Meeting people

I don't normally write about relationship issues. Not here anyway. Mom reads this. But I'm gonna touch on something here that has been getting lots of coverage on more popular blogs. The topic is how single women are supposed to meet single guys. There's about a million caveats I should include, but the biggest is that these rules change depending on what kind of person you want and what kind of relationship you want.


1) Probably the most important thing to do is go out alone.
This is also item one on the "Five Ways To Get Attacked" list. So while you want to go out by yourself you don't want to be alone.
The key factor here is not being in a pack of friends. Guys know the friends of a woman you're trying to win points with are only slightly less cruel than children. Children are just plain evil.
Being in a group makes it significantly more difficult for someone to approach you.
I go out by myself all the time and I'm always having guys hit on me. Yeah, bad news for you and me both.

2) Lose the finger jewelry.
Wedding and engagement rings go on one of those three middle fingers on either the right or left hand. So if you want to wear a purely decorative ring put it on your thumb or pinky.
Some will argue that decorative rings are clearly decorative rings and relationship rings are clearly relationship rings. This may be so to someone who is into rings. However, most guys aren't. Many of us would buy either a gum wrapper twisted in a circle or something that can hold poison or something unless we have someone telling us what is and isn't appropriate.
I've seen all sorts of rings used for engagement rings and several oddities for wedding rings, too. I have some friends who made each other's wedding rings. One has said he'll make one for me some day if I can get him a laboratory made diamond to play with. They're not normal looking rings.
I've also seen people using rings that have been passed down over the generations. These tend to have more jewels and be more gaudy than modern rings.
And if you keep moving your hands around so we can't get a good look at the ring we really can't tell. One woman threw me off for a couple of months because she was wearing her class ring. Her hand was always in motion when I saw her so all I knew was that is was shiny and on some central finger.
You can probably wear one of those rings that has chains running to a bracelet or other rings. That's almost never used as anything but decoration. But I HAVE seen one as an engagement ring once.

3) Give the guy some way to start up a conversation.
Pets are a traditional favorite but not always a possibility. Carry a good book around with you. You don't have to be reading it, although you should have at some point. You could just have it sticking out of your bag. It should be something that a guy is likely to have read so stay away from the Oprah book club. It should also be something that you'd enjoy reading.
I rarely answer personal ads, but one I did because she had read Robert Heinlein's "Stranger in a Strange Land". Turned out she only read it because it's enough of a classic that she felt it was something she SHOULD be reading.
I'm always getting in conversations about books with other guys on the subway.

4) Stay out of the bars.
This is one of those caveats I mentioned before. Bar = meat market. You're more likely to meet Mr. Right in a chat room than you are in a bar. But if you're looking for a short term thing or just someone for the night then go right ahead.
Ask any group of people where to meet a guy and they're gonna start listing bars first. Often these are people who know better. It's just reflex. They're right in that you'll meet a lot of guys there. But are you after quality or quantity?

4.1) Coffee shops. That's the place. A guy sitting alone in a coffee shop is probably there hoping to meet someone. That or using the free Wi-fi. or both.
The most promising date I've had since moving to DC was with a woman I met in a coffee shop. She just caused every hormone gland in my body to dump at once. We went out a few times and then hung out a few times. An amazing woman, perfect in almost every way. But she writes letters to the kids she'll have some day and I don't want to have kids ever. I'm just not up for a relationship that is guaranteed to end poorly. We kept hanging out until she landed a job at a non-profit. She works 12 hour days 6 days a week. The time she had left she used for laundry, going to visit family, etc. We see each other on the street from time to time.

4.2) Or the park. Same basic idea. Look for a guy sitting alone. Especially if he has a parrot on his shoulder. I know that's where most guys hit on me.

5) Ask him out yourself.
"But traditionally..."
"I want the man to chase..."
"A man needs the confidence to..."
"But I'm afraid I'll get rejected."
Fuck all that. It's the 21st century. There's no more arranged marriages. You don't need someone to look after you. Tradition is just another word of "There's no good reason for it". The guys are afraid of being rejected, too, and have been ever since the first female amoeba laughed at the first male amoeba and made sure every other bit of slime in the pond laughed at him, too.
I've actually had a woman I'd never seen before walk up to me, tell me they'd never go out with me, and storm off. That was a real WTF moment.
You can drop all the hints you want, wear whatever slinky outfit you want, and flirt outrageously but the only sure way to let him know you're interested is to ask him out.
In college there was one woman who was interested in me. We saw each other around the dorms all the time and had several classes together. We were pretty friendly and she was really interested in me. But she was a flirt. She flirted with absolutely everyone. I had no way of knowing that she was actually interested until she out and told me as she was turning in her final. By the time I caught up with her the semester break was over and she had met someone else.
I was having dinner with a couple of girls I'd gone to college with. They told me the waitress was hitting on me. I didn't believe them. I mean, she's a waitress. How can you tell who is hitting on you and who is working for tips?

6) Friends.
The idea is that if you have friends in common then you're likely to have something in common, too. It doesn't always work, but it's someone you wouldn't have otherwise had contact with.
My cousin and his wife tried to hook me up with the wife's best friend. She had quite a bit going for her except she smoked and she lived in Seattle.

7) Get a better job(see 4.1)
If you have one of those jobs where you work 12 hour days 6 days a week your options are:
1) remain single with the occasional 1 night stand
2) date a co-worker
3) move in with someone who seems OK and hope things work. Because that's the only way you're gonna have time to see this guy.
4) get a job with better hours

Graphic novel reviews

First I want to explain the difference between graphic novels and comic books. Comic books are those thin bundles of flexible paper that tell stories about super heroes and only cost a quarter back in the day. Graphic novels can be a storyline of 6-13 comic books all bundled together with the ads removed and a better cover. They can also be something non-super hero related. Some artists write autobiographical stories in a graphical format and sell that. Some of your favorite movies probably started out as a graphic novel that then got adapted for screen. "V for Vendetta" (the movie was better), "300", "30 Days of Night", and many others. I'm sure My Krodie can add more or enhance my limited definition.

I'm going to talk about two.

"1602" was a series of comic books written by Neil Gaiman. Gaiman's name was probably about 1/3 of why I bought it. It starts out fairly strong. It's the year 1602 and your favorite Marvel superheroes are manifesting. They don't have the silly outfits they have now, but they have the powers. X-Men, Fantastic Four, Spiderman, Capt. America, Daredevil, and Nick Fury have to face King James, the Spanish Inquisition, and figure out what strangeness is happening in Roanoke.
My biggest criticism is that instead of making this a nice stand alone story they felt the need to tie it in with the existing Marvel Universe through time travel and all that rubbish. Why can't they just let it stand on it's own?

"Pride of Baghdad" is based on a true story. During the American invasion of Baghdad four lions escaped from the zoo and got to roam free. This book tells the story from the point of view of the lions.

I'm not gonna insist you run out and buy either one. The fact that I'm discussing them at all should tell you they're better than most graphic novels I've picked up. Next time you're in the book store stroll by the graphic novel section and flip through them.
No, not the Manga section. I'm sure if Manga demonstrates the effects of radiation on a large population. It tells me we either shouldn't have nuked Japan or we should have nuked them more.

Book Review: Jennifer Government

This is why Amazon will never replace bookstores and why NetFlix will never replace the video store. There's just too much good stuff that you'll never know about unless you're walking the aisles. That's how I discovered "Good Omens" (now sitting next to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy) which led me to the rest of Neil Gaiman's and Terry Pratchett's work. And now I stumbled into "Jennifer Government" by Max Barry.

"Jennifer Government" tells of the world as Ron Paul would have it. No, really. Research was done by surfing libertarian websites. The United States is a free market utopia. Your last name is determined by what company you work for or what school you attend. The schools are run by corporations that require certain levels of merchandising from the students. The government doesn't have the authority to collect taxes. Their only remaining task is to prosecute criminals and they need funding from the wronged to prosecute. The US also now runs all of North and South America and has just purchased Australia.

The book opens with Hack Nike looking for a water cooler with some water. He gets talked into signing a contract without reading it. The contract drags him into Nike's latest marketing campaign. They've built a world of hype around their latest shoes. Only 200 have been released so far so their price is $2,500 a pair. They've been spreading word that the local store will have a shipment of 5 on a particular day. Which local store? All of them. And much more than 5. Hack's job is to shoot between 5 and 10 of the people buying shoes to make it look like the demand is enough that people are killing for them. This will drive up sales even more. He just has to make sure to shoot some of the poorer people so their parents can't afford to prosecute.

Hack subcontracts to the police who subcontract to the NRA. The NRA is now the biggest baddest group of mercenaries you've ever heard of. They're an Army for hire.

Jennifer Government has a history with John Nike, the mind behind this marketing campaign. She is also investigating the Nike shootings.

This is just the start of the story. Some books you have trouble telling the characters apart, but not with this one. This one has a healthy cast of characters who all come into contact with each other to form a chaotic network of relations. The story escalates from a comedic marketing campaign to an all out war between two massive corporate partnership that climaxes in an exchange of heavy artillery between a McDonalds and a Burger King complete with missile launchers and truck mounted chain guns.

There's no message to this book. No more than what you give it. It's just a good corporate comedy.

