Thankful

Black and White Walls
Originally uploaded by Cheryl Rollman.

So much of our lives are spent worrying about the future, over things which we have no control, over people who have their own minds and their own actions. You need to stop as often as possible and gather up all the small wonders in your life and let the smells bring back memories and the sunbeams warm your nap. You need to carry your loved ones in your pocket and always take a lot of pictures.

My life and the life of my family has changed over the years - it changed recently to something nearly unheard of. Through it all I was always able to walk up these stairs and see these faces and remember what it's liked to love and be loved, what it's like to know you have a home no matter where you live and no matter what happens there are people who care about you and want you to be happy.

So it is on this Thanksgiving Eve that I think about the things in my life that really matter and for which I truly grateful. It's been a unique year punctuated by world crisis, American hope and individual struggle. As the end of each year approaches, the mantra always becomes, "Next year will be better." But don't forget the good parts of the year, the good parts of your life. Don't forget that time you found $5 in your old jacket when you needed some gas until pay day. Don't forget that convenience store clerk who always rounds up your change. Don't forget the new friends you made while completing a task you didn't want to do in the beginning.

It's easy to forget the Good Samaritans, the generous, the caring, the nice. It's easy to remember the mean, the cold and the nefarious. All the talk from the neighborhood gossip to the political theater rarely bring up the joyful and kind nature that humans posses. So take this Thanksgiving, give thanks to something new. Parents, we know you're thankful for your kids, be thankful for their teachers and daycare workers. People with jobs, be thankful not that you have a job, but that your boss and his boss and his boss, in this climate, are still paying you and hopefully being decent people. Don't be thankful for the food you're about to eat, be thankful to the people who grew that food, shipped it, packaged it and run the stores from which you bought it.

Mankind needs to stop every once in a while and look at the pictures in its hallway and remember how it got where it is now. We're a violent, warring people by instinct. But if we stop and show others that we're thankful to be included in this world, maybe they'll stop and be thankful for us too.

Happy Thanksgiving.

TVZ Reviews: Fringe

The FBI running an operation against a dock warehouse. A freight truck appears (and looks to be steaming or covered in dust) and the FBI jump it, pull the drivers out and open the back to see a bunch of stuffed pandas. The head agent, Agent Loeb reports to Broyles saying they made a switch. Loeb shows Broyles a file on a Joseph Smith. During the debriefing, the Loeb starts convulsing and is taken to the hospital. The ER team takes paddles to him them opens him up. His heart starts beating normally as they crack and spread and the ER doctors all freeze stupefied as we see inside the chest cavity to what appears to be a toothed, gray growth around the heart.

For the rest, visit www.televisionzombies.com

Like A Kid Again

Nebulon Ranger
Originally uploaded by xadrian.

...only with bigger toys.

For the last few months I've been pulling my old LEGO from the garage, dusting them off (literally, with a toothbrush) and doing all manner of playing, building, sorting, dismantling and generally messing up my room. I finally broke down all the Star Wars sets and had them sorted in a moderately convenient fashion. No sooner did I finish putting the last single 1x1 rounded plate into its bin did I start building a model I've been wanting to do for years. In fact, I'd begun even before all the bits were sorted completely - I'd find pieces I thought I could use and set them aside for later, I'd pull out all the browns I had because I knew it was an uncommon color.

The ship I wanted to build was seen in a Dark Horse Comic series called Tales of the Jedi. It was one of the better Star Wars stories and sadly one of the ones not to get much interest outside of the comic. There was no giant media push, no associated video game or novel or cartoon. My guess is because it was dark, deep and decidedly not cute. I owned the books for a long time but after a few times moving I decided to thin out what few comics I had and thus they were sold to a local shop. Figuring I could use the internet to find images of the ship, these are the two I was able to find.

I thought I had a long road ahead of me. The comic image is decent enough but is full of "comic detail;" the quick pen strokes that fudge the construction bits. (Not their fault.) And the schematic, while useful, had nothing indicating scale and only had the front and left side. I was really concerned my take on this ship wouldn't be as true to the design as I'd have liked and I really wanted to make my first MOC (my own creation) a success. So I was really lucky when I finally stumbled on to this. It was a godsend. I couldn't believe I'd found someone who'd made a model of this and shot it from so many angles. Finding this really energized me and while the shots weren't very detailed, they were good enough to give me an idea of how this needed to be built. (A good example, from the schematics, can YOU tell there are six engines? I couldn't.)

With the project revitalized, I set about getting it built. I realize now I should have taken some progress shots, but what are you gonna do. The next step was to determine size. I wanted to make it minifig scale (for the layperson - minifigs are the LEGO figures) but there were only the Wookieepedia references to length and weight. Given a minifig is 1.5" and a normal human is roughly 1.7m, you can get a basic 1inch=1meter ratio. Meaning this sucker was going to be two and a half feet long and that big ass wing was going to be almost four feet.

I wasn't going to have enough brown.

So I made do with a lot of light and dark gray and did a lot of internal construction with other colors. I started like I do every ship I've ever built by building around the pilot. I was trying to keep it simple, knowing I could always go back and add any greebles I'd want later. (Greebles - small bit of detailing to break up the surface and add visual interest.) But the more I built, the bigger it got and soon I was outside the realm of manageable model to giant UCS (ultimate collector series) sized model. And it was getting unwieldy - the wing itself was so heavy that I had to work on ways to reinforce it to keep it from just separating and falling off. If I were to do it all over, I'd build a different frame first, something that had all it's support based off that huge friggin wing. As it is, I'm fairly certain while the ship sits up on a shelf in the library that it's going to come crashing down and I'm going to lose a ton of parts. (I should move that tonight.)

