Sitting in a staff meeting. They can sod off.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Yard pics
The pics from my yard.
Damn. I, uh, I guess you'll have to turn your head for some of them. I decided against using MC Escher Landscaping.
Damn. I, uh, I guess you'll have to turn your head for some of them. I decided against using MC Escher Landscaping.
Yard work
It's a safe bet that we no longer have to worry about frost in this area. That means we can start planting!
Last night I tackled my yard. I threw out the bits of garbage that blow into the yard. Any dead branches hanging out of pots got trimmed away. The orange tree in a pot got moved outside.
At the end of last year I dug up a small sand plum bush from the family farm in Kansas and brought it back to DC. The trunk snapped during the drive and I tried to splice it back together. It didn't work, but I didn't expect it to. My big hope was that the roots would grow something new. And they did. I had two good samples of root and between them I got three shoots. Yesterday I got them transplanted into a bigger pot. So long as they last the summer I shouldn't have to worry about them. If they can survive Kansas winters they can survive DC winters. I'm keeping it in a pot so they don't spread and take over the yard. They reproduce more through spreading roots than they do from seeds.
I also have a big trash barrel full of dirt. I tried to get as much dirt as I can out of it. I'll try to find temporary homes for even more this evening. I'm gonna take another swing at growing potatoes in it. As the plant grows you're supposed to keep building up the dirt until the barrel is full. When the plant dies you kick over the barrel and have potatoes.
Some of the dirt was used to top off another pot that was moved near the house. I've ordered some hops rhizomes to stick in the pot. I shouldn't expect any yield this year, but next year I should have a decent crop. I'm sending some to my brother, too. He has a lot more land to play with than I do. If our brewing efforts do well over the next few years then I may have to include a fermentation tank if we ever replace the barn. That's a huge if. That if could have wiped out the dinosaurs if collided with the Earth.
The tulips and allium Yummy planted last year are peeking up. The kale are getting tall. The mint is coming back. Buds are forming on the tree we planted last year. Still waiting for some signs of life on the sickly blackberry we planted late last season or the grape vines that started coming up wild last summer.
And we finally found a bird bath for the yard. I should have a report on the table I'm making for the yard in the near future.
But that's just my yard. Yummy got permission to plant a garden in the back yard of her place in Baltimore. We spent a good part of the weekend removing trash and raking up several years worth of fallen leaves. The ground was largely bare underneath it. Some weeds needed killing, some still do. But we got a patch churned up and planted. A couple types of tomato, some peppers, Brussels sprouts, catnip, a blackberry bush, and some birdhouse gourd plants. Marigolds were planted along the sides of the garden to drive off the grubs. There's a few other things, but I forget what at the moment.
We put a shelf outside her kitchen window with some basil and lettuce growing in it. Hopefully we can reach out and pluck some lettuce for our hamburgers.
I made her get a tray of peat disks, too. We filled them with marigold and camomile seeds. They were picked for their short germination periods and having prettyish flowers. They're needed in a couple of weeks for something the DC Guerilla Gardeners are doing with some bicyclists from New York. I think they're gonna be taking soup cans and tying them to posts with these plants growing in them.
The residents who are taking care of the front yard at her place are moving in a month. She plans on taking it over. We have a ton of seeds bought or stolen from yards. That front yard is gonna be nuts.
We have some colorful corn and more birdhouse gourds that we're gonna be sticking around town. Gonna get into some actual guerilla gardening.
Last night I tackled my yard. I threw out the bits of garbage that blow into the yard. Any dead branches hanging out of pots got trimmed away. The orange tree in a pot got moved outside.
At the end of last year I dug up a small sand plum bush from the family farm in Kansas and brought it back to DC. The trunk snapped during the drive and I tried to splice it back together. It didn't work, but I didn't expect it to. My big hope was that the roots would grow something new. And they did. I had two good samples of root and between them I got three shoots. Yesterday I got them transplanted into a bigger pot. So long as they last the summer I shouldn't have to worry about them. If they can survive Kansas winters they can survive DC winters. I'm keeping it in a pot so they don't spread and take over the yard. They reproduce more through spreading roots than they do from seeds.
I also have a big trash barrel full of dirt. I tried to get as much dirt as I can out of it. I'll try to find temporary homes for even more this evening. I'm gonna take another swing at growing potatoes in it. As the plant grows you're supposed to keep building up the dirt until the barrel is full. When the plant dies you kick over the barrel and have potatoes.
Some of the dirt was used to top off another pot that was moved near the house. I've ordered some hops rhizomes to stick in the pot. I shouldn't expect any yield this year, but next year I should have a decent crop. I'm sending some to my brother, too. He has a lot more land to play with than I do. If our brewing efforts do well over the next few years then I may have to include a fermentation tank if we ever replace the barn. That's a huge if. That if could have wiped out the dinosaurs if collided with the Earth.
The tulips and allium Yummy planted last year are peeking up. The kale are getting tall. The mint is coming back. Buds are forming on the tree we planted last year. Still waiting for some signs of life on the sickly blackberry we planted late last season or the grape vines that started coming up wild last summer.
And we finally found a bird bath for the yard. I should have a report on the table I'm making for the yard in the near future.
But that's just my yard. Yummy got permission to plant a garden in the back yard of her place in Baltimore. We spent a good part of the weekend removing trash and raking up several years worth of fallen leaves. The ground was largely bare underneath it. Some weeds needed killing, some still do. But we got a patch churned up and planted. A couple types of tomato, some peppers, Brussels sprouts, catnip, a blackberry bush, and some birdhouse gourd plants. Marigolds were planted along the sides of the garden to drive off the grubs. There's a few other things, but I forget what at the moment.
We put a shelf outside her kitchen window with some basil and lettuce growing in it. Hopefully we can reach out and pluck some lettuce for our hamburgers.
I made her get a tray of peat disks, too. We filled them with marigold and camomile seeds. They were picked for their short germination periods and having prettyish flowers. They're needed in a couple of weeks for something the DC Guerilla Gardeners are doing with some bicyclists from New York. I think they're gonna be taking soup cans and tying them to posts with these plants growing in them.
The residents who are taking care of the front yard at her place are moving in a month. She plans on taking it over. We have a ton of seeds bought or stolen from yards. That front yard is gonna be nuts.
We have some colorful corn and more birdhouse gourds that we're gonna be sticking around town. Gonna get into some actual guerilla gardening.