But don't take my word for it. If you see this book in the bookstore pick it up and read the first two pages. If you're not sold by then just put it down. I'm pretty sure that you'll want a copy.

The movie is due out in 2010.

Coming in from the cold

I got another company to squeeze me in this morning. I zipped home, let the guy in, and gave him the run down. His conclusions pretty much matched up with mine. He hit all the reset switches I did and they all seemed to be in place.

See, all the limit switches are in series so if one blows you only know that one went down, not which one. One end plugs into the controller for the gas flow while the other plugs into another board along with several other wires. I considered this but gave it a pass for some reason. See all those wires go into one big plug. He detached that plug and plugged it back in place. It caused some related limit switch on the board to reset and everything came back on.

He charged me $70 which was their basic "yep, it's broke" fee. Or as the joke goes "the $70 ain't for flipping the switch. The $70 is for knowing which switch to flip."

Anyway, we're pretty sure the problem was initially caused by a clogged air filter. All the dust I've kicked up clogged it faster than normal. Plus I got a good filter. The filter that was there when I moved in could be smacked against a wall and replaced every few months. Even clogged it didn't really stop the air. So, it's a Home Depot trip tomorrow.

Cold

A few hours ago I was walking through the kitchen and felt a cold draft. The furnace was blowing cold air. Upon investigation I found that the blower was going like mad but the gas wasn't on and the electric ignition wasn't even trying. I removed the filter, played with the thermostat, checked the gas in the house, toggled some switches, noticed a red status LED blinking in patterns of four, and threw the breakers a few times. Once I ripped the furnace open far enough I finally found a brand name to feed Google.

Google gave me one other reference to a similar problem. Four blinks means the limit circuit is open. This means that one of four switches must have been thrown. Of course none of them were. After talking to a guy in California, since all the furnace repairmen in the more local time zones had closed, I got my multimeter and checked to see that the switches were still good. They were. So just for giggles I shorted past all the switches with an LED. It lit up. I threw the breaker just for fun. The status light continued it's blinking. Blowing, no heat.

9:00 pm and the indoor temperature was down to 58°F and 30°F outside. It's supposed to get down to 23°F out there. I fobbed off the parrot on a neighbor since she can't cope with the cold as well as I can.

But that's the question. How do I plan to cope? I was gonna pop a pizza in the oven but I'm out. I tried to order a pizza but yet another pizza place has stopped delivering to this area. I'll try boiling something up later. Eventually I'll have to retreat back to the attic since it's the highest and will stay the warmest the longest. Do I stay awake and try to keep warm or hunker down and cocoon myself?

Tomorrow I'll call a repairman and probably have to take a half day. So long as the pipes don't burst first.

---

The next morning...

Luckily the temperature didn't drop below 50°F indoors last night. Only 10° below where I kept the house at the beginning of the winter. I coped by wrapping myself up in five layers of the warmest blankets I could find. Dad suggested electric blankets. The controls for them showed up a few days ago but the blankets themselves are still in the steamer trunk which I probably won't get to unearth for another couple of weeks.

I just got off the phone with some furnace techs. They were impressed with how much I was able to tell them about the problem. As well they should be I think. They're gonna call me back to tell me when, and if, someone can come by today.

Further progress

With the hole cut and the ladder installed (see yesterday) I started moving stuff into the attic. I started with my computer museum.

Pictured here are 15 bits of the museum. I have all together 23 computers.

The Epson in the upper right is my first computer. It's a 1983 model with an 8086 processor. I think my Dad's watch has a more powerful processor. It dates back to before hard drives. And yes, it still works.

Below it is a database server from my last job. Below that is a Mac that I found on the sidewalk here in DC. I fixed it up for a neighbor kid to use. To the left is a kit I got from Tiger Direct. Nothing special about it. To the left and at the bottom is a Gateway 2000. It's only significance is that it was such a major product in it's time. Above that is a Mac LC that I got at a university auction. It mostly fills a slot in the timeline. Above that is another DB server from my last job. Then there's the remains of my second Epson. I know it looks empty but all those parts are still around. I just don't have the same attachment to it. To the left is some tower that I used to use. I think it replaced the Tiger and was what I used when I moved to DC. Next to that is a 486 that I use mostly for playing old games. To the left of that is one of those rare machines from the brief period when Apple allowed other companies to make compatible machines. To the left of that is another timeline placeholder. In the upper left corner are three Mac SEs from the early days of Macs.

I've also got an Apple ][, a Mac Performa I used in college, another tower for playing old games that my cousin recently left me, a couple of ill laptops, a first generation iMac, my main computer, ... that's 21 ... there's the G3 that Avery is using... that's 22... I'm missing one... There was one that I gutted and turned into a kitty litter box as a wedding gift but that's not the one I'm thinking of. Man, that's gonna bother me all day.

Also, in the far right of the picture you can see a bit of blanket poking into the scene. That's because once I had that floor down I started sleeping up there since it was warmer than the couch on the first floor. Last night I finally got enough computers and electronic components (and comic books) moved into the attic that I had room to take the bed away from it's place against the bedroom wall. I used the wet-dry vac to clean the whole room 2" at a time and put down the bed. This is the first time I've slept in it since June 30... 2006.

The attic is sufficiently climate controlled that I'm not worried about the heat and humidity damaging the stuff I'm cramming up there. But just in case I will be monitoring the temperature up there this summer.

Attic hatch pics

You've seen the great shot of me working in my attic from a few weeks back. Now there's more pictures.

This is the hole I was cutting in that picture.

This is why I was cutting the hole. Yes, the joists have all been properly reinforced.

Museum Review: National Geographic Frogs

The National Geographic building has a pretty slick setup.

There's several TVs setup along the glass windows and external speakers so you can sit outside and watch the National Geographic Channel.

Between the TVs are displays of various artifacts from National Geographic expeditions.

There are several stands around the outside for the first display you see as you approach. Currently they talk about the albatross. (Note: the word "albatross" must be said in your best John Cleese voice)

On either side of the courtyard there's a museum. The smaller one, to the left, has a life size replica of a Nigersaurus skeleton and information about it and it's recovery.

It's the larger of the two museums I want to talk about today. They've converted almost the whole area to an exhibit on frogs. I went there expecting a collection of dead frogs pinned to something and a lot of pictures. Or maybe some displays full of hiding frogs. This isn't what I got at all.

First, there was a crowd like I've never seen at the National Geographic before. People of all ages, too. Senior citizens, twenty-somethings on a date, lots of people there with their kids, and a bunch of people practicing their "nature" photography.

In the main display area there are twenty or so display cases decorated to recreate the frogs' natural habitats. But what you get here that you don't get in the zoo or PetSmart is the ability to see the frogs. Normally the frogs blend into their artificial habitat well enough that you have trouble knowing which displays are empty and which ones are just hiding well. Not here. While the habitats are good they have also been made so that the frogs are generally easy to find. Or if some have found a hiding spot there's enough frogs in that container so that you can find at least one with some ease.

Besides the frogs there's an exhibit where you perform an autopsy... er, dissection. Whatever. There's videos on how they eat, recordings of how they sound, and a long jump area to see how far you jump relative to a frog. There's a display showing the blow darts and guns used by tribes that use frog venoms in their darts.

Then you move into the photo gallery. That guy has one doozy of a camera.

Totally worth it. One of National Geographic's better exhibits. They need to do more living creature exhibits.

Book Review: Quantico

I got this book for Dad when Greg Bear was in town last summer. Alas, in the confusion I didn't get the signature made out to Dad.

Before I get into the book let me remind you why Greg was in town. Greg Bear is one of the bigger names in hard science fiction today. He's got the PhDs and all that good stuff. His technology is credible. So when the Department of Homeland Security's technology division wanted some science fiction authors to come in and tell them what they might be missing and what they should be developing Greg Bear made the list. And since he was in town Reiters bookstore had him sign some books.

"Quantico" takes place in the near future. Not long from now 9-11 has a sequel on 10-4. Security and terrorism becomes the focus of just about everyone everywhere. Anti-terrorist tech makes some great leaps. But since they're having trouble fighting the terrorists and cut a few corners legal-wise the FBI is fighting for it's life.

A truckload of empty cartridges for obsolete inkjet printers is found overturned along a highway next to a dead cop.
A fanatical uber-christian terrorist and his family are discovered in their back woods cabin and monitored by the FBI.
The guy responsible for the anthrax mailings turns out to be a mad social recluse living at a deserted vineyard. He's now working on a version of anthrax that kills only Jews and glows green and red in the late stages. He's doing this at the motivation of a man with eyes two different colors.
Some people from Quantico are investigating the first two which may lead them to the third.

The book starts kinda slow. Lots of descriptions intermixed with more interesting conversation. But after page 50 things start to pick up. There's raids, powerful and creative explosives, interesting and feasible anti-terrorist tech, black-ops organizations, and all mixed in with an agency quickly going under.

There's a lot that I'm not telling you. That's only because much of the fun in the book is the story unfolding bit by bit.

This book is for the person who watches CSI, The Unit, and similar investigative shows. Not really my thing but I really did get the book for Dad.

I'm still gonna recommend the author Greg Bear if not this specific book. He's a good writer who can present most subjects in an interesting manner.

