Chasing Crichton

Success!!

My copies of Scratch One and The Last Tomb (previously published as Easy Go) came and I also found Odds On and Drug of Choice for about $50 each. That sounds like a lot for 35+ year old books that average about only 200 pages each, but Odds On was usually in the $200 range when I could find it on sites like Alibris or Amazon Marketplace. Seeing as how these are books I thought I'd never get a chance to read and that I could probably sell them again for roughly the same amount it seemed like a bargain. They both were in surprisingly good shape. The spine on Drug of Choice wasn't even creased! These aren't first printings so that's probably why they weren't in the >$100 range but I don't care. I'm just glad I found them. The only one I didn't get so far is The Venom Business (and it's the last John Lange book that I have to get). The cheapest I found it for was $65; that seems a bit high and to be honest it seemed to be more of the same as Grave Descend and Zero Cool (and Easy Go and Scratch One). I can wait and see if a cheaper copy comes along or if Hard Case Crime does a rerelease. Odds On is different because it was his first book and it's got a heist theme. Drug of Choice has a medical theme (and I do enjoy his MC's take on medical culture). Those two seemed worth the higher price tag.

I'm most pleased that I was able to get a signed book. As I was looking over the ebay listings for books MC signed, I was concerned that there was no way to tell if the signature was a forgery or not. I have a few examples of MC's signature verified by experts online and I could compare them with the pictures on ebay. Of course, the whole point of a good forgery is that it LOOKS correct and I'm no expert so that's not foolproof. Luckily, there are Franklin Library editions of his books that come with a publisher certified signature. Even that concerned me a little as in 1993 there was a "Gift Edition" of Jurassic Park that came signed and billed as personally autographed by MC-- but in reality the 'signature' was an autopen signature. That is, a machine programmed to sign MC's name wrote the signature in those JP books (MC's website confirms this. He regrets the decision to do the autopen edition as one he didn't think through carefully). I was concerned that the Franklin editions were autopen signed. But I did compare pictures of the signatures in some ebay listings of the Franklin editions and there is some variation in the signature so it's highly unlikely that they were signed with an autopen (unlike the JP signatures which were all the same, down to the little loop on the "C" and tick mark as the pen is lifted off the page). If they were, they had to have had different machines with slightly different signature programs. I don't think they bothered to do that. And they do state that it was personally signed by the author, after all.

So $65 and careful scrutiny of the ebay listings later, I am now the proud owner of a Franklin Library signed first edition copy of Rising Sun. I think that I got an awesome deal. Granted, my copy isn't still sealed in plastic nor in perfect near mint condition. I can tell it's been read, the gold leafing in the sides show some dings and rubs and the corners of the cover show some stress. It probably rates as a VF or even F copy. But I like it this way. If it were still sealed in the plastic I'd probably never open it and never be able to see the signature; and my whole object in getting it was to draw inspiration from it by thumbing through it. Plus it's a book that I really like. I had a chance to get a Franklin edition of The Andromeda Strain but I haven't read that one yet. Also, I don't view that book as particularly interesting. Yes, it was the first book MC released under his own name and not a pseudonym but it's just about a modern day plague. The premise isn't particularly novel. Robin Cook wrote Outbreak. I haven't read that one, either (hmm, I guess plague books don't interest me...) but the idea is about the same. Rising Sun-- who else would have written that one?

So I'm happy with what I found. Now if inspiration to write would just strike....

John Lange, I presume

With Michael Crichton's passing, I found myself perusing eBay looking at the signed books listings and getting interested. I stopped collecting 'things' (comic books, autographs, baseball cards, that sort of stuff) about 5 years ago and that's about the time I think I lost the old me. I wouldn't say that I got depressed, though dysthymia has been a part of how I've felt these last few years. But the interest I had in a lot of things just sort of stopped. I stopped playing video games (as I type, Metal Gear Solid 3 sits on my shelf unfinished. The old me would have finished it in the first week I got it). I sold all of my CD's after ripping them to my computer. I have a few boxes of comic books that I honestly don't know what to do with (they hold some sentimental value so I don't want to just throw them away or even sell them but they take up a lot of space also).

But Michael Crichton's passing has shaken something inside me. Despite knowing better, I had thought that I'd have a new book of his to read every 2-3 years for the rest of my life. It never occurred to me that he would pass at a relatively young age. Now I know that only one more book will be published next year and that's it. No more books from the author and person I hoped to emulate.

As I was saying, while looking at the books that he signed, I felt a stirring somewhere that I hadn't felt in years. I feel like I have goals again-- things I want to accomplish. I don't know where the desire to set and complete goals went, but it's starting to come back and I want to fan the flames and stoke the fire. I plan to get a signed copy of one of his books and put it next to my computer for inspiration (not as an 'investment'). It seems silly, but I'm to the point of not questioning why I feel it would provide inspiration so I'm just going to get one and see where it goes. In addition, I found a couple of beat-up copies of the books MC wrote as John Lange used and fairly cheap (these can be expensive if in good condition given their age and scarcity) so I ordered those. I was hoping that Hard Case Crime would re-issue all of them (as they did with Zero Cool and Grave Descend), but I read somewhere from the publisher that with John Lange's passing (they still wouldn't acknowledge that MC and JL are one and the same, though they said it was a 'co-incidence' that Mr. Lange passed at the same time as MC) the plans for releasing more of his works are in the air and may not happen. Scratch One and The Last Tomb should be here by the end of the month. The rest are going to be a lot more expensive.

Lions fan jinx on Crosby

Look here first:

http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/blog/puck_daddy/post/Detroit-Lions-fan-jinxes-Pens-by-touching-Cup-c?urn=nhl,121348

Classy.

OK, I don't quite understand the outright hate that people have for Sid. You get a pass if you're a fan of any Atlantic division team-- fine, I can understand why a Flyers, Rangers, Islanders, or Devils fan would actively hate Sid.

