First things first, I finished No Door No Windows by Joe Schrieber. I think that's how his name is spelled. I read it based on a review that sold it mostly as a haunted house story featuring a house that had no true corners and no straight lines. This reminded me of House of Leaves and the lovely domicile contained in those pages and so I thought I'd give it a try. It's a decent little horror story if you know what you're getting into. And it's not really a haunted house story. Although it does feature a nicely trippy lodging. It's more a haunted family story. It takes a little to get started, but there are some nice creepy bits and it tells a decent tale although I felt that the ending was a little off. Still, if you're looking for something spooky to read, give it a shot.
I think I'll detail the history repeats itself (mostly) story next. Younger sis will probably remember slamming a door in my face and chipping my tooth. That's the context. So this morning McK and M decide that their room is far too tidy and proceed to free all of their stuffed animals from the tub where we store them. They needed some air or whatever. Lovely wife was none too thrilled and orders an immediate re-incarceration of said animals on the lam. Also the girls were to put some clothes on and basically get ready for school. The things they should have been doing instead of staging fuzzy jailbreaks. A couple minutes later M comes downstairs and informs lovely wife that instead of performing said tasks they were playing Kenichi [anime series about a kid that learns to fight] and McK had hit M with an uppercut and chipped her teeth. Apparently she hit her with the flat of her palm knocking her teeth together (her mouth had been open). And so the two bottom teeth on either side of the middle ones got chipped/jarred pretty good. I guess one of them has a nice chip knocked off, I don't know about the other. Oh and they're permanent teeth as well, natch. Lovely wife then morphs into terrible visage of motherly justice, inflicts some small harm upon McK and basically proceeds to lose it. (Yelling, weeping, gnashing of teeth, Old Testament type stuff)
After she manages to have M try eating (bread of all things, I mean who tests chipped teeth with bread?) she ferries them off to school. After I get the email detailing this I give her a call and try to sort out what's going on. She then calls M to see how eating breakfast went (I had Captain Crunch but chewed on the other side and I had juice but I drink through a straw... Seriously what kind of tests are these?) So we now have a dentist appointment scheduled for tomorrow morning first thing. Fortunately (or not) we just got school pictures back, so I guess this won't be detailed any time soon. Although I may have to take a picture and attempt to update the post later. I feel bad for all those involved, but mostly chalk it up to every family having this exact same story to tell. Well ok, their kids probably weren't aping random cartoons from Japan (although that's certainly more prevalent now - Bakugan and Pokemon and Yugi-oh say hi)
but still...
As for the fish story. Lovely wife made Parmesan Tilapia the other night (McK still calls it Parmesan chicken) and it was all duly consumed with G trying to steal pieces from everyone else. Apparently he likes his Tilapia. The next day he asked for something from the store, but lovely wife informed him it wasn't shopping day.
"Are you going food shopping on Thursday?" G asks.
"Yes."
"You don't need to shop for food. We can have fish for dinner. Fish fish fish fish fish."
"I don't think we want to have fish every night." She opined.
"Hmm...."
Then later for lunch G decided he wanted chicken noodle soup. Lovely wife prepares said soup.
"Hey, this is chicken soup."
"Yes, that's what you asked for."
"I will pretend it's fish soup. Fish meat." *bite* "Fish meat." *bite*
And so on. As mentioned little dude apparently loves his fish (oh and guess what he asked for for his upcoming birthday dinner...)
Oh and Zombieland is awesome. Best. Cameo. Ever. Plus some really decent lines and, well, zombies. Plus a quest for Twinkies. Yeah, it's really that good.
And this cracks me up.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Thursday, October 22, 2009
In which I discuss word games, books and a stunning loss
And another week goes by. Hard to believe October is about to call it quits. Lovely wife had a grand birthday. (And apparently we sat just across from Dale Murphy at dinner.) She got a Professor Layton game to help keep those wits sharp and Bananagrams to scratch the word game itch. It's basically competitive crossword puzzle building. You draw a set number of tiles and then at the same time turn yours over and start to build your own crossword. As you run out of tiles you yell "split" and everyone draws one more and on it goes until there are fewer tiles than players and then the first one out of tiles wins. You can dump a tile at the cost of drawing three more, which is occasionally helpful as it gives you more to work with. It's fun. If you like word games it's certainly worth picking up. I like it better than Scrabble as you can work at your own pace and compete that way. McK enjoys playing it as well.
I don't believe any more movies have been watched although we're about to watch The Wrong Guy, so more on that later. I did tape The Dunwich Horror on Syfy last weekend, so Lovecraft goodness coming up as well.
I finished reading The Magicians by Lev Grossman. I really enjoyed it. The pitch is Harry Potter/Chronicles of Narnia for grownups and it mostly delivers. There are a few (not so) subtle nods to those series throughout the book, but mostly it tells its own tale of what it would be like if magic was real. And real people used it. So while it's not a completely depressed Harry Potter, it's close. I think the best description I read was how the main characters were able to consistently snatch failure from the jaws of success. That really does sum it up well. It's a pretty fascinating story though. Great style and fun to read.
And now I'm on to the new Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett and Boneshaker by Cherie Priest (steampunk zombie novel). They are both quite good so far.
Lovely wife and I got stomped on at Settlers of Catan last night by the letter 'r'. It was a pretty disgraceful loss on our part. Although he really did have much better options than either of us. I was arguably close in points, but getting those last couple would have been a real struggle. That's a pretty decent game as well if you've not tried it. (And it sounds like the new Dominion supplement is trés cool.)
I don't believe any more movies have been watched although we're about to watch The Wrong Guy, so more on that later. I did tape The Dunwich Horror on Syfy last weekend, so Lovecraft goodness coming up as well.
I finished reading The Magicians by Lev Grossman. I really enjoyed it. The pitch is Harry Potter/Chronicles of Narnia for grownups and it mostly delivers. There are a few (not so) subtle nods to those series throughout the book, but mostly it tells its own tale of what it would be like if magic was real. And real people used it. So while it's not a completely depressed Harry Potter, it's close. I think the best description I read was how the main characters were able to consistently snatch failure from the jaws of success. That really does sum it up well. It's a pretty fascinating story though. Great style and fun to read.
And now I'm on to the new Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett and Boneshaker by Cherie Priest (steampunk zombie novel). They are both quite good so far.
Lovely wife and I got stomped on at Settlers of Catan last night by the letter 'r'. It was a pretty disgraceful loss on our part. Although he really did have much better options than either of us. I was arguably close in points, but getting those last couple would have been a real struggle. That's a pretty decent game as well if you've not tried it. (And it sounds like the new Dominion supplement is trés cool.)
Thursday, October 15, 2009
In which Horror is watched, but not necessarily understood, and a couple other things
So, we caught A Tale of Two Sisters over the weekend. It was a little on the confusing side. And not just because we had to read the subtitles. I suspect The Uninvited (the American remake) is much different. Partially because wikipedia confirms this and partially because the original definitely took a few turns that left us scratching our heads. It starts off a little slow, but just at the point where you start to get fed up it picks up nicely. There were some nice creepy moments and you definitely want to know what's going on, but the end makes you work for it quite a bit. I'm not sure if something was lost in the translation or if we just weren't quite up to the task. So give it a go if you want, it's not bad, but you may wonder just what happened. (And all without a single plot detail - nicely obscure letter 'd')
And now another installment of Games my Wife Hates. Mostly because she's about to have to play it again. This time we're talking about Arkham Horror. I picked this up because of my oft noted love with all things Lovecraft/Cthulhu. First things first - this is published by Fantasy Flight Games and they're known for a few things: their main line board games are not cheap ($80 is not an uncommon price), they have some amazing artwork/components, the games themselves tend to take a while, and their rulebooks can leave a little to be desired. The biggest strike against this game is that it takes 3-4 hours to play. And it is certainly difficult to carve out that sort of time commitment when you have 3hellions kids running about. I can't really argue that one. Strike two deals with the difficulty, and this comes in a couple flavors. Arkham Horror is a cooperative game - all the players work together to defeat the Great Old One rising from the depths bent on world domination/destruction of humanity. The victory conditions the game sets really do require that you all work together as it's tough to save the world. A lot of the time you feel like you're spinning your wheels - gateways to other worlds will open again if you don't have the proper bits to make sure the darn things stay closed. And you actually need to play a bit to get the feel for the way the game works - which locations are the most notorious for opening said portals, which locations offer money or items or other things you need, how best to set up your characters stats so you can safely navigate the world you find yourself in. The rules themselves are also a little on the complex side and take some getting used to. It's also recommended that you track down some of the player aids created by others as the rulebook is a bit of a nightmare. And when the game takes a long time to play, it can be difficult to get that experience. Unless of course you happen to just fall in love with the thing.
Which my wife hasn't (see title of this segment in case you forgot). There are things to love - the pieces and board are a thing of beauty. Fantasy Flight is known for their bits for a reason (of course, my wife would argue there are way too many of them). It is nice to play a game where you all work together - it's not something that happens a lot. And the theme is indeed part of the game - it's not hard to feel the urgency that the characters themselves would be feeling as another monster has just shown up, but you're low on health and sanity and maybe you should just try sneaking past the darn thing... I have managed to convince lovely wife and the letter 'r' that we should play the game at least once a year. Mostly because I can't quite bring myself to part with it. I'd really like to give it a go with a few more people (it can play up to 8 I believe) as I suspect that really helps with some of the difficulty. Of course it might make things a touch more confusing too. One thing is certain, if you do decide to give this one a go, make sure you have somewhere to set it up, it takes quite a bit of room.
And this is the point where I send a quick Happy Birthday to lovely wife as she is certainly worthy of said felicitations. You're the best sweetie!
Recently stumbled upon the Yoshida Brothers thanks to the vastness that is the internet and the randomness that is Pandora. They're a couple guys that play the shamisen. And they're good at it. Also the Jonathan Coulton cd Best. Concert. Ever. is quite nice. I'm really looking forward to checking out the DVD of the concert that's part of the package.
Here's a lovely, creepy short story for your October pleasure. It's in the same vein as Paranormal Activity.
And on a final note, ListenUp has come to an end of sorts. The show's host, Garnett Lee, as well as regular guest John Davison have moved on to new jobs. There will continue to be a podcast of sorts, but it won't be the same. I'll miss that show, I listened to it every week for the last several years. The members of the cast definitely fell into that strange internet friend type territory. I listened to them enough that I felt like I knew them. So good luck to Garnett and John and good luck to those still with 1up. Here's to the future.
And now another installment of Games my Wife Hates. Mostly because she's about to have to play it again. This time we're talking about Arkham Horror. I picked this up because of my oft noted love with all things Lovecraft/Cthulhu. First things first - this is published by Fantasy Flight Games and they're known for a few things: their main line board games are not cheap ($80 is not an uncommon price), they have some amazing artwork/components, the games themselves tend to take a while, and their rulebooks can leave a little to be desired. The biggest strike against this game is that it takes 3-4 hours to play. And it is certainly difficult to carve out that sort of time commitment when you have 3
Which my wife hasn't (see title of this segment in case you forgot). There are things to love - the pieces and board are a thing of beauty. Fantasy Flight is known for their bits for a reason (of course, my wife would argue there are way too many of them). It is nice to play a game where you all work together - it's not something that happens a lot. And the theme is indeed part of the game - it's not hard to feel the urgency that the characters themselves would be feeling as another monster has just shown up, but you're low on health and sanity and maybe you should just try sneaking past the darn thing... I have managed to convince lovely wife and the letter 'r' that we should play the game at least once a year. Mostly because I can't quite bring myself to part with it. I'd really like to give it a go with a few more people (it can play up to 8 I believe) as I suspect that really helps with some of the difficulty. Of course it might make things a touch more confusing too. One thing is certain, if you do decide to give this one a go, make sure you have somewhere to set it up, it takes quite a bit of room.
And this is the point where I send a quick Happy Birthday to lovely wife as she is certainly worthy of said felicitations. You're the best sweetie!
Recently stumbled upon the Yoshida Brothers thanks to the vastness that is the internet and the randomness that is Pandora. They're a couple guys that play the shamisen. And they're good at it. Also the Jonathan Coulton cd Best. Concert. Ever. is quite nice. I'm really looking forward to checking out the DVD of the concert that's part of the package.
Here's a lovely, creepy short story for your October pleasure. It's in the same vein as Paranormal Activity.
And on a final note, ListenUp has come to an end of sorts. The show's host, Garnett Lee, as well as regular guest John Davison have moved on to new jobs. There will continue to be a podcast of sorts, but it won't be the same. I'll miss that show, I listened to it every week for the last several years. The members of the cast definitely fell into that strange internet friend type territory. I listened to them enough that I felt like I knew them. So good luck to Garnett and John and good luck to those still with 1up. Here's to the future.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
On properly raising children
Some initial notes: the girls are 11 and 8. Over the summer they attended an overnight Girl Scout's camp. They came back telling ghost stories. At least two of three children were emotionally scarred in the making of this post.
So it's October. October means horror movies, ghost stories etc. Ol' letter 'd' decided to break out one of the ghost stories from his youth and tell it to his kids at bedtime. So off goes the light, on goes the flashlight under the chin and the kids are in a circle sitting next to lovely wife. I then proceed to (badly) tell The Golden Arm. It's been a while since I've told this story, I hit the high points and make up my way through the rest. As the ghost of the wife makes her way through the house, the girls scootch closer to lovely wife. Good, at least I've gotten the atmosphere right. Then comes the big reveal, You've got it! The girls scream and burst into tears. Oh yeah, I've still got it. Lights come up. Girls are in hysterics. "Daaad, that story was scary! We don't like scary stories!" (Note: this is patently untrue, see initial notes) I make some brief attempts at calming them down.
We head out of the room telling them to go to bed. Lovely wife is helping G get ready for bed. (And laughing) The girls start talking in their room. This is the point at which true parenting comes in handy. I lowly whisper outside their door, "Where's my golden arm?" Shrieks ensue. I wait a five count, throw open the door and yell "You've got it!" Shrieks become full blown panic attacks. Tears, screaming, the whole nine yards. Lovely wife? In the bathroom doubled over in laughter. Unable to breathe laughter. We then spend the next 10 minutes calming the girls down (and by we, I mean lovely wife). I get several "How could you" looks from the kids. And then proceed to call little sis to relay the story. More laughter ensues.
Oh and through pretty much this entire situation G just wondered what all the fuss was about.
Parenting is an art. It takes a soft touch to raise kids. And a flashlight to scare the crap out of them.