Movie Review: Vantage Point

There's good things and bad things about being a professional movie reviewer. Sure, you get to see all the movies for free before anyone else sees them. On the down side you are forced to watch every awful piece of crap that comes along. Luckily for me I'm not at all professional and get to skip the stuff that you can tell is crap before you ever step into the theater. So after a long spell where only really gawdawful movies were available to me for free I finally get to see decent stuff again.

"Vantage Point" feels like part "Lost" and part "24".

Some years ago I thought it would be cool to make a TV show that covered a story one hour at a time. One season would be one day. I wasn't the only person with that idea. Somebody else came up with an idea for what kind of story would work in that format. That person made the show "24".

Another idea I had, one that's been used in several TV shows for decades, is to tell a story from several viewpoints. "Vantage Point" is that movie. It tells the story of terrorists attacking the President at an international peace conference. So the movie has a storyline much like a season of "24".

The movie opens in the press trailer of GNN. Sigourney Weaver is directing the feed from six different cameramen, telling them how and where to point, and directing the reporter in the field. This first view point sets up the foundation that the rest of the movie builds on. Peace conference, not everyone thrilled, President gets shot, one set of explosions, more explosions, and then rewind to noon.

The second POV is from Dennis Quaid. He's a Secret Service agent who took a bullet for the President and is just now going back into service. Everyone is a bit worried about him.

The third POV is from suspicious character #1.

The fourth POV is from observant tourist Forest Whitaker.

The fifth POV is from the President's perspective

The sixth POV is more muddled since it's from suspicious characters #2, #3, and #4.

The seventh round really pulls things together.

Each perspective ends with a cliffhanger that gets dealt with later in the movie. The erratic time line, the plethora of cliffhangers, and the way that it keeps you trying to figure out how the next part will unfold is what makes it feel like "Lost". That much more than the inclusion of Matthew Fox who plays Jack in "Lost".

It's an entertaining movie. There's a few holes in the behavior of some characters but you overlook them because this isn't a movie for taking seriously. This is a movie for watching explosions and car chases and action ... stuff.

I won't get it on DVD. I'm glad I saw it. I'm glad I didn't pay for it.
Go with a group. Pay matinee.

Museum Review: The Cinema Effect - part 1

Just opened at the Hirshhorn Museum: The Cinema Effect. It's supposed to explore our relationship with video and how if shapes our perception of reality and dreams and other words that make you think art.

The exhibit is a series of videos. Not short films such as you could get off YouTube. This is "art" which means "really kinda messed up". You go through curtains, which are backlit orange, and enter a dark room. Once your eyes adjust you go through a series of dark rooms showing different videos.

It starts with simple stuff such as Andy Warhol's "Sleep". "Sleep" was originally 5 hours and change of Andy sleeping. It's been cut to only 2 hours for this exhibit.

Other exhibits include:
what appears to be several minutes of random stock footage stuck together,
a train going through a series of tunnels with some narration while not in a tunnel,
what looks like every Sega Genesis landscape stuck together and scrolling down so it looks like you keep rising up and up,
bits of star falling into a lake,
a projection of geometric shapes going through a misty room (apparently one of the favorites),
a ride through an amusement park haunted house shown at half speed,
a doll with an egg shaped head and the face of a film director projected on it while he gives direction,
a line of video screens that are mostly dark except for the video that keeps running back and forth along them scattering human body parts,
a line of video screens showing footage of factory workers going home over 9 decades,
and many others

I was in a hurry so I blew through in about 40 minutes. I'd suggest you give yourself more time. Two hours should do. Three tops. I'll probably go back some other weekend.

The exhibit will last until May 11. Then they tear it down and start setting up part two which opens on June 19.

---

Also, the Newseum is nearing finished. The building looks awesome. You can start booking space in the Newseum Residences. The museum itself opens April 11.

Movie Review: Diary of the Dead

George Romero is back and making movies again. He vanished for about 15 years. (This number includes a couple of movies you've never heard of so they don't count.) Romero is the guy who came up with what most people think of when they think zombie. As a film student he made "Night of the Living Dead" and neglected to copyright the shambling brain eating zombie. He'd probably be a billionaire by now if he'd claimed right to that. On the other hand he used that idea because he was a poor film student with no budget. By not copyrighting it he made it a gift to hundreds of other poor film students with no budget.

His latest movie is "Diary of the Dead". Much like "Casino Royale" it's a prequel to other movies in the series but somehow takes place after the other movies. So I'm ignoring the rest of the Romero's zombie flicks when discussing this.

This movie has a message. Not "watch out for commies" like some of the early work. This is more a commentary on film makers and their behavior in situations like New Orleans after Katrina or, more pointedly, their behavior in war zones like Iraq and Afghanistan. They hide behind the camera and the detachment, real or imagined, it provides from the horrors around them. They become more interested in capturing everything than anything else.

The movie is supposed to be a documentary chronicalling the rise of the undead using mostly their own footage but mixed with footage pulled from YouTube and the rest of the internet. It opens with uncut footage uploaded by a news cameraman who disliked how the press cut it up to change what happened. What they were there to cover was a three person murder/suicide. What they got was the dead rising from the stretcher as it was being taken to the ambulance. A voice over helps explain what the project is.

The movie then cuts to a bunch of film students in the woods trying to make a mummy movie. They hear on the radio about the dead rising and decide to call it a night. Upon returning to campus they decide to load up the Winnebago and try to get home as a group.

The movie is like "Cloverfield" but with people who know how to work a camera. It tries to capture some of the human element that the original movie had. It doesn't explore the ravished countryside like "28 Days Later" did but it does chronicle their trip and the people they meet or run over along the way.

"Diary of the Dead" is a good supplement to the other Romero zombie flicks but it doesn't have the gore that they do. It's "Shawn of the Dead" only without the humor or the happy ending.

I apparently see more good in the movie than many other reviewers. I'll go see the sequel but I won't get it on DVD.

Movie Review: The Spiderwick Chronicles

I haven't read the book so I can't compare to the movie. If I were to guess I'd say this book was written in the 40's in England. It has the same feel as many of the children's books written back then but updated for today.

In this movie a woman and her three kids move to a large house out in the country. She's recently divorced and can't afford their old place on just her salary. While exploring the big spooky house the surliest of the kids finds a book with a warning not to open or read it that he promptly ignores. Almost immediately unseen creatures described in the book start messing with the family. In fact pretty much everything that goes wrong in the movie is the direct result of that kid being a real idiot who can never follow sound advice.

As usual there's good invisible creatures and evil invisible creatures. The evil ones want the book's secrets so they can conquer the world.

It's a well done, richly populated fantasy story akin to "The Neverending Story". I rather preferred this movie to "The Neverending Story". It doesn't feel crammed to fit like so many movies in this genre do. But even so I probably won't get it on DVD. I dunno why. Go see it.

X-Minus One

I got the complete collection of old "X-Minus One" radio shows. If you don't know them they're half hour productions based on the short stories by some of the greats sci-fi authors of the day. Robert Heinlein and Ray Bradbury are some of the more common sources. I've read most of the original short stories from both authors. Something occurred to me awhile back, but the tedium of my job has allowed me to work it out a bit more.

When Isaac Asimov wrote about space travel he'd send out the best and the smartest. His universe is full of lightly colonized planets with some of the best educated humans and tons of robots. Most of Earth's brightest have been lost to the stars while the poor, the uneducated, and miserable are stuck on the home world. That leaves a planet crowded with the people most likely to have more kids while those least likely to have a bunch of kids are out on empty planets. Earth has few robots because the humans need the work. Despite having more people the people on Earth are pretty much stuck since the brain drain has allowed all the people who could develop advanced weapons and fighters to live elsewhere.
OK, that was a bit more than needed for my original point. The so-called best and brightest are on the ships. Space travel is expensive so they want the best trained to get the most for their money.

Heinlein was in the Navy until some lung condition forced him out. He views starships more like Navy vessels. They're crewed largely with people you're more likely to find in a bar than in a lab. Crude, loud mouthed, and handy with a wrench. The planets have people who are indentured servants. People you're likely to see working the fields or the mines on modern Earth. Hopefully when you've finished your contract you have enough money left to pay your way home or else you have to sign on for another contract.

Gene Roddenbury's universe (Star Trek and Next Generation) was more like Asimov's not because only the smartest got to move away but because he made everyone the smartest. The education system worked, the government was benign, and they'd achieved the perfect balance of capitalism and socialism to see that everyone had the chance to be something great.

I'm not sure what my point is other than to notice that difference between these different visions of the future.

What's your vision?

A eulogy

An old classmate of mine recently died. We were in school together K through 12. It's just as well I wasn't at his funeral. They wouldn't have liked what I had to say.

He was a bully. Not one of the alpha bullies. Not one of the huge, mindless, violence machines that littered my class. No, this guy was one of the followers. He was a Crabbe or a Goyle to a couple of very large and dangerous Malfoys. But still, if he went to Columbine instead of Clearwater he would have made the "must shoot" list of the guys in trench coats.

Less than a week after graduation he was out partying with several other people at Lake Afton. He dove in, hit his head on a log, and was left paralyzed from the neck down from then on. Rumor has it that he regained some motion in his fingers, but he spent the rest of his life like that. This was the first of a series of incidents that left many of the brutes from my class dead.

