Well, At Least They Keep Life Interesting

Dear cats,

If you absolutely must throw up, there are good places to do it, such as on the easily cleaned tile floor. There are bad places, such as on the carpet. And then there are OMGWTF?! places, such as in your water dish.

For the love of catnip, could you please, please try to avoid those last two?

Frustrated affection,
Me

(Man. I thought I was long since done being grossed out over cat vomit. Gaaah.)

I Know I've Remarked On This Phenomenon Before, But I Think I Bears Repeating.

You know, I was all set earlier to make a blog post about what an incredibly annoying day I've been having. But then, over my long-delayed lunch, I sat down and watched an episode of Farscape. (I've been slowly re-watching it and have just hit the end of season 1.) Man, that show always makes me feel so much better about my own life. Sure, I had to do some yardwork today, and it was hot and tiring and left me with trembly muscles. But, hey, it didn't involve exposure to the vacuum of space! Yes, I had to run a bunch of errands, but none of them ended with people shooting at me. My house may need a gazillion repairs and my car may have had battery problems again, but neither of them is psychotic... or pregnant... or on fire. Lunch may have been delayed, but at least I had more than crackers to eat. I may still have the remnants of a cold, but it's nothing compared to that plague that makes your skin slough off. No one is trying to kill me, enslave me, or dissect my brain. And none of my mortal enemies have moved in with me. Heck, I don't even have any mortal enemies.

Contemplating all this has now made me feel downright cheerful. I honestly do think that this is one of the important functions of fiction.

Wait, It's What Now?

How did it get to be September? I'm not sure I'm really ready for it to be September yet. Even if it does mean I get to buy more books.

Unproductive

Well, today has pretty much been a giant waste. I have a ton of things I really want to get done, now that I'm back from my brief travels and still have some time off. But, gah... I feel well enough that I want to be up and doing things, but unwell enough that I don't want to get up and do things. A subtle distinction, but a crucial one.

Sigh. Well, at least I'm getting some reading done. That counts as an accomplishment, right? Considering that the To-Read Pile is currently sitting at 430 volumes...

What I Did On My Vacation (Part 2: Pictures)

As promised, some pictures of My Colorado (and a Bit of New Mexico) Vacation.

Here's the Gila cliff dwellings. Or at least, the cliff. Though if you look closely -- try clicking on the picture for a bigger version -- you can see the structures inside the cave. My apologies for not getting any close-up pics.



Here are a couple of cool rock formations in the Garden of the Gods park:





And several pictures from Pike's Peak. Here's the train at the top of the mountain:



A couple of views from the summit (which is less impressive in photographs than it is in person):





And, oh, look, it's me:

In Other News...

I think someone in Colorado gave me a cold. The nose is a bit snotty, and the throat is distinctly sore.

Stupid Coloradans.

What I Did On My Vacation (Part 1: Text)

I am now back from my travels, although still very tired and a bit behind on things, and Mom has been dispatched on her way home. (She wasn't sure whether she was going to be leaving today or tomorrow, but decided she really wanted to start back so she'd have time to rest up and take care of some things before having to go back to work.)

We basically did two trips. The first was a day trip to the Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument. Mom picked this out as a spot she wanted to visit because it was a part of New Mexico she hadn't been to yet and she thought it looked interesting. Poor Mom; she got a bit of a shock when she realized just how mountainous and remote it was and just how many miles of very, very twisty mountain roads she was going to have to drive on. (Sorry, Mom! I thought you knew! Oops.) Harrowing as it may have been, though, it was still a gorgeous drive. We saw quite a few mule deer, both on the way out and the way back.

The cliff dwellings are well worth a visit, too. (I'd spent some time in the area back in college, camping and hiking, but never had gotten around to visiting the ruins, so was kind of glad to correct the oversight.) It's the remains of a fairly elaborate structure that was built into a high mountain cave about 700 years ago by a group of a few dozen Mogollon people. They were only there about thirty years, though, before a major drought forced them to relocate. Poor bastards. That must have been a lot of work for a home that turned out not to be permanent after all.

Anyway, that was Monday. Tuesday, we headed off on the second and main part of our trip. Originally this was going to be a much longer and more ambitious vacation. My sister was intending to join us, and we were going to take a full week or a bit longer and drive around Colorado and Utah, and I'm not sure where else. But my sister ended up having less vacation time than she'd expected and bowed out, Mom realized she needed to go somewhere else with someone else the week we'd originally planned on taking, and with one thing and another our road tour of the Southwest's national parks turned into a plan that, basically, consisted of "Well, let's just drive north!"

Now, a comfortable day's drive north from here takes you to Colorado Springs, which features a number of interesting attractions, so that's where we went. (For the fannish types in the audience: I kept my eyes open for off-duty Stargate personnel and/or aliens while we were there, but if there were any about, they were well disguised.) We got into Colorado Springs Tuesday evening, despite the best attempts of a truly apocalyptic rainstorm to kill us just before we got there. (Between that and the Winding Roads of Doom, I'm sure my mother is so glad she volunteered to drive. Heh.) We then found a restaurant featuring what I can quite confidently state must be the most transcendently delicious cornbread in the entire known universe. In fact, it was so good we had to go back the next day and have more of it. Mmmmmm.

Wednesday, we visited The Cave of the Winds. This is a smallish cave system, at least by Carlsbad Caverns standards, but it was interesting and the tour was fun. I never get tired of caves. I just find something wonderfully pleasant about the kind of cool, damp, dark atmosphere you get in caves. (So naturally, I live in the desert.) We then went to the Manitou Cliff Dwellings, which were a bit disappointing in their tourist trappiness after the Gila, but kind of fun to crawl around in. Then we drove around the Garden of the Gods park, which features some amazing rock formations, and had a nice little picnic. After which, unfortunately, Mom was feeling pretty tired, so we called it an early day.

Thursday, we took a ride on a cog train up Pike's Peak, which is a trip well worth making. It's about a three hour round trip, counting an hour's stop at the top of the mountain. Very pleasant ride, with some interesting commentary on the way up about the scenery and the history of the area and of the railroad. We were lucky enough to be sitting in the front row, too, so we got a great view out the front window. And, needless to say, the views from the 14,000-foot summit were spectacular.

And then, since it was still early enough to make the drive and get back here at a semi-reasonable hour, we got on the road again and were back in Socorro by about 10 PM.

I'm not sure whether that quite qualifies as a road trip or not, but it was a nice little mini-vacation. And since I took this weekend off, I'm not actually scheduled to go back into work until next Thursday, which is awesome.

And, yes, there will be pictures, after I bother getting them off my camera.