So it's October. October means horror movies, ghost stories etc. Ol' letter 'd' decided to break out one of the ghost stories from his youth and tell it to his kids at bedtime. So off goes the light, on goes the flashlight under the chin and the kids are in a circle sitting next to lovely wife. I then proceed to (badly) tell The Golden Arm. It's been a while since I've told this story, I hit the high points and make up my way through the rest. As the ghost of the wife makes her way through the house, the girls scootch closer to lovely wife. Good, at least I've gotten the atmosphere right. Then comes the big reveal, You've got it! The girls scream and burst into tears. Oh yeah, I've still got it. Lights come up. Girls are in hysterics. "Daaad, that story was scary! We don't like scary stories!" (Note: this is patently untrue, see initial notes) I make some brief attempts at calming them down.
We head out of the room telling them to go to bed. Lovely wife is helping G get ready for bed. (And laughing) The girls start talking in their room. This is the point at which true parenting comes in handy. I lowly whisper outside their door, "Where's my golden arm?" Shrieks ensue. I wait a five count, throw open the door and yell "You've got it!" Shrieks become full blown panic attacks. Tears, screaming, the whole nine yards. Lovely wife? In the bathroom doubled over in laughter. Unable to breathe laughter. We then spend the next 10 minutes calming the girls down (and by we, I mean lovely wife). I get several "How could you" looks from the kids. And then proceed to call little sis to relay the story. More laughter ensues.
Oh and through pretty much this entire situation G just wondered what all the fuss was about.
Parenting is an art. It takes a soft touch to raise kids. And a flashlight to scare the crap out of them.
Thursday, October 08, 2009
Couple quick thoughts on Art (and some other things)
The Tap Dogs were in SLC the other day and they put on a free preview of their show here at the Library. It was quite amazing. They were a lot of fun to watch and had it not been so last minute (they were in town that night and the next) and had we not been recovering from several illnesses, I might have gotten lovely wife and myself some tickets to the show. I suspect it was great.
The thing that struck me while I was watching them was how it's important to experience some Art in your life every so often (be that a good book, some nice live music, an art gallery, or a wandering band of tap performers). That's certainly one of the neat things about working at this particular Library - we often have most if not all of those available. So take 5 minutes, head on over to your local Library and see who they have visiting in the not too distant future, you'll be glad you did. (And if the Tap Dogs find their way to your neighborhood, go see them.)
In somewhat related news I have been listening to several of the new remastered Beatles albums. And they are truly amazing as well. I think, so far, my favorite is Help, but that's certainly subject to change as I make my way through them. I would like to have seen them in concert. And don't let anybody tell you that Elvis is better. Because he's not. At all. (Not even close...)
The new kinder, gentler House still has a bit of pixie charm in him and that's good. Can't be all fluffy kittens all the time.
The first horror film of the season will be A Tale of Two Sisters. The original Korean version (yes, more subtitles oh favored niece. You should try them some time). I forget what it was remade as over here, but it's good to be watching something unsettling again. Feel free to suggest horror films to be watched. I think we'll do the Ring remake and possibly The Grudge as well. I actually liked the remakes of those two.
Finished Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins. It was good. Since this one wasn't quite so Battle Royale as the original Hunger Games, it was a little easier to enjoy the story on its own merits. The plot twists were all pretty decent and it certainly ends with a good cliffhanger. I look forward to the next book.
Amulet, Book 2 by Kazu Kibuishi was also enjoyable. The story continues to pick up steam and there are some nice moments. And the art is amazing as always.
Well, so very tired. I suspect I had a mild-ish case of the flu over the weekend. I'm still not quite back up to snuff. I could use about a 2 day nap. Alas, those are in seriously short supply. So I suspect this will have to tide you lot over. Go find some Art, or even better, make some. And read a book. And get off my lawn ya durn kids.
The thing that struck me while I was watching them was how it's important to experience some Art in your life every so often (be that a good book, some nice live music, an art gallery, or a wandering band of tap performers). That's certainly one of the neat things about working at this particular Library - we often have most if not all of those available. So take 5 minutes, head on over to your local Library and see who they have visiting in the not too distant future, you'll be glad you did. (And if the Tap Dogs find their way to your neighborhood, go see them.)
In somewhat related news I have been listening to several of the new remastered Beatles albums. And they are truly amazing as well. I think, so far, my favorite is Help, but that's certainly subject to change as I make my way through them. I would like to have seen them in concert. And don't let anybody tell you that Elvis is better. Because he's not. At all. (Not even close...)
The new kinder, gentler House still has a bit of pixie charm in him and that's good. Can't be all fluffy kittens all the time.
The first horror film of the season will be A Tale of Two Sisters. The original Korean version (yes, more subtitles oh favored niece. You should try them some time). I forget what it was remade as over here, but it's good to be watching something unsettling again. Feel free to suggest horror films to be watched. I think we'll do the Ring remake and possibly The Grudge as well. I actually liked the remakes of those two.
Finished Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins. It was good. Since this one wasn't quite so Battle Royale as the original Hunger Games, it was a little easier to enjoy the story on its own merits. The plot twists were all pretty decent and it certainly ends with a good cliffhanger. I look forward to the next book.
Amulet, Book 2 by Kazu Kibuishi was also enjoyable. The story continues to pick up steam and there are some nice moments. And the art is amazing as always.
Well, so very tired. I suspect I had a mild-ish case of the flu over the weekend. I'm still not quite back up to snuff. I could use about a 2 day nap. Alas, those are in seriously short supply. So I suspect this will have to tide you lot over. Go find some Art, or even better, make some. And read a book. And get off my lawn ya durn kids.
Thursday, October 01, 2009
Last line, some rambling, what? Are you new here?
It's been a while since our last Last Line, so I felt like another one. This time the ol' letter 'd' goes where he's not gone before. Romance novels. At least, I think it's a romance novel. I really don't know and more to the point, don't care. Anyway.
From Distant Dreams (Ribbons of Steel No. 1) by Judith Pella and Tracie Peterson. "Perhaps the dreams were not so distant after all." Now, while I am certainly not a professional writer (and based on the contents here, it's arguable I'm even an amateur) I offer this valuable tip: if the last line of your book is going to contradict the title, you might want to change one of them. Unless you are an artiste and darnitall that's the whole point! Why do you not get my Art?! Begone unworthy cretin!! (Artistes live and breath exclamation points!) Since this not Art (no, really, it's not) I have sincere doubts about the location of these dreams. And I wonder if they're really dreams at all. Perhaps flights of fancy. Or night terrors. I have a sneaking suspicion that's what this book would leave me with...
An on to the rambling. It's October. I'm not entirely certain how that happened. School has started and the weather is starting to finally cooperate, so I suppose it makes sense. But I'm not convinced I'm ready for the roll into the holiday season. It is nice to have a few Halloween decorations up. We need some more tombstones. Perhaps a scarecrow. I'll have to break out some horror movies soon.
I did read Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman and it was brilliant. I really enjoy Norse mythology and this was a pretty good tale set in that milieu. It was of course Loki's fault and possibly lessons were learned, but mostly it's a good romp. It's quick and it will leave you wanting a few more stories with the All Father and crew (in fact I checked out a collection of Norse mythology to scratch just that itch). So if you are at all familiar with Thor or want to be, it's a fun little story.
I don't think we've seen any movies lately... Oh wait, I did watch the Ghost in the Shell:SAC movie, Solid State Society and it was good (if a little confusing). It is sort of a retelling of the original Ghost in the Shell film (much like the TV series was a reboot of the film franchise) so that was interesting. It's actually a little hard to call it a retelling as there weren't a lot of plot details that were shared, but if you've read the graphic novel or seen the movies and then the tv stuff you probably understand what I'm trying to say. Which I suspect is very few of you, but this is not Brought to you by the letter 'whoever you are', so skip to the next paragraph already.
At this point I would like to mention that homework is stupid. Especially in the large amounts that the local grade school feels the need to pass along. I have no problems with work being done to teach concepts, but large amounts of it are not helpful. That is all.
Had a rather nice training session on Graphic Novels at the Library yesterday. It focused mostly on the non manga side of things, so lots of things I hadn't heard of. It was fun. And some new titles to look into. I'm sure you'll hear about them in the coming months.
From Distant Dreams (Ribbons of Steel No. 1) by Judith Pella and Tracie Peterson. "Perhaps the dreams were not so distant after all." Now, while I am certainly not a professional writer (and based on the contents here, it's arguable I'm even an amateur) I offer this valuable tip: if the last line of your book is going to contradict the title, you might want to change one of them. Unless you are an artiste and darnitall that's the whole point! Why do you not get my Art?! Begone unworthy cretin!! (Artistes live and breath exclamation points!) Since this not Art (no, really, it's not) I have sincere doubts about the location of these dreams. And I wonder if they're really dreams at all. Perhaps flights of fancy. Or night terrors. I have a sneaking suspicion that's what this book would leave me with...
An on to the rambling. It's October. I'm not entirely certain how that happened. School has started and the weather is starting to finally cooperate, so I suppose it makes sense. But I'm not convinced I'm ready for the roll into the holiday season. It is nice to have a few Halloween decorations up. We need some more tombstones. Perhaps a scarecrow. I'll have to break out some horror movies soon.
I did read Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman and it was brilliant. I really enjoy Norse mythology and this was a pretty good tale set in that milieu. It was of course Loki's fault and possibly lessons were learned, but mostly it's a good romp. It's quick and it will leave you wanting a few more stories with the All Father and crew (in fact I checked out a collection of Norse mythology to scratch just that itch). So if you are at all familiar with Thor or want to be, it's a fun little story.
I don't think we've seen any movies lately... Oh wait, I did watch the Ghost in the Shell:SAC movie, Solid State Society and it was good (if a little confusing). It is sort of a retelling of the original Ghost in the Shell film (much like the TV series was a reboot of the film franchise) so that was interesting. It's actually a little hard to call it a retelling as there weren't a lot of plot details that were shared, but if you've read the graphic novel or seen the movies and then the tv stuff you probably understand what I'm trying to say. Which I suspect is very few of you, but this is not Brought to you by the letter 'whoever you are', so skip to the next paragraph already.
At this point I would like to mention that homework is stupid. Especially in the large amounts that the local grade school feels the need to pass along. I have no problems with work being done to teach concepts, but large amounts of it are not helpful. That is all.
Had a rather nice training session on Graphic Novels at the Library yesterday. It focused mostly on the non manga side of things, so lots of things I hadn't heard of. It was fun. And some new titles to look into. I'm sure you'll hear about them in the coming months.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Oh yeah
The other thing I should mention. Scribblenauts. If you have a DS, this is worth picking up. It's a puzzle game in which you try to get the main character (Max, if you need a name) to the star(ite). The hook is you type in what you want to use to get there. Piranha in the lake between you and the starite? Type in shark or bear and drop it in. One less piranha. Cat up a tree? Try an elevator. Or wings. Or a dog. Or catnip. You get the idea. The dictionary in this thing is huge (as are the pop culture and geek references - keyboard cat, the large hadron collider, Cthulhu and lots of others say hi) so if you can think of it, chances are you can use it. The best part is the title screen acts as a drawing board where you can try out whatever you want. See how things interact: pit zombies against vampires (stronger than zombies, but scared of garlic and the sun will kill them, not make them sparkle), Cthulhu against a Shoggoth and so on. Honestly this may be the first game where the title screen is better than the game. The controls are certainly a bit wonky but the chance to stretch your brain more than makes up for it. So yeah, Scribblenauts. It's awesome. (And make sure you have a kid around when you play some times. It's totally worth seeing how what they come up with works too.)
And a week's gone by
No snappy title for you this week. Too tired to think of one. There has been a distinct lack of sleep in my life lately. Not as bad as some of my insomnia bouts, but things are definitely a little on the fuzzy side.
So I finished The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown. Honestly you don't need me to review it. You already know it's bad. Readable, but bad. Plot holes, bad characters, too much lecturing, out there science that's real darnit, yadda yadda. If you've read any of his stuff you know the drill. If you haven't, don't read this one. Read Deception Point instead. I still seem to remember thinking that one was good. It posits a relatively interesting question and then pretty much fails to deliver anything worthwhile. So yeah. Umptymillion readers are wrong. Or gullible. I fall into the taking one for the team category natch.
Also finished The Book of Fate by Brad Meltzer. It was alright. Relatively decent little political thriller. Unfortunately I was listening to the audiobook version and several of the cds were scratched to no end. So there are some strange gaps in my knowledge of the story. Especially near the end. Annoying. The one down side to audiobooks from the Library. May try his next one The Book of Lies. We'll see. The end was a little off, but I suspect it's because he's hoping for a movie deal.
Up next are Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman (book he wrote for charity in the UK that just came out over here), Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins (sequel to The Hunger Games) and I'm still in the midst of The Magicians.
Season opener of House was fun. Will be interesting to see the new nicer House. Season finale of Eureka was good if frustrating. I liked Tess, am annoyed they're potentially writing her off. Not the biggest Carter/Allison fan. Meh. And last week's Bollywood inspired episode of Psych went a long way to redeeming an otherwise forgettable season.
So enough rambling commentary on ways to pass your time. If I were more awake I'd throw in a last line, or a game my wife hates, but I suspect that's better saved for next time. Or whenever I get back to this thing.
So I finished The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown. Honestly you don't need me to review it. You already know it's bad. Readable, but bad. Plot holes, bad characters, too much lecturing, out there science that's real darnit, yadda yadda. If you've read any of his stuff you know the drill. If you haven't, don't read this one. Read Deception Point instead. I still seem to remember thinking that one was good. It posits a relatively interesting question and then pretty much fails to deliver anything worthwhile. So yeah. Umptymillion readers are wrong. Or gullible. I fall into the taking one for the team category natch.
Also finished The Book of Fate by Brad Meltzer. It was alright. Relatively decent little political thriller. Unfortunately I was listening to the audiobook version and several of the cds were scratched to no end. So there are some strange gaps in my knowledge of the story. Especially near the end. Annoying. The one down side to audiobooks from the Library. May try his next one The Book of Lies. We'll see. The end was a little off, but I suspect it's because he's hoping for a movie deal.
Up next are Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman (book he wrote for charity in the UK that just came out over here), Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins (sequel to The Hunger Games) and I'm still in the midst of The Magicians.
Season opener of House was fun. Will be interesting to see the new nicer House. Season finale of Eureka was good if frustrating. I liked Tess, am annoyed they're potentially writing her off. Not the biggest Carter/Allison fan. Meh. And last week's Bollywood inspired episode of Psych went a long way to redeeming an otherwise forgettable season.