I'm told that he managed to start his own stock trading company. How well he was doing I don't know. It's better than I'd have expected from him. I imagine that being a quadriplegic limits your options enough that he was forced to work in directions that he otherwise would never have gone.

It's been 15 years since I've seen him. I'd like to think that in that time he became a better person. Maybe the chair altered his attitude in the same way it altered his career path. Maybe he used the extra years so many of his friends didn't have to change his ways. It could happen. My cousin married a bully who smacked around her brother for years. Her husband seems to have reformed but he can still be heard bragging about some of the mistreatment he heaped upon others back in the day.

I know the man in that coffin is not the same person who sat a few rows behind me at graduation. Only his family can really speculate about how much he changed.

The chicken and the egg

Happy Valenteen. I hope you didn't shave or apply make-up.

---

I've known for several years now the answer to the question to which came first, the chicken or the egg. What I've just realized is that the answer is one which can come back into question when dealing with the theocratically minded.

A Dougintologist believes that the egg came first. As one species becomes another through the gradual process of evolution there must at one point have been a creature that was almost but not quite a chicken. This creature, the chucken, laid an egg expecting another chucken to come out. Instead a slightly different creature came out. That creature and it's offspring would eventually become the creature we now know as lunch.

A Biblical literalist would claim that between five and six thousand years ago the first rooster and the first chicken popped into existence in some oasis in Algeria or possibly Morocco. A couple of days later some naked guy came along and called them chicken.

The Social Constructionists would claim there was neither chicken nor egg until scientists said there was.

Movie Review: Futurama: Bender's Big Score

From Matt Groening, the guy who brought you the comic strip "Life in Hell" and "The Simpsons" came sci-fi comedy "Futurama". It was a popular show while it lasted and when it could be seen. But the schmucks at Fox shoved it into the 7:00pm (6:00 central) time slot. This meant that it ran an hour before standard prime-time shows. This was rough on ratings but the show muscled on thanks to die hard fans. The second problem with this time slot was that sporting events frequently pre-empted the show. The only people who got to see the show were on the west coast. The rest of the country had no idea if the show was going to air at all. This successfully killed off the show.

Jump forward a couple of years. Those head Fox schmucks are gone now. The turnover rate for people in the position of head schmuck is ridiculous. I'd lay odds that those were the same bastards who canceled "Firefly". Anyway, they're gone now and the new head schmucks recognize they had a good thing. Partially because the DVD sales are great, ratings for the reruns on Comedy Central are high, and Comedy Central was talking about commissioning new episodes. So they start talking about bringing it back. What they have instead are a series of movies that can easily be broken into episodes.

The first movie is "Futurama: Bender's Big Score". Why I didn't buy it myself I don't know. I'll buy the next three.

"Bender's Big Score" is very self referential. I think they make reference to almost every previous Futurama episode and bring back nearly every character who has ever appeared. Big fan service episode. Really, that's who is gonna be watching this.

Time travel is a major factor in this episode. They tell you early on that it's gonna get confusing and they're not kidding. Some time travel shows are confusing because of their use of grandfather paradox or predestination paradox. This show says screw all that and works cause the universe to collapse every couple of minutes. The episode is littered with duplicate people who the universe has to destroy in horrible and inventive ways.

Quick summary: They open by mocking the people who canceled the show. Then they get conned by spammers who take the crew for everything and then start using Bender to pillage history. Fry returns to his own time several times and works his way back to the future.

Coming soon:
Futurama: Bender's Game
Futurama: The Beast with a Billion Backs
Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder
all in post-production

It's monday

There were no good movies this weekend, I didn't quite finish the main book I'm reading, and I'd rather not dip into my reserve postings yet so... I guess you get to hear about construction.

You should have seen the picture of me working on my attic. If not just scroll down a bit.

I got the hole cut and cross beams installed. Then I needed to get the hatch and folding ladder up through the hole. It weighs about 65lbs (~30kg). I ran a extending ladder up through the hole, leaned the hatch against the ladder, and lifted. I got the hatch above my head and through the hole with about an inch to spare. But it needed to go higher. I lifted my right foot to climb the ladder and the hatch started swinging to the left. I put that foot down and tried again with the left foot first. The hatch swung to the right. I tried a few more times but without a third arm to stabilize myself better it just didn't work.

The clothesline rope I've been looking for for a year or two materialized as if by magic. I tied it on to the hatch, climbed into the attic, and started hauling. But the closer it got the harder it was to lift. I never got it high enough to grab and leave my spine intact.

I needed help. I considered the neighbor kids who are always asking to help since they're bored silly. But they're too short and probably not strong enough to lift. And even if they are they'd get squashed if I lost my grip. So I called Bruise at work and asked him stop by on the way home. He lifted, I grabbed and pulled. No sweat.

Later I sat the hatch on my shoulders and lowered it into place. I hadn't cut the hole to fit the hatch. I cut the hole to get the pieces of ceiling joist removed. So the hatch was supported by slats on one end and by a tight fit on the other. I'd also sunk some screws into the sides so if the first line of support failed there was something else to back them up. I drove what nails I could and cut the hole larger so the hatch would open.

Yesterday I opened the hatch so I could swing the hammer enough to drive the rest of the nails. The ladder comes in three pieces that are hinged. When fully unfolded the hinges should also unfold completely. Anything less and the ladder becomes unstable and more prone to breaking. But there was about a 15° gap that I had to close. Plus the legs were squared off so I needed to cut them so they'd hit the floor flat. I made an educated guess and cut. I apparently wasn't educated enough because two further cuts still didn't do the job. Finally I grabbed a slat of bamboo flooring, ran it along the middle 1/3 of the ladder and on to the floor. Then I marked it. I transfered the mark to the lower 1/3 of the ladder and cut. This cut was just above the bottom step. It seemed a ridiculous amount to cut off but it turned out to be right.

It was a thrill to be able to walk up the ladder the first time.

Then I hooked up the wet/dry vac in the attic to start getting crud out. The bedroom ceiling was built by nailing thin slats to the ceiling joists and then smooshing some cement/plaster-type substance through the gaps. So I had to move back and forth along the ceiling, reaching between joists, and running the vacuum hose up and down the slats between smooshed substance. By the time I ran the width of the house three time (15ft/pass) the wet/dry vac was full of a nasty black substance and refused to take any more. Still, it's an improvement on vacuuming up a dust so fine that it clogged the filter every 5 minutes. More of this task tonight.

The next horror will be to make the ceiling around the hatch look clean. It's all ragged and ugly at the moment.

Book review: The Subtle Knife

"The Subtle Knife" follows "The Golden Compass" in the "His Dark Materials" trilogy by Philip Pullman.

This book wasn't nearly as insulting and obviously intended for little kids as the first book. As way of review and summary I'm going to focus on the controversy of these books. Christians are very upset by these books. I'll get to why quickly.

The world of these books contains multiple dimensions or alternate worlds.
The first book focuses on something that looks a bit like England before the invention of the automobile. Each person has a being that is never far from their side their whole life. It can change shape when you're a kid but when you reach puberty it picks one shape that is indicative of your personality and stays that shape until you die. This creature, a Daemon, is basically a manifestation of your soul.
In this world the church is pretty much still in control of everything. They monitor all scientific research, make sure people obey them, and aren't above assassinating people that piss them off. They're researching a substance called Dust while making sure that nobody else researches it. They fear Dust without really knowing what it is. They know it's attracted to adults but not kids. They've found that Dust loses interest in people once they've had their Daemon's cut away. But that makes the people effectively zombies (voodoo, not braaaainnns). They find this out by experimenting on children. They've already cut away the souls of their staff who mindlessly continue their given tasks.

In the second book our heroes have made their way into another dimension where people don't have daemons, but there are spectres that are invisible to kids but not to adults. When you reach puberty you can see them and they come eat your soul.
From there our heroes make it into a third dimension that is much like our own world. They're researching dark matter which is the same as Dust. It's established that the Dust is really fallen angels. So, the church is really the good guys right? Fighting those who rebelled against God? I started wondering what the churchies were objecting to. Sure, the church is running experiments on kids and cutting out people's souls but if it's to help fight God's enemies then it's good, right? Lord knows that the real world church has a history of being much nastier and repressive than the one in the book.
The Dust caused people to evolve into intelligent beings, not God. The Dust wants to use us in in the next war against God. So... thanks, but no thanks.
The Subtle Knife is a tool that can kill the spectres in the second world and open passages into alternate dimensions.
Meanwhile, back in the first dimension the church has been busy cutting out people's souls to raise an army of mindless soldiers. The zombie soldiers are to be used to fight the army that is being raised by the hero's father to fight God.

So really, the question of who is good and bad depends on your point of view and whether you think the ends justify the means.

At the end of the book we find that Dust and the people working for it call God "The Authority" and view it as an oppressor who cares only for obedience from everyone. From my own reading of the Bible I can't really say that this view is out of line. God always seemed like a real self important jerk to me.

So aside from the obvious bit where the fallen angels talk about the oppressive nature of God (what else would you expect them to say about God?) I think the big objection that the Christians would have against this book is that it encourages people to think about issues. Christian leaders have never been big on people thinking about stuff.