But a Red Wings fan like this guy? I don't get it. Um... dude? You realize that your team already won the Cup, don't you? And to wear a Lions shirt while posing with the Cup? What does that say about how much of a fan he is?

Ok, so he's vacationing in Traverse City (that alone sounds like a joke, but I'll leave it alone) and the Cup happens to be on display there and-- Red Wings fan that he is-- he has to go see it. Oops, except that he doesn't have any Red Wings clothes with him, just a Lions shirt. His excuse for wearing a Lions shirt is "I didn't pack any Red Wings gear, I just happened to have a Lions shirt in my suitcase because it was clean when I packed." Awesome, dude. You don't have any gear of your CHAMPIONSHIP TEAM on you, but you happen to have packed a shirt for the local horribily run, joke of a football team that (amongst other indignities): 1) hired Matt Millen for GM on the basis of his color commentary work and didn't figure out that he didn't have a freakin' clue how to run a football team until EIGHT YEARS later and 2) Barry Sanders was so embarassed to play for that he decided to retire instead of risking further pounding just for the chance to finish last in his division again-- even though he was on pace to break Walter Peyton's rushing record. And you evidently don't do laundry before you leave for vacation. Your house must smell like a rose.

So anyway, somehow this Red Wings fan thinks that chanting Crosby's name while wearing a Lions jersey and touching the Stanley Cup will jinx Sid. This is analgous to me wearing a Pirates jersey while posing/touching the Lombardi trophy and chanting Matt Hasselbeck's name.

Right.

Oh, and by the way-- the Wings blew a 3 goal lead in the 3rd period and lost in OT. Crosby had a goal. Sir, I have one thing to tell (show) you:

So much for jinxing Sid. Maybe you jinxed the Wings with some Lions mojo (it would actually make more sense. But who's talking about making sense here...). BTW-- Mr. Selke looked awesome in the final 2 minutes of OT. Maybe you'd have been better off wishing good luck to your own team than bad luck on one player. If the Wings choke and get hit with injuries the rest of this year, Hockeytown will know who to thank. Be sure to stand up and take credit. Dick.

As a parting shot, the guy says:

"The funniest part of the story is that my five-year-old son wouldn't touch the Cup. He said, 'My body just wouldn't let me.' Could it be fate?"

I hope so. I'm 36 and haven't touched the Stanley Cup. I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean, either.

Michael Crichton 1942-2008

As exhilarating as it was to have Barack Obama win the election Nov 4, it was sobering to hear that Michael Crichton died that day.

Michael Crichton was someone I long admired. He was a true Renaissance man; well educated (it often gets lost amongst his many achievements that he graduated from Harvard Medical school), a critical and independent thinker (not many people would criticize the "Global Warming" theory in our times), and of course a prolific novelist, screenwriter, director, and producer. At one point in time he had a hand in the #1 TV show, the #1 bestselling book, and #1 boxoffice movie at the same time (ER, Disclosure, and Jurassic Park respectively). Not to mention that he directed several movies. Amazing.

I've made my way through his books these past years. I slowed down my reading, intentionally delaying starting his last couple of books as I realized that I was rapidly catching up to the latest book that he wrote. I finished State of Fear last year and just have started Next. I suppose technically I still have The Great Train Robbery and Eaters of the Dead to read but those are historical fiction pieces that he experimented with and I prefer his modern day social commentary works. I'll make my way to those older works eventually (as well as the stuff he did under his John Lange pseudonym once SOMEONE gets around to republishing them-- Odds On, Scratch One, Easy Go, The Venom Business, Drug of Choice. C'mon, you can't tell me that there's no market to republish them. Zero Cool and Grave Descend were both recently republished, after all). And I read that he had a book that was to be published on December 2 but it will be understandably pushed back to May.

You'll be missed, Dr. Crichton. I don't know too many authors who can shift gears the way you did. Who else can write about genetic engineering dinosaurs to Japanese business culture to sexual harassment in consecutive books? None, I daresay.

Pitt shirt spotted on How I Met Your Mother!!!

Marshall (Jason Segal) sporting a Pitt shirt on HIMYM.

Awesome.

Supernatural

This has to be the best show on TV since Buffy (or Angel, since that was the last Whedon show to be cancelled). I know I said Chuck was the best show on TV before. Fine-- go tell the Hyperbole police.

I was compelled to write about it tonight because I just watched the latest episode and was completely blown away. Needless to say it was incredibly well written. It must be the Whedon influence on Ben Edlund (a co-exec producer on Supernatural) from his days on Angel. Mind you, Ben Edlund was the creator of The Tick (remember that one?) so he was no slouch in the creativity department. I don't mean to leave out the other producers or writers; Ben Edlund is the only name I knew. But man-- I was speechless watching the show unfold. The pop culture references were hilarious. I realize that Back to the Future is now a 23 year old movie that the younguns from this generation may not have seen, but the little touches and references to it were light and created some expectation in the viewer that they could play off of. I still can't tell if Castiel's loose-tie and trenchcoat look is a shoutout to John Constantine (not the Keanu Reeves movie-- look at the character as he was originally formed in Swamp Thing from the late 80's) or an unintentional reveal on his character (as he does have that mysterious warrior of the Lord/hidden-agenda conflict). Whatever, it works. And to have the "Hunter" line run through Sam and Dean's MOTHER'S side of the family was genius. The thing that really gets me-- here we are in season 4 and they are coherently paying off a mythology plotline from the FIRST EPISODE. I had thought that we'd never know what came of the yellow-eyed demon's plan but it clearly is a single thread in a larger tapestry.

I can't wait for the next episode.

