89. Brad Pitt And Rebecca Romijn

  

Brad Pitt And World War Z

It is a tough decision this month when deciding what actor you want to see saving the world. The choices are as follows:

1. Brad Pitt in World War Z
2. Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx in White House Down
3. Gerard Butler in Olympus Has Fallen
4. Jack in Jack The Giant Slayer
5. Superman in Man Of Steel

Our pick, just because he needs the money and is turning fifty in December, is Brad Pitt. He is fighting zombies starting this Friday and his Trojan War battle experience (Troy 2004) should serve him well in his new epic. Eric Bana, Orlando Bloom, and Julian Glover won’t be showing their buff bodies in this one, though revisiting Troy would be exhilarating to start one’s week.

Mireille Enos from the TV series The Killing plays his wife in the movie as he and his family try to flee the zombie pandemic and solve its mystery at the same time. Sometime during the evening the lady next to you will say she just enjoys looking at Pitt and doesn’t care about his acting. Promise! It is another pandemic that has been going around for years. Please don’t use any smart retort to the comment. Let her dream because we can’t come anywhere in the neighborhood of his appeal.

Channing Tatum And White House Down

 

This is the second time in two months that the White House will be getting a face lift after battle scenes and incursions. Channing Tatum seems to fit the old adage of being a lover not a fighter as he and his daughter take on a paramilitary evil in this one while touring the White House. He will not be kissing Amanda Seyfried (Dear John) in this one but co-stars Maggie Gyllenhaal and Rachelle Lefevre might help him to forget her.

Money And Stardom…Forbes Magazine Speaks, Once Again

The Forbes Magazine list of the top grossing stars is always an interesting read. The most interesting fact of the twenty stars in this year’s top grossing list is that Gisele Budchen is approaching one billion dollars in earnings.  She is the only model to do so. The word supermodel in front of all her appearances is well deserved.

Here are the yearly salaries and net worth of some familiar couples.

Net Worth/Yearly Salary

1. Beyonce and Jay-Z…775 million/92 million
2. Maria Carey and Nick Cannon…515 million/80 million
3. Garth Brooks And Trisha Yearwood…365 million/50 million
4. Tom Brady and Gisele Budchen…350 million/60 million
5. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie…270 million/70 million
6. David Beckham and Victoria Beckham…255 million/48 million
7. Harrison Ford And Calista Flockhart…224 million/40 million

Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson are at 40 million if they stay together and their careers don’t quickly approach their Twilight. Sorry creative writers that reference had to be thrown into the mix. Justin Bieber will soon knock everyone out of the water if he settles on a girlfriend.

Iris Johansen And Eve Duncan…

If you need one, two, or three summer reads Iris Johansen is a mystery writer that will keep your interest piqued on a large number of stages. The Eve Duncan series starting with Face Of Deception and followed by The Killing Game is a great double start for your summer. Eve Duncan is a forensic sculpture. As a teen her illegitimate seven year old daughter, Bonnie, was kidnapped and killed. This haunted her and drove her to study forensic sculpting at school. It was a resolution to her pain and a way to help find and put the faces on the fragments and bones of the many lost children murdered like her daughter.

You can meet Iris Johansen in an eight-minute YouTube video as Iris describes Eve Duncan in her new book, Eve. It is one of a new three part book series Iris Johansen says will be finished at the end of 2013. The Internet offers such a great venue for viewing the authors we read and want to know more about as we explore their subjects. They all have Internet talks about their books and character development like Johansen does in four different YouTube features. It will just take a little Internet research to find and view your favorite author.

If you have On Demand in any form on your television, look up The Killing Game (2011). It stars Laura Prepon of The 70’s Show as Eve Duncan. This made for television movie followed Johansen’s books and characters perfectly. Prepon was so much like the description of Eve Duncan in Johansen’s books that it is eerie. Hopefully Prepon will take this character, her stepdaughter, and boyfriend to the big screen some time soon???

 

David Baldacci With King And Maxwell

You will recognize David Baldacci from his twenty best selling books and his movie Absolute Power (1997) starring Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman, Ed Harris, and Laura Linney. Absolute Power is a political thriller that has Eastwood battling the President (Eastwood), the FBI, the Secret Service, the local police (Harris), and his estranged daughter (Linney). It is one of Eastwood’s best movies.

King And Maxwell is Baldacci’s new television series. Jon Tenney (Sean King) and Rebecca Romijn (Michelle Maxwell) star as two former secret service agents who are now private investigation partners. The first three episodes in the series follow Baldacci’s books like melon follows honey dew….another creative writing stretch but different, yes???!!!

If you like mysteries and thrillers start with Baldacci’s five-part book series beginning with The Camel Club. The Camel Club is a group of critical thinkers and off-beat characters that meet in the Library of Congress and attack a variety of subjects and cases in the Washington, DC area. Murder and politics head their list.

