but used as a method to grief, honor and remember. There was no extraneous patriotism or hostility in the film, unlike what I expect from the film "World Trade Center" starring Nicolas Cage, who seems to be in practically everything right now. According to Internet Movie Database, Cage made one film in 2004, two in 2005, three in 2006, has announced four films for 2007 and another four for 2008. To keep the increasing velocity of one more film each year, he should try to get into one more film appearing in 2008. And if he keeps it up long enough by year 2055 he'll appear in a new film every week!

I liked the film "Lady in the Water". I don't care what anybody says. It was scary, funny and tragic all at once. I liked especially the performance of stuttering Paul Giamatti. I liked him in "Sideways" and "American Splendor" before.