Because when I don't do it, people pout.
Thursday, August 12, 2004
Search Request Thursday
Because when I don't do it, people pout.
klingons legends gods "too much trouble": The Klingons have the coolest legends. They really do.
sikozu dislike: I disliked her a lot at first, too, but she grew on me.
"childhood's end" stargate photo: Hmm. Apparently Stargate is stealing titles from Arthur C. Clarke now.
microbe groovy baby wav: Why do I now have the mental image of a paramecium in a disco outfit?
where can i find video clips of women sneezing: Not here.
FREE PICTURES OF GRANNYS IN SEXY PANTIES: I thought grannies had to wear those great big granny knickers. Isn't that, like, a rule or something?
pictures of scott bakula's bare chest: Ooh, can Scott Bakula wear the sexy panties? 'Cause that would be entertaining. In a mildly disturbing, yet still vaguely sexy way.
anal sex clips last2weeks: What, there's a weekly archive?
night surf adult dvd bondage toy store: Wait, so is it the DVDs that are in bondage, or...?
ice cream "personality test" printable: Personally, I'm just as happy if my ice cream doesn't display any personality whatsoever.
Edgar Rice Burroughs pussy nude: Um, I don't think he had one.
spirograph draw sports car template: Oh, I'll never believe you can draw that with a spirograph!
postcard of passenger cruiseline: So you can send postcards to all your friends and make them think you were on a cruise, when actually you were in jail or something?
scott bakula armpits: Hmm. Slightly less appealing than his bare chest, I'm afraid.
garak bashir children slash: Children? No, I don't want to think about it.
"Bill and Betty" yeti: Yes, I think those would be excellent names for yeti.
martianwear: What all the best-dressed Martians are wearing this year!
bunions "my feet" "august 2004": Yes, it is August, 2004, and I do have bunions on my feet.
(scientfic)+(interesting)+(download)+(free)+(book): Presumably it's a book with lots of equations in it.
count dracula chocula monte cristo: Three! Three famous Counts! Ahahahahaha!
"TV Guide" "past issues" "May 23, 2004": For all I know, I might have that one lying around somewhere. I wonder if there was anything interesting in it?
porn nstars r us: Hmm, must be a new franchise...
simak "way station" synopsis OR summary spoiler: Oh, come on. It's a short book, and it's good. Just go and read the damned thing already.
Neil Gaiman's sandman lemon fanfic: You know, I've heard that term before, but I honestly have no idea where it comes from. Or which Sandman characers you'd apply it to, for that matter.
tardis dimension measurements diagram: Are those the inside or the outside measurements?
Because when I don't do it, people pout.
Clearly It's Been Too Long Since I Put Up a Farscape Post.
TV Guide Online has a nice little article about the upcoming Farscape miniseries. People who haven't seen the 4th season and the deeply spoiler-phobic might want to avoid it, but I don't think it really reveals anything you couldn't already guess, plot-wise.
TV Guide Online has a nice little article about the upcoming Farscape miniseries. People who haven't seen the 4th season and the deeply spoiler-phobic might want to avoid it, but I don't think it really reveals anything you couldn't already guess, plot-wise.
Monster vs. Monster!
With Freddy vs. Jason and now Alien vs. Predator, apparently a lot of people have been inspired to arrange their own Monster Match-Ups. Christopher Bahb has an absolutely hysterical article on the subject, and Matthew Baldwin of Defective Yeti draws up his own Supervillian Tournament Showdown chart, as well as linking to a couple of other people's thoughts on the subject.
Personally, I think I'm putting my money on Agent Smith. It's tough to beat a guy who has the cheat codes to reality.
With Freddy vs. Jason and now Alien vs. Predator, apparently a lot of people have been inspired to arrange their own Monster Match-Ups. Christopher Bahb has an absolutely hysterical article on the subject, and Matthew Baldwin of Defective Yeti draws up his own Supervillian Tournament Showdown chart, as well as linking to a couple of other people's thoughts on the subject.
Personally, I think I'm putting my money on Agent Smith. It's tough to beat a guy who has the cheat codes to reality.
Wednesday, August 11, 2004
Here, Have Some Random Links
Just a few interesting links I've picked up here and there. Happy web-surfing.
Hello Cthulhu and Tales of the Plush Cthulhu
Spot the difference between these two photos.
Penguin Warehouse
Just a few interesting links I've picked up here and there. Happy web-surfing.
Hello Cthulhu and Tales of the Plush Cthulhu
Spot the difference between these two photos.
Penguin Warehouse
Tuesday, August 10, 2004
Hey, Look, It's This Thing Again.
Current clothes: Blue jeans. A t-shirt in a sort of textured brown color that makes it look a little like some kind of stone, covered in a design of Native American petroglyphs. White crew socks. No shoes at the moment.
Current mood: Starting to relax a bit after a rather irritating day.
Current music: Was most recently listening to Coldplay's A Rush of Blood to the Head.
Current annoyance: Being on morning shift, mostly. Well, that and the fact that my foot still hurts.
Current thing: Sitting in front of a computer for up to fourteen hours a day.
Current desktop picture: This picture of the Aurora Borealis.
Current song in head: Coldplay's "The Scientist." But before I answered the "current music" question, I think it was "Porcelain Monkey" by Warren Zevon.
Current book: The Lost Slayer, Part Four: Original Sins by Christopher Golden. It's a Buffy the Vampire Slayer novel (or, OK, 1/4 of one), so apparently I haven't sworn off these things, after all.
Current video in player: Still the same Farscape tape that's been sitting in there forever. I'm a bad, bad fan.
Current DVD in player: The first disc of Futurama season 3. Which appears to be working just fine now. Go figure.
Current refreshment: Darjeeling tea.
Current worry: That this stupid foot thing is going to turn out to require medical intervention and otherwise just be really annoying.
Current thought: Aww. Now I'm out of tea. Maybe I should go and make some more. Or possibly get some food.
Current clothes: Blue jeans. A t-shirt in a sort of textured brown color that makes it look a little like some kind of stone, covered in a design of Native American petroglyphs. White crew socks. No shoes at the moment.
Current mood: Starting to relax a bit after a rather irritating day.
Current music: Was most recently listening to Coldplay's A Rush of Blood to the Head.
Current annoyance: Being on morning shift, mostly. Well, that and the fact that my foot still hurts.
Current thing: Sitting in front of a computer for up to fourteen hours a day.
Current desktop picture: This picture of the Aurora Borealis.
Current song in head: Coldplay's "The Scientist." But before I answered the "current music" question, I think it was "Porcelain Monkey" by Warren Zevon.
Current book: The Lost Slayer, Part Four: Original Sins by Christopher Golden. It's a Buffy the Vampire Slayer novel (or, OK, 1/4 of one), so apparently I haven't sworn off these things, after all.
Current video in player: Still the same Farscape tape that's been sitting in there forever. I'm a bad, bad fan.
Current DVD in player: The first disc of Futurama season 3. Which appears to be working just fine now. Go figure.
Current refreshment: Darjeeling tea.
Current worry: That this stupid foot thing is going to turn out to require medical intervention and otherwise just be really annoying.
Current thought: Aww. Now I'm out of tea. Maybe I should go and make some more. Or possibly get some food.
Monday, August 09, 2004
At Death's Door
Man, I had this really weird/disturbing dream last night. I'd gone down some stairs in somebody's perfectly ordinary house, and I was in this little basement utility area. It, too, was absolutely normal. There was a door on one side that led to a little bathroom, and a storage room on the other side, and a space beyond that with a washer and dryer and stuff. It was all incredibly detailed and realistic. I remember a bucket with a rag sitting in it, that kind of thing. The place looked perfectly ordinary and used.
But beyond the bit with the washer and dryer, there was a little more space, and there was a door. It was a perfectly ordinary door-to-the-outside kind of door, like anybody might have in their house, and I'm not sure, but there might well have been sunlight visible through it. In front of the door was a man. He was calm. His voice was mild-mannered. He was wearing a suit. And he told me that this place was death, and that once I'd come down those stairs I could never go back up them into the world again. I don't think he ever said it, but the obvious next thing was to go through that door, and he was clearly there to see that I did it.
I had this dream twice. At least, I think I it was twice. It might have been once, and the dream came pre-built with a sense of having dreamed it before. I'm not sure. But in what I remember as the first time, I went and hid in the storage room and shut the door. It was very, very dark and small and enclosed, like a good hiding place. But he very calmly told me that I couldn't stay in there forever, and that when I came out, there was only one place to go. Because you couldn't ever, ever, ever go back up the stairs. In my heart, I knew this was true. The second time I dreamed it, the weight of this knowledge, the sheer horrible unfairness of the thought that just by walking down an innocuous-seeming set of stairs I'd cut myself off from my life forever became simply too much to bear. I knew I couldn't go back up them; that was, like, an unbreakable physical law. So I had to find another way out. I had to escape this level of reality altogether and wake up. So, with a truly massive effort of will, I made myself realize that I was dreaming, and I woke up. Which, by the way, is something I am very rarely able to do, possibly because very few of my dreams are bad enough to require it.
There are probably deep, dark, rich layers of symbolic content in there, but I'm not at all sure I really want to explore them.
Man, I had this really weird/disturbing dream last night. I'd gone down some stairs in somebody's perfectly ordinary house, and I was in this little basement utility area. It, too, was absolutely normal. There was a door on one side that led to a little bathroom, and a storage room on the other side, and a space beyond that with a washer and dryer and stuff. It was all incredibly detailed and realistic. I remember a bucket with a rag sitting in it, that kind of thing. The place looked perfectly ordinary and used.
But beyond the bit with the washer and dryer, there was a little more space, and there was a door. It was a perfectly ordinary door-to-the-outside kind of door, like anybody might have in their house, and I'm not sure, but there might well have been sunlight visible through it. In front of the door was a man. He was calm. His voice was mild-mannered. He was wearing a suit. And he told me that this place was death, and that once I'd come down those stairs I could never go back up them into the world again. I don't think he ever said it, but the obvious next thing was to go through that door, and he was clearly there to see that I did it.
I had this dream twice. At least, I think I it was twice. It might have been once, and the dream came pre-built with a sense of having dreamed it before. I'm not sure. But in what I remember as the first time, I went and hid in the storage room and shut the door. It was very, very dark and small and enclosed, like a good hiding place. But he very calmly told me that I couldn't stay in there forever, and that when I came out, there was only one place to go. Because you couldn't ever, ever, ever go back up the stairs. In my heart, I knew this was true. The second time I dreamed it, the weight of this knowledge, the sheer horrible unfairness of the thought that just by walking down an innocuous-seeming set of stairs I'd cut myself off from my life forever became simply too much to bear. I knew I couldn't go back up them; that was, like, an unbreakable physical law. So I had to find another way out. I had to escape this level of reality altogether and wake up. So, with a truly massive effort of will, I made myself realize that I was dreaming, and I woke up. Which, by the way, is something I am very rarely able to do, possibly because very few of my dreams are bad enough to require it.
There are probably deep, dark, rich layers of symbolic content in there, but I'm not at all sure I really want to explore them.
Sunday, August 08, 2004
The Latest Annoyance
I think my DVD player is dying. I was noticing some problems on the Northern Exposure discs I was playing last week, but I figured that was probably something with the discs themselves. (And briefly debated returning them, but decided they weren't quite messed up enough for that.) Except earlier today I was playing a Futurama disc, and the episode played back fine, but when I tried playing it a second time with the commentary on, it was almost unwatchable. So I stuck it in the computer's DVD drive and played it with the commentary on, and it was absolutely flawless.
Sigh. That DVD player isn't very old, either. Well, I suppose I was looking for an excuse to buy a region-free machine...
I think my DVD player is dying. I was noticing some problems on the Northern Exposure discs I was playing last week, but I figured that was probably something with the discs themselves. (And briefly debated returning them, but decided they weren't quite messed up enough for that.) Except earlier today I was playing a Futurama disc, and the episode played back fine, but when I tried playing it a second time with the commentary on, it was almost unwatchable. So I stuck it in the computer's DVD drive and played it with the commentary on, and it was absolutely flawless.
Sigh. That DVD player isn't very old, either. Well, I suppose I was looking for an excuse to buy a region-free machine...
Saturday, August 07, 2004
Who You Callin' a Pansy?
That's definitely right, though. Heck, I'm busy wishing people would leave me alone right now.
| I'm a Pansy. The bloom of thought. Thoughts are my haven. I prefer solitude and quiet places so I can ponder uninterrupted. What bloom are you? by Polly_Snodgrass |
That's definitely right, though. Heck, I'm busy wishing people would leave me alone right now.
All Wet
Long-term readers of this blog will remember the swampy summer of '02, during which the trailer park I live in flooded long enough for entire generations of frogs to lie and die in my front yard. Well, the park's gotten very mud-puddly from time to time since then when we've had big rainstorms, but nothing on remotely the same scale. Until yesterday, that is, when apparently our entire quota of yearly precipitation fell in the space of half an hour[*], and I found myself once again living in the middle of Lake Socorro.
This morning, though, I woke up to find that some blessed soul (probably at the landlord's behest) had installed both a makeshift wooden walkway and a pump in my front yard. It's good to know they've figured out how to deal with this stuff.
[*] Note: Not an actual figure. I completely made it up. But damned if it don't sound about right.
Long-term readers of this blog will remember the swampy summer of '02, during which the trailer park I live in flooded long enough for entire generations of frogs to lie and die in my front yard. Well, the park's gotten very mud-puddly from time to time since then when we've had big rainstorms, but nothing on remotely the same scale. Until yesterday, that is, when apparently our entire quota of yearly precipitation fell in the space of half an hour[*], and I found myself once again living in the middle of Lake Socorro.
This morning, though, I woke up to find that some blessed soul (probably at the landlord's behest) had installed both a makeshift wooden walkway and a pump in my front yard. It's good to know they've figured out how to deal with this stuff.
[*] Note: Not an actual figure. I completely made it up. But damned if it don't sound about right.
Friday, August 06, 2004
Ouch
My foot hurts, and I can't figure out why. I first noticed it weeks ago, but didn't think much of it at the time. I've had a lot of general achiness in my feet for the last couple of years as my bunions have gradually gotten worse, and sometimes when I've been walking a lot my arches hurt, especially if my shoes aren't laced up exactly right. But this is definitely something different, and there's a spot on the outside of the heel that hurts quite a lot when I press on it. It's weird. There isn't anything visibly wrong with it, and I don't remember injuring it at all. (Well, with the way my memory works, it's always possible that I did and just completely forgot about it, but I don't think so.) Given that it has been weeks, I suppose I ought to think about seeing a doctor or something. I'm not in a big hurry, though. It doesn't hurt anywhere near enough to keep me from walking or anything.
