Top Gear

Spanking new gear, same old Cubs bullshit.

A free gift that came with my package, one of those ionic titanium necklaces that's supposed to enhance athletic performance. More bullshit, in my opinion. It's called eight hours of sleep each night and training.

When I started playing ball in fourth grade, I was given a glove thin as a wafer, flat as a pancake and told to play third base. No, it wasn't the streets of the Dominican Republic -- I had a proper shirt, shoes and went to games in a school bus -- but didn't have any real gear to call my own. In middle school through early high school, it was the same thing -- standard issue equipment from a selection of Mizuno and Louisville Slugger bats to mitts. You picked one that fit, whether you're catching, playing the infield or patroling the outfield. At least I didn't have to pull a Shoeless Joe Jackson -- I had my own cleats. But they were soccer boots because that's what everyone wore for softball. We just weren't sophisticated enough to wear actual spikes.

Things looked up a little towards the end of high school. I actually had my own glove now, a 12.75-incher that worked for catching, even though my pitcher Shulin was a flamethrower (I played very well with fire). I developed the habit of wearing a batting glove under my mitt, but batted bare-handed Mark Grace-style -- I agree, the swing doesn't feel as sweet unless you had control of the grip -- and owned my personal pair instead of sharing like some of the girls did (fortunately, SARS and swine flu were not yet invented then). I now also had metal cleats, which I wore out a couple pairs each season. Still, some things never changed. Shared catcher's equipment. Chin zits? Shared sweat.

After high school and joining the Singapore Recreational Club for club-level softball (my ball club to this day), an identity began to develop. I begin to always carry two gloves, the tighter, compacter infielder's mitt and the roomier outfield leather. A sliding pad came on my much-maligned, injury-prone left knee. Always a wristband on my right forearm. But it was when games didn't carry as high a stake (national school championships, national club leagues, international tournaments) that I really came into my own as a ballplayer. On the recreational slowpitch diamonds of Chicago, you'll know me from a distance -- different-colored socks on each leg, Oakleys as long as you can see the sun, red adidas cleats, a personal Louisville Slugger bat (a lifelong Slugger user, I only recently stepped out of character to purchase a 2008 DeMarini Evo composite shaft). Playing first or second base on my co-ed teams and third base on my women's team, I became a much more physical player, diving into the red dirt, getting down, earning the nicknames of Spazz and Pigpen. But when you play against guys and you're a chick, you need to make a statement. You need to burn them by sailing that homer over their heads. You need to take someone out on the bases. You need to nail their line drives. And so, when the top prize was just bragging rights and a championship sweatshirt, I truly became a better reader of softball, and fine-tuned my game like never before (funnily enough, watching as many as I can of the Cubs' 162+ game schedule each year helped). Going down to the well tonight and trying to recapture the glory days? Guilty.

Today is Christmas Day, because I received a box from North Wichita, Kansas labeled BaseballSavings.com. Inside, a bounty of play ball pleasures -- a new Louisville Slugger Zephyr 12.5" infield glove and red adidas cleats. Shiny, lingering smell of leather, ready to smack some dirt and yellow softballs. Last weekend at the Old Rafflesians Association slow-pitch tourney, I was struck by how well-equipped the high school kids are these days -- they have a lot more stuff to enhance their performance (minus the 'roids) than we did. But still, it's still fun to get new gear, no matter how many years I'm past my prime. The fun of lacing up so the rawhide melds into your left palm perfectly, so the spikes dig into the ground just right moving across the infield or outfield. Feeling a little taller because the studs haven't been worn down, feeling like your range is a little longer because new gloves don't shortchange on you. Hey, this stuff is important when your breakthrough years are over, but at least there's still a lot of breaking in left to do. You can't replace cranky, creaky old catcher's knees or the impossibly foolish belief that the Cubs will win the World Series championship in your lifetime, but at least you'll never miss a grounder or trip on a base. That you can blame on equipment, that is.

All Sunshine All The Time

Wings and fries -- two of the best inventions in the whole world. The fries were crisp outside and fluffy inside. Genius.

The Mexican burger had us at hola. Ay carumba!

I customized a burger to go with my Racing In The Street program -- half-pound of grade one Australian beef with a slice of portobello. Hello beautiful thing!

I'm a pizza nut with stringent requirements for my pizza. This crust? Lust.