Off

So, my mother is coming into town sometime tonight, and we're going to spend a few days, I dunno, driving places and doing stuff. Meaning I'll probably mostly be offline for a while. Given my posting frequency of late, I doubt anyone will notice a difference, but if you send me any e-mail, say, in the next week or so and don't get a reply, it doesn't mean I'm ignoring you. Of course, for all you know I may be, but you shouldn't assume anything.

Rubbernecking

On the way home from Rifftrax in Albuquerque the other night, we passed what looked like every cop car in Belen clustered along I-25, but we couldn't see anything going on. One of the people in the car with me said it looked like a train was stopped, though. (Being as supremely unobservant as I am, I never saw it.)

Well, I just thought to check up on on it. Turns out it was the aftermath of this bizarre, but luckily non-fatal accident.

Even Though Albuquerque Is a 9 PM Town

Just got back from seeing Plan Nine from Outer Space with live snarktastic commentary from Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett, formerly of Mystery Science Theater 3000, now of the eerily similar but more internetty RiffTrax. (They were broadcasting from somewhere in Tennessee to theaters across the US, including, amazingly, Albuquerque.)

And it was hi-larious. Actually, I'd forgotten just how hilarious Plan 9 is all by itself; when they start "explaining" the mysterious nature of light rays I cannot help cracking up. And when these guys are on top of their game, they really bring the funny, transforming the merely absurd into the comically sublime. Or something like that... Anyway, it was immense fun.

I also ate a bunch of ribs, and accompanied some friends on geeky shopping trips instead of staying home for a few extra hours and cleaning my house. So, pretty much a good day all around.

See, I'm Still Not Dead. At Least, Not Until The Zombie Apocalypse. But While We Wait For That, Have Some More Random Links.

The "Doctor Who" Theme: Various versions of the Who theme, as found on YouTube. What's really scary is how many of these I have sitting on my iPod. Not to mention how many versions I have on my iPod that aren't here.

Futurama cast members ink new deal with Fox: First it was announced that Futurama would be back on television, and there was much rejoicing. Then it was put about that the voices would probably be recast, and there was much lamentation. Well, good news, everyone! Looks like the original cast is in after all! Whew. That's gonna save me a lot of time in the angry dome.

Inspired by Trek: Cool little blog post about NASA’s first African-American flight director honoring his Trekkish role model, Captain Ben Sisko.

When Zombies Attack!: Mathematical Modeling of an Outbreak of Zombie Infection (PDF): Mathematical predictions of the possible outcomes of a full-scale zombie apocalypse. Alas, the equations are not comforting...

Yes, It's This Again.

Current clothes: Gray sweatpants. A t-shirt from White Sands National Monument, which I'm sure I've described here in the past. White socks. Black sneakers.

Current mood: Not bad. Relaxed and lazy. Kind of hungry.

Current music: I think the last thing I listened to might have been part of The Who: The Ultimate Collection.

Current annoyance: Oh, all the usual things. Various minor physical complaints. The fact that my cats are capable of some very creative destructiveness. Not being able to spend 24 hours a day reading, meaning that I will never, ever catch up.

Current thing: Too lazy to have one right now.

Current desktop picture: This extremely cool picture of an erupting volcano.

Current book: Cat's Cradle: Witch Mark by Andrew Hunt. It's one of the Doctor Who New Adventures, although perhaps we ought to be calling them the Not-So-New Adventures now, as this particular book is from seventeen years and three Doctors ago. It's also very boring, which is a sad thing for a Doctor Who story.

Current song in head: It appears to be the theme song to The Banana Splits, which wormed its way into my brain while I was very young, and now pops up every so often at random just to confuse me.

Current DVD in player: One of the discs from The Avengers complete Emma Peel megaset. I'm currently on the last few episodes of the '66 season, which was the last to be filmed in black & white. And I am enjoying it immensely. Ah, Steed and Peel! Sexy, stylish, playful. Not to mention capable of taking the most brain-breaking weirdnesses in stride and of kicking large quantities of ass while armed only with Steed's umbrella and Emma's lethal bod. Coolest. Crime fighters. Ever.

Current refreshment: Nothing, but I'm really going to need some lunch soon.

Current worry: I refuse to worry about anything today. It's my weekend, and I'm going to spend it being blissfully worry-free.

Current thought: Foooooood. Must have fooooooood.

My Life According to Farscape

This is an entertaining meme, and I was encouraged to post my answers to it here, so...

Using only EPISODE names from ONE SCI FI TV SHOW, cleverly answer these questions.

Are you a male or a female?
PK Tech Girl

Describe yourself:
I, E.T.

How do you feel:
Mental as Anything

Describe where you currently live:
Terra Firma

If you could go anywhere where would you go?
...Different Destinations

Your favorite form of transportation:
Through the Looking Glass

Your best friend is:
Out of Their Minds

What’s the weather like:
Meltdown

Favorite time of day:
Bad Timing

If your life was a TV show, it would be called:
The Way We Weren't

What is life to you:
A Constellation of Doubt

Your fear:
Season of Death

What is the best advice you have to give:
Dream a Little Dream

Thought for the Day:
Crackers Don't Matter

How I would like to die:
What Was Lost: Resurrection

My soul’s present condition:
Losing Time

My motto:
Thank God It's Friday... Again


There. I don't know how clever it was, but it's quite fun to do with Farscape, which has some of the most entertaining titles ever. (I didn't even get to use some of the best ones.) As usual with these things, I refuse to tag anyone. Do it if it amuses you. And, heck, feel free to use non-SF shows if you like.

Stuff

It's been almost a week since I last posted, so before my sister pops in again and asks me if I'm still alive -- assuming she's still alive, and not melted into a puddle of goo in the unfamiliar heat -- I figured I ought to, y'know, post something.

So here are some completely random things about my life at the moment:

1. I was eating leftover pot roast for four days, but it is gone now, and I am sad, because I had not yet grown tired of it. One of those days, I took some of the leftover meat & veggies and baked it into a pre-made pie crust for a yummy meat pie. I can recommend this as an excellent way to vary your leftover pot roast diet.

2. I have been spending far too much time lately playing Plants vs. Zombies. Those of you whose fault this is, you know who you are.

3. I have also been obsessively watching Freaks and Geeks on DVD, which is pretty amazing, since something that puts me back in the mindset of high school seems like pretty much the last thing I'd ever want to watch. But, wow, is that a good show. (The person responsible for this also knows who he is.)

