Archive for November, 2007
Joe Biden = Idiot
Joe Biden is threatening Bush with impeachment if he bombs Iran. Hey stupid! You are a Senator, not a Representative, therefore you cannot impeach crap. Nor could the President be impeached for exercising his powers as Commander-in-Chief unless he commits high crimes or misdemeanors. The more Mr. Fu hears this kind of garbage the more he thinks Balkanization of the U.S. would be a good idea. How do we get away from these clowns?
The Phantom of the Opera
FOGHORN presents his Phantom of the Opera story. Funny.
Changes, Always Changes
Mr. Fu was examining some alternate sources for television shows. Looking through some online links he found AOL TV. It is a pretty interesting site, you can catch some off the air shows that you either missed, or do not really want to drop money on to get on DVD.
But, they also have a line up of Looney Toons cartoons, and were featuring Foghorn Leghorn. Mr. Fu always enjoyed Foghorn, and so he popped up a episode, the one where Foghorn is about to starve in the winter, goes to romance Miss Prissy, and the Chicken Hawk’s mother abandons him on Miss Prissy’s doorstep (Strangled Eggs, 1948). When Foghorn looks in his cupboard and finds it empty he says, “Bare as a cooch dancer’s midriff!” Later he talks about being “as anxious as a bubble dancer with a slow leak.” These are tropes Mr. Fu never caught as a lad. But they make the whole thing incredibly fresh.
So change, anyway, given Foghorn’s great capacity to be both funny and generate tropes to beat the band, Mr. Fu was thinking about another funny, trope creating individual. Jame Lileks, under callsign METAPHOR, has been a constant source of amusement for Mr. Fu for years. Given that metaphors are not necessarily humorous, but Foghorn and James are, Mr. Lileks will henceforth have the callsign FOGHORN on this site. METAPHOR sounds a bit impersonal, but FOGHORN captures a spirit that more closely fits the man.
We Are Most Fortunate
That in spite of all the issues we seem to have with youth these days, this country still produces some of the hardest working, most dedicated young people in the world. The video at this link shows you a young lady who will reach her goals despite all obstacles.
Congratulations on a race well run Miss Markwardt! We should all be so strong. At least we can be inspired by your example.
Out of Context is Funny
This is out of context, but funny:
Does Bill Clinton hang with Michael Vick or something? To quote Bill: “We’re going to fight this action until the last dog is hung.“
Ex-President hanging dogs? Well, not really. But it wouldn’t be the first time an ex-President killed someone’s pet:
http://emptyage.honan.net/mth/2007/11/jimmy-carter-he.html
I saw this letter yesterday in the Athenaeum, a private library and document collection in Eufaula, Alabama—just over the river and around the way from Jimmy’s home in Plains, Georgia. It’s addressed to his sister-in-law Sybil Carter, Billy’s widow.
5/13/90
To Sybil,
Lamentably, I killed your cat while trying just to sting it. It was crouched, as usual, under one of our bird feeders & I fired from some distance with bird shot. It may ease your grief somewhat to know that the cat was buried properly with a prayer & that I’ll be glad to get you another of your choice.
I called & came by your house several times. We will be in the Dominican Republic until Thursday. I’ll see you then.
Love, Jimmy
Apparently the image of the letter was taken down by request of the museum curator. But Mr. Fu recorded this text from the original image posted at the web site cited.
That’s Easy
Here is an easy question that clueless anti-gun whackos cannot seem to answer: examine the deviant art and answer the question.
Similar and Disturbing
Some retro-futuristic art, Commie style. Looks oddly similar to American retro-futuristic art, except their future still had Commies in it. Mr. Fu hopes they will not get the chance to take over the Moon. But they missed the idea that the guys on the Moon might be Chi-coms.
High Voltage Clue Machine
Wizbang had this video posted here. Based on the comments at Wizbang and on YouTube Mr. Fu regards himself as being in minority for thinking that the police officer acted in a controlled, level-headed fashion, and handled the situation about as well as could be done under the circumstances. Mr. Fu has no idea how Jared Massey was raised to think that he can try to question and attempt to manipulate a law enforcement officer the way he does, but in Mr. Fu’s opinion he deserved at least what he received. The time for questioning the case is in court.
