Generally I’ve no truck with heavy metal music and like it that way, as there’s almost nothing about the genre that appeals to me. Nevertheless, that didn’t stop me from enjoying the hell out of Sacha Gervasi’s 2008 documentary “Anvil! The Story of Anvil,” which I watched a few nights ago. The movie tells the sometimes hilarious, somewhat sad and shockingly heartwarming story of an indefatigable Canadian metal band that, some three decades after their initial, minor brush with success, continues to plug away in search of rock stardom. It’s surprisingly well made, being gorgeously photographed and incisively edited, and is also universally appealing, even if like myself you prefer a lot fewer serifs in your music, if you’ll permit me to contort a metaphor for novel purposes (you know what I mean!).

Truth be told, I was pretty nervous before facing off against Nicholas Felton in our Layer Tennis exhibition match last Friday afternoon. I’d never played the game before, and its structure, in which two visual artists volley a collage-like series of images back and forth under the scrutiny of a stopwatch, seemed very high pressure. Plus, my opponent was none other than Feltron himself (as Nicholas is sometimes better known), a designer famous for autobiographical annual reports in which he creates gorgeous visual narratives from nothing more than the statistical mundanity of everyday life.

All that trepidation wasn’t without good reason, as it turned out. You could hardly count layer tennis as physically demanding, but its breakneck speed and creative intensity do require dexterity and stamina — the fifteen minutes allotted to each volley is surprisingly intensive and vanishingly brief. Still, what I didn’t expect was how much fun the live atmosphere of layer tennis was. In the past, I’d always come to layer tennis matches after they were over and done with, perusing each match’s archive of volleys after the fact. Layer tennis in real time, though, is where the fun is.

By the time I thought to go see Mike Judge’s third live action feature “Extract” at my local cineplex it was already gone, having disappeared almost as quickly as it debuted back in September. I then promptly forgot about it — until I remembered it again, and realized a few weeks ago that it had been out on DVD for over a month already.

Most people, I suspect, regard Mike Judge’s movies with similar levels of mild interest, even those who are devotees of his unexpectedly great classic of the cubicle age, “Office Space.” At first glance, Judge’s movies are deceptively unremarkable, even generic. But upon closer inspection, they turn out to be surprisingly memorable — very nearly indelible — and his thus far brief oeuvre has already made for a directorial record that many other auteurs would envy. The satirically dystopian future he imagined in “Idiocracy,” for instance, is probably more accurate and certainly more entertaining than most of what science fiction has ever offered us. It also happens to be more hilarious than most movies of any genre.

Tune in this coming Friday afternoon for Coudal Partners’ Layer Tennis, in which I will have the honor of matching my graphical prowess against Nicholas Felton of the famously self-aware Feltron Annual Reports. It’s sure to be a cornucopia of wild, free-ranging visual expressionism. ’Cuz y’know, that’s what both Nicholas and I are known for. What’s more, the venerable John Nack of Adobe will be providing the commentary as Nicholas and I parry back and forth.

Layer tennis, for those unfamiliar with it, is that curiously un-aerobic Internet sport in which two graphically adroit competitors, armed with Photoshop, swap a single image file back and forth, embellishing each volley with collage-like visual ornamentation. Oh, and it’s all done under the watchful eye of a stopwatch, so the pace can get kind of frenetic; each volley is fifteen minutes long, and the match is over after just ten volleys. Fun stuff. Check out the archive of previous matches to get a sense of what’s ahead. And point your browser to Layertennis.com on Friday to see Nicholas probably kick my ass.

All told, I think I did a pretty good job of ignoring “Lost” for years, in spite of all the raves and recommendations from friends. Mostly, it was out of self-interest; I couldn’t afford the time investment that another hugely complicated television series would require, especially one that seemed to inspire such obsessive fandom. But now, living with a “Lost” devotee as I do, I find I can no longer willfully ignore the persistent phenomenon that is J.J. Abrams’ labyrinthine television saga. I started watching a handful of episodes here and there last season, and when the show’s sixth season debuted on Tuesday evening I joined Laura on the couch to take in its latest two hours.

Here’s my assessment so far: it’s a superbly crafted entertainment but it executes itself haphazardly. I find myself easily drawn into its fundamentally strong storytelling tactics, but even after watching the best episodes, the momentum of the series inspires no real confidence that the next installment will be any good.

And, frankly, I don’t really get what’s happening. What is this show about? A time shifting island? A fractious fraternity of metaphysically-challenged losers? A just-in-time catalog of bogus belief systems? I have no idea, really, but to the show’s credit it’s all good enough to keep me thinking about it. Herewith, then, are some random notes from a Viewer New to “Lost”