Miraclo Miles

Mutant Mayhem Well, late May's arrived and with it X-Men 3: The Last Stand . Nick and I (Trav, having been up most of the night, decided to skip it) went to see it at the 10 am showing today. (I'll keep anything that might be a spoiler beyond the "More?" marker, so what you can see here on the main page should be considered safe. As the day's soon to sweep me back out the door to other duties, some travelling and a visit, I might revisit this for an edit sometime tonight, maybe to add some other links and images to dress it up.) In this, the installment all of the cast's been instructed to present to the world as very likely the last time this cast will be together, multiple elements are moved forward and resolved. Well... as resolved as anything in comics or a successful movie franchise can be said to be resolved. Much action & spectacle. Two love triangles, though one of them more perceived than real. Several new characters, including a fairly good Beast...

Quick touch on a Saturday morning We're headed out shortly to see X3 , so I'll be back later in the day to write a little about that and kick some comments back and forth here and with some fellow bloggers. Into the first, full stride of the three-day weekend, it at least seems we've pulled nice weather this time out. Hey, I have to go! No time for anything else...

ytmnd When Tony Collett posted a link to a nicely-done bit of Cosby-be-bopping done in an anime-opening style it reminded me that for over a year, since I - perpetually behind the cultural curve - first learned of the You're the man now, dog 'Net phenomenon, known more economically as ytmnd . (Note, the slower your net-connect speed, the narrower your bandwith, the more irritating many of these will be as they'll need more time to fully load and begin to play smoothly.) This is likely old, old news to nearly anyone who's reading this, but sometime in 2005 was the first time I found out about what had already been a highly-active meme and a site-building theme since 2002. The original idea (as the Wikipedia entry above elaborates on) was Max Goldberg's, come up with on a whim when he wanted some place-holder on his newly-purchased on a whim web page. The result was a screen shot of Sean Connery and a loop of him saying "You're the man now, dog" - a...

## Happy Birthday, dear Jesus..! ## Had another decision been made, and scholarly reason trumped marketing savvy, today might be Christmas Day. Then again, if that were the case it might also be something that next to no one here in the 21st century would recall. And in that region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. And the angel said to them, "Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people; for to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger." And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men with whom he is pleased!...

Straw into gold and blood from stones? Some recent NPR pieces on alternative fuels. I've been enjoying a recent series on NPR examining alternate fuels, and kept meaning to post some links. All links include a spot to click for the audio. From yesterday, we have a visit with Brian Foody , a Canadian entrepreneur whose ethanol plant is promising regional ethanol plants that use inedible materials such as wheat straw instead of corn, and which - unlike corn-produced ethanol - would require little energy to run. At the moment his bottlenecks are capitalization and a further refining of the enzymes used to break the tough cellulose down into fermentable sugars. The offer of renewable, low-pollution energy that makes use of what's largely treated as a waste product by the agricultural industry - usually either left to rot or burned in the fields - is terrific. While far less focused a program, Nobel Laureate George Olah emphasized a methanol economy during an April 28th Talk of ...

"...and lesh me tell you sumshin', captain ..!" Although one could put Romulan Ale, Antarian Glow Water or, as Crypt Leak suggested when he sent the link to me - Tranya - in it, this Mr. Spock decanter is awaiting someone's beverage of choice. Hopefully the worn cork, box and discolorations on box and short will mean that whoever buys it isn't a hardcore collector looking for unplayed-with toys to salt away and will, instead, replace the cork for a good seal and get some fun use out of it. My weekend got away from me (imagine that!) so I have yet to start my auctions for the extra DC giants. I didn't get as far as the ad copy or the research on current prices. Perhaps tonight... I did bring flowers to wife, mother-in-law and mother yesterday, surprising all, and between Friday and late Sunday managed two visits with mom. It's slow-going, but we're working on it.

Muthuh! Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers out there. Breakfast and a bouquet of flowers here so far today, with king crab legs on the menu (for later -- not breakfast) as they're one of wife Ari's favorites. That's mainly for her, though, as the rest of us are indifferent to them. A crock pot of beef stew I made up last night has been simmering its way to full flavor overnight, and will make for an easy serve yourself meal for us as we move through this busy day. I have a trip out later for, among other things, a visit to my mother. She was transferred to a physical rehab facility back on the sixth, and it's tough going between the hip replacement having gone in on a leg where the knee's shot -- which was what precipitated the femur-fracturing fall the week before -- and trying to sort out the interaction of other conditions and meds. Whip-cracking and parental assist on some late-year school projects, including an outline for the Great Depression and a thr...

Hey, maybe they're the Bush constituency? (or You don't have to be crazy, but it helps ) Some military commanders in charge of troops and troop deployment these days are reportedly taking a page from Patton's book in refusing to acknowledge mental and emotional problems in the troops beyond having them prescribed antidepressants . The usual Catch-22 -ish observation comes first to mind. Anyone who doesn't want to be in combat is sane, and anyone who may be nuts in a way that has them wanting to be in combat is at least nominally doing his job, so his status isn't coming up for review unless he does something so outrageous that it starts eliciting complaints from fellow troops. Also, though, it shows us once more that there's a pharmaceutical reflex mentality in place in our culture. Children start to act up, get 'em on Ritalin. Someone sanely goes into a state of depression in response to being sent thousands of miles from home on a dangerous, fool's m...

Wings & Wake This shot from last year's Fleet Week, taken on the San Francisco Bay, was posted on airliners.net (though I spotted it via this Fark thread , where some misinterpreted the effect as being a visual analogue of a sonic boom.) This one's become my wallpaper of the moment. I know I kicked around some of the physics of these compression wave & condensation effects months ago when someone posted a similar pic on a different blog -- I thought it was over on the long-silent My Favorite Alibi , but if so I'm missing it upon review. I've never been a big avionics maven, though I do know some people who practically eat and breathe stats and history for a wide range of aircraft. I may be ambivalent at best about tax maintenance for things such as the Blue Angels - especially as even on their official website half of their mission is " ...to enhance Navy and Marine Corps recruiting efforts " - but the technical skill is always impressive, and it...

