Cuban Sky Getting Pinker by the minute.

I'll try to keep this post more civil so that I don't have to remove it.

Anyways, once you get used to Rie's mom, she's quite humorous. Not in the "laughing with her" meaning, but definitely in the "laughing at her" sense. For instance, this last Sunday, when we were eating lunch before going out house hunting, Rie's mom made some comment about "later, if God blesses you with a baby." I was immediately reminded of the Calvin and Hobbes cartoon where Calvin's dad tells Calvin they won't decorate the tree and will just leave it in the garage "Then on Christmas Day," his dad says "if you get a present...." "If I get a present?" Calvin responds, horrified. Anyways, I just had to laugh at the idea that "possibly" in a while Rie and I might have "a" baby.

But aside from that, things went quite well. After seeming somewhat averse initially to my insistance that $400,000 was too much and that we should start by looking at things closer to $250,000, she quickly opened up and showed us some 1 bed, 1 bath condos (all we need for now, really).

Idiot(s) of the Day/Week/Month
AKA More Best Parking Jobs Ever

Now, I've known some crazy female drivers (not naming names here... *cough*Cari*cough*), but NONE quite this bad. My favorite is the one with the boat. I mean, just imagine trying to get out of the car. Also imagine trying not to laugh while watching the person get out. This one was linked from JengaJam.

Here's one I saw on BBSpot a while back and am only just now getting around to ridiculing. It's a Gallery Of Bad Designs, the only problem is it's mostly a gallery of stupid people. I know, I shouldn't be so quick to judge, but consider this example:

From the site: "When I get gas for my car, I have to make an effort to read this gas pump display carefully or I confuse the dollar cost of the gas purchased with the amount of gas purchased. I need to know the dollar cost, not the number of gallons. It doesn't look like it would be confusing, but it is. The dollar cost should be more obvious. A person shouldn't have to make an effort to read a display like this." Now, I don't know about you, but the GIANT DOLLAR SIGN would have tipped me off. Here's another good one:
"They pulled the handles that opened the doors and went down the walkway. Upon reaching the other end they again pulled the handles, but the doors wouldn't budge. Assuming the doors were locked, they returned to the doors they originally opened to enter the walkway. But when they tried to pull open these doors, they wouldn't open either. They were trapped in the walkway between the two buildings!" It goes on to describe how they waved to the people inside and tried to get them to open the doors. They were trapped for several minutes until they finally pushed the doors open. Again, maybe it's just me, but whenever I run into a door like this, if opening it one way doesn't work, I immediately try opening it the other way insteading of assuming it's locked. If you read carefully, you'll notice that when they tried to go back out the way they came in, they didn't even try opening the doors the same way they had before. Gary Larson's famous "School for the Gifted" comic comes to mind.

To be fair, the point about the door's design is valid. Likewise for most of the items on the site. But a few of the complaints seem like people just couldn't figure out something really simple. Maybe it's my math genes (thanks Mom and Dad!) that lead me to consider all possible configurations before coming to a conclusion, but if you ever have the desire to feel mentally superior to strangers, visit this site.

I know, I shouldn't pretend to be so smart. After all, it took me three days to figure out Petals Around the Rose. Oops, sorry Joe.

True Story

Well, since Cari's writing about all her funny experiences in college, I figured I should share this story from my recent past.

One of my numerous jobs here at [company name deleted] is to conduct training in the use of our software. So the last training session I conducted before Australia was here in our offices this July. When I actually have to meet face to face with a client or potential client, I can't wear my usual jeans and T-Shirt to work, so I wear my "nice clothes": the now-6-year-old faded "blue"pants my mom bought me when I started at El Camino College, and one of two identical white long sleeve shirts. My co-workers, Jeremy and Amy, sat in on parts of the course that took place over three days. Well, at one point when I was in the training room and they were back in the office, Jeremy said to Amy, "this may sound bad, but we have got to get Joe new clothes". So before the training in Australia, Amy staged an intervention and offered to take me out to help me buy new clothes. You may not know it but Amy is getting married this Saturday. The poor girl, nine days before her wedding, when she's in the midst of final preperations, dealing with her future mother-in-law, and the stress caused by everything, takes a long lunch from work so she can take me to go clothes shopping.

So the day before I left, Amy and I went to Kohl's so I could get some nice clothes. How much of a guy am I that I need my co-worker to take me to buy clothes because I would be too helpless on my own? It is truely amazing watching a woman at work shopping, though. While I was walking amongst the endless racks of pants, I saw only three kinds: Black, Blue, and Gray. Amy, however, was able to see through these superficialities to the inner core of the pants and was somehow able to determine, through some kind of special feminine intuition, that some of these pants were better than others. She also mentioned some strange terminology like "pleats". I'm assuming this is some strange concept that only women can understand.

Also, I was amazed to learn that shirts now come in actual colors other than white. Not only that, but some of them even have patterns on them, such as pinstripes. What will modern technology come up with next?




