25 July 2009

The comfort of macaroni cheese

Every time I make macaroni and cheese I flash back to to an evening at my pal Mark's house when he measured out the six cups of water that the instructions called for. He was mocked by our lady -type friends at the time as there was no real need to measure the water; it gets drained off anyway. I sided with Mark as I did the same thing. They laughed at us and I thought it odd for a number of reasons. It was mostly strange to me to see women trying to be worse than men, or meaner. Besides, there was better things to make fun of us about than that and they knew it.

As for me, I stopped measuring the water. I couldn't stop thinking about it though.

I wish there was a smart-aleck ending for the story like that they were both later crushed to death by undercooked macaroni but, to the best of my knowledge, no such thing occurred. Maybe I'll start thinking of that instead.

24 July 2009

Quick notes for the record

I'm leaving for baseball soon and that anticipation has ruled my thoughts today. The Crew REALLY need to get something going and they needed to do so three weeks ago. The biggest advantage they have at the moment is that, as rough and uneven as their play has been of late, they're only 2 and 1/2 games off of first place at the moment.

Have seen a number of pictures from the filming of the fifth/thirty-first/first series of Doctor Who. Matt Smith's costume for the Doctor is interesting, stylish in a way that seems a bit off, fitting tradition and yet not being a copy of anything previous. Hair's not quite as shaggy as it was when he was announced. Companion Karen Gillian is very pretty. All that plus Steven Moffat in charge makes me excited for what's to come.

Haven't watched 'Torchwood: Children of Earth' yet. Heck, I keep forgetting that I have 'Doctor Who: Planet of the Dead' to watch...

Am bracing for the flood of information to pour from the San Diego Comic-Con. Today's the first big day of the Con so it should be all over soon. So far, I've not seen anything too exciting, more promises of information rather than the information.

23 July 2009

A Few Thoughts on Comics from this week

This week we'll start with the battle of the 600. Well, I guess it's not really a battle, it just happened that Incredible Hulk #600 and Amazing Spider-Man #600 both came out this week. Both books featured Ben Urich and Peter Parker/Spider-Man oddly enough.

Hulk #600 is one of those recent Marvel Books that reached a high number by somewhat spurious means as a number of different series are added together, a number of issues of a title that didn't feature the primary character are included, and somehow it adds into this number.

Amazing Spider-Man does have a restarted numbering in its history but is the 600th issue of a book that started as Amazing Spider-Man and wasn't a monster anthology for 70 issues first.

Like most Marvel Anniversary books, Incredible Hulk #600 has a slightly longer than normal lead story, a few new backup stories, and some reprints to fill it's 100 pages.

Amazing Spider-Man #600 has a 60 page lead story (the pages aren't numbered, I don't feel like counting them, but that's what John Romita Jr. noted the length of the story was and I've decided to believe him) and some new backup stories. No reprints fill up the 100 pages.

Both issues feature a change in situation for main characters in the books. Impactful things happen here. The 'big deal' in the Hulk book reads less as a shock and more as a 'huh, how long will that last?' reaction. There are some revelations about recent issues that show a conspiracy has been afoot. The idea seems to say 'all that stuff that didn't add up recently didn't add up for a reason'. No clue what adding Spider-Man to the mix did. I mean, if you're putting Ben Urich in the mix and he needs a photographer, it makes sense that he'd call on Peter Parker but Spidey didn't seem to contribute anything specific by being there. The identity of the Red Hulk has still not been made obvious.

Most of the 'big deals' in Amazing Spider-Man #600 come from story threads that have been building for some time. Daredevil, the New Avengers, and the Fantastic Four appear as guest-stars. These characters have a lot to do with Spider-Man in general and their appearances make sense within the context of the story. The status change for another character is shocking but developed logically within the story, built up in a way that made me go 'I never thought about that but it's true'.

Hulk felt like it was trying to be a surprise, trying too hard to go 'ha! see what we did?'. Amazing Spider-Man felt like a story that was part of a bigger story. I liked Spidey #600 much better. Hulk was okay.

In other books:

Dethklok vs the Goon was a funny one shot book. The title page that explained in 'Toki-speak' how this book was its own continuity was hilarious. The story itself tries to bounce back and forth between Dethklok type art and Goon style art. As the Goon is Eric Powell's creation and he's been drawing that world for some time now, that art looks fine. The efforts to translate the Dethklok world are less successful, not often looking like the art from the show and yet not translated into Goon-style either. The story is, well, brutal, as you'd expect and is enjoyable. If there was a way to rent comics, I'd say do that rather than buy it. I don't feel ripped off but I don't know that I'd recommend someone else pick it up either.

Futurama Comics #44 made me laugh out loud a lot. This is the best compliment I can pay a book that is meant to be this funny. I can sum up the plot in a few words that tell you so much and yet so little: Fry and Zapp Branigan in a spaceship race to the End of the Universe. The jokes fly. I heard all the voices in my head as if they were done by their original voice actors. This is good stuff right here.

22 July 2009

Catching Up a Bit

Realized this morning that I missed out on adding to this here blog yesterday. This was rather unintentional. Some days I can find no topic to discuss or time is critical so I will intentionally bypass this in an effort to not have a week of one line updates that read like Twitter bursts. It's not that I actually feel like I have an audience to tick off... Well, hang about, I understand that people do read this, and I'm grateful for that, but I think the bulk of the people that do read this get the header at the top: I ramble here. Some topics will interest some people but not others. I have no hard-core collective that will grow irritated with me if I veer 'off-topic' as I have no promised topic. That said, I do want to provide some value for the time you spend here. If I can be brief and witty, that's fine. Sometimes this should be longer, more in-depth. Sometimes I just burble on and you'll want me to get to the point, which is probably where you're at now.

