thebitterguy

• 20:01 RT @MaxGeiger: We can't pit Bruce Lee against Chuck Norris in our simulator because (and this is seekrit) Bruce Lee IS our simulator. #
• 22:18 #deadliestwarrior "I wanna see what it does to our ARMOUR" is the call of the pussy. #
• 08:53 Re: #deadliestwarrior If you have a neato blinding or otherwise incapacitating weapon? Leave that shit at home. #

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So, yeah. Cynra got up early to get breakfast started and I wallowed in bed until I heard from downstairs a thumping and screaming.

Well, fuck, I thought, that can't be good.

I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter, kicking cats out of my path and trying to remember if this was smoothie day or not (the aftermath of a broken blender would be a bad thing to charge into, y'see).

It turned out my demon spawned Thermos brand tea mug tends to explode if you put hot liquid into it (I think that's the very definition of a product flaw), getting hot water all over Cynra's foot.

We got her up to the bathroom and ran cold water over it. Then added some Solarcaine.

The End.

P.S. Well, apparently not. So I called Telehealth, and they did some diagnosis and decided that she had, in fact, burned her foot and that she should keep it in cool water. Okay, fine, thanks Dr. House. We had no other ointment, so I called mr_weasel and asked him if item A from our first aid kit would do. He suggested we check the expiry date (hey, we've had this first aid kit a decade! Imagine that! And the ointment had expired eight years ago! Imagine that!) and said that it wouldn't be necessary in any case unless there were blisters.

The End.

P.P.S. Okay, so there's no way she's going to work with her foot unpleasantly charred (singed, really. Pink like fresh salmon), so she had to call in to work. Teachers (and assorted librarians) have this fascinating problem that normal folk don't. If I can't make it to work, I simply call in and say "Can't make it!" and everything's fine. They, on the other hand, have to go through an arcane ritual or life as we know it ceases to be.

So Cynra needs the yellow phone & Pin Number card which is next to the phone. But the card isn't next to the phone. So she needs her principal's phone number. Which I can't find.

So I get her the phone number for one of her co-workers, who does not in fact have the principal's phone number. He does agree to switch morning duty with her, which at this point is a triumph on the scale of D-Day.

Keep in mind, kiddies, she's trying to orchestrate this with one foot in the tub. It's like one foot in the grave, only sitting on ceramic.

The situation is turning into something resembling an NFB animated short (please feel free to pick your favourite). Eventually I find the number for her principal, who it turns out is already at school because someone set off the fire alarm.

The principal says she should call in. Which requires, all together kids, the phone and pin number on the little yellow card.

Thankfully, after several minutes of excavating the dining room table, YHB managed to finally uncover the card (things to do: put that info on the cell phone) and Cynra managed to, foot in bucket, call the board's sick line.

The End

P.P.P.S. I didn't get breakfast today, but I managed to make it to work on time.

Okay, so a few weeks ago, I saw the trailer for Glee, the new musical TV show set in a High School on Fox (hmmm...).

It's got a solid cast so far, with roles for Guest Star Jane Lynch and Charlie2 Jayma Mays as well as a group of talented (or at least well produced) youngsters (which, for a TV show means they're under 30).

But... I look at it, and I see that Fox is going to release each week's musical tracks on iTunes almost immediately after each episode's broadcast (Synergy makes me feel Dirty, peoplel. Dirty and used and a little bit angry), and I look at the basic description of the show, which is a muuuuusical. Set in a high school.

And I go Hrrm.

Is this just a version of High School Musical for Hipster Douchebags? Am I being led with the promise of candy to a sinister van in a parking lot?

Good God, people. This is Fox we're talking about.

The lead actress being the product of a mixed race gay marriage is interesting, admittedly. I just hope the Glee club being lead by an Aryan superman with a fat black girl, an Asian/Jewish stutterer and a guy in a wheelchair on backup isn't played for TOO many laughs.

Because, yeah, Fox. Oh, Fox. See how I distrust you?

Edit: And, on the front page of LJ, A community: glee_tv. I can only imagine how thick MySpace was for promotional material for the show for the past few weeks.

So I'm surfin' LJ and I found This link in someone's LJ.

I decided to just click over to take a look. It was, as advertised, some sort of day camp for the hyper-masculinized.

But my favourite bit was this part on the What You Get page.

# A Ninja suit and assorted Ninja weapons.

Oh, man. I feel the craziness washing off them.

The picture on the front page is the best.



A Ninja-to in one hand, a bottle of tequila in the other, and your friends around you. Where do I sign up?.

Believer Magazine interview with a ninja.