4. I have a ticket to see this next month. Should be fun!

5. Also next month I am doing some kind of road trip with my mother. I'm not even entirely sure where we're going. I think we're maybe going to drive north, then west, and see how many national parks we hit before we have to turn around. Wish me luck!

6. If there was going to be a 6, I've forgotten what it was. (Oh, wait, I just remembered. But it was even more boring than the rest of this stuff, so never mind.)

Culinary Triumph

Ooh, baby. I have pot roast so tender I just dipped it out of the pot with a ladle. Man, I don't know why I don't use my slow cooker more often.

Maybe It Is Possible To Have Too Many Books? Naaaah.

The Great Book Migration, it is finished! Well, there are one or two little things still to do. I've got a small bookcase that's now completely empty, which I think I'm going to fill up with magazines or something... later. But otherwise, everything is now where I want to it be. Yay! I guess that's what happens when, instead of three days of intermittent, leisurely activity, you for some reason opt for one sweaty, day-long marathon session of hammering and dragging and hauling and re-arranging.

I must say, I am quite pleased with the results. I very much like having the non-fiction in the computer room. It just feels like it belongs here. And, as predicted, adding an extra three bookcases allowed me to accommodate everything beautifully.

Here's what my dining room looks like now:



That's just one side of it, of course. There's two more bookcases on the opposite wall: one the same size as these, and another that's a bit wider, but has only three shelves. (I couldn't use a bigger one there, as it would have blocked a light switch and a thermostat control.)

This room now looks much more like a library than it does like a dining room, certainly, but I regard that as a good thing, because a) I think any room can be substantially improved by becoming more library-like, whatever its function. (Well, OK, maybe not the bathroom, but only because the books would get soggy.) And b) I almost never actually dine in there, anyway, so I might as well get some use out of it.

Note the nearly empty bookcase on the right, which was pretty much the entire point of the exercise.

So, I am happy, yes, but also very tired and very achy. My current plan is to spend the next couple of days lying on the sofa reading more books to put on my new shelf space.

Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle...

The great book migration has begun! I've only taken the first few preliminary steps so far, but hopefully I should be all done by Friday.

Wish me luck!

Fashion News

So, we now have our first look at what the 11th Doctor will be wearing. I am... underwhelmed.

That Light In The Sky Is A Place That We've Been.

Now here is an awesome way to mark the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11: taking pictures of the Apollo landing sites from orbit. Check out the Apollo 14 pic, in particular, where you can actually see the trail left by the astronauts' footprints. Wow.

Butterfly Porn

I was greeted with an odd and interesting sight in my front yard this morning when I went out to bring in my garbage bin: a couple of mating butterflies. So of course, being the shameless voyeur that I am, I had to take pictures.




Actually, I took a lot more pictures than that, but I figured there were probably only so many photos of butterfly fucking you guys would want to see. I had lots of opportunity to snap away, though, because butterflies definitely have what you'd call stamina. I went back out again an hour later, and they were still at it. In fact, I was beginning to worry that there might have been some kind of problem and maybe they'd gotten stuck, but, no this paper I found online (warning: PDF) assured me that butterflies can spend up to three hours in the act, and that larger ones take longer than smaller ones. Well, these were certainly the biggest butterflies I've ever seen around here, so I guess they were just being normal.

Anybody know exactly what kind of butterflies these are, by the way? I have an insect identification guide, but I'm not sure I've ever been able to correctly identify a single bug from it. These look a lot like the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail picture, but I think I might be a smidge far west for those.

Happy B-Day To Me!

So. As of today, I am 38. I'm getting to the point now where my age is starting to seem like a totally meaningless number, but I guess maybe in a couple of years I'll feel differently.

Zombies!

Aaargh! Zombies! They're everywhere! It's the freakin' zombie apocalypse, man! I'm going to try to hold them off with my giant metal wrench, but if you don't hear from me by tomorrow, assume I'm already out looking for tasty brains to munch on, and for gods' sakes, don't come looking for me!

(Well, OK, not really. But yesterday my sister told me that this blog was "too boring" lately, so I figured I'd try to spice it up for ya. Zombies are exciting, right?)

Your Regularly Scheduled Memey Thing

Current clothes: White t-shirt from the International Space Hall of Fame in Alamogordo. It has a picture of a space shuttle in front of the Earth and the moon. They are very much not to scale. Short-sleeved blue deinim shirt over that, unbuttoned. Blue jeans. White socks. Black belt. No shoes.

Current mood: Not too bad, actually. I was feeling a little bit groggy and out of it, thanks to my current messed-up sleep schedule, but after a nice lunch I feel a bit perkier.

Current music: Nothing at the moment, really

Current annoyance: Primarily aforementioned messed-up sleep schedule, I suppose. I've been trying to keep 26-hour days in order to rotate myself forward from night shifts to day shifts. This can work very nicely, but when you keep waking up after six hours for some stupid reason, it becomes problematic.

Current thing: Keeping wacky hours.

Current desktop picture: The Jellyfish Nebula.

Current book: The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride by Daniel James Brown. And, man, "harrowing" is right. Books like this can certainly give you a sense of perspective on your own problems. Even on the worst days of my life, at least there was never any cannibalism. Also, I believe I now understand why people in California are crazy. Anybody who would make that journey in a covered wagon is certifiably insane. Presumably this is genetic.

Current song in head: Nothing at the moment, but Brain Radio's been weirdly hyperactive lately. I had "Particle Man" stuck in my head for two days earlier this week.

Current DVD in player: The season 2 finale of The Pretender. I was listening to the commentary track.

Current refreshment: Lemon-ginger tea.

Current worry: That my stupid feet are never going to stop giving me problems. Bah. I'm really going to have to see a podiatrist. Probably very soon.

Current thought: My foot hurts, and it makes me pouty.

Vrooom!

My car is working again! $25 for a new battery cable, and I'm back in business and can cross one major worry/annoyance off my list. Hooray!

While I Wait For Monday Morning, Have Some Random Links

Farscape DVD News: Complete Series Coming from A&E: Announcement about a new Farscape DVD megaset, to be released in November. May possibly be of interest to some of you.

50 Reasons No One Wants to Publish Your First Book : A very amusing list. Although I would read a book about vegetarian zombies.

Vanishing Head Illusion: Freaky fun with your blind spot!

Giving up my iPod for a Walkman: A 13-year-old's reactions to having his iPod replaced with a vintage Sony Walkman. Made me feel kind of nostalgic, even though I only ever had a cheap Radio Shack knockoff, not an actual Walkman. Ah, kids, today, they don't know how good they have it.

Baby bat eating and care: Little orphaned baby bats! I honestly don't know how people can think bats are ugly. These little guys are the most adorable things ever!