So enough rambling commentary on ways to pass your time. If I were more awake I'd throw in a last line, or a game my wife hates, but I suspect that's better saved for next time. Or whenever I get back to this thing.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Weekly dose of books and such
Finished Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld. Enjoyed it thoroughly. It's a steampunk take on WWI, so you have giant robotic war machines on one side and living zeppelins (and other home brewed beasties) on the other. The story itself follows the young not quite heir of archduke Franz Ferdinand (the guy what got assassinated and started the whole shindig) on one side and a young girl masquerading as a boy so she can join the military on the other. The only down side is that this is the first book in a series, and so while it wraps a few things up there's still plenty to come. And I can't wait. It's typical readable Westerfeld with some fun characters and lots of good bits. Check it out.
Who watches the Watchmen? I watch the Watchmen. That's who. Movie was a decent adaptation of the graphic novel (which is still better). I'm not convinced the altered ending works as well as some have claimed (honestly I have a pretty big problem with it), but it's definitely standard Snyder. If you liked either 300 or his remake of Dawn of the Dead you'll find some decent bits here too. Lots of stylish slow-mo and some effective color palette use. (Strangely I wasn't as drawn to the opening montage as everyone else either. I think I'd have found it horribly confusing if I hadn't read the graphic novel and understood the history it was compressing. I'll have to double check with lovely wife and see if that's true...) I guess I can only really say it was alright. Not great, not horrible. I'm not convinced the message in this one holds up as well as something like V is for Vendetta. Cold War ended a while ago and most folks my age really can't relate.
I've started The Lost Symbol. It's... not good. It is standard Dan Brown. You'll get lectured a lot. The bad guy is a caricature (tattoos instead of albino-ism in this one). The plot is mind blowingly stupid. (I've spent most of my time yelling why would you do that?! No really, except for the fact the author needed you to, why would you do that?!) But it's strangely readable. And you sort of want to know what the big secret is. Guy's got a struck a deal with the devil to get it writing style, I'll give him that. So, turn brain off and read. Or wait for everyone to talk about it and nod along. You're probably not missing that much.
I really need to come up with a way to snag the two player board for Ticket to Ride. The problem is, you need either the original game, or the European sequel to cannibalize for parts. We've got Marklin. I suspect I'd really like the 2 player version of the game it's actually built for that number of players. The other boards really seem built for lots of players. At least that's my impression of Marklin. It's fun, sure, but also pretty cutthroat. If you happen to be lucky and don't end up heading for the same sections of the map the game is alright, but if you do... Well. You've been warned. Actually now that I think about it, I suspect the 2 player version probably ends in tears a lot more...
Oh and a quick plea to Dad - Send more Skinny Cows. That is all.
Who watches the Watchmen? I watch the Watchmen. That's who. Movie was a decent adaptation of the graphic novel (which is still better). I'm not convinced the altered ending works as well as some have claimed (honestly I have a pretty big problem with it), but it's definitely standard Snyder. If you liked either 300 or his remake of Dawn of the Dead you'll find some decent bits here too. Lots of stylish slow-mo and some effective color palette use. (Strangely I wasn't as drawn to the opening montage as everyone else either. I think I'd have found it horribly confusing if I hadn't read the graphic novel and understood the history it was compressing. I'll have to double check with lovely wife and see if that's true...) I guess I can only really say it was alright. Not great, not horrible. I'm not convinced the message in this one holds up as well as something like V is for Vendetta. Cold War ended a while ago and most folks my age really can't relate.
I've started The Lost Symbol. It's... not good. It is standard Dan Brown. You'll get lectured a lot. The bad guy is a caricature (tattoos instead of albino-ism in this one). The plot is mind blowingly stupid. (I've spent most of my time yelling why would you do that?! No really, except for the fact the author needed you to, why would you do that?!) But it's strangely readable. And you sort of want to know what the big secret is. Guy's got a struck a deal with the devil to get it writing style, I'll give him that. So, turn brain off and read. Or wait for everyone to talk about it and nod along. You're probably not missing that much.
I really need to come up with a way to snag the two player board for Ticket to Ride. The problem is, you need either the original game, or the European sequel to cannibalize for parts. We've got Marklin. I suspect I'd really like the 2 player version of the game it's actually built for that number of players. The other boards really seem built for lots of players. At least that's my impression of Marklin. It's fun, sure, but also pretty cutthroat. If you happen to be lucky and don't end up heading for the same sections of the map the game is alright, but if you do... Well. You've been warned. Actually now that I think about it, I suspect the 2 player version probably ends in tears a lot more...
Oh and a quick plea to Dad - Send more Skinny Cows. That is all.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Hikes and fish
As you can see pictured here, we did indeed hike up to Timp Caves while family was in town. It was a pleasant enough trek (and apparently exercise is good for something as I was only vaguely sore the next couple days) that did afford some decent photos. You can see a couple more from the trail over at the flickr site.
So family was in town and that was nice. Everybody got along and a good time was had by all. I introduced Dad and youngest sis to Dominion. McK was insistent that she teach Dad how to play. She needs to work on buying point cards. Lovely wife's Dad took G to see Ponyo. I would have liked to have seen it as well. We all went out for ice cream at Maggie Moo's. (Twice! Once for each Grandpa) And the sprinkler system got fixed. That job went shockingly well.
And we got some yummy pulled pork from The Smoking Apple. Yummy enough that it deserves its own paragraph. Yes folks, it's that good.
McK featured in her own version of a favorite niece story. While Dad was here he took us over to Costco to wander around. He offered to make us some Parmesan Tilapia for dinner so we picked up some fillets along with a few other things. It came out nicely and was quite good. McK, known for her extremely narrow diet, refused to have fish for dinner. (Everyone else ate theirs, G eating an entire fillet by himself) We told her she had to try it. Shockingly we actually got her to. At which point she decided we were teasing her and we really had Parmesan chicken, not fish. She refused to acknowledge Tilapia as a type of fish, because fish can't taste good on general principles or something. So there you go, Tilapia - the new chicken of the sea.
Finished The Fall of Cthulhu: Godwar last night. I really, really enjoy this series. I don't have anything terribly illuminating to say about it other than it's a darn good Lovecraftian horror tale. Worth reading if you like Lovecraft.
Race to Witch Mountain was fun. I like Dwayne Johnson - I find him funny. We're a couple episodes into the second series of Hamish Macbeth and it's still good. There are a few things waiting in the wings.
Oh that Misplaced Effigy book showed up at the Library today. It doesn't go out until next week. But it's here. Mwa ha ha ha.
There really should be a few other things to cover, it's been a pretty momentous week, but I think that's really all that's worth mentioning. Poor McK has come down with walking pneumonia, and I've got a head cold I'd love to get rid of. The one downside to being around people that have been on planes and in other parts of the country, accursed foreign germs. Hopefully family didn't come down with things too.
So family was in town and that was nice. Everybody got along and a good time was had by all. I introduced Dad and youngest sis to Dominion. McK was insistent that she teach Dad how to play. She needs to work on buying point cards. Lovely wife's Dad took G to see Ponyo. I would have liked to have seen it as well. We all went out for ice cream at Maggie Moo's. (Twice! Once for each Grandpa) And the sprinkler system got fixed. That job went shockingly well.
And we got some yummy pulled pork from The Smoking Apple. Yummy enough that it deserves its own paragraph. Yes folks, it's that good.
McK featured in her own version of a favorite niece story. While Dad was here he took us over to Costco to wander around. He offered to make us some Parmesan Tilapia for dinner so we picked up some fillets along with a few other things. It came out nicely and was quite good. McK, known for her extremely narrow diet, refused to have fish for dinner. (Everyone else ate theirs, G eating an entire fillet by himself) We told her she had to try it. Shockingly we actually got her to. At which point she decided we were teasing her and we really had Parmesan chicken, not fish. She refused to acknowledge Tilapia as a type of fish, because fish can't taste good on general principles or something. So there you go, Tilapia - the new chicken of the sea.
Finished The Fall of Cthulhu: Godwar last night. I really, really enjoy this series. I don't have anything terribly illuminating to say about it other than it's a darn good Lovecraftian horror tale. Worth reading if you like Lovecraft.
Race to Witch Mountain was fun. I like Dwayne Johnson - I find him funny. We're a couple episodes into the second series of Hamish Macbeth and it's still good. There are a few things waiting in the wings.
Oh that Misplaced Effigy book showed up at the Library today. It doesn't go out until next week. But it's here. Mwa ha ha ha.
There really should be a few other things to cover, it's been a pretty momentous week, but I think that's really all that's worth mentioning. Poor McK has come down with walking pneumonia, and I've got a head cold I'd love to get rid of. The one downside to being around people that have been on planes and in other parts of the country, accursed foreign germs. Hopefully family didn't come down with things too.
Thursday, September 03, 2009
Gardens, Monsters, Last Lines
So, here is the picture of the recent green bean/cucumber harvest. Alas, these are the only 2 cucumbers we were able to grow. Soon they will be pickles. Oh yes, yes they will. Tasty tasty pickles. Hopefully. As mentioned the green beans have been the big winner this summer (oh and the snap peas, can't forget them). This represents only a small amount of what we've grown, but this was the single biggest batch we picked. And they are mighty fine. We've had some decent tomatoes and some decent peppers as well. All in all the garden has been a success. And I just found out that lovely wife planted some spinach for a fall harvest. So yay for that. Next year we'll have a slightly better idea about what we're doing.
I have finally finished all 18 volumes of Naoki Urasawa's Monster. It was quite the ride. I'm uncertain how I feel about the ending (and really given the buildup that occurred across 18 volumes, I'm really not sure what would have worked) but I can wholeheartedly recommend the series. If you have access to it, track it down. It's a pretty fascinating ride. Politics, questions of humanity, intrigue - this series has just about a dash of everything. It really is pretty amazing how much stuff is crammed into the story. The few knocks against it are the constant introduction of new characters (even at the end) which can be pretty difficult to follow (wait, who did what to who and when?) and the fact that the story really does cover a lot of ground. It can be difficult to keep track of (even with the helpful charts at the beginning). (And yes I'm aware I just said that was a positive as well, thanks) So yes, Monster good. Letter 'd' approved.
And lest you think I forgot, here's another last line. This time it comes from The Latent Powers of Dylan Fontaine (Amazon link, yo) by April Lurie. It reads, "From the audience, Headbone calls out, 'Dylan! Studmeister! Give us lessons!'" It's been a while since I made note of this particular line, so I have no scathing commentary. I will simply say that if anyone should be using the term studmeister, it's definitely someone named Headbone. (Based on the blurb I have a sneaking suspicion that he's a band member. A particularly gnarly one at that dude. But that almost counts as research, so ignore that bit.) I am glad to see that Headbone is interested in learning something. Especially as the book is now over and he will never get the chance.
We recently caught the first few episodes of Hamish Macbeth, a Scottish TV series based on the M.C. Beaton books. It's good. It takes an episode or two to make sense of the accents, but after that it's an amusing little police show. Robert Carlyle makes an excellent Hamish (and a good zombie as well - 28 Weeks Later says hi) and the girl who plays Moaning Myrtle in the Harry Potter films does a good job as one third of the main love triangle. Also worth tracking down.
And I think that about does it. Family is in town at the moment and will continue to arrive through Saturday. It will make for a busy weekend, but it will be nice to see everyone again. So happy early Labor Day to all. (And who let it be September already?!)
I have finally finished all 18 volumes of Naoki Urasawa's Monster. It was quite the ride. I'm uncertain how I feel about the ending (and really given the buildup that occurred across 18 volumes, I'm really not sure what would have worked) but I can wholeheartedly recommend the series. If you have access to it, track it down. It's a pretty fascinating ride. Politics, questions of humanity, intrigue - this series has just about a dash of everything. It really is pretty amazing how much stuff is crammed into the story. The few knocks against it are the constant introduction of new characters (even at the end) which can be pretty difficult to follow (wait, who did what to who and when?) and the fact that the story really does cover a lot of ground. It can be difficult to keep track of (even with the helpful charts at the beginning). (And yes I'm aware I just said that was a positive as well, thanks) So yes, Monster good. Letter 'd' approved.
And lest you think I forgot, here's another last line. This time it comes from The Latent Powers of Dylan Fontaine (Amazon link, yo) by April Lurie. It reads, "From the audience, Headbone calls out, 'Dylan! Studmeister! Give us lessons!'" It's been a while since I made note of this particular line, so I have no scathing commentary. I will simply say that if anyone should be using the term studmeister, it's definitely someone named Headbone. (Based on the blurb I have a sneaking suspicion that he's a band member. A particularly gnarly one at that dude. But that almost counts as research, so ignore that bit.) I am glad to see that Headbone is interested in learning something. Especially as the book is now over and he will never get the chance.
We recently caught the first few episodes of Hamish Macbeth, a Scottish TV series based on the M.C. Beaton books. It's good. It takes an episode or two to make sense of the accents, but after that it's an amusing little police show. Robert Carlyle makes an excellent Hamish (and a good zombie as well - 28 Weeks Later says hi) and the girl who plays Moaning Myrtle in the Harry Potter films does a good job as one third of the main love triangle. Also worth tracking down.
And I think that about does it. Family is in town at the moment and will continue to arrive through Saturday. It will make for a busy weekend, but it will be nice to see everyone again. So happy early Labor Day to all. (And who let it be September already?!)
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Haunted Houses, Dangerous Islands, you know, your typical stuff
Recently finished the audiobook version of Richard Matheson's Hell House. It's a decent haunted house type story that is not in any way for people under the age of, oh, say, 30. Matheson opted to go the creepy lurid route as opposed to the creepy psychological route (although there is some of that too). Which is to say there's some sex folks. I'm a little interested how the book got turned into a PG movie, because it seems like they'd pretty much have to re-write the entire thing to accomplish said task. And maybe they did. Who knows? There are some good twists and some nice spooky moments, but it's actually a little hard to recommend the title. The guy doing the reading did a pretty good job though, so that's something.
I'm actually going to start listening to some audiobooks as part of my commute. Up next is The Book of Fate.
Finished Warren Fahy's Fragment. It's fine for a summer popcorn book (which is pretty much what I read it for). Not quite up to Jurassic Park standards, but not bad for what it is. Follow the scientist based reality TV show as they head to an island left to itself for far too long. Cower in terror as they get devoured by said island's insane ecosystem. Thrill as more scientists show up - will they be saviours? Or savored? Yeah, it's kind of like that. Characters aren't terribly 3 dimensional, and plot is pretty standard. It does get points for some creativity in the monsters that inhabit the island though.