Monday, March 21, 2011
Book review: The Last Starship from Earth
Do I read too much sci-fi? Possibly. But most of it is old sci-fi. Does that help?
I recently read the 1968 book "The Last Starship from Earth" by John Boyd. Not one of the greats. This is his best known of his books.
This was the first book that I felt I needed to share the "about the author" section. Most science fiction authors who served in WWII served in a scientific or technical or even medical capacity. They'll talk about their service, but it's not generally part of the "about the author" section. Boyd was commissioned in the Navy in 1940, served in Russia, England, Japan, and the Philippines. He's the only junior officer mentioned in Samuel Eliot Morison's naval history of WWII.
I debated how much to tell you about the book. I'm tending toward spoilers since this isn't a book you can find electronically and isn't terribly common in the online book sellers. So it's not like you're gonna read it. I've put in a big spoiler alert marker further down. If you read that far and decide you want to find and read it you can stop there. Beyond that we get into the twists and turns of the story.
The book starts out in what appears to be the distant future. The world is divided into castes based on what your family does. If your father was a Mathematician then you're a Mathematician and you have his name but with a number increase. If I'm Doug IV then Dad was Doug III and grandpa was Doug II. We're also all part of a profession and skill level that makes us "professionals". That is we're important and we matter. Unskilled laborer aren't highly regarded. So much so that they're an underclass. It's possible to move between classes, but you have to be something special.
See, the world is run by this computer called "The Pope". It replaced human popes some many, many years back. It does the bulk of planning and thinking and running things and does a good deal of the spouse selection. It sort of narrows your options down to four or so. And they'll all be within your class and profession unless they're trying to breed for special traits.
There are other groups helping to run things. The Sociologists and Psychologists, along with the Priests, run things and have since long before they had the computerized Pope. They're not the smartest, but they know how to manipulate people in ways that the Mathematicians can't.
With all that we have the setup for a Romeo and Juliet story. Mathematician meets Poet, they fall in love, but their love is forbidden. They sneak around but are ratted out and the government comes for them.
Before I move beyond that I need to tell you how the book reads. Since she's a poet he starts studying poetry. In very short order the book becomes worded poetically. It might be crap if you're actually of sufficient poetical interest to know good from bad. It does make the book a bit more challenging to read.
To cover up their secret liaisons they come up with a cover story. First she's trying to write a poem about the Mathematician that created the Pope. When they find out that too much of his life is considered classified they start trying to build an electronic poet in much the same way an electronic pope was created.
But it wouldn't much of a story if they didn't get caught. He goes on trial. She's pregnant so there's not much doubt about his guilt. He's interviewed by the four members of the jury: one each from the three major specialties and one from his own. He thinks he's done well, so does the reader, but they determine that he has the same mental illness as the son of the guy who created the electronic pope. He's too much of an individual and they're afraid he'll start an uprising. They can wipe his mind, they can sterilize him and put him to work as a grunt, or they can fire him off to the planet Hell. Really, the only option they see is sending him to Hell so he doesn't start more shit on Earth.
Another aside - For the most part it seems like the distant future. They talk about a period of time known as The Starvation. Little is known about before. Abe Lincoln started the UN. There's others, but that's the big one that stands out. This isn't the future. This is the present with an alternate past. It's not clear what caused the big change.
There is space travel in this alternate present. Or, rather, there was. There's only two ships left and they ferry passengers to Hell. The pilots are an odd lot. Due to the relativistic effects of near light speed travel they show up on Earth for 3 days every few years and only months have passed for them. They suffer long bouts of solitude with short bouts on a world that keeps changing and passing them by.
So our hero is sent to Hell in suspended animation. They wake him after several months to check on him and he gets to talk to the pilot who also flew the son of the guy who created the electronic pope to Hell.
Once on Hell our hero finds out that his pregnant poet girlfriend arranged to be sent here as well. They find out that the ice world of Hell isn't really an ice world. The planet's orbit is an ellipse so it's a barely habitable ice world for two months of the year, tropical for four, and very pleasant the rest of the time. The guy who created the electronic Pope knew this and rigged the Pope to schedule visits by the ships only when the planet was icy so those on Earth wouldn't find out. After all, his own son was being banished here. And he's still alive. Yeah, apparently they have longevity treatments on Earth, but can't use them due to the size of the population. Hell's lesser population almost requires it even with the rapid rate of reproduction they're undergoing to try to populate this planet.
And it keeps going. The pope maker's son had worked out the same formula for faster than light travel that our hero had worked out. What the formula means is that one can go back in time. He'd created a ship based on that formula to send his own daughter back to Earth to find someone with our hero's education who has a mindset similar to his own and entrap him in such a way that would get him sent to Hell. So, yeah, the poet girl is the granddaughter of the guy who build the electronic Pope.
Why would they do this? They need someone with his brains and personality to send back in time far enough to change the whole world and prevent this repressive society from forming.
How far back? Far back enough to end the 60+ year life of Jesus Christ. In their world Jesus raised up an army and overthrew the Roman Empire to establish a theocracy that survived until the present. But instead of killing him he put a 33 year old Jesus in his ship and sent it back to Hell. That meant he had to stay on Earth. Thanks to his longevity treatment the book ends with him back in the present day at a campus protest with a history that looks remarkably like our own.
I recently read the 1968 book "The Last Starship from Earth" by John Boyd. Not one of the greats. This is his best known of his books.
This was the first book that I felt I needed to share the "about the author" section. Most science fiction authors who served in WWII served in a scientific or technical or even medical capacity. They'll talk about their service, but it's not generally part of the "about the author" section. Boyd was commissioned in the Navy in 1940, served in Russia, England, Japan, and the Philippines. He's the only junior officer mentioned in Samuel Eliot Morison's naval history of WWII.
I debated how much to tell you about the book. I'm tending toward spoilers since this isn't a book you can find electronically and isn't terribly common in the online book sellers. So it's not like you're gonna read it. I've put in a big spoiler alert marker further down. If you read that far and decide you want to find and read it you can stop there. Beyond that we get into the twists and turns of the story.
The book starts out in what appears to be the distant future. The world is divided into castes based on what your family does. If your father was a Mathematician then you're a Mathematician and you have his name but with a number increase. If I'm Doug IV then Dad was Doug III and grandpa was Doug II. We're also all part of a profession and skill level that makes us "professionals". That is we're important and we matter. Unskilled laborer aren't highly regarded. So much so that they're an underclass. It's possible to move between classes, but you have to be something special.