On the Homefront: Bread and Circuses Okay, it's well past time for a political piece. I've been feeling so drained in recent weeks (months?) that I've kept putting this aside and focusing on trivialities. The central focus today is on the illegality of the Iraq war, and why George W. Bush and his administration meet the standards for war criminals. I want to start by re-recommending a piece I mentioned on April 30th which drew no comments - which I blame myself for, as I never did come back with comments or expansions of my own - A San Diego Citybeat interview with Scott Ritter . (As with all my links, that will open as a separate window.) A former U.S. Marine who proudly took part in the first Gulf War as an adviser to General Norman Schwarzkopf, and testified in 2002 as to the mistake he saw the nation moving towards - the invasion of Iraq - Ritter is author of Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of the Intelligence Conspiract to Undermine the U.N. and Overthrow Saddam ...

When Giants Walked the Earth! Tuesday my collector's set of Heroclix DC Giants arrived via the generally friendly people in brown shirts. I'd written briefly about the set -- well, focusing on one of them -- back in January . I'm very pleased with the general quality of the seven-piece set - though some people's sets apparently took some knocks along the way and arrived as 8, 9, 10 or even more piece sets, as figures came off their bases while in transit. Confidentially, I believe that some of these people inadvertently pulled them off the bases when they failed to note that while the figures were twist-tied to the back-board the bases were similarly wired to the cardboard from below. The only real mistake - which everyone noticed - is that they forgot to put the giants symbol (over there on the right) next to the damage stat, and instead put the usual jagged explosion symbol. Sooooo, all true believers are watching for the errata (The Holy Errata! Infinite Errata! ...

(Do Not Go Gently) Into The (Dark) Weekend Saturday, among other things, I'll be combining a severl errands with a trip back to the area I moved away from some years back. I don't want to get into all the details, but aspects of my mother's health have taken a dark turn. What was originally going to be a visit to check on her progress (I spent four hours there Tuesday, but she was asleep through most of it) has become a trip to evaluate a possibly grim matter as best I can. Wish us luck. I've known for the past few days, but there wasn't much to do about it before now. This is probably a big reason why I've been focusing so much on the simple trivia that is Heroclix.

More from Sinister Arkon, Maximus, Daredevil and Kraven. Click below to read, or skip to not. I'm doing these pieces for myself, so no worries if there are scant to no comments. Aside from looking at the info up front I'm interested in looking back on these comments later, once the pieces have been added to my collection and - hopefully - I've actually gotten to have some fun working them into teams and into games. Seeing which ones I over-estimated, what major flaws and features I missed -- that sort of thing. So... on with it, starting with the ones just posted today (Friday) in the Sinister directory, let's start with the evil genius of the Royal family of the Inhumans. Brother (and archenemy in this set) of Black Bolt, it's Maximus the Mad! (He's trying to play down that "Mad" thing these days. Maybe he's on better meds.) Having no innate powers of his own - save his considerable intellect and a genius for invention, which has proven fairly s...

Sinister Scans I know, I know... I start posting again and I keep coming back to clix, which next to no one around here cares about. This post's a series of scans for pieces we mostly hadn't seen much of so far from the upcoming Sinister set, as presented in Inquest Gamer magazine #134. Special thanks to Superfro over at HCRealms for coming through with the scans. Don't blame him (or me) for the often lame humor in the captions. It's one of the reasons I don't buy Inquest Gamer . (This assortment shows us that attack values of 10 have made it into the set here and there, and even a couple of 11s, but by and large we're continuing to see many many 9s and on down. We'll really only be able to judge these well as part of the complete mix, but as I'd mentioned in an earlier post I'm expecting an awful lot of rolling dice between successful attacks.) First is Arkon , the teleporting, barbarous ruler of an alternate Earth, rendered as an 80 pt uniq...

Quick Comics Notes First, don't forget that this Saturday, May 6, is Free Comic Book Day . Follow that link and plug in your zip code to see who's in your area scheduled to participate and to check on the list of free comics likely to be seen. Keep in mind that many of the stores will also be giving out free Wolverine Heroclix . Visually there are two different types (though, depending on which press release one reads you might only see one of them), both repaintings of the Armor Wars version - one with a white shirt and "I Heroclix" on the back, and the other in a black shirt and "Wizkids" printed in white on the back. They each have the same stats and while as a promotional piece it's not tournament legal, the dial's a nice 57 pt. version of the character unique to this piece; very much worth slapping a 12 pt. Automatic Regeneration on and sending out into battle. While heading back to visit with my mother in the hospital yesterday afternoon I ca...

The Many Rolls of Sloppy Sinister? Some more figure info from the Heroclix Sinister set (which as of this writing shows 71 records, but I expect that to bump significantly by the end of the day) debuted late last week and early this week.., and I'm having mixed reactions. I haven't been mentioning many of the pieces as it's not my intent to do a complete, piece by piece review of the set. Sure, part of me is always up for pouring time into something safe like this, but I have to show some self control. Let me start with one of the last pieces (as of this writing) to debut, one which for several people I know was a selling point for the set: Black Bolt , King of the Inhumans. A flying powerhouse, silently imperial and commanding. (While I'll reserve full judgement, especially on the face, I like what we've seen of the sculpt.) The "silently" is an important aspect, as Black Bolt dares not whisper a sound. Why? His voice is an almost unparallelled destruc...