Poker career fini

I played the last ring games of poker today. It was pretty anticlimactic, really. In a movie I'd be dealt KK or AA for my last hand and I'd go out in a blaze of glory dragging a huge pot. In reality, I got deakt K8 offsuit and folded.

It feels good and I'm pretty relieved to not be obsessing over playing enough hands of poker each day. I'd been having a rough go of it lately, with my big hands getting beaten by hands who had no reason to stay in despite my raising and betting. The last week or so was pretty brutal and I think I was negative for the week. If not for rakeback I'd have been down quite a bit. But at the very least, I finished up for the day today and can walk away on a good note.

Now I can use the player points on getting some swag from the players' store. I'm looking at getting an 80GB Ipod Classic from there. I've had my eye on the 8BG Ipod Touch and I could get one from the players' store, but Apple put out a better 2nd generation model Touch that won't show up in the players' store for a long time (if ever). I may use the Classic Ipod myself or just sell it and put the money toward a 16GB Touch. I'm sure I'd use the Classic for watching movies on planes or trips, but since I don't travel much it wouldn't be worth it (plus the Touch is just so cool I want one anyway). It depends on how much I could get for it, I suppose. $200 and it's a sell. $150 and I should just keep it. Meh. Funny thing is, the 80GB Classic is 58,000 points and the 8GB Ipod Touch (first gen) is 67,000 points. And now that the 2nd gen Touch is out, the prices have dropped dramatically; $299 used to get you a 8GB Touch (1st gen as that was all there was). $299 now gets you a 2nd gen 16GB Touch, $229 gets you the 8GB 2nd gen. For $199 you can get a 1st gen 8GB Touch. Always worth it to spend another $20 for the latest technology. It'd have to be more like $125 for the 1st gen for me to think about getting that one. Even better, with the 9,000 points that I'd save by getting the Classic, I can get a messenger bag and gym bag.

So aside from a couple of free tournaments, I'm done with poker. On with screenwriting!

Remember when...? SNL edition

Hey remember when Saturday Night Live was edgy and funny?

It was not a good start to the new season this weekend. Mind you, I had no problem with Michael Phelps hosting. He wasn't good, but he's an athlete-- not an actor, comedian, noted author, newsman... really nothing that would prepare him to host a nationally broadcast live sketch comedy show. It was part of the "Michael Phelps media blitz" that he earned himself and I don't begrudge his hosting. They made every effort to make it easy for him, limiting his lines and screentime and going to old sketches that worked before. Note that they pulled out the locker-room Will Forte pep-talk/dance to a goofy song skit that they first did (to great effect) when Peyton Manning hosted (which was a damn funny show, so not all athletes are duds hosting). His other 'parts' were him playing a home-schooled inbred country boy on a quiz show (so if he was stiff or awkward, well that was the part he played), himself as a guest on a fictional Charles Barkley talk show, a son on a fake T Mobile Fave Fives commercial, the son on the 'ugly kids' sketch opposite Kristen "I said WE!" Wiig (another retread sketch that I first saw when Seth Rogan hosted), and himself (again) on a commercial for the Michael Phelps diet. The Michael Phelps diet commercial was the funniest sketch that he was in and it seemed to have that absurdist nature that SNL likes (or used to) so I was puzzled as to why they made that they last sketch of the night. I would have put that up front in the first 1/2 hour.

So anyway, my criticism of the show has to do with all of the redone sketches and jokes and the ones that weren't redone had no bite or payoff. I mentioned the locker room and ugly kids sketches-- both were done before. Plus they pulled out Fred Armisen's "Nicholas Fehn, political comedian who can't put together a coherent thought" for a bit on Weekend Update. Now, I don't have a problem with recurring characters on SNL-- that's how they get a following, after all (and I loved Hans and Franz back in the day. Even the MacGruber bit is funny when they choose to do it). I DO have a huge problem with REDONE SKETCHES. The ugly kids sketch was THE EXACT SAME as when Seth Rogan did it. The locker room sketch was THE EXACT SAME as when Peyton Manning did it (except with a different song and not nearly as funny). Nicholas Fehn was amusing the first time I saw it, but Fred Armisen did THE EXACT SAME thing as last time. It's a one-note-joke that he can't put together a coherent thought. It gets a laugh the first time as it keeps going, but you can't go to that well again. I mean, what was the point? I can tell when they're just killing time and the first episode of this season was 60-75% filler. You could pull this off when you had Will Ferrel and Adam Sandler as they would spin their WU bits a little differently. Maybe they could do the Nicholas Fehn thing similarly. This time they didn't.

As for the other sketches:

Seeing Tina Fey as Sarah Palin (Emphasized Fargo accent and all) was a great start. That, unfortunately, was the high water mark.

The quiz show sketch seemed like a hastily thrown together commentary on the state of education in America (public school sucks, home schooling sucks-- haha). It could have been funny with some bite but felt like it needed a few more rewrites. As it was, it didn't hold together and in the end wasn't funny.

The Chalres Barkley Show was pointless filler. Was there even one laugh in there?

The restaurant sketch.... I don't even know what to say. Maybe they were showcasing the new guy (I don't remember his name. The one who looks like Jonah Hill in 10 years) but it was so unfunny and pointless that I didn't even pay attention to it. Was Phelps in that one? He might have been.

The T Mobile Fave Fives commercial was good. Not a home run, but a solid double. Not enough to save the show, unfortunately.

I just hope next week is better. DO YOU HEAR ME JAMES FRANCO????

Football season! Wabbit season! Football season!

Wow, quite an eventful day in the ol' NFL.

Brady's out. Let that sink in for a moment. As a Steeler fan, I'm no Brady or Patriot fan. But even I wouldn't want the Pats to followup their crushing Super Bowl loss with a horrible Brady-less season. I'd rather it be a horrible season for them WITH Brady. Seriously, it's no fun to watch a hated rival bite it due to unfortunate circumstances or injuries. I'd rather the rest of the AFC figure out a way to beat the super-genius and Brady at their own game than just have the Pats slink off into obscurity due to the loss of their QB.

