Month: February 2007

Categories
And Beyond The Infinite

The 50 Mile High Club?

This news story is just beyond the pale when one considers that it wasn’t really so long ago that an active-roster astronaut getting a divorce was a bit of a scandal. Not exactly the kind of publicity NASA needs, either…yeesh. Keep your orbital docking maneuvers to yourselves!
I’m having a hard time figuring out the newsworthiness of the whole thing to begin with. It’s bizarre enough as it is without bringing any of the players’ occupations into it, but you can bet that this one will stay in the news because of the NASA connection.
In other news, Turner’s deal to pay Boston $2,000,000 is a bargain. Turner and Cartoon Network could’ve deliberately deployed $2 mil of promotion and they wouldn’t have gotten the kind of impact out of it that they did here: even rival news outlets are mentioning the signs and the show they’re from. I don’t think they planned it this way, but you better bet that someone down the road will try to pull something like this off in the future – and will probably fail miserably.… Read more

Categories
Home Base Music

I don’t remember anything after that

Turns out I have the mother of all sinus infections. Loverly. I’m on some meds for it, not sure if I’ll be back at work by Wednesday or not. Ick.
Got the new Intrada CD of the original 1968 Alex North sessions for the 2001 movie score that Kubrick rejected. Without wanting to upstage the eventual movie review too much, this CD is awesome if you’re a 2001 fan, an Alex North fan, or still curious about North’s unused 2001 music even after the 1993 release that was arranged and conducted by Jerry Goldsmith (North himself having passed on in 1991). The music is very different from that recording in some places – it’s often a matter of the balance of instruments used, the timing, and other subtleties, but there are some sections of music that, despite the 1993 Goldsmith recording, are completely new to me. The booklet itself is worth the price of admission too – I had no idea that the whole thing had led to this intractible feud between North’s widow and Kubrick, and wouldn’t ever be settled until both she and Kubrick were gone. I highly recommend it. I’ll slot a more comprehensive review into the schedule soonish, but it may be a couple of weeks – I’m still happily digesting it all.
I see that the ELO fan club, or at least its UK congtingent, is working to make “Latitude 88 North” an iTunes hit. Hey, if it worked for “Love Don’t Roam“…
I’ve got some more news…but of course I can’t tell you what it is just yet. 😛… Read more

Categories
Television & Movies

Celebrating 3 to 5 glorious years of stupid apes

Sleep still hasn’t claimed me yet, despite the Nyquil (and no, I haven’t been fighting the sleep either – I think I need another swig of that icky green stuff.)
I was recently re-reading a bit of the outstanding, essential-to-any-Doctor-Who-fan’s-bookshelf volume Regeneration, by Philip Segal and Gary Russell, which is basically the book on the making of the 1996 movie. Love it or hate it, the ’96 movie is such an important part of the mythology, and sometimes I think the reason it gets such a bum rap is because it’s only available on the other side of the Atlantic on DVD. (I kid you not when I say that this movie, and the promise circa 2001 of imminent Blake’s 7 DVD sets, were why I purchased a multi-region DVD player.) I know folks who are all about the new series and think the movie was crap, which I just can’t fathom – the ’96 movie dictated so much of the pace and style of the new series that you’d think they were made nine months apart rather than nine years.
Excerpt from 'Regeneration'To read Russell and Segal’s book is to get a better understanding for how far off-format the project that eventually became the Paul McGann movie could’ve strayed. Excerpts from abandoned scripts and series bibles are plentiful, and the mind boggles are how close the whole thing came to being a reboot of the entire mythology with no room for the 26 years of the original series (though there would’ve been plenty of reasons why that wouldn’t have been a bad move when trying to launch a series in the States). Every time I read this book, I find something new that I hadn’t noticed before, one of which I’ve included a scan of here because it’s just deliciously ironic. (Obviously, it’s from a stage of the proceedings before Paul McGann was decided on as the eighth Doctor.) One wonders if Mr. Eccleston would’ve been more amenable, at a younger age, to the concept of the Doctor as being somewhat foppish. Or what kind of Doctor that Hugh Laurie would’ve been (wait, let me rephrase that… 😆 ).
I’ve recently rewatched some of Eccleston’s episodes and gained a better liking for him; I think by ingesting the last half of his season as the Doctor, I burned out a bit on his portrayal, but now that we’ve had Tennant in place for a year, I think the intention was always that Eccleston would only be there for a year, and that the character would be necessarily lightened up after another actor took over. Like everyone before him, Eccleston was the right actor, with the right take on the character, at the right time, with almost more of a straight through-line from the seventh Doctor to the ninth.
If you haven’t read this book, I strongly, strongly recommend it – it really is right up there with the Howe/Stammers/Walker books on the making of the series, and at no point do either of its authors wind up as apologists for the ’96 movie. (Despite the fact that it’s Segal’s baby, he’s actually surprisingly harsh on it, and on himself, in places.) You can check it out here, and if you’ve got a region-free DVD player, might as well get the DVD here, because God only knows if it’ll ever see the light of day on DVD on this continent unless you import it. You don’t need to see it to understand the new series, if you’re new to the whole mythology, and yet it’s so interesting to see how a whole different team in a different decade tried to re-introduce the audience to the show.
Apologies for the Doctor Who ramblings and sales pitch; I just thought that excerpt was worth sharing. More green stuff for me now. Night night.… Read more