Up next is Scott Westerfeld's Leviathan. I love me some Westerfeld and this one has a steampunk-ish twist, so yay for that. Should be good.
Kids have been reading the Legend of Zelda graphic novels (and by kids I mean pretty much all of us - in fact I think all 5 of us read the first one...) and enjoying them. That's kind of fun.
The big success of the garden has been green beans I think. Snap peas are a close second, followed by the tomatoes and then the peppers. I suspect next year we may turn the trellis over to the pole beans and the snap peas and rearrange everything else a touch. But the beans have been great. Mmmm fresh steamed green beans...
Eureka season one has been fun, but it really makes me want to watch season two as I forget how some of these plot lines wrapped up. Leverage has been alright and Psych is still fun. Although the star of the week vein they're in is a little silly.
I would like to point out at this point that my wife has made some sort of pact with the devil when it comes to Alhambra. No one will ever beat her at this game. Ever. I think the letter 'r' and I will start handicapping ourselves about 50 points to keep things fair...
And that's pretty much how the summer has gone. Some books, some TV, some movies, some games and so on. Looking forward to settling into the fall and winter. Although the commute in winter is an absolute nightmare. Family in town soon, so that should be nice.
I'm actually going to start listening to some audiobooks as part of my commute. Up next is The Book of Fate.
Finished Warren Fahy's Fragment. It's fine for a summer popcorn book (which is pretty much what I read it for). Not quite up to Jurassic Park standards, but not bad for what it is. Follow the scientist based reality TV show as they head to an island left to itself for far too long. Cower in terror as they get devoured by said island's insane ecosystem. Thrill as more scientists show up - will they be saviours? Or savored? Yeah, it's kind of like that. Characters aren't terribly 3 dimensional, and plot is pretty standard. It does get points for some creativity in the monsters that inhabit the island though.
Up next is Scott Westerfeld's Leviathan. I love me some Westerfeld and this one has a steampunk-ish twist, so yay for that. Should be good.
Kids have been reading the Legend of Zelda graphic novels (and by kids I mean pretty much all of us - in fact I think all 5 of us read the first one...) and enjoying them. That's kind of fun.
The big success of the garden has been green beans I think. Snap peas are a close second, followed by the tomatoes and then the peppers. I suspect next year we may turn the trellis over to the pole beans and the snap peas and rearrange everything else a touch. But the beans have been great. Mmmm fresh steamed green beans...
Eureka season one has been fun, but it really makes me want to watch season two as I forget how some of these plot lines wrapped up. Leverage has been alright and Psych is still fun. Although the star of the week vein they're in is a little silly.
I would like to point out at this point that my wife has made some sort of pact with the devil when it comes to Alhambra. No one will ever beat her at this game. Ever. I think the letter 'r' and I will start handicapping ourselves about 50 points to keep things fair...
And that's pretty much how the summer has gone. Some books, some TV, some movies, some games and so on. Looking forward to settling into the fall and winter. Although the commute in winter is an absolute nightmare. Family in town soon, so that should be nice.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Charts and such
Ran across this the other day. I think it will surprise no one that I found it amusing and somewhat fascinating. I am surprised cleavage did not feature on the list.
Summer (as far as the school is concerned) is officially over. There has been some rejoicing in casa del 'd'. Kids aren't quite sure what to make of it. They miss the lazy days some, but also look forward to school some, so it's a bit of a draw for them. This is the last year McK will be in the same school as any of her siblings. That's a bit odd. I managed to realize yesterday that there will be one year where each of them will be in a separate school. I suspect lovely wife will enjoy that year the most. G gets ready to start preschool in a week or so. I suspect we're about to enter the next phase of lovely wife's craziness. Adjusting to empty house for a few days a week. Expect random coverage as a new feature. (Not really, as much as I like needling lovely wife, I like breathing a touch more.)
A game to put in the other column (loves, not hates) for lovely wife is San Juan. In a lot of ways it's a watered down version of Puerto Rico. It's card based and your goal is to develop a settlement by building buildings and plantations. The cards are used for everything - currency, buildings, placeholders, etc. This is actually a nice feature as there aren't too many bits involved. The game is played as a series of rounds. Each round each player will choose a role (builder, trader, producer, etc.) and all players get the option to exercise the benefit of that role. The person that chose the role gets a slight edge (usually a slightly lower cost for something, or an extra thing planted/traded, etc,) and the buildings you set up in your settlement also allow you to play with the rules some. Once someone builds their twelfth building your settlement is scored. Ultimately this is a hand management game. Which cards do you use to build things? How many cards do you keep in your hand? What kind of settlement do you build? And so on. It plays pretty well with 2 or 3, but I seem to recall really enjoying the 4 player games. It's actually a little more strategic then as the various types of cards aren't as plentiful. If you want something in the same vein but with a sci fi them on top instead of old world settlement, go for Race for the Galaxy. We might try picking that one up at some point as the letter 'r' is where we go for our San Juan fix.
I've recently been listening to the audiobook edition of Hell House by Richard Matheson. I really like haunted house stories. May have to track down the film version once I finish the book.
And that's about all I've got. It seems like we've been watching stuff, but nothing is jumping out at me. And I'm still reading stuff (almost done with Fragment), but I think most of that will keep till another post. (Oh and I still have more last lines, but I don't want to do too many of them right away.)
Summer (as far as the school is concerned) is officially over. There has been some rejoicing in casa del 'd'. Kids aren't quite sure what to make of it. They miss the lazy days some, but also look forward to school some, so it's a bit of a draw for them. This is the last year McK will be in the same school as any of her siblings. That's a bit odd. I managed to realize yesterday that there will be one year where each of them will be in a separate school. I suspect lovely wife will enjoy that year the most. G gets ready to start preschool in a week or so. I suspect we're about to enter the next phase of lovely wife's craziness. Adjusting to empty house for a few days a week. Expect random coverage as a new feature. (Not really, as much as I like needling lovely wife, I like breathing a touch more.)
A game to put in the other column (loves, not hates) for lovely wife is San Juan. In a lot of ways it's a watered down version of Puerto Rico. It's card based and your goal is to develop a settlement by building buildings and plantations. The cards are used for everything - currency, buildings, placeholders, etc. This is actually a nice feature as there aren't too many bits involved. The game is played as a series of rounds. Each round each player will choose a role (builder, trader, producer, etc.) and all players get the option to exercise the benefit of that role. The person that chose the role gets a slight edge (usually a slightly lower cost for something, or an extra thing planted/traded, etc,) and the buildings you set up in your settlement also allow you to play with the rules some. Once someone builds their twelfth building your settlement is scored. Ultimately this is a hand management game. Which cards do you use to build things? How many cards do you keep in your hand? What kind of settlement do you build? And so on. It plays pretty well with 2 or 3, but I seem to recall really enjoying the 4 player games. It's actually a little more strategic then as the various types of cards aren't as plentiful. If you want something in the same vein but with a sci fi them on top instead of old world settlement, go for Race for the Galaxy. We might try picking that one up at some point as the letter 'r' is where we go for our San Juan fix.
I've recently been listening to the audiobook edition of Hell House by Richard Matheson. I really like haunted house stories. May have to track down the film version once I finish the book.
And that's about all I've got. It seems like we've been watching stuff, but nothing is jumping out at me. And I'm still reading stuff (almost done with Fragment), but I think most of that will keep till another post. (Oh and I still have more last lines, but I don't want to do too many of them right away.)
Thursday, August 13, 2009
A joke for Dad
An optimist looks at the glass and says it's half full.
A pessimist looks at the glass and says it's half empty.
An engineer looks at the glass and says it's improperly toleranced.
(That's twice as big as it should be for all you folks not my Dad or engineers.)
A pessimist looks at the glass and says it's half empty.
An engineer looks at the glass and says it's improperly toleranced.
(That's twice as big as it should be for all you folks not my Dad or engineers.)
Last lines and thoughts on board games
Ok, it's time for a new feature here in letter 'd' land. I know, I know, "but letter 'd'" you say, "what about the movie trading cards and your lackadaisical flickr account and all the other "features" you start but then never do anything with?" "Well," I say, "here's another. Now shut up and eat your vegetables. That garden isn't just for looks you know."
Anyway.
Working in a Library (especially the hush hush behind the scenes super cool I could show you but then have to kill you part) comes with certain perks. Namely books. I can look at lots and lots of books. And there are a lot to look at let me tell you. So I decided it would be great fun (for me) to find some of the really out there books and post the last line from said books. There may be some sarcasm involved. I am still me after all. So hopefully since there will always be books coming in, it won't be too hard to make this happen every once in a while. Or more often than that...
Anway, this week's lovely little gem comes from Cast in Silence by Michelle Sagara. It's part of the Chronicles of Elantra which is a fantasy series I believe. Possibly urban fantasy, I've no real idea. Part of the charm of this feature is a distinct lack of research. I don't believe I even read the blurb. I did provide the Amazon link so you could go look at the cover. It will be important. Trust me.
The last line of Cast in Silence reads, "She felt some tiny part of her unclench and relax, and she began to ask him what, and why, and how, as they walked, and she didn't even mind when he got all technical and half his words went straight over her head." I will not comment on what part of her unclenched except to say that by saying that much I've let all of you make that joke for me. Thanks. It's nice to see that airheads are capable of saving the world as well. If you looked at the cover you will notice the lead female is not blond. Assuming that is said female on the cover (and it usually is) this obviously adds an element of sci fi to the book as she must have dyed her hair in order to achieve some form of artificial intelligence. (I offer the old blond joke about hair dye and AI as evidence for this.) I'm also curious as to why she did not ask who, and where, and when, since as a former blond I'm pretty sure her terribly limited AI could have handled the answers to those questions. Point a blond to a party and well... you get the idea.
So thanks Cast in Silence for being our first test subject for last lines. I'm sure it will be back. I've got a Library full of source material and I'm not afraid to use it.
On to other things. I've got a few random observations about board games. And the people who play them. We got into board games a few years back when we were introduced to Settlers of Catan. I played board games before that, but I'm pretty sure it was around then that I realized board games had come quite a way since titles like Monopoly, and Risk, and Clue and so on. Poked around some and starting finding all sorts of fun titles like Ticket to Ride and Blue Moon City etc.. I have several relatives who are convinced I have some sort of back alley board game dealer as there's no way these things are sold in stores. I've been to Walmart man and they do not sell Zooloretto! they say. So yes, hobby games are in a completely different place now.
Which is not to say it's a place for everyone. Much like saying all animated films are for kids will get you a quick punch to the kidney, saying all games are simple time sinks will get you another bruised kidney. I do my best to research the games I pick up in order to make sure I will have people to play against, but apparently I have some optimism in me as occasionally I stumble and pick up a game that lovely wife or even letter 'r' have trouble going near.
Let's take Blue Moon for example (note, do not confuse this with Blue Moon City which we all love). It's a card game similar in some ways to Magic and other collectible type games. They removed much of the random collectible nature by simply offering standard expansion decks. You buy the Flit deck and you get the same 30 cards as everybody else that buys that deck. There were a handful of these decks put out so that the game offered some variety. At it's heart, Blue Moon is a trick taking game. You play cards that allow you to control dragons. Win 4 dragons and you win the game. Run the other player out of cards while you control more dragons (if you can't get to 4) and you win the game.
Part of the problem (if you're my wife) is that the game only comes with 3 dragons. "If you're supposed to attract a 4th dragon, why isn't there a 4th dragon?" She says every single time I bring up the game. I don't know. Because it was cheaper this way. Because Knizia only likes the RGB color wheel. Who knows. Really not a terribly rational thing to get hung up on if you ask me. The other problem is that since there's a bit of Magic in the game's heritage, you really have to learn the way a deck works. Each deck offers different ways to break the relatively simple rules of the game (you play one character card and one booster or support card in an effort to at least match your opponent's strength). Once you learn how the deck works you can start to build a little bit of a strategy against the other decks.
I suspect this game fails for my wife because there's a little too much effort in learning the game for what she perceives as not enough reward (the non existent 4th dragon). Usually if she wins at something I can entice her to play again. Not so much with this one. The appeal of learning the strengths and weaknesses of each race (deck) and then trying to pit those abilities against the other races isn't enough of a motivator for her. The letter 'r' and I can spend a good hour or so trying them out and seeing how they work. As mentioned not everything is for everyone. The letter 'r' may get a slightly used birthday present this year as there's nothing sadder than a game that sits in a closet and doesn't get played. Although I may give McK a chance at learning it first. She's getting old enough that some of the games that have typically been adult games are starting to be interesting to her. As well as playable.
Then there's something like Arkham Horror. I picked this one up as I really like the Cthulhu theme and I thought it would be fun to give a co-operative game a try (all the players work together to try and prevent the end of the world). The problem here is (and I can't even convince the letter 'r' to try this one) it's got a lot of bits and even more rules. Learning curve strikes again. I often wonder how things would have gone if we'd played that first time with someone that knew the game. It doesn't help that you really need more than 3 people to play. And a typical game clocks in at 3-4 hours.
So those are some of the factors that come into play when looking for a new game. Time, number of rules/bits, what drives the fun of the game. Which isn't to say that it can be hard to find a game that everyone will like. As mentioned, Dominion is a big hit. Ticket to Ride goes in phases (have I forgotten how much my blood pressure tends to rise when I play it?). No Thanks and a few others make the rounds too. It helps if you know the people you're playing with. It also helps if you have a back alley game dealer that knows the product so you can ask questions. I mean, Walmart doesn't sell this stuff man. (Pro tip: if you want to go looking for something new and off the beaten path start here)
This may eventually become something of a feature as well. Games my wife hates. Or loves. It might prove more interesting review fodder. We'll see.
In other non Library/geek news there is a birthday coming up in casa del 'd'. So happy birthday bug. Remember, brains are not food.
Anyway.
Working in a Library (especially the hush hush behind the scenes super cool I could show you but then have to kill you part) comes with certain perks. Namely books. I can look at lots and lots of books. And there are a lot to look at let me tell you. So I decided it would be great fun (for me) to find some of the really out there books and post the last line from said books. There may be some sarcasm involved. I am still me after all. So hopefully since there will always be books coming in, it won't be too hard to make this happen every once in a while. Or more often than that...
Anway, this week's lovely little gem comes from Cast in Silence by Michelle Sagara. It's part of the Chronicles of Elantra which is a fantasy series I believe. Possibly urban fantasy, I've no real idea. Part of the charm of this feature is a distinct lack of research. I don't believe I even read the blurb. I did provide the Amazon link so you could go look at the cover. It will be important. Trust me.