Surprise! Owner Andrew brought out these freshly baked brownie squares drizzled with chocolate sauce on the house. The perfect treat.

I flip for burgers. I really do. I know you know I like a lot of different types of food. But I have a top shelf of what truly constitutes food I can't live without. Such as my mom's laksa (or pretty much anything that comes out of her kitchen), steak, pizza, cheese fries, ice cream, hot dogs. And burgers.

I always like to tell the story of how my first dinner at college was at the infamous Yesterdays (that doesn't exist anymore) down University Place in Evanston, Illinois. I got a honking massive half-pound burger buried under fries. I ate a third of it. Having lived in the city of cows for almost 13 years, I can now eat something like that, plus beer, plus cheese on the fries, plus dessert. No more growing pains.

Chicago is going through a burger craze right now, with one of the lifestyle reporters at the Chicago Tribune declaring himself burger bureau chief, making it his personal mission to hit every burger joint in town (and there are a lot) rating every single one of them. I have a few favorites -- Kuma's Corner (burgers inspired by heavy metal, the Slayer, mercy - piles of fries topped with half a pound of solid black angus, chili, cherry peppers, andouille, onions, jack cheese and anger), to name one -- and I won't eat that fancy stuff that's so trendy now. Also, burgers should never be less than half a pound of meat. I'm sorry, if you're wussing out on a burger, then you should be eating a salad instead.

In Singapore, it's not easy to find a good burger, because few hit the initial half-pound requirement. Also, consider this following equation for our weekly Beer Night outing:

Excellent beer + excellent food = Beer Night. Beer Night is not excellent beer + regular food. Beer Night is not regular beer + excellent food. We don't compromise. Each week, a new joint, dive or bar is proposed for exploration. Last night, Suan proposed Sunshine @ Carrie's, having heard raving things about the burgers there. Suan is a genius.

You probably don't expect the cafe to be located in a condo, by an Olympic-sized pool, and to be hanging out on patio furniture while waiting for your food. But you might not also expect that everything here is homemade, from the grade one Australian beef patties to the pizza crust. It's pretty easy to make a burger, but it's brain surgery executing a juicy, tender slab of meat that melts in the mouth (although I should have been asked how I'd have liked it done -- medium rare). We ordered a total of three burgers -- Mexican, Sunshine and my customized 200g with a grilled portobello and peppercorn sauce on the side. All flippin' fantastic -- it's very key that real burger buns are used, not some of the skimpy, wimpy, limp bread you see mocking good beef. The rucola pizza had a crust that made me wax nostalgic of what emerges from the best pie shops in Chicago. When you make a pizza crust comparable to pizza capital of the world (outside of Naples), you're a maestro. Crisp around the edges without feeling too heavy, it was a great host for the tomato slices, fresh rucola leaves topped off with mozzarella. Note to all restaurateurs: fresh ingredients make your cuisine taste really, really good. The sides of mesclun greens drizzled with balsamic vinaigrette were perfect.

Speaking of great hosts, we really appreciated that the owner Andrew stepped out from behind the grill to check on how we were doing, take a picture for his Facebook group and oh my god, serve us a platter of freshly made brownies with chocolate sauce. It wasn't just a piece of brownie for each of us. There was enough for three squares each. Too many places are run like a business. Last night, hanging out by the pool with a little lantern on our table, we felt like we were at a good friend's house, who wouldn't stop bringing cold beer and other treats from the kitchen. In fact, even though some portions of the order took 50 minutes to serve (we were given due warning), it didn't feel like it at all. And we were more than happy to wait.

Oh, I got so far ahead of myself I forgot to mention that the wings and fries appetizer combo we had, as well as the grilled portobello salad, were fantastic. The fries, although not hand-cut, were cooked just right - perfect crispness is not an easy feat. I didn't have any of the wings, but they disappeared fast. The salad will soothe any conscience for indulging in beer, pizza and burgers. We hung out into the night, but it was like sunshine all the time. Thanks, Drew, for a wonderful evening!

P/S Just $7.80 for a bottle of Little Creatures and no GST or service charge? SCORE! Just please be sure to be nice to your servers, who are really capable and a rare breed in Singapore.

Running For Our Lives On Them Backstreets

"You can't just stop at Chhomrong."

"I wish I would stop sweating!!!"