It also makes for a much less interesting week 2 matchup vs the NY Bretts next week. The consolation is that it'll still be Favre taking apart the Belichick D. At least THAT side of the ball hasn't changed.

And the fall TV season kicks off tomorrow with the season premiere of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Buckle up kids!

Watch CHUCK, dammit!

Everybody needs to start watching Chuck on NBC. It's a damned good show. The schedulers, in their wisdom, are now showing Chuck reruns leading up to the new fall premiere. However, they are showing Chuck at 8pm on Saturdays but the fall time slot for Chuck will be Monday at 8pm. So even if they capture an audience on Saturday, these people may not know to look for Chuck on Monday nights in the new season. Make sure you follow it when it changes time slots. Or set the DVR to record it. And watch it again online the next day to let NBC know that we like this show, ok?

It's a great show. It's the only show since the Buffyverse that can handle action, comedy, and drama (Buffyverse gets the edge for the addition of horror, but Chuck's premise doesn't lend itself to horror). It amazes me that Zachary Levi in the titular role is Hollywood's idea of a geek. But I guess if James Van Der Beek can be a film geek on Dawson's Creek, Zach Levi can be a computer geek on Chuck.

First screenwriter's workshop

Well, we actually had out first post-class screenwriter's workshop last night. I was there early as usual and as it creeped closer to the appointed time with nobody showing up I was afraid I'd be stood up again.

Ah, but all was well as two other former classmates showed up and much catching up was done. I didn't have anything specific other than to hash out some possibilities on a screenplay idea I have. It still may not pan out as realistic, but the group discussion showed me some possibilities that I hadn't considered before. That's what workshopping's all about! Next meeting is tentatively in about 5 weeks. It's always tough to get people together but we did it once, so hopefully again!

In other news, I ordered a Wii online. What a pain trying to get one has been. CircuitCity had 'Wii bundles' for sale, but no Wii consoles alone. So you were stuck paying full retail price for Wii peripherals and games that you may or may not want along with the Wii (you had to buy 2 games at $50 each, plus buy another controller). Thankfully, Walmart.com had the console alone for sale. I had to pay for shipping, but I figured it was worth the extra cost just for the hassle factor alone, plus it'll keep me from driving to different stores to see if they have it in stock so I'll save the gas. It should arrive at the end of next week.

Wet floor

So I'm walking down the hallway when this woman about 10 feet in front of me slips and makes a slow, awkward fall to the floor. It wasn't one of those cartoon banana-peel slips where both feet went out from under her and you can almost hear the high-pitched "wheeeeee" sound. It was more of a little slip; one foot went out farther ahead of her and her back foot was also in whatever was slippery on the floor. She couldn't find any traction but she wasn't going to do a full split, either, so she jerked her back leg forward and stumbled to the ground.

She wasn't hurt (I stopped to ask if she was ok. I may be an asshole, but I'm not THAT much of an asshole) and the fall itself wasn't comical. But I mention this incident because she did stumble forward into the yellow "WET FLOOR-- SLIPPERY" sign that was placed there to warn people about this happening. And she broke the sign in half.

That struck an absurdist nerve in me.

Maybe I'm more of an asshole than I think...

How to use a Japanese toilet

I can't even begin to describe how wrong this is.

Reason for the Wii shortage.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/DN-gamer_0329gl.ART.State.Edition1.464cd43.html

"During the course of the interview, the analyst, Michael Pachter at Wedbush Morgan, said the real culprit for the Wii shortage in the U.S. is the weak dollar.

With a weak dollar, foreign companies that sell their goods in the U.S. for dollars and then convert those dollars to their native currencies get a smaller profit than if they sell their products in countries with strong currencies of their own (such as Europe with the euro). In other words, Nintendo makes a bigger profit on Wiis sold in Europe than on Wiis sold in the U.S."

Quest for a Wii

I thought I was done with video games. When Metal Gear Solid 3 came out for the PS2 and I didn't run out and get it immediately, I thought my interest in video games was on the decline.

When the Xbox 360 and PS3 came out and I wasn't even aware of the release dates, I was sure the gamer in me had died.

But a friend of mine got a Wii and said it was fun. What's more, he's a physical therapist and said that after playing the boxing game for a while he was pretty sore the next day. Hmmm, that's interesting. He's in good shape, so if this game has him moving enough to get sore, there must be something to the reports of the Wii helping people get some exercise in. At only $250 for the base system, it's worth looking into. I remember how tired I'd get sparring when I was in the karate club in college, so it's not surprising that a game that makes the player shadow box can burn some calories. That's a decent work out.

Then I heard about the Lightsaber Duels game that is coming out:



A game that has you use the Wii remote like a lightsaber handle? I'm in-- I want a Wii now. Too bad they're still SOLD OUT EVERYWHERE. After almost 2 years they still can't keep up with demand. Sick.

Buffy the Animated Series

We can finally see what might have been.



Sigh.

Even though the animation style looks a little like Erin Esurance, you can tell it would have been great.

Nobody puts Baby in a corner

So I finally saw Dirty Dancing. Good script. Classic Hero's Journey.

It took a while for the "Hey look!" factor to settle down. As in "Hey look-- it's Jerry Orbach pre-CHUNG-CHUNG Law & Order!", "Hey look-- it's Wayne Knight pre-Newman!", and "Hey look-- it's Jennifer Grey pre-nose job!".

The more I learn about screenplay structure, the more dialogue and scenes seem stilted and contrived, not just in this movie but in others as well. "Oh, here his where Patrick Swazye defines his need." "This is Jennifer Grey's refusal of the call to adventure." But people love this movie, so the lesson must be not to think too much about how contrived something seems. When it works, it works.