My foot hurts, and I can't figure out why. I first noticed it weeks ago, but didn't think much of it at the time. I've had a lot of general achiness in my feet for the last couple of years as my bunions have gradually gotten worse, and sometimes when I've been walking a lot my arches hurt, especially if my shoes aren't laced up exactly right. But this is definitely something different, and there's a spot on the outside of the heel that hurts quite a lot when I press on it. It's weird. There isn't anything visibly wrong with it, and I don't remember injuring it at all. (Well, with the way my memory works, it's always possible that I did and just completely forgot about it, but I don't think so.) Given that it has been weeks, I suppose I ought to think about seeing a doctor or something. I'm not in a big hurry, though. It doesn't hurt anywhere near enough to keep me from walking or anything.
Hic!
Here's a game that'll help you kill a few minutes: try to keep a drunk guy from falling over. The instructions are in German, but they're easy enough to figure out: hold down the mouse button, and if he starts to tip, move the mouse in the other direction. My high score so far is 48 meters of drunken ambling, which is probably pretty pitiful.
Here's a game that'll help you kill a few minutes: try to keep a drunk guy from falling over. The instructions are in German, but they're easy enough to figure out: hold down the mouse button, and if he starts to tip, move the mouse in the other direction. My high score so far is 48 meters of drunken ambling, which is probably pretty pitiful.
Thursday, August 05, 2004
Search Request Thursday
the hellmouth spellbook: Oh, man, I really don't think you wanna go messin' with spells on the Hellmouth.
salman khan underarm: Who is Salman Khan, and why are we concerned with his underarms?
dawn legolas fanfiction: Well, that makes a change from the inexplicably popular Willow/Legolas fanfiction people are always coming here looking for.
pfeffernusse what is it supposed to look like: Like this, apparently.
free sex chatbots: Yeah! Free the sex chatbots!
old porn grannys: Old porn grannys never die, they just... No, never mind. There really is no good way to complete that.
sneezing breasts -itching -coughing -congestion: So, uh, what symptoms do your breasts have, then, besides the sneezing?
scooby doo personality and iq quizzes: I'm having an interesting time trying to wrap my brain around the idea of a Scooby Doo IQ quiz.
why does my "swamp cooler" smell like fish? There are so many possible punchlines to that that I think I'll let you come up with your own.
servalan captures photos: How's this?
addiction to hall's honey lemon cough drops: Yeah, that's a hell of a monkey to have on your back.
what does rush's starman mean?: I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you.
acumen scorpius: Yeah, that guy possesses all kinds of acumen.
curious frog cheating: Looks to be on the up and up to me.
body piercing in pennsauken mart: Oh, yeah, I remember that place. Frankly, it never looked all that hygienic to me.
nude half-orcs: Thank you. I shall now go and wash out my mind's eye with lye soap.
Wednesday, August 04, 2004
Set Phasers to Stun!
OK, here's another interesting link, this one to a recent CNN article about non-lethal energy weapons being developed by US weapons labs. Interestingly, it sounds to me like they're working not just on what sounds an awful lot like a phaser's "mild stun" setting, but also on the Mirror Universe's Agonizer gadget...
OK, here's another interesting link, this one to a recent CNN article about non-lethal energy weapons being developed by US weapons labs. Interestingly, it sounds to me like they're working not just on what sounds an awful lot like a phaser's "mild stun" setting, but also on the Mirror Universe's Agonizer gadget...
To Quote the CyberLeader: "Excellent."
Looks like the Daleks are going to be returning to Doctor Who after all!
Looks like the Daleks are going to be returning to Doctor Who after all!
Tuesday, August 03, 2004
Hello, Computer!
Today's featured link is Computer Stupidities, a massive collection of Stupid User Tricks and Tech Support Calls from Hell. Some of 'em are a lot funnier than others (I think the ones under "Emergencies" are probably the most entertaining), they do get repetitive fairly quickly, and a few of 'em made me feel mildly stupid. But, man, oh man, after spending the last hour or so on the phone to my Mom saying things like, "Now, right-click. That's the right button. On the mouse. Press the-- No, Mom, that was the left button," while she tried futilely to open an e-mail attachment, I really feel for the people on the support end.
Should I feel bad that in the end I pretty much told my own mother to RTFM?
Today's featured link is Computer Stupidities, a massive collection of Stupid User Tricks and Tech Support Calls from Hell. Some of 'em are a lot funnier than others (I think the ones under "Emergencies" are probably the most entertaining), they do get repetitive fairly quickly, and a few of 'em made me feel mildly stupid. But, man, oh man, after spending the last hour or so on the phone to my Mom saying things like, "Now, right-click. That's the right button. On the mouse. Press the-- No, Mom, that was the left button," while she tried futilely to open an e-mail attachment, I really feel for the people on the support end.
Should I feel bad that in the end I pretty much told my own mother to RTFM?
Heck, It'll Probably Be Better Than the Official BBC Version.
For any Blake's 7 fans in the audience who don't know about this already, there is a short film parody of the series which will be airing at the Edinburgh International Festival this month. You can see a trailer for it here. (Look for the one labeled "Blake's 7 Junction Trailer.) Looks pretty well done to me. Wish I was going to be in Edinburgh to see it.
For any Blake's 7 fans in the audience who don't know about this already, there is a short film parody of the series which will be airing at the Edinburgh International Festival this month. You can see a trailer for it here. (Look for the one labeled "Blake's 7 Junction Trailer.) Looks pretty well done to me. Wish I was going to be in Edinburgh to see it.
Monday, August 02, 2004
It Is Kinda Cute.
I'm an Audi TT!
You're not the fastest, nor the most nimble, but you're cute and you have style. You're not intensely competitive, but when you pass by, everyone turns to look.
Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.
Sunday, August 01, 2004
Danger, Will Robinson!
A week or so ago, after having seen the movie I, Robot, I mentioned that it'd caused me to have some thoughts about Asimov and Asimov's Laws of Robotics, and about how the movie touched on some things that follow logically from Asimov's postulates but that Asimov himself never really dealt with. And I said I might ramble on about these topics at some point. Well, hey, now seems to be as good a time as any! I don't think I'm actually going to talk about the movie in specific, but at least a couple of the points I've been thinking about are very relevant to the way the movie works out. I'll leave those who've seen it to identify which points those are.
So, right. The Three Laws of Robotics. You know, I've heard occasional bits of speculation (though how serious, I really don't know) about whether Asimov's Three Laws might be useful to incorporate into real-world robots. Personally, I rather doubt it. They're too vague (a point I am definitely going to come back to). But it's easy to understand where Asimov was coming from when he thought them up and why he formulated them as he did. He'd read one too many stories about crazed robots turning on their creators and, frankly, thought that idea was stupid. Robots, he reasoned, were tools, nothing more, nothing less, and tools can and should be designed to specifications that don't include homicidal rampages and plans for world domination.
The most important feature for any tool, he figured, is that it must be safe to use. And the more potentially dangerous a tool is, the more safeguards inevitably get built into it. There's a reason, he said, why you build a saw with a handle, and there's absolutely no reason why we wouldn't build robots with something fundamentally equivalent. Thus, Law 1: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
The second thing is that if you build a tool, well, hey, you want it to do what it's designed to do. We build robots to do our bidding, thus, Rule 2: A robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. That "except where" proviso makes sense, because, after all, safety is paramount over efficiency. No machine that performs its job by ripping its operators to shreds is going to be tolerated for long.
Third, a robot is going to be a pretty expensive and valuable tool, and when a tool is expensive and valuable, you want to build safeguards into it to keep it from being damaged. So, Rule 3: A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. Again, safety is still paramount, and the phrasing of the rule recognizes that there may well be times when the machine itself may be expendable in the performance of its duty.
So. Those are the Laws. Now, the problems with them...
Problem #1: These laws assume that people will deal with robots fairly intelligently, not giving them conflicting orders or ordering them to do self-destructive things without realizing that they'll be self-destructive. Asimov, like most writers of the era, was mainly writing about extremely intelligent people, and even they occasionally got themselves into trouble with this stuff. Call me a cynic, but I doubt it would work in the real world at all. (Actually, even Asimov seemed to realize this, and allowed for a considerable amount of flexibility in the Second Law, with most robots appearing to have complex additional rules about which orders would be considered to take precedence over which other orders. Still, I don't see any way an Asimovian robot could ever be anything remotely resembling idiot-proof.)
Problem #2: How the heck do you program this stuff in? Asimov, for the most part, was writing puzzle stories: Given these three rules, how can Our Heros figure out why Robot X is doing Strange Activity Y? For this purpose, he had to assume that the Three Laws were absolute and immutable, built directly into the very structure of a robot's brain. They have to exist on a simple, basic level, but the truth is, they're not simple, basic concepts at all. This leads us into:
Problem #3: These rules rely on a hell of a lot of interpretation. This really is the big problem, and it leaves the door open for all kinds of scary nastiness. In particular, there's a couple of words in the First Law that we really need to know the strict definitions of in order to understand exactly what the law is even saying. To begin with, what, exactly, is the definition of "human"? Asimov did touch on this question in his story "Evidence," which considers a robot who is outwardly indistinguishable from a human being, and eventually comes to the conclusion that if such a creature really can't be told apart from a human being, it might as well be treated like one. Which, as far as I'm concerned, is fine. But there's a sinister flip side to that, which is the question of what happens if you can convince a robot to exclude someone, or some group of people, from its definition of "human." Admittedly, it's been a while since I read the stories, but I don't think Asimov ever really deals with that possibility.
The other problem is with the definitions of "injure" and "harm." Does a paper cut constitute harm? How about elective surgery (with the small but very real possibility of something going wrong on the operating table)? What about emotional harm? Taken to its logical extreme (and Asimov's robots are nothing if not logical), the First Law seems like it ought to require robots to do everything in their power to keep humans from ever doing anything dangerous, regardless of the humans' own wishes. Asimov never deals with this, either, but Jack Williamson tackles it head-on in his brilliant and nightmarish story "With Folded Hands." (For the Star Trek fans in the audience, the original series also address this issue, in a much more light-hearted vein, in "I, Mudd.")
So those are the biggest problems with the Three Laws, as far as I can see. But it doesn't end there. Because, much later in his career, Asimov introduced yet another law, one that certain extraordinary robots were able to develop for themselves. He called it the "Zeroth Law": A robot may not injure humanity or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm. As might be surmised by its numbering, this law was given precedence over the other three, being deemed more fundamental and important than even the preservation of individual human lives. Now, the way Asimov presents this, it's all very noble and moral, and his robotic hero applies it in a gentle and benevolent fashion. But there's no reason to assume that must be the case, and there are some very disturbing possible implications to the Zeroth Law, especially when combined with the aforementioned fuzzy definitions of "injure" and "harm." For instance, given humanity's problems with pollution, over-population, war, etc., etc., might it not, from a strictly logical point of view, be argued that the best way to preserve humanity might be to cull out 95% of us and stick the rest on nature preserves? And, really, how many atrocities have humans propagated based on the firm belief that what they were doing was in the ultimate best interests of humanity as a whole, and that that noble goal far outweighed the value placed on individual human life? This is scary, scary stuff, and I really don't think (as Asimov perhaps did) that the fact that robots are clear-headed and unemotional is going to render them exempt from this kind of response. "Garbage in, garbage out" is one of the oldest precepts of computer science, and all it takes is the right sort of faulty or biased input and you're right back to homicidal rampages and world domination plans.
So, um, yeah. Those are my thoughts on Asimov's Laws of Robotics. Anybody who's actually read this far have anything they'd like to add?
A week or so ago, after having seen the movie I, Robot, I mentioned that it'd caused me to have some thoughts about Asimov and Asimov's Laws of Robotics, and about how the movie touched on some things that follow logically from Asimov's postulates but that Asimov himself never really dealt with. And I said I might ramble on about these topics at some point. Well, hey, now seems to be as good a time as any! I don't think I'm actually going to talk about the movie in specific, but at least a couple of the points I've been thinking about are very relevant to the way the movie works out. I'll leave those who've seen it to identify which points those are.
So, right. The Three Laws of Robotics. You know, I've heard occasional bits of speculation (though how serious, I really don't know) about whether Asimov's Three Laws might be useful to incorporate into real-world robots. Personally, I rather doubt it. They're too vague (a point I am definitely going to come back to). But it's easy to understand where Asimov was coming from when he thought them up and why he formulated them as he did. He'd read one too many stories about crazed robots turning on their creators and, frankly, thought that idea was stupid. Robots, he reasoned, were tools, nothing more, nothing less, and tools can and should be designed to specifications that don't include homicidal rampages and plans for world domination.
The most important feature for any tool, he figured, is that it must be safe to use. And the more potentially dangerous a tool is, the more safeguards inevitably get built into it. There's a reason, he said, why you build a saw with a handle, and there's absolutely no reason why we wouldn't build robots with something fundamentally equivalent. Thus, Law 1: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
The second thing is that if you build a tool, well, hey, you want it to do what it's designed to do. We build robots to do our bidding, thus, Rule 2: A robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. That "except where" proviso makes sense, because, after all, safety is paramount over efficiency. No machine that performs its job by ripping its operators to shreds is going to be tolerated for long.
Third, a robot is going to be a pretty expensive and valuable tool, and when a tool is expensive and valuable, you want to build safeguards into it to keep it from being damaged. So, Rule 3: A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. Again, safety is still paramount, and the phrasing of the rule recognizes that there may well be times when the machine itself may be expendable in the performance of its duty.
So. Those are the Laws. Now, the problems with them...
Problem #1: These laws assume that people will deal with robots fairly intelligently, not giving them conflicting orders or ordering them to do self-destructive things without realizing that they'll be self-destructive. Asimov, like most writers of the era, was mainly writing about extremely intelligent people, and even they occasionally got themselves into trouble with this stuff. Call me a cynic, but I doubt it would work in the real world at all. (Actually, even Asimov seemed to realize this, and allowed for a considerable amount of flexibility in the Second Law, with most robots appearing to have complex additional rules about which orders would be considered to take precedence over which other orders. Still, I don't see any way an Asimovian robot could ever be anything remotely resembling idiot-proof.)
