August 1, 2016
-
Saw the new Godzilla movie today. It is dramatic documentary about how the government is not prepared to deal with a crisis situation and is not for kids. There are A LOT of government meetings in which the officials collect all kinds of data, but can't decide on any consistent means of dealing with the monster, meeting after meeting after meeting. It is the kind of thing where you just have to sit back and wait until the officials are done shilly-shallying. "So do we capture Godzilla or kill him? or drive him out to sea?" "Oh, there is one old lady and a kid who might possibly become collateral damage, so call off the attack on the monster who just keeps getting bigger as we stall!" "We can't drive tanks on the roads because there is no law about that..." and on and on and on.... Godzilla is destroying Tokyo, but all the officials can think about is potential fallout from any course of action they might take. They cannot see the forest for the trees. I suppose torturing the audience with all of the meetings was the point of the movie.
The train we were about to get on to go home stopped far short of where it was supposed to and the doors didn't open, so we wondered what was up. The driver had apparently gotten a mistaken message that a mag 7 quake was about to hit Tokyo. Glad it was a mistake. Some equipment somewhere malfunctioned and set off a false alarm. I heard later that the false alarm was the result of a lightning strike somewhere in Fuchu.
