The Map Is Not the Place

Avatar.

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 19:54:47 GMT

I will preface all this with the statement that I did not hate Avatar. In the great ranks of Cameron movies, I'm gonna stick it with the Terminator flicks: I'm not likely to ever buy it, but I'm not gonna shriek in displeasure when I see it on TV.

You know... the only Cameron movies I actually like are Aliens and The Abyss.

Anyways, if Cameron really wanted to make a good movie with that technology, I have some suggestions:

Don't remake Dances With Wolves. Old plot is old. (Sure, I love The Last Samurai, but the movie had more character. And depth of character.)
Multidimensional characters are nifty!
On the subject of multidimensional characters, I'd have liked to know why they were after unobtainium. If, say, the unobtainium is a critical component in the defense of planetary systems (including Pandora) against xenomorphs, the movie is completely different. If the unobtainium is a critical component in hologram TVs, the movie is different. If the unobtainium is a critical component in, say, atmosphere processors to help revive a "dead" earth, or in Earth's defense system against xenomorphs, and who cares about Pandora, then the movie is suddenly interesting on a non-eye candy level. I would care about the question of whether or not it's right to displace a bunch of blue savages in order to save a single planet.
If Cameron had really wanted to drive the point about the Na'vi lifestyle being better, more pure, more holy, and more natural, he should have pulled a Wizard of Oz and only done the sections where Sully inhabits a Na'vi body in 3D.
Make the Na'vi more alien. Or at least make them look like they belonged on Pandora, instead of looking like they're invaders themselves. They share pretty much nothing in common with the wildlife, except for the USB-tentacle-braids, and maybe bioluminescence, if their little white spots actually glowed in the dark and I didn't imagine it.

And why is it that aliens kiss? Always? And have the same sort of sexual dimorphism?

All this having been said, I don't regret the twelve bucks.

How do you know one is a nerd?

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 19:36:56 GMT

Consider his browser tabs:

Gmail, normal enough. Stargate Wiki. An article on Ediacaran fossils. An article on the discoverer of Edicaran fossils. Wikipedia, with an article on a particular example of Ediacaran life, and, for no apparent reason, a wikipedia article on Electron degeneracy pressure. Plus Facebook. Nerdiness bookended with normality.

Space porn!

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 16:03:52 GMT

The Flame Nebula, courtesy of the VISTA telescope in Chile. (Via Space.com)

The Wrong Damn Thing To Say--

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 15:50:27 GMT

Or, 46 seconds of it.

Writer's Block: 2012

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 01:27:56 GMT

If the world were going to end on December 21, 2012, how would you spend the last of your days on earth and why?

Submitted By rainwizard

View 714 Answers

Silly people. The world won't end in 2012. Nope. 2012 is when the Mu show up over Japan, launching the chain of events that wind up with Tokyo sequestered behind a dimensional barrier called "Tokyo Jupiter."

I will then enlist with TERRA, the organization that will eventually be formed to combat the Mu.

Verne vs. Wells

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 22:23:20 GMT

From Hark, A Vagrant

"How we deal with death is at least as important as how we deal with life, wouldn't you say?"

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 21:59:44 GMT

Welp, time for nerd gushing!

So I finished SG-1, sans Ark of Truth and Continuum, which I will probably pick up this weekend.

It's a good show. Check that; it's an amazing show. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that the Stargate universe (SG-1, SGA, and even SGU, though it's the weak point currently. Well, maybe SG1 Season 1 is the weakest offering.) has popped up to become one of my favorite fictional works.

It's just... well constructed. Episodic, but with a sense of things actually happening. We're talking Lensmen sort of escalation here; the meta-story starts with Earth (well, really, just a USAF spec ops team) barely being able to deal with a single aggressive alien and winds up with Earth forces (The Tau'ri, to most of the galaxy) being major players in galactic power struggles. And then intergalactic power struggles. Ships are blown up. Planets are blown up. Stars are blown up.

But through it all it remains focused on characters. They're likable and endearing, even in their flaws. I mean, they go past Macross sort of likable (In which the death of Roy Fokker made just about everyone I know sniffle, including my (karate) sensei, who was a USAF captain, 3rd degree black belt, and Baptist pastor), past Babylon 5 likable, and wind up squarely in Firefly territory. The high point of any episode after SG1 Season 8 in any Stargate is seeing "Special Guest Appearance by Richard Dean Anderson" in the opening credits of an episode.

