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Nov102009

The Jealous Astronaut Plea Bargains

This will be short because I’m trying to finish a bunch of mundane chores and miscellaneous loose ends so I can leave tomorrow on a last-minute adventure with a clear conscience, but I couldn’t let this pass without mention. Remember Lisa Nowak, a.k.a. The Jealous Astronaut? The woman who drove nonstop from Florida to Texas while wearing a space diaper so she could confront (and possibly do major damage to) her romantic rival?

When last we encountered Captain Novak roughly 18 months ago, she had entered a “not guilty” plea. Well, I just spotted the news that she’s now pled guilty to lesser charges of felony burglary of a car and misdemeanor battery as opposed to the original charges of attempted kidnapping, burglary and battery. The prosecutor in the case has complained that Nowak’s attorney has “chipped away” at the case until there’s nothing left, i.e., the defense has fought to have evidence thrown out and managed to get a prohibition on any discussion of the diapers.

Nowak and her paramour, Commander William Oefelein , were both throw out of the astronaut core in 2007. The woman Nowak was apparently after is now living with Oefelein and they’re reportedly engaged. So I guess that’s the end of this strange tale. I have to admit that it feels rather anti-climatic…

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Nov092009

Anniversaries of Note

The Berlin Wall coming down, November 1989

By some strange confluence of historical currents, there seems to be a number of noteworthy anniversaries happening within days of each other this week. The most significant, of course, is the fall of the Berlin Wall on this very night 20 years ago, when ordinary Germans took matters into their own hands — literally, considering they went after the Wall with hammers, crowbars, and even their fingers — and put an end to one of the most powerful symbols of Cold War tension and communist repression, while border guards and secret police stood by and let it happen without firing a shot.

Continue Reading…

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Nov052009

Continuing in the Same Vein…

I haven’t followed country music very much (read: not at all) since the early ’90s, so I’m only dimly aware of who Taylor Swift is, and I probably wouldn’t even know her name if she hadn’t done that CMT Crossroads thing with Def Leppard a year ago. But then, you really don’t need to know who someone is to enjoy something like this, do you?

taylor_swift.jpg

I don’t have my dad’s uncanny knack for identifying classic cars on minimal evidence — his knowledge of mid-century tail-light design is nothing short of amazing — but I think she’s sitting in a Chevy Bel Air from the early ’60s. A pretty girl in a cool old car… these things make me happy.
(Via.)

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Nov052009

The Conundrum Faced by Every Middle-Aged Male Sooner or Later

Here’s something I was planning to throw into one of those Halloween entries I mentioned earlier, since it’s based on a publicity still from the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and I figured vampires and slayers and Halloween go hand-in-fang and all. But really, it’s the sort of gag that plays at any time of year:

anthony head and sarah michelle gellar
see more Lol Celebs

Yeah, who among us has not been in that uncomfortable position while in the company of some pretty young thing? I sympathize, Giles, I sympathize…

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Nov052009

The “Handy Substitute for an Actual Entry” Meme

I was planning to do a whole string of Halloween-themed entries last week, followed by some long-overdue business (such as a tribute for the late Patrick Swayze, whose premature death moved me to a surprising degree) this week. But, as it seems to do with distressing regularity these days, work has simply overwhelmed every other aspect of my life lately. Busy, busy days, a few late nights at the office, and a major truckload of job-related stress and anxiety haven’t left much time or energy for anything else.

A few days ago, however, feeling the need to get something posted up here for the sake of my own sanity, if not the pleasure of my Three Loyal Readers, I thought to fall back on the ol’ reliable of the blogosphere, the not-quite-an-entry exercise that you can noodle at a little bit at a time whenever you find yourself with five free minutes. Yes, that’s right, kids, it’s a meme. This particular one is courtesy of Jaquandor.

So, without further ado, let the meme-ocity begin!

Continue Reading…

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Oct292009

There Are No Cows in Space

So, that Castle/Firefly meta-joke I was looking forward to? Every bit as brilliant and funny as I hoped, from the rapid-cut “gearing up” and familiar Malcolm Reynolds action-hero pose to Castle’s daughter puncturing his balloon with her teenagery command of the obvious:

I loved this whole sequence. I do find myself wondering, however, if any Firefly fans took the “get over it” line as a slight; browncoats seem to take a lot of crap in certain corners of the InterWebs for making such a fuss over a series that lasted only 13 episodes. Personally, I doubt it was intended that way, but fans can be notoriously touchy, as William Shatner learned with his own “get over it” joke. Hopefully, we all learned something from that ugly incident…

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Oct282009

One Possible Future…

It was a beautiful launch this morning for the Ares 1-X rocket, a unmanned prototype for the next-generation Constellation spacecraft that are intended to replace NASA’s aging space shuttle:

It looks to me like the ship wobbles a little bit right after ignition, when it’s balancing on the thrust column but hasn’t actually started lifting yet, and I had a nervous moment when I wondered if it was going to spiral over and blow up like some of the spectacular accidents from the very early days of spaceflight (many of which are shown in the movie The Right Stuff, if you’ll remember). But I haven’t seen anyone commenting on that motion, so perhaps it’s normal for this design. Or maybe I’m not seeing what I think I am.

