2007: May It Be A Happier New Year! A quick post. Arrived home a few minutes ago from my most-of-New Year's Eve time over at Crypt Leak & Abbygal 's. We had a fun time, almost ringing in the new year, eating, drinking, talking and eventually playing about 10 games of Man Bites Dog . One alcoholic drink along the way (gin & Wink was actually a nice combination) which was just fine for me. As always, my appreciation for the hospitality. The final minutes of 2006 running past, I can't say that I feel any more optimistic about 2007 than I did about 2006, nor do I feel any more capable of dealing with the problems that are dogging me from 2006 as they follow me into the new year. I keep waiting for an Exit sign to light up or a switch to throw in my head (no, I'm not necessarily courting a stroke) but I'm aware that I'm just burning time. Any true resolutions remain unset, and if that changes it'll likely remain my secret. Public declarations of resoluti...
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Magic Mirror at the End of Time Half a day remaining in 2006, and at the pace the time's been keeping through this holiday stretch it almost wouldn't feel out of line to start getting ready for work Tuesday right now. Ugh. This past Thursday Crypt Leak and Abbygal were kind enough to host another gaming session, for which I was the least prepared of any of them so far. This saw me hauling a huge number of clix with me, and not even doing that efficiently. While I generally think of myself as empathetic (though more often I simply drop the first syllable), I often confront myself anywhere from minutes to days to months or worse later with the same scene from a different perspective. So it was with part of this past Thursday. See, I was mostly irritated with myself for lack of preparation. This was made worse because I'd believed I'd brought the majority of my Marvel clix -- at least the majority of the ones that were on my list of figures to go on the 300 point te...
Dick wants us to remember that to forgive is divine! I know, this is more of a political post, but I can't help it. Reading an AP article (reproduced below) about Dick Cheney hailing Ford's pardon of Nixon -- especially now in the shadow of Saddam Hussein's rope trick dance -- I couldn't help but chuckle at the thought that he one of the spirits that visited him on Christmas Eve might have found a nervous Cheney tugging at a spectral noose around his own neck as he looks into the next few years. Associated Press Cheney Hails Ford's Pardon of Nixon By CALVIN WOODWARD and JEFF WILSON 12.30.06, 8:31 PM ET With the thunder of cannon and the whistle of a bos'n pipe, the nation's capital honored Gerald R. Ford's memory Saturday in funeral ceremonies recalling the touchstones of his life, from combat in the Pacific to a career he cherished in Congress to a presidency he did not seek. Old colleagues, today's leaders and ordinary Americans remembered him ...
Origin Update (The full 96?) I was going to simply update my post from this past Saturday, but Blogger started throwing fits via spontaneously generating superfluous code, so I thought I'd leave that post be and display the expanded list here. As before, my earlier comments are in red . After the list I'll make some general comments. CONFIRMED CHARACTERS: #01-03 Blackhawks (Stanislaus/Hendrickson/Blackhawk) Well... that's darn close to a generic, I suppose. #04-06 Phantom Lady Now we can dig out Deathstroke and have him kill her again and again. #07-09 Robotman (Cliff Steele) Good! I'm a big fan of the original Doom Patrol. The only worry is which design they'll use. #10-12 Ray I was going to say the modern one doesn't mean much to me, but then I realized the earlier version didn't really either. #13-15 Wildcat It'll be nice to see him added -- and to come that much closer to a full JSA team. I'm expecting Willpower, Toughness and Close Combat Expert...
Giddyap, Christmas! As events (which I'll mention more after the fact) threw off our Christmas Day plans, we've opened everything tonight. For the most part everyone's happy with what they received. For my part, Darren and Tammy sent me an Unpainted Huffheimer Arizona shirt, a quality item referencing a fun, quirky movie. Unless it's still too damned warm out I'll wear it to Thursday's gaming session. Thanks! Wife & kids came up with a Days of Future Past set for me, which had me happy I'd held off on picking one up for myself since it came out so soon after Supernova. A new, advanced Sentinel , Colonel Logan and Rachel Summers in her Hound mode bring me an interesting new trio, along with new rules for the Sentinels and a new map that ties into the maps from the Danger Room set. From out of the Windy City, Grant sent me the Aliens set ! Set up as a Horrorclix set, it's nonetheless something easily brought into a Heroclix game. Whether or ...
Toys! It's Christmas Eve! While such things are sadly long behind me in most respects, how many Christmas Eves was I in high anticipation of some special toy? Well, what better time for a bit of commercial nostalgia? Well, at least that's where I'm starting, with a commercial for a set of toys I was very much into -- Major Matt Mason: Mattel's Man In Space! These were likely my favorite toys of the late 1960s. They didn't even show all the cool things the Space Crawler could do. Here's another of the toys I opened on a Christmas morning long ago. It's a dangerous, evil-smelling toy that brought burns and several messes: Creepy Crawlers !: From a little later on -- something I don't believe I owned, but a grade school buddy was deeply into little racing cars so I got to play with these: Sizzlers! Jumping back into the middle sixties, this is one of those toys a cousin of mine who never asked for a toy he didn't get, it's the Electro Shot Shoot...
