Technicon 2005
I’ve always liked Niven’s Laws. I don’t slavishly agree with them, but they are an excellent source of topics to ponder.
This leads to the fact that I’ve just deleted a lengthy rant about SF/fantasy fans who, despite entreaties from their favorite authors that they start thinking for themselves, are still want to be told what to think and what to believe. The only thing we humans got that the rest of the animal kindgom didn’t is a more complex brain. It’s way past time that we as a race consider trying out some of its higher gears, just to see what happens, you know?
Ok, wow, Technicon report, cool.
Movie thoughts etc.
Why couldn’t Watto take Republic credits? They’d have to be a pretty solid currency at that time. For that matter, why couldn’t Qui-Gon find someone who’d change his Republic credits over to Tatooine ones for a fixer’s fee? “Wretched hives” always have someone who can do this.
Message to the Wachowskis: I saw some of Revolutions the other day, and I’m sorry, but your movies make a lot more sense if Morpheus. Oracle, and Architect were supplying Neo with inaccurate / incomplete information, and Zion / the tunnels were simply another layer of the Matrix. This explains too much to be dismissed, no matter what you tried to sell us in movie three. Maybe what you told us “was true, from a certain point of view.”
I remain amazed at the Tolkien fans who feel that Peter Jackson did a poor job with LOTR. He pulled off a movie-making miracle, coherently filming a epic that the original author considered unfilmable, and in the process winning the hearts of both the general public and the Academy with a fantasy film. Sure, lots of us would have made a few different choices, but I don’t care to hear anyone say he’s a hack until they personally can produce something better.
Over the weekend, a friend made some excellent conjectures on who Harry Potter’s “Half-Blood Prince” might be. At least two of them could lead to very interesting storylines; the trick will be to not have it spoiled before I can read the actual book.
Rain got her PSP yesterday. I’ll say the first thing everyone else does – “Nice Screen!” She’s enjoying a couple of the games, too. With the default settings I found on the web, 30 minutes of video are ~200 MB more or less of a memory card, so at ~$100 for a 1 GB card, it’s clear we won’t be carrying around a fistful of pre-loaded feature-length movies.
I might head to the Rocky Horror Picture Show tonight. We’ll see.
Eight years and (happily) counting!
Sunday night raininva and I celebrated both an early Valentine’s Day, and a late anniversary of the day we began a serious relationship. We drove out to one of Rain’s favorite restaurants as she told me about the incredible gift she’d got me that would blow me away.
Well, we got settled at the table and she presented me with my gift – the first season of Gargoyles on DVD. Now, that was certainly cool and something I’m pleased to have in my collection, but it didn’t quite measure up to the hype she’d been giving me. But I played along, and told her I was very pleased with the gift (not hard to do, since I did like it).
She said, “Yeah, I’m glad you like it; though I did get you a backup gift in case you didn’t.” And she hands me a 1 GB iPod shuffle.
iPod!
An iPod has spent quite a long stretch on my list of “things I’d like to have but I’m not holding my breath”. And I have to admit it’s keen to have a device which plays hours and hours of music on a single charge, with no moving parts besides the control switch. And it’s tiny, and weighs nothing!
A passing waitress saw me looking at The Precious and said, “You must have been a very good boy lately!”
Not really. But my sweetie loves me 🙂
*****
Rain got a nail in her Pontiac’s right rear tire Friday night, and assuming the tire was unsalvageable, we headed to Wal-Mart on Sunday afternoon for a replacement. There was a five-hour wait there! I swear, I’m going to start boycotting Wal-Marts not because of any political feeling, but because they are always overcrowded and scary. I want to start bringing a machete when I go to the Superstore down here!
So, I was about to admit defeat – Wal-Mart was impossible, and everything else was closed – when I saw a Shell station with a bunch of tires propped outside; I rolled the dice and pulled in. Turns out there was a friendly good-ol-boy in there who wasn’t even busy, and had the tire plugged and airtight in 15 minutes, and even re-inflated the spare for us. Only charged about 15 bucks, too!
Here’s some karma for you, guy. You deserve it.
“What? The Outfit’s Not Enough?”
I glanced through a magazine article this morning that discussed the poor box-office performance of Catwoman and Elektra. “Looks like audiences aren’t ready for female superheroes,” commented a studio exec.
Right. We’re not ready. Or, maybe, they were weak movies to begin with? Idiot.
I bet the guy who did Batman: Dead End and World’s Finest could make a kick-ass Catwoman or Wonder Woman flick. Maybe someone should suggest it to him.
From sepia tone to sickness
So I’m finally fully aware again, for the first time since Wednesday night. raininva had brought home Sky Captain And The World Of Tomorrow last week, and we settled down to watch it, but halfway through the movie I couldn’t stay vertical (and it wasn’t the film, really). This turned into an excruciating night’s fight with stomach flu (I lost). It’s taken this long for the nausea and weakness to fully recede; last night was my first full meal in days, and eating a proper dinner felt sooo good. Of course, insult to injury, Rain was battling the flu too by Friday morning 🙁
Sky Captain‘s visuals impressed me – the integration of the virtual sets was very slick and never distracting. I think “Dex” won the spot of my favorite character over the leads, though. Interesting to watch that movie in such close proximity to The Aviator (which I really liked, but I’m an aviation geek and a Cate Blanchett fan).
I heard on the radio this morning that the B-52s covered “Paperback Writer” for a Buick commercial that won’t air. The heck with the commercial, I want a copy of that cover!
Busy morning. Information Services is the only career I can think of where one will be metaphorically asked, “Come over and move some furniture for me; I’ve lost the keys to my house, so bring burglary tools.”
EDIT: Almost forgot! I have addicted one of our houseguests to Katamari Damacy. Resistance is futile!
“Microhumans? Microhumans!”
So after an evening of trying to guess other people’s movie quotes, I’ve tossed in ten of mine in no special order.
Weekend thoughts
Ocean’s Twelve had some really funny parts, but it wasn’t really a good caper movie. It’s so busy being cute and inscrutable that the we give up on the plot too long before the Big Twists are revealed. Still worth a ticket for the good bits, but don’t expect the coolness of the first one.
Continued musings on the plight of the superhero: if you have a Code Against Killing, but the serial-murdering super-villain you’ve just captured laughs at you and tells you he’ll be back on the street killing people in 6 months – and you know he’s right – what do you do? Break your code and make sure the villain can’t hurt anyone else ever? Or follow your code, knowing that the likelihood is that people will die for your choice?
Morning linkage: This is a keen Smithsonian webpage that allows you to sit in the cockpit of several aircraft, from a Spad to a Mercury capsule, using QuickTimeVR.
Saw the last of the Vulcan arc of Enterprise this weekend – it did not disappoint. As usual, a few quibbles – I’d have like to have gotten farther in the head of the main bad guy, and another character did something stupid for an excruciatingly long time before stopping and admitting he should have known better – but plenty of good stuff. Trip is growing up fast, and it’s great to watch; and the sehlat exchange was classic Vulcan dry humor. “You keep a pet – Porthos.” “Porthos doesn’t try to eat me if I’m late with dinner.” “Vulcan children are never late with dinner.” I’m back to being a regular watcher, I think.
I’ve had a cold or a bug or something for days. Sore throat and stomach issues all week, then weakness Friday and Saturday, and Boom! – Sunday was Drainage and Constant Sneezing Day. This morning, it’s nearly all gone away – I am thankful.
