thebitterguy: (Iron Man)
That's my problem, you see. I'm unfamiliar with the canon.

I don't know about the back history of this thing, whether this thing is Tolkien's Middle Earth, Fleming's James Bond, or Doyle's Holmes. So if I see a media iteration, I'll assume that's it. Even if I know there's gaping bloody holes in it, I'm fine as long as that's behind the scenes (or at least out of my eyesight).*

I'm usually not familiar with the genre (any genre), even if I love it. No, seriously, I'm a huge fan of Godzilla and other Kaiju, but the US Remake makes up an unacceptable percentage of my viewing history. Most of my knowledge comes from a magazine article that included an illustration of Big G done by John Severin (IIRC). I love the concept of giant monsters, and remember enough that I know that any Godzilla movie with a baby Godzilla is likely to suck. But I don't know the canon.

I'm married to a Trekkie, but my exposure was mostly through CKWS' Saturday afternoon broadcasts which, and I am serious, seemed to consist almost entirely of reruns of Devil in the Dark**. I read a scattering of the novels (which tended to be about the quality of... Well, Star Trek novels). My first consistent exposure to the franchise was TNG, which I still recognized as being off.

Dr. Who? Look, that just scares me. The Canon on that sucker consists of 40 years of TV, much of it only preserved by monastic scribes while society fell around them.

Marvel Comics of the '80s? Sure, I am familiar with that Canon. Champions? I'm familiar with that Canon, mostly by luck. D&D? Canonical by assimilation. Star Wars? Religiously, up until Zahn's atrocious trilogy, which was easy enough (he said sardonically, drinking a hot chocolate while his lightsaber opened with a snap hiss). But then I schismed.

But mostly? I'm not familiar with the Canon.

That's freeing. I can look at something and not go "But that isn't right". I can judge things on their own merits, as much as I'm able to. Experiencing without the depth of history is a valid experience, just as much as approaching it with a bibliographic knowledge of which side of the aluminum foil was used for the Cybermen costume in which specific episode.

So I don't mind that I am unfamiliar with the canon.

* I suspect this is the same reason people can enjoy the LXG film.

** To this day I cannot recall having seen City on the Edge of Forever in full. Or Amok Time. I'm pretty sure I saw the Gangster one. And the Nazi one. And the Jesus one. And the one with the rabbit and Kirk getting beat up by a drunken Irishman.
thebitterguy: (Default)
For some reason I've never read a Christopher Moore book. I've had lots of friends recommend them to me; as a guy who's fond of absurdist reads, it seems like a good fit.

This weekend, when we were visiting with some friends in Waterloo to watch the new Futurama movie (report: More cohesive than Bender's Game, funnier than Beast with a Billion Backs & Bender's Big Score), Valerie introduced me to Moore's Christmas novel over R4TG. Since I found it amusing, she agreed to lend me a copy, but warned me that it was very referential to his previous books. So I borrowed this one.

Practical Demonkeeping is about a small California tourist town which gets visited by a demon and his master, who are being pursued by the king of the Djinn under orders from King Solomon. They get involved with the various townsfolk, who include a down and out wedding photographer, his soon to be ex-wife, the laconic owner of the local general store/bait shop, and a restauranteur who bears no small resemblance to an obscure early 20th century fantasy writer.

It's everything that was promised, which includes being funny and a pretty quick read. Valerie had told me that I would finish it in an afternoon, and if it were possible for me to get an uninterrupted afternoon I'm sure I could put that to the test.

Thankfully, I have a couple more of his books that [livejournal.com profile] redeem147 has loaned me in the past, so I'll be able to dig deeper into his oeuvre. She also loaned me the Christmas book, which
thebitterguy: (Comic Book Guy)
Well, Abe Vigoda's still alive as of half an hour ago, but Starlog is no more.

Starlog was one of my favourite periodicals in my youth. It, along with Ah! Caramelo!s were two things I always sought out at the corner shop where we'd wait for the feeder bus to take us home. It brought me constant joy to read Starlog, reading about books and tv shows and movies and comics (and occasional games).

There were always interesting articles to be found, too. They'd print interviews with scriptwriters and FX people in addition to performers and directors. They even published, with disturbing regularity, episode guides for all your favourite shows. I remember they did a Trek one written in character. Scotty had one that went "I dinnae remember a thing, Captain, I was droonk".

Good times. I haven't picked up an issue in decades (and that could, of course, explain much) , but I still have fond memories of it.
thebitterguy: (Default)
Just out of curiosity, you see. Plus, I've got polls, might as well use 'em.

[Poll #1360259]
thebitterguy: (Default)
Since Cynra is a fan of Cats (Shut up I love her) I decided that I'd get her a copy of Elliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats for our anniversary. And a copy of Dr. Horrible.

So I find a very nice copy of the book and order it on Amazon. I've got it in my shopping cart, where it's been for a while, and I go to finalize the order tonight.

Only now, it's sold out. Feh.