Problem #2: How the heck do you program this stuff in? Asimov, for the most part, was writing puzzle stories: Given these three rules, how can Our Heros figure out why Robot X is doing Strange Activity Y? For this purpose, he had to assume that the Three Laws were absolute and immutable, built directly into the very structure of a robot's brain. They have to exist on a simple, basic level, but the truth is, they're not simple, basic concepts at all. This leads us into:
Problem #3: These rules rely on a hell of a lot of interpretation. This really is the big problem, and it leaves the door open for all kinds of scary nastiness. In particular, there's a couple of words in the First Law that we really need to know the strict definitions of in order to understand exactly what the law is even saying. To begin with, what, exactly, is the definition of "human"? Asimov did touch on this question in his story "Evidence," which considers a robot who is outwardly indistinguishable from a human being, and eventually comes to the conclusion that if such a creature really can't be told apart from a human being, it might as well be treated like one. Which, as far as I'm concerned, is fine. But there's a sinister flip side to that, which is the question of what happens if you can convince a robot to exclude someone, or some group of people, from its definition of "human." Admittedly, it's been a while since I read the stories, but I don't think Asimov ever really deals with that possibility.
The other problem is with the definitions of "injure" and "harm." Does a paper cut constitute harm? How about elective surgery (with the small but very real possibility of something going wrong on the operating table)? What about emotional harm? Taken to its logical extreme (and Asimov's robots are nothing if not logical), the First Law seems like it ought to require robots to do everything in their power to keep humans from ever doing anything dangerous, regardless of the humans' own wishes. Asimov never deals with this, either, but Jack Williamson tackles it head-on in his brilliant and nightmarish story "With Folded Hands." (For the Star Trek fans in the audience, the original series also address this issue, in a much more light-hearted vein, in "I, Mudd.")
So those are the biggest problems with the Three Laws, as far as I can see. But it doesn't end there. Because, much later in his career, Asimov introduced yet another law, one that certain extraordinary robots were able to develop for themselves. He called it the "Zeroth Law": A robot may not injure humanity or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm. As might be surmised by its numbering, this law was given precedence over the other three, being deemed more fundamental and important than even the preservation of individual human lives. Now, the way Asimov presents this, it's all very noble and moral, and his robotic hero applies it in a gentle and benevolent fashion. But there's no reason to assume that must be the case, and there are some very disturbing possible implications to the Zeroth Law, especially when combined with the aforementioned fuzzy definitions of "injure" and "harm." For instance, given humanity's problems with pollution, over-population, war, etc., etc., might it not, from a strictly logical point of view, be argued that the best way to preserve humanity might be to cull out 95% of us and stick the rest on nature preserves? And, really, how many atrocities have humans propagated based on the firm belief that what they were doing was in the ultimate best interests of humanity as a whole, and that that noble goal far outweighed the value placed on individual human life? This is scary, scary stuff, and I really don't think (as Asimov perhaps did) that the fact that robots are clear-headed and unemotional is going to render them exempt from this kind of response. "Garbage in, garbage out" is one of the oldest precepts of computer science, and all it takes is the right sort of faulty or biased input and you're right back to homicidal rampages and world domination plans.
So, um, yeah. Those are my thoughts on Asimov's Laws of Robotics. Anybody who's actually read this far have anything they'd like to add?
Friday, July 30, 2004
My Exciting Day
Having finished up my most pressing chores for the day (like the good girl I am), I suddenly realized at about 1:00 that I was starving. So I got in the ol' car, figuring I'd make a stop at the ATM for some cash, pick up something fast-foodish, bring it home, supplement it with that nice healthy salad I made earlier, and relax in front of a Northern Exposure DVD for a while before work. After all, I'd earned it. Right?
Yeah, needless to say, it didn't work out that way. I got as far as the bank, and then the damned car wouldn't start again. There wasn't even enough juice for the radio this time. Hell, there wasn't enough juice to light up the numbers on the clock. Eventually, some kind soul gave me a jump, which, somewhat to my surprise, actually worked, and I headed back to my mechanic, who, foolishly enough, had said "If you have any more problems with it, just bring it back in!" On the way over there, the battery light came on. Yeah. Not good.
The mechanics seemed pretty surprised. "But we checked everything out! We swear! It was good!" Hey, I believed 'em. I mean, if a mechanic's going to lie to you, he's much more likely to be telling you something's broken when it's not than vice versa, right? They said, well, maybe it was some kind of intermittent problem that just wasn't showing up before. They also said they were pretty busy, but that if they waited until they weren't, it'd probably be Monday, and they didn't want to leave me without a car that long, so if I hung around for a while, they'd take a look at it when they got a chance.
So I hung around for, oh, twenty or thirty minutes in a little room with some really crappy magazines for company. (You know, I used to never go anywhere, not even on a ten-minute run out to the bank, without a book on my person. Why the hell did I stop doing that?!) Anyway, the guy took a look at it and said, yup, sure enough, whatever the reason was, the battery was pretty much hosed. Bad news, though: they didn't have the right kind of replacement battery in stock. But he replaced the terminals and got the car started again for me so I could go somewhere and buy a battery. (By the way, they made no attempt to charge me for any of this, which is the other reason why I trust these guys. I like my mechanics.)
So, I drove the car home, went into the house without shutting it off, grabbed my toolbox -- which is pretty well-stocked and should have everything even an automotive ignoramus like me needs to change a battery, right? -- and took myself to the auto-parts store to buy a battery. The guy told me there'd be a four dollar "core charge" which I could have refunded if I brought in the old battery. "Hey, no problem!" I said. "I'm just gonna go and swap 'em out in the parking lot, and I should have the old one for you in a few minutes." He didn't bother charging me the four bucks.
So, out into the parking lot I went. Terminals came off the battery, no problem, and... the damned thing wouldn't come out. It was immediately obvious why: there was a bracket holding it in place. Perfectly sensible, of course, and easily dealt with. Right? Well, yeah, except for two important facts. Fact one: there isn't enough room under the hood of your average car to swing a field mouse. Fact two: I had three different sets of wrenches and sockets, and not one of 'em was designed to work in that small of a space. Worse still, they were all metric. I have an American car.
I spent the better part of half an hour trying to loosen that one damned bolt. In 97-degree heat. Not having eaten anything all day. By the end of which time, sweat was dripping into my eyes and onto the lenses of my glasses, I'd torn a good hunk of skin off my pinky finger, the damned bolt was no looser than when I'd started, and it was beginning to look like that battery was going to sit right there under my hood until the end of time.
Fortunately, at about the point where I felt ready to collapse from heat exhaustion, a kind stranger in possession of an (American!) socket set with a very long shaft happened by and dealt with the problem in about two minutes. At which point I discovered another interesting fact. The guy at the auto parts store had given me the wrong battery. I told him the battery number the mechanic had given me. I gave him the make, model and year of my car. I asked him twice if he was sure this was the correct battery for my car. And he gave me the wrong battery! The terminals were on the wrong sides. Now, I know reversing the polarity always works on Doctor Who, but, really, I don't think my car would have appreciated it.
Fortunately, he didn't give me a hassle about exchanging it, and the correct one cost exactly the same as the incorrect one. Mr. Kind Stranger helped me get it hooked up and, halle-frellin'-lujah, the car actually started!
Of course, I realized after we'd gotten it in there that we'd forgotten to put the plastic cover that went over the top of the battery back on, but I figured, screw it. That can't possibly be an essential part, and if it's important I can re-install it later. After all, it doesn't involve loosening that damned bracket.
Then I drove home, washed the sweat off, ate some food, drank a bunch of liquid, and actually managed to make it to work more or less on time.
And that was my exciting day. How was yours?
Having finished up my most pressing chores for the day (like the good girl I am), I suddenly realized at about 1:00 that I was starving. So I got in the ol' car, figuring I'd make a stop at the ATM for some cash, pick up something fast-foodish, bring it home, supplement it with that nice healthy salad I made earlier, and relax in front of a Northern Exposure DVD for a while before work. After all, I'd earned it. Right?
Yeah, needless to say, it didn't work out that way. I got as far as the bank, and then the damned car wouldn't start again. There wasn't even enough juice for the radio this time. Hell, there wasn't enough juice to light up the numbers on the clock. Eventually, some kind soul gave me a jump, which, somewhat to my surprise, actually worked, and I headed back to my mechanic, who, foolishly enough, had said "If you have any more problems with it, just bring it back in!" On the way over there, the battery light came on. Yeah. Not good.
The mechanics seemed pretty surprised. "But we checked everything out! We swear! It was good!" Hey, I believed 'em. I mean, if a mechanic's going to lie to you, he's much more likely to be telling you something's broken when it's not than vice versa, right? They said, well, maybe it was some kind of intermittent problem that just wasn't showing up before. They also said they were pretty busy, but that if they waited until they weren't, it'd probably be Monday, and they didn't want to leave me without a car that long, so if I hung around for a while, they'd take a look at it when they got a chance.
So I hung around for, oh, twenty or thirty minutes in a little room with some really crappy magazines for company. (You know, I used to never go anywhere, not even on a ten-minute run out to the bank, without a book on my person. Why the hell did I stop doing that?!) Anyway, the guy took a look at it and said, yup, sure enough, whatever the reason was, the battery was pretty much hosed. Bad news, though: they didn't have the right kind of replacement battery in stock. But he replaced the terminals and got the car started again for me so I could go somewhere and buy a battery. (By the way, they made no attempt to charge me for any of this, which is the other reason why I trust these guys. I like my mechanics.)
So, I drove the car home, went into the house without shutting it off, grabbed my toolbox -- which is pretty well-stocked and should have everything even an automotive ignoramus like me needs to change a battery, right? -- and took myself to the auto-parts store to buy a battery. The guy told me there'd be a four dollar "core charge" which I could have refunded if I brought in the old battery. "Hey, no problem!" I said. "I'm just gonna go and swap 'em out in the parking lot, and I should have the old one for you in a few minutes." He didn't bother charging me the four bucks.
So, out into the parking lot I went. Terminals came off the battery, no problem, and... the damned thing wouldn't come out. It was immediately obvious why: there was a bracket holding it in place. Perfectly sensible, of course, and easily dealt with. Right? Well, yeah, except for two important facts. Fact one: there isn't enough room under the hood of your average car to swing a field mouse. Fact two: I had three different sets of wrenches and sockets, and not one of 'em was designed to work in that small of a space. Worse still, they were all metric. I have an American car.
I spent the better part of half an hour trying to loosen that one damned bolt. In 97-degree heat. Not having eaten anything all day. By the end of which time, sweat was dripping into my eyes and onto the lenses of my glasses, I'd torn a good hunk of skin off my pinky finger, the damned bolt was no looser than when I'd started, and it was beginning to look like that battery was going to sit right there under my hood until the end of time.
Fortunately, at about the point where I felt ready to collapse from heat exhaustion, a kind stranger in possession of an (American!) socket set with a very long shaft happened by and dealt with the problem in about two minutes. At which point I discovered another interesting fact. The guy at the auto parts store had given me the wrong battery. I told him the battery number the mechanic had given me. I gave him the make, model and year of my car. I asked him twice if he was sure this was the correct battery for my car. And he gave me the wrong battery! The terminals were on the wrong sides. Now, I know reversing the polarity always works on Doctor Who, but, really, I don't think my car would have appreciated it.
Fortunately, he didn't give me a hassle about exchanging it, and the correct one cost exactly the same as the incorrect one. Mr. Kind Stranger helped me get it hooked up and, halle-frellin'-lujah, the car actually started!
Of course, I realized after we'd gotten it in there that we'd forgotten to put the plastic cover that went over the top of the battery back on, but I figured, screw it. That can't possibly be an essential part, and if it's important I can re-install it later. After all, it doesn't involve loosening that damned bracket.
Then I drove home, washed the sweat off, ate some food, drank a bunch of liquid, and actually managed to make it to work more or less on time.
And that was my exciting day. How was yours?
Search Request Thurs-- Er, Friday
Because I forgot yesterday.
what tv commercial says obey your thirst: I believe that's a commercial for a popular brand of lemon-lime soda. But you do realize, right, that they don't actually want you to "obey your thirst." They want you to buy their product.
"biggest boobs" blog: Sorry. I think this blog is, at best, a C-cup.
lo carb catfood: Aaaaargggh! God damn it, your cat does not need to be on Atkins!
farscape hidden memory stark fic: Ooh, a fan after my own heart!
lovely c++ exercises: Hmm, some people have strange definitions of "lovely."
duct tape bondage "superglue": Duct tape and superglue? Isn't that kind of overkill?
how does conan o'brien describe his wife: Mrs. O'Brien?
ragan ship: Alas, I am shipless.
"stark" "pregnant" "farscape": Hey, the writers said he was! I'm just waiting for it to be revealed! (What do you mean, they were joking?)
flooby dust origin: Flooby dust? Is that like pixie dust?
frell hardcore clips: I guess Chiana's making a little money on the side...
fanfic buffy angel buffy/angel gentle climax: Erm, I think it's what happens after the climax that ain't exactly gentle...
Examples of famous verbosity: Is my verbosity famous?
unscratchable CDs: Do you think our future truly holds such a miracle?
tatoos of a mythological phoenix: As opposed to a real phoenix?
wallpapers of girls having big boobs: "Having" them, huh? OK, that's an interesting way of putting it.
huxley shirt store: A Brave New World of shirts!
leela/bender fanfiction: If the phrase "bite my shiny metal ass" features, I don't wanna know about it.
vampire hobbit fanfiction crossovers: Is it just me, or is "vampire hobbit" just the cutest really disturbing idea ever?
black butt: Somehow "kiss my black butt" just doesn't have quite the same ring to it.
1000 taped to rabbit: OK, this one wins the prize for the search request I really want to know the background to.
hot grannys sex trailer: Aww, it's sad that the grannies have to set up their brothel in a trailer...
Because I forgot yesterday.
Thursday, July 29, 2004
Howwwwlllll!
Category V - The Lone
Wolf
Though you'd be welcome in most groups, you prefer
a more solitary path.
What Type of Social Entity are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
Category V - The Lone
Wolf
Though you'd be welcome in most groups, you prefer
a more solitary path.
What Type of Social Entity are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
Then Again, Maybe I'm Just Lazy.
