Month: July 2002

Not sure how long this scanned in copy (ACTION COMICS NO. 1) will be allowed to stay online by the copyright owner. To me, it’s only of historical interest, even though I’m a Superman fan, because the actual comic is pretty pitiful. Somewhere along the line later the beginning was redone and became much more interesting.

Listen to “Mary’s Place” and I’ll let you form your own opinion, at least for now.

As she says in her weblog, this new show on NBC sucks. The girls are gorgeous, no doubt, but the writers were going for a kind of whacky Austin Powers meets La Femme Nikita thing, with a little Candid Camera thrown in, and didn’t come close pulling it off.

The Sweet One said to me, “Even Monk is better!” and I agree. We’ve watched the pilot and the first regular episode of this new Tony Shalhoub series and are liking it. Think Felix Unger to the modern extreme as a brilliant police detective. Bitty Schram plays his nurse and has to keep him from giving in to his neuroses and keep other people from tossing him in an institution. Plus, it’s set in San Francisco and environs. This is pretty original so far and if the writers can keep this going can be a big hit.

Resurrection Day, by Brendan DuBois, is an alternative history novel by a mystery author. Maybe that shouldn’t matter but I get a different feel from it than, say, something by Turtledove or Stirling. Good enough, until the ending, but a thriller and not alterna-SF.

Alternative history stories always posit some known historical event and change it, then play out the consequences of that change; the classic example is Turtledove’s How Few Remain. In that story a messenger gets through to General Lee, who died before delivering his message in reality, allowing Lee to win the Battle of Antietem in 1862 preserving the Confederacy’s independence. The novel takes place 20 years later, when the two Americas are about to face off again.

Resurrection Day is set in 1972, ten years after the Cuban Missile Crisis spun out of control and both sides launched nukes: the Soviets got the worst of it but America lost big too, with DC, New York City, San Diego, and south Florida melted by nukes. Times are still really hard for Americans, with shortages of many necessities and continuing martial law, and few of the characters see any end to the misery.

Carl Landry is the protagonist, a former Kennedy idealist (he enlisted in the Army when JFK was elected, hoping to help realize that dream) who was a Special Forces advisor in South Vietnam when the bombs went off, continued in the Army in the early post-nuke years (the book never makes clear if his hitch was unilaterally extended or he re-upped), and then in 1968 returned to Boston and taking a job as a reporter with the Boston Globe. The job was a veteran’s benefit and many of the other reporters make clear their opinion that he’d have never been hired otherwise. Landry is assigned to cover the murder of an old vet and through this stumbles into a potential nightmare conspiracy that might lead to the end of the United States as an independent nation and, of course, often leads him into situations where he’s lucky to come out alive.

DuBois creates an interesting place in this novel, respecting that some cultural trends were probably so on course or inevitable that even a nuclear war couldn’t derail them and also detailing the realities of this life in an involving way. But I wouldn’t say that the plot itself is as compelling is it could be. Final judgment: I enjoyed reading this but I’m a big alternative history fan.

Alton Brown, the culinary cartographer, has a Blogger blog: Rants & Raves! [via Slashdot’s review of Brown’s new book which has it’s own funny, informative, and just plain weird discussion]

Andy Grove argues (Opinion, 7/19) that miscreant corporate executives are the exception today and that commentators and regulators should not be getting in their way with exaggerated criticism when we need these CEOs’ energy focused on getting us out of the reception. Gee, Andy, tell that to the thousands of us out of work due to poor, if not always illegal, decision making by executives; his Intel has perhaps done nothing illegal or unethical but they sure did just announce another 4,000 layoffs.

I’m sorry that he feels such a resonance with the Communists of his childhood but I’ll get past my hard feeling when Lay and Fastow, Ebbers, Rigas pere et fils, and many others are behind bars and have regurgitated their ill-gotten gains. Oh yeah, and when I get my first job interview after a year of searching.

From: “Bill Lazar”

To: <bloggerPro2@yahoogroups.com>

Sent: Friday, July 19, 2002 4:54 PM

Subject: [bloggerPro2] Been fun serving you all

> just to echo another poster’s comments, bill, i’m beyond impressed

> with the support you provide here.

