The Robot Apocalypse Inches Ever Closer, A Gelfling Astride Its Back

I know, I know, not long ago I was raving about the inevitabilities of the pending zombie apocalypse, and now here I am preparing to rave about the robot apocalypse creeping up behind us with its cold, glowing red eye staring at us unblinkingly. So what? I'm covering my bases. It's like the man who bets on both red and black on the same roll at the roulette wheel, except he always breaks even and looks like a jackass, while in this scenario we die or are enslaved. ...Okay, so maybe it's not the most accurate metaphor. Perhaps my abject terror is clouding my judgement.

It's not that there's yet another futuristic prototype finding corporate backing that threatens to bond man to machine in blasphemous parodies of coupling that make the soul blush and, like Adam and Eve, suddenly recognize its own nakedness. Though that's part of it. My larger concern is that our budding robot overlords are beginning to cull from my childhood in the least likely of places, and that I will not stand. Behold, if you dare: the Deux Ex Machina Motorcycle Exeskeleton, first runner-up for most pretentious invention name ever (it just lost out to the "Jesus Excelsior Christ" Crock pot). You really need to watch this thing in (simulated) action to get the full picture.

When it's completely extended, I suppose I can see the Tron reference, though to be honest you're never really gonna sell me on the comparison until the subject is glowing in some hideous shade of neon and is followed by a stream of solid, two dimensional energy. Call me a purist. But honestly, am I the only one who thinks this thing looks like a Landstrider from The Dark Crystal?

Do you know why the driver in the picture is covered head to toe, his reflective visor pulled down to obscure even his eyes? Because it's a Gelfling, thrust unceremoniously into the 21st century and determined to compensate for his weak, puppet physique by augmenting it cybernetically. This is not a pretty picture, my friends. These little bastards could already communicate feelings, thoughts, and impressions telepathically via their dreamfasting ability, and to make matters worse, they can communicate with savage, amorophous beasts like this:
Imagine what will happen when they replace those skewed, felt teeth with razor sharp fangs, or, God help us all, they actually attached a body to this thing. It'd be like having Chewbacca devour you whole, and I'm sorry, but if I'm going to be killed by a wookie, I'll have my arms ripped off for beating him at space chess, thank you very much.

Joss Whedon Strikes Again: This Time, My Heart

So I sometimes have a habit of coming to the party late, so to speak, as I don't know the proper channels on which to scour the interwebs for the latest "buzz." Thus I hope you'll forgive me when I come to you bearing expired gifts you undoubtedly already own, but in case even one of you haven't seen this yet, allow me to brighten your day.


You see, there's this little gem called Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, a delightful three-act musical comedy about an up-and-coming supervillian who's trying to gain membership in an evil fraternity and win the heart of a girl he semi-stalks at the laundromat. Neil Patrick Harris (NPH) plays the good doctor, Felicia Day is his love-to-be, and Nathan Fillion (aka Captain Mal Reynolds, aka Han Solo before Lucas went back and made Greedo shoot first) is Horrible's nemesis, Captain Hammer. As the last member of that trifecta might suggest, Joss Whedon--and from the credits, most of his extended family, too--is behind this. It is, in a word, delightful.

Still, I feel a bit like the guy running into church on Easter morning shouting "Hey, have you guys heard about this dude Jesus? He's awesome!" so I won't go on much longer. The link above will let you watch the whole thing in its entirety, fo' free, so that's not a bad thing. If you're dubious, though, and too lazy to click the link, I've posted perhaps my favorite song from the piece below. Bon appetit.

For the Elderly Cosmonaut

With Christmas just around the corner, are you worried about finding the perfect gift for the octogenarian NASA enthusiast in your household? You know, the foreign national whose tenuous grasp on the English language may horribly mutilate his speech, but never his fiery enthusiasm? Well, look no further, my dear reader. Your prayers, and my own, have clearly been answered:

Alternate Endings Cannot Save Season 2's Mediocrity

So it's no surprise that I'm a fairly big fan of the show Heroes, and for those of you who watch it, it's also no surprise that the second season wasn't necessarily their best yet, though the addition of Kristen Bell (aka Veronica Mars) to anything is always a good idea. I'm willing to bet that if they dropped her onto Beijing from 10,000 feet she would cleanse the very air of China as she plummeted to her doom, but as our nation is unwilling to squander such a valuable natural resource, we have remained content to let the world's Olympians blacken their lungs. But I digress.

