People keep sending me Star Trek-related links lately for some strange, unknown reason. So I figured I'd pass on a few of the more interesting or fun ones:
The Conversations: Star Trek: A fascinating discussion of the first six Trek movies from a couple of non-Trekkie film buffs. I'm used to seeing this level of analysis from Trek fans, but it's unusual and interesting to see it from an outsider's perspective, so to speak, particularly when it's as thoughtful as this. I don't agree with all of their opinions, but they do have some insightful things to say, and while they're perfectly willing to mock the movies' faults, I never once felt that they were mocking the movies' fans.
Star Trek Week: Which was the one with the whales? A mercifully quick guide to past Trek movies: If the long analysis at the previous link was too much for you, maybe this extremely brief, tongue-in-cheek guide will be more your speed.
Trekkies Bash New Star Trek Film As "Fun, Watchable": All right, this one mocks. But it mocks knowingly, and with a certain degree of "funny 'cause it's true."
I'm not sure, by the way, when I'll be getting out to see the new movie. I wasn't feeling enthusiastic up 'til now, because I thoroughly expected to hate it. Now, having read a bunch of glowingly positive reviews, I'm feeling trepidatious because I might not hate it, and I kind of want to. Ah, the Trekkie purist's life is a difficult, difficult thing.
Friday, May 08, 2009
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
If The Human Body Were Made By A Designer, There'd Be So Many Customer Complaints That They'd Have To Issue A Recall.
You know the story of the Little Mermaid, and how she was given legs to walk around on, but at the cost of feeling with every step as if knives were being shoved into her feet? I'm pretty sure she just had plantar fasciitis.
Yep, mine is back, and that first step out of bed in the morning is a doozy.
Sigh. All my life, I've been kind to my feet. Sure, I walk on them a lot. That's their job. But I've never made them mince around in high heels. I don't cram them into dainty little shoes with pointy toes or make them walk barefoot over pointy rocks. And yet they pay me back with nothing but cruelty.
Come the cyborg revolution, I am so trading them in for robotic feet.
Yep, mine is back, and that first step out of bed in the morning is a doozy.
Sigh. All my life, I've been kind to my feet. Sure, I walk on them a lot. That's their job. But I've never made them mince around in high heels. I don't cram them into dainty little shoes with pointy toes or make them walk barefoot over pointy rocks. And yet they pay me back with nothing but cruelty.
Come the cyborg revolution, I am so trading them in for robotic feet.
Saturday, May 02, 2009
How Much Is That In Gold-Pressed Latinum?
It would be, like, horribly frivolous and irresponsible of me to spend $255 on the complete Deep Space 9 boxed set, wouldn't it? Even if that is an excellent sale price? Aargh, I am seriously tempted, anyway.
By comparison, the remastered Original Series boxed set seems downright affordable...
Damn this science fictional monkey on my back!
By comparison, the remastered Original Series boxed set seems downright affordable...
Damn this science fictional monkey on my back!
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Mmm, Tastes Like Sick Leave
I just got a $40 restaurant gift certificate as a reward from work for not taking any sick days last year. I immediately went out and used a large portion of it on a giant artery-clogging steak and an obesity-inducing dessert.
Somehow, I'm not sure this is really the best way of encouraging employee healthiness. Sure was tasty, though.
Somehow, I'm not sure this is really the best way of encouraging employee healthiness. Sure was tasty, though.
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Lazy Linkages
I am still alive, really. But it's getting warm outside, and I'm getting lazy. Or something. Anyway, have some random links, at least.
Uncomfortable Plot Summaries: Some of these are very funny. Like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: "Deranged pedophile big-business industrialist tortures and mutilates young children." Heh.
Don't Leave Now Without It: Handy cheat sheet should you find yourself stranded back in time and needing to reinvent civilization for survival or profit. Print out a copy and keep it in your DeLorean at all times!
TrekMovie's Guide to KirkFu: Marvel at Kirk's amazing patented drop kick maneuver! Bonus feature: William Shatner tells a rambling story that involves putting some random teenager in a headlock.
Why Geeks Make Good Lovers: 'Nuff said.
Wolf and Pig: Really, really cool video using some kind of funky stop-motion photography... thing. Just go watch it. It's easier to view than to explain.
They Fight Crime!: I might have linked to this before, actually, but what the heck. It's still amusing. And occasionally comes out with stuff I'd actually watch. "He's an old-fashioned alcoholic boxer possessed of the uncanny powers of an insect. She's a pregnant insomniac nun from Mars. They fight crime!"
Uncomfortable Plot Summaries: Some of these are very funny. Like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: "Deranged pedophile big-business industrialist tortures and mutilates young children." Heh.
Don't Leave Now Without It: Handy cheat sheet should you find yourself stranded back in time and needing to reinvent civilization for survival or profit. Print out a copy and keep it in your DeLorean at all times!
TrekMovie's Guide to KirkFu: Marvel at Kirk's amazing patented drop kick maneuver! Bonus feature: William Shatner tells a rambling story that involves putting some random teenager in a headlock.
Why Geeks Make Good Lovers: 'Nuff said.
Wolf and Pig: Really, really cool video using some kind of funky stop-motion photography... thing. Just go watch it. It's easier to view than to explain.
They Fight Crime!: I might have linked to this before, actually, but what the heck. It's still amusing. And occasionally comes out with stuff I'd actually watch. "He's an old-fashioned alcoholic boxer possessed of the uncanny powers of an insect. She's a pregnant insomniac nun from Mars. They fight crime!"
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Books!
Yet another book-related meme that I picked up somewhere on my internet wanderings:
1) The worst reading experience that you have ever had?
Probably being trapped on an airplane with Battlefield Earth. Gaaah!
2) The best reading experience you have ever had?
I'm not sure there's any one best experience I can point to. But, man, there are few things in life as overwhelmingly pleasant as curling up in bed on a rainy day with a good book and a mug of cocoa.
3) Which book has affected or influenced you the most so far?
I'm going to have to say Carl Sagan's Cosmos (an answer I'm sure I've given to this type of question before). This was actually the companion book to his PBS series, but I read the book long before I watched the TV show, at a point when I was just beginning to feel some pressure to decide what I wanted to do with my life. I was already very interested in science generally and in astronomy specifically, but I give a lot of the credit (or possibly the blame) for my decision to major in astrophysics to Sagan. He just made studying outer space seem so freaking cool.
4) Have you ever read a book that you got really scared of?
William Sleator's House of Stairs freaked me the hell out when I first read it in my early teens.
5) What do you use as a bookmark?
I have a huge store of bookmarks, which I seem to just sort of randomly acquire from nowhere in particular. So mostly I use those, but in the rare occasions when I'm caught without one, I'll use a folded-in-half post-it or something.
6) When do you usually read? At home, work, while cooking, in the morning, noon, afternoon, before you go to bed...?
Yes. Also while waiting in line, while walking, while eating, in the bathtub, in the movie theater before the movie starts...
7) Do you remember the first book that you read?
Not as such. My mother tells me there was a Mother Goose collection I used to "read" when I was three, more by virtue of having the entire thing memorized than actually decoding the letters. I do remember that book, actually, but not necessarily reading it at age three.
8) Which do you prefer - paperback or hardcover?
I'm fine with either. Hardcovers have the advantage of being more durable and are easier to prop open with your plate while you're eating, but paperbacks are more portable and can be carried in the pocket of your jeans. I also buy quite a lot of trade paperbacks, or quality paperbacks, or whatever the actual technical name is for those things that are hardback-sized but have soft covers.
9) What are you currently reading? What page are you on?
I'm currently on page 140 of The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins, about to start a chapter entitled "Battle of the Sexes." Mmm, racy!
10) Do you ever leave "a mark" (deliberate and/or not deliberate) in your books? For example, write in them, underline quotes, coffeemarks or food crumbs and etc.
I do not write in books, with the not-recently-practiced exception of textbooks that I'm actually using for a class. (I regard those as being a special kind of book, and figure that helping me store and solidify my own knowledge is part of their function.) Unfortunately, due to my above-mentioned tendency to read while eating and bathing and etc., I do sometimes leave inadvertent marks in books. I'm afraid The Selfish Gene now has some chicken grease spots somewhere in the chapter about game theory and evolutionarily stable behavior strategies. I do try to avoid this, but as long as the book remains in readable shape, I don't obsess over it. In my opinion, books are meant to be read, not coddled. (I make an exception for books that don't belong to me, of course, although sometimes it seems that the harder I try to keep a book in pristine shape, the more impossible it gets.) Oh, and for books that do belong to me, I have a "from the library of" embosser that I use to stamp them with. It's a handy thing in case I lend them out.
11) Does the title, amount of pages and the cover affect you when you are considering a specific book?
An interesting title can certainly catch my attention, and although judging a book by its cover is just as bad an idea as the proverb suggests, sometimes it's kind of hard not to. I generally don't worry too hard about how long a book is when I'm deciding whether to purchase it or not, but it can certainly make a difference when I'm deciding what I want to read next.
12) Do you ever browse through to the last pages in order find out the ending?
Ye gods, no! I've occasionally accidentally read the last sentence of a book while flipping through to see exactly how many pages it is -- something I do fairly often -- and if I actually do pick up a spoiler that way, it upsets me.
13) Has knowing the ending of a book (example, through spoilers or a movie) ever made you decide whether you will read the book or not?
Not really, I don't think. Seeing a movie based on a book can sometimes make me decide to read the book, but generally that doesn't have any more to do with the ending than with any other part of the movie. Come to think of it, though, I have been considering picking up some more Agatha Christie books at some point, but will probably avoid the ones I happen to be spoiled for.
14) Is there a book that you have read more than five times?
I probably read A Wrinkle in Time that many times when I was a kid.
15) Have you ever been in an accident where the book was the cause? (for example, almost getting hit by a car when reading while walking, or having stacks of books falling on you from a bookshelf...)
There was the time Vir the cat knocked that omnibus volume of Harry Dresden novels off the headboard and directly into my cornea. I still have to lubricate my damned eye every night thanks to that.
16) Do you sell/give away your books or do you keep them, even though you don't like one of them?
I keep them. Obsessively. Even the sucky ones.
17) Do you have some kind of book system, where you write down what you are reading, have bought, will read, will buy and etc?
I have my entire book collection cataloged at LibraryThing, with tags indicating what I've read, what I haven't read yet, etc. I also keep an extensive list of books I'm interested in using Amazon's wishlist feature. (Speaking of which, Amazon does seem to have fixed their dodgy book-burying issues, which is good enough for me. Your level of internet-fueled outrage may vary.)
1) The worst reading experience that you have ever had?
Probably being trapped on an airplane with Battlefield Earth. Gaaah!
2) The best reading experience you have ever had?
I'm not sure there's any one best experience I can point to. But, man, there are few things in life as overwhelmingly pleasant as curling up in bed on a rainy day with a good book and a mug of cocoa.
3) Which book has affected or influenced you the most so far?
I'm going to have to say Carl Sagan's Cosmos (an answer I'm sure I've given to this type of question before). This was actually the companion book to his PBS series, but I read the book long before I watched the TV show, at a point when I was just beginning to feel some pressure to decide what I wanted to do with my life. I was already very interested in science generally and in astronomy specifically, but I give a lot of the credit (or possibly the blame) for my decision to major in astrophysics to Sagan. He just made studying outer space seem so freaking cool.
4) Have you ever read a book that you got really scared of?
William Sleator's House of Stairs freaked me the hell out when I first read it in my early teens.
5) What do you use as a bookmark?
I have a huge store of bookmarks, which I seem to just sort of randomly acquire from nowhere in particular. So mostly I use those, but in the rare occasions when I'm caught without one, I'll use a folded-in-half post-it or something.
6) When do you usually read? At home, work, while cooking, in the morning, noon, afternoon, before you go to bed...?
Yes. Also while waiting in line, while walking, while eating, in the bathtub, in the movie theater before the movie starts...
7) Do you remember the first book that you read?
Not as such. My mother tells me there was a Mother Goose collection I used to "read" when I was three, more by virtue of having the entire thing memorized than actually decoding the letters. I do remember that book, actually, but not necessarily reading it at age three.
8) Which do you prefer - paperback or hardcover?
I'm fine with either. Hardcovers have the advantage of being more durable and are easier to prop open with your plate while you're eating, but paperbacks are more portable and can be carried in the pocket of your jeans. I also buy quite a lot of trade paperbacks, or quality paperbacks, or whatever the actual technical name is for those things that are hardback-sized but have soft covers.
9) What are you currently reading? What page are you on?
I'm currently on page 140 of The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins, about to start a chapter entitled "Battle of the Sexes." Mmm, racy!
10) Do you ever leave "a mark" (deliberate and/or not deliberate) in your books? For example, write in them, underline quotes, coffeemarks or food crumbs and etc.
I do not write in books, with the not-recently-practiced exception of textbooks that I'm actually using for a class. (I regard those as being a special kind of book, and figure that helping me store and solidify my own knowledge is part of their function.) Unfortunately, due to my above-mentioned tendency to read while eating and bathing and etc., I do sometimes leave inadvertent marks in books. I'm afraid The Selfish Gene now has some chicken grease spots somewhere in the chapter about game theory and evolutionarily stable behavior strategies. I do try to avoid this, but as long as the book remains in readable shape, I don't obsess over it. In my opinion, books are meant to be read, not coddled. (I make an exception for books that don't belong to me, of course, although sometimes it seems that the harder I try to keep a book in pristine shape, the more impossible it gets.) Oh, and for books that do belong to me, I have a "from the library of" embosser that I use to stamp them with. It's a handy thing in case I lend them out.
