Idle Ramblings: 01/01/2004

Warping to a new time slot
For those of you that actually get UPN, Enterprise is moving.

WARNING!!! CYBERATTACK!!!
This isn't nearly as cool as the headline makes it sound. I was expecting a warning system for Cylon attacks or invasion by Cybermen or the Borg.

Super Apple II
First there was the G5 Supercomputer, next, we'll have the G5 Xserve Supercomputer.

Startling realization
This just came to me earlier today. I'm a mild mannerd journalist working at a newspaper and I now wear glasses. Therefore, I must actually be a super hero and this is my secret identity. I kind of wonder what super hero I am?

Oh, and don't reveal my secret identity, please.

Personal Note
Since I doubt Rebecca will be updating her blog anytime soon, I just thought I'd let ya'll know that she was hired as a research assistant by one of her law school professors this past week. I think she's helping him research the portrayal of attornies in Indian cinema or something like that. She's also working with the professor on a paper she's doing comparing modern defense of marriage laws and laws against same sex marriages to laws against interracial marriage. Needless to say, she's being kept pretty busy.

She also just had Airport installed in her PowerBook and said it's great to be able to sit in the Grove and surf the Internet.

Late night discovery
I discoverd, quite by accident, that you can drag a track from your iTunes into GarageBand and it will convert it into another track on your composition. That could be cool for making mix tracks for a party or adding in loops from other songs. This little tidbit ay have been in the instructions, but reading the instructions first before playing with the software is for wusses.

No sleep Data...
I read an article today, actually yesterday since it's well past 1 a.m. and I have spent the last 8 hours playing with Garage band, that sleep is supposed to help one's creativity. Oh, the irony.

BTW, I've made it my mission in life to make the ultimate 80s song using just the prerecorded loops in Garage Band. Then I'm going to make the ultimate 80s movie about a nerdy alien who falls in love with the most beautiful girl at his high school, but as luck would have it, the Russians invade just as he gets his classic 1950s car repaired and he has to take the car back in time to save the girl of his dreams from an evil Russian ski instructor. There's a training montage and he beats the ski instructor but in the end he actually falls in love with the girl who has been his his best friend, who is disguised as a man, but comes clean to him when they have to serve Saturday detention on her 16th birthday.

If they made prerecorded loops for iMovie, I could probably put this movie together, like totally in a day.

Biiiiiig Mistake!
I should have never gotten garageband, cause now I have to figure out a way to quit my job and sit around playing with it 24 hours a day...and my midi keyboard hasn't even gotten in yet. But finally I can do something with my guitars other than just annoy the cats.

This has got to be one of the coolest things Apple has come out with since the iPod.

Platinum selling album, here I come.

Making music
I'm anxiously awaiting delivery of Garage Band. Will give you all a rundown on it and the other stuff in the iLife suite once I get into it.

Blog fodder from David and Lane
Thanks from David and Lane for providing the newest link on my blog to the campaign site for presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche. For those of you wanting to go to Mars, just remember, Larouche campaigned on it long before the Bushes.

Bagpipes: The Revenge
I managed to get a sound out of the bagpipes last night without getting too dizzy, so I'll call that one a draw.

Professional praise
I'm pleased to announce I received a note of praise in a city meeting last night from one of my newspaper's loyal readers who said I was going to be lashed for eternity in Hell by the fiery whip of Satan because of a letter to the editor which ran in the paper.

I must be doing pretty good if I'm worth Satan's personal attention for all of eternity.

The power of the "F" word
It still amazes me how scared we, as a society, are of the word "fuck." I wonder if other curse words are jelous because all of the attention given to the word "fuck." It seems like there's little else that will evoke a respose like the old "F-dash-dash-dash." It's almost like if the word is uttered in public, on the airwaves or appears in print frogs will begin raining from the fucking sky, peoples fucking ears will start bleeding and the whole fucking world will come to an end. Fuck!

BTW, if anyone has a copy of my dirty words column from the DM let me know. I'd like to get a copy of it. I don't even remember exactly when it ran. If you know that, that'd be great too.

Infinite Divirsity
Carol Moseley Braun, who today dropped out of the presidential race to back Go. Howard Dean, appeared on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart last night, where, she alluded to the fact that she might be a Star Trek fan and familiar with other works of science fiction by presenting the Vulcan salute and saying "Live long and prosper" and also by, later, quoting a line from Dune.

It will be interesting to see which presidential candidate will now court the all-powerful Trekkie vote.

Of personal interest
I came across my bagpipes last night while cleaning some in my storage room. I have decided to make yet another attempt to learn to play them. After last night, the score for those of you keeping track at home is:
Bagpipes - 1
Joe - 0

My Favorite Martians
Because of all of the stuff going on with Mars lately, I thought I'd compile a list of my favorite characters from the Rust-colored Planet:

10. The Martians from Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. There is apparantly a 2002 version penned by Ben Edlund, but IMDB doesn't have any details.

9. The Martians from Mars Attacks! which, for my money, is the best science fiction comedy based on a set of trading cards from the 1960s.

8. O.J. Simpson from Capricorn One.

7. The silicon invaders from Bad Girls from Mars, a really terrible softcore porn sci-fi spoof.

6. The Martians who built the pyramids and faces on Mars. (On a related note, I'm interested to see what this might be.)

5. The human residents of Mars in Asimov's The Martian Way. (One of his best short stories.)

4. John Carter (technically an Earthman), Dejah Thoris and Tars Tarkas from the John Carter of Mars series. Otherwise known as the Naked People Running Around Mars with Swords series.

3. The Martians from The Ward of the Worlds.

2. Valentine Michael Smith from Stranger in a Strange Land.

1. The Martians from The Martian Chronicles. Not so much the TV miniseries, more from the book, though the masks from the miniseries were kind of cool.

Mr. Voldemort?
Alas, it seems that the rumors that Rowan Atkinson would be Voldemort in the next Harry Potter movie are untrue. It's a shame. He would have been great.

Twins?
It turns out that our sun has a twin. If this is truly a twin, does it have the parallel Earth ruled by children after their parents died from a disease, the parallel Earth where Rome never fell or the parallel Earth where the Yangs and the Comms are still at war?

Idle Ramblings

Wednesday, January 28, 2004

Friday, January 23, 2004

Thursday, January 22, 2004

Friday, January 16, 2004

Thursday, January 15, 2004

Wednesday, January 07, 2004

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