That's it. That's all there is to the story. No, there's no punch-line, aside from "I'm a guy".

What? You're not satisfied with that? Ok, how about this: A priest, a rabbi, and a buddhist monk walk into a bar, sit at the end and start having some drinks. Two hours later, they come out with a better understanding of each other and a mutual respect, the beginnings of a friendship that lasts a lifetime.

Still not laughing, eh? Well how 'bout this one? What's worse than finding a worm in your apple? Give up? The holocaust.

Sheesh, this room makes an igloo seem pleasant. Well, you better laugh at something. I've got enough material to go all night.

Foster's: Australian for Swill.

At least, that's what I've been told by every Australian I've ever asked about it.

Anyways, I failed to adequately determine the directional flow of toilet flushes in Australia, mainly because I forgot to look, but I did notice the water flowing down the drain of the shower went counter-clockwise. Apparently Coreolis effects don't register over a radius of a couple inches.

Anyways, the primary discovery of the trip is that there are a lot of crappy movies out there, and they're easily accessible. I watched many of these crappy movies, simply because I had nothing better to do. Crappy movies on the 15-hour plain ride on the way there, crappy movies in the hotel every night after training and every morning before (when you're jet-lagged, you tend to wake up at 4am, and since you don't have anything better to do, crappy movies fill that void), and crappy movies on the 14-hour plain ride back. Oh, and one crappy movie after I got back. No excuse for that one.

Anyways, following is a list of the crappy movies I watched over the last few days and some mockery of them. Sidebar will be updated.

1- Kingdom of Heaven: 7.0
Not actually that crappy. We're supposed to learn from this that there are good and bad people from every faith. Good Christians, bad Christians, good Muslims, bad... hey, where are the bad Muslims? I guess according to this movie, no one of the Islamic faith has ever commited an evil in the name of Allah. Fantastic battles scenes, Orlando Bloom carries his weight well, but the movie lost me when it tried to portray all religions as being equal.

2- Monster-In-Law: 3.0
I didn't know they'd made a movie about Rie's mom. Ha ha ha... ha ha... ha. Oh well. I do have to admit I did laugh at a couple things in the movie. I've forgotten what those things are, so obviously they couldn't have been that funny. The primary draw of the movie is we see that Jane Fonda truely is evil.

3- Criminal: 7.5?
Unfortunatley, I missed the first 20 minutes of this one, but it looked interesting. A movie about con-men, sort of like a modern-day "The Sting". It loses points for vulgarity though. It's also just plain boring in some parts.

4- The Incredibles: 10.0
Not a crappy movie by any stretch of the imagination. My favorite Pixar movies ever, and the movie that saved me from despairing in the sea of mediocrity.

5- Constantine: -1.0
Utter, utter drivel. The moderately attractive Rachel Weiss was the only thing in it that kept me from clawing out my eyes and swallowing them because the inside of my stomach would look better than this movie.

6- The Pacifier: 6.0
Mainly humorous because you get to see Vin Diesel make a fool of himself, but very silly and not always in a good way. You might like it if you liked Kindergarten Cop.

7- Bride and Prejudice: 7.0?
Not crappy, but unfortunately I missed the beginning, so I didn't always understand what was going on (who's marrying who now)? Definite chick-flick.

8- Madagascar: 5.0
Oh, it tried so hard to be funny. Shouldn't we give it bonus points for that? No.

9- Sin City: -5.0
Definitely, the worst movie I saw the entire trip. Not bad because of acting or writing, but bad because it is utterly, utterly depraved. Of course, what would you expect from the title?

10- Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: 9.0
So long and thanks for all the fish.
So sad that it should come to this.
We tried to warn you all but oh dear.

You may not share our intellect,
Which might explain your disrespect,
For all the natural wonders which grow around you

So long, so long, and thanks for all the fish.

You're world's about to be destroyed.
There's no point getting all annoyed.
Just lay back and let the planet dissolve around you.

Despite the nets and tuna fleets,
We thought that most of you were sweet,
Especially tiny tots and your pregnant women.

So long, so long, so long, so long, so long,
So long, so long, so long, so long, so long,
So long, so long, and thanks for all the fish.

There, now that I've passed it on YOU can start singing it and maybe I can get it out of my head.

11- Fever Pitch: 6.0
Not bad. Not good either. Except Drew Barrymore. I've seen her in enough things that I liked that she's avoided my black-list for the amazing crap that she's done as well.

12- Catwoman: 4.0
Not as bad as I had been lead to believe... which isn't saying much. 'Bright' spot was Alex Borstein (voice of Lois Griffin on "Family Guy"), but then again, a beagle seems bright in a sea of June Bugs. What I learned from this movie: women and cats like shiny objects.

---Edit---
Forgot one:
13- In Good Company: 7.0
Not half bad. Interesting take on a young man's life and the things that really should be important. Although, for once I wish someone in a movie would say "Oh, I can't sleep with you; we're not married."

