BFF

 

These two, on the other hand: Best Friends Forever.


Nice story actually - both rescued animals, they took to each other when each was but a babe, and have remained inseparable ever since. AWWWW!

Good Friends

Not great, though. There's space issues. To be honest, Tabby barely tolerates Binky, but keeps it mostly to herself - they are stuck in the same research facility, after all. You make do with what you got.

Monkey Jesus

Just so there's no confusion.

Forbidden

This is high blasphemy, apparently. But I don't believe any religion can be blasphemed, since they are all but fictions. Would anyone be outraged if I proclaimed Lord of the Rings but a myth, a story? And then mocked it (I wouldn't, of course. LOTR is excellent.)? I think not, but here we are killing ourselves over tribal myths writ large. Insane.

Now, there's politeness and respect, diversity and all the rest. Which I get. But I will not self-censor or encourage the censorship of another over the expression of an opinion, and my opinion is that Religion IS the opiate of the masses; it drives them insane, and is a tool used by the Pusher Man to control the multitudes. And I'm not afraid to say it. Are you?  If so, ask yourself why.

Sick o' Politics

After the Masshole debacle, and the general climate of US politics, I've kinda checked out. I know this is precisely the response the Evil Repuglicans want, but frankly, I waste too much time following the minutiae, and most of it is pure bullshit, which I've documented extensively. So, what's left to say? The Wingnuts are insane (see the latest survey? 70% or so of self described Republicans think Creationism should be taught in schools. Which is insane, but there we have it), they've got the levers of media power and will use that power to spread their insanity until they succeed or destroy the nation in so doing.

Above is a nice clip from our old friends "The John Birch Society". Who used to be considered crazy extreme, but today would fit into the snug middle of these teabagger wingtards.

One might gain reassurance from the fact that look above! There were crazy wingtards back then too. Which is true, of course. The difference is, then, they were considered fringe/extreme by the actual Republicans. Today, they are the Republican Party, and not just the political party, but the entire Newscorp empire - which is not just Fox News and Fox Business, but so many newspapers - and not just the biggies like the WSJ, but likely, one of the papers in your town. And it's not just that - what about your local Fox affiliate? Think they're not taking cues from the top? Right. And etc...


And so you see we've been entirely walled in - unless you are prepared to find your own sources, and the vast majority of Americans are not - then you're force fed either pure Corporate propaganda (NBC, CBS, CNN) or corporate propaganda from the PR wing of the Repuglicans, which is Newscorp.

And thus, we have debates in America, in the sci fi year of 2010, about teaching science in science class. Insane.


I still love Barack, of course, more than ever. I think he's doing an incredible job, and if he's allowed to continue, will do much to heal this world. But will he be allowed? You know there's a sizable percentage of the actual US Government that will do everything and anything they can to prevent him.

So, send your positive vibes the Prez's way. For whatever that's worth, which, objectively, is nil. 

Flocke

It appears the Internet has decided on a nickname for the "Smokey as Locke" character: Flocke, short for Fake Locke. It works. Go with it.

Also, Terry O'Quinn (actor) is amazing, and I would guess he's really enjoying this season (and this show in particular) - he's got a lot of material to work with.

Another Life

ACHTUNG! From here on out I will be posting comments about the latest Lost episode - so if you have not seen it yet and don't want to get spoiled, be advised!

My Lostmas eve was great. I cannot say I was blown off my feet by the episode (save one scene - where EviLocke apologizes to Ben for his behavior as Smokey!), but the more I think about it (a lot) the more and more I'm digging it.

SPOILERS for Stephen King's Dark Tower series!


In the second book of the series - The Drawing of the Three - we read about two alternate realities, which split off from each other. But characters in each reality have some awareness (which increases) of the other reality, and compels them to act in such a way that eventually the two realities are merged. Pure speculation based on the DT, but I think that's likely how Season 6 will play out - the folks in the Alt reality will be ever more compelled to act in ways they don't fully understand, until they come together, presumably to save Jacob and/or the Island.

