Welcome to this week's installment of Picks. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to click on all the blue words scattered throughout this document. Not altogether an impossible mission, and why not, how else are you going to see the selection? That said, let's begin.
With the release last week of the previously (and cheesily) alluded to Mission: Impossible movie, a handful of related, action-packed web sites have appeared on the scene, complete with promotional games and giveaways. Apple Computer's M: I (abbreviated for everyone's benefit) The Web Adventure offers, amongst other features, an episodic game in six parts. Registering for the game gives you a shot at winning Apple's M: I Sweepstakes. You don't need to play the game to win the loot, which includes the actual PowerBook used by Tom Cruise in the movie, but if you do, the mission requires a couple of plug-ins. The site also includes an archive of sounds and images from the movie's Hollywood premiere. Nevada County Gold's M: I Trivia Challenge, a web scavenger hunt of sorts, also offers "Cool Stuff" if you manage to know or find the right answers to their series of questions. What kind of cool stuff? Looks like you have to play to find out.
While on the subject of questions and answers, how's your health? Feeling a little stressed out since you heard John Tesh is leaving Entertainment Tonight? You may want to visit the first part of HotWired's new HealthClinic, Ask Dr. Weil. The site provides a Q&A format with Weil, bestselling author of the health book, Spontaneous Healing. Send in your questions and the good doctor posts responses on a daily basis. The site includes a weekly RealAudio meditation, a weekly health poll and a threaded discussion.
In other health related news, 2Chicks 2Bikes 1Cause follows the story of two women on a 4,400 mile bicycle trek, "dedicated to educating and creating awareness about breast health while celebrating life." Read about the cause, participate in a breast health forum moderated by Dr. Julie Gralow, or see what you can do to help. The site currently includes an emergency announcement about the fate of the 2Chicks RV. Seems like the vehicle blew up, leaving "plenty of ruffled feathers and a documentary film crew standing on the side of the road with their thumbs pointing to Colorado!" Anyone have an extra set of wheels lying around?
If you're the type that likes to hum a tune, and you find yourself humming something like, "State in loco in quo habitatis, nunc aspicite ad occidentem" and, uhm, you know, the rest of that popular R.E.M. song, well you're either crazy, gifted, a mixture of the two, or you've seen Song Lyrics in Latin. Put together by a class at Homestead High School in Mequon, WI, this brief site holds the translated lyrics of five songs, including "Miss American Pie", "Light My Fire", and R.E.M.'s "Stand". Let's hope a couple more make it onto the list. In the meantime, you can follow a handful of latin-related links. Either that, or sing "Age, columba, incende ignem meum." Your choice.
For more language translation fun, try LingWhat?, "the IDRIS language decipherer thang." The purpose of LingWhat? is to help you figure out what language a document is written in. Follow a series of yes or no questions and the program should lead you to the correct answer. In the words of its designers, "It's certainly not perfect, and only handles languages that are used in publications, but we hope that you find it useful."
And finally, with the event just around the corner, two new 1996 Summer Olympics sites are worthy of a visit. NBC Sports' The Games of the XXVI Olympiad includes a countdown to the Games (last time we checked they were 54 days, 23 hours, 3 minutes and 52 seconds away), news, athlete profiles, the latest on the torch relay and a weekly interactive poll, amongst other things. Past polls have asked questions such as, What's your favorite Olympic memory? What Olympic theme song would you choose? and, If you had a chance to compete in an Olympic sport, what would it be?
NationsBank has put together a site that includes 100 Years Looking Back, a history of the modern Games from 1896 in Athens, Greece, to this year's event in Atlanta. Read brief histories, peruse athlete profiles, or learn small tidbits for each of the year's Games. Hey, it's either that or spend all your time looking for faults in James Bond Movies. Take your pick(s).