Miraclo Miles

By Wednesday We'll Be Making Our Own Gravy Maybe where you are you're already in the thick of it, but our peak heat days are coming up Tuesday and Wednesday, when our local temperatures will take us to and past the 100 degrees mark. Add the humidity and we're expecting heat indices up to 110 by Wednesday. Hopefully we won't have any power problems. Stay cool where you can, folks. (Yeah, I know the folks of that alternate Earth seen in the cover up top are holding together surprisingly well given the temps.)

Brick or Bludgeon, Bucks Is Bucks After reading about how Oxfam auctioned a brick used to break into one of their shops and made 225 pounds (roughly $420), I found myself wondering if once she's reached the end of producing Harry Potter books J.K. Rowling's publisher plans to have her attacked so they can sell off the murder weapon as a parting bonus. No, that's all I have at the moment. Weak, weak, I know. Still, it's more plausible that that will Luthor extracted in Superman Returns not being tied up in probate for years. I've been mostly doing housework today and I'm just taking a break... so to speak.

Self Serve (or "Can't We All Just Get Away?") Coutesy of the American Inventor Spot, illustrated by specialty dolls (ultimately a marketing ploy, but we can ignore that part), we have 10 Types of Women You Need To Avoid , and 10 Types of Men You Need To Avoid . One can be excused to thinking we're certainly doomed. Oh, to be sure, part of the lesson to be remembered in these gross, negative over-simplifications is that most of us aren't dedicated as one type 24/7, and most people can change. The trick's trying to figure out quickly whether or not mutually agreed-upon changes in the other person and adaptations of one's self are viable, and which ones are spiritual death traps one should flee. Deciding whether or not is a moral imperative to slap on a Condemned warning for the benefit of others is up to you, but your attorney would likely advise against it. Mostly these lists are probably best used smugly in retrospect to classify one's exes - it'l

Everything Is Not Going To Be Okay Nick and I came back a little while ago from seeing the Warner Independent Pictures release of the adaptation of Philip K. Dick's A Scanner Darkly . Not feeling especially creative this evening, worn down by real life worries and finding the line perfectly adequate, I chose a tagline from the film's official site as the header for this post. In its simplest framing, A Scanner Darkly (Rated R, running time 1 hr 40 min.) is an anti-drug piece. It's also an anti War On Drugs piece, ultimately calling into question who is best served by creating an escalating, never-ending war. (If you're worried about spoilers you should stop reading now. I don't feel like writing about the movie by not writing about details. Call me lazy or unskilled if you must, but I'm not in the mood for dancing around the edges tonight.) In the end we're faced with questions as to who is truly worse, the deteriorating wrecks hooked on life-splitting and

In Your Face, Jethro Bodine! You Passed 8th Grade Science Congratulations, you got 8/8 correct! Could You Pass 8th Grade Science? I still can't decide between Double Nought Spy and Hollywood Producer, though...

Quorum Leap Thanks to Tony Collett for both reminding me that I wanted to at least note a new show on BBC America and providing a link to some more info on the same. This past Monday (10 pm EST; it's set timeslot) BBC America began to run a show titled Life On Mars , centering on a modern, British detective who finds himself time-shifted thirty three years into the past (following being hit by a car) still the same name and biological age, and still a detective, but coming in as the new transfer to the 1973 version of his police unit. Here's a video intro for the series. (The narration's somewhat arch and cliche' to start, but it loosens up.) Tying this first episode together is the mystery a serial killer baffling the police in 2006 who, as it turns out, is operating in 1973, too. The series itself ties the islands, 33 years apart, together both by the culture and tech shocks Sam Tyler (the central character) being dumped in 1973 provide, and by the knowledge that he

Progress or Mere Politics? I've found myself following the issue on living wage legislation going on currently in Chicago. The city council there just voted 35 to 14 in favor of a requirement for "big-box" retailers (stores with 90,000 sq ft or more of space) to pay employees a minimum of $10/hr plus $3/hour in benefits . For the purposes of this post I'm going to ignore the political in-fighting going on, including the battles against Mayor Daley, and how much of the push for this veto-proof vote (34 votes was what was needed to protect it from a veto, and they managed 25) was prompted simply by an opportunity to thumb their noses at a weakened Daley. Even if this stands (a court challenge is inevitable) it won't take effect until 2010 -- by which time such rates will be even less adequate than they would be today -- but if I can take this at face value it's a nice step. With a better administration we might have seen this at the national level, but it has to

At eBay! Just a note that Tony Collett has a an assortment of toys, action figures, comics and games coming down to their final minutes on ebay . (Sorry for forgetting to note this earlier, Tony. It seemed as if they'd just gone up and here we are near the end.) Also, Mike Leuszler's ebay store has an interesting mix of games, comics, prints, etc. I'll finally be putting some more items (probably only clix) up within the next day or two. Last week's power outage threw my schedule far off, and there were some complications due to me selling something large for someone else.