Many of you have been following my self-inflicted "Tri-ing Hard" and "Chumps Like Us" training program to get back into better shape for everything -- softball, tennis, races, mountains, whatever. Today I made my 15k race debut, but that's not the main event though.

The race that should grace this post is Racing the Planet's Namibia 2009 ultra-marathon, in which competitors ran (and trekked, and climbed, and put one foot in front of another) 250km across an African desert in seven days. There were 213 competitors this year, and one of them is my good friend Belinda Holdsworth. I'm the reason why she signed up for this insanity -- a friend's husband and his brother, Philipp and Mark Mossiman, are doing this for the second year um, running, to raise money for Operation Smile. I forwarded their drive for donations email to my Annapurna trek team and said dismissively said, "Whatever, this can't even come close to what we went through!" As a joke, of course, but momentarily forgetting about Bel's sense of humor. A couple of days later, she responded: "I signed up. And we might not be friends after I'm done with this."

Bel began her racing career at about the same time as I did, and although we didn't know each other then, we had both run Chicago as our first marathons in 2006 (well, I only ran the route pacing Mofo for 18 miles). In just three years, she has completed many more marathons, Olympic distance triathlons, half-Ironmans and is working her way towards an Ironman this year. We met trekking the Himalayas last year and after lots of ascents side by side, or when the going got tough there was always one behind the other, great conversations and beer, we promised to run a marathon together this year and we're signed up for Chicago. Not bad, but I'm the chump here -- Bel is a sleek slicked machine, a brick house of grit. She'll say yes to any physical challenge. Her philosophy: "How hard can it be?"

I admire every single competitor who signed up for the Namibia 2009 ultra-marathon, because it takes guts just to even consider this endeavor with any sort of pure seriousness. Although I haven't heard from her, I know as I'm writing this that Bel has completed the race. She would not and will not take no for an answer. Her feet had been split, her back chafed, her ankles swollen, her legs locked, her arms numb and soles ravaged but her spirit never once broke and her soul remained intact, even as she's succumbed to periods of hysterics and hysterionics. But don't let me do the talking -- in her daily blog, "This Is Crazy," she tells all by what she doesn't say. She doesn't own up to what it exactly takes to not cave in to pain and going against physical impossibility -- humans (that is, regular humans) are just not constructed to inflict this upon themselves. She doesn't admit to what's in her that propels her up each sand dune and to keep moving. I have trekked seven days with this girl and I know that nothing is more sacred to her than a shower, and the fact that she had to go without cleaning herself properly while running/trekking/suffering 250km is likely harder than the physical exertion itself. But this is what you should know: she never once shed a tear, even as the torrent of swear words expunged across the continent likely stunk more than camp each night. The only time she has gotten verklempt is at the thought of completion. Bel is a fighter, a champion and a true competitor. I will be very proud to run with her this fall. Although, ya know, she is a sub-3:55 marathoner and I would be happy to finish in 4:30. At least I know she'll be waiting with the beers.

Now, my piddly 15km debut at the Singapore PAssion Run this morning was exactly that -- piddly. I was extremely excited for the race. I probably didn't prepare for it as well as I should have in training, but I wasn't worried about it -- I am in sprint tri shape and I just biked across some mountains. Obviously, the question isn't whether or not I could finish, but how well I can (let's take "quickly" out of the equation). I even went as far as to play around with some radical tapering nutrition, carb draining between Monday and Wednesday, to starve and deprive my body of the energy it needed while continuing to work out, then re-loading to ensure every milligram of energy is absorbed.

According to my watch, I completed in about 1:27, with my splits being about 27, 30 and 30 each 5km. This was a great learning experience, as I move from being just a distance finisher to trying to improve on all aspects of racing. I had set a goal of completing under 1:30, which I did -- however, I've also completed the distance in training in 1:23, so I definitely could have done better. I'm happy to get this out of the way and set a standard for improving, but I wish I did not made the following mistakes:

- I only slept a total of 4.5 hours last night. I went to bed at 10pm for a 6pm wake-up call, but adrenaline woke me up at 1am and I couldn't get back to sleep until close to 4.30am. This is my problem -- I get overly excited about races and never enough rest the night before. I should have made sure rest was adequate all week. I've completed a sprint tri on just 2.5 hours of sleep, but that was my first one, which I didn't train for and it took me 2:00. Adrenaline and the beautiful city of Chicago kept me going though -- I never once felt it until I collapsed on my couch back home, two burgers and slabs of watermelon later. Heat, humidity and the individualistic atmosphere of races in Singapore didn't help much this morning, but then again, the distance wasn't long enough to need much value-added excitement.