Everyone,

I’d like to take some of your inbox space to say that the last six weeks have been interesting and fun for me. Even when things got frustrating, such as the missing archives and templates, I was happy that I could be a hand in getting Blogger back and functioning. I truly appreciate the kind words from Dave and the rest of you.

However, all good things must come to an end, and so it is with my short adventure as a part of Pyra. I jumped into fill an unexpected hole but circumstances aren’t right for me to stay on as part of the permanent staff. Ev or Jason will need to speak about their plans for support going forward but I’m confident they’ll have good ones. And that the Blogger service will be better and stronger very soon–I peeked behind the curtain–so please keep that in mind.

I’ll still be using BloggerPro and will answer questions that don’t require me to access the secret databases because I believe in the community.

On the other hand, this also means I’m free to accept other work, not to mention that my checkbook software (no, it’s not a BillSaysThis blog!) says I have to get busy, so if you know of a good position for a well-regarded tech support or product manager please let me know. My blog (and resume) are online at http://www.billsaysthis.com.

Regards,

Bill L.

Yes, now you can keep up with the latest in starship design and related technology! “The Journal of Applied Treknology, published by the Advanced Starship Design Bureau, is a Federation-wide forum for starship design and innovative technology. The Journal is aimed at engineers and interested laymen. Readers are invited to contribute their own ideas and share their views on existing concepts.” Woohoo:

The Journal

Reporters that leave important info out, today’s example – in Wi-Fi group clears up naming confusion, Ben Charny explains that WECA is changing it’s name to WiFi Alliance (good) and that it’s dropping the term WiFi5 as an alternate to 802.11a (like 802.11b is also called WiFi). But he doesn’t make clear what name the Alliance will be using in place of WiFi5–just 802.11a or something else. D’oh!

Continuing the recent theme of what’s good for us to eat (good in a healthy, not tasty sense): When a Crop Becomes King. Another Op-Ed piece from the NY Times, this short essay by Michael Pollan covers why some people might begin to wonder if we’ve domesticated corn or if corn’s domesticated us. We use more of it for more purposes each year and it rewards us by making us and our food animals unhealthy, driving our small to medium size farmers ever closer to bankruptcy, destroying marine systems anywhere connected to the farms, and using up our limited supplies of petroleum ever faster.

Oh yeah. K is back and splittin’ wigs! Why MIB2 got such bad reviews I can’t tell you. It’s not Spider-Man or The Bourne Identity, but it isn’t a film where you walk out saying I want those two hours of my life back, either. I laughed and enjoyed it, maybe not quite as much as the original.

Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith have the same great chemistry as ever, with Jones putting Smith quickly in his place once he’s back in action. Lara Flynn Boyle and Rosario Dawson are truly luscious as the bad and good girls, respectively. I like the worms but you can keep the dog and Patrick Warburton (sorry Patrick but your act never appealed to me on Seinfeld or The Tick either). David Cross was an inspired pick as Newton, the UFO fanatic video store owner, who gives a totally different comic feel–who else could get over the line “So what’s with anal probing?” so, well, naturally?

Everyone loves Rick Baker’s aliens. I have to agree, especially some of the scummy bad guys Boyle sends after the duo. Director Barry Sonnenfeld even uses one of Baker’s creations, the alien called Creepy, to pay homage, sort of, to Dr. Arliss Loveless from his previous film Wild Wild West. I think that Smith plays much better off Jones than Kevin Kline.

Plus, you get to see Meet the Chubb Chubbs! beforehand. Totally cute computer generated animated short with lots of your favorite science fiction characters thrown in.

Recommended for laughs

I’ve made some phone calls and done some further research. Seems like one of the weak points of the BASOC bid to host the 2012 Summer Olympics here is the need to build 3,000 residential units for the Village here in Mountain View. I say weak because if they can’t get approval for it there is not much in the way of backup, at least not that they’ve publicly described.

On the other hand, this housing would be built on land owned and controlled by the Department of Defense and the Army, so the City of Mountain View has no control over planning and zoning compliance. Suckage! Next step is to contact Rep. Anna Eshoo and California’s senators. Somehow I doubt they’ll be too inclined to help me out here. More suckage!