Happy Labor Day

Ah, the first day of September-- the "symbolic end of the summer" according to Wikipedia. A day off for us working citizens. Life is good.

I was just looking at the remote control for my Comcast Motorola DVR. One of the reasons to use a DVR is the ability to skip commercials and the Motorola DVR is no exception. Except, whoever designed it may not have taken a human factors in design class.

Here's the remote:




See the two buttons I circled in red? One button is the 30-second skip (forward) button. The other is the Instant Replay (skips backwards 7-seconds) button. Which do you think is which? Call me crazy, but I'd think that the button on our right would be the skip forward button and the button on the left would skip backward.

Wrong.

I guess because the button on the left has an arrow that points up, we're supposed to intuitively know that it moves us forward. And the button on the right, having a downward pointing arrow, moves backwards. Except that this GOES AGAINST THE WESTERN CONVENTION OF READING LEFT TO RIGHT and that we tend to think of the button on the right as the one that moves forward. Tivo got it right. Even ReplayTV got it right.





Now I can sort of understand that these are the "Page Up/Page Down" buttons that function on other menus. These weren't really meant to be the skip buttons; they just added that function to them during playback. Better that than just leave them functionless. But what's strange is that there actually is a labelled Instant Replay button on there. It's to the left of the white "My DVR" button. Yes, that's right-- they knew to put the labelled Instant Replay button on the left side of the remote. But they didn't include a labelled 30-second skip button at all. In the place where I thought a 30-second advance button would be, there is a LIVE button-- a button that stops the playback of your recorded show that you're watching and takes you to what's playing on the currently selected channel (hitting the "stop" button serves this same function, BTW). Brilliant. How useful.

You just have to wonder sometimes.

Comic book murder

I heard that the former organizer of the Pittsburgh Comicon was recently convicted for the murder of his wife 20 years ago.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24546594

Not that I ever knew the guy, but he always struck me as a profiteer with no interest in comics other than what money he could make from them. The MSNBC article says that comics were his passion, so I guess I'm wrong. I guess I'm still bitter over watching the comic book industry get ruined by the sleazy profit-mongers and I automatically lump any white guy over 45 wearing a suit in with them. Anyway, the Pittsburgh Comicon hit its high point in 1995 (the year before I moved here, of course) when they had Stan Lee as a guest. It's been on a slow decline ever since and I haven't even gone to it the last couple of years. Aside from a rare high point of having Clare Kramer (Glory from Buffy) and Mark Lutz (Groosalugg from Angel) as guests it's been pretty bad the last few years. I did get to talk to Ernie Hudson from one of my all time favorite movies (The Crow) though. What a nice guy.

Anyway, I remember the Con organizer guy at the auction on the last day back probably in 1999 or 2000. The item for auction was an autographed picture of the band Nirvana and he held it up for everyone to see. Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl had signed but "the guy in the middle didn't sign it," according to the organizer.

Um, yeah. That'd be Kurt Cobain, and he didn't sign it because he's dead.

Dumbass.

Poker

I was going to write some crap about online poker and gambling but bored myself halfway through. So I erased the whole thing and will just say that I played for 3years and will be stopping after September. It's been fun but it's time to move on to better things. I was spending too much time playing that stupid game for too little money. The reason I don't just stop now is that the site I play at has a loyalty program through which I can get an Ipod Touch if I earn enough points. After playing 20 more days I'll have enough points for that, and that'll be my final reward for playing this silly game all this time.

So what's next? I hope I'll spend that 2 hours a day writing instead of playing poker. Heck, whacking myself in a frying pan for 2 hours a day is marginally more productive than playing poker.

Comic book geekery

It's been a long time since I've bought a comic book. I've continued to read them and still enjoy them, but having them laying around is more trouble than they're worth. So I content myself with reading them in Borders over an orange-mango Cremekula or downloading them.

Not to mention, I think the medium is dying.

It's sad to think that this hobby that I enjoyed so much for a large part of my formative years will likely not exist in another 10 years. There are just too many distractions and comic books can't compete. There are too many video games to play, movies and tv shows to watch, gambling games to try to maximize expected value, porn sites to browse-- these are all hobbies that rely on introverted, near-auticstically intelligent, obsessive teenagers for their lifeblood and comics have to take a back seat to these more immediately gratifying hobbies.

The comic book industry only has iteself to blame. When speculators struck on comic books as a possible investment vehicle, the publishers were only too happy to milk them for all they were worth with multiple covers, special editions, and relaunches of titles starting the numbering at #1 again hoping speculators would buy and hoard boxes of them. For example, Marvel renumbered Iron Man at #1 for "volume 2" sometime in about 2000-- then inexplicably started at #1 again 13 months later for "volume 3". After the novelty of a new numbering system wore off, they wanted to reconnect to the original numbering of the Iron Man series so the comics would sport TWO issue numbers-- so the same issue would be Iron Man #80 (for volume 3) and #498 (for volume 1). Confused yet? I was long gone from being a regular comic book buyer by then. It didn't help that the collectors made the publishers shift comics from an intentionally cheap form of entertainment printed on newsprint to more expensive 'books' printed on longer-lasting paper stock. Comics were $0.65 each when I started buying them in the mid-80's and they're $3.99 now.

Not to mention that there hasn't been a good run of a monthly title in a while. All of the really good comic moments either happened in the silver age from 1960-1988 or in one-shot/miniseries. Too many of the new comics today are re-interpretations of these events, remapped to today's world. Not that these new interpretations aren't entertaining but orignality is severly lacking. The novelty of seeing modern Gwen Stacy in Ultimate Spider-Man's 21st century life versus the hip 60's chick wears off quickly.