- I charged out of the gate, which goes against my regular pattern. I should have aimed to complete the first 5k closer to 30:00, and then build up a steady stride. I was so eager to go quick that I lost my focus and burned up too much momentum. I usually go my last 5k pretty hard, but I found it tough to stay consistent. In fact, I was pacing a stronger runner for 7k, and lost him at about 12k. I took longer to get going after water stops...

- ... which brings me to my next point. A new challenge is learning how to respond to my body's needs for this distance. I can usually complete a 10k race without needing to stop for any water, because I'm very comfortable with that distance but the additional 5k threw me off a little. Also, I always had a tube of gel tentatively in my hand each time I approached a water station but didn't know if I should eat it... and I didn't. I probably should have -- I was getting pretty winded by the heat and humidity. I stopped at every station from 6k onwards and likely drank more than I should have. I know I should "listen to my body", but honestly, I'm not sure what my body wants for this distance. Training mindset and conditions today differed a lot, so I need to find the synch between the two. Coach Mick and others...?

Of course, as I do after every goddamned race in Singapore, I think to myself -- I am never running here again. It's just too hot. I took close to 45 minutes to completely cool down after -- I dripped the entire time. In fact, my entire kit was drenched by 3k into the race. But, of course, the only race I am never running here again is the marathon. Other distances keep me honest and would only make me better-equipped for more temperate conditions. Thank you for your support, encouragement and advice, as always -- next week is a bit of a break, then June 1 I officially begin training for the marquee Olympic distance triathlon and marathon events of the year. It will be a new challenge as I've never done an O.D. tri and full marathon within six weeks of each other, but it should be fun. Actually, it would be my first ever O.D. tri! In the meantime, I will continue to work towards getting leaner and more than ever, expect resistance training and conscientious recovery to be an important part of the program.

By the way, did you know my brother Dion surprised me with a visit home to cheer me on? He is a Spartan who rocks hard!

Jock Jam

Gym rat working out... on the Blackberry machine.

The problem about being a regular Joe athlete is that your mind is often going in a million directions. You're always full of confidence and positivity because you know what you can achieve, but because you know you can complete a marathon in 5:13 without training very hard (meaning, just three long runs, none of which surpassed 15 miles or 25 kilometers), you always wonder about what could have been. I won't lie. I'm pretty cocky. I know how far I can hit a softball if it was a big fat meatball I was sitting on and I know I can return impossible tennis shots. I know a combination of my physical affinity and mental psyche can make me good at most sports (except for gymnastics, skating, synchronized swimming and anything that requires grace) if I wanted to try -- and most times I do, so I can beat my competition. All my life playing softball, I was taught to play hard, and I do.

But I know there are better athletes than me in my life, and I am in constant awe of their power and prowess. They have always been my inspiration, as have my larger-than-life heroes -- John McEnroe, Pete Sampras, Roger Federer, Kirk Gibson, Mark Grace, Ryne Sandberg, Kerry Wood, and so on. And when you're told your body fat percentage is 37.2 percent, it's like getting a 100mph fastball landing in your gut like sucker punch, before a Roddick serve lands in the middle of your skull. And I'm thinking, how much better could I have been in my 31 years of playing sports (I was put into a pool when I was barely a year old) if I had not been carrying a reserve tank I didn't need? Seven weeks ago, I began a self-imposed Tri-ing Hard program in which I targeted to lose, in three stages, five pounds, two pounds and two pounds. I started at 147.2 pounds and figured that once I hit 140, I would be less concerned about weight and more about body fat.

Three weeks into my program, I made good progress through a combination of training for my first race of the season, Tribob's Singapore Sprint Series on April 19, and a much improved nutrition program. Top on the list -- I restricted myself to no more than one beer a day, or a maximum of seven a week. I cut out as many processed foods as possible, minimized my saturated fat and unnecessary carbohydrates, and made sure I had at least five servings of fruit or vegetables a day. By the time I was measured at my first personal training session, I had already lost two pounds in about three weeks, but that's just part of the way.

