To me! My X-Men! Pip Pip!
Mar 7th
Yes, this is a steampunk version of Professor Charles Xavier’s wheelchair.
And if you don’t know what most of the words in that last sentence mean, I pity you your lack of nerd.
Stop picking at it
Mar 6th
I like to pick at the wordpress theme from time to time.
This one (called “Mystique” of all things) is quite nice. Though the built in widget for twitter was simply broken to the core and the flickr widget wanted my soul and blood type just to read an open photostream. But otherwise, it’s clean and simple. Notice in the upper right hand corner two little bumpy things that stand in for twitter and RSS. Clever bit of business that.
I’m always looking for the idea theme. I mean, my dream of a site looks like this though obviously less about the inimitable Mr. Fry and more about the inevitable Mr. Farrelly, of course.
But until I’m a 1/10th as accomplished as that lovely British polyglot, I’m quite happy with my “Mystique”.
The Guardians
Mar 5th
The Guardians of Ga’hoole is a great series of YA books by Kathryn Lasky. The main characters are Owls.
Yes, owls.
I’ve always been kind of in awe of owls. They’re very frightening animals actually. Circling for hours on updrafts, their eyes evolved to such a point as to be able to see the tiniest flicker of movement on the ground. Their razor sharp talons, rock-breaking beaks and speed, oh goodness, their speed.
Guardians of Ga’hoole is a post-human story. Seems humanity has shuffled off leaving a world of raw nature. This is backdrop to the story, but it’s vital since it avoids the trite “Man vs Nature” flummery you so often get in animal stories.
Zach Snyder (“300″ and…”Watchmen”) is adapting the books (some of them, there are 15 plus some spin-offs) into a movie and it looks really good. The stories are filled with daring-do, legends, and the epic sense of adventure. Kids need more adventure stories. Comedies are great, but some peril, some dashing, that’s a fine thing.
It also looks GORGEOUS. The photo-realism of CGI is almost terrifying at this point. In a good way.
100 Stories for Haiti
Mar 4th
I contributed a short story to the “100 Stories for Haiti” book, an amazing effort put together by author Greg McQueen to benefit relief efforts in haiti.
I wrote “An Island’s Story” which is a bit of a mystery story about stories and surviving and how one helps the other. Inspired by the oral tradition of Haitian culture, which has adapted and incorporated religions, musics and movements for centuries. Hope that doesn’t sound like a bunch of flummery.
The book runs 10 pounds (that’s about 15 in Yankee currency) and is available as an e-book and paperback.
Please pass this link on, as it’s a relief effort that’s using stories to help people that sprung up on twitter and via social media. It’s a crowd-sourced solution to an awful situation and very much worth supporting. Especially as Haiti’s struggles slide from the front page.
Sunday Screed: Youth and Taste
Feb 28th
All right, when I was a kid, I had very bizarre taste in music.
When I was five, my FAVORITE song in the world? Why it was the theme to “The Greatest American Hero” also known as “Believe It or Not”
For YEARS I would dance around the house in a cape (blanket) to this. Also the 1960’s “Batman” theme.
I should note that I still think “The Greatest American Hero” would make a fantastic tv show and that Adam West is the single greatest Batman. Pure…West.
Outside of television theme songs, my tastes ran to Annie Lennox and the Eurythmics.
I think that my long-standing penchant for women in suits (hello Rachel Maddow) comes from Annie’s wonderful get-up in that video. I don’t know what’s going on with the cow.
And what Irish childhood would be complete without the Clancy Brothers. “The Irish Rover” is a lovely, carousing drinking song. The sort of thing my mom cousins would sing when the evening was a little late and the small beer had been drunk just a little deep. Years later I’d discover “The Pogues” version, which is lovely. I’d also date an Irish musician (who was not Irish nor very lovely in the long run) who did a fine job of putting me off most Irish music for years. Only now, in my dotage, am I starting to appreciate the warmth of it all again. It’s pure nostalgia, as dangerous a drug as any, but inviting all the same.
Yes, I wrote this for Elise, who I’m sure thinks I sound adorable as a wee tot bopping to the tunes.
Arctic Life
Feb 28th
Vice Magazine has been putting out amazing documentaries for a while now on the VBS.tv site. Their tours of North Korea and the hell on earth that is Liberia are gut-punches. Better than anything you’ll see in film docs these days. I warn you, both of those videos are worth watching, but brace yourself, it’s not easy to see child soldiers on heroin or a whole nation locked in desperate 1950’s communist poverty.
This one kind of blew my mind, in less horrifying way. It’s a week in the life of the only family living in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. That’s the place Sarah Palin wants to “Drill Baby Drill”. A beautiful, stark landscape.