I wonder if Marvel and DC will continue to be comic book publishers. Marvel has already made strides into producing their own movies instead of licensing their characters to others to make movies. The huge success of Iron Man shows that that may be a viable alternative to comics for them. They already redid The Hulk and a new Punisher movie is coming. Publishing comics may be a loss-leading strategy just to keep their characters in the public eye until they make their next movie.

The Fisher King

I had the day off today. I have to work on Saturday and having today off was the usual day off to make up for working tomorrow. Then I'm off Sunday and Labor day. You can't beat that.

I, uh, FOUND a way to watch The Fisher King before the library got it so thankfully when they're talking about it in class on Tuesday I'll be able to follow what they're saying.

The first thing I thought was that it takes place in NYC and was released in 1991, which prompted me to think "10 years after this film was released the world changed dramatically". I don't mean to be a downer about 9/11 but when I think about the world pre- and post-9/11 I get nostalgic. Before the tragedy, I wasn't even 30, my time in the informatics program just ended and I didn't know where my life was headed. I remember waking up 9/11/2001 listening to a TV news story on the Krispy Kreme that opened up in Cranberry that day (I used to fall asleep with the TV on and sometimes it'd be on all night). I only wish that was the biggest news story that day.

Wow, this entry sure took an unexpected turn! So, The Fisher King--

I enjoyed it. I'm not too familiar with the classic story of the Fisher King so I think a lot of the little touches were lost on me. But it's a story of redemption, and that's something universal. Jeff Bridges plays Jack Lucas, a highly successful, self-absorbed NYC radio shock jock who makes an off the cuff comment about how the patrons at a certain upscale NY bar/restaurant 'aren't human, only mate with their own kind and need to be stopped' to a deeply disturbed caller who had designs on asking out a woman that he had seen there. The caller later goes on a shooting rampage at the restaurant killing 7 people before turning the gun on himself. Lucas blames himself and goes into a deep depression. The film picks up 3 years later where Lucas spends his days drunk and ineffectually working at the video store of a woman he has been cohabitating with. One night he nearly tries to kill himself but encounters Parry (Robin Williams), a homeless man that Lucas learns was once a college professor who was with his wife at the restaurant the night of the shootings. Parry's wife was one of the 7 victims and witnessing her murder sent Parry on a downward spiral into mental institutions and homelessness.

In terms of screenwriting, there's definitely a lot to learn from how Lucas' character was set up. In only 8 mintues, we have a crystal-clear picture of who Jack Lucas is. That's impressive economy (on more than one occasion I've heard that poets and poetry students do very well writing screenplays). I'm sure we'll deconstruct it in class next week.

Dirty Dancing is next!

I forgot to mention...

Have I mentioned how good I am at jinxing myself? The room that I thought was going to be big enough for the screenwriting class actually wasn't the one I had pictured. It was much smaller and there aren't enough chairs even for the registered students. I, along with 2-3 other students, was sitting on the floor against the wall for class. I didn't mind and will continue to do it if that's the only option for me, but there really ought to be enough chairs for the paying customers at least.

I'm just saying.

Maybe the instructor will ask for a room change, but I'm not counting on it. Doesn't matter, though-- what is art without suffering?

First Class

The first screenwriting class was awesome. The 'book list' for the class is actually a DVD list: Dirty Dancing, The Fisher King, and Lars and the Real Girl. He made sure to point out that these movies were all made from 'spec scripts'-- that is, scripts that were written by the writer first (with no promise of getting paid or the script being made into a movie), then shopped around looking for someone who would want to make it into a movie. This is in contrast to a writing assignment where the studio knows that they want to make a movie about something (a book adaptation or an established character) and then they hire a writer for a treatment. The writer gets paid for his treatment but the studio can then decide they don't like it and throw out his/her script and hire someone else to write another one. The first writer still gets paid for his treatment even though the script was canned. The assignments of course go to the top A-list writers, folks who have proven reliable in meeting deadlines for writing and oh yeah-- have written a successful movie or two. Spider-Man was a writing assignment, as was Superman Returns, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone... you get the idea. I can tell that the prof loves movies and a good story. You can't fake enthusiasm like that and it really carries over into the class (I'm sure we've all had classes where nobody wanted to be there, especially the instructor). Lots of energy here. This is going to be good.

First assignment is to write one scene and include a specific sentence that he gave us in the scene. And it has to make sense in the context of the scene (i.e., you can't just have a character say this sentence because he's reading out loud from a book). Since I'm there just to listen and learn I won't be handing in the assignments, but I'll probably do them for the practice anyway. The purpose of the assignment is probably to get us writing in the proper format with some semblance of a goal (we have to work that sentence in somehow). I never hurts to go back to basics, so the undergrad class is exactly what I need right now.

Dirty Dancing is on Comcast On-Demand, I have Lars somewhere though I haven't watched it yet, and I reserved The Fisher King at the library. I should be all set to go.

What would you do for a Klondike bar?

How about $50,000? Would you make an ass of yourself on national TV by jumping onto giant red balls and falling facefirst into a mud pit?



I'm talking about the ABC show Wipeout. It may sound like I'm slamming the show but I'm not-- I actually find it pretty damn funny. People tune in (me included) to laugh at other people's misfortune. That sounds pretty terrible but nobody is forcing any of these folks to run this obstacle course which is so obviously built to make them look as stupid as possible. And I didn't even mention the contestants that apply to get on. Good grief, what are some of these people thinking? The athletes going on this show fine, I get it-- you're agile and strong and this represents a challenge to you. But the couch potatoes and average joes? Come ON! Why in the world would you go on this show? Have you exercised at all lately? No? Then what makes you think that you'll be able to complete the obstacle course faster than the 20 year-old, 6'0", 175lb personal trainer from Van Nuys? Because you're going to have to beat him in three different courses to win the money.

That's right-- only one person out of 24 wins $50,000. It'd be one thing to get paid $50,000 for making an ass of yourself on TV. But to make an ass of yourself, not make it past the first round and not get paid? No thanks.