Anytime a person is stopped by a law enforcement officer on the road, starts arguing, refuses to comply with the officer’s directions, especially in regards to movements in and around a personal vehicle, the officer is going to take control of the situation. His life depends on it, and possibly the lives of the citizens in general, and of the stopped party in particular. If an officer gets to the point where he has to draw any sort of weapon, he has reached the point where he needs to and will use that weapon unless the suspect starts cooperating immediately. Is this so hard to understand? What part of “you are under arrest, turn around and put your hands behind your back” don’t you understand?
This is the authority, the job, and the responsibility that we the people have entrusted to these men and women in law enforcement. If you do not like the way they are doing their job, the proper channels are through the police public relations people and your elected officials, not by getting in an officer’s face and trying to dictate how they are going to do their job. Mr. Fu wonders how Mr. Massey would feel were Mr. Fu to show up at his place of work and start telling him how to do his job?
What Goes On Here?
Mr. Fu was throwing out a bunch of surplus computer parts, cases, motherboards, some dated stuff. Some of it was still useful though, especially to the young geeks and nerd in the neighborhood to whom Mr. Fu has contributed generously before. CLONE RED asked about a particular system, “May I have it?”
“You have had your shot at it for weeks. Why would you want it now?”
“I want to keep it and get it working, so that one day I can tell my kids, ‘Hah, we had big giant boxes like this for computers!'”
Weird, the apple does not fall far from the tree.
Originals
It looked like a meeting of the first Star Trek fan club’s original members. Huntsville shines in its ability ti turn out the proto-geeks by the dozen (Mr. Fu included). We gathered and paid money to see a two hour long advertisement for Paramount Pictures latest release in the science fiction genre, the re-mastered Star Trek, The Original Series.
Rob Roddenberry (Gene‘s son with Majel Barrett) presented a nice introduction with some insights into his early views of the series in his father’s den at home. There was some discussion about the re-mastering and re-scoring process. Many statements were made trying to re-assure the fans that the essence and original intent of the show remained untouched. Perhaps the public is a bit wary on this front given George Lucas’s butchery of childhood memories and blatant pandering to toddlers.
It was hoped that they would not be digitally inserting ewoks or Wesley Crusher in with Kirk and Spock. They digitized the original negatives, so it is nice to know this bit of television history can be digitally propagated into the future. Mr. Fu wonders what the future will have to say about the show.
There was a look at some home movies filmed on the set by Billy Blackburn. Billy was a uncredited extra in many episodes, never with a speaking role. Several shots included an arrow pointing to one of the actors, labeling him “Billy.” The actually presented a different behind the scenes view of the series then Mr. Fu had previously experienced, giving some insight into the personalities involved. Though it added an element that somewhat haunted the show was the episode itself started.
The episode “The Menagerie” finally kicked off. The contrast and brightness as presented in the theater was a bit dark. Mr. Fu kept expecting it to get better or his eyes to adjust, neither of which happened. But anticipation kept him from heading out to have a discussion on quality control with the management. Even with the conditions in the theater (including the other patrons, which is one of the reasons Mr. Fu avoids the theaters) the re-mastered images were very crisp. The update effects were obvious, but not jarring. They actually enhances the experience though this was not an effects heavy episode. But there had been enough effects shown in the preview to demonstrate they were treating the subject well and making some really nice, but not substantive, changes.
Perhaps experience (read age) added an appreciation of this episode that Mr. Fu had lacked. Recent politics has only heightened Mr. Fu’s bristling reaction to the idea of even highly attractive gilded cages. Mr. Fu noticed two things about the Talosians: 1) while they appeared evil for imprisoning members of many different species and judging their suitability for a purpose, that purpose was the survival of their race, 2) they were concerned enough for the survival of the human species to refuse Captain Pike’s offer of help, lest humans learn the Talosian’s power and destroy themselves as well.
There was recently an article on awesome sci-fi inventions that would actually suck. One invention mentioned was the holodeck:
Death by fantasy, the fate that the Talosians warned Pike about. And the reason for General Order Seven. It is interesting considering the warnings of this episode the that holodeck, and its multitude of problem, would be featured so prominently in the follow-on series.