See, the world is run by this computer called "The Pope". It replaced human popes some many, many years back. It does the bulk of planning and thinking and running things and does a good deal of the spouse selection. It sort of narrows your options down to four or so. And they'll all be within your class and profession unless they're trying to breed for special traits.
There are other groups helping to run things. The Sociologists and Psychologists, along with the Priests, run things and have since long before they had the computerized Pope. They're not the smartest, but they know how to manipulate people in ways that the Mathematicians can't.
With all that we have the setup for a Romeo and Juliet story. Mathematician meets Poet, they fall in love, but their love is forbidden. They sneak around but are ratted out and the government comes for them.
Before I move beyond that I need to tell you how the book reads. Since she's a poet he starts studying poetry. In very short order the book becomes worded poetically. It might be crap if you're actually of sufficient poetical interest to know good from bad. It does make the book a bit more challenging to read.
To cover up their secret liaisons they come up with a cover story. First she's trying to write a poem about the Mathematician that created the Pope. When they find out that too much of his life is considered classified they start trying to build an electronic poet in much the same way an electronic pope was created.
But it wouldn't much of a story if they didn't get caught. He goes on trial. She's pregnant so there's not much doubt about his guilt. He's interviewed by the four members of the jury: one each from the three major specialties and one from his own. He thinks he's done well, so does the reader, but they determine that he has the same mental illness as the son of the guy who created the electronic pope. He's too much of an individual and they're afraid he'll start an uprising. They can wipe his mind, they can sterilize him and put him to work as a grunt, or they can fire him off to the planet Hell. Really, the only option they see is sending him to Hell so he doesn't start more shit on Earth.
[SPOILERS AHEAD!]
If you think you'll want to read this book you should stop now.Another aside - For the most part it seems like the distant future. They talk about a period of time known as The Starvation. Little is known about before. Abe Lincoln started the UN. There's others, but that's the big one that stands out. This isn't the future. This is the present with an alternate past. It's not clear what caused the big change.
There is space travel in this alternate present. Or, rather, there was. There's only two ships left and they ferry passengers to Hell. The pilots are an odd lot. Due to the relativistic effects of near light speed travel they show up on Earth for 3 days every few years and only months have passed for them. They suffer long bouts of solitude with short bouts on a world that keeps changing and passing them by.
So our hero is sent to Hell in suspended animation. They wake him after several months to check on him and he gets to talk to the pilot who also flew the son of the guy who created the electronic pope to Hell.
Once on Hell our hero finds out that his pregnant poet girlfriend arranged to be sent here as well. They find out that the ice world of Hell isn't really an ice world. The planet's orbit is an ellipse so it's a barely habitable ice world for two months of the year, tropical for four, and very pleasant the rest of the time. The guy who created the electronic Pope knew this and rigged the Pope to schedule visits by the ships only when the planet was icy so those on Earth wouldn't find out. After all, his own son was being banished here. And he's still alive. Yeah, apparently they have longevity treatments on Earth, but can't use them due to the size of the population. Hell's lesser population almost requires it even with the rapid rate of reproduction they're undergoing to try to populate this planet.
And it keeps going. The pope maker's son had worked out the same formula for faster than light travel that our hero had worked out. What the formula means is that one can go back in time. He'd created a ship based on that formula to send his own daughter back to Earth to find someone with our hero's education who has a mindset similar to his own and entrap him in such a way that would get him sent to Hell. So, yeah, the poet girl is the granddaughter of the guy who build the electronic Pope.
Why would they do this? They need someone with his brains and personality to send back in time far enough to change the whole world and prevent this repressive society from forming.
How far back? Far back enough to end the 60+ year life of Jesus Christ. In their world Jesus raised up an army and overthrew the Roman Empire to establish a theocracy that survived until the present. But instead of killing him he put a 33 year old Jesus in his ship and sent it back to Hell. That meant he had to stay on Earth. Thanks to his longevity treatment the book ends with him back in the present day at a campus protest with a history that looks remarkably like our own.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Friday Links: March 18
The Demo Knight - a Dark Knight trailer starring characters from Team Fortress 2.
Mimes that aren't mute. They just don't make sense.
Important wetware patch. [link]
CNN reporter in Japan can feel the Earth, move, under his feet. He feels the sky come tumbling down, tumbling down.
Some places in Japan got a 1 minute warning before the quake. How? Something a bit like this. [link]
How oil became known as a "fossil fuel".
I was gonna try something like this. But it was a C17 and I was gonna convert it to a home on the planes of Kansas. [link]
Ammunition insects. [link]
There's no argument possible to claim that this pharmaceutical company is motivated by anything but greed. [link]
Printable bike. [link]
"Bike" run by electric screwdrivers. [link]
Awesome new stamps from the Royal Mail. [link]
Owl wants to look at you.
Insane asylum floor plans. [link]
Minecraft chickens: are they a particle or a wave?
Here's a better explanation of what you're seeing in the previous video.
The Enterprise NCC-1701-A full Minecraft tour.
Material store for inventors. [link]
Batman: Arkham City trailer. Still with Kevin Conroy as Bats and Mark Hamill as Mr. J. The only Batman and Joker voice, in my opinion.
Marble machine with interchangeable parts.
PonyCraft 2
Interview with the guy who was Tweeting as Rahm Emanuel. I think I'll have to read his archive. [link] [the archive]
More poems by cats. [link] [even more]
Roll up any website in a Katamari. [link]
Photo history of Discovery. [link]
Great website for inventors. [link]
If you've played "Portal" you already know why you need to buy "Portal 2". If you haven't then this trailer should explain why.
Dr Who Fan Service:
Enter your homemade TARDIS into a competition. [link]
Or just look at the other entries. [link]
Mimes that aren't mute. They just don't make sense.
Important wetware patch. [link]
CNN reporter in Japan can feel the Earth, move, under his feet. He feels the sky come tumbling down, tumbling down.
Some places in Japan got a 1 minute warning before the quake. How? Something a bit like this. [link]
How oil became known as a "fossil fuel".
