The .Plan

During my surgery clerkship, every morning when I walked down that damn hill at 4:30am, I would play Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” and Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger” to prepare for the day’s customary tongue lashing by Rasa, my ball-busting chief resident.

If I were a surgeon, I think those two songs would be the first two on my playlist.

Anesthesiologists have an important say because they must hear the beeps of their equipment. “There’s a bunch of them who are always saying, ‘Can you turn it down?’ ” said Dr. Bessler, the director of laparoscopic surgery at NewYork-Presbyterian. (He has 760 tunes on his iPod Mini. “For me, Abba is the thing,” he said. “There’s no gangsta rap in my O.R.”)
–Daniel Wakin, “While in Surgery, Do You Prefer Abba or Verdi?”, New York Times, June 10, 2006

Saw the new Pixar movie, Cars, tonight.

• The plot is entirely derived from Doc Hollywood, that early 1990s movie starring Michael J. Fox and Bridget Fonda.
• Long movie. Two hours.
• This is the first time that Pixar has inserted a substantial romantic subplot into one of its movies. I don’t do romantic comedies. It was exceedingly distracting — not just because today has just been one of those days — but because the romantic subplot made this Pixar movie lose its customary discipline and tightness. My friend Dave fell asleep for about 20 minutes during the movie.
• The computer generated animation work was amazing, especially the smoke coming from car engines and dust from the road. Racing scenes were very impressive.
• You will probably appreciate the movie more if you have driven The Mother Road (Route 66). Otherwise, you just won’t understand the Americana, nostalgia, and kitsch that pervades the movie.
• If you ever have the chance to drive Route 66, you should do it. Best cross country road trip of my life. The coolest stretch is across the Texas panhandle to the Arizona-California border.
• Did they really have to resort to racially stereotyped characters? Sassy black woman, the low-riding Mexican, the melodramatic Italian, etc.

Cool excerpt from Slate.com’s review:

The new Pixar movie is called Cars (Disney). It’s hard to think of a title that would more instantly light up the hearts of men and boys, except, perhaps, Nachos.
–Michael Agger, “Sunday Drive”, Slate, June 9, 2006