POTPOURRI

According to NBC News:  major winter storms to wallop two-thirds of U.S., could bring heavy snow and hazardous ice.  About 45 million from Kansas to Maryland should brace for blizzards and thunderstorms.

Also from NBC News:  Alcoholic drinks should carry cancer risk warning labels, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said in a report. Medical experts who cheered the announcement shared what to know about the risks of drinking.  Alcohol already carries a warning label about risk of birth defects.  The more you drink, the higher the risk of cancer.

Tomiko Itooka of Japan, the oldest person in the world, passed away on December 29 at the age of 116.  She was born in 1908.  Loved bananas and Japanese drink Calpis.  The oldest person now is 116-year old Brazilian nun Inah Canabarro Lucas (below).  Only two years ago, another nun, Sister André of France, born Lucile Randon, died at the age of 118 as the oldest person.  The oldest person ever was Jeanne Calment (left) of France, who lived 122 years and 164 days, leaving us in 1997.

From oldest person to the youngest ever chess world champion at the age of 18, Gukesh Dommaraju of India.

• He beat 24-year old defending champion Ding Liren of China.
• Dommaraju was born in Chennai to a mother who is a microbiologist and father, a surgeon.
• He dropped out of school after elementary school to focus on chess.
• His style is compared to former world champion Anatoly Karpov:  incremental, with anaconda-like gains.

Forty years ago I had a projection 100-inch TV system.  Hisense just unveiled an all-new 4K laser TV, dubbed L9Q, with a screen size of 150 inches (diagonal direction), delivering up to 5000 ANSI lumens of brightness.   

• 
  The best OLED TVs top out at 85 inches and cost around $6000.
• The L9Q has a 6.2.2 surround sound system, and supports Dolby Atmos and DTS Virtual X.
• Runs on Google TV, so can receive streaming services.
• No price officially announced as of today, but one report says more than $5500 for the projector, to which you need to add the screen and other assorted costs.  If this is true, well worth the expense.  Hmmm...

From the New York Times this morning:

🏆 Golden Globes (Sunday): The Globes, once a charming, boozy cousin to the more austere Oscars, are on life support after a series of ethical, financial and diversity scandals. The show has a new owner (the Hollywood Foreign Press Association no longer exists), a more diverse voter pool and a new network. But will those changes — and a slate of A-list nominees — be enough to attract viewers? The ceremony is tomorrow night on CBS and Paramount+.

From NBC News:  Gold Derby predictions aside, the film that goes into the night with the most nominations is “Emilia Pérez,” a genre-busting song-and-dance spectacle about a Mexican drug cartel boss who undergoes gender-affirming surgery and attempts to start a new life as an anti-violence humanitarian. The movie, distributed by Netflix, nabbed 10 nominations, and is playing on that streaming channel.  

Emilia is played by Karla Sofía Gascón, a transgender.  She has been nominated for Best Performance by a Female Actor.  If she wins, she will become the first openly trans woman to win a Golden Globe for acting in a film.  The movie is a drama, but also a musical.

The group behind the Globes introduced a new category last year: Cinematic and Box Office Achievement. It’s a field that allows voters to recognize movies that have “garnered extensive global audience support” (read: ticket sales); last year, the prize went to “Barbie.”

Eight hit movies are in the running this year: “Alien: Romulus,” “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice,” “Deadpool & Wolverine,” “Gladiator II,” “Inside Out 2,” “Twisters,” “Wicked” and “The Wild Robot.”

Unlike the Academy Awards, the Golden Globes also recognize achievements on television.  The best odds for globes go to Shogun in drama and Hacks in comedy.  About Shogun, as of two days ago:

• 
  Season One won a record 18 Emmys last year.
• Writing has begun, with new material, because Season Two no longer will reference James Clavell's 1975 novel, will begin shooting this year, but probably not be released until 2026.
• Will be shown on FX and streamed on Hulu.
• There will also be a Season Three.

If you're of Japanese ancestry and living in Hawaii, like me, you might be interested in The Untold Story:  Internment of Japanese Americans in Hawaii.  Originally shown on PBS, the whole nearly one hour documentary can be seen by clicking on that link.  Over 2,000 men and women of Japan ancestry were arrested 48 hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, and largely interned in Hawaii.  That year there were 158,000 people of Japanese ancestry living Hawaii, which was 35% of the population.  Too many to jail all, like what happened on the West Coast.  Lucky for me, as I was one year old.  My mother mentioned that she pointed out to me the smoke emanating from Pearl Harbor on 7December1941.

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