Mid Life Crisis--With Elves

I turn 41 on Tuesday. Time for my mid life crisis!

So in lieu of affairs, Corvettes, or hair implants (or in my case, actually getting a haircut that goes over my ears and collar)....I...and I hope you realize how strong I'm being here, how courageous I am in sharing this....I...started playing MMOs.

Star Wars:Galaxies and Everquest II, to be precise.

Currently, I'm a 6th level smuggler in Galaxies, and a 3rd Level Fury High Elf in Evercrack.

I need an intervention. Or a Corvette.

My First Time

Oh, happy relatively speaking day!

Whilst crawling around City Lights today on my life long quest to complete my collection of Tarzan and Doc Savage paperbacks, I came across this lost little gem. My copy is in bad condition: bits of it crumble each time I pick up the bag it currently resides in, and I know to read it would be its final literary apocalypse. But when I saw it, I knew I had to have it. After being a fan of this form of cheap entertainment all my life, I had never actually owned one before.

Now I do.

Ladies and gentleman, may I present...my very first pulp.

Hit Me Sakura, One More Time

Apparently, this sold out worldwide. And here I thought I was the only one reading the Street Fighter comic. Wait--maybe they only sold the one copy. That would explain things.

What else? Read Green Lantern Corps #3--my love for the series continues, even with Guy Gardner trying to score a 'massage' off a waitress. I've said it's the best space opera comic on the rack, and...heh. Heh. Heh. I said 'rack'.

Some people in Comic Land aren't really feeling Grant Morrison's first issue of Batman--but I am. Okay, so maybe it didn't blow me across the room the way I had hoped, but Morrison is riffing on the whole 'Seventies' aspect of the Batman mythos in his own inimitable style. We have Bruce Wayne swaggering around Europe (because--and I love this--Batman really applied himself and caught the majority of supervillians in Gotham, so now he can go tootle around in England.) We learn what exactly Alfred feeds the bats in the Batcave, and we get Man-Bat. It's Denny O'Neil and flares all over again. At least I have the right hairstyle this time round.

On a whim, I also picked up Ultimate Spider-Man Annual #2. Really enjoyed that, as well. Writer Brian Michael Bendis does great dialogue, and I feel more at home with this Spider-Man than the one in the 616 Universe: this one doesn't rip off his mask at news conferences, for starters. Funny lines, Moon Knight, Punisher, and Daredevil are here as well, so that more than justifies your $5. Really, it does. Trust me.

Some Things Are Not Meant For Human Eyes

Click, if you dare.

But I warned you. When your eyes melt, don't come running to me.

Today Is Not That Day

One day I will not adore Puffy Ami Yumi.

Today is not that day.

Harnesses Are Good--Aging Is Not

Okay....fell from near the top of the wall yesterday when my hands slipped from the little multicoloured rocks. Harnesses are good. Very good in fact. Injury report: one very banged knee, and some nasty scrapes on elbows. Still, happy. Not too bad for an old man creaking towards 41.

Last night, my 17 year old niece came over to play Super Smash Brothers. She leads a whirlwind life: she just spent two days in Las Vegas, headed over to California to search for old issues of Runaways at Golden Sun Comics in LA, and then ends up back in London to play video games. After two hours of play, I had only managed to win one battle.

She turned to me and said, "I thought you were supposed to be, like, the Video Game Master."

"I said I played a lot. I didn't say I was any good."

"I'm disappointed in you."

"Better now than later," I offered.

There is a horror of being bested by someone you once held as a newborn. If you haven't experienced it yet--oh, you will. It's how life lets you know that--in Colbert-ease--you're 'on notice' with mortality.

Into Thin Air

Well, kinda. I'm off rock climbing this afternoon with my sensei. Of course, he is a master at it, has his certification, and will school me in the ways of climbing sheer, vertical walls. We're starting off easy--down at EastPark. Still, I fear. What if I get stuck up high? What if I have to eat my own arm to survive?

Wish me luck, gentle readers. I'm not even bringing oxygen!

ReeeeeeBOOT!

I said I wasn't going to, I said I'd be strong, but it's like me and the lead singer of Scratching Post: I just can't say no. So I picked up the first issue of Justice League of America #0.

