Ted Stevens Indicted

<nelson voice>Ha! Ha!</nelson voice>
Our favorite intertube rambling, bridge to nowhere building, oil execs don't need to be sworn in to testify to Congress dissembling Senator from Alaska is going to court today to enter a plea on a seven count indictment that he received $250,000 worth of home improvements from an oil exec and lied about them on a disclosure form. What's that sound? I think the bell might be tolling for thee, Ted. Could it have happened to a nicer politician? Maybe. There are a few nicer I can think of. But anyway, maybe (and this is only a maybe) that which hath went around is now coming around.
[article] [another article]

Carrie Fisher: Wishful Drinking

Esther was nice enough to arrange to get tickets for Carrie Fisher's one woman show: Wishful Drinking. That woman is hilarious! And so are the terrible, terrible things that have happened over the years to her and her family. She talked about her family's various problems, how George Lucas ruined her life, her exes, her drug problems, etc, etc. I heard her on some show on NPR a few years ago and she seemed pretty funny then, so that's why I signed on for this show. And, boy, did it deliver! She is a funny, funny lady.

X-Files: I Want To Believe

Noelle, Rachel, and I went out to see the second X-Files movie Monday night. The cast was all a bit older, but otherwise it was like stepping into a regular monster of the week episode, although it was a little different because Mulder and Scully are a couple now, and they weren't through most of the series. Billy Connoly plays a former priest whose visions of a kidnapped FBI agent lead the FBI to try the talents of Fox Mulder once more. Not a revelation, but the movie is worth checking out if you're a fan of the show.

STP

Noelle and Coallee and Sean and I caught Stone Temple Pilots in San Diego Sunday night after Comic-Con wound down. The opening acts were BRMC and Wolfmother. Wolfmother! Hooray! I've been wanting to see them again for ages, so this was quite a pleasant surprise. STP came out and did a bunch of songs from Purple that I haven't heard in a while, so that was worth the price of admission alone, to me. (Well, Wolfmother probably was worth it too.) Overall, the band seemed kind of mixed to me, especially Scott Weiland's vocals. Sometimes they were hard to listen to, other times they were fantastic. Definitely worth doing, but I felt a little nostalgic for the turn of the decade shows I saw when they were an incredibly tight band. Hopefully they'll get things better together after being on the road for a while.

Greetings From Comic-Con

So, here I sit at the Eureka panel at con. For once I got into a panel without getting into a huge line. Yesterday I waited in line for three hours and missed two panels (one of which was the Venture Brothers, sadly.). I did get to see the MST3K 20th anniversary panel and the Dr Horrible Sing-along Blog (Joss and the cast showed up).

The floor has been extra miserable the year: most every day has been like Saturday (except Saturday, ironically). I did get to see the Watchmen panel, which was really cool. They had a longer, darker trailer in which it is revealed that the pattern on Rorshach's mask moves. They also said there was not very much in the way of green screen. Dave Gibbons was there and he said he was really excited about the project, which I think bodes really well.

The BSG panel was cool, as was the previous panel for Joss Whedon's upcoming project: Dollhouse. I have seen a number of famous people, waited in interminable lines, been insanely tired all week, but generally been pretty happy when not despising all other humans. But generally it's been pretty cool this week, weather included. I will post more later when my thumbs recover.

Oh!!! I got to meet Randy Milholland, creator of the cool webcomic Something Positive!

The Dark Knight Delivers

A bunch of us went and waited in line Friday night for the latest Batman movie. I was only sort of into it, because I didn't really like the first one with American Psycho in it. Yeah, I was That Guy. Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised by this sequel, as I thought I might be, given the trailers for it. Heath Ledger did a spectacular job as the Joker. Not Gielgud, but a very convincing Joker. I will take Maggie Gyllenhal over Katie Holmes any day of the week. It was kind of a long movie (like its predecessor), but the story (about the Joker's plan to bring down the Bat Man) was surprisingly tight. That was my main beef with the first movie, I thought story was lacking. Not so, DK. I might even go see this one again.

Has the Whole World Gone CRAZY???

On a routine expedition, they decided to remake Land of the Lost? With Will Ferrell as Marshall? Really? Really?

Watchmen Trailer is Up

Looks pretty good. Go here for more Watchmen goodness.


But "The Beginning is the End is the Beginning," Zak? Really? It's a fine song and all, but for some reason makes me think of perhaps the worst comic book movie of all time, possibly because it was on that movie's soundtrack.

Hellboy 2: Del Toro Unleashed

We went to see Hellboy 2 on Friday night and I have to say I was impressed. Imagine the writer of of Pan's Labyrinth had created a new Hellboy movie. Oh, wait, he did! HB2 starts with the coolest backstory evar (with puppets, no less). Basically, an elvish prince decides to restart an ancient war with humanity and Hellboy and company have to stop them. The scenes in the faery kingdom are super cool. This is one of the few times when I think the sequel is better than the original (granted the original was certainly enjoyable). I am really pleased that Del Toro let himself go with the writing.

Glad I Updated Yesterday

Glad I updated the iPhone to the 2.0 software yesterday. Apple apparently forgot the activation mess they had on the 1.0 launch, since AT&T and Apple are now sending home customers with unusable G3 iPhones. Worse, 1.0 customers trying to update their phones now have bricks that they cannot use because the activation servers are overwhelmed. Someone's gonna get a paddlin'.
[Engadget article]
[Gizmodo reports on new Apple iBrick product]

Goodbye From the World's Largest A-Hole

George W. Bush, our fearless leader, recently departed from the G8 summit and left with the final words: "Goodbye from the world's largest polluter." and then did a fist pump. This did not evidently have the comedic effect we can only assume he was looking for, as the other G8 leaders appeared shocked. I have to commend Shrub, as every now and again he really manages to find totally new ways to appall me. Some would say that China is the world's largest polluter, while others might say that the US is the world's largest per capita polluter, but I think Shrub is not really that much of a detail guy. Certainly we can all agree that he's in contention for world's largest asshole, though, can't we? [article]

Lead By Example, Douchebag

So, right before the G8 leaders met to discuss the problem of world hunger, they had a six course lunch and an eight course dinner. The african attendees to the meeting who were working with the G8 nations to avert a food crisis on that continent ironically were not invited to dinner. This bodes poorly for the plan, I think.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown had early exhorted Britons to stop wasting food and "reduce unnecessary demand." I guess fourteen courses plus five kinds of wine were totally necessary for two meals. Wankers. Hypocritical wankers. [article]

WALL-E

Noelle and I went to see WALL-E the other night. This is quite possibly the most beautiful animated movie I've ever seen. The textures were simply amazing and I kept forgetting that I was watching an animated movie and not a regular film. So, the story runs thusly: in the future, humans have screwed up the planet so much that they decided to depart, leaving behind robots to clean up the trash they left behind. After hundreds of years, WALL-E is the last robot left. WALL-E lives a lonely existence amongst the detritus of humanity with a cockroach as his only companion until one day his world is turned upside down. WALL-E doesn't speak much, but is voiced by Ben Burtt, who also did a lot of the audio effects. You might recall Burtt as the guy who developed many of the signature Star Wars sounds. Or not. Anyway, the sound effects are top notch too. Overall, I was so impressed with this movie that I was wondering when I would see it again before it had even finished.