Also, Stargate has the Asgard, who are the coolest Sufficiently Advanced Aliens (Warning: Tvtropes link. By clicking on it, you absolve me of all blame for wasted time.) since the Vorlons. The Asgard might be better than the Vorlons; if it weren't for Kosh, there'd be no contest.

Writer's Block: Name that tune

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:05:53 GMT

Is there any song you'll never grow tired of hearing? If so, what is it, how long have you loved it, and why?

Submitted By connxx

View 1387 Answers

This song, I think. I find it... absolutely beautiful. Sometimes, it strikes some chord in my soul that moves me in an amazingly profound way-- generally, a sense of emotion that is comparable only to what I feel when look at the night sky. On occasion, it just about moves me to tears.

(...Yeah. Stars are an emotional thing to me. Go figure :p)

....And now that it's cued up, I can't leave my computer until it stops.

The Geisha.

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 17:52:26 GMT

When I was working on Binary Boys as a short story, I had a character that I thought of only as "the geisha." I knew her last name, because her family name was intended to be part of a plot twist. It still is; but now that I've decided to flesh an absurdly long short story into a novel, referring to her only as "the geisha" seems impractical. And so the search began to find her a first name.

I wanted Greek, because the second (after Tokugawa-era Japan) major societal influence is classical Greece, or supposed to be, and it's sorely lacking so far. As I've been tweaking the first chapter and taking feedback from my writer's group in mind, I've been trying to up the Greek factor a bit. So I went skimming down a list of feminine Greek names, trying to find one that fit.

It's harder than you'd think. I've settled on "Hestia" for the time being, mainly because it sounds Greek, is not "Helen," and sounds similar enough to "Helen" to appease my initial subconscious leanings, but, even still, it's weird to think of her as "Hestia Satou" and not just "the geisha."

It's funny how difficult it can be to change the name of a character in your head.

The Lensmen.

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 14:47:54 GMT

So I finished The Chronicles of the Lensmen today. Doc Smith wasn't the greatest writer ever, but he knew how to entertain, and good lord, he understood the word "epic."

It's funny, though, how much of the Lensmen I now see in modern scifi epics. Stargate and Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann and Babylon 5 and even Macross, although Macross reined in the escalation a little bit. I see Lensmen everywhere now, in Rangers and in Jedi-- well, Jedi as they were painted pre-Episode One, at least.

Seriously though. The Lensmen books start with humanity barely covering the solar system, and wind up, by the end of the last book, not only converting entire planets into missiles, but harvesting planets to be used as missiles from another universe where everything has an intrinsic velocity of fifteen times light speed, insuring REALLY big booms.

Good series. Well worth the read, and the not-so-hot writing full of things a modern publisher would never let you do.

Star Wars.

Wed, 25 Nov 2009 02:06:02 GMT

Star Wars Facebook. Funniest thing all day.

How do you know a work is very well done?

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 01:54:09 GMT

When you come back to it after not seeing/reading it for a while and you get a warm, fuzzy glow from the characters. I get that watching RahXephon-- sitting down with it is like meeting old friends. I noticed the same thing when Richard Dean Anderson shows up in Stargate Universe or in one of the episodes of the SG-1 or SGA after he left the series. It's like, "Yay, Jack!"

I was watching SG-1's 200th episode today. It's an amazingly light-hearted episode in which the team is stuck on Earth due to a malfunction with the gate and they're throwing out ideas for a movie based on their exploits. (Which, in turn, ties back in with the 100th episode, in which they wound up consulting on a cheesy syndicated scifi show that was pretty much about the stargate program, in order to help build plausible deniability for the program.) The episode was riddled with metafiction and cracks that just barely stopped short of taking a sledgehammer to the fourth wall.

It was seriously 42 minutes of the warm fuzzies. I'm gonna be sad when I finally finish the FIFTEEN BLOODY SEASONS of SG-1 and Atlantis. Guess I'll have to fire up the X-Files and see if I get the warm fuzzies from Mulder and Scully.

Star Trek

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 01:02:53 GMT

You know who I really want to see in the new Star Trek movie(s)? Mudd. Harcourt Fenton Mudd.

More thoughts on Stargate.

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 01:06:48 GMT

Stargate is good at breaking your heart in unexpected ways. Like the episode about the guy finding out he was originally a Wraith, and is now only human because of a retrovirus.

Also... Stargate Universe's big problem that makes it not seem like Stargate? Not a single person has consumed or even mentioned blue jello. What kind of Stargate doesn't have blue jello?

Story synopsis writing....