Man, I don't know what's wrong with me this week. I've been feeling incredibly sleepy and lethargic. And not sleepy in the way I feel when I actually haven't gotten enough sleep. Just like, hey, I could curl up on the bed and nap at any given moment if I let myself, whether I actually need to or not. Indeed, I ended up sleeping until noon today (after going to bed around, I dunno, 1:30 AM), just because I kept waking up and simply not feeling like getting up. And when I'm awake, I just don't feel like doing anything. If I sit down in front of a book or the computer, I'll stay there and be entertained, but getting myself to get up and move and do something else is next to impossible. I'm not sick. At least, I'm pretty sure I'm not sick. I feel a lot like I do sometimes in the depths of winter, when it's dark and cold and I just want to curl up and hibernate for a while. Except it's freakin' July. Maybe I could blame the whether if it was hot, but for the last few days, it's been comparatively cool. Weird.
(And before anyone jumps to the wrong conclusions, I'm not depressed, either. In fact, I feel pretty darned mellow...)
Man, I don't know what's wrong with me this week. I've been feeling incredibly sleepy and lethargic. And not sleepy in the way I feel when I actually haven't gotten enough sleep. Just like, hey, I could curl up on the bed and nap at any given moment if I let myself, whether I actually need to or not. Indeed, I ended up sleeping until noon today (after going to bed around, I dunno, 1:30 AM), just because I kept waking up and simply not feeling like getting up. And when I'm awake, I just don't feel like doing anything. If I sit down in front of a book or the computer, I'll stay there and be entertained, but getting myself to get up and move and do something else is next to impossible. I'm not sick. At least, I'm pretty sure I'm not sick. I feel a lot like I do sometimes in the depths of winter, when it's dark and cold and I just want to curl up and hibernate for a while. Except it's freakin' July. Maybe I could blame the whether if it was hot, but for the last few days, it's been comparatively cool. Weird.
(And before anyone jumps to the wrong conclusions, I'm not depressed, either. In fact, I feel pretty darned mellow...)
Wednesday, July 28, 2004
Plastic Fantastic Villains
Here's some photos from the filming of the new Doctor Who series. Look! Autons!
(Link lifted from Sore Eyes again.)
Here's some photos from the filming of the new Doctor Who series. Look! Autons!
(Link lifted from Sore Eyes again.)
Freud Was a Bit of a Crackpot, But I'm Addicted to Quizzes.
Take Free Freudian Inventory Test
personality tests by similarminds.com
Learning is living. And what the heck does "stuck between a progressive and regressive outlook on life" mean?
| Freudian Inventory Results |
| Genital (46%) you appear to be stuck between a progressive and regressive outlook on life. Latency (63%) you may be using learning as an escape from living. Phallic (20%) you appear to have negative issues regarding sexuality and/or have an uncertain sexual identity. Anal (46%) you appear to have a good balance of self control and spontaneity. Oral (43%) you appear to have a good balance of independence and interdependence. |
personality tests by similarminds.com
Learning is living. And what the heck does "stuck between a progressive and regressive outlook on life" mean?
Tuesday, July 27, 2004
Or It Might Just Be That I've Been Watching Northern Exposure Lately...
You're Alaska!
You're big, bulky, and extremely wild. At the same time, you're rather cold and standoffish, even a loner of sorts. Taming you may be one of the last great quests of the people who do manage to find you or even seek you out. So many of them just want to plunder you for what you have of value, but there are a few, the ones who will stick with you, that truly value your rugged remoteness. As long as no one is spilling stuff on you, you are truly beautiful.
Take the State Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.
Link of the Day
This gave me quite a chuckle: The 10 Laws of Bad Science Fiction. My personal favorites:
(Link via Sore Eyes.)
This gave me quite a chuckle: The 10 Laws of Bad Science Fiction. My personal favorites:
6. Remember that any device improvised or jury-rigged, out of available materials on short notice, will work at least as well as or better than the actual device whose function it is meant to emulate or replace. Makes you wonder why we don't just build all of our weapons and warp-drives out of rubber bands and chewing gum. This principle is also known as "MacGyver's Law", or "The Doohan Principle."
and
9. Remember that technology introduced at the start of the story always causes everyone's problems, while technology introduced in the middle or at the end of the story always solves everyone's problems. This could be referred to as the "If-Only-I'd-Invented-It-Ninety-Minutes-Later" Conundrum.
(Link via Sore Eyes.)
Monday, July 26, 2004
Sunday, July 25, 2004
Hey, Faint Praise is a Lot Better Than No Praise
I just got back from seeing I, Robot. Now, I have to say, my expectations for this movie were about as low as they could possibly be. I'm a big Isaac Asimov fan from way back, and absolutely everything I'd seen or heard about the film led me to believe that it was going to be yet another complete butchering of a science fiction classic. In fact, before leaving for the theater, I told someone I was mainly going out of curiosity as to exactly how many RPMs ol' Isaac was likely to be doing in his grave.
But you know what? I didn't hate it. OK, I wouldn't call it a really good movie. Most of the action sequences aren't all that exciting (and the stupid camera tricks they use in an attempt to make them more exciting just annoy me). The pacing drags a bit in the middle. It suffers from a couple of major cop-movie cliches. And the dialog isn't nearly as clever as it thinks it is.
But it isn't the horrible desecration I was expecting. Yeah, I think the movie does stretch Asimov's conception of how his robots worked a tiny bit, but it does so far less I anticipated, and certainly much less so than the trailers led me to expect. The very idea of casting a fashion model as Dr. Susan Calvin made my blood boil, and seemed like a good enough reason to hate the movie all by itself, but, I have to admit, they actually did get her personality right. The mystery plot, while it bore no resemblance whatsoever to any of the stories in the book, at least felt vaguely like the sort of thing Asimov might write, albeit punched up in a Hollywood-action kind of way. I rather doubt Asimov would have liked the ending (which actually seems to have been lifted from a different science fiction writer altogether), but the honest truth is that it does follow on pretty logically from some of the things Asimov himself explored in his novels. (Actually, there's quite a lot I could say about the Three Laws of Robotics and the end of the movie and some of Asimov's later books, but I don't want to get too spoilery and it's getting towards my bedtime, so I won't go into it now. But it's an interesting topic, and I may ramble a bit about it later on.)
So, yeah. Didn't hate it. Color me surprised.
Of course, I'd still love to see Harlan Ellison's version.
I just got back from seeing I, Robot. Now, I have to say, my expectations for this movie were about as low as they could possibly be. I'm a big Isaac Asimov fan from way back, and absolutely everything I'd seen or heard about the film led me to believe that it was going to be yet another complete butchering of a science fiction classic. In fact, before leaving for the theater, I told someone I was mainly going out of curiosity as to exactly how many RPMs ol' Isaac was likely to be doing in his grave.
But you know what? I didn't hate it. OK, I wouldn't call it a really good movie. Most of the action sequences aren't all that exciting (and the stupid camera tricks they use in an attempt to make them more exciting just annoy me). The pacing drags a bit in the middle. It suffers from a couple of major cop-movie cliches. And the dialog isn't nearly as clever as it thinks it is.
But it isn't the horrible desecration I was expecting. Yeah, I think the movie does stretch Asimov's conception of how his robots worked a tiny bit, but it does so far less I anticipated, and certainly much less so than the trailers led me to expect. The very idea of casting a fashion model as Dr. Susan Calvin made my blood boil, and seemed like a good enough reason to hate the movie all by itself, but, I have to admit, they actually did get her personality right. The mystery plot, while it bore no resemblance whatsoever to any of the stories in the book, at least felt vaguely like the sort of thing Asimov might write, albeit punched up in a Hollywood-action kind of way. I rather doubt Asimov would have liked the ending (which actually seems to have been lifted from a different science fiction writer altogether), but the honest truth is that it does follow on pretty logically from some of the things Asimov himself explored in his novels. (Actually, there's quite a lot I could say about the Three Laws of Robotics and the end of the movie and some of Asimov's later books, but I don't want to get too spoilery and it's getting towards my bedtime, so I won't go into it now. But it's an interesting topic, and I may ramble a bit about it later on.)
So, yeah. Didn't hate it. Color me surprised.
Of course, I'd still love to see Harlan Ellison's version.
Saturday, July 24, 2004
And Another Quiz...
Your Patronus is a cat!
Harry Potter: What is your Patronus?
brought to you by Quizilla
Well, yeah, not much I can do but nod my head at that one.
Your Patronus is a cat!
Harry Potter: What is your Patronus?
brought to you by Quizilla
Well, yeah, not much I can do but nod my head at that one.
I Think That I Shall Never See/A Poem That Fixes My Battery.
Feeling annoyed over my car problems, I took myself off to do this quiz, which purports to find you a poem to match your mood. Well, it told me I was having an existential crisis, and offered me some Yeats:
Hmm. Not bad at all, in a pleasantly depressing sort of way. It certainly hasn't done anything to make me feel better about my automotive problems, though.
Feeling annoyed over my car problems, I took myself off to do this quiz, which purports to find you a poem to match your mood. Well, it told me I was having an existential crisis, and offered me some Yeats:
An Irish Airman Forsees His Death
I KNOW that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate,
Those that I guard I do not love;
My country is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan's poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.
Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;
I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.
Hmm. Not bad at all, in a pleasantly depressing sort of way. It certainly hasn't done anything to make me feel better about my automotive problems, though.
Car No Go.
Damned car. I was out running errands in it today, and it suddenly decided it wasn't going to start on me any more. Turn the key. Click. Nothing. Turn. Click. Nothing.
It might just be the battery; there's a lot of corrosion around the darned thing, and it hasn't been replaced since I've had the car. Didn't have anybody around to try giving me a jump (mainly because I didn't look hard enough, but oh, well), so I called AAA, who apparently just ask you "where do you want it towed?" instead of trying to determine whether you need a jump or whatever. So I had them drop it off at the service center. There's nobody there on a Saturday, but I guess I'll call 'em Monday morning and ask 'em to take a look at it. I'll be kinda embarrassed if it is just a dead battery, but I'll be really annoyed if it's something major with my electrical system, so I guess there really is just no good outcome here. Sigh.
Damned car. I was out running errands in it today, and it suddenly decided it wasn't going to start on me any more. Turn the key. Click. Nothing. Turn. Click. Nothing.
It might just be the battery; there's a lot of corrosion around the darned thing, and it hasn't been replaced since I've had the car. Didn't have anybody around to try giving me a jump (mainly because I didn't look hard enough, but oh, well), so I called AAA, who apparently just ask you "where do you want it towed?" instead of trying to determine whether you need a jump or whatever. So I had them drop it off at the service center. There's nobody there on a Saturday, but I guess I'll call 'em Monday morning and ask 'em to take a look at it. I'll be kinda embarrassed if it is just a dead battery, but I'll be really annoyed if it's something major with my electrical system, so I guess there really is just no good outcome here. Sigh.
Friday, July 23, 2004
Color Me Surprised
You're a Black Crayon. Dark and Mysterious. At
times sexy. You can be conservative and
elegant. The bad thing is that you represent
rebellion, darkness, and mourning.
What Color Crayon Are You
brought to you by Quizilla
You know, the black crayon was always my favorite. It'd be worn down to a tiny little nub while many lesser colors still had all of their wrappers.
You're a Black Crayon. Dark and Mysterious. At
times sexy. You can be conservative and
elegant. The bad thing is that you represent
rebellion, darkness, and mourning.
What Color Crayon Are You
brought to you by Quizilla
You know, the black crayon was always my favorite. It'd be worn down to a tiny little nub while many lesser colors still had all of their wrappers.
Thursday, July 22, 2004
Search Request Thursday
Here we go again. It's a little shorter than usual this week, I think, 'cause I kept forgetting to look at the logs. (Told ya I was feeling kind of apathetic lately.)
"cute firefly": The cute one on Firefly? Ah, that'd have to be Kaylee. Kittens don't get as cute as Kaylee.
"flavored ice cream" "free pictures": But you can't taste the flavor by looking at the pictures!
"ASCII ART" +Dune +Frank Herbert: Ooh, I wanna see an ASCII sandworm.
i-robot will smith nude: Does he have a nude scene? Hmm, I guess it's good that movies are also pitching their gratuitous sex appeal to the women in the audience these days...
"free video clips" of human biology: I think that's the coyest request for porn I've seen yet.
"swamp cooler" "fan" alignment: I think mine is Chaotic Neutral.
"giant hands" episode: Was that an MST3K episode?
"breasts sneezing": Eww.
buzz aldrin lone gunmen: I just hope the Lone Gunmen weren't pitching some weird conspiracy theory about the moon landings being faked, 'cause Buzz punches people out for that.
APOLLO Chocolate Waffer: It's so waffer thin, it's lightweight enough to carry on a space capsule!
cabinet dental hygine: I think I'd be a little afraid of a cabinet with teeth.
blog tv nude: I've tried interpreting that four different ways, and none of them make very much sense.
where can i see grannys nude for free: I dunno. Volunteer to give sponge baths at the old folks' home? Or, on second thought, don't. Ick.
"swamp cooler" smell rid: I'd recommend cleaning it, but what do I know?
Here we go again. It's a little shorter than usual this week, I think, 'cause I kept forgetting to look at the logs. (Told ya I was feeling kind of apathetic lately.)
Still More Shiny New Electronics
I just got a new printer! And about damned time, too. I was starting to get really fed up with the old one. It was an Epson Stylus 740, which I bought a couple of years ago when I first got this computer, and I guess I'm not going to complain about it too hard because for quite a while it really was adequate for what I wanted to do with it. (Mostly just printing text. Often quite a lot of text.) But it was starting to have some major problems. Even immediately after replacing the cartridge, the text would be blurred and broken, to the point where it was getting hard to read. Cleaning the heads a few times would sometimes help a little, but not for long. And, frankly, it was never much good with printing pictures. They'd always come out with faint horizontal lines through them.
So, I replaced the poor old thing with a shiny new HP Deskjet 5150, which I believe cost me just about exactly the same amount of money. I've just now got it set up and running, and I'm already feeling very, very glad I made the replacement. This thing prints nice, crisp text and pictures (much better than the old Epson ever did). It's quiet, it's relatively fast, and it's got a big old "job cancel" button on the front, which is very handy for me because I constantly keep hitting "print" and then suddenly realizing that, no, I wasn't quite ready to print that out yet and I just need to change one more thing. The only drawback seems to be that if you don't remember to extend the output tray before you print, it shoots your pages across the room. Which is kind of entertaining, actually, although I imagine the novelty value of that probably wears off pretty quickly.
Anyway, yeah, I am currently feeling very happy with my personal electronics purchases, and I just thought I'd share.