11) Does the title, amount of pages and the cover affect you when you are considering a specific book?
An interesting title can certainly catch my attention, and although judging a book by its cover is just as bad an idea as the proverb suggests, sometimes it's kind of hard not to. I generally don't worry too hard about how long a book is when I'm deciding whether to purchase it or not, but it can certainly make a difference when I'm deciding what I want to read next.
12) Do you ever browse through to the last pages in order find out the ending?
Ye gods, no! I've occasionally accidentally read the last sentence of a book while flipping through to see exactly how many pages it is -- something I do fairly often -- and if I actually do pick up a spoiler that way, it upsets me.
13) Has knowing the ending of a book (example, through spoilers or a movie) ever made you decide whether you will read the book or not?
Not really, I don't think. Seeing a movie based on a book can sometimes make me decide to read the book, but generally that doesn't have any more to do with the ending than with any other part of the movie. Come to think of it, though, I have been considering picking up some more Agatha Christie books at some point, but will probably avoid the ones I happen to be spoiled for.
14) Is there a book that you have read more than five times?
I probably read A Wrinkle in Time that many times when I was a kid.
15) Have you ever been in an accident where the book was the cause? (for example, almost getting hit by a car when reading while walking, or having stacks of books falling on you from a bookshelf...)
There was the time Vir the cat knocked that omnibus volume of Harry Dresden novels off the headboard and directly into my cornea. I still have to lubricate my damned eye every night thanks to that.
16) Do you sell/give away your books or do you keep them, even though you don't like one of them?
I keep them. Obsessively. Even the sucky ones.
17) Do you have some kind of book system, where you write down what you are reading, have bought, will read, will buy and etc?
I have my entire book collection cataloged at LibraryThing, with tags indicating what I've read, what I haven't read yet, etc. I also keep an extensive list of books I'm interested in using Amazon's wishlist feature. (Speaking of which, Amazon does seem to have fixed their dodgy book-burying issues, which is good enough for me. Your level of internet-fueled outrage may vary.)
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Have A Chocolate Bunny And Some Random Links.
Sunday Sweets: Geeky Goodness: Stargate-themed cakes. Because geeks are endlessly inventive people.
Bill Bailey - Doctor Who: Comedian Bill Bailey offers his take on the music and sound effects in Doctor Who, including his own interpretation of the theme song as "60s Belgian jazz."
Wide Angle: Top Ten Moments in Astronomy: Most of these are pretty hard to argue with.
Star Formation: The Game: Make your own stars. For points!
Uranium Ore: A jar of uranium ore on sale from Amazon. The user reviews are hysterical.
Speaking of Amazon, though, they appear to have been snorting that uranium or something: Amazon Censors Its Rankings & Search Results to Protect Us Against GLBT Books.
How We Staged the Morristown UFO Hoax : The authors set up a UFO hoax in New Jersey and, unsurprisingly, lots of people fell for it lock, stock and alien laser gun barrel.
Bill Bailey - Doctor Who: Comedian Bill Bailey offers his take on the music and sound effects in Doctor Who, including his own interpretation of the theme song as "60s Belgian jazz."
Wide Angle: Top Ten Moments in Astronomy: Most of these are pretty hard to argue with.
Star Formation: The Game: Make your own stars. For points!
Uranium Ore: A jar of uranium ore on sale from Amazon. The user reviews are hysterical.
Speaking of Amazon, though, they appear to have been snorting that uranium or something: Amazon Censors Its Rankings & Search Results to Protect Us Against GLBT Books.
How We Staged the Morristown UFO Hoax : The authors set up a UFO hoax in New Jersey and, unsurprisingly, lots of people fell for it lock, stock and alien laser gun barrel.
Wednesday, April 08, 2009
Currently, My Life Is Boring.
Current clothes: A white terrycloth bathrobe. At some point, I will put on some clothes and make some pretense of getting on with my day.
Current mood: Eh. I didn't get quite enough sleep today -- or yesterday, for that matter -- and it feels like a largish section of my brain has just sort of... gone off-line. I did just have a nice, hot shower, though, and am at least feeling slightly less groggy than I was before.
Current music: More random stuff from the iPod. It seems to be on a something of a "cheesy music of the 70s and 80s" kick lately.
Current annoyance: Why have night shifts suddenly gotten so much more difficult for me in the last year or so, when I used to be such a complete night person? Is this an aging thing? I do not like it, and I wish it to stop.
Current thing: I dunno. Procrastinating on all the things I should be doing, I guess.
Current desktop picture: Still the same nebulae as last month. They're very pretty, and I haven't gotten tired of them yet.
Current book: Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives by John Palfrey and Urs Gasser. When I try to imagine what my life would have been like if I'd had the internet as a kid, I just can't do it, any more than I can imagine what it would be like not to have it as an adult. So I was interested in seeing what this book might have to say on the subject. Unfortunately, though, it's been pretty dull so far, and has not offered me any great insights on what it's like to grow up in the Information Age.
Current song in head: "Skullcrusher Mountain" by Jonathan Coulton.
Current DVD in player: The last disc of Third Rock from the Sun season 2, which I started watching as my treadmill show while waiting for my Venture Bros. season 3 discs to show up. Also, a disc of extras from the giant Stargate SG-1 boxed set.
Current refreshment: Nothing. But I need to go and make myself some breakfast or some lunch or something soon.
Current worry: It would probably be the fact that I'm procrastinating on the things I should be doing, except that I'm also putting off worrying about it.
Current thought: "Skullcrusher Mountain" is an awesome song, but I kind of wish it would vacate my head now.
Current mood: Eh. I didn't get quite enough sleep today -- or yesterday, for that matter -- and it feels like a largish section of my brain has just sort of... gone off-line. I did just have a nice, hot shower, though, and am at least feeling slightly less groggy than I was before.
Current music: More random stuff from the iPod. It seems to be on a something of a "cheesy music of the 70s and 80s" kick lately.
Current annoyance: Why have night shifts suddenly gotten so much more difficult for me in the last year or so, when I used to be such a complete night person? Is this an aging thing? I do not like it, and I wish it to stop.
Current thing: I dunno. Procrastinating on all the things I should be doing, I guess.
Current desktop picture: Still the same nebulae as last month. They're very pretty, and I haven't gotten tired of them yet.
Current book: Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives by John Palfrey and Urs Gasser. When I try to imagine what my life would have been like if I'd had the internet as a kid, I just can't do it, any more than I can imagine what it would be like not to have it as an adult. So I was interested in seeing what this book might have to say on the subject. Unfortunately, though, it's been pretty dull so far, and has not offered me any great insights on what it's like to grow up in the Information Age.
Current song in head: "Skullcrusher Mountain" by Jonathan Coulton.
Current DVD in player: The last disc of Third Rock from the Sun season 2, which I started watching as my treadmill show while waiting for my Venture Bros. season 3 discs to show up. Also, a disc of extras from the giant Stargate SG-1 boxed set.
Current refreshment: Nothing. But I need to go and make myself some breakfast or some lunch or something soon.
Current worry: It would probably be the fact that I'm procrastinating on the things I should be doing, except that I'm also putting off worrying about it.
Current thought: "Skullcrusher Mountain" is an awesome song, but I kind of wish it would vacate my head now.
Monday, April 06, 2009
If She Were A Dog, I'd Call This Post "Rags To Bitches," But As It Is, I Have No Punny Title.
It has been pointed out to me that I am failing to meet my regulated minimum quota of cute cat pictures, so here's one of Happiness, sleeping on a pile o' cleaning rags in the utility room closet:
I've been a little worried about Happiness, as she threw up several times last night. But that is something that cats just do sometimes, and she seems OK today, as far as I can tell. Maybe all she needed was a nice little rag pile-assisted snooze.
I've been a little worried about Happiness, as she threw up several times last night. But that is something that cats just do sometimes, and she seems OK today, as far as I can tell. Maybe all she needed was a nice little rag pile-assisted snooze.
Saturday, April 04, 2009
Seriously! Only Two Books!
I went to the Friends of the Library book sale today, but the pickings were slim, and I turned out not to need the formidable self-restraint I equipped myself with beforehand. I almost feel cheated. What am I going to do with all this self-restraint now? Maybe I should go to Amazon and not buy books there.
Anyway, all I picked up was Iain Banks' Look to Windward and a humorous volume called The Hypochondriac's Guide to Life. And Death. Which is probably just as well, as I've still only read four of the ten books I bought at the sale last year.
Anyway, all I picked up was Iain Banks' Look to Windward and a humorous volume called The Hypochondriac's Guide to Life. And Death. Which is probably just as well, as I've still only read four of the ten books I bought at the sale last year.
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
And In Non-Jokey Cool Stuff News...
Here, have a trailer for the new Doctor Who special, "Planet of the Dead," which will be airing in the UK on April 11. (Not sure about US release dates yet. Sorry!)
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Who Interview
I've just been told that the interview I did with the authors of The Greatest Show in the Galaxy: The Discerning Fan's Guide to Doctor Who for Kaleidotrope a while back is now available from Marc Schuster, one of the authors. The easiest way to read it, should you be interested in such a thing, is to click on the "fullscreen" button on the left. They've added some fun pictures to it, too!
Random Links: Science, Etc. Edition
Ten Things You Don't Know About the Sun: Fun facts about our favorite mass of incandescent gas.
Dr Who Dalek found in pond: This was all over the internet several weeks ago, so I suspect anyone likely to find this interesting has already seen it. Still, just in case you are and you haven't... Someone found a Dalek in a pond. Seriously.
Cosmos on Hulu: One of the great science programs of all time, now available to watch for free online (although, sadly, only if you happen to be in the US). I just re-watched this show fairly recently, myself, and it holds up amazingly well. Awesome, inspiring stuff. Watch it with your kids, if you have 'em, because this is exactly the kind of science programming kids should be exposed to.
Science Tattoo Emporium: I don't really understand the appeal of tattoos, myself, I must admit, but it's nice to know that they're for science nerds, too. The guy with the resistor symbol on his wrist gave me a strange, disturbing flashback to Alien Nation, though, before I realized what it was.
100 Hours of Astronomy: A "global astronomy event" running from April 2-5, featuring, among other things, live webcasts from astronomical observatories all over the world, including the VLA.
Andy Hallett, the green demon of 'Angel,' dies at 33: Deeply depressing news, not least because, dammit, nobody should have to die of heart failure at 33. Hallett was a truly talented guy. There aren't many people who can make green makeup look that good, and, man, could he sing. His character, Lorne, was easily my favorite person on Angel, even though he was just a recurring guest role.
Dr Who Dalek found in pond: This was all over the internet several weeks ago, so I suspect anyone likely to find this interesting has already seen it. Still, just in case you are and you haven't... Someone found a Dalek in a pond. Seriously.
Cosmos on Hulu: One of the great science programs of all time, now available to watch for free online (although, sadly, only if you happen to be in the US). I just re-watched this show fairly recently, myself, and it holds up amazingly well. Awesome, inspiring stuff. Watch it with your kids, if you have 'em, because this is exactly the kind of science programming kids should be exposed to.
Science Tattoo Emporium: I don't really understand the appeal of tattoos, myself, I must admit, but it's nice to know that they're for science nerds, too. The guy with the resistor symbol on his wrist gave me a strange, disturbing flashback to Alien Nation, though, before I realized what it was.
100 Hours of Astronomy: A "global astronomy event" running from April 2-5, featuring, among other things, live webcasts from astronomical observatories all over the world, including the VLA.
Andy Hallett, the green demon of 'Angel,' dies at 33: Deeply depressing news, not least because, dammit, nobody should have to die of heart failure at 33. Hallett was a truly talented guy. There aren't many people who can make green makeup look that good, and, man, could he sing. His character, Lorne, was easily my favorite person on Angel, even though he was just a recurring guest role.
Friday, March 27, 2009
I Think I'm Gonna Sit Today Out.
The snow seems to have nearly stopped, and it was mostly just scattered flakes, anyway. And the weather report says Abq. should be dry this afternoon. But, damn it, it's cold and gray, and I don't feel like running around the city doing things that, frankly, aren't all that urgent, anyway. I'm sure no one will think less of me if I take the hours I set aside for errand-running and spend them curled up with a book instead. Will you?
(If I need another excuse, it's also true that I slept badly last night. Which isn't much of an excuse, I admit, as I feel more lazy today than tired. But I forgot to take my allergy pill and woke up in the middle of the night with an itchy nose. Then after I got up to take the pill, I realized I was cold and had to get up again and fetch the warm blanket I'd put away about the same time I packed up the sweaters. I did get back to sleep, but it seemed like shallow sleep, and involved odd dreams. Did you know zombies were allergic to milk? I didn't either, but apparently my subconscious believes it, as it was an extremely important plot point in said dreams. Then, when I woke up this morning, I was busy trying to buy a train ticket in South America. Yeah, your guess is as good as mine.)
(If I need another excuse, it's also true that I slept badly last night. Which isn't much of an excuse, I admit, as I feel more lazy today than tired. But I forgot to take my allergy pill and woke up in the middle of the night with an itchy nose. Then after I got up to take the pill, I realized I was cold and had to get up again and fetch the warm blanket I'd put away about the same time I packed up the sweaters. I did get back to sleep, but it seemed like shallow sleep, and involved odd dreams. Did you know zombies were allergic to milk? I didn't either, but apparently my subconscious believes it, as it was an extremely important plot point in said dreams. Then, when I woke up this morning, I was busy trying to buy a train ticket in South America. Yeah, your guess is as good as mine.)