Strange Attractors I want to point out two sites I have in one or another section of my blogroll over on the right, each of which deserves a highlight. Each initially might seem to be a narrow focus, but the interest of the author comes through in each case to demonstrate that it's broader and more detailed a subject than you might have thought. No snubs intended to the multitude of sites I'm not mentioning -- I have so many in the blog roll for various reasons -- but these two are ones that I haven't noted in posts before, one because it wasn't there before this week. One spot I always enjoy visiting is Exclamation Mark's Vintage SciFi/Horror Review . If you're a fan of sci-fi/horror movies, particularly older ones and B-movies, then you'll find enough material over there to keep you browsing for a long time. It's a marvelously well-organized site, with an alphabetical listing, a direct search window and movie reviews archived by decade - down to indiv

From the fine miners of commerce culture artifacts at Lileks , passed along by Crypt Leak , it's The Bureau of Corporate Allegory. In a few spots they have the code for the "Next" and "Back" links mixed up, so look at what the link info is as your mouse browses over each, otherwise you're going to think the gallery's much briefer than it is.

Terrain, Anyone? Okay, the last thing most of us into Heroclix need is another expense, but I wanted to pass along word of a 3D terrain gaming system Hasbro has that is about to expand into the Marvel Superhero universe. A recent posting at About.com's boardgames section : Marvel Legends HeroScape Announced An entirely new set of HeroScape figures -- based on the Marvel Comics universe -- was announced recently at San Diego Comic Con. The figures will be packaged in a new Master Set edition of the game, and it will be known as Marvel Legends HeroScape. It's expected to be available in November 2006. According to a post at Heroscapers.com by Doc_Savage , the Marvel HeroScape master set will include 10 figures (five pairs of heroes and their arch-villains): Spiderman, Venom, Captain America, Red Skull, Hulk, Abomination, Iron Man, Dr. Doom, Silver Surfer, and Thanos. A photo of the Comic Con display is available at The Lair of the Evil DM. In a post at Heroscapers.com by allskull

Crazy Castle In the Sky Yeah, I know two died and over a dozen were injured, but this had to have been a bizarre, surreal experience -- as Dreamspace, an inflatable, walk-through sculpture half the size of a soccer field, briefly became an airship. Police are appealing for anyone with film footage of the incident to contact them. Oh, I hope there was. If so, it should be all over the net soon enough. The pre-disaster promotional materials are still up in a few places.

All-New, Cranky Comics Catch-Up Some odds and ends from the comics pile from the past several weeks. I'm not going to do a comprehensive attack, just note what comes to mind at the moment as I pick a few comics out of the handiest stack that I've gotten around to reading. JSA ended it's current numbering with issue 87 by Levitz, Orway and Ross. This issue wraps up a slightly overlong story concerning a Silver Age Batman villain: the Gentleman Ghost. While I've read far worse the arc has reeked of filler material and mostly has me looking forward to the return of Geoff Johns (even though they'll be starting the numbering all over again) in a few months. I'd probably have been a little less critical of it had this been a filler arc and next month would see #88 and the return of Johns. As it stands, making it the capper for a series puts a bit more strain on it, IMHO. Still, Levitz and company built towards a big climax as they face a legion of spooks, and it wi

FZZZT! A funny thing happened on the way to this, my 1000th post. As I was lining up a brief post early Tuesday evening it was with nothing particularly auspicious to offer, deciding it was simply time to do a minor update of some sort before dropping into some other items out in the real world. I went into the oven that morning - meeting with the boss - and I emerged in one of those Secret Clock Is Ticking scenarios. Largely what I expected, which means that I'm moving ahead with much the same heavy object hung over my head. Lists to make, schedules to set and a more managerial/directorial mindset to get into if I'm to survive this without major upheavals. All standard tasks - all the things that need to get done and have been getting done - those count for very little, apparently, because they've always been done I suppose. The coal miner meets the new, larger quotas and brings home the rent and food money, so that eventually becomes expected and then people start to grip

