"Cars" Didn't Crash, Stocks Did

Welcome to the re-opening of "Weekends at TDI," now known affectionately as The Weekend Recap! Our mission is the same; to bring you a quick look at the stock market which affects our bottom line, and to take a look at the box office, which is where we spend our hard-earned cash. We also bring you up-to-speed on what you may have missed on this site, and on our sister site, Epsilon.

Why change the name from "Weekends at TDI" to "The Weekend Recap"? To be honest, we felt like "Weekends at TDI" felt more like it was announcing something to come, rather than recapping. Plus, the editorial board has been uneasy about that name for months, and finally came up with a suitable alternative. From there on out, we were just waiting for the busy graphics department to come up with a new, slicker look, and voila! A popular weekend feature is re-branded.

The stock markets continued to hemorrhage their earnings for the year as the Dow Jones dropped to it's lowest level for the year. Investors are jittery about investing because of an increase for foreign goods, a jump in import prices, and the fact that the Fed has been saying that it'll raise interest rates once again, to help counter inflation. And there's the fact that June is somewhat of a downer, historically, for the year, and you've got one major international market that's moving backwards. Here now is your even-prettier-than-before weekly stock report.

(Source: Yahoo! Finance)

It must be summer, because the top movie at the box office this weekend is making well over $50 million. $62.8 million, to be exact! Pixar's latest animated film, Cars, managed to get about 10 million ticket-payers into the theaters, making it the fourth biggest opener for the year to-date. An estimated 19.5 million ticket-payers went to go see the top five films this weekend, which was more or less in the same ballpark as last week. But last week didn't have the new-and-slightly-improved box office scoreboard, did it? We'll give you a moment now to get over the shockingly bright upgrade.

(Source: BoxOfficeMojo)

Have you been away from Delta or Epsilon for a while? If so, here's what you missed over the past week:
- Names are beginning to leak out for next season's "Dancing with the Stars," and Vivica A. Fox is among those rumored to have signed up. But it's an ABC feel-good reality show so Mario Lopez has already won. (Read)
- Wednesay's Weekend Preview noted that while stocks continue to fall to record lows, Americans love to watch the devil incarnate kill people. But what else is new? (Read)
- American Idol dominates television, record sales, and concert tours. Oh, and Chris Daughtry might turn out to be more popular than Taylor Hicks. But his fans didn't speed-dial for two hours straight every Tuesday now, did they? (Read)
- Will blogging really revolutionize the world? That's what I asked a year ago. I guess the answer, at least for now, is "no." (Read)
- We posted some video from Festival of the Arts 2006 up at Epsilon. We have the good, the bad, and the surprising self-cameo! (Read)
- For those who don't like looking at box-y internet video, we also put up some pictures from the festivities. (Read)
- We also started a little game called Epsilon's Internet Improv, which is totally worth checking out, not only because it's a promising start for something actually cool on these sites, but because the graphic for this feature totally screams what some retailers think "cool teen's" like. Heh. (But we'd encourage you to play the game as well.) (Read)

And that's it for The Weekend Recap for this time. Stay tuned to the twin institutes for further updates, and stay tuned for our new mid-weekly update, The Weekend Preview! In it, we tell you how the stock markets are doing so far for the week, and we tell you what new films to expect at the box office for the upcoming weekend. Not only are our weekend graphics sharp, but the words surrouding them are helpful as well!