The last line of Cast in Silence reads, "She felt some tiny part of her unclench and relax, and she began to ask him what, and why, and how, as they walked, and she didn't even mind when he got all technical and half his words went straight over her head." I will not comment on what part of her unclenched except to say that by saying that much I've let all of you make that joke for me. Thanks. It's nice to see that airheads are capable of saving the world as well. If you looked at the cover you will notice the lead female is not blond. Assuming that is said female on the cover (and it usually is) this obviously adds an element of sci fi to the book as she must have dyed her hair in order to achieve some form of artificial intelligence. (I offer the old blond joke about hair dye and AI as evidence for this.) I'm also curious as to why she did not ask who, and where, and when, since as a former blond I'm pretty sure her terribly limited AI could have handled the answers to those questions. Point a blond to a party and well... you get the idea.
So thanks Cast in Silence for being our first test subject for last lines. I'm sure it will be back. I've got a Library full of source material and I'm not afraid to use it.
On to other things. I've got a few random observations about board games. And the people who play them. We got into board games a few years back when we were introduced to Settlers of Catan. I played board games before that, but I'm pretty sure it was around then that I realized board games had come quite a way since titles like Monopoly, and Risk, and Clue and so on. Poked around some and starting finding all sorts of fun titles like Ticket to Ride and Blue Moon City etc.. I have several relatives who are convinced I have some sort of back alley board game dealer as there's no way these things are sold in stores. I've been to Walmart man and they do not sell Zooloretto! they say. So yes, hobby games are in a completely different place now.
Which is not to say it's a place for everyone. Much like saying all animated films are for kids will get you a quick punch to the kidney, saying all games are simple time sinks will get you another bruised kidney. I do my best to research the games I pick up in order to make sure I will have people to play against, but apparently I have some optimism in me as occasionally I stumble and pick up a game that lovely wife or even letter 'r' have trouble going near.
Let's take Blue Moon for example (note, do not confuse this with Blue Moon City which we all love). It's a card game similar in some ways to Magic and other collectible type games. They removed much of the random collectible nature by simply offering standard expansion decks. You buy the Flit deck and you get the same 30 cards as everybody else that buys that deck. There were a handful of these decks put out so that the game offered some variety. At it's heart, Blue Moon is a trick taking game. You play cards that allow you to control dragons. Win 4 dragons and you win the game. Run the other player out of cards while you control more dragons (if you can't get to 4) and you win the game.
Part of the problem (if you're my wife) is that the game only comes with 3 dragons. "If you're supposed to attract a 4th dragon, why isn't there a 4th dragon?" She says every single time I bring up the game. I don't know. Because it was cheaper this way. Because Knizia only likes the RGB color wheel. Who knows. Really not a terribly rational thing to get hung up on if you ask me. The other problem is that since there's a bit of Magic in the game's heritage, you really have to learn the way a deck works. Each deck offers different ways to break the relatively simple rules of the game (you play one character card and one booster or support card in an effort to at least match your opponent's strength). Once you learn how the deck works you can start to build a little bit of a strategy against the other decks.
I suspect this game fails for my wife because there's a little too much effort in learning the game for what she perceives as not enough reward (the non existent 4th dragon). Usually if she wins at something I can entice her to play again. Not so much with this one. The appeal of learning the strengths and weaknesses of each race (deck) and then trying to pit those abilities against the other races isn't enough of a motivator for her. The letter 'r' and I can spend a good hour or so trying them out and seeing how they work. As mentioned not everything is for everyone. The letter 'r' may get a slightly used birthday present this year as there's nothing sadder than a game that sits in a closet and doesn't get played. Although I may give McK a chance at learning it first. She's getting old enough that some of the games that have typically been adult games are starting to be interesting to her. As well as playable.
Then there's something like Arkham Horror. I picked this one up as I really like the Cthulhu theme and I thought it would be fun to give a co-operative game a try (all the players work together to try and prevent the end of the world). The problem here is (and I can't even convince the letter 'r' to try this one) it's got a lot of bits and even more rules. Learning curve strikes again. I often wonder how things would have gone if we'd played that first time with someone that knew the game. It doesn't help that you really need more than 3 people to play. And a typical game clocks in at 3-4 hours.
So those are some of the factors that come into play when looking for a new game. Time, number of rules/bits, what drives the fun of the game. Which isn't to say that it can be hard to find a game that everyone will like. As mentioned, Dominion is a big hit. Ticket to Ride goes in phases (have I forgotten how much my blood pressure tends to rise when I play it?). No Thanks and a few others make the rounds too. It helps if you know the people you're playing with. It also helps if you have a back alley game dealer that knows the product so you can ask questions. I mean, Walmart doesn't sell this stuff man. (Pro tip: if you want to go looking for something new and off the beaten path start here)
This may eventually become something of a feature as well. Games my wife hates. Or loves. It might prove more interesting review fodder. We'll see.
In other non Library/geek news there is a birthday coming up in casa del 'd'. So happy birthday bug. Remember, brains are not food.
Thursday, August 06, 2009
Of Big Bangs, Little Girls and Cities
Recently started watching Season One of The Big Bang Theory. It's terribly funny, occasionally crude and pretty much all true. Sheldon is certainly the best character in the show (I actually find Leonard only ok) and the one that really shines out as an example of true nerddom. If you've not caught an episode, it's worth hunting down. We've laughed quite a bit and look forward to the rest of the season. The nice thing is that they aren't making fun of nerds in the show. They are the main characters and they're portrayed honestly. The humor just comes from the situations they're placed in and their own interactions.
Finished off China Mieville's The City & The City. An interesting murder mystery where the locale the story takes place in is as much a character as the people involved. I won't go into details about the central conceit as it is a nice little twist (and honestly spoiled everywhere else) but it does make for interesting reading. While it would be fascinating to see something like that attempted in real life, I'm pretty sure it would be nigh unto impossible. It works in the story as both a physical thing and a symbol. Glean from this rather ambiguous paragraph what you will. If you get nothing else, just know it is an interesting story and also worth checking out.
Girls are off at Girl Scout camp. Although it sounds like the place they're at double booked and they're getting kicked out this afternoon. Oh well. I'm sure they had some fun.
I may need to start looking into making some homemade salsa. We're starting to get a decent number of tomatoes from the garden. Can't slice them all up for burgers. Or salads. Wish we had some jalapenos or serranos as well...
Finally got around to seeing Coraline the other day. It's decent. I'm not entirely crazy about some of the changes they made to the story and it seemed a touch long in places, but it is a bit of a marvel of stop animation cinematography. And the core story is pretty much intact. Kids liked it quite a bit and that's what really mattered.
Finished off China Mieville's The City & The City. An interesting murder mystery where the locale the story takes place in is as much a character as the people involved. I won't go into details about the central conceit as it is a nice little twist (and honestly spoiled everywhere else) but it does make for interesting reading. While it would be fascinating to see something like that attempted in real life, I'm pretty sure it would be nigh unto impossible. It works in the story as both a physical thing and a symbol. Glean from this rather ambiguous paragraph what you will. If you get nothing else, just know it is an interesting story and also worth checking out.
Girls are off at Girl Scout camp. Although it sounds like the place they're at double booked and they're getting kicked out this afternoon. Oh well. I'm sure they had some fun.
I may need to start looking into making some homemade salsa. We're starting to get a decent number of tomatoes from the garden. Can't slice them all up for burgers. Or salads. Wish we had some jalapenos or serranos as well...
Finally got around to seeing Coraline the other day. It's decent. I'm not entirely crazy about some of the changes they made to the story and it seemed a touch long in places, but it is a bit of a marvel of stop animation cinematography. And the core story is pretty much intact. Kids liked it quite a bit and that's what really mattered.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Thoughts on Harry Potter
So we recently managed to watch Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince in the theater (shocking in and of itself I know!). It was decent. I knew about most of the changes made to the film going in so those particular shocking moments weren't particularly shocking. I was sad they left out a couple of the memories/trips that Dumbledore and Harry encounter that related to Voldemort's past, but overall it was a fine film. And at almost 3 hours I never really felt that it was dragging, so that's something. The kids seemed to enjoy it well enough so that's another point in its favor. I think the director is in dire need of another film filter as I'm a little tired of the bluish tinge he paints everything with (this is SERIOUS! the story is SERIOUS! please to pay attention to my SERIOUS film making and story telling skillz!) But yeah, certainly worse pieces of cinema out there.
Which leads into Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I decided to read through book 7 again as I haven't read it since it came out and I wanted to see how it held up. Not terribly well is the answer. Book 5 got a little better the second time through, Book 7 is definitely a little worse. Honestly the entire first half of that book could be ripped out, burned and otherwise deleted from the Universe and it would be fine. Things do get a little better in the second half, but only a little. I'm not crazy about the author wish fulfillment that turns Hermione into uber-witch Granger, the revisionist half hearted attempt at redeeming Snape (that still fails miserably in my book - he wasn't good, he wasn't really working for the good guys, he was basically a creepy stalker who with his dying breath wanted to see the eyeballs of said stalking obssession), the basic underwhelming-ness of Harry... Yeah I could go on. I think the publishers decided to just let Rowling write whatever she wanted. Editing? What's editing? Who needs a canonically consistent plot? Which is a shame as it is after all the end of the series. Oh well, chalk one up for the whimper column.
Which makes me worry about the movies. They're splitting the book into two movies. I've already made my thoughts on the first half of the book clear. This will not end well folks. Admittedly there will be a couple pretty nice moments. There are some flashes of brilliance throughout the book, they're just never capitalized on or used effectively. Oh well. I did actually like the whole Hallows subplot more this time around (and how crazy is it that a book named The Deathly Hallows relegates that bit to pretty much subplot status? Although come to think of it, it's happened before in the series - The Chamber of Secrets says "hi") .
We managed to make an actual side dish of the green beans from the garden over the weekend. Grilled some steaks and served them with said beans. They were yummy. Asparagus next year!
I finished up Confessions of a Part Time Sorceress. It was a fun little read. It's a girl's eye view into the world of D&D. Lovely wife read through it as well. It's a decent starting point for looking into D&D and you want a feminine perspective.
I'm very close to finishing The City & The City. Also an interesting read. But more on it later.
Which leads into Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I decided to read through book 7 again as I haven't read it since it came out and I wanted to see how it held up. Not terribly well is the answer. Book 5 got a little better the second time through, Book 7 is definitely a little worse. Honestly the entire first half of that book could be ripped out, burned and otherwise deleted from the Universe and it would be fine. Things do get a little better in the second half, but only a little. I'm not crazy about the author wish fulfillment that turns Hermione into uber-witch Granger, the revisionist half hearted attempt at redeeming Snape (that still fails miserably in my book - he wasn't good, he wasn't really working for the good guys, he was basically a creepy stalker who with his dying breath wanted to see the eyeballs of said stalking obssession), the basic underwhelming-ness of Harry... Yeah I could go on. I think the publishers decided to just let Rowling write whatever she wanted. Editing? What's editing? Who needs a canonically consistent plot? Which is a shame as it is after all the end of the series. Oh well, chalk one up for the whimper column.
Which makes me worry about the movies. They're splitting the book into two movies. I've already made my thoughts on the first half of the book clear. This will not end well folks. Admittedly there will be a couple pretty nice moments. There are some flashes of brilliance throughout the book, they're just never capitalized on or used effectively. Oh well. I did actually like the whole Hallows subplot more this time around (and how crazy is it that a book named The Deathly Hallows relegates that bit to pretty much subplot status? Although come to think of it, it's happened before in the series - The Chamber of Secrets says "hi") .
We managed to make an actual side dish of the green beans from the garden over the weekend. Grilled some steaks and served them with said beans. They were yummy. Asparagus next year!
I finished up Confessions of a Part Time Sorceress. It was a fun little read. It's a girl's eye view into the world of D&D. Lovely wife read through it as well. It's a decent starting point for looking into D&D and you want a feminine perspective.
I'm very close to finishing The City & The City. Also an interesting read. But more on it later.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Friday night dose of awesome
If you've not seen the Take on Me literal video, hunt it up after this one. I love these and this one's especially good. And it's Friday and you deserve a treat. A lovely 80's treat.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Weekly dose of randomness
Actually, I don't really have anything all that random to point you towards. The San Diego Comic Con is going on and apparently all the Twilight fans are out in droves for hopes of a glimpse of Paper(cut) Moon New Moon. Le sigh. Don't they know there are real movies worth being interested in? I somehow doubt it.
Finally caught Taken the other night. It was a decent action flick. Typical Dad knows best, torture is ok, completely silly ending sort of movie. I'm just glad it was only 90 minutes. Otherwise actually thinking about what was going on would probably have ruined vast amounts of that film. Other than the ending. Seriously. How was he not in jail by the end? But Liam Neeson does kick some serious butt.
We have since played a few more games of Dominion. I'm finding it to be rather enjoyable if a bit mysterious. I'm not at all surprised it won the SdJ this year, there's a fair amount of depth as you try to figure out the best way to construct your deck. There's not a whole lot of player interaction (at least not with the initial set of recommended cards) but the up side is that any mistakes you make are pretty much your fault. There's not a lot of luck involved (and that's a great thing). Definitely worth picking up if you like relatively light strategy games.
This is a long weekend and I couldn't be happier. Well ok if it were much cooler out and I didn't have as much stuff on my schedule I might be a touch happier, but still pretty happy. We may try a recipe for meatballs that involves grape jelly. I'm a little scared, but supposedly it's tasty...
Oh I should point out that G let us know last night that eating celery had made his mouth hot. I feel science should study this effect. The power of celery to raise one's mouth temperature. Sure beats some of the studies they do. I'm not entirely convinced it was really celery that caused this as we had curry for dinner and that was a much more likely culprit, but he seems convinced.
Finally caught Taken the other night. It was a decent action flick. Typical Dad knows best, torture is ok, completely silly ending sort of movie. I'm just glad it was only 90 minutes. Otherwise actually thinking about what was going on would probably have ruined vast amounts of that film. Other than the ending. Seriously. How was he not in jail by the end? But Liam Neeson does kick some serious butt.
We have since played a few more games of Dominion. I'm finding it to be rather enjoyable if a bit mysterious. I'm not at all surprised it won the SdJ this year, there's a fair amount of depth as you try to figure out the best way to construct your deck. There's not a whole lot of player interaction (at least not with the initial set of recommended cards) but the up side is that any mistakes you make are pretty much your fault. There's not a lot of luck involved (and that's a great thing). Definitely worth picking up if you like relatively light strategy games.