I was gonna try something like this. But it was a C17 and I was gonna convert it to a home on the planes of Kansas. [link]
Ammunition insects. [link]
There's no argument possible to claim that this pharmaceutical company is motivated by anything but greed. [link]
Printable bike. [link]
"Bike" run by electric screwdrivers. [link]
Awesome new stamps from the Royal Mail. [link]
Owl wants to look at you.
Insane asylum floor plans. [link]
Minecraft chickens: are they a particle or a wave?
Here's a better explanation of what you're seeing in the previous video.
The Enterprise NCC-1701-A full Minecraft tour.
Material store for inventors. [link]
Batman: Arkham City trailer. Still with Kevin Conroy as Bats and Mark Hamill as Mr. J. The only Batman and Joker voice, in my opinion.
Marble machine with interchangeable parts.
PonyCraft 2
Interview with the guy who was Tweeting as Rahm Emanuel. I think I'll have to read his archive. [link] [the archive]
More poems by cats. [link] [even more]
Roll up any website in a Katamari. [link]
Photo history of Discovery. [link]
Great website for inventors. [link]
If you've played "Portal" you already know why you need to buy "Portal 2". If you haven't then this trailer should explain why.
Dr Who Fan Service:
Saturday, April 23!!! Ah, ah, ah. Spoilers.
Enter your homemade TARDIS into a competition. [link]
Or just look at the other entries. [link]
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Watson
By now you all know that the IBM supercomputer dubbed Watson won in a three day Jeopardy game. It's finally available on YouTube and is embedded below.
This game will soon be considered of historical note. You may think I'm overstating things a bit. It's not like a war or a presidential assassination. But it totally qualifies as equal or greater than Deep Thought beating David Levy in 1989 or IBM's Deep Blue beating Garry Kasparov at chess in 1997. (I'm having some issue with that later date. I could have sworn that happened before I graduated high school.) I'm sure that as soon as next year there will be programming classes teaching this game in the history portion along with Babbage's (and Lovelace's) Difference Engine, the German Enigma Machine, ENIAC, ARPAnet, and Deep Blue. The difference being that now the class will be able to watch this historical event as homework.
Day 1 part 1
Day 1 part 2
Day 2 part 1
Day 2 part 2
Day 3 part 1
Day 3 part 2
Before you go, you'll want to read Reddit's interview with Ken Jennings. The man is a riot. [link]
This game will soon be considered of historical note. You may think I'm overstating things a bit. It's not like a war or a presidential assassination. But it totally qualifies as equal or greater than Deep Thought beating David Levy in 1989 or IBM's Deep Blue beating Garry Kasparov at chess in 1997. (I'm having some issue with that later date. I could have sworn that happened before I graduated high school.) I'm sure that as soon as next year there will be programming classes teaching this game in the history portion along with Babbage's (and Lovelace's) Difference Engine, the German Enigma Machine, ENIAC, ARPAnet, and Deep Blue. The difference being that now the class will be able to watch this historical event as homework.
Day 1 part 1
Day 1 part 2
Day 2 part 1
Day 2 part 2
Day 3 part 1
Day 3 part 2
Before you go, you'll want to read Reddit's interview with Ken Jennings. The man is a riot. [link]
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Sleepin in
Since I've been working from home I've not dealt with the alarm clock too much. What good does it do to start work at 7:00 if I have to take a nap a few hours later? If I just sleep in I'll get the work done at the same time and do a better job.
This last weekend I spent working our booth at a pediatric medicine convention. I started pulling hours like I'm gonna have to once I start working. I tried going to bed early to compensate, but did a very bad job of it. So I'd go to the convention with something like four hours of sleep. But now I'm trying to catch up and am sleeping until around 1:30 in the afternoon. That's why the post is so late. I've just finished the shower and breakfast routine.
Not that I should have been at the convention at all. Bruce was supposed to do it. It's the one thing that he still can do right. Instead he went to Florida for two weeks. When he asked for the time off nobody bothered to check the calendar. It was assumed that having agreed to go to the convention he wouldn't skip out. There was lots of "But [the managing editor] said I could go!" Yeah, just like that tone of voice you read it in. Like a spoiled kid.
Then he didn't even get to leave on his trip on time. He'd screwed up the displays bad enough for this and some other out of town event that he was forced to stay in town a few extra days to fix it. At least they held him to that level of responsibility.
This last weekend I spent working our booth at a pediatric medicine convention. I started pulling hours like I'm gonna have to once I start working. I tried going to bed early to compensate, but did a very bad job of it. So I'd go to the convention with something like four hours of sleep. But now I'm trying to catch up and am sleeping until around 1:30 in the afternoon. That's why the post is so late. I've just finished the shower and breakfast routine.
Not that I should have been at the convention at all. Bruce was supposed to do it. It's the one thing that he still can do right. Instead he went to Florida for two weeks. When he asked for the time off nobody bothered to check the calendar. It was assumed that having agreed to go to the convention he wouldn't skip out. There was lots of "But [the managing editor] said I could go!" Yeah, just like that tone of voice you read it in. Like a spoiled kid.
Then he didn't even get to leave on his trip on time. He'd screwed up the displays bad enough for this and some other out of town event that he was forced to stay in town a few extra days to fix it. At least they held him to that level of responsibility.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Movie review: Battle LA
For the Idea of March I've come to slay "Battle LA", not to praise it.
If you're looking for a good action movie this is what you want to see. If you're looking for a bout of motion sickness you'll get your $11 bucks worth here. If you're looking for a storyline you might want to go elsewhere.
I'm not sure what I was expecting. A steady-cam maybe. Seriously, this has to have been the shakiest movie I've seen that didn't try to justify it with scared people holding the camera.
The story comes down to this: Aliens are attacking Earth. Their explanation for why is total crap. The tactics the aliens use are rubbish. And how they kill the aliens pretty much comes down to applying sufficient kinetic energy (i.e. blow them up). They do try to throw in a bit about how people think that Two Face let some soldiers under his command die and he's about to retire. But it's pretty weak. As is the scared father, the orphaned boy watching his scared father die, Two Face bonding with orphaned boy, and the go nowhere sexual tension with the vet.
The one thing I credit this movie with is that their technology has the exact same vulnerabilities ours would have if we developed something similar.
Oh, and that lots of shit blows up. It's a straight up action movie.
Will not get on DVD.
If you're looking for a good action movie this is what you want to see. If you're looking for a bout of motion sickness you'll get your $11 bucks worth here. If you're looking for a storyline you might want to go elsewhere.