I just got a new printer! And about damned time, too. I was starting to get really fed up with the old one. It was an Epson Stylus 740, which I bought a couple of years ago when I first got this computer, and I guess I'm not going to complain about it too hard because for quite a while it really was adequate for what I wanted to do with it. (Mostly just printing text. Often quite a lot of text.) But it was starting to have some major problems. Even immediately after replacing the cartridge, the text would be blurred and broken, to the point where it was getting hard to read. Cleaning the heads a few times would sometimes help a little, but not for long. And, frankly, it was never much good with printing pictures. They'd always come out with faint horizontal lines through them.
So, I replaced the poor old thing with a shiny new HP Deskjet 5150, which I believe cost me just about exactly the same amount of money. I've just now got it set up and running, and I'm already feeling very, very glad I made the replacement. This thing prints nice, crisp text and pictures (much better than the old Epson ever did). It's quiet, it's relatively fast, and it's got a big old "job cancel" button on the front, which is very handy for me because I constantly keep hitting "print" and then suddenly realizing that, no, I wasn't quite ready to print that out yet and I just need to change one more thing. The only drawback seems to be that if you don't remember to extend the output tray before you print, it shoots your pages across the room. Which is kind of entertaining, actually, although I imagine the novelty value of that probably wears off pretty quickly.
Anyway, yeah, I am currently feeling very happy with my personal electronics purchases, and I just thought I'd share.
Wednesday, July 21, 2004
RTFM!
Still kind of in "blah-about-blogging" mode, but here's a highly amusing link for ya: a kitty-cat user's manual for computer geeks. A small sample:
Heh.
Still kind of in "blah-about-blogging" mode, but here's a highly amusing link for ya: a kitty-cat user's manual for computer geeks. A small sample:
A CAT unit should be taken once a year to a VET (Very Expensive Technician) for a system checkup. Do not attempt to open a CAT. There are no user-serviceable parts inside. If a unit emits strange smells or sounds, it should be serviced immediately by a VET.
You may examine the CAT system to determine if it has a male or female scuzzy port. If the port is male, then the CAT unit may emit a non-toxic aerosol. The VET can remove this component. CATs with female ports are plagued by periodic heating problems. The VET can fix this permanently by removing an internal part.
Heh.
Tuesday, July 20, 2004
Dull
I've got nothing I feel like blogging about. Oh, I'm sure there's stuff I could talk about, but, frankly, none of it is interesting me enough at the moment that I feel like writing about it at all. I couldn't even find any stupid internet quizzes I hadn't already done. And, believe me, I looked.
I got nada. Nothing. Zip.
You people post some entertaining links in the comments or something.
I've got nothing I feel like blogging about. Oh, I'm sure there's stuff I could talk about, but, frankly, none of it is interesting me enough at the moment that I feel like writing about it at all. I couldn't even find any stupid internet quizzes I hadn't already done. And, believe me, I looked.
I got nada. Nothing. Zip.
You people post some entertaining links in the comments or something.
Sunday, July 18, 2004
Well, That Was Productive.
Things I did today:
lay sprawled on the couch reading a mediocre Doctor Who novel
lay sprawled on the couch reading a Lemony Snicket book
lay sprawled on the couch reading a true crime story
lay sprawled on the couch watching The Simpsons
drank many liquids
attempted to move as little as possible
stripped down to as few clothes as possible
sweated
Man, I hate summer. It isn't even the swamp cooler's fault, really. It's just that god-damned hot outside.
Things I did today:
Man, I hate summer. It isn't even the swamp cooler's fault, really. It's just that god-damned hot outside.
"God, I Love Science Fiction!"
Here's yet another "top 100" list I've seen floating around the internet... I'm not at all sure where this one came from, but it's somebody's list of top 100 SF novels, which naturally caught my attention. I agree with a lot of these, actually. Several more of them I regard as books which are important in the field, even if they're not really top-100 material in terms of quality writing. A few of them I think are good, but not that good, or not the very best work of their respective authors. And a very few of them left me thinking, "You have got to be kidding."
Anyway, here 'tis. I've bolded the ones I've read, italicized the ones I have but haven't gotten around to reading yet, and added a few boring parenthetical comments.
TOP 100 SF BOOKS:
1 Frank Herbert, Dune (1965)
2 Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game [S1] (1985)
3 Isaac Asimov, Foundation [S1-3] (1951)
4 William Gibson, Neuromancer (1984)
5 Ursula K Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness (1969)
6 Robert A Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land (1961)
7 Larry Niven, Ringworld (1970)
8 Robert A Heinlein, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (1966)
9 George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)
10 Dan Simmons, Hyperion (1989)
11 Ursula K Le Guin, The Dispossessed (1974) (Can't believe I've gone this long without reading this one. I really ought to get to it soon.)
12 Frederik Pohl, Gateway (1977)
13 Joe Haldeman, The Forever War (1974) (I read a library copy of this in my teenage years, but I really don't think I was old enough to appreciate it. There's a copy now on my To-Read Pile waiting for me to give it another go.)
14 Walter M Miller, A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959)
15 David Brin, Startide Rising [S2] (1983) (One of these days, I may get around to reading this series.)
16 Arthur C Clarke, Childhood's End (1954)
17 Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy [S1] (1979)
18 Alfred Bester, The Demolished Man (1953)
19 Ben Bova [ed], [A] The Best of the Nebulas (1989)
20 John Brunner, Stand on Zanzibar (1969) (I thought for a minute I might have this on the Pile, but, no, I was getting it confused with The Sheep Look Up. Which I seem to do a lot.)
21 Ray Bradbury, [C] The Martian Chronicles (1950)
22 Gene Wolfe, The Shadow of the Torturer [S1] (1980) (I've got a Wolfe omnibus edition that I think has this in it.)
23 Arthur C Clarke, Rendezvous With Rama (1973)
24 Alfred Bester, The Stars My Destination (1956)
25 Roger Zelazny, Lord of Light (1967)
26 Theodore Sturgeon, More Than Human (1953)
27 Robert A Heinlein, Starship Troopers (1959)
28 Isaac Asimov, [C] I, Robot (1950)
29 Philip K Dick, The Man in the High Castle (1962)
30 Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451 (1954)
31 Harlan Ellison [ed], [A] Dangerous Visions (1967)
32 Daniel Keyes, Flowers for Algernon (1966) (I've read the short story many, many times. The novel version is on my Pile, but I'm a little wary of cracking it open, as I don't see how it can possibly compare to the original.)
33 Orson Scott Card, Speaker for the Dead [S2] (1986)
34 H G Wells, The Time Machine (1895)
35 Niven & Pournelle, The Mote in God's Eye (1975) (Another one I read as a kid and have a copy of that I hope to get to sometime soon. At least, I think I do. I vaguely remember buying it.)
36 Vernor Vinge, A Fire Upon the Deep (1991)
37 Philip K Dick, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968)
38 David Brin, The Uplift War [S3] (1987)
39 Kim Stanley Robinson, Red Mars (1992)
40 Clifford Simak, Way Station (1963)
41 H G Wells, The War of the Worlds (1898)
42 Connie Willis, Doomsday Book (1992)
43 Isaac Asimov, The Gods Themselves (1972)
44 Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash (1992)
45 Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (1932)
46 Philip Jose Farmer, To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
47 Gardner Dozois [ed], [A] The Year's Best Science Fiction [S] (1984) (I've got a couple of these, but not the 1984 edition.)
48 Gregory Benford, Timescape (1980)
49 C J Cherryh, Downbelow Station (1981)
50 Arthur C Clarke, 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
51 Isaac Asimov, The Caves of Steel (1954)
52 Greg Bear, Blood Music (1985) (I hereby nominate this as my top condenter for Book That Really Doesn't Belong on This List.)
53 Robert Silverberg, Dying Inside (1972)
54 John Wyndham, The Day of the Triffids (1951)
55 Pohl & Kornbluth, The Space Merchants (1953)
56 Neal Stephenson, The Diamond Age (1995)
57 James Blish, A Case of Conscience (1958)
58 Clifford Simak, [C] City (1952)
59 Hal Clement, Mission of Gravity (1953)
60 Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)
61 Jules Verne, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1870)
62 George R Stewart, Earth Abides (1949)
63 Edgar Rice Burroughs, A Princess of Mars [S1] (1912)
64 Philip K Dick, Ubik (1969)
65 Lois McMaster Bujold, Barrayar (1991)
66 Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange (1962)
67 Isaac Asimov (et al) [eds], [A] Hugo Winners/New Hugo Winners [S] (1962)
68 Tim Powers, The Anubis Gates (1983)
69 Arthur C Clarke, The City and the Stars (1956) (I'd thought I had read this, but it turns out I was thinking of Against the Fall of Night. I think.)
70 Philip K Dick, The Three Stigmata Of Palmer Eldritch (1964)
71 Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five (1969)
72 Arthur C Clarke, The Fountains of Paradise (1979)
73 Poul Anderson, Tau Zero (1970)
74 James Blish, [C] Earthman, Come Home (1955) (This is one of the "Cities in Flight" series, right? I have a couple of collected volumes of that on the Pile.)
75 E E 'Doc' Smith, Grey Lensman [S4] (1951) (I've got a collection of Lensman stories on the Pile too, but I don't think this one is in there.)
76 Joanna Russ, The Female Man (1975)
77 Jules Verne, Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864)
78 Joan D Vinge, The Snow Queen (1980)
79 Robert A Heinlein, Time Enough For Love (1973)
80 Stanislaw Lem, Solaris (1961) (Actually, I think I may have read this one ages ago, too, but I'm always getting it confused with Fiasco. In any case, I do have a copy now.)
81 C J Cherryh, Cyteen: The Betrayal [S1] (1988) (Read all of Cyteen in one collected volume.)
82 Harlan Ellison [ed], [A] Again, Dangerous Visions (1972)
83 Robert A Heinlein, The Puppet Masters (1951)
84 Kurt Vonnegut, The Sirens of Titan (1959)
85 Samuel R Delany, Babel-17 (1966)
86 Brian Aldiss, Helliconia Spring [S1] (1982)
87 Harlan Ellison, [C] Deathbird Stories (1975) (I might have this on the Pile, actually. I know there's some Ellison on there somewhere, but I can't seem to find it. Which really tells you something about the state of the To-Read Pile.)
88 Samuel R Delany, Dahlgren (1975) (The only Delany I've read was Triton, and I didn't really find it to my taste.)
89 Robert A Heinlein, Have Space-Suit - Will Travel (1958) (I may have read this at some point, but I don't think I have. That's an oversight I really ought to correct.)
90 Niven & Pournelle, Lucifer's Hammer (1977)
91 Frederik Pohl, Man Plus (1976)
92 Robert Silverberg [ed], [A] Science Fiction Hall of Fame 1 (1970) (Read this ages ago and don't even remember what was in it.)
93 Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men (1930)
94 Robert A Heinlein, The Door Into Summer (1956)
95 Thomas M Disch, Camp Concentration (1968)
96 John Varley, Titan (1979)
97 Michael Bishop, No Enemy But Time (1982)
98 Robert A Heinlein, Double Star (1956)
99 David Brin, The Postman (1985)
100 Vonda N McIntyre, Dreamsnake (1978)
Here's yet another "top 100" list I've seen floating around the internet... I'm not at all sure where this one came from, but it's somebody's list of top 100 SF novels, which naturally caught my attention. I agree with a lot of these, actually. Several more of them I regard as books which are important in the field, even if they're not really top-100 material in terms of quality writing. A few of them I think are good, but not that good, or not the very best work of their respective authors. And a very few of them left me thinking, "You have got to be kidding."
Anyway, here 'tis. I've bolded the ones I've read, italicized the ones I have but haven't gotten around to reading yet, and added a few boring parenthetical comments.
TOP 100 SF BOOKS:
1 Frank Herbert, Dune (1965)
2 Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game [S1] (1985)
3 Isaac Asimov, Foundation [S1-3] (1951)
4 William Gibson, Neuromancer (1984)
5 Ursula K Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness (1969)
6 Robert A Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land (1961)
7 Larry Niven, Ringworld (1970)
8 Robert A Heinlein, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (1966)
9 George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)
10 Dan Simmons, Hyperion (1989)
11 Ursula K Le Guin, The Dispossessed (1974) (Can't believe I've gone this long without reading this one. I really ought to get to it soon.)
12 Frederik Pohl, Gateway (1977)
13 Joe Haldeman, The Forever War (1974) (I read a library copy of this in my teenage years, but I really don't think I was old enough to appreciate it. There's a copy now on my To-Read Pile waiting for me to give it another go.)
14 Walter M Miller, A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959)
15 David Brin, Startide Rising [S2] (1983) (One of these days, I may get around to reading this series.)
16 Arthur C Clarke, Childhood's End (1954)
17 Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy [S1] (1979)
18 Alfred Bester, The Demolished Man (1953)
19 Ben Bova [ed], [A] The Best of the Nebulas (1989)
20 John Brunner, Stand on Zanzibar (1969) (I thought for a minute I might have this on the Pile, but, no, I was getting it confused with The Sheep Look Up. Which I seem to do a lot.)
21 Ray Bradbury, [C] The Martian Chronicles (1950)
22 Gene Wolfe, The Shadow of the Torturer [S1] (1980) (I've got a Wolfe omnibus edition that I think has this in it.)
23 Arthur C Clarke, Rendezvous With Rama (1973)
24 Alfred Bester, The Stars My Destination (1956)
25 Roger Zelazny, Lord of Light (1967)
26 Theodore Sturgeon, More Than Human (1953)
27 Robert A Heinlein, Starship Troopers (1959)
28 Isaac Asimov, [C] I, Robot (1950)
29 Philip K Dick, The Man in the High Castle (1962)
30 Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451 (1954)
31 Harlan Ellison [ed], [A] Dangerous Visions (1967)
32 Daniel Keyes, Flowers for Algernon (1966) (I've read the short story many, many times. The novel version is on my Pile, but I'm a little wary of cracking it open, as I don't see how it can possibly compare to the original.)
33 Orson Scott Card, Speaker for the Dead [S2] (1986)
34 H G Wells, The Time Machine (1895)
35 Niven & Pournelle, The Mote in God's Eye (1975) (Another one I read as a kid and have a copy of that I hope to get to sometime soon. At least, I think I do. I vaguely remember buying it.)