So, in the halcyon days of the '80s, one man stood for the supremacy of the American male. Rocky Balboa. A plucky, scrappy boxer from Philadelphia, Rocky faced every challenge that came to him with determination and a swollen face.

This is not about him.

Rocky had two great foes he faced in his career. One, a boxer from the mean streets with a neck full of gold and a hunger to succeed (and possibly the Eye of the Tiger. I can't be sure). The other, Rocky's Soviet counterpart, the greatest achievement of Communist Sports Medicine.

Clubber Lang, portrayed in a career making role by Mr. T (who would go on to drive the van), defeated Rocky in their first match. Rocky had allowed himself to be softened by success, which left him a ripe target for Lang's prison hardened rage. Although Lang was eventually defeated by Rocky (Spoiler!), Rocky's defeat left him shaken to the core.

Some time later, Rocky would once again be forced back into the ring to face Ivan Drago, a Soviet super boxer. Rocky initially declined to fight Drago, only to have the gauntlet taken up by his one-time adversary, now friend, Apollo Creed. After a James Brown laced opening, Creed would be slaughtered in the ring, LITERALLY, leaving a grief stricken Rocky to take the fight back to the Motherland. After an equally ostentatious Soviet Style pre-show (Red Army Choir & showgirls), Rocky defeated his outsized opponent before giving the audience a tear-stained paean to world peace.

The next day, the Berlin Wall fell.

So! We look now to see who would be triumphant in this battle between Rocky's defeated foes. Would it be the South Side Slugger, or the Iron Curtain? Let's Get Ready to Rumble (and also Violate Trademarks)!

[Poll #1403937]

That's my problem, you see. I'm unfamiliar with the canon.

I don't know about the back history of this thing, whether this thing is Tolkien's Middle Earth, Fleming's James Bond, or Doyle's Holmes. So if I see a media iteration, I'll assume that's it. Even if I know there's gaping bloody holes in it, I'm fine as long as that's behind the scenes (or at least out of my eyesight).*

I'm usually not familiar with the genre (any genre), even if I love it. No, seriously, I'm a huge fan of Godzilla and other Kaiju, but the US Remake makes up an unacceptable percentage of my viewing history. Most of my knowledge comes from a magazine article that included an illustration of Big G done by John Severin (IIRC). I love the concept of giant monsters, and remember enough that I know that any Godzilla movie with a baby Godzilla is likely to suck. But I don't know the canon.

I'm married to a Trekkie, but my exposure was mostly through CKWS' Saturday afternoon broadcasts which, and I am serious, seemed to consist almost entirely of reruns of Devil in the Dark**. I read a scattering of the novels (which tended to be about the quality of... Well, Star Trek novels). My first consistent exposure to the franchise was TNG, which I still recognized as being off.

Dr. Who? Look, that just scares me. The Canon on that sucker consists of 40 years of TV, much of it only preserved by monastic scribes while society fell around them.

Marvel Comics of the '80s? Sure, I am familiar with that Canon. Champions? I'm familiar with that Canon, mostly by luck. D&D? Canonical by assimilation. Star Wars? Religiously, up until Zahn's atrocious trilogy, which was easy enough (he said sardonically, drinking a hot chocolate while his lightsaber opened with a snap hiss). But then I schismed.

But mostly? I'm not familiar with the Canon.

That's freeing. I can look at something and not go "But that isn't right". I can judge things on their own merits, as much as I'm able to. Experiencing without the depth of history is a valid experience, just as much as approaching it with a bibliographic knowledge of which side of the aluminum foil was used for the Cybermen costume in which specific episode.

So I don't mind that I am unfamiliar with the canon.

* I suspect this is the same reason people can enjoy the LXG film.

** To this day I cannot recall having seen City on the Edge of Forever in full. Or Amok Time. I'm pretty sure I saw the Gangster one. And the Nazi one. And the Jesus one. And the one with the rabbit and Kirk getting beat up by a drunken Irishman.

( Behind the cut, a preview of next week's Deadliest Warrior )

Whereas previously the fights have been "hypothetical guy of defined ethnicity vs hypothetical guy of defined ethnicity", this is two guys who are at least postage stamp notoriety. Hell, you could play Shaka in Civ!

It was fun before now, but now it seems a bit into eye territory.

• 20:30 Well, Hotspot no longer works. Bugger. #
• 20:45 What do you do to a hippo with three balls? #
• 20:47 Remember, folks, Glee on Fox tonight! #
• 22:02 Guys! Guys! Guys! Shaolin vs Maori on #Deadliestwarrior! Guuuuuuys! #
• 22:33 Does anyone know anything about new Fighting Fantasy books? #

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