Monthly Archives: August 2015

The Intergalactic Nanny

Posted on by
Reply
191948-12332-47

My brother says this isn’t the box art he remembers, but it’s what appears to have been the 1969 release art. Image courtesy of Scalemates

My brother had a model Saturn V rocket. Assembled, I believe it stood about 30 inches tall. I guess he assembled it. I remember yellow streaks of model glue on the… does a rocket have a fuselage? But you could separate it into stages (what good is a rocket if you can’t separate it into stages?) and it was almost always disassembled. It was almost always disassembled because his annoying little brother, who was much too young for such a model, wanted to play with it all the time.

And who wouldn’t want to play with it? It had the Apollo command module and capsule, the capsule just the size of an acorn, but still… It may have had a lunar module on the side. And I’m pretty sure there was a completely-out-of-scale figure of an Apollo astronaut in full gear.

It now lies in state in a cardboard box in my old bedroom at my parents’ house. What’s left of it lies in state, anyway. The bright orange launch pad is still around, and some odds and ends, including that little capsule. Yeah, we’re that family. I haven’t lived in that house for 28 years, but my room is still full of my stuff. And… y’know… stuff I permanently “borrowed” from my brother.

20858579076_93cfa9b947_z

The remnants…

Continue reading →

Jennifer Granick – Listen to Her If You Want the Future to not SUCK

Posted on by
Reply

Read this article. Just read it. Now. Every word. If you don’t understand it, ask someone who can explain it to you. Hell, ask me. Or, if available, ask somebody smart instead.

But don’t ignore it.

I had a whole blog post prepared for tonight about Saturn V rockets, Star Trek and childhood memories, with a gentle dose of being careful about your political environment tossed in. You can read that next week. This week, read something by someone who’s paying close attention than I am, and is here to tell you that the future is going to SUCK.

At least, the future is going to suck if you keep letting power-hungry assholes convince you that “the issues” are the need to re-illegalize abortion, legislate away climate change, defend marriage against those who just want to get married, or provide for absolutely FREE every damn thing our parents used to work for.

Those are not the issues. HERE are the issues, the ones important to people way beyond the borders of these United States, and the threats that exist to your future, brought to you by someone a lot smarter than I am. Her name is Jennifer Granick, and this is her keynote speech from this year’s Black Hat 2015 information security conference:

https://medium.com/backchannel/the-end-of-the-internet-dream-ba060b17da61

Read it. Read every damn word.

(Or watch the video.)

Spoiler: CyberSecurity is the threat. Donate to EFF.

Lies

Posted on by
1

There’s nothing more baffling to me than having to deal with someone who lies. In particular, I’m concerned with someone who lies about another person in order to look superior, or, more accurately, in order to make that other person look inferior.

The whole concept of making yourself look good by making someone else look bad is alien to me. Sure, you made that other person look bad, but can’t someone else just do the same to you? What have you proven?

If we throw objective measures of virtue and success out the window, isn’t life just a free-for-all? And then there is no virtue, and no success, just an endless parade of people trying to boost their image.

You make yourself look good by, well, making yourself look good. By doing something of value.

Continue reading →

Mini-Review – Ultraman X

Posted on by
Reply

This is a short entry. Today is my birthday (my 50th) and I’m spending it all with my family and dear friends.

329A while back, I reviewed Ultraman Mebius, a series from 2007 which continued the very successful Ultraman franchise. I believe I explained then that Ultraman was a character created by Eiji Tsuburaya, also the creator of Godzilla, in 1967. The show had been imported to the US shortly thereafter, and was a big hit with kids my age in the early 70s. Mebius was the 40th anniversary tribute series, and I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it.

Since then, Tsuburaya Productions has released a couple of other series, including Ultraman Ginga. I didn’t watch it, and I got the impression it largely existed to market toys. Apparently, its premise was that all the Ultramen and all their monster foes had been turned into vinyl miniatures call Spark Dolls. None of the subsequent series seemed to hold the same interest for me that Mebius did.

Continue reading →