36 Vernor Vinge, A Fire Upon the Deep (1991)
37 Philip K Dick, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968)
38 David Brin, The Uplift War [S3] (1987)
39 Kim Stanley Robinson, Red Mars (1992)
40 Clifford Simak, Way Station (1963)
41 H G Wells, The War of the Worlds (1898)
42 Connie Willis, Doomsday Book (1992)
43 Isaac Asimov, The Gods Themselves (1972)
44 Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash (1992)
45 Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (1932)
46 Philip Jose Farmer, To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
47 Gardner Dozois [ed], [A] The Year's Best Science Fiction [S] (1984) (I've got a couple of these, but not the 1984 edition.)
48 Gregory Benford, Timescape (1980)
49 C J Cherryh, Downbelow Station (1981)
50 Arthur C Clarke, 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
51 Isaac Asimov, The Caves of Steel (1954)
52 Greg Bear, Blood Music (1985) (I hereby nominate this as my top condenter for Book That Really Doesn't Belong on This List.)
53 Robert Silverberg, Dying Inside (1972)
54 John Wyndham, The Day of the Triffids (1951)
55 Pohl & Kornbluth, The Space Merchants (1953)
56 Neal Stephenson, The Diamond Age (1995)
57 James Blish, A Case of Conscience (1958)
58 Clifford Simak, [C] City (1952)
59 Hal Clement, Mission of Gravity (1953)
60 Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)
61 Jules Verne, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1870)
62 George R Stewart, Earth Abides (1949)
63 Edgar Rice Burroughs, A Princess of Mars [S1] (1912)
64 Philip K Dick, Ubik (1969)
65 Lois McMaster Bujold, Barrayar (1991)
66 Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange (1962)
67 Isaac Asimov (et al) [eds], [A] Hugo Winners/New Hugo Winners [S] (1962)
68 Tim Powers, The Anubis Gates (1983)
69 Arthur C Clarke, The City and the Stars (1956) (I'd thought I had read this, but it turns out I was thinking of Against the Fall of Night. I think.)
70 Philip K Dick, The Three Stigmata Of Palmer Eldritch (1964)
71 Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five (1969)
72 Arthur C Clarke, The Fountains of Paradise (1979)
73 Poul Anderson, Tau Zero (1970)
74 James Blish, [C] Earthman, Come Home (1955) (This is one of the "Cities in Flight" series, right? I have a couple of collected volumes of that on the Pile.)
75 E E 'Doc' Smith, Grey Lensman [S4] (1951) (I've got a collection of Lensman stories on the Pile too, but I don't think this one is in there.)
76 Joanna Russ, The Female Man (1975)
77 Jules Verne, Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864)
78 Joan D Vinge, The Snow Queen (1980)
79 Robert A Heinlein, Time Enough For Love (1973)
80 Stanislaw Lem, Solaris (1961) (Actually, I think I may have read this one ages ago, too, but I'm always getting it confused with Fiasco. In any case, I do have a copy now.)
81 C J Cherryh, Cyteen: The Betrayal [S1] (1988) (Read all of Cyteen in one collected volume.)
82 Harlan Ellison [ed], [A] Again, Dangerous Visions (1972)
83 Robert A Heinlein, The Puppet Masters (1951)
84 Kurt Vonnegut, The Sirens of Titan (1959)
85 Samuel R Delany, Babel-17 (1966)
86 Brian Aldiss, Helliconia Spring [S1] (1982)
87 Harlan Ellison, [C] Deathbird Stories (1975) (I might have this on the Pile, actually. I know there's some Ellison on there somewhere, but I can't seem to find it. Which really tells you something about the state of the To-Read Pile.)
88 Samuel R Delany, Dahlgren (1975) (The only Delany I've read was Triton, and I didn't really find it to my taste.)
89 Robert A Heinlein, Have Space-Suit - Will Travel (1958) (I may have read this at some point, but I don't think I have. That's an oversight I really ought to correct.)
90 Niven & Pournelle, Lucifer's Hammer (1977)
91 Frederik Pohl, Man Plus (1976)
92 Robert Silverberg [ed], [A] Science Fiction Hall of Fame 1 (1970) (Read this ages ago and don't even remember what was in it.)
93 Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men (1930)
94 Robert A Heinlein, The Door Into Summer (1956)
95 Thomas M Disch, Camp Concentration (1968)
96 John Varley, Titan (1979)
97 Michael Bishop, No Enemy But Time (1982)
98 Robert A Heinlein, Double Star (1956)
99 David Brin, The Postman (1985)
100 Vonda N McIntyre, Dreamsnake (1978)
Saturday, July 17, 2004
Not Actually a Post About Farscape
You know, there's something almost reassuring about receiving such blatant confirmation that the Sci-Fi Channel are a bunch of total jerks.
You know, there's something almost reassuring about receiving such blatant confirmation that the Sci-Fi Channel are a bunch of total jerks.
Friday, July 16, 2004
Thursday, July 15, 2004
Search Request Thursday
Here we go again:
3d sex glasses viewer: Do you need a special kind of 3d viewer for watching sex scenes?
"klingon christmas carol": 'Tis the season to die with honor!
"star blazers" "making love": I'm pretty sure they never showed that when I watched the cartoon as a kid.
animated pics of King Ravana: I have no idea who this guy is or what he's king of. Sorry.
funky duster pens: I don't know what those are, but they sound interesting.
(Water Jet | "water jet") Machine for Men -cutting: Having popped over to google to look at the results for this and thus discovered what the device in question actually is, I really, really, really don't want to know why the word "cutting" would come up in conjunction with it.
guy nude penis photo porno: Is it just me, or does that "guy" in there seem kinda redundant?
grayza's breakdown: Oh, yeah, my heart just bleeds for the poor woman.
guinness book of records biggest boobs: Those Guinness people. So dedicated to their job.
stevie nicks nude: Who are you, Homer Simpson? (Oooh, now there was an obscure Simpsons reference! I'm all proud of myself now.)
all hap hop pussy: Is that some of that new-fangled slang the kids are using these days?
Grayza John fan: I don't think either one of them is a fan of the other. Really.
ticklish chat transcript 2004: Is it just me, or does tickling over chat seem sort of, well, impossible? Or at least deeply unsatisfying?
"Fables: Legends in Exile" fanfiction: I wonder if they were looking for fanfiction based on the comic, or for a discussion of the fact that, in a sense, that kind of riffing on fairy tales actually counts as a sort of fanfiction. But, then, these are the kinds of things I think about.
"wacky action" blog: Yep, it's Maximum Verbosity, your wacky action blog!
printable themed linguistic riddles: I'm not sure I know any linguistic riddles. Somebody tell me a linguistic riddle.
Dragonlance personality quizzes: Can I be one of the dragons?
dilbert quotes cartoon gum: Mmm. Cartoon gum.
pretzel man pennsauken mart: Man, I owe the Pennsauken Mart pretzel man for many happy childhood experiences, I really do.
bigbody sexy women: Well, I do recall mentioning "Fat-Bottomed Girls"...
Biology: why a stuffed nose effects the sense of taste: A stuffed nose does not effect the sense of taste. Quite the opposite, in fact. But a stuffed nose does affect the sense of taste. (Why, yes, that last quiz result was quite accurate...)
Here we go again:
I Am the Book Gal!
You speak eloquently and have seemingly read every
book ever published. You are a fountain of
endless (sometimes useless) knowledge, and
never fail to impress at a party.
What people love: You can answer almost any
question people ask, and have thus been
nicknamed Jeeves.
What people hate: You constantly correct their
grammar and insult their paperbacks.
What Kind of Elitist Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
All true. Completely and undeniably true. Except that I never insult people's paperbacks, not even if they're reading D&D novels or Kevin J. Anderson. Well, OK, maybe if they're reading von Daniken or something...
You speak eloquently and have seemingly read every
book ever published. You are a fountain of
endless (sometimes useless) knowledge, and
never fail to impress at a party.
What people love: You can answer almost any
question people ask, and have thus been
nicknamed Jeeves.
What people hate: You constantly correct their
grammar and insult their paperbacks.
What Kind of Elitist Are You?
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All true. Completely and undeniably true. Except that I never insult people's paperbacks, not even if they're reading D&D novels or Kevin J. Anderson. Well, OK, maybe if they're reading von Daniken or something...
Wednesday, July 14, 2004
Crushing on The Onion
Have I mentioned lately that I love The Onion? I mean, how can I not love stuff like this?
Mind you, I hardly consider that "obscure." And I think Tuddenham's voice was much more attractive as Zen then as Slave, although his performance as Orac had perhaps the most charm of the three.
And what does it say about me that three different people e-mailed me this article?
Have I mentioned lately that I love The Onion? I mean, how can I not love stuff like this?
NERD HAS MOST OBSCURE CRUSH EVER
JACKSONVILLE, FL—The unrequited nature of area nerd June Manzo's crush on actor Peter Tuddenham, who provides the voice of piloting computer Slave on Blake's 7, is only slightly more agonizing than the process of explanation she must put herself through every time her media obsession is discussed. "He has this slightly sinister but dynamic way of speaking on the show, particularly in the 'Headhunter' episode," Manzo said, painstakingly describing Tuddenham to fellow science-fiction fan Bradley Preakniss. "When I hear his voice congratulating Avon on his 'consummate skill,' I just get shivers... Doesn't that ring a bell? No? Not at all?" Manzo's crush is surpassed in geekiness and obscurity only by that of Denver's Demitri Ostrow, who has a long-harbored passion for author Neil Gaiman's "fabulous" assistant Lorraine.
Mind you, I hardly consider that "obscure." And I think Tuddenham's voice was much more attractive as Zen then as Slave, although his performance as Orac had perhaps the most charm of the three.
And what does it say about me that three different people e-mailed me this article?
Hot
My swamp cooler is dying. The pump seems to be working fine, but even on "high" barely any air comes out. It's like the inside of a furnace in here. Or like the inside of a big metal box in 95-degree heat, which is exactly what it is. And I'm not gonna be able to get anybody out to look at it until next week, probably, because this week I'm asleep during the day when they'd be able to come out.
Stupid summer.
My swamp cooler is dying. The pump seems to be working fine, but even on "high" barely any air comes out. It's like the inside of a furnace in here. Or like the inside of a big metal box in 95-degree heat, which is exactly what it is. And I'm not gonna be able to get anybody out to look at it until next week, probably, because this week I'm asleep during the day when they'd be able to come out.
Stupid summer.
Tuesday, July 13, 2004
Happy Birthday to Me!
I am now a third of a century old. Well, OK, as my sister pointed out a while, back, technically I won't be a third of a century old for about another four months. But I am 33 today and, I have to admit, not entirely thrilled about this fact. It seems like every day, I feel just a little bit older. Funny thing, that...
I am now a third of a century old. Well, OK, as my sister pointed out a while, back, technically I won't be a third of a century old for about another four months. But I am 33 today and, I have to admit, not entirely thrilled about this fact. It seems like every day, I feel just a little bit older. Funny thing, that...
State of the TV Report
Here's a little article on the current state of science fiction on television. I do love the first paragraph:
Ain't it the depressing truth. The article then goes on to list a number of genre shows worth looking forward to, though, some of which seem much more worthy of anticipation than others. Alas, I strongly suspect only the Farscape miniseries and the new Doctor Who (if and when it's available here) are likely to prompt me to overcome my apathy enough to actually turn on the television.
Here's a little article on the current state of science fiction on television. I do love the first paragraph:
"Buffy" is long gone, and the "Angel" TV series just had a stake driven through it. "Farscape" was cancelled long ago, and the "Star Trek" franchise has for years been zooming at Warp Nine to the Suckitude Galaxy.
Ain't it the depressing truth. The article then goes on to list a number of genre shows worth looking forward to, though, some of which seem much more worthy of anticipation than others. Alas, I strongly suspect only the Farscape miniseries and the new Doctor Who (if and when it's available here) are likely to prompt me to overcome my apathy enough to actually turn on the television.
Sunday, July 11, 2004
Saturday, July 10, 2004
Good News for Trek Fans!
It looks like Paramount is finally releasing the original Star Trek in season boxed sets. I'd been waiting and waiting for this, and I can't for the life of me understand why they didn't do it sooner. I'm definitely what you might call a "lapsed Trekkie" these days, but I still have a soft spot in my heart for the original series and would love to have it on disc. But there was no way I was going to buy the individual episodes on DVD. Admittedly, the boxed set is pretty pricey, but getting 29 episodes for $85 sure as hell beats buying 14 or 15 discs at $16-17 each.
It looks like Paramount is finally releasing the original Star Trek in season boxed sets. I'd been waiting and waiting for this, and I can't for the life of me understand why they didn't do it sooner. I'm definitely what you might call a "lapsed Trekkie" these days, but I still have a soft spot in my heart for the original series and would love to have it on disc. But there was no way I was going to buy the individual episodes on DVD. Admittedly, the boxed set is pretty pricey, but getting 29 episodes for $85 sure as hell beats buying 14 or 15 discs at $16-17 each.
Homonymophobia
Here an interesting little quiz a friend sent me: see how good you are at distinguishing between easily-confused words. I got 9/10 (and am feeling rather unhappy about the one I missed).
Here an interesting little quiz a friend sent me: see how good you are at distinguishing between easily-confused words. I got 9/10 (and am feeling rather unhappy about the one I missed).
In Case You Missed It...
For those who didn't catch it when it aired but may be curious to see the 30-second Farscape miniseries promo, you can download it here. (Scroll down to the "Not Really Music Videos" section.) One warning, though: the ad incorporates a longish clip from the final scene of the TV series, so if you haven't watched that, you might not want to watch this.
For those who didn't catch it when it aired but may be curious to see the 30-second Farscape miniseries promo, you can download it here. (Scroll down to the "Not Really Music Videos" section.) One warning, though: the ad incorporates a longish clip from the final scene of the TV series, so if you haven't watched that, you might not want to watch this.
Friday, July 09, 2004
Green, Green, My Brain Is Green...
What Color is Your Brain?
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That's all remarkably accurate. Although, with people I'm truly comfortable with, I'm much less reserved these days than I used to be.
What Color is Your Brain?
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At work or in school: I work best by myself. I like to focus on my ideas until my desire for understanding is satisfied. I am easily bored if the subject holds no interest to me. Sometimes, it is hard for me to set priorities because so many things are of interest.
With friends: I may seem reserved. Although my thoughts and feelings run deep, I am uneasy with frequent displays of emotion. I enjoy people who are interesting and of high integrity.
With family: I am probably seen as a loner because I like a lot of private time to think. Sometimes, I find family activities boring and have difficulty following family rules that don't make sense to me. I show love by spending time with my family and sharing ideas and interests.