Quick hits: I was wrong about the first scene (not an eye!). However, this same scene was used before - Jack looking out the window - to detail the crash. But this was Alt reality. In our reality, Kate's eye was the first shot.

Awesome to see all the old characters in different ways. Clearly, they're all starting to connect - fer example, it seems clear Alt-Sawyer will try and con Alt-Hurley (Luckiest man alive!).

What I like best about this direction is it actually provides a realistic and fulfilling path of redemption for John Locke. If not the real John Locke, at least the Alt version (and definitely not the Evil version). I really liked the late scene of Jack and Locke talking about his paralysis.

Also, I'm thinking Resurrected Sayid might actually be Jacob - watch and find out!

More later. For now, I'll be rewatching and reading the Hive Mind.

Oh! Finally, Desmond. He's "The Constant", if you recall. I bet he can appear and be fully aware of both realities, and he'll play a large part in the resolution.  He did disappear from the Alt Plane, after all.

Lost Supper

I've never been this excited about a TV show. Except maybe Part 2 of the TBOBW - you nerds know what I'm talking about. 

I don't really watch much of any "normal" tv except for Survivor and Lost - note the connection - and I don't really miss it: 86% of all TV is utter tripe. 

But not tonight. I feel like Xmas morn, about to head downstairs too early, overeager to glimpse my asked for Millennium Falcon.

See you in another life, brutha. 


(I got the Cloud City carbon freeze chamber set piece. Hated it - I pray this is not a precursor.)

Gone back

Alright already!

Merry Lostmas!

For all the other plots, themes, and storylines, the core drama in Lost has been between Jack and Locke, or, more abstractly, between "Science" and "Faith". I suspect this dualism will drive the thematic focus of Season 6 as we resolve our character arcs. Jack has seemingly switched over to being a man of faith - his fanaticism regarding Jughead is proof of this - whereas Locke. Well, Locke's dead, mister. What is walking around as Locke is presumably the MiB.

So, it appears we've been prepared for a role reversal, with Jack taking on the more messianic aspects that Locke once embodied. I also assume all of our characters in the 1970's will return to the present day (Jacob said as much with his dying words: "They're coming.") for a final conflict.

Also recall from very early on in the show (Locke's speech to Walt about Backgammon in season one), the show has set up binary conflicts between Light and Dark, Logic and Faith, Good and Evil, but presenting all these binary conflicts in degrees of gray.

Resolution of any of these "conflicts" is improbable, as there is no resolution possible since there's not really a conflict. Regardless, this whole tale may play out as the motions of bored God like beings, trying to prove a point regarding humanity's higher nature with humanity's lower nature.

Only one way we find out: We start tonight!

Merry Lostmas Eve!

Get on the bus! It's Lostmas tomorrow!

Ochocinco's Ride

I'd like to report the following findings: Ochocinco is awesome.

Bullets

If you've ever been to Europe or Japan, you might have had a chance to see or ride on a bullet train - bullet train defined only by its high speed. They're awesome - there's a new bullet train in Spain which has drastically reduced inter-country air traffic, due to the incredible speeds of the train.

It looks like we here in America might finally join the party - Obama's Admin recently released something over 3 Billion dollars of Stim money to fund high speed rail projects in Florida and California, and one hope the next region would be the overall Northeast Corridor.

My money is on California getting it done first (train from LA to San Fran). When it happens, it's gonna be a big change in American psyches, I believe.

Thomas Alan Alda Ladada

I think this picture speaks for itself. Alan Alda.

Thomas the Transformer

An actual Chinese knock off product, composed of several pirated patents. Ain't nuthin sacred in the sweatshops of Shenzen.

Somebody IS always watching you

We're just about there - the time and place where there are security cameras everywhere, such that you in fact might spend a majority of your day monitored remotely.

Does it matter to you? If so, how will you, or anyone respond? And always remember: If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear!

Eye of Jack, Eye of Horus, Eye of Saturn

Eyes! Lost has used the image of the opening eye pretty consistently throughout the show -- the first image of the show is of Jack's eye, above.

