General, Uncategorized

I Assure You They're Open

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Jen and Joe are doing something pretty cool at their house later this summer– they’re having Justin Roth over for a house concert. I’ve been thinking that they have a nice venue for such a show pretty much… well, since they moved in there.

In my experience, house concerts are the most fun when you have people who really enjoy the artist there for the show. I went with the Kiefers once to see Chris Cunningham (of Storyhill) all the way over in Lodi. And cool as our friends and family may be, they’re not all necessarily hip to the Roth-jive. I encouraged Jen & Joe to offer to make the show open to the public, just because they would most assuredly draw some extra bodies that way. They agreed.

So despite what Justin’s current schedule might indicate for Friday, June 20, let me be clear on this point– ALL ARE WELCOME, but reservations ARE REQUIRED. You can contact Jen for that– jenjedi at soloshootsfirst dot com. I am going to try to spin some Justin tracks more often on the last.fm stream as we lead up to the show… He’s also got a MySpace page if you’re into that sort of thing. And some video on YouTube:

General, Uncategorized

In a Haze

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Had a rough weekend, as I started to get sick late in the afternoon on Friday, and basically didn’t get out of bed on Saturday.  By mid-day on Sunday, I was feeling a lot better, but I’m still pretty congested and I’m working through a murky, medicine-induced fog.

The positive thing is that I’m getting all sorts of work done today.  I have to think it’s because my brain is more or less zoned out, and just functioning enough to keep my bodily functions up and running.  Maybe a frontal lobotomy is the solution to the probs I’ve had with getting motivated around here…

The Singularity, Uncategorized

Machines Knows Science

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From today’s Tech wire, “Mechanical Squirrels, Robot Lizards Jump Into Research“– here’s my fave excerpt:

Sarah Partan, an assistant professor in animal behavior at Hampshire, hopes that by capturing a close-up view of squirrels in nature, Rocky will help her team decode squirrels’ communication techniques, social cues and survival instincts.

And in related fictional news, it appears that the Cylons have been among us from the beginning, apparently for the exact same reasons.

General, lists, The Singularity, Uncategorized

Some Notes for Thursday

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Couple random items from around the web for you this morning:

First, a short Obama ad about a summertime reprieve from the gas tax, with a good point:

Second, I do enjoy lists. New Scientist offers a list of the Top Ten Fictional Scientists in popular culture.

Finally, it’s exciting that Kyle and Robin will be headed to Thailand next month to pick up Thanu, but I’m a little conflicted on their plans for conditioning him to accept the reality of the coming robot menace. I guess it will be up to MY children to lead the resistance.
Thanu's robot overlords
And a PS, not from the webs, but from the real world– today is Grandma’s birthday. She is 77!

Hollywood, Uncategorized

Four Three Four Stars

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Finished watching the first season of Jericho on DVD yesterday. I have now ventured back to the CBS website and found out that I have 7 ep’s to go before they call it a series. I started out really enjoying the show, then I felt like it hit a lull and lost direction mid-year, before (sort of) picking it back up again down the stretch.

If I were making a critical assessment strictly from a content standpoint, I would have downgraded it to three stars– I thought it was enjoyable, but I have a feeling I might’ve given up on it if I were watching week-to-week.  For one thing, there were some significant continuity problems, and second, the method used to turn an apparent “bad guy” into a “good guy” was pretty sloppy and poorly executed.  There was also a tendency to dwell on certain plot points and present NEARLY EVERY FRACKING CHARACTER’S VIEWPOINT of a set of circumstances before moving forward.  Even as I sit here and consider the continuity issues… they become more numerous. That was a major thing as the season wore on.

However, I still think that the show played well on an allegorical level– I feel that, overall, the series (at least as much of it as I’ve seen, which is most) did a good job of interpreting a harrowing, 3rd-World-type disaster into English.  I found myself appreciating the sense of isolation and lawlessness that I could only imagine would exist anywhere when a small group of people are suddenly and violently cut off from the rest of the world.