When it comes to training, I don't compromise. I don't run shorter distances to cut corners -- in fact, I would make my distance for the day or even a little more, if I can. I do more reps in my resistance training than I have to, because, it won't hurt you, would it? In addition to tri training, I play softball and tennis and bike everywhere. It's fun, I love it. But when I began my regime at the Fitness Factory with Augustine Lee and Moses Ching, my training was taken to a whole new level. Put it this way -- when I started on March 2, I did 120 leg raises. This morning, March 24, I did 225. I'm not saying it was easy -- my last five in the my fifth rep of the day felt like someone was trying to rip my abs off me while digging through the beer belly. But the fact is that I did it, and once you're done, it feels like being drenched with ice cold draught Guinness after a marathon. Mmm.

Because I'm at a point where beyond the leg raises, I'm doing 125 leg curls (40 pounds), 130 chest presses (55 pounds), 125 weighted squats (20 pounds), 130 cable crosses (too challenging to notice the weight) and 130 bend rolls (25 pounds), I have also found myself accomplishing the following: running three miles in 25:00 (hitting a maximum speed of 9mph), running 7 miles in 1:05, a huge improvement in my swim, higher stamina on the bike, wider range at softball and tennis, and the ability to just keep going, going, going without feeling winded. More than that, the new surge in fitness and power is also pumping iron for my mind and spirit. Just like boxing, I feel pretty invincible and like I can Viva la Vida the world. I know what my limitations are, but still, for the first time in my life I'm thinking I could try to qualify for the Boston Marathon (3:45 and under, and whatever happened to my vow to only run one more marathon in this lifetime?). I'm beginning to get hung up on personal records, which is the nerdiest thing ever if you do endurance races. I've always said to Mofo and Jenny B and the rest of my softball girls that when we're 60, we should still be playing ball together and running races together. I think we're on our way.

And the weight? I am at 142.3 pounds, which means I have lost 5.2 pounds in seven weeks, which doesn't account for muscle toning weight I've maintained or put on. We've yet to re-measure the body fat percentage, but it better be down, goddamn it, or something's going to be at the receiving end of either my right cross or my right hook, my two best punches.

Play Classy For Me

Magnum force.

It's hard to explain why the hell a Clint Eastwood film is so damned good. The guy started out as a squinty renegade cowboy without a name, the meanest badass in spurs then got even worse as Dirty Harry, blowing the heads off punks. Then, in Unforgiven, he suddenly absolved his soul of sins, though not his hands of blood. He couldn't be bad anymore, because all that justice had softened the heart, resolved the spirit and tamed the wild abandon. As his voice graveled down into a gruff rasp, everything else inside calmed down and made peace with karma. The movies became about fatherhood in all its personalities, redefining religion and devotion to the grit of fighting. There was still violence and death, but these were secondary -- part of the landscape of living as the foreground came into focus as a meditation of what makes a life, vis a vis what takes it away. Death speaks for life more than the art of living itself.

Eastwood is 79 this year, and I get the feeling he makes every movie like it could be his last. And if so, beginning with Mystic River in 2003 to Gran Torino from last year, which I just saw today and am in denial and disbelief that it did not get a single major Oscar nomination, you might see his recent work as the labor of what love can do. (If you haven't see this film, watch it now -- the honest realization of comeuppance and salvation could take up to the last summer of your life, rather than a deer-in-headlights flashback through a childhood of circumstantial coincidence where you are blessed with a fairy-tale ending at age 20.) Fatherhood is more than the art of birth, it is the reincarnation of finding flesh and blood in the unification of disparate destinies. Religion is a bystander, because matters must be taken into your own hands. It's basically Dirty Harry asking God if he feels lucky, and the answer is no, God isn't winning the lottery any time soon.

But most of all, it is a grace and understatement of someone who knows enough to not be bothered or shackled by the big picture. An Eastwood film is simple in direction, mood and ambience, so much so that it could feel like a part of something in your life, if every feeling, conundrum, frailty and imperfection was just a smidge bigger than you can handle. It's so moving because you've felt that way before, but his often emotionally wrecking and wrenching conclusions stir quiet sobs, not Titanic bawling, because real life is too little for hot air melodrama. With the execption of Changeling, which was as good as The Bridges of Madison County ever could be -- the man is not flawless, after all -- each movie this decade has been a masterpiece in Shakespearan tragedy, everyday Twainsian ironic comedy, Conradian violent savagery and a depiction of the Steinbeckian responsibility of justice and truth. There is no romance -- that's too easy -- but there is love.