So, a prediction (pure specualtion!): Season 6 will open with a close up of an eye, of a character we either don't know yet, or a mysterious character like Richard, or the MiB, or maybe even Jacob. That first scene will most likely be very incongruous from what you expect Lost to be -- recall the Season 2 opener, for example. So, as a guess, it will be the eye of the person who first "discovered" the island.

I'm hoping they go into some detail about the Egyptian influences. But who knows? I don't care, actually, because at this point I have faith in the writers to bring this story home.

Also, of course, Horus (or Horace) is a semi-major character - leader of the DI, and the ghost form that pointed Locke in the direction of the Cabin in Season 3.

Octogons of Former Innocence

This is an edited copy of the blacklight map that appeared on the blast doors in the hatch in Season 2 of Lost. It only flashed on the screen briefly, but lo, all falls before the power of the internet. It always goes a little something like this: A handful of nerds capture the image on the TV, and post it (some better than others). Then, the legion of other internet folks spend countless hours going over theories of meaning, in a true dialectic in that these theories will evolve quite quickly. There's no guarantee of accuracy, of course, but I lean towards a computational model whereby when you have hundreds of people analyzing anything repeatedly, collectively they are likely to come to a correct decision. That is another awesome power of the internet - to provide the space for that collective analyzation.

This image is no longer as exciting as it once was, owing to the fact we've learned about many of the mysteries shown here. However, of note, behold the references to "Cerberus System", which the internet concludes is Ole' Smokey.

Hexagons of Saturn

I had this unsourced theory that geometric shapes such as squares and rectangles don't appear in nature, other than in crystaline structures. But lo! A hexagon, a gigantic hexagon, swirling along on the bottom of Saturn. Mysterious!

Eclipse

Awesome pic of the sun's Corona from a recent total solar eclipse. Fun facts: It is entirely co-incidental that the moon can perfectly eclipse the sun. There is no reason that the moon is the precise size at the precise distance to block out the sun perfectly, other than luck (or a process no one yet has any idea about). That said, the moon is moving further and further away from the Earth every year - every moment, actually - such that, in a billion years or so, the moon will no longer perfectly block the sun.

Also cool is the Corona itself, which we could only see for a long, long time during an eclipse (We can see it anytime we want now thanks to the fleet of satellites monitoring the sun). Strange fact: The Corona extends pretty far out into space, yet it is far, far hotter than the surface of the sun. Also, in the picture above, you're essentially looking at the layout of the sun's magnetic field, with the ejected energy/matter of the sun streaming along these magnetic lines.

Here's another cool pic of the recent eclipse:

 

Black Hole Suns

This here image represents stars orbiting a supposed black hole - the only way, practically, to find black holes: by their effect on the matter around them.

The supposed black hole is the star icon in the center, and each different colored dot represents an actual measurement of a specific star's orbit, and the rest of the orbit is calculated therefrom.

Briefly as I can, black holes are the remnants of massive stars that go supernova. If the star is really big, but not quite big enough, it becomes a neutron star: essentially, a single nucleus the size of Manhattan, made of an incredibly dense fluid. And so on down the line, the smaller the star, the less dramatic will be the aftermath. Our star, for example, will puff up big for a while, but then simply shrink down and wink out, eventually, with no big explosion.

Anyways, a black hole could also be called a Singularity, a word used to describe what is frankly impossible in physics: Infinite mass in zero space. How could that be? The effect of the black hole on space-time (think of space time as a giant loaf of slowly expanding bread - every thing that has mass presses down onto this bread, depressing it to the degree of their mass.) is to essentially rip it - a depression in space time so deep we really don't know what is at the bottom, except for infinite gravity in zero space....

But! There is a thing down that hole which could be called the physical manifestation of the black hole: Matter, space-time itself falls down into the hole, faster than light, generating enormous, enormous, enormous energy (and heat). The further down you go the faster you fall, except you're also being compressed. As the compression and speed increase ever further down, eventually you reach a spot where there's just nothing more to do, and matter is actually forced back up the black hole, ever so briefly. There it meets the matter falling down, of course, creating an interference which we would describe as a cloud. A black cloud of inconcievably hot matter.