I am so sick of reboots. The marketing just makes me ill--a comic with a #1 on the cover will always outsell any other book that month. It makes me feel worse when it's the Justice League--a title that DC really let slide into utter crapitude after Grant Morrison left. It became so bad they had no choice but to cancel the title--which considering it should be one of their flagship titles--makes me sad. Like when Amber Benson left Buffy sad.

Still, this was a very good issue. I enjoyed Brad Meltzer's Identity Crisis, and was interested in what he would do with the JLA. This issue just riffs back and forth in DCU history, from a reboot of who actually founded the JLA (Wonder Woman has now been added to the original three), skipping through various periods in JLA history (the satellite years, the Detroit fiasco, the Watchtower) while also showing hints of what is to come in the future (Wonder Woman marrying a mortal, someone close to Batman dying).

It was a very good read, and the various artists pitching in really caught that indefinable feeling of a good JLA story. Nice touches showing Batman being very nervous about fighting aliens and magic users, wondering if that really isn't his sort of fight. I especially liked Meltzer having Diana in her white pantsuit from the Seventies, as well as Batman chewing out Superman for not stopping Red Tornado from sacrificing himself: Superman says he didn't hear him, and Bats points out that he's 300 pounds of metal walking on a steel floor.

So am I in? I don't know. I want to cut down on comics. Really I do. But I think as I hit 41, and have over 5,000 of them, it may be a little late.

The Kinda New Buffy?

Ghost Stories is my new most favourite thing in the whole wide world. Or at least for today. I've been cursed with seeing quite a bit of utter crap anime lately, but coming across this one has made me give up the drinkin' and whorin' and set me on the right path.

Originally released in Japan as Gakkou No Kaidan, the anime used traditional Japanese ghost stories as the plot device for young teenagers to fight against. When it was brought over to North America, ADV completely re-wrote the dialogue, giving it a much more adult comedic tone. One character who was a psychic, for example, became a born again evangelical Christian, who gives the backdrop of screaming teenagers and howling demons an unexpected funny tone. The sexual jokes are non-stop: in one scene, the typical snotty anime young lad comments that his female friend mustn't have any mirrors in her house, since she's so ugly she must break every one she looks into. She then grabs his mouth and begins pulling it, which I assume is a traditional Japanese form of humiliation torture.

"You're pulling my lips apart!" he shouts.

"I'm sure this isn't the first time!" she screams back.

" I don't like your insinuation!"

Tranny jokes, lesbian jokes, alcoholic mother jokes--it's like Buffy when all the writers are on their third bottle of Chivas Regal.

I love it. But then, I have issues.

Odd Moments In East London

So the dojo was flooded. Apparently, a manicure store above the dojo had a flood, which meant water, obeying gravity, ended up downstairs in the dojo as well. Cher had to go down there last night to clean out her locker--it's sealed off while insurance adjusters stand around and fret over their calculators--and she describes it best as 'devastated'. The walls are in pieces, the wooden training floor is destroyed. It's fair to say we won't be down there again for awhile.

So the school has had to move upstairs. The school is now on the same floor--and same hallway--as a massage parlour. The dojo is really now just a giant warehouse room, with the mats that weren't destroyed being dragged up to cover the concrete floor. There are no electric lights--the only source of illumination comes from the west wall floor to ceiling windows.

And so I came upon an odd sight last night. As I entered the dojo around ten to nine,the first thing I saw was a room of silohuettes against the sunset, all practicing kenpo karate. The surprise of the image gave it a quick, instantaneous beauty. I just stared, lost in the magic for a few moments, until one of the students came over and asked me if I played Kingdom of Loathing. Still, it was cool while it lasted.

Speaking of cool while it lasts, Cher will be doing the Inkblog for the Free Press next week. It isn't an ongoing thing, the Free Press is quick to point out, but they have asked her to help them out this week. One week only! Cher! Collect 'em all!

Mace Told Me!

Got a call from Samuel L. Jackson telling me to see his movie, Snakes On A Plane. I love viral marketing almost as much as I love hype.

I don't even need to see this movie. I've had too much fun with the advertising already. The movie can only dampen the party.

Book Meme

I came across this meme here, and I liked it, so I spread the meme! Go cultural info virus!

One Book That Changed Your Life

The Hobbit, by JRR Tolkien. It was the first book that gave me a deep love of fantasy, and gave me that feeling of being transported into a completely different, wonderful world.