Area Man Could Care Slightly Less About Network Availability Modeling.

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - According to sources close to him, area man Joe Belland gives "half a rat's ass" for network availability modeling. During a recent training session, Belland was reported to state "and as you can see, by defining a parts list to contain all the interchangeable interface cards in the parts library, we can easily swap out parts in a given slot with a similar one, to see how a more or less reliable component would affect the availability of the entire- y'know, this is really boring, but at least it's not reliability-centered maintenance"

Belland later stated that "after spending numerous hours going back and forth from watching a faucet drip and modeling network availability, the network availability rates as slightly more interesting."

Idiots of the Day/Week/Month.

Va. laptop sale turns into a stampede.

Good Gravy, people. It's just a bunch of old Macs. If you're going to riot, make it over something worthwhile, like Star Wars tickets.

NCAA Requiring Notre Dame to Change Mascot

SOUTH BEND, IN - In the wake of the National Collegiate Athletic Association ruling to prohibit American Indian names and mascots in postseason tournaments, the NCAA has issued another ruling requiring the University of Notre Dame to change their team name and mascot if they wish to participate in postseason play.

"After requiring the University of Illinois Fighting Illini and the University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux to change there names as 'hostile' and 'abusive' to Native Americans, we realized it would be racist if we didn't require the Notre Dame Fighting Irish to change their name, as abusive to Irish persons," said NCAA spokesman Jamaal Foney.

The ruling has come under immediate fire from Notre Dame administration, as well as from sports commentators around the nation. Said one dissenter to the name change, "even though I support the ruling about American Indian mascots, I don't think we should apply the same standard to other groups. The Native Americans have been so oppressed by this nation that I don't think we should say anything about them that may or may not be considered hostile. It's a different story with the Irish, though. I mean, it's not like anyone has ever oppressed them."

A University of Notre Dame spokesman said "while we do approve of the removal of stereotypes, particularly Native American stereotypes, from sports teams, I would like to point out that the Notre Dame's mascot is not a stereotype. While not all Indians wear feathers, throw tomahawks, and collect scalps, all Irishmen are short, wear green, drink beer, and get in bar fights."

Movie Review: Lawrence of Arabia

Ok, so I admit: maybe watching a patriotic Arab movie in the wake of global terrorist attacks wasn’t the best way to enjoy and do justice to the film Lawrence of Arabia. Still, aside from Peter O’Toole sporting a bleached ‘do similar to Brad Pitt’s latest catastrophe (minus the gag-inducing spikes) and running around like a madman just escaped from the psyche ward, the movie was at best…befuddling. In fact, my reaction of What the stinking heck? was probably one of the greatest tributes ever paid to that multi-Academy-Award-winning film.

So there I was, alone as if in a desert, watching the eight thousandth shot of a God-forsaken desert pass before my eyes, helplessly struggling to find meaning in the most plot-lacking plot I had ever encountered, and wondering when in the world I could see some green grass again—because we all know that in the desert the sand is always sandier on the other dune. I examined the characters. There was Lawrence, the British soldier fighting to…do what?, prancing around the desert like a self-worshipping god, blowing up trains, trying to be an Arab, then trying not to be an Arab, and overall feeling like a lowly pawn attempting to straddle the composite grandeur of all the mountains in the world—in short, a simple, average English boy. Ok, moving on. Then there was Prince Feizel (spelling up for grabs), played by the greatest actor in history, Sir Alec Guinness, who looked like his skin had been browned with wood stainer, and whose painfully fake Arabic accent sounded way too British for comfort. (However, his black goatee was, to use Paris Hilton lingo, hot!)

Aside from those two, Omar Sharif was…who the heck was he supposed to be? Some tribal Arab leader, I gathered, just thrown in the mix for his (successful) sex appeal, though I was convinced that even his screen presence would fail to entice women to view the flick. Claude Rains was established as a random evil genius-behind-the-scenes of some squeaky political deal (though what that deal was, only the flying pigs could say). An American reporter graced several scenes, and his true-to-life accent was a breath of fresh air; his main mission in life was to paint Lawrence as a hero so that America would go to war, and which war was dubious. Exactly. You fill in the missing puzzle.

I watched Lawrence off and on throughout the week while I folded laundry and did situps; it was the most sleepless week I’ve ever had. The fact that I did not understand the movie AT ALL kept me awake at night as I struggled to make some sense of everything. I was sincerely thrown into an existential crisis as I pondered whether or not I really exist, whether I was really a rational being, and whether my acute feelings of dehydration were at all related to the film, and if so, did that mean I existed?