So I finished this weekend and it came in at roughly 18" long, 36" tall and weighing about 4.5lbs. I'm very proud of it but I'm a little worried that I don't have anywhere to go after this. It's a big model and an obscure ship that (as far as I can tell) no one has built out of LEGO before. What's left to do? More of the same ships over and over again? I have a few ideas for things to build so I'll leave this bad boy together for a while then it'll be time to tear it all apart and start something new.

So this brings up two things I wanted to mention in closing. One, if you find any garage sales or online deals with LEGO sets, please let me know. I still plan on trying to get all the Star Wars sets as well as some older space sets, but now it's more for parts than to have a collection. I might get a few in boxes to hang on to. And two, if you have or know where to find cheap (see: free) storage bins, drop me a line. I still have half of my sets to break down but I'm out of bins and most of the parts are in Ziploc bags.

So, that's what I've been doing lately. You?

Remember, remember, the 5th of November.

No I don't plan on blowing up anything with gunpowder, but apparently there's enough emotion in a phone center to blow the doors off. Ms. A volunteered at the Travis County Obama election HQ to make phone calls to get out the vote. Here's her story.

* * *

Last night was one of the most perfect nights I've ever seen. I spent the entire day at the Obama Austin Headquarters downtown volunteering. I called Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia, Nevada and Alaska. I made over 800 phone calls (on my cell phone) reminding people to vote and telling them where their polling place was. They brought food and drinks and snacks in all day long. I met Lucy Baines Johnson after she spoke to the crowd giving words of encouragement. I shook her hand after she handed out water to those of us that needed to wet our lips a little and right before she got on the phones herself. She said that helping with Obama's campaign was the equivalent of working on her dad's campaign. She said she couldn't think of a better thing to do with her time yesterday. I couldn't think of a better thing to do with mine either. There were about 250 of us there at that time.

I drank over 7 bottles of water. My lips were still chapped and my voice was hoarse.

I had to recharge my phone three times yesterday. 800 phone calls is a lot! Thank goodness for free long distance.

Old people in Pennsylvania can be exceptionally mean. Let me tell you, MEAN. I was cussed out by a 97 year old woman named Estelle. Not even kidding.

At five thirty, Ben picked me up, we grabbed a quick beer downtown and watched the first few returns come in. Then we sped home and I grabbed a quick shower and went back downtown. I got back to the headquarters at 7:30 and got back on the phones, calling Nevada. They were MUCH nicer. I called Nevada until five minutes before their polls closed and then moved on to Alaska, interrupting the calls only to scream and cry when they announced Ohio. The roof nearly came off when Ohio was announced.

There was about 150 of us there when Nevada's polls closed and they announced Ohio.

After I finished about 100 calls to Alaska, I sat on one of the couches and drank a beer (paid for by the Obama campaign) and ate some peanut butter crackers. I'd been keeping to myself mostly, not much time to socialize when there is change to be made. I sat on the couch next to a woman for about five minutes, talking idly about the campaign and some of the reporters on cnn. Then they announced it.

And the roof did come off.

You could hear the screaming for miles.

You could hear the screaming coming from the streets. You could hear cheers from downtown.

I jumped into the air, landing about 10 feet in front of where i'd been standing. When i landed, I was crying. We yelled, cried, screamed and jumped into the air for what seemed like forever. I can still hear it echo. I've never felt such electricity in a room before and never experienced spontaneous contagious emotion.
I turned around and the woman I'd been sitting next to was standing very still, looking very calm with tears streaming down her face as well. We hugged each other and just let go this world of emotions. I'm convinced that if we hadn't been holding on to each other we'd have both been in the floor.

I found out later her name was Jennifer.

After things called down a little, and i'd had another cigarette and beer, I went back to the phones. There is always more work to be done.

I walked back up to the front and made my way to the big screen in time to watch McCain's concession speech. There were no more chairs so I knelt in the floor, the big screen in front of me, behind it, an open door and the view of the Capitol building. I hugged my knees and cried some more. I've never been more proud, if ever proud at all, to be an American. The man sitting in the chair next to me put his hand on my back and said very softly, "its over now. We did it. We don't have to worry about it anymore."

There were close to 200 people in the building when McCain spoke.

I realized that if McCain was giving his concession then Obama would be speaking soon. I packed up as fast as I could and drove 80 mph up I-35 to Pflugerville.

I made it home last night in time to watch Obama take the stage with his family. I woke Rowan up and brought her downstairs to watch it with me. I sat in the floor in front of Miia and next to Rowan and let the tears stream down my face as I watched history walk out of fiction, onto the stage of the American Presidency.

And there is more work to be done. Here we go!

Horse Before the Cart

A wholesome trottin' race
Originally uploaded by xadrian.

So hey...been a while since I wrote anything. So how about some family news.

This won't come as a shock to the family and you all probably know. Last weekend, Ms. A's SO moved in to the house. I want all my readers to know that I'm totally ok with it, and I'll spell it out in detail in just a second. They've been dating a while and the lease was up on her place so after some serious discussion, we agreed that she should move in.

For those just joining us, Ms. A and I have been in a not-married mode for a while, nearly two years. After roughly nine years of marriage and a couple great kids, Ms. A came out (I guess RE-came-out) and we decided to stick together as friends and raise the kids. At some point we'll probably file for an actual divorce but that's just not on the plate now. It's costly, it's not friendly, it's a pain in the ass, we're not doing it. No reason to just now either. I'm not dating anyone and with the two of them, well, we're in Texas so go figure that out for yourself. Ms. A and I are the best of friends and it just doesn't make sense to us to split up the family like that.

