So if my list of movies wasn’t enough Halloween-themed amusement for you, how about a whole gallery full of famous artworks retouched via Photoshop to include famous monsters? Predators and Aliens seem to be especially popular subjects for this little project. I was especially amused by Michaelangelo’s David after encountering a facehugger and Godzilla taking care of Pompeii. The page has a few ads and such across the top, so scroll down to see the art, and enjoy!
I love this time of the year, with its mildly warm afternoons and crisp, dark nights (what my buddy Cheno calls “jacket weather”). I love the colors of the harvest: yellows, golds, oranges and browns, colors that evoke a pleasant childhood in the 1970s. I love the rattle of dried cornstalks, now more often store-bought than standing in the fields, and the smell of woodsmoke rising from chimneys (sadly, that’s one I don’t notice so much anymore; wood-burning fireplaces are fading into history, I guess). I love the way the autumn sunlight slants across the lawns in great amber patches like the dimming embers of the summer just ended. And I love Halloween.
The death of Rosa Parks is already old news at this point. A week in today’s 24-hour journalistic environment may as well be six months, and I’ve probably let the iron grow cold when it comes to writing this entry. Even so, I’d still like to say a few words about the passing of this remarkable woman.
Passed a silver BMW Z4 on the way into work this morning. The rear deck featured one of those custom license-plate frames you can have made at the mall to say anything you wish. This one said, “Martinis, girls and guns.” It enclosed a vanity plate that read “BONDCAR.”
It’s nice that some people have active imaginations and the income to flaunt them. Bastards.
I went for a walk this afternoon, and on this walk I passed through Gallivan Plaza in the heart of downtown Salt Lake City. There I saw a city workman hanging Christmas lights before the snow flies. Nothing particularly unusual about that… except for the fact that it was at least 75 degrees out there on the plaza, I was sweating in the bright sunshine, and this workman I spotted was wearing shorts and a thin t-shirt. And it’s the end of October. I’m thinking the weather gods haven’t checked their calendars recently, or else there’s something to this global warming hysteria. Something. Whatever the reason, though, it was very tough to force myself back to my proofreading desk…
It’s another online survey designed to tell you what you want to hear about yourself! In this case, you can learn which fantasy/science fiction character you are. I know you’re dying to know whether a soulless piece of programming code thinks I’m a Jedi or a Toydarian junk dealer, so I won’t keep you in suspense. My results are:
James T. Kirk
An impassioned commander with more respect for individuals than for authority, you have a no-holds-barred approach to life and its obstacles.
I don’t believe in the no-win scenario.
I probably would’ve been more amused by a more obscure character, but I can live with this. After all, Jim always had the best chair on the ship…
My father has been trying to sell the car pictured above for an acquaintance of his, a widow whose late husband doted on this fine automobile. Dad hasn’t had much luck finding a buyer around here, so about a week ago he asked if I’d help him put it up on eBay in the hopes of reaching a larger audience. The auction went live tonight and will run through Halloween.
I have no idea if anyone reading this blog would be in the market for a car like this, but I figured it wouldn’t hurt to use my bully pulpit as best I can. FYI, this is a 1929 Ford Model A with an all-metal body and fiberglass fenders, a modern frame and drivetrain, a custom-built fiberglass trailer, and lots of chrome under the hood. Additional details can be found in the auction description. Dad’s been driving it to car shows all summer, and it’s a sweet little ride. If you’re interested, please check out the auction. And, if you’re not interested, do me a favor and pass this news along to any friends of yours who might be. Let’s do a little viral marketing here, folks, and sell a car for a kindly old widow lady.
You can click on the photo up there to get a larger view of the vehicle, or just go straight to the auction for some different views. Thanks for looking, and good luck if you decide to bid.
If you’ve spent much time exploring the rest of blogosphere, you may have gotten the erroneous impression that all bloggers are cat owners. That’s because of a common phenomenon called catblogging, the posting of adorable photos of cats doing, well, cat stuff. Cat owners love to catblog, it seems, while dog owners remain oddly introverted about displaying their pets to the world. I say it’s time for canine-lovers to balance the scales. In the name of equal pet exposure, I present the following image, which I’ve just added to my photo gallery
That’s my dog, Shadow. He’s a border collie, a breed rumored to be among the most intelligent of all dog varieties. I don’t know about that, but I can say that he often gives me the willies with the way he seems to understand ordinary, conversational English. The drawback to such an intelligent pet, of course, is that he suffers from a whole raft of neuroses, including a tendency to sulk for the rest of the day whenever he doesn’t get to go along in the car. And then there’s that whole obsessive-compulsive ball-chasing thing. If you don’t know what I mean by that, you’ve obviously never encountered a border collie.
Come to think of it, you might count yourself lucky for that…
[For the record, I’ve nothing against cats. I’ve owned many cats over the years and frankly think the whole “cat person-dog person” thing is silly. They both have their pluses and minuses as companions. It’s just that, at the moment, I have a dog. And even with the neuroses, he’s a pretty cool dog.]
John Scalzi of Whatever fame has just added another title to his growing list of published works, a non-fiction volume called The Rough Guide to Sci-Fi Movies. I haven’t seen the book yet, but it sounds like a pretty thorough overview of the genre, including information on the origins and history of science fiction movies as well as lots of other stuff that fans should find interesting. However, as Scazi himself noted the other day, the part of the book that people will find most interesting is The Canon:
…the 50 science fiction films [he] deemed to be the most significant in the history of film. Note that “most significant” does not mean “best” or “most popular” or even “most influential.” Some of the films may be all three of these, but not all of them are — indeed, some films in The Canon aren’t objectively very good, weren’t blockbusters and may not have influenced other filmmakers to any significant degree. Be that as it may, [Scalzi] think[s] they matter — in one way or another, they are uniquely representative of some aspect of the science fiction film experience.
John helpfully listed said Canon in the entry I’ve quoted. Not surprisingly, given the way the blogosphere feeds on its own young, some ambitious blogger immediately transformed the list into one of those memes where you bold the titles you’ve seen. Not being one to miss out on a good meme, let’s take a look at how of these movies I can cross off the list:
Regular visitors to this site — all three of you — may have noticed that the frequency of my postings has become erratic of late, and that the posts themselves are shorter and, well, lamer than they used to be. I feel like I owe you guys an explanation for what’s going on.