The most pervasive mystery of all was the question of why this movie had garnered so many awards. The scenery was ok, if you like desert, or desert spotted with brown little Arabs, or desert flecked with awesome horses, or desert with a few palm trees, or—you get the point—but it wasn’t breathtaking. The acting was ok—a bit haywire, but with all those big names, someone was bound to deliver. But I couldn’t for the life of me understand the politics. All I knew was that Lawrence was an Englishman leading the Arabs to victory over the Turks. Why? When? Eventually, everything revolved around taking the city of Damascus, and when he accomplished this, Lawrence got to go home. The End.

The End. Those two words restored my faith in my own sanity. I had hit the end of the tape, and it hit me: I had watched the movie bass ackwards. Yes, I, the ultimate critic of other people’s intelligence, had put in the second tape first (it was in the first tape’s slot). I wept for joy.

So, I popped in the first tape second, and gradually the film started to make sense. Except for now, in the middle of the story, Lawrence was dead. That will do weird things to your brain. But it won’t do anything as weird as watching the movie backwards and not knowing it. I recommend this sort of sport for anyone who loves to play mind games. Just keep pointy objects at a safe distance.

Loud, Shrill Shriek Disrupts Southland.
Area woman causes traffic accidents, work stoppages, heart failures with ear-piercing noise.

El Segundo, CA - At precisely 1:04 pm PDT today, a loud, high-pitched squeal was heard by residents of Southern California. The noise, which could be heard as far away as Victorville and Santa Barbara, is being blamed for numerous disruptions, including traffic accidents, work stoppages, and 3 deaths. Additionally, initial damage estimates for cracked and shattered windows range between $900,000 and $3 million.

Several southland freeways experienced traffic congestion caused by accidents, as motorists slammed on their brakes when they heard the cry. Said one commuter from West Covina, "I heard this shrill screech and thought it might be my brakes failing. I slowed down to pull off the freeway, and was hit by the person behind me, who thought the noise was coming from his radio and was adjusting the volume."

Additionally, some hospitals are reporting a spike in the number of heart attacks treated. At least three people have died, including a 76-year-old man who grew up in London during the Blitz and thought the shriek was an air-raid siren. Witnesses reported that he started yelling that the Krauts were attacking, before keeling over. He was pronounced dead by paramedics on the scene.

Initial investigations have traced the screech to Anne Marie Belland, an Exectuve Assistant at the Raytheon facility in El Segundo. According to witnesses, a deafening screech was heard from her cubicle shortly before she emerged, screaming "I got the job! I got the job! Blizzard wants me!" She then ran out of the building and has not been seen since. Police have been dispatched to locate her, although no formal charges have been brought against her. Said ESPD Police Chief Jim Bravura, "we do not know Mrs. Belland's current whereabouts, but believe she may be heading to Big Bear, or some other colder climate, in search of this 'Blizzard' that she seems to believe has called to her. We are working closely with psychiatrists to try and guess what her next move will be."

The police chief also stated that Mrs. Belland would most likely not face criminal charges, since according to all witnesses she fled in a state of total mental hysteria and was not rational.

Another One Bites the Dust



S. Korean man dies after 50 hours of computer games - Yahoo! News



This is the second case I've heard of a South Korean keeling over from exhaustion. The other one was after 80 or so hours. There was also the case of a taiwanese man dying after only 30 hours.



They're all wimps. I bet I could do at least 100 hours.

The XYZ Affair

I earned my college spending money (which was more often than not sunk into that pizza franchise that was really the salvation of the entire student body, rescuing us from the evil clutches of the cafeteria) in the computer labs of various halls at the university. My lab of choice was located in the science building, because most people there usually had some remote clue about computers and required the least condescending assistance. However, a few idiots did seek me out to haunt me, eventually becoming members of the infamous group dubbed “The Regulars.” But theirs is a different story, so stay tuned; it promises to be a good laugh for all who have a grain of intelligence.

On this particular day, I was relaxing in the lab and aggressively surfing the net when Professors A and B, whose offices were near the lab, walked by. A social being, I went outside to talk to them. Our riveting discussion on celestial mechanics was suddenly rendered more interesting when I happened to notice that Professor A’s fly was unzipped. Not wanting to embarrass him, I repeated mentally, “Just maintain eye contact, just maintain eye contact,” and continued to smile and nod politely.

After about half an hour, I returned to my lab and began working on a project. As I sat down, I noticed, ironically, that my fly was also unzipped. I had to laugh to myself as I realized that Professor A had probably been making the same polite mental notes about me that I had been making about him during the entire conversation.

I was part of a team for the programming project on which I was working, and had to email some information to Tom and Joe about it, so I logged onto the university’s class pages. After including the information about the project, I decided to add a bit of humor: “Hey, a funny thing just happened while I was talking to Professors A and B…” and proceeded to relate the whole ironic story.

I hit the “send” button—and realized I had accidentally sent it to the entire class, including the professor in question.

In a quandary, I ran into Professor A’s office, got down on both knees, and exclaimed, with hands clenched desperately, “Professor A! I must tell you something important immediately!”