WTF, Weather?
Geez. A few days ago, I put away my sweaters and got out my shorts, and today it's snowing.
I was going to drive up to Albuquerque today and run some errands, but now I'm wondering if I can use stupid weather as an excuse to put it off. Hmm...
I was going to drive up to Albuquerque today and run some errands, but now I'm wondering if I can use stupid weather as an excuse to put it off. Hmm...
Thursday, March 26, 2009
All Hail The God Of Nerds!
Apparently this is a slightly updated version of this thing, so how could I resist?
Good to know that hasn't changed, then.
Good to know that hasn't changed, then.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
In Which I Answer Your Burning Questions
A while back, my sister called and left a message on my answering machine saying that she'd just seen the movie Donnie Darko and wanted me to explain the ending to her. For some reason, people seem to have this touching faith in my ability to explain weird SF-related stuff. I have no idea why. *cough* Anyway, I had to call her back and admit that I'd never actually seen the movie, oddly enough, but I have corrected this gap in my cinematic experience now. And, without delving into spoilers here, I will just say that the ending seems pretty explicable to me. It's the middle I'm a bit mystified by. Which nevertheless puts it significantly ahead of Primer, a movie I watched not all that long ago and about which my only comment was, "OK, clearly I need to watch that at least another five or six times before it makes sense." I think, by the way, that this is a very unfair thing for a movie to ask of me, given that I don't even seem to have the time to watch most of the stuff I'm interested in once. Anyway, uh, if you want to discuss it now, sis, you can call me back or leave a comment here or something. Don't say I never did anything for ya!
In a matter that's completely unrelated, except for also involving a deeply weird work of fiction, at least one person said they'd be interested to hear what I thought of Perdido Street Station after I finished it. Which I did a while ago. I'm actually not entirely sure what to say about it... On the one hand, the plot is, objectively, pretty thin for a novel that long; I'm not at all sure how satisfying I found the ending; and the long passages describing people's exact routes through the city every time they traveled somewhere where not exactly excitement-inducing, no matter how cool the city itself might be. On the other hand, the setting was amazingly cool and imaginative and well-realized, the characters were believable, and all of the individual plot elements were interesting. For me, at least, the stuff on that second hand dominated, and I found it on the whole to be a decidedly enjoyable and worthwhile (albeit rather slow) read. I'll definitely be interested in checking out more of Mieville's work.
There. Anything else anybody wants me to comment on?
In a matter that's completely unrelated, except for also involving a deeply weird work of fiction, at least one person said they'd be interested to hear what I thought of Perdido Street Station after I finished it. Which I did a while ago. I'm actually not entirely sure what to say about it... On the one hand, the plot is, objectively, pretty thin for a novel that long; I'm not at all sure how satisfying I found the ending; and the long passages describing people's exact routes through the city every time they traveled somewhere where not exactly excitement-inducing, no matter how cool the city itself might be. On the other hand, the setting was amazingly cool and imaginative and well-realized, the characters were believable, and all of the individual plot elements were interesting. For me, at least, the stuff on that second hand dominated, and I found it on the whole to be a decidedly enjoyable and worthwhile (albeit rather slow) read. I'll definitely be interested in checking out more of Mieville's work.
There. Anything else anybody wants me to comment on?
Merry...
I was tootling around minding my own business today when this poem suddenly popped into my head and I found myself more than a little startled by the fact that I was able to remember it very nearly word-for-word. (Well, OK, there was one line I blanked on and had to look up.) So, I thought I'd share:
Merry...
No one's hangin' stockin's up,
No one's bakin' pie,
No one's lookin' up to see
A new star in the sky.
No one's talkin' brotherhood,
No one's givin' gifts,
And no one loves a Christmas tree
On March the twenty-fifth.
--Shel Silverstein
Peace on Earth and happy March 25th to all!
Merry...
No one's hangin' stockin's up,
No one's bakin' pie,
No one's lookin' up to see
A new star in the sky.
No one's talkin' brotherhood,
No one's givin' gifts,
And no one loves a Christmas tree
On March the twenty-fifth.
--Shel Silverstein
Peace on Earth and happy March 25th to all!
Monday, March 23, 2009
"It's Like Breaking The Ninth Wall."
I recently picked up Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on DVD, and, as I'd sort of expected, I do think the ending works better when you see the whole thing as a unit, rather than watching it an act a day on the internet. What I didn't expect, though, was the fully produced musical commentary track, which was easily the most hilarious damned thing I've encountered in weeks (and that's counting the actual show on the DVD). Seriously, if they put out a soundtrack for the commentary, I'll buy it.
There's just something really, really wrong about that, I know. And yet it's so right!
(I'm also amused, by the way, that when you search for "Dr. Horrible" on Amazon, as I did to find the link above, the last thing that comes up on the list is this.)
There's just something really, really wrong about that, I know. And yet it's so right!
(I'm also amused, by the way, that when you search for "Dr. Horrible" on Amazon, as I did to find the link above, the last thing that comes up on the list is this.)
Thursday, March 19, 2009
A T-Shirt From The Uncharted Territories
I just had two different people ask me whether I knew that the Henson Company is selling Farscape 10th anniversary t-shirts today. Come on, guys, you know me! I ordered mine last night. Heh.
They're on offer for 24 hours only, though, so if you want one so you can be cool like me, act now!
And happy anniversary, Farscape! I can't believe it's been that long, but, then, I did start watching a couple of seasons late, so it's only been something like eight years for me. And I'm gonna hold onto that thought, 'cause it makes me feel younger.
[ETA: Looks like they're going to be extending the sale through Sunday.]
They're on offer for 24 hours only, though, so if you want one so you can be cool like me, act now!
And happy anniversary, Farscape! I can't believe it's been that long, but, then, I did start watching a couple of seasons late, so it's only been something like eight years for me. And I'm gonna hold onto that thought, 'cause it makes me feel younger.
[ETA: Looks like they're going to be extending the sale through Sunday.]
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Infectious Laughter
All right, here's somebody being snarky and witty about Skiffy's proposed name change:
"According to research done exclusively for BNET Media by TNS Cymfony, syphilis jokes account for about four percent of all commentary about Syfy." Ouch. That's gonna leave a mark. Or an unsightly rash leading to eventual brain damage.*snicker*
Monday, March 16, 2009
I'd Prefer "The Scientifiction Channel," Personally.
I feel as if I ought to have something snarky and witty to say about the news that the Sci Fi Channel is changing its name, but I just... I don't know. You can't satirize this:
The principal reason the idea kept coming up, Mr. Howe said, was a belief “the Sci Fi name is limiting.”Excuse me. I'm just going to go and bang my head now.
“If you ask people their default perceptions of Sci Fi, they list space, aliens and the future,” he added.
Goofy Watchmen Videos, Continued
Here, by the way, is part 2 of the "Vague Recollections of Watchmen" video I embedded in last week's post. Maybe it's the fact that it's three o'clock in the morning, but I find this hysterically funny. Also, I totally think they should have cast the guy doing Ozymandias in this one in the movie. Hee!
Note: Contains huge honkin' spoilers.
Note: Contains huge honkin' spoilers.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Cavlacade Of Goofy Watchmen Videos
Most of the random links I'm accumulating at the moment seem to involve goofy Watchmen-themed videos on YouTube. Eventually, I decided they needed their own post. Enjoy!
First up, Rorschach vs. Wolverine! Not really spoilery, except maybe for X-Men 3, if anybody actually cares about that.
Then, the single Wrongest thing I have ever seen in my entire life.
And some half-asleep guy summarizing what he remembers of the comic. Contains very large (albeit incompletely remembered) spoilers. Also contains the single most hilarious description of Rorschach imaginable. Hee! This is part 1, which covers everything but the ending. I can't seem to find part 2. I don't think it's up yet.
And this... may be a bit spoilery. And will be a bit painful. Um.
And there ya go. Do I need to mention that most of these will probably make no sense at all if you're not familiar with the comic, the movie, or both?
First up, Rorschach vs. Wolverine! Not really spoilery, except maybe for X-Men 3, if anybody actually cares about that.
Then, the single Wrongest thing I have ever seen in my entire life.
And some half-asleep guy summarizing what he remembers of the comic. Contains very large (albeit incompletely remembered) spoilers. Also contains the single most hilarious description of Rorschach imaginable. Hee! This is part 1, which covers everything but the ending. I can't seem to find part 2. I don't think it's up yet.
And this... may be a bit spoilery. And will be a bit painful. Um.
And there ya go. Do I need to mention that most of these will probably make no sense at all if you're not familiar with the comic, the movie, or both?
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
The Current Currently
Current clothes: Dark gray t-shirt with a picture of a Dalek on it. Long-sleeved shirt over that, unbuttoned. Um, I think it's sort of off-white. Blue jeans. Black belt. White socks. Black sneakers.
Current mood: Not too bad. Much more awake than I felt an hour ago, which is good. Especially as this is the point where I need to switch from going to bed disgustingly early to trying to stay up as late as possible.
Current music: Haven't really been listening to much of anything recently. Probably some more random-shuffle stuff a few days ago.
Current annoyance: Well, my sinuses are definitely aware that it's spring. Although I shouldn't complain too hard. So far, the allergies aren't all that bad this year. Of course, not everything's started blooming yet.
Current thing: I'm not sure I have one. Reading, maybe. A bit more intensely than usual, I mean. I feel ridiculously pleased by the fact that the infamous To-Read Pile is now down below 450 books -- enough below that it seems likely that I'm not going to creep back up above it again. Maybe when I get down to 400 I'll throw a party.
Current desktop picture: Well, it was this image of the Milky Way over Mauna Kea, but when I went to the Astronomy Picture of the Day site to find a link to it, I loved today's nebula picture so much that I immediately changed to that one.
Current book: Just started Perdido Street Station by China Mieville. Which I've been meaning to get around to reading for approximately forever.
Current song in head: "Someone Keeps Moving My Chair" by They Might Be Giants.
Current DVD in player: The last disc of season 10 of Stargate SG-1. I've got one more episode to go, and then I can say I've seen the entire series (minus the TV movies, which I'm planning to get to soonish). I should probably watch that tonight, but I'm almost a little reluctant for it to be over. It's been fun!
Current refreshment: Peppermint/spearmint tea.
Current worry: I don't want to worry about stuff right now!
Current thought: The thing that bothers me is someone keeps moving myyyyyyyyy chaiiiiiiiiiir.
Current mood: Not too bad. Much more awake than I felt an hour ago, which is good. Especially as this is the point where I need to switch from going to bed disgustingly early to trying to stay up as late as possible.
Current music: Haven't really been listening to much of anything recently. Probably some more random-shuffle stuff a few days ago.
Current annoyance: Well, my sinuses are definitely aware that it's spring. Although I shouldn't complain too hard. So far, the allergies aren't all that bad this year. Of course, not everything's started blooming yet.
Current thing: I'm not sure I have one. Reading, maybe. A bit more intensely than usual, I mean. I feel ridiculously pleased by the fact that the infamous To-Read Pile is now down below 450 books -- enough below that it seems likely that I'm not going to creep back up above it again. Maybe when I get down to 400 I'll throw a party.
Current desktop picture: Well, it was this image of the Milky Way over Mauna Kea, but when I went to the Astronomy Picture of the Day site to find a link to it, I loved today's nebula picture so much that I immediately changed to that one.
Current book: Just started Perdido Street Station by China Mieville. Which I've been meaning to get around to reading for approximately forever.
Current song in head: "Someone Keeps Moving My Chair" by They Might Be Giants.
Current DVD in player: The last disc of season 10 of Stargate SG-1. I've got one more episode to go, and then I can say I've seen the entire series (minus the TV movies, which I'm planning to get to soonish). I should probably watch that tonight, but I'm almost a little reluctant for it to be over. It's been fun!
Current refreshment: Peppermint/spearmint tea.
Current worry: I don't want to worry about stuff right now!
Current thought: The thing that bothers me is someone keeps moving myyyyyyyyy chaiiiiiiiiiir.
Sunday, March 08, 2009
The Annoying Kind Of Time Travel
You know what's a really great time to have to arbitrarily put your clocks forward? Right smack dab between two 12-hour shifts, both of which start at 7:45 AM. Thanks a lot, congress!
Didn't I read somewhere that Obama was in favor of abolishing Daylight Savings Time? Why hasn't he done something about that yet? I demand action! Forget fixing the economy, I want my goddam hour back!
(OK. I feel better now. Really.)
Didn't I read somewhere that Obama was in favor of abolishing Daylight Savings Time? Why hasn't he done something about that yet? I demand action! Forget fixing the economy, I want my goddam hour back!
(OK. I feel better now. Really.)
Saturday, March 07, 2009
My Poor Young Ears
Created by Train Horns
Clearly I should have gone to more rock concerts in my youth, because that hurt.
Friday, March 06, 2009
I Watch The Watchmen
Man, this has been a good week. I've been walking around feeling fine and happy for days, which is a nice change from the low-energy, high-stress state I was in for a while before that. Mainly the difference is due to the fact that I've finally gotten my sleeping patterns switched around into something sane and adequate. As a bonus, my current sleep schedule means that I'm up and around during the day to enjoy the beautiful spring weather. And even the allergies that come with said beautiful spring weather haven't been nearly as bad as they were last week. In the interests of making a good week even better, I've burned some vacation time in order to put in shorter days at work and divided the hours thus recovered between accomplishing useful things (like getting a desperately needed haircut) and indulging in some quality goofing off. And then today I skipped work entirely and instead drove to Los Lunas to see Watchmen, which I regard as a truly excellent use of my time.