One Book You've Read More Than Once

The Lord of The Rings. Haven't read it as much as some (wife! cough! cough!), but still enjoy revisiting.

One Book You'd Want On A Desert Island

The Diary of Adrian Mole, Age 13 3/4 by Sue Townsend. Still makes me laugh.

One Book That Made You Laugh

Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett. I was in hospital recovering from surgery when I read this, and was in pain laughing, feeling the staples across my stomach pulling with each suppressed giggle. Good times!

One Book That Made You Cry

The Subtle Knife, by Philip Pullman. I admit it.

One Book You Wish You Had Written

Goth Opera, by Paul Cornell.

One book that you wish had never been written.

JPod, by Douglas Coupland.

One Book You're Currently Reading

A Brief History of British Sea Power. Sad, but true.

One Book You've Been Meaning To Read

Hyperion, by Dan Simmons. Cher is reading it now, and adores it. I've only had the book for over ten years. It still has that new book smell.

Cowboys, Creeps, and Coolness

I didn't go see The Hills Have Eyes, and now I don't have to: I've read Jonah Hex #10, which I like to call The Swamp Has Eyes--until Hex plucks them out, of course.



This time around, Hex deals out Cheyenne justice on a bunch of swamp living, baby killing, low life, serial killing rapists. It's brutal, it's disturbing, and if you're not reading one of the best books DC is quietly putting out, you must be a girly-man who likes to wear pink frilly underwear and read po-try. So either get yerself a pair and go down to the mercantile and fetch up a copy, or sit down with the ladies and play bridge. Time to decide whether your balls hang or are just for show, boys. Time to decide.



Sigh. This marks the end of BPRD for awhile, and it ended magnificently. A very nice surprise for longtime Hellboy readers in the final few pages, and a very moving story as well. Damn it! Why is it all the good books are forever going on hiatus? I thought Universal Machine was BPRD at its best: creepy, a little lower scale than some of the previous stories, with a very heavy occult centre. The next Hellboy series--Darkness Calling--is due out this fall, and I'll be grumpy until then.



It took me to my forties to finally realize my dream of seeing Mandalorian Knights in battle. You know the Mandalorians, right? Boba Fett and Jango Fett swiped their armour, and stormtroopers swiped their designs from them. So the thought of seeing an army of Jangoes and Bobas has kept me going through this dark vale of tears we call life--and now I've seen it. And it was different than I thought. I mean, who knew the Mandalorains would modify their armour? Of course,I thought, slapping my head. The Mandalores are more of a culture than a race, so anyone can join, even those who don't think a jet pack and cool helmet are enough, and want to add shoulder spikes. Or crotch spikes. Or just spikes.

Knights of the Old Republic starts a new storyline here--and it's interesting that Dark Horse put that on the front cover. Are sales lower than expected? Was the initial story, which dealt with Zayne being betrayed by the Jedi on Taris, too boring? This one gets more into the 'outsider' feel of Star Wars, as Zayne and the rest of the crew of the Last Resort are now on the run, raiding Republic outposts for supplies on the front line of the Mandalore War. Of course, things go to hell, and they find themselves deep in the middle of a Mandalore invasion. Things don't end well.

I did think the first storyline dragged a bit, since it had the inevitable position of trying to explain the KOTOR universe to those who had never played the games while not boring those who have. The Jedi On The Run element works well, and the crew is fairly enjoyable. Nice scene with Jarael--the hot babe of the story-- pretending to be a Jedi, and then not wanting to give the lightsabre back, just content to play with it while everyone else works. Heh. Nice art from Dustin Weaver, which I actually prefer to the artist on the previous arc. Great attention to detail, especially on the Mandalore weaponery and ships.



See? Cute, in a deadly sort of way. Which is how I like my cute. Because I read Hex and got a pair.

Life at a Keyboard

Working on The Ring of Truth--I remember being all optimistic and thinking I'd have it done in two weeks. Ha ha. I can't even organize my sock drawer in two weeks. This is my first attempt to write fiction that doesn't involve fantastical elements or horror, and it's going far easier than I thought. Well, not to say that my writing goes easy, because it never does, and I would be happier swallowing razor blades than sitting down to write anything. In fact--and here I digress, yet the fuck again--I'm deeply suspicious of any writer who says they love writing. I don't remember who said it, but I'm more of the 'I like having written more than actually writing.' Question anyone who says they love to write and I guarantee many will say they also drink while they write. And as anyone knows, that's a sure road to writing pure shit. I've only just started listening to music when I write--and even that feels like cheating, of not totally givin'er.