That's all remarkably accurate. Although, with people I'm truly comfortable with, I'm much less reserved these days than I used to be.
The Monthly Meme
Yep, it's this thing again!
Current clothes: Long, dark blue denim shorts. A light gray t-shirt with a light-blue short-sleeved denim shirt unbuttoned over it. Gray wool hiking socks. White sneakers.
Current mood: Mostly OK, but with a tiny thread of unfocused irritation lingering in the back of my brain for some reason.
Current music in CD player: Hmm, since I got the MP3 player, the CDs have mostly been sitting in the rack. I guess I ought to change this one back to "current music," huh? I've been listening to randomly generated playlists a lot, which can get really interesting. Let's see, on the walk in to work today I heard: The Beatles, "The End"; Stevie Nicks, "After the Glitter Fades"; Rush, "Beneath, Between, and Behind"; James Galway, "Shenandoah"; U2, "Elevation"; The Chieftans, "Txalaparta"; Over the Rhine, "Cast Me Away"; Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, "One More Day, One More Night"; Enya, "Deireadh An Tuath"; Fleming & John, "Devil's Food"; Gordon Lightfoot (again!), "The Last Time I Saw Her"; The Rooftop Singers, "Walk Right In"; Pink Floyd, "The Post-War Dream"; and a bunch of promos for Doctor Who audio plays. I love this gadget.
Current annoyance: Being at work.
Current thing: Listening to randomly generated playlists on the Karma.
Current desktop picture: This extremely cool picture of the nebula NGC 2440 and the white dwarf at its center.
Current song in head: Well, now it's "Walk Right In." The radio in my head appears to be very suggestible at the moment. For the last few days, it's only taken the merest mention or even the vaguest association with a song to start it playing in my head.
Current book: I just finished The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, which was extremely good. Next up, I think, is Terry Pratchett's A Hat Full of Sky.
Current video in player: Still a tape of third-season Farscape episodes I started copying a while back. I still need to finish that, but I don't think there's much of a hurry, because now it's looking like the second-season tapes I mailed out a while ago might have gone missing. Sigh.
Current DVD in player: Disc three of The Simpsons season 3, which I went back to after finishing with the Angel discs.
Current refreshment: Ginger ale.
Current worry: Time passing far too quickly.
Current thought: That that response to "current worry" sounded a lot more vague and general and philosophical than I really intended, when what I really meant was, "I have some stuff to get done by the end of the month and I'm worried about finishing it."
Yep, it's this thing again!
Current clothes: Long, dark blue denim shorts. A light gray t-shirt with a light-blue short-sleeved denim shirt unbuttoned over it. Gray wool hiking socks. White sneakers.
Current mood: Mostly OK, but with a tiny thread of unfocused irritation lingering in the back of my brain for some reason.
Current music in CD player: Hmm, since I got the MP3 player, the CDs have mostly been sitting in the rack. I guess I ought to change this one back to "current music," huh? I've been listening to randomly generated playlists a lot, which can get really interesting. Let's see, on the walk in to work today I heard: The Beatles, "The End"; Stevie Nicks, "After the Glitter Fades"; Rush, "Beneath, Between, and Behind"; James Galway, "Shenandoah"; U2, "Elevation"; The Chieftans, "Txalaparta"; Over the Rhine, "Cast Me Away"; Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, "One More Day, One More Night"; Enya, "Deireadh An Tuath"; Fleming & John, "Devil's Food"; Gordon Lightfoot (again!), "The Last Time I Saw Her"; The Rooftop Singers, "Walk Right In"; Pink Floyd, "The Post-War Dream"; and a bunch of promos for Doctor Who audio plays. I love this gadget.
Current annoyance: Being at work.
Current thing: Listening to randomly generated playlists on the Karma.
Current desktop picture: This extremely cool picture of the nebula NGC 2440 and the white dwarf at its center.
Current song in head: Well, now it's "Walk Right In." The radio in my head appears to be very suggestible at the moment. For the last few days, it's only taken the merest mention or even the vaguest association with a song to start it playing in my head.
Current book: I just finished The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, which was extremely good. Next up, I think, is Terry Pratchett's A Hat Full of Sky.
Current video in player: Still a tape of third-season Farscape episodes I started copying a while back. I still need to finish that, but I don't think there's much of a hurry, because now it's looking like the second-season tapes I mailed out a while ago might have gone missing. Sigh.
Current DVD in player: Disc three of The Simpsons season 3, which I went back to after finishing with the Angel discs.
Current refreshment: Ginger ale.
Current worry: Time passing far too quickly.
Current thought: That that response to "current worry" sounded a lot more vague and general and philosophical than I really intended, when what I really meant was, "I have some stuff to get done by the end of the month and I'm worried about finishing it."
Thursday, July 08, 2004
Search Request Thursday
I dunno, I'm kind of starting to get bored with this again. I wonder if there'd be another public outcry if I just stopped doing it?
Anyway, here's the latest:
"hit the curb" rim alignment: Man, I needed way more than a rim alignment the last time I hit a curb.
albuquerque blog: Sorry, I'm a few miles south. Try The Soap Box.
chiana nude clubs: Hey, I wouldn't be the slightest bit surprised to find Chiana at a "nude club." Well, except for the fact that she's a fictional character. And an alien. And that I don't know what I'd be doing at a "nude club."
text adventure game "plot ideas": How about: "Watching Paint Dry: The Text Adventure!" Hmm, what do you think? Limited commercial appeal?
video captures (buffy stethoscope): Wow, TV memorabilia is getting really out of hand if there've got Buffy stethoscopes now.
deodorant demographics: Now, there's a subject I think I can honestly say I've never given any thought to whatsoever.
pattern making of a buzz lightyear helmet: Ooh, now there's a cool fashion accessory!
stevie nicks blog: Stevie Nicks has a blog?
futurama hypnotic: Yeah, it kind of is. Especially when it features Hypnotoad!
Artemis Harry Potter crossover fanfic: Am I think only one who thinks Artemis Fowl is way over-rated? I mean, though I've enjoyed the Harry Potter books a lot, I don't think they're up there with the best classics children's literature. But Artemis Fowl makes Harry Potter look like the kidlit equivalent of Shakespeare.
blog tom petty: Tom Petty has a blog? Does he share it with Stevie Nicks?
gan's island bondage stories: OK, now I'm imagining a Blake's 7/Gilligan's Island crossover TV show done as softcore porn, and, man sometimes I am afraid of the stuff that comes out of my brain.
tips on switching from graveyard shift to day shift: Drink lots of coffee your first morning on dayshift and resign yourself to the fact that you're going to spend the day all sleep-deprived and feeling like shit. Especially if you're a night person.
average amateur granny sex pics: I don't think there's anything "average" about that.
"but I do like vanilla" "sort of": But I do!
farscape you know when you'are obsessed: Yes. Yes, I do.
I dunno, I'm kind of starting to get bored with this again. I wonder if there'd be another public outcry if I just stopped doing it?
Anyway, here's the latest:
Marking My Calendar
Sci-Fi has just announced an air date for the Farscape miniseries: it begins on Sunday, October 17th. As it happens, my sister is going to be out visiting me the week before that, and that's the date she's flying back.
So I immediately called her on the phone and informed her that she'd better make her airline reservations for early in the day, as I am not missing this because I'm busy driving her to the airport. I mean, I love my baby sister, but you gotta have priorities. Of course, one of the reasons why I love my baby sister is because she understands this sort of thing perfectly.
(Oh, and there's supposed to be a trailer for the miniseries during Stargate tomorrow. I think I'll set the VCR. I've no great desire to watch a Stargate episode, but that's what the fast-forward button is for, after all.)
Sci-Fi has just announced an air date for the Farscape miniseries: it begins on Sunday, October 17th. As it happens, my sister is going to be out visiting me the week before that, and that's the date she's flying back.
So I immediately called her on the phone and informed her that she'd better make her airline reservations for early in the day, as I am not missing this because I'm busy driving her to the airport. I mean, I love my baby sister, but you gotta have priorities. Of course, one of the reasons why I love my baby sister is because she understands this sort of thing perfectly.
(Oh, and there's supposed to be a trailer for the miniseries during Stargate tomorrow. I think I'll set the VCR. I've no great desire to watch a Stargate episode, but that's what the fast-forward button is for, after all.)
Angelic Thoughts (Warning: Spoilers for season 3 of Angel)
I just finished watching Angel season three (though I still have some of the extras to get through). I find I have very mixed feelings about it. It started out as possibly the weakest season of what I've seen so far. The first half had some excellent individual dramatic moments (such as the circumstances of Connor's birth, which really took me by surprise) and some good touches of humor, but it was also unevenly paced and full of overly trite and obvious "message" stories. Watchable, in other words, but not exactly gee-I'm-glad-I-have-this-series-on-DVD quality. Then, just as I was starting to feel pretty much resigned to this, it suddenly got really cool. Surprising plot twists! Stunning revelations! Suspense! Angst! Tension! Betrayal! I found myself planning to sit down and watch one episode and instead watching two or three at a time because I wanted to see what happened next. And for quite a while, it was very good. Unfortunately, the last few episodes were kind of anticlimactic. Interesting, but not exciting. I somehow can't help but feel that they would have done better ending with Holtz disappearing through the spacetime rip with Connor as the season finale, as opposed to the rather cliched cliffhanger they did end with. All in all, I'd say I'm about equal parts pleased and disappointed, but I'm certainly still interested enough that I'm planning on picking up season 4 when it's available.
Some random thoughts:
I like Fred. A lot. In fact, I think she's my new favorite character on this show. (Sorry, Lorne! I still like ya, though.) And Gunn and Fred? So. Adorable.
The Angel/Cordelia stuff, on the other hand, I could have done without. Ditto the demony superpowers. And what happened with her in the season finale had me rolling my eyes.
Adding a baby to a TV show is usually the equivalent of holding up a huge sign proclaiming "We've Jumped the Shark!," but they actually handled it pretty well. I actually wasn't rolling my eyes at the schmoopy baby stuff, and I rather expected to be. Of course, cheating by having the kid grow up practically overnight really helps avoid the usual problems attendant with television baby-having.
Poor Wesley. Poor, poor Wesley. The thing is, I really do think that everything he did made perfect sense. Yes, he should have talked to the others instead of deciding to act on his own, but I can understand why he didn't. Which is pretty remarkable, really, because the vast majority of the time Big Angsty Misunderstandings just make me want to thwap people over the head for not talking to each other. And while I can also understand Angel's reasons for not forgiving him, my sympathies still lie entirely with Wesley. Angel, in some respects, is just a great big jerk. And he, of all people, should understand that "I would never hurt Connor and Wesley should know that" is a really, really stupid thing to claim.
I just finished watching Angel season three (though I still have some of the extras to get through). I find I have very mixed feelings about it. It started out as possibly the weakest season of what I've seen so far. The first half had some excellent individual dramatic moments (such as the circumstances of Connor's birth, which really took me by surprise) and some good touches of humor, but it was also unevenly paced and full of overly trite and obvious "message" stories. Watchable, in other words, but not exactly gee-I'm-glad-I-have-this-series-on-DVD quality. Then, just as I was starting to feel pretty much resigned to this, it suddenly got really cool. Surprising plot twists! Stunning revelations! Suspense! Angst! Tension! Betrayal! I found myself planning to sit down and watch one episode and instead watching two or three at a time because I wanted to see what happened next. And for quite a while, it was very good. Unfortunately, the last few episodes were kind of anticlimactic. Interesting, but not exciting. I somehow can't help but feel that they would have done better ending with Holtz disappearing through the spacetime rip with Connor as the season finale, as opposed to the rather cliched cliffhanger they did end with. All in all, I'd say I'm about equal parts pleased and disappointed, but I'm certainly still interested enough that I'm planning on picking up season 4 when it's available.
Some random thoughts:
And I Hardly Ever Even Cook...
Hmm. Did I say something about having actual content sometime?
| Which generic smut novel character are you? (With somewhat relevant pictures!) The Well-Endowed Kitchen Wench Look, if you’re going to keep slipping in the rain, at least stop wearing those revealing cotton gowns.
|
| Click Here to Take This Quiz Brought to you by YouThink.com quizzes and personality tests. |
Hmm. Did I say something about having actual content sometime?
Wednesday, July 07, 2004
OK, I Admit, This Is Still Kind of Lame. But I'm Trying!
Since I've got a birthday coming up very soon, this seemed like an appropriate thing:
It's actually kind of cool to think that I've been around exactly as long as e-mail.
Since I've got a birthday coming up very soon, this seemed like an appropriate thing:
| In 1971 (the year you were born) |
| Richard Nixon is president of the US Charles Manson and 3 of his followers are convicted of multiple counts of first-degree murder An earthquake in California's San Fernando Valley kills 64 people New York Times begins publication of classified Pentagon papers on US involvement in Vietnam The $70 million Kennedy Center opens in Washington, DC A four day revolt at New York's Attica state prison ends after being stormed by 1000 state troopers A new stock-market index called the Nasdaq debuts Walt Disney World opens Intel releases world's first microprocessor, the 4004 Ray Tomlinson sends the first e-mail Libertarian party established in USA Kid Rock, Denise Richards, Sean Astin, Winona Ryder, and Ricky Martin are born Pittsburgh Pirates win the World Series Baltimore Colts win Superbowl V Montreal Canadiens win the Stanley Cup The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath is published The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour premieres on television "Bridge Over Troubled Water" by Simon & Garfunkel wins Grammy for song of the year All in the Family premieres |
It's actually kind of cool to think that I've been around exactly as long as e-mail.
Whoo-Hoo! I'm Not a Crappy Prequel!
You are A New Hope era from Episode IV!
You are surrounded by Jawa and miles and miles of
hot deserts. Your future looks bleak but have
hopes to move on to bigger and better things.
Old mentors and space adventures await you. Who
knows? Maybe you'll save a princess!
Which Star Wars Era Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
(Yes, I know. My blogging has consisted mostly of lame quizzes for days now. I resolve to do better... uh, sometime.)
You are A New Hope era from Episode IV!
You are surrounded by Jawa and miles and miles of
hot deserts. Your future looks bleak but have
hopes to move on to bigger and better things.
Old mentors and space adventures await you. Who
knows? Maybe you'll save a princess!
Which Star Wars Era Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
(Yes, I know. My blogging has consisted mostly of lame quizzes for days now. I resolve to do better... uh, sometime.)