Finally, it is always interesting to me to consider that, supposedly, our Universe, our entire reality, was "big banged" out of a Singularity. And now, consider the notion of thousands of Singularities, tens of thousands, existing in every galaxy. Is it the same Singularity? The same kind or type? Something entirely different?

No one knows - but mark my words well: This notion of the Singularity, if we can ever tease meaning out of it, will be revolutionary.

That's why it's called a Sacrifice

This is the drawing the young John Locke had hanging up when visited by Richard Alpert as a small boy. Means something I think!

The idea of "the sacrifice", it occurs to me, is similar to the idea of the "American Dream", in this sense: Elites use a meme which causes people to give themselves up for an Elite cause. A traditional mythic "Sacrifice" is always done at the behest of the elite, and the sacrificee is almost never part of that group, save for some children of the elite.

The American dream, of course, is a great tool to convince vast majorities of the population to buy into an economic system designed against them - however, because of the few rare cases where people do succeed in this system (and these cases are almost always highlighted by the Elite media), people buy into it, and think, "Yeah, I could get rich too".

Odds are you won't, but in the process of trying, you'll be aiding the continuation of your own subjugation. But more on this later. For now, this:

 

Where There's Smoke...

There's laughter! Smoke Monster spin-off?


H/T The Onion.

Workman

Be sure you're stocked up on Dharma beer - it's almost time to break it out! 2/2 approaches.

Skull n' Bonz

Lots of bones out there at America's Elite Uni's.

"taH pagh taHbe'!"

You might be surprised at the number of people worldwide who speak and/or write Klingon. Nerds everyone of them, no doubt.

The title is "To be or not to be" in the original Klingon.

Shats

I got all the Shats for Xmas once, but my mood was more cerulean.

Rumble

Oh, I am ready. This is gonna be the best Lostmas EVER! I've banned myself from reading anything about Lost on the almighty Interwebs, so as to avoid any possible spoilers - spoilers are a bane on the net. Take it from me, friends, getting unexpectedly spoiled stinks. Thus, my advice to all is read nothing else about Lost on the intertubes, except here on this blog with my 100% Iron Clad Locked Guarantee SPOILER FREE ZONE!!! Of course.

Said it before, but who is the bad guy on Lost, really? Ben is an easy candidate, but one can have some sympathy for him, and he appears to have been sincerely working in what he thought was the best interests of the magical island, and Jacob in specific. If the island turns out to be Good, does this redeem Ben?

I think it's conclusive, ja? That Ben never talked to Jacob until the Season 5 finale; however, less clear in my mind is who was calling the shots with the Others then? Ben was getting instructions from who he thought was Jacob, via Richard. So, was Richard really dealing with Jacob, or was he dealing with the Man in Black(MiB)? And even then, if it was the MiB, was it the MiB pretending to be Jacob, or straight up, fully representing MiB? So many questions!

Does Widmore really seem like the bad guy? He, too, has some sympathetic characteristics - did he grow up on crazy Island, as an Other? If so, can you really blame him for being a bit "direct" as an adult? And while he's unquestionably committed evil acts as well, it's quite possible he knows the truth about Jacob and the MiB and is doing everything he can to help Jacob. Widmore quite possibly might be the big hero. Or the big villain.

And what of the Dharma Initiative? Surely they're not done in the tale. And while they were ostensibly all peace and love, they sure did have a lot of evil folks and evil plans, it seems. What about Alvar Hanso, and the DeGroots? So many questions!

Is the MiB also Smokey? If so, how would Smokey get to the Hydra Island and take the form of Locke, if that's what's going on (which seems likely to me, since we've seen the Smoke Monster scan people and play back their memories, and we've also seen dead people from the past visit these same people who were scanned). Is Christian working for Jacob or the MiB?

I could go on, and I will. But later.

Come on 2/2!