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:43:07 GMT

...makes me feel like I'm penning the beginning of a Star Wars movie. I mean, really:

Story so far: Ellison, Shogun Alexander's right hand man, has arrived on the colony world of Susanou in order to investigate a seemingly impossible murder that may have a destabilizing effect on galactic civilization. The local government enacts plans to gain any sort of edge possible against the intrusive presence of the shogunate, as personified by Ellison.
Unable to actively refuse to help Ellison, the governor assigns two police officers, Lambert and Thornhill, to aid and supervise Ellison.
Bodhisattva: From the Buddhist equivalent of an angel, these are semi-sentient computer utilities that handle everything from monetary transactions to web searches.
Dataspace: A galaxy-wide version of the internet, viewable as a sort of virtual reality overlay to anyone with the appropriate implants.

Can't you see that in yellow text, scrolling on a starfield? Well, the part that's not definitions of terms used in the last chapter.

Bad hotel guests.

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:52:12 GMT

I suppose that, if there is a hell for bad hotel guests, spilling soy sauce on the sheets barely rates me a spot. Perhaps in the first circle, where I will chill with the virtuous pagans. Still, I feel kinda jerky.

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:36:08 GMT

Today, I learned about what's called a CG envelope, which is a range in which an aircraft is loaded so that it is properly balanced. I learned, also, how to tweak the CG envelope to make it larger or smaller as needed, and why you'd want to make it smaller. (To make life easier on the flight crew and let people sit all over the aircraft willy nilly.)

Today, I learned about the OEW of an aircraft, and the ZFW. I've spent my day immersed in the nitty gritty of aviation and I've found that it's absolutely fascinating.

Not that I didn't find this stuff fascinating before. I'm an airplane nerd. I grew up on Langley AFB, home to the 1st Tactical Fighter Wing, who are pretty much the USAF's Rogue Squadron(s). Or Skull Squadron, if you prefer Macross to Star Wars, which I do :p I find the sound of god-awful noisy fighter aircraft to be amazingly comforting.

I'm considering looking into getting a dispatcher's license now. Well, I looked into it; I didn't do much considering of looking into it. The courses run about $4000-$5000.

Oi vey.

Right, so not gonna run out and sign up for it now. In a year or two, though, after I get my student loans paid down a little, I think I may spring for it.

Ops training!

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:42:12 GMT

So it turns out that when you're a real employee, and not a silly new hire, Continental doesn't make you share a room with someone when you're traveling for the company. So I get the hotel room to myself-- this is a good thing.

Got up at 0400 this morning, dug out my business casual clothing, and hopped on the plane for Houston. Landed and spent the next 6 hours or so learning about the horribly outdated mainframe-based system that we use-- ran on an emulator on a windows machine now-- and typing in large amounts of commands that appear to be mostly random letters with little rhyme or reason, and trying not to stare at the bespectacled, drop-dead gorgeous girl from Costa Rica sitting at the computer next to me.

Learned some nifty things-- like the logic behind runway numbering, which I sort of understood but didn't truly grok-- and I now maybe actually have a clue on what to do for a flight. Maybe. I will after tomorrow, anyways.

Writer's Block: Opposites attract (sometimes)

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 20:05:54 GMT

In general, do you find yourself more attracted to people with similar or different interests, life experiences, political beliefs, and religious backgrounds? Do you think having some common interests/goals is essential for a successful relationship?

View 564 Answers

I find girls with similar interest to be more attractive pretty much like 99% of the time. The ideal girl: I want someone who can carry on the kind of conversations I enjoy. She should know about theology, philosophy, science, science fiction, and preferably video games. Glasses are a big plus. Knowing the distance to Sirius and our sun's spectral type are huge pluses. (Nifty things in non-astronomical sciences will work.) I want a girl with a mind like a diamond. I want a girl who knows what's best. I want a girl with shoes that cut and eyes that burn like cigarettes. I want a girl with the right allocations, who's fast and thorough and sharp as a tack.

Er.

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 22:00:28 GMT

[16:55] [Screen name redacted]: Portal's not one of the best games of the decade.
[16:56] BadgerSensei: Ok. I've identified this conversation as being one in which I converse with the spirit of an internet troll, replying to me ouija-board style with your screen name, and will henceforth drop the subject.

The Adventures of Lil' Cthulhu

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 00:40:23 GMT

This might be the funniest thing ever.

Radio chatter is serious business, vol 2.

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 17:16:29 GMT

Afternoon Ops agent, over radio: "2938 will be here at 1400."
Random gate agent, over radio: "Gate copies."
Ramp lead, over radio: "Ramp copies."
Me: "Bag room copies, but is completely ambivalent."