Categories
Critters Home Base

My nose isn’t running. It’s engaged in a carefully planned tactical retreat.

Fevered thoughts:
To work or not to work. I don’t see how I can possibly go to work tomorrow. I feel like total crap. Every sneeze makes my head feel like someone’s shot me from the grassy knoll – back, and to the left, back, and to the left. I don’t see how the hell I’m going to get any sleep tonight. And yet if I don’t go in tomorrow, I can’t pick up the paycheck I wasn’t able to pick up on Friday. Worse yet, between snow and adventures in the emergency room, I only worked one day last week, and not even a full day at that. The place where I’m working right now is so tiny that it operates on an “if you don’t show up, you don’t get paid” system. At that rate I might as well be working from home already – I can sit around and edit video in this state, but answer phones? Don’t think so. And yet my not being able to get my check on Friday already has us in the hole. All of this scares the crap out of me when it comes to the impending arrival of a third human being in the house. As if the state of the house itself wasn’t already scaring me for that reason.
I missed the Super Bowl, but I am watching the Puppy Bowl. Might as well confiscate my testes now, what kinda red-blooded American male does that? 😆 Seriously, since I can’t sleep and I’m still up doing laundry and working on the site and a video assignment, I’ve got the replay of the Animal Planet Puppy Bowl on. As much as I love the little camera at the bottom of the water bowl, that Puppy Bowl (and the Kitten Halftime Show) kinda creeps me out a little bit. I doubt very much the animals are being mistreated, but there’s just something about it that makes me look at it askance, sorta like “would these animals be in that room, under those lights, doing those things if they didn’t have to be?” Then I get to wondering why Oberon tries to run out of the house if a door’s left open just a little too long, and the whole free will thing bugs me even more coming from the other direction. I’m hoping I can chalk this whole philosophical dilemma up to being sick as hell, but if watching a bunch of frolicking kitties and puppies on TV puts me in this state of mind, I’m not gonna survive having to raise a critter with two legs. Then again, I’ve heard enough about my utter unsuitability as a potential parent from some corners that I’ve probably got a reservoir of doubt built up.
On that cheerful note, I think I’m gonna finish my hot chocolate, chase it down with some Nyquil, and maybe actually get some sleep.… Read more

Categories
Critters Home Base Music

…and tired always followed sick.

