So its after midnight on one of my nights off, and I'm sitting here at my pc working my way through over 400 entries in my rss reader, and I'm thinking to myself how nice it is to relax at home and listen to the rain through my open window.
I'm also thinking that I subscribe to entirely too many rss feeds.
I found out yesterday that my contract with my current job got picked up, likely for at least 6 more months. I didn't have to go through the re-interview I was told I would have to, and even though I wasn't really all that worried about that, every few minutes I look over at Superwife and my daughter sleeping in the bed a few feet away from me and I find myself feeling so fucking relieved.
Btw, out of the 400 entries I just finished, I did find a few worthy of linking:
Star Trek's EMH not as far off as you might think
Poking fun at 10 religions at once!
A girl who compares daily life to an RPG is a girl after my heart (notwithstanding the facts that I'm happily married. and she's a lesbian. and taken)
My Next Project, or What to Do With that Bible You've Got Laying Around
Rick Mercer mulls the Liberal candidate race (worth the click solely for the Stockwell Day joke)
I'm also thinking that I subscribe to entirely too many rss feeds.
I found out yesterday that my contract with my current job got picked up, likely for at least 6 more months. I didn't have to go through the re-interview I was told I would have to, and even though I wasn't really all that worried about that, every few minutes I look over at Superwife and my daughter sleeping in the bed a few feet away from me and I find myself feeling so fucking relieved.
Btw, out of the 400 entries I just finished, I did find a few worthy of linking:
Star Trek's EMH not as far off as you might think
Poking fun at 10 religions at once!
A girl who compares daily life to an RPG is a girl after my heart (notwithstanding the facts that I'm happily married. and she's a lesbian. and taken)
My Next Project, or What to Do With that Bible You've Got Laying Around
Rick Mercer mulls the Liberal candidate race (worth the click solely for the Stockwell Day joke)
I was just browsing through my rss feeds and came across one that had linked to a blog posted by the civilian space tourist, Anousheh Ansari. I have been following this story since I first heard about her $20 million dollar trip to the International Space Station, but it never occurred to me to search for a blog authored by her.
How amazing is it that we live in a time when not only are some of the best and brightest of humanity actually circling the earth in a space station, making huge strides in technology, medicine, among other disciplines? That would be enough. But these people are blogging to us while they're up there, and we no longer have to feel that disconnect that has been (IMHO) the major stumbling block of the various global space efforts over the past fifty years.
No, now we can sip our coffee and read about Dooce's latest experiences with her dog and her daughter, and with one mouseclick, we can move on to an entry posted from space, and read about people doing things that as a child, I only imagined could be achieved within the confines of my favourite comic book.
I talk all the time about how we live in such a great time because of all of the science fiction that drooling fanboys like me get to enjoy. But the really cool thing about the time we live in is that right now there are some truly great strides being taken that make some of that same fiction, with its vision of a future that puts mankind among the stars, look a lot more plausible.
Here's the post that first got my attention. Ansari's description of her ride from launchpad to orbit is nothing short of amazing.
Check out the blogger from space's main site here.
And her flickr gallery here.
Labels: everything else
One of the funniest movies I have ever seen, and easily the movie I have watched more times than any other is Spaceballs, Mel Brooks' brilliant spoof of almost all things science fiction.
I have seriously seen this movie hundreds of times, and quote it very often, much to the chagrin of Superwife.
I read an article today that reports that after almost 20 years, Spaceballs 2 is finally getting made. Not in the format that Yogurt was so hoping for, but it is coming to tv as an animated series.
So if you're so inclined, get ready to watch Lone Star, Barf and the gang make space tracks again sometime in 2007.
Story here.
Space is reporting that William Shatner has opted not to take up Sir Richard Branson on the offer of the first (free) ride on one of his forthcoming fleet of Virgin Galactic spaceliners. The ships will be basically high atmosphere shuttles, capable of a few minutes of weightlessness as the ship's course takes it through a suborbital trajectory.