Book review: The Han Solo Adventures

Back in the 70's Brian Daley wrote a trilogy of books about Han Solo and Chewbacca that came before the Star Wars movies. "The Han Solo Adventures" is a compilation of all three books.

If you're looking for a Star Wars book this isn't it. All three books take place in a galactic arm with no native intelligent life. It's just a bunch of star systems and planet being stripped of their resources by a big corporation that operates outside of the Empire's influence.

There are certain story elements that had to be replaced since they hadn't encountered the Star Wars heroes yet. C3-P0 and R2-D2 are replaced with two other droids, Bollux and Blue Max. Bounty hunter and sharpshooter Boba Fett is replaced with another sharpshooter (whose name escapes me) that wants to put his skills against Solo. Obi-Wan, Luke, and Leia were just story related passengers that get replaced story to story.

But if you're looking for Han Solo stories then these books are for you. They do expand upon his character and background.

They're not terribly compelling books. They're not making my top 10 anything list, except maybe top 10 Star Wars books that I've actually read since a one eyed shop teacher could count the number of Star Wars books I've read without taking off his shoes.

If you're looking for a good Star Wars book I'd suggest "Tales From the Mos Eisley Cantina". It's a collection of short stories that tell the stories of each and every creature you see in the Mos Eisley Cantina in the original Star Wars movie (Episode IV: A New Hope)

The attic

An unmodified picture of me working on the new attic. If my pose seems awkward for operating a saw it's because I was cutting through ceiling beams and really didn't want to be sitting on one. Plus 118-138 year old wood is REALLY hard.

Hand off

Sunday:

I just got off the subway and I'm heading for the surface. In front of me is some white guy in a jogger's outfit with something Hawaiian written on the back. As he approaches the escalator he looks off to the side. Coming off the down escalator some middle eastern looking fella in American style clothing comes crosses over and bumps into the first guy. They apologize to each other and as they pass their right arms bump and their hands meet. Not just a bump. The white guy took something from the middle eastern looking fella's hand that he then slipped into his pocket without looking at it.

I don't know if they heard me laugh or not.

Good Saturday

No, I'm not declaring yet another new holiday. I mean I had a good Saturday.

After sleeping late (any weekend that I get up before 10 AM is automatically a failure) I went out for my typical breakfast. There's no new movies or good talks to attend so I'm just bopping about.

Walking down 13th street I found a new historical sign. They're popping up all over town to tell about historical buildings and neighborhoods. This one was stuck to a fence announcing that the house behind it was where Duke Ellington grew up. I knew that one of the big jazz legends had gone to school up the street from me but I'd forgotten who.

Several blocks later I was deep in thought about not terribly deep subjects when something demanded that I stop. I'd just walked past the first ForTwo Smart Car I'd seen in person. As I was checking it out to make sure it was really what I thought it was someone actually came up and asked me if it was my car. We walked on for a few blocks talking about it. And no, I didn't ask her out. She has a husband.
My next car

I finished two books that you'll get reviews for soon. "The Han Solo Adventures" by Brian Daley and "The Subtle Dagger" by Philip Pullman. I never have just one book going at a time.

I got home and councelled an old friend via chat.

Then I shimmied back into the attic and got back to cutting away some beams. But that's another post completely. I think I got some good pictures, too. Before coming down I started finally creating an opening into the bedroom. I should be able to, at the very least, get the box created Sunday even if I don't get the ladder put up.

Valenteen

Valenteen. It's the day before Valentine's Day. You know, like Halloween comes before All Saints Day (a.k.a. All Hallows, a.k.a. Hallowmas). Only instead of dressing up you're supposed to completely fail to dress up.

Here's how to celebrate. On February 13th you skip all the usual morning preparation stuff. Guys shouldn't shave, apply cologne, or use anything other than a hairbrush on their hair. Women should skip their makeup and perfume, only use a hairbrush on their hair, and wear comfortable clothes to work.

Obviously if there's a dress code you have to stick to that. So sweat pants are probably out of the question. But still you should feel free to leave the high heels at home. Forget the tight and/or revealing clothes for one day.

Why?
Because the next day is Valentine's Day. It's all about romance and candy and candles and dressing up for your significant other... and huge profits for the candy, card, flower, and lingerie companies. Every day we dress up a bit. For Valentine's Day we dress up a LOT. If for just one day, Valenteen, we fail to dress up and show our partners our real selves it'll make the work we do on Valentine's Day that much more impressive and hopefully make our partners appreciate the work we do every other day a little bit more.

Why?
Because Valentine's Day is the day for all the people who have someone to really rub it in the noses of the single people of the world. As if we don't have to put up with enough of that crap the rest of the time. Valentine's Day is the day they really do it up and yell "neener neener neener" at the single people of the world.

You don't think so? Send those flowers to her home instead of her office and see how much they mean when all the coworkers DON'T get to see them.

Valenteen is the holiday for single people and for those who found someone only after a long hard struggle to show their solidarity with the singles of the world.

Why?
Because men are clueless dorks who have seen so many Valentine's Day signs, displays, and decorations since January 2nd that they've become numb. After all that they're still gonna screw up the big day. If you come out without makeup, your hair pulled back, a sports bra, and frumpy clothes he might realize he has 24 hours left and actually be able to pull something off.

Book review: Murder at the ABA

Isaac Asimov was one of the most prolific authors ever. Besides having much of his sci-fi I've got several of his kids books, his Guide to the Bible (really excellent), and his joke book. I almost picked up his Guide to Shakespeare the other day. I used one of his medical texts to disprove the idea that men have fewer ribs than women - as taught by my high school science teacher. See most medical texts don't even mention it because it's stupid.

Now I'm slowly fleshing out a murder mystery of my own. The subjects are isolated so I'm reading other mysteries that take place in a limited area. Books like "Murder on the Orient Express" and movies like "Clue". I'm not planning it as a comedy, but most everything I write is a farce on some level.

In collecting research material I found "Murder at the ABA" by Asimov. Asimov isn't known for his mysteries. Ok, there's those short stories with all those old guys in the lounge of their club but that doesn't count. This book helps show why he's not known for his mysteries. It's not bad. But it's not something you just can't make yourself put down.

The central character is so-so author Darius Just. Just is attending the ABA (American Booksellers Association) convention to help his publisher convince major bookstores to carry his stuff. Also there is much more successful author, former protégé of Just, and murder victim Giles Devore. Asimov and several other real world characters who you might see in a mid-70's ABA conference are also there.

We're given a list of people who Devore has pissed off in recent months and then Devore is found dead in his room. Just blames himself for Devore's death thinking that if he'd just remembered to pick up a package that Devore asked him to get then none of this would have happened. So over the next two days Just works on proving not only that Devore was murdered but who dunnit.

Just and Asimov bump into each other several times in the book. Just is trying to solve a murder and Asimov is contracted to work on a book called "Murder at the ABA". Eventually they end up working together on the book I'm talking about. In several areas they end up squabbling via footnotes. By including himself in the book Asimov gets to poke fun at himself.

But unless you're an Asimov junky there's no real reason to read this book. I may crack it open again to take a few notes but other than that it'll just get shoved in the Asimov wing of my library.

Book review: Schlock Mercenary: The Tub of Happiness

I've been bad about reviewing some of the cartoon books I collect. Heh. I'll have to post a picture of the comic wing of my library sometime soon.

Howard Taylor was an engineer at Novell. He needed a hobby to help blow off some steam. So he started cartooning. He'd draw around the kitchen table and kill several hours a night. The cartoons went up on a website. Fast forward a few years and he quit his job at Novell to do the cartoon full time. The first book, "Schlock Mercenary: Under New Management", was released a little more than a year ago. I ordered one for me and two for gifts. The problem with this book was that it jumped into the cartoon several years in. It's book three in the eventual series. It contains a couple of story lines but there's missing background. I have to assume he started there because that's where he became happy with his art.

"Schlock Mercenary: The Blackness Between" is the second book released and the fourth in the series.

"Schlock Mercenary: The Tub of Happiness" is the third book, starts before the first strip and runs through several story lines.

The comic is the ongoing tale of a company of missionaries. It successfully pulls off the daily joke format and the long running storyline format. Being an engineer, Taylor does his best to keep the science accurate, or at least consistently wrong. When dealing with the more obscure sciences or feels the need to explain why he's doing it wrong or the history between certain species and corporations the author puts a blurb under the cartoon. All blurbs are contained within the books along with a few extras and some fan art.

If you're not sold on the book yet feel free to have a free look. Schlock Mercenary is a daily strip appearing at http://www.schlockmercenary.com/. The archives are complete and you can read the whole run before deciding whether you want to help support his career choice by shopping at http://store.schlockmercenary.com/.

Movie Review: Rambo (2008)

When I first heard Stallone was working on another Rambo movie I was skeptical. Not as skeptical as I was about a new Rocky movie, but still skeptical. And while I can't remember the early Rambo movies well enough to make a comparison, I did like this movie.