So instead, we're adding to it. Here's where the fundies are going to blow a gasket. The kids love this girl (she needs a nickname, Ms. Louisiana?) and I think she's pretty cool as well. She and Ms. A worked together for a long time at a photo portrait company that went bust. Now she works with a catering company and is putting in something like 150 hours a week. Still, it's an extra person in the house to help with things and it's not a bad deal. She brings home food from events, watches and plays with the kids and will eventually help with bills.

It's really not a bad situation, as weird as it may sound. Ms. A and I weren't going to stay together but because it was amicable and I didn't want to split my time driving around with the kids every other weekend, this just works out. Plus, I get the biggest room in the house, I can put my LEGO sets in my room, there's catered food most nights and honestly there's a new circle of friends. (Which is huge for me, I don't seem to have much luck with that.)

I'm ok, the kids are ok, Ms. A is ok. We're all fine. No one has any hard feelings toward each other, it's all just fine. In fact, I've got a serious amount of karma for being so groovy about the whole thing, which I plan on saving with interest for that future time I may need to fly to Rio with that physics student/poet/rollergirl.

I think the worst thing that will happen is there will be people who can't or won't understand what's going on. So far the people we know have been okay with the whole thing, supportive of in fact. But I do expect to get some hate mail or disingenuous writings saying nasty things about the lot of us. Someone's a home wrecker, someone's selfish, someone has no self esteem, blah blah blah. I'll read them all I'm sure, but I'll go ahead and save you the time by saying it's not going to change anything. Lose sleep over it for us, it won't change what we're doing or why or how we feel about it. If you need to make yourself heard in a malevolent way, there's always a political rally where you can tell people what you really feel with a sharpie and some cardboard.

My biggest concern is when I find someone I like and am courageous enough to open my mouth and tell them, the first few words are going to be about this situation and it will be a deal breaker. If they can't handle the situation, I'm not even going to waste my time. It's a fact of my life the same as people with disabled relatives they take care of or college students with dorm mates or folks who've hit hard times who may live with they're parents or siblings. It'll change eventually I'm sure, just not right now.

Moving on!

Speaking of moving, Ms. A's mom has finally moved out of Conroe. Ms. A and her brother and sister helped find her a place out here and got her packed up and moved. There was a bit of travel, a couple weeks staying at Ms. A's brother's house and she even sold her house and car on Craigslist. Isn't that something. So now she's about 10 minutes away (in Pflugerville) and Ms. A is genuinely excited that she's here. It'll be good for both of them.

Election day is just over a week away. If you're in the states and your state has early voting, go do it now. Don't wait, don't put it off. Election day is going to be a fucking nightmare and you don't want to lose your chance to vote or be part of the problem by waiting till the last minute. Get to it early. Also, if you're undecided, don't vote. If you haven't made up your mind by now, just tune into Wheel of Fortune or something and keep your mouth open while you breath.

Thanks for reading all, take care.

The Mole-men Cometh

206. Sir Vincent Chunnel, a visionary digger
Originally uploaded by xadrian.

It has begun again!

October 21, 2008 marks the continuation of John Hodgman's gift of knowledge. Complete world knowledge, that is. In Areas of My Expertise Hodgman revealed the world of the hoboes, including names for 700 hoboes. Now, with his new compendium, More Information Than You Require we learn of the deranged world below our own world of the strange naked-mole-rat-like people known enigmatically as "The Mole-men".

If you'd like to participate, just head over to the official list, pick out a name, and upload it to Flickr. Once it's on Flickr, add it to our official 700 Mole-men Flickr group to get it to show up on this site. Sound easy? It is!

And of course, thanks to John Hodgman for giving us these fake facts. Be sure to pick up a copy of his new book (and the old one too) for your enjoyment and inspiration.

Vote

Third Time's a Charm Braclet

It's just recently hit the wires and tubes that Connecticut is now the third state to allow same sex couples to be equally recognized under the state constitution.

First off, good for CT! With Cali's ruling in danger of getting a state congressional repeal, it's good the fight is still being fought.

Neither candidate nor their running mates support same sex marriages but 0bamiden does support civil unions and I believe that's important, but it's not going to be enough. Why? Because the country is still being run by and populated with those who believe "marriage" is between a man and a woman. And you know what? That's fine. Believe it, teach it to your kids, practice it, silently admonish others in your own house. I believe prisoners should be sent to the front lines of combat instead of college age kids. I believe the money we spend collectively on advertising and entertainment could, in one year, be funneled into a Globe Foundation that will both find a vaccine for cancer and AIDS AND distribute relief to areas of the world that need it AND solve our renewable energy problem. (Tag line would be, "Suspend your wants for our needs" and OUR would have the globe as the O. Eh? Eh?) I believe that there should be mass transit in every city over 500,000 people to such a degree that even if you had a car you couldn't drive it into the downtown or urban centers. It'd be all sidewalks and trains. And yet some how, these beliefs only impact my brain. I may talk about them with people but they're just MY beliefs, not yours. The slippery slope we run into is we want to live in a world where society is just and fair. We want bad people to be punished and good people to be rewarded. We want children to thrive and old people respected. The problem is, it all comes from which book you read. Our just and fair belief structure comes from religion and not a logical set of rules. And because everyone believes different things, those rules are going to break and be rewritten.