But I enjoy watching it. I'm a bad person.

First class tonight-- and I can't wait!

The first screenwriting class of the semester meets tonight from 6-9:50pm. And it's a GOOD thing. It's so refreshing to be a student by choice instead of necessity; to learn something out of interest instead of a need for credits toward a degree. I think I have enough letters after my name and post-bac class time for 2-3 people. Since I don't want credits, I don't see a reason to have to pay for attending class. I got permission from the instructor (the screenwriter of Snakes on a Plane!) to sit in on it as long as there are enough chairs in the room. I'm so glad I work for the university so a request like this isn't much of a stretch to grant. I'm not so sure I'd be as welcomed if I were a random person asking to sit in (thus depriving the university of some tuition money). I've done this before with other classes and I know this room is pretty big, so there shouldn't be a problem. This is an undergrad class, whereas the last two screenwriting classes I've sat in on were graduate level. The grad level classes were great, thanks in large part to the very experienced and down-to-earth instructor (a writer from Saved By the Bell who is a 'burgh native). I've sat in on nearly all of his classes, screenwriting or not, just to scrounge for some nuggets of wisdom and for the funny anecdotes and I'll be doing it again in the spring when he teaches screenwriting again (he's let me sit in on so many of his classes it might be weird for him if I'm NOT there ha ha). But I'm looking forward to seeing how a different instructor approaches teaching screenwriting. [I'm so glad nobody reads this blog. Otherwise some university administrative bigwig might put the kibosh on my classroom freeloading]

I feel good about digging in and finally focusing on writing instead of spending all my free time on something stupid like online poker (I'll leave my not-so-favorable perspective on having been a semi-pro online poker player for another time). As a bonus, it looks like enough people from the screenwriting class from last spring are interested in finishing the screenplays they started so we should be meeting monthly. Sept 4th looks like our first non-class related screenwriting workship. If this blog becomes a 'screenplay progress report' I would be so happy. That would mean I'm making progress on my own screenplay.

I have a good feeling about this year. Not that I've had bad feelings at the start of previous years-- they've been more indifferent feelings before. That's got to mean something, right?

Kevin Smith Hosting Dinner for Five

Geez, how did I not know that Kevin Smith hosted a DF5 episode with freakin' Stan Lee, JJ Abrams, Mark Hammil, and Jason Lee before now?

Monday Monday...

In my first blog post I mentioned that I can now record all of the shows on network TV in HD but that I'd use the ReplayTV's and the remaining Tivo to record as backup. The reason for that is the last 3 of 4 episodes of Supernatural that were shown on the WPCW HD station on Comcast had a weird audio problem where the dialogue track was muted while the background music and sound effects tracks could still be heard. I know that it's not my Motorola box as I recorded the episode on the Vista machine also with the same problem. And during commercial breaks the audio was just fine; this only happened during the show. Quite annoying. I got around the problem by hooking the ReplayTV (on which I had also recorded the episode) up to my speaker system. So I could watch the HD picture with the audio from the SD recorded broadcast. The only difficult part of this hack was synching up the audio with the video. Luckily the TV has a Picture-in-Picture feature, so that made it easier to play back the show on both recording devices so they'd be in synch. I emailed Rob Owen (the TV writer for the Post-Gazette) and I also emailed the WPCW station website about the problem. I wonder if either one will respond. I just hope they fix this soon and that we don't have to wait til 2/09 for the digital OTA switch for the problem to go away.

I'll see if I still have use for my remaining Tivo in a couple of months or if I'll be happy enough with the ReplayTV's carrying the load for recording the standard def broadcast stuff. If I could DEFINITELY get $210 for it I'd sell. But if I'll only get something like $170 (a very real possibility), then I'd just as soon keep it until I have no use for it anymore or it breaks. It never hurts to have another 157 hours of potential recording time at your disposal. And Tivo just plain does a better job of keeping track of season passes and when shows change time slots. I trust that it'll grab Robot Chicken when the new season starts. Not so much with ReplayTV. I'll set up Vista Media Center to record Robot Chicken and see how it fares. I should add Mad Money and Chelsea Lately to the Replays and see how it works out. If I find I never use the Tivo, I might was well get some cash for it.

Otherwise, it's the first day of classes for the kiddies here. I can't believe how young they look. It's been a good day so far-- we haven't been overrun yet. Hopefully we won't be all year and we can keep up.

A moment of silence please

I sold my Soloflex home gym today. I got it a few months after I moved to Pittsburgh waaaaaay back in 1996 off a classified ad in the newspaper (before Craigslist. Geez, was Amazon even in business then? Ebay?). In retrospect, it's kind of surprising that I was able to get one in the first palce just because of how big and heavy they are (I think all told we're talking about 120lbs of metal and the longest piece of the thing is about 6 feet) and the only model car I've ever owned is the Honda Accord. Yeah, the Japanese engineers didn't really have hauling huge hunks of metal around in mind when they designed it. Luckily the dude I bought it from had a truck and for $20 delivered it to me. It's a nice piece of machinery. I wish I had the room to keep it. Not that I'm any kind of athletic specimen, but it did serve as a daily reminder to do some sort of exercise. It probably kept me in decent shape during the first 2-3 years I was in Pittsburgh when I'd be too mentally tired to trek over to Trees Hall to exercise after work. Sort of luckily the apartment building I was in built an exercise room in the first floor my second year of living there. That was the beginning of the end of the utility of the Soloflex machine but I'd still do some dips or pull ups on it every so often. Then the Bellefield Hall exercise room was built, which was a lot closer and easier to get to than Trees, knocking the Soloflex down another notch or two.