John Rambo is getting up there in years. Duh, right? He's been living out his years in Thailand in relative peace. He runs a boat up and down the river and captures snakes for selling to snake fighting pits. A group of Christian Missionaries ask him to take them up river to the war zone in Burma (Myanmar). They plan to offer medicine to villagers in exchange for being allowed to force their religion on them. Rambo rejects the superior-to-thou "leader" so a more sincere pretty face asks him. Naturally, Rambo agrees to ferry them in but with ample warnings.
They're attacked by river pirates. Rambo offers to pay them off but they want everything plus the girl. So he kills them all. And Mr. Leader criticizes Rambo for saving the from a short life of non-stop rape.

They get to the village and the leader says they'll walk back. They get to the village which is promptly raided by the people claiming to be the Army. Anyone who isn't gunned down is locked in small bamboo cages.

A few weeks later the head of the church comes to Rambo and asks him to ferry a team of mercenaries to where he dropped off the missionaries. Rambo and his bow and arrow come along on the mission despite the wishes of the mercs.

That's pretty much it for plot. Most everything after that is sneaking, shooting, and explosions. Lots of flying body remains. Giant holes appearing in things.

It's pretty good for a last grab at money from an old franchise. It could have been awful. It wasn't.

I won't get it on DVD. I don't have any other Rambos on video either.

Scientific philosophy

On of my co-workers' kids asked her if windows cast shadows. I concluded that thick enough glass blocks all light so windows must block a tiny bit of light so yes it does cast a shadow.

This let to another question I've pondered from time to time. Is the area under a magnifying glass that isn't the focal point a shadow? The ring that holds the lens does block light so it casts a shadow. But the area between that shadow and the focal point just has the light bent away from it... the light isn't really blocked, just redirected.

Here's what I mean.


What do you think? Is that area in shadow or not?

Ebay

When did Ebay stop being an auction site? I remember the early days when you'd go there, see something you like, and wait for days so you could undercut some poor slob at the last second. But the last few years the "Bid" buttons have been overwhelmed by "Buy Now" buttons. Now I don't even see many "Bid" buttons.

I went looking for a Panasonic EP-3203 massage chair and the only option was "Buy Now". Now, I'll grant you, the price they're asking is half of MSRP but what about that "shop victoriously" crap on their new commercials. This isn't an auction. It's become just another store.

---

Don't bother looking. It's gone now. No, I didn't buy it.

Home supplies

I did some shopping late last week. Then some more material for the house came in Monday. Repairs are back in full swing.

I've been mudding some dinks in the sheetrock and covering some big holes. Experience has shown me to be very bad at this. But after considering all the other options I realized there really are no other options worth considering. I've had the opportunity to watch some professionals so I'm hoping this will go better than previous efforts. So far so good. The first coat was horribly cracked since I had to fill large holes and the plaster contracted as it dried. The second coat is looking pretty good but not perfect. I think after a third pass I'll be able to resort to a wet sponge and sandpaper.

The delivery was a hatch with a fold down ladder and some platforms for making a walk area in attics. I have no kitchen left. It's all cardboard.

The hatch promises to be harder to install than I thought. I hoped to be able to fit it between ceiling joists. I was a fool. I'm gonna have to order some lumber and really do some damage up there before I can put this in. Being resigned to that means I am have more options in where I install this thing.

To open up some room in my living room I emptied one of the boxes of attic panels and pushed them through the gap into the area I'll call an attic from now on. Then I followed them through. Even my scrawny self barely fit. These are designed for use in places where there's consistently 16" (center to center) between ceiling joists instead of just 16" average between joists. Why do I keep forgetting that this place was built by primitive knuckle draggers? I can still make them work, but I'll need to take a Dremel or something to cut a few tabs off the bottom.

And I still have flooring so I'm still putting down more of that.

Mostly I'm finding excuses to spend time upstairs since it's so bloody cold down stairs.


That post was written Monday. Since then I moved two more boxes flooring panels up into the attic. I crawled up there yesterday with a hand saw, a clip on light, a tape measure, and a parrot. A "Foundation" book was playing in the library while I worked.

Gandolf was very uncertain about being up there. It's kinda dark and cramped and dusty. I hoped to drag the wet/dry vac up there to deal with the dust but it wouldn't fit through the gap. Gandolf got spooked as I shuffled around flooring. She started to fly around which kicked up dust which spooked her more. She went through the gap into the library. After a bit she came back and sat on the ladder. Every so often she'd hoot and I'd hoot back. She just wanted to know that I was still there.

The hand saw was the one I was using with the miter box to cut the bamboo flooring. I was using it to cut off some of the tabs on the bottom of the attic panels. Not all. Just enough so they all fit. I didn't screw them into place yet. I still intend to get the vacuum up there and clean up the dust. If there's gonna be dust up there it's gonna be MY dust. With all this cardboard lying around maybe I can put some of it under the panels to make it easier to vacuum in the future. Maybe not.

Getting up and down is great fun. I climb up and work my torso through the gap. Then I bring my legs up above the ceiling joists in the library. Then I'm flat enough that I can pull myself through while sliding along the panels. Getting down is just the reverse. Legs go first and get above the ceiling joists. Once I'm mostly out then I can start looking for the ladder.

The tape measure was to get some real world measurements of the space between the joists. My proper construction numbers mesh up close enough to the real world numbers that the boards I planned for will still work. In both cases I left an inch or two more than I need so I can cut them to the proper fit. I'll have to cut them close and then whittle them to the proper form.

Movie review: The Orphanage

This is an independent film from Spain so readers in Wichita and places like that who don't have an independent movie theater probably won't get to see it.

I didn't see any trailers for this. I'm not sure what got me to go see it. I'm glad I did. Again, it's more of a rental than something to own.

"The Orphanage" is a horror movie. For much of it the scariest thing you see it the opening credits. But there are a few points where even I jumped. That's not easy either. It doesn't have the suspense value of "The Others" but it pulls off most of it's scares without blood. Really, it's the ending that made it for me. A good twist instead of the lame twist many get.

The movie starts with a little girl playing with the other kids at an orphanage. She's getting adopted later that day. Thirty years later she buys the place and moves in with her husband and adopted son with the intent to reopen it. At the masquerade themed open house she's attacked by a kid with a bag over it's head. When she gets back up her son is missing.

Months pass. She hears sounds and holds seances. She finds that there was a deformed orphan there thirty years ago who wore a bag over his head. After she left some of her friends led him to a cave on the beach and stole his bag. He drown in that cave rather than show his face. The five friends vanished.

I can't tell you more than that. I can. I won't.

Movie review: Cloverfield

Lets start off with the warnings.
If you got sick watching "The Blair Witch Project" then you don't want to see this movie. If you're particularly susceptible to motion sickness or migraines then don't see this movie. That said, playing "Quake 2" on the slightly off TV in my parents' basement made me sick after 20 minutes or so. I didn't get ill during this movie.

The point of this movie is to show a Godzilla-type film from the perspective of the people living in the city. To do this they needed a plot device that not only explained why someone was running a video camera the whole time but why they were stupid enough to stay in the city instead of fleeing with everyone else.

The movie opens with footage making it clear that the film is property of the Pentagon. It shows a young man and woman enjoying the morning after discovering their long term mutual attraction. The time stamp jumps ahead a month to when the young man is preparing to move to Japan for a new job. The old memory card is being recorded over to document his going away party. The camera is passed off to one of those guys who is perpetually stoned by nature. Shortly we find that something happened to the couple and there are hard feelings. Then the action starts.

There's booms, shaking, and a power failure. The power comes back on. Everyone runs to the roof. Something big explodes and everyone scatters as pieces hit the roof. They run down to the street where the head of the Statue of Liberty flies in and rolls down the street. If you look closely you can just see a tentacle waving way up the street.

So our heroes get joined up in the mob heading out of town. Bad things. The young lady calls and says she's stuck. The young man must save the day. So four characters head back into town. We see TV's showing news footage, we travel through the abandoned subway, we get apprehended by the military, we climb through some ruins, etc.

We don't ever really get a clear shot of the creature. Much like the original "Alien" movie the fear factor is enhanced by not giving anyone a clear view of the creature.

The real mystery isn't what the creature is or where it came from, but where did they find a handheld video camera that works in widescreen?

Again, I enjoyed it and recommend seeing it, but I don't see a place for it in my video collection.

I'm going to hell

I posted this Wednesday but it got listed a year ago.

I'm still burning through stuff I wrote a couple of years ago.
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Jerusalem lie in ruins.

Barely an hour had passed since the twenty story Battle Jesus had marched out of the Mediterranean Sea and onto the beaches south of TelAviv. Absentmindedly flicking jets of the Israeli army out of the air, Jesus quickly strode across the short distance to Jerusalem.

At the city limits the gargantuan son of man pulled the 150 foot crucifix from his back and, in the manner of someone hacking their way through an African jungle, began swinging. With each blow of the mighty cross another city block fell.

But even Battle Jesus wasn't ready for him when he finally reached the Temple Mount. The Profit Muhammad, clad entirely in shining armor, his hair and beard pulled back into a braid running down his back, placed a size 243 sandal on top of the golden dome of the mosque. "This temple is mine! You shall not desecrate it!"

Jesus responded not with words but a volley of cross mounted missiles. Muhammad lept in front of the mosque to protect it from the missiles. Even as the last of them exploded Jesus was on him. Together they rolled through the city crushing homes and offices, apartments and kosher delis alike. First one had the advantage, then the other, and back, over and over across the city.