Since some of you may not have watched this show up to its current point yet--or at all--I won't go into any details, save to say that Season 2 contains the worst fake Irish accents in the history of sound. While that kind of stuff is a deal-breaker for me, it passes under sane people's radar, so I'll let it be. Anyway, said season is out on DVD now, and already some of its extras are popping up on the Interwebs. I've linked a page here that has three such tidbits: 1) an alternate ending where what they were trying to stop wasn't stopped and got out (you know, when I write it like that, it sounds pretty damn cliche, doesn't it?); 2) the revelation of Kaito Nakamura's (Hiro's father, aka Mr. Sulu) ability/power; and 3) a scene with Nathan yelling at his wife and kids, which I think is a lovely segue from my last post. None of these are particularly earth-shattering, but of course if they were, they probably wouldn't have been cut. Still, enjoy.

Everybody Poops...On Their Kids' Self Esteem

As a staunch Irish Catholic and someone who likes to think of himself as "Old Skool," I obviously approve whole-heartedly of the aggressive, even draconian physical, psychological, and emotional chastisement of children. As I have none of my own yet --barring the pug who rules my apartment with a chubby, iron paw--I freely substitute my students, and on rare occasion, random children in the supermarket. There are few things so satisfying in this world as slapping the wrist of a strange child with a wooden ruler (like you don't carry them on you at all times, too) as he reaches on tippy toe to snatch a bag of Double Stuff Oreo cookies from the shelf. Finding that perfect mix of utter disgust and disappointment on my face is difficult, I'll admit, but my acerbic "God hates fat children, Oreo-lover" usually overrides any facial nuance the lad may have missed.

Imagine my shame, then, to have found that I am behind the times in this necessary, revered pastime. Simpleton that I am, I always assumed to only berate children for their own shortcomings, but truer prophets than myself have thankfully seen the primrose path of abusing kids for their parents' flaws. Take, for instance, My Beautiful Mommy, a book ostensibly in the same spirit as Everyone Poops and The Gas We Pass: The Story of Farts. But unlike these insightful tomes, which are designed to help explain the foul realities of the body to kids, My Beautiful Mommy is intended to explain the vile realities of their mothers' narcissism.
Now, the issue isn't about cosmetic surgery per se, nor about the fact that it has become prevalent enough in our culture that there are now books explaining it to children. The true beauty of this little gem is that the primary symptom needing surgical remedy is stretch marks--specifically, stretch marks resultant from pregnancy. In other words, it's essentially Junior's fault that Mommy needs to go under the knife. And here I thought accusing them of stealing the best years of your life was enough!

And there is absolutely no evidence of bias, no lingering stench of opportunistic "tweaks" on reality. For instance, the cosmetic surgeon himself looks like Superman in scrubs, and when we are privileged with a glimpse into Mommy dearest's mind, we see this very Hercules--this time in a suit--planting a tiara upon a newly "did up" Mommy. I'd be concerned that this Adonis was invading the fantasies of America's housewives, but he isn't really the most articulate chap, according to page 1: "Blah, Blah, Blah, Tummy, Blah, Blah, Blah, Nose." So the bastard may be staggeringly good looking, physically statuesque, obscenely rich, and enchanting to the fairer sense, but I've got my pointy verbal barbs. Oh, how I hope they sting.

"But I can't even read, Colonel Gentleman," you might say. "Is there any way to psychologically abuse my child from the comfort of my own double-wide trailer?" Have no fear, disembodied hillbilly voice! Like some sort of twisted perpetual motion machine of despair, you can plant a seed at birth that will cripple your child emotionally from the moment it can comprehend human speech. Or at least, you could until Johnny Law got involved. Apparently, some leftist nut job of a judge stepped in and made a Hawaiian child a ward of the court so that they could change her name. And what was it? Talula Does the Hula. I shit you not. Hell, just calling the kid "Talula" by itself is skating on thin, rotted ice, but to then blatantly reveal her favorite pastime in the same stroke? She may as well be that guy from the fraud protection commercials who has a truck with his Social Security number drive around downtown Manhattan. The poor kid was so damaged by the name that even her best friend didn't know her true identity, and instead was asked to simply call her "K." Apart from strategically positioning her little friend to tacitly agree with anything she says ("Do I want to suffer through Don't Mess With the Zohan....K"), why the hell would she choose that letter? If you're going to lie, why not use a full name? Clearly, the child has been damaged already by the moniker...so why bother changing it now?

My favorite part of the whole story, though, is the list of other names that have been banned, and on occasion, allowed: "Fish and Chips, Yeah Detroit, Keenan Got Lucy, and Sex Fruit...But others were allowed, including Number 16 Bus Shelter [always nice to be named after the place you were conceived, eh?] and tragically, Violence."