The was the craft of putting together a television show that made the original series great. Drama mixed with comedic moments. A formula lost in the follow-ons, but recaptured brilliantly in Babylon 5 and Firefly, to name two of the other greats. In “The Menagerie” Vena’s complaint that in matching Christopher Pike with Number One that they “might as well cross him with a computer” lays the irony that Majel Barrett went on to provide the voice of many of the computer systems later in the series and follow-ons.
But, through the whole episode whenever there was a shot with extras about, Mr. Fu kept expecting the test “Billy” to appear and a large arrow to point to one of the chorus. And the appearance of the backs of the Talosian’s heads always invited the term “butthead” to one’s mind.
This vast commercial had the desired effect, Mr. Fu and THE KAT are both interested in purchasing the re-mastered series. But we are first going to review the original set of DVDs before venturing into the newly digitized world of Star Trek.
How Bad Will It Have Been For Them?
Mr. Fu was relating one of his favorite “in my day” lines to CLONE RED, “In my day, we couldn’t afford shoes. And in winter we had to wrap our feet with barbed wire, just for traction.”
Mr. Fu went on to wonder what sort of “in my day” line RED CLONE will have for his children? “Well, in my day we didn’t have computers implanted in our skulls. We had big boxes that connected to a limited bandwidth carrier, and display monitors that we had to look at with our own eyes, and to input data we had to actually push buttons with our fingers!”
The Headline Today
Mr. Fu can see the result of METAPHOR‘s latest Bleat:
James Lileks Crushed in Wii Avalache
Mr. Fu can only imagine his fans will be responding by sending him Wiis because of his complaint of their being unavailable in Minnesota (Land of 10,000 Lakes, and One Fish). We have them here the forelands of Alabama (as opposed to the hinderlands, Rocket City is most advanced in region, our rocket scientists is better than all other city’s rocket scientists). Happy to acquire and ship you one James.
Oppose the Iraq War? The Afghan War? War in Iran?
Read this. If you still oppose all these wars, let Mr. Fu know. Then Mr. Fu will understand a little bit more about you.
Taking the Plunge
One of the most interesting uses of the word plunge ever:
Mr. Fu wonders if a cow gets the same thrilling sensation of falling, all a flutter inside as you hang weightless, with an ever increasing breezing blowing up from below. It is like standing on a sidewalk grate with an exhaust fan below, only there is no grate.
Ah, the things to which Google links. Try to have a discussion of string theory on Gmail without getting a good chuckle.
More Jobs That Americans Won’t Do
Cassy Fiano turns in an article on the illegal aliens working around aircraft at O’Hare Airport. Apparently one of the jobs American’s won’t do is be the freakin’ President of the United States and actually crack down on one area where we have proven vulnerabilities to terrorist attack: illegal aliens. We are fortunate that the shear incompetency of the Al Qaeda, et. al., is so complete that they have not yet exploited these vulnerabilities. But even as a blind squirrel occasionally scores a nut, one of these yoyo’s is going to fall right into a crack and put a bunch of Americans in a real world of hurt.
A job some twisted Americans will do is potentially sell out the lives of their fellow Americans for thirty pieces of silver. As evidenced by the actions of certain personnel at Ideal Staffing. This kind of behavior better be stepped on hard and now, otherwise more will follow. One of these clowns is eventually going to place a real terrorist in a choice position, and they better hope that if something happens their role is never revealed to the American public.
What Does Mr. Fu Do?
This is representative of the kind of things Mr. Fu works on for a living. It’s a nice living.
Your Friendly Neighborhood METAPHOR
And his ever-lovin’ wit. Of course it is easier to criticize than to create, thus Mr. Fu does not have to invest a huge amount of time in production. He just scavenges off of METAPHOR. And METAPHOR has a nice science fictiony Bleat today. As a scientist Mr. Fu wholly endorses the science part, and leave the fiction part to the reader. Interesting note on Clifford Simak, Mr. Fu enjoys his work, what little he has read of it, but never delved into his history. METAPHOR is also really keen with the whole Star Trek TOS references, which is endearing.
Fall Has Arrived
One of those beautiful clear mornings you seem to recall as completely new. Though you have probably seen them so many time before. Nice to be able to forget somethings so that it can be brought back anew.
The trees are in full turning mode, a mixture of still very green and gone all golden brown. One of the more interesting aspects of fall in northern Alabama. Though perhaps it happens this way everywhere. But it is here and now, thus wonderful.
Wilson Fu 