This is a long weekend and I couldn't be happier. Well ok if it were much cooler out and I didn't have as much stuff on my schedule I might be a touch happier, but still pretty happy. We may try a recipe for meatballs that involves grape jelly. I'm a little scared, but supposedly it's tasty...
Oh I should point out that G let us know last night that eating celery had made his mouth hot. I feel science should study this effect. The power of celery to raise one's mouth temperature. Sure beats some of the studies they do. I'm not entirely convinced it was really celery that caused this as we had curry for dinner and that was a much more likely culprit, but he seems convinced.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
On podcasts
It's been a while since I've rambled on about the podcasts I'm currently listening to, so you poor souls get to deal with that for a post. The rotation has morphed a little, I haven't listened to Escape Pod or any of the spinoffs for a while. Mostly because the stories started getting too long. I had a hard time finishing them in a commute. That and I found a few others I liked listening to a touch better. Also I stopped listening to them at work. Old job used different parts of my brain or something so I could actually listen to them a little easier than I can now.
At any rate, the top dog is still Listen Up by the 1up folks (formerly 1up Yours). It's generally 2-3 hours of commentary on the video game world. They start off with what they're currently playing and then move to news and industry commentary. I really like several of the guys that are regulars and this is pretty much where I get my news/reviews type fix from. Although they can be a touch down on Nintendo.
In a related podcast (for a couple reasons) I also listen to What They Play. This one is also video game oriented, but the site is a parent's guide to video games type site. They let you know what sort of content can be found in the games your kids are begging you for. I started listening because I really like the host John Davison (formerly of 1up and still on Listen Up) but I've kept listening because I like their take on the industry. It's a little more geared for my life as a gamer at the moment. (i.e. the rug monkeys are playing all the games, when did that happen?! Gimme that controller back you rug monkey!)
For the analog equivalent (boardgames) I listen to Pulp Gamer: Out of Character and Myriad Games. I like Out of Character as that's the roundtable show where they cover a pretty wide variety of board games (as well as some industry news and listener feedback). They've since started building a boardgame podcast empire and Myriad Games is the other offering I really enjoy. This one is run by the staff of a game store and they cover everything from game reviews to rules to random solicitation of hate mail. Be sure to get your free pair of dice by leaving them a review in iTunes. Mine are a nice shiny blue color. Alas they're only d6's, but nobody's perfect.
Let's see, for music based podcasts there's Random Signal (they do geek stuff as well) and the Irish and Celtic Music podcast. TMBG have one (I'm getting tired of hunting links). I follow the Dungeons & Dragons podcast whenever the Penny Arcade guys are in a campaign (Acquisitions Inc! There's no dark magic like Jim Darkmagic.) The Retronauts podcast is usually a pretty humorous look at older video games. Hmm. Yeah, running out of stuff. Reality Break is an infrequent, yet enjoyable look at the sci fi industry. A Life Well Wasted is This American Life does video games. (Yeah, yeah I listen to a lot of gaming podcasts...) I'm sure there are others, but those are certainly the big names that take up my weekly commutes. So give them a look, you might find something of interest.
In other news, we picked up Dominion, this year's SdJ winner. It's a deck building card game. So far we've played a couple games (lovely wife, oldest rug monkey and myself) and I've not managed to win a game yet. Well ok, when it was just my wife and I, I did manage a rather stunning victory. But oldest rug monkey took us both to the cleaners the second game we played. Basically you try to collect cards that allow you to build your deck in such a way that you can buy the really good scoring cards so that you have the most points at the end. There's a decent amount of strategy involved as you can build your deck several different ways and there are (I believe) 20 types of cards that you use - only a game is just played with 10 of them. So lots of room for different types of decks and ways to keep the game from just being the same thing over and over. Nice.
Leverage is back on and that's nice. Eureka has started up as well. I believe Psych isn't too far behind.
Whiteout is a nice little murder mystery set in Antarctica. I believe they're turning it into a movie. And Confessions of a Part Time Sorceress is a fun look at the world of D&D through a woman's eyes. But that's enough of that. I believe this post has run its course.
At any rate, the top dog is still Listen Up by the 1up folks (formerly 1up Yours). It's generally 2-3 hours of commentary on the video game world. They start off with what they're currently playing and then move to news and industry commentary. I really like several of the guys that are regulars and this is pretty much where I get my news/reviews type fix from. Although they can be a touch down on Nintendo.
In a related podcast (for a couple reasons) I also listen to What They Play. This one is also video game oriented, but the site is a parent's guide to video games type site. They let you know what sort of content can be found in the games your kids are begging you for. I started listening because I really like the host John Davison (formerly of 1up and still on Listen Up) but I've kept listening because I like their take on the industry. It's a little more geared for my life as a gamer at the moment. (i.e. the rug monkeys are playing all the games, when did that happen?! Gimme that controller back you rug monkey!)
For the analog equivalent (boardgames) I listen to Pulp Gamer: Out of Character and Myriad Games. I like Out of Character as that's the roundtable show where they cover a pretty wide variety of board games (as well as some industry news and listener feedback). They've since started building a boardgame podcast empire and Myriad Games is the other offering I really enjoy. This one is run by the staff of a game store and they cover everything from game reviews to rules to random solicitation of hate mail. Be sure to get your free pair of dice by leaving them a review in iTunes. Mine are a nice shiny blue color. Alas they're only d6's, but nobody's perfect.
Let's see, for music based podcasts there's Random Signal (they do geek stuff as well) and the Irish and Celtic Music podcast. TMBG have one (I'm getting tired of hunting links). I follow the Dungeons & Dragons podcast whenever the Penny Arcade guys are in a campaign (Acquisitions Inc! There's no dark magic like Jim Darkmagic.) The Retronauts podcast is usually a pretty humorous look at older video games. Hmm. Yeah, running out of stuff. Reality Break is an infrequent, yet enjoyable look at the sci fi industry. A Life Well Wasted is This American Life does video games. (Yeah, yeah I listen to a lot of gaming podcasts...) I'm sure there are others, but those are certainly the big names that take up my weekly commutes. So give them a look, you might find something of interest.
In other news, we picked up Dominion, this year's SdJ winner. It's a deck building card game. So far we've played a couple games (lovely wife, oldest rug monkey and myself) and I've not managed to win a game yet. Well ok, when it was just my wife and I, I did manage a rather stunning victory. But oldest rug monkey took us both to the cleaners the second game we played. Basically you try to collect cards that allow you to build your deck in such a way that you can buy the really good scoring cards so that you have the most points at the end. There's a decent amount of strategy involved as you can build your deck several different ways and there are (I believe) 20 types of cards that you use - only a game is just played with 10 of them. So lots of room for different types of decks and ways to keep the game from just being the same thing over and over. Nice.
Leverage is back on and that's nice. Eureka has started up as well. I believe Psych isn't too far behind.
Whiteout is a nice little murder mystery set in Antarctica. I believe they're turning it into a movie. And Confessions of a Part Time Sorceress is a fun look at the world of D&D through a woman's eyes. But that's enough of that. I believe this post has run its course.
Thursday, July 09, 2009
Books, tables, weekly dose of randomness
Let's see. I finished The Strain by Del Toro and Hogan. It was good. Definitely the first in a trilogy (I believe). This initial story was sort of wrapped up, but there are certainly story lines left hanging and characters in dire situations. Briefly, it's a vampire story with a bit of a medical bent. Not so briefly? Well, we follow Eph Goodweather of the CDC as he's called to investigate a plane full of dead people. He provides the medical background mentioned earlier while Abraham Setrakian provides the vampire background. (He's the hunter, not the vampire) They either use or at least nod at most of the accepted vampire myths while tweaking a couple (it's a virus and teeth are not involved in the blood drinking). It will be interesting to see where the story goes, I look forward to the next one.
I also made it through The Magic Thief: Lost book 2 of that series. I really like the way these stories are told and this one is another fun little romp. Conn, the titular magic thief has lost his focus stone and proceeds to try and speak with the magic by blowing things up. Good lad that Conn. Sarah Prineas relates the story in a nice easy going fashion that will have you done with the book in an afternoon. Again I look forward to seeing what happens next.
I've burned through a couple of the Kindaichi Case Files books. They're always fun. I really need to track down some of the ones I've missed.
The letter 'r' has run across some lovely tables. If Dad wants to make that first one in the video we'd take a couple. Although I can't imagine how careful you'd have to be putting that one together... Yikes. Talk about measure twice cut once. I'm not sure I'd ever get out of the measuring phase on that one.
Weather has finally turned very much summer-y. Too hot. ^_^ I miss the rain. Although parts of the garden don't. I think our cucumbers and watermelons are doomed. Peas and beans seem ok though. As do the tomatoes. We finally have some serranos, although the poor jalapeno seems to have gone on strike... We blame the monster of a tomato plant we've got next to it.
Kids have been enjoying the pool (thanks littlest sis), although lovely wife is about to throw the lot of them in it and leave them there. Apparently they think she's some sort of pool toy.
We managed to survive the 4th without setting anything on fire (sounds like we're one up on Dad in that respect) although that can certainly liven things up. We had good food and decent fireworks. If I ever have to light lightning flashes again it will be too soon. That and snakes. Why did it have to be snakes...
At any rate the summer marches on. Which is good.
I also made it through The Magic Thief: Lost book 2 of that series. I really like the way these stories are told and this one is another fun little romp. Conn, the titular magic thief has lost his focus stone and proceeds to try and speak with the magic by blowing things up. Good lad that Conn. Sarah Prineas relates the story in a nice easy going fashion that will have you done with the book in an afternoon. Again I look forward to seeing what happens next.
I've burned through a couple of the Kindaichi Case Files books. They're always fun. I really need to track down some of the ones I've missed.
The letter 'r' has run across some lovely tables. If Dad wants to make that first one in the video we'd take a couple. Although I can't imagine how careful you'd have to be putting that one together... Yikes. Talk about measure twice cut once. I'm not sure I'd ever get out of the measuring phase on that one.
Weather has finally turned very much summer-y. Too hot. ^_^ I miss the rain. Although parts of the garden don't. I think our cucumbers and watermelons are doomed. Peas and beans seem ok though. As do the tomatoes. We finally have some serranos, although the poor jalapeno seems to have gone on strike... We blame the monster of a tomato plant we've got next to it.
Kids have been enjoying the pool (thanks littlest sis), although lovely wife is about to throw the lot of them in it and leave them there. Apparently they think she's some sort of pool toy.
We managed to survive the 4th without setting anything on fire (sounds like we're one up on Dad in that respect) although that can certainly liven things up. We had good food and decent fireworks. If I ever have to light lightning flashes again it will be too soon. That and snakes. Why did it have to be snakes...
At any rate the summer marches on. Which is good.
Saturday, July 04, 2009
Guinew Moon
In case you haven't run across it yet, this is awesome. Although I must admit after talking to lovely wife and learning that the paper cut bit was not parody I have now declared that I will NEVER read the rest of this series. Paper cut? Seriously? If you're going for humor it's brilliant. If you're trying to set up an event that drives a serious plot point, not so much.
Thursday, July 02, 2009
In which I talk about Blade Runner AGAIN
So. Blade Runner. You'd think I'd get tired of talking about this film. Actually, more to the point you'd think Ridley Scott would get tired of re-working it every few years. The "Final Cut" (and those quotes are the "made with the fingers" variety) came out a while ago and I finally (pun firmly intended) got around to seeing it. I feel a little bad it's taken this long, but eh, whatcha gonna do? I can't actually tell you the last time I rented a movie...
At any rate. As has been documented here in this blog (not long after it started in fact) I have a bit of history with this film. From birthday parties to college classes the film (as well as the original PKD novel) has a bit of a place in my life. Much to the disbelief of friends and relatives. (Boring is the word most often invoked.) Philistines the lot of them. I'm not completely convinced the Final Cut really offers anything new, but it is certainly a touch prettier. That opening sequence (which I'm pretty sure is a touch longer now) is still breathtaking. And I think there are a couple extra quick shots and the soundtrack is tweaked in a couple places. Oddly I think Bryant's math is fixed in this version once again making it a little less obvious that Scott's Deckard is a replicant, but whatever. Anyone that's followed the film knows his opinion on that score.
I think the thing I enjoyed most about watching it this go round were all the little touches. Gaff's origami, the sound of the neon lights flashing, the photo reading machine, Vangelis's score. It's all highly iconic stuff now and in some ways a little difficult to appreciate. The language of this film has been borrowed so many times (from 5th Element to Cowboy Bebop to well, really any dystopic sci fi film of the last couple decades) it's easy to forget just how new it was at the time. Between this film and 2001 (there's that boring word again) I'm not entirely certain there's another film out there that shaped sci fi cinema as much.
So I'll avoid all the talk of humanity and dystopia and influence and simply say, yeah Blade Runner still has it. There's a reason this thing is a classic and a touchstone. If you've not seen it, track down the Final Cut and give it a look. Your geek cred will thank you.
Speaking ofdystopias family, congratulations go out to younger sis on birth of baby girl. Although you don't fix the spelling of that middle name and well... At any rate. Congratulations, glad all are healthy and well. Good luck restoring any sort of order to that house. You are all doomed now as you are well and truly out numbered.
I've been watching Piranha these last few mornings while I exercise. Also a truly great film.
I think I'll stop commenting on Monster until I've finished the series, but if you've thought about reading manga, but not been sure of a decent series to start with, this one's a good bet. Pretty compelling.
I'm this close to finishing The Strain. It is good. More when done.
I'll be starting the sequel to The Magic Thief (called Lost I believe) soon. Looking forward to that. It's a pretty good little series.
Added in the Event and Relic decks for Cutthroat Caverns last night. They do offer a nice little twist on the gameplay. Usually making things even more difficult for the poor players that refuse to trust anybody. Not bad. I really need to convince everyone to take another stab at Arkham Horror. I've been itching to play that one again... I blame that Innsmouth blood.
At any rate. As has been documented here in this blog (not long after it started in fact) I have a bit of history with this film. From birthday parties to college classes the film (as well as the original PKD novel) has a bit of a place in my life. Much to the disbelief of friends and relatives. (Boring is the word most often invoked.) Philistines the lot of them. I'm not completely convinced the Final Cut really offers anything new, but it is certainly a touch prettier. That opening sequence (which I'm pretty sure is a touch longer now) is still breathtaking. And I think there are a couple extra quick shots and the soundtrack is tweaked in a couple places. Oddly I think Bryant's math is fixed in this version once again making it a little less obvious that Scott's Deckard is a replicant, but whatever. Anyone that's followed the film knows his opinion on that score.
