Doyce Testerman

Joss means ‘good fortune’ in ancient egyptian. It’s a good name. In the world of television writers, it’s my favorite name.
So: Firefly, Joss Whedon’s take on Sci-fi. I came into it cold: the previews and trailers didn’t do much for me, and I wasn’t sure about the premise, and I don’t trust the support of the Fox Network as far as I can comfortably spit a rat.
Love at first sight? Pretty much, and it sounds like there’s a lot of really good stuff coming along after a really fun first episode. I’m stoked.

I have always firmly believed that Monsters, Inc. is a superior movie to Shrek. I like Shrek fine, and the finally ‘message’ is a good one that I wholeheartedly support, but it isn’t just about the final message, and when it comes to the whole movie, I just enjoy MI so much more. Watching the show again last night simply reinforced my previous opinion.
Dave agrees, which doesn’t really surprise me, as the similarities between Boo and Katherine are both strong and multiplying :).

During a press conference today at the Tokyo Game Show, Blizzard unveiled StarCraft: Ghost, a tactical-action console game set in the StarCraft universe. The game is currently under development and is scheduled for worldwide release on multiple console systems in 2003.

(I will preface this post by stating that no one I know likes the music I like – not all of it. Someone might like Tupac, but think BNL is too silly to be real music, or like BNL, but disregard rap as a wasteland of skill-free thugs. That’s all right. I understand that my tastes do not suit anyeveryone. We’re all entitled to opinions. These are mine. So there.)

Secret to peaceful work.

• Play the CBT (computer-based training) for software you have no interest in learning, but that everyone else wants you to know.
• Put on headphones, ostensibly because the CBT has a voiceover, and you want to be considerate of others.
• Shut off the voiceover option.
• Play Avril while you flip through the CBT manually.

Yeah, she’s seventeen and does some of the same dumb stuff I did at that age (there are a few fashion mistakes she’ll be regretting in a year or two, if my experiences are any indication), but dammit, I like Avril Lavigne. I bought Let Go two months ago and frankly the only complaint I have is that I don’t have enough copies of it to keep me properly saturated at work, home and in the car. It’s hard to get sick of the music when every song is just a little bit different in style.
Whatever. I’m a lame old man listening to a seventeen-year-old singing pop, but at least she’s writing her own stuff, and at least I’m listening because I really like it.*

* – By rights, I suppose I should be listening to Dave Matthews, who is so deeply revered by my demographic that he could sign his name to a steaming pile of dog crap and sell it to my panting, sweating generation without even trying**. I guess he’s just not my cup of tea – give me fire, attitude, and harmonized anger-management issues***.

** – Can’t remember where I first heard this sentiment expressed re: D Matthews? Seki? P’raps.

*** – One of the ways I’ve heard Linkin Park described, which seems aptly put.

I have a bad habit of buying DVD’s for movies that I enjoyed in the theatre and then never watching them. I mean, I dig the behind the scenes stuff, I love the movie commentaries (assuming it’s not just the producers talking about how brilliant they were to support the movie), I just don’t have the time lately, especially when it’s a movie I’ve seen a couple times already. I used to do better at this when my laptop played discs and I could work on something while the movie played but now I have to go downstairs and give up all other activity to watch a flick.
So last night, I forced myself to (a) start the damn movie and (b) stay up long enough to watch it, even though I started it around 11:30. The movie (which I’d liked but only seen once) was Resident Evil.
I like it even more than I did the first time, and I recognize now that a big part of it is Michelle Rodriguez, whom I recognized this time around as “the girl from Girlfight” (haven’t seen it) who was just in Blue Crush. (Which somehow manages to be a hardbody movie about girl power.)
This is a good actress. Maybe she’s mostly playing to her strengths (which, briefly stated, lies in playing strength), but there’s nothing wrong with that. She’s competent, athletic, attractive, and could break any two anorexic actress-waifs over her knee, even if you tied them together for added strength.
And oh yeah, there’s a lot of shooting and walking dead and stuff. That’s cool too. It’s actually a pretty kick-ass movie, even speaking from a cinematography standpoint.

I am never going to paint myself blue again, for any reason, and that’s all I’m saying about that. I’m still getting that crap out from under my fingernails.
Gahd it was a long weekend. Long. Longer.
Not longest, but a close runner-up.
I’m still beat down and my throat and ears are killing me, but I had a pretty good time. It was nice to stay at the hotel and not have to add “running back and forth from the house” into the mix of events. Being at the hotel was sort of a hassle as well, but it wasn’t as much of a hassle, and I’ll probably do it that way again (also, I didn’t leave blue gunk all over my towels — although the hotel staff are probably cursing my name).
Next time I want a room that’s a little closer to… anything… cripes but that is a poorly laid-out hotel.
Everything was fun and I only had one real let-down the whole weekend, which I’ll probably bitch about on my games page later.
Glad to be home, glad to be here, and now it’s time for lunch.

David Kemper, Richard Manning, and Ben Browder called a special chat in the SCI FI Channel’s #Farscape chat room on September 6th to announce that SCI FI had opted not to pick up Farscape’s fifth season option.
This page contains the chat transcript and contact information for those who would like to call or write to try and get SCI FI to reconsider.

DEAR GOD I WANT THIS!
*pant**pant**wheeze*

(via email from John S.)