Think about it for a second and let's imagine there's a gargantuan religious society. In this religion there was a prophet who told his followers, say, 4,000 years ago that to eat the fruit from a tomato plant was sinful and wrong. There's something evil about tomatoes, they're used like a vegetable but are classified as a fruit. Pick a side! Over the years, this religion spread and many many people believed in it. So much so there were virtually no tomato growers and those that did plant them kept it quiet. Then this new country was formed and they used their belief system to create a set of rules. There's only a few hundred at first so everyone was in agreement. They all believed in not working on Sunday, being executed if you murdered someone and being hung till death for growing tomatoes. Over the years, as the society changed, people from different lands came into the country. They abided by all the laws as best they could and those that didn't were sent away or punished. Still, quietly and discretely, a group of farmers began growing tomatoes but not selling them. Theses farmers were from somewhere else so they didn't believe a tomato was bad, but wanting to stay within the rules they didn't tell anyone they grew them and had them.

More time passes until eventually this country is comprised of so many different people with so many different view points that things like tomato growing doesn't bother close to half of them. These farmers want to grow tomatoes just as they would corn and wheat, but the law says they can't. Why does the law say they can't? Because 4,000 years ago people were scared of/didn't understand that a tomato was different from other fruits and they were afraid that their god would punish them for eating it or even knowing people who ate it or grew it. Having faith in their beliefs dictated they eschew all things tomato, regardless of the logic because they were afraid of not knowing what happens to them after they die should their life have any tomato stains. The farmers don't believe in everyone else's afterlife and only want the right to grow whatever plants they want, they can't understand that why growing their own food impacts other people who aren't eating it anyway.

This might be a weak (and horrible elongated) metaphor for homosexuality but there are plenty of other stories, gospels, teachings from various holy books that didn't make it into 20th century American, French, Hindu, Shinto law - not because they were any less important to the people at the time, but because over time the people who followed these religions began to realize that it wasn't hurting them or their lives to allow other people to function this way. It always suprised me the most about Christianity's "love thy neighbor" and "live and let live" tenants that homosexuality was such a big deal. It seemed contradictory and hypcritical, which isn't surprising given who God is. If we're made in his image, and his words contradict themselves, it's no wonder we're messed up. But the point I'm trying to make is that something like "marriage" shouldn't be in the hands of the government any more than "football" should. "Marriage" shouldn't be in the hands of your elected officials any more than "Star Wars" should.

The other thing I wanted to bring up was this and I'll try to be brief. Government only recognizes a marriage between a man and a woman. Why? Because it's in the Bible. Ok. So you only recognize things from the Bible. What about handfasting? It's not in the Bible? If I know my Wiccan, it's not "the union of a man and a woman" it's "the joining of two souls." So, are Wiccan/Pagan marriages still legal under the law? There's no book guiding them to only be a man and woman, and it's not in the Bible. I know Pagans are a small subset of a fraction of a lesser group of a minor collection of people, but the premise still stands. Is it fair to legislate something that not all people believe? Majority rules, I agree, but are we still at the point in America where the majority of people believe that two ladies can't live together AND file taxes together AND adopt a child AND make sure that child can be put in a will AND (on and on.) Are the majority of people STILL in the belief that knowing your neighbors are gay is going to be any more detrimental that being in an abusive (but traditional) home?

Yes, the majority still believe that it is SO wrong that you have to make it a law because you can't KILL IT WITH FIRE! The majority would rather know that their daughter is marrying an alcoholic than another daughter. The majority sees nothing wrong with lying and cheating your way into the most coveted political post in the land, but will not vote for you if you believe in same sex marriage.

I'm not saying the majority is stupid...

Wait, yes I am. Grow up, majority.

Holiday Gift Ideas

36. WikiBot, the robot that is edited by volunteers
Originally uploaded by xadrian.

The holidays are coming up, you need that special gift for a niece or nephew, geeky husband, cartoon loving son or daughter and you don't want to get the typical toy that will be discarded after just days of use.

Why not get a customized and inexpensive piece of art that will show how much you care?

Stop by http://robotportrait.blogspot.com and put in a request.

You send a photo, I draw the person as a robot. Or you can just send a word or phrase that I turn into a lovable mechanical cartoon. Each portrait is done either on a 5x7 or 8x10 card and the drawing is recorded and set to music. Prices range from $15 to $30 depending on size. Discounts for multiple drawings.

And for you collectors, there's robot presidents and world leaders already available.

Thanks for looking!

Fringe and Charlie Jade reviews

Brooklyn, NY.  Willie Nelson’s “Crazy” playing in the background as a waitress takes a very specific order for a hairless white dude in a suit.  The man is observing construction across the street through 50’s spy binoculars that give him a very Terminator, highly advanced readout.  He’s also checking a stopwatch and writing notes in a peculiar script.  The waitress asks if it’s Asian because she studied Korean, he just says no.  He then eats his rare roast beef, jalapeno, pepper and tabasco sandwich in about four seconds right before an explosion rocks the construction site.  He calmly pays his bill, dons his fedora and shades and takes his briefcase to the site of the blast.  With shining blue lights around the area he makes a call and says, “It has arrived.”

For the rest head over to Television Zombies.

You can aslo read the latest Charlie Jade review.

Carry on.

Hey Austin, Sorry about your KXAN

7126 - Battle Droid Carrier
Originally uploaded by xadrian.

I know what you must be going through. I'm sure you'll have KXAN back soon enough and I hope you enjoy your slightly extended local coverage of weather and sports.

In the meantime, to cheer you up, here's a LEGO set I have for sale on Craigslist. Even if you're not a collector, you could definitely spend the time you now have by not watching your local NBC news shows building this fine (new in the box) set.

