Monday stuff

Reading: Finished Rum on Friday, and mostly took the weekend off from "real" reading, instead going through about a hundred assorted DCU books leading up to Infinite Crisis (and yes, I can finally admit that Gail Simone is a hell of a good writer, something that I'd never have said during her Marvel years -- Birds of Prey, Villains United, and Action were just leagues better than Deadpool). Started Blood and Iron (by matociquala) this morning, and am quite loving it.

Playing: I spent hours this weekend searching for my copy of the original Saga Frontier for the PS1. No fucking luck. Dammit. So not much Playstation for me. Over on the Kingdom of Loathing side of things, I ascended again last night (#20!), keeping Torso Awaregness. I'm on a Turtle Tamer run this time. Now that I've got Thurst-Smack and Eye of the Stoat permed, I'm finding things a lot easier. I actually almost never used by Disco Bandit combat skills on that last run.

Watching: Thanks to TCM (which is really probably the best network ever, in terms of never, ever showing anything that sucks), I watched two classic Harold Lloyd shorts: Bumping Into Broadway, and An Eastern Westerner. Neither one of them is Safety Last, of course, but both were damned good. I'd actually put Bumping Into Broadway up there amongst his best works, though. The final chase through the speakeasy/gaming house is not only brilliant, but very clearly inspired more than a few Jackie Chan moments.

That's pretty much it. Was a low-key weekend. Which is better than a Loki weekend, all things considered.

Tony Bourdain

A couple of weeks ago, someone (hangingfire, I believe) noted that Tony Bourdain was amongst those trapped in Beirut. The good news is (as noted by robyn_ma), that he made it home safely. Alas, it doesn't sound like he got enough material for a show on the city.

I adore Lebanese food (okay, I adore all food), but I know that my experience with Lebanese cuisine is limited (only two restaurants, one of which was a cheap one that was open Emory Village until a few years ago). I'd have liked to see Bourdain show the real deal.

Stupid is as stupid does

A family put up a sign targeting a neighbor's kid.

The sign is incredibly offensive, and the reporter (and everyone interviewed other than Mr. and Mrs. Hicky McHick) rightly takes the family to task.

But he clearly didn't read the sign closely enough. Go on. Look at it.

Yeah. Maybe they shouldn't have dropped out of school after the second grade.

For the Hex fans

I know that a few of you (robyn_ma and taraljc come to mind) have mentioned watching the show. A while back, muse0fire posted an exhaustive (and spoiler-laden, so be warned) analysis of the show.

I still haven't watched it (I'll probably dive into it next time BBCA does a marathon), but figured y'all might be interested.

And speaking of BBCA genre shows, tonight's the premiere of Life on Mars.

Blingo goodness

I don't know which of you I have to thank, but one of my Blingo Friends just won a $25 Visa gift card, which means that I just won one as well. So thanks! This is actually the biggest prize I've won from them so far.

(I haven't pimped it in a while, but the idea of Blingo is that they do Google searches, and random searches win prizes for the searcher and their referrer; I'm assuming that whatever revenue they're making is based on shared ad revenue on the sponsored Google ads on each search page. I'm less concerned with where they get their money from than the fact that they do give our prizes, and if you win movie tickets from them, you can use them during the opening weekends of new releases, which is quite nice).

It's a fact!

As most of you know, I am not Christian, nor was I raised as such. Nor did I attend any Christian funerals while growing up (or ever, actually).

Which is why, when I first saw one enacted on TV, I was outraged. Because, dammit, they were ripping off Peanuts!

Took me years to accept that Linus hadn't come up with the quote first.

Powers to the people!

I've raved about Powers plenty of times; it really is one of the best comics being published today, with sharp dialogue and an art style that's perfect for the story that Brian Michael Bendis is telling.

As of today, you can read it online from the beginning. So go add this one to your daily webcomics list. Trust me; it's worth the time.

(That said, I'm still sticking with my issues, not only because the webcomic is six years behind the comics, but because there's no better and more entertaining letters column anywhere than in Powers.)

The greatest music video of all time

Well, if you're an Atari 2600 fan, at least.

Enduro! Solaris! Keystone Kapers! Yay!

(link ganked from cassielsander)

And the second-greatest video ever

An anime mashup to "It's Tricky."