I think the thing I enjoyed most about watching it this go round were all the little touches. Gaff's origami, the sound of the neon lights flashing, the photo reading machine, Vangelis's score. It's all highly iconic stuff now and in some ways a little difficult to appreciate. The language of this film has been borrowed so many times (from 5th Element to Cowboy Bebop to well, really any dystopic sci fi film of the last couple decades) it's easy to forget just how new it was at the time. Between this film and 2001 (there's that boring word again) I'm not entirely certain there's another film out there that shaped sci fi cinema as much.
So I'll avoid all the talk of humanity and dystopia and influence and simply say, yeah Blade Runner still has it. There's a reason this thing is a classic and a touchstone. If you've not seen it, track down the Final Cut and give it a look. Your geek cred will thank you.
Speaking of
I've been watching Piranha these last few mornings while I exercise. Also a truly great film.
I think I'll stop commenting on Monster until I've finished the series, but if you've thought about reading manga, but not been sure of a decent series to start with, this one's a good bet. Pretty compelling.
I'm this close to finishing The Strain. It is good. More when done.
I'll be starting the sequel to The Magic Thief (called Lost I believe) soon. Looking forward to that. It's a pretty good little series.
Added in the Event and Relic decks for Cutthroat Caverns last night. They do offer a nice little twist on the gameplay. Usually making things even more difficult for the poor players that refuse to trust anybody. Not bad. I really need to convince everyone to take another stab at Arkham Horror. I've been itching to play that one again... I blame that Innsmouth blood.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Befuddlement
Seems like there should be things to talk about here. I'm pretty sure I was aware of them earlier, but it's been that kind of day.
The Arts Festival is going on outside of the Library at the moment and if any of you have a couple grand toloan give us, I will acquire some nice art. As it stands I suspect it will once again pass us by. Although there's a rather nice Army of Darkness spray paint piece... Anyone? (And don't get me started on the beautiful Greek Boat photo... Water! So blue!)
Watched Sunshine again the other day. First 2/3 or so of that movie are great. Ending, not so much.
Apparently DirecTV does not play well with rain. You have rain for a few days in a row and suddenly the signal just wanders away looking for some sun. I wonder what people in, oh, say, Forks do for satellite service. Have the Cullens hold the dishes andsparkle sweat heavily?
Currently reading The Strain by Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan. It's a pretty good vampire book. Part medical thriller (some pretty gruesome details yo) part horror novel, it's been pretty interesting so far. Although it appears the vampires don't have teeth. It looks like they may have some sort of extra appendage in their throat that they use instead. I'm actually just getting to the part where the vampire outbreak starts in earnest so I'm not certain of all the details yet. Why do people play around with the vampire rules so much? I don't know that any other undead critter gets yanked around quite so much...
I have a jalapeno from the garden. It will go on the chicken tacos we're making tonight. I'm hoping it is very yummy. And not without some kick. We shall see. Tomatoes are in existence, spinach too. Watermelons down for the count. Not sure about the cucumbers. Or the serranos.
The Arts Festival is going on outside of the Library at the moment and if any of you have a couple grand to
Watched Sunshine again the other day. First 2/3 or so of that movie are great. Ending, not so much.
Apparently DirecTV does not play well with rain. You have rain for a few days in a row and suddenly the signal just wanders away looking for some sun. I wonder what people in, oh, say, Forks do for satellite service. Have the Cullens hold the dishes and
Currently reading The Strain by Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan. It's a pretty good vampire book. Part medical thriller (some pretty gruesome details yo) part horror novel, it's been pretty interesting so far. Although it appears the vampires don't have teeth. It looks like they may have some sort of extra appendage in their throat that they use instead. I'm actually just getting to the part where the vampire outbreak starts in earnest so I'm not certain of all the details yet. Why do people play around with the vampire rules so much? I don't know that any other undead critter gets yanked around quite so much...
I have a jalapeno from the garden. It will go on the chicken tacos we're making tonight. I'm hoping it is very yummy. And not without some kick. We shall see. Tomatoes are in existence, spinach too. Watermelons down for the count. Not sure about the cucumbers. Or the serranos.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
The one with the Twilight movie review in
So. The rumors are true. (Although if there are actually rumors about my Twilight viewing habits, the internets just got a whole lot creepier) I have seen Twilight. And just what did the ol' letter 'd' think of said spot of celluloid? It didn't suck (and believe me, that comment works on lots of levels for this film). Given the fact that they had to hire a writer, they fixed the biggest problem with the books (y'know the writing). So except for the lines they lifted wholesale from the novel, the dialogue and so on wasn't too terrible. Plot was pretty much nonexistant, but that can be said of most romantic comedies. Wait, this wasn't a comedy? Hmm. They definitely need to fire the hairdresser. And the FX guy. I'd really like to know whose bright idea it was to change "sparkling" into "sweating heavily". That glitter effect. Man. Although he did have to carry Bella all over the place, so I suppose a little sweat is expected. (And yeah, the carrying... less said the better.)
Strangely the scene I liked the most was the one that sounded pretty silly from the book, the baseball game. I blame the fact that I enjoyed it on the Muse song though. Can't beat a good Muse song. And Muse apparently makes just about anything better. Bella needs to lose the headphones. Surely she can find a better way to learn her lines. Although if I were surrounded by the people in that movie, I'd probably try to drown them out too.
I did like Alice. She can stay.
So there you go. Not the worst thing ever, but certainly far from anything worth watching more than once. (I am looking at you 2nd oldest niece. Take the headphones out, put the remote down and go start reading some Westerfeld or something.)
Still trucking along through Monster. It is still pretty darn good.
Decided to throw Metal Gear Solid 3 back in the ol' PS2. I still really suck at that game. I may one day make it to the end, but that is not going to be any time soon.
An early Happy Father's Day goes out to Dad. I have no idea what we're getting you. You have no idea what we're getting you. This has not helped matters. So yeah, Love you Dad, you'll have to settle for heartfelt appreciation. ^_^
Oh. They're still not vampires. Deal with it people.
Strangely the scene I liked the most was the one that sounded pretty silly from the book, the baseball game. I blame the fact that I enjoyed it on the Muse song though. Can't beat a good Muse song. And Muse apparently makes just about anything better. Bella needs to lose the headphones. Surely she can find a better way to learn her lines. Although if I were surrounded by the people in that movie, I'd probably try to drown them out too.
I did like Alice. She can stay.
So there you go. Not the worst thing ever, but certainly far from anything worth watching more than once. (I am looking at you 2nd oldest niece. Take the headphones out, put the remote down and go start reading some Westerfeld or something.)
Still trucking along through Monster. It is still pretty darn good.
Decided to throw Metal Gear Solid 3 back in the ol' PS2. I still really suck at that game. I may one day make it to the end, but that is not going to be any time soon.
An early Happy Father's Day goes out to Dad. I have no idea what we're getting you. You have no idea what we're getting you. This has not helped matters. So yeah, Love you Dad, you'll have to settle for heartfelt appreciation. ^_^
Oh. They're still not vampires. Deal with it people.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Incroyable
What's this? Not one, not two, but three posts?! Some with actual relevant content? Yeah, yeah, don't get used to it. It's been an odd week.
Ghost in the Shell: 2nd Gig was pretty darn decent. It played with my mind quite a bit as they lifted characters and settings from the first graphic novel without using those plot points. And then they ended the season right where the graphic novel started. So I've no idea what that means as far as compatibility with the manga's timeline, but it was certainly interesting from a nudge, nudge, wink, wink sort of standpoint. I think I liked the end of season 1 better, but they're both good. Good on ya' Production I.G.!
Monster continues to be interesting as does Cromartie High School.
I will be tackling The Hunger Games soon, mostly to see how it compares to Battle Royale. I will admit to being somewhat skeptical... It might be decent, but I'm expecting a certain amount of been there, done that, it was better in the original. Heh. ^_^
Well, my brain is fried. I blame the updating. I'll get back to you next week. Or will I?
Oh I really, really want to see Moon. Yeah, that's all.
Ghost in the Shell: 2nd Gig was pretty darn decent. It played with my mind quite a bit as they lifted characters and settings from the first graphic novel without using those plot points. And then they ended the season right where the graphic novel started. So I've no idea what that means as far as compatibility with the manga's timeline, but it was certainly interesting from a nudge, nudge, wink, wink sort of standpoint. I think I liked the end of season 1 better, but they're both good. Good on ya' Production I.G.!
Monster continues to be interesting as does Cromartie High School.
I will be tackling The Hunger Games soon, mostly to see how it compares to Battle Royale. I will admit to being somewhat skeptical... It might be decent, but I'm expecting a certain amount of been there, done that, it was better in the original. Heh. ^_^
Well, my brain is fried. I blame the updating. I'll get back to you next week. Or will I?
Oh I really, really want to see Moon. Yeah, that's all.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Jungle's gonna get you man
First, the amusing thing about the quiz below, is that I've not read any Susan Cooper. So I've no idea if that's accurate or not. I shall have to remedy this situation. Always interesting stumbling on something new.
Secondly, I have finished The Lost City of Z, by David Grann. Absolutely brilliant book. There's nothing like a good adventure tale for summer reading. And this one was all true. It's amazing what people went through to discover new things and to follow their obsessions. Percy Fawcett was convinced there was a lost civilization deep in the Amazon jungle. He vanished along with his son and his son's friend while searching for it. David Grann, a journalist, became intrigued by the story and ended up journeying to the Amazon himself to see if he could discover what happened. Truly fascinating stuff. Cannibals, spies, rivals, adventure, romance this book has it all - just like the Princess Bride, well ok, there's not really any romance. Maybe a little. If you ever thought you wanted to go visit the Amazon, this book will either cement that desire, or cure you of it.
Also read Emily the Strange: Lost Days. Another great little young adult book. Emily has amnesia. In fact she doesn't know her name is Emily. It might be Earwig. Or Molly. She also doesn't know why she's in the town of Blackrock. Or why it's so beige. Her life is truly a mysterious thing. Fortunately she has a slingshot, some helpful black cats and some pretty decent sleuthing skills. She's going to need them to make sense of her life and the town she's found herself in. Recommended.
For grins and chuckles I threw Sly Cooper in the PS2 the other day. Game is still good and oddly, surprisingly challenging.
Secondly, I have finished The Lost City of Z, by David Grann. Absolutely brilliant book. There's nothing like a good adventure tale for summer reading. And this one was all true. It's amazing what people went through to discover new things and to follow their obsessions. Percy Fawcett was convinced there was a lost civilization deep in the Amazon jungle. He vanished along with his son and his son's friend while searching for it. David Grann, a journalist, became intrigued by the story and ended up journeying to the Amazon himself to see if he could discover what happened. Truly fascinating stuff. Cannibals, spies, rivals, adventure, romance this book has it all - just like the Princess Bride, well ok, there's not really any romance. Maybe a little. If you ever thought you wanted to go visit the Amazon, this book will either cement that desire, or cure you of it.
Also read Emily the Strange: Lost Days. Another great little young adult book. Emily has amnesia. In fact she doesn't know her name is Emily. It might be Earwig. Or Molly. She also doesn't know why she's in the town of Blackrock. Or why it's so beige. Her life is truly a mysterious thing. Fortunately she has a slingshot, some helpful black cats and some pretty decent sleuthing skills. She's going to need them to make sense of her life and the town she's found herself in. Recommended.
For grins and chuckles I threw Sly Cooper in the PS2 the other day. Game is still good and oddly, surprisingly challenging.
Apropos of nothing
Your result for Which fantasy writer are you?...
Susan Cooper (b. 1935)
23 High-Brow, -3 Violent, -13 Experimental and -15 Cynical!
Congratulations! You are High-Brow, Peaceful, Traditional and Romantic! These concepts are defined below.
Though born in England, Susan Cooper currently lives in the United States. She is most well-known for her The Dark Is Rising sequence, which has received substantial critical acclaim, the second book (also called The Dark Is Rising) in the series winning a Newbury Honor and the fourth book (The Grey King) being awarded the Newbury Medal, one of the world's most prestigious awards for children's literature. The series is one of the finest examples of contemporary fantasy: the kind of fantasy where magic happens in an actually existing place. The Dark Is Rising is set in Britain, where two common themes of fantasy are combined; that of a magic world parallel to ours, which later became so popular with the Harry Potter books and that of ordinary British school-children playing a role in the struggle between Good and Evil, which had earlier been explored by C S Lewis.
Cooper manages to use the idiom of traditional children books to tell a tale of epic proportions, as evil beings from Celtic legends appear on Earth to do battle with the Old Ones, a secret society of people with magic powers. She is also able to combine this rather romantic vision with important messages, the compassion of one of the children being vital to the cause of Good at one point in the story. In Cooper's world, what you think and do matters on a grand scale, a message children and adults alike should take to their hearts.
You are also a lot like Ursula K Le Guin.
If you want some action, try China Miéville.
If you'd like a challenge, try your exact opposite, Lian Hearn.
Your score
This is how to interpret your score: Your attitudes have been measured on four different scales, called 1) High-Brow vs. Low-Brow, 2) Violent vs. Peaceful, 3) Experimental vs. Traditional and 4) Cynical vs. Romantic. Imagine that when you were born, you were in a state of innocence, a tabula rasa who would have scored zero on each scale. Since then, a number of circumstances (including genetical, cultural and environmental factors) have pushed you towards either end of these scales. If you're at 45 or -45 you would be almost entirely cynical, low-brow or whatever. The closer to zero you are, the less extreme your attitude. However, you should always be more of either (eg more romantic than cynical). Please note that even though High-Brow, Violent, Experimental and Cynical have positive numbers (1 through 45) and their opposites negative numbers (-1 through -45), this doesn't mean that either quality is better. All attitudes have their positive and negative sides, as explained below.
High-Brow vs. Low-Brow
You received 23 points, making you more High-Brow than Low-Brow. Being high-browed in this context refers to being more fascinated with the sort of art that critics and scholars tend to favour, rather than the best-selling kind. At their best, high-brows are cultured, able to appreciate the finer nuances of literature and not content with simplifications. At their worst they are, well, snobs.
Violent vs. Peaceful
You received -3 points, making you more Peaceful than Violent. This scale is a measurement of a) if you are tolerant to violence in fiction and b) whether you see violence as a means that can be used to achieve a good end. If you aren't, and you don't, then you are peaceful as defined here. At their best, peaceful people are the ones who encourage dialogue and understanding as a means of solving conflicts. At their worst, they are standing passively by as they or third parties are hurt by less scrupulous individuals.