Football Season…Already!

The Eagles have just started a week of mandatory preseason practices. We thought this would make a good thinking challenge as you explore past and present football favorites. There is a three-minute time limit on this exercise. On your mark, get set, and go.

Rita’s Football Forecast

 Each clue will help you to guess the nickname of a football team.
Write the nickname and city for each clue.

                                             NICKNAME                                    CITY

EX.    America’s bird               Eagles                                    Philadelphia

1.  King of the jungle                ______________            ______________

2.  A color                              ______________            ______________

3.  Has horns                           ______________            ______________

4.  Fast plane                           ______________            ______________

5.  Very big person                 ______________            ______________

6.  A rough horse                    ______________            ______________

7.  Young pony                       _______________          ______________

8.  A grizzly                            _______________          ______________

9.  Indian’s leader                    _______________          ______________

10. A dead battery needs          _______________          ______________

11. Bug spray                          _______________          ______________

12. $5 and $10                        _______________          ______________

13. Gas, electric or____heat      _______________          _______________

14.  A number                         ________________        _______________

15.  Stronger than iron             ________________        _______________

 Pick a sports league.  Write your own hints for the teams in the league.

Helping Local Businesses, Entrepreneurs, And Artists
Making A Difference In Our Community

More and more community members and business representatives are sending information about their companies, businesses, and work to the column. Here are the two latest that have reached out to the column through email or the business site LinkedIn. We have recommended LinkedIn a number of times for business dialogue and social media connections. Here are our latest business updates:

3P Learning

Lee Finkelstein is the Regional Manager, Northeast for 3P Learning.  Here is what Lee shared about his company. 3P’s impressive products are used throughout the world.

3P Learning is the global leader in online learning for school-aged students, with our programs covering mathematics (Mathletics), spelling and literacy (Spellodrome), and Science (IntoScience).  All of our e-learning programs are designed by educators and educational technologists and are fully aligned with over a dozen National Curricula, making them trusted by over 3.5 million students and 10,000 schools across the world.  Lee is a certified instructional technology specialist working with Philadelphia area schools utilizing the Mathletics resource.

Mathletics combines an international, live gaming interface with aligned curriculum activities.  The program is fun, engaging, and highly instructional.  Animated visual support for all Mathematical concepts, intelligently adaptive questions, and personalized learning all contribute to students improving their Math skills.  Available for students K-12, access from any internet connection with apps for iPad and Android tablets really helps to connect Math to students’ and families lives.

Thanks Tom and feel free to edit wherever you feel necessary.

Regards,

Lee

Referable…Business Marketing Assistance And Advice

Everyone is looking for a way to enhance and streamline their business. Here is another organization you should explore. Their free sign-up information at the bottom of this email looks inviting.

Tom,

I apologize, I sent over an un-edited version. Here is the newer, more concise version. Thanks!

Referable puts years of online marketing experience in the hands of local business owners, helping them drive new calls, emails, and sales. They empower small business growth with the expertise of a full service marketing agency for the price of a dinner for two.

On July 4th, they are declaring “Financial Independence Day” for small business owners with the first public release of their Business Optimization Success System (BOSS), which includes hours of video training to show you exactly how to grow their business.  BOSS helps you:

1. Increase visibility on Google, Yelp, and more with SEO and PPC
2. Drive calls, emails, and walk-ins from a website that works
3. Build customer loyalty and referrals, and increase positive online reviews

You’ll see immediate results, because the BOSS system helps you take action right away to grow your business.  If you need a hand, they’re ready to help!  The end result is improved leads, increased sales, more satisfied customers and lower marketing costs.  Referable is selecting 75 business owners on a first come, first serve basis to gain access to the full BOSS system.  If you’d like to be selected, please email your name and the name of your business to boss@referable.com.

Ryan

New Visitor’s Greeting…Welcome to Let’s Talk, a freewheeling column on movies, theater, television, books, educational practices, the arts, current events, and the Internet. If you are a first time visitor to the column, I recommend that you start with the About topic in the Index Bar at the top of the page. Follow About with the Let’s Talk column I in archives. It was the first column of the New Year. Proceed to Let’s Talk II and then work your way up to today’s column. These columns will introduce a plethora (a better word choice than myriad) of new ideas and old delights you may have missed. It will give you a strong foundation for some of the issues we are introducing and then following up in newer columns.

New Visitors…New visitor’s comments are welcome, too. They are immediately placed on this page in the contributor’s comment section or are shared with the column’s readers on Sunday. You are welcome, also, to suggest topics for discussion or enlist help from the site’s family of readers. I am a compendium of useless information. Challenge me, please, with great theater, travel, history, books, movies, and educational issues that would interest a wide audience of readers. The “compendium comment” was stolen from Orson Bean. Bean used the quote many times on television talk show interviews. Please recommend my column to your friends and other lovers of creative discussion.