“Just a moment, just a moment, let me finish checking my email…” said Professor A nonchalantly, his back to me. I watched as he silently read, then embarrassedly looked down to his zipper…

My face turned a million shades of red, then white, then gray. What had I done? Why did I do it? This was the professor who had to grade my senior thesis and all my finals, this was the professor who could single-handedly prevent me from graduating. I had broken bread with him at his table, had taught his daughter racquet ball in exchange for violin lessons, and had had many good and strange discussions about everything eccentric in the world with him...He finally looked at me, and I am grateful and surprised that he ever spoke to me again.

My self-inflicted penance was to search high and low all over campus for the members of the class and beg them on their honor not to read the email. Of course, this just made them more curious and inclined to open it.

Over two years have passed since that time, and I thought that the memory had died in the minds of my classmates. We’re all graduated now, and have moved on with our lives. It’s easy to forget these things, right?

Last month I received a login for a friend’s website. He assigned me a password. It was professorAlefthisflydown.

Rat finks.

Mess Hall Memories, Part I

I know you guys have already heard this one, but I have been itching to write it down for the sake of posterity. It's funnier because it's true, and Tom and Joe may even remember it...

I signed up to major in Computer Science because I had learned HTML at the age of 12 and thought I was some sort of computer expert, and suffered from the delusion that the world needed me and would give me a paying job (as opposed to a "begging" job commonly ascribed to theology majors) when I was unleashed from the womb of college. Little did I know that HTML is not a “real” programming language, that computers are really imbecilic machines whose main reason for existence is to exasperate people, and that there are as many computer programmers as there are grains of sand in the Mojave Desert. I also did not know I would be the lone woman in the Computer Science Department at Franciscan University for three years--so much for female companionship--and that I would suddenly inherit 20 male classmates who could only think linearly. Had I known these things beforehand, I would have immediately signed on as a Biology major, instead of waiting to do so when Joe and Tom discovered my middle name online and bribed our CS professor to use it during roll call…

Be that as it may…

I was sitting in the computer lab working on my second “real” programming project ever, dejectedly reading the gajillion error codes generated by the dumb compiler. (It really was a dumb compiler because it never intuited how my programs were supposed to work; instead, it just did exactly what I instructed it to do, except it wouldn’t budge when I told it to go to hell.) Just as I was approaching my wits’ end (and wanting desperately to keep them intact), I espied Dr. Kovach entering his office. A miracle! It wasn’t even office hours!

“Dr. Kovach, Dr. Kovach, what luck! Can you please, please help me with my program?” I gave him the classic puppy-eyed look, thinking that the only XX chromosomes in the department might actually come in handy in a time of crisis, but his sarcastic expression quelled all hope of assistance.

His eyes lit up mischievously at my request, and his frazzled red hair and eccentric orange beard made him seem a devilish sort of imp. “I will only help you IF--” he paused dramatically, “you give me a dozen chocolate chip cookies right now.”

For many, deportation to Siberia would have been more welcome than this impossible sentence. As for me, I jumped excitedly up and down as I produced for him exactly twelve chocolate chip cookies from my coat pockets, suppressing the urge to laugh maniacally. His eyes almost fell out of his head.

I had just come from the cafeteria, from which it is absolutely forbidden to sneak food, even though our semester bills screamed the fact that we did pay an arm and a leg for that slosh. That day, I had made it my particular mission in life to see just how many chocolate chip cookies would fit in my deep coat pockets. I got exactly six in each one.

Needless to say, that A was the most ingeniously earned mark in the history of the department.

ComicCon.

Okay, this post has been a while in coming.

On Friday July 15th, the question I was asked more than any other was "can I take your picture?" I could hardly walk 10 feet without some one pulling me aside. But y'know what? I didn't mind one bit. It felt awesome. I felt awesome. Even though by the end of the day I was exhausted and felt like I could keel over, I still was smiling underneath my mask for every single picture. I couldn't help it.

Why was I so popular? Well the handsome cream certainly isn't the reason. Instead I was dressed as one of the least-feared villains in movie history: I was a Stormtrooper.

As I walked around the San Diego Convention center, I could barely see. I couldn't tilt my head up because the helmet would hit the back armor piece. I couldn't tilt it down because of the chest armor piece. The only way to see the ground in front of me was to bend from the waist. Also, the guy who's helmet it belonged to had glued his prescription glasses lenses inside the helmet, so that helped to make everything blurry and distorted.

But even still, I could see the people around me stare as I walked past. Some one would notice me and grab their camera. "Can I take your picture?" was always the next thing out of their mouth. Even though I could barely hear them over the noise of the convention, through the muffle of the helmet, and over the drone of the fans inside the helmet, I could have said it with them, I was so used to hearing it. And once I had stopped for one person, a whole flock would come rushing in.

A couple times, a mother would ask me to say hi to her son. "Hello" I would say in the deepest voice I could muster. "Be sure to eat your vegetables. It will make you a good citizen of the Galactic Empire." They never laughed (no one ever laughs at my jokes).

