My first paper for my ENG102 class, a short summary of the second half of the first chapter in our textbook. I ended up with a 3.8/4.0, and a comment that I have “a wonderful, lucid prose style.” I can cope with that.
Desperation
Heh.
Someone just came to my site via a Google search for “oh god give me a job i need a fucking job just give me a job i want a job okay“.
As if that search string isn’t amusing enough on its own, wanna take a guess at which page they landed at? Three guesses, and the first two don’t count. ;)
“Material Girl” by K.M.F.D.M. from the album Virgin Voices: A Tribute to Madonna Vol. 1 (1999, 4:27).
Fall ’06 TV Plans
Shows that Prairie and I (either together or individually) plan on doing our best to keep up with this season (though, admittedly, our schedules will be busy enough that it may occasionally be difficult):
- Sundays:
- The Amazing Race 10 (CBS): Prairie’s been a fan of this one for a couple years now, and this is my first time actually watching it. Generally speaking, I’m no big fan of “reality” TV (most of what I’ve heard of and seen of “reality” programming has little or nothing to do with reality), but I’ve actually been enjoying this one so far. I’m a bit bummed that some of the more interesting teams were eliminated so soon (though, as some commenters have pointed out, my geopolitical placement skills leave something to be desired), and we’ve been surprised that so many teams have been eliminated so quickly — apparently there will be a few stretches later in the season where eliminations don’t come quite so fast and furious. At this point, our current favorites are Lyn and Karlyn and David and Mary.
-
Desperate Housewives (ABC): I missed the first year of broadcast (though Prairie often gleefully filled me in on some of the more outrageous moments over IM sessions before she and I moved in together) and had to catch up via DVD before season two started. Season two hooked me, and we thoroughly enjoy watching the weekly over-the-top shenanigans on Wisteria Lane (and I get to tease Prairie about being the perfect [i.e., non-psychotic] mix of Susan and Bree).
-
Mondays:
- Heroes (NBC): This one’s just me, and I’m not entirely sure I’ll stick it, but I heard just enough to make me curious (a group of ordinary people suddenly discovering not-so-ordinary abilities) and snagged the first three episodes via BitTorrent. So far I’m not entirely hooked, but it’s caught enough of my interest to keep me checking it out for bit, at least. At this point, Hiro is by far my favorite character.
- Thursdays:
- Grey’s Anatomy (ABC): Originally, I just tuned into a couple episodes to laugh at the goofy Seattle geography and then shrugged it off. However, it was in a broadcast slot just after Desperate Housewives, and Prairie and I just kept getting sucked in when we didn’t turn the TV off fast enough. A few weeks of that, and we were hooked (it’s Prairie’s “new ER“). Unfortunately, with their move to Thursday nights, when I’m often working and Prairie teaches ’til late, we’re not able to keep up with it at broadcast, so we’ve been using BitTorrent to watch it on Wednesday evenings.
- Fridays:
- The Ghost Whisperer (CBS): This one’s all Prairie’s — her “silly ghost show”. I’ve not seen any of it yet, as I tend to be at work when it’s on.
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Battlestar Galactica (Sci-Fi): I’ve babbled about it often enough that this shouldn’t surprise anyone. Still hands-down the best show around (admittedly, I pull from a very small pool, but it’s really good). Prairie and I are just about done watching Season Two on DVD (I’d already seen it via BitTorrent while it was broadcast, she waited for the DVDs to come out), and now I’m BitTorrenting Season Three as it appears (I know, I could get them legally via iTunes, but…[sigh]…the quality still just isn’t quite there). The season premiere? Oh, so very good.
So that’s the TV plan for the next few months. A lot more than I used to do, and all subject to being preempted by school, work, or other major life events…but it’s nice to have some downtime every so often.
“An American in Paris” by San Francisco Symphony Orchestra (Seiji Ozawa) from the album Panorama: George Gershwin (1977, 18:01).
About to be published…
I’ve been holding off on saying anything about this just in case something fell through, but since I got the check in the mail today, I figure it’s worth letting the cat out of the bag…
…the freakin’ New Yorker just purchased one of my photos to use in an ‘advertorial’ for the MGM Grand casino for $250!
The photo will be part of a spread in the Nov. 27th issue of the magazine.
Too cool!
“It’s De-Lovely” by Williams, Robbie from the album De-Lovely (2004, 4:40).
Not in our stars, but in ourselves.
We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof; and that conviction depends upon evidence, and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine and remember that we are not descended from fearful men. Not from men who feared to write, to associate, to speak, and to defend the causes that were, for the moment, unpopular. This is no time for men who oppose Senator McCarthy’s methods to keep silent, or for those who approve. We can deny our heritage and our history, but we cannot escape responsibility for the results. We proclaim ourselves indeed as we are, the defenders of freedom, wherever it continues to exist in the world. But we cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home. The actions of the junior Senator from Wisconsin have caused alarm and dismay amongst our allies abroad, and given considerable comfort to our enemies. And whose fault is that? Not really his, he didn’t create this situation of fear, he merely exploited it, and rather sucessfully. Cassius was right: “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.” Good night, and good luck.
— Edward R. Murrow, as portrayed by David Strathairn in George Clooney’s Good Night and Good Luck
Every time I hear this monologue, it strikes me — and I’m very sure that this was Clooney’s point — just how topical it is. How easy it would be to replace the references to Sen. McCarthy with references to President Bush and have it read just as accurately.
Eragon and Dragon Wings
I’ve not read either of Chris Paolini‘s young-adult fantasy books, Eragon or Eldest (presumably there will be a third at some point, as these are billed as being part of the ‘Inheritance Trilogy’), but I saw a trailer for a movie adaptation of the first book, to be released this Christmas season.