Shatner's exact quote:
"I'm interested in man's march into the unknown but to vomit in space is not my idea of a good time. Neither is a fiery crash with the vomit hovering over me. I do want to go up, but I need guarantees I'll definitely be coming back."Far be it from me to disparage my
You think Kirk would've turned down an offer like that? To be one of the first private citizens to ride in the first commercial starship? I fucking doubt it.
He'd probably strap on a spacesuit and do an orbital skydive just to show that it could be done. (And yes, I do know that the orbital skydive scene was cut from Generations. That's why I brought it up)
Here's the link to the article.
Labels: star trek
There has been no larger cultural influence on my life than Star Trek.
Its as simple as that.
My very first movie experience was with Star Trek: The Motion Picture, an experience that I have blogged about in detail before.
I have in fact written fairly extensively about how Trek has influenced the course of my life. If you search my site for entries containing 'Star Trek', you'll get over 40 posts, so if you intend to read your way through my life long love affair with the show, go make yourself some coffee first.
Over the course of keeping my blog, I have mentioned before about some of the shittier experiences in my early life, and I don't need to go into them again, because everyone has a history and you choose what to do with the marks the past has left on you as you make your way through life.
I will say though, that whenever I retreated from the events of my childhood, I found refuge in the universe that Star Trek inhabited. I remember making trips to this fantastic old bookstore in my home town where I would spend hours scouring the new arrivals of remaindered and used books, just standing in the aisles and inhaling the heady scent of all that old paper just to find a Trek novel that I hadn't yet come across. I remember watching every episode of the original series I could over and over, committing them all to memory. And I still remember where I was the night TNG premiered, and how momentous it felt, even then, to know that I was watching the first new Trek made in my lifetime. And even though I never came to appreciate the next three series' the same way, I remember where I was when each of those premiered as well.
Now that I'm (kind of) an adult, I still stop and check out every rerun of the original series when I come across them on tv, even though it is a guarantee that I've see the episode many, many times. Even now, I still feel a connection with a show that was imagined over 40 years ago by a man whose impact on world culture will survive him far better than most people have a right to expect.
And it was with a bigger helping of regret than I would've liked that I was unable to go to the 40th anniversary convention in Vegas this year. And by unable to go, I mean to say that I thought about it, realized that between me being the bread-winner at home, and my family having to eat, I dismissed the idea out of hand.
But still, it would've been nice.
I've collected a few links to help commemorate the 40th anniversary, written by individuals better equipped than I to do it proper justice:
Remembering 40 years of Trek, courtesy of StarTrek.comHappy 40th Anniversary Star Trek.
A perspective from the only Star Trek alumnus not to get invited to the 40th anniversary convention | Updated perspective here
MSNBC discusses the Star Trek phenomenon
Toronto Star interview of Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner
Labels: star trek
Dear Trin,
I'm writing this letter a few days late, and I can't say why I haven't found time to write this month yet. I spent my days off over the long weekend with you and your Mom, and it is hard to take time away from playing or reading a story or going to the park to write you a letter about the same.
So now before I crash for my day's sleep, I'll take the opportunity.
There have been some fun developments over the last month. You continue with the firsts: You're trying so many new foods that it really is hard to keep track. A few off the top of my head are broccoli, steak, mashed potatoes (which you love, btw). You also love to fling whatever it is you're working on in all directions. You really amuse yourself with that one.
You went on your first carousel ride this month. You went absolutely delirious riding that thing. I think the music kinda scared the crap out of you, but that was overshadowed by how much fun the lights, the movement, the horses were to you. You just latched on to Mom and rocked out the whole time.
You also tried out swings for the first time. Now we can't go by the park on our daily dog-walk without you trying to jettison yourself out of the stroller in an attempt to get yourself into one of the swings.
And that's another thing: You're vocabulary is increasing by leaps and bounds. Your version of swing sounds something like 'weeng', cheerios sound like 'cheer' and you have 'do' and 'des' for no and yes respectively. You have Mom down great, but you only trot that one out when you're very sad. You know, as you should, that Mom = Comfort/Safety/Love. Daddy, I'm happy to say, you've had down for a few months now. That will never get old for me.
