Apparently Boondocks as a daily strip is no more. Word is that Aaron wants to focus on TV, movies, etc. More power to him, although I have to say that so far the TV series is a pale imitation of the comic strip. Too much gangsta/kung fu violence, not enough snark.
Ms. Espenson has a piece up that discusses act breaks in TV shows. Interesting stuff, but it seems worth noting that some networks will utterly ignore them. TBS does this all the time, plowing right through the act breaks and instead stopping the action for commercials smack in the middle of a conversation. I suppose they can be forgiven for this, since they do it to re-runs. However, Cartoon Network recently did the same thing when they broadcast the new Teen Titans movie, I think for the first time.
Now I'm no Jane Espenson, let alone a bona-fide screenwriter, but that's gotta be frustrating. I know it drives me crazy.
And so not work-safe. But hey, who doesn't like magic?
In an era where "sacrifice" means you get a 32" widescreen instead of the 40" you've been coveting, this shouldn't surprise anyone. Rest assured, however, that someone is going to eventually pay for all this folly. Probably all of us, in one way or another. I can only hope that Republicans get saddled with a decades-long reputation for fecklessness in the same way that Democrats have been painted for years as anti-war peaceniks because of what happened during Vietnam.
Caught the tail end of a story this morning with Sonny Perdue explaining his pleased reaction to Georgia now ranking 46th in SAT rankings. He acknowledged that 46th out of 50 was maybe not so hot, but explained that it was the best Georgia had ever done (which explains a lot) and said that the trend was good.
We didn't bomb them into the stone age, we engaged in alternative diplomatic techniques.
He didn't rape her, he used alternative seduction techniques.
They didn't stage a coup, they used alternative voting techniques.
Funny. Except when it's not.
So apparently atomic weapons are so bad, we need to nuke anyone who tries to build them.
At least next time I don't there will be any doubt why they hate us.
Item 1: Idiotic rumors about Condoleezza Rice
Item 2: The Wife of Bath
Gap-toothed I was, and that became me well;
I had the print of holy Venus' seal.
So help me God, I was a healthy one,
And fair and rich and young and full of fun;
And truly, as my husbands all told me,
I had the silkiest quoniam that could be.
I'm not really sure what "quoniam" means (google search didn't really help), but it sure sounds dirty.
On January 21, 1959 Switzer arrived at Stilz's home in Mission Hills to get his money back. Once Switzer arrived he banged on Stilz's front door demanding that he let him in. Once Switzer got inside he and Stilz got into an argument. Switzer informed Stilz that he wanted the money he owed him. But when Stilz refused to hand over the money the two engaged in a physical fight when Switzer bashed Stilz in the head with a lamp which caused Stilz to bleed from his left eye. Stilz retreated to his bedroom and returned holding a gun, but Switzer immediately grabbed the gun away from Stilz which resulted a shot being fired but neither man was hit. Then Switzer forced Stilz into a closet, despite that Stilz had got his hands back on the gun. Switzer pulled out a knife and was attempting to stab Stilz with it. But just as Switzer was about to charge Stilz, Stilz raised the gun and shot Switzer in the chest. Switzer died of intense blood loss while on his way to the hospital. He was 31 years old.
The killing was held to be a justifiable homicide. Switzer had allegedly pulled a knife; therefore, the shooting was judged to be self-defense. During the trial regarding Switzer's death, it was revealed that what was originally reported as a 'hunting knife' was in fact a jack knife. It had been found by crime scene investigators under his body, but with no blade exposed. Switzer's death was largely ignored in the media, mainly because director Cecil B. DeMille had died on the same day.
Why am I just now hearing about Sonny Perdue's $100,000 gift to himself?
Those who need a visual to help understand failure need look no further than Gary Weddle's beard.
More Americans have now died In Iraq than died On 9/11
Over the last couple weeks or so, an increasing number of people have been coming to this site looking for the following (admittedly crude) cartoon:
I can't imagine why...
Via a piece in Daily Kos looking at Afghanistan, there's this little tidbit from the CBC:
NATO soldiers fighting in Afghanistan face a higher risk of being killed than the U.S.-led international forces that invaded Iraq in 2003, a British statistician says.
Sheila Bird, the vice-president of Britain's Royal Statistical Society, said in the Sept. 9 issue of New Scientist magazine that she made the conclusion after analyzing casualty rates and the number of soldiers deployed on each mission.
Bird said the risk to the NATO forces fighting militants in Afghanistan — including more than 2,000 Canadian troops — is approaching the level faced by the then-Soviets, who abandoned their war there in 1989 after 10 years.
Five of the approximately 18,500 soldiers in the NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) have been killed every week since May, she said.
Yow. I wonder how long it will take for this to penetrate into the American consciousness. We like to think of Afghanistan as "done," with just minor flare-ups, but I'm thinking that's not so much true.
INT. dining room, morning
Jason enters the room muttering to himself in reaction to a report on NPR that Congress voted to protect horses against being slaughtered for food.
Jason
I don't know what their deal is. I've had horse sausage. It was yummy. I'd eat it again.