By the end of the day, I was so exhausted, I was nauseous. I hadn't eaten or drank anything all day. (I wanted to keep the tanks empty, so to speak; how does a Stormtrooper go to the bathroom?) I had been on my feet on the cement floor for close to 8 hours. (It's also really hard to sit down in Stormtrooper armor). By the time I got back to the car and took the armor off, I had bruises on my shoulders, in my hips, and on the balls of my hands. I had terrible shin splints from standing on the hard floor while wearing the costume. My legs were almost numb from the knee down.

But it was worth it. I was ready to do the same thing again the next day.

-The Backstory-

A few weeks ago (July 15-16) Rie and I went to San Diego for ComicCon. If you don't know what ComicCon is, imagine every geek in the Western United States in one room. That's ComicCon. It's billed as the "Convention for the promotion of Comics and popular art." A week prior to the event, I didn't know I was going. Rie had been planning on attending and had pre-registered, but I assumed she was going with her Star Wars geek friends. It was only just prior that I asked if she was intending for me to go.

At first I was really hesitant. I had no idea what ComicCon was all about. I figured it was just going to be some Anime porn thing with really weird Japanese comics. As it turns out, ComicCon is the coolest thing ever!!! All sorts of companies show up to display their wares. Most importantly, video game and film companies show up. Just to give you an example of some of the stuff we saw:

- LucasFilm had the largest "booth". I use the term booth loosely as it was more of a "small football field". They had all sorts of affiliates there displaying/selling stuff. Master Replicas was there and selling tons of lightsabers (really, really good quality replicas). Lego was there showing off some of the Lego sets (including the multi-thousand piece Prequel Star Destroyer). LucasArts was there and they had playable demos of Empire at War and Battefront II! (This was what I was most excited about). There were also a few other toy companies that were selling Star Wars related stuff. They also went all out in the setup. In the middle, towards the ceiling was a huge display showing all sorts of movies. They went through the trailers for all 6 movies; They showed a bunch of fan films; they had a guy walking around with a camera filming the fans around the booth (particularly those in costume); they also had a couple guys come out periodically and duke it out with Master Replicas' lightsabers (which the camera guy filmed for the big screen above). The LucasFilm booth was consequently one of the most crowded.

- Several video game companies were there, including Activision, EA, and most importantly Blizzard. Activision and EA were primarily showing there in-development games based off comic book licenses (like The Incredible Hulk). Blizzard had WoW and StarCraft: Ghost.

- Dreamworks, Disney, and Weta were also there. Dreamworks had some cool stuff (more shown later). Disney had a huge Chronicles of Narnia setup (again, more later). Weta had a cool setup with models from some of their different films (LOTR, Narnia, and King Kong). They also had a TV that was showing the trailer for King Kong as well as some behind-the-scenes stuff for Narnia.

- There was some booth that had something to do with Matt Groening. They had a bunch of the Simpsons comic books, as well as a TV that was showing Futurama. I watched part of the episode where Fry microwaves non-microwaveable popcorn (because it's in a metal tin) during a super-nova, which rips a whole in the fabric of the space time continuum and sends them back to Roswell, 1947, where Fry kills his grandfather and impregnates his grandmother.

There were a ton of other booths showing stuff (not just porn). Basically, if a company had anything to do with some form of animation or popular art, they were at ComicCon

So anyways, on to the pictures. But before the pictures, some more backstory. I had expressed interest to Rie about getting some Clone Trooper armor (before I realized how much said armor kits cost). So a couple weeks before ComicCon, Rie took me to the house of one of her Star Wars friends. This guy (Kevin is his name) is a member of the 501st legion and has his own Stormtrooper armor (to get into the 501st, you have to have an authentic Star Wars costume). He was also constructing his own Episode III Clonetrooper armor. So Rie and I went to look at it and while we were there, he showed me some pictures of some of the places he's worn his armor. Places like Celebration III (this past May in Indianapolis) and the AFI salute to George Lucas (he was actually on stage as part of the dancing Stormtrooper line, if any of you watched that on USA TV network). He has an additional Stormtrooper helmet that he's had signed by almost every major cast member from Star Wars, and also by The Man himself (Lucas). So while we were there, I tried on his Stormtrooper armor. We're about the same height and have almost identical builds, so it fit perfectly.

So anyways, Kevin was busy getting his Clone Trooper armor together for ComicCon, and he agreed to let me wear his Stormtrooper armor for the event. So I did.



I think I was sticking out my tongue in that picture. That's Rie in her Sith costume. She can't get into the 501st with that costume because it's not "Canon". Only a few non-canon costumes are let in (Mara Jade and Thrawn, primarily).

