26
May 05

creationists are freaks, too

creationists have some silly ideas, but i never thought i’d see them all in one fucked up museum.


18
May 05

ipod sweater

granted, it’s not as creative as the domokun ipod but it’s an improvement on my previous ipod cozy prototype:

ipod sweater


13
May 05

flames!

i decided to make a set of magnetic flames for my mini this weekend. $40 in materials from a craft store, some time in illustrator, and some quality time with an x-acto blade later…

Flames! Flames I tellya!


12
May 05

wtf?

you know, the whole advantage of running the latest high availability, super-stable stable and svelte operating system on this site is somewhat negated when the UPS it’s hooked to goes tits up.

sigh.


12
May 05

scientologists are freaks

scientologists are freaks.


08
May 05

the one-word hitchhiker’s guide review

a phrase i honestly never thought i’d have the opportunity to utter in my lifetime:

“one ticket for the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, please”

what follows is my review of the movie, made from the book based on the radio plays which were later made into a TV series. you’ve heard about it by now, or else you’ve been dead. in which case, my condolences.

sorry. from this point in, i’ll try not to be funny. everyone tries to be funny, to match the wit of the late Douglas Adams, when reviewing or even discussing his work. it’s as if, when discussing Shakespeare, one must adopt olde English spellyng. i find myself falling into the same trap, though, but i’m trying hard to be as unfunny and non-Adamsesque as i can muster.

because, frankly, the movie did the same.

so, my one-word review of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the movie:
meh.

that’s right, “meh.”

i really really wanted to love this movie when i heard it was finally being put into production. then i read the early reviews, this one with special interest, and i started really really wanting to hate it.

but, after seeing the movie, all i can say, equivocally and definitively is that it was a movie.

in many places, however too few, it was brilliant. in many places, unfortunately many, it was flawed. there were times when i laughed, even though i knew all the lines before they were spoken. there were times i didn’t laugh, though i should have, again because i knew the lines that weren’t spoken.

the film looked magnificent – the henson creature shop earned its keep with Marvin and the vogons, and i can see now what they’ve been up to since Farscape went off the air. in particular, the entire sequence with Slartibartfast almost, but not quite, made up for the loss of many of the earlier sequences from the book and radio series.

this review is getting longer than the one word i promised in the title, but i’ll sum up here:

i was disappointed in the movie version of a book which i loved. it’s an unavoidable fate for any such film, regardless of the book, the author, or the genre to which it belongs. my sentiments in that regard are, i’m certain, shared by many of the book’s fans.

i was, however, not as disappointed as i had hoped.


06
May 05

new server

after some small strife and gnashing of teeth, the new and improved (?) mentalhygiene is now working.

it is:
running on the option8 linux server now instead of the mac server
powered by php, mysql and wordpress instead of lasso and filemaker
considerably easier to maintain
considerably easier to comment on posts
considerably faster

share and enjoy.

i’ll continue to make more adjustments to the templates and add back some updated content from the old site – all the old posts are already here, though unfortunately i haven’t figured out how to get my old comments system imported.


03
May 05

minirant

i’m currently reading:




Crimes Against Logic

by Jamie Whyte

highly enlightening, even in the slightly americanized version (the original, UK version is Bad Thoughts). an excellent logical vocabulary builder for your next discussion with a politician, priest, or management consultant, and a vitally useful reference whilst reading or watching the news.

i recommend it and, though the link above goes to amazon (and i don’t get any credit or affiliate points if you click on it) it’s probably available in the philosophy section of your local bookseller.


02
May 05

minirant

so we get disclaimers and warnings on our prime time cartoons these days about “animated nudity” and “sexual dialogue” – presumably referring to a second of cartoon butt and a humorous conversation about which of the men in a gay relationship has the vagina – but no mention of, say, the attempted assasination of one spouse by another, the drinking of hazardous toxic waste from a thermos, underage girls exposing themselves in exchange for beer, a man biting off his own thumb, or homeless men fighting over the belongings of one of their friends who has just died. this is American Dad, after all, i suppose.

i love our american value system. i wouldn’t trade it for anything.

unless it was money. yeah. i’d trade it for money.