Sadly, Independence Means "Having To Deal With Your Own Crap Yourself."

I have decided I do not much like holiday weekends. They're like some sort of engraved invitation for things to go wrong. Now my roof is leaking again, my car has died, and I seem to have lost my work key. None of this is necessarily disastrous, but it's all deeply annoying, and, of course, there's not a thing I can do about any of it until Monday.

Sigh.

While I'm At It, Happy Anniversary, Crab Nebula!

Happy Independence Day to my fellow Americans!

Also, here's an interesting trivia fact from my astronomy wall calendar: the Earth is at aphelion today, meaning it is now at its farthest point from the sun: 152.1 million kilometers.

Only now I'm wondering if it's somehow unpatriotic to use the metric system on Independence Day. Y'know, that's one area in which I wish we were a little less independent.

To Continue With This Theme...

Dear comics,

Naming your aliens by spelling your friends' names backward is not clever and cute. It is distracting as hell and snaps my suspension of disbelief into tiny little pieces. Please stop it.

Love,
Me

Hollywood Pet Peeve #97

Dear television,

Astronomers do not wear lab coats, as there is very little danger of accidentally spilling a galaxy on your clothing.

I hope this information is of some use to you.

Love,
Me

I Realize This Will Be Insanely Boring To Everyone But Me. But It's Vitally Important To Me.

Aaargh! I just filled up the last of my bookshelves in the computer room! This happened slightly sooner than I was anticipating, due to the annoying domino effect you get when a thin book bumps a thicker book off onto the next shelf, and it bumps a whole bunch of thin ones, which then bump off a thick one and some thin ones... Stupid long-winded Stephen King. Stupid long-winded J.K. Rowling.

Well, my initial thought for when this happened was that I'd add another small bookcase, sticking into the room at a right-angle, but the more I think about it, the more I think that's an annoying solution. It'd make the room more crowded than I'd like, and would only be a fairly temporary measure, anyway.

Much as I tried to get out of it, I suspect a major re-organization is called for. This is actually kind of traumatic to contemplate. I'm used to my books where they are! But where they are just isn't going to work indefinitely. Sigh.

So, OK, here's the plan: Hardback fiction gets moved into the dining room, where there's still plenty of wall space. (I'll have to move a picture off the wall, but I'm sure I can find somewhere else to put it.) Five full-sized bookcases should fit in there quite easily, and, having done some measuring, I'm 99% certain I can accommodate the medium-sized one as well. That gives me an entire five shelves worth of expansion room for the hardback fiction, which should last me quite a while, and there's even room to add another five-shelfer when needed, assuming I find somewhere else to put the telephone. I'll have to move the CD rack, but that is comparatively small and can go almost anywhere.

The Star Trek and Doctor Who books currently in the dining room will migrate to the bedroom. Unfortunately, the ancient folding shelves the Trek novels currently reside in are on their last legs and will probably not survive the relocation. So I'll replace those with another five-shelfer. Unfortunately, that'll be about half a shelf too small for what's currently on there, so the hardbacks will have to go somewhere else. I think what I'll do is replace the three-shelf case the non-fiction Trek books are currently on with another five-shelfer, which will not only accommodate the overflow, but will give me extra shelves which could be used for any number of things in the future.

The non-fiction currently in the bedroom will move into the big bookcases currently in the computer room. That's a straightforward migration: from four bookcases onto four bookcases, and there's already a lot of expansion room built in there. Two of the big cases in the bedroom will stay there, and two of them will swap with the smaller ones from the dining room. That will leave me three large bookcases to buy and put in the dining room for the hardback fiction.

The paperback fiction, mercifully, can stay right where it is. Otherwise, it's basically one big rotation of books from room to room. And the results seem like they should actually be something of an improvement: the embarrassingly large number of media tie-in books can live discreetly in the bedroom, the non-fiction will surround me where I do most of my typing and thinking and writing, and the hardback fiction will be in a public place where people can exclaim, "Have you actually read all of these?!" as they seem to inexplicably enjoy doing. And the To-Read Pile stays on the shelves in the utility room like the work-in-progress that it is.

Which is all well and good, but holy crap, I'm not looking forward to doing all that.

Well, At Least I'm Not Jar-Jar.

Your results:
You are C-3PO

C-3PO 76% Jabba the Hutt 70% Jar Jar Binks 63% Yoda 59% Qui-Gon Jinn 58% Obi-Wan Kenobi 57% Darth Vader 52% Emperor Palpatine 51% Darth Maul 51% R2-D2 50%

You don't have a lot going for you, and you let everyone know it. You may have one or two close companions left, but if you keep complaining they may wander off.

(This list displays the top 10 results out of a possible 21 characters)


Click here to take the "Which Star Wars character am I?" quiz...

Also, I Complain About The Weather.

Lately, it seems as if some mischievous weather god has replaced my nice, dry desert with a freaking Amazon rain forest, and I am discovering that I no longer have the faintest idea how to deal with persistent humidity. And, geez! I put down some bug spray twenty minutes ago and it's still not dry! Which is annoying, because I can't let the cats back out of confinement until it is. Also, I actually had to towel myself off after my shower this morning, and I can't do laundry because, despite having a shiny new washer, I never bothered buying a dryer.

How do people who live in damp climates cope?

No News Is... No News.

You know what I want? I want to know when CNN's Breaking News e-mail service turned into the Nothing But News About Dead Celebrities Service. Knowing how I could make it start sending me real news again would also be nice.

Yes, all right, the death of people like Michael Jackson does constitute actual news, I'll admit. But did I need to be kept updated on his condition three times in one hour? I note that said service apparently did not think the Iranian election was worth wasting any electrons on.

I mainly subscribed to the damned thing in the first place because every time there's a major natural disaster or a terrorist attack or something, it seems to happen while I'm asleep, and several times I've gotten up, poured myself a nice cup of coffee, sat down to check my e-mail, and discovered that every mailing list I belonged to had erupted into a heart-stopping explosion of posts saying, "OMG, is everyone all right!?" and "This is so awful! I'm so very, very sorry for everyone affected!", with any actual explanations of what the hell they're talking about buried somewhere deep in the e-mail avalanche or missing entirely. This is what happened on 9/11, for instance, and when the shuttle Columbia broke up. Believe me, it is not a good way to be introduced to bad news.

But I belong to far fewer mailing lists now, so that seems rather less likely to happen to me again. I dunno. Maybe it's time to just drop Dead Celebrity News and start getting my news from The Daily Show like normal people.