I'm not sure what I was expecting. A steady-cam maybe. Seriously, this has to have been the shakiest movie I've seen that didn't try to justify it with scared people holding the camera.
The story comes down to this: Aliens are attacking Earth. Their explanation for why is total crap. The tactics the aliens use are rubbish. And how they kill the aliens pretty much comes down to applying sufficient kinetic energy (i.e. blow them up). They do try to throw in a bit about how people think that Two Face let some soldiers under his command die and he's about to retire. But it's pretty weak. As is the scared father, the orphaned boy watching his scared father die, Two Face bonding with orphaned boy, and the go nowhere sexual tension with the vet.
The one thing I credit this movie with is that their technology has the exact same vulnerabilities ours would have if we developed something similar.
Oh, and that lots of shit blows up. It's a straight up action movie.
Will not get on DVD.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Movie review: Rango
There are, in my opinion, three great westerns: Blazing Saddles, Three Amigos, and now Rango. Obviously, I have a particular taste.
The main story is inspired by the old fairy tale "The Brave Little Tailor" about a tailor who kills seven flies with one blow but is recruited for the king's guard due to them thinking he killed seven people. In this movie Rango the pet chameleon is separated from his family and lost in the desert. He makes his way to a town that is suffering from a drought. He starts telling stories to earn the fear of the town goons and is soon made sheriff. Rango has to protect the town from area villains and solve the mystery of what's happening to the water.
"Rango" has a different sense of humor than you might expect if you're a regular watcher of Pixar-like movies. It has a good dose of old Warner Brothers cartoons (Bugs Bunny and the like) and Monty Python. There's lots of throw away lines that are thrown out and moved on from while you're still processing it. It mixes slapstick and dry humor. And the spirit of the west is awesome.
It works if you don't think about it too much. If you do you start to see major plot points that seem to have belonged to earlier drafts of the movie. You see how they might have tried to give it a message but messed it up. Is the villain really responsible or are the humans? Will the villain's plan work or is he starting another Cargo Cult?
Rango is made up to resemble the Hunter S. Thompson-type character Raoul Duke in "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas". He has the same floral shirt. He has the same actor for his voice. When Rango hits a windshield the people in the car are supposed to be the central characters from "Fear and Loathing...". When the bats come out you can't help but think "We can't stop here. This is bat country."
I will get this on DVD and may see it in theaters again.
Friday, March 11, 2011
Friday Links: March 11
Conan showing Apple's new marketing video. [link]
A touching video about an 86 year old WWII veteran sniper being honored. Turns out he's still a crack shot whether using a replica of his old gun or the latest and greatest. [link]
Punishment housing in prison for military WikiLeaker. [link]
New Hampshire Republicans trying to prevent college students from voting. [link]
I Could Pee On This - poems by cats. [link]
Soviet space capsule for auction. Dog not included. [link]
By Mike Huckabee's thinking my parents can't get married. I mean who wants to think about their parents' closed door activities? [link]
Bad for evidence collection, but you can bet these data drives will be popular among government agencies protecting top secret or simply criminal behavior. [link]
Make the show host shut the hell up. Still, listening to Shatner giving Discovery a sort of send off was more touching than I expected. [link]
A series of paintings with messages. [link]
Android users beware of these apps. They are being resold with malware installed. [link]
Wooden binary calculator. [link]
MS Paint for Windows 7 played as sound. [link] [the remix]
An animation of the ISS being assembled. [link]
Image: Read FASTER! [link]
Super Mario Brothers with updated sound effects.
Just Dance as performed by the Fallout: New Vegas dancers.
HP Lovecraft: mathematics substitute. [link]
Game: Transmover new generation. You'll figure it out. [link]
A touching video about an 86 year old WWII veteran sniper being honored. Turns out he's still a crack shot whether using a replica of his old gun or the latest and greatest. [link]
Punishment housing in prison for military WikiLeaker. [link]
New Hampshire Republicans trying to prevent college students from voting. [link]
I Could Pee On This - poems by cats. [link]
Soviet space capsule for auction. Dog not included. [link]
By Mike Huckabee's thinking my parents can't get married. I mean who wants to think about their parents' closed door activities? [link]
Bad for evidence collection, but you can bet these data drives will be popular among government agencies protecting top secret or simply criminal behavior. [link]
Make the show host shut the hell up. Still, listening to Shatner giving Discovery a sort of send off was more touching than I expected. [link]
A series of paintings with messages. [link]
Android users beware of these apps. They are being resold with malware installed. [link]
Wooden binary calculator. [link]
MS Paint for Windows 7 played as sound. [link] [the remix]
An animation of the ISS being assembled. [link]
Image: Read FASTER! [link]
Super Mario Brothers with updated sound effects.
Just Dance as performed by the Fallout: New Vegas dancers.
HP Lovecraft: mathematics substitute. [link]
Game: Transmover new generation. You'll figure it out. [link]
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Movie Review: The Adjustment Bureau
Let me tell you what I had to go through to see this movie. The theater was showing both "The Adjustment Bureau" and "Rango". I went to the theater with the plan of seeing both. I showed up in time for "The Adjustment Bureau" as advertised, half an hour after the start of "Rango", only to find out that they were installing a new projector in that theater and they'd cancelled the showings of "The Adjustment Bureau" for the day.
But "Rango" would be showing in a little over two hours. So I went to the store clearance at Borders and... well, I won't tell you what I spent, but I saved $76. They had to get me a box.
I showed up for the next showing of "Rango". It was cancelled. Too many people coming to see "The Adjustment Bureau". So if I'd just wait yet another half hour beyond when "Rango" was to start I'd finally get to see the movie that I wanted to see three hours before.
That's a pretty good description of "The Adjustment Bureau" right there. Only I'm filling the role of Matt Damon.
Ever read any Discworld books? In particular the Death centered books? No? Then making comparisons to the Auditors in the Discworld and the Adjustors in this movie won't make any sense. If you have then you'll see the parallels.
There's these guys in grey outfits who look a bit like they're wearing the wardrobe discards from the show "Mad Men". They work for someone who may or may not be God. They look and feel human. Some are programmed to think they are human. There are many copies. And they have a plan.