But, if it's not up your alley, at least tell a friend about it. Maybe while you're over at their house in Pflugerville or Kyle watching the debate on NBC tonight.

Carry on!

Yes, there will be a Cars 2.  This from a  friend who attended Fantastic Fest this last week.

Coming to a theater near you in 2011. That's a year earlier than before. And that's what happens when your tie-in merchandise outsells trinkets from TOY STORY, FINDING NEMO and MONSTERS, INC..

Brad Lewis, not Lasseter, will direct the sequel, which will be something of a globetrotting affair. To tide audiences over, there will be a series of "CARS Toons", which will feature Mater (the tow truck voiced by Larry the Cable Guy) telling whoppers about his adventures as, for example, a fire truck or a matador (battling Bull-dozers, of course). We watch the first short, "Rescue Squad Mater", in which he bravely extinguishes a blaze at the Gasoline and Match Factory. Kinda funny.

I hope "globe trotting" means Lighting races Ferraris or has to compete against Grand Prix cars or something.  In fact, I can see the story now, it's years later and Lightning has his own racing company, Radiator Springs Racing that's taken the racing world by storm and he has a protege who is a young upstart Formula One racer.  Along the way, young Dino Berlinetta (a 1968 Ferrari concept car name) has to overcome his shyness and lack of racing desire in order to win the Monaco Grand Prix and use the winnings to help save his family's financial problems.  Lighting, now in a mentor role, tries to coax some bragadocio out of the little F1 car and sends him off to New York to work as a pizza delivery car (do cars eat pizza?)  The experience teaches young Dino how to drive in the heavily trafficked city streets and he uses these techniques to win the race.

Mater gets to ride on a big cargo plane and then parachuttes into Monaco.

I liked Cars a lot.  I know that the movie was hit or miss with a lot of people, especially Pixar fans.  It was the equivallent of musical or opera fans when seeing Cats for the first time.  If you don't think about it being about living cars, it's quite a charming and funny movie.  Even if you DO think about it being about living cars, that's the part I liked the most.

I can't even begin to rate the Pixar movies.  I liked them all equally.  Sure Incredibles was more my taste in genre but that doesn't mean it was any more or less fun to watch than the rest.  Pixar has so far been ok with not doing many sequels (so far Toy Story is the only one) and I'd almost rather they didn't do another sequel.  Sequels from Disney only mean one thing; toy sales.  Cars was a mechandising dream, something the others didn't have.  So I know that's the whole reason for a sequel.  It's a cartoon about talking cars.  The main character gave up the race to become a champion and he got the girl, what's left to tell?  I'm glad Up is still on tap, but I'd given Pixar a lot of credit for being original, now I need to temper that if they're going to reach back into the past to pull up ideas for new movies - even their own new ideas.

Oh well.  Carry on.

Rating A Show

I wanted to write this down before I forgot.

As most of you may know, I've been writing a few reviews for the television podcast and review site Televisions Zombies.  I don't mean to pimp it so often here, but honestly it's the most notable and enjoyable thing I've done for a few years now - hoboes notwithstanding.

Reviewing all the Charlie Jade episodes as well as the first couple Fringe shows, I came to the conclusion that I have no idea how to give something a five star rating.  I've been reaching the end of my reviews (which technically are 80% recap and 20% op-ed piece) frustrated because I have no idea how to grade a show let alone a series of shows.

My brother-in-law (ex brother-in-law?  almost ex...) my friend's come up with a pretty decent system for movies that I thought I'd try but it didn't work for serials.  Here's how it goes.

5 stars - Pay full price to see it again in the theater.

4 stars - Pay matinee price. 

3 stars - Rent it on DVD.

2 stars - Watch it on a premium channel.

1 star - Watch it on network TV.

Pretty good, right?  Especially knowing him, I can now get a fair idea of what a movie will be like if he gives me that rating.  It even allows for 1/2 stars; wait in line for hours before full price to see it again may even give it a glorious 5 1/2 stars.   3 1/2 stars may mean putting it high up on your Netflix queue.  The lowly half star would be to watch it on basic cable with no HD if there was nothing else on.  No stars would mean to never speak of it again.

I tried to adapt this to TV shows, but the first 3 don't really work.  First, it's a serious investment to watch a show you've never seen on DVD.  The sets are expensive and it generally takes weeks if not months to get through a series.  I had to rethink.  What I came up with isn't so much system where a show just falls into a category, but more like gymnastics scores where something starts out at a certain difficulty and is deducted points based off things that may have gone on during the show.  I haven't finalized this list or had an opportunity to try it out, but I came up with the idea because I was getting tired of not wanting to grade shows poorly just because they weren't exciting.  They may have been interesting, may have only had one or two small problems, but no reason to give something what amounts do a D (3 stars.)

So here's some ideas, and feel free to comment or add to it.  Each show starts at 5 stars.  There's no automatic deductions going in as I'm willing to let every show I watch have a chance to just wow the socks off my ass.

-1 if I'm not excited to see next week's episode.  Week to week dramas may suffer in this department, and they should.  If I watch an episode of In Plain Site and then miss a week and I'm not depressed about it, it's not an exciting show.

-1 if the show ends on a cliff hanger that's immediately resolved in the preview for next week.  Yes this is out of the show's control, but you know what?  It's an overall experience and you ruined any reason for me to wait with bated breath until next week's installment.

- 1/2 if I can detect a plot hole while watching.  I'm not terribly bright when it comes to writing conventions, so if I see a major issue in the show WHILE I'm watching, that's a bad sign.