All Ackbar, All the Time

Strangely, I find myself genuinely appreciating Admiral Ackbar, in many different regards. For example, in an evolutionary sense, I suppose there's nothing in particular - is there? - which would prevent any lifeform from developing sophisticated strategies for dealing with their particular environment, and through the millennia, and with successful reproduction, the lifeform continues to advance until one day some magic happens and they are "smart" - language, rudimentary trade, specialization, tools, etc. So on and such till there's some big fish in charge of the Rebel Fleet. Could it happen on on some alien world if all the conditions turned out right? Why not?

Sadly though, Ackbar is proven wrong on more than one occasion in ROTJ, so he's something of a tragi-comi-evolutionary hero for me, you see? Advanced fish might just be objectively inferior to advanced mammals, and struggle mighty though he surely does, even Admiral Ackbar cannot overcome that, can he?

Also, I am a gigantic nerd, if I have not mentioned that recently.

What would Admiral Ackbar say?

That's all he ever says. According to the "media".

If you're looking for nerdy, wholesome fun, here's the link to the "'Admiral Ackbar's' "It's a Trap" Generator Extravaganza", here .

Massholes

Sorry America, and thus the World! I've lived in MA far, far too long now. I despise the place utterly and completely, save for the small understanding that it's probably better than South Carolina. For what that's worth.

As a Mainer, I find this state to be filled to the brim with assholes. Everyone's an asshole -- I, in fact, have become an asshole on the road, just like everyone else, despite my best intentions. This place is poison!

So, I've always been somewhat amused to hear MA referred to as some Liberal Mecca - I've never seen it. Of course, you've got pockets of concentrated Dirty Fucking Hippies (DFH), like in Cambridge, but I've always seen this as a college phenomena - these so called Liberal towns are really big college towns, and I think any college town in any state is prone to be more liberal than the norm.

Because my anecdotal experience is, there's as many Wingnuts in MA as anywhere. I work for a high tech company, filled with intelligent people, and I swear I'm one of 5 people maybe who voted for Obama - I made a ton of money betting with people throughout the office. It was shocking and depressing to me, however, to learn that these smart, engaging people were otherwise mindless zombies programmed to destroy America all the while chanting NEVER FORGET!!!

So, we elected a male, nude, Sarah Palin - make no mistake, this Brown guy is no moderate, and he'll fall entirely inline with the Southern Agenda, which is of course to ensure no Democrat can succeed, even if that means sinking this nation in the mire. As long as Republicans can "win the day", that's all that matters. Oh, that and massive amounts of money and power.

As I've said before, I am a member of no party, and the Democratic party is something of a joke, especially in MA. But, if I'm forced to choose - and I am - I'm choosing a Democrat everysingle time over any Republican. Because the Republican party is really hell bent on destroying this nation - do you want to join that effort, or fight against it? 

Don't say bot

Robonic is the new way to say it, man. George Lucas owns the word "bot", and you can't afford the long term license fee, so you might as well start saying Bonics for short.

They're coming...

The robots, that is. These are robotic jellyfish, for example. Cool and all, but a harbinger of the terrible mechanical doom which awaits. And this concludes my annual "Be afraid of the robots!" post.


Seriously though: I just read an article describing efforts to create a robot/software that allows the robot/software to improve its own operation. Much like Natural Selection, the system had to go through an enormous amount of attempts to generate anything, and the vast majority of these were utter failures. But over time, the system got better and better, till it was outperforming the scientist's own programing of the same function. But, even more disturbing, the manner in which the robot/software did this was not understood - for instance, on the computer chip was the subject of the repogramming, there were sections entirely disconnected from the rest. We normally would never program like that. The scientist could not figure out what these isolated sections did, but lo! As soon at these sections were disabled, the entire process stopped.

So, robots designing better robots - that will be our Darwinistic doom. Maybe.

Fish out of water

In America, everything gets a Hall of Fame. This one is for Fresh Water Fishing, which is very popular, or so I've read.

Waves

Waves are everywhere - perhaps one could say accurately, waves are everything. Ocean waves are caused by a variety of sources - the sun (which is the root cause of the others, really), wind, and the moon, via tides.