Just south of Hebrew University Muhammad managed to shove a massive thumb through the hole in Jesus's right hand. Roaring in pain he lept away from the Muslim Prophet. But his scream was cut short as 100 feet of sword was inserted just below his ribcage. Jesus staggered. Looking at Muhammad a smile spread across his face. Throwing back his head Jesus uttered the call to prayer. Reflex took over. Muhammad turned toward Mecca and bowed in prayer. Jesus used this opening to bring the cross down on his opponent's head.

Jesus drew the sword from his chest. Struck by a sudden coughing fit he found his mouth filled with his strangely alcoholic blood. He spat once upon the body of Muhammad before limping off towards the Temple Mount.

Behind him Muhammad struggled to pull himself to his feet. He was the first to see the newest player in their conflict.

Coming up fast over the horizon was the one thing that terrified Muhammad and Jesus alike. A woman. A liberated, scantly clad, woman with six arms and twice as much attitude. And from the way she was holding her trident she clearly intended to finish this once and for all.

The Dougmas Jar

I've been meaning to say how my Dougmas Jar went this year. I generated $16.50 in change in the month of December. It got inflated a bit because I bought stamps and got several of those dollar coins.

Expired Copyright Theatre

One of my pending projects is what I want to call "Expired Copyright Theatre". If I had actually become a teacher I probably would have done this with students in conjunction with the English or drama teacher. The idea is to take material whose copyright has expired and make audio books out of them. I was going to do some Brothers Grimm stuff to test the equipment and then get into more serious stuff. I wanted to start with "Allan Quatermain" and if I liked it work through the series. But when I went out to Gutenberg.org to download the text I found that someone had already recorded that one. This led me to Librivox.org. They're already doing this sort of thing. I'm gonna listen to it so I can see if the reader was any good. If not then I'll still do it but with voices and sound effects.

Why Allan Quatermain? Have you seen "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen"? I love that movie. I've read every book and story referenced in the movie except Allan Quatermain. I knew the reference, but I hadn't read them. I figure I'll start through the series and see if they're any good.

The Gutenberg Project is an effort to make old texts where the copyright has expired available for anyone to download. I've dropped several of their books on my Palm Pilot over the years. They've got a few audio books, but last time I looked even most of those were computers reading them. Which is part of why I wanted to do this.

Librivox is an effort to make those same texts available for listening. The big difference between Librivox and my proposed Expired Copyright Theatre is the copyright on the audio. I want to use the Creative Commons license. Specifically, we use the Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 license. Briefly, this means that the entire world has permission to distribute the podcast for free, provided they give credit for it, don’t try to make money off of it, and don’t change it in any way¹. Librivox on the other hand has all recordings donated into the public domain.

Anyway, watch this space. If I do start recording I'll start a separate blog and post the links there as half hour shows.

¹Credit: Pseudopod

Roland in Afghanistan

The contextual search for the Doonesbury archives is being worked on so they've pulled it for the time being. Still, as per yesterday's post, here's the strips for 28 July 1980-2 Aug 1980

Movie Review: Charlie Wilson's War

At first this movie had no appeal for me. Just another movie about some political blah-dee-blah. Then I heard a review on NPR and I realized that it's a comedy. Sorta.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=17525023

Charlie Wilson was a fairly worthless politician. He voted on other people's stuff and sat on a couple of key committee. He was a womanizer and a scoundrel and worked mostly to get reelected. But one day he saw Dan Rather on TV in a turban and wanted to know why. It's because the Soviets were in control of Afghanistan but the people were revolting. This led Wilson to push Congress to better fund the resistance and to get Egypt, Israel, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia to work together to provide funds, arms, and training. The movie ends with the Soviets pulling out and Wilson being laughed at and ignored when he tried to build a few schools and do just a bit to rebuild the country.

Elementary history shows that with us ignoring them once the Soviets were gone that they fell to the Taliban. Osama Bin Laden was among the people that we trained and armed.

I was hoping to get some of the old Doonesbury cartoons from when Roland did a Dan Rather bit but I'm having some trouble getting into the searchable archives. Maybe in the next day or three.

The movie has some great banter which really turns the movie from the standard bickering politicians to a dry comedy.

I won't get it on DVD but I did enjoy seeing it. It was pretty much exactly what I expected from the NPR report.

a couple of events of note

I felt that I should mention that Tuesday was the 100th birthday of actor William Hartnell. Of course, he died in 1975 and was unavailable for comment on the event. William Hartnell was best known in the United States for being the first actor to play the role of The Doctor in the show Doctor Who. He held the role from 1963 to 1966.

Also, Sir Edmund Hillary just died at the age of 88. In 1953 he became the first person to climb Mount Everest creating a new growth industry for the Sherpas of Nepal. He followed this with a 1958 jaunt to the South Pole in modified tractors - the first successful vehicle-borne trip to the bottom of the world - and a 1975 jetboat expedition to the source of the Ganges.

Much of his time, however, was dedicated to bettering the lot of the Sherpa people. His Himalaya Trust raised about US$250k annually which was invested in schools, hospitals, bridges, pipelines and even an airfield, many of which Hillary helped personally to build. [source: The Register]

Book review: Beyond the Blue Event Horizon

This is the second book in Fredrick Pohl's "Gateway" series.

In this universe mankind has discovered an alien artifact full of ships that they can't figure out how to steer. People volunteer for missions where they ride the ships out and back. They have no idea how long they'll be gone or if they'll survive. But if they find something of value they'll get a reward and a percentage of any money generated from that tech.

Robin Broadhead is one of the richest people ever and the principle owner of the Gateway Corporation. He discovered some terribly profitable tech on a mission. Alas, his wife and the rest of the team didn't return with him. His wife is still stuck inside the event horizon of a black hole. He remarried but still wants to save her or at least apologize for leaving her.

Another alien artifact has been discovered in the Solar System's Oort Cloud (an area about a light year out from the sun that all comets are thought to originate from). A family is sent out in a slow moving Earth ship to investigate. After many years they get there to find that it's a ship for mining comet material to make food for the aliens. There's a teenage boy on board whose mother came there in a Gateway ship and gave birth but never returned. Plus there's some primitive creatures living in one section that seem to kidnap and torture people.

This book follows both stories. It's on par with the first and sixth books in the series but you might want to read "Gateway" first.

Book review: Saturn

Ben Bova is one of those authors who is well respected by other science fiction authors. Part of why I hear his name a lot is because he used to be the editor for the sci-fi magazine "Analog". He helped a lot of big names get started. So when I saw one of his books on sale at the Friends of the Arlington Library Book Sale I grabbed it.

"Saturn" takes place after some major disasters happened on Earth. Religious organizations have taken over almost all governments and imposed a rather oppressive form of order on them. One of the reasons enough people were willing to accept them as the government was that they'd changed their views on birth control and abortion. It was the population problem that caused most of the problems the fundamentalists were trying to solve.

Anyway a space station capable of supporting 100,000 people is loaded up with 10,000 people and sent off towards Saturn on a scientific expedition to study the moons, rings, and whatever else they can find. The people chosen for the mission tend to be free thinkers and independently minded folks who don't fit in with the current administrations. Some are in scientific exile and some are in prison. There's scientists, farmers, engineers, shopkeepers, doctors, barbers, bureaucrats, and all sorts needed for a society.

The real purpose of the expedition is to study what will happen to a group of people sent off on their own. Will they form a new government or keep the rules and leaders assigned on Earth? What kind of society will develop? How will people behave?

Slipped into a few key places are representatives of the religious organizations ruling Earth. Their job is to make sure these people can't escape God's holy rule. They're to take power and keep everyone under their type of control.

And so the story goes. There's some unexpected scientific discoveries late in the book about why Saturn's rings are so full and bright while Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune have such puny rings. But most of the book focuses on the political manipulations aboard the station.

This story was OK but not great. The writing has convinced me to pick up a few other of Bova's work.

A very loose definition of the word "done"

I've "finished" the room I've been working on forever. I've been meaning to post these pictures for a week now.

The floor is natural color bamboo. There's no glue or nails holding it down. The tongue and groove technique along with strategic staggering of the boards means it's pretty solid. Plus the underflooring is uneven enough that nails and glue wouldn't be useful.
That duct is just dropped in place. It came out of the ceiling and fit nicely in that slot. Eventually I'll get a round duct to run up into the ceiling. That's the other reason I've not fastened the floor too securely. Once the duct is in place I'll fasten everything better.

I wanted to leave the ceiling joists their natural color but something was splattered on one of them that would have required sanding them all down. So dark green was used instead. It goes well with brick.
The far wall still needs some work. I'm trying to decide what to do. I'm awful with mud. I may rip it out and put up some bead board or something. Then cover that with a TV and a painting from Chris Cummings.

Moulding will eventually go in to cover the rough edges. I've been looking for shelving to put off camera to the right (second pic) since it's unfinished wall right now. Of all the places I've looked only one had premade stuff close to what I want and that's Ikea. The other two places that might work make it custom and charge a fortune. I'll probably use the Ikea stuff. Seems strange to me since I was basically trying to keep from putting my cheap college furniture in this room.

But most of the rest of the work, in this room, will wait until warmer weather.