- 1/2 if at any point I roll my eyes at a piece of dialog.  Be it sappy or campy or predictable or completely out of place, if I have a physical knee jerk reaction to something going on then it's at least worth a half - more if I start yelling at the TV.

- 1/2 if I can't follow along.  With this in mind, I'd have constantly down graded The West Wing because I'd have to constantly rewind to see who said what, or ask fellow viewers what happened.  If my big clue that something major happened is a musical cue then I'm having a hard time following along.

- 1 if I don't mind leaving the show while it's playing.  Chances are I'd change the channel anyway, so what does it matter that I'm not paying attention.

- 1 if I don't plan on watching it again later.  This may happen more to new shows, but also changes in shows that have gone on a long time.

- 1 if I get to the end of the show and either immediately forget what happened (because it's forgettable) or I feel like I just wasted a half hour/hour of my time.

It's general, it's vague, it's subjective, but I think it's a good start.  I tend to write recaps while I'm watching the show (which is an interesting task) so I'd be easy to keep notes about any of these events.  It may also mean some shows may seem good at first but end up getting a lower score and some blasé shows rate much higher than they otherwise might have.  But that's the nature of critiques; it's all personal.  I know that while I'd give Fringe a pretty good rating, other people I know very much despise the show and are now only going to watch it to make fun of the "science."  To each his own.

 

I'm also trying to avoid feeling like I'm grading a show based on the series as a whole and not each episode's individual performance.  If a new person comes into a TV show, they need to know if that was a good episode or a bad one based on the strength of that show alone.  Later they can go back and say it wasn't the best of the season.  Reason being, a five star show you see at 2am on cable versus a five star show you see at 8pm on Thursday night is going to show obvious differences.  But to me productions values, while important, shouldn't make or break the show.  This is then done to try and alleviate the comparison to other shows as well.

In the end, it's going to come down to what kind of mood I'm in, what time of day it is, if I have to pause it to go bath or feed kids or if I get a phone call that makes me have to watch the rest of the show on another night.  It can't all be perfect, but I think this is a good start.

Yes I need to spend more time doing something else.

Carry on.

This post brought to you by Kia

Last night the AMC series Mad Men won a few awards, were nominated for quite a few as well.  30 Rock won a couple as well.  As I drove in this morning, a bit on the radio reminded me of something I'd read and discussed a while ago about product integration.

(The discussion was a post I'd written about the Marvel Comic Rush City.  That post died in the Year That Wordpress Forgot, so here's an article to bring you up to speed.)

In this Morning Edition story by Neda Ulaby, the idea of product placement became overshadowed by a more cunning and dastardly paradigm; product integration.  No longer will the host of the variety show pause to announce that this last half hour of plate twirling and susaphone playing was brought to you by Palmolive.  Instead, the stories are now written ABOUT Palmolive...and Heinekin and Ford and Verizon.  Writer's now have to create a story that centers around their characters, their worlds, their events and ideals and now the products the producers want placed.  Mad Men has it easy because their world is in advertising, but I don't see how most shows will cope without compromising the plots.  Think about some of the shows you watch (major network or cable fictions, no reality or game shows) and try and cram a story idea in that features a product.  Think about Law & Order and if you could just write in a character that only ate at Subway and have it be a part of the story.  Sure, maybe someone was killed in a Subway, it's a good parody of New York life (not a subway but a Subway) and could work.

The trick, however, is to advertise that product - to integrate it.  It's not enough just to mention the name, TV shows have been doing that for years.  Shows where the cast is outside almost can't help but see cars, gas stations, restaurants, foods that exist in real life.  I do remember as a kid how funny it was to see all the knock off brands in TV shows because either the production team wasn't savvy enough to allow a Pepsi to be consumed on air or it just cost to much to do.  (I'm fairly sure that's how Shasta got started.)  But this isn't about just showing Joey or Chandler drinking a brand named soda, this is about Joey or Chandler talking about the brand named soda and having it be part of the story - and not in a comedic way but in a way that extols the virtues of said product.

Joey - Hey, man.  You ready to go?

Chandler - Almost, let me finish eating.

Joey - Hey, is that the new Coke Ultra?

Chandler - Yeah and it's really good.  Plus with no sugar and just that touch of ginsing, I don't have to worry about that debilitating sugar crash later.

Joey - Right because when you have that job interview later, you don't want to be twitchy or groggy.

And thus you have product integration.

Yes, it can be more sophisticated than that, but at its very heart, product integration needs to be something that shows you something about the product, not just the face of it.  You need the characters to talk about what the product does and have it impact the story, otherwise writers could just be having people watching TV and commenting on the commercial they just watched.

But think about it for a minute and ask yourself, do you talk about products with your friends?  Sure you do.  You discuss the quality of frozen foods, the signal strength of your cell phone, the options your cable company gives you, the gas mileage your car maintains and a plethora of other qualitative discussions.  But you don't talk about those things during childbirth, a robbery, cross examination, escaping from a brain eating villain, shooting island inhabitants or wiring your brain into a comatose FBI agent.  When you aren't doing those things, you're talking about those things, that's how these shows work.  Let's say you and I were just a couple ordinary people (likely) and we were hanging out at a bar.  Not TV worthy (sorry Bochco, it isn't.)  But, had we just come in from supressing an alien invasion and needed a beer, that's our down time.  Are we going to talk about the beer?  Outside of ordering it, no.  We're going to talk about how much alien ass we just kicked.  As soon as I say, "This Woodchuck amber cider is amazing.  You know, I wonder if we can convince these aliens to stop attacking our city based purely on the strength of this fine product alone?" the audience knows they're being handled.  And that's the danger.