Stay On Target

I'd save this for the next batch of random links, but it's only up for the next week, and I suspect at least one person reading this might find it interesting: On the Outside it Looked Like an Old Fashioned Police Box, a radio production in which Doctor Who writer Mark Gatiss celebrates the old Target novelizations.

Ah, the Target books. They mostly ranged from mediocre to terrible, but I sort of love them, anyway.

Geeks, Represent!

This is very possibly the most entertaining thing I've seen in ages: John Hodgman at the Radio & TV Correspondents' Dinner, talking about the Jock vs. Nerd culture wars, and grilling the president on his nerdly knowledge.



But, man, even I knew the Conan question, and my information on that subject, like almost all my comic book knowledge, comes entirely from osmosis. Clearly, however, it's been far too long since I last read Dune.

Happy Days

Happy Father's Day, and Happy Solstice!

Dad, if you're reading this, I will call you later.

As Further Proof That I'm Still Alive, Have Some Random Links.

Science and Entertainment Exchange: A new program that aims to provide people in the entertainment industry with easy access to real scientists willing to help them get their science right. I think this is quite possibly the best idea ever.

Star Size Comparison: Nifty video showing the size of various bodies in the universe. I now have the Animaniacs singing in my head: "It's a great big universe, and we're all really puny. We're just tiny little specks, about the size of Mickey Rooney..."

30 Awesomely Bad Unicorn Tattoos: A Gallery: "Awesomely bad" is an understatement. Warning: NSFW.

Galactic Center of Milky Way Rises over Texas Star Party: Gorgeous time lapse video of the Texas sky.

Bad Transcript: Star Trek (2009): Amusing parody of the new Star Trek movie. Warning: full of spoilers!

Broken Picture Telephone: Online words-and-pictures version of the old party game Telephone. Fun to play, even if you can't draw, and the results are often hysterically funny. Browsing through the game archives is a great way to waste a lot of time.

Yes, It's Just A Thrill A Minute With Me.

Every time I go a week or so without updating this thing, somebody -- usually my sister -- checks in to make sure I'm not dead. Which is really rather reassuring, when I stop to think about it.

Anyway, no, I am not dead. I've just been very, very boring of late and haven't had much of anything to say. Well, I can tell you about my ever-so-exciting day, I guess. I blew off work and drove up to Albuquerque to run some errands, which involved doing the following deeply stimulating things:

1. Got the oil changed on my car (which was disturbingly overdue), and also the transmission fluid (which it was just about time for). By the way, does anybody know whether when the guys at Jiffy Lube tell you to come back in a couple of days so they can check your fluid levels, they're actually serious about that? Because I'm not making another 2-hour round trip just so they can shove a dipstick somewhere.

2. Ate lunch at Fuddrucker's, where I discovered that it is, indeed, possible to make a greasy buffalo burger.

3. Went shopping for bras. If it weren't for the fact that it happens much less often, this would provide serious competition for menstruation in the Worst Thing About Being a Female contest. Every time I do it, it makes me start thinking wistfully about breast reduction surgery, and I'm so much of a wuss about people doing medical things to my body that I still haven't worked up the guts to get my wisdom teeth out, despite repeated admonishments from my dentist. Sigh. It's expensive, too. I spent $200 on freaking bras! And half of them were on sale! Well, hopefully I shouldn't need to do it again for a few years.

4. Got ambushed by a guy who wanted to show me the OMG AMAZING! product he was selling. Which turned out to be a nail buffer. Which he insisted on demonstrating. I let him, because it was weirdly amusing, and because he looked so doggone bored, but I did keep telling him I wasn't going to buy the thing. I don't think he actually believed me until I started walking away, though. Anyway, as a result of this, the middle finger on my left hand now has a nail of freakishly unnatural smoothness and shininess. I can't stop touching it, and have occasionally been amusing myself by positioning it so as to reflect light. (Yes, I am easily amused. I've also never had a manicure in my life.)

5. Went to Barnes & Noble and bought the one book my self-imposed monthly quota system would still allow me to buy. I'm actually kind of impressed that I was able to limit myself. And I didn't buy the Star Trek DVD game that kept trying to convince me it was something I might actually want to play, either. See, sometimes I am capable of self-discipline!

6. Sat in the Barnes & Noble coffee shop for a while, sipping an iced cappuccino and reading, while I recovered from the stressily stressful stress of shopping and, y'know, being around other human beings. I wish I were more than half joking about that; I sometimes worry a little that I'm in danger of coming down with some weird phobia. Sometimes just having someone else in the same supermarket aisle with me makes me feel kind of ill-tempered and itchy. Then again, maybe it's just a fact of life that people are annoying.

7. Got lost in a construction detour, missed a poorly marked highway entrance, ended up on a road leading toward the middle of nowhere, turned around, found another highway entrance, got on the highway going the wrong way, turned around, and got caught in the construction again. All of which proves -- or, rather, reconfirms -- three facts: 1) I couldn't navigate my way out of a paper bag if you put a big arrow on each surface pointing towards the opening and handed me a GPS. 2) I have the memory of a goldfish, because if I hadn't somehow completely forgotten that I'd encountered construction around Gibson on the way in, I would have just taken I-40 like a normal person, instead of cruising the surface streets. And 3) there are perfectly legitimate reasons why I hate driving in the city, even when the city is Albuquerque, a place I am familiar with and which is not exactly known for its teeming traffic.

So, yup, that was my exciting day. What's really sad is that actually is a pretty active and event-filled day by my current standards. One of these days I should listen to Mr. Shatner and get a life.

On top of everything, of course, I now have much less money than when I left this morning. But at least the car seems happier, and I have somewhere to put my boobs. (What? Don't look at me that way! It's true!)

They're Back, Baby!

Futurama is coming back to television with all-new episodes on Comedy Central!

OK, to be honest, I might be a little more excited about this if the last couple of movies had been better, but it's still very, very cool.

Are We This Far Into June Already? Well, OK...

Current clothes: White terrycloth bathrobe. I just got out of the shower.

Current mood: Lethargic. I've only been awake for a couple of hours, and I'm still moving sloooowly. I've got to leave for work in another couple of hours, too, and I really don't want to.

Current music: Haven't been listening to much music lately. I've been trying to catch up on various podcasts, without a great deal of success.

Current annoyance: My foot still hurts. Which means I get no exercise.

Current thing: Working night shifts. Lots and lots of night shifts. Tonight's my last one for a while, though. Switching off of them is going to be weird.

Current desktop picture: This gorgeous picture of the shuttle Atlantis.

Current book: Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman.