So, Watchmen... I gather that reactions to this cover a wide spectrum. Personally, I thought it was marvelous. Although I will admit that it's within the realm of possibility that the movie doesn't stand on its own quite as well as I think it does, and that the main reason it pleased me so much was because it did such an incredible job of evoking the comic, which I can say without hesitation is one of the best things I've ever read in a lifetime full of reading.
Mind you, it's been probably ten years or so since I last read the graphic novel. I had vaguely intended to give it another re-read before seeing the movie, but never quite got around to it. Which may be just as well. I find that with any movie based on something I've read, it works better if there's enough of a time gap to erase the details of the original from my memory. It means I'm not sitting there the whole time drawing minute comparisons instead of enjoying the movie on its own terms. What I do remember very clearly from the original, though, are the emotions it evoked in me, the themes and the symbols and the unique feel of the individual characters, and the movie had that stuff nailed.
There was one plot change that's impossible not to notice if you have any memory of the comic at all, but my reaction to that was, essentially, "Oh, man, I wonder how they're going to pull off [huge honkin' spoiler] with any credibility at all?" followed a bit later by, "Oh, I see. They don't need to. Huh. Cool." So, that worked, impressively enough. I guess that's the kind of adaptive tweak you can pull off when you really, really get your source material.
I do have one eensy, weensy nitpick, though. Guys, the word "gila," as in "Gila Flats" is pronounced "heela." Dr. Manhattan should not mispronounce things! But other than that, it kicked ass.
I was thinking that I'd find it really interesting to hear from anybody who'd seen the movie without first reading the comic, but honestly... If you haven't read the original and it seems remotely like the kind of thing you might be interested in, I suggest buying a copy right this minute. Then, as soon as you get your hands on it, cancel everything you have planned for the day and read the thing. Then go and see the movie; whether you want to wait ten years first or not is up to you.
(Note: I'll happily discuss the movie and/or the comic in the comments if people are interested, but I ask that spoilers be carefully labeled. I'd hate to ruin this one for anybody. Even if it's an entirely different kind of cool when you go in knowing what's going to happen.)
So, Watchmen... I gather that reactions to this cover a wide spectrum. Personally, I thought it was marvelous. Although I will admit that it's within the realm of possibility that the movie doesn't stand on its own quite as well as I think it does, and that the main reason it pleased me so much was because it did such an incredible job of evoking the comic, which I can say without hesitation is one of the best things I've ever read in a lifetime full of reading.
Mind you, it's been probably ten years or so since I last read the graphic novel. I had vaguely intended to give it another re-read before seeing the movie, but never quite got around to it. Which may be just as well. I find that with any movie based on something I've read, it works better if there's enough of a time gap to erase the details of the original from my memory. It means I'm not sitting there the whole time drawing minute comparisons instead of enjoying the movie on its own terms. What I do remember very clearly from the original, though, are the emotions it evoked in me, the themes and the symbols and the unique feel of the individual characters, and the movie had that stuff nailed.
There was one plot change that's impossible not to notice if you have any memory of the comic at all, but my reaction to that was, essentially, "Oh, man, I wonder how they're going to pull off [huge honkin' spoiler] with any credibility at all?" followed a bit later by, "Oh, I see. They don't need to. Huh. Cool." So, that worked, impressively enough. I guess that's the kind of adaptive tweak you can pull off when you really, really get your source material.
I do have one eensy, weensy nitpick, though. Guys, the word "gila," as in "Gila Flats" is pronounced "heela." Dr. Manhattan should not mispronounce things! But other than that, it kicked ass.
I was thinking that I'd find it really interesting to hear from anybody who'd seen the movie without first reading the comic, but honestly... If you haven't read the original and it seems remotely like the kind of thing you might be interested in, I suggest buying a copy right this minute. Then, as soon as you get your hands on it, cancel everything you have planned for the day and read the thing. Then go and see the movie; whether you want to wait ten years first or not is up to you.
(Note: I'll happily discuss the movie and/or the comic in the comments if people are interested, but I ask that spoilers be carefully labeled. I'd hate to ruin this one for anybody. Even if it's an entirely different kind of cool when you go in knowing what's going to happen.)
Thursday, March 05, 2009
Anybody Want A Slightly Used Cat?
You know what's really fun? When a 25-pound cat suddenly decides to jump up onto a TV tray upon which is resting, among other things, a very full mug of very hot tea.
I wouldn't necessarily have thought tea droplets could fly that far.
I wouldn't necessarily have thought tea droplets could fly that far.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Random Link Dump
I've been accumulating these for a while.
LOST spoof - Ben and Jack Have a Conversation: This goofy little Lost spoof made me laugh a lot. Warning: features spoilers for the episode before last. Probably will do nothing for you if you don't know the show. May annoy you if you're a Jack fan. (Assuming Jack has fans.)
Inside the Inboxes of 15 Fictional Villains: Ever wished you could spy on a bad guy's e-mail? Now you can! Some of these are funnier than others, some of them went right past me because I'm clearly not familiar with the source material, and at least one invites debate over the definition of the word "villain." But some of them are very funny indeed.
Barack Obama is tired of your motherfucking shit: Clips from Obama's audiobook reading of Dreams from My Father, in which he quotes a foul-mouthed friend. Because there's something surreally amusing about getting to hear your president say "motherfucker!", however unfairly out of context it is.
And the Circle is Complete: Covers of Star Trek novels, entertainingly retitled. It's kind of disturbing how many of these I recognize.
Back to the Future Alternate Ending: Short video offering a slightly different ending to the movie. It's all the more amusing thanks to a certain coincidence of casting.
Fishmen: H.P. Lovecraft's "The Shadow over Innsmouth" presented in under two minutes. As a musical.
What Does a Lunar Eclipse Look Like from the Moon?: A picture taken by the Japanese lunar probe Kaguya answers this question beautifully.
Progress on NASA's Constellation: Pictures of the space shuttle's future replacement as it begins to take shape.
Making a proper Doctor Who anime: Unfinished scenes from an anime version of Doctor Who (Third Doctor era), featuring original animation and audio clips taken from the show. Pretty darned impressive.
LOST spoof - Ben and Jack Have a Conversation: This goofy little Lost spoof made me laugh a lot. Warning: features spoilers for the episode before last. Probably will do nothing for you if you don't know the show. May annoy you if you're a Jack fan. (Assuming Jack has fans.)
Inside the Inboxes of 15 Fictional Villains: Ever wished you could spy on a bad guy's e-mail? Now you can! Some of these are funnier than others, some of them went right past me because I'm clearly not familiar with the source material, and at least one invites debate over the definition of the word "villain." But some of them are very funny indeed.
Barack Obama is tired of your motherfucking shit: Clips from Obama's audiobook reading of Dreams from My Father, in which he quotes a foul-mouthed friend. Because there's something surreally amusing about getting to hear your president say "motherfucker!", however unfairly out of context it is.
And the Circle is Complete: Covers of Star Trek novels, entertainingly retitled. It's kind of disturbing how many of these I recognize.
Back to the Future Alternate Ending: Short video offering a slightly different ending to the movie. It's all the more amusing thanks to a certain coincidence of casting.
Fishmen: H.P. Lovecraft's "The Shadow over Innsmouth" presented in under two minutes. As a musical.
What Does a Lunar Eclipse Look Like from the Moon?: A picture taken by the Japanese lunar probe Kaguya answers this question beautifully.
Progress on NASA's Constellation: Pictures of the space shuttle's future replacement as it begins to take shape.
Making a proper Doctor Who anime: Unfinished scenes from an anime version of Doctor Who (Third Doctor era), featuring original animation and audio clips taken from the show. Pretty darned impressive.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
This Post Brought To You By Too Little Sleep And Too Many Kleenex
Ah, allergy season. Back again so soon.
Sigh. There are times when I really kind of wish I lived somewhere that got more than about twelve weeks of winter.
Sigh. There are times when I really kind of wish I lived somewhere that got more than about twelve weeks of winter.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
This Is Entirely Possible.
| How will I die? Your Result: You will die of boredom. Try not to take so many quizzes. And while this answer may seem like a joke, it most certainly is not. Boredom is one of the most frequent causes of death. The body will simply stop functioning. Try not to become an excercise junkie. One cannot escape destiny... | |
| You will die in your sleep. | |
| You will die from a terminal illness. | |
| You will die while having sex. | |
| You will die while saving someone's life. | |
| You will die in a nuclear holocaust. | |
| You will be murdered. | |
| You will die in a car accident. | |
| How will I die? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz | |
But, really, I hardly ever do these stupid quizzes any more.
Confuse-A-Cat
I had the cats into the vet for their regular annual checkup last week, and it appears that Lard-Ass Kitty has lost no weight since I put him on the diet. None. Sigh.
So, in an attempt to supply him with some kind of exercise regimen, I went out and bought a little laser pointer so he could have a nice dot of light to chase around while I sit comfortably in my chair and move nothing but my arm.
It does seem to work reasonably well. He won't always jump up and chase after the thing, although he does always look keenly interested, but when he does, he moves with an insane energy you'd never expect in an animal that obese.
But I dunno. I actually feel weirdly guilty playing this game. Because it's a terrible tease, isn't it? The very laws of physics dictate that no matter how diligently the cats chase down the little light spot, they are never, ever going to have anything to show for it. It's like some kind of cruel kitty mind-fuck, really.
But, man, it is entertaining to aim the light right between their paws and then suddenly turn it off and watch their little "WTF? Where'd it go?!" faces.
So, in an attempt to supply him with some kind of exercise regimen, I went out and bought a little laser pointer so he could have a nice dot of light to chase around while I sit comfortably in my chair and move nothing but my arm.
It does seem to work reasonably well. He won't always jump up and chase after the thing, although he does always look keenly interested, but when he does, he moves with an insane energy you'd never expect in an animal that obese.
But I dunno. I actually feel weirdly guilty playing this game. Because it's a terrible tease, isn't it? The very laws of physics dictate that no matter how diligently the cats chase down the little light spot, they are never, ever going to have anything to show for it. It's like some kind of cruel kitty mind-fuck, really.
But, man, it is entertaining to aim the light right between their paws and then suddenly turn it off and watch their little "WTF? Where'd it go?!" faces.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Show Me The Money! Or, Y'know, Not.
So, I just did my federal taxes. Apparently I'm entitled to a forty-seven cent refund. I'll try not to spend it all in one place.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Hip, Hip, Hooray!
I'm feeling much better today, I think. The sore throat seems to have disappeared entirely.
Three cheers for the healing powers of sloth!
Three cheers for the healing powers of sloth!
Monday, February 16, 2009
Ooky, But Undefeated
Since last night, I've had a bit of a sore throat, and a tiny bit of a headache. Bah! Well, actually, it's not too bad, but I'm definitely fighting something off. So, since amazingly enough I don't have to be in to work today, I hereby declare that my plan for the day will consist of lying on the sofa accompanied by my laptop, that copy of Great Expectations I've finally gotten around to reading, a stack of Stargate DVDs, throat lozenges of various kinds and flavors, and large quantities of mint tea.
Fear me, germs! I shall defeat you with my amazing powers of idleness!
Fear me, germs! I shall defeat you with my amazing powers of idleness!
Friday, February 13, 2009
Further Proof That TV Executives Hate Me Personally
Oh, god damn it. I meant to record the premiere episode of Dollhouse tonight and completely forgot to set it up. And my TiVo is already recording both Battlestar Galactica and Psych.
Geez. There are all of six TV shows I'm interested in following at the moment, and half of them are on in the same time slot?!
Well, maybe I'll be able to watch it online somewhere.
Geez. There are all of six TV shows I'm interested in following at the moment, and half of them are on in the same time slot?!
Well, maybe I'll be able to watch it online somewhere.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Happy Scaper
I got my copy of the second Farscape comic in the mail today, and I've just finished reading it. If anything, I think I enjoyed it even more than the first one, though it seemed to be over even more quickly.
These characters? Are insane. I love them to bits.
These characters? Are insane. I love them to bits.
Monday, February 09, 2009
Random Link Time!
Previously on Lost: Mildly entertaining video about a guy who decides to watch all of Lost in one marathon sitting. It's his facial expressions and incoherent outbursts that really amuse me; I think it's possible to tell from them exactly which episodes he's watching. I believe I made some of those same noises, just not quite as close together. Warning: said outbursts contain spoilers through the end of season 4.
The Planetary Society's Year in Pictures: 2008: A nice overview of what's been going on in the solar system in the last year, with pretty pictures.
Space Station in the Moon: Speaking of pretty pictures, this image of the International Space Station flying in front of the moon is freaking amazing.
Pic Shows Man Robbing Stores With Klingon Sword: News article about a robber with a bat'leth. Except it really looks like a tiny, cheap knock-off. This man has no honor! What really amuses me, though, is that apparently both the clerks he held up were able to identify the weapon. Nerds are everywhere, man! We live on both sides of the law!
Star Trek: Trailer: The version of the Star Trek movie trailer that aired during the Super Bowl. I'm still not feeling good about it, even if the guy playing McCoy does seem to be doing his damndest to imitate DeForest Kelley's voice. (Note: video is only accessible to folks in the United States.)