Individual consumers are smart.  They know when they're being sold, but for some reason, the masses react differently.  (Which always fascinates me, it means there are a lot of weak minded lemmings out there.)  To that end you have to be careful how you push your product or how your ask the creators to push a product.  It can't seem hackneyed or ham fisted.  It has to be smooth and honestly, if you're going to place a service or good in your show, you should take out a block of commercials as a trade off.  Don't give me 20 minutes of ads per hours and then 40 minutes of story about the new HP Camera and Printer combo.  If I wanted to watch a solid hour of commercials I'd turn to QVC.

The Marvel comic was called Rush City and it was a promotional experiment.  The book only ran in a limited series and it featured a super hero who was tied very much to his Pontiac Rush in the same way James Bond is tied to Aston Martin.  Comic book fans were mixed on the idea.  A lot of people were pissed at Marvel trying to panhandle the fans via a major auto industry while others felt that as long as the story was ok and you didn't cram the book with more pages of ads, it wouldn't be so bad.  (Sadly, the book wasn't that well done which made it even more transparent what a money grab it was.)  Which brings us again to the heart of the topic.

People don't like being advertised to.  Sure we like the entertainment value of some commercials but you have to know that given the choice we'd surely like there to be no commercials at all.  Other entertainment venues are no less immune to this game where to bring the audience a worth while product, the production needs money.  In order for the production to get money, it needs to sell advertising.  Theater can get by with putting ads in their programs as their allotment comes in the form of ticket sales and donations.  Public radio and TV run pledge drives.  Even streaming audio/video online either has short ads in between segments or is on a site with ads on them.  Product integration will only work if you reduce advertising and you don't oversell the product.  The shows have their own little worlds and the stories are about them, not the product you try to sell.  If Lost ever became ABOUT airline travel rather than the spookiness of that island, you can bet I'll turn it off.

Carry on.

KXAN Goes At It Again

Man do I feel sorry for metro Austinites. At the beginning of 2008, I wrote about how Suddenlink Cable was going at it with KXAN's owner LIN TV and KXAN went dark on New Year's Eve. It started with my writing to them asking when they planned on getting NBC in High Def, it ended with Suddenlink airing an NBC affiliate out of Waco (which is about 90 minutes away.) Eventually Suddenlink and KXAN were reunited.

I'm not saying I was integral to what happened - I am but a small voice in a small city. I enjoyed a few emails from both parties but so would any customer who took the time to complain. I haven't read back on the posts I'd written, so let's just assume they were filled with golden and flakey civility.

Which made me laugh just a little bit when I saw a public service announcement saying that Time Warner and KXAN were having the same issue. Far be it from humble little consumer to point fingers or call names or throw flaming hot rocks in my sugar-glass house but reading the ins and outs of the situation was like going back in time. Here it is in a nutshell. KXAN thinks it's worth more, its parent company LIN TV goes to Time Warner and says, "Pay us cash for fair market value." Time Warner says, "We'll keep paying you what we're paying plus we'll increase some ad placement." (If they went that far at all, doesn't look like they came back with much.) LIN TV says they'll play hardball and KXAN is pulled from Time Warner. If all goes according to history, that will last a couple days until Time Warner picks up either a close affiliate or the two sides agree.

So it got me thinking, does KXAN really think it's not getting its value in the Austin market? Is it just the Austin market? I read originally that Suddenlink and LIN were also having a problem with a CBS station in New Mexico, so it's not just NBC stations. I honestly haven't read a lot of cable/broadcast TV business news, but having the only two instances I've seen in my city include the same owners, I'm wondering if there's something with LIN TV - something like...I don't know, delusional greed?

I'm sure that's not the case, but I'd like to reiterate that putting out ads for your customers saying the stations owners and the cable owners can't agree and you as the customer should call and complain is like your divorced parents telling you they don't like the settlement the court gave them and if you don't want your allowance cut you should contact the other parent. Getting customers in the way of a money/power struggle between broadcast companies is a shitty way of doing business. You want our input? You want our help? Bring in a la carte packages.

Carry on.

Fringe Reviews

Reviews for episodes 1 & 2 are up at TVZ.  Please check 'em out, listen to the podcast, read some of the news and stuff.  Vote for them at the podcast awards.

Avast! There be reviews ahead!

Yarr, me harties!  It be International Talk Like a Pirate Day!  There be much ta do around ye old intARRnet today.

First!  Cap'n Scruffbeard Coulter has fangled a rich man's contraption out of his wits, a bit of fluff and a lot of rum.  If you scrawl your handle and thoughts on Twitter, than stop over to http://tweetlikeapirate.com/ and play along.  The squeezebox waits for no man to dance.

Second!  I've spent too much time in front of the land lubber contraption known as the "television."  It's siren call is nigh impossible to resist.  But some nice folk have offered me rum and the love of a buxom woman were I to put pen to parchment and relay my thoughts on these "programs."

To that end, there are a few reviews of Charlie Jade up, please stop by and read them.  I'm also doing reviews on the first couple Fringe episodes, make sure to stay tuned.

Yarr!

Vote for Television Zombies

(originally posted by Chris Piers on TVZ)

The nominations are now open for the Podcast Awards. These are annual awards for the best podcasts, and we need the help of all of our readers and listeners to try for an award. Even if we don’t win, it can be great publicity, getting the TVZ name out there.

The nominations are here: http://podcastawards.com/index.php?option=index

The rules are very clear and enforced, so while we appreciate anyone taking the few seconds to vote for us, please don’t try to vote more than once. Spreading the word is appreciated, but we don’t want votes thrown out because someone tried to cheat on our behalf.