Flying

Well, that was a nightmare.

You may recall that after driving home for Thanksgiving I didn't really have any desire to do it again too soon. So I booked a flight. Of course, that close to Christmas most seats were gone. I got what I could and ended up booking first class on the way out and everyone else class on the way back. It was more than I wanted to spend, but it turned out good.

On the way to Chicago I had the expected big chair, large arm rests, and leg room. Drinks were served before liftoff. Still, the seat itself was the same miserable thing everyone else gets.

In Chicago I found out that all the flights to Wichita had been cancelled. A look at the weather map showed a big nasty blob just passing Wichita. Clearly the airport would open later, but Chicago was already so backed up that they were still dropping small airports, not planning more departures.

I got in line at customer service and was about 25 people back. A big sign over their heads was encouraging people to use the machines. I'd lose my place, but I might make progress. So I talked to the machine. No more flights to Wichita, but I was automatically booked on a flight the next day. Being pushy I got it to tell me about a flight to Denver since Denver planned to still do Wichita flights later. So I asked the machine to get me booked on standby for both flights. But when the tickets printed they said I was booked for flights through Denver on the next day. I got back in line and was about 60 people back.

Nice people in line. We were all comrades in adversity. Cellphones were being passed around and everyone was sharing stories. One chap was going from Mexico to Fargo. He'd been in the airport system for 36 hours and was on his 3rd visit to Chicago.

Eventually I noticed that half of my ticket said standby while the other half said confirmed. So I got some lunch, went to my terminal, sat, and ate. I learned that the standby list is based not on first come-first served but on who paid the most and who has the most frequent flier miles. Since I was shanghaied into first class I was bumped up the list. The flight to Denver had 17 seats for 42 people. I made the list.

Similar story in Denver. More people than seats, but I still made the list.

I got to Wichita and waited with the crowd for an hour and a half. Everyone was rushing in now that the runways were clear. The baggage carousel was overloaded and kept shutting down once the baggage carts were dug out of the snow. My flight's luggage was split between two carousels so I had to watch both. Turned out it wasn't on either.

I check in with United. They say my bag is on a plane from Denver to Wichita that would land around 12:15am. This is another two hours. My brother and I go hunting food instead.

2:00pm the next day I call in and I'm told my bag in on a flight from Chicago at 10:30 that night.

The next day the system is down. But when I go to the airport to check they say (eventually) that my bag is out being delivered. Sure enough, when I got back to my parents' place there it is.

On the way back there was icy fog in Wichita so planes could take off but not land well. Our plane came in late so we took off late. In Atlanta a fast walk through the airport got me to my gate just as they were closing up the doors. Apparently Delta likes to close up early.

But I made it and got my bird picked up from the bird kennel before they closed for the night.

Caucus review: Iowa

There's been no avoiding news about how things went in Iowa last night. Much of it wasn't terribly clear. Reports about how Hillary came in second to Edwards make it sound like Edwards won when the actual breakdown was Obama first, then Edwards, then Clinton. And Huckabee for the GOP with Wossname the Mormon in second.

First, why Huckabee? What the fuck is wrong with you people? Most of his appeal seems to be based on the fact that he's playing the religious card like mad. Jaysus this and Gawd that. You know who else is a "good" religious man? George Bush. Yeah, that's right. You nutters wanted to put a devout Christian in the White House despite all the warnings from the Founding Fathers. And now you know what happens. Christian Jihad. The American Crusade. A President who could and should be next in the International Criminal Court in the seat Saddam and Milošević so recently left. Torture, suspended rights, suspended Constitution, loyalty oaths, First Amendment zones, nuclear treaty violations, on and on and on. This is what a devout Christian does in power. No, not just sometimes. Every time. EVERY! SINGLE! FUCKING! TIME! You didn't want to believe so you had to try it. Fine you did. Now even our allies hate us, our credibility is shot, we've encouraged terrorism around the world and spawned a new generation of suicide bombers, and we're gonna be stuck with troops in Iraq for at least a decade. Are you happy? This is your fault. I knew he'd send troops into Iraq the first time I heard him talk. But you're still not convinced. No, despite the weight of history backing me up you still want another Bible thumper in the White House. "Four more wars! Four more wars!" Well fuck you all.

Oh! I almost forgot. This doesn't get mentioned enough. The man released a convicted multiple rapist from prison because one of his victims was a Clinton. No other reason. Apparently raping a Clinton is enough to forgive all the other rapes. The man eventually went back to prison for several more rapes and a murder in Missouri. He eventually died there. But think about that when you ask yourself who you want making decisions for the country.

The Mormon, I don't remember his name and it doesn't matter. The Democrats could probably run the reanimated corpse of Joseph Stalin and still beat the Republicans after 8 years of Mad King George. I actually kind of like the Mormon. See, the smear ads I've seen run against him show him to be exactly the sort of person we should have as president. He's had to flip his position on almost every issue just to run. I think he'd do well. Better than many of the Democrats.

And Giuliani running so far below everyone else. That's kinda funny. I used to like him before Sept 11. He was one of those Republicans in name only types. Now he's all for Bush's War. But what really killed him was that he didn't campaign in Iowa. He went straight to the February states figuring he'd make it big then. What he's not thinking about is the fact that long before then we'll see who can win and who can't. With numbers like 2% early on he's gonna be viewed as someone who can't win and even the people who like him won't vote for him. I mean the man came after Ron Paul. Ron Paul is insane. Even Alan Keyes seems sane in comparison. Drop out Rudy. It's over.

I'm finding the Democratic results to be kinda funny. Ever since Bill left office the GOP and their media voices have been screaming about President Hillary. She and they treated her like she was the candidate before the campaign started. And she fell behind the guy who already lost one election and has been running third among Dems by a good chunk for a long time. She'll probably do better in New Hampshire but I still like the presumed Queen fairing so poorly.

I like Edwards. He's a fairly good guy. I like his health insurance and health care reform plan. The only thing I have against him is that it'd be nice if a black, a woman, or a Mormon was president and I think this is the only election for the next few decades that this would happen. Why? Because after The War (Crimes) President anyone the Dems run will win. Still, I'd vote for him over the other two.

Obama is charming but there's nothing to him. He's been careful not to vote on controversial issues so he can't be attacked.

Hillary supported Bush's War even though all the evidence showed that he was lying to us. Her old health care plan was a good one but this one is awful. Plus Baby Bush made me a bit squeemish about voting for people related to other powerful politicians.

Movie Review: National Treasure: Book of Secrets

"National Treasure: Book of Secrets" is on par with the original "National Treasure" movie. The first was written as an American response to the book "The DaVinci Code". "National Treasure" was actually much better than the "DaVinci Code" movie. This movie holds up nicely to the original. Better yet, you don't have to have seen the original to enjoy this one. Really, outside of being aware that there was a previous one you don't need to know anything about it.

In this movie an ancestor of our hero (Nick Cage) is accused of planning the assassination of Lincoln instead of foiling a plan by the Confederates to find a missing treasure as was previously thought. Cage goes on a mission to find the truth and clear his ancestor's name. It's not as heavy on the "the clue is hidden in George Washington's hair in the dollar bill" as the first, but there's still lots of hunting for clues on monuments and cracking codes. This includes a raid on the Queen's office in Buckingham Palace, sneaking about in the Oval Office, kidnapping the President, nabbing the President's secret book, and searching for the Lost City of Gold in the Dakotas.

There's a lot of nonsense in some areas, but in other areas they seem to have really worked to get details right. There's no lake on Mt Rushmore, but the insides of the Library of Congress look right.

I can't see getting it on DVD but it was fun to watch.

---

A little side note. In a movie about finding messages hidden in strange places I saw one of my own. The President has Cage look on page 47 of the President's Secret Book.

There was a paper written in 1964 at Pomona College that claimed that 47 is the most common random number (or all numbers are equal to 47 depending on the source). It's been a long running joke there. If you know where to look the number 47 appears in some form in most episodes of Star Trek, as well as lots of movies, video games, music, and some of my passwords.

Movie Review: Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

I'm just going to forward you on to the review written by KassyK.
http://kassyk.wordpress.com/2007/12/22/breathtakingly-depraved/

I hate musicals. No, there's just not enough letters in "hate" to describe the loathing I have for musicals. Most musicals are a bunch of songs tied together by a weak plot. Or they're stories that have songs shoehorned into them. Like that awful one we had to watch about the writing of the Constitution. But almost all just start bringing you into the story and then ruin it by breaking into song and dance routines.

Sure, there's a few I've liked. Fiddler on the Roof grew on me. I saw one production of Guys and Dolls that I liked. South Park was my favorite by far. The Producers was better the first time, before the music. But the movie version of Sweeney Todd I liked. I may even get it on DVD. Maybe it was the lack of dance routines. Maybe it was the fact that it furthered the story line. Maybe the comically macabre nature of the movie that helped me get past it.

It's the story of a barber who was sent to prison on false charges because a judge wanted his wife. Fifteen years later he's escaped and returns to London to get his wife back, or, failing that, vengeance. He winds up a mass murderer whose victims get ground up for meat in the meat pie shop below the barber's shop.

Go read KassyK's review. She gives a great review while I just go on about how much I hate musicals.