Experimental vs. Traditional
You received -13 points, making you more Traditional than Experimental. Your position on this scale indicates if you're more likely to seek out the new and unexpected or if you are more comfortable with the familiar, especially in regards to culture. Note that traditional as defined here does not equal conservative, in the political sense. At their best, traditional people don't change winning concepts, favouring storytelling over empty poses. At their worst, they are somewhat narrow-minded.
Cynical vs. Romantic
You received -15 points, making you more Romantic than Cynical. Your position on this scale indicates if you are more likely to be wary, suspicious and skeptical to people around you and the world at large, or if you are more likely to believe in grand schemes, happy endings and the basic goodness of humankind. It is by far the most vaguely defined scale, which is why you'll find the sentence "you are also a lot like x" above. If you feel that your position on this scale is wrong, then you are probably more like author x. At their best, romantic people are optimistic, willing to work for a good cause and an inspiration to their peers. At their worst, they are easily fooled and too easily lead.
Thursday, June 04, 2009
Summer madness
And so the kids are out of school. Alas poor wife, we hardly knew ye. After the initial, "you are all driving me insane, now GO OUTSIDE!" phase has worn off I'm sure she'll be fine. Once she's applied some sunscreen since they're apparently living at the city pool.
Garden continues to grow, although we seem to have lost some watermelon seedlings along the way. We may have to plant one more just to be safe. Tomato plant seems a little stressed as well. I really need to take another picture so I have proof that we had things growing at one point. ^_^
Monster vol 2 was quite good and the story continues. Looks like Dr. Tenma plans to leave the hospital to hunt after the serial killer he saved. And the police are convinced he had something to do with several new deaths. Ooo tension. heh heh.
I'm currently reading through Cromartie High School volume 1 and let me tell you, it's hilarious. Upstanding student applies to delinquent high school to encourage friend to go to school. Only friend does not make it into said school. Hijinks ensue. Lots and lots of hijinks. There are stories about dominoes and rabbits living with lions and pudding. (And I believe I've made my feelings known on stories with pudding) If you can locate it, read it. Or possibly watch the anime, I have plans to do that as well.
Speaking of anime, Ghost in the Shell: 2nd Gig (or Stand Alone Complex season 2) is excellent. I really like that series. Production IG has done a great job with that world.
In other slightly related news, this week was E3. And there were some excellent Wii related announcements. New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Super Mario Galaxy 2, Metroid: Other M, and some others. If you have a Wii hooked up to the net, I recommend checking out the Nintendo channel and watching the videos. Some great looking stuff. Can't wait for Galaxy 2, I loved the first one. Oh and there's more Wii Sports and Wii Fit and... heh heh, like I said list goes on.
Anniversary was this week. 14 years. 14long great years. ^_^ Love you honey! This last year was certainly better than the previous, but held it's own set of challenges. We're certainly ready for things to settle down a touch more.
And I believe that's enough. Oh I'll throw this out there. Some of those stories look pretty great. And it's possible to waste a bit of time at that site...
Garden continues to grow, although we seem to have lost some watermelon seedlings along the way. We may have to plant one more just to be safe. Tomato plant seems a little stressed as well. I really need to take another picture so I have proof that we had things growing at one point. ^_^
Monster vol 2 was quite good and the story continues. Looks like Dr. Tenma plans to leave the hospital to hunt after the serial killer he saved. And the police are convinced he had something to do with several new deaths. Ooo tension. heh heh.
I'm currently reading through Cromartie High School volume 1 and let me tell you, it's hilarious. Upstanding student applies to delinquent high school to encourage friend to go to school. Only friend does not make it into said school. Hijinks ensue. Lots and lots of hijinks. There are stories about dominoes and rabbits living with lions and pudding. (And I believe I've made my feelings known on stories with pudding) If you can locate it, read it. Or possibly watch the anime, I have plans to do that as well.
Speaking of anime, Ghost in the Shell: 2nd Gig (or Stand Alone Complex season 2) is excellent. I really like that series. Production IG has done a great job with that world.
In other slightly related news, this week was E3. And there were some excellent Wii related announcements. New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Super Mario Galaxy 2, Metroid: Other M, and some others. If you have a Wii hooked up to the net, I recommend checking out the Nintendo channel and watching the videos. Some great looking stuff. Can't wait for Galaxy 2, I loved the first one. Oh and there's more Wii Sports and Wii Fit and... heh heh, like I said list goes on.
Anniversary was this week. 14 years. 14
And I believe that's enough. Oh I'll throw this out there. Some of those stories look pretty great. And it's possible to waste a bit of time at that site...
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Myths and Monsters
The last book in the Percy Jackson series, The Last Olympian is out and it's quite good. It manages to wrap things up while still leaving the author lots of room to play in. The only real question is, will we get more stories with Percy and crew, or will it be the "next generation". As the book is still pretty new, I won't go into great detail, but this one is certainly action packed (almost a little too much so) and manages to tell a pretty unique story. There's not as much cribbing from older mythologies this time around, so that's nice. Give it a read.
Monster volume one, by Naoki Urasawa is mostly setting the stage for the story to come, but it does a pretty good job. Part hospital drama, part crime thriller, we follow Dr. Kenzo Tenma a brilliant young neurosurgeon that seems to have it all. He's engaged to the Director's daughter and has a promising career ahead of him. Until he runs afoul of hospital politics. Deciding that all lives are equal and that he's going to operate on a young boy that's come in ahead of the city's Mayor (in direct violation of the Director's orders) Kenzo loses everything he had. He saves the young boy but the Mayor dies. The Director makes it his mission to put Kenzo in his place and his fiance leaves him realizing his fate is sealed. That might be enough to get things going, but the real twist comes in when years later, now actually running the hospital, Kenzo finds out that the boy he'd saved is now going around killing people. And so the chase begins. Looking forward to seeing where this one goes.
JCVD is a rather brilliant little movie. It follows Jean Claude Van Damme as he gets stuck in a hostage crisis. Much like My Name is Bruce, the film plays with audience expectations concerning the main star and puts the hero in a situation they've dealt with theatrically a million times. Only now it's for real. There's a lot of humor here and some heartbreak. Good on Van Damme for playing the part.
And that's about it for random review time. In other news, we had a nice little game of San Juan last night with the letter 'r'. I rather like that game. And cheeseburgers on demand season is officially open. Gotta love the grill. I think we'll try ribs this week.
Monster volume one, by Naoki Urasawa is mostly setting the stage for the story to come, but it does a pretty good job. Part hospital drama, part crime thriller, we follow Dr. Kenzo Tenma a brilliant young neurosurgeon that seems to have it all. He's engaged to the Director's daughter and has a promising career ahead of him. Until he runs afoul of hospital politics. Deciding that all lives are equal and that he's going to operate on a young boy that's come in ahead of the city's Mayor (in direct violation of the Director's orders) Kenzo loses everything he had. He saves the young boy but the Mayor dies. The Director makes it his mission to put Kenzo in his place and his fiance leaves him realizing his fate is sealed. That might be enough to get things going, but the real twist comes in when years later, now actually running the hospital, Kenzo finds out that the boy he'd saved is now going around killing people. And so the chase begins. Looking forward to seeing where this one goes.
JCVD is a rather brilliant little movie. It follows Jean Claude Van Damme as he gets stuck in a hostage crisis. Much like My Name is Bruce, the film plays with audience expectations concerning the main star and puts the hero in a situation they've dealt with theatrically a million times. Only now it's for real. There's a lot of humor here and some heartbreak. Good on Van Damme for playing the part.
And that's about it for random review time. In other news, we had a nice little game of San Juan last night with the letter 'r'. I rather like that game. And cheeseburgers on demand season is officially open. Gotta love the grill. I think we'll try ribs this week.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Moments in the Sun
Special follows your Average Joe™ who is accepted into a drug trial, becomes convinced he has super powers (he doesn't) and uses them to fight crime (tackle people). Drug company suits are not amused and downward spiral of events follow. Will Average Joe™ prevail over the suits? Well watch the movie. Draw your own conclusions. The trailer is a little misleading on this one. It sounds like a relatively funny movie right? And in some ways it is. The problem is, they play everything a little too straight and so there are times you really start to wonder if you should be laughing at what's happening. Instead of crying or finding someone to help the poor man. The performances are all really well done and I think that's what makes it so hard to decide how you should view this movie.
We officially have the starts of several things growing in the garden. Some Spinach, some Cucumbers, a couple others. This is good. I'm really looking forward to seeing if we can actually keep things alive long enough to get some food out of them. Mmm pickles. And Spinach salad...
I suddenly have a lot of things to read/watch. Some of them may make their way here. I can recommend Melody A.M. by Röyksopp. If you're familiar with the caveman Geico commercial that takes place in the airport (he's on the moving sidewalk), you know one song on the album, Remind Me. It's a good album if you like electronica (actually it's good even if you don't). Bits of it remind me of Pink Floyd for some strange reason.
We officially have the starts of several things growing in the garden. Some Spinach, some Cucumbers, a couple others. This is good. I'm really looking forward to seeing if we can actually keep things alive long enough to get some food out of them. Mmm pickles. And Spinach salad...
I suddenly have a lot of things to read/watch. Some of them may make their way here. I can recommend Melody A.M. by Röyksopp. If you're familiar with the caveman Geico commercial that takes place in the airport (he's on the moving sidewalk), you know one song on the album, Remind Me. It's a good album if you like electronica (actually it's good even if you don't). Bits of it remind me of Pink Floyd for some strange reason.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Goings on gone
Yeah a little late and you've seen the pictures, blah, blah, blah. Blame my wife who seems not to understand the concept "flickr pool".
Managed to enjoy the week off with Dad in town. Even if we spent most of it working. Here you can see one of the boxes we built for our square foot garden. There are two. And hopefully they will provide us with lots of yummy food. We also rearranged the girls' room. Bunk beds are now single beds. And the corner of shame has been banished.
We did squeeze some fun in. Star Trek is a good show (even in spite of reboot romances... Spock?! Seriously?!). Quantum of Solace is good (pay no attention to my wife or father, they're muddled from the work and the heat). And the Aquarium is quite nice now. A really nice South American exhibit.
Managed to finish Drood by Dan Simmons. I quite liked it. I'd really like to know which parts were fiction. Well ok, a lot of it is, but there's a lot of fact in there too. Sounds like Dickens got a little strange at the end of his life, although not as strange as some of his associates. Drood tells the tale of the end of Dickens's life as seen through the eyes of his friend/collaborator/jealous adversary William "Wilkie" Collins. Pretty fascinating and a touch horrifying. And what more do you want from a summer-y novel?
How about South American adventure and jungles and spies and lost cities and madness and death? That's what The Lost City of Z, the current book I'm reading, promises. Oh and did I mention it's all true? Nice.
20th Century Boys Volume 1 is pretty good. It sounds like it's a long series, but I look forward to the chance to read it.
Well, it's hot. Even in the basement. I must go melt now. As you were.
Managed to enjoy the week off with Dad in town. Even if we spent most of it working. Here you can see one of the boxes we built for our square foot garden. There are two. And hopefully they will provide us with lots of yummy food. We also rearranged the girls' room. Bunk beds are now single beds. And the corner of shame has been banished.
We did squeeze some fun in. Star Trek is a good show (even in spite of reboot romances... Spock?! Seriously?!). Quantum of Solace is good (pay no attention to my wife or father, they're muddled from the work and the heat). And the Aquarium is quite nice now. A really nice South American exhibit.
Managed to finish Drood by Dan Simmons. I quite liked it. I'd really like to know which parts were fiction. Well ok, a lot of it is, but there's a lot of fact in there too. Sounds like Dickens got a little strange at the end of his life, although not as strange as some of his associates. Drood tells the tale of the end of Dickens's life as seen through the eyes of his friend/collaborator/jealous adversary William "Wilkie" Collins. Pretty fascinating and a touch horrifying. And what more do you want from a summer-y novel?
How about South American adventure and jungles and spies and lost cities and madness and death? That's what The Lost City of Z, the current book I'm reading, promises. Oh and did I mention it's all true? Nice.
20th Century Boys Volume 1 is pretty good. It sounds like it's a long series, but I look forward to the chance to read it.
Well, it's hot. Even in the basement. I must go melt now. As you were.
Thursday, May 07, 2009
Storm before the calm
Getting ready for an entire week off. It will be glorious. And the best part is getting to see Dad since he's flying out this weekend. Looking forward to that. Even if we are getting suckered into manual labor. Got to build some squarefoot garden boxes and get some grub planted as well as possibly redoing the girls' room.
Had a great lunch to celebrate Cinco de Mayo yesterday (yes we celebrated a day late). Some truly yummy Mexican food. (I made salsa)
Watched Cronocrimenes (Timecrimes for favorite niece) the other night. Decent time travel mystery type flick. Some of it was predictable, but there were a couple nice little twists.
Will finally get to watch Quantum of Solace soon. Looking forward to that. Making my way through the first season of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. It's pretty enjoyable too, but then I like the GitS universe.
In mocking Twilight news, it gave G nightmares. Lovely wife decided to snag it from the redbox due to massive amounts of whining from McK and M. They all watched it without me (probably wise on their part). But yeah, G not so much ready foremo dudes with bad hair "vampires". Even ones that sparkle. And aren't really vampires. Oh and the director of the third movie totally mocked the first movie (wouldn't watch it at gunpoint) and then backpedaled when fans (and believe me, Twilight fans put the fanatic back in fan...) expressed emo whining outrage.
And long live blogger's autosave. This post was almost gone due to some lovely Firefox issues.
Suspect that's good enough for now.
Had a great lunch to celebrate Cinco de Mayo yesterday (yes we celebrated a day late). Some truly yummy Mexican food. (I made salsa)
Watched Cronocrimenes (Timecrimes for favorite niece) the other night. Decent time travel mystery type flick. Some of it was predictable, but there were a couple nice little twists.
Will finally get to watch Quantum of Solace soon. Looking forward to that. Making my way through the first season of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. It's pretty enjoyable too, but then I like the GitS universe.
In mocking Twilight news, it gave G nightmares. Lovely wife decided to snag it from the redbox due to massive amounts of whining from McK and M. They all watched it without me (probably wise on their part). But yeah, G not so much ready for
And long live blogger's autosave. This post was almost gone due to some lovely Firefox issues.
Suspect that's good enough for now.
Friday, May 01, 2009
Cue the mad laughter
Just a quick note to point to this. Not the most amazing 600th post, but it mocks Twilight so it fits the basic criteria.
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