It’s about an hour long, and theres some rough bits with a bear and animals being trapped and skinned for fur. But this is how this man and his family live. The way humans lived for most of history. Strong water, but worth drinking. The way the wind and the cold and the EMPTY just rings around the little cabin made of moss and trees…it’s something to see.
No, this isn’t terrifying
Feb 26th
An iceberg the size of Luxembourg has split off from the Antarctic continent and could disrupt global ocean patterns and weather systems for decades, according to scientists.
Oh and climate change isn’t real.
Dalai Lama
Feb 25th
The BBC takes a bit of an askew look at the Dalai Lama and the way he’s often seen as a catch-all icon.
Back in college the Dalai Lama ranked up there with Che Guevara and Jim Morrison in terms of being the catchy savior for politically active folks. A t-shirt messiah, someone you could talk about being in “awe” of in mixed company.
Morrison and Guevara had the benefit of being dead of course, which always adds a layer of mystique. But close scrutiny on all three men doesn’t paint the most flattering portrait. Morrison’s spiraling drug addiction and general abuse of his prodigious talents (and those around him); Guevara’s violent revolutionary efforts that did enormous damage in nations like Bolivia and the Congo.
The Dalai Lama would be the head of a theocracy, were it not for the Chinese occupation. The article points out that the Dalia Lama would have likely liberalized the nation from the serfdom it existed under well into the 1950’s, but it would be a theocracy nonetheless. Like Saudi Arabia, the Vatican or Iran.
There’s also the intellectual component of fetishizing “the other”. Many westerners, even secular folks, want a pocket messiah. They make the ousted leader of a Buddhist nation who speaks very kindly of peace and non-violence, into a sort of vessel for all their wishes. I’m not saying you should heap scorn upon the man, but putting your faith into someone based on books of platitudes and not careful reflection is a dicy thing.
Health Carelessness
Feb 25th
Nothing makes me sicker than watching the debate on health care.
The little dog and pony show this morning is a fine example. The GOP is already whining about the Democrats taking up too much time. Watching a bunch of old white dudes who spend most of their time droning on in the house and senate get snippy about not enough airtime is quite funny.
Look, here’s the problem. None of these fools, right or left, have a dog in this fight. Them and theirs are well taken care of. If one of them so much as gets a back ache they get the best medical care available, and we’re footing the bill.
John McCain warbled on today calling for the whole debate to “Start Over.” Beyond the humor of the loser from 2008 calling for a do-over, there’s the fact that John can wait til hell freezes over to enact any kind of reform. See, John’s been getting government health care since he was born. Thanks to his Navy upbringing. Then his military service gave him a lifetime of care through the VA. Mind you, he was so disabled by his torture that he’s on a nearly $60,000 a year disability (tax-free) plus his congressional and then senatorial salary. Plus all the benefits of the same.
John McCain has done very well gobbling up all that government cheese.
But if you want affordable health care, you’re a free-loader.
We need single-payer health care. No half-measures, no kinda-sortas. Ignore the tea-buggers and baggers, most of them have simply been riled up by a GOP so desperate to gain back congressional seats they’ll use the rhetoric of the John Birch Society and clowns like Glenn Beck to work up the crowd.
Note: 1 out of 3 Republicans do not appear on film.
The vast majority of these folks will be better off, paying less of their income in medical expenses and barely notice any change in their taxes. Ignore their racially-charged invective. They’re scared old baby-boomers who see just how badly things have been managed and are giving into panic.
I don’t agree with Barack Obama on everything, but he’s worked for a living, recently, and he’s had to get health care for a young family. He’s not that far removed from the middle-class struggle like Little Lord Faltonroy McCain or that creepy old gold pro John Boehner. Obama gets it and he needs to drive it home, hard.
A civilized modern nation does not make people choose between health care and poverty. A civilized modern nation does not make practicing medicine a lawsuit minefield for most physicians. If you get sick, you go get healed and go back to work. That’s where the savings happen.
"Whose up for kicking some orphans?"
Instead of losing employs to illness (either personal or in their family), having to rehire and retrain, businesses could have a stable job pool. Businesses could stop having to worry about providing benefits. Yes, that means higher taxes, but it also means a workforce that’s more mobile, responsive and not just hanging on til the dental plan kicks in. People and business both benefit, though frankly I’m more interested in people.
But look at that sad room of old men. How few women are in there. Even though women are more than half the population and suffer the worst from health care inequalities, it’s mainly men. Reading their talking points at each other. They’re not interested in reform, they’re invested in gridlock, in glib soundbytes and cheap rhetoric about “socialism”.
Health Care Reform is going to happen, the tipping point of the boomer generation’s retirement will see to that. But whether that reform is a calme restructuring of a broken system or the panicked efforts of people trapped in a house fire is what matters.