Current song in head: "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)" by R.E.M. I woke up with that in my head today, probably because I was having a dream about watching a post-apocalyptic movie. It was some 1960s thing that looked like it was going to be cheesy, but turned out to have some surprisingly sophisticated thematic/symbolic stuff going on. A bit like Planet of the Apes, I suppose. I was mildly disappointed on waking to realize that it didn't actually exist.

Current DVD in player: Disc one of season 6 of Penn & Teller's Bullshit!

Current refreshment: Nothing. I should probably have some food. After I get dressed.

Current worry: I'm trying to decide whether switching off nights by staying up all day or by trying to get to sleep earlier and waking myself up after a few hours is likely to suck less. I suppose I'm mildly concerned about deciding wrongly, but, honestly, it's not like both options aren't about equally sucky.

Current thought: I should have dried off more after my shower and before donning my bathrobe. Certain areas of me are uncomfortably damp.

Any Political Implications Are Left As An Exercise For The Reader.

I just watched the 2006 movie The Astronaut Farmer on DVD. It's about a guy who never finished astronaut training, thus missing out on his dream of going into space, so he builds his own rocket in his barn. In many respects, it's a reasonably good movie, or at least one with a certain amount of low-key charm. And, man, if they had to pick one ambition that'd be almost guaranteed to resonate with me personally, the desire to get into space is most definitely it.

And yet I have to say, there were a couple of things about it that really rubbed me the wrong way, though I think they're things that are less about this movie in particular and more about movie trends in general. First off, this is one of those classic American celebrations of rugged, can-do individualism. Which I don't actually object to. I happen to think that innovation and individuality are great things, but of course what tends to happen in movies is that if you're celebrating one thing you have to do it by demonizing something else. So here we have NASA and the FAA and various other government agencies acting as the baddies who are actively trying to squelch our poor hero's dreams, apparently because he's attempting to steal their glory or is likely to prove that they're not as necessary as they want people to think. Which strikes me as downright slanderous. The truth is that the private spaceflight industry, while still in its infancy, is growing and thriving, and is in fact getting quite a bit of official encouragement and support. Of course, these aren't guys building rockets in their barns all on their lonesome. These are teams of smart, knowledgeable people working together. Which, y'know, is how we got to the moon in the first place. So, OK, rugged individualism, yay, but let's give a little credit to teamwork, too, huh, because it's achieved some damned impressive things.

The other issue that bugs me is that the theme or moral of this story, as with so very, very many other Hollywood stories, is more or less: "If you believe in your dreams, you can do anything. Never, ever give up, even if people think you're crazy." Which sounds great because, sure, people who don't try don't succeed, and if you want to accomplish great things you have to be willing to take risks and not worry too much about what the neighbors think, and so on. Call me cynical, though, but the extreme version of this that you usually get in these kinds of movies -- and that you certainly get in this one -- strikes me as a really bad message. Because, let's face it, sometimes crazy ideas really are just plain crazy. And more often than not, turning a deaf ear to all attempts to present you with a reality check is a recipe for disaster. I think a much, much better message, and one I'd love to see presented more often, would be "Dream smart." Because dreams are good. But people who dream stupid don't get into outer space. People who dream stupid win Darwin Awards instead.

Cleaning Theme Continued

Those of you who've received e-mail from me recently have probably seen my current .sig quote: "A clean house is a sure sign of a broken computer."

As proof of this, a list of things in my house that are cleaner and/or tidier now than when my internet went down a couple of hours ago:

Kitchen counters
Dishes
Toaster, coffeepot and electric kettle
Bedsheets
Toilet
Underwear drawer

And that's with a long break for lunch. I was hoping to get the floors cleaned, too, but now that I'm connected again, I don't know if it'll happen.

[ETA: The internet was being remarkably boring, so I did get the floors done, after all. Yay, me!]

Clean Machine

I have a new washing machine! It's kind of sad how excited I am about this.

I have no idea how old my old one actually was, but I would not be entirely surprised to be informed that it and I shared a birthday.

Too Many Books, Too Little Sleep

One of the unforeseen consequences of imposing a strict quota of the number of books I'm allowed to buy in any given month is that I end up ordering a whole bunch of books just after midnight on the first of the month. Possibly this is not entirely healthy behavior.

Speaking of things that are not entirely healthy, I am not pleased with this three-hours-of-sleep thing I've got going on today. I'm telling myself that, despite the fact that I have to work night shift again this weekend, waking up at 8 AM is actually a good thing, because there are several things I need to get done this week that will require being awake during the day. But the thought of doing any of that crap today just makes me feel grumpier. Bah! Need more coffee.

US Who News

For those of you watching Doctor Who in the US, it turns out that BBC America is going to be getting this year's Who specials before that channel that's changing to the silly new name. Looks like they'll be airing the Christmas special on June 27th.

I guess whether that's good news or bad news for US Who viewers depends on what your cable package is like.

Fun Things That Come In The Mail

I am pleased to report that this is the most entertaining way of terrorizing your cats ever.

I'm Sure That Was More Than Seven Percent.

Speaking of re-imaginings of classic characters, the trailer for the new Sherlock Holmes movie looks kind of entertaining, in a complete "What the hell where they smoking when they made this?!" kind of way:

Yayful Things

I have my glasses back! And they are noticeably gouge-free. Three cheers for warranties!

Also, my original -- well, OK, remastered -- Trek discs came in the mail! You know, one thing that has made me happy about the new movie, whatever mixed feelings I might have towards it, is that it does seem to generating a new enthusiasm for Old School Trek in many people, apparently including me. Given that one of my initial sources of hostility towards the film was the heart-sinking possibility that an entire new generation would, say, hear the name "Leonard McCoy" and immediately think of that Urban guy while the world slowly forgot the existence of the lovely DeForrest Kelley, this is a very gratifying and reassuring thing. (And, no, I didn't deliberately set up that sentence so I could make jokes involving the phrase "the Real McCoy," but you can insert your own here if you wish.)

Also, I do not seem to have come down with Pig Flu, after all. Thank you, immune system!

Oh Noes! Pig Flu!

Um... Why is my throat kind of sore? And why is it not going away even when I drink nice, soothing tea?

Oh, no, body. You do not get to be sick this week. I forbid it.

Back From The Final Frontier

OK, I am now back from seeing the Star Trek movie! I present for you my thoughts/analysis/review, which I have rendered pretty much non-spoilery, although I won't blame anyone for skipping it until they've seen the movie, if they don't want to go into it with my thoughts knocking around in their head.

The verdict? Didn't love it, didn't hate it. Which, considering that up until about a week ago my reaction to the whole idea was pretty much "Abomination! Sacrilege! Why must you rape my childhood?!", is actually a pretty darned positive reaction.