Thanks a lot, Oberon. Little fart ran out of the house around this time last night, and I had to get something/anything on to go outside and fish him out from under the side deck, again. This time Xena was no help at all – she thought me wallowing around in the snow on the ground was a sign that it was playtime, and wound up scaring Obi back under the deck repeatedly. The result? I woke up this morning feeling like death warmed over, and not even properly warmed over, but like someone kinda half-ass read the microwave instructions for warming death over and forgot to peel the film back on one corner of death and didn’t stir death halfway through, so the applesauce is still frozen and the melted cheese hasn’t melted over anything that it was actually supposed to melt over. (In fact, half of it is in the applesauce.) I must really love that little dipwad because that’s the second time in a week I’ve had to go retrieve him before he wanders too far off, and the second time with snow on the ground.
The wife was unbelievably happy that I made Jello for her tonight, like it’s the most remarkable thing anyone’s ever done for her. Erm…okay. Maybe I need to make Jello more often. It’s a kitchen challenge that taxes my cooking skills to their very limits, and maybe someday I’ll be ready to move up to Jello Pudding! Not that there’s anything wrong with making her happy, especially when she’s lugging my two-headed mutant love child around in her belly, but I’m just gonna chalk this one up to the hormones. 😆
I’ve been munching on some Reese’s chocolate dipped peanut butter cookies lately and wondering why it is that no one outside of the Girl Scouts can seem to nail down the perfect balance between peanut butter, chocolate and cookie that we mere mortals know only as Tagalongs. Then again, if Tagalongs were available more than once a year, I’d probably be hovering closer to 350 pounds than 250. The terrifying thought also just occurred to me that, no longer working at the station, I can’t order my usual annual forklift pallet of Tagalongs from Donna anymore. Holy crap, my source has dried up! I’m going to start having tremors somewhere around Easter weekend.
Without even really deliberately setting out to do it, I embarked on something of an exploration of electronic music today, from Raymond Scott’s 50s and 60s experiments to the non-Doctor Who repertoire of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop to Hot Butter to Jarre to Art of Noise to early Juno Reactor and Christopher Franke. (And some other stuff in between that I’m probably forgetting.) I need to hurry up and get a USB MIDI cable extra soonish because I’m feeling the music-making bug chewing away at the edge of my consciousness almost around the clock right now. Maybe it’s inspiration from recent events, but I’ve had some lyrics that were very vague suddenly swim right into focus, along with a lot of other stuff, and I’m charting out arrangements as best someone can when they can’t actually read or write music, working out and practicing guitar parts, that sort of thing. I’ve got one humdinger that I’ll probably use as my first experiment, but it’s a bit daunting, what with some rather specific instrument sounds that I’m gonna have to coax outta Cubase, and at least 8 part harmonies on the vocals. (Yeah, fair warning, I’m probably finally going to sing.) (Gee, I wonder who could’ve inspired me to pile that many vocals on something?) But it’s the one piece that’s just burning a hole in the back of my brain, so challenging or not, that’s probably the one that needs to come out of my head first. I’m not sure what’s flipped a switch in my head that’s made me feel like actually exposing the rest of the world to my singing voice, aside from the possibility that I’ll be having to sing to someone a lot here in a few months.
You have been warned.… Read more

Categories
Critters Should We Talk About The Weather? Television & Movies

Log cabin fever (it’s a remote possibility)

This blog is about to become a chronicle of my descent into madness. I couldn’t even get out of the driveway to go to work this morning, which is just as well because the road our house is on is a solid sheet of ice. They’ve plowed it, but didn’t sand it – what’s the point? All that does is just expose the ice. Might as well have left the snow there so at least there’d be something to get some traction on. Anyway, yet another day where I’m not making any money. Yeesh.
I do have some cute new kitty pictures for ya though. Isn’t that what this blog is really supposed to be about?
Othello, Oberon, Olivia
Guess who’s keeping the bed warm for mommy? How about…everybody? (Well okay, the dog’s not up on the bed. But she would be if she could.)
Othello, Oberon, Olivia
The beast awakens.
Othello, Oberon, Olivia
The beast asks his big brother to handle that bright flashing thing and then goes back to sleep.
Speaking of cute kitties, there’s a newly-re-processed, higher-resolution version of Olivia Vs. The Daleks here for your amusement – and this one doesn’t even go to another video when it’s done! 😀
Watched the very, very good bonus features on the Doctor Who Inferno DVD today, and did some more work on the massive, nigh-insurmountable task of converting our entire music review section into a database.
Thanks to everyone who’s ordered stuff through theLogBook.com – the first quarter revenue is in and I’ve turned around and spent the lot of it. 😆 Your patronage is appreciated – don’t stop now, please!
I’ve been following the saga of Boston vs. the Mooninites with great amusement. Keep in mind, I don’t even really like Aqua Teen Hunger Force, but the hysteria surrounding this whole things has been amusing and frighteningly enlightening. I’m almost convinced that the city officials who are going balls-to-the-wall with the pressing of charges and so on are just doing this to try to justify their initial reaction. In the end, the joke really is on them – and it’s created the kind of publicity that Cartoon Network couldn’t have bought if they had originally wanted to. Now that it’s News, don’t expect any arm of the Turner octopus to let it drop out of the headlines any time soon. Maybe I’m sympathetic to Turner because I’m left in goggle-eyed admiration of what they managed to pull off here (without even trying!) in the name of promoting a TV show, but I’m also less than sympathetic to Boston for just not getting it. Yes, I’m sure they spent money mobilizing their task force of terror…but they’d probably get a lot more points for laughing it off, bragging about how well they responded, and asking Turner Broadcasting to reimburse them for the “exercise.” This is kinda like prosecuting someone to the fullest extent of the law for toilet papering your house.… Read more