The H o l i d ay s -- at Last! I've been holding off on posts recently in part because I've simply been too tired and mostly because I found myself holding off until I could say "I'm done!" Well, that last part isn't happening just yet -- but I'm getting close. The pic up top, and the next side shot, are courtesy of Crypt Leak , who use the camera in his new phone to catch this... enthusiastic bit of seasonal, vehicular dress-up. Click on each image to get a larger view. The nativity scene in the grillwork is somewhat inspired. This was in a parking lot near El Cancun, where we (this being a trio including Jason, CL's assistant) decided to have lunch on that last work day before the holiday break. My wife had been in the hospital a week earlier, from Monday the 11th through Monday the 18th, and there were follow-up visits and multiple runs to the pharmacy throughout this past week, which meant another week of havoc wreaked on the work schedule, though ...
Looking towards Origin (Updated 12/26, as full REV & unique list is added.) The niggardly dispatch of information about new sets from Wizkids has seen people fishing about for any and all news for this DC set, the first new expansion for 2007. Above is the best shot of the artwork that'll be on the boxes, and here to the right is apparently what we'll be seeing in the figure gallery as a set symbol once they start revealing any of the figures from the set. While their offices are shut down for the holiday weekend there's some hope (however slim) that the pieces are in place for him to trigger the first of the set's sneak peeks in the next day or so. Since it's been made clear that the Heroclix Brand Manager (Mark Tuttle) is the one who decides when such things are done, here's hoping he'll decide to do so instead of trying to starve us into getting excited about the January Horrorclix expansion, for which he is also the Brand Manager. (If that's the...
B r o u - h o - h o Another of those holiday culture clashes you may have read about: Airport removes Christmas trees to avoid lawsuit . A report from ABC claims the rabbi "asked" (though since it was part of a legal action, perhaps "demanded" would be more in order, "the port of Seattle, which runs the airport, to build an eight-foot menorah and hold a lighting ceremony." That's a critical difference, as it's not as if another religious group with a December holiday offered to donate something -- leaving it to the airport authorities to simply deal with the logistics of whether or not they had the space to accomodate it -- but if this story is true the demand was for the port authority to not only construct the giant menorah but to arrange a lighting ceremony. If true, then the rabbi deserves to be seen as the source of the problem rather than someone who brings a solution. The 1989 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that both Christmas trees and menorah...
Tonight's the company Christmas party, which naturally enough makes me want to do something else. Still, it reminds me of the coming season in a warped fashion, so here's this. So, here's something posted, claiming to be the cast of Scrubs worked into the Charlie Brown Christmas roles. I believe I've seen most of an episode of the sitcom during its first season and that was about it. It's difficult carving out time for a sitcom. Tags : Charlie Brown Christmas , Scrubs re-dub
Kibbles & Bits Well, really just some bits. Nothing specific to post about, but it'd been three days since my most recent post, so even a brief post seemed a better idea than none. I'm in the same spot that likely many of you are, trying to juggle time and finances in getting ready for the holidays. I'm having even less patience than usual with work items as being pinned down there finds me thinking about what I could be getting done otherwise. It's a wintry Spring fever. I know this is going to only intensify in the near future, especially if I don't knock down the stack of pre-holiday items. This Saturday's the company Christmas party, and I'm finding myself looking forward to it even less than usual. I'll be keeping my time there to a minimum. It's no fault of the company (well, there's one decision I won't go into that rankles me), it's just that I don't enjoy these things. There are obviously many people who do -- including ...
Rock, Paper, Scissors Not getting home until after 3:30 this morning definitely threw my schedule off. A day lost to some domestic tasks, shopping, meal prep, some family business, a little movie watching and some attempts to sleep. Only sleeping for three to four hours at a stretch continues to leave me... un-recharged. Hopefully I'll manage a longer stretch tonight; coming up on a Monday morning the only thing that's worth betting on is that I'll feel most like sleeping when the time comes to get up and start getting ready for the work week. CL & A , as ever, were wonderful hosts, and three out of household pets were happy to hang out with us for as long as we wished. That was for yesterday's gaming day , which had several things that worked out, including all five of us being there. We didn't get a start with the game until 4:30 or so Saturday afternoon. At least at this level of player experience paring it down to 500 pt builds (from the odd 640-ish ones th...
Push! Kept busy today, and just as importantly I kept away from work for the day. I still need some sleep -- didn't get anywhere near enough last night and when I dropped for a brief nap in the late morning, and with a gaming day coming up over at Crypt Leak & Abbygal 's on Saturday I'll need to be rested. I prepared the main meal - a hit-as-you-please one - for Saturday at the same time I was waiting for Friday's dinner to finish cooking. Simmering in the crock pot is a beef stew I'll make final adjustments to in the morning. Extremely unseasonal warmth -- which became sticky Friday as some rain started to fall -- has been cleared out by the system that swept across so much of the nation in the past 36 hours. We're headed for highs around 30 degrees cooler Saturday than the near 70 we saw Friday, and that's fine with me. For many of you similar drops have happened, and in some cases that's meant snow and ice. As for the game day prep, I still draw...