So it seems my dreams of simply smacking my children and occasionally locking them in the basement are merely average, even pedestrian. Thankfully, my wife has no intention of letting our DNA mingle anytime in the foreseeable future, so I have time to plan. And now that my brother has taken the BAR exam, he's officially a lawyer and can warn me about the most obvious legal pitfalls that might prevent me from constructing a truly magnificent warren of psychological torment for my progeny. Sure, my kids will be all kinds of fucked up, but I guarantee that if you give them a birthday present, you'll be getting a thank you card within the week. Of course, it'll be covered with their desperate pleas for liberation, but oh, what stunning penmanship.

Mantastic! ~Fin~

While the use of tildes on either side of the word "Fin" might suggest some sort of ominous dorsal ridge skimming the water, my intention here was the unnecessarily inclusion of a foreign word in a pretentious grasp at sophistication, one so very commonplace that its dependence on cliche only screams to the world that I'm a hack. Clearly I'm trying to get into character here in the hopes of better understanding dear Prof. Chiarella, an effect I mean to heighten through the donning of a turtleneck and the quick application of Crisco to my face to enhance my already pallid glow to downright sickly, vampirish levels:


That done, let us breach the even more hideous depths of the man's affected prose. I'm less concerned here with stumbling upon the Holy Grail of masculinity as I am an end to this hellish pit into which I've cast us. To borrow from the urban youth, "my bad, yo," but I promise I'll finish my grisly business this time. I fear some of us may already be suffering from a sort of frostbite of the soul, and the longer we dwell amidst the barren, arctic wastes of this man's intellect, the more we'll have to amputate later. So, let us proceed.

41) Speak to a waiter so he will hear, curiously, appears immediately adjoining 42) Talk to a dog so it will hear, clearly betraying the rosy impression our host has of those in the service industry.

45) Break another man's grip on his wrist. Why am I not surprised that Prof. Chiarella sees masculinity as predicated upon enacting his favorite scenes from an episode of Walker Texas Ranger or any of Steven Segal's exquisite canon of work? Personally, I have found squealing in pain and bawling like a hungry infant to be the best bet, for inevitably the man's man clutching you wil turn away in disgust, at which point you kick him in the small of the back or break your bottle of Bartles & Jaymes "Body Shot Lime" over his head.

46) Tell a woman's dress size. Never out loud. Not if you want to live.

52) Step into a job one one wants to do. Like reading your work, sir?

55) Point to the north at any time. Thanks, Daniel Boone. How very rustic of you, defying our savage, contemporary days of GPS phones and sedentary, indoor existence. I hope that little skill comes in handy at the tenure meeting when your department chair tells your sorry ass your scholarly acumen is no longer required.

59) Write a thank you note. Fair enough. And what sort of note does our sage recommend?
Thanks for having me over to watch game six. Even though they won, it's clear the Red Sox are a soulless, overmarketed contrivance of Fox TV. Still, I'm awfully happy you have that huge high-definition television. Next time, I really will bring beer. Yours,
Wow, not only did he come off as his usual pretentious self, but he also made himself seem a cheap, ungrateful prick. Of course, it would definitely ensure a second invite from me, if only to ambush him in my living room and hold a dry-cleaning bag over his head until he stopped fighting.

61) Cook bacon. Yes. A hundred times YES. Put it on anything and everything: burgers, sandwiches, salads, even your children will be better human beings with a few strips of bacon judiciously hidden amidst their flaxen curls.

62) Hold a baby. ...nestled in bacon. Obviously. Get them used to the heady aroma of grilled pork early on, and if you're really lucky and they end up smelling vaguely of bacon for the rest of their lives, then that's just all the more reason to hug your delicious progeny every single day.

64) Know that Christopher Columbus was a son of a bitch. You mean we're not supposed to desperately cling to the oversimplified lessons of our second grade history class? Okay. "I loved the very idea of Christopher Columbus. I loved the fact that Irish kids worshipped some gnome who drove all the rats out of Ireland or whatever, whereas my hero was an explorer." Wait a second...what the fuck was that? A gnome? Rats? No wonder the Irish kids on your block beat the sweet shit out of your chubby ass at every opportunity. I'm tempted to track you down next week myself and tell you Saint Patrick sends his regards, courtesy of Lefty McUppercut and Righty Fitzsuckerpunch.

That's it. I'm done with this guy, lest my paroxysms of rage give me a stroke. I think I'll instead turn to some student papers now; at least they have something intelligent to say.

