Remember him?

He has a new movie.

The soundtrack reminds you of Elfman's piece for Pee-Wee's breakfast machine, but doesn't have the panic-at-the-circus oompah-oompah sound that characterized Elfman's early work. (Aside from the first Batman score, I'm not a big fan, but I think Elfman was trying to channel Raymond Scott's "Powerhouse" on that one, at least in spirit, and succeeded.) The score is by Mark Mothersbaugh, a Devo member who's made quite the career in soundtracks.

One of the movies he's scoring now is the 57th "Ice Age," movie, which has this description: "Scrat's epic pursuit of his elusive acorn catapults him outside of Earth, where he accidentally sets off a series of cosmic events that transform and threaten the planet. To save themselves from peril, Manny, Sid, Diego, and the rest of the herd leave their home and embark on a quest full of thrills and spills, highs and lows, laughter and adventure while traveling to exotic new lands and encountering a host of colorful new characters as well as a new enemy who is a brother to one of their old foes."

"Ice Age" in space. Okay.

GELT Turns out that inventing a currency out of digital pixydust isn't a long-term proposition for growth. Or, to put it another way, money walks, bitcoin talks:

Chinese Bitcoin miners control more than 50 percent of the currency-creation capacity and are connected to the rest of the Bitcoin ecosystem through the Great Firewall of China.

And:

with the majority of Bitcoin being owned by the small group that started promoting it, it has been compared to a Ponzi scheme. Exchanges built on top of it also had severe security vulnerabilities. And then there were the venture capitalists who got carried away. Several of them purchased considerable coinage and then began to hype it as a powerful disruption that could underpin all manner of financial innovation, from mobile banking to borderless, instant money transfers.

The author notes this:

In Venezuela, citizens wishing to buy anything of value on supermarket shelves wait all day in lines to do so, because hyperinflation causes the paper currencies in their pockets to lose significant value every day. When migrant workers there send money back to their families in places such as Mexico, India, and Africa, they are gouged by money-transfer companies—paying as much as 5–12 percent in fees. And even in the United States, payment processors and credit-card companies collect merchant fees of 1–2.5 percent of the value of every transaction. This is a burden on the economy.

It is? Would the author prefer that the convenience provided by card payments be gratis?

JUNK This piece describes the downfall of a store you might not have heard about, or care about:

Every era has its store. Ernest Hemingway and James Joyce socialized at Shakespeare and Company; British punks shopped at Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren's SEX boutique; and Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, and Heidi Montag shopped and posed for paparazzi at Kitson—a West Hollywood, CA, fashion boutique known for selling overpriced "Team Jolie" and "Team Pitt" shirts. This month, Kitson will shut down for good. The shop's famous clientele views the closure as a symbol for celebrity in 2016.

"It's an end of an era, an end of that type of pop culture," laments Hills star Heidi Montag. "I never thought that Kitson would be ending. Kitson is the celebrity clothing store!"

Boo and/or hoo. The description made me think of Spencer Gifts, mall purveyor of gag gifts and pin-up posters; made me wonder if Spencer is still around. I read on:

After Kitson opened 16 more locations in Los Angeles and Portland, OR, the retailer took out a $15 million credit line from Salus Capital Partners in 2013. Then last summer, the Los Angeles Times reported Kitson had to take out another loan, this time from Spencer Spirit Holdings Inc. (the owner of Spencer's gift store) to pay back Salus.

Answers that. The story has the details on why Kitson's failed, if you're one of those who enjoys a good tale of overreach and retail failure. Contains graphic desciptions of "crumbly leatherette."