If "Free" is trademarked, what then does it mean? The comics news site Newsarama sent me an email this afternoon for a site offering free downloads of books and magazines on a variety of subects, including indy comics and graphic novels, called WOWIO . So far it sounded good, but when I looked into the account process their "simple" process begins with "prove your identity, tell us a little bit about yourself,..." The methods they have to this oh-so-essential task? Well, if one has an email address from a domain ending in .edu, .gov or .mil, that's good enough. If not, then it's either a credit card or a scan of any government- or college-issued identification. Oh, but don't worry, they only use it to verify that you are who you say you are, then they destroy this information. Oh, have I just become monstrously cynical, or are you with me in looking at a "free", advertiser-driven site, this identity verification process and their ple...
So fell the five Just a quick, last speck of vacation weekend post. Thanksgiving went well -- all the food prep went well and we, amazingly, blew through all of it over the course of three days. No leftovers survived that to be incorporated into other dishes. As ever, I end up confused as to where much of the time went, as many things didn't get done and it wasn't because I was catching up on sleep. Some lessons learned to apply to any future time off, which I may or may not go on about at some point -- preferably after I've followed my own advice. I did get in some reading along the way, but more casual television watching than should have been the case. I was on target to get back on a proper (well, practical ) sleep schedule last night, but I woke up around 1am this morning having refluxed up into my sinuses. The pain and the built-in smell from that lasts, so it was 7 or so this morning before I was able to get that clear enough to sleep again, so my Sund...
Once More, With Feeling A Buffy, the Vampire Slayer video post. Sure, as if anyone was calling for this. I came across this online and decided that I wanted to have a tidy link to it since I don't have that season on DVD. So, it's the complete musical episode from the 6th season, appropriately if coincidentally enough in 6 parts. It's important to keep in mind that to the best of my knowledge most of the cast makes no claim to being able to sing. Anthony Head (Giles) is one exception, as he's had some stage singing background, I know, even starring in a stage production of The Rocky Horror Picture Show sometime back in the day. As you listen to the vocally uneven results keep in mind how "off" Alyson Hannigan (Willow) must have been if she was given almost a complete pass from having to sing. This was a fun gimmick which was used to peak advantage, advancing the plot of the series considerably as many of the secrets each character had been holding insid...
Mix Tape 11/23/06 Tammy 's done a few of these, usually for someone specific, but I'm doing this one for myself. These are all songs I've found myself listening to, at one time or other, back to back several times in a row. I'll kick it off with the theme song from the latest Bond Film, Casino Royale , " You Know My Name " which continues to grow on me. Then I'll go for one of the most underrated musicians operating out there today -- Ben Folds . Ignore the video and just listen to the song. " Best Imitation of Myself " A bit of fun pop from a band that may as well have been cursed for all they were taken for and the way the principle members ended up, it's Badfinger . On to something just as pop but far, far more recent, it's Fountains of Wayne and " Mexican Wine ." (No, I will not link to " Stacey's Mom ") Just to emphasize that I'm an old fart I'll reach back for one from The Monkees . One of...
It's Thanksgiving! Surprise! Didn't you wonder why the house smells so good today? (If it doesn't, then go with the "My house has no nose!" joke...) (I've removed some of the formatting for this entry because Blogger keeps giving me a "Not Found" error when I click on "More?" Apologies for having this take up so much of the page scroll.) We appear to be on target for dinner in the middle of the day, right at noon, leaving ample time for relaxed seconds, thirds and whatever naps as might be required along the way. I have an errand or two in the morning, but then I expect to be in until at least Friday after that. The morning's going to be busy enough, so now that I'm still awake, all the prep that's to be made for the moment's been made, and the turkey's cooking, I thought I'd get this posted. Yes, this year it's a T-Day just for the nuclear family, so no traveling and/or relatives to deal with for us. R-E-L-A-X ...
Bird Eve (updated) This finds me on the first of five days off. I automatically woke up just before 6am only to go back to sleep until just past 10. A muddle of dreams merging some ongoing personal anxieties with movie, novel and comics elements finally drove me back to the waking world. Since then the Thanksgiving prep's been under way, including cubing and toasting some more bread, cutting onions and celery and starting them on a slow saute' - all for the stuffing. Getting all the dishes done and the kitchen re-cleaned for the main prep tonight, too. I still have to go through the refrigerator and clear out some items so we have plenty of room for items that'll be in overnight, and then for short-term leftovers tomorrow. Crypt Leak and Abbygal are likely going full tilt over at their place today, as they're hosting Thanksgiving for their extended family on both sides. After surviving that the planned December 2nd get-together for four or five of us (still not sure i...