Sorry. I'm getting distracted. They do have a plan. They don't understand it, but they have one. They have to keep Congressional candidate and Presidential hopeful Matt Damon from falling in love with potential famous dancer and choreographer Emily Blunt who wears this necklace that draws all kinds of attention to her cleavage.
That's a very short description of a movie that is much more than that. It's like calling "Titanic" a disaster movie at sea or saying that "Jurassic Park" is a dinosaur flick. All movies may be rehashes of old stories, but sometimes the quality of the telling makes it worthwhile. And this story was well told. They take the time to tell a good love story. They also show enough of the behind the scenes stuff of the Adjustment Bureau to make them interesting characters instead of just emotionless drones. The end is a bit awkward, but not enough to ruin the movie.
I think I'll probably get it on DVD. I highly recommend seeing it.
If it matters, this movie is based off of a Philip K Dick story. That puts it in with movies like "Blade Runner", "Total Recall", "Minority Report", "Paycheck", "A Scanner Darkly", and "Next". Quality stories with varying quality of story telling.
But "Rango" would be showing in a little over two hours. So I went to the store clearance at Borders and... well, I won't tell you what I spent, but I saved $76. They had to get me a box.
I showed up for the next showing of "Rango". It was cancelled. Too many people coming to see "The Adjustment Bureau". So if I'd just wait yet another half hour beyond when "Rango" was to start I'd finally get to see the movie that I wanted to see three hours before.
That's a pretty good description of "The Adjustment Bureau" right there. Only I'm filling the role of Matt Damon.
Ever read any Discworld books? In particular the Death centered books? No? Then making comparisons to the Auditors in the Discworld and the Adjustors in this movie won't make any sense. If you have then you'll see the parallels.
There's these guys in grey outfits who look a bit like they're wearing the wardrobe discards from the show "Mad Men". They work for someone who may or may not be God. They look and feel human. Some are programmed to think they are human. There are many copies. And they have a plan.
Sorry. I'm getting distracted. They do have a plan. They don't understand it, but they have one. They have to keep Congressional candidate and Presidential hopeful Matt Damon from falling in love with potential famous dancer and choreographer Emily Blunt who wears this necklace that draws all kinds of attention to her cleavage.
That's a very short description of a movie that is much more than that. It's like calling "Titanic" a disaster movie at sea or saying that "Jurassic Park" is a dinosaur flick. All movies may be rehashes of old stories, but sometimes the quality of the telling makes it worthwhile. And this story was well told. They take the time to tell a good love story. They also show enough of the behind the scenes stuff of the Adjustment Bureau to make them interesting characters instead of just emotionless drones. The end is a bit awkward, but not enough to ruin the movie.
I think I'll probably get it on DVD. I highly recommend seeing it.
If it matters, this movie is based off of a Philip K Dick story. That puts it in with movies like "Blade Runner", "Total Recall", "Minority Report", "Paycheck", "A Scanner Darkly", and "Next". Quality stories with varying quality of story telling.
Wednesday, March 09, 2011
Tuesday, March 08, 2011
Ain't nothing but a book thing
It took us awhile to find this place. When Yummy mentioned she was moving to Baltimore I looked at a map of the area around the address she gave me. There were several book stores in her area, including a cluster of used book stores. One of them was Book Thing. The weather hasn't allowed a lot of walking around, but when we would go out I'd try to direct us in that direction. Saturday I saw a bumpersticker with the Book Thing URL on it and punched it into my phone. Sunday we stopped in.
Book Thing is a place where you get free books. People donate books. They shelve them. Other people take them. All you have to do is write on a piece of paper the number of books you're taking.
The roof leaks. Climate control was minimal to non-existant. Maps of the place were out of date. The floor was concrete. The bathroom is in a McDonalds two blocks away.
It's kinda awesome.
The neighborhood also boasts a Goodwill, a couple of pawn shops, an adult bookstore, several skeezy clothing stores, a quicky tax place, a check cashing place, a community health center, a KFC with heavy bolts on the bathroom and bulletproof glass in front of the cash registers, and a rather nice church.
I'm glad it's not as close to Yummy's place as I initially thought.
The front room seems kind of sparse. A row of plastic bins holds books for children of a wide variety of ages. One wall has books in and about foreign languages. There's a gardening and home maintenance section. One wall contains all manner of textbook about biology, genetics, engineering, welding, programming, some even in the quantities you might need for a modest classroom. A small shelf holds their sci-fi selection. Seems kinda weak just looking at this room.
Then you step through another door to their main room. It runs most of the length of the building. Their legal section rivals their whole other textbook section. The rest of the room is just labeled "fiction". A couple shelves have the romance books. If you're into books about CIA agent [insert name] there's about 20 shelves for you. A couple more for just mystery. Then another small room that I barely looked at because my arms were getting tired.
So really, what you have is a place that provides free books in a poverty stricken area for people who need them. Or people who bother to find the place. I recommend you check it out if you're in the area. If you have books they can use be sure to let them know.
More info at http://www.bookthing.org/.
Book Thing is a place where you get free books. People donate books. They shelve them. Other people take them. All you have to do is write on a piece of paper the number of books you're taking.
The roof leaks. Climate control was minimal to non-existant. Maps of the place were out of date. The floor was concrete. The bathroom is in a McDonalds two blocks away.
It's kinda awesome.
The neighborhood also boasts a Goodwill, a couple of pawn shops, an adult bookstore, several skeezy clothing stores, a quicky tax place, a check cashing place, a community health center, a KFC with heavy bolts on the bathroom and bulletproof glass in front of the cash registers, and a rather nice church.
I'm glad it's not as close to Yummy's place as I initially thought.
The front room seems kind of sparse. A row of plastic bins holds books for children of a wide variety of ages. One wall has books in and about foreign languages. There's a gardening and home maintenance section. One wall contains all manner of textbook about biology, genetics, engineering, welding, programming, some even in the quantities you might need for a modest classroom. A small shelf holds their sci-fi selection. Seems kinda weak just looking at this room.
Then you step through another door to their main room. It runs most of the length of the building. Their legal section rivals their whole other textbook section. The rest of the room is just labeled "fiction". A couple shelves have the romance books. If you're into books about CIA agent [insert name] there's about 20 shelves for you. A couple more for just mystery. Then another small room that I barely looked at because my arms were getting tired.
So really, what you have is a place that provides free books in a poverty stricken area for people who need them. Or people who bother to find the place. I recommend you check it out if you're in the area. If you have books they can use be sure to let them know.