Anyway.

One of the advantages of having a little more available time is that you can execute decisions more quickly. The other day I had one of those 'if I move this here, and that there, I could do this' moments and, rather than having to think about it, plan it, and find the time to do it, I just did it.

You see, some months ago I got a second-hand Mac Mini with a digital converter with the idea that I could work on the video archive this way, save some space, and have a back-up computer in the event of failure of my main device. This project started out okay but I didn't have a good plan for it, nor a good location for it, and the project quickly ground to a halt. Now the Mini is next to my TV and I'm *cough* backing up my DVR onto the Mini. It's still in 'test' mode as I want to see how the end result AVI files look before I get too excited. Getting this all arranged and set up didn't take that long but playing with my 'new' toy took more of yesterday than I expected. We'll see how this goes. There are still lots of tapes to go through after this works.

Another change I made was to the original location of the Mini, the desk in my bedroom. My old iMac was there in an effort to get old data from old disks, not the sort of thing I work on often. It occurred to me that if I were to move the computer equipment more to the side, I could actually have a desk surface to work upon. As I'd just been reminded that a writer should have a space set aside for writing, this seemed ideal. I got it arranged quickly and promptly got busy with other things. On the plus side, I finally set aside some time this morning and cranked out a handwritten page like it was nothing. If I can grow more regular at this, I'll finally be getting somewhere. This is what I've always wanted of myself in this regard.

At the moment, I'm spinning plates, er, projects, and keeping active. It would be nice if I getting paid to do something but one thing at a time I suppose.

20 July 2009

Updated Baseball Stats

I found another ticket from last year and it changed the stats a little bit. It landed right at the beginning of the streak and, thankfully, added to it. I'm re-presenting an old paragraph with the updated information.

Going back to last season, I observed 13 straight victories at Miller Park by the home team. This includes one playoff game as well as a game played by a Brewers associated minor league team, the Timber Rattlers. 10 of the victories took place this season, starting with Opening Day. The streak started on Wednesday September 24, 2008 vs the Pittsburgh Pirates with a 4-2 win. The last win of the streak was Sunday May 31, 2009 vs the Cincinnati Reds with a 5-2 win.

This means I attended 19 games last year with a record of 14-5. This gives me a winning percentage of .737 up from .722 (I can't have done the math properly before, or I'm doing it wrong now).

Yay team!

19 July 2009

What Can Be

As I sit in my stench and filth, I am illuminated solely by the flickering of the display before me. Images appear, perform their tasks, and continue on. I know my own eyes to be dull, full of sleep and weariness, yet here I sit and watch. Other projects surround me in their incomplete states. Them I pay no mind. Only this completed project holds my interest, this viewer into other worlds.

Upon successful activation of the device, the display has only followed the activities participated in by my counterparts. I am at a loss to explain why this should be so. Do I, perhaps, act as an antenna, filtering the signal to the device by my genetic coding? Am I special in some way, that I would appear in all possible realities? Are the variations I've seen, as great as some of them have appeared, not actually been that varied? Were I to invite another to view the scope it may lead to answering these questions. Scientific method would demand I follow this path, to bring others in to view the scope, to gain varied results, in an effort to discern what truth may reside within this matter.

Yet, I find myself unable to accomplish this task. The concept of making another suffer as I have would be cruel and I fear the addiction I find in myself would be replicated in another. In truth, I know not which outcome troubles me greater: that another may become fascinated in a like manner or their desire to utilize the device would be such that would prevent my access.

I know within myself that I should turn away, use my energies towards a new goal, but I find myself unable so to do. Other tasks appear in my mind, begging to be accomplished, but I do not do them. I neither rest nor eat properly. In truth, were sustenance not brought to me, I should already be long dead. I sleep fitfully, in the briefest of moments when action lags on the display. When I stir, do I deactivate the device and allow myself to rest? Of course not. I fear that the machinery may never function again were it to cease for but a moment, so I locate another world and begin viewing anew.

Yet, would the non-functioning of the device truly be such a terrible thing? It torments me. I cannot turn aside from it.

At times, in my weariness, I regret assembling the scope. I hesitate to utilize the term 'create' in referring to the device for that part of the process is but a blur to me now. Inspiration being what it is, the completion of the device came to me in a flash. To where, then, can inspiration be credited? Is it the interaction between the conscious and sub-conscious minds? Is inspiration triggered by some outside force, positive or negative, holy or infernal or otherwise? Or, perhaps, is there another me, on another world, who transmitted the design of the device to me so that he may no longer feel alone in his observation of other realities?

I have no way to discern the difference at this time. Perhaps the reasons and origins of my situation are immaterial. A tool is only good or evil based on its use. Even if the device be of infernal design and exists only to torment me, it is still I that am allowing it to torment me or not. It is but a machine and nothing more. Isn't it?

Yet, perhaps again the details remain unimportant. Perhaps 'why' and 'how' pale in comparison to what is understood. Why I am here viewing this machine's output is less important than the fact that I continue to observe the output.

I no longer do anything of consequence. I am but an Observer.