After reenergizing ourselves following our afternoon at Turner Field, Sandip and i had a surprisingly great and cheap dinner at a fish place called Bonehead's in Atlantic Station, a sort of Santana Row-esque outside mall. This chain restaurant specializes in fish and chicken grilled with piri piri sauce, a Portuguese invention based on a pepper discovered in Mozambique. Quite good, especially the grilled zuchinni side. We then walked down to the Atlantic Station theater and caught the 8:30pm showing of the Da Vinci Code. I've been a bit leary of this whole phenomenon since popular culture has adopted it as truth, despite its variety of historical exaggerations, inaccuracies, and flat-out misrepresentations. Author Dan Brown has taken a smug back seat to this whole controversy, clearly enjoying the attention his work has received while retreating into his "it's a work of fiction" excuse whenever someone tries to nail him on something. I enjoyed the book, despite the more unbelievable and poorly written aspects of the suspense thriller. And in spite of all the mediocre reviews, both Sandip and i found the movie to be a worthwhile endeavor. It can be heavy-handed in parts, with both Tom Hanks and Ian McKellen launching into extended diatribes on the Knights Templar, the Council of Nicea, art history, and a variety of other subjects. Also, certain elements of the plotline just flat-out do not make sense, such as McKellen's thought processes in the later portions of the story, something that bothered Sandip. And Ron Howard's visual deconstruction of some of the puzzles and codes borders on insulting. But on the whole, the film presents an interesting speculation on the history of Christianity. Taken as a historical fiction as opposed to fact, it's great food for thought.

you're a taker of vanities, a stealer of games
now show me a night where us both can be safe

Today i again avoided the conference, and instead slept in, finished my presentation for tomorrow morning, had a late lunch at an Asian bistro down the street from our hotel, then went on a two hour walk around downtown Atlanta. Like every city, it's got nice parts ... the Atlanta Underground is a cool mall area, and the centennial Olympic park is a nice place to relax, if a bit on the small side ... and not so nice parts. The racial makeup here is worlds different than California, with fewer ethnicities and, to my eye, African Americans clearly the majority. Despite the liberal west priding itself on racial diversity and tolerance, visiting a place like this where diversity comes in a different form makes me wonder if we Californians are really as progressive and color-blind as we like to think we are. But at any rate, people here are definitely friendly, the food is great, and i've had a great time.

I didn't mention that i finally finished reading Eduardo Galeano's Soccer in Sun and Shadow a week or two ago. It took me quite a while because unfortunately it got to the point where the only place i was reading it was on the toilet. (no, not a pretty mental image, but typically male, eh?) But it was a fittingly beautiful description of the history of the beautiful game, with lyrical prose recounting exquisite goals, the mythology of the game's great competitions, and the philosophy of football. It's a brilliant poetic treatment of soccer, something for every fan to revel in and wax nostalgic about their sport.