There is just no other filmmaker whose movie steals my heart like Clint does, putting it in safekeeping for 120 minutes before returning a much more robust, knowing and understanding human organ. By the way, my favorite Clint Eastwood movie of all is Million Dollar Baby. Boxing, loyalty and compassion. Principles I live by.

A Wii Bit Of Pain

The usual suspects.

Because I am a Cubs fan, play softball, sign up for endurance races and can't say no to good pizza, beer and ice cream, pain is not a stranger to me, my anatomy, my heart and my psyche. Once when I was 12, my right hand was dangling off the top of a car when my friend Vanessa slammed the door shut, catching my ring finger. The pain was so immense and intense that it took me five seconds to scream. I never saw a doctor for it, but I must have at least hairline fractured it. The ring finger on my right hand will be forever crooked, making it very hard for an engagement ring to make its way on. Pain. I know you.

A few weeks ago, I was over at Wallie and Ben's and after a few rounds of Guinness and Texas Hold'em, the Wii machine was revved up. It was my third time playing this thing, and I wasn't hooked immediately like when my parents got us a Nintendo Entertainment System 16-Bit when was 13. A white box and nunchuks do not measure up to Mario and Luigi in their most basic pixelations. So I knew that it's quite possible to play Wii well belly up on a couch with just a flick of the wrist, but I couldn't do it. What's the fun in that? I had to be standing in front of the 32" flat screen TV flinging my right arm around from baseball to tennis to boxing. Completing forehands and backhands, full pitching motion like the bases were empty and busting balls with hooks and crosses. It was like I was playing Wimbledon, the World Series and the Main Event at the Bellagio. I was Joanne Sports Schmuck powered by beer so when I woke up Sunday morning, I had a sore right arm. I mean, it's a pretty good arm that's worked out nicely regularly, but Wii must have found some muscle threshold to trash.

I made it through three hours of softball practice that day and on Monday morning, it hurt worse but I braced it for the first of 30 personal sessions I'd received as an early birthday and Christmas gift from my fantastic parents. My arm raged on as my girth measurements were taken but you know what hurts more? Being told you have a body fat percentage of 37.2 percent. Really? I couldn't believe and I still refuse to accept it. I know I'm not stacked and my BMI makes me out to be the biggest loser but the last time I checked on an electronic scale, I was about 24 percent, just four percent from what a good athlete should be. Apparently, the calipers' pinch method is the most accurate measurement, short of being dunked into a density tank at a lab. I still don't buy it, but my trainer Augustine inked it onto my record, so it's now a true fact. Nothing was in as much pain than my jock ego right then, when the chart declared me obese. Seriously, no way. Unacceptable. But it is now my goal to beat those calipers at their foolish game and show them who's boss.

Pinch test. You're cruising for a bruising, motherfucker.

(Check back tomorrow for a three-weeks-later follow-up!)

Lost and Found

"D'ya feel lucky, punk? Well, do ya?"

I just watched "Mystic River" for the fourth time, a film by Clint Eastwood that clocks in at two hours and 17 minutes. Over two evenings in the last week, I spent about three hours and 15 minutes watching the first four episodes of "Lost."

I had misgivings watching the show even though I tried hard to like it, so that I could maybe be socialized into that water-cooler circle of avid discussions about last night's episode. Even as a countless number of people told me to keep watching, that it keeps getting better, that I was going to keep going through the episodes faster and faster. Well, the first thought that comes to me is this: the first seven minutes of "Mystic River" sent a deadly chill through my soul that was harder and more urgent than any of the purported scary moments and frights in "Lost." Eastwood didn't need any special effects, plane crash or a woman jabbering in French on some unknown signal. He put a boy alone in a darkened frame, lying prone and shaking in sawdust as a skewed figure loomed above him. Before that, the boy was driven away in a black Cadillac and stared out the back window. It was a story so real and the sensation of the unknown so dreadful and the direction so graceful and gentle, an extreme to the moment in the film, that made you feel coweringly disturbed. Before you knew it, Eastwood had entered your consciousness in all its realms -- spiritual, psychological, emotional and logical -- and instilled a responsibility to his movie, because you recognize the blind passion and the sometimes futile attempts to negate the unprompted effects of moral negligence.