Tuesday, July 06, 2004
Mmm... Ice Cream...
What is your Icecream Flavour?
Find out at Go Quiz
Hey, I like the vanilla and strawberry just fine! Actually, though, I much prefer mint chocolate chip.
| Your Icecream Flavour is...Neopolitan! |
 You aren't satisfied with just one flavor. They say variety is the spice of life and this shines through in your Ice cream of choice! Just don't eat all the chocolate and leave the strawberry and vanilla behind! |
Find out at Go Quiz
Hey, I like the vanilla and strawberry just fine! Actually, though, I much prefer mint chocolate chip.
Monday, July 05, 2004
Fly Guy
Wash
Which Firefly Guy is For You?
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Hey, Wash is adorable! But, yeah, his wife could kick my ass without even breaking a sweat. So, uh, no thanks.
Wash
Which Firefly Guy is For You?
brought to you by Quizilla
Hey, Wash is adorable! But, yeah, his wife could kick my ass without even breaking a sweat. So, uh, no thanks.
Sunday, July 04, 2004
Happy Fourth of July!
Today is a day worthy of recognition, a day which it is marvelously appropriate to celebrate with explosions of fireworks. Yes, that's right, today is the 950th anniversary of the supernova explosion which created the crab nebula! (Well, OK, it's actually the anniversary of the date on which the light from said explosion reached our planet. But, please, it's a holiday! Let us not quibble over details.)
Today is a day worthy of recognition, a day which it is marvelously appropriate to celebrate with explosions of fireworks. Yes, that's right, today is the 950th anniversary of the supernova explosion which created the crab nebula! (Well, OK, it's actually the anniversary of the date on which the light from said explosion reached our planet. But, please, it's a holiday! Let us not quibble over details.)
Saturday, July 03, 2004
Caught in the Web
I got out to see Spider-Man 2 today. And, you know, it's odd... I could name a dozen things in that movie that shouldn't have worked. Story elements that were silly or cliched or that just plain didn't make any sense. Places where the pace dragged or the tone got way too preachy. And yet, honestly, I enjoyed the hell out of nearly every minute of it.
I gotta respect a movie that gets away with that.
I got out to see Spider-Man 2 today. And, you know, it's odd... I could name a dozen things in that movie that shouldn't have worked. Story elements that were silly or cliched or that just plain didn't make any sense. Places where the pace dragged or the tone got way too preachy. And yet, honestly, I enjoyed the hell out of nearly every minute of it.
I gotta respect a movie that gets away with that.
Friday, July 02, 2004
And Now, the Answers You've All Been Waiting For!
OK, I don't think anybody else seems particularly interested in the Name That Tune game, so here, at last are the answers. Which I'm sure you were all absolutely dying with curiosity to know.
1. "Some say he was a prisoner who never was set free"
"Bitter Green" by Gordon Lightfoot. Because, as previously mentioned, I seem to have somehow ended up with a metric shitload of Lightfoot tunes.
2. "This doesn't have to be the big get even"
That would be Stevie Nicks and Tom Petty with "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around." See? Not all that obscure.
3. "Now he's drinking down his Christmas blood-wine in the curse-ed halls of Stovokor"
Yes, as several people have pointed out, it is quite obviously a "Klingon Christmas carol." What it is, specifically, is part of Luke Ski's "Fanboy Christmas," an utterly charming medley of geeked-up holiday tunes. That particular segment is, of course, "Gowron Got Run Over By a Reindeer," which I, hopeless nerd that I am, find absolutely hysterical.
4. "Roll us both down a mountain and I'm sure the fat man would win"
That would be Jethro Tull's catchy but politically incorrect "Fat Man."
5. "Ah but a man never got a woman back, not by begging on his knees"
This is Leonard Cohen's "I'm Your Man," although the version I have is actually a cover by Elton John. I've got an entire disc full of Cohen covers, most of which are far inferior to the originals. Elton's version would be OK, if he weren't making a truly unfortunate attempt to mimic Cohen's gravelly voice.
6. "Forget about the worries on your mind"
"Rhythm of the Night" by Valeria, from the Moulin Rouge soundtrack.
7. "I don't believe in destiny or the guiding hand of fate"
That's "Ghost of a Chance," once of my favorite Rush tunes. It's a secular humanist love song! How many of those have you heard?
8. "And if the dead man won't depart, drive a stake into his heart"
This is a song called "Journeyman's Grace" by Fairport Convention, and definitely falls under the category, of "songs I didn't even recognize as stuff I own." Which tells me that I need to listen to that Fairport Convention disc more often. Or, you know, at all.
9. "Without evil there could be no good so it must be good to be evil sometimes"
That's Satan, the Prince of Darkness himself, singing "Up There" from the South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut soundtrack.
10. "It will surely light up--darkened worlds"
"Stoned Love" by the Supremes.
11. "Heat the pins and stab them in"
"Bulletproof... I Wish I Was" by Radiohead.
12. "Crossed lines I shouldn't have crossed"
"In My Place" by Coldplay. I like Coldplay.
13. "It was 1910 and they never had a friend"
"Cherokee Bend" by Gordon Lightfoot. Again. Did I mention I had an inexplicably large amount of Lightfoot?
14. "Not that we're complaining, since the fresh fruit all comes free"
This would be "Carmen Miranda's Ghost" by Leslie Fish. It's about the ghost of Carmen Miranda haunting a space station. I couldn't make this stuff up.
15. "Slipping in and sliding out of conscious feeling"
"Comatose" by Depeche Mode. Which gets filed under "why the hell did I buy this disc, again?"
16. "This machine will will not communicate these thoughts"
"Street Spirit (Fade Out)" by Radiohead. I'm not actually a big Radiohead fan. I've only got one of their discs, and I think I've played it all of twice. But sheer random chance picked up two songs off of it.
17. "You need elephant balls"
This is "Rhino Skin" by Tom Petty. And I apologize for choosing that line.
18. "With every wish there comes a curse"
That's Bruce Springsteen's "With Every Wish." Ha! Now don't you feel stupid! Not one of my favorite Springsteen tunes, for the record.
19. "If you believe in the power of magic, I can change your mind"
"Don't Answer Me" by the Alan Parson Project. Sort of an anti-love song.
20. "Heap big woman you gonna make a big man out of me"
This is Queen's "Fat Bottomed Girls," of course. Classic!
OK, I don't think anybody else seems particularly interested in the Name That Tune game, so here, at last are the answers. Which I'm sure you were all absolutely dying with curiosity to know.
1. "Some say he was a prisoner who never was set free"
"Bitter Green" by Gordon Lightfoot. Because, as previously mentioned, I seem to have somehow ended up with a metric shitload of Lightfoot tunes.
2. "This doesn't have to be the big get even"
That would be Stevie Nicks and Tom Petty with "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around." See? Not all that obscure.
3. "Now he's drinking down his Christmas blood-wine in the curse-ed halls of Stovokor"
Yes, as several people have pointed out, it is quite obviously a "Klingon Christmas carol." What it is, specifically, is part of Luke Ski's "Fanboy Christmas," an utterly charming medley of geeked-up holiday tunes. That particular segment is, of course, "Gowron Got Run Over By a Reindeer," which I, hopeless nerd that I am, find absolutely hysterical.
4. "Roll us both down a mountain and I'm sure the fat man would win"
That would be Jethro Tull's catchy but politically incorrect "Fat Man."
5. "Ah but a man never got a woman back, not by begging on his knees"
This is Leonard Cohen's "I'm Your Man," although the version I have is actually a cover by Elton John. I've got an entire disc full of Cohen covers, most of which are far inferior to the originals. Elton's version would be OK, if he weren't making a truly unfortunate attempt to mimic Cohen's gravelly voice.
6. "Forget about the worries on your mind"
"Rhythm of the Night" by Valeria, from the Moulin Rouge soundtrack.
7. "I don't believe in destiny or the guiding hand of fate"
That's "Ghost of a Chance," once of my favorite Rush tunes. It's a secular humanist love song! How many of those have you heard?
8. "And if the dead man won't depart, drive a stake into his heart"
This is a song called "Journeyman's Grace" by Fairport Convention, and definitely falls under the category, of "songs I didn't even recognize as stuff I own." Which tells me that I need to listen to that Fairport Convention disc more often. Or, you know, at all.
9. "Without evil there could be no good so it must be good to be evil sometimes"
That's Satan, the Prince of Darkness himself, singing "Up There" from the South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut soundtrack.
10. "It will surely light up--darkened worlds"
"Stoned Love" by the Supremes.
11. "Heat the pins and stab them in"
"Bulletproof... I Wish I Was" by Radiohead.
12. "Crossed lines I shouldn't have crossed"
"In My Place" by Coldplay. I like Coldplay.
13. "It was 1910 and they never had a friend"
"Cherokee Bend" by Gordon Lightfoot. Again. Did I mention I had an inexplicably large amount of Lightfoot?
14. "Not that we're complaining, since the fresh fruit all comes free"
This would be "Carmen Miranda's Ghost" by Leslie Fish. It's about the ghost of Carmen Miranda haunting a space station. I couldn't make this stuff up.
15. "Slipping in and sliding out of conscious feeling"
"Comatose" by Depeche Mode. Which gets filed under "why the hell did I buy this disc, again?"
16. "This machine will will not communicate these thoughts"
"Street Spirit (Fade Out)" by Radiohead. I'm not actually a big Radiohead fan. I've only got one of their discs, and I think I've played it all of twice. But sheer random chance picked up two songs off of it.
17. "You need elephant balls"
This is "Rhino Skin" by Tom Petty. And I apologize for choosing that line.
18. "With every wish there comes a curse"
That's Bruce Springsteen's "With Every Wish." Ha! Now don't you feel stupid! Not one of my favorite Springsteen tunes, for the record.
19. "If you believe in the power of magic, I can change your mind"
"Don't Answer Me" by the Alan Parson Project. Sort of an anti-love song.
20. "Heap big woman you gonna make a big man out of me"
This is Queen's "Fat Bottomed Girls," of course. Classic!
Ooh, Pretty Planet!
The Cassini Spacecraft has been sending back some wonderfully detailed pictures of Saturn's rings.
The Cassini Spacecraft has been sending back some wonderfully detailed pictures of Saturn's rings.
Thursday, July 01, 2004
Search Request Thursday
Here we go again. (Is anybody getting tired of this yet?)
"Peter Parker" Deneb: Peter Parker was from Deneb? Nah...
You know you are obsessed with Farscape when: ...you make lists like this one.
water jet machine chiana: Yes, I'm sure Chiana would find all kinds of interesting ways to enjoy a water jet machine...
pics exterminated by daleks: Those Daleks are ruthless. Not even pictures will escape them!
"Doctor Who" "blake's 7" quatermass vampire: There were vampires in several episodes of Doctor Who, most notably "State of Decay." Blake's 7 only had mutoids, which subsisted on green stuff called "blood serum" and were popularly referred to as vampires. Dunno about Quatermass.
googles pictures; concussion: Does a concussion really look like much of anything?
mean tinkerbell pics (cartoon): Poor Tinkerbell. Her reputation has taken such a beating in my referrer logs.
sound effect hypnotic frog channel futurama: Not "hypnotic frog." Hypno-Toad! Man, I love Hypno-Toad.
still-plays-with-cars earth: Where else would you play with cars?
plumber's putty "what does it do": Probably something involved in plumbing. Beyond that, I couldn't tell ya.
gilligan's island fake bondage pictures: I suppose that's mildly less disturbing than real Gilligan's Island bondage pictures...
tickling episode transcript: That can't be very interesting. It's probably just things like "[giggle] Stop it! [giggle]" repeated over and over.
tickling socks laughing pictures: Socks that laugh when you tickle them are pretty disturbing.
"bigfoot baby" "weekly world news": Hey, if they printed it, it must be true!
lotr to star trek timeline: Um, I'm pretty darned sure those don't take place in the same universe. But if they did, it'd probably look something like this.
sikozu makeover: Man, she really has had one, hasn't she?
tickle tickler ticklish angel buffy xander willow spike: I'm the only result for this one on Google. I'm... not sure how to feel about that. Especially as I've never tickled a Buffy character in my life.
blakes lotaburger shake: Back when I worked there, we had a guy come in once and ask us to take some of the coffee grounds (unused, I hasten to add!) and mix them into a shake for him. Which, after determining that, yes, he was serious, we did. Afterwards, curious, we tried this concoction ourselves, and, damn, but it was good. I used to make coffee-ground shakes all the time after that. (OK, the pointless story is over now. I promise.)
verbosity killer: Who, me? *hides axe behind back and whistles innocently*
piddling and puppy poem: Hmm, somehow I never did that poem in English class.
personell hygine: In a weird way, you kind of have to admire searches where every single word is wrong. Well, maybe.
"harlan ellison" "i robot" "will smith": I like to think that if they'd actually filmed Ellison's version, it wouldn't have ended up starring Will Smith. But I'm a foolish dreamer, I admit.
Stargate SG-1 Children of the Gods pics nude: I'm not a Stargate fan, so I can't say whether seeing these "Children of the Gods" nude would be a bad thing or a good thing. Opinions?
transmetropolitan desktop appearance: I can't remember exactly what Spider Jerusalem's desktop looks like, but it's probably covered in cigarette butts and empty wrappers that once contained mind-altering drugs.
croup cough wav and slurping cup wav: Man, is there no sound in existence that people don't want to hear?
skagway laundromat drop off: Ah, maybe that's where the person from a couple of weeks ago wanted to go on their moped...
Here we go again. (Is anybody getting tired of this yet?)
Fear My Evil Genius!
According to this mildly goofy personality quiz:
Yeah, that's right! Fear me and my intellectual abilities, my amazing self-control, my explosive potential, and my extreme ability to focus on... Hey! Look! Shiny objects!
According to this mildly goofy personality quiz:
You are an SEDF--Sober Emotional Destructive Follower. This makes you an evil genius. You are extremely focused and difficult to distract from your tasks. With luck, you have learned to channel your energies into improving your intellect, rather than destroying the weak and unsuspecting.
Your friends may find you remote and a hard nut to crack. Few of your peers know you very well--even those you have known a long time--because you have expert control of the face you put forth to the world. You prefer to observe, calculate, discern and decide. Your decisions are final, and your desire to be right is impenetrable.
You are not to be messed with. You may explode.
Yeah, that's right! Fear me and my intellectual abilities, my amazing self-control, my explosive potential, and my extreme ability to focus on... Hey! Look! Shiny objects!
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