Category: Diversions

What’s up with me, lately…

First, because it’s too cute to resist:
(from a mailing list I’m on.)

Other than that, not a lot of news. I’m back from a vacation that wasn’t, in the end, all that relaxing… though I will have got my AA Platinum renewed for another year once the miles post for the flight home. I’m not sure I’m going to bother next year; I’ve got the miles for Marie’s graduation trip, and I can’t help feeling that I’ve got better things to do with my life than travelling by myself (with company would help, I grant… perhaps someday, when Marie is done with school, or under other better circumstances.)

Slappy’s getting married this Saturday, which is really cool, though I am sad I will be missing a third weekend in a row out of town. Work is hectic; we have some deadlines coming up I have been procrastinating on finishing up rather badly, so I will be busy with that. Ah well.

If you’re really bored… some book/movie commentary follows.
Continue reading “What’s up with me, lately…”

I have too many DVDs, redux

I just did an incomplete recount, and if I’m counting right and have removed all the duplicate entries properly, the total is around 550-600 of them (I had an exact number, but have already noted duplicates and omissions especially ones not ordered online).

A list, for the truly masochistic (or those who want to gloat that they’ve got even more) after the break. Actually, it’s mainly for family to make sure that any Christmas gifts don’t duplicate ones I already have.

Continue reading “I have too many DVDs, redux”

One of the greatest hours in radio history (and political satire)


One of the greatest hours in radio history

The Jounal of MultiMedia History has put on its website one of the best and most important dramas ever presented on radio, the 1954 Canadian play “The Investigator” by comedy writer Reuben Ship. It’s a laugh-out-loud parody of Joseph McCarthy and his hearings, where Joe goes to Heaven and takes over the committee that decides who stays and who goes “down there.” He replaces the original officials with Torquemada, Cotton Mather and The Hanging Judge, and they then proceed to “deport” people like Socrates and Thomas Jefferson.

The Realaudio is at the Jounal of MultiMedia History… I heard an audiotape recording of this radioplay as a kid (my mom probably still has it somewhere) and it is incredibly funny. And given the present political climate climate, it deserves a listen as well.

Here’s another interesting link on the subject.

Fanfic I’d like to see

OK, there are a few fanfic stories I’d really like to read. Perhaps I’ll get to writing one someday; more likely not.

Two alternate versions of Harry Turtledove’s Lizards/Worldwar books:
1) “Fleetlord Atvar and the Cuban Missile Crisis”
2) Lizards arrive in 2021, as described/implied in John Birmingham’s Axis of Time Trilogy

Harry Potter:
1) Book 7 ends with Harry and Voldemort, the way Ralph Bakshi’s Wizards ended
2) An alternate universe where Harry joined Slytherin house

There are some others I’m forgetting now, perhaps I’ll update this later

A must for any time traveller

Joseph LeConte, 1823-1901: Instructions for the Manufacture of Saltpetre. (Columbia, S.C.: Charles P. Pelham, State Printer, 1862.)

At the UNC Chapel Hill online library. Very cool, and if you’ve ready much time travel fiction, you’ll know exactly why this is so handy if you ever get trapped in the pre-industrial past. I love the internet.

I never promised that this would be a family blog…

So consider yourself cauthioned cautioned before checking out Fleshbot, from the people who brought you Wonkette.

But funny and informative stuff, if you follow the adult industry. A sample post of theirs includes such gems as:

We know it’s supposed to be a protective device, but why do we feel like the FemDefence tampon is going to wind up modified for use as an extreme BDSM appliance someday? (Gizmodo)

Geez I’m lame – another one of those quizlet things…

I am a d12

You are the rare, the overlooked, yet incredibly useful dodecahedron: the d12. You are a creative, romantic soul. You often act without thinking, but make up for your lack of plans with plenty of heart. You easily solve problems that stump others, but your answers tend to put you into even deeper trouble. You write long, detailed backgrounds for all your characters, and are most likely to dress up as one or get involved in cos-play. You can be silly at times and are easily distracted by your own day dreams, but are at the end of the day you’re someone who can be depended on.

Take the quiz at dicepool.com

And for the record, I have NEVER gotten involved in cos-play or larping. C’mon, tabletop RPG guys have to have SOMEBODY to look down on.

Three (oops Five!) TV serieses I really want on DVD…

  1. “The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.”: Bruce Campbell, in one of his funniest roles, and what the Wild Wild West movie could have been, even if Kenneth Branagh was cool as the villain.
  2. “Voyagers”: Early 1980s time travel TV show. Probably in retrospect not as cool as “Quantum Leap,” but one is less demanding at age 7 than at age 14 I suppose, and the “Titanic” episode is stuck in my memory.
  3. “Dungeons & Dragons”: My favorite game as a kid, turned to one of my all time favorite cartoons. Shlocky, and simultaneously dumb and intelligent. (Actually, this one IS on DVD, but last I checked only in the UK… UPDATE Sep. 2005: Marie bought the UK Region 2 DVD box set when we were in England a few months ago,)

And how could I forget “War of the Worlds”, and”Friday the 13th”, both late 80s shows I watched when I finally started staying up late? Both vaguely science-fictiony, and at least in the case of War of the Worlds, there was something of a story arc as well.

Given the riches of recent TV re-releases on DVD(Buck Rogers in the 25th Century - The Complete Series,Land of the Lost - The Complete First Season,Quantum Leap - The Complete First Season, etc…) perhaps I’ll get to see these again after all. Do they ever live up to memory? Perhaps not, but I still want to see them again.

“What about a catapult?”

From a post on a post of RASF.written:

The idea:
http://qdbii.pyoko.org/upload/catapult1.gif

The execution:
http://qdbii.pyoko.org/upload/catapult2.gif

I think this all started from a discussion some geeks were having on
Somethingawful.com. I have nothing to do with it, just thinks its pretty
good work.

Brin on Star Wars vs. Star Trek

A great article that I’d lost track of by David Brin… “Star Wars” despots vs. “Star Trek” populists

Anyway, when it comes to portraying human destiny, where would you rather live, assuming you’ll be a normal citizen and no demigod? In Roddenberry’s Federation? Or Lucas’ Empire?

See also his “incautious and heretical re-appraisal of J.R.R. Tolkien”… this latter article should be mandatory reading for would-be fantasy writers.

Now, this just about begs some Amazon links, but I’ll spare you the blatant shilling today. Just go look at the links, instead.