Actually, I partly take that back. I did in fact love the movie during pretty much every second when Spock was on the screen. I am kind of flabbergasted by that. Yes, I thought Zachary Quinto was not at all a bad choice for Spock if anybody had to play him, but until today I might very well have said that "Nobody but Leonard Nimoy ever, ever could or should play Spock" was as close to an article of religious faith as I have. And yet, lo and behold, he's the one character I accepted easily as being the character. Period.

Not only was Quinto entirely believable as Spock, with what appeared to be a full understanding of the incredibly subtle nuances of the character, but from the middle distance, he even looked reasonably like a young Leonard Nimoy. It's a pity that illusion was inevitably shattered a bit when he talked, as no matter how fine his acting skills, he simply does not have Nimoy's distinctive voice. But that's not his fault, and the fact that I looked at him and saw Spock anyway is, frankly, nothing short of amazing. It was also, in a way, enlightening. I walked out of the theater awash in the realization that, simply put, Spock is wonderful. Intrinsically wonderful, whoever might be playing him. For this old Trekkie, that sense of re-connection to a character I've loved since childhood was marvelous, and well worth sitting through the movie for, all by itself.

As for the other characters, well... Sorry, but they weren't them. They were trying to be, but whatever transcendent magic Quinto had, he was the only one who did. Then again, Spock, frankly, is the make-or-break character here, and the fact that he worked means that the movie as a whole worked -- or at least, it worked whenever he was on screen. For the rest of the time, though, if I just let myself think of it as a really good, extremely high-budget fan film, I was OK and could mostly short-circuit the voice in my head going, "Dude, that's not Kirk."

Because, really, he wasn't Kirk, and that was pretty much down to the actor. If you'd summarized for me everything Kirk says and does in the movie, I probably would be nodding my head and saying, "Yeah, that sounds pretty much like him." But while the cockiness is there, Chris Pine just doesn't have Shatner's cheesy charisma, and the result is a character who's less appealing than he really ought to be. Karl Urban as Dr. McCoy worked a bit better for me. We really only got to see a couple of aspects of McCoy's personality in the movie, but they were entertainingly done, and even if I couldn't look at Urban and effortlessly see Leonard McCoy, I could certainly see someone doing and saying the things that McCoy would say and do in something very close to the way he would say and do them.

Most of the other characters I don't have much to say about, mainly because they didn't have loads of characterization on the original series, or in the movie, or both. Chekov, for example, is pretty easy. "Excitable young guy with a silly accent" is pretty close to the extent of his characterization, and since Anton Yelchin had the silly accent nailed -- to the extent that I could almost mistake him for a young Walter Koenig if I close my eyes -- he pretty much works. I had more of a problem with Uhura. Again, the character was badly under-served in the original series, so I understand that there's not a whole lot there to work with, but, well, Uhura always had a certain... I'm not even sure how to describe it. A certain graceful, self-possessed quality. But my general sense of her character is the movie is closer to "spunky" than "self-possessed," and for much of the movie it was hard to see any of the Uhura I knew in her, xenolinguistics skill aside.

As for the plot... Well, I did find some of the action sequences a little tedious, the storyline was a bit silly and contrived, perhaps, and the science was terrible. But really, I can't say that any of that isn't Star Trek. A bit less easy to shrug off, perhaps, is the slightly annoyed sense that I was watching a bunch of kids playing at being starship officers with insufficient adult supervision, but it bothered me much less than I would have expected. Seriously. Much less. I've thought the whole "Starfleet Academy" prequel idea was painfully, vomit-inducingly bad since the first time it was ever proposed, umpteen years ago. So the simple fact that I was feeling neither pain nor nausea is, in fact, pretty incredible.

I was also pleasantly surprised by the gazillion lovely little continuity touches, which were fun without being unnecessarily obtrusive. Unfortunately, such careful attention to continuity just made their one big continuity lapse all the more annoying. Actually, there are several things that initially look like continuity errors in this, but they pretty much all shake themselves out as the story unfolds... leaving just one thing to bug the nitpicky crap out of me. Sigh. (People who've seen the movie and have a good knowledge of Original Trek, you may feel free to try to guess what it is.)

I also wish that they'd paid as much attention to making the other non-human character in Star Trek -- the Enterprise herself -- look and feel familiar as they did the characters with speaking lines. The exteriors were lovely, but the interiors? Look, I really wouldn't expect them to entirely re-create the 1960's aesthetic, because that would be... bizarre. But the bridge of the Enterprise should at least look and feel a little like the bridge of the Enterprise, in more than just the placement of the chairs.

But, anyway, again, I didn't hate it. It's not the Trekpocalypse. I can't really accuse it of raping my childhood. It was... a pretty good fan film, into which, astonishingly, a real-feeling Spock happened to wander. Hey, I'll take it!

Actually, I'm thinking I may very well want to see it again, just so I can give myself a chance to experience it on its own merits, instead of obsessively analyzing and drawing comparisons, as I was inevitably doing this time.

By the way, I'll be happy to discuss the movie at even greater length in the comments, and to hear what the rest of you think, but I ask that people please use spoiler warnings on anything that gets more spoilery than this review.

Star Trekkin' Across The Universe (Or At Least Up I-25)

All right. I've done the grocery shopping and the laundry and all the other crap I really needed to do today. (Well, OK, maybe not the vacuuming, but that can wait.) In about half an hour or so, I'm gonna go see this new Star Trek thing, doggone it, if only so it will be possible for me to participate in the internet again.

That means you've all got until I get home tonight to place your bets on what my reaction will be. Will I return shouting "Abomination!" or "Frell me, THAT WAS COOL!"? Anything is possible! Stay tuned!

Big Batch O' Random Links

We Didn't Start The Flamewar: This pretty much sums up the entire internet, right here. (Warning: NSFW.)

The Biology of B-Movies: Just how plausible are all those shrinking men and giant bugs? (Yeah, I think you can probably guess the answer to that one.)

Study: Why Cute Overload is Critical to Your Work: I am thoroughly convinced, and will now make a point of stopping whatever productive activities I may be engaged in to look at cute animals several times a day. For the good of my work.

Why Space Repairs Aren't Easy: Astronaut John Grunsfeld (mentioned in this article) has some ties with NRAO, and a few years back he came and gave us a talk about repairing the Hubble telescope, which was very cool indeed. The main thing I remember about it is thinking that I cannot possibly imagine having that job. It once took me the better part of an hour to change a car battery, never mind servicing a delicate, multi-million-dollar scientific instrument. In microgravity. While wearing giant space gloves.