The Battle of Coulda Shoulda I went over to Abbygal and Crypt Leak 's place Saturday afternoon for a Heroclix game. They'd been gracious enough to invite me over for this, a game they hadn't played before, along with food, drink and both their fine company and that of several, furry pals. On the plus side, I tried to cut down the set-up time by bringing pre-built teams, heroes and villains. That much was good. Beyond - and even within - that, I made a number of mistakes. I didn't pull together an all-female team of powerhouses as one of the alternatives, however, which would have come in handy. Taking five extra minutes to cobble together an all-female team using the femmes I'd brought along as a base for that would have been worth it. We simply got going with the game setup heading for 4pm, and I felt every delay from me was dragging things out. There were only three of us, since Eric was tied up with a sudden, Saturday assignment that quickly turned from morning

Yes, Another Useless Self-Evaluation Questionnaire... But what the hey? Of course I have to find it amusing that the graphic refuses to publish centered in the column despite it appearing where it should during editing. Okay, deduct 5 more points...

Go, Get 'Em! I'm very pleased to see Valerie Plame go after Cheney, Libby & Rove concerning the leak. I would dearly love to see this lead to the truth.

Blink and Miss a Shooting Star During a lunchtime cyber-stroll I happened across Watching the Planet , and saw a piece from July 6th concerning a sudden, Internet phenom. A pro-lifer named Pete read an article in the satirical paper The Onion , believed it, made it the subject of an anti-abortion post, and upon getting a huge number of hits and comments tried to pretend he knew it was a joke piece all along. Be sure to check out the Wikipedia entry before his petitioning to have it deleted works.

Some Nightmares Before Bedtime? Almost anyone with basic cable knows that TNT is beginning a four-week, Wednesday night Stephen King "event" tonight, presenting hour-long teleplays of eight Stephen King stories. If I'm recalling correctly, they're being presented commercial-free. Four of the adaptations are based on stories from King's 1993 anthology NIGHTMARES & DREAMSCAPES . The Road Virus Heads North comes from King's 2002 anthology Everything's Eventual , while Battleground comes from 1978's Nightshift . Initially I was a little bothered that only half of the tales were being taken from the titular anthology, but after a little reflection it's probably for the best. I'd have liked to see an adaptation of Dolan's Cadillac , but much of what made that work as fiction in print - the narrative running in the main character's head - would likely have made clumsy material for a screenplay. That Crouch End and (later in the series)

Sandwich Speak (Another trivial post, this is something that was sitting in draft mode for a while now, and it occurred to me I'm not going to to anything more with it, so why not post it?) Asking the question "What do you call the long sandwich that contains cold cuts, lettuce, and so on?" UWM's dialect poll received over 10,000 responses and allowed them to create maps of what this sandwich is called in different parts of the continental U.S. Sub, hoagie, grinder, hero, poor boy, bomber , etc., as with any poll question there are imperfections, ranging from likely having some correspondents answering as if they were still living where they grew up, to differences in the sandwiches in question. On the latter point, here in southeastern Pennsylvania, the thick of hoagie country... ...we also have grinders , and understand that a grinder is a hoagie that's placed back the oven so as to toast the roll, melt the cheese and deliver a warm sandwich. A hoagie, perhap

The Real(er) Deal Remember that week I was bracing myself for back on June 19th ? It appears that this will be it. At most it'll spill into next Monday or early Tuesday, but most likely it'll be by the end of day Friday. I'm not at all encouraged by what I have and especially haven't accomplished in the meantime. Anyway, this will likely be a fairly quiet week for me on the blog front.

Victory or Be Damned! (Part I) Having had him for a month, I finally decided to at least start setting up a battle against The Spectre . Introductory note: Yes, I'm sure that if I were to check the appropriate boards at Wizkids' site or over on HCRealms I'd find no shortage of strategies, including team builds and maybe even map selections for taking on the Spectre. Those are wonderful resources for someone who's looking for tips prior to a local gaming scenario at their venue. For people looking for shortcuts to a possible prize. Me, I'm just doing this for fun. I'll fumble my way through the process. Deciding to go whole hog -- rather than battle against one of his weaker forms -- I'm opting to build a team to take on the full-powered Spirit of Vengeance -- the 1800 pt. representation of the Spectre during the time when he wasn't tempered by a human soul. (Think Donald Rumsfeld after he helped himself to W's coke stash.) A frightening figure of