It wasn't too out of place in my last apartment as my bedroom was huge, but the bedroom in my condo is quite a bit smaller. I had to put it between my bed and the window as there was no other place for it. It made for an adventure to open/close the window in the middle of the night-- it was hard enough to get around it to the window when I was fully awake, let alone half asleep. Last week, I finally got to the point of wanting the space more than the Soloflex. I hadn't used it in the last 2 years other than to hang my clothes on it to dry (that seems to be the fate of most home exercise equipment. The clothes hanging phase is the menopause/middle-age equivalent stage for exercise equipment, I have concluded) so I thought with the new year coming up and the other changes I'm making in my life I'd also finally get rid of the Soloflex.

So I posted a Craigslist ad. I paid $320 for it back then (when a new machine was $2000). Not bad. CL had a few other Soloflexes listed in the $120-200 range. Since I was more interested in getting a little something for it than as much as possible and the buyer had to haul it away, I listed it at $75. That probably opened me up to getting a lower offer when it came down to selling (you can expect that on CL whenever you sell something anyway), but I was ok with that so long as the buyer would come to haul it away. I eventually got $65 for it which was just fine with me, especially since the guy brought a friend to help him load it onto his truck. My bedroom looks more like an actual bedroom now, instead of a storage locker.

I'm still a little sad. I've had that thing for all but 3 months of my time in Pittsburgh and as stupid as it sounds, it was like having a good friend move away. I'll miss it. I'll still be able to exercise with Bellefield Hall being so close and in all truthfullness I hadn't used the Soloflex at all in 2 years. Still, the Soloflex came into my life during a more innocent and optimistic time. Not having it around anymore just makes the difference between myself then and now all the more striking.

But at least I found a good home for it.

Hot dogs

So I was in the Aldi on McKnight road this morning. I'm not entirely sure how MUCH cheaper it is buying stuff there versus Giant Eagle. Things are always cheaper but given that you can't use a credit card to pay in addition to the limited (actually there aren't any) brand choices, is it worth it? At least at Target you get the name brand choices in addition to the Dharma Initiative/Market Pantry branded stuff. I went to Target after Aldi to get some vanilla extract. One ounce of McCormick's was $2.79. A two ounce bottle of Market Pantry vanilla extract was $2.99. No brainer on that one.

The Aldi branded hot dogs caught my attention. It was something like $0.59 for a pack of 8. Hmm, pretty cheap. Then I looked at the nutrition information label. 110 calories, 90 calories from fat. I know that's not really a surprise for hot dogs-- I don't blame Aldi for making a standard issue hot dog. But 90/110 calories from fat?? So there's only 20 calories per hot dog coming from carbs and protein? Think about it.

So anyway, shopping at Aldi... Bananas were $0.45 per lb; Giant Eagle-- $0.49 per lb. That's about a 9% savings, so on that basis that's pretty good. The way food prices have skyrocketed in the wake of increased transportation costs due to $4/gallon gasoline, I'll take any savings I can get.

Better late than never (I hope)

I'm too old for this (blogging, that is).

Or so I thought. It occurs to me that if I really want to be a writer, I'm going to have to start writing something creative on a regular basis. And since screenplays and fiction are giving me trouble-- why not something like a blog? I can do it at home, over lunch at work, maybe even once I get an Ipod Touch I'll do it on the run in airports or the library. At the least it'll let me find my voice. Besides, other people's blogs (down with OPB, yeah you know me) have been a real help to me in the past. For example, I just got a HDHomeRun QAM tuner for my Vista Media Center computer that I use as a DVR (I'm getting ready to record all of the good fall network TV shows so I can timeshift and watch them in HD at my leisure). I was having trouble getting it to work until I came across a blog where the blogger put some really easy to follow steps in place (much clearer than the manufacturer directions) and bingo-- I was up and running. This blog probably won't be as helpful to others as that, but you never know.

So anyway, I'll be rambling about whatever I feel like at the time. This definitely won't be a big personal "what did I do today?" thing. My life is not nearly interesting enough to support that and I wouldn't want to write anything that'll get people mad at me or fired from work. It'll more likely be a place to vent my spleen and sort through some thoughts. I imagine that poker, the Penguins, Steelers, comic books, movies, game theory, tv shows, and books will be the main subjects. We'll just have to see how it goes.

So as I was saying, once I got Vista Media Center working with the HDHR recording HD content on the QAM signal, I had less use for one of my Tivo Series 2 units (I have two of them) that don't record in HD. At one point I had two Series 2 Tivos, two ReplayTV showstoppers, the Comcast Motorola HD DVR (dual tuners!), and the Vista MC/HDHR machine that can record 2 HD shows at once plus a standard NTSC tuner. So if there were 9 television shows that I want to watch and they are all at the same time, I can record and watch all of them at a later time. Well, that doesn't happen and HD is soooooo much better than standard def that I find that I don't find myself using the Tivos or ReplayTV's much. I can now record 4 HD shows at once thanks to the Comcast box and the HDHR. Plus with the coming digital change-over, analog tuners (such as the tuner built in to the Tivo Series 2) won't be of any use much longer. Yes, cable companies will still transmit some analog channels to homes after the 2/09 switch date but that may not last long. I read somewhere that they're mandated to do so for three years. After that they could go all digital and once they do, Tivo Series 2 boxes will be almost useless. I might as well get something for it while I can. I'll recount my ebay story later. I just wonder if I should sell the other Tivo. I still have the two ReplayTV's to record stuff as a backup (more on THIS later) and the chances of selling them for anything worthwhile are slim (ReplayTV just never got popular with Tivo taking most marketshare and word of mouth. Nobody cares to buy old ReplayTV's even though they work just fine). But for now I can relax safe in the knowledge that on Mondays this fall I'll be able to record Chuck, Terminator: TSC, and How I Met Your Mother/The Big Bang Theory at 8-9pm all in glorious HD to watch later. And that's all that matters.