The Planetary Society's Year in Pictures: 2008: A nice overview of what's been going on in the solar system in the last year, with pretty pictures.
Space Station in the Moon: Speaking of pretty pictures, this image of the International Space Station flying in front of the moon is freaking amazing.
Pic Shows Man Robbing Stores With Klingon Sword: News article about a robber with a bat'leth. Except it really looks like a tiny, cheap knock-off. This man has no honor! What really amuses me, though, is that apparently both the clerks he held up were able to identify the weapon. Nerds are everywhere, man! We live on both sides of the law!
Star Trek: Trailer: The version of the Star Trek movie trailer that aired during the Super Bowl. I'm still not feeling good about it, even if the guy playing McCoy does seem to be doing his damndest to imitate DeForest Kelley's voice. (Note: video is only accessible to folks in the United States.)
Sunday, February 08, 2009
More On The Inconvenient Nature Of Cats
When you want to sleep, they want you to get up. When you want to get up, they lie on top of you so you can't. They're like perverseness covered in fur.
Saturday, February 07, 2009
February Currently
Current clothes: Dark gray sweatpants. Light brown shirt with a drawing of some books on a shelf and the words "Life is short. Read fast," which is very much my personal philosophy. White socks. Black sneakers.
Current mood: Meh. Okay, I guess.
Current music: More random-shuffle stuff on the iPod. I don't quite remember what the last thing it served up was. I think maybe some Bowie.
Current annoyance: Various minor physical complaints, including the fact that I woke up with a tiny bit of a headache this morning, although I think that's fading now.
Current thing: It seems like I have been doing pretty much nothing with my life lately, except perhaps for indulging in random bouts of vague existential angst about how I'm not doing anything with my life. I think I need a vacation.
Current desktop picture: Still Sarah Jane Smith and friends.
Current book: A Trio for Lute by R.A. MacAvoy, which is actually a trilogy in one volume, consisting of Damiano, Damiano's Lute, and Raphael, about a young musician/wizard in 14th century Italy. I'm about halfway through the second book now. The plot is kind of slight -- at least so far -- and while the main character is pretty three-dimensional, I'm not finding him quite as engaging or sympathetic as the author was probably hoping for. But it's very smoothly written and pleasantly character-based, and free of the usual cliched fantasy tropes, so I'm definitely finding it worthwhile.
Current song in head: Doesn't seem to be one at the moment. Maybe the headache chased 'em all out.
Current DVD in player: Disc 3 of season three of The Pretender, which I am watching pretty slowly. I'm still enjoying it, but it's not eating my brain nearly as much as the previous two seasons. Which is probably a good thing. Also disc one of season 8 of South Park, which is my current "watching while I'm on the treadmill" show.
Current refreshment: Water. I also woke up feeling a little dehydrated, which may help explain the headache.
Current worry: I'm worried about my house cracking in half and falling down again. I really need to get the cracks in my concrete repaired, and maybe even have the foundation shored up, if it turns out to be necessary. I keep putting it off, though. I don't actually think I'll have too much trouble paying for it, I just don't want to deal with the hassle. Sigh.
Current thought: While I was writing this, Happiness the cat, who was sitting on the windowsill next to me, started making barfing noises. Not wanting her to throw up on the window, or anything underneath the window, I grabbed her and shoved her into the tiled utility room. She then proceeded to walk all the way through that room, and the one next to it, and the dining room, and on into the kitchen, vomiting a little all along the way. To make this even more entertaining, I was in the process of cleaning my glasses when she started this and threw them down somewhere when I went to grab her. And then, of course, I couldn't find them, because I couldn't see. Somebody remind me again why the heck I have cats? (Oh, wait. While I was proofreading this, Nova came up and climbed into my lap and started purring. Yeah, OK, I guess that's the reason.)
Current mood: Meh. Okay, I guess.
Current music: More random-shuffle stuff on the iPod. I don't quite remember what the last thing it served up was. I think maybe some Bowie.
Current annoyance: Various minor physical complaints, including the fact that I woke up with a tiny bit of a headache this morning, although I think that's fading now.
Current thing: It seems like I have been doing pretty much nothing with my life lately, except perhaps for indulging in random bouts of vague existential angst about how I'm not doing anything with my life. I think I need a vacation.
Current desktop picture: Still Sarah Jane Smith and friends.
Current book: A Trio for Lute by R.A. MacAvoy, which is actually a trilogy in one volume, consisting of Damiano, Damiano's Lute, and Raphael, about a young musician/wizard in 14th century Italy. I'm about halfway through the second book now. The plot is kind of slight -- at least so far -- and while the main character is pretty three-dimensional, I'm not finding him quite as engaging or sympathetic as the author was probably hoping for. But it's very smoothly written and pleasantly character-based, and free of the usual cliched fantasy tropes, so I'm definitely finding it worthwhile.
Current song in head: Doesn't seem to be one at the moment. Maybe the headache chased 'em all out.
Current DVD in player: Disc 3 of season three of The Pretender, which I am watching pretty slowly. I'm still enjoying it, but it's not eating my brain nearly as much as the previous two seasons. Which is probably a good thing. Also disc one of season 8 of South Park, which is my current "watching while I'm on the treadmill" show.
Current refreshment: Water. I also woke up feeling a little dehydrated, which may help explain the headache.
Current worry: I'm worried about my house cracking in half and falling down again. I really need to get the cracks in my concrete repaired, and maybe even have the foundation shored up, if it turns out to be necessary. I keep putting it off, though. I don't actually think I'll have too much trouble paying for it, I just don't want to deal with the hassle. Sigh.
Current thought: While I was writing this, Happiness the cat, who was sitting on the windowsill next to me, started making barfing noises. Not wanting her to throw up on the window, or anything underneath the window, I grabbed her and shoved her into the tiled utility room. She then proceeded to walk all the way through that room, and the one next to it, and the dining room, and on into the kitchen, vomiting a little all along the way. To make this even more entertaining, I was in the process of cleaning my glasses when she started this and threw them down somewhere when I went to grab her. And then, of course, I couldn't find them, because I couldn't see. Somebody remind me again why the heck I have cats? (Oh, wait. While I was proofreading this, Nova came up and climbed into my lap and started purring. Yeah, OK, I guess that's the reason.)
Friday, February 06, 2009
Today's List Of Annoyances
DVD-related things that annoy me:
- Double-sided DVDs. Dude, I like to be able to tell at a glance what the disc actually is, not to mention which direction I ought to put it into the machine. (Level of annoyance: low, if it means the DVDs are cheaper than they would be otherwise.)
- Title menus that force you to sit through some flashy FX or a video clip before you can access the damned menu. South Park, I'm lookin' at you! (Level of annoyance: moderate, particularly for discs with multiple TV show episodes that I'm not gonna watch all at once.)
- Spoilery images on episode menus. Um, guys? If the fact that the hero's girlfriend turns out to be a glowy-eyed alien is the big surprise plot twist, maybe it's a good idea not to show her being a glowy-eyed alien on the menu screen. And, why, yes, that is a real-world example. (Level of annoyance: high, although often it just ends up spoiling me for stuff I was pretty much expecting to happen, anyway.)
Tuesday, February 03, 2009
Welcome To The Future. Have A Pizza.
Ever since I hooked it up to the broadband, my TiVo keeps asking me whether I want it to order a pizza for me while I'm watching. I honestly can't decide whether this is an appalling example of the way in which modern society is trying to turn us all into complete lard-ass couch potatoes -- I mean, heaven forbid we should have to put down the remote control long enough to dial a phone for our food! -- or whether it's a really cool example of clever 21st century technology.
Of course, what it really is, no doubt, is a marketing stunt on the part of Domino's. But that goes right along with both couch potato-ism and 21st century technology, I guess.
Of course, what it really is, no doubt, is a marketing stunt on the part of Domino's. But that goes right along with both couch potato-ism and 21st century technology, I guess.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Oh, Yeah, I Do Have Random Links To Post.
In the absence of anything remotely interesting from yours truly, have some links:
Dave Barry Year in Review: Bailing out of 2008: Not exactly timely now, 28 days into the new year, but still amusing.
Jennifer 8. Lee: Who was General Tso?: Amusing and oddly fascinating lecture on Chinese food in America. I must admit, I always did kind of wonder who the heck General Tso was and why he had a chicken dish named after him. And, damn it, now I'm hungry...
The Best Cat Video You'll Ever See: After this, and you'll never have to watch another humorous cat video on YouTube ever again.
The 9 Reasons Doctor Who Is a Terrible Time Lord: Funny, affectionate snark from someone who clearly knows his Who (no matter how many humor-challenged commenters seem to think otherwise)
BOOM! Studios’ Chip Mosher on Hexed, Farscape and more: An interview with BOOM!'s sales and marketing guy about various comics, including Farscape.
Dave Barry Year in Review: Bailing out of 2008: Not exactly timely now, 28 days into the new year, but still amusing.
Jennifer 8. Lee: Who was General Tso?: Amusing and oddly fascinating lecture on Chinese food in America. I must admit, I always did kind of wonder who the heck General Tso was and why he had a chicken dish named after him. And, damn it, now I'm hungry...
The Best Cat Video You'll Ever See: After this, and you'll never have to watch another humorous cat video on YouTube ever again.
The 9 Reasons Doctor Who Is a Terrible Time Lord: Funny, affectionate snark from someone who clearly knows his Who (no matter how many humor-challenged commenters seem to think otherwise)
BOOM! Studios’ Chip Mosher on Hexed, Farscape and more: An interview with BOOM!'s sales and marketing guy about various comics, including Farscape.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Still Not Dead
I'm still not dead. Really. My sleeping patterns are still kind of fubared, however (although they are improving a bit), which means that I seem to spend most of my free time lately either sleeping (at strange hours) or trying not to fall asleep (and frequently failing). Which means that I have done very little worth speaking about in the last week.
Well, at least we have new TV... My reaction to Battlestar Galactica, oddly, is still to be perfectly interested in it while I'm actually watching it, and to immediately stop caring about its existence as soon as I turn off the TV. But I'm very much enjoying Lost, and the most recent episodes, pleasingly, give me what feels like the beginning of the glimmer of an inkling of the sense that things are developing in such a way that it will all make some vague kind of sense in the end.
Well, at least we have new TV... My reaction to Battlestar Galactica, oddly, is still to be perfectly interested in it while I'm actually watching it, and to immediately stop caring about its existence as soon as I turn off the TV. But I'm very much enjoying Lost, and the most recent episodes, pleasingly, give me what feels like the beginning of the glimmer of an inkling of the sense that things are developing in such a way that it will all make some vague kind of sense in the end.
Monday, January 19, 2009
I Aten't Dead. Also, Stuff.
Um, apparently it's been long enough since I actually posted anything here that people have started e-mailing me to make sure I'm not dead in a ditch or something. Well, no, I'm fine, just apparently deep in winter hibernation mode, in which my body moves slowly, my brain partly shuts down, and my blog goes sadly neglected.
But let's see what miscellaneous stuff has been happening in the last week that I can talk about...
1. We lost Ricardo Montalban, Patrick McGoohan, and now Bob May, the guy who played the robot on Lost in Space. It's been a bad week to be someone who's appeared in a genre TV show. I was the most bummed to hear about Montalban. I've watched The Wrath of Khan a truly disturbing number of times, and I never, ever, ever get tired of seeing Montalban doing his villainous thing.
2. Thanks to a $25 software upgrade, I can now send videos from my PC to my TiVo and watch 'em on my TV instantly. This came in really handy when the TiVo missed Sunday's episode of The Mentalist thanks to a stupid football game running long. I love the internet, and I love finally being all WiFi'd!
3. I watched Wall-E on DVD yesterday. It's cute, beautifully animated, and features a nice environmental message, so I definitely enjoyed it. But, y'know, while I like Pixar's stuff a lot, and while it's fascinating to watch their animation improve over time, I still don't think they've ever surpassed Toy Story for quality.
4. I'm basically keeping 26-hour days right now, in an attempt to switch over from last week's night shifts to this weekend's day shifts. Today I went to bed about 1:30 PM and woke up a little after 9:00 PM. Sometimes, this works incredibly well, and I feel great, if a little out of sync with the world, and never suffer from a lack of sleep. Other times... Well, let's just say it doesn't combine all that effectively with aforementioned winter hibernation mode. I'm feeling really drag-ass this week. Also, I've gotten to the point where I'm suffering a noticeable sunlight deficit, which, considering what a night person I am, takes some doing.
5. It's Martin Luther King Day. I feel as if I ought to say something meaningful about that, but all I can think is, man, it's Martin Luther King Day, and tomorrow we are inaugurating a black man as president of the United States. King was a dreamer and an optimist, but I'm not sure even he would have believed it. It's a very warming thought.
And, uh, I think that's about all I have to say at this point. Here's hoping it's enough to tide you over if I randomly disappear for another week.
But let's see what miscellaneous stuff has been happening in the last week that I can talk about...
1. We lost Ricardo Montalban, Patrick McGoohan, and now Bob May, the guy who played the robot on Lost in Space. It's been a bad week to be someone who's appeared in a genre TV show. I was the most bummed to hear about Montalban. I've watched The Wrath of Khan a truly disturbing number of times, and I never, ever, ever get tired of seeing Montalban doing his villainous thing.