The now accepted theory about the moon is it was created some 500 Million years or so after the creation of Earth 1.0. A planet the size of Mars collided with Earth 1.0, utterly destroying itself and the young Earth, reforming eventually into a more massive Earth 2.0, with a new satellite, the moon.

When Earth 2.0 finally cooled enough for water to form - and it took a while, for, veritably, it was Hell on Earth for millions of years - the tides were present from the start, and massive due to the proximity of the moon (much closer). For millions and millions of years, massive tides, hundreds of feet high, swept over the Earth, churning up everything. The theory now goes that it was this churning which was key in the development of life on Earth 2.0 (along with water, of course), as it broke up bigger rocks and mixed nutrients - such as iron - into the water, and thus to spread across the globe. These elements make us up, make everything up, and thus, life on Earth exists because of the moon. A theory!

Interesting tangent: If the moon were to magically disappear, all the water on the globe would instantly snap to a solar tidal pattern - which exists today, but is far weaker than lunar tides. This snap back would the biggest wave ever to exist on Earth, and would make an eternal legend out of some lucky surfer.

All my dreams of yesterday are today's cliches

There is no official map, so take it as but an interpretation, but based on my reading of Lost, this is the most accurate map existant. There are many versions that place the Hydra to the Southeast of the Island, but I think the events of Season 5 prove that wrong, and North to be the correct location (NERD!!!).

Anywho, years and years ago I came up with a cool story idea that heavily featured an island upon which a secrective organization attempted to build a Utopia and thence change the world. Not exactly an original trope, I grant you, but not that cliche either, until of course Lost, which has taken that idea and run with it, to great success. Such success, in fact, that forever and anon, the trope will be associated with Lost, and any use of the trope thereafter will be attributed to the show, for good reason. But I thought of it first! I even drew up a cool map.

And so it goes: I wrote a few books in the glorious mid 90's, and have spent the years since watching all the good bits get used in other works. Don't get me wrong, I am taking zero credit for any of it, just lamenting.
 

That's what it's all about, after all!

4 8 15 16 23 42

It's either a fairly incredible co-incidence, or a very smart trick by the writers, but when you convert the numbers from Lost into geographical co-ordinates and place that into Gmaps, well, gosh - it takes you deep into the Pacific Ocean, roughly along a general flight path from Sydney to LA, as convincing a location for the Island as any other.


Cool. Need I say I'm obsessed with this show? More cool Lost posts to come in the lead up to 2/2. And I can promise you this, fellow Losties: There will be not a hint, not a whiff of any spoilers here.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO PLAY A GAME?

10 Throw graphite rod
20 Chase graphite rod
30 Retrieve graphite rod
40 Return graphite rod
50 GOOD ROBOT DOG

60 goto 10

Signal in the noise

Here's a fun picture - the big solid bright line you see above is the main light from the far away star, and the color represents the wavelength of the visible light. Slightly above the main band, however, there is another band, and this is the spectrum from an orbiting exoplanet -- the first time we've been able to see an exoplanet's spectrum

Evaluating these spectrums is extremely important in astronomy, as you learn two very important facts - the motion/speed of the object, and its composition. Redder lights means the object is moving away, bluer lights means is moving towards us; individual elements reflect light differently, so it is possible to asses what the object is composed of by analyzing its spectrum of light.

Cool, right?

All of them

It's taking me some mental effort to make this adjustment, but remember: These Teabaggers, Fundies, Wingnuts and the rest of the motley crew don't care about facts, logic, truth, evidence, science, anything really, unless it explicitly aids their agenda of the day. How do you reason with people who don't believe in reason? A big question for the future of America.

Also:

This is an actual review of Bill Donohue's new book. Donahue represents the oh-so-fun Catholic League, who's job of course is to harass anyone who doesn't bow down to their viewpoints.

Remember when Colbert hosted the Press Roast for President Bush, and actually lambasted him, much to the horror of the Washington Village - they had no idea what his humor was, but invited him anyways. These people literally don't understand satire, and think Colbert actually believes in the content of his show.

It's incredible, really, this gap in understanding.

We don't need another hero

Hey mister, I done found your missin' feline.