First of all, let me say that, when I threw off in passing the remark about "the scenes in Valhalla" being so much less interesting than "the scenes on earth" (as an analogy with "threads about Cracky" being so much less interesting than "threads about camwhores") I didn't realize it was going to have to bear the whole weight of a "who's-more-cultured-than-who" flame-war. If I had, I might have formulated it in a more careful and nuanced way. But OK, let's not make a thing out of that. Your account of what I said is basically correct: the vivid, living core of the story lies, for most opera-goers, in the scenes on earth, and the long philosophical discussions between the gods are, for most people, pretty hard to sit through, both musically and on the level of the "dialogue".