You can only nominate a podcast in ONE category, as well as either the “Peoples Choice” or “Best Produced” categories. We would appreciate the votes in “Peoples Choice” and “Cultural/Arts.”

All you need to do is:

1. Follow this link to the Podcast Awards (same as the link above)
2. Enter the podcast name (Television Zombies) and podcast url (http://www.televisionzombies.com)

Nominations are only eligible through midnight the night of September 30th. Thanks!

Tidbits

Greetings intrepid readers. You know, if you've read more than a year's worth of posts at LIA or have this blog on your RSS reader, I'd like to commend and thank you for your patronage. I often get the most random of comments from posts I'd forgotten about and it's nice to know that some people actually read the site...people I'm not related to that is.

That said, Deb, I'll also have to look at the Morning Star packaging. I generally don't eat the products with the exception of the veggie crumblies we put in spaghetti sauce or for burritos and I have no known food allergies so checking those boxes isn't terribly important to me. I will check it out though, but I'm sure Ms. A probably wouldn't eat so many of the breakfast sausages if there was stuff in there that she couldn't handle.

Moving on. Hurricane Ike has come and gone from Texas. It's now being a pain in the ass for the midwest in the form of rain and possible tornados. The hurricane itself never made it to Austin. Original models had it glancing off the hill country before traveling north, but the closer it came the impact became smaller until finally it was looking as though we'd not see any problems. Which we didn't. As the storm saturated everything along I-35 from Galveston to Hunstville, we enjoyed partly cloudy skies and some gusty breezes, but not a drop of rain. By Sunday morning we had bright blue skies and at present a cold front has moved through Central Texas bringing highs in the low 80's through the rest of the week. Not bad.

Ms. A's dad and step mom came out yesterday to leave the powerless Conroe. They tried leaving ahead of the storm, but decided not to and so they rode out the storm instead of riding a twelve hour car trip to Austin. Can't say as I'd blame them. Twelve hours to go 150 miles, I'd rather get punched in the nuts...but just once.

Moving on yet again, my LEGO addiction has taken full hold. All my old sets are built and I'm now debating on whether or not to go buy more older sets as well as new Star Wars sets or to dismantle what I have and start building on my own. It's the collector versus creator fight and sadly I've abandoned most of my drawing. Odd considering how many times on this blog I've bitched about not having enough time or motivation to draw. Amazing what one good weekend with an old familiar plaything can do for your morale. LEGO is a happy place for me. I could lose hours building with it, organizing it, coming up with ideas for new things. At one point in my life I'd even sent a letter to LEGO asking how to become a builder/designer. Turns out, at the time, you needed something crazy like an engineering degree or an architecture background. Later I became aware that you could get a Toy Design degree (which most major universities don't offer, but you can get them at art institutes.) Even later it became apparent that these accredited individuals were not sallying forth with the same creative spark as average LEGO fans so LEGO started Master Builder and Amabassador programs. These are hobbyists that are involved in the LEGO community but are recognized by LEGO (though not official employees) and as such have certain responsiblities and receive certain perquisites for being community role models.

How you get to be one I'm not sure, but from looking into it, I believe owning millions of bricks for more than 30 years is the only way. So I've got some work to do.

Talk about dream job. Long before I wanted to be a voice actor or comic book artist or cartoonist or comedian I wanted to build LEGO for a living. Wouldn't it be funny after 20 years of doing nothing but drawing I end up doing what I wanted to do from when I was 8? Don't get me wrong, I will likely still draw and doodle and illustrate when given the right motivation (good idea, money, familial request) but without daily practice that muscle will likely wither. I don't have 10 hours a day to draw and hone that craft, but I do have a few hours a night to build and building doesn't take as much practice, just a love of the bricks.

Moving on thrice fold, the 100 Artists Project is still going on. There was a snafu with the sketchbook so I had it sent back to me for corrections. So I got to see a year and a half worth of input and it was kind of neat. The book has traveled all over the US and to see it still in one piece was joyous - I almost teared up, honestly. I've received five short stories and one piece of artwork for the new project and so far about 50 people have signed up for the various charities. It's obvious this is going to be a long term project and I hope it gets its due at some point. It doesn't require a lot of work and I hope we can raise some good amounts of money for these groups. That's really all I want. If I wanted fame I wouldn't be doing a charity project.

Moving on completely and finally, the new season of shows are out and so far I've only caught a couple. I saw Fringe the other night and liked it. It didn't blow my mind but it didn't make me blow chunks either. I thought it was well rounded and it did admirably well for a pilot. I also caught The Sarah Conner Chronicles and was really impressed with that. I'm glad that show is back. I'm still watching Charlie Jade for the remainder of its sad little 2am run. It's not a bad show, honestly more well written and plotted than a lot of shows. Television Zombies has a current review and I've got more to come. Plus, keep an eye out for a Clone Wars commentary I recorded (yay voice!) that they'll hopefully play on the show or link on the site.

No more moving on today. I hope you all had a good summer and let's see if I can start posting more.

More Charlie Jade

I'm still reviewing Charlie Jade over at Television Zombies. The season is a little more than half over and when it's done, it's done. It's a summer filler but so far it's more entertaining than the rest of the junk on Sci-Fi.

You can read the all the reviews here.

I'll also be picking up Dollhouse when it hits FOX in January. In the mean time, the fall television season is upon us. Make sure to stop by TVZ every week for their news and discussion and reviews of all things science fiction and television.