Mantastic! Part deux

It appears I have betrayed you once more, dear reader, fleeing from my responsibilities as a blogger for other duties, and in so doing leaving you hanging in the wind. Sure, I can promise I'll never do it again, but we all know that's a lie, if not a particularly convincing one. But allow me to say that I won't let virtually another month lapse between posts again. I promise.

At least part of my absence is explainable, though. You see, I was in the Sierras playing Dungeons & Dragons for a week straight. Yes, nestled in the trees and rock, in passages where no cellular reception dare stray and where savage men with long beards and no hygiene rein supreme, there I was feverishly rolling my twenty-sided die (poorly, more often than not) and seeing my paladin spread righteous justice throughout a corrupt and evil land. Oh, if only the rest of my life were as simple as that week, where virtually every decision can be made through the fortuitous roll of a die. I sit now at my desk on campus, trying to make myself work on my dissertation, but clearly I have failed my Will save. Somewhere in the world a twenty-sided die has skittered across a tabletop, coming to rest with a 1 staring skyward like the fiery eye of Sauron.

So if I can be of no service to myself, allow me to be of service to you and continue our journey through the trite and staggeringly inane world of Tom Chiarella's "The 75 Skills Every Man Should Master." And let me warn you: these ones are worse than the last batch.

21) Argue with a European without getting xenophobic or insulting soccer. Reminding them that we bailed their ass out of World War II (or stomped their ass, if you're talking to a former Axis power) is completely fair game, though. I recommend telling them they'd be speaking German now if it wasn't for us. If it's a German, compliment him on his lederhosen.

22) Give a woman an orgasm so that he doesn't have to ask after it. Forgiving the pronoun confusion and all the deliciously Freudian things it suggests, as a Catholic, I can't endorse this whole communicating during sex thing. I'm even on the fence about eye contact. Instead, may I humbly suggest a gong placed on the nightstand, which upon orgasm, your partner hits with a mallet. Should one find oneself in flagrante delicto without your gong present, simply shouting "Yahtzee!" should suffice.

25) Drive an eightpenny nail into a treated two-by-four without thinking about it. Thanks for "sexing up" this one, as "hit nail into wood" might threaten to undermine the man who considered this an essential aspect of his identity.

27) Play gin with an old guy. While I would prefer drinking gin with an old guy--and recommend not calling hiim "old guy"--this item only becomes truly hilarious when you take it in stride with the subsequent tip.

28) Play go fish with a kid. Fair enough. His first bit of elaboration recommends "You talk their ear off," which is great when you glance above and see he warns that the "old guy" will "drown you in meaningless chatter, tell stories about when they were kids this or in Korea that." Oh I see. This older gentleman's story about serving in a war or living through the Great Depression is 'meaningless chatter,' but the author's stories about "when you were a kid this or in Vegas that" are utterly apropros: "So after we dumped the hooker's body in the laundry shoot we went downstairs, did some blow, and took a piss on the roulette wheel. Do you have any 8's? How old is your mom, kid?"

30) Feign interest. Preach on, Dr. Chiarella! Your take on masculinity is refreshing and fascinating! It's doesn't make me want to drive an eightpenny nail into my eye socket at all!

33) Hit a jump shot in pool. By now, we should not be surprised that this superflous and largely impractical shot is just the type of thing to catch Sir Douche's attention. A new revelation, however, is that our gracious author seems to have difficulty describing fundamental spatial relations. Observe: "Make the angle of your cue steeper, aim for the bottommost fraction of the ball, and drive the cue smoothly six inches past the contact point, making steady, downward contact with the felt." Actually, if you drive the cue six inches past the "bottomost fraction of the ball" in a steady downward motion, you'll put your cue through the felt and into the slate underneath. Bloody hell, is there anything this asshat knows how to do well?

40) Speak to an eight-year-old so he will hear. This, of course, bears upon the Go Fish fiasco from above, so allow me to help our befuddled author with how to accomplish this feat: call the kid "Child," regardless of age or gender, or perhaps "Hey you, tax deduction"; shout at them, reaching spasmodically for your belt as if about to wrench it off and brandish it menacingly in the air; confide that you're actually their father, but don't let daddy know, then wink at their mother over their little shoulder, pat them on the back, and tell them to get lost.

More to come, sooner rather than later this time. I left a significant number out this time around, as I was literally choked by contempt and couldn't will my fingers to type; feel free to comment with your own response to those others, assuming you can stifle your gag reflex.