Let me tell you about Stormtrooper armor.
1) It's quite heavy. Basically, everything from the knees up is resting on two small points on your shoulders. I had bruises the next day.
2) It's not as hot as you might think. Yes it is plastic, which doesn't breathe well, but it's white, so even in the sun, most of the heat was reflected.
3) The helmet is the hottest part. To that end, most members of the 501st install CPU fans in their helmets to circulate the air. Thank goodness I had a couple (hooked up to 9V batteries).
4) It's hard to sit down. For the first 6 hours or so, I didn't even think I could. I didn't want to try, since it wasn't my armor and I was being extra-careful. Eventually, it was either sit down or fall over, so I managed to make do.



Ignore the bad Jango Fett costume guy on the left. Next to Rie, in her Sith costume, is Kevin in his Clone Trooper armor. He had done an awesome job with it and even applied some battle damage. The paint was scuffed up to make it look like he'd seen action. The Jawa is Kevin's 7-year-old son Christiano. After me is Kevin's wife, Brook, in the Imperial Guard get up. She's not exactly flat chested, so sometimes kids will come up to her and say "Mommy that one's a girl!"

In the above picture we're standing in a box made to look like a box of action figures. Entertainment Earth was the company selling them. Rie and I volunteered to pose with people for pictures. For every 3 hours we put in, we got a free box of the action figures.



Stupid Clone Troopers giving us Stormtroopers a bad name! They think they're so hot because they can actually hit their target!



This is at the Lego booth inside the LucasFilm area. There was a remote controlled lego R2-D2 rolling around.



Yeah, I wasn't the only Stormtrooper there. There were probably about a dozen just like me. In addition, there was a Sand Trooper (complete with sandy armor), about a half-dozen Episode II Clone Troopers, a few Scout Troopers and Snow Troopers, some Jango Fetts, a few Boba Fetts, (some modified Fetts, including one girl who had an awesome black with red highlight Mandalorian battle armor), a couple Vaders, and this Commander Cody. He was the only other Episode III Clone (aside from Kevin).



I think this is Rie's dream come true. In case you haven't been able to tell from the other pictures, she's wearing a leather get up (without the cloak she looks like Trinity from the Matrix) and high-heeled leather boots.



This chick's hot. Rie knows her name (I don't remember). She was one of about 3 slave Leias (and the one with the best costume). She goes around to a bunch of different events like this and poses for pictures (WITH the costume, you perv).



Here are a few other not-as-hot girls with some Amidala/Handmaiden costumes. I thought the one on the left was actually pretty good.



Gah! My own wife trying to kill me!



There was also a Han and Chewie that were wandering around. The Han didn't look much like Han in facial features, but he had a good costume and could act the part. The Chewie was perfect. His costume was perfect. He was perfect.



Keep in mind with that armor on, I'm about 6 feet tall. This guy could also do the Chewie call perfectly (Brrrrrr, or however you would spell it). The kid is Kevin's son Christiano.



After we took the group shot, Chewie grabbed Christiano and hoisted him above his head and Chewie-called to him. The kid loved it.



There were a few other good and interesting costumes there. I thought this one was interesting, if not necessarily canon.



"But you've forgotten one thing. I'm Captain Jack Sparrow." I think Rie's costume would look great if she had red contacts.

There were a number of other cool costumes I didn't get pictures of, including some great Jedi costumes. One guy had a Episode III Obi-Wan, with perfect beard and hair. There's also one guy that had a kick-arse Episode III Anakin costume. He had the perfect hair sweaty-looking long hair, he drew the scar over his eye, put the red make-up under his eyes, and even put in the yellow contact lenses. I wish I'd gotten a picture of him. There was also a Stormtrooper Elvis. He was wearing the armor, except for the helmet, a white cape, and had sideburns with elvis-style sunglasses and hairdo.

There were also a lot of non-Star Wars costumes. Some Klingons went into the Entertainment Earth booth to take a picture with Rie (she greeted them with a hearty "Kah'plah"). There were also a good bunch of freaks in weird Goth leather and stuff. I even found Waldo: Blue jeans, red and white striped shirt and cap, glasses, and cane.


2nd day

On the second day, I wasn't dressed up (we overslept because we were both so tired, then didn't meet up with Kevin to get the armor). So I was able to actually browse the convention and take more pictures.



This is at the Disney booth. They had a wardrobe you could walk in where they had samples of the armor and a trailer for the movie, with behind the scenes stuff (mainly talking with Richard Taylor). Mom would have gone nuts over it.



Ever watch Judgement Day on G4TV? Yeah, me neither. It's an inferior version of X-Play. But anyways, they were filming an episode at ComicCon. On the left is Tommy Tallarico, and on the right is his co-host Victor Lucas. They're not as funny as Adam Sessler and Morgan Webb on X-Play, but Mr. Tallarico is a cool character because he's also a video game music composer and one of the two people responsible for Video Games Live (the concert at the Hollywood bowl that featured nothing but video game music).