"Lost," on the other hand, felt to me like a collective of every narrative device ever employed in an M. Night Shymalan movie. Sure, many of the plot twists were akin to the genius of "The Sixth Sense," and there is a little of "Unbreakable" from the impossibility of surviving a crash caused by a plane torn apart in mid-air. Unknown entities shuffling through long rainforest brush, we've seen aliens do that in "Signs." People banding together when forced into a state of separatism, just like "The Village." Weird, unfathomable happenstance, "Lady In The Water." That end of the world feeling -- "The Happening?" Unfortunately for Shyamalan, his moviemaking magic ended with "The Sixth Sense" and every subsequent movie was a poor attempt to cash in on the Big Irony that earned him an Oscar nomination. It feels forced, a frustrated auteur trying to get smarter with each movie he makes but the burden of his own intelligence must be crippling -- it just falters into lameness weaker than a thug staring at the wrong end of Dirty Harry's .44 Magnum.

There's nothing new on "Lost" thus far in four episodes. The teleplay is atrocious -- when one of the survivors tries to convince his disgruntled sister that a lady in depression needed to be helped, she retorts without looking up from her crossword, "What's a four-letter word for 'I just don't care'?" I've never seen "Survivor" either, but I have to believe that was as cringeworthy as some of the things contestants on that show are made to do. "Lost" seems to me like an hour each week of being told how to feel and react to the events unfolding. Cue orchestral maneuvers which crescendo and alert you to start feeling creeped out and cue Matthew Fox looking cute and hot and squinty so you can focus on a nice hero. "Lost" is an amazing television enterprise, getting it right at a time when broadcast production is in about as much trouble as the music industry -- it has managed to get people tuning in every week and on to its Web site inbetween episdoes for the last five years. In TV, all you need to do is shepherd the viewers from one commercial break to the other and have them hang off a cliff like Stallone so the advertisers can pay for million-dollar episodes to be produced in Hawaii. It's much more challenging than I'm making it out to be, and cable produces much more provocative programming. But the "Lost" formula is great: a large cast of characters with convoluted secrets that you could spend a l-o-t o-f t-i-m-e r-e-v-e-a-l-i-ng t-o s-t-r-e-t-c-h t-h-e n-u-m-b-e-r o-f a-i-r t-i-m-e y-o-u- c-a-n s-e-l-l. Some day, all this would make a really good theme park, or at the very least, a Wii game.

I suppose as the mystery thickens in "Lost," there must be plenty of puzzles to ponder over which I'm quite sure I'll never be able to get, because I'm just no good at things like that. That's why people log on to ABC's Web site and work on this stuff as ads scroll on. But in these times, it's all about cutting back so 30 seconds of a shot of Sean Penn's tattooed back with tight, tensed muscles thinly veiled by a singlet showed me a much fuller and complex character than the three plus hours and multitudes of people on "Lost." The convulsion of grief upon learning of his daughter's death carried by the organ death march of a first communion hymn is stirring and frightening at the same time, especially when passion is a religion. The entire film is a street opera where ballets of betrayal are fought in Boston backwater alleys and the roots of Shakespearan tragedy creep along each scene like a cancerous virus, from the screen to you. The two women in the film are the schizophrenic psychoses of Lady MacBeth -- the lunacy of guilt and the madness that underlies a lack of remorse. As in the greatest literature from the Victorian Age, tragic events are set in motion because of the occurrence of what is usually seen as pure and life-affirming: love. And they don't stop, because there is no commercial break in life. This isn't a word game or a brain teaser. The film gets darker and bleaker and I got more afraid accordingly, because I just can't find the answers by flipping to the back of the book.

I'm not saying "Lost" is a bad program or that it's stupid to watch it. It's just not for me. The fourth episode revived my faith because it finally unlocked the secret to my heart -- it tugged at a few strings when Locke could walk, because it was his "destiny." When all else fails, sentimentalism is always effective, as evidenced in pet food commercials. I'll likely keep the second DVD of season 1 in my HomePal queue to see what else is revealed about the other characters, but I think I need to bump "Mean Streets", "Ran" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" up before it.