The Ares is really kind of strange-looking, in my opinion, oddly proportioned with an anorexic body — which is actually a derivative version of the solid rocket boosters you see on either side of the shuttles during their launches — beneath a bulky payload section way up high. It looks top-heavy, although I would guess the weight of the propellant balances it out. Strange or not, though, this is what the future of American manned spaceflight is going to look like. Assuming there is one, of course. Right now, that’s somewhat questionable, since the shuttle is slated to stop flying next year, the International Space Station may very well be abandoned after its funding runs out in 2015, and the Constellation ships — the Ares booster combined with a manned Orion capsule — likely won’t be ready to safely fly humans until sometime after that. Meanwhile, there’s a lot of talk in space circles about sending people back to the Moon or on to Mars, but frankly I don’t see that there’s much public or political interest in doing either, and some experts are now questioning whether the Ares rockets are even the right hardware to meet those goals. So we’re essentially developing a whole new spacecraft system with no clear idea of where we’re going to send it or what we’re going to do with it.

That’s not smart. Especially these days, when everyone is so concerned with return on investment instead of merely wanting to do great things for the sake of doing great things. But still, no matter what the future holds, I have to admit that I got a genuine thrill this morning as I stood in the coffee shop, watching on the flatscreen over the counter as a whole new type of bird took flight over Cape Canaveral. It reminded me of those early mornings when I was a boy, getting up before dawn to watch the first few shuttle launches with my dad.

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Oct262009

Memo to the Pretty Young Thing on My Morning Train

Dear PYT:

While I don’t claim to be any kind of great sage, I have acquired a certain amount of wisdom in my four decades of life on this planet, and, in particular, in this valley. So believe me when I say that you would be much more comfortable during the frosty mornings of the final week of October if you were wearing a coat. I know it’s crucial that everyone on the train know that you buy your t-shirts at American Eagle, and of course you want to show off how this snug-fitting shirt cradles your toned and lean body, but when you’re hunched over and clutching your forearms in a vain effort to stay warm, we’re really not seeing your bodaciousness anyhow. And another thing… flip-flops? Really? Do you have any idea what a bunion is? Or a fallen arch? Because these decidedly non-bodacious defects are in your future if you continue wearing those stupid things everywhere you go. That’s assuming, of course, that you don’t end up with frostbite for being dumb enough to shuffle around in 37-degree weather with exposed toes.

I know, I know… I sound like your father. And we all know how totally uncool that is. But really… I lecture because I care.
Seriously, I think you’d really like this coat thing. Or even a sweatshirt. I’ll bet American Eagle carries sweatshirts. Go get yourself one and see if your day doesn’t improve about a million-fold…

Sincerely,
A concerned old curmudgeon

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Oct242009

The Return of Captain Tightpants

The TV series Castle is about the only thing running these days that demands “must-see” status for me. It’s admittedly a trifle, but truthfully that’s why I like it so much. I’m really damn sick of all the scripted dramas with no sense of humor and a grim, clenched-tooth fascination with how sucky everything is. A lighthearted 1980s-style detective show is the perfect antidote to all that self-importance.

Anyhow, because of our conflicting schedules and mutual interest in the show, The Girlfriend and I usually record it and then catch up on each week’s episode a few days after it airs. We watched this week’s episode on Tuesday. It was a good one that tied up some dangling threads from earlier segments (I suspect this would’ve been the show’s finale if it hadn’t been picked up recently for a full second season), but what really made us both sit up and notice was the preview of the next episode.

I caught it first, a glimpse of something familiar…

“Hey,” I said, “Does that look like Nathan’s Firefly coat?”

“It sure looked like a duster to me,” Anne replied. “You don’t think…?”

“Well, it is the Halloween episode. Maybe Castle is dressing up as… Mal?”

And then we both started grinning because it was so obvious, so likely, and so damn cool.

See, the star of Castle, Nathan Fillion, played the dashing space captain Malcom “Mal” Reynolds on the short-lived and much-lamented series Firefly. And Fillion is well-aware that much of his fanbase — and Castle‘s, too, I suspect — is composed of Firefly “browncoats.” Because of this, I’m certain, every episode of Castle to date has had some kind of little shout-out to the science-fiction lovers who have stuck by him through several prematurely canceled ventures and are now delighted to see him in something that seems to be working. And what do you think would be the ultimate shout-out? Well, how about… this?

If you don’t recognize the outfit, I’ll confirm it for you: Fillion is wearing the complete Mal costume, right down to the really big gun. This is really a brilliant meta-joke… and considering how even that lousy cell-phone photo has plastered a big, big grin on my face, I can’t wait to see how it works in the full episode.

Props to the always-interesting Adventureblog for spotting this…

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Oct242009

Oh, If Only I’d Had a Camera…

After I finally got out of work last night, I was standing on the TRAX platform at the Gallivan Plaza stop, the heart of what little activity there is on downtown Main Street following the end of the business day. I was waiting with a dozen or so fellow commuters and passing the time by watching pedestrians across the street. That particular block is a rich environment for people-watching; there are always a few homeless folks around, and usually a mob of scruffy teen and twentysomethings who seem to have nothing better to do than sit on the big planter boxes in front of Sam Weller’s and be obnoxious. You also see a lot of beautiful people along that stretch of sidewalk, thanks to a popular nearby club called Keys on Main, and the interactions between the clubgoers and the miscreants are often pretty entertaining.

The street show on this particular evening starred a young woman, a redhead dressed in the shortest miniskirt I’ve ever seen outside an Austin Powers movie. And if that wasn’t enough to grab the attention of any heterosexual male with a pulse, she was also wearing thigh-high, patent-leather, lace-up, platform-souled boots that made her legs look about 175 feet long. Think of Julia Roberts strutting down Rodeo Drive in that scene from Pretty Woman and you’ll get the idea.

As noteworthy as the woman herself may have been, though, what really made me smile was the reaction she was getting from, well, everybody. I guess she was killing time waiting for Keys to open or something, because she walked from the club down to the corner and back several times. And every time she did, the heads of every man on the block — including, I’m not too proud to admit, my own — very obviously turned to follow her.

It was like watching a slow-motion tennis match.

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