And now it's time for me to clock out. Yays.

On Critiquing Fellow Writers.

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 15:56:35 GMT

Or, "Oh god."

So, got the next writer's group meeting coming up tomorrow, and haven't had a chance to read through all the works yet, so I'm taking advantage of it being Saturday and all and reading them at work.

I try to be very diplomatic with criticism. Diplomacy is a strong point for me; it comes naturally. On occasion, though, some people are just so... bad... that I have trouble being diplomatic.

When I did my first workshop at OSU, there was a girl that wrote a story so horrifically sappy and sweet and amazingly incoherent that I had to dig to find something positive, and then I'm pretty sure I made it up. By the time I was done reading her story, my comments had degenerated into, and I'm being serious, "Grah, what?"

Well. Anyways. I just pulled up one of the stories for tomorrow by a new guy and he doesn't appear to be a native English speaker by what I'm reading. Tenses all over, viewpoints shifting around like a kaleidoscope... I'm pretty sure that I can be gentle, but I wonder about some others. Hmm.

Edit: *sigh* Vampires. Again.
Edit: Not vampires. Gargoyles. Who may or may not hunt sinners or just this one priest or all priests or all humanity or grah.

Radio chatter is serious business.

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 14:49:12 GMT

Sammmy, who is the bagrunner currently, over the radio: "Josh-- any more Cleveland bags?"
Me, from the bag room: "Clear on Cleveland."
Sammy: "Clear on Cleveland?"
Me: "Clear. Zero bags."
Corey, over the radio: "Josh, how many more Cleveland bags?"
Me: (slightly annoyed.) "None. Zero. Clear on Cleveland."
Corey: "Are we clear on Cleveland?"
Me: "Clear on Cleveland."
Mike, the ops agent today, over the radio: "Josh, the ramp wants to know if you have more Cleveland bags."
Me: "No more Cleveland bags. Zero. Clear on Cleveland-- Though, I suppose, in a broader, spiritual sense, we all have Cleveland bags."
Mike: "Copy. One more bag."
Jeremy, the weekend lead, over the radio: "Josh, is that bag a heavy or standard bag?"
Me: "Only as heavy as my soul."
Jeremy: "Copy that. Three heavies."

We interrupt Josh's frantic work on -Binary Boys- to bring you this story:

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:31:32 GMT

Josh is going to operations training. This is a good thing.

What does this mean for Josh? Several things:

-It means that Josh will be able to pick up overtime that he wouldn't normally be able to pick up.
-It means that, should the operations agent be ill, and call off during the wee hours, the ramp isn't quite as screwed, because Josh will know how to do weight and balance and communicate with load planning via normal channels instead of frantic phone calls.
-It means three days paid in Houston for training, per diems, paid hotel room and flight time on the clock.
-It means that Josh is more useful to his company, which is a very good thing for someone during Scary Airline Times.
-It also means that Jodi, the oh-so-wonderful supervisor who went to bat for him when he was trying to get days off to see his sister graduate from Basic Training in San Antonio, once again went to bat for him.

There's a lot of inter-station politics going on here. Continental (and presumably most airlines) divide the station grunts into two categories: Ramp workers (CSAs, in CO parlance. "Luggage monkeys" or "ramp rats" to jerky pilots.) and Ticket counter/ Gate workers. (ASAs, in CO parlance. "Hens" when I'm frustrated with them.)

Now, in some stations, Ops is considered an ASA position. In others, a CSA position. Here, in Columbus, it is a CSA position. But yet, last year, when they scheduled CSA couldn't make the class, they sent an ASA instead of sending me, to appease the hens upstairs, who were upset that someone who recently switched from being a CSA to ASA was still considered qualified to work ops.

So I resigned myself to not going then. (The ASA sent is a complete jerk, by the way, and I'm not normally judgmental like that, but this guy is a sleazeball, lazy, and rude. Anyways.) I spent the last few months harping on the supervisors: "When am I going for ops training? I want ops training!" and then, the GM turned around and scheduled another ASA to go.

An ASA who won't work past 1 PM, who trades off most of her days. I haven't seen her in weeks, and the whole point of sending people to this training is to cover when the normal ops agents don't make it in.

And when Jodi found out, she was pissed. I was pissed. The guy who was supposed to go last time but couldn't make it was pissed. Several people began emailing HR about it.

And now Jodi just called me (I'm over in the bag room, hence the posting from work) to tell me that there are still two open seats in the class, so I'm going, along with the ASA (Grrr.) and the guy who was supposed to go last time.