I'll have to look for another one, I guess. Chapters doesn't seem to have the same edition.
thebitterguy: (Default)
[Error: unknown template qotd]

Oh, yeah. And that motherfucker [livejournal.com profile] heraclitus fucked up the ending of Half Blood Prince for me.

He will burn.
thebitterguy: (Default)
So I went book shopping with Cynra on Saturday in order to validate our parking (If you buy $25 of books you save $8 on parking. To some people, that might not make sense), and I picked up a book of essays by Ray Bradbury and Blood and Iron by Elizabeth Bear.

Bear's name gets bandied (I love that word, btw. Bandied, bandied, bandied) about during discussions of new genre authors, so I thought I'd get something of hers. I consider this a noble action on my part since Hammered, one of her SF books (about a Canadian, even!) just didn't get my crank turning. I left it to read a cheesy TSR paperback, although I never finished F.R.E.E.Lancers either.

The strange bit was I had a great deal of difficulty figuring out which book to buy. The Promethean Age books seemed interesting (covering urban fantasy in modern and Elizabethan times) but I could not for the life of me figure out which one to buy first. When I was a kid, books in series had numbers on them! And they let us keep track of which one was which! And we LIKED it!

I also remembered that I'd gotten a short story compilation of hers when I was out East for Thanksgiving too. So I'll make my way to that when I finish this one.
thebitterguy: (Iron Man)
So, I finished Carrie Fisher's Wishful Drinking last night.

I was expecting a harrowing tale of addiction, maybe about how her coke habit and her film-making collided. Some stuff on her marriage (specifically to Paul Simon) and a bit on her diagnosis with Bipolar and her treatment.

You... You KIND of get that.

The problem with this book is.. Wow, there ain't much here. It's 156 pages. That's a short book. It features generous use of fonts and margins. Look, I figured out that trick in high school. The best part of it is the cover. But if you're reading it for stuff about Star Wars, you'll be dissapointed.

Fisher has a great way with words. I loved reading her telling of her parents marriage and its breakup. I can't get enough talk about Eddie Fisher's penis. And the stuff about going to New York to work in a broadway show with her mum is good.

But if someone is selling "how I was drugged out of my skull while making some small independant movies in the late '70s/early '80s you might have seen", they should give us more than just a reiteration of George Lucas' directing style ("Faster! More intense!") and adventures in being an action figure/PEZ dispenser.

If the combination of drug abuse and ECT therapy have rendered her unable to remember the period (a defense she offers up herself in the early parts of the book), that's something I'd like to hear more about.

That's just my fanboyism being a dick, I guess. What there is of the book does an ok job covering her life so far, and I'm glad to know which Paul Simon songs refer to her (Graceland, Allergies and Hearts and Bones).

Fisher is very, very funny. The bit about waking up in bed with a gay, drug using Republican? Who among us, right? I wish now she'd done a Q&A at FanExpo last year, or that her stage show had come to town.

In the end, yeah, I'm glad to have gotten this through the MPL, but it was an enjoyable read for a distracted evening.

*I present a link to pics of Carrie Fisher from when she was making Empire to make up for the omission.
thebitterguy: (bith)
"Han's dick? This big"


So, today I got Wishful Drinking, Carrie Fisher's first non-fiction work of memoir. It seems to be kinda big print and wide margins, so I'm glad I got it out of the library.

Anyway, it appears she's taken the show on the road, so that might make for an interesting night out. Apparently shows will soon be announced on her website, and she'll be blogging on there as well.

I did not know that she'd gotten ECT. Interesting. I had a friend who had discussed getting that as well once.
thebitterguy: (Default)
Excited about game tonight. We've been on hiatus for a month now, so getting back into the game will be fun. We're going for "rescue mission, pt 2"

The Annihilation:Conquest HCs are heavy tomes. Physically heavy. I got Nova: Knowhere this week, so I decided to give them a readthrough again, and whoa, that ain't easy. I'll need some time alone on the couch to get through those.

I got Knowhere with a Chapters GC, and also got a D&D book (Manual of the Planes 4E) and a book on the Canadian Newspaper Wars by one of my old Journalism school teachers.

Only $5. I feel kinda bad about that.

What I've mostly been reading have been books on the iPhone, though. I have done 1984 and Little Brother so far, and have started A Princess of Mars.
thebitterguy: (Default)
SF author Michael Crichton has died.

Although he was easy to disagree with recently, he was partially responsible for giving us the greatest onscreen dinosaurs ever.
thebitterguy: (Default)
Anyone out there read House of Leaves? After a recent RPG.net thread inspired by a recent XKCD, I'm interested in the book, but I'd like to get some verification as to what people think of it.
thebitterguy: (Default)
Finished Old Man's War yesterday. Enjoyable story, although it's a good thing he pretty much acknowledges the bits that were "Starship Troopers with new paint".

I'm glad to see that I was not the only one who found Bender a bit troublesome, though. Apparently I missed that whole thing a couple years ago.

I totally called the sex bits, though. And I knew the Ghost Brigades had significance, because it was capitalized.

Not dead

Jun. 18th, 2008 10:42 pm
thebitterguy: (Default)
Quick summaries: Reading Old Man's War at work. Good book. I totally called a few thingies.

