February 29 2012

1. Yesterday the last of my recent order of edged weapons arrived. It’s an ax, or a hatchet. While taking the sheath off to look at it, I promptly cut my finger open. As I was cleaning and bandaging it, I could not stop laughing. Something along the lines of, “This totally figures, you ridiculous [...]

The Quibbling Dead

I started watching The Walking Dead yesterday. It’s clearly a very well-made show, well-written and acted, with great special effects. That said, I don’t think it’s for me. I do have some quibbles, the kind I always have in post-apocalyptic-type movies and tv. Some spoilers for The Walking Dead follow, though not really spoilery if [...]

February 27 2012

1. My derangedly Lego-obsessed family had a 24-hour Lego Micropolis building marathon on Saturday. Lunatics, I tell you. But my kind of lunatics. 2. I recently re-watched the movie Labyrinth with my daughter. She said she liked it. I am not really surprised by this. 3. This past weekend while weight lifting I did some [...]

Wiscon Programming for New Attendees

Hello! If you are reading this post, you may be a new attendee to Wiscon. Or you may have attended in the past, but never volunteered for programming. Welcome! Programming at Wiscon is an open, volunteer, attendee-driven process. Months ago, people who bought memberships at the forthcoming convention were asked what types of programming they [...]

Good Enough

There’s a line, somewhere in Jonathon Greyson’s Freedom from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, that runs something like the following: There is no clean, there is only cleaner. I have spent a lot of time incorporating this idea into my life. There is no perfect state, there is only more or less of a thing. In the past [...]

Things I Like: Disturbing Behavior, the movie

In my head I have trouble distinguishing between Disturbing Behavior, the James Marsden and Katie Holmes thriller, and The Faculty, a similar film featuring Josh Hartnett, Jordanna Brewster, and Clea DuVall. The Faculty is a more inventive and more flawed film, by Robert Rodriguez. It dares more, is more imaginative, and falls farther. Disturbing Behavior [...]

Repo and Rapunzel

I re-watched Repo: A Genetic Opera this weekend. There are some things I’d forgotten. Like the fact that Alexa Vega plays Shiloh. Alexa Vega being one of the stars of the Spy Kids franchise. Like the fact that at one point Vega gets to sing a number with Sarah Brightman, or that at another time [...]

Britney Spears’ “Till the World Ends”

I’ve written at some length about Britney Spears before. I was listening to the single “Till the World Ends” the other day. Here’s the video. . When I listen to the song, not watching the video, I keep thinking this song sounds like a suicide note. It’s supposed to be this bippy club hit, about [...]

February 17 2012

1. I was going to come up with a more thoughtful post of substance for today, but yesterday got away from me and I didn’t. I actually … have a bit of stress about that, but it’s my blog, and using for a diary is one of the functions of same. And any defensiveness you [...]

February 16 2012

1. My mother’s visit for K’s birthday was lovely. Thanks, mom! 2. We finished Downton Abbey. Now we have no more until they make season three. This is a sadness! 3. The SF Squeecast mentioned how good Paul Cornell’s “Human Nature” and “Family of Blood” episodes of Doctor Who are. I hadn’t re-watched them, eve, [...]