2. Thanks to a $25 software upgrade, I can now send videos from my PC to my TiVo and watch 'em on my TV instantly. This came in really handy when the TiVo missed Sunday's episode of The Mentalist thanks to a stupid football game running long. I love the internet, and I love finally being all WiFi'd!
3. I watched Wall-E on DVD yesterday. It's cute, beautifully animated, and features a nice environmental message, so I definitely enjoyed it. But, y'know, while I like Pixar's stuff a lot, and while it's fascinating to watch their animation improve over time, I still don't think they've ever surpassed Toy Story for quality.
4. I'm basically keeping 26-hour days right now, in an attempt to switch over from last week's night shifts to this weekend's day shifts. Today I went to bed about 1:30 PM and woke up a little after 9:00 PM. Sometimes, this works incredibly well, and I feel great, if a little out of sync with the world, and never suffer from a lack of sleep. Other times... Well, let's just say it doesn't combine all that effectively with aforementioned winter hibernation mode. I'm feeling really drag-ass this week. Also, I've gotten to the point where I'm suffering a noticeable sunlight deficit, which, considering what a night person I am, takes some doing.
5. It's Martin Luther King Day. I feel as if I ought to say something meaningful about that, but all I can think is, man, it's Martin Luther King Day, and tomorrow we are inaugurating a black man as president of the United States. King was a dreamer and an optimist, but I'm not sure even he would have believed it. It's a very warming thought.
And, uh, I think that's about all I have to say at this point. Here's hoping it's enough to tide you over if I randomly disappear for another week.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Look, Now I'm A Comic Book Reviewer!
A buddy of mine who posts over at Comic Book Resources' Robot 6 blog asked me if I'd write up a short review of the Farscape #1 comic for them. Why people think of me for things like that I'm sure I don't know. Heh.
Anyway, I did so, and if you're curious, it can be found here. It's really just some vague comments on how Farscape-y it is -- answer: very! -- and contains no spoilers or anything.
Anyway, I did so, and if you're curious, it can be found here. It's really just some vague comments on how Farscape-y it is -- answer: very! -- and contains no spoilers or anything.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
I Still May Not Have HD, But I'm Pushing My TV-Watching Forward Into The 21st Century In My Own Way.
I just tested it, and, thanks to my new state of wiredness, I can, indeed, talk to my TiVo over the internet and tell it to record stuff. If, say, I'm at work and somebody mentions that there's a really cool show on tonight while I'm stuck at the ol' data mines, never fear! Thanks to the power of the internet, that piece of televisual entertainment will be mine!
Of course, now that this is the case, that particular situation will probably never come up again.
Of course, now that this is the case, that particular situation will probably never come up again.
Wednesday, January 07, 2009
First "Currently" Meme Of The New Year! How Exciting!
Current clothes: Blue jeans. My "Irreversibly Contaminated" t-shirt from watchfarscape.com. Blue Blogger hoodie over that. White socks. (And, hey, speaking of Farscape... I got an e-mail a couple of days ago saying the store was at last getting ready to send me the Farscape comic I pre-ordered, but I still haven't seen one letting me know they've actually mailed it. Why, oh why, must they tease me so?!)
Current mood: Pretty good. It took four hours and half a pot of coffee, but I did finally manage to clear out the mental cobwebs left over from my strange awakening this morning.
Current music: You know, I haven't been listening to much music lately. I think the last thing was the soundtrack to Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog.
Current annoyance: There's a cat crawling around on my lap/desk/keyboard and making it difficult to type.
Current thing: Um, obsessing over TV shows, still, I guess. But I'm also blogging more! Look!
Current desktop picture: This picture of Sarah Jane Smith and her kick-ass kids.
Current book: The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil by Philip Zimbardo, creator of the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment. Not exactly a fun book, but a fascinating and rather enlightening one.
Current song in head: It's "Christmas at Ground Zero" by Weird Al Yankovic, for some reason. Which is better than most of the stuff that's been looping around in my skull for the last couple of weeks, so I'll take it.
Current DVD in player: Disc one of season three of The Pretender. I'm trying to stretch this season out a bit by interspersing it with some South Park, but I find myself starting to use it as an artificial mood-elevator. "Bah, I'm feeling cranky! I know! I'll watch a Pretender episode!" It works quite well, too, I think in large part because observing fictional characters' larger-than-life pain helps make my own trivial issues seem quite cheerfully bearable.
Current refreshment: Mint-flavored tea.
Current worry: Eh, there are plenty of things I could worry about, but why bother?
Current thought: My feet are cold.
Current mood: Pretty good. It took four hours and half a pot of coffee, but I did finally manage to clear out the mental cobwebs left over from my strange awakening this morning.
Current music: You know, I haven't been listening to much music lately. I think the last thing was the soundtrack to Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog.
Current annoyance: There's a cat crawling around on my lap/desk/keyboard and making it difficult to type.
Current thing: Um, obsessing over TV shows, still, I guess. But I'm also blogging more! Look!
Current desktop picture: This picture of Sarah Jane Smith and her kick-ass kids.
Current book: The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil by Philip Zimbardo, creator of the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment. Not exactly a fun book, but a fascinating and rather enlightening one.
Current song in head: It's "Christmas at Ground Zero" by Weird Al Yankovic, for some reason. Which is better than most of the stuff that's been looping around in my skull for the last couple of weeks, so I'll take it.
Current DVD in player: Disc one of season three of The Pretender. I'm trying to stretch this season out a bit by interspersing it with some South Park, but I find myself starting to use it as an artificial mood-elevator. "Bah, I'm feeling cranky! I know! I'll watch a Pretender episode!" It works quite well, too, I think in large part because observing fictional characters' larger-than-life pain helps make my own trivial issues seem quite cheerfully bearable.
Current refreshment: Mint-flavored tea.
Current worry: Eh, there are plenty of things I could worry about, but why bother?
Current thought: My feet are cold.
Life Is But A...
I just had the strangest experience while I was asleep. I was having some not-terribly-interesting dream about being at work, when one of the people in my dream, who'd been doing an increasingly good job of intruding himself on my attention, mentioned to me that it was, in fact, a dream. I thought he was nuts. Huh? What? Dude, I know solid reality when I feel it! But then he pointed out that every time I looked at somebody they were wearing different shoes. Whaddaya know. They were! He was right. And at this realization, of course, I woke up. (Amusingly, it was only after I woke up that I realized that the fact that one of said people appeared to be Mickey Smith from Doctor Who, and that he was wearing bowling shoes, should have been more of a tip off.)
Man. I've heard of lucid dreaming before, and I've had the experience of escaping from a nightmare by suddenly realizing that it's just a dream, but having people you're dreaming about come up and insist to you that it's not real? That's the sort of thing I thought only happened in unconvincing TV dream sequences.
Freaky. And now, damn it, I'm awake too early. And I'm going to be checking reality for inconsistencies all day.
Man. I've heard of lucid dreaming before, and I've had the experience of escaping from a nightmare by suddenly realizing that it's just a dream, but having people you're dreaming about come up and insist to you that it's not real? That's the sort of thing I thought only happened in unconvincing TV dream sequences.
Freaky. And now, damn it, I'm awake too early. And I'm going to be checking reality for inconsistencies all day.
Monday, January 05, 2009
To Boldly Go Where No Cartoon Has Gone Before!
So, as I mentioned a while back, I got a copy of Star Trek: The Animated Series on DVD for Christmas -- thanks again, Sis! -- and it's become my new cartoon show to watch while walking on the treadmill, since I finished watching all of Futurama (again).
You know, I had some pretty fond memories of that cartoon, but it'd been ages since I'd seen it, so I was kind of wondering how well it'd hold up. The answer turns out to be "surprisingly well." The scripts may vary widely in quality, but, just as I'd remembered, they do capture the feel of original-series episodes remarkably well in a half-hour format. And while the animation is a bit crude and static, in that 1970s kind of way, it's actually really impressive for its time. They clearly went to a lot of trouble to illustrate the original Enterprise sets accurately, and the exterior shots of the ship are downright beautiful. They also made full use of animation's ability to create elaborate and genuinely alien-looking environments in ways that can't be done cost-effectively in live action. Actually, to be honest, I think they frequently got a little too fanciful with the alien planets, but I can't fault them for trying. And the characters actually look reasonably like the people they're supposed to be, which is never a given in cases like this. The one big negative, really, is that they skimped a lot on the casting... Apparently the lack of Chekov was solely due to budget issues, and although Jimmy Doohan and Majel Barrett tried hard to vary their performances as nearly every guest character on the show, the constant doubling-up is still obvious enough to be a bit annoying.
Anyway, I'm feeling all nostalgic now. Awww. I like TNG, and think DS9 was great, but for all its cheesiness and occasional self-righteousness, TOS was just something special. And I do consider the animated series, if not exactly part of TOS, at least an extension of it. In fact, I may be unusual among Trek fans in that I happily consider the animated show part of the Trek canon -- despite a minor continuity issue or two -- but stubbornly toss Voyager and Enterprise out.
Yeah, never mind the new prequel/reboot thingy. I'll be over here, happily watching my cartoons.
You know, I had some pretty fond memories of that cartoon, but it'd been ages since I'd seen it, so I was kind of wondering how well it'd hold up. The answer turns out to be "surprisingly well." The scripts may vary widely in quality, but, just as I'd remembered, they do capture the feel of original-series episodes remarkably well in a half-hour format. And while the animation is a bit crude and static, in that 1970s kind of way, it's actually really impressive for its time. They clearly went to a lot of trouble to illustrate the original Enterprise sets accurately, and the exterior shots of the ship are downright beautiful. They also made full use of animation's ability to create elaborate and genuinely alien-looking environments in ways that can't be done cost-effectively in live action. Actually, to be honest, I think they frequently got a little too fanciful with the alien planets, but I can't fault them for trying. And the characters actually look reasonably like the people they're supposed to be, which is never a given in cases like this. The one big negative, really, is that they skimped a lot on the casting... Apparently the lack of Chekov was solely due to budget issues, and although Jimmy Doohan and Majel Barrett tried hard to vary their performances as nearly every guest character on the show, the constant doubling-up is still obvious enough to be a bit annoying.
Anyway, I'm feeling all nostalgic now. Awww. I like TNG, and think DS9 was great, but for all its cheesiness and occasional self-righteousness, TOS was just something special. And I do consider the animated series, if not exactly part of TOS, at least an extension of it. In fact, I may be unusual among Trek fans in that I happily consider the animated show part of the Trek canon -- despite a minor continuity issue or two -- but stubbornly toss Voyager and Enterprise out.
Yeah, never mind the new prequel/reboot thingy. I'll be over here, happily watching my cartoons.
I Am Wired!
Well, after many, many months worth of delays (which were to a large extent my own fault, as I kept saying, "Eh, I'll call them about it later" for month after month), I now finally have wireless networking set up at my house! I can surf the internet in bed if I want to! And I was at last able to remove that unsightly telephone wire connecting my TiVo to the phone jack in the kitchen. Huzzah!
Saturday, January 03, 2009
The Doctor Is In!
OK, the announcement has just come through, seconds ago on British TV! The new Doctor will be...
...drumroll please...
Don't look if you don't want to know!
It's...
...
...
...some guy I've never heard of!
Apparently the honor goes to one Matt Smith, and the fact that I've never heard of him probably counts in his favor, as far as I'm concerned. Every time we go through this, famous names get bandied about, and so far, every time they end up casting someone I don't know (or, in Christopher Eccleston's case, had seen in something once, but wouldn't have recognized if I'd passed him on the street), and every time it's worked out well -- all the more so, I think, because I get to meet the new guy as the Doctor, without any pesky preconceptions.
The only thing I'm a little uncertain about is the fact that, apparently, this guy is all of twenty-six. Twenty-six! Dude, the Doctor should not be a decade-plus younger than I am! Should he?
...drumroll please...
Don't look if you don't want to know!
It's...
...
...
...some guy I've never heard of!
Apparently the honor goes to one Matt Smith, and the fact that I've never heard of him probably counts in his favor, as far as I'm concerned. Every time we go through this, famous names get bandied about, and so far, every time they end up casting someone I don't know (or, in Christopher Eccleston's case, had seen in something once, but wouldn't have recognized if I'd passed him on the street), and every time it's worked out well -- all the more so, I think, because I get to meet the new guy as the Doctor, without any pesky preconceptions.
The only thing I'm a little uncertain about is the fact that, apparently, this guy is all of twenty-six. Twenty-six! Dude, the Doctor should not be a decade-plus younger than I am! Should he?
Friday, January 02, 2009
Who's It Gonna Be?
Apparently the BBC ia planning to announce the identity of the actor to play the Eleventh Doctor tomorrow. Time to make your last-minute predictions and place your last-minute bets!
Thursday, January 01, 2009
My Year In Books
Traditionally on New Year's Day, I make a post looking back on the last year's worth of book-reading, and I see no reason to break with that tradition now. So here then, is the complete list of books I read in 2008. The grand total is 161, which seems quite respectable, even by my biblioholic standards. Given that number, though, it's a bit sobering to contemplate the fact that I started the year with 465 volumes on my unread pile and ended it with 453. And that's with the self-imposed (and more or less adhered-to) book-buying quota. My addiction, let me show you it!
I'll refrain from attempting to identify major trends in the year's reading, except to mention the obvious (to me, anyway) fact that I'm reading a lot more non-fiction than I used to. In fact, by the end of the year, the fiction/non-fiction ratio was pretty much one-to-one, with the two mainly alternating. Part of the reason for this is that I've been buying a lot more non-fiction, and at this point I literally have no more room for it on the unread non-fiction shelves, so I have to keep reading it, or I'll have nowhere to put it.