The over-arching problems that the characters faced, and the troubles that they had to deal with rang true to me, even if the way that those problems were handled didn’t always do as well.  I did find it distracting at times when they would run too long on tangents pertaining to conspiracies or characters’ back stories– Jericho wasn’t LOST or 24, but it tried to be both at different times.  Maybe that was part of the problem, and why they were whacked after 22 29 episodes– the show was definitely at its best when it told the story of a fractured society that was torn from its comfort zone and had to reinvent a whole new way of life.  As a tale of human ingenuity and perseverance, Jericho works.  As an action/mystery serial, not so much.

General, Uncategorized

Standards

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Picked up this link from the AP tech wire: Electronics makers to create home networking standard

I’m totally shooting from the hip here, but my first thought was “well, duh.”  But to be honest, I’m a little surprised that A) people aren’t more annoyed yet that bringing any new device into your home requires the stringing, plugging, and inevitable tangling of MORE FRACKING WIRES, and B) principle to this discussion by “electronics makers” is not necessarily the development of a full-duplex wireless communication standard for all this stuff to start talking to each other.

I know that bluetooth is sort of supposed to be that solution, but last time I checked, a scenario whereby your plug in your TV, and set your stereo receiver and your PlayStation 4 right next to it, and surround the room with your 7.1 DTS speakers and everything would just WORK, without being wired together, was a bit out of the realm of possibility for this technology as it currently exists.

Ah, well.  Sometimes I forget that living in the Future still means that there’s a future of the Future.

The Singularity, Uncategorized

Destroying The Machines May Only Slow Them Down

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David L. Schrubbe, a valued colleague and fellow sentry on watch for The Singularity, sent this link for video evidence of a robot capable of reassembling itself when destroyed. Imagine how pissed that robot would be if you gave it a gun.

Hollywood, Uncategorized

On the Topic of Summer Movies

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Yeah, so thinking about a new ‘X’ prompted me to check out the balance of the summer schedule. This is shaping up to be a very geeky summer at the movies for me…

May 2 – Iron Man. I know, we’ve been very disappointed by the non-Spidey-or-X-Men offerings coming out of Marvel in the past, but I’m willing to give this one a shot. I was never even into Iron Man as a character, but I have enjoyed Robert Downey Jr. and Jon Favreau in the past, so…

May 16 — Prince Caspian. I wouldn’t characterize The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe as a picture that I didn’t enjoy, but frankly, trying to be The Lord of the Rings all over again is a bad move, and really tough to live up to. When I read the Chronicles of Narnia as a kid, I think this was my favorite of those books, so I’m looking forward to seeing it on the big screen.

May 23 — Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Are you frackin kidding me? Indy 4, ’nuff said. Geeks have not anticipated a movie this much since 1999. We’re just hoping for a better outcome. Lucas didn’t direct, so that’s a start.

June 13 — The Incredible Hulk. I know, I know… just see notes on Iron Man above, replace Downey Jr. and Favreau with Ed Norton. Also see trailer.

July 18 — The Dark Knight. Here’s one to get seriously, legitimately (and mainstream-ed-ly) ramped up about. My expectations are extremely high. They were also really high for Batman Begins, and that delivered.

July 25 — The X-Files: I Want to Believe. As I’ve recently stated in other forums, “I have to believe this will be better than the series finale. Which was ass.”

Six movies is more than I’ve seen in one summer for a while. The bummer part is that out of all of them, I expect Michelle to be interested in roughly 0% of them. Reckon that’ll leave me dateless for most of my movie viewing this summer… but isn’t that sort of what being a geek is all about?

Hollywood, Uncategorized

News to Me

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Sometimes, all those random, bizarre emails that I get from Justin, et al. are actually worth something.  I found out about this, which had COMPLETELY evaded my radar.

If I’m not mistaken, the discussion of an X-Files sequel started somewhere around 122 minutes after the premiere of the first film.  For a variety of reasons, it took some time for it to come to fruition.  But the simple fact that it’s now about 12 weeks from opening and this is the first evidence I’ve seen of an actual movie being produced…  Well, that just speaks to how out of touch I’ve become with Hollywood.

I’ll add it to my list of stuff to check out this summer, though.  And speaking of checking things out–if you hurry, you might get to watch this before the YouTube Police take it down.

Want to Believe?

firing from the hip since 2002