More info at http://www.bookthing.org/.
Monday, March 07, 2011
Esperanza Spalding
Yummy's brother got us tickets to the sold out Esperanza Spalding show in Frederick, MD Friday night. I was unfamiliar with her or her work before this. Obviously, I don't watch the Grammies. From what I've seen online most people are familiar with her because of the outrage by fans of that Bieber girl for best new artist. What impresses me more is that at age 23 she was a professor at ... wait, Berklee? Not Berkeley? The Berklee College of Music. Still, impressive, just not quite as impressive as I was thinking.
Anyway, here's one of her videos. I recommend you search for some others.
After the concert we went looking for somewhere to get something to eat. The area around The Weinberg Center for the Arts has lot of restaurants and bars. They didn't seem to be interested in doing business, however. We checked several places and they had cover charges for DJs that didn't seem to be more than a guy with an iPod and a genre in mind. The kitchen were all but closed. The place we landed still had appetizers and things that could go in a frier, but stuff off the grill was off the menu.
Frederick was struggling to roll up the sidewalks, but they had people like us going around and hitting the sidewalk crew with sticks and shouting "STOP! Put down that sidewalk, dammit! We're using that! GET BACK!"
Anyway, here's one of her videos. I recommend you search for some others.
After the concert we went looking for somewhere to get something to eat. The area around The Weinberg Center for the Arts has lot of restaurants and bars. They didn't seem to be interested in doing business, however. We checked several places and they had cover charges for DJs that didn't seem to be more than a guy with an iPod and a genre in mind. The kitchen were all but closed. The place we landed still had appetizers and things that could go in a frier, but stuff off the grill was off the menu.
Frederick was struggling to roll up the sidewalks, but they had people like us going around and hitting the sidewalk crew with sticks and shouting "STOP! Put down that sidewalk, dammit! We're using that! GET BACK!"
Friday, March 04, 2011
Friday Links: March 4
If HP Lovecraft were a gardener. [link]
A very expensive, but very nifty video gaming chair. [link]
I don't normally spend long on the sites of artists, but I enjoyed this guy's stuff. Might even use his patterns to line Yummy's new cabinet. [link]
The White House and DOJ will no longer be defending the Defense of Marriage Act in court. [link]
Trails of Tarnation: Black Coffee - stick with it. I almost turned it off several times, but liked the ending. [link]
Camping in a volcano. [link]
Quotes from lesser Transformers. [link]
This quote came up in conversation the other day.
But I credited it to Duke Nukem.
And then this trailer came out.
Sorry, but we've seen trailers before. Until it's on the shelves it's still Duke Nukem: Whenever.
How to beat Watson at Jeopardy. [link]
Step 1 of the Chinese uprising. [link]
Toccatta and Fugue in D minor played on floppy drives.
Best of Canstruction this year. [link]
Strange known Windows bug. [link]
More ammo for the Terminators.
The last known American WWI vet dies. [link]
How to make a Pokebra. [link]
Man almost manages to foreclose on a bank.
Political ideologies represented with cows. Yes, we got it in an e-mail in 1995, but they've refined it since then. [link]
There's a new Thundercats cartoon coming. Looks like it doesn't suck.
If steampunk is too dated for your tastes you can try decorating with something more modern. [link]
Stephen Fry was in DC last week and dressed as a Klingon. [link]
New Simon's Cat.
It started as a joke, but here's a fleshed out version of the book "Goodnight Dune". [link]
Game: Name the movie from the silhouette of an item from the movie. Plays like hangman [link]
Lamps that you might expect from Agatha Heterodyne. [link]
A guy starts with DOS 5.0, installs Windows 1 and runs nearly every Windows update through Windows 7. Possibly only interesting to us older geeks. He tests the differences by installing DOS games and setting some colors and checks to see if they remain and run from version to version.
Teeny homes. [link]
Nifty pics from the Google car. [link]
Freaky walking cactus fossil found in China. [link]
Video of a team of horses pulling a semi out of the snow. [link]
Nifty personal "submarine" prototype. [link]
New York smokers growing their own. [link]
Why computer nerds don't date much (in theory). [link]
repost: Ant spiral
What's the difference between the Tea Party and the Taliban. [link]
The recent Discovery launch seen from a plane.
I don't care if steampunk is dying as a fashion, this house will always be awesome. [link]
This may be a repost, too.
George Carlin put to an autotuner.
Videos of wonderfully engineered moving sculptures. [link]
Dr Who fan service:
The 2011 Dr Who swimsuit calendar now available for free download. Sorry, no Amy Pond. [link]
Continuing memorial to The Brigadier. [link]
And I'm so far from finished with this weeks links.
Somehow these escaped from last week:
The alleged original recipe for Coke. [link]
A fan made trailer for The Avengers using clips from the buildup movies and trailers.
A sad piece about a mummy and the human he falls in love with.
A very expensive, but very nifty video gaming chair. [link]
I don't normally spend long on the sites of artists, but I enjoyed this guy's stuff. Might even use his patterns to line Yummy's new cabinet. [link]
The White House and DOJ will no longer be defending the Defense of Marriage Act in court. [link]
Trails of Tarnation: Black Coffee - stick with it. I almost turned it off several times, but liked the ending. [link]
Camping in a volcano. [link]
Quotes from lesser Transformers. [link]
This quote came up in conversation the other day.
But I credited it to Duke Nukem.
And then this trailer came out.
Sorry, but we've seen trailers before. Until it's on the shelves it's still Duke Nukem: Whenever.
How to beat Watson at Jeopardy. [link]
Step 1 of the Chinese uprising. [link]
Toccatta and Fugue in D minor played on floppy drives.
Best of Canstruction this year. [link]
Strange known Windows bug. [link]
More ammo for the Terminators.
The last known American WWI vet dies. [link]
How to make a Pokebra. [link]
Man almost manages to foreclose on a bank.
Political ideologies represented with cows. Yes, we got it in an e-mail in 1995, but they've refined it since then. [link]
There's a new Thundercats cartoon coming. Looks like it doesn't suck.
If steampunk is too dated for your tastes you can try decorating with something more modern. [link]
Stephen Fry was in DC last week and dressed as a Klingon. [link]
New Simon's Cat.