Despite my notorious inability to be decisive enough to feel comfortable making best-of lists of anything, I did sort of put together a "favorite books I read this year" list. It is, I should note, extremely subjective, being based more on personal interest and enjoyment than on any judgments about cultural importance or literary value. It's also to a large extent arbitrary, as there are lots of other books that could just as easily have made the cut, and if I were to draw up a list of honorable mentions, it would be several times as long. And I haven't even attempted to put them into any order except the order I read them in. But here we go...
Ten Favorite Books of 2008:
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach: OK, I have to admit it. Even thinking about dead bodies creeps me out. I don't even attend funerals if I can avoid them, and you won't get me near an open casket. So I was reluctant to read this book even though I'd heard all about how cool and non-icky it was. Well, you know what? It's wonderful: well-written, thoughtful, compassionate, fascinating, and genuinely funny. I actually feel, if not better about death, at least much less squicked out by the subject than I did before reading this. I've also come to the conclusion that I actually very much like the idea of donating my body to science when I'm done with it. (If any of my next-of-kin are reading this, feel free to make a note!)
Soon I Will Be Invincible by Alan Grossman: I've never been a huge comic book geek, certainly not nearly as into the whole superhero genre as... well, as most people I know. But I do love seeing writers play around with superhero tropes in thoughtful and original ways, and this novel does a terrific job of that. It's impossible not to find the supervillain anti-hero both sympathetic and interesting.
Fray by Joss Whedon: Yes, it really has taken me this long to get around to reading this! Hey, I was late to discover Buffy in the first place, too. But it's a very good addition to the Buffy universe, capturing much of the sensibility of the TV show while still being very much its own story, with its own well-realized science fictional setting. I'm not entirely sure how it reconciles with the end of the series, continuity-wise, but I don't honestly care all that much.
Your Inner Fish: A Journey Into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body by Neil Shubin: It may be just me, but there's something unbelievably, incredibly cool about being able to trace your own evolutionary lineage. I kept constantly looking up from this book to gaze in fascination at my own hands, picturing where all those little bones had come from, and where, in other creatures, they had gone. Understanding evolution means understanding the ways in which you are connected to all other life on this amazing planet, and that's such a rich, uplifting, and satisfying thing.
A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon: A fairly lightweight, if slightly dark-ish comedy about a dysfunctional English family -- not really the sort of thing that usually grabs me and takes over my brain. But I was surprised how utterly absorbing I found it.
The Secret Life Of Houdini: The Making of America's First Superhero by William Kalush and Larry Sloman: A fascinating biography of a fascinating person who did some astonishing things.
Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Autobiography of a woman who grew up in various Muslim countries before emigrating to Holland, where she became involved in Dutch politics. It's an enthralling, informative, insightful, occasionally disturbing story, and it certainly helped open my eyes to the complexity of the Muslim world and the role of women in that world today.
The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi: Coincidentally, another memoir of a woman growing up in a Muslim country (in this case Iran) and relocating to the West, this time in graphic novel format. This one, too, is highly moving and informative.
Bone: One Volume Edition by Jeff Smith: The cute, simple style of the artwork in this graphic novel gives a pretty good indication that this story will be funny and charming, but I wasn't at all expecting it to be as deep, nuanced, and downright epic as it was.
The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream by Barack Obama: Even when I don't entirely agree with him, this guy comes across as thoughtful, reasonable, intelligent, level-headed, and full of genuine integrity. He's making it very, very hard to hold onto my political cynicism, and, I must say, that's a really pleasant, if slightly scary, feeling.
I'll refrain from attempting to identify major trends in the year's reading, except to mention the obvious (to me, anyway) fact that I'm reading a lot more non-fiction than I used to. In fact, by the end of the year, the fiction/non-fiction ratio was pretty much one-to-one, with the two mainly alternating. Part of the reason for this is that I've been buying a lot more non-fiction, and at this point I literally have no more room for it on the unread non-fiction shelves, so I have to keep reading it, or I'll have nowhere to put it.
Despite my notorious inability to be decisive enough to feel comfortable making best-of lists of anything, I did sort of put together a "favorite books I read this year" list. It is, I should note, extremely subjective, being based more on personal interest and enjoyment than on any judgments about cultural importance or literary value. It's also to a large extent arbitrary, as there are lots of other books that could just as easily have made the cut, and if I were to draw up a list of honorable mentions, it would be several times as long. And I haven't even attempted to put them into any order except the order I read them in. But here we go...
Ten Favorite Books of 2008:
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach: OK, I have to admit it. Even thinking about dead bodies creeps me out. I don't even attend funerals if I can avoid them, and you won't get me near an open casket. So I was reluctant to read this book even though I'd heard all about how cool and non-icky it was. Well, you know what? It's wonderful: well-written, thoughtful, compassionate, fascinating, and genuinely funny. I actually feel, if not better about death, at least much less squicked out by the subject than I did before reading this. I've also come to the conclusion that I actually very much like the idea of donating my body to science when I'm done with it. (If any of my next-of-kin are reading this, feel free to make a note!)
Soon I Will Be Invincible by Alan Grossman: I've never been a huge comic book geek, certainly not nearly as into the whole superhero genre as... well, as most people I know. But I do love seeing writers play around with superhero tropes in thoughtful and original ways, and this novel does a terrific job of that. It's impossible not to find the supervillain anti-hero both sympathetic and interesting.
Fray by Joss Whedon: Yes, it really has taken me this long to get around to reading this! Hey, I was late to discover Buffy in the first place, too. But it's a very good addition to the Buffy universe, capturing much of the sensibility of the TV show while still being very much its own story, with its own well-realized science fictional setting. I'm not entirely sure how it reconciles with the end of the series, continuity-wise, but I don't honestly care all that much.
Your Inner Fish: A Journey Into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body by Neil Shubin: It may be just me, but there's something unbelievably, incredibly cool about being able to trace your own evolutionary lineage. I kept constantly looking up from this book to gaze in fascination at my own hands, picturing where all those little bones had come from, and where, in other creatures, they had gone. Understanding evolution means understanding the ways in which you are connected to all other life on this amazing planet, and that's such a rich, uplifting, and satisfying thing.
A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon: A fairly lightweight, if slightly dark-ish comedy about a dysfunctional English family -- not really the sort of thing that usually grabs me and takes over my brain. But I was surprised how utterly absorbing I found it.
The Secret Life Of Houdini: The Making of America's First Superhero by William Kalush and Larry Sloman: A fascinating biography of a fascinating person who did some astonishing things.
Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Autobiography of a woman who grew up in various Muslim countries before emigrating to Holland, where she became involved in Dutch politics. It's an enthralling, informative, insightful, occasionally disturbing story, and it certainly helped open my eyes to the complexity of the Muslim world and the role of women in that world today.
The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi: Coincidentally, another memoir of a woman growing up in a Muslim country (in this case Iran) and relocating to the West, this time in graphic novel format. This one, too, is highly moving and informative.
Bone: One Volume Edition by Jeff Smith: The cute, simple style of the artwork in this graphic novel gives a pretty good indication that this story will be funny and charming, but I wasn't at all expecting it to be as deep, nuanced, and downright epic as it was.
The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream by Barack Obama: Even when I don't entirely agree with him, this guy comes across as thoughtful, reasonable, intelligent, level-headed, and full of genuine integrity. He's making it very, very hard to hold onto my political cynicism, and, I must say, that's a really pleasant, if slightly scary, feeling.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Swiftly Now The Old Year Passes.
Happy New Year, everybody! As I write this, we have a little over six hours of 2008 left here, and my neighbors have already started with the fireworks.
2008's been a fairly interesting year for me, I guess, mostly notably as The Year I Went to Australia, but also as The Year the Guy I Voted for Actually Won, and possibly also The Year of Too Many Computer Issues. Or, indulging my fangirl side, The Year of Donna Noble or The Year The Pretender Ate My Brain. Well, that's all much, much better than thinking of it as The Year the Entire Economy Collapsed in on Itself, anyway.
Whatever kind of year it's been for the rest of you, here's wishing you a bigger, better, brighter 2009! Don't party too hard, now.
2008's been a fairly interesting year for me, I guess, mostly notably as The Year I Went to Australia, but also as The Year the Guy I Voted for Actually Won, and possibly also The Year of Too Many Computer Issues. Or, indulging my fangirl side, The Year of Donna Noble or The Year The Pretender Ate My Brain. Well, that's all much, much better than thinking of it as The Year the Entire Economy Collapsed in on Itself, anyway.
Whatever kind of year it's been for the rest of you, here's wishing you a bigger, better, brighter 2009! Don't party too hard, now.
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Happy Merriness!
Here's wishing a Merry Christmas to those who celebrate, and a general merriness to all! I'm having a pleasantly lazy and low-key holiday, myself... I did have an invitation to Christmas dinner in Albuquerque, but chose to stay here in town this year, instead. Which, nice as it would have been to see the folks in question, I think was a good call, as a bit of relaxing downtime seems to be exactly what I needed this week.
Festiveness has happened, in any case. Yesterday, I made myself a nice Christmas Eve dinner, then opened my presents at midnight. Today, I might or might not visit friends in town, and later there will be Doctor Who. What more could one ask for?
Speaking of presents, this year I got:
My sister, by the way, wins the Coolest Santa award for the animated Trek DVDs, which I have been wanting forever. Yay! And a giant "thank you!" to all the lovely, lovely people who think of me at Christmas, whether gifts are involved in the process or not. *hugs you all*
I only hope the stuff I got for other people makes them half as happy!
Festiveness has happened, in any case. Yesterday, I made myself a nice Christmas Eve dinner, then opened my presents at midnight. Today, I might or might not visit friends in town, and later there will be Doctor Who. What more could one ask for?
Speaking of presents, this year I got:
- A copy of SpaceShipOne: An Illustrated History.
- In the Shadow of the Moon on DVD.
- Star Trek: The Animated Series.
- Two generous Amazon gift certificates.
- Tourist Season and Stormy Weather by Carl Hiaasen. (From my LibraryThing Secret Santa!)
- A wonderfully silly, colorful hand-knit hat.
- A chocolate mouse in a Santa hat that was almost too cute too eat. (Not that that's stopping me!)
My sister, by the way, wins the Coolest Santa award for the animated Trek DVDs, which I have been wanting forever. Yay! And a giant "thank you!" to all the lovely, lovely people who think of me at Christmas, whether gifts are involved in the process or not. *hugs you all*
I only hope the stuff I got for other people makes them half as happy!
Monday, December 22, 2008
I Can Haz Internet!
It seemed like a simple, five-minute exercise, involving installing one piece of software and getting one piece of information over the phone. And then, it seemed like it had broken my computer. And then, after I carefully unbroke the computer, it seemed like it wasn't working correctly, and then after that, I started randomly poking things, and then it wasn't working at all.
But I kicked it one last time, and, lo, I have wireless! And there was much rejoicing!
Except now in a couple of weeks, they're going to come and replace my old PCI card with a radio that should allow me to actually get some networking going on in here, finally. Which will doubtless break stuff all over again, because that's how this sort of thing goes.
Never mind! I has internet! Not that I really ought to be typing right now, since I was up working all night, spent all morning mucking about with the computer, and am starting to get punchy. Of course, at this point, I might as well just stay up...
But I kicked it one last time, and, lo, I have wireless! And there was much rejoicing!
Except now in a couple of weeks, they're going to come and replace my old PCI card with a radio that should allow me to actually get some networking going on in here, finally. Which will doubtless break stuff all over again, because that's how this sort of thing goes.
Never mind! I has internet! Not that I really ought to be typing right now, since I was up working all night, spent all morning mucking about with the computer, and am starting to get punchy. Of course, at this point, I might as well just stay up...
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Behold! Random Links!
Time to do this, I guess, since I have decent internet access at the moment.
TIGERS LEOPARDS vs Pumpkins!: Video of big cats playing with pumpkins. It's remarkable how much they remind me of my own cats.
6 Famous Unsolved Mysteries (With Really Obvious Solutions): Not all that mysterious, perhaps, but very funny. Remember folks, some things really do have simple explanations!
Exclusive Farscape Interview: A nice interview with Keith R. A. DeCandido and Matt Gagnon, writer and editor, respectively, of the upcoming Farscape comics. Warning: contains spoilers for the TV miniseries!
Majel B. Roddenberry, wife of 'Star Trek' creator, dies: A lot of people sent me this news while I was having my computer issues, so I thought I'd at least link to an obituary. I suppose it's inevitable that we'd start losing the original Trek actors in a steady stream eventually, but it still makes me sad.
Caprica Promo Now Live: Promo for the new Battlestar Galactica prequel, Caprica. I have no idea whether this is going to be worth watching or not -- I'm always leery about prequels -- but the promo at least looks kind of interesting.
ST:XI-The animated episode: The sound from the ST:XI movie trailer, set to images from the 70s animated Trek series. Personally, I think that makes it about ten times more appealing. But then, I liked the cartoon series.
Top Ten Astronomy Pictures of 2008: The Bad Astronomer picks his top space images of the year. Man, what a cool, cool universe we live in.
Mmmm, Delicious Gingerbread Geekery: Yes, it's geeky gingerbread! I think I like the K-9 best.
TIGERS LEOPARDS vs Pumpkins!: Video of big cats playing with pumpkins. It's remarkable how much they remind me of my own cats.