A couple things caught my eye in this trailer: firstly, both Jeremy Irons and John Malkovich star. So far, we’re off to a good start.
The third, though, was a decidedly unusual (in my experience) take on dragon’s wings. In general, dragon wings are presented as structurally similar to a bat’s wings: a thin flesh webbing over a skeletal framework. If there’s any variation at all, its rarely in the wings themselves, but rather in the physiology of the beast itself, with the two most popular variations being either a six-limbed creature (forelegs, rear legs, and wings as a separate set of limbs, generally just behind the forelimbs) or a more bat-like four limbed creature (with the forward set of limbs doubling as both forelegs and wings).
| Six-limbed dragon | Four-limbed dragon |
|---|---|
 |
 |
Personally, I’ve always been partial to the four-limbed variety as to my mind, even though we’re dealing with a fantastical creature, it feels more “accurate” for the universe we live in: I can’t think of any naturally occuring six-legged creatures outside of the insect realm; all mammals or reptiles I know of are zero-, two-, or four-limbed (and while it’s been years since I’ve had any sort of biology, I believe there is evidence that all such creatures are genetically four-limbed, and it’s just a matter of whether any of the limbs have evolved into not developing, as with snakes).
(As an aside — one of the strongest disappointments I had with the last Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, was the lack of any screentime for the Chinese Dragon during the first challenge in the TriWizard Tournament. While only Harry’s dragon got any ‘hero’ time, we at least saw the miniature versions of all the others, however they were all fairly traditional dragons. I was really looking forward to even a glimpse of a Chinese style dragon, but was sadly denied. Pity, that.)
The upcoming Eragon, while using the more common six-limbed physiology, uses wings of a type I’ve not seen before. Rather than the bat-wing style, they look very much like bird’s wings, complete with feather-like patterning…however, they still appear to be skinned, not feathered.
Under the cut are a few screengrabs I took from the trailer that illustrate the wing style:
Aperture
Consider this firmly on my wishlist come Christmastime: not only has Apple just upgraded Aperture to version 1.5, but Frasier Spiers has announced the first beta of an Aperture version of his excellent FlickrExport plugin (I consider the iPhoto version of FlickrExport an unconditional must-have for iPhoto/Flickr integration, along with Ken Ferry’s Keyword Assistant).
Even better, the educational pricing for Aperture is just $150 — half off the standard retail of $299.
It’s not a critical need, but it’s definitely a wishlist item. So pretty…
Cydonia redux
The European Space Agency‘s Mars Express orbiter has obtained new, high resolution images of the ever-popular Cydonian ‘face’ on Mars, putting to rest (again) the myth that there’s actually a constructed face on the surface of the red planet.
A perspective view showing the so-called ‘Face on Mars’ located in the Cydonia region. The image shows a remnant massif thought to have formed via landslides and an early form of debris apron formation. The massif is characterized by a western wall that has moved downslope as a coherent mass. The massif became famous as the ‘Face on Mars’ in a photo taken on 25 July 1976 by the American Viking 1 Orbiter.
Image recorded during orbits 3253 and 1216 by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA’s Mars Express. Image is based on data gathered over the Cydonia region, with a ground resolution of approximately 13.7 metres per pixel. Cydonia lies at approximately 40.75° North and 350.54° East.
Credits: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin (G. Neukum), MOC (Malin Space Science Systems)
This seems like as good a time as any to revisit one of my favorite silly posts from the past: Mars Needs a Facelift!
NASA has recently released photographs of the famous Cydonian face on Mars that show that one of the strongest pieces of evidence we have yet of alien intelligence is in danger of being eradicated from our Solar System.
[…]
The only question now is how is this happening? […] The only answer I can come up with is that the Face is being deliberately destroyed to hide its existence from us! This single image — released by NASA itself — does more to prove that the Government has been hiding information from us (either about its own capabilities, or about its involvement with extraterrestrial intelligence) for years than anything previously found!
Heh.
(via /.)
Going to be a busy year…
Looks like there isn’t going to be a lot of free time in the coming months…but it’s all for a good cause.
I got financial aid this year (yay!), so I’m up to a full 15 credits at NSCC. This means I’ll be at school from 9am – noon Monday through Friday for classes.
On top of that, while half of my financial aid is grants (and I do like free money), the other half is work study, so I’ll be working part time on campus in addition to my normal part time job. I’ve signed up to do my work study tutoring at The Loft, NSCC’s writing center — the same place that Prairie puts in a few hours a week tutoring. She’s said for a while that a tutoring position there would be perfect for me, as it’ll give me good experience, so seeing an opening there during the work study orientation was perfect.
So, my current schedule (assuming nothing explodes in the near future) is something like this:
- M-F, 9-9:50am: CSC110: Intro to Computer Programming (Schaffer)
- M-F, 10-10:50am: ENG102: Composition (Harradine)
- M-F, 11-11:50am: HIS101: World History to 1500 (Rausch)
- Wed, 3:30-6:30pm: Tutoring at the Loft
- Thurs, 2:30-6:30pm: Tutoring at the Loft
This will leave me from 1pm to 10pm Monday to Friday and both weekend days available for my off-campus job, with homework time on Wed and Thurs between classes and tutoring, plus whenever I’m not scheduled at work.
Busy. Definitely busy. But eventually, that should lead to a degree….
“Difficult Listening Hour – 02v2” by DJ Wüdi from the album Difficult Listening Hour (2000, 1:04:41).