Saw Incredible Hulk tonight. Enjoyable little film. Didn't work as well as Iron Man, but the final fight was better.

Got the final Y trade today. Fucker of an ending, there.

Not dead. Blocked at work. Feh.

----------------
Now playing: Jill Sobule - I Kissed a Girl
http://foxytunes.com/artist/jill+sobule/track/i+kissed+a+girl
thebitterguy: (Kingston in the summer)
You know, for some reason, I'm curious about visiting Kentucky, if only to see if the chicken is really that good. Plus, I'm sure they have many interesting attractions.

I've been reading Achtung Schwinehund! over the past few days. It came in the same day as the 4E PH, and I think I had it recommended by [livejournal.com profile] muskrat_john a few weeks/months/years back. It is a more interesting read, but that's just because it would be a very bad book if it was a less interesting read than most RPG rulebooks.

Stop crying. You know I'm right.

It's subtitles "A Boy's Own Story of Imaginary Combat" and is the tale of the author's youthful (and grownup) affections for toy soldiers, action figures, and other things that a lot of people reading this will recall with much fondness.

There's one passage on page 100 that, well, might ruffle a few feathers among the readers at home. So I shall post it in full for your enjoyment.

He starts off that section by talking about how much he hates Games Workshop (and, who among us?). He then proceeds to step a little over a certain line, even for a 'humour' writer.

To my mind, three men are responsible more than any others for the creation of this perversion of the hobby: J.R.R. Tolkien, creator of Middle Earth, Robert E. Howard, creator of Hyboria (which was kind of Middle Earth with breast) and E. Gary Gygax, the mild-mannered Canadian (sic) inventor of Dungeons and Dragons. 'All three of them should be put up against a wall and shot,' I said to TK while I was feeling particularly aggreived at World of Warcraft's continued encroachment into our territory. he raised an eyebrow. 'I think you're getting a bit carried away there, mate,' he said.

'Are you sure?' I said.

'Oh yes,' TK said. 'I mean, two of them are already dead. It would be a waste of bullets.'


Ouch. Zing, as it were (and now doubly factually incorrect). I was going to do a poll asking what kind of polearm [livejournal.com profile] maliszew would use to dispatch them (my money was on the Glaive Guisarme, or possibly Lucerne Hammer), but that was kinda childish too. Later on, he does say

But it is hard to maintain the moral high ground when you have just bought three hundred Garrison 20mm Macedonian phalangites from a man named Alistair in Auckland, New Zealand.


Overall, though, it's a good read. Paul in the Thursday Nighters is gonna borrow it when I'm done.

Good weekend at ACB. Uday & I did some more geocaching, and after two frustrating sessions we finally managed to find one.

The first one was called on account of "where the hell is that thing?", the second on account of gooseshit.

The third one was right in the middle of a parking lot. No, really, right smack dab in the middle of a parking lot. Very cleverly concealed.

Much BBQ was eaten, and I visited the Kingston Gaming Nexus and met up with the Sunday guy. Turns out he's going for a UD Tournament ranking, so maybe he will solve one of my problems.

Bought some Star Wars minis, and they're kinda pricy down in K-Town.
thebitterguy: (Default)
When I was visiting [livejournal.com profile] uniquecrash5 for Cheese Weasel day he loaned me a copy of Altered Carbon, a noir SF novel about body swapping, dysfunctional marriages and functional immortality.

The story follows an ex UN Envoy (i.e. shock trooper), Takeshi Kovacs, as he gets involved in investigating a suicide.

Of course, in this setting, the human consciousness can be backed up, so he's hired to investigate the suicide by the perpetrator/victim.

It's an interesting book. The narrator/protagonist comes across as just a little too competent, and the plot gets a bit too convoluted, but overall it's enjoyable if you're willing to invest into the story. And flip back a few times.

There were enough references to previously undisclosed facts that I kept wondering if this might be the second or third book in a series, but it is indeed the first. The story is definitely hard-boiled, with pheromone spewing femme fatales and cybered up mob torpedoes threatening our hero at every opportunity.

It does make me want to go back to the Chandler & Hammett books I have from my university English courses.

Oddly enough, I don't think it ever explains what the title alludes to, even though it mentions it on several occasions.
thebitterguy: (Default)


So, surfing Wikipedia I decide to look at Claudia Christian's entry to see if it has any interesting or useful info on her (answer: no).

It does mention that she has published an autobiography, My Life with Geeks and Freaks (oooh, classy!) which can be found at http://www.yarddogpress.com/mylife.htm.

Oh, wait. 404? That's not good. (Google Cache!)

Going over to Amazon does prove the book does exist.

Apparently, the book is a big hit with other Green Room survivors:

Review
Having had the pleasure of performing improv comedy with Claudia on stages around the world, it is even a bigger pleasure that she can make me laugh even more with her written word! High-larious! --Dean Haglund

Review
Pee your pants funny --Denise Crosby


But, seriously, 72 pages? Is there a digit missing there, or is the text really small, or should she have hired a better ghost writer?

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