6 Famous Unsolved Mysteries (With Really Obvious Solutions): Not all that mysterious, perhaps, but very funny. Remember folks, some things really do have simple explanations!
Exclusive Farscape Interview: A nice interview with Keith R. A. DeCandido and Matt Gagnon, writer and editor, respectively, of the upcoming Farscape comics. Warning: contains spoilers for the TV miniseries!
Majel B. Roddenberry, wife of 'Star Trek' creator, dies: A lot of people sent me this news while I was having my computer issues, so I thought I'd at least link to an obituary. I suppose it's inevitable that we'd start losing the original Trek actors in a steady stream eventually, but it still makes me sad.
Caprica Promo Now Live: Promo for the new Battlestar Galactica prequel, Caprica. I have no idea whether this is going to be worth watching or not -- I'm always leery about prequels -- but the promo at least looks kind of interesting.
ST:XI-The animated episode: The sound from the ST:XI movie trailer, set to images from the 70s animated Trek series. Personally, I think that makes it about ten times more appealing. But then, I liked the cartoon series.
Top Ten Astronomy Pictures of 2008: The Bad Astronomer picks his top space images of the year. Man, what a cool, cool universe we live in.
Mmmm, Delicious Gingerbread Geekery: Yes, it's geeky gingerbread! I think I like the K-9 best.
Season's Greetings!
A happy winter solstice to all of you! Except for those of you in the southern hemisphere. Happy summer solstice to you. Now, give us our sun back.
Saturday, December 20, 2008
A Note, Upon Looking Back At This Month's Posts
Wow, I've done almost nothing this month except whine about computer problems, haven't I?
Update On The Computer Saga
So, the PC is back up and running, and apparently behaving itself as I slowly work on reinstalling everything that needs to be reinstalled. The earlier problem, as I'd suspected/hoped, was simply that a bunch of drivers needed to be installed, but it's remarkably difficult to get that done when you don't have a decent internet connection, and the driver disc that came with the computer was much less useful than you might imagine. Fortunately, my buddy and his broadband came through for me!
Unfortunately, I still don't have broadband, as there's more stuff that needs to be installed and set up properly to get my wireless working again. I'm really hoping I can get that dealt with soon. In the meantime, hey, at least working twelve-hour night shifts on the weekend means twelve hours a day of net access at work.
So, that's where things stand at the moment. What the heck. I'll take it.
Unfortunately, I still don't have broadband, as there's more stuff that needs to be installed and set up properly to get my wireless working again. I'm really hoping I can get that dealt with soon. In the meantime, hey, at least working twelve-hour night shifts on the weekend means twelve hours a day of net access at work.
So, that's where things stand at the moment. What the heck. I'll take it.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Even More Woe
Have new hard drive. Have re-installed Windows. Many, many things now appear not to work.
Sigh. This may be a while.
Sigh. This may be a while.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Woe, Cont.
Well, apparently the hard drive is dead. Gaaah. I am really, really, really relieved that I had the sense to back stuff like the music files and my documents up a few days ago. Considering how lax I usually am about that sort of thing, the timing, frankly, could not have been better. If, you know, there were ever a good time for your hard drive to die. Which there isn't. Regardless, I am so not looking forward to having to reinstall every damn thing. Sigh.
My friend might not have been able to revive the drive from the dead -- some things are, alas, beyond even the geekiest among us -- but he and his wife are going to be in Albuquerque on Thursday and offered to pick me up a new one while they're there. He even found one on sale! So that's something, anyway.
In the meantime, I'm still on laptop dialup here at home. I'm going to try to take that as a sign to spend less time on the internet for a couple of days, but that thought really does make me all twitchy.
My friend might not have been able to revive the drive from the dead -- some things are, alas, beyond even the geekiest among us -- but he and his wife are going to be in Albuquerque on Thursday and offered to pick me up a new one while they're there. He even found one on sale! So that's something, anyway.
In the meantime, I'm still on laptop dialup here at home. I'm going to try to take that as a sign to spend less time on the internet for a couple of days, but that thought really does make me all twitchy.
Monday, December 15, 2008
Woe.
My computer crashed. Sigh.
Fortunately, I have the laptop. Unfortunately, for stupid reasons that are, frankly, far too boring to get into here, I can only access the internet from the laptop here at home via dialup. And, man, that's even slower and more annoying than I remember it being.
I have no idea what the PC's problem is, unless maybe it's some kind of disc issue. Will go and beg one of my geekiest friends for help tomorrow. Remarkably, though, I am not really panicking, as I just backed up pretty much all my important files a couple of days ago.
Anyway. It seems likely that my presence on the internet may be more sporadic than usual for the next few days... Not that anybody who's main contact with me is following this blog is likely to notice, admittedly.
Fortunately, I have the laptop. Unfortunately, for stupid reasons that are, frankly, far too boring to get into here, I can only access the internet from the laptop here at home via dialup. And, man, that's even slower and more annoying than I remember it being.
I have no idea what the PC's problem is, unless maybe it's some kind of disc issue. Will go and beg one of my geekiest friends for help tomorrow. Remarkably, though, I am not really panicking, as I just backed up pretty much all my important files a couple of days ago.
Anyway. It seems likely that my presence on the internet may be more sporadic than usual for the next few days... Not that anybody who's main contact with me is following this blog is likely to notice, admittedly.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
If You're Relying On My Navigation Skills, Lost In The Woods Is Definitely Where You Will Be.
You Are a Gingerbread House |
 A little spicy and a little sweet, anyone would like to be lost in the woods with you. |
In other news, I think I have all my Christmas shopping done now. Or I hope I do. It happened rather haphazardly this year, I admit.
Tuesday, December 09, 2008
No, Really, I'm Still Alive! I Have A Meme And Everything!
Current clothes: A blue-green sweater. Well, blue-green with a tiny bit of black. It's got... Oh, what do you call a neck that's about the height of a turtleneck, but doesn't roll up? I swear, I don't know words for clothes. Also, blue jeans, white socks, black slippers.
Current mood: OK. A little tired and distracted. I had a boring day at work, trying and failing to concentrate on stuff I should have been working on.
Current music: Random tunes on the iPod again. I think most recently some Leonard Cohen and some Jimmy Buffett.
Current annoyance: I still have a wet, hacking cough. It comes and it goes, but when it really gets going, it's annoying as hell. Plus, it's cold and damp today -- an unusual combination here -- and that's not really helping.
Current thing: So, a little while back a friend of mine started watching The Pretender -- a show from the mid-90s that I somehow never got around to checking out when it was on -- fell in love with it, and insisted I had to start watching it too so she could talk to me about it. Being the accommodating sort that I am, I did so with only a token amount of protest, and it then proceeded to completely eat my brain. When I said in the last post that I'd been marathoning this show, that's not really accurate. What I've mostly been doing is spending 45 minutes every day watching an episode, and then many hours having thoughts and conversations along the lines of, "Oooh! The way character A said thing B in scene C, it made me wonder if he meant thing D about E's relationship with F, which got me to thinking about how that reflects thematic element G and makes me feel emotion H about possibility I..." Which, okay, is a thing I do, and, to be honest, is one of my great joys in life. But this is just about the unlikeliest show to provoke that kind of obsession ever. It's basically a gimmicky, formulaic 80s-style action/crime/drama thing -- my friend described that part of it, aptly enough, as "Quantum Leap meets The A-Team" -- with a sort of X-Files type shadowy conspiracy arc thing grafted rather oddly onto it. And it works infinitely better than it has any earthly right to, even when it's doing stuff that, on almost any other show, would seem far too cheesy to bear. I'm still not sure what the hell it is about it that's plunged me firmly into obsessive-fan mode, but I'll give a lot of credit to an astonishingly talented cast, some really good directing, a tendency to push their pet thematic issues as far as they'll possibly go, and a remarkable shades-of-gray sensibility that kind of sneaks up on you.
Current desktop picture: Still Rigel and the Witch Head Nebula. Maybe I should change it back to the wreath-on-the-TARDIS one now.
Current book: A Confederation of Valor by Tanya Huff. This is actually a compilation of the first two novels in a series: Valor's Choice and The Better Part of Valor. I got this book as part of LibraryThing's Secret Santa exchange last year, and am only just now getting around to reading it. Which I feel a bit ashamed about, but a 450-book backlog will do that to ya. Anyway, I'm most of the way through the first one now, and am really enjoying it. I'd call it Military SF, but it definitely has a stronger focus on character and dialog than on action and technology. Not that it's lacking in action; I actually think it'd adapt really well as a movie.
Current song in head: "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free" by Sting has been popping up in my brain off and on for the last couple of weeks.
Current DVD in player: Most recently, disc 6 of Season 2 of The Pretender. Which is as far as I've gotten as of yet. I've got four more episodes to go in this season, and then I'm going to take a break and watch something else while my brain recovers.
Current refreshment: Just finished some lemon-ginger green tea. Which totally tasted like more, except there's a cat on my lap preventing me from getting up and making any. Woe.
Current worry: I'm mildly worried about getting enough sleep on Friday night, because I keep falling asleep at 2AM, and I've got to work at 7:45 AM on Saturday. But, eh, that's days away.
Current thought: No, sorry. My mind just went completely blank.
Current mood: OK. A little tired and distracted. I had a boring day at work, trying and failing to concentrate on stuff I should have been working on.
Current music: Random tunes on the iPod again. I think most recently some Leonard Cohen and some Jimmy Buffett.
Current annoyance: I still have a wet, hacking cough. It comes and it goes, but when it really gets going, it's annoying as hell. Plus, it's cold and damp today -- an unusual combination here -- and that's not really helping.
Current thing: So, a little while back a friend of mine started watching The Pretender -- a show from the mid-90s that I somehow never got around to checking out when it was on -- fell in love with it, and insisted I had to start watching it too so she could talk to me about it. Being the accommodating sort that I am, I did so with only a token amount of protest, and it then proceeded to completely eat my brain. When I said in the last post that I'd been marathoning this show, that's not really accurate. What I've mostly been doing is spending 45 minutes every day watching an episode, and then many hours having thoughts and conversations along the lines of, "Oooh! The way character A said thing B in scene C, it made me wonder if he meant thing D about E's relationship with F, which got me to thinking about how that reflects thematic element G and makes me feel emotion H about possibility I..." Which, okay, is a thing I do, and, to be honest, is one of my great joys in life. But this is just about the unlikeliest show to provoke that kind of obsession ever. It's basically a gimmicky, formulaic 80s-style action/crime/drama thing -- my friend described that part of it, aptly enough, as "Quantum Leap meets The A-Team" -- with a sort of X-Files type shadowy conspiracy arc thing grafted rather oddly onto it. And it works infinitely better than it has any earthly right to, even when it's doing stuff that, on almost any other show, would seem far too cheesy to bear. I'm still not sure what the hell it is about it that's plunged me firmly into obsessive-fan mode, but I'll give a lot of credit to an astonishingly talented cast, some really good directing, a tendency to push their pet thematic issues as far as they'll possibly go, and a remarkable shades-of-gray sensibility that kind of sneaks up on you.
Current desktop picture: Still Rigel and the Witch Head Nebula. Maybe I should change it back to the wreath-on-the-TARDIS one now.
Current book: A Confederation of Valor by Tanya Huff. This is actually a compilation of the first two novels in a series: Valor's Choice and The Better Part of Valor. I got this book as part of LibraryThing's Secret Santa exchange last year, and am only just now getting around to reading it. Which I feel a bit ashamed about, but a 450-book backlog will do that to ya. Anyway, I'm most of the way through the first one now, and am really enjoying it. I'd call it Military SF, but it definitely has a stronger focus on character and dialog than on action and technology. Not that it's lacking in action; I actually think it'd adapt really well as a movie.
Current song in head: "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free" by Sting has been popping up in my brain off and on for the last couple of weeks.
Current DVD in player: Most recently, disc 6 of Season 2 of The Pretender. Which is as far as I've gotten as of yet. I've got four more episodes to go in this season, and then I'm going to take a break and watch something else while my brain recovers.
Current refreshment: Just finished some lemon-ginger green tea. Which totally tasted like more, except there's a cat on my lap preventing me from getting up and making any. Woe.
Current worry: I'm mildly worried about getting enough sleep on Friday night, because I keep falling asleep at 2AM, and I've got to work at 7:45 AM on Saturday. But, eh, that's days away.
Current thought: No, sorry. My mind just went completely blank.
Thursday, December 04, 2008
Well, This Is My Life. Really, You Ought To Have Known It Was Like This When You Started Reading.
Apparently it's been a full week since I last updated my blog. I'd like to say that this is because I've been incredibly busy cleaning the entire house, or exploring the Amazon or something, but mostly I've just been marathoning episodes of The Pretender.
So, uh, how about you guys? Found a cure for the common cold in the last week or so? Watched any good television? Found any more interesting blogs?
So, uh, how about you guys? Found a cure for the common cold in the last week or so? Watched any good television? Found any more interesting blogs?
Thursday, November 27, 2008
T-Day
I am back! Turkey was eaten, and it was good. And the internet was working when I returned. Yay!
(Now I am way tireder than I have any right to be at 6:30 PM, though. I have no idea why driving takes it out of me so much.)
Hope all the rest of you have had a great day, whatever you've spent it doing!
(Now I am way tireder than I have any right to be at 6:30 PM, though. I have no idea why driving takes it out of me so much.)
Hope all the rest of you have had a great day, whatever you've spent it doing!
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