Ten Things You Don't Know About Hubble: Speaking of Hubble, here's the latest in the Bad Astronomer's "Ten Things You Don't Know" series.

Open-mindedness: Interesting video exploring what it actually means to be "open-minded," and why it doesn't involve accepting every ghost story you come across at face value.

The Internet as Imagined in 1969: I'm not sure which tickles me more about this video. The truly impressive way they managed to get the broad details right, or the chuckle-inducing ways in which the hardware and the social aspects are just plain wrong.

Pregnancy Myths BUSTED!: Mythbuster Kari Byron, currently expecting a baby geeklet, punctures a few myths about pregnancy. Pretty much a fluff piece, but some of her comments are great. She really does have an entirely unique set of pregnancy-related concerns.

40 Inspirational Speeches in 2 Minutes: Well, I feel inspired! Though I'm not exactly sure to what.

International Space Station comes Together: And just to end on another space link, here's a cool flash animation showing the progress of the ISS's construction.

I Lost Lost.

Dear TiVo:

Is there a reason you only saw fit to record two minutes of the Lost season finale? Was it due to some sort of magnetic anomaly? Or is it because you hate me?

Contemplating feeding you to the smoke monster,
Me

[ETA: I have managed to see it now. And, lo, it was awesome.]

Upside, Downside

Bad: I went to bed about 2 AM yesterday after getting off work at midnight... and was woken up by the mailman ringing my door at 8:30. Sigh. Why does the world conspire to keep me from getting a decent eight hours of sleep? On the upside, he was bringing me a box full of books and some more Pretender DVDs, and if you have to get woken up an hour or two too early, at least that's a nice thing to be awakened by.

Good: Turns out the warranty on my eyeglasses covers my giant lens scratch even though it's purely due to my own clumsiness. They're going to replace the lens, and it'll cost me zip. Considering that I was afraid I might have to buy another pair of $400+ glasses, or at least pay a good percentage of that for repair, this is excellent news. On the downside, it's going to take a week or so, during which I have to go back to wearing my old pair. The prescription's barely changed at all, so that's mostly OK, but I find any change in eyewear at least mildly disorienting.

Even My Furniture Is Out To Get Me.

Today's major annoyance: I was bending over to pick something up off the floor, managed to slip in some fashion I still do not remotely understand, and ended up smashing my eyeglasses directly into the sharp corner of a metal desk. I suppose it would have been a lot worse if I weren't wearing glasses and it had been my eye smashing into the desk, but still. I now have a giant gouge in one lens, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to replace the damned glasses.

OK, it may only be Monday, but at this point I really want a do-over on the whole week.

On, Second Thought, Scotty, I'll Just Stay Down Here.

I fell asleep last night about about 2 AM -- a reasonable hour for my current work schedule -- and then woke up at 6:30 and could not get back to sleep. Bah. As a consequence, I'm pretty sure this is a "lie around on the sofa drinking tea and reading, with occasional breaks for DVDs and comfort food" kind of a day, not a "drive an hour and a half round trip through the desert to see a movie that's doubtless going to get me all worked up one way or another" kind of day.

In other words, no Star Trek for me. Next weekend, probably.

Currently: The Brains And Feet Edition

Current clothes: Khaki-colored shorts. A t-shirt from The Planetary Society; it's black, and features a false-color picture of a spiral galaxy, with an upward-looking human silhouetted against it and the words "Is Anyone Out There?" across it. White socks. No shoes.

Current mood: Not bad. Sort of mellow. I'd say "sleepy," but given how late I slept today, I refuse to believe I can be sleepy right now, so "mellow" it is.

Current music: Not much music lately, really. I've mostly been listening to a bunch of podcasts.

Current annoyance: My stupid human body. Not only am I suffering from Little Mermaid Foot Syndrome, but while I was cooking dinner earlier, my cornea apparently tried to fall off again. I've had that suddenly happen when I first open my eyes in the morning, but never randomly between blinks like that. Fortunately, the pain didn't last long once I got some liquid flowing over my eyeball. Unfortunately, that is some capital-P Pain, let me tell you.

Current thing: I don't know. I may be sort of thing-less at the moment. Or maybe I have many small and uninteresting things.

Current desktop picture: The stars in Orion's Belt. I've been having trouble settling on one I want to keep lately, though. I might change it again.

Current book: Day One: Before Hiroshima and After by Peter Wyden. It's a book about colorful people doing fascinating things with incredibly important global implications, so I don't know why it keeps sort of making my eyes glaze over, but it does.

Current song in head: "Re: Your Brains" by Jonathan Coulton. I've been on something of a zombie kick lately, I think.

Current DVD in player: Disc two of season 4 of The Pretender. Yes, I am still slowly watching through this series, and still enjoying it beyond all rationality or reason. Even if the last episode I watched did have some images that I suspect may have scarred me for life. I also have the first disc of season ten of South Park in the other DVD player, because it was my on-the-treadmill show until I had to stop due to aforementioned Mermaid Foot.

Current refreshment: Just finished some tea.

Current worry: Mostly that this stupid foot isn't going to improve as quickly as I would like. Also that zombies will eat my brains, because that's a lot more fun to worry about.

Current thought: I've been trying to decide whether I want to go and see the Star Trek movie tomorrow. It seems like everybody and their pet sehlat is rushing out to see it this weekend, which means I'm already feeling left out of a lot of conversations. And it's been getting astonishingly positive responses, which is making me curious to see it and form my own opinion. (I'm still kind of secretly hoping that I'll hate it, but that's looking less and less likely.) I really don't know if I feel like driving all the way up to the theater in Los Lunas, though. Sometimes it's deeply annoying, living in the middle of nowhere.

Yet Another Reason Why I Sometimes Long To Be The Last Person On Earth

Dear person who apparently walked up my driveway, found my already-nearly-full trash bin parked out of sight between a shed and a length of fence and dumped your giant-ass bags of yard debris into it two days after trash-pickup day,

WHAT THE FUCKING HELL, DUDE?!

Bewildered annoyance,
Me

[ETA: Except that, on further reflection and investigation, I think those giant bags may instead have come from the guys I had out here working on my swamp cooler yesterday. Damn it. There's a great head of righteous indignation, wasted.]

Not-So-Random Links: Star Trek Edition

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.

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.

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!

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.

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!"

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.)

Ugh.

OK, allergy season can be over now. Really. Aaaaannnny time now.

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.

Cute Cat Pictures, Pt. 2: Nova

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.

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.

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.

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!)

Good Old April First

Damn, but I wish this were real.