You also have a new person in your life, as of sometime around 6:00 pm last night. Your Aunt had a little baby girl, and hopefully by the time you are old enough to read this, you've done a good job of befriending her and teaching her your unique view of the world.
Or of at least giving her some great ways to annoy her parents.
And here's a pic of my favourite part of my desk at work. If I ever get stressed out over an issue or bummed that I am not home half of the nights to put you to bed or read you a story, I look over at your pictures and remember what I'm working these crazy shifts for in the first place.
Love you lots,
Daddy
I'm writing this letter a few days late, and I can't say why I haven't found time to write this month yet. I spent my days off over the long weekend with you and your Mom, and it is hard to take time away from playing or reading a story or going to the park to write you a letter about the same.
So now before I crash for my day's sleep, I'll take the opportunity.
There have been some fun developments over the last month. You continue with the firsts: You're trying so many new foods that it really is hard to keep track. A few off the top of my head are broccoli, steak, mashed potatoes (which you love, btw). You also love to fling whatever it is you're working on in all directions. You really amuse yourself with that one.
You went on your first carousel ride this month. You went absolutely delirious riding that thing. I think the music kinda scared the crap out of you, but that was overshadowed by how much fun the lights, the movement, the horses were to you. You just latched on to Mom and rocked out the whole time.
You also tried out swings for the first time. Now we can't go by the park on our daily dog-walk without you trying to jettison yourself out of the stroller in an attempt to get yourself into one of the swings.
And that's another thing: You're vocabulary is increasing by leaps and bounds. Your version of swing sounds something like 'weeng', cheerios sound like 'cheer' and you have 'do' and 'des' for no and yes respectively. You have Mom down great, but you only trot that one out when you're very sad. You know, as you should, that Mom = Comfort/Safety/Love. Daddy, I'm happy to say, you've had down for a few months now. That will never get old for me.
You also have a new person in your life, as of sometime around 6:00 pm last night. Your Aunt had a little baby girl, and hopefully by the time you are old enough to read this, you've done a good job of befriending her and teaching her your unique view of the world.
Or of at least giving her some great ways to annoy her parents.
And here's a pic of my favourite part of my desk at work. If I ever get stressed out over an issue or bummed that I am not home half of the nights to put you to bed or read you a story, I look over at your pictures and remember what I'm working these crazy shifts for in the first place.
Love you lots,
Daddy
Labels: trinity
Well, this makes it pretty much official: Thanks to the 12 hour graveyard shifts I work, I have finally made the full transition to Vampire. I rotate 4 shifts on and 4 off, and for the first few months of working this shift I was actually capable of going back to a normal human being's schedule, what with the sun being up, and the daytime tv, and such. But now here I am on one of my days off, and I just know that if I try to go to bed anytime before 3 am, I will lay there like a lump.
A wideawake lump.
So it's a good thing there's this in-ter-net thing. Don't know what the crap else I'd do with all this free time once I've burned through a PSP charge. One can only watch so much porn. (Did I just say that?!?)
One of the beautiful things about the net is there is always something to download, read, devour. And always some asshole putting links to those consumables on his/her blog.
Here's mine tonight, courtesy YouTube:
Conan O'Brian does The Emmys Pt. I and Pt. II - Hilarious. There is no way that the rest of the show was this funny
Smallville Season 6 Trailer - My favourite show keeps getting better and better
Nobody knows the words to 'Blinded By The Light!' - By a weird coincidence my wife and I are probably the only 2 Canadians to have actually watched this bit, years before we ever knew each other. Still funny as hell.
The Dharma Initiative Orientation Film (I can't wait for the return of LOST - Is that an oxymoron?)
Classic Sesame Street Video - Bert's bitching is what makes this so funny
Intro to 'Spiderman and His Amazing Friends' - I can't be the only one who loved this show. And Firestar? She was awesome.
Some great Star Trek Outakes - Funny but no swearing.
Ah, there's the swearing
Labels: everything else