After the market closes today, quarterly numbers come out for SUNW ($0.01/share profit consensus estimate) and MSFT ($0.42). Other software and internet companies due to report include: APLX ($0.04), ASKJ (-$0.21), EBAY, INFA ($0.00), IT ($0.12), KANA (-$0.28), MERQ ($0.14), PSFT ($0.13), SIVB ($0.32), FON ($0.33), PCS (-$0.07), TMTA (-$0.18), and WEBX ($0.04). Could be a big day in any near term turnaround if a large number of these companies meet or exceed expectations.

President/clown-in-chief Bush says he is sure VP/puppetmaster did nothing wrong as CEO of Halliburton but I’m coming to believe that this will become a very big scandal in the near future. Just how can Bush be sure, I wonder, when the SEC has barely begun it’s investigation. Bush even made his own typically ridiculous nonsense statement at yesterday’s press conference: Whatever the facts are, Mr. Bush asserted, there will be nothing to embarrass Mr. Cheney. Whatever the facts? So, Mr. President (I’d love to ask at his next Q&A), if you don’t know what the facts are, how can you know he did nothing wrong?

MSNBC digs into Cheney’s Sticky Business and how its forced him to be absent from the Bush Administration’s part of the debate on corporate reform. He won’t talk about it, according to his chief political aide: “His view is that it would be a distraction from what he’s trying to get done here.” Regardless, the current Halliburton management claims the Veep was well aware of the issue behind this controversy, a change in accounting practices that made a large difference in how investors perceived the company’s earnings, and he did sign the financial statements. The SEC hasn’t come calling yet (and why not?) but Judicial Watch has filed a private lawsuit and using the rope provided by Republicans in the Paula Jones case may be able to force him to give a deposition.

Robert Dallek, a professor of history at Boston University and the author of a two-volume biography of Lyndon B. Johnson, wrote a letter to the NY Times with historical background on KBR: Some Fight Wars; Others Make Money.

Watch for it, it’s coming. And it won’t be good.

If you have never eaten at this wonderful restaurant, do it. Do it soon! But go with a big group as the portions of food from the salad (the small Ceasar can feed 4-6 people easily) to the entrees (spaghetti and meatballs for six?) and even desserts (chocolate cannoli) are huge and served family style. Delicious but huge. I made the “mistake” of eating there last night with only one buddy. No room for a dessert course, strangely, but we did split a small Ceasar salad and the new Buca Per Due special of veal parmaggiano and baked maniccoti. Apparently it’s part of this chain, with nearly 20 locations in California alone; other area locations include Campbell and San Francisco. Yum!

Tony Todd shows up all over the place. He’s had a number of role in various Star Treks including a recurring spot as Worf’s brother on Next Generation, the older Jake on Deep Sapce 9, and the Alpha Hirogen on Voyager. When will he be on Enterprise? Two weeks ago I saw him as the Ancient Mariner on Xena. Last night I saw him as the Krypton-infected janitor gone whacko on Smallville. Now I’m watching an old episode of Homicide (an incredible cop show if you get Court TV) and his was the first guest name listed. Tons of movies, both film and TV. Cool!

Interesting, needs some thought – Amazon.com Web Services

PHP Glue: Incutio Limited

Not only did we get Into the Fire but there’s a new Southside Johnny release too. How lucky are we? Three songs you can listen to online:

• Passion Street – the trademark Juke horns are blasting on this one! A bouncy, rolling good time story song.
  

• She’s Still In Love – classic R&B guitar riff opening, then bass, then horns preceed Johnny’s vocals on slick, sweet love song, so reminiscent of the old Philly International sound that Hall & Oates only dreamed of capturing.
  

• No Easy Way Down – big time ballad, Johnny telling such a sad love story; a Goffin/(Carol) King cover song, must be from the early ’60s.

The album is titled Going to Jukesville:

John gives us this hyperbole himself: “That low moaning sound you hear is music fans the world over sobbing in relief with the knowledge that their long, lonely wait is finally over. A real honest-to-Betsy JUKES record. With horns on every G-damn song. Horns, horns and more horns. Horns til ya wanna hurl yer lunch up. Well, at least I do. Yes, it’s me; ole man Southside, fresh from slaving over a steaming 24 track Studer recording device, and I’m here to tell ya, this new hunk-o-plastic is about as Jukified as it can get without it being confiscated by the authorities.”

No doubleheader on the concerts, though, as the closest the Jukes will get to Mountain View is Los Angeles in early September.

One of the few things, I tell ya, that can make me long for those Jersey Summer evenings back in high school!