It started as a joke, but here's a fleshed out version of the book "Goodnight Dune". [link]
Game: Name the movie from the silhouette of an item from the movie. Plays like hangman [link]
Lamps that you might expect from Agatha Heterodyne. [link]
A guy starts with DOS 5.0, installs Windows 1 and runs nearly every Windows update through Windows 7. Possibly only interesting to us older geeks. He tests the differences by installing DOS games and setting some colors and checks to see if they remain and run from version to version.
Teeny homes. [link]
Nifty pics from the Google car. [link]
Freaky walking cactus fossil found in China. [link]
Video of a team of horses pulling a semi out of the snow. [link]
Nifty personal "submarine" prototype. [link]
New York smokers growing their own. [link]
Why computer nerds don't date much (in theory). [link]
repost: Ant spiral
What's the difference between the Tea Party and the Taliban. [link]
The recent Discovery launch seen from a plane.
I don't care if steampunk is dying as a fashion, this house will always be awesome. [link]
This may be a repost, too.
George Carlin put to an autotuner.
Videos of wonderfully engineered moving sculptures. [link]
Dr Who fan service:
The 2011 Dr Who swimsuit calendar now available for free download. Sorry, no Amy Pond. [link]
Continuing memorial to The Brigadier. [link]
And I'm so far from finished with this weeks links.
Somehow these escaped from last week:
The alleged original recipe for Coke. [link]
A fan made trailer for The Avengers using clips from the buildup movies and trailers.
A sad piece about a mummy and the human he falls in love with.
Thursday, March 03, 2011
Favorite links from the archives 3
I Got Nothin' Week continues with this uncompleted post that I'm posting anyway.
Dudley Moore had been around longer than I'd imagined. Here he plays Beethoven.
Filming the invasion of Omaha Beach with only 3 guys and 4 days of filming.
Video of why you don't look at the sun through a telescope. Keep in mind, this is how long it takes to burn a hole, not how long it takes to do damage. [link]
50 lbs of Silly Putty dropped from a great height.
Game: The Eyeballing Game - how well can you manipulate geometric figures by hand? [link]
5 Comic book character that made a real world impact. [link]
Dudley Moore had been around longer than I'd imagined. Here he plays Beethoven.
Filming the invasion of Omaha Beach with only 3 guys and 4 days of filming.
Video of why you don't look at the sun through a telescope. Keep in mind, this is how long it takes to burn a hole, not how long it takes to do damage. [link]
50 lbs of Silly Putty dropped from a great height.
Game: The Eyeballing Game - how well can you manipulate geometric figures by hand? [link]
5 Comic book character that made a real world impact. [link]
Wednesday, March 02, 2011
Ash Wednesday
The holiday is next Wednesday, but I'm not terribly religious.
The picture I posted Monday was kinda crap. It was taken from a phone in a car at a stoplight. And it looked better on my phone. You can just make out that the gas station is an S-Mart. That's where Ash worked in the movie "Army of Darkness".
The picture I posted Monday was kinda crap. It was taken from a phone in a car at a stoplight. And it looked better on my phone. You can just make out that the gas station is an S-Mart. That's where Ash worked in the movie "Army of Darkness".
Tuesday, March 01, 2011
Monday, February 28, 2011
Friday, February 25, 2011
Friday Links: February 25
A lesson for fans of first person shooter video games.
Doctor Who fan service:
British actor Nicholas Courtney passed away Tuesday evening. Some of my readers know him better as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. [link]
Dr Who coffee menu. [link]
Meat eating clocks. Be sure to watch the video. [link] [more]
It occurs to me that they should be able to make it work with cat poop. Just give it one of those self cleaning litter boxes.
A Dilbert cartoon come to life. [link]
Nifty special effects for a stage.
I'm liking the bit of art at the top of this page. [link]
Even this vampire flick looks better than anything from the Twilight series.
Trailer for "Apollo 18".
Picture: World's teeniest fish tank. [link]
The RoboCop statue in Detroit... it's gonna happen. [link]
Nathan Fillion would buy the rights to Firefly and revive the series if he could afford it. [link]
Sigourney Weaver talks about the John Hurt Moment in Alien and they try to reproduce it.
Video: The Saga of Biorn - an elderly Viking tries to die in battle so he can go to Valhalla. [link]
Nice, but depressing. It's a home for alcoholics to drink themselves to death. [link]
Nifty geological wonders. Number 12 has been on my Bucket List most of my life. [link]
Video: 500 people each tracing the line the previous person drew. [link]
Hundreds of overlapping tourist photos of the same place. [link]
Video: Controversial magic trick. [link]
The Phelps family taunts "Anonymous". [link]
They should consider it brought. [link]
My summer job. [link]
Video: A remote controlled airplane playing chicken with wind turbines. [link]
Macaques have more self awareness than many people. [link]
ET 2: Extinction - the first visit was research. The second will be for colonization.
Doctor Who fan service:
British actor Nicholas Courtney passed away Tuesday evening. Some of my readers know him better as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. [link]
Dr Who coffee menu. [link]
Meat eating clocks. Be sure to watch the video. [link] [more]
It occurs to me that they should be able to make it work with cat poop. Just give it one of those self cleaning litter boxes.
A Dilbert cartoon come to life. [link]
Nifty special effects for a stage.
I'm liking the bit of art at the top of this page. [link]
Even this vampire flick looks better than anything from the Twilight series.
Trailer for "Apollo 18".
Picture: World's teeniest fish tank. [link]
The RoboCop statue in Detroit... it's gonna happen. [link]
Nathan Fillion would buy the rights to Firefly and revive the series if he could afford it. [link]
Sigourney Weaver talks about the John Hurt Moment in Alien and they try to reproduce it.
Video: The Saga of Biorn - an elderly Viking tries to die in battle so he can go to Valhalla. [link]
Nice, but depressing. It's a home for alcoholics to drink themselves to death. [link]
Nifty geological wonders. Number 12 has been on my Bucket List most of my life. [link]
Video: 500 people each tracing the line the previous person drew. [link]
Hundreds of overlapping tourist photos of the same place. [link]
Video: Controversial magic trick. [link]
The Phelps family taunts "Anonymous". [link]
They should consider it brought. [link]
My summer job. [link]
Video: A remote controlled airplane playing chicken with wind turbines. [link]
Macaques have more self awareness than many people. [link]
ET 2: Extinction - the first visit was research. The second will be for colonization.
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