Chandra
When have you ever had horse sausage?
JASON
Suomessa.
CHANDRA
Finland?
JASON
Yup.
CHANDRA
(after a beat)
So what is their deal with horses, anyway?
JASON
Well, they need every horse's ass they can get if they're going to keep their seats.
More on that 9/11 "docudrama." Now apparently the screenwriter is admitting to just making stuff up. Hell, I can do that. Here's my "docudrama" of the first moments when Dubya learned about the attack. For reference, you may want to check the Wikipedia entry on "The Pet Goat", or the Memory Hole's video of Bush sitting on his ass for what seems an eternity after hearing of the attacks.
InT. classroom, morning
The PRESIDENT is sitting in front of a class of primary school children while the teacher begins a lesson.
Teacher
Open your book up to lesson 60 on page 153.
ANDREW CARD enters the room and leans over to speak to Bush.
ANDrew card
A second plane hit the second tower. America is under attack.
TEACHER
At the count of three everyone should be on page 153. One...
George W. Bush (V.O.)
Oh, jeez.
TEACHER
Two...
GEORGE W. BUSH (V.O.)
Ah, crap.
TEACHER
Three. Okay, is everybody ready?
GEORGE W. BUSH (V.O.)
I think I left the iron plugged in.
TEACHER
Okay, everyone. Let's start with the title of the story, and read the first paragraph out loud. Ready?
The class begins reading the story in unison. As they read, the teacher taps her pointer stick against the board in a steady rythm. Caught up in the moment, Bush's thoughts begin following the same cadence.
Class
The Pet Goat. A girl got a pet goat. She liked to go running with her pet goat. She played with her goat in her house. She played with her goat in her yard. But the goat did some things that made the girl's dad mad. The goat ate things. He ate cans and he ate canes. He ate pans and he ate panes. He even ate capes and caps.
GeoRGE W. BUSH (V.O.)
Oh, my god I'm fucked. I don't know what to do. This was not in the manual. I think I have to pee. Can a goat live in a house? Can a goat live with a mouse? Wait a second. How can a goat fly a plane. What? They think a goat makes Dad mad. They should try snorting cocaine with embassy stationery. Man, I could use a line right now.
And neither do I, apparently. Saw a piece on Wired today discussing how quickly Microsoft got out a patch after their DRM scheme got cracked. You can measure the turnaround in days, vs. what it takes them to fix the kind of holes that can lead a cracker to turn your computer into a v1a6ra pushing spam-bot, which is apparently less important and thus takes weeks to months. This brought to mind a recent piece by Ken Levine about radio, where in discussing why KZLA changed its format after 26 years we find out from an exec:
"We work for our advertisers. Through our research and other research we know there was a large phantom cume that never got measured in Arbitron, as good as Arbitron is."
As Ken rightly points out, radio stations are supposed to broadcast in the public's interest, and he's called on folks to challenge their license. Microsoft doesn't require a license, but you would think that Microsoft would be required to look out for the public interest by fixing their software, but no. All they care about are the other conglomerates with billions to shell out in money. Fine, that's capitalism, I suppose. But I dream that there there will come a time when the Ignored Consumer will just walk away. Radio drove me away a long time ago (save NPR and student radio stations), and the DRMisation of everything under the sun threatens to do the same.
I'm not normally one for memes, and frankly no one asked me, but there's one going around to the effect of "dress up your blog for halloween." The tack people seem to be taking is to describe what they typically wear. *Yawn*. Here's my take:
Costume:
Accessories:
I've had a short burst of progress on the movie. The whole thing is at least roughly storyboarded, and I'm starting to fill in the gaps where my drawing skills have failed me (see "The Evaluation") to build a proper first draft of the movie. Since I'm using Final Cut Express and don't have the ability to do motion keyframes there are a few segments that are going to be a little more difficult to convey without dipping into full-blown 3D animation, but I should be able to wrangle something using other software tools (Director, Toon Boom Studio, etc.).
Of course, even within a focused burst of attention there are still detours. The latest is dealing with Hotie's mop, which plays a not-insignificant role in the flick. I had initially envisioned it as one of those classic mops with the long strands of yarn, but that was proving difficult to simulate without either spending a ton of time on it or investing in additional software that would give me proper hair simulation. So-- Hotie's going to use a sponge mop instead.
We won't discuss the little details that have been built into said mop that will (probably) never be visible on screen.
This is the first I've heard anything about it, but word is that there's a new 9/11 "docudrama" coming out that is going to once again attempt to use the events that day to promote the Bush/Republican agenda.
I and everyone else have been complaining awhile about Bush's habit of conflating various groups. We see here, though, that this isn't just some matter of intellectual fastidiousness. The idea here is that absent the US military, we would be handing Iraq over to some nefarious -- and, admittedly, it would be quite nefarious -- coalition of Baathists, Iranians, and al-Qaedists, presumably joined by Dr. Evil and the Cobra Commander.
So the real question then, is who gets to be Hitler?
Crooks and Liars » Keith Olbermann Delivers One Hell Of a Commentary on Rumsfeld