When they were done filming and began to move on, some people started yelling stuff like "Sessler sucks!" I yelled "thanks for Video Games Live." Mr. Tallarico turned around and said "Oh yeah!" I shook his hand and thanked him for all he was doing to put video game music into the main stream. He asked where I was from. "Long Beach," I said. He replied, "yeah, we'll be back in the area soon, in Irvine." "Any chance of making it out to Florida? That's where my brother is and I know he'd love to go." "Yeah, we're looking at perhaps either Orlando or Tampa." Awesome. Dave, keep a look out.



The episode they were filming is where they review Batman Begins, the game. Tommy gave it an 8.5 and Victor gave it a 7.5. Tommy liked how it integrated all the best parts from several different genres (GTA, Splinter Cell, and others). Victor didn't like how unbelievably linear it was. If you want to know more, just watch the episode.



Hey, did anyone know Dreamworks is making a Transformers movie? It's supposed to come out July 4th weekend, 2007. Anyways, this was cool. They drove in a big semi and covered it up. It was in fact a red cab with a grey trailer.



This is from the Dreamworks booth. They had some dioramas of the new Wallace and Gromit movie: The Curse of the Were Rabbit.







Bunnies! They're even cuter than the sheep.

That's all I took pictures of. There was tons of other cool stuff I didn't get. Some prop place had statues and models of Hellboy, the Terminator, the Alien, the Predator, and tons of other cool sci-fi stuff. Nintendo was also drawing a big crowd, but I was avoiding the big floating Pikachu balloon.

So anyways, it was a lot of fun and I have a feeling we'll be going again next year.

Florida Woman Denied Civil Rights.
By Cari Burud, F.U. News correspondant.

In a vicious battle that emblazoned the court as “mean,” “unfair,” and “lacking in understanding,” a Florida woman’s very identity has been legally shot down. Cari Burud, a bay area professional, brought suit against her state of residence last week, claiming that the Department of Motor Vehicles would not feature a suitable photo on her driver’s license.

The great “stress, embarrassment, insult, and injury of this injustice,” she argued, posed a threat to her “mental and emotional well-being,” disrupting her “inner karma.” Ms. Burud, a horizontally challenged, one-eyed, hair-lipped, middle-aged woman, declared that all photos of herself were unacceptable, and insisted on featuring a seductive shot of actress Jennifer Lopez on her license instead. When asked why this actress in particular, Ms. Burud retorted that “this is how I see myself, inside and out.” She noted further: “It is utterly reprehensible that society today urges its members to be whatever they want to be, while simultaneously refusing to recognize who they have chosen to become.”

The court’s refusal to acknowledge her “true identity” has been marked by Burud as “an outrage tantamount to identity theft.” However, the court is considering a compromise: if Burud loses 232 pounds, acquires an eye, dyes her hair black, and suddenly becomes 15 years younger, she may place a photo of Catherine Zeta-Jones on her license. Ms. Zeta-Jones’ representatives were unavailable for comment on the subject.

Q Declared Coolest Letter of Alphabet.
X's long reign comes to an end, amid scandal.

The United Letters of the Alphabet have elected Q as the successor to X as the coolest letter of the alphabet, ending X's long reign. The election has been planned since X announced its plans to resign last year, following the scandal that erupted after the X-Y affair came to public attention.

The election of Q comes as a major upset, as the letter Z was the front-runner and was expected to win in a landslide. Exit polls indicated that while Z won an 80% majority among vowels, consonants favored Q overwhelmingly. In a short speech after the results were announced, Q promised not to abuse his status as coolest letter of the alphabet, in a thinly-veiled jab at X.

However, signs of abuse are already starting to come to the surface. Within hours after becoming elected, it was revealed that Q had signed an exclusive agreement with G4TV to rename their popular video-game show "Q-Play". Other similar deals came to light in the time following:
-Fox has ordered all DVDs of the show X-Files pulled from retailers, amid plans to re-label them "Q-Files".
-Marvel comics has announced that it is releasing a new series of comic books about a group of humans with super powers called the "Q-Men", led by the handicapped professor Charles Quentin. 20th Century Foques has already agreed to a 3-movie deal.
-Atari has announced plans to bring back 80's video game icon Q*Bert in a new video game/TV show/movie/book deal. The newest video game will launch Microsoft's new Q-Qrate video game system.
-Apple has announced that its latest operating system will be dubbed OS Q. The Q represent how Quicktime will be integrated into the operating system to bring fully interactive multimedia to the user interface.
-Vin Diesel will be starring in a new Hollywood blockbuster entitled "QQQ" or Triple-Q.
-Webster's International has announced that the words X-mas, Extreme, and Maximum will be replaced by Q-mas, Questreme, and Maquemum. Following suit, the SpikeTV program Maximum Exposure, or Max-X will be referred to as Maquemum Quesposure, or Maques-Q
-The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has announced the creation of the .qqq top level domain for use by web sites with adult content.

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