Anyway, yes, Truth is coming along fine. Like I wrote awhile ago, the plot all fell into place, so that headache is over with. Now it's just characters, dialogue and transition. Oh, and gettiing it published. And selling it to Spielberg. And getting drunk with Clare Danes and waking up on Mel Gibsons' front lawn. So, you know, almost done.

Oh, saw this last night.



V For Vendetta is one of those Alan Moore stories I keep returning to, since I always find something more in it as the years go by. When I first read it when I was 22, much of the political aspects went over my head, since I was more interested in V as a vigilante. But as time has passed, more of the future Moore and artist David Lloyd envisioned becomes more and more our present day reality. I thought the film hewed very close to the original source material, was very true, and was one of the finest films I've seen this year. Well polished without being Hollywood, still retaining its edge. Stephen Fry was as good as he always is, and even Natalie Portman--who I've not really seen outside of the Star Wars prequels--carried the film. And then there's Hugo Weaving. Oh yes--Hugo. His entire role was delivering his lines behind a mask (which was thankfully muffled) and using body language. He just continues to amaze in every film I see him in.

An action film for the politically distrustful. If you haven't seen it, do so. And read the original comic--there's a nice trade paperback out right now, and I think Heroes downtown is selling it for around $13.

This weekend, Cher wants to see Wordplay, that film about the New York Times crossword. She is the master of crosswords, Sudoku, and ancient prophecies. I wish I was smart enough to do crosswords, cryptic or otherwise. I'm still trying to figure out just how it is the blind man picked up his hammer and saw.

You Have Been Warned.

If you press play, you will fall in love and will hum this for hours. You have been warned.

Not Much Of A Conversationalist

I'm taking care of a friend's cat while he's in Toronto for cancer treatment this week. So today I arrive at his apartment, figure out which key opens the front door, and head into the lobby. A woman holding several water bottles is in the elevator, which is closing. She moves to grab the door, and I wave at her, indicating it's okay, let it go, I'll grab the next one.

But she hammers the door open, so I run to get onboard. Inside is another passenger. Both people are...let us say...heavier than me.

"What floor you want?" the man asks.

I lean over, and tap the appropriate button. I smile. The two of them begin to chat with one another. I wait patiently, staring at the lights as we ascend.

We get to my floor. I get out and walk away. I don't embrace them, or promise to write.

The door shuts. "Not much of a conversationalist," the woman sneers.

And I thought: Please. Fuck Off.

This is why I prefer the company of animals. They aren't backstabbing little fat fucks full of self love, ready to fire off a snarky comment once they're sure the target of their comment is far enough way not to react.

I mean, I could have said she wasn't much of a dieter, but that would have been petty of me.

Formian Invasion!

I knew this would happen. The bastards invaded.

I'm a bit of an ant afficianado. As a kid, I used to sit and watch them quite literally for hours. It's one of those treasured family stories my mother likes to break out now and again. "Oh, remember when he was little? Just stare at those ants. Just sit down in the middle of the sidewalk and just stare."

So I noticed a few scouts in the kitchen this week. That's how ants work: like a good RTS, they send in scouts, who look for food, then report back to the main nest. I found the scouts, swept them up, and threw them out onto the deck. I didn't do the usual anti-ant dance: no vinegar around the deck door, which kinda worked last time, but we actually had more luck using hockey tape to cover the bottom of the deck door.

So this morning at five to six, I came downstairs to find a full army in the kitchen. The cats were lying there, waiting for treats, with ants marching beside them. So out with the broom. The little bastards were everywhere: floor, sink, cupboards. And I was almost late for work. Combine that with this heatwave and the fact my place of employment doesn't have AC ( we hit nearly 40 inside today), it ain't been a super duper day.

So now I've found more cool non toxic ant repellents. Cinnamon, cayenne pepper, black pepper, and even drawing